meadowlark | @eugene.hicks

（ well, that's good at least. he laughs, easy, an' shakes his head. ）

No ma'am. I ain't about that.

（ whether he means 'women' or 'relationships' or 'attraction' is sort of up in the air. the man may be biromantic as the day is long, but at thirty-two, he's still a virgin. ~~until the aerie anyway.~~ ）

Just wanted to make sure that I hadn't made you some measure of discomfited with the dancing.

[Ellie grins back, both relieved and interested in his answer. She figures he means age-wise, considering how young she is, or maybe he just doesn't like women. That's a lot more common here, enough for Ellie to feel almost confident with saying out loud:]

Nah, I'm not about that either. Not with guys, anyway.

Ah.

（ as much as this place has done its level best to instill the idea such conduct can be announced out in the open, it hasn't stopped bein' a shock to have a gal just announce it like that. he ducks his head, obviously a bit embarrassed by her openness and then opts to say: ）

You know, reckon a fair shake of women in the Army Corps were just the same.

[Maybe it's a misstep, but she draws herself up, ready to be bare her teeth- and Gene surprises her again with his easy acceptance, or the appearance of it.]

... yeah?

（ still a sore spot, then. gene sucks his teeth an' takes another idle drink of his beer to give himself a moment — but she's a kid, an' he ain't about to hang her out for it. he ain't strictly comfortable tellin' near strangers about the intricacies of his own life, but he's comfortable enough with who he is that he can set the concerns of the former aside. the greater sin by far would be to let her sit there thinkin' he's in judgement of her. ）

Had a fella in the war myself, an' a gal before that. Weren't no word for it in my time, but, ah... been here long enough to learn otherwise.

（ he even met up with anna a few years back. still as sweet as ever, though she's married now to that navy boy she met after him. the red of her hair as bright as any flame an' replicated now on three little daughters he'd smiled fondly to see. ）

[Ellie softens, startled, then realizing that Gene's shock about her openness mirrors her own, when she first came here, when people would talk about their significant others of the same sex.

It's still fresh in her mind.

And maybe it's the sympathy, maybe it's just Gene and how willing he is to be open with her, but she nods.]

My, um- my ex was like that. She had a boyfriend before me.

World takes all sorts, don't it now?

（ he gives her a bit of a smile, mouth quirked up at the corner, an' lifts his glass up. ）

I'll drink to that, wouldn't you?

[It doesn't usually come this easily. Ellie nods back, heartened, and lifts her glass to lightly clink it against his own. It's different, being utterly open about these things, but she likes it.

The music rolls over them, but things are definitely winding down, people leaving in groups and pairs, last rounds all done. Tired-out and happy. It's not a bad place to be, and despite the high energy, it's winding down to something comfortable.

Ellie gestures over at the slightly raised platform that comprises the "stage".]

You play anything? Sing?

Piano, a few chords on the guitar. As to singin' — ah, mostly hymns an' the like, an' rarely without another voice raised up with mine. My brother, now, he's the one that sings like an angel. Lord, he'd have the whole'a this place wrapped around his finger in a month if he ever set foot on a stage.

（ his voice is — serviceable, decent but without much range. better if he doesn't try to do it loudly. but robbie, now, robbie's been singin' in church since he was all of seven or eight years old. between that an' his recent discovery of elvis, good lord. gene ain't never heard a song robbie couldn't improve on in some way. ）

[Brother, present tense. Ellie leans a little against the table. That's rare enough where she's from, having living family members.]

What's his name?

Robert. Robbie, generally. He's not much older'n'you. The youngest of all the Hicks boys.

（ and frankly, everyone's clear favourite. ）

You two real close?

[For some people, talking about family is painful and for others, it's a pleasure- but Gene's the one who brought him up, so it feels safe to ask after. She's curious, she's always been curious, especially about the people in her life she gets on with.

She's never been able to shake it.]

Ah, I'm close with all my brothers.

（ he smiles to think of 'em — much as he and albert have had their differences over the years, they've mostly sorted them out these days. ）

Got two others — John and Albert. John's an engineer, Al was a Marine, he does carpentry now. We still get together for Sunday dinners most weeks.

[The smile's- heartwarming. And a little familiar. Joel had his differences with Tommy, but family means a lot of things. Among them, damn near unconditional love. And it sounds like Gene's no exception.

It's nice.]

What about your parents?

Both passed on, now. Ma when I was eleven or so, Pa just a few months before my comin' back here. They were incredible folk, though. Ma was a suffragette, an' a nurse in the Great War. Wild lady, she had a million stories about all the things she got up to all across Europe.

（ fearless. spoke her mind. didn't care one whit for social conventions. she's been gone more of his life now than not, but there are echoes of her in all he does. everything he is was hers first. ）

My Pa — it's funny, Ma taught us to stand up for ourselves, not to back down, to step in when we see injustice, but Pa taught us to be kind. He had that way about him, you know? Never saw him use a harsh word to a soul alive, never raised his voice, never walloped any of us boys — an' I won't say there weren't times when one'a us would'a been served by it — knew to turn the other cheek an' leave well enough alone.

（ he misses them both, but death doesn't bite at him the way it does others — speakin' to the dead saw to that plain enough. ）

Neither of 'em ever complained about a thing I ever heard. Tough as Hell. The world was poorer when they passed on.

[Ellie listens without interrupting. A few of the older people back in Jackson would tell stories like this, about their families or the people they loved, usually someone they lost even before the outbreak. People the good memories outweighed the bad, for.

Gene practically lights up, glowing from inside when he talks about his family, and how much they meant to him. It's easy to see that he admired his parents, loved the dearly, and internalized what they taught him.

... has him as a person making a lot more sense.]

They sound like they were pretty amazing.

But who taught you how to dance?

（ ah.

his smile softens a little. touched by grief an' loss, the sort that's dug in deep an' made a home of him. ）

That'd be Reggie. My best friend.

（ dead now longer than gene knew him breathin', but his ghost stayed on. stayed near. is the reason, no doubt, that gene survived the war, an' equally as much that so many of his boys did. love company, they used to say, was the luckiest goddamn bunch of paratroopers in the war. ）

Amazin' fella. Could dance, sing, recite poetry, speak half a dozen languages. Jetsetted the world over before his folks settled in New York, met him when I was fifteen doin' an apprenticeship with a carpenter.

[Another look that Ellie recognizes. She's settled into the edge of the table, watching Gene's face. Everything with him is so immediate, close to the surface. If she touched him she figures she'd feel just what he's showing her.

It's rare, but good- and Ellie likes listening.]

And you two stuck together from there?

（ he makes a soft 'mmhmm' of affirmation. so clearly, purely fond. ）

We had a few good years, yeah. When the War hit, he felt called up. He went over in '40, got in with the SOE. That's, ah, — Special Operations Executive. Spies, essentially. Worked just south of Champagne with the French resistance until '43. Got killed blowin' up a rail line.

（ it's a gentler version than what actually happened. it ain't so much that he's sparin' her the gritty details as he just doesn't want to relive them. he's intimately familiar with how reggie's death came about, after all. his expression softens some. old grief worn at the edges by the many turns of the earth it's been since then. bein' dead ain't the same as being gone for him, but it's been gettin' harder to see reggie as the young man he'd been then, all of twenty-one, an' lord does he look younger every goddamn year. his smile still lights a room, even if the hicks boys are the only ones now that can see it. ）

Good man, though.

[It's a common story, especially since Ellie knew so many people who were soldiers, and then smugglers, and then... everyday Jacksonites. Death was ever-looming, but never did get easier, even if it happened during something that people had to do.

The grief in Gene's eyes brings it home, though. Even if Ellie never met Reggie, he must've been special.]

He sounds a lot like it.

Damn good.

（ grief changes with time. or maybe you just grow more used to it, like the roughed-up edges of a callous or scar. ）

I still keep in touch with his folks, though, an' his sisters. Sweet gals.

Guess having other people who knew the person makes it easier to make peace with, I guess.

[Not always. Definitely not always. But sometimes.]

（ she's tryin' to offer comfort in her own way, an' much as he can stand it back home on accountin' for havin' to, here it ain't quite the same. gene shakes his head some, works his jaw off to one side. ）

Ah, well... you know how we have powers here, yeah? Things folks can do. I had somethin' like that of my own back home. I can speak with folks that've passed on. Ghosts an' the like. So I don't... grief don't touch me like it does most folk.

（ it still hurts, lord knows. but he can say goodbye, an' that's more than others get the chance at. ）

[Ellie watches the way he reacts, the discomfort; it's mutual. Nobody knows what the hell to say in the face of grief. Nothing really makes it better.

... but she wasn't expecting Gene to say that.

Ellie sits for a moment, thunderstruck by the possibility, by how cool that is and everything it means. She has to remind herself to take a deep breath.]

So you- you got to see him?

Yeah. Still do — not here, I mean, but back home. Been over a decade since he passed on, he still drops in once in a while to visit. He says he'll move on one day, when he knows it's time, but he wants to — you know, keep an eye on things.

（ it's kind of him, though gene's sure it bothers reggie to watch him age just as much as the reverse is also true. he ain't even sure why reggie hasn't moved on — whether it's aveline, his folks, him. some combination of them all. ）

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