abster | The Quill [OPEN]

Headphones in, Abby hummed to herself as she bit into a cheese and onion muffin. Scrawling over her dad's face in the local rag pretending to be a newspaper, Abigail worked on finding something more secure than working for some crappy little fishing place fixing up their internet and online business. And something that paid a damn sight better seeing as she now had a house to maintain. Head down, she didn't see the person who attacked her until the last minute.

"ABBY!" Looking up at the excited sound of a voice, Abigail blinked in confusion as this tiny little bundle of blonde hair threw herself at her. Letting out an ooof as the kid crawled all over her, she managed to free herself from the tangle of wires to wrap her arms around... her sister. Her stupid, amazing baby sister Gabrielle- Gabby. "Hi! Were you surprised? Mom said to wait in the car while she called to find out where you were but then I saw you and I wanted to surprise you."

"Gabby... one thing at a time. Does mom know you're in here?" Abigail asked, pulling her up to sit on her lap properly and not just flail around. "What are you even doing in here anyway? Why the hell are you in town?"

"Awww, you swore! I'm going to tell on youuuu," Gabby sang. Abigail looking up as her mom walked through the door, looking pale and tired. Which was weird. "Mom! Abby swore lots, she said the h word."

"Gabrielle don't tell tales, Abigail don't swear." Flushed Abigail, ducked her head as she picked Gabby up and put her down on the floor so she could hug her mom. Her mom looked smaller too, thinner, almost unwell. It was weird. "I'm glad I found you, could you look after Gabby for a little bit while I go run some errands."

"Sure but mom-" Abigail began as her mother cut her off and kissed Gabby and her goodbye. Blinking at her mother's strange behaviour, Abby's voice trailed off. "-why are you here? And who dressed you brat, you look like a rainbow vomited all over your clothes."

"Do not!" Gabby yelled as Abby watched her mom through the window, the way she slowly walked away from the Quill. The way she stopped every so often as if catching her breath.

"Do too!" Abigail muttered worrying.

"Do not!"

"Do too, what are you five?" Abby asked as Gabby held up her hands with eight fingers showing. Abby held one back in response.

"I'm so telling," Gabby said, making Abby smile. "Unless... you buy me an ice cream."

"Yeah, yeah fine. Come on, let's get you something to eat. And maybe some ice cream." Abigail muttered, groaning as Abigail jumped onto her back as she carried her over to the counter. It was nice to see her sister but it was kind of weird and her mom was acting so, so weird. Maybe she'd tell her later.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

phoenixfalling

"I know, maybe one day I'll meet a girl with a face like yours," he teased, taking his phone back. Kim was pretty sure that she had done something to it but it would be super rude to check right now. He only wanted to be a little rude to the potential serial killer.

"And there, I sent her the picture," Kim said to Gabby, texting it to Abigail as he changed her name in his phone to "maybe a serial killer". As an afterthought he snapped a quick picture of her to set as her profile picture. Just to be safe.

From:

abster

"Maybe next time you won't call that girl a serial killer to her face or behind her back." Abigail replied, grinning at him as she poked him in the stomach and laughed. She'd seen him write her name as Maybe a serial killer. She'd been called worst. "Maybe next time you should just ask that girl out like a normal person instead of being all let's duet. Like that's a thing that happens outside of musicals. Or really lame Glee inspired movies."

Feeling her phone vibrate, she copied his contact over to Maybe a serial dater in her photo and snapping a picture back at him.

"I want to see the picture!" Gabby moaned, passing her sister before checking it herself she made a face at her sister.

"What did you send her anyway?"

From:

phoenixfalling

"I'll keep that in mind for next time," Kim assured her, grabbing her hand so that she didn't like him again. Was that a subtle hint from her to ask her out? Kim really wasn't good with that sort of thing so he wasn't entirely sure but he thought maybe it was. She was cute and fun, although probably a bit younger than he was. Not too young though? Maybe she was hinting? Maybe this was why he was single?

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you, but you can go ahead and look at it if Gabby lets you."

From:

abster

Abigail twisted her hand in his, scrunching her nose up at him as she held his hand. Trying 'hard' to get him to let go. Well, maybe not really trying at all.

"I don't think I'm getting that back before I'm thirty." Abigal muttered with a wry smile. Her sister was holding that phone like she was going to hold onto it forever. "What do you think? Maybe if I try bribery she'll let go?"

From:

phoenixfalling

Kim eventually let go of Abigail's hand, although he had to admit that as far as hands went, it was pretty nice to hold. Not that he had a whole lot of experience but it certainly wasn't unpleasant. She didn't seem to be trying all that hard to let go of his hand though, so was that something? Ugh, why was this so hard?

"Gabby, you should let her see, just so she can be jealous," Kim said. He didn't think Abigail would really be jealous but he kind of knew something about siblings and how their minds worked.

From:

abster

Abigail looked at Kim expectantly as he continued to hold her hand before he finally gave her hand back. Yeah, she wasn't quite sure how he didn't realise what he was doing but apparently he was just that kind of guy. The actual innocent, not aware of his actions kind.

"Make sure that girl doesn't catch you holding hands with me then, she might get jealous. I heard someone with my face is apparently a serial killer." Abigail said with a snort, letting her hand linger on his for a moment before she reached for her phone.

Gabby gave Kim a very long, long look. The same one her sister gave people sometimes before sighing dramatically and handing Abigail her phone back. Abigail opened the picture before looking at Kim.

"What kind of photo app do you have on your phone? I haven't seen work this good since I made it look like the president came to my graduation."

From:

phoenixfalling

Kim had no idea why she was looking at him like that other than it might be her serial killer face? Sometimes people were really hard to read. Okay, not true, people were only hard to read when he was reading too much into their actions because he may or may not like them in a certain way.

"Well, I'll be sure to not let her do that. And the app is just iMessage," Kim said, pushing back his sleeves a bit to reveal some of his tattooing as he took another drink of coffee. "It's standard on every iPhone these days."

From:

abster

"What? Hold hands with a girl or let her catch you doing it?" Abigail asked, raising an eyebrow at him to see if she could poke him into realising what she was saying. He really was pretty clueless though. Letting her hair fall forward, her eyes widened at the tats on his arms. The pretty hardcore tattoos. "You have tats, Mr Straight Laced has tattoos."

"I told you I saw him." Gabby told her sister smugly as Abigail pushed Kim's sleeves up.

"Look at these," she said, thumb brushing against his skin as she looked at him. "How the hell do you know TSwizzle?"

From:

phoenixfalling

Kim was super glad that she was distracted by his tattoos because there was absolutely something going on before but he would be damned if he knew what it was. Instead she was rubbing his arm with her thumb which was... okay that was nice and kind of distracting and he didn't know if it meant anything.

"I know, I've seen them, they're on my arms," Kim pointed out. "And I just know her. You'll have to figure the rest out."

From:

abster

"No but seriously you have tattoos? Did you wake up one morning and found someone had transplanted your arms or had drawn all over you in permanent marker?" Abigail asked, licking her thumb before wiping it against his wrists just to check to see if it wasn't fake which apparently it was. Bumping her leg against his, she turned into her seat to look at him properly as she tried to figure why the hell he had Taylor Swift's actual number. "Are you in a barbershop quartet?"

"Nope!" Gabby said cheerily in between bites of her ice cream. She knew but she wasn't telling. Apparently.

"Are you the geeky tech guy whose not actually good with tech? You know I could just hack your phone right? Find out." Abigail said. Still not letting go of his arms apparently. They were nice arms, she was totally using them for balance.

From:

phoenixfalling

"What? No, I got these in New York when I was there for school," he said, frowning as she tried to rub the tattoos of with her spit. Because that was kind of weird and gross. Although she suddenly seemed really interested in him, which was actually a bit of a bummer. Apparently he was only really interesting because he had tattoos and Taylor's number. Awesome.

"All you'd get from my phone is my name, which you already know," he said, wondering why she was holding his arms still. Her hands still felt nice though and she was... close.

From:

abster

"And you woke up and decided to get tattoos? Well, Mr Straight-Laced you are full of surprises." Abigail answered, scoffing when he made this tiniest face when she rubbed his arm with her thumb. Really if he had problems with saliva on his arm then he was probably not going to react to exchanging saliva with her. "It's cute that's all you think you have on your phone. Honestly, cute."

"Are you going to kiss now? Because that's gross." Gabby said, words almost distorted by all the ice cream she managed to shovel in her mouth.

From:

phoenixfalling

"No, I wanted them for a while but I had to wait until I was 18. Plus we didn't have a real good tattoo artist here," he explained. After what she said about his phone though he narrowed his eyes a bit and turned his phone off. The last thing he needed was to accidentally give out a bunch of celebrities contact numbers.

"And no, we're not going to kiss," Kim said giving Gabby a look. "Why do you think we're going to kiss? Does Abby kiss lots of people in coffee shops?"

From:

abster

"Well you do now, I've met him. He seems pretty cool," she replied, looking at him curiously. And maybe wondering a little how much older than 18 he was. Okay, so she may have dated a few older guys. Entirely older guys. It wasn't a thing at all. "So, you're what nineteen... twenty?"

"Because you're doing the thing Abby used to do with Sam. They used to kiss all the time, ick." Gabby replied while Abigail stared at her little sister wondering if she could still get away with kicking her little sister's chair over.

"We didn't kiss all the time- and I don't kiss guys all the time in coffee shops either." Abigail muttered, rolling her eyes at her sister as she let go of Kim's arms.

From:

phoenixfalling

"Yeah, I met him too. I think I might have him to some more work," Kim said with a shrug. He really liked what he had now and other than his face and hands his arms were the most visible part so anything else he got would be easy to hide. "And I'm 23, thanks."

And if she was guessing that it meant she was probably around that age too. Which made her pretty young and now he felt sort of like a creep, especially if she was underage. Of course, he didn't want to think about why that really mattered but apparently it did. For reasons.

"What did Abby used to do with Sam that made you think I was going to kiss her? Sam who she used to kiss some of the time. Most of the time? At least part of the time."

From:

abster

"Yeah? What would you get done? Where would you get it done? And please keep it you know rated for kids." Abigail replied, gesturing at her irritating brat of a sister who kept talking about kissing. Which was terrible because this guy at age twenty three clearly still did not have a clue when it came to women flirting with him. But then again, her kind of flirting was... unusual.

"She used to touch him and hug him all the time and then they'd argue and bicker and then they'd smooch and it was gross. But Sam said it was because they were best friends, except I have friends and I don't smooch them." Gabby replied as Abigail reached across to Kim's leg and pinched him.

"Don't encourage her. And Sam is my oldest friend... and little sister's should keep out of their older sister's business."

From:

phoenixfalling

"More of the phoenix and koi theme," Kim said, shrugging out of his hoodie so that she could see his left and right arm tattoos better. "And I wouldn't get anything inappropriate, jeez."

Kim yelped when Abby pinched him and Gabby gave him a look like she knew exactly what had happened. It was probably not the first time that Abby had pinched someone to keep them quiet. Apparently all older siblings were the same in some ways.

"Okay. Must be a pretty good friend. Does he live here in town?"

From:

abster

"No, he's back home. We... were... we are? It's kind of complicated, he's just a friend who used to be close and now we're just close." Abigail said, looking at him thoughtfully as she tried to figure out if he was trying to figure out if she was single. Reaching out to touch his tattoos, she leaned a little into him as she turned her head and body to look at them better. "And the pinch didn't hurt that much."

From:

phoenixfalling

Kim was kind of used to people looking at his tattoos, even as infrequently as he showed them to others. Everyone that he did was pretty curious or appreciative of them, although not all of them wanted to touch them like Abigail did. He had already resigned himself to the fact that she was kind of weird.

"Where is home then?" he asked before turning to Gabby. "And her pinches do too hurt, don't they?"

From:

abster

"In Washington, we're one sparkly vampire away from an invasion." Abigail said with a grin. Seriously the amount of tourists she'd seen throw themselves off cliffs just to reenact a scene from a book was ridiculous and dangerous and stupid. And Sam had totally been one of those should've known better older guys then to do it himself. "What about you- you Siren Cove elite?"

"Ahuh, she's the worst." Her sister announced, making Abigail give her little sister a glare.

From:

phoenixfalling

"So does that make you the Bella?" he asked. She... okay she looked sort of like Kristin Stewart, what with the hair and the make up but that was about it. Hopefully she wouldn't be insulted? He had never actually read the books or seen the movies so he wasn't sure how flattering or unflattering that was.

"Does Sam, sparkle, Gabby? Does he sneak in and out of her window and brood a lot?"

From:

abster

"Nah, I wouldn't be so much of an idiot to fall for a sparkly stalker. I'm more of the dry humoured sidekick maybe." Abigail replied, laughing at the idea of Sam sparkling. Yeah, considering Sam... he would not take that well. He hated the whole Twilight thing.

"No, Sam looks like Jacob." Gabrielle announced. Abigail looked over her sister and nodded, her sister was almost right about that. "And he's too old to climb out of anything. What does brood mean?"

From:

phoenixfalling

"I'll keep an eye out for just that kind of person for you," Kim said. He wasn't sure if she meant that was her type or that's who she was but either way it was interesting information. Kim didn't even know if that meant she was his type- okay, whatever his type was she was it- or if he was hers or... why was this so confusing?

"Oh, like Jacob. God it," he said. Sam sounded like he was a pretty amazing guy.