4676/Laundry day

Laundry day
Date of Scene:	10 January 2021
Location:	Laundry Room
Synopsis:	Remy and Nori do laundry. The end.
Cast of Characters:	Remy LeBeau, Noriko Ashida

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Remy LeBeau has posed:
It's LAUNDRY DAY!

The day of the week where Remy brings his laundry to the mansion to take advantage of free laundering services rather than paying for it at the shop around the corner from his apartment.

Seated on one of the unused driers while all six laundry machines run to clean his plethora of clothes, very few of which anyone actually sees him wearing for reasons. He's dressed in sweat pants and a t-shirt, socks, and has the small length of hair pulled back into a douchie manbun. A hat sits atop another of the driers a few feet from him, turned upside down so the opening is pointed upwards, and he's flicking playing cards across the distance into the upturned garment.

Turning them over in his index-middle finger to see which one it is before sending it spiraling away from his hand.

Nothing, but net.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
In a lot of ways, Nori and Gambit are alike, at least on the surface.  She'd do the exact same thing if she were in his shoes!  Does understanding that using the mansion's free laundry services bring her closer together with him, create some kind of kinship?  ABSOLUTELY NOT.  This is an 18 year old girl who eats barbs for breakfast and spits them back out at the juniors, seniors, residents, guests, and staff.  The only ones that are safe are younger students who aren't absolute little shits.

Noriko is on laundry duty, /again/.  She's supposed to have a partner (as if she needs one), something yadayadasocializationyadateamwork whatever.  Most of them buzz off on her after the first snap anyways, which is exactly what she wants.  But to be completely stood up?

THE NERVE.

BLIP!  Noriko only stops right inside the door because she see Gambit, of all people, ALREADY HOGGING EVERYTHING.  "So now I have to wait on my partner, the machines, /and/ you?"  There's a huuuuuge pile of clothes underneath the laundry chute and a huge rolling of eyes.

"Laundry day?"  At least she'd worked through her attitude enough to say that more like a commiserating friend than a teenage asshole.

Suddenly she's tipping back in one of the chairs at /least/ 5 feet away from the guy.  Casual.

Remy LeBeau has posed:
Red eyes glance up at Noriko when she speaks, whether he realized she was standing there or not. He doesn't look startled or surprised, not so much to see her, as to see someone.. It's Sunday. Traditionally this is the day of mourning the weeks worth of attire here at the Mansion.

And what mourning it is!

A hundred or so students (maybe more?) can create a ton of clothes to wash!

Remy does not envy Nori right now.

With his eyes up, one knee close to his chest with the foot down on the top of the drier and the other dangling over the side, he tosses another card towards the hat with a jerk of his wrist.

"Oy. Don'tcha worry non, I be done wit dem machines in a tick."

Whirrrrrl.. right into the hat. Six of clubs.

"Ya feelin' better after ya get kick't da other day?"

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko had dropped a satchel (her book bag) somewhere along the way...maybe she did it before even appearing to Gambit, because it's just sitting there by her chair. Maybe some other student left it?  That is certainly the impression it could give, a natural conclusion, but Gambit isn't an everyday person.  He's been around /the/ block, not that Noriko knows that, so who knows what he thinks.

The girl reaches down at 'normal' speed to pull out a spiral notebook and begins doodling.  She's paying attention to him when he speaks, using her speediness to work between their exchanges, and obviously not worried about what his body language might convey.

"Cool.  I appreciate it.  I always get stuck with the fucking stables with all the other idiots or this pile of nonsense."  The stables are for the worst, whom detention just doesn't cut it.  It's like those kids who are on suspension and force to pick up trash around their campus.  Kinda like being forced to help Logan outside of their normal chores.

"You want any help with your laundry?  I'm not touching your underwear...boxers, whatever, and I'm pretty sure you don't want me to either.  But I get bored," Noriko explains, which for her, instead of a thorny quip, is practically an olive branch.

"I don't remember it.  I'm not even sure what happened.  My roommate just said I fell on the floor.  Did I really get kicked?"  A shameful dark cloud washes over her features as she retreats into sticking her eyes to the notebook, save for some speedy glances.

Remy LeBeau has posed:
It's fair to assume Remy sees a lot more than he acknowledges as having seen. Busying himself throwing cards at the upturned hat in the same nonchallant manner with which Noriko is doodling in her notebook.. Practiced, easy motions. His wrist jerks, his fingers extend, and the card goes where he wants it to.

At first it's just silence between them. Which is fine.. he's never been afraid of quiet. Which might come as a surprise to most who wish he'd shut up sometimes...

In reality he's just reading the room and adapting accordingly.

"Hm?" Glancing up, "Nah, I got it.. Anyting I want folded I send to da dry cleaner, so I jus' toss it in a basket and throw it in my car." Typical man. Smirking at her refusal to assist him with his delicates.

"Da typical answer would be I don't wear dem, but tha's bullshit.. an' a good way ta get jock-itch.. I jus' don't wear da same pair twice." FLICK. Card whirls across the room into the hat. "Dere is two tings in life ya never skimp on... underpants and socks. Everyting else is negociable."

Two fingers, holding another card, point at Nori. "Good life lesson."

To her question, he shrugs, "I tink so.. kicked or punched or... someting... dat was a piss poor idea on Emma's part and I'm very glad I did not come up wit it."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Efficient," Noriko says with appreciation, which is really just your typical I'm not going to bite your head off for no reason tone.  The ability to shift tones like an actress always playing a part...or a manipulative sociopath is really thanks to her ability to speed in place, a rare thing, allowing her to cycle through her emotions rapidly or just slip into /her/ normal speed from losing her concentration or retreating naturally.

But Noriko's just as vulnerable to the salt of returning to the subject matter as if the wounds were still fresh.  The comment about not wearing underwear or anything else down there gets a smirk from the wayward girl.  She latches onto the levity like it can wash out her wound.

"I'll write it down," Noriko says, eyes glancing downward and scribbling out what are supposed to be the notes, but is obviously just scribbling.  The normal speed, which is unnecessary, indicates the reciprocated joke.  "I gotta add food and shoes to that for me though.  And electricity.  My life is so hard," she says facetiously.

"I mean I get people won't hold back?" Nori says switching back to the subject quickly, "But I think you can learn that lesson pretty quick.  Kinda just felt like punishment or a chance to put us in our place.  But I don't know what I was expecting from Mind Bitch," so called because of how Emma met her...and the fact that Noriko doesn't trust telepaths, save for Ruth, who has never shown an ounce of ill intent and is not in a position of authority over her (therefore a threat in her natural habitat).

"I didn't hurt Ruth did I?"  A part of Noriko doesn't want to know, but it's obvious she's a slave to caring and possibly some kind of principles.  Let's not think about this.

"I know it's none of my business, but why do you hang around here at all?  Aside from the free laundry stuff and the ability to do it all at once?  I mean we're all just a bunch of broken brats."

Remy LeBeau has posed:
The card, once held out in a point towards Nori, is flicked towards his mostly full hat. His lip pulls between his teeth, sucking it thoughtfully at the rage of emotions meandering in Noriko's voice through the course of the few short words she's spoken in response to his own statements.

"Oy, so very difficult." There's little snark in response to her commentary on her lifes complications.. just a smirk and the flffffff of cards spraying from one palm to the other and back again.

"No, you did not hurt Ruth." Spoken ernestly, just to satisfy her caring curiousity.

Nothing more on it, though. Not with the latter series of questions. Which have him raising a brow at her, black eyes shifting up to regard the teenaged speedster. One shoulder lifts in a half hearted shrug, "Because dere is a full pantry." Brushing off the seriousness with sideways, even dismissal, humor. "Why do you?"

Noriko Ashida has posed:
"Good," Noriko utters at her own pace.  It comes out like a weird utterance, in the same ballpark as a huh, a grunt, something non-vocal, but not, because it's an actual word being compressed into a sound which it was never meant to be.  It's hard for Noriko to admit she actually cares about other people.  That guard, to protect her from falling apart.  To try and go on.  Emma saw right through it and likely everyone else does, but she's still trying to do what Emma asked of her.  She's trying to not lie to herself and others.  Baby steps though, and a neutral response is all she can muster at this point in her development.

Noriko doesn't expect Remy to expand or answer half of her questions, or even one.  She's used to rapid firing and people making their selections.  Does it torture her already boredom-tortured mind?  Surely, but she's already onto her next thought.

"Oh yeah.  That's why I stay too," which is not in itself a lie.  The girl needs food more often to live and has no wish to starve on the streets.  "I mean I get to run to the city every night here, so it's not so bad."  None untrue, but...that slap from Emma keeps bringing her back to that conversation with the woman.

"...and because there are people I can't leave here."  Her eyes are suddenly wide and she follows up as if there wasn't a beat between.  "I mean I can't stop running you know?  I know some of the teachers just take pity on me, and I know some of them actually care.  And I guess there are people I care about here too," she says as if this were a recent self revelation she had never allowed herself before...well, beyond Jubilee, but isn't that obvious to anyone?  The two have been thick as thieves since day one when they were stuck together as roommates.

An exquisitely engineered pairing by Jean, probably.  Help one by giving her the embodiment of pure sunshine and the 4th of July 24/7.

Remy LeBeau has posed:
Remy isn't quiet out of disinterest, but seems to appreciate the teenage mentality.. even if he cannot possibly understand the way Nori views it. Regardless of how quickly she might think, however, she does not think differently. She's still 18 and she thinks 18 year old things... albeit at lightning fast speeds. It might make her difficult to predict physically, but socially?

Not as true.

So he weathers it.

Let's her sort it out and express things... leaves an open forum for her to fill in the verbal void where he says nothing at all... In more than a few ways, they really are a lot a like, he and Nori. Trouble with authority because of their upbringing... emotionally distant.. deep engrained caring nature.

The cards shuffle from one palm to the other.

"The teachers here don't pity you." He glances back and forth to make sure none of those teachers are around before saying anything positive about them. "They understand more than you might realize... Dere a lot of them share a whole lot more similarities with you den not, universally aint nobody here at da school was given the golden spoon... except maybe Wings.. and Roberto.. but even dem.." His shoulder hikes in a Remy-shrug.

"Besides all dat, tho... dere a lot you can take away from dis place. A sense of belonging, a moral compass dat will very rarely steer you wrong, and friends." Like Jubilee. He's seen how close they've gotten in such a short time.

"Hold onto dem things and try to use da parts that aint so interesting to become someone better than you was when ya got here."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
When Remy zeros in on Nori's armor, her little thing she just had to throw in about teachers pitying her, so closely tied to that broken and beaten down self-esteem lurking inside...Noriko listens.  She can't hide from him, and while that isn't anything she actively thinks about (she's just not that self-aware yet, like most teenagers).  It's an obvious habit that she assumes the worst when she lacks information, a peek into her psyche.

Noriko starts watching the cards fly between sentences, kind of mesmerized with the elegant trajectories and apparent finesse as they set sail in perceived slow motion.  When they effortlessly transport themselves from hand to hand.  It's a rare pleasure, like watching a pleasant screensaver.

The girl doesn't say anything in response, but that's because Remy's words are actually sinking in.  Listening. Undivided attention (when he's talking).  Who thought she could do that?

Then, "I guess I just don't feel-" Ugh, why is she rambling about feelings, Noriko thinks to herself.  It might just come across as her letting him talk, which she is after the impulse passes and he's speaking again.  Yielding.

"I don't feel like I belong.  I know we share things."  UGH AGAIN.  What she was trying to avoid in the first place, the exact same things she was going to say!  "I just look around, and I'm not getting any better at anything, even after putting in so much damn time."  At this, she looks exhausted, even a touch defeated, which only belies that there is more underneath.  Disappointment with herself, with the situation, with the minor inconveniences that make her feel like an invalid because she can't do the simplest things, and then there's this...

People who've gotten here after me.  It's like they've lapped me three times.  I feel like I'm wasting people's time.  They're so nice to me...I wish they'd just kick me out." Because /she/ can't stop caring.  It's almost as if caring enough is going to eventually edge her all the way to the point where she thinks the only caring thing to do is leave this place behind herself.

"Am I crazy?"  Noriko doesn't have any real frame of reference for how horrible she's failing at controlling her powers.  Grades?  She's a top student.  She'd be a smart cookie if she were merely a human.  Her speed powers give her a leg up for sure, but she gets even further, to an extent, with churn.  There's more breadth than depth, though part of that is her age.  So, to her, she's doing everything.  She's doing everything she can, and it isn't good enough, for her, and she thinks, for other people who deserve it more for their generosity.  It's there, plain as a book for Remy to read.

Expressing emotion isn't Noriko's strong suit, so all of this lies between the lines.

Remy LeBeau has posed:
Is she crazy.

The cards stop in their back and forth shuffling suddenly.. it might not appear it, but it's a deliberate tactic. Having seen how closely she's watching them, like a piano player listening to a metronome, he removes the stimuli. Not to set her off balance, but to fully capture her attention for the seconds it takes to fully impregnant a silent moment.. An eternity to a speedster.. a breath for a normal person... and an important moment for a Gambit.

"No, you're not crazy, mon amie. You're a teenager." It's not a jab, as so much of what he says sometimes oft seems to be. It's just the statement of facts, spoken to clarify a moment, rather than patronize her with the seperation of age. "Your experiences out dere in dem streets has cast you into an iron facade, a steel guilding... but dem tings you tinking, dey just the same as what... any of dem kids tinking. You just tink dem through your own lense, ye no?"

Just as fluidly as he shuffles the cards back and forth, Remy slides down off the drier a half second before the reee reee reee ree ree reee of six washers all finishing their load in a rythmic unison. Padding over to place them from washer to drier, he doesn't pause in speaking.

"It also very easy for someone who views seconds like other people view minutes to overlook small details... where-" He realizes he doesn't really know any of the students that well, and thus cannot put names to explanation, "- other students-" Quick recovery, "-can see da minute improvements, you see dem in grand strokes, so ya tink maybe you don't advance at all. The unfortunate truth is dat nothing in dis world works at da speed you do... If I can give you any one piece of advice.."

Click, the last drier closes and the machines are started one after another. "It would be dis... sometimes you actually have to slow down to appreciate da day.. Because livin' at lightning speed might seem natural to you, but a bulb that never turns off burns out twice as fast."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
It's apparent that Nori's emotional capabilities to read people is a lot higher than she lets on, an illusion that leads people on to think she's more in the gutter on that regard.  Not /that/ gutter.  This gutter over here.  Okay sometimes she struggles, but it's more that she's tripping herself up than trusting her instincts.

Because she picks up on Remy's tone immediately, not incensed in an instant by being called a teenager, no pondering.  "I don't know how to get out of that," she confesses softly.  The comment slips away as if it was pre-ordained to drift in and out in the first place, though unintentional.  His perspective on how she perceives the world is insightful, her differences, and nothing she really pondered in this deeper context.

When Remy moves his clothes out of the driers, Noriko's not right behind him.  She's not putting anything in as he's taking it out, slipping clothes of his into the driers like a embezzler syphoning off the top and hoping the person won't notice, in this case, hurrying him along.  She doesn't wait till a full machine is even cleared out.  It isn't till he's done loading up the driers completely and finished speaking...after a silence to contemplate, that she actually starts off her chore.  Not just a sign of listening, but respect.

"I get it," Noriko says and thinks.  This isn't just a physical thing.  Naturally, slowing down is terribly exhausting and takes away concentration she just doesn't have given she doesn't have any mental powers beyond the knock-on effects of her speed.  It /feels/ natural to go fast, it feels right, like someone following their circadian rhythm, but isn't natural in other ways for a /person/.  She'll burn out in other ways, and even if this isn't what Remy means, it's what she takes away from it.

"Thanks.  You make a lot of sense."  Weird.  Awkwardly blunt and short.  The girl still has a lot to learn about /speaking/ even if she's studied every micro expression she's seen in her life, something that can breeze by most anyone else, and even more minute details.  She's got a lot to learn about assumptions and delivery, allowing herself to relate.  Speed doesn't solve everything, and even hurts other things.  His words help her understand what some others have (one other) has told her.

"So more sipping tea," Nori can't help but insert, obviously in jest.

Remy LeBeau has posed:
"Nobody does." Know how to get out of that, "We are our own worst enemies in every situation dat pretains to ourselves.. Because we see what we tink, while we do what we do." Tapping two fingers against his temple, he then turns and hops back up on the vibrating drier and retakes his cards to gingerly flick another off the top towards the overstuffed hat a few feet away. Rather than toppling the pile, it slips effortlessly in between two sitting at jaunty angles against a third and the bill.

It's a demonstration of exceptional aim.

Like her, Remy is quiet.

Like her, he's weighing what to say against what is said.

"Back in Nawh'lens..." He begins quietly, running his tongue across the inside of his bottom lip, along the front of his teeth in the breath that preceeds him speaking those simple introduction to whatever he says next.

"I grow up hard.. Got dese eyes early, ye no? Did not have no mom or dad to look to me when I needed it.. so I built up walls around me-" Motioning around with the deck of cards half clutched in his last three fingers, the index extended out.

"Learn to take care myself. Don't let nobody get close enough to see through da guilding of steel I build up. Easier to play aloof, den explain tings. Reasons why I am way I am." A card flicks off the top, wrist jerking to extend one away from the other so his first two fingers can grip it and flip out. The card doesn't go for the hat, but the activation switch on one of the washers Nori is filling. Setting it off with the hiss of water starting to fill the bowl.

"Til I come here... but I feel like outsider most of da time too. I feel like dey look at me with quiet contempt, like dey don't know whether it dangerous to trust me.. So I understand." Pointing at himself, then over to her. "We share dat.. where we come from create da mentality in which we live."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko visibly blinks when the card slips into the spot like it always belonged...like it'd been played in reverse on the TV.  A moment in the silence.

The girl can't tell one southern accent from another.  Noriko only knows that western tv and movies are shit at depicting them and that there's a variety that come from different places, so Remy's origin is a revelation to her.  Nori quietly slips it away.

Noriko knows.  Those walls are emotional, even physical when one needs to keep people away...physical for you or them...emotional...for you and then them later because of what you've become.  At least she reflects on it that way, and some of that not for the first time.  So absorbed, she doesn't even notice she forgot to start that washer until Remy takes care of it.

There's a nod.  "Yeah, and I guess I've pulled enough shit here that I'm not exactly trustworthy..." except maybe to be a decent hustler, but by definition, eh, they aren't.  The comment is a cherry on top, not meant to imply Remy is in the same boat there.

"Soo, what's your thing then?"  Because Remy isn't so bad, Nori now sees, and maybe he'd be cool to hang out with, or get him something in thanks (she's broke), or whatever...Whatever, not soft, not weird at all.  Don't mind me, she thinks awkwardly in wake of her question.  "Now," she tacks on quickly enough, even though by tone it's still clear she tacked it on.

Remy LeBeau has posed:
Remy snickers at the question, flicking his hands up in a shrug, "Lazibout, nerdowell.." He murmurs absently as if these are poor representation of him, even by his own estimation. ESSPECIALLY by his own estimations. Regardless of what he may say to the contrary, Remy bleeds self confidence. It's probably part of a construct to hide the fragile parts he doesn't want people to see, but it's a well constructed construct. The physical embodiment of fake it til you make it.

Another card twists off the top, but remains extended rather than thrown. His thumb brushes it down and to the bottom of the remaining deck. Which doesn't seem to shrink regardless of how many he throws. It's fair that he probably has several decks carried at any time though.

"Depends on who ya ask.. but if ya ask me? I'm keepin' dem honest. Like Logan... we aint part of da machine dat churns out promises and utopia, ye no? So I keep'em honest. Honest wit us and honest wit demselves."

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko could replace some of her mean-girl retorts with more cool, more fake it till you make it.  She could learn a thing or two from Remy, or even the latter from her own roommate.  But don't tell Jubilee because she'll insist that she's also the coolest, and who wants to burst that bubble?  Not that she isn't, but Noriko knows she's biased about agreeing that Jubes is the coolest.  But if she's going to be 'objective,' she herself is the coolest girl in school.  Okay maybe tied.

The possible multiple decks detail does not go unnoticed, but does go uncommented.

"Someone has to," as if Noriko knows anything about faculty dynamics or those between residents in any way, but it sounds like a good idea.  "I like Logan.  He let us get a fancy doorknocker and I think some supplies," because he ever so suavely looked the other way, literally.  "Plus he doesn't take lip."  Thank you American tv.  You have provided a good colloquial, cultural education.

Noriko decides in retrospect, after giving herself time to organize her thoughts, to just be a normal and not press into the man's likes and dislikes, hobbies, and whatnot.  It's personal, and she realizes her mind has skipped ahead.

"I think you're clothes are about done."  Noriko's head blips into a tilt.  "You know, if you're ever around and want to beat me at pool," as she somehow is sure he would, "I'd be down.  You just need to accept chips bought into with IOUs or favor slips because I'm dead broke and I can't seem to hold down a job."  She's not joking about the job, but it would be fun to even play for pretend money.  Maybe the rec room has some poker ships buried somewhere.  Maybe teachers are hiding some somewhere!

Noriko reaches up to sort of muss her hair with her gauntlet and regrets it.  Nori blurs as she tries her best to untangle strands of blue from the metal finger joints.  "These ugly things are so fragile.  Bulky pieces of crap."  There's a press of her lips and wince as she realizes she's picking on Dr. McCoy, though he did admit that he sucks at fashion.  Also, it's not like this isn't her second pair, cobbled together in just as much of a hurry as her first pair, for her own good and others'.

"Thanks for keeping me honest," Noriko finally says, each word sincere and obviously said with care in terms of pacing and speed.  Actually, too much care, like someone overthinking something, she fluctuates a little to correct the too-much-slowness and overshoots, probably even unaware that she's missing the mark of the speed she usually locks into for others.  She's just trying to make it count.

"Mind Bitch," no remorse, though maybe Noriko might have regret if she called Emma that to her face.  "I mean Emma..."

Nori's usage of first names for her elders (/technically/, in age and position) is probably a direct affront and personal rejection of her parents' values.  Occasionally she still bows in propriety to people, something engrained, but this is on purpose, evident to keep perception by how diametrically opposed it is to her native culture (well she's also always been American in terms of citizenship).

"She is trying to keep me honest too, but I think she's too smart for me to get what the fuck she's saying half the time."  And Nori not being the best at being transparent, yet still blunt and honest (though maybe still emotionally dishonest by omission), and the fact that Emma isn't abusing her powers and reading Noriko all the time doesn't really give Emma's communication style a leg up in this case.  Can anyone really be faulted for trying to figure out what works with a bratty acting teenager who is unraveling at the seams?  "But I guess she means well."  Nori sounds even unsure of that.  "I don't know.  She's cryptic, or I'm overthinking shit."  Noriko, no doubt, thinks that Emma /is/ reading her thoughts the whole time, regardless of what the woman says or does not say about it.  It's a recipe for defensiveness and confusion.

Noriko Ashida has posed:
Noriko doesn't seem tied to burdening Remy with the tangent, but it's given him enough time to clear his clothes out. By the time he has that done, she's loaded up more laundry into the driers. She still has a bunch more to do, but races out to go get some other things done like surprising Jubes with a non-apocalypse room, waiting patiently only for him to go out and up before her. He was there first, technically, even if she might have been able to sliiiiip past him. Jubilee won't know where anything is in their room anymore, but at least they'll get a reset button on the microcosm they were growing. "Thanks! See you around!" she says a bit fast, though not un-intelligible.