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

[temporicide]

[ There occurs in her head a mean little square joke about herself, how much would that narrow it down?, one she only doesn't make out loud because it'd be so attention-seeking in its self-deprecation. Without much further consideration: ] Sure would.

Would you let yours house sit for you?

[haggle]

( her teeth catch on her lip, a drag that nips back an extra little fluff. there's an amused spark, matches in her eyes, anyway: )

Yeah. For sure. They wouldn't burn my shit down. Does yours look like they have a gym membership?

[temporicide]

Yeah, I mean — yeah, they do. [ She comes within a hair's breadth of introducing a determining pronoun, disrupting her bearing with a huff of something like laughter's ghost. ]

Now one of the boring ones. Guy or girl?

[haggle]

( so close to a slip-up. ani groans, dramatic — edged by the possibility of a playing advantage, for ruined pay-off in the end. )

Fuckin' tease.

( said warmly, almost approvingly. )

Guy. Yours someone I know?

[temporicide]

Always. [ Grin bright and remorseless, like she did it on purpose (she did not, but is quick to claim the glory of a good feint). ]

Youuuu might? [ Considering, because Roza thinks they'd get on, actually: ] You might. You should, if you don't. Blond, brunet, the secret third thing?

[haggle]

( you should, if you don't. a promising enticement — consider the sale of whatever roza is pitching sold. )

Okay. ( a laugh woven through the syllables, the kind between two girls threading together a secret. ) What, like, is he bald? That our third option?

Brown hair. Does yours have tattoos?

[temporicide]

[ Satisfied by the efforts of her eternal drive to match-make, Roza settles back in her chair with a lit-up-inside smile, itself the warm reception to the little laugh of Ani's.

(It's just a game, sure. But she feels kind of cool, for a second, the childish but eternal impulse to seek peer acceptance alive and well inside her.) ]

Noooo! No, not bald, I meant redheads. You know, the most oppressed male subspecies. [ But then, thoughtfully, ] Do bald guys not get to be brunet or blond anymore? They lose rights?

But mine definitely has tattoos. Is yours thirty or older?

[haggle]

( casual, she shrugs — something to indicate she has not dedicated more than five seconds to pondering the privileges of men, with or without hair. )

You know what they say. You gotta lose some to win some.

( which translates, from ani-ism to standard oxford english, to: )

They get bald rights. And a head shinier than Mr. Fucking Clean.

( first name fucking, last name clean. definitely is an interesting cookie crumb of sweet information, though — someone who roza knows, or someone with visible enough ink. she stashes it away with a drawn-out mmm and a squint, surveying who's left on the board, like she can mentally draw out the lines of a tattoo through sheer willpower. )

Definitely over thirty. Got the attitude to match, too. Is yours a guy?

[temporicide]

You know, I have never touched a bald guy's head.

[ Roza puts her own hand on top of her own head, thick black hair scrunching under her palm. Her expression is pensive. ]

Seems like a weird sensory experience.

[ Over thirty narrows it down a little. Her tongue clicks in her mouth, in tandem with tearing her gaze away from the tiny pictures, considering the array of strangers and acquaintances. Maybe this would be easier if she knew more people. Means she ought to be more extroverted. ]

Mine is a guy. Is yours one of the Americans? [ A beat in which Roza reflects upon her own phrasing: ] Not like I'm not an American.

[ Sometimes she forgets. Third culture kid problems. ]

[haggle]

( behind headquarters is the nest she and lulu made from alleyway concrete and burnt cigarettes, winking signage and the glinting teeth of lit-up windows in a city that never goes dark. ani leans in like it's the same type of smoke break session, voice imparting some inherited, ancient secret passed around by strippers who have seen too much, touched too much, heard too much: )

It feels like rubbing on a bowling ball. ( her face cracks open in a conspiratorial grin. the kind used by girls at recess, or working girls in the dressing room, sharing the latest gossip and glossy tips from cosmopolitan and which customers are stingy, piss-poor tippers. ) Or, like — what the fuck do you call 'em?

( a kinetic snap of her fingers to summon it. an engine-rasp of a laugh, when she lines up the word in her vocabulary: )

One of those cue balls. I'll call dibs for you if we get some bald guy in town. Get you the hands-on experience.

( the girls on the board topple down with a peck of ani's fingernail each. )

I don't know. He sounds American. That help? ( not a helpful answer. not not a helpful answer to narrow down the players still left on the field, and less revealing than the thought that buzzes through her mind. huh. i never asked. ) Does tattoo guy look high class?