guess who!

[bronze]

what's this? it seems like there's a board game for you and a friend to play — one guess who, featuring all the guests currently in saltburnt! post a blank top-level with your character and play the game in the comments, keeping your assigned character in mind (you'll want a different character for each thread, fyi!).

for ease's sake, all threads will be outside of the au event 🖤

Comments

[ailerons]

[ Turn for turn, pitch to pitch. Jake's voice goes whisper-lite, faux-humility. ]

I paid attention in class, Ani. [ Weird, how her judgy syllables make his grin kick upward even further. Like either way, she's given him a helping of something extra to hold onto, dislike, distaste, irritation. A beat of thought, before he allows, ] They are an almighty pain in the ass.

[ Without looking up: ]

What are you doing later?

[ Followed immediately by, ] —dark hair?

[haggle]

Cute. You must've been the smartest thirty-year-old in your kindergarten class.

( she's 60% confident she's locking onto target, slowly calibrating for the kill. bright odds on ani mikheeva's horizons, if her follow-up question wasn't sideswiped by another one: is this man seriously asking her what she's doing later in the middle of a fucking board game. she hiccups into a snort of an incredulous sound. )

Nope. Rule-break. ( with no obnoxious buzzer, her palm slaps down on the table, loud. ) You get one question per round, and it's gotta be yes-or-no. Try again, Einstein.

[ailerons]

I have, [ he starts, cheerfully, ] so many gold stars.

[ In, like, a very literal sense. 5⁄16 inch gold stars line up pretty well on his rack. Jake leans back, apparently no longer interested in peering neatly at the remaining 33-odd faces. His shirt, which is half a size too small, pulls across his shoulders. Helpfully. ]

Are you going to let me buy you a drink later?

[ For whatever the hell constitutes buying. One question, yes or no answer — fits, doesn't it? ]

[haggle]

( jesus christ.

she expects that shirt does most of the work for him, most places with most girls, gi joe packed tight in tiny doll's clothes. pointedly, she zeroes her focus in on the lines of his expression, not the (annoying) (distracting) obvious shift of muscle, as modest about showing off the goods like a babe in a wet t-shirt contest. no easy gold stars awarded from anora mikheeva's class — just As for solid effort.

not a bad effort, if she's grading on a curve: the trap of that question, no cheap bullshit like can i buy you a drink? to set-up her smug little i don't know, can you? he leans back, she leans forward; call, response, elbows planted on the table. tips her head to one side and then the other, like she's rattling around an eight ball in her head (uncertain. try again later) or looking for a loophole. )

No. ( a tip of her nail taps the back of his pieces. down goes one, kerplunk. one question, yes or no: ) Do you think I should say yes just 'cause a guy asks nice?

[ailerons]

[ He laughs. Same as it ever was. Bright and early, like she's said I don't know, can you? anyway. His arms cross his chest — less about defense, and more one that shows off the thick round of his biceps. Which is kind of an offense, by all counts. ]

No.

[ Easily, ] You should say it when I've earned the yes.

[ Because who gives a fuck about anyone else? Jake's stare swings back to his alphabetized faces. A knee kicks out, letting his chair swing back, balanced perfectly on its hind legs. Poised on the precipice, his brow knitting in calm, genuine thought. Like he might not quite get the chance again to play this round, this game. ]

Have you ever been to Texas?

[haggle]

( ani's expressions go through the motions of flipping through a picture book: quick, animated flashes. a recoil of confusion, first. settles into the usual skepticism after, like he cheated the nature of the game between one blink and the next — mostly because he has, with no fucking rulebook to help her know what he's playing at. what he's hoping to win. )

What the fuck — ( kind of question is that. is wrong with you. either is serviceable for filling in the blanks. with no other defensive maneuver on the table, she exhales, huffy and evasive, as if it's not a perfectly reasonable question to ask someone. ) No. Come on. Be real, Lieutenant. What the fuck's a girl like me gonna do in Texas, huh?

( she flicks a rhetorical hand out, signaling what's obvious to her and invisible to him: a raised city girl, all new york barbed wire to his boots and backyard barbecues. a bad fit. how the fuck would she even afford getting there, anyway? the time-off? the plane ticket? a shithole like atlantic city is as far as her bank account dreams, and even that's pushing it. )

Why, you gonna offer to take me next?

( mock-sweet. gutting the cliche before he can bring it to life, in case he's stupid enough to rehash a cheap line she's heard from worse men and better tippers a thousand times over. )

[ailerons]

[ Action, reaction. Her hand flicks out somewhere in his peripheral, and Jake blinks up. Stares. Immediately rolls his eyes without any real heat — less like he doesn't believe something she's saying, Come on, Be real, What the fuck's a girl like me gonna do, because there's a hundred and fucking one answers to that, and more in tune with the idea that either of them are going to go anywhere. Fucking MC Escher meets Winchester House. Nobody's going nowhere, let alone the rising heart of Texas, USA. He doesn't get homesick for that, not the way other people do. ]

Why isn't a yes or no question.

[ He reminds her, a little less pointedly than everything else about him might suggest. As if to even the score, somehow, Jake pitches level, front legs of his chair landing with an audible thud. His eyes stay glued on the rows of names and pictures. ]

I'm not taking you to Texas. I'm facing a court martial the second I'm back in. [ And still, easy breezy: ] —do they have dark hair? [ Back in play again, like nothing happened at all. ]

[haggle]

( no real heat. it hits like stray shrapnel gone sideways, anyway. ani reclines back in her seat, settling into a tactical retreat of silence — the kind someone should expect after they drop a bomb like that, the impact still ringing in her ears. guess that's what happens when a girl lobs a loaded grenade of a dare and a guy fucking fumbles the catch — all eye-rolls, like she was dumb to even toss the idea out. to even think he had the thought in his head. )

Wow. ( about as animated as day-old soda gone flat, unimpressed. safe to say: points deducted from jake seresin's total. ) Slick.

( if all of his pivots are that fucking obvious, the navy's future looks grim. there's no lift of his eyes to meet, no attention to shutter out. ani follows suit, eyes trained on a bronzed, baroque candlestick — just as pretty and indifferent as him — she tip-taps the ashes of her cigarette into, for the butler to britishly bitch over later. )

Yeah. ( breezy, but only in the way that a distant wind is. felt, but far. maybe she's thinking, or just holding her energy closer, now. her little tiles boast six faces, compared to what he has left on the board. doesn't ask the follow-up question she should, or even the one most people would: ) Do you think you fucked up?

( zeroed in on the part that matters, because who gives a fuck about anyone else? clarifying, even if it means having to hint she gives a single fuck: ) — Made the wrong call, I mean.

[ailerons]

[ Jury's out, what does it. If it's the way her mouth shapes around the flat Wow, or he hears the raspy tap of ashes against bronze, or the fact she asks him at all. Jake's turn, to glance up and for his face to shutter, twisting between neutral focus and surprise. It wears strangely on him — almost uncomfortably, as if Hangman's never understood what the hell a word like that means until right now. ]

No. [ A pause. He fills it in with a clear of his throat, pretending like he's even seeing any of the faces he's back to frowning at. ] I don't make calls I want to walk back. I knew the consequences. [ It fucking throws him off his game, bizarrely. Acknowledging it in full. Going back, placed right into his own life like nothing's changed, cleanly dealing with the Navy brass. Plink-plink-plink go the tiles, until he's only left with 14 or so. Close, but still off-target.

Instead of leaning back to reconsider his angle, Jake stays put. His shoulders hunched, arms folded on the table's edge. He stares evenly back — like he's not walking back any of the other shit he's said, either. ] 

You have family in New York?

[haggle]

( it's a good answer. solid, steady, strong — jake seresin's shiniest qualities pinned to his chest. maybe not what makes a perfect little wind-up soldier, but a better man: medal-worthy loyalty to a personal belief, and the will — steel spine, and the balls to match — to stand behind it.

(unfortunate side-effect: that phantom ache in her chest, flaring up like a bad joint in winter, every time she's reminded she was a decision a man made. one he wasn't proud to defend.)

she hums a low, considering sound. maybe approval. maybe not. it leans just noncommittal enough to keep him guessing, even if he's finally said the right thing. point recouped, and all it took was the high cost of being fucking real. )

So tell 'em to go fuck themselves. ( — with the conviction of a lawyer submitting evidence. then: a purse of her mouth, recalibrating. rolls her eyes, like acknowledging the concept of authority is physically painful for her: ) Respectfully, or whatever the fuck. Could lose you one of your gold stars, but better that than your fuckin' spine.

( because that's the part they don't warn you about when they're trying to tidy up a narrative, reframe you as the mistake: your dignity is the first thing they target. first thing they try to take. ani meets the crosshairs of his sights, just as steady. )

Sure. I do. ( a small, almost imperceptible twitch of her mouth. technically an answer. no additional freebies. ) You think your CO'd like my tits?