rouge lips pull into a wide , infectious beam , watching the raven - haired glider with sheer , piqued hilarity . it’s almost as if she’s been shot back through time — to the 1950s , no less . all that’s missing is the big , poufy wig and the giant , inflatable boobs ! ❛ oh , do you have to ?? i quite like watching you skate around like that . i feel like i’m a guest star in an snl comedy skit . ❜ a light chuckle punctuates the words before persephone presses onwards , her waggish persona remaining on full exhibit . ❛ however , i’m as free as santa is on everyday bar christmas and can totally hang ! i guess the real question is … whatcha wanna doooo ?? ❜
“ ’fraid so. but i’ll be here all week ! ” juliet backs up a few inches to perform a ( somewhat less graceful, not everything can be prefect ) curtsy, giggling after as she leaned against the neighboring table. it’s a slow enough point in the day that she’s pretty sure she can relax for the last few minutes of her shift, aside from maybe refilling someones coffee, but that’s a simple enough task. “ i’ll be honest, i was hoping you had some plans i could tag along to, ” a laugh left her lips along with the confession. “ i mean, if nothing else there’s always going to my parents’ place and playing mario kart with my sisters? ”
lifting his gaze from the menu in his hands, elvie smiled at the waitress who had appeared at his table. “greetings and salutations.” he’s visited cutie pie’s a lot in the two months since he arrived in irving. ( the kitchen in his apartment is fully functional and everything, but things have a pesky tendency to … catch fire whenever he tries to cook. ) he recognizes most of the wait staff now. “okay, so i was reading through the milkshake menu and i think your printing press forgot to put black licorice flavored on here, but i was wondering if i could please have that anyway ?” his most polite, plastered - on smile vanished, mouth falling open and brows leaping in surprise at her offer. “oh. uh … ” he nodded. “ … sure, yeah. i can drink an entire milkshake in forty - nine seconds flat, so that shouldn’t be any scheduling conflict.”
juliet likes to think that she’s on some friendship level with most of the people who come in regularly. at the very least, there are people who wave at her when they walk in and seem to enjoy chatting when it’s slow enough to allow for it. most of them being around her age. elvie being one of them. “we have a black licorice flavor?” she tilted her head to skim the menu in front of him. maybe it’s some kind of starbucks secret menu thing she’s out of the loop on. “i’ll see what i can do for ya’.” a grin appears on her face, scribbling it down on her notepad with hopes that someone in the kitchen knows what he’s talking about. he looks surprised at her offer, and it makes her giggle. “you don’t have to look so surprised,” she teased and straightened her back to run his order back. “i’m gonna run this to the kitchen — i wanna hear more about that milkshake record when i come back though.”
the skates are effortless now, almost as natural as walking ( she thanks the heely’s she wore nonstop in first and second grade ) after a couple of years at cutie pie’s. in one smooth motion, juliet glides from one table to another, scooping her tip off the end of an empty table on her way to the occupied booth across the room. “what can i get for ya’, hun?” she occasionally tries on the persona of a sixty year old waitress at a diner frequented by truckers — with no real idea how well it works. the formal smile she wears with customers drops, switching to her normal and more casual one before continuing. “i get off in fifteen minutes if you want to hang out later.” / @irvingstarters
* auli’i cravalho, cis woman + she/her | you know juliet makoa, right? they’re twenty-one, and they’ve lived in irving for, like, ten years? well, their spotify wrapped says they listened to hey angel by one direction like, a million times this year, which makes sense ‘cause they’ve got that whole homemade earrings, floral skirts paired with doc martens and tangled hairties thing going on. i just checked and their birthday is july 13th, so they’re a cancer, which is unsurprising, all things considered.
hello tis i with the single cis girl character i have that i consistently have muse for <3 her doc is a wip, will get that to yall asap, but in the meantime heres this
she’s originally from hawaii, her mom growing up there and her dad moving temporarily for work and then permanently after they got into a Serious relationship. they both have marine biology backgrounds, and her dad’s been doing some university teaching work for almost as long as juliet can remember.
dad took her mom’s last name when they got married. i have no explanation for why atm but gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss i guess.
she has three siblings — eight year old twin sisters named lucy and eloise, and a brother just a little bit younger than her who’s actually technically an adopted cousin who i will leave unnamed for now for future wc reasons.
they moved to north carolina ten years ago when her dad got an offer to teach at a university a little ways out of town. they liked the idea of being right on the beach and not constantly surrounded by college kids, so irving it was.
she’s following in both her parents’ footsteps with her fascination with the ocean. she’s leaning more toward her mom’s conservation, but the science is still cool and she’ll happily talk your ear off about seaweed and jellyfish. her dad might work at a university but she’s rocking online school from the comfort of her lil apartment.
between school and beach.....stuff.......... she’s waitressing at cutie pies and running a tiny lil etsy shop with handmade jewelry.
small and absolutely harmless, catches spiders and releases them safely outside kind of ‘wouldn’t hurt a fly’ but she’s also a blackbelt in taekwondo so ? takes after her dad with that one.
she has a bearded dragon named hiccup who is her pride and joy and her actual daughter. she’s named after the guy from how to train your dragon, by her sisters. she likes to take her on walks when the weather’s right.
her pintrest board is right here if u wanna peruse it and get a feel for her whole vibe <3
from time to time cassie will walk along the beach to check on the sea turtle nests she spotted that summer. the particular nest she’s been keeping her eye on was down near the cove. the eggs were a little late hatching by her calculations (which, to be fair, weren’t … completely accurate). however, she went every evening to make sure the little guys made it. it wasn’t like being all into marine life and the beach in general was a secret for her anymore. she was past caring about someone spotting her; she looked too out of place (sporting heels and an outfit that looked like she just left fashion week) to blend in. frankly, she just cared about the damn sea turtle eggs. knowing they usually only emerged at night, cassie has made it a habit of coming down to see if they would finally hatch – this included making sure no one was in the way of their easiest path to the ocean. looking towards the water, she saw some things laying right in the path. not far away was someone just hanging out, from what she could tell. taking her heels off (just to make it easier on herself to walk through the sand) she walks over to the anonymous silhouette who was only lit by moonlight. “ hey, uh – do you know who’s stuff is laying over there? ” she asked, acknowledging to herself how creepy she sounded – “ i just … there’s a nest of sea turtle eggs and i wanted to move the stuff over a few feet but i don’t want people to think i’m trying to take them ” her sentences were coming out all at once, almost jumbled together to the point of incoherence.
living in a little apartment above his mother’s bakery with his parents and two small children doesn’t exactly give arin a whole lot of space to just exist on his own. don’t get him wrong, he loves nolan and wren to death, but sometimes they’re just a little too much. so more often than not he tries to spend an hour or two just about anywhere else until they’re definitely asleep before creeping back in. and tonight, that led him to the beach. not doing anything in particular, mostly looking for cool seashells and crabs, tossing skate eggs back in the water — simply vibing, if you will. hearing a voice, he looks up from the small hole he’d dug in the sand, than shifted his gaze to where he’d left his shoes, skateboard and drawstring backpack nearby. “sea turtles?” he hears that and grasps onto it, only remembering about his crap after he’s already stood up. “oh, yeah, that’s mine. you can move it.” wherever it ends up is future arin’s problem. “where are the turtle eggs?”
“mom wants you to come over for dinner tonight.” a simple message, one that could have been delivered via text, but why do that when he could drag both of them out of their houses? get some vitamin sunny d or whatever it is that you’re supposed to get from being out in sunlight. “also we need to start planning for halloween. i’ve been scoping out the spirit halloween since they started setting it up for inspiration.” and he already put up his 12-foot home depot skeleton outside, but he’ll let her see that for herself. / @eastrnhighway
RICARDO MAKES A SHOW OF ROLLING HIS EYES AT RIVER’S ANTICS . he crosses his arms over his chest , to show that he won’t be signing anything until river puts the damn hearing aids back in . PETTY , but sometimes that’s ricardo’s M. O and the only way of communicating with river . the pair imitate each other , perfectly . parallels to one whole , as they sit across from each other , jaws set - faux patience for one another , and their arms crossed . who will break first ? neither . both . roll the dice and find out . ricardo’s jaw grinds together more at river’s next sign . he keeps his jaw clenched , resolutely NOT signing back , even though he itches to argue and break his arms free to sign another ‘ go fuck yourself ‘ to river . instead , he pointedly looks at the hearing aids clasped in river’s hands , then pointedly looks at river’s ears - where the hearing aids should be . slowly , ricardo mouths . “ i’ll wait . asshole . “
might as well get comfortable, making a whole show of leaning back in his seat and shifting around for the best position. nobody around to break it up means they could well be in for the long haul. unless boredom gets the better of stubbornness. ( more like until, it’s pretty inevitable, but far be it from river to admit that. ) he maintains fairly steady eye contact, something he has to really work to do, only shifting his gaze when ricardo’s jaw moves to read his lips. not really too difficult to decipher and take a guess at what he’s saying. river shrugs, a silent ‘ okay. fine. ’. and with that, and for the sake of being extra obnoxious, he looks away in the most dramatic way possible. like a little kid turning their nose up at vegetables. essentially cutting off communication in an effort to get ricardo to break first.
“ PRETTY SURE THAT’S ILLEGAL . “ nadia calls out a bit more loudly than she probably needs to . she tilts her head to the side , chewing her gum obnoxiously at the same time as she leans on her car , watching . she glances down at the empty spray cans by the male’s feet , in slight astonishment of it all . she briefly wonders how many cans he plans on using tonight . she straightens up , only slightly , to take in the whole piece properly ( or as properly as she can seeing as she has next to no visual ability to appreciate anything , really ) . “ what’s it supposed to be ? “ she can’t help but ask , after another small pause . she’s not trying to be sarcastic or quippy for once , but actually trying to UNDERSTAND and appreciate a bit more . she’s always been slightly in wonder of people who can just create things like he has - albeit , it’s usually not just on any blank public wall or surface they happen upon .
it takes a second before nez realizes she’s talking to him. probably says something that he’s so comfortable showing up to just paint that he rarely remembers he really shouldn’t be. “ art doesn’t care about what is and isn’t legal. ” he calls back. maybe art doesn’t, but he probably should. nez takes a couple of steps back from the wall to look at his own work — it’s mostly outlines right now, needing details and shading to make it more recognizable, but he’s happy with it so far. “ it’s a giant squid, ” he answers, gesturing to the orangey-red blob with half-finished tentacles on one side. “taking out a whaling ship.” his arm moves to the other side and a brown blob. “ i think it’s avenging moby dick like a megafauna mob hit. or something like that. i don’t know, i never actually read moby dick.
IMPATIENTLY - as is ricardo’s norm - he signs ’ go fuck yourself ‘ to river , and with faux - patience and understanding , waits for river to meet his eyes . ricardo makes a show of shrugging his shoulders , and throwing up his hands . ‘ are you going to keep acting like a fucking child ? ‘ he signs it in the same way he does everything : crisp . borderline perfect and too practiced . ricardo doesn’t do anything unless he does it perfectly , and he forced river to show him exactly how to communicate with them a while ago ( and spent hours punishing himself if he didn’t get it exactly perfect ) . EVEN IF THAT MEANT COMMUNICATING IN CLASSIC RICARDO STYLE , aka by being a complete and utter asshole . “ put in your damn hearing aids. i wasn’t finished talkin’ . “ ricardo says , pointing to his mouth as he talks now , loudly , so he doesn’t have to sign and hopefully riv can notice just how irritated ricardo is getting by the lack of co-operation from their end .
river rolls his eyes with far more drama than necessary, mockingly signing ‘ go fuck yourself ’ back as he crosses his arms across his chest like the child they’re acting like. how much of his behavior is genuine annoyance and how much is playing it up for drama’s sake is yet to be determined, but they’re both too stubborn to just give in easily. how they’re still friends is anyone’s guess. untucking one hand, he signs ‘ yes ’, spelled out calmly and definitively. perhaps adding to how annoying he’s being, he hadn’t even bothered to turn off his hearing aids — leaving them on in his clasped hand, squealing away from being held so close together. it obnoxious. river has no idea. ( even though he’s been told they do this, he never remembers. ) he shrugs, uncrossing his arms and looking his hearing aids over his thumb long enough to sign, ‘ i was done listening. ’
“ i know. and don’t even get me started on recycling, ” august sighs, “ the recycling bin is right next to the trash and yet they still insist on throwing their recyclables in the trash. there’s a lot of work that needs to be done to educate this town, but hey, if we don’t do the work, who else will, y’know? ” she’s glad to have stumbled upon a likeminded individual, someone else who seems to care about the wellbeing of irving’s beaches. “ really? that’d be great. we’d love to have all the help we can. it should be a fun and rewarding day. ”
“there’s even a sign.” an old, kind of dusty sign, but a sign nonetheless. it’s still readable. “you’d think that being in a beautiful place would make people want to keep it that way. guess they all missed the day in second grade when we watched that video about it with the weird little trash and recycling mascots.” he’ll never understand it, personally. maybe happy feet and wall-e just hit him different as a kid. “yeah, totally.” he smiles. “let me know any advertising i can help with. i got a good idea where the good bulletin boards and walls are.”
sky’s eyes fixated on the fire in front of her, it took a minute for her brain to process what he had said. “huh? – oh, yeah. i definitely need one.” she offered a half-smile though her tone suggested she was in a very dark place. clearing her throat and putting on what she would call her ‘charming’ tone – even if it consisted of nothing more than a pep in her step – sky continued, “you’re pup is so cute! what’s their name?” she asked, looking for a sign that told her it was okay to reach out and pet them. it might be obvious to other people, but after being chased down the road by a dog … twice … sky was a bit more wary.
try as he might, river can’t tell whether or not he actually recognizes this person. it’s not uncommon for people to bring other friends along, he just can’t tell if it’s that, or it’s too dark and he’s too buzzed for his memory to work. “i feel that.” he nods. maybe if he paced himself he wouldn’t have this problem. “ransom.” the dog’s ears perk up at her own name, clearly happy about the attention. he glances back up at the other and grins. “she’s friendly. and off the clock for the night if you wanna pet her.” her service vest with all it’s “don’t distract” patches lies upside down on top of river’s backpack nearby, which is usually enough of a greenlight from him, but he still appreciates getting a chance to actually say it’s okay.
“how did you turn out so selfish?” those words ringing through sky’s head as she walked out the door of the trailer she once shared with her brother and her mom. her brother still lives there and her mom only comes around when she needs something. this time? money and food. it’s not that sky didn’t have it – it’s the fact that she knew selina would be spending it on drugs and she’d rather not wake up in the morning to see selina on the news. but selina didn’t see it that way. selina would rather guilt and punish sky for not jumping when she said jump. sky couldn’t tell you why something so small would bother her so much. you’d think after growing up with a mom like hers, she’d be used to the disappointing storm that trailed behind selina everywhere she went. but, maybe it’s the fact that selina was still her mom… god, sky needed a drink. getting into her car, she heads out into the dark of night, making her way down to vela pier – which was still alive with people enjoying the lights and beach bonfire happening just down the beach a little. skylar walks into the crowd, checking to see where she could grab a shot … or 4. drinking on an empty stomach isn’t something she did frequently – but it’s something she does tonight. after a round of shots she took with total strangers, she goes to sit by the bon fire – hoping she could forget her life for just a few moments. @irvingstarters
river kind of knows the people he’s hanging out with. well enough to get invited, but not really well enough to hold a decent conversation. which is fine by him, everyone needs a couple of good drinking buddies. better than drinking at home alone with his dog. speaking of whom — ransom’s off the clock. there’s enough people around that he’s not worried about not hearing something important. she’s relaxing in the sand next to the warmth of the fire, perfectly content, got a little bowl of water away from the noise and everything, but river’s still been making sure to circle back around and check on her frequently. as he approaches the bonfire he notices the silhouette of a person sitting nearby, and being the social butterfly he is of course he’s going to chat. ransom’s tail wags as he comes into view and signals her to come, which she does just as he plops down in the sand next to the figure. “hi,” he waves at them as he moves to pet his dog. “taking a breather?”
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