checkingout | [open + closed] nothing to keep me from the storm

[open + closed] nothing to keep me from the storm

Who: Cashmere + you
What: After being gone for 5 days, Cashmere returns to the hotel with the fury of 1000 suns
Where: All over the hotel
When: June 8th
Warnings: likely violence and ugly crying

Cashmere wakes up in the boiler room on the afternoon of June 8th, having disappeared without warning five days earlier. Five days in hotel time, but less than two for her. The last thing she remembers is the sharp pain of Johanna's ax cutting into her chest, but that's gone now. She thinks back - before that? Katniss' arrow in Gloss' chest. It doesn't take long for the realization she's returned to the hotel to sink in, on her feet and eventually yanking the door open with a frustrated scream and one goal - to find Katniss.

It feels like something inside her has snapped and though she's exhausted and afraid of what it means to be back at hotel ( she's dead this time. really, truly, dead just like Johanna said. there isn't anything left for her in Panem and nothing for her at the hotel.) and is propelled by the rage that threatens to spill over and the need for revenge.

open

She starts with the lobby, yelling Katniss' name as though it might get her to appear. She stops to interrogate anyone she sees, and if they were expecting Cash to be happy to see them again they've pick the wrong day for a reunion. Those from Panem won't be surprised to see her verbally lash out at people - it's falling back on old habits. She's fresh from the Games and it feels like everyone is the enemy.

She does stop by her room to be sure nothing's missing, and will respond to any tablet communication.

closed - Haymitch

Despite being told otherwise by literally everyone she's come across, Cashmere's next stop after the public areas of the hotel is Katniss' (now former) room, pounding at the door. "Katniss! Katniss! Come out, Mockingjay. Don't be a coward." There's no answer, but she's already convinced herself the girl is hiding inside.

She catches Haymitch's approach from the corner of her eye, stopping her tantrum to move protectively in front of the door. "Don't come any closer," she warns. "Unless you're here to help me find your stupid Mockingjay."

closed - Hook

After her run in with Haymitch, Cashmere's finally given up on finding her nemesis but it hasn't done a single thing to make her feel better. If anything, it makes her feel worse - too much pent up anger and no outlet for it. She returns to the lobby in search of an answer (or maybe a fight. probably a fight). She's looking positively feral: wild eyed and charcoal-dirtied hands that hint that she'd even gone so far as to poke at the fireplace like it might be filled with secrets. Cashmere doesn't notice him until he's close enough to touch her, distracted by her current task of looking through all the drawers of the front desk.

closed - Trip

Exhaustion finally wins over, but not until after Cashmere has completely trashed her room. It'll cause quite the ruckus for her neighbor. When he comes by to see what the hell she's doing, he'll find that she's pulled the mattress from her bed's frame, the table and chair have been overturned, and her belongings are scattered everywhere. She tried unsuccessfully to smash the window with her suitcase, and it lays discarded on the floor.

All knocks on her door she ignored until she's finally tired herself out. Cashmere hadn't been expecting Trip (or anyone, really) and rolls her eyes when she finds him waiting in the hall. "Can I help you?"

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Trip wasn't sitting idly in his room when the commotion had started. He had been in the middle of a shower and rushed to rinse off and get dressed at hearing the noise. It had been days with no sign of Cashmere and everyone had thought the worst. It wasn't a knock but him trying to kick the door in when she finally opened. He pushed past her--his eyes panning the room to make sure she wasn't in trouble.

"What the hell is going on?! Where the hell have you been? We've been looking all over for you!" he answered her question as brusquely as she asked it. The t-shirt he put on clung to his wet skin, not taking the time to dry too thoroughly before rushing to see what was going on in the room next door. "Was it Rumlow? Did someone hurt you?" The questions came in rapid succession. His hands clasped her face to look for any signs of injury.

Touching her was the wrong decision, and Cashmere moves reflexively to distance herself from him with a sweep of her arms, capturing him by the wrists and shoving him roughly into the door frame. "Don't," she snaps. "I'm not a little girl." He didn't deserve that and later she'll feel a little bad about it, but she doesn't regret any of it at the moment.

She still feels explosive, and takes a step back to give herself more space. "I went home." It's not much of an explanation, but it might be enough for him to figure out that she's not doing so well.

That wasn't the reaction he expected by far. In the past, Cashmere had been cynical and bitter over circumstances but never toward him. This was...something was wrong. Trip quickly pushed himself off the doorframe and took a more stable stance. "Home? What do you mean you went home? How?" he asked with the utter confusion on his features and inflection.

It's a reasonable question. It's also one she doesn't have an answer to. "I was here and then I was back in the Games right where I'd left off. Then I died." She'd known she wasn't going to win - she'd even known Johanna would be the one who killed her, but she hadn't expected things to end like they did. "And now I'm back in the universe's shittiest hotel." she huffs, and then adds sarcastically: "and how's your day going?"

She hasn't been able to shake the memory of watching her brother die, not for a second. Her stomach turns again, and she closes her eyes to count to two and try to not fall to pieces about it.

"Cashmere." Her name is said with emotion, not warning. Maybe she hadn't seen his dream. Maybe she had. He loved Skye but Trip wasn't fool enough to believe it was to the depths that Cashmere loved her twin. So while he knew the pain she was going through, he recognized hers was more severe. "I'm sorry you had to go through that. You're not alone here."

It wasn't time yet to explain that he meant both what she experienced and physically in the hotel. He wanted to hug her but only if it brought comfort, not further turmoil. Trip couldn't just stand there when she closed her eyes. His arms enveloped her as he held his breath both figuratively and literally.

She had seen his dream, but it's not what she's thinking of right now. Cash is more upset about her own death than she expected to be, but the loss of Gloss is an open wound ten times worse. As far as she's concerned, it doesn't matter how well people understand or how many friends surround her, she will always be alone.

The hug is unexpected and she tolerates it for a second before stiffening under his touch and pushing away. She's less rough this time, but only because she breaks from the hug easily. It's too much closeness to have with anyone at the moment. "Stop. Doing. That." She waves a hand at him, and then at herself. "Your space. My space." Her voice breaks on the last word. Feeling defeated, she sighs. "Nothing is going be be okay."

At least she didn't punch him in the throat. Cashmere was well within her right to deny the contact. He gave a nod of acknowledgment and took a few steps away. No form of argument could be made against her last statement though he was one who always tried looking at the bright side. Trip watched her with sad eyes.

"I'm sorry for your loss. I met Haymitch and Annie while you gone. They explained what you might've gone back to. ...Let me at least fix the room for you?" he offered quietly. He'd offer to be her personal punching bag if it'd help any.

Haymitch and Annie, right. Just more confirmation that everyone she'd been dumb enough to trust just because they were from home has been keeping secrets from her for months. She kicks petulantly at the bed frame and shrugs at his offer.

With everything overturned there's no where to sit and the dismantled bed will make it difficult to sleep (not that she's interested in sleeping but she'll have to give in sooner rather than later). The only reason for destroying the room had been to get some of the anger that was inside onto the outside, which says something about her lack of appropriate coping skills and maybe about her common sense too.

"Fine," she agrees as though it's her doing him the favor and not the other way around. "You can help." No promises that she won't try to put anything through the wall again.

He started with the bed--the largest item that needed straightening, deciding to work his way backward and leave the smallest for last. More physical work for him and less for her. Trip wasn't sure if she needed anymore exertion from the way she answered him.

Then again, she had said he could 'help' which prompted Trip not to take over the straightening but follow her lead. "You hungry at all?" he asked while helping to move the mattress back in place.

She grabs the other side of the mattress, and again she's quiet at his question. The bed slides back together easily, and Cashmere shrugs. "I don't know." She has no idea when she ate last. They'd had food in the arena but eating hasn't crossed her mind since she woke in the hotel.

"I don't think I could keep it down," she admits, focusing on smoothing the blankets instead of looking at him. "So that'd be a waste."

Her response made sense under the circumstances so he went on to another suggestion than remain on the subject of food. "I can keep going if you wanna grab a shower." He also wasn't pushing for eye-contact, more her benefit than his. Cashmere was there and moving forward through her heartache. Her strength to continue amazed him though he hadn't found the words to say as much. It wasn't the right time either, he knew that much.

There was a major concern over whether Cashmere would do something worse than destroy things in the hotel. Trip remained steadfast without giving away his agenda of remaining by her side. It was a trick of not pushing where he found resistance and redirecting every time he came up to a roadblock. He had been fixing the linen with her and continued on to her pillows when he suggested a shower.

She shakes her head. The only thing she does want is to somehow roll back the last 48 hours, back before the arena, when everything still felt like it had some chance of not collapsing. She wants the impossible, to take back every single decision that led the siblings to the arena. An odd thought crosses her mind - are her parents proud?

The table should be next. She knows she should fix that. Instead, she sits on the bed with a heavy flop. "Katniss killed Gloss. I couldn't get to him fast enough." She glances to Trip, her eyes welling with tears. "And now she's gone."

"I'm sorry you had to go through that. I won't pretend to know how you feel, but I know how it feels to lose someone that I cared about--watch them and be helpless to stop it..."

Trip didn't watch her with pity or in a way that showed any sign of him finding her helpless. There was concern, sadness and respect.

"...I was lucky to find them in the hotel. For me, everything happened just before I got here while she'd been here for months and mourned my death before getting here. If this place is good for anything, maybe you can be reunited with Gloss."

He couldn't in good conscience allow Cashmere to focus on her brother's killer. No one stayed dead and it would put his friend in a bad light. Trip kept a watchful eye while setting the table back in place within the room.

She's listening, though she's not looking at him. Cash keeps her head bowed, trying to steady her breath and hold back her tears. "Do you really think so? He could come here?" It's her only hope now, though she knows it's a long shot. The hotel seems to be a strange halfway point between life and death - and idea that she gets to go on in some sort of strange new lift and her brother doesn't completely guts her.

Trip is being almost impossibly nice, and she does appreciate it though she doesn't show it. From what she can tell, life in the hotel hasn't changed. Even so, Cash feels lonely. Maybe she'll always feel like half of a whole, maybe she'll always be lonely.

"You and I are both proof that it's possible. From what I've heard, there're others too. So you can't give up, Cash. No matter how hard it gets. It might be the very day you throw in the towel that he shows up..."

He continued moving around her room and straightening up. Getting physically close had been a bad idea but it seemed good that he stayed. The table and chair were put in place as he talked. Trip was on her suitcase next.

"...Besides, if we do get to the bottom of who's responsible for us being here then you can go a step further and maybe even get him yourself. Maybe instead of returning to Panem, you and Gloss can make a life where I'm from. I can guarantee there will be more books than he'll know what to do with and you can run from one ocean to the other."

As prickly as she's been, it does help to have someone be kind to her. She's still not feeling particularly sane or reasonable but it's calming to have Trip around (he's both of those things).

"I'd like that," she admits. Cash bites at her bottom lip. In the past she's not allowed herself to linger on thoughts of what life could be like. What other choice does she have now? Trip has a point - they'd both come to to the hotel after the worst happened. Gloss could be next. She can focus on that and try to take things one day at a time. Or one hour a time.

"Trip?" She asks quietly. "Will you stay for a while?" She could use the company.

He was glad that she seemed to find some solace in his suggestion and hoped like hell to be right for her sake. It had been one thing to believe she'd been separated only temporarily and had a chance to get back, another to learn there was no possibility. Cashmere had every right to be abrasive under the circumstances. She'd never hear a word of her behavior that night from him.

"However long you want..." he answered softly with a single nod of acknowledgment that held a slight reverence. She didn't need to be alone. He didn't want her to be alone so soon. "...I'll stay." Trip didn't make a big deal of her request, continuing to straighten her room. He'd gladly spend the night on the couch or even the floor.

"Okay." If he stays, she'll be a little better. Someone to distract her instead of being left alone with her thoughts. "You don't have to," she waves to the room, her strewn about clothes and the knickknacks she's collected in her months at the hotel. "do all this. You can sit."

Cashmere takes a deep breath, and then another. "Tell me what happened while I was gone." How long has she been gone? She doesn't know and honestly doesn't care what everyone else was up to while she was busy dying. But it'll be something else to think about.

She received a nod of acknowledgment but he continued to slowly pick up and straighten, just to give her eyes something to follow. "Just a little more."

"I missed you," Trip immediately answered. The statement was said factually. "It took me off guard that you were gone. Annie's good people. She tipped me off on you disappearing. I met Haymitch then. A number of us started looking for you. It's been five days."

Her clothes were all carefully put back into her luggage and the luggage placed on the table. "A young girl--Caroline, I think her name is--was found murdered and everyone was on the hunt for who did that. I pretty much haven't slept between all that."

She groans when he mentions Annie and Haymitch, flopping back across the bed. What's she going to do about them? They're her allies - or were her allies - but they'd been keeping secrets from her the entire time. She doesn't feel like she can trust them any more. Five days isn't that long but it's long enough to shift the balance of her life.

"I was here for the murder. Barely." There's something else she doesn't want to think about. Home is a nightmare, the hotel is a nightmare. What did any of them do to deserve this?

Cashmere curls on her side, and buries her face into her hands, thinking back over what he said. "You missed me? You looked for me?"

The groan she let out made him rethink that she considered the two as friends. He filed the thought away for a later time. It was more important now to keep Cashmere from added stress. He gave a nod at her reply about the murder. A few last things were picked up before he sat in a chair close to her bedside.

"Of course I looked for you," he immediately answered. "Every day since." Trip unconsciously slid down into the chair. "Checked every inch of this place for you, a handful of times a day."

She exhales with a shaky breath but can't bring herself to look at him. True friends have been few and far between in her life, and she doesn't know why Trip cares so much for her. To go out of his way to try and find her shows an incredible level of kindness. He'd kept looking, and now he's at her side even though she's been nothing but a terror since her return.

"How am I going to live without him?" It has nothing to do with Trip being present at the moment, but it's where her thoughts keep returning to. She's never been without her brother and really had imagined that time in the hotel was temporary and along with it, so was her separation from Gloss. It feels final now. She continues softly: "We're twins. I can't be a twin by myself." It might sounds childish, she knows that. Her brother has always been part of her identify. Being Cashmere without Gloss feels impossible.

It was tempting to reach out and sit closer to Cashmere but he refrained. Trip curled forward from his seated position and his hands reached for one of hers instead. "Hey...you've been doing great here. You'll do the same while you wait for him to show up. What would you want him to do if he was here without you?"

He couldn't be anything but understanding with what she was going through. Not only had he been through a similar loss, but her disappearance had genuinely made him worry given recent events. Cashmere would have to figure out her life as a twin without her brother but Trip would have her back along the way.

She hesitates, stretching her hand so it's nearly to his and then second guessing herself. Her hand closes and shrinks away from him, but before she pulls away entirely she grabs his hand and squeezes. Cashmere's glad she asked him to stay. She's not much of a conversationalist but it's better to have someone one to talk at instead of throwing her furniture around the room.

"I'd want him to be happy." She's not convinced that she can do the same. Happy was hard at home, and it'll be harder now.

Still holding his hand, she moves to bury her face further beneath her other arm, like she might successfully hide away from everything. She's quiet again until her shoulders shake with an escaping sob. She hasn't allowed herself to cry until this moment.

"You're twins. You have to know he'd want the same for you," he immediately responded with his hand giving hers a squeeze in return. He kept her hand while allowing Cashmere to lead. Slowly, very slowly, Trip moved closer--taking a seat on the floor next to the bed rather than have her feel that he was just sitting watching her. His arm remained on the mattress with her hand in his while his head was nearby without invading her space.

His other hand reached to cover their joined hands as she started to sob. She could rest her head on his shoulder or arm to cry, he'd welcome it. Yet Trip didn't pull her close though he was easily able to do so. Cashmere had free reign. He'd sit and hold her hand until she pulled away or cried herself to sleep. The truth was that she suffered a loss and she had every right to mourn. He could only hope for her well being that her brother did show up in the hotel but knew there was no guarantee.

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64th - 2015-06-20 21:37 (UTC) - Expand

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triplett - 2015-06-21 03:33 (UTC) - Expand

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