#Fridayflash: Come Home

Extracts of Nan's diary, as pertains to Walker. 

1994
October
He's gone. I don't know where he is. No one knows where he is. Milly asked about him at the funeral: Where's Uncle Walker?
He's late. He's coming. 
He never showed. I lied. Only Walker would pull a stunt like this in the middle of a funeral. I'm so angry I could kill him.

November
It's been a month. The detectives can't find him. No clues. No bloody clues. He's just vanished. Poof.
Magic.
I don't believe in magic.
He just "walked out of his apartment" and nobody has a clue where he's gone. This is ridiculous.
I hope he's alright.

December
Milly wanted to know why Uncle Walker didn't show up for Christmas. I want to know why Walker hasn't shown up for months.
Maybe he's dead in a ditch somewhere.
Good riddance.
Lina doesn't know. I can't tell her.


1995
January
Maybe he's gone crazy and forgotten his name and address. If he's institutionalised, how will we find him? Will he grow old alone, forgotten in a home?
Lina's doing better. Time to break the news.

February
I can't deal with two crazy people in a family. Maybe he's dead so I won't have to deal with him.
Harry says I should let go. I try.
We're letting the detectives go. We can't afford it anymore. They said they'd leave it on the radar, let us know only if something pings.

March
I managed to catch Pip's show again. I miss him.
I miss Walker.
I wonder if they checked if anyone jumped off the bridge.

April
Six months. Six months and we don't know if he's dead or alive.
He's probably dead. I can't--
Milly turned four today. We had cake. Balloons.
She asked about Walker again. I don't know what to tell her.
I said he's on a long trip in a faraway land. I hope she'll forget about him soon.

May
Harry says Walker can't possibly be kidnapped because no one has asked for ransom. He also says Walker's probably not dead because the police would have asked us to identify his remains.
Unless they haven't found his remains.
Or his body's been eaten by wild animals and there's nothing left with which to identify him.
Or maybe they can't ask for ransom until the estate's settled, but we need Walker to settle the estate so--

June
I cannot not think about him but I cannot think about him. If I go crazy, it will be Walker's fault.
Maybe he was in a plane crash. Or a car crash. Train crash. Burning wreckage out in the desert. Somewhere.

July
What if he's homeless? And too ashamed to ask for help?
Why did he just walk out of his apartment?
Ned's death must have set off an episode.

October
I'm meeting Walker tomorrow. It's been a year. But he's back.
Finally back.
We'll meet the lawyer with Pip.
It'll be good to see Pip again.

---

EVENT PAGE

Our Pip/Theo was injured, so we're starting fresh this week.

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You know who you are, though I doubt you'll read this.
Come home.

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EDIT for additional note: realised it's supposed to be cold in New York during the time the original scene takes place, so the months are probably off. Oh well. 

#musicmonday: Lina's playlist

Chris asked us to come up with songs that our characters would listen to/like, so here's a playlist of songs from the 50's which Lina would likely like, or at least have heard. Often.

Question though: would Lina be a jazz or a rock kind of person?
Ned and Theo are undoubtedly more of the jazz type.

Lina never says, and she's pretentiously artsy and intellectual enough to appreciate jazz, with her cigarettes and wine (she mentions wanting to be a Negro blues singer, so that's a slight indication) but her penchant for smothering the day in speech makes me think she might secretly like a bit of Elvis. Just for the noise.

EVENT PAGE

#fridayflash: Lina

She is
        Sharp lines and taut strings
        Focused on
        Theo, Theo, Theo
but Ned.

No, Ned is comfort. Ned is safety. Ned is the sudden silence in a world of cacophony and if only Theo could be that be comfortsilencesafetysimplicity --

Oh what is the secret behind Theo?

But maybe there is no secret. Maybe he is as empty, as broken, as loud, as crazy and Lina cannot see it. Lina cannot see past -- He wants. Fame. Fortune. Acknowledgement. He is consumed and she is drawn into his orbit; sucked in swallowed down engulfed --

-- no.

She draws herself up, pulls away. The Southern belle has her strength and her dignity and she may not have weight, but she has her power.

A tilt of the shoulders
        A twist of the fingers

Ned doesn't need seducing. Ned is just... there. Easy. Simple. A rock. An abstraction turning into facts. A lifeline. He pulls her out of deep waters, just by kindness. And she needs to escape because Theo, but Ned --

And maybe it's not wrong. Maybe this simplicity is what she wants and needs and craves but cannot get because Theo wants and Theo needs and Lina

cannot be anything other than what she is needed to be.

No matter how hard she tries. 

What you want.
                                  >
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                                                                                                                >

What you will get.

But it's not her ascent.

it's her descent

into madness

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Character work on Lina; Three Days of Rain by Richard Greenberg.

#fridayflash: Nan on Walker

Look. The thing with Walker is. Is. Well, I don’t know.

He came back and… and I was angry. He was supposed to meet me at the airport—he didn’t, of course. What did you expect—and then he was rambling on and on and we were going to be late and…

And then he hugged me and everything was alright for a while because he was alive. He was there. He was real. It was just like the old days. The ones we grew out of. Or I grew out of at any rate. I don’t know whether Walker every grew up or grew out of anything.

The place—Ned and Theo’s place—it… Do you suppose their ghosts… but well, that’s the sort of fanciful thing Walker might believe in. When I first stepped in—all I wanted to do was leave. It was dank. Musty. Draped. Walker might say it’s a place where life has stopped abruptly. Only in more poetic words. Like a graveyard. Of dreams.

I didn’t want to sit. I didn’t want to stay. It’s the sort of thing I’d rather leave behind. But he was going on and on… rather like Lina, really. Like Lina, only old. So fervent. So alive. So… ridiculously alive.

Which I suppose is better than the alternative.

Maybe.

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The thing with secrets is… they’re supposed to remain secret. What’s the point of dredging up all this mess? What’s the point of talking about all of this? Some things are better off not said, you know?

Only Walker never realises that. He wants to talk. He wants to fill the world with his words and with his… and Pip can’t…

Walker can’t leave the past. He must dig at it, he must prod, trying to find out the truth—but only the truth he decides he can accept. I don’t think he—we—either of us can handle the truth anyway. Whatever that may be. Not that we’ll know now. It’s… he wants to know and I don’t.

I… don’t.

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Note: character work on Nan Janeway; Three Days of Rain by Richard Greenberg.