2024-12-16 - Who Brings a Baby on the Ice?

"Well, hey there, stranger!" A familiar voice calls out in Dodge's direction, and before she can do much more than look up, Hayley has settled in next to her. She's clearly dressed herself up to go out into the cold, off the clock instead of in the green coveralls that Dodge might have caught her in in her spot at the gardens, and her hands coming down to tug off -- yes, that's a cowboy boot.

"I was just thinking, I never was in a true winter wonderland before, and even if it doesn't really snow here, I bet a lot of people know how to skate for real. Figured I would give it a try."

Dodge doesn't need to turn to recognize who is calling out to her; Hayley's southern drawl is unmistakable. "Hey there," she chirps back, unaccented; any Midwestern accent she once had was sloughed off during her time in New York.

"I'm better at rollerblading than ice skating, but it's been a while since I tried either. I figured today was as good a day as any," she muses, pulling off her left shoe and replacing it with an ice skate, and then doing the same with the right foot. She ties the laces tight. No loose ankle support for her.

"Got any holiday plans?"

"A couple," Hayley says, pausing in her shoe changes now that Dodge has reminded her and instead reaching into her purse, pulling out a headband of reindeer antlers and a bright red nose adornment, which she, of course, immediately puts on.

And, of course, she has spares, both of which get set next to Dodge in a quiet offer as she reaches down and starts to pull on her skates. She glances to the side, watching what the more-experienced skater is up to and mimicing those motions. "Probably gonna go down and see the family in a week or so, but they want me here to help with all the winter shows -- you know how finicky the plants get this time of year." Laces tied tight, she stretches her legs and angles the toes down, testing.

"Oh, and remind me when we get back, I got you something. I don't know if you really do Christmas or not, but, I do, so you're getting something, and that's that."

Dodge picks up the headband of reindeer antlers and puts it on without any discussion, but the bright red nose she leaves alone. "There's only one Rudolph," she points out, an explanation for her abstention. Or maybe she just doesn't feel like wearing something on her face. Either way.

"You didn't have to get me anything," she smiles, shaking her head, though the gesture touches her. "But I won't argue," she's quick to add, raising her hand in acquiescence.

She rises to her feet and tests the tension of the laces and the ice skates, making sure neither foot is too wobbly. "Perfect," she decides, and she waves Hayley after her towards the rink entrance. "If you fall, don't fight it. Just bend your knees and let it happen. If you fight it, it's worse," she offers as she steps onto the ice.

"Yeah, okay, Vixen," Hayley says in what may or may not be a playfully cutting remark in her mind, taking the nose and putting it back in her purse afterward.

Then she stands, and, woop, that's harder than it looked, her hand coming out to grip Dodge's shoulder to steady herself on instinct. "I was a kid last time I did this," she admits, taking a few cautious steps once she's steadied and looking satisfied enough to start making her way to the rink.

"You do a lot of this?" she asks.

"Do a lot of what? Falling?" Dodge scratches thoughtfully at the side of her head, dark eyes flicking off to the side and taking in a gaggle of schoolchildren who are driving their chaperone mad, squabbling over who will get what color ice skates. They're all the same color.

"I try not to. But if you mean ice skating," and presumably Hayley does, "Then, no, I haven't been ice skating in at least a couple of years. It's the blind leading the blind," she smirks, winking, letting go of the side of the rink and starting to drift across the ice backwards. She pivots and starts to ice skate in a forward-facing direction; there's absolutely nothing fancy about the way she skates, but it does the job.

Hayley is also watching the schoolchildren, an open grin bright on her face as she takes in their squabbling. She leans in and says to Dodge, "Reminds me of my sisters when they were little," before she nods at the acknowledgement that they are both going into this with Heavy Levels of Danger.

She lets Dodge go first, while she holds the wall nearby. It's not too long after, though, that she takes a tentative step out, then another, her body picking up small amounts of momentum. "Oh, this ain't so bad," she claims as she catches up.

"Not at all," Dodge agrees from a few yards ahead of Hayley, keeping herself steady as she takes long skating strides, careful to dodge around any small children that may wind up in her path -- and plenty do.

"How many sisters do you have?" she wonders back at Hayley.

"Three. All of 'em older, but they always kept the fighting between themselves," Hayley answers Dodge without hesitation. She keeps up her momentum, and nearly crashes into a couple holding hands, but manages to veer to the side just in time.

"How about you? What's your family story? Doing anything for the holiday with them?" she rattles off.

"No siblings," Dodge shakes her head, laughing, looking over her shoulder just in time to see Hayley avoid crashing into that couple. "I think my parents went through it with me and they were like, Yeah, no, that's enough of that."

"And yeah, I'm going to go home for the week of Christmas to New Year's Eve, and then I'll be back here for the big New Year's party," she goes on. "Are you and Paul planning on going?"

"We are, actually! I finally talked him into it," Hayley tells Dodge with clear excitement in her voice, though there was an obvious, sympathetic pout from her at the mention of no siblings. Not something she elaborated on further. "I'm getting sorta tired being cooped up in there all the time, so I'm glad."

What's left unspoken is that Paul has stood her up at least four times now for something like this, and cancelled last minute three other times.

"You going to bring Poe? I need some time with my best friend, after all."

"Bring Poe to the New Year's Party? I'm sure she'd rather walk on glass," Dodge laughs again. "No, no, Poe will grumble outside the party from a distance and then tut-tut at me for getting home late. Now, Koda," she says, bobbing her head in a long nod. "He's a party dog. But I don't think it's a Bring-Your-Familiar kind of soiree," she admits.

She doesn't say anything about Paul coming to the party, just smiles that he's agreed to come. Dodge personally finds Paul a little underwhelming, but she's not the type to drag someone's significant other unless/until they really cross a line, and if Paul has done that, then Hayley hasn't told Dodge about it.

Nothing that Hayley has said that would openly cross lines -- more fights, none as bad as That One, and if Dodge had ever tried to probe Hayley's emotions again, they were usually much the same. Sad. Lonely. Frustrated. It's probably not clear why she's stuck with him to an outsider, when she could almost certainly do so much better.

Paul also, to this day, had not even acknowledged Dodge once in the halls of their apartment when they happened to bump into one another.

"Every party is that kind of party if you just bring your familiar to it," Hayley chides Dodge with a playful tone. "You just have to be brave and be the person who shows up at the party with the amazing puppy. You know I'd be all over him."

A moment of silence, and then, "I just hope he behaves."

It is not clear to Dodge why Hayley stays with Paul, but she keeps that to herself. Attacking someone's significant other has a way of coming across as an attack on the someone, too, and besides: it's none of Dodge's business. If you learn anything living in New York, it's to mind your fucking business.

"I'll keep that in mind," she says instead, addressing the playful chiding with a sleepy tease of a grin. As to him behaving, Dodge asks the obvious: "Who?" Koda? Or does Hayley mean Paul?

Hayley shakes her head, sliding with her skates to a stop near a wall -- or rather, slowing enough that she can grasp the wall and stop, rather than falling. Because she was almost certainly about to fall.

"He gets weird about me drinking, sometimes," she confesses. "His dad's an alcoholic, and I think he worries about me doing something I'll regret a lot. I just want a night where we have fun, so I might just stick to sparkling cider or something."

"Ah," Dodge reacts, that sole syllable doing a lot of heavy lifting. She'll just quietly add 'weirdly controlling due to his own issues' to her list of reasons that Paul doesn't exactly scream partner-material.

"Well, it should be a really fun night," she redirects. "I think there's going to be a drone lights show at midnight." Fireworks are out. Drone light shows are in. "And hopefully you'll get to unwind and have a good time. Any new years resolutions?" she asks, coming to a halt alongside Hayley and resting her hand on the wall.

"He's a good guy, really," Hayley weakly defends Paul to Dodge, but she doesn't offer any kind of defense of the man past that, instead crossing her arms and tapping at her elbow. "I hadn't really thought about it," she admits. "But I think I have a couple, yeah."

She starts ticking off on her fingers. "I want to be a lot more spontaneous. I'm young, and I want to actually live life. Get out more and do things," she decides. "I'm going to climb a mountain," is her next addition. "Maybe go diving in the lake, I hear there's maybe some weird things down there. I want to try making some cool new plants, too." Then, to Dodge, "What about you?"

In the face of Hayley's weak defense, Dodge raises her hands like an innocent bystander. She didn't say anything!

"My new year's resolution is to drink more water," she answers, showing her teeth in a grin. As resolutions go, it's not terribly exciting, and she knows that. "Whenever I aim too high with them, I find myself falling off by the second or third week, or maybe lasting until February. But then it's cold and I don't want to do anything except hole up and be covered in blankets," she whines.

She looks down and lifts her heel, chips at the ice with the front of her skate. "You wanna race?" she asks, which is by no means a good idea.

Hayley balls her hand up into a fist and lightly strikes Dodge's upper arm, rolling her eyes at the resolution she hears. "You should be drinking water anyway! It's good for you!" she exclaims in exasperation.

But she had also just said she wanted to be more spontaneous, and so when Dodge asks her that, she answers with, "Threetwoonego!" and is already taking off. To where? Who can be sure!

"Wait, hey!" Dodge hardly has time to form a coherent thought before Hayley is taking off, so she starts sprinting after her, headed in the same general direction--towards the other end of the rink.

She has to maneuver around a small child and nearly plows into a mother who is holding her baby on the ice for reasons Dodge doesn't have the time to fathom, and finally catches up on Hayley's headstart, neck and neck in a dead heat for the final stretch of the ice before she pulls off a very thin victory.

Unfortunately, they didn't exactly determine where the finish line is, so winning just involves slamming into the ice rink wall with an unceremonious thud.

The only reason Hayley really had any chance is because she had given herself that head start, and now, that head start is fading with every step. She's doing her best, but she is from the Texas/Louisiana border and the last thing, the very last thing that is around for her to practice with is ice.

All that to say, it's no shock to her when Dodge pulls ahead when she swerves too hard to avoid a BABY, why is there a baby on the ice, and tries to right herself.

That's enough for her to lose control. Her feet start moving apart from each other, and she tries to take Dodge's advice and just fall -- which leads to her skidding right across the last few feet and slamming into Dodge's lower half from behind.

But, any worry that she's hurt is dispelled by her bright laughter.

Dodge doesn't notice Hayley falling in those final few sprinted yards, but she certainly notices it when Hayley plows into the back of her legs, taking her right off her feet.

She hits the ice with a low "oof!" and just lies there for a moment, mildly dazed (though she fortunately did not hit the back of her head). But then she's laughing, too, and after she catches her breath, she pushes up into a seated position and struggles back up to her feet, which is a bit more of a trick on the ice -- but she manages.

"Damn, stakes," she says, snapping her fingers. "I should have picked stakes. Ah well. The thrill of victory and bragging rights will have to be enough."

"You should have picked stakes!" Hayley cackles, reaching up to try to pull herself up, failing, and just laying there for a solid moment on the cold ice, before following Dodge back to standing. "Too late for that. You're just going to have to be happy with being better than me."

She stretches out a leg, winces slightly, then asks, "Break to eat a crappy hot dog, my treat?"

"I accept a crappy hot dog as a champion's token and symbol of your noble defeat," Dodge quips, reaching for the ice wall to steady herself.

"You alright there?" she asks on noticing Hayley's wince.

"Yeah, it's just going to be a bit of a bruise, I think, but I'm tough," Hayley says as she shakes her leg out a bit, then steps off the ice just a touch gingerly, looking much more stable once she is off the slippery surface.

A quick breath, then she asks, "How do you do your hot dogs? Keep in mind that there -is- a correct answer, and that I'm probably going to disappoint you when I tell you mine," she intones as they head toward the concession stand.

The rubbery mat outside the ice rink is soft and pliable, easy for skates to sink into so people can walk through the concessions area even still laced up for the ice. So Dodge doesn't bother to remove hers yet. She's only just started skating!

"With mustard and ketchup, or with relish if it's on hand," she answers like she couldn't possibly fathom a different answer. "Now break my heart and tell me how you ruin America's favorite artery-clogging snack."

"Oh, well, according to the great people of Chicago, you have committed the cardinal hot dog sin," Hayley informs Dodge, Very Serious, a hand going to her shoulder in consolation. "For never shall ketchup touch a wiener in the Windy City, so sayeth Obama."

She can't keep a straight face for long doing that, and instead pivots to her own. "Chili, cheese and onions," she explains. "Nothing that horrific."

"Obama was a great president but he can keep his hot dog wisdom to himself," Dodge decides, and she looks thoroughly underwhelmed by Hayley's proclamation of her preferred hot dog accoutrements.

"What? That's so inoffensive, that's nothing. Onions, though, really?" she adds in afterthought.

"I had a friend from Chicago who would give me crap every time," Hayley explains. "The real issue, though, is no one up north knows how to do chili. Beans! In chili!" This, it seems, is the thing that she draws the line at. "Onions on hot dogs are good," she insists. "White ones, diced. Try it sometime."

Meat tubes and garnishes acquired, she finds a spot where they can both sit and relax, turning to watch the people out on the rink. "There's a rink in this place called the Woodlands, we went a couple times, but it was almost a two hour drive. Something you only really did for a big party or whatnot."

Dodge settles in beside Hayley and watches the people out on the ice; people-watching is one of her very favorite activities, whether inside or outside the park, and she's never sorry for an opportunity to do just that.

"I bet caramelized wouldn't be bad," she muses, still hung up on the notion of onions on hot dogs. "There was an ice skating rink about fifteen minutes from where I grew up, just outside Indianapolis. It was a popular place to hang out. And there's plenty of them in New York. Wollman, Rockefeller, Chelsea Piers. But they never had the same charm."

"This is nice," Hayley agrees. "Especially this time of year. I'm glad I caught you here," she adds, taking a bite, and then staining copious napkins to recover after it as she watches a bunch of kids form a line by linking hands, inevitably separating with crashes and laughter the moment they hit a curve.

"That's what it's about," she says, motioning to the kids. "This whole place, really. Sure, there's all the weird junk, but being able to show them all that the world really is a magical place, and seeing their wonder? I don't know. Gives me hope that they'll shepherd this world a little better than we've been doing so far."

Dodge turns her head and looks over at Hayley's pronouncement, informing her blandly, "Well, that's adorable." She smiles and turns back to her hot dog, taking another bite and swallowing it before she continues.

"But you're not wrong. The joy never gets old, you know?" She takes another bite. "So, do you have any favorite places in the park to people-watch? I have a top ten list."

"What?" Hayley asks, looking right back at Dodge and not even seeming to understand for a moment that it's herself being referred to as adorable. She even looks over her shoulder to see if she missed something, then back.

But rather than linger on that, she jumps on the question. "I see so many cute couples in the gardens. Mostly I'm up by the castle, or in the botanicals, and -- I don't know, I think the romantic mood gets to them. You see a lot of teenagers with their first crushes, or the grandmas and grandpas bringing their grandkids and falling in love with each other all over again." A beat, and a blush, "Though it ain't always so wholesome," she admits. "And then we have to shoo them back to their rooms. What are your spots?"

"Oh, no, not shoo-ing duty," Dodge reacts, laughing at the prospect of Hayley having to chase off horny teenagers from her beloved foliage.

"My number six favorite spot, right now, is the Midway," she reveals, though that's all she reveals. "The others are in a state of flux due to the holidays, but that one is pinned down. Like this place, this is probably eighth or ninth, depending on the day. I'll text you the full list and you can let me know how you'd rank them," she offers.

"Sometimes, if I'm just not in the mood to deal with it, I just grow thorns around them real thick and walk away," Hayley admits to Dodge, letting her fill in the blanks for what the next events would be.

"You text me the spots, and if there's any I don't really know good, I'll check them out," she decides agreeably. "Do you ever take pictures of them?" she wonders to Dodge. "I don't mean that in like a creepy way. Candid photos, though, I bet you could make a buck off of good ones."

Dodge laughs brightly at Hayley's admission, then finishes her hot dog and pitches the trash into a nearby receptacle.

"It is literally part of my job to take pictures of people in the park," she reminds the blonde. "Anything that marketing can use, I've got an excuse for, and that's a pretty broad brush to paint with."

"Well, text me some of those, then!" Hayley insists as she finishes as well, wiping her face and fingers clean and tossing the napkin in the trash after. "Also, I meant to ask you, do you want me to grow any flowers in particular for you?"

Dodge cants her head at an inquisitive angle when Hayley asks her that question, blinking. "You don't have to do that," she starts to say, but she well-knows that Hayley will do it anyway.

"But let me answer your question with another question," she says, appeasing. "What is your favorite flower?"

"Lilies," Hayley answers Dodge without hesitation. "I really love orchids, too, but lilies smell so great, and they add so much color and life to everything. Oh! And there's this little flower that grew up in Washington that I saw, they're called bleeding hearts. I don't know," she says, arms crossing and tone going a little quieter. "I really liked them. But I would live in a jungle if I could get away with it, have all sorts everywhere."

"Bleeding hearts is such a metal name for a flower," Dodge replies. "And those, then. Lilies," she decides with a little nod of her head as if yes, that settles it. "Grow those."

"Okay!" Hayley chirps, clearly excited. "You can't have cats around them, but you let me know if you want to get one and I'll figure out a way to alter them so they don't make the same kind of pollen."

She's in plant nerd info dump mode now. "Bleeding hearts have like, an arc-shaped stem and these really tiny, delicate leaves, and each flower is about the size of the last bit of my pinky. But they're these gorgeous pink or purple blooms, and they do look a little like broken hearts. I'll grow you some of those, too!" she instantly decides.

"I don't have any cats," Dodge smiles, shaking her head. "But thank you for the warning, I didn't actually know that."

As Hayley drops deep into nerd mode, Dodge smiles and chuckles softly, charmed by it all. "Okay," she graciously accepts the offer of yes, also bleeding hearts. "If you want, I can photograph your favorites and get you prints of them to hang in your apartment."

"They're deathly allergic. Even a couple bits of pollen can be bad. It's why they can't have garlic or onions, either. It destroys their blood." Hayley shakes her head sadly at that, but seems excited anyway -- after all, Dodge has no cats -- right until the mention of 'hang them up in her apartment' comes up, and it's like her excitement hits a brick wall and just scatters away.

"Yeah," she says after a moment, looking back out toward the ring, her voice back to its normal level. "That sounds nice, I'd really love to have some prints like that up and around."

Dodge catches her lower lip under her teeth and glances sidelong at Hayley when her excitement peters off like that, and, well, she can help it but she also can't help it (because of curiosity) so she reaches out through the ether and just very gently unfolds the top layer of the blonde's emotional disposition, revealing longing and fear and hope, all smothered in bitterness and resentment.

She regards Hayley for another moment, newly appreciating the reaction she got, and decides to forge ahead anyway. "Everything okay?"

Hayley doesn't seem to notice her emotions being laid bare like that, if that even is a thing she can, but when asked the question, she sighs a long sigh and shakes her head. "It's Christmas. I don't want to talk about it," she says after a moment.

That lasts all of one moment.

Then she's leaning against the railing, looking out into the rink again. "He's being a real pill again lately. I wanted to do some decorating for the holiday, and he went into this whole spiel about how it's just corporations twisting my arm making me want all this, and couldn't we just celebrate without it?" She looks aside to Dodge. "Even getting the tree was a struggle. I don't know why I bother, sometimes. I'm sure he'd find some way to tear down your pictures, too."

"Gee, you make him sound so fun..." Dodge trails off, giving Hayley a little look.

"If you want to decorate, you should be able to decorate," she says plainly. "Paul sounds like a Grade A stick in the mud. He doesn't do fun shit with you, he flirts with other girls and basically told you he won't stop, he won't even let you put up decorations in your own home, like--what are you doing, Hayley?" she emphasizes, the rebuke coming out all at once. "What are you doing? Why?"

Hayley neither seems offended or bothered by the rebuke, beyond an initial, small wince at it, and she tightens in on herself before she lets out a long sigh. "It used to be good," she says finally. "Real good. When we first met," she explains. "We'd do all sorts of things, and he -- you know I never dated before him, right?"

She had definitely left that part out.

"I really thought he was the one, and for a while, he was. I even had this dream that -- no, that's stupid, nevermind," she pivots away from that particular bit of knowledge for now.

"Mama basically made me promise that if I moved out here with him, if I lived with him, I would try to stick it out. No matter what. Said she knew for a fact he wanted to marry me, and that's the only reason she was even allowing it."

"I did not know that but it makes sense, in the grander scheme of things," Dodge murmurs. "Look, you do you, okay? But you prickle whenever Paul is even brought up, nine times out of ten. Hearing his name doesn't make you smile, it seems to piss you off. And your Mama isn't the one who has to live with that," she adds.

"So--" she raises her shoulders. "I don't know. But after nine months of hearing how shitty your boyfriend is, who gives a damn if he wants to marry you? Who cares? He doesn't act like it."

Hayley is quiet for a long time, then nods her head slowly. "You're probably right," she admits softly. "I'm just... scared. I've never lived on my own, and I know there's a good guy inside of him still. I just have to figure out how to bring it back." She rubs at her face with both hands, thumbs brushing moisture away from her eyes.

"I'm going to just grit my teeth and make it through the holidays, then I think I need to talk with him after. Make some things clear."

Dodge reaches out an arm and loops it around Hayley's shoulders, pulling her into a side-hug. "It's okay to be scared," she mumbles quietly. "But you should. You should talk with him. Tell him to cut the shit," she says, though she says it in a consoling kind of way.

Hayley lets herself be pulled in, then asks, quietly, "If he flakes on New Year's, can I spend it with you, or is your date going to be upset about that?"

"No, my date will not be upset about that, for a couple of reasons: one, that's not a normal thing to get upset about. Two, my date is imaginary," Dodge adds, laughing softly at the second part. "It's a solo act out here, babe. No date."

Smiling to herself at that, Hayley says, "I'm sure he'll be there and it won't even matter, but thank you. And I don't get that," she adds. "If I were a single guy, I would be all over you." She straightens up, then motions to the rink. "Round two?"