A FEMININE URGE,

ᵀᴱᴸᴸ ᴹᴱ ᵂᴴᴱᴿᴱ ᵀᴼ ᴾᵁᵀ ᴹᵞ ᴬᴺᴳᴱᴿ ᵀᴱᴸᴸ ᴹᴱ ᵂᴴᴱᴿᴱ ᵀᴼ ᴾᵁᵀ ᴹᵞ ᴬᴺᴳᴱᴿ ᵀᴱᴸᴸ ᴹᴱ ᵂᴴᴱᴿᴱ ᵀᴼ ᴾᵁᵀ ᴹᵞ ᴬᴺᴳᴱᴿ

[paranoeo]

THE MEMORY IS UNCLEAR BUT THE FEELINGS REMAIN.

SKELETON. PINTEREST. PLAYLIST.

Visit Original Link

NAME: mabel mae stafford. AGE: twenty-one. DOB: march 21st, 1967. POB: misty mountain, carolina, usa. GENDER: cis woman, she/her. OCCUPATION: technically unemployed. she hunts in the woods surrounding her cabin, and either sells or eats what she catches. she gets by a lot of the time by adhering to a strange sort of barter system with a select few of her fellow misty mountaineers. SIBLINGS: an older sister, louisa dean. PARENTS: charlie jo and gunner stafford, both deceased by the former's hand. PETS: one dog, cleverly called bear. a mixed breed, though there's definitely some german shepherd in him. essentially 'adopted' her shortly after high school graduation, and before moving into her cabin. a stubborn and driven dog, fiercely protective, which mabel has only ever encouraged.

FACECLAIM: margaret qualley. HEIGHT: 5'7". FRAME: gangling and wiry, but athletic. EYES: blue-grey, very emotive. often give her the look of being a deer caught in headlights. HAIR: a very dark brown. quite frizzy, quite lifeless. she does nothing in terms of styling it, opting simply to pull it away from her face in a ponytail or a braid.

ZODIAC: aries sun, cancer moon, gemini rising. MYERS-BRIGGS: isfj. ENNEAGRAM: 1w2. INSPIRATION POINTS: longlegs, where the crawdads sing, the marsh king's daughter, ziggy berman (fear street trilogy), laurie strode (halloween series, specifically 2018-2022), sidney prescott (scream 3 onwards especially).

[paranoeo]

do you ever miss having parents?

The words are dumped over her like a bucket of ice water, and she's left stunned into silence for a moment. It's not like it's ever been easy to remember her status as a grade-A orphan: there were painful reminders of it every day since that night. She'd had no mother to turn to when she first got her period, no father to teach her how to drive, nobody sat there in the audience at her high school graduation.

Some days, Mabel thinks she misses her pa more than she remembers him; what she does remember of him is muddied, dark gory blood swirled throughout the memories, smearing them with his final moments, his gasping breaths. Her ma, on the other hand ... well, Charlie Jo lingers like a bad smell. She clings on, stuck in her head like the roots of her hair. In the back of her head, in the corner of her eye. Mabel's never been able to escape her. Her mother is her boogeyman, the monster under her bed, even all these years later.

In truth, they slice and sink into her chest like a knife, something that has often aggravated her whenever she's read it in novels because people so rarely understand just how fuckin' painful being stabbed actually is; her blood runs cold for a minute and then boils with a bubbling kind of rage, prickling away just beneath the skin.

"Least mine taught me basic goddamn decency before they died. More than your fucked-up excuses done did for you."

[paranoeo]

Which Mountaineers do you consider your friends? Or, at least, people you don’t dislike as much.

"I got friends." Try as she might to not sound so defensive, it's difficult to keep it from leaking into her voice, arms folding tight across her chest. "Sugar, for a start." Likes to think it's reciprocal. "Cher too. We've been— friends since high school, thereabouts." Knows it's reciprocated. "I guess I, uh, like Serendipity and Bobby Hugh too." The name Abilene lives and dies on her tongue, reckoning it's too early on in their tentative amiability to say anything about it. She's surprising herself, honestly, at how the list is more extensive than she thought it would be. Truthfully, it might be easier to just name the folks that she actively dislikes: it's a shorter list, she begins to realise. Sure as shit has changed since graduation, she knows that much.

[paranoeo]

Lou, Cher, Sugar are all hanging off a cliff and you can only save one. Who do you save?

God, what a fuckin' question. It ain't an easy one to answer, but then, she supposes that's the whole point, isn't it?

She and Cher are two misfits from the same oddity tree. Have been since High School, a notoriously difficult time for Mabel, and an arguably better one for Cher. Whatever it was that clicked between them, it clicked quick, and hard, and she's been there for Mabel at some of her worst moments, and it never scared her away. She was there throughout it all, save for her own troubles in life.

It's more than can be said for Lou.

She doesn't blame her sister. Can never truly blame her for anything, no matter how hard she might want to try. Most times, when she looks at Lou, she can almost see that toothy grin tossed over her shoulder as she peddles ferociously down the road, Mabel bouncing unreservedly in the little red wagon attached to her bike. Their momma eventually comes out past the screen door shrieking at them to stop b'fore Mabel Mae gets her head cracked open! but they just speed further on down the rocky tarmac, giggles floating above them without a care in the world.

It does somethin' funny to you, having an older sibling. She's never known a life without Lou in it, even when Lou was ... physically not there. Mabel's always been a little sister, and maybe that's part of why she's been so lost in life. When they were forcibly separated in their adolescence, different families taking them in and passing them around like dolls rather than traumatised children; whenever Lou goes on her damn benders, high off her tits. They were opposites as kids, just as they're opposites now: yet there's the same thread running through them, and it's coated in a sort of rage. At the world, at their parents, at their town.

And then there's Sugar. She'll never know she feels about her, because Mabel's feelings about her will never be totally simple. She's grateful, of course; for everything that the Pascal family have done for her, for what they've given her, and continue to give. Her unlikely protectors and providers, the family who have taken care of her the most in the aftermath of Charlie Jo's attack, even a decade on. Sugar's become a kind of sister to her, stepping into the role whilst Lou was absent, and she almost feels halfway to normal when they're together, talkin' away. But there's been the silent acknowledgement of the poppy fields for a few years now, and it makes Mabel's skin crawl whenever she thinks about it—it makes her suspicious of the family, and God only knows she doesn't need much to go off of to be made suspicious.

"Lou." The best answer is the simplest one, sometimes, and she doesn't think Sugar would hold it against her. (Cher, on the other hand? ... Well, she doesn't want to think about it.)

[paranoeo]

have you ever kissed anyone?

"Don't see how it's any of your business." Yeowch! Even more prickly than normal, Miss Mabel Mae! A sore spot, perhaps? "We can't all be as ..." Words cycle through her head as she tries desperately to find one that isn't wildly offensive, or that would make her heart hurt a little using it to describe someone else. (She's a softie at heart, just don't tell anyone.) "–Liberated as some folks."

There was a weird little instance in the earlier days of her friendship with Cher, sure. It's one that she feels strangely cagey about, unsure of why and unwilling to examine it any closer. She doesn't know if she'd quite count it, if only because she doubts that Cher herself does.

In truth, your first proper kiss is one of the things you tend to miss when your teen years are made up of sleepless nights and paranoid days. Doesn't help when she only started talkin' again in the junior year of high school; it tends to do something to people's image of you. Tends to get you tarred with a particular brush, certain words becoming synonymous with your name. Sure, Mabel can only count the amount of times that she heard the word touched in conjunction with her name on one hand, but it was four times too many for her own liking. It's stuck with her, much as she hates to even think about admitting it.

[paranoeo]

have you thought about kiki-ing with serendipity? i think your freaks would match

"Have I ever thought of what?" It's a question that takes her so by surprise—by confusion, more like—that her reply comes without any of the usual harshness. "If I don'know what it is, I ain't sayin' whether or not I'd do it with anyone. But..." She trails off uncertainly, gaze flitting side to side before she eventually heaves a sigh, hands being shoved into the oversized pockets of her jeans. "I guess West is one of the few in town I can tolerate better than most. So, sure, whatever."

[mistyconfidential]

Well, well, well... It's been a little while since we got to have a little chat, huh? We're all just DYIN' (too soon?) to know what's on your minds over here, so - what do you say to pullin' up a chair, and havin' a good little bout of Front Porch Gossip? Some say it heals the soul!

Here's the deal! You're gonna reblog this post to participate - and then you're gonna grace any little nasty question that comes your way with an HONEST answer... or at least as honest as you can stand to be. And don't you forget to send some questions over for me and my lovely Cherie too - you know we can never resist a little gossip.

[serendipitywest]

If she had scared the buck off for herself, no one else, she would have been annoyed, but she would have moved on. Hell, if her scaring the buck off hadn't been acknowledged by another party before she could acknowledge it, she would've admitted fault then moved on. It was really as simple as that -- there were a few instances that Pity found it easy to be a Normal Human Being, and those two were amongst them! But someone pointing our her blunder before she could?

Yeah, sure, maybe it wasn't that serious. But now she and Mabel (someone Callie had worked so hard to understand) were deer-less for the foreseeable future and she knew what he would say if that had happened! Maybe Mabel didn't care all that much about one fumbled buck, but he would have been absolutely livid! And, man, that just doesn't get out of your head fast enough, does it?

She kept rubbing Red's good-boy-head (the old guy was really starting to become more of an emotional support animal than he was a hunting dog, huh?) and subtly shook her head. How embarrassing! She was officially pretty sure the apology was more about showing human emotion than it was about fumbling the deer. Being a human was weird!

"Yeah, it's... it's pretty much been deer and foxes for me." And considering folks did not often eat foxes? Why she'd been trained to kill them, she didn't know, but she wasn't going to waste a hunt! She would eat the fox (as tough and dry and kind of awful as they were, she would do her damndest to make sure as few parts of any animal she killed went to waste) and she'd sell the rest of it for pelts. High class fashion coming to Misty Mountain. "Man, that would've been so fuckin' perfect." (It may be worth noting, dear reader, that she felt Red's ears perk up when he heard 'fuckin.'' She was officially sure that he was, indeed, starting to think that that was his name.)

"Sorry for that, man. That was... fuckin' weird." Embarrassing! Okay, she was pretty sure she could stop now. Hell, she was pretty sure the social script only called for one apology -- if that -- but she'd only read it... eh, maybe twice? She really needed to go reread it if she wanted to successfully reintegrate into society for her amateur investigation -- ya know, successfully cosplay as Normal. "You got enough? Leftovers, I mean?"

[paranoeo]

"Yeah, foxes are pretty nasty." It brings a slight grimace to her face, the recollection of the stench that lingered for days after cooking it. Makes sense that people really only ate it during the Depression, when they were down on their luck and times were tougher than fox meat itself. It's not the worst thing she's ever put in a stew, but it sure as shit isn't the best thing either.

Apology after apology after apology, and each one just makes her feel a little bit more uncomfortable, spolotches of heat starting to pop up on the back of her neck, along her chest, across her shoulders—why the fuck is she feeling anxious right now, and why is it manifesting in rashes? "No, really, 's'all good." It's not really, considering being a deer down can mean the difference between a couple nights worth of dinner and a couple groceries, but it seems like the West gal is taking it as far more of a blow than Mabel herself is, so there's no point in making her feel any worse.

"Yeah, yeah, I should do." She runs a mental inventory of her fridge, her pantry, the ice box in her little cellar, and if she shifts down to two meals a day, she should be able to make it work. The thought of phoning Sugar crosses her mind, but she strikes that down almost as soon as it rises up, hating the idea of feeling needy, or being any more beholden to the Pascal family than she already is. "What about you, will you, uh, be alright?"

[mistymountainmonster]

The monster recoiled the moment it realized its mistake, stepping silently but swiftly back into the safety of the shadows, out of reach of the floodlight’s probing glare. Its movements were deliberate, careful not to disturb another twig or crunch the frost beneath its feet too heavily. It was patient, after all. It could wait.

From its vantage point, it watched Mabel crane her neck, her silhouette taut with the readiness of someone who knew the woods too well to dismiss a sound like that. It admired her caution, the subtle way her fingers hovered near her rifle, her every muscle coiled like a spring. The creature tilted its head, a grotesque mimicry of curiosity, and let a sound escape it - a noise like brittle bones rattling together, faint and rhythmic, a dry, unsettling click that seemed to crawl into the air itself.

When it spoke, its voice was no longer its own. It carried a chilling familiarity, an echo dredged up from Mabel’s nightmares. It was the voice of her mother -sweet yet sour, warm yet rotting at the edges.

“Come here, sweetie!” the words cooed, soft yet dripping with malice, the cadence eerily perfect, as though her mother were standing just beyond the light, waiting for her.

[paranoeo]

Blood runs cold, veins turning to ice in the matter of seconds, and the sound of her own pulse rises to her ears, heart plummeting to the pit of her stomach. It's a voice that she hears every other day, lingering in the back of her mind, stuck in her head like the roots of her hair, but this ... this all is so different. This time, it's not coming from inside; it's coming from the woods.

"Maw?" The word comes out as little more than a croak, head slo-o-wly scanning the clearing, eyes squinting as she tries to see in between the trees, where the shadows lurk. Fingers trail along the window sill next to the door, not daring to stop until they find the muzzle of her rifle, iron-clad grip closing on it.

It can't be her mother. She's dead, she's definitely dead, Mabel saw her—her body, blood slowly draining from her, felt the life leave her in those final moments. Close to a half hour she had spent like that, mere inches from the terrorising form that was both her mother and her attacker, unable to move. Frozen on the spot, cradling her knees to her chest, covered in the gore of at least three people, floral pyjamas slashed and stained all the way through.

It can't be her mother. It just can't be.

"Maw, is that you?"

[sugarpascals]

Sugar grinned back, "Y'welcome doubly." She liked the sound of Mabel's laugh, as shaky as it was, there was somethin' honest in it. Like she couldn't help but for it to bubble over. It made Sugar feel all warm inside that she was the one who'd caused it.

She'd never been scared of dogs none, but Sugar still watched with admiration while Mabel Mae put hers at ease with a look. It was the kinda power and control Sugar spent her whole life protectin', and here, this seemingly harmless girl was in complete control of another beast entirely. When he came up sniffin', Sugar scratched underneath his chin, cooing at the thing. "What's 'is name again?" she asked, craning her neck to look at Mabel.

She clicked her tongue, not exactly surprised by Mabel's response, but making note of the fact that Mabel Mae's first thought with alcohol was sterilization, not inhibition. Sugar ought to chalk it up to Mabel's survival skills-- that is, the skills she had to pick up to make it all this time on her own-- but she'd rather think about it as childlike. Pure and untouched by nasty adult things like alcohol and drunkenness. "We could getcha couple more bottles," Sugar offered, taking a seat at the kitchen table and smiling mischievously, "Case ya ever did want to throw a rager."

Sugar crossed one leg over the other, planting her elbow on the table so she could watch Mabel muddle around the kitchen. She hummed, "What about the idea don't ya like?" She couldn't much disagree. Sugar'd only been drunk a handful of times, and almost always on her own accord. 'Cept for that one fateful time Silas'd convinced her to try his daddy's moonshine. Bein' drunk just made Sugar sad, and she hated to feel sad. "And how c'n ya know if an idea is true if y'never try it?"

[paranoeo]

"Bear. It's Bear." His ears perk up at his name, but he's too busy lavishing attention on the newcomer (how exciting, he rarely gets to meet new people!) to focus much on his owner for the time being. He's come a long way since wandering the streets of Honeycutt, a malnourished mutt who snapped at anyone who looked at him. She'd like to think the same could be said for her—gone is the pathetic, wiry little girl, unable to speak or sleep through the night—but what is it that's replaced her?

Kitchen cabinets are relatively devoid of crockery; three mugs, three bowls, three plates. Bit like Goldlilocks, she thinks, now that she's looking at them through a critical gaze, and it stirs up another chuckle deep in her chest, albeit a little lighter than before. "Naw, don't think I'd know how to throw a rager if my life depended on it." Can't say she's not self-aware, at least.

She takes down two mugs and a side plate, leaving them on the table behind her with a clatter, and focuses her attention next on filling up the ancient tea kettle (enamelled, white, fruit decoration almost worn off entirely) and setting it to boil on the stovetop. There's a sleeve of Oreos on the counter, and she grabs them to bring over with her; this kind of hospitality is unfamiliar to her, and it's as if she's just going through the motions, trying to recreate what she can remember from her childhood or tv shows.

"Losin' the run of myself. Hangovers don't sound much fun either." God knows that Mabel could do with letting loose a little, but it's what might happen when she lets loose that scares her. What she might miss when her guard is down, when her senses aren't operating at their best, what might happen when she isn't on constant vigilance. "'Cause I remember what my parents were like with drink, I guess." Her daddy was just a little funny, but her maw was a mean drunk. Maybe that's the difference between beer and spirits; maybe it was a sign of the darker things that would follow.

[bobbyhughx]

"Oh...that's an understatement if I've ever heard one." Bobby Hugh agreed. He didn't know what he expected from her. Some people experienced tragedy and turned to something like religion. Bobby Hugh tried...but it didn't last very long. He eyed the statue a little bit longer. "But I read that the Greeks liked their gods a little fucked up. Funny that we're so...stuck up about our big man." He pondered, tilting his head to the side as he admired the great i am's washboard abs.

He shoved his hands into his pockets and bounced from the tip of his feet to his heels.

"I'm pretty agnostic too. That's what they call it right? Mama used to say grace." Bobby Hugh nudged, his voice getting a little quieter. "She made it sound like the most important thing in the world. Now I can barely get her to eat...let alone pray." He went on. He didn't mean to dump...especially on Mabel. But this funeral was bringing a lot of unsaid to the surface.

[paranoeo]

Arms wrap around herself in a pathetic sort of self-hug, though really it's just a way to keep her hands out of her pockets. Feels like it would be a weird stance to take up in a church, what with the multi-tool weapon in her jacket pocket. A tad too hostile in a place like this, even for Mabel. "Greeks had the right idea, I reckon."

She thinks back to the stashes of books dotted around her cabin, cracked spines and dog-eared pages, well worn and well read. Some of them are mythologies and tragedies of the Greek kind; Euripides and Sophocles, and other names that she'd be far too embarrassed to even try and say aloud, because she knows she'd mispronounce them. Makes sense that their religious lore would be a little fucked up, because their tragedies sure as shit are too.

"Y'could always ... pray for her. I mean, you could say grace like she used to an' all. Might encourage her to eat, if it used t'mean that much to her." The thing about not being much of a talker, is that it can sometimes make you a better listener, and when she feels like it—when she decides she likes you—Mabel makes for a damn good listener. "Prob'ly would mean a lot to her in general too. Even if y'don't believe so much yourself anymore."

[geryone]

Blud, Rachel McKibbens

[serendipitywest]

Pity did not know if she was ready to apologize, what given that there was enough room in the sprawling woods to be eyeing different prey -- man, the Staffords really loved interrupting her! -- but she was certainly ready to acknowledge the fumble. She was keen on being the one who shot and retrieved the buck, but she'd still fumbled the bag for them both! Food and/or money would have to wait. Wee hee! But... maybe it's Maybelline? no, no, Mabel! -- beat her to the punch.

She heard Mabel and she heard Isaac. How fuckin' ironic, right? Couldn't be more different! But she heard Mabel and she heard Isaac and she was 12 and 24 at the same time. 12, so angry at herself for failing him, so anxious about what he might do because of it. 24, wishing she had pointed the gun at him during one of his fits, wishing she had pulled the trigger piglet. 12, scared and contrite. 24, angry and resentful.

So which one would win out?

"I -- fuck!" She slapped her hand to her forehead. How fucking stupid! Nearly a lifetime of hunting, and she made that idiotic mistake! "Fuck -- how the fuck did I fucking fumble that!?" Get a hearing aid, dumbass. She let her hand slide down the rest of her face, shaking her head all the while. "Jesus Christ -- the fuck, Pity!?" Ooh, now she was Isaac!

Huh. So it seemed some interesting combination of 12 and 24 were winning here!

Running a hand through her hair as Red came dashing over, summoned by 'fuck' (his favorite word... possibly what he thought was his name) and a new person (she'd really failed him, he was so social now!), she set the barrel of her rifle in the snow. At least she could crunch in the snow now! At least she didn't have another buck to scare off! At least she wasn't an idiot who forgot to turn the safety on. "Fuckin' Christ..."

Once Red began sniffing around the barrel, he effectively redirected her attention from that fumble to nudging him away from the gun. The safety may have been on, but he didn't need to get into that habit! Placing her hand on his good-boy-head, she finally turned to fully acknowledge Mabel's presence. "God, sorry." 'Sorry'? How embarrassing! But what was she really apologizing for here? Fumbling the deer for the both of them or for displaying human emotion? Now, she could cite her hearing... but that would mean admitting defeat to her hearing. "Don't take it you've seen any other deer around t'day? Or, like... fuckin' anything worth its salt?"

[paranoeo]

Eyes widen to the point that they almost bulge out of her head, half in disbelief and half in bemusement at the sight before her. Her run-ins with Serendipity in the past have always been brief. Ships passing in the night, one could put it; sure, hunters passing in the woods is probably more apt a saying, but it doesn't roll off the tongue half as easy.

Even in the past, back when Mabel lived a semi-normal life and was sociable, she only ever saw her when she was hanging around Calliope, and something had always seemed off about her. Nothing terrible, nothing suspicious, and nothing that she could put her finger on, which had bugged her at the time. She's become a little self-occupied in the years that have come between then and now, and not without a good reason, she thinks.

But seeing her now, beating herself up over something as little as scaring away a buck ... it brings back that feeling, that gut instinct that something is up with the last West standing. "Fu-u-uck, Pity, it's ... it's not that serious." It all comes out on a singular exhale, low and raspy, eyes hopping from woman to dog to gun and back again. Something stirs in her chest, closer to a laugh but not quite, when she sees just how curious and lively Red is. He'd probably get along well with her fella, she thinks, though she's quick to extinguish that thought. Never gonna happen. She can't let Bear go soft– softer than he already is, anyway.

"Couple cottontails up the mountain, but that's all I been able to see today, 'sides from our friend there." She nods stiffly in the same vague direction that the buck scampered in. "Guess it'll be leftovers for me tonight." Finally, her grip on her rifle relaxes some, even if it is still held aloft in front of her, more like a staff than anything. "Been a rough winter out here, huh?"

[mistymountainmonster]

The creature had been observing her for what felt like an eternity, concealed in the shadows of the woods. Its gaze was locked on Mabel as she gracefully moved through the trees. Each time she entered her cabin, she danced around the traps she had meticulously set, avoiding them with a skill that both baffled and captivated the creature. It was as though she possessed an innate understanding of the forest, surpassing its own knowledge, and it couldn't resist the allure of her silent precision and unwavering resolve. On this particular night, with the ground blanketed in frost and the air heavy with the chill of winter, the monster made a choice. It followed behind her, its steps light and deliberate, mirroring her every move. The snow crunched softly beneath its feet, the cold penetrating its skin as it matched her pace, maintaining just enough distance to remain undetected. It was an unsettling imitation, akin to a shadow that had gained autonomy, and it discovered a hypnotic quality in the rhythm of her journey. However, as she approached the porch, the monster's foot inadvertently snagged a concealed twig, snapping it with a sharp crack that pierced the tranquility of the night. It froze, its breath suspended, its gaze fixed on Mabel's back, uncertain if she would turn, if she would hear it - or if, perhaps, she was already aware.

@paranoeo

[paranoeo]

It's harder some days than others. She can still hear the distant and ugly crunch of fingers being trapped in a window, of an ankle cracking upon impact, the terror in Lou's voice when she told her to run as fast and as far away as she could. Her joints ache in the cold, sometimes, muscles screaming the same way they did nearly a decade ago when she was trying to fight her momma off. Peripheral vision can be blurred, and it's like she's seeing things coming at her when they aren't really there. (Or are they?)

Most of the time, on her return to the little cabin she's made a base out of, she feels as though she's being followed. Stalked. Thinks darkly about how it must be the same way the poor animals she hunts feel. She never is being followed, but it doesn't stop her from looking over her shoulder every few yards, ears pricked up the same way that Bear's do, on the lookout for any sign of a pursuer. Shadows dance behind her, the tree branches above sinisterly cast by the moonlight that slips through, contrasted against the snow.

It makes tracking damn easier, at the very least.

She's been on higher alert than usual since that incident before the holidays, the run-in with ... well, she's been referring to it as a basilisk in her own head ever since, even if she doesn't think that's totally right. Whatever the fucker out there is, she knows that Christmas Eve wasn't the last that any of them have seen of it. Would be foolish to expect otherwise, or wishful thinking taken to an extreme. Mabel knows that she's either one of the luckiest Mountaineers around, or one of the unluckiest—suppose it all depends on how you see a half-filled glass.

A few times she thinks she spots something more than just a shadow from a tree. Reckons she can see a faint puff of breath in the cold, one that's too far away to be her own and too high up to be any kind of animal that she's seen around here. It's too high to be a human's, either. That thought alone sets her teeth on edge. But nothing comes at her, and nothing seems to move any of the times that she looks back. It's against her own creed to go investigating where she doesn't need to, so she just hops to, knowing that once she's home safe, she's got a far better chance against whoever (or whatever) could be out there.

The snap! she hears very clearly, though. Doesn't stop her from ascending onto the porch, just slows her movements, steadies them almost. The motion floodlight is on by now, casting streams of light on the stretch just in front of her cabin: she doesn't want to turn around, doesn't want to see. It's only when she makes it to the little box bench under her front window that she dares to crane her head around, feeling safe in the knowledge that her rifle is within arm's reach.

[sugarpascals]

"She don't need thankin', I did all the work," Sugar protested, eyes gleaming with the joke... and the fact that she was far away to make the joke without fear of retribution. When she was little and still learnin' the land with Dad, Sugar took a real liking to the baby animals. The orphans, skittish and uncertain on account of bein' left behind, were her favorites.

She figured she used a lotta the same skills everytime she stopped by to see Mabel Mae, talkin' in a low voice, movin' real slow with her hands in sight, establishing some sorta give-and-take so they were on equal footing, or at least seemed to be. And, of course, even if you have ulterior motives, never let 'em know. It was needlessly cruel to tell a lamb about its slaughter before it saw the pole-axe, wasn't it?

If there was anything Sugar was good at, it was overstayin' her welcome. This time it just so happened to work in her favor. She smiled at Mabel's offer, more'n ready to get off her feet for a minute... and more than a little curious about the state of Mabel's cabin. "I'd like that, Mabel, thank ya," she accepted, though Sugar didn't move just yet in case she spooked the other.

"You drinkin' this early, Miss Stafford?" Sugar asked, eyes brimming with amusement. There was almost a spunky streak buried underneath Mabel's fears. She wondered what she was really like, before. "You ever had too much to drink?" Sugar asked, curious.

[paranoeo]

"Well in that case, thank ya doubly, Shug." A dark chuckle manages to slip out; a little nervous, but it's a chuckle all the same.

She's more skittish than usual, though Mabel supposes that's to be expected. Lou is about the only person to have stepped foot in her cabin in ages, and even that wasn't exactly by her design. "Yeah, o'course," Uncertainty colours her voice as sways some more on her feet. Finally, she pulls the door open wide enough to let Sugar slide in past her, and slams it shut no more than a few seconds later, locks turning and deadbolts sliding into place once again.

All of the noises set poor Beat on high alert, and though his first instinct at the sight of another person in Fort Knox Stafford is to growl in warning, one look from Mabel (aided by an verbal dismissment) is enough to send his tail wagging and his nose sniffing, eager to meet this new friend. Mabel's cautious enough for the two of them, it seems.

"No, no, God no." Adamant is she about her drinking, or lackthereof. She's never had more than a glass of whiskey at a time, in truth, and she'd wager she could count on one hand the amount of times she's done that. "Vesta gave me a bottle a while back, and, uh, it's better antiseptic than Dettol." Sounds shittier spoken out loud than she had intended, but such is life.

There's the faintest patter of her feet against hardwood floor as she moves to set the basket down on the kitchen table, daring to turn her back on someone for the minute it takes—talk about personal growth. Her therapist from high school would surely be impressed. "I don't much fancy the idea of bein' drunk." She remembers what her daddy was like when he had a couple beers, the disorientation that came with it, the lack of focus, of control. It's Mabel's worst nightmare, some of her biggest fears all bundled into one, and packaged as being nothing more than a "grand ol' time".

[serendipitywest]

who: @paranoeo what: so two women walk into a bar -- jk no they don't, they're too busy being in the woods! [spiderman pointing] where: da woods

Now, Serendipity had no lack of confidence in her marksmanship -- it was one of the few things her father had made her sure of herself in! -- but she also had no plans of risking even the slightest misstep in these harsh winter months. Some of the best possible prey were tucked away, sleeping the cold off -- you see something, you fucking trail that guy until you're certain there's no way you can't make the shot square between his eyes. It was a white-tailed deer, a strong buck. He'd been wandering alone for a while now -- Pity had come to the conclusion that he had no family that would be coming out, no extra meat, just him. And that was acceptable. A few other deer would have been far better, but a buck? That would be enough to get the cash she needed. Unfortunately, she still had yet to do anything about the incessant ringing in her ears. And, unfortunately, Red had gotten too distracted by a leaf to be of any use (maybe telling him he was the best boy in the world had softened him up a little too much...). Indeed, it was all the perfect storm to find herself getting jump-scared by another person -- someone who had managed to get just close enough to justify a start! It appeared that start had been just enough to step on a twig, and that stepping on a twig had been just enough to send the buck dashing away. And Red had gotten too lazy to chase him down (you know, she really had no one but herself to blame for that, but she just couldn't find it in herself to justify treating him the same way her father had!). So the buck was gone, the potential money was gone, and there was nothing that could go after it. "Fuck. First animal worth its weight in fucking miles." She desperately wanted to place the blame on... uh... Macy? Maybelline? Whatever her name was! -- but, motherfucker, she was the one who stepped on the twig!

[paranoeo]

She's not a picky eater anymore, thank God. Maybe it's to do with her strange semi-self-exile from society at large, or maybe it's just something she grew out of, but she'll eat just about whatever she can get her hands on. Deer, though, has become something of a favourite of hers. Venison is the proper term for it, Mabel supposes, but it's difficult to care much about what she calls it when she's the one killing and skinning and cooking it.

When she first moved out here, and started the process of providing for herself she nearly cried at the idea of shooting a deer. She'd be killing Bambi, for crying out loud! But a few too many curious—or downright judgemental—looks from the folks at Wynn Pixie's or Tastee's quickly pushed her over that particular reservation, and it turns out that Bambi-style Sloppy Joes are pretty damn delicious.

What she hasn't grown accustomed to is the few other people who seem to hunt in these here woods. She doesn't own this stretch of land, and she knows that, but aren't they big enough that they can all do their hunting without crossing paths? Entirely too unrealistic a wish, but she's allowed a little impracticality every now and then, surely.

"Shit!" While there's no need to whisper the profanity, with her (their?) target scampering away to relative safety and a total lack of impressionable children around, she still whispers it. Force of habit, maybe. Knuckles turn white with the way her grip on her rifle tightens, muzzle pointing skywards as she moves the butt out a little, ready to swing if need be.

Once the fog of panic clears, though, and she realises it's only Serendipity, she shudders out a sigh; all the same, she doesn't drop her guard, even at the sight of Red a few feet away. "Jesus, West. The fuck are you doin', makin' a rookie mistake like that?" Bit rude, Mabel, judging somebody who's been doing this for a hell of a lot longer than you have.

[paranoeo]

FOR BUCK,

storms, fleetwood mac / yesterday once more, carpenters / you've got a friend, carole king / the circle game, joni mitchell / bridge over troubled water, simon & garfunkel