RP:Where You Don't See Me
Summary: Xiem and crew start work on the house purchased in the Sage for Alvina and her children. Alvina's invited to join in tearing the interior apart before the work begins. After the work day is complete, Alvina's invited to join Xiem and the crew for dinner at the tavern afterwards.
That I've been the best I can be, but
I don't think I could stand to be
Where you don't see me
Landon Estate, Sage Forest
Alvina sent the address and copies of the approved papers showing ownership to Xiem's office. Hudson's response to the invoice is swift and silent, everything paid in full. The house itself was finalized shortly after Lanara's lovely realtor intervention, so it sits ready for inspection when Xiem arrives. Alvina is inside, haunting through the rooms languorously. Today finds her in work attire; prim, proper and distant. Sparse spots of second hand furniture fill the empty echoing kitchen and dining room. A sturdy table and several chairs are scattered around the space. The bard's sketching new memories here. Painting the children in the yard, framing the landscape with familiar colored curtains. And trying very hard to not be awkward to Xiem when he gets here.
Xiembantointh is on his way to the location Alvina sent along, but his crew arrives first with loaded up carriages containing materials and tools. All of them respectfully greet Alvina and introduce themselves before getting to work on things that need to be gutted or removed while making sure Alvina isn't in harm's way first. A few of the workers head outside and start clearing off a patch of land for some reason, but Xiem is still nowhere to be found. Maybe the dragon doesn't actually do any of the work since he's got a well staffed crew nowadays! How nice. If Alvina might try to ask one of the workers where he is, they would just confidently mention that he -is- on his way. There is a loud booming dragon's screech in the air in warning to the workers outside and that is their queue to scurry away from the clearing to help the dragon place what he hauled here on the ground. The first thing anyone will see is plenty of lumbar securely tied together along with the heavier materials they need to complete the additions to the home, but the impressively large creature beating it's scaled white wings slowly in order to place the hefty load as gently as possible could easily strike fear in a warriors heart. The azure eyes focus on the workers surrounding the clearing below and the pristinely white scales seemingly glisten in the sun like a blanket of snow on a bright winter day. It is a shame white dragons are viewed as evil because most don't really get this close to one without already meeting their demise. After the load is securely placed, the dragon settles behind the big block of building materials and from Alvina's perspective, he is easily hidden behind it. Only a few seconds later Xiem is rounding the corner while pulling the rest of his simple white and short sleeved tee shirt down his torso. He seems pleasantly surprised to see Alvina here on the first day of construction, "hey there Alvina!" With a wave he sort of trots the rest of the way over to her and pulls his hair back in a knot, "welcome. How are you doin'?" The dragon turned human asks in a casual way and not in that 'delicate pity' way. Xiem doesn't seem to have any reservations about the hug they shared or how Alvina cried because it seemed pretty normal to him.
Alvina greets the workers politely and shows them around the property to any places they might have questions about. They had blueprints, so they need little direction. She's surprised by the number of workers that arrive but it makes sense, the property and plans were quite large. Tucked away near the property's edge, she watches the workers mill about for measurements and dividing supplies. She doesn't ask because she's secretly relieved to avoid an awkward encounter. It gives her a minute to gather her professionalism and avoid slipping into anything too sentimental. The gust of wind flutters her pinned autumnal curls away from her face. She shields her eyes with her arm, looking up to assess the situation, the dragon's call sounding both controlled and wild in it's assertion. She's not struck with any errant fears of the dragon's arrival, even before she remembers the owner was a dragon. Probably part of working with a dragon Queen at one point in her little life. On Xiem's reappearance in his human form, shrugging on clothes, she waits a second before turning to acknowledge him for the first time. Alvina waves back limply, smile askew on her face as she straightens her long skirt. "Shouldn't I be welcoming you?" She laughs, gesturing to the site. "Your men have been hard at work since they got here. All very polite and respectful too." Not what one would usually expect from a construction crew. "I'm well, thank you." She didn't wish -every- hug was her husband, but last time shook her a little too much for her liking. She thankful he doesn't bring up their last run in. The bard will happily tuck that away in the past and forget her transgressions. "How are you? Have a nice flight?" She laughs, hair fixed finally.
Xiembantointh lets out a hearty guffaw at her ribbing and pats her shoulder, “thank you and I apologize for my tardiness. I mean, I saved you a month of labor,” more like saved Mr. Landon. “At least you’ll be in your home a month earlier,” he surveys the area with a squint and begins walking towards the house alongside Alvina. He fakes a disappointed look when she mentions his workers have been nice and polite with her, “they have? I told them to be rude to you so it would make me seem so much nicer,” his grin spreads in his jest. “I’m glad you’re fitting in because it will be nice having you around during the building process. Things go much smoother that way,” he motions one of the workers carrying something heavy where to place it down. Xiem knows what it is like to miss a loved one and many times he wished he could hug his wife, even wishing it from time to time when embraced by another woman. Even if she admitted it, that would make sense to him. “I’m great, thanks for asking. The flight had to go a little slower than usual to maneuver around the mountain, but I also had to fly around the outskirts of towns. The last time I flew over one, they sounded the warning bells and the city guards started shooting arrows towards me!” He chuckles with a hand over his chest as if trying to contain the laughter. “I’d rather not induce panic like that again.” He is curious why she is here because that usually means she might have changed her mind about an aspect of the blueprints. “What brings you out here today, Alvina?”
Alvina partially remembers Xiem's comments about White Dragons being seen as evil. She felt a special kinship to this because her wolf form was, strangely, pure white. She'd bitten a woman in that form and that form had been hunted as evil. Her half lidded gaze flicks to the ground, thinking briefly that maybe her wolf color was a warning about how her life would play out. It's there and gone in a flash. "Anything less than a month late isn't tardy." She jokes back, eager to put him at ease. He jokes about his workers and it makes her laugh against her better judgement. "Pfft, yeah like you need the help." Coming off nicer. If he came off any nicer, she'd get diabetes. Alvina feels proud that she's fitting in, though of course she is, she's just sitting around. One day she could tell him or maybe she'd never have to. About how she wished it was her husband smiling at her. Seeing her. About how easy it would be to paint Hudson's face over his and feel all the things she wanted her husband to make her feel in being seen. Her pain acknowledged. Her humanity restored. No one had that power but if it could only be so easy. "Good." She nods to his being 'great'. "Oh gods," she covers her mouth, still surprised that such a thing could happen. Racism is never ending. "I'm sure the town appreciates the consideration." A teasing joke to keep the conversation light. At his last question, she looks surprised. Why is she here? "I wanted a clear before and after picture, in my head." In the kitchen were parchments on the table of rough sketches of the empty rooms as they were now, the size and layout as they were now. "I'll cross compare afterwards. So I can be extra thankful for all your help." She looks at the inked sketches. Brennia's words play back in her mind. There's no way this man has a dark side...right?
Xiembantointh grins even wider in a goofy way until nearly all of his pearly white teeth are visible as he replies to her comment about him being nice, "aw, you do like me." With that he gently elbows her arm with their teasing. It feels nice to joke around with Alvina. Maybe he noticed that darkness passing over her gaze, but he isn't going to comment about it, not with everyone around and he can tell there is a lot she is holding in which is her choice. Xiem shrugs at her shock of the towns he flies over and their assumption of him, "yeah. If it were my oldest son, they would have every right to be in a panic," he lets out a short sigh. "Sometimes the evil nature of one's scales is too tempting to resist," Xiem sort of mumbles in disappointment, but he still has all the love in the world for his son even if he doesn't agree with his deeds. He walks over to the sketches and glances around to the rooms they match, "these are pretty good!" With a clap of his hands, he looks around for a moment, "a lot of this needs smashed up and ripped out here in the kitchen." He picks up a repurposed helmet one might use in battle which has been fashioned into something like a hard hat with padding within and then he picks up a smashing tool before presenting both of them to Alvina, "how about you help us smash some stuff up?" Secretly he was hoping she would be here today so this opportunity wouldn't pass her up because sometimes you just need to wreck some things when there is too much you're holding in. A physical outlet is one of the best coping mechanisms sometimes. Xiem doesn't make this side of his offer obvious as his suggestion makes it seem like she would really be helping them out if she joined in rather than it helping her.
Alvina lofts a brow and rolls her eyes. "In your dreams." It all felt very normal and not at all weird. Brennia's reassurances surely helped calm the bard to a more agreeable temperament. She tries to keep the shock off her face at his hinting at his son's misdeeds. Her children were still younger and while Harper had her rebellious outbursts she was still not destroying or hurting anyone. Bryce, typical teenage boy, also mouthed off but he'd cooled his temperament after a good talking to from his father. They're lucky, for now. There's always time. There's no time to comment on this, Xiem has moved into the kitchen and is handing her a hammer. "Me?" She didn't look like the type to break things down. To look at her, she's never done a day of physical labor in her life. Her eyes survey the helmet and hammer with skeptical surprise. Smooth palms and uncallous fingers take both items and examine them. "Are you just trying to get free labor?" She grins, slowly squishing her red curls under the helmet's padding hesitantly. The hammer is heavy but her lean werewolf frame accommodates the weight. "Taking advantage of a lady." She goes on, dramatically rebuking his offer while smiling and waiting for direction. "What am I smashing?"
Xiembantointh offers her a pair of work gloves as well so she doesn't wind up with a nasty callous after he fakes a pout when she rebukes his teasing flirt. "No, the other badass lady here," his sarcasm is coupled with a little smirk. Xiem shrugs, "if you come out to dinner with us workers, I'll pay for you so it isn't free labor," he nonchalantly drops the invite while lifting a sledge hammer with ease and looking around the outdated kitchen they are standing in. "Yes, that's me. Xiem the dastardly dragon tricking unsuspecting people into hard labor," he chuckles while smiling right back at her. If she asked anyone, they would say how kind and generous he is… too generous, even. "Pretty much everything in this kitchen needs to go and then we can move onto the bathrooms because the few in this home need updated," he flips a 'hard hat' on even though he doesn't need it because he leads by example with his crew. Then he flips a thick glass attachment down on Alvina's hat to protect her eyes, "I bet I can smash more than you!" He challenges her and lifts the sledgehammer over his head before bringing it down hard on the old countertop. It fractures in satisfying chunks and then he slides some of them off to clamor onto the floor before he moves on to break up the cabinet that was underneath the countertop.
Alvina takes the gloves and slips them on. "I'm absolutely not tipping." She teases back without specifying if she meant at dinner or for the housing project. It isn't violent or wrong. Breaking up the inside of the new house certainly isn't a bad boy status but it makes her feel on more even footing with the workers and with Xiem. "You're on!" Competitive to a fault. Her husband would laugh at this sight - his delicate flower of a wife, wielding a hammer on a project he's paying for. Her hammer hits the kitchen sink, cracking it into pieces. The vibrations of the impact make her arms tingle but it's satisfying. Maybe, that's how he would have laughed, if he'd ever be coming home here. Glass attachment flipped down, her concentration breaks and the hammer is too heavy for a tick. Dust around them, Alvina lifts the hammer again to slam a hole into the wall cabinets, wood splintering out and scattering across the floor. It was all his fault. Another hit and a cabinet door cracks away with the hammer. I was a delicate flower. The hammer hits the sink, knocking it down and clear of the wall. I loved you, became a monster, for you. The next cabinet falls pray to her calculated crashes. And it made me hate you so much I couldn't look at you anymore. Tears sting her eyes, hidden by glass and debris. I changed into something else and it made me hate you. She stops staring briefly at the countertop around their feet. It made me hate myself more. All this anger. It sits under the happier memories, under the sadness of the ending and the emptiness Hudson's absence left in the life of her and her children. How did she both...hate him and miss him? How did she love him...and wish he was gone? She lifts the hammer again, following Xiem's lead in morose silence, letting her anger manifest however it needed to in the safe space of her thought. It could be argued that this part of her, the destructive, angry, violent Alvina was the thing she'd become that she hated. But maybe she just acknowledged rage she'd had long before. Maybe she'd always been angry but stuffed it down for no one to see. Not the people she loved, not the people that hated her. Maybe she'd always been a monster and Hudson helped her see that. And maybe, just maybe, that would be okay some day.
Xiembantointh is surprised by her determination, but something is telling him that this little activity might be having the opposite effect. He thought maybe she could channel all of that turmoil into the hammer and be able to let it go in the form of broken countertops and cabinets, but it doesn't work the same for everyone it seems. For a moment, he continues working alongside her in case the lightbulb finally clicks for her. Eventually, he lets out a primal yell while going at some ugly pantry cabinet and it is actually quite comical. His wavy umber brown hair has come loose from its secured knot and he has this expression on his face like he's some oversized ape. Then he starts waddling about the debris hunched over like a caveman while scratching his hard hat as if scratching his own head, "Xiem DeStrOOY," he calls out comically in an exaggerated deep voice and raises his arms over his head to flail them. He was trying to get her to loosen up and have some fun and this is the only way he can think of putting a damn smile on her pretty face! A real one. In the fashion of making a fool of himself, he lets out another roar when smashing up the kitchen island in hopes she will let out a little yell of aggression, but in the fun of stomping around in the debris, he slips and he goes full on airborne for a second there before a thud brings him on his back. "OoOF!" After realizing what just happened, he rolls over and is laughing uncontrollably because that part was not planned at all!
Alvina stops moving at Xiem's yell. Not out of fear but surprise. He'd never raised his voice above a pleasant conversational pitch and the sound beats out over the literal hammers beating countertops. She watches him lumber around with wild hair and covers her mouth to muffle a laugh. What in the world? The directionless feeling, the tapestry of fear, anger and pain, is quickly distracted away by whatever this giant man is doing in her soon to be kitchen or foyer or whatever the heck it's supposed to be. She shields her face playfully when he brings his hammer back down to smash more of the kitchen island. A split second of concern when Xiem lifts off the ground in his charade. She holds her breath, panicked, until he rolls over laughing. He's okay. She can exhale. Alvina walks over to where he's rolling around on the floor and bends over to smile at him. "And that's why, women were the smarter of the two sexes." Cave people, that is. "You're crazy, you could have really hurt yourself." Her words sound serious but she's still smiling, her voice light and unburdened. "Sure, I'm kind of a healer, but calm down will you?" She lowers a pale hand to help him back up again, brushing bits of dust off his sleeve when he rights himself. "Is this what I'm paying you people for?" A tease. All this silliness. "I hope the home stays this lively, even when it's through." Maybe Xiem's good energy would make it so. "Technically, I think I'm still winning on the 'destroying the most' contest, unless falling on your arse counts." Alvina sticks out her tongue and flips the glass shield back down on her helmet. He was clearly much stronger than her, and much faster, but he'd made a show of looking a fool for her sake. Of course she thinks the fall was planned and played out accordingly to make her laugh. "Why are you so nice, all the time? It's amazing." She laughs again, her voice still light and bright with warmth. "Hit your head too hard one time maybe? Pulling stunts like this?"
Xiembantointh feels victorious that he at least distracted her and then even more so when she's stifling a laugh. Sure, there was a hiccup in the antics and he was never supposed to fall flat on his ass, but then he gets a look at the woman smiling down on him and he simply smiles back up at her. A dangerous feeling slithers in the pits of his stomach and he props himself up on his elbows while ignoring the feeling. "I won't argue with you on that point, Alvina." He lets her scold him as he simply stays on the floor like the fool he is, but there is still a kind smile on his lips and a twinkle in his eyes. It's almost as if she has forgotten he's a dragon and it would take quite a lot to hurt him even in human form, but he lets her help him up. Xiem doesn't realize he is holding his breath as she brushes some dust off his sleeve, to which she will find a rather solid feel of muscle underneath. "Exactly, let's get reckless," there is a tense few seconds of quiet between them because that could have a couple of meanings here, but then he holds up his hammer a little to make his meaning literal. Then she ponders on what her home will be like, "I have a good feeling it will be. From the sounds of it, you've got a strong group of friends and loving family that will make it so," he offers genuinely. "That you are! I embarrassed myself in front of a pretty lady and my confidence is now destroyed," he jests. Xiem gets a wide broom to shove the current debris to a corner of the room so Alvina won't get hurt slipping on anything and answers her question, "well… life is made hard enough by forces we cannot control and I just make a choice to shine a little light with me wherever I go." He hopes his cheeks aren't red from her compliment because they sure as heck feel warm now. It is rare when he gets pulled down with sadness, but it does happen and he knows the day is fast approaching on the anniversary of his wife's death.
Alvina nods knowingly. "No need to argue, because I'm right." Her confidence is oddly in place after being so concerned she'd made a fool out of herself last time they met. Xiem sits through all her nagging banter and lets her help him up despite his wounded male pride, which she's sure does not exist. The brief silence is comfortable and not at all embarrassing or awkward. When he holds up his hammer, she laughs. "Nice pun." She holds hers up in solidarity. At his answer about the home's future, she flushes and looks towards the walls that are still intact. "I'm very lucky to have such a good community of people around me." She was, and she knew she was, but the loneliness of missing her husband was a gap no one could fill. No amount of love from her friends or family could overwrite that feeling. One day, she hoped, it would fade. For now, she'll take the laughter her friends offer as a place holder. "Mmmhmm you seem really defeated." She agrees at his quip about his confidence. Her face looks a bit more serious when he answers the last bit. "A little light." She says thoughtfully. How did one make that choice with so much heavy history in life? "You make it look easy." A compliment and a jealousy. Alvina scoots a piece of countertop across the floor, out of their way. A piece that the broom missed. "You know what we need?" She says, sounding serious but cracking a smile. "A chained saw."
Xiembantointh lets out a laugh that is felt through his whole being at her showing off because he finds this side of her quite endearing. They seem to be trading places in the 'making a fool of yourself' department! "I'm a dad! We are full of them," he winks her way while tying his hair back into a knot at the base of his neck. Her revelation is met with a firm and comforting pat on her back, "it takes a village." Even though she isn't a child, Xiem feels that community is the most important things and it applies to lots of aspects throughout one's life. He lets out a sigh, "it wasn't easy at first. How could it be, but my children were adults at the time and we helped each other through it. They had to get back to their own lives and I made sure they didn't worry about their elderly father. I was good for a while and then I hibernated for about two hundred years, but when I woke up, I realized I still never really dealt with the grief and hibernating for so long didn't skip the tough parts for me. You have to do the work," he shrugs with a kind look on his face. Her smile soaks into his soul again and he returns it as he ponders what the heck she just said, but all he offers is a, "sounds destructive! I like it," before they get back to work on the rest of the kitchen and then the bathrooms.
Alvina'd only seen a vegetable oil chained saw ONCE in her life and it was a sight to behold. One of the many benefits of being an inventor and having inventor friends. She did miss whipping up crazy contraptions for crazier adventures. When she was younger, before life anchored her with children. One day, her children would be grown and gone, and while that day would come faster than normal because of her werewolf children, the day would come and she wouldn't look much older, she assumed. Not that she would have ever before, before Hudson. She thinks about what Xiem says, about working through the grief, in bits and pieces while they work. It creeps up at odd times and she wonders what exactly the work consists of. Maybe, like the time she'd had that miscarriage, it would be good to see a therapist again. Maybe it would be good for the kids too, especially Harper, who was taking this hit the hardest. Luna was in pure denial. Bryce was putting on a brave front and Meadow...well, Meadow was a wolf most of the time so she didn't really have the attention span to handle the change, gods love her.