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wisdomeagleTitle: "Opening Night"
Fandom: Baby-Sitters Club
Featured characters: Janine (and Claudia) Kishi
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: And I remain, Ann, Your Biggest Fan.
Notes: A stocking stuffer for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
piscaria in Yuletide 2007. Originally posted here.
Summary: Janine is hiding in the bathroom, and her sister knows a secret.
Wordcount: 915
Opening Night
Janine takes a deep, shuddery breath that she lets out slowly. She once presented a complicated paper about her interpretation of fluid dynamics to an audience of tenured physics professors and she did it without sweating. She answered their questions and posed a few of her own, and received two job offers, valid whenever she graduated or even if she didn't. "It's obvious your creativity will only be stifled if you continue at school. Come work for us right away, and you'll have an experimental budget twice the size of your current scholarship." Nice to dream, but she had her heart set on the B.S. (now nicely framed in her office, so it was worth it), and her future -- and the future of the economy -- lay in computer science. Theoretical research grants go dry after a few years, but the internet is forever.
Which is a fairly close approximation of the amount of time that Janine's currently spent hiding in the ladies' room, fighting real nausea while hovering over a disgusting toilet bowl. She's nervous for the first time in a decade, and she's overdressed in a long pleated skirt and fancy blouse, and the bracelet Claudia gave her last Christmas, the only part of the ensemble that feels like it belongs, and Janine considers just sending the bracelet out to do the socializing, because she is clearly going to fail.
The gallery is just like Claudia's room, cluttered with junk masquerading as art. Even the refreshments are more on the order of Claudia's favorites -- frosted cookies and greasy doughnuts -- than the fruit-and-cheese affairs that Janine has grown used to. Well, she's square, and that's not going to change, and Claudia's her sister and her artwork is gorgeous -- vibrant colors, impressive technique, shadows and darkness haunting the corners of her elaborate paintings of flowers and fruit. There are shadows under your eyes, the paintings say. There are secrets in your darkness.
Well, thanks a lot. Somehow, the natural lighting that reveals the delicacy of Claudia's brushstrokes was garish on Janine's cheeks, made her feel underdone and empty, revealed that she spent most of her hours in a plastic chair staring at a plastic screen. She knew that, but in the light of Claudia's floor-length purple and gold robe, which isn't tacky but reveals that she's a queen, Janine's dowdiness is sinful.
So she's wasting her life. So what? It's not like Claudia's settled down either, not like the string of boyfriends has become any less frenetic, not like the man on her arm tonight is going to last any longer than one more opening. It's not like she's sold enough paintings to live on, not like Claudia, art museum tour guide by day and art store clerk by night and starving artist in the manic light of midnight, is going to support their parents' retirement.
That, like every other difficult and unpleasant task in existence, has fallen to Janine. She's used to gritting her teeth, so why can't she pry herself from the porcelain and face the phoniness of greeting her sister? Before she can find her nerve, the door swings open, and Claudia, cup of wine in one hand and cookie in the other, is smiling at the mirror.
"Janine!" Air kisses, big hug, gorgeous proud smile. "Do you like it?"
"Very innovative," Janine confesses, and Claudia glows at the praise. Like Janine knows something about art, like she can understand the subtle curves and shadows of an unripe peach. Her work, her thought, her life is angular, and Claudia knows that. Janine can program outside the box, but the world is still made of boxes and and lines, straight paths from one school to another to the high-paying job in Boston that affords her the luxuries of nice linen suits and sensible shoes made of real leather.
"I knew you'd like them! The venue is fabulous, too. You should come party. Please?"
"I don't think -- this is my type of event."
"What is your type of event?" Janine anticipates a jeer, but Claudia closes her mouth before it can escape.
"I... enjoy discussing my work with colleagues. I go to the theatre sometimes, as I have a friend who's a theatre critic and he enjoys my input. Occasionally the symphony, but work's been so busy lately that I hardly have the time...." It sounds even more boring coming out of her mouth than it feels in her head, and she looks away before she can see the pity in Claudia's eyes.
"At least you're having fun, even if it does sound -- like it's not my scene. But hey, this is hardly your scene, is it?" A timely burst of laughter and music from the gallery punctuates Claudia's point. Janine would like to understand the joke, but she fears she's moved from being the punchline to being an outlier, completely unrelated to anything Claudia would find amusing.
"Actually," she tries, blushing a little, "I think I would enjoy it. But... you'll have to... explain to me. The nuances of your paintings are a complete mystery to me and you'll have to show me how to interpret them from the perspective of your... lifestyle."
Claudia's grin is wider than ever. Her skin is radiant, her expression beatific. "To start with," she says, gesturing with her glass, "I think you need to become less sober. Let's get you a drink."
Fandom: Baby-Sitters Club
Featured characters: Janine (and Claudia) Kishi
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: And I remain, Ann, Your Biggest Fan.
Notes: A stocking stuffer for
piscaria in Yuletide 2007. Originally posted here.Summary: Janine is hiding in the bathroom, and her sister knows a secret.
Wordcount: 915
Opening Night
Janine takes a deep, shuddery breath that she lets out slowly. She once presented a complicated paper about her interpretation of fluid dynamics to an audience of tenured physics professors and she did it without sweating. She answered their questions and posed a few of her own, and received two job offers, valid whenever she graduated or even if she didn't. "It's obvious your creativity will only be stifled if you continue at school. Come work for us right away, and you'll have an experimental budget twice the size of your current scholarship." Nice to dream, but she had her heart set on the B.S. (now nicely framed in her office, so it was worth it), and her future -- and the future of the economy -- lay in computer science. Theoretical research grants go dry after a few years, but the internet is forever.
Which is a fairly close approximation of the amount of time that Janine's currently spent hiding in the ladies' room, fighting real nausea while hovering over a disgusting toilet bowl. She's nervous for the first time in a decade, and she's overdressed in a long pleated skirt and fancy blouse, and the bracelet Claudia gave her last Christmas, the only part of the ensemble that feels like it belongs, and Janine considers just sending the bracelet out to do the socializing, because she is clearly going to fail.
The gallery is just like Claudia's room, cluttered with junk masquerading as art. Even the refreshments are more on the order of Claudia's favorites -- frosted cookies and greasy doughnuts -- than the fruit-and-cheese affairs that Janine has grown used to. Well, she's square, and that's not going to change, and Claudia's her sister and her artwork is gorgeous -- vibrant colors, impressive technique, shadows and darkness haunting the corners of her elaborate paintings of flowers and fruit. There are shadows under your eyes, the paintings say. There are secrets in your darkness.
Well, thanks a lot. Somehow, the natural lighting that reveals the delicacy of Claudia's brushstrokes was garish on Janine's cheeks, made her feel underdone and empty, revealed that she spent most of her hours in a plastic chair staring at a plastic screen. She knew that, but in the light of Claudia's floor-length purple and gold robe, which isn't tacky but reveals that she's a queen, Janine's dowdiness is sinful.
So she's wasting her life. So what? It's not like Claudia's settled down either, not like the string of boyfriends has become any less frenetic, not like the man on her arm tonight is going to last any longer than one more opening. It's not like she's sold enough paintings to live on, not like Claudia, art museum tour guide by day and art store clerk by night and starving artist in the manic light of midnight, is going to support their parents' retirement.
That, like every other difficult and unpleasant task in existence, has fallen to Janine. She's used to gritting her teeth, so why can't she pry herself from the porcelain and face the phoniness of greeting her sister? Before she can find her nerve, the door swings open, and Claudia, cup of wine in one hand and cookie in the other, is smiling at the mirror.
"Janine!" Air kisses, big hug, gorgeous proud smile. "Do you like it?"
"Very innovative," Janine confesses, and Claudia glows at the praise. Like Janine knows something about art, like she can understand the subtle curves and shadows of an unripe peach. Her work, her thought, her life is angular, and Claudia knows that. Janine can program outside the box, but the world is still made of boxes and and lines, straight paths from one school to another to the high-paying job in Boston that affords her the luxuries of nice linen suits and sensible shoes made of real leather.
"I knew you'd like them! The venue is fabulous, too. You should come party. Please?"
"I don't think -- this is my type of event."
"What is your type of event?" Janine anticipates a jeer, but Claudia closes her mouth before it can escape.
"I... enjoy discussing my work with colleagues. I go to the theatre sometimes, as I have a friend who's a theatre critic and he enjoys my input. Occasionally the symphony, but work's been so busy lately that I hardly have the time...." It sounds even more boring coming out of her mouth than it feels in her head, and she looks away before she can see the pity in Claudia's eyes.
"At least you're having fun, even if it does sound -- like it's not my scene. But hey, this is hardly your scene, is it?" A timely burst of laughter and music from the gallery punctuates Claudia's point. Janine would like to understand the joke, but she fears she's moved from being the punchline to being an outlier, completely unrelated to anything Claudia would find amusing.
"Actually," she tries, blushing a little, "I think I would enjoy it. But... you'll have to... explain to me. The nuances of your paintings are a complete mystery to me and you'll have to show me how to interpret them from the perspective of your... lifestyle."
Claudia's grin is wider than ever. Her skin is radiant, her expression beatific. "To start with," she says, gesturing with her glass, "I think you need to become less sober. Let's get you a drink."
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Date: 2008-01-01 08:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2008-01-01 08:22 pm (UTC)