All Dressed Up [Arc 16]

[ARC 16: ALL DRESSED UP]

Marisa took a sip from her drink in a lesbian bar and had time to remember a few things from her past. Matoi had been sick with a sort of host flu for the entire week, so she had quarantined herself, Mia was helping Serena with Naomi, and Samuel with... whoever Kate's protege was, she figured. She thought of when she was middle-school and mocked by Corabitch, as Marisa called her, for wearing hand-me-downs, and how she later confronted her in highschool.

Corabeth came from a family that owned a line of rent-to-own furniture stores, and reflected her parents in many ways. She seemed a young prodigy, for she was always being praised by her teachers and could usually be seen surrounded by other upper-middle-class children. Perception is reality to many, and rarely do they venture beyond it. The general asskissery lathered upon her was enough to solidify her position as a smart student, along with her ability to spout any number of historical facts. She could even recite pi to a dozen places as she still wore braces.

Of course, she had no real intelligence; she was merely best able to repeat whatever her parents were forcing her into her. If you haven't met these types, you will eventually: as adults they are ready to pontificate on a great number of topics, but press them on any one in particular and they scurry, agitated. Their superiority complex extends up until they are challenged; then they screech. It's odd, because one would expect if they hope to maintain their ego, then they can't afford to open themselves up.

But to Marisa, she was a bitch who always had the best clothes, cars, and likely girls. The chance to confront her again was not one normally afforded to her, but for future Urasaria students, each state has one middleschool & highschool they are required to attend, and if a family lives too far away, the government provides transportation for their future employees. Once their Revenant activates, they are taught separately from the civilian population, sometimes at separate times, and while most states have only a few host students, New York (as the academy's main state) has a few dozen.

Thus before students begin their first-year at Urasaria, there is the usual gossip, violence, romance and rivalries that had frequently led Marisa, when she was mentoring Mia, to point certain people out and say: "Don't go near them, okay?"

"Er, alright." Mia would say. "Why?"

Marisa would frown. "I don't remember why, but I just don't like them."

Before the policy of separation was adopted, the little assholes of host students would wreak numerous pranks & destructions upon each other -- especially civilian students. Legends spread fast in those decades, and some legendary in their stupidity.

There was once a teenager in the 90s, who... yes, he was male. He often used his mind control Revenant to make civilian kids bark or grab dog turds off the side of the road, or stick their tongues to streetpoles in winter. Mostly an egghead otherwise, he nonetheless was once fucked with in his chemistry class; the teacher was out, and while he studied, a voice approached him, flipped his textbook up in his face, then laughed in to it.

"Hey, what the fuck are you reading for, dumbass? You see anybody else here with their head in a fucking book?"

The host kid gave him a look of disdain and went back to reading, so the civilian flipped the textbook in to his face again and continued: "You thinking about Cindy? Yeah, I bet you are. She sees how you've been looking at her lately. Well, she's fucking me now. Isn't that something, how she's fucking me instead of you? You've got your superpowers and shit, but when it comes down to it you're just some fucking little queer who tugs his dick and-"

-the host kid grabbed him by the throat and his breath died in a tiny gasp. Standing from his chair, he kept his grip on the other kid the entire time as he began to choke and sputrer. What has not been mentioned yet is that the host kid was far taller than the other, so the civilian kid was flailing like a spider that had just been caught, a mass of writhing limbs that kicked and punched at something twice its size.

He was beginning to scream for help, which disappeared in to the hallway outside as the host kid took him there, forced open a locked locker with his free hand, set the civilian's head in to it, grabbed the door and began slamming and slamming it shut. His legs writhed as streams of blood ran down the ventilation of the lower row of lockers, then eventually were limp. As a man might grab a wishbone, the host kid picked up both of his legs, pulled him out of the locker, then kicked him in the back with such force it bent his thighs forward over his knees, with a *crunch* like the sound of biting in to a candy-bar.

This was the first sign of the permanent paralysis the host kid later learned he had inflicted on this little ingrate who he didn't even know the name of. Now that he was aware everyone in class watching from the doorway behind him, all he thought to do was unzip his own pants, lower the front slightly, and - you get the rest.

Magnus was never punished for this. It's important to remember this was back in a time where Los Angeles had just been nuked, the population was/is clueless on *what* Revenants can actually do, and legislation giving Urasaria students legal immunity was about to pass. The civilian's parents considered sueing his parents for medical damages or the school for allowing it to happen, but no lawyer would take a case that could've ended with them being forced to munch on turds.

This entire episode caught a senior host-girl's ear, who was attracted by the thought of a boy -- a true man -- so willing to assert his existence in life. When later assigned as Magnus's mentor, she would ask if he had really paralyzed someone half his size, and he simply told her: yes.

Thus the romantic beginning to Mia's raison d'etre. His teenage years were marked by physicality mellowed by later scientific interest, but he was always somebody who found the walls of life and punched and punched at them until his knuckles cracked and bled.

But to return to the Corabeth, the immiseration of families and putrescence of spirit that had created their dynasty's wealth. Unlike a family like Marisa's, she had access to private tutors for any difficulties in her classes, and that she was rarely needed to contribute around the house allowed her more time for extracurriculars and the cultivation of professional connections. Through no work of their own, most rich children would stay ahead as long as they lived.

One day,, she was speaking to a friend outside of her class when a voice approached from over her shoulder and said: "Hey, bitch!"

She turned and saw the source as a 14-year-old Marisa Gwynvere & Boudoir, that continued: "Remember me? I'm a host now. Not so raggedy now, huh?"

Corabeth recognized her, her new Revenant, and her own need to not show any of this recognition so her ass could remain un-pulped. "I'm… sorry, do I know you?"

Marisa blinked. "What? Yeah, you know me! And you're gonna know my new Revenant, too, because when I punch you it'll be two hits. I'll hit you and you'll hit the ground."

"I really don't think I know you, I think you're confusing me with someone else." Corabeth smiled, quickly stepping past her. "But, I- you should get some matching shoes for that rainbow dress!"

And so Marisa simply stood there as Corabeth walked past her, having just narrowly avoided being given a face that would have looked like it caught on fire & was put out by an axe.

By the next week, Corabeth resumed mocking the Marisas of the world and their circumstances, and her inflated sense of self-worth would continue throughout her life; none of the various businessmen or upper-middle-class socialites had the acumen or care to call her on her fraud. She was in essence the type who stiffs their workers yet gives to charity; she steals from the poor and gives to the poorer.

These were things Marisa understood later in life, but for now, she stood annoyed, then ran to catch her fifth period with the other hosts. After school, she would steal something to eat with her friends, then watch them walk into walls and disappear home. Marisa wouldn't have trusted that government Revenant if it paid her, so she always swung home with Boudoir and came home after her older, civilian sister Penelope.

They lived in a rural neighborhood in Upstate New York a few hours from Urasaria. In Marisa's memory, the neighborhood always had a nascent gray filter placed over it, overlaying the drip of December rains that froze into snowflakes and the icicles that hung from the porch awnings. Had she ever seen 'Radio Days', the introductory scene where the narrator monologues over the overcast rain of Rockaway Beach would have matched her mind's image, for the same reason as the narrator: this was it as its most beautiful, and how she remembered it.

Many times, she would swing into the neighborhood and see from the backyards rise streams of smoke, which in the winter would be drawn through the chilly air and into the icicles gathered on the power lines. The source of the smoke was those burning their trash to save money on disposal, or heating in the winter & spring. She had once saved someone's home after they forgot to put out their fire and went to bed, and she needed to fire a barrage of Boudoir-balls into the developed blaze. For the aversion of commotion, she was treated to the elderly man who lived there walking out of the house, yawning, patting her on her 14-year-old hair, and giving her $5.36.

She threw the quarter, dime, and penny back at him as he walked back into the house, saw them descending into the snow, then quickly scooped them back up. She went back over to her home, where her mother and father would usually be engaged in an argument:

"You think Boar's Head has better turkey than Hillshire Farm's? Well, here's what I'll do. I'll go out and buy both, and we'll ask our daughters what they think of-"

"God, now you've gotta get them involved in it? I swear, I'm trying to keep this place from becoming some pigsty and all you're worried about is what Marisa and Penelope think about your goddamn cold cuts. We shouldn't be buying that crap for them, either, it's fattening."

"Fattening? What, now you're trying to make them lose weight? Maybe if they were your fat sister Edna's kids, but they can't put ten pounds on between the two of 'em."

"Yeah, well they're your kids, too, and looking at you, maybe they should be worried. I don't give two shits or a lollipop if *you* want to treat your body like crap, but..."

Marisa usually walked in just as her father was gaining the upper hand in this inane bullshit. It's human nature to, when seeing two men fighting, to cheer for the smaller man; thus she always sided with her mother in sitcom characters, peaches versus pears, and which brands of frozen ice were better. Not ice cream -- ice cubes.

She saw her father as someone who enjoyed busting the metaphorical balls of most women, like most men, and not only that but felt entitled to it. She felt women were more naturally attuned to empathy, and her growing awareness of her own lesbianism meant she never needed to excuse men's behavior nor settle for it. Many a times as she aged, she saw women debase themselves for detestable men, simply because they could not be alone. Goodness, as she knew, had no correlation with happiness.

She never realized her mother was the one starting those arguments.

Her father was the primary breadwinner for the family, and when he would work late the girls talked to their mother as they watched television together. Their mother would sit on the couch and have Marisa seated below her, checking Marisa's hair for lice and if she needed to cut it again soon. Inevitably Marisa would ask why she put up with him.

"Yeah, mom." said Penelope. "We know you could do better than him. I mean, who gets in to arguments about whether the Pacific's bigger than the Atlantic?"

"Well, I had a bit to do with that one." muttered their mother. "God, Marisa, your hair's getting too long again. But girls, there's a little thing called 'compromise'. You know how your Aunt Edna's never gotten married, and she's got a new boyfriend every time we see her?"

"Yeah, but that's because she's ugly." said Marisa. Penelope giggled.

"Well, I don't want to hear you saying that around her, even if it is true." said their mother. "But when you start getting older and looking up to see what your life is like, you start making excuses for people. Maybe I do it a little more than I should, but your father's got a job, he mostly treats me right, and we've got you two to worry about. And I know you don't understand that, just like how when I was your age, I wanted to marry someone who was tall and had money and a full head of hair." She looked to the door. "I struck out on all three of those. Well, not the third one, but it's on the wrong head."

Penelope and Marisa just looked at each other.

Penelope was four years older, and when they would eavesdrop on their parents' conversation, usually concerning their debts or finances, she would translate the concepts for young Marisa. They developed their own bizarre telepathy and incomprehensible in-jokes, like saying "oatmeal and applesauce" whenever an uncomfortable topic came up at the dinner table. It was as if their mother's genetics had simply been split between the two minds; albeit the ones of beauty went to Marisa.

And while some readers may cringe at how continually Marisa's beauty has been propounded, physical attractiveness has much to do with how one is treated and subsequently views others; a sexy lunatic at least has the option of being treated well, whereas an ugly bitch is just a *bitch*. Some adults never realize that relationships are not (entirely) about bodies but minds, and so too it was with the teenage girls who pursued Marisa intensely. These early years of dating were stamped by the same issues she had later in life, mostly that none wished to know well the creature contained within the chased silhouette, and in the perfectionism of her own choices in companions. If she was with a civilian girl and showing her where she lived, she would often look over, hoping they would make some comment about it being a dump or shithole. Though it be perhaps a bit Freudian, she likely was attempting to rob her opportunity with Corabeth back from fate's ever-ambivalent hands.

The family's financial troubles lessened after Boudoir's activation, for despite their misinterpretation of any registered host having legal immunity, no civilian officer knew the relevant statute and few students arrested thieves. She stole especially in the winter, whose dryness caused her skin to break out and need new skincare products. The icicles would return to their power lines, and the first time she attempted to swing home using these anchors, she missed with Boudoir's strand, impaled a nearby power line and put the entire neighborhood in a blackout, then fell and busted her ass on the ice.

She needed to be brought to Urasaria for healing.

So afterwards she ran home from school, and one afternoon she felt something crunch underneath her boots and stopped on a rime. It had been a dead beetle, and using a Boudoir-knife, she scraped it off and was reminded of a conversation she overheard from a few boys recently, about whether taking a shit was a good feeling or the expulsion of one bad. They even began to argue over this shit, but allow a mere digression.

One can certainly argue that if one has an addiction, it certainly may not be good, but is it not relatively good via sublimating a worse feeling? If one believes themselves to be greater than they are, even convinces themselves of it, is it good or does it hide away their own internal bereftness? What is the pleasure to shit on company time? Does it not act as a shield from reality? One would certainly not be able to go on living, without taking their own various shits.

One such shit was the one Marisa took around Christmastime, in between making thick Boudoir-sweaters & jackets, and setting up a fireplace using Boudoir's pieces. It added a sense of meaning to her, memories she could enjoy, and forget their reasons for existence had been that Christmas sucks when you're poor.

Now to Samuel's situation as a young male host in southern Texas.

The typical age of Revenant activation is 12-14. Some events can trigger this earlier, and such it was for Samuel, whose armor grew quickly from when it was first summoned at 10 years old. Like Magnus he was gifted a size befitting a boy above his years, and was afforded a level of importance as he became a teenager. No longer did civilian students try to fuck with host students, either, and so Samuel's views of bullying were more influenced by what he saw than what he experienced.

It has already been seen how Samuel does not fit with many of Urasaria's other men. In truth, most individuals will end up merely as the most probable version of themselves they could be; this is why systemic racism and poverty continues to exist despite the anecdote of successful individuals; yet when the dice of men Samuel's age were rolled, his were loaded with lead. He was always respectful with women, walked girls home from class for their protection, and the other five hosts in his class were lesbians; there was no potential for lust there.

Though there was a sister of a civilian girl he walked home: he usually visited her if he needed good emotion in his system.

His mother died shortly after birth, and for much of his early years he was taken care of by his Aunt Cassidy. He remembered little of her.

After Outcast activated and he was officially registered as a future student, his father began a habit where, while pumping gas at Buc-ee's, he would ask Samuel to go into the store with him and leave with whatever sweets & salts he liked; his father would pay for them, so he said. Soon, his father entrusted him to stay home alone, after a falling out he had with Aunt Cassidy. They had no cable where they lived, so Samuel would play outside, climbing trees and all manner of activity unholy to contemporary suburban parents.

But there was also a nearby shopkeeper who frequently invited Samuel to stay in his store after school, and would affectionately pat his hair while remarking how quickly he was growing for his age; so perhaps progress is good.

The Poundstone family did not live far from the host-accepting highschool he later attended, so his father suggested he walk there on his own; there really was little worry with a host teenager, for they cannot get themselves killed doing stupid shit *until* they attend Urasaria. This allowed his father to work more hours as a roofer, and when they could come home at the same time, they would cut the calluses off their feet together.

On the weekends, he brought Samuel to the sites he worked, and inevitably one of his co-workers would have packed too heavy a lunch and offer the rest to him while his father worked. Samuel himself could show off his Outcast-given strength by transporting wheelbarrows of smooth river rocks to where they would cover the membranes of roofs, and was satisfied to find this grew on his hands the same layer of calluses as his father's.

They seemed to be a man's hands to Samuel, and so he never developed the complexes so associated with partially formed masculinity. This callus gained from hard honest work inured him to lashing out when taunted in later years, when he received jeers from other male students for debasing himself by working under President Matoi, who was generally assumed to be hiding something long & thick under her trenchcoat. He knew actual superiority needed not be shown or boasted, but was an immanent thing to a person.

One such trait stamped on Samuel's essence is his form of 'host psychopathy' since he was thirteen years old; mostly the numbness to violence & gore a Revenant gives. His superbacterial strength and penance for violence presented a problem, one he needed to give its due, and his father suggested a nearby scrapyard where Samuel could take his aggression out on whatever he found there. He could often be found there, generally going apeshit on the half-broken cars he found.

Once he heard a car pull up and saw two men wearing suits & ties stepping out. They looked at him with disdain, even condescension, like he was some fucking lunatic. It had confused Samuel for a long while why, for it persisted even after he explained he was a Urasaria student and showed them his Revenant. He showed them a move he had devised where he could grab a dryer in both hands and twist the two halves off like the cap of a soda: all this succeeded in doing was in causing the two to slowly back away and run back to their car.

Samuel chalked it up to the fear some civilians have of students, and before any further revelation, burped these thoughts out and returned to his wrestling with household appliances. He had learned such moves from his father's VHS tapes of Jim Crockett Promotions, which ran around World Championship Wrestling back in the 80s & 90s. He loved the brute violence & psychotic outsiderness someone like Dr. Death Steve Williams projected, and of course he knew all the insider terms: the dark matches that never made television, the jobbers, heels and babyfaces.

So, the world of fake violence allowed Samuel to live fantasy rather than actualize it for now. He immediately wished to emulate the 'Russian Nightmare' Nikita Koloff, for such a hulking man projected the aura of menace he wished to have as a student. By all accounts, obviously, Samuel never lived up to this except in his fights; he oftentimes found himself with more empathy on campus than most other men, whether it be towards women, drug addicts or the homeless all students occasionally run across. That Matoi could vouch for him with other lesbians obviously helped; he is generally the only man she likes.

His father was proud that Samuel never developed any of the typical problems associated with men & single parenthood, yet Samuel did sometimes feel guilty. There was a kid in the civilian classes Samuel knew was being bullied; something he rarely saw directly, but he could tell just from the way that when people said the last name Scaglioni, they removed the Sc- and prefixed it with an F-.

Samuel regretted not being of steel enough character to befriend him, and while he had considered intimidating these bullies using Outcast, he was aware of his own desire for violence and decided it best not to fuck with a situation like this. What he most remembered of this kid was one afternoon when a few other kids passed by their victim, and one made a comment like: "Hey Faglioni, you gonna walk back home to Cooper?"

It was then that Samuel could think back to the day with the landfill and realized that the eyes of his interlopers had not taken him in apart from the stink that surrounded him. He felt not only a sense of embarrassment & shame, he felt ignorant, and he despised it. Shortly after, he realized the purpose of many of the anecdotes relayed earlier - and to someone that age, the apex of knowledge was Plato & Aristotle & other philosophers he could barely name at the time, but had picked up from his classes.

Thus began Samuel's interest in philosophy, and particularly Stoicism, that for some time ould comfort him in that regardless of his financial lot in life, his own virtue could be cultivated & reason would inevitably prevail.

For some time, yes, he was the annoying teenager just beginning to think his way through the world. Perhaps you know the type: he often loves bad philosophers like Ayn Rand or the distorted versions of Nietzsche. Philosophy frequently observes the world to be selfishly pointless & cruel and says it is the natural outcome of the twisted wood from which man is carved, and proclaim this as everlasting truths, which in actuality are nothing but banal and complacent tautologies.

Yet there does still exist the question of why needs and existing institutions so often conflict. Were they in alignment, there would be no need to inquire in to them as Samuel did. Samuel reconciled it by means of logic. Knowledge is useful, of course, but mere possession cannot solve worldly issues.

Just around this time, Penelope was showing Marisa a newspaper she had seen a few days ago. "You see this?"

"No. Why, what's special about it?"

"It's a host who robbed some bank, and they said the students didn't kill him. Isn't that weird?"

Marisa shrugged. She looked up and saw that her sister's eyes were on the newspaper for a few seconds more, then seemed to give Marisa a look of unplumbable disdain. As with Samuel, it would take time before she knew why this was. It was summer then, which part of Marisa enjoyed for being able to wear Boudoir as a tank-top & shorts, but part of her disliked for, well-

"Hey, sweetheart, you got any milk for me in those tits?"

It's interesting how one can read newspapers of supposed hidden pedophile rings, while a teenage girl like Marisa could easily point out three on a typical walk home.

From the sidewalk she was standing on, a rainbow glove appeared on her right hand, and a fabric bullet shot out of it that pierced his gas tank & soaked all of the liquid. He realized immediately she was a host and ducked his head down, repeatedly trying to drive away, so Marisa laughed as she listened to the scrape of the engine.

This was when, like Samuel, Marisa was also growing in to her Revenant, and so she thought of how easy it would be to rip his head out of the window while leaving his torso inside. She wanted to maim him and torture him and murder him all at once. Unlike how that very description was used previously with Saya & Henry, however, for Marisa this passed as dully as the annoyance she had towards scraping the pieces of beetle off of her shoes, which she thought of again as she ripped a Boudoir-tissue out of her dress, emptied her stuffy nose & bad feeling in to it, then flung it to the side as she swung her way home.

By the time she was 16, her sister had been in the workforce for a few years as a housekeeper at a local nursing home. This provided some relief for the family's finances as their father aged and could not work as much as he once had, as well as their mother's growing medical problems. That Marisa was fully willing to steal for her family (and quite efficient at it, to where ten local stores had her picture up captioned: 'Don't bother her.'), also helped matters.

Penelope would still often come home and complain about her job to Marisa; whether it was about coworkers whose shift she was required to cover, bosses, her pay or what she was asked to clean up did not matter, for it was the talk that did. One such evening, Marisa was sitting in her room and watching online videos when she heard her sister come home from work, and Marisa shouted out to her: "Hey, Penelope, can you get me a soda out of the fridge?"

Penelope did not respond, so Marisa shouted it again, and Penelope soon came in to her room with a soda. Marisa extended her Boudoir-gloved hand out and Penelope handed the soda to her, looking at the rainbow as Marisa cracked it open.

Penelope said: "You know, I hope you realize how fucking lucky you are. You've never got to worry about being overworked or your boss trying to get you to do sick shit for him. Just because of that Revenant, you never have to work a job nobody else wants. I've been a good person all my life and now all I get for it is being treated like I'm some fucking robot."

She left the room and left Marisa there, holding the soda.

Their relationship from then-on became tilted, both in that Penelope would generally come home and exact similar rants upon her sister, and in that Marisa no longer spoke to or relied on her sister as much as she once had. She was thankfully not at an age where this could permanently affect her psyche, and sometimes forgot about it even as she entered Urasaria, which Penelope had seen her off to.

But a funk had developed, one that lingered between them where neither wanted to be the first to fall in to the stink. They would say hi and shit if they saw each other around town or if Marisa was out on a nearby investigation, but that was all. Marisa continued to steal for them & drop off goods at her old household when she could, and she generally favored entertainment items, for as she told Mia at their first meeting: "I just hate that they can't fully enjoy life."

And if one wonders why depression rates are so high in a time of great wealth, one need only look at Marisa, Marisa she is, who still was able to figure why. Human need is a historically conditioned desire; the world of wealth increases, yet so too does one's sense of lack. So too it was with Penelope, whose meager earnings shaved pieces of herself off like the deterioration of a long-running machine.

Over the next years, Penelope would move in to her own apartment and continue at the same type of jobs, and she would never see the inside of the middle-class outside of the house calls sometimes made of her. She was home for when Marisa visited her family for Thanksgiving earlier this year, and the fashionista was surprised to see Penelope wearing a silver cross necklace, who laughed and told her that her boyfriend bought it for her.

Marisa blinked. "Uh, that wasn't what I was surprised about. Since when were you religious?"

"Marisa, can you come in here and help us set the table?" said her mother from the dining room.

Marisa stood up, then felt guilty as her sister waved her down and went in instead. She sat on the couch for a few minutes, then was called to sit down with the others.

"Like I was just telling mom, I started after I met this man who lives in the same complex as me. I'm sorry he wasn't able to come, but he's been so busy lately volunteering with our church, and the food bank, and... you know, with the winter coming up and all. You remember the one I'm talking about, right, Marisa? And, alright, yes, I know all of it sounds a bit silly, and I thought it was ridiculous at first, too, the way he would say grace before we had dinner and all. But I eventually started actually listening to what he was saying, and... I don't know, something clicked for me. I just needed a reason for things to be the way they are, you know? I'm more mature, now, I couldn't just keep viewing the world as this empty, pitiless thing without any higher power in it."

Marisa shrugged. "I guess."

"Well, hey, so long as you ain't going around trying to convert people." said their father.

Their mother cut in to her ham. "Oh, will you stop it. She's trying to tell us something personal, and you've always got to cut in with your snide comments."

"Snide comments? Snide comments? Penelope, did I sound like I was being snide to you?"

"No, but you sure implied it." said their mother. "What's with you? Why've you always got to cut in front of somebody when they're happy?"

Marisa and Penelope looked at each other.

Their father said: "I am happy for it, Christ. Sorry, should I not use his name in vain? That's all I was saying. I just didn't know if she was going to be one of those - Marisa, what's that word? You were always the smart one. Someone who goes on the television, and..."

"Uh, televangelical?"

"That's right. I don't want her being one of those types like that Jerry Falwell. He's a nut, that guy. Or was, maybe he's up in Hell where he belongs."

"Well, I can tell you I won't be getting a television show any time soon." said Penelope. "Marisa, maybe, but not me."

"Well, maybe this neighborhood could use a bit of God in to it." said their mother. She sniffed. "Oh, and there it is, just in time for the winter."

Marisa sniffed. "The trash?"

"Ain't nobody burning their trash on Thanksgiving." said their father. "You're smelling things that ain't there. Marisa, too. Marisa, honey, the last time someone in this neighborhood burned anything was back with that time when you had to get those stitches on your ass."

"Uh, it wasn't stitches, it... nevermind."

"Well, somebody's burning their trash now, and I can still smell it. This neighborhood has been a total mess lately." said their mother.

"Who? Pauly?" said their father.

"Yes, I'll bet you it is Pauly, because he doesn't know any way to dispose of it like a normal human being. God, but what happened to his wife, and..."

"Wait, what happened?" said Marisa.

"She died a few months ago." said their father. "Revenant."

"Yes, and he still pretends like they're there. I saw him out on his porch a few weeks ago, and I thought he was talking with somebody at first - until I heard him say Eleanor. And when I came home the other day, he was setting out Roxxy's bowl and filling it with dog food."

"Wait, Roxxy died too?"

"Yes, don't you remember? I was worried that some student had come by and done something to him. Doesn't that woman you mentored hate dogs?"

"Uh, Mia doesn't hate dogs, she... whatever. Nevermind."

"Well, whatever it is, he sounds like he's turned in to a nutjob." said Penelope. "He can't actually think they're still alive, can he?"

"Well, some people, they... they make a compromise with reality. I mean, with all that's happened in his life, maybe we can't judge him for building his own version of the world. Now, Marisa, what were you saying about your friend with the flu?"

So this conversation continued until Marisa reached the end of her memory, and was still sitting in this lesbian bar. She finished the rest of her drink, went on her phone for a while, and after no other women approached her, she decided to leave and return to Urasaria. On her way out, she attempted to push the door open. It caught on something outside and budged only an inch. Glancing back as she tried it again, Marisa saw a woman at the bar who would drink through the rest of evening, and her head tilted as though she were deferentially listening.

[END OF ARC: ALL DRESSED UP]