(no subject)

[tragic_mask]

They are outside the Blue Owl Bar. It's mid-morning, so there are cars rushing [so to speak] by, and people walking, biking, or rollerblading down the sidewalk nearby.

"Well, here we are,"  she says brightly, ponytail ruffled by a light breeze.

Comments

[tragic_mask]

"I don't know," she says, making a face. "I've always preferred the starving artist to the pompous one. Summer home or no summer home."

[mechanicalswans]

"Then it's lucky for me that the mainstream won't want my work, until maybe--maybe twenty years after I'm dead," he grins. "So hold on to what I give you, and it may pay for college for those hypothetical adopted children."

[tragic_mask]

"Oh, yeah, I'll make sure to do that," she says.

[mechanicalswans]

"For when I have that tragic art accident," he explains. "Crushed to death by a metaphor--tragic. But you'll be well situated, I'll see to that."

He glances out the window as they slowly approach the border.

[tragic_mask]

"Oh, well, I appreciate the sentiment," she says. "Sounds like it will be perfectly planned."

[mechanicalswans]

"I'm nothing if not loyal," he says. "Do you have a passport or papers with you, or do you need something? It'll be our turn soon enoguh."

[tragic_mask]

"No, I have a passport," she says, rooting through her pockets, and pulling out her passport. "You definitely don't want to see my photo."

[mechanicalswans]

"I can't imagine a bad picture of you," he says with a smile. "Were you blinking? Or did they ask you something and then take the picture while you were talking? Or were you really hungover, maybe? My driver's license picture, I'm hungover in."

[tragic_mask]

"The lighting makes me look like a criminal," she says. "That's mostly it."

[mechanicalswans]

"It's a shame I wasn't with you at the DMV that day," he says. "I'm sure you would've inspired quite a lot of daydreaming. I would've made up a story about you being the head of some international smuggling ring... but what would you have been smuggling? That's a tough one."

[tragic_mask]

She thinks for a minute.

"Pekingese puppies."

[mechanicalswans]

"Just as long as you're not one of those people who always wind up on the news, because they were smuggling them in their pants," he says. "You could maybe get away with it with very small puppies, but I can't imagine it would be very comfortable for anyone involved."

[tragic_mask]

"Oh, pants are old-hat," she says. "Haven't you seen women's purses these days? I could fit at least three puppies in there, and still have room for makeup and wallet."

[mechanicalswans]

"Purses are fine," he says. "It isn't nearly as embarrassing, if you get caught, to be known on television as 'that women with the puppies in her purse.' But I do have to ask--who were you smuggling the puppies for?"

[tragic_mask]

"Rich Polynesians," she says, tapping her nose. "It's where the demand and money always are."

[mechanicalswans]

"I've heard of them," he says with a smile. I've heard they're trouble, but if you can handle doing business with them, it's worth it."

And he rolls down the window to show his papers to the border guards.

[tragic_mask]

She hands her passport across, then sits back.

[mechanicalswans]

He answers the questions he is asked--no weapons, no illegal substances, both American citizens, tobacco for personal use, going for the weekend to see the falls.

It's a very ordinary thing, so he loses himself for a while in his role--an ordinary, not very outgoing man heading off for a weekend vacation with his girlfriend. It feels good.

[tragic_mask]

She looks earnest but slightly bored, an ordinary front-seat passenger crossing the border. She waits, drumming her hands lightly on the dashboard.

[mechanicalswans]

Eventually they are given their passports back and cleared to go. Weyland smiles as he rolls up the window.

"It's a good thing they didn't find all those puppies," he says as he starts driving again, toward the bridge. "We'd have been sent away for twenty years, minimum."

[tragic_mask]

"You think so?" she asks. "I feel I could have wriggled out of it."

[mechanicalswans]

"Maybe you could've," he grins, "but then I would've been on the hook. But at least I'd have an advantage in prison, and you'd write me letters, wouldn't you? With puppies hidden in them, so I can escape via dogsled."

[tragic_mask]

"Oh, yes. And I'd sleep you innocuous pieces wood during visitation that would form the sled itself. It'd be the greatest escape ever. Then we could go to the Canary Islands and break up the wood for a bonfire, so no one could ever trace it."

[mechanicalswans]

"As long as they don't send me to Alcatraz," he says. "A dogsled wouldn't do much good there. But anywhere else... we'd be legends."

[tragic_mask]

"Now that's a script worth writing," she says. "Everyone loves the prison breakout."