Lacrima: Chapter Twenty Four

Statuesque

Bae smoothed the end of her dress, but the end never stretched past her knees. She looked to Lucille, who watched her. They sat together as Job and Konrad played a round of darts. Bae tried to focus on the flight and thumps of the missiles as they nailed the board. But even when she didn’t look directly at Lucille, those unnerving eyes refused to look elsewhere. She could feel them burn into the side of her skull.

Bae had been the first to descend from her scripting in her room. All her life, Bae had been used to people telling her who she is. Lucille’s script was easy enough to accept. It really wasn’t any less different than how the people in her life

Bae played the “perfect, studious daughter” to her parents.

She played the “available, yet distantly beautiful performer” as a member of LOCO-MOTION.

Under the tagline @BaeAllDay, she played the “ambitious athlete who could climb mountains and look good doing it.”

I even played for Daniel that one time, she thought. Creeping unease crawled underneath her skin. This situation, the dress, the drinks, the expectant gaze, smelled too much of that night.

Swallow it - just get through this.

Ultimately, Bae played the paradox of a person the best. Contradictions only obvious to her. She looked back at Lucille. Bae wondered if her eyelids worked or if Lucille’s eyes could self-moisturize.

“What’s on your mind?”

Didn’t you just invade my mind a few short hours ago? Bae thought. “What’s on your mind?” You put stuff in there yourself. Is Lucille playing a role as well? Like a director who cast herself in her own film? Or did she earnestly not know what thoughts I have right now?

“I hope I don’t come off as harsh, but…” She opened her palm. “What do you want from me?”

Lucille rested a hand on Bae’s shoulder. The fingertips pressed into the muscle.

“Just be you,” she said, simply. “Sit there. Be present. That’s all I ask. I mean - look at you, Bae. You’re statuesque.”

Bae noticed how Lucille’s fingers never lingered on her, but liked to wander. Lucille enjoyed tracing the starker lines of her physique. Now that she noticed, Bae felt uncomfortable by it. Previously, it didn’t bother her - she even liked it. In this moment, however, the action only emphasized the terms of this part she had to play.

An object for her viewing pleasure.

She wondered, if Lucille could, would she shrink her down to the size of a doll and place her among the figurines on her desk. Bae could stand there while Lucille tapped away and perhaps glance at her pretty little possession.

Was that the impulse behind saying I could stay in her bedroom? She thought. I thought it was flirting, but… No, that was still flirting - just filtered through Lucille’s understanding of herself and the world.

Her head hurt. She felt the discordant ache strum her brain, but also she never took this much time to consider the inner workings of another person. Bae knew how to analyze, taking both text and subtext, of people’s outward wishes. A stage manager’s criticism. A chastising from her Father. The comments below her posts. Bae held a social literacy that sometimes morphed into neurotic anxiety. But still vigilance did her well so far.

With Lucille, Bae was forced not only to take the script. That part proved relatively easy. She also had to understand Lucille Azure - the whole gestalt.

Is this what Job wants to do for a living? She thought. Couldn’t be me.

As if summoned by her tangential thought, the suave Job came to inadvertently save her. Bae observed how he unbuttoned his shirt, letting the hair breathe atop his pectorals, plush with flesh. His glasses dangled where the third button clinched his shirt. She could imagine what script Lucille ran through his head. He pointed to the board with his thumb. A bundle of blue darts pocked the inner circles of the dart board. Konrad’s reds held a more scattershot pattern. “Did you see me win?”

“Sorry, Job,” Lucille said, “I was talking to Bae.”

“No problem,” he said.

“Let me make it up to you.” She rose and gifted Job with an outstretched hand. “I can have the Servants clear out the pool tables and such. We can dance.”

“I’d love to.” He accepted the offered hand. Lucille used her other hand to direct the ghostly Servants. They shuffled away the game tables with ease. Boards below opened up to allow ease of transport. Bae found herself lingering on the negative space, the dark, which the boards left behind. With the script jammed into her skull, she could only conjure half-images of what happened down there. She remembered exhaustion. Heat on her skin. And that person down there. Again, a stake drove into her mind as she tried to form a face and a name. A relief came over her though - that was her and not down there. Bae didn’t know if this feeling was wholly hers, but she accepted it. She had to.

Konrad slid up to Bae. When she looked at him, she smiled back without reservation. Especially with Lucille away, Bae didn’t feel as put upon.

“Konrad,” she nodded.

“Bae, the bar is still here,” he said, motioning to it. “Do you want to get some drinks?”

“Um.” She paused, feeling Lucille’s look on the back of her neck. “Sure.”

A flicker of hesitation cracked on Konrad’s face, but the grin sustained. “Cool.”

Konrad and her took their seats on the hightops as a large-bodied Servant presided. It bowed to them and placed a laminated menu between them. Snapping a glance at Bae, Konrad picked up the drink menu.

“Ah, so.” He performed a cough. “What’re you getting?”

“I don’t know.” Bae looked over at Lucille and Job. They already began their dance. Job looked to cradle Lucille with one hand on her waist and another clasped around her gloved hand. The pair glided back and forth in a simple waltz. One-two-three. One-two-three. Their dual weight swayed with assuredness and practiced steps. Neither Job’s loafers nor Lucille’s slippers barged into the either’s space. Both dancers shared the space. On closer look, Bae observed that Lucille led the dance. Her momentum constituted the central force in their pendulum swing. She mouthed the word ‘Spin” and Job executed the action with a grand flourish.

Job is better at this than me, Bae learned.

Konrad hummed, bringing Bae’s attention back to the bar. He shook his head. “I still have no clue what I want.”

Bae took the menu from him. “What do you normally like drinking?”

“Um, beer,” he forced out.

She squinted at him. “What kind?”

“Y’know,” he sighed. “Whatever is in the cooler.”

“You don’t drink much, do you?”

Konrad hung his head. “No.” He rubbed his neck. “Bringing you to the bar just made sense,” he whispered.

“I get it.”

They crept at the margin of the accepted script. Neither of them wanted to breach further. The imposed migraines worked as fine boundaries for what Lucille wanted and didn’t want from them. Bae still appreciated the human moment, though. They found something in common, but they couldn’t sit with it. Lucille’s script wouldn’t like it.

Out of curiosity, Bae looked at the drinks offered.

Wine. Beers. Limoncello? Whiskey. Ah, soju. She remembered the many, many nights her band manager brought her and the rest of the girls out to drink. After several rounds, they would pack up and commanderie drinks from the next establishment on the street. Even when they toured, the manager made it point to that for “bonding” and “exposure.” Bae preferred that to the traditional method where idols, like her, couldn’t even be seen with alcohol or boyfriends or anything that would mar a perfect image. Luckily, LOCO-MOTION wasn’t beholden to those spine-snapping standards. Unluckily, Bae was still subjected to the brutal whiplashing of rehearsals and expectations. Double unluckily, they also now had to deal with the social binge drinking common in Seoul. That was the first time Bae gained a distaste for drinking.

The incident with Daniel turned her distaste to swearing off completely.

“Hey,” Konrad said. At first, Bae thought that was for her. When she looked up, she saw Konrad speaking to the bartender Servant. Its blazer, deep blue, could barely contain the chest of the spectre. The general shape looked familiar. Perhaps a Servant she saw down below?

“What do you recommend to drink, eh, Servant?” Konrad asked.

A crackle of static peaked from the Servant. The mess of pixels, polygons, and distortion sharpened for a moment as it processed. For a split second, a face appeared. Bae couldn’t contain herself. She stood up from her high top seat and breathed in a sharp gasp. The features came together in a second, but formed an unmistakable visage.

High-bridged beak nose. Starkly gray hair, brows, mustache, and beard. Cool, pale skin pulled across high cheekbones. The steady, but vibrant eyes. Argus Nebble. The odd one out. The apparent suicide. The corpse Bae herself pulled out of the pool. This was who tended the bar. Pulled from dead and retrofitted as a Servant.

The face snapped back into the inscrutable tangle.

“I have no preference personally.” Argus’ voice didn’t come from this Servant, but Service’s standardized speech pattern. Even, barely humanoid. “However, I would recommend any of our sparkling white wines for the wonderful occasion tonight. Elysium does not open every day, after all.”

“Then, I’ll have a glass of…” Konrad squinted. “Tintero Bianco,” he mispronounced.

“Coming right up.” As the maybe-Argus Servant, turned to the wall of bottles and taps. Konrad glanced across to see Lucille still in the throes of dancing with her chosen Job. He then looked to Bae.

‘I saw that too,’ he mouthed with a knowing look.

‘What can we-’ Bae mouthed back, but was interrupted with a raised finger.

‘We wait,’ he enunciated. ‘For now.’

Stiff, Bae settled back in her seat, crossed her legs, and pretended to fix her hair. She leaned her elbow on the bar. Lucille and her met gazes by happenstance. Bae put on a smile before Job whipped Lucille back into their dance.