A night on the town.

Alice moved the wand with ease from base to tips on her upper lashes with black. She did not bother bringing the makeup remover pads out of the storage — in her hands, a mascara wand was no less controllable to her than the wind. She did not apply much to her lower lashes; she left the tops as defined as possible. She saw a girl on a TV show once when she had been flipping through cable channels late at night who did something like this. It made her look pretty but mysterious. Alice winked at herself in the mirror when she was done. One eye had to look through a cover of her wavy fringe, but regardless, she felt like she pulled off the effect perfectly. For the rest of her makeup, she followed suit with what she had learned from television, applying a minimal, sheer layer of blush. Since she knew she would be eating, she figured that she could safely ignore her lips. She tried one last time to get her hair to agree with the hairspray to no avail, leaving her hair as disagreeable as ever. It did not matter that much though. To her, pretty was a game she seldom played. To her, the game was watching the world go 'round.

After lunch, Alex had asked if she wanted to visit the city, try out some of the local food. In a testament to her lack of sense of time, Alice at first was reluctant. Her first studies started tomorrow, after all. Then Alex asked her what classes she had on Saturday. That, naturally, was the end of Alice's reluctance though she was a little irritated that she would not figure out the mystery of the obsidian rocks until Monday. It would be a girl's night out, like she had seen so many times on the television, though she wondered often why the event appeared so often in dramas. Would she discover something terrible and find herself back here with ruined mascara, reeling from a terrible revelation?

Alice unbuttoned the top button of her white cotton blouse which let her collar be loose, and turned to the back of the bathroom door where the new dress hung on a hanger covered in pink foam so it would not slip off and fall. She took it off the hanger and pulled it over the blouse and the top of her black skirt. The jumper dress was plain at the top with wide straps that almost covered the seams of her sleeves. It had no collar of its own, showing the top of Alice's blouse. It was plain until the waist, which had a sewn-on black belt. The short skirt of the dress was slightly more showy, with four large pleats. Down from the dress extended Alice's long skirt that she had worn throughout the day, a black, pressed, two-tier prairie skirt. Since it had somewhat sharp angles in common with the rest of the outfit, it seemed fine to her. She checked herself one last time in the mirror and smiled wide. She looked like somebody about to run off to impress some boy. She liked the idea that she could two-thousand times better than the thought that she would. If there was one person without a romantic bone in her body, Alice knew it was her. She nodded her approval one last time, fetched her discarded white turtleneck from earlier, and shut off the light on the way out.

Alice caught Alex's look as she left the bathroom. Her features looked a bit less enthusiastic, almost worried perhaps, since Alice had disappeared into the bathroom. Still, the contrast between the Alex she had quickly begun to get used to, with jeans, hair back, and the Alex in the small blue dress was striking. Alice wondered if either was alien to Alex or did she like to alternate looks like Alice liked to alternate between colors. Alice folded the sweater and put it into one of the dresser drawers. Lastly, she patted her waist where the keys to the building were tucked into her blouse pockets to make sure they were there and then she gave a playful grin to Alex, testing the weight of her makeup by batting her eyes.

"Ready!"

Alice sat down on her own bed. Was Alex feeling alright? She remembered her monumental effort that morning just trying to keep her background thoughts quiet so to avoid waking Alex up. Alice had not considered it at the time, but now, taking a look into the wastebasket by Alex's desk, she spotted a discarded plastic fork, a straw. Alex did not usually eat in the cafeteria, Alice guessed. Was Alex exhausted from a room full of background thoughts? Alice turned away from the questions in her head and focused on Alex's question. After her huge lunch, she felt like her appetite had regulated itself again — she was not too hungry. Maybe someplace with smaller servings but not a salad place...someplace fun. Someplace —-

"I know it's a long shot, but since we're here in th'Pacific, maybe...a tea house?" She had heard that teahouses were places were you did not just go in and out like any American restaurant. Apparently they were there for people to experience a long and relaxing meal with friends, not just a fast one.

A tea-house. She thought and stood. "Adventure? Sounds good t'me," she said with a small smile.

Alice began putting on her boots. Earlier, she spent an hour shining them the way her dad showed her. How spitting at boots helped was beyond her, but she liked the game as a kid. The boots positively gleamed, though anybody looking would still see the rends in the leather. She silently engaged in the ritual of tying them just like he showed her. When she was done, her thoughts were clear.

...I should make sure first. It is only considerate...

Alice approached Alex, her boots clunking with her footfalls. Alice looked with all of her years' focused perception. Alex wore thick blush where none was before. Was she alright? The last thing Alice wanted was to make her roommate feel like she had to entertain her, just because she was new, when she was not feeling well. Alice stopped close.

"Alex, are you alright? I keep forgetting that a bunch of people make that thought-noise and that it bothers you. I forgot at lunch. I do not want to go someplace that might be crowded if the noise is..." Alice stopped. She forgot to talk with contractions, with the slightly off-kilter accent of her home.

Alice nodded and was about to put her concerns to rest when she noticed that Alex seemed unsteady. Heels. Between there and the city was nothing but island as far as she knew. There must have been a bus or taxi service that she missed. Otherwise, Alice thought, she could offer the skies, but she was worried that she might bother Alex by getting so concerned again.

Alice followed Alex out of the door. "Hey Alex, how should we get to th'city? Is there a taxi or somethin'?"

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

Alice felt like she wanted to say more once away from the Teahouse, once she felt a second wind turn up the second they left the door behind. If nothing else, she had felt like apologizing about one-hundred times about falling asleep so suddenly. There was a small crowd waiting for the bus when they made it to the stop. Everybody seemed apprehensive about the smell of rain in the air while one person could be heard saying “You all just see. Weather said sixty-seven percent chance of rain. That's no chance to me!” Above, Alive could feel the charges in the clouds shifting, preparing to ignite the cloud with light.

The bus was crowded for most of the ride, so Alice did not talk all that much, though she did keep near to Alex's side, looking for any sign that she had made offense. The city flew by them in the night colors of glowing curtains in tall apartment buildings and all the various lights on the street from normal and magical apparatuses. Alice found herself drawn in thought. There was no denying it now; the Teahouse was a place of subtle magics. She did not know how it worked, but she knew that it worked as a force in her mind, making her reach conclusions that she would not have considered so easily. When she looked at Alex though, she knew that she had done what she had wanted to, but that she acted so easily still surprised her.

By the stop at the school, the bus was empty and drops had been streaking hard across the windows like a transparent meteor shower. Alice had been sitting closer to Alex as the bus emptied. When the vehicle stopped, she stood and gave a friendly glance, showing the gray glow Saffwyns had in their eyes when their magic was used for more challenging tasks. Rain would not reach the two girls. The winds that combed through the trees before now attacked the drops around them. It did not help the wet lawn, though. Alice began to feel the wetness seep into her damaged boots, though it felt like a faraway occurrence. The only feeling was each drop of water that she batted away, her invisible dance at full tempo. She could not think much of anything else until they arrived at the door of the girl's dorm.