[TAZ] i know i like to draw that line when it starts to get too real

[monstertea]

The problem isn't that the kid is too young to walk himself home, it was the neighborhood. Taako doesn't live in the slums, but his neighborhood isn't really a place for kids to wander around alone, either. Especially a boy detective who does't know how to keep his nose out of other people's business. That's why he's stuck with the kid in the first place, or so he reminds himself when his brain starts to think too fondly of him.

He walks at a languid pace next to Angus, knowing but not acknowledging that he's in no hurry to go home. "You keep working on that mage hand," he says as they walk through a neighborhood much nicer than Taako's. "Just don't go trying anything fancy on your own, little dude." It's a historic area where buildings have been converted into homes and quickly filled by the hoity-toity type of people who like white picket fences and employ other people to take care of their homes. It's easily the nicest foster home Angus has been in yet. So Taako could have dropped him off at the corner, it isn't a neighborhood that sees trouble. He tries to avoid run-ins with Angus's family, but he always has an excuse to see him to his door. At least with this neighborhood he has the easy excuse that it's just interesting to look at the houses, to answer Angus about what each building used to be. Yeah, he knows shit, too. He's just trying to remind the kid that he isn't smarter than him, he's not trying to impress him.

Comments

[solarisirius]

"Yes, especially since I'm trying very hard to make a good impression. Throwing up and then maybe passing out aren't very conducive to that end," Kravitz sighs forlornly, waiting for Taako to pour what he wants before adding to his own glass.

Of course, the elf isn't fast enough to add his little addendum before Kravitz realizes what he's said and begins to smile. "Oh, of course, we haven't decided yet if you're going to teach me, that's right," he says benevolently, taking a swig of his wine. "But if you do, it's good to know that we won't be including that in the list."

[monstertea]

"That's right we haven't decided yet," Taako says more decisively. He's distracted from thinking about cooking by Kravitz's comment about trying hard to make a good impression. When was the last time someone put effort into impressing him? Especially someone completely out of his league like Kravitz. "Making a good impression will help that decision, of course. You're doing pretty well so far, handsome. Skeletons, body drawers, wine, you've pulled out all the stops."

[solarisirius]

Kravitz flushes a little, as is pretty damn typical of him at this point, when the elf calls him "handsome". It makes his heart flutter, and he can't help but wonder if Taako would find him handsome in ratty jeans and thin, overwashed t-shirts as well as when he's all dressed up for work. "I don't let just anyone see the body drawers," he says seriously. "I think Istus is the only other person who's seen, and she didn't last thirty seconds. She thought it was creepy as hell, and I'm lucky she even comes in here to feed me."

[monstertea]

"Your sister. The one you ran around in graveyards with?" Taako says doubtfully. "I mean, for sure, downstairs is creepsville, but Wednesday Addams couldn't take it?" He's kind of built up this idea of Kravitz's family all being odd in the way he is. A little offbeat in their comfort with death and corpses and the spaces they occupy. It's ridiculous to him to think a member of Kravitz's family wouldn't find themselves right at home in the morgue-turned-house.

[solarisirius]

"Yeah, that's Istus," Kravitz chuckles, the expression on his face undeniably fond. "She doesn't mind the ones at our family's mortuary, but the fact that these were just abandoned, that there was apparently a body in one of them that rotted down to nothing but bones, it doesn't sit right with her. She's very superstitious, and I'm pretty sure the only reason she doesn't have the house blessed is because she hasn't had the time to hunt someone down."

[monstertea]

"See! See!" Taako sits up straight, pointing at Kravitz accusatorially. "I told you this place was messed up! Even your sister can tell. You're gonna start renovating downstairs and that's gonna release all the ghosts and then this place is gonna be haunted as fuck, just crawling with ghosts. She's gonna come over one day and you're going to have to look her in the eye and tell her there are approximately a shit ton of ghosts in this place." He makes a show of rubbing his arms like he's cold. "Gives me the chills just sitting here."

[solarisirius]

Kravitz just gives Taako a Look. "I'm not a necromancer, but I have just enough magic to be able to say with full and absolute certainty that there isn't a ghost anywhere inside this house." The statement starts seriously, but he loses his ability to be strict and no-nonsense when Taako is pointing at him so accusatorially. "Do you actually want to be a ghost hunter or something? You've talked so much about ghosts, liches, all that stuff."

[monstertea]

Taako returns the Look when Kravitz asks if he wants to be a ghost hunter. "No thank you," he says. "Well, I mean, if the gig paid, I wouldn't turn it down, but I've seen ghost hunters, they aren't exactly living it up. That is a labor of love that I have no love for. But you go somewhere with a spooky history, you think of those things." He shrugs. "And the lich thing didn't start with me, at any rate. I'm just going with the information I have."