Teraton, North Carolina. What. A. Place. It wasn't like it was some crappy little time in the middle of bumfuck nowhere; It was actually a very nice little town and she had been able to buy the cutest little cottage out in the middle of the woods with the most amazing and cute little pond and [as of her arrival] the most beautiful and colorful garden. It wasn't Maui or Los Angeles, but it was still a beautiful home for her. The cottage was green and pretty...small. It wasn't like her last actual home [before prison] where she had the newest and latest in all her appliances. But it was so homey and comfortable and just.... Cozy. That was the word. She had an adorable, cozy apartment. When she arrived, the Uhaul was already there but there was nobody to help her move her things so she spent most of her morning moving things into her new home and trying to find that perfect feng shui, calling on some vines to help her. Perhaps that was one of the good things about being revealed: She didn't have to hide her abilities anymore and she could bring flowers to the world without pretending that it was some sort of special effects or that she was just some sort of epic illusionist. She would bring flowers to the world! Her optimistic nature never failed her.
As the morning soon turned into afternoon, the sun rising higher into the sky, she found herself finished with the arrangement of her home. And with nothing else to really do. She tried to sit for a while and watch some old Gene Kelly movies but she grew restless of that. She moved on to playing some video games but found no joy in that or re-reading her old comic books. She missed Zane. She had never been without her brother since the day that they had met and he had always been her partner in crime. She could make friends without him – Easy peasy. But she had never met another supernatural before and she wasn't exactly sure if they had some super secret government of their own or if there were any foreign rules and regulations. Maybe she was just scared to meet a Vampire and end up getting eaten, assuming that they were all psycho like Russel Edgington. She might just be watching too much True Blood though. She would find these thoughts bouncing around in her head and soon after chastise herself for being both a coward and a bigot.
After a nice shower, she took thirty minutes to turn her honey blonde hair a nice shade of hot pink and another thirty minutes to flat iron it. Today was going to be a pink sort of day, as anyone would see from her apparel; Pink tube top under an unbuttoned pink and black plaid button down with light pink convereses sporting silver spikes and pink embellishments on her daisy dukes. Oh! The joy of being obsessive compulsive about color coordinated fashion. But she hardly spared the time to pick out pink piercings, going for simple black and silver bars and hoops for her left nostril, jestrum, and snake bite holes. It took about two hours of conversing with herself out loud to actually get her out the door, pausing by a mirror to give herself a smile of reassurance. Her parents and Zane would be out of prison in another year - maybe a few months - and her tree would be arriving tomorrow. Not to mention she was going to make some friends today. Yeah. Everything would work itself out.
With the last addition being a charm bracelet with several small wooden charms hanging from it. She was never without it. Ever.
The deep red Rogue was soon parked outside of a small cafe and Lani found herself riding down the sidewalk on a skateboard, her messenger bag slung over one shoulder and a frappuccino in her free hand as she scoped the downtown. To be honest, she had initially thought that the town was going to be like some sort of cult commune where everyone lived in mobile homes and gathered under the light of the moon to discuss a revolution. But she had an extremely overactive imagination and attributed her outlandish ideas of other supernaturals to lack of knowledge on them besides what she'd seen on Supernatural, True Blood, Vampire Diares, The Originals, and Bitten. It wasn't completely her fault that she had no idea what they were like. But it was a normal town and everyone within seemed normal. In her other hand was a video camera that she had held up, intervieweing everyone who caught her eye.
She had made a game out of trying to guess what everyone was and generally turned out positively wrong nine times out of ten. There went her theory that supernaturals had some super cool innate ability to sense each other. Everyone seemed pretty friendly and she soon found herself thinking she had been stupid to be afraid. She soon launched herself into adventure mode and wore a smile on her face, happy to stop and take pictures with people and get their opinions on living in Teraton, spending a bit of time to hold conversations about the pros and cons of supernaturals living in communities of their peers and sympathizers.
After some investigation, she found out that the local public library had a load of comic books and video games ready to check out. Not just new ones like most libraries, but vintage ones. With high hopes of finding Shepherd's Crossing for her PlayStation and possibly even a few Aquaman comics, she followed the directions given to her and soon found herself in front of a rather nice building with a few cars parked outside. Giving a low whistle, she paused to strap her skateboard to her messenger bag and headed inside, the video camera finally turning off and going into her bag. She looked around cautiously, soaking up the look and feel of the quiet building before spotting the video games. Grabbing one of those little plastic baskets that they had for when people had a lot of things to check out, she began grabbing things from the shelves, hardly giving them a second glance until she came across the comics. Aquaman! The tattooed Nymph gave a squeal of delight, hardly caring for the sharp glances she caught as she took off to find somewhere to read with an armful of comics. After setting everything down, she removed her plaid top and plopped onto her stomach into a bean bag, basking in the sunlight while she immersed into the world of Aquaman, kicking off her shoes and humming to herself.
She was content reading about the adventures of the much underappreciated hero that was Aquaman, her head nodding from side to side as she quietly sang The Wheels On the Bus under her breath. For the first time in approximately two years, she was happy and completely calm. All traces of previous paranoia was gone and she didn't fear an enemy to be over her shoulder. But that peace of mind was shattered as she turned the page, sighing at Aquaman's romance. For there, right in the middle of the graphic novel, was a spider. It was hardly bigger than a dime and she could squash it with her pinky easily. But what did she do? Her green eyes went wide and she let out an earsplitting shriek as though someone had just stabbed her in the face. She didn't move, absolutely petrified of the small arachnid in front of her, tears welling up in her eyes as she began to hyperventilate, fanning herself rapidly with her small hands as a knot formed in her chest and she felt the need to vomit coming on.
Jem had simply been continuing to enjoy his trip down memory lane, on which was brief and had various turns as he moved on from one book to another, when a sudden shriek pierced through the air. It appeared to come from a young woman, whose entrance he had not noticed and face he did not recognize, fanning herself rapidly and staring at a book. Instantly he is up, or perhaps not instantly but close enough, rushing over to see what is wrong. A people person at his core, he has no problem going up to try and comfort a stranger- especially one who seems to very upset. "Hey, are you alright, Miss? Is something wrong?" he asks, noting her drastically paled face, almost sickly looking, when he is near enough. He arrives just in time to watch what he had thought to be an image of the comic book, but is in fact a spider of some sort, crawl down the page and onto the girl's lap- a heavily misguided attempt to escape, it would seem.
She had been too petrified to confirm whether or not she was okay when the boy asked and had become even more freaked out when the spider crawled onto her. Even more panic kicked in as she felt it crawl over her belly and she immediately threw herself into a standing position, tears running down her face and smearing her eyeliner now as she wildly began to sweep her body with her hands, unsure where it was anymore, dancing and jumping around as she messed up her hair and nearly fell into a bookshelf, more than once bumping into the guy that had come to her rescue. Even though he did not do a very good job at it. When she saw it fall to the floor, she immediately began to stomp on it. The way she stomped, you'd think that the spider had killed her child or something. Only when it was so crushed that nothing remained did she finally stop. Her hair was a mess, though she was quickly straightening it out by running her fingers through the locks and began to slowly starting to even out her breathing. “You saw that thing attack me, right?! It had murder in its eyes!” She turned to the boy now, straightening out her top as she gave him a pleading look as though she had just bludgeoned a child and was now pleading with a nearby witness to assure that she was in the right.
Before Jem can do anything, the girl had jumped up and screamed, soon launching into a barrage of attacks against the small thing that include catching him in the crossfire, as he is bumped into several times over the course of the insanity. He is helpless to do anything but remain still, dumbfounded, as this stranger completely overreacts to what had been no larger than perhaps a dime. Honestly, she attacks the little thing with such venom and passion that he nearly feels bad for it. There is a point where one crosses the line from killing a bug to committing a cruel and unusual murder. She certainly ensured that the thing is dead, that much is certain. Finally done, the girl turns to him and presents her case, sort of, eyeliner smudged and her entire being in a sort of mess, a state of strange intensity. It takes a moment for words to return to him. "Uh, yeah, sure," he humors her, not really sure what else to say. She looks at him like a madwoman, and he the witness of a crime scene. The librarian has already rushed over to shush them, and with good reason.
She cringed as the librarian gave them stern glares and shushed them, using fingers to indicate that one of them had better clean up the mess of books all over the floor. She issued a groan only to be violently shushed once more. Gesturing with fingers to her lips as if to zip her lips closed, she assured the librarian that she would indeed shut up. Turning to the guy who had run over, she caught her reflection in a blackened computer screen and realized that she must have looked like some kind of psycho to him, reacting to such a small spider. Her face turned bright red as she gave a nervous laugh and pushed some strands of hair from her face, offering out her hand to shake in an attempt to not completely freak him out. “Hiwalani-Noa. Disgraced star, former convict, and deathly afraid of spiders any smaller than a cookie. I swear I'm not crazy.” Smooth. Very good way to recover. She flashed him her best megawatt smile, pink Poincianas blooming in her hair as she relaxed. “I'm so sorry about bumping into you and nearly destroying your eardrums. I didn't bruise you or anything, did I?” Her face expressed a great deal of genuine concern as she looked him over, though she was sure that she hadn't bumped into him that hard. It was polite to check. “Hrm. Also, has anyone ever told you that you are very attractive? Not exactly Hugh Jackman or anything, but definitely got something. Do you have a six pack? Any nice muscles, y'know?” 'Shy' was not in Lani's vocabulary and seeing that he didn't seem hurt, she approved of moving on to expressing her thoughts. She didn't always think before she spoke, but when she did, it was less fun.
Jem rubs the back of his head, apologizing in a string of long, conjoined sentences to the librarian, despite the fact that none of the noise had really been his fault. Had he remained back in his seat, she probably wouldn't have even noticed his presence. But he hadn't, obviously, and consequentially he stands facing a half-mad looking girl as she sticks out her hand and gives the sort of introduction that stamps a clear label on her head: Extrovert. Not that Jem has a problem with this, of course. He's always preferred people like this, with a radiance that draws people like him as a light draws moths. At her promise of sanity, Jem can't help but raise his eyebrow slightly, but a smile of amusement begins to break through, dimples making little dents of curiosity in his cheeks. At her concern, he shakes his head, "I'm-" he begins, but apparently the girl isn't done yet. A bit loquacious, he observes, mentally noting the obvious. Of course, once he processes what she's said, Jem turns bright red. He's not really particularly good with these sorts of things, social or not. Any smooth speech is immediately broken up, leaving him a deer in the headlights. "Um. Not really? I'm Jem, by the way." He sort of skips over her last comment to the best of his ability. "Are you new here or something? I haven't seen you around?" the last bit comes out as a question of sorts.
“Jem. Nice. And people should definitely compliment you more. And yes. I just got out of prison two days ago. Got here today.” Because that made people feel safer. It was a slight blow to her ego to be seen as an unfamiliar face, but she had more than enough ego to spare anyways and simply gave another smile before excusing herself to pick up the books she had knocked over. She was just lucky that the librarian hadn't told her to put her shoes back on and get rid of her frappe.