A Lesson in Aesthetics (for asthedrivensnow )

[prettyawkward]

Maybe there was something to be said for less sleep in a twenty-four hour day.  Rabastan hadn't done much to the rest of the house, but his studio was, for the most part, much cleaner than it had been previously.  He had even purchased a new chaise, shoving the other in the far corner as a new storage place for scrap canvases and boards.  The lighting had been rearranged, and he had even managed to paint the walls in solid colours, relieving it of the splattered paint swatches, cracks, and tears that had developed over the last few months of his restless nights.  His room, of course, was still an absolute disaster area, but Narcissa hadn't mentioned needing to occupy that space.  

Currently, Rabastan was sitting in the hall that led to his bedroom, staring at the wall before him.  Several times, he had imagined Narcissa returning, to the point where he had almost convinced himself she had, only to realise it hadn't happened, after all.  His eyelids closed and opened in near slow-motion.  Everything felt delayed, and he wasn't really sure how long he had been sitting there.  There was a mutter, and he responded, but so quietly he could hardly make it out himself.

Comments

[asthedrivensnow]

"Really? I was certain you'd been there..."

Perhaps she was wrong. Narcissa had been more on the periphery, partaking when offered but not actively pursuing anything. Dried Gillyweed had a marvellous effect - making a person feel relaxed, and somewhat euphoric, and generally promoting a happy mood amongst the crowd who'd breathed it in. And frankly, it was rather nice, though not something she wanted to be seen buying, even in Knockturn Alley.

"But it's not important. A drink will be fine - shall I head through?"

[prettyawkward]

He shook his head, fairly certain he had avoided hanging around much of anyone his last few years. There had been a couple years where he met the love of his life, and pursued her to no end, even after she dumped him. She had been a Ravenclaw, so he had spent most of his time in the library, even though he never bothered to study.

"I'll know for next time. Dolph is bound to know where to find some," Rabastan commented, certain that between Rodolphus and Augustus, one of them would know where he could get some.

"Head on through, I'll make you something relaxing..."

[asthedrivensnow]

Both will know. She's fairly certain Antonin got it from Rodolphus to begin with, if she'd heard correctly. As for the pursuit of academically-inclined loves, Narcissa prefers not to discuss that in too much depth. Or at all. It will only upset her.

"I'll be waiting," she calls over her shoulder as she wanders back through to his studio. It's tempting to peek into rooms hidden behind closed doors, but the fact that she can hear him in the kitchen dampens her curiosity.

When he arrives, he'll find her standing in the window, feet here and hair unbound, but still clothed, staring out at the rainy afternoon.

"This seems to be a theme..."

[prettyawkward]

Rabastan had a couple of mixed drinks, part firewhiskey, and part of a calming potion he had been given for his fits. He'd found they complimented each other well, and helped him to dampen out the noise that surrounded his ears all the time.

He set one down near where she was standing, taking a sip of his own.

"I think it's just the joys of living in England," he said, glancing around the room. "It's one of the main reasons my parents spend most of the winter months in their place in Turin, Italy. I only get to see the place during the hols. Still rainy, but less often, and warmer."

[asthedrivensnow]

It's probably a mistake to not look at what she's drinking before she drinks it, but that's what she does, and she gives the glass, and then Rabastan, a a peculiar look upon swallowing.

"Is this a new cocktail? It's... sweeter?"

But not unpleasant, and it certainly takes the fiery edge off that usually makes her cough and splutter. There's a hint of something that brings out the honey undertones in the liquor, and this time she has a larger mouthful before setting her glass down.

"I've not been to Italy since I was very small, and I don't recall it raining. But I like rain. It's cleansing."

[prettyawkward]

Rabastan gave her a wry smile as she drank. He wasn't absolutely sure what sort of effect it would have on her, he only knew from his own experiences, but it certainly made one feel incredibly pleasant.

"It is. I like warm rain. Cold rain makes me feel...I don't know...desolate. Gray. Lonely..."

[asthedrivensnow]

She has no voices in her head to silence, no drums pounding in her ears, so a calming potion for a specific purpose is going to make her blithely dreamy. Add the alcohol...

"You're describing an English winter in general," she points out, taking another mouthful. Her palate is trying very hard to pick out the new flavours from the potion, but the potion itself is working against her, calming the interest in the new and prompting her to give him a slow smile instead. "But I like to watch that sort of rain from inside."

She turns back to the window, eyes on the very weather in question. It takes her a moment or two to speak again.

"How shall I pose today, Rabbie?"

ah, busy busy...sorry for the delay :)

[prettyawkward]

"Precisely, which is why I think if I ever get chance, I might leave this place," Rabastan commented, with a bit of a sigh. He'd never get that chance, though. Not until things were settled, at least. He was bound to far too much around here.

"I suppose it isn't so bad from the inside out."

He sipped quietly at his drink as she paused, swallowing hard and feeling the alcohol move its way down. As she had experienced, it didn't burn as much, but it certainly caused a sensation. The potion always seemed to have an immediate effect, but the alcohol would kick in later.

"Ah...have you any suggestions? Anything you'd like to try?" He asked, hoping that would be a bit safer than the other ridiculous ideas he had in mind. He had pictured her in so many ways in the last week, and none of them seemed like something he could get away with calling 'art' to the casual patron.

Perfectly fine. :)

[asthedrivensnow]

She wonders where he'd go, given the chance - would it be Italy, as he'd mentioned? Or perhaps somewhere with a more tropical clime... Narcissa is quite sure she's asked that out loud, but when he doesn't respond, she realises she's only thought about it.

And that's odd, really.

She has another mouthful of her whiskey mix, and rests her forehead against the window. It's cool, almost cold, when compared to the way her body is heating from the Firewhiskey.

"Maybe... maybe here. In the window." She tucks one bare foot behind the other, the angle displaying her lovely ankle and calf, before her legs disappear under the full green dress. "Unless you've anything else in mind?"

Her head feels a little floaty, and she thinks... "I might be drunk. Rabbie, what's in this?"

[prettyawkward]

He had been so busy watching the milky skin of her exposed leg, that he had almost missed her question. When there's a pause, he looked up.

"Hmm? Oh. It's a...a potion. I thought since we didn't have the gillyweed, you'd want something a bit more. ...That wasn't inappropriate of me, was it?"

There was that fleeting thought that maybe this was similar to what he had done with his first girlfriend, offering her chocolates laced with love potion to try and get her to be a bit more amourous than normal with him. Rabastan had lost quite a lot due to that, and there was a chilling sensation that maybe Narcissa would be offended by what he'd done, even if his intentions weren't completely the same. Not that he'd really refuse if her inhibitions were lowered...

[asthedrivensnow]

Well, that explained it. She turns to face him, balance moderately compromised, but she saves it by resting her backside on the wide windowsill.

"Terribly inappropriate," she replies. "You shall be punished most severely; my retribution is swift and painful."

And then the bright peal of her laughter fills the room.

"I feel as though I could fly!" Whatever he'd given her, it's had the effect of making her drunk far more quickly than whiskey alone, and has removed several layers of prim and proper to a giggling young woman who's even now having another mouthful. "Or... dance upon clouds..."

[prettyawkward]

Before her laugh, he had a growing show of fear on his face. As soon as he heard her giggle, though, everything seemed to relax. She seemed at ease, and it put him there, as well. Or maybe that was also the drink. He took another sip.

"I could draw you at the window. I could draw you on clouds!"

[asthedrivensnow]

"Mmm, but clouds are cold..."

She pushes herself up onto the window sill, legs crossed at the ankle, and has another sip of her doctored drink.

"And I don't want wet feet. So you're going to have to settle for cloudless art, today."

But being in the window isn't so bad; the sun struggling through the grey clouds is brightened by the downpour and backlights her rather charmingly.

[prettyawkward]

Rabastan was searching for a sketching pencil, and when he finally came across the one he wanted, he made his way back to his seat with it and his sketchpad. She was practically glowing with the backlight, and he was certain he wanted to use that in some way.

"I wouldn't want you to be too cold, or too wet..." he said with a small grin upon his settling across from her.

[asthedrivensnow]

She raises an eyebrow in amusement. Last time he'd drawn her, he technically had no issued with either of those things, if not in the current context. Her smile, mostly hidden by her glass as she has yet another sip, is smug.

"I'd say you're a gentleman, but..."

Her half-empty glass is set to one side, and she rests her hands on the sill, either side of her thighs. Her skirt hides them from view, and her ankles still swing gently back and forth. She'll stop them when he asks her to.

"Are you going to show me the results of our last sitting? Or do I have to wait until this one is done?"

[prettyawkward]

"I think...later," he said, as his pencil began to scratch short, fine marks across the paper. He worked swiftly, but with care, and his eyes switched back and forth from the woman before him to the developing picture.

Rabastan didn't mind her movements, since he already had her pose in his mind's eye. She was mostly there for details and lighting, and as long as she wasn't running about the room, he was sure he could make do. It felt better this time around for him, what with not being as fidgety and nervous as he had been at the first meeting. It might have been the potion, or it might have been the fact that he had made sure to take care of business prior to her arrival.

His thoughts couldn't help but linger on the memory of their last moment in this room together, and as much as he was trying to focus on the task at hand, he found himself remembering the way her hands moved, the way her lips parted, and other various snapshots. He'd try to remain civil as long as the afternoon allowed. Of course, then there was the alcohol.

"Do you mind that?"

[asthedrivensnow]

Watching him is easier this time, since her attention isn't divided between his movements and her occasional panic whenever she truly thought about being nude before him. Of course, she'd had whiskey then, too, which had led to an interesting conclusion, and Narcissa thinks that this time, she has things under control.

She doesn't, it's the potion talking.

Her smiles are too easy, her demeanour too relaxed to have true control. She's amenable to suggestion, though she doesn't realise it.

"Mmm, no," she muses, her tone light. "I can wait. But I do want to see it, Rabbie, you mustn't keep it from me."

Her gaze returns to her glass for a moment, then back to her knees - and then she peers down at her feet, before lifting her gaze to where he sits, sketching.

"...what do you see?"

[prettyawkward]

"I promise I will," he said, more to the parchment than to her, "I will."

He kept his eyes on his lines until she spoke, again. The question gave him pause, and he lifted his gaze back to her. This time he slowly let them trace her body, before landing on her eyes.

"I see...radiant light. I see brightness, I see shadows, and I see lines and curves. I see beauty in all that, you know. I can see the sharp edges of fabric. I see colour. Deep, and light, contrasting and playing off of each other. I see strands of hair, and smoothness of skin, and...all I see is on here. Or will be, eventually."

Rabastan paused, hoping that he hadn't said anything offensive. He was never sure if anyone understood what his world was like; what his sight, his sound, his sense of touch and taste were. Sometimes he felt like he was living in an extrasensory world, and no one else was.

[asthedrivensnow]

Her skin feels tight as he looks her over, her dress suddenly made of needles for a moment - and then just as suddenly it goes, and she smiles dreamily at him as he describes how he translates her physical being onto parchment.

"You see beauty..." she murmurs, not sure if she's being complimented or not. Indecision hurts her happy floating brain, and she reaches for her glass to drown it out, draining it in a single elegant motion. "S'all anyone ever sees."

Her feet stop swinging.

"Pretty face, pretty figure, pretty hair, pretty eyes, isn't Narcissa so lovely." Her feet begin to swing again. "Do you see me? Or just pretty Cissy Black?"

She hates that name.

[prettyawkward]

That caused him to stop, completely, his eyes moving back to her once more with a rather bewildered expression. Maybe it was a revelation. For so long he never felt like anyone actually saw him for who he is, or understood him at all.

"Well, you are lovely, and I am drawing you with full realism. I do like abstraction, though. You're bold. You're daring. But you're confined. Like me, yeah? Held in rigid walls, trying to break free. But we can't. We're not allowed to..."

[asthedrivensnow]

His expression tells her she's voiced something she usually keeps rather well-hidden. Her scorn for those who don't bother to look past her face and figure is most often disguised as sarcasm, and it's rare that she actually gives voice to her worry that all she'll ever be is someone's pretty trophy wife.

But the potion takes the edge off so many things, and so she stares at him in return, concentrating until he's in sharp focus.

"Rules," she states, agreeing with his comment about walls. "And duty. Proper ladies this, correct behaviour that."

Narcissa hates the confinement of being a dutiful Pureblood daughter... but Andromeda had to go and be an obvious rebel and left her baby sister to pick up the pieces, and there is absolutely nothing in the world that will make Narcissa cause a further rift in the fabric of her family. So even though she inwardly rails against the familial cage, she still allows herself to be kept within it.

"...thank you, though." Because a lady always acknowledges a compliment.

[prettyawkward]

Rabastan paused a moment longer, and then continued his sketch in silence. It wasn't until many moments later that he spoke again..

"I'll paint this, then. I'll paint it in my style. Abstract and raw. I'll make you show up. I can do that."

[asthedrivensnow]

Her head is floaty enough that the silence feels warm, and when he does speak, she blinks at him in surprise.

"I know you can."

She stretches, back arching and arms reaching out wide, before she resumes her position-- and then ruins the pose entirely by bringing her feet up onto the wide sill and hugging her knees. Hopefully, he's captured as much of the initial position as he required, because she's settled into a little ball, quietly and happily rather high.

Although her dress still feels like needles, and she shifts slightly.

[prettyawkward]

He finished without much pomp, he knew he'd use it later for a painting, so he could add more details at that point. With a fleeting, twisted sort of smile down at the piece, he closes his sketchbook and looks back at Narcissa.

"Are you well? Is there anything else I can get you? Is that drink treating you all right? I feel fucking wonderful. I don't know how it affects others, I've never given it to anyone before..."

Rabastan felt a bit more secluded in his brain, which was probably a good thing. He might have even felt lonely, if it wasn't for the fact that Narcissa was right there before him. He hated the noise, but he'd grown accustomed to it, and living alone had some extreme disadvantages. Now he felt buzzed and heady. Creative, but slow.

[asthedrivensnow]

"I feel..." Her voice trails off as she thinks about his question. It's probably not a good idea that she drinks something medicinal created for him and then combines it with whiskey, but it's too late now, and anyway, she does feel good.

Definitely floaty, and hyperaware of everything she touches.

"I feel strange. I feel as though I can fly and as though I can sleep for a thousand years and I like it, I think... But my dress is made of needles and pins and my skin prickles wherever it touches me."