Weather is a funny thing. It is quite able, and likely, to change at the last minute when you are least expecting it. While the forecast for the day was to be slightly cloudy, Xanthe Reigner found herself jumping over puddles forming in the steadily falling rain. While she had a scarf wrapped artfully over her hair to keep it dry, the way it was coming down would soon force her to get to a warm and dry place. She was wearing a pair of victorian boots she was rather fond of, and she'd rather not ruin them. With a sigh, she set her sights on the first place she saw... a coffee shop.

There was a tinkling of bells as she let the door close behind her. The shop smelled of spices and coffee and the murmurs of the few other customers were almost drowned out by the classical music playing from the above speakers. Overall, it was rather cozy. There were large and comfortably worn in leather chairs by a small gas fireplace that was ablaze, and Xanthe moved over to one of the chairs to remove her jacket and scarf. Soon her golden hair was free and falling down her back, and Xanthe turned her eyes to the expansive menu above the counter.

Now, let's see if they have anything worth drinking. Thought Xanthe a little sourly. No one ever claimed she was easy to please. Some would go so far as to say she was positively picky. Xanthe thought this was ridiculous. She simply knew what she liked.

Making her way to the counter, Xanthe pulled her over sized gray sweater down a little more and it fell halfway to her knees, her black leggings covering her legs to her victorian boots. It was a bit of an unusual combination, but it looked good in a raggedy sort of way. She wasn't really looking to impress anyone, after all. Today's outing had been simply to get some fresh air before classes started again tomorrow. Weekends were entirely too short.

Tatters is on his third coffee, and isn't alive yet.

Today he is the personification of "morning after the night before." His face is pale, with a vague sickly cast and dark smudges under his half open eyes. Last night's silver glitter is still fused with his skin, so that he both sparkles and shines under the faerie lights.

His hair is a faded antique lavender, piled on his head in an elaborate hair-do that started life as Marie Antoinette but which has slowly been sliding towards Amy Winehouse since yesterday, and which has been shedding tiny flowers all over the coffee shop.

He is half way through his third latte, and he is smoking, in a bored, semi-covert way. Technically he's not supposed to smoke, but he can't really bother pretending not to and he needs nicotine to help out with the hangover. A haze of smoke hangs around him, and the cigarette slips in and out of view depending on how much attention he's paying it.

"Morning," he drawls. He is paying attention all of a sudden now, because the door opened and the girl who just came in is hot. Her outfit puts him in mind of Diane, though. He smiles, crookedly, the cigarette blinking out of view, and pulls up his sage chiffon dress, which had been sliding haphazardly down his shoulders. "What can I get ya?"

"Good day to ya'." Xanthe replied, still looking at the menu. She was aware of the smell of cigarettes, and finally looking to the man waiting on her she was pleasantly surprised to see that he resembled a sparkly, if not somewhat past-bloom, drag queen. As off putting as his clothes may have been to some, she simply appreciated how his lavender hair clashed so perfectly with the dress.
"How is your Costa Rica roast?" She asked, looking back to the menu. "I want something dark today... and, can I smoke in here?" Nodding to the lit cigarette in his pale hand.

"Not yet it isn't." Tatters drains his cup and rubs a hand thoughtfully along his jaw. He needs at least one more coffee before it gets to be a good day. He is starting to get a five o'clock shadow. There is a smear of purple face paint still clinging to the side of his face.

He's not sure if he's ever actually tried the Costa Rica roast, but... all their coffee is good, so.

"Delicious" he says, managing to sound vaguely offended that she'd even ask. "And not legally, no."

The cigarette is no where to be seen, but he exhales silver smoke ghosts nonetheless.

"Ah, legality." Xanthe said, as if amused with something. "I suppose I'll brave the elements then. In the mean time, I'll try that roast." she waved vaguely at the menu as she said this, beginning to rifle through her over-stuffed purse for her wallet.

Xanthe had a decently large purple purse that she carried with her always. While she loved this purse, it had a horrible habit of concealing that which she happened to be looking for at the time. With an exasperated 'hmph!', she began pulling things out and laying them on the counter in search of her elusive wallet.
A book entitled, 'Breaking open the Head: a look into contemporary shamanism', a pack of large Bailey's flavored cigars, about half a dozen lighters, a notebook, and then...

"Aha!" Xanthe pulled her wallet from her bag and grinned at the man. "So, what do I owe you?"

The cigarette reappears, burning to ash in the corner of his mouth, as he watches her unloading the contents of her bag. You can tell a lot about a woman from the contents of her bag, or so he's been told. If this is true, he's pretty sure this chick is... mental. Yeah. Bailey's cigars? He doesn't even know where to start thinking about that. It seems... strange. Drinking and smoking are for pleasure, you shouldn't need to multitask. It's like having an espresso flavoured condom.

Tapping his cigarette on the side of his cup, he slides off his stool and goes to get her coffee, in a swirl of chiffon skirts and lace petticoats.

"Two fifteen, please."

He sets the steaming mug of coffee down on the counter in front of her. "You're from the University, then, are you? Cream and sugar are there."

Handing him the money, Xanthe begins shoveling the things on the counter back into her bag. She really should invest on a new bag, but this one has so much character.
Coffee in front of her, Xanthe watched it steam. Thoughts began twisting in her brain, but a voice brought her back as soon as it began.
"I take it black, thanks. And, yes, I attend there. How'd you guess?" She asked, raising an eyebrow. A tinkling of bells behind her, Xanthe turned to see an old couple walk in from the rain and begin looking at the menu.

The money disappears, supposedly into the cash register. Tatters drops his cigarette butt in his cup and shrugs. Mostly because he knows it's so fetching when his dress slips down his shoulders like that.

"No one else reads books like that," he points out. It's a combination of wordy and crazy that only university students subscribe to. Not that he'd know a whole lot about university students, but he sleeps with them occasionally. Once he had a room mate who went to KU.

The elderly couple is giving him a sideways look, and if it's not dirty quite yet it's because they haven't realised he's supposed to be a guy.

Another sidelong glance at the elderly couple. They were whispering quietly to one another with the occasional glance at the man she was talking to.

"Well, it doesn't really have much to do with school to be honest with you." She said as she grabbed her coffee and got out of the way for the two other customers. "I'll be over there," She said, waving her hand in the general direction of the leather chairs "if you'd like to keep talking on your break or something. I'm Xanthe, by the way."

Xanthe walked back to her seat slowly, careful not to spill any of the blistering coffee. Sitting her cup down, she looked around and then as nonchalantly as possible she pulled out a small rolled cigar from some deep recess of her purse. What no one knows can't hurt them, right?

"Tatters," he says, returning the introduction. Her back is too him by then, though, and it's not like it's recognisable as a name. He watches her crossing the coffee shop with a small sigh. Gods she's gorgeous.


The old lady - looking more and more disapproving - gets up and orders two decaf Americanos. There's something of a competition between her and Tatters as to who dislikes the other more. She might not approve of his dress sense, but he thinks her taste in coffee sucks.

Time passes. He serves several muffins and a few donuts, some coffees, one of the luridly yellow Bananarama Latte Deluxes that most people are too smart to order... The mid-morning coffee break rush comes and goes. He puts on a best of the Pogues album to replace the gods awful classical stuff Charissa had been playing, lights up another cigarette, and slouches across the room to where Xanthe is sitting.

"Here."

He hands her a steaming cup of coffee as a friendship offer and folds into the chair opposite her, balancing his own mug on the arm of it.

Cigar held limply between her pink lips and coffee held steaming in her hand, Xanthe gazed down at the volume in her lap. As her eyes took in the words on the page, the vapor rising from the cup swirled in a helix-like spiral and then dissipated. Her hair was pushed to the side and hanging over one shoulder, and every few minutes a wisp of smoke would rise from the end of her cigar which had all but gone out. The tip burned red, and Xanthe exhaled slowly, smoke snaking from her lips.

From time to time she glances out the front window of the coffee shop to see the progress of the weather. The sky outside was overcast and rain came down in a dusting of drops. Had she known the weather would have taken such a turn, the smoking woman would have worn her favorite set of rain boots. Ill weather such as this was her most beloved, as odd as it was to many sensible people. One could even say they were her spiritual forte'.

Beneath the veil of the this world, she felt the pull. Drawing gently at her mind and her heart like the silk of a spider, threads that were ever connected...
Come...
Xanthe closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Now was not the time.

"Here."

Storm eyes open and look to the man handing her the coffee. A smile pulls at the corners of her mouth as she takes the cup and sets it next to her own empty one.

"Thankyou."

For a second her eyes take him in, then quickly return to her book as he seats himself. He was quite beautiful in an eccentric way, wisps of his lavender up-do falling to his shoulders.
"I like your dress." A puckish smile behind the words.

Tatters spreads the layers of flounced chiffon out, admiringly. He likes the dress too, in a total failure of masculinity. But why be macho when you could be pretty?

"Thanks," he says, smiling nicely at Xanthe. He takes a sip of his coffee, cigarette invisible in his hands. "So you were telling me what the book was for, if it's not for a class." He seems pretty certain that that's what she was doing, anyway. "And then you're going to explain what would possess a nice girl like you smoke Bailey's flavour cigars."

His hand comes up to his mouth, and for a moment he's dragging on a cigarette that isn't there. Then it reappears, caught between his soft lips - someone goes through a lot of chapstick, looks like - and he exhales a rush of smoke. He's waiting, ever so patiently, for her answers.

Xanthe marked the page in her book and then turned it to show Tatters the cover. In a small circle on the front cover there was a photograph of diminutive mushroom.

"This book is written by a man who, during a period of questioned identity, goes around the world and meets the shamans of different cultures and plays a part in the rituals they do. He's looking for enlightenment, a sense of self... " A cheshire smile plays on her lips. "All through the use of psychedelics and hallucinogens. Being a student of anthropology, it's actually quite relevant to the field. However, it speaks very specifically to my... my own interests."

Taking a slow sip of coffee, she looks down at the stub of a cigar in her fingers.
"As for these, I just enjoy them more I suppose. Especially the ones wrapped in tobacco leaves. The Bailey's flavor is just because I like coffee." She takes a draw from the nub of smoldering tobacco and grins as the smoke snakes from her mouth and nostrils. "I'm usually too cheap to buy them, but I felt like indulging."

"Well, there's no accounting for taste," Tatters rationalises with a shrug. He still thinks Bailey's cigars are bloody queer. "I guess if you like it, why not." He's an accepting guy that way.

"So you get high to find yourself." He stops, thinking about this, the cigarette burning aimlessly between his lips. "And here was me thinking that oblivion was the whole point of the exercise." Tatters has done his fair share of drugs in his time, but the goal has always been to lose any remaining fragments of his own, not entirely lovable personality. That meth, say, was a step on the road to enlightenment had not occurred to him. He drags on the cigarette. "You know that shit can get your brain turned into mush, right?"

Like Syd Barret. Total waste of pure genius. Not that Tatters can talk, except that he doesn't really view himself as a waste of anything. He didn't have much potential to start with.

"Oh yeah. I can't tell you how many people I've met who've ruined themselves in search of the truth. 25 year old guys who can't even speak in full sentences. S'a damn shame, really." She shook her head, blonde tresses waving. "But I'm pretty careful. I do my research, try not to do any lasting damages... besides, I only do organics. They're just as dangerous, of course, but the chances of OD are less."
The little nub of cigar was all but gone now, and Xanthe stubbed it out in her empty coffee cup.
"Don't get me wrong, it's not like I don't have fun. I found this path through my own experimentation, and those were some dirty days." There was humor in her voice, but no smile on her face when she said this.

"So," she said, "how about you? What do you do for fun?"

"Well if it's what you're cool with," he says, again, because that's what he thinks. "As long as you like what you find at the end of the tunnel." It's kind of crap living with yourself generally, but if you'd definitively found yourself and hated what you'd found... Well, that would suck. And if you'd already tried drugs, gods alone knew how you'd manage to lose yourself again.

What does he do for fun?

Same thing everyone else does, really. Goes out and tries to find some pretty thing to bring home. "I like dancing," he says. He does, absolutely loves it. "I like... consuming stupid amounts of booze to the point where I can't remember my own name, and I like... getting dressed up and being Cinderella for someone."

This should be pretty evident from the sparkles and the frock, honestly. "When the weather doesn't suck so much I busk a lot. I'm a magician. Rabbits in hats and all that shit."

"Well, aside from the dancing I'm right there with you. I've got two left feet." Xanthe looked at her feet as if she were checking to make sure she still had a matching pair. "And I think, deep down, we all want to be someone's Cinderella. I don't give a fuck if you're a man or a woman, everyone wants to be pretty." She rummaged in her purse once more for a cigar, and once again the purse conspired against her.
"Dammit, I know they're in here somewhere... So, magic huh? Having the slight of hand is a very neat skill, I've always thought." Exasperated, Xanthe dumped the enitre contents of her purse out on her lap. There, on top of the pile, were the cigars.

"Ha. Gotcha'."

Tatters shakes his head. "It's all about the hips, sweetie... The feet are much less relevant. No one's gonna look at your feet."

He taps some ash off the tip of his cigarette, on the edge of Xanthe's empty coffee cup. His nails are pale shimmery pink, the varnish seeded with glitter. Everything about Tatters glitters. "I think we're both doing a pretty good job of it," he says, with a confiding smile. A good job of being pretty, that is.

"Yeah, magic. I spent highschool vanishing pencils instead of paying attention in class..." Retrospectively this might have been a mistake, but he doesn't really think of it like that. He likes his life. And it's not like there's any other job where you could maintain his fashion statements, except maybe drag queen, he could possibly be Jodie Harsh.

Xanthe gave a little laugh and flashed a smile. "Well, maybe you'll just have to teach me sometime, and I think you are far more glamorous than myself, to tell the truth. I could never pull that hair off." Lighting her cigar, she shoves the rest of her belongings into the black hole that is her purple purse.

"So, not that big on school? That's okay, I mean, if you're the kind of person that can create your own success, then you don't really need further education. I'm not one of those people... thus college." Picking up her cooling mug of coffee, she took a big gulp. "Besides, magic kicks ass. Where do you usually busk?"

"Okay then, let's go dancing sometime. How's tonight look for you?"

Trust Tatters to ask a girl out within an hour of meeting her for the first time. But he smiles so nicely - albeit a little crookedly - that chances are he'll be forgiven. Especially given how gay he's acting.

A hand goes up to touch his somewhat disheveled coiffure, which has been shedding flowers onto the back of the chair. "It looked better last night, honestly," he admits. "It's suffered wear and tear. You've got gorgeous hair anyway," he adds, because she does. "Although... a little blue might bring out the colour of your eyes." He's resisting the temptation to just reach out and turn a couple strands of her hair a bright aquamarine.

He is in fact his exaggerating his lack of interest in school. "I was an English major," he admits, "so yeah, clearly not." English is such a lightweight subject. "Redway Park, if it's nice. The shopping centre gets pretty good business. Anywhere with tourists. Nowhere, in this shit." By which he means the weather. Bayfield weather sucks this time of year.

Xanthe raised her eyebrow and raked him with her gray eyes. She figured, what's the harm? He didn't seem to be (as far as she knew) a creep, and in all likelihood, he was probably gay.
"Yeah, alright." She gave him a winning grin. "Where are we going?"

Taking a few strands of her hair in her fingers, Xanthe twirled them absent-mindedly. She had always loved her hair, and people generally agreed. Some even said it was her best feature, as it was incredibly soft and lustrous and hung in perfect tresses.
"Thankyou. And... blue, you think? Maybe. It's been a long time since I've done anything different to my hair." She took a puff from her cigar, still twirling her hair slowly in her fingers. "I like how your roots are grown out with the purple tips. It's like tye-dye for your head."

Looking out the window, she let out a little sigh. "This is my favorite weather, actually. I'd love to go jump in a good puddle, but I'm not really wearing the appropriate attire."

"Warehouse?"

It is after all the generally accepted druggie hangout, and Tatters isn't about to drag some possibly unsuspecting girl into Dark. The Warehouse is more Tatters scene anyway. Much more flamboyant.

Oops, are his roots showing again? Tsk. Lazy boy. He laughs, takes a sip of his coffee. "Yeah, blue, I think," he reiterates, reaching out to finger a piece of her hair. The temptation was too great to resist - her hair just looks so soft. "Your hair's pretty light so it'd show up well and you wouldn't have to bleach it or anything."

"Heliophile, myself," he says. "This is okay I guess, it's warmer than it usaully gets this time of year, which is cool." Fuck winter. Fuck cold. Fuck snow. "But you're not really gonna get up a crowd when it's bucketing down like this."

"Sounds good. My friends and I go there on weekends. Even though I don't usually dance, the atmosphere is perfect." She drained her cup of coffee in a single gulp. "I really enjoy the energy of the place, I guess."

While she hadn't been expecting him to reach out and play with the smallest bit of her hair, it didn't really bother her. One would be surprised how often that actually happened.
"Lemmie think about it." she crooked the edge of her mouth as she gathered a handful of her hair and looked at it. "I've been growing this forever. I'd hate to do something to it I wouldn't like, then have to bleach it or something. Yes, I'm a little protective."

"I can understand that. The general populous isn't really interested in being soaked to the bone. But, I just don't think they know what they're missing." The rain was absolutely pouring now, small streams of were running through the roadways. "I guess some people can't feel the power of it." she shrugged.

"I'll meet you there at eleven," Tatters says, delighted to be getting his way. After all, what would be the point in being pretty if people didn't oblige you?

"Aww, you don't wanna be tie-dye like me?"

If only he could glamour a bit of it blue... Just to show her... But he resists the urge. It might be tricky to explain. "Tell you what," he says, "you should get some of that washout stuff, and you can see how it looks. Or even just use paint, that works okay. You can probably steal some from the art department..." Klepto much? "And then you can decide if you like it." See? There are simple, non-magical solutions to things.

"Well think about it, they probably end up with their make-up all over their face..." A travesty in his mind, no doubt. "And then you're all wet and your jeans are uncomfortable and you have to go sit in your office in damp jeans and a see-through blouse..." Tatters laughs. He knows nothing about sitting in offices. "Or something like that, I guess that's what they're thinking. Exploring spirituality isn't really the goal of the general population I guess."

After a moment of pause, Xanthe nodded. "Alright. I'll try the blue. I'll have it done before tonight, and you can help me decide if I like it or not." She cocked an eyebrow and looked at Tatters with a mischevious grin. "Though I may be mad taking fashion advice from one so ... glittery as yourself."

She laughed and nodded. "Yes, I suppose those who have jobs of importance would be too practical for jumping puddles. I hope I'm never overcome with such practicality... or to be so dour in general. The inner child keeps me sane."

"Sounds good," Tatters says, happy to be corrupting some young not-quite-innocent. "It'll look great. I promise. And glittery is good. It makes me look prettier than I am, don't you think? And it certainly makes you look."

He's not totally sure how much inner child he wants in a hot girl, but puddle jumping sounds okay. "Well clearly you need to dance," he points out. "Nothing like it for frivolity. Oh. Shit." He has noticed the large clock on the wall, ornately decorated with metal faeries and flowers. He promised he'd pick Di up from work if the weather was crap and the weather is. "I have to run," he says, putting his cigarette down and pulling himself up in a swish of skirts. "I'll see you tonight gorgeous."

He leaves her with a crooked grin and a cigarette smoking on the table.