anunluckypenny | IC Contact

[Chase will just need to try harder to wrap his mind around being cared about for being himself.

And Penny's openly pleased with his answer.]

Then can I bother you to stick around?

I'd love to stick around.

[There is, after all, still half a pizza to finish, cooling in its box, but he doesn't seem to be paying that much attention anymore.]

But I can't promise it's going to bother me.

Thank you... and it'll be easier on both of us if you don't mind.

[She has successfully finished a slice, but the rest of the pizza is up for grabs.]

And it really does get lonely, sometimes.

Even with the fish?

[The fish he'd bought for her for that reason exactly - not because he expected what was essentially a small, orange wall decoration to cure the loneliness, but as a gateway to talking about it. Because, roommates departing notwithstanding, there was just something about her that telegraphed that she was. It took one to know one, maybe.]

Have you thought about getting your own place again? There must be storage space above here you could turn into a flat, be on the premises but have room for some less peripatetic company.

Even with Lucretia and the dogs. They're good company, though, just not that talkative.

[Lonely attracts lonely? He hasn't said as much, but Penny would bet good money that Chase is lonely--if not in a literal sense.]

You know, I've been thinking about renting that area. It's kind of attic-y, but it could work.

[As literal a sense as hers, surrounded by people who come and go.]

Paint on the walls, a couple of new windows knocked through - I'll have a look at it if you like.

That almost sounds like an offer to help de-attic the place. I'll see if it's up for grabs. I don't know why it wouldn't be... it's not like there's anyone up there.

Then it sounds as it was intended.

[He tips his head back to start on another slice of pizza, catching the dangling strings of cheese first. Not graceful, but at least he chews and swallows before continuing, using the rest of the slice to gesture.]

There's this place on the beach I've been working on in my downtime. I wouldn't mind a warmer winter project.

Then thank you.

[Chase is a lot more polite about eating than some people who come through here. At least he has mastered the art of not talking with his mouth full.]

What kind of a place? Maybe I could help you out with that when spring comes around.

[Which assumes that both of them will be in the City come spring.]

I've been turning one of the vacation chalets out there into something more permanently liveable. Or that was the original intention.

What's the current intention? Summer home? I've only been inside one of them and it wasn't exactly warm and cozy.

Currently it's liveable, I'm just... not. I've ended up with a rented room and a property portfolio. You're welcome to come down and take a look - there's not much to the decor but a fridge and some surf gear.

A property portfolio?

[She declines the invitation with a shake of her head.] Nah, I'm not big on the beach--I mean, unless you'd like me to go. Do you surf?

No, I just like looking at the wetsuits on the wall.

[He spoils the deadpan within seconds by grinning sheepishly and adding-]

I also keep an apartment in one of the buildings—it's got most of the things people told me were mine when I first arrived.

Okay, dumb question.

[His smile is returned regardless.]

That's handy, I guess. Do you ever... I don't know, look at those things that're supposed to have belonged to you and almost remember them?

[He's not sure how to answer that. Most people would get a curt 'no'.]

Sometimes I think I do. I don't know if that counts.

[sometimes he gets that feeling with people, too.]

It counts. I mean, I think so... I do it. There's a box of stuff that used to belong to the me that was here before and sometimes there's this... deja vous, you know?

Could just be that they're things we would own, that we're recognising ourselves in that.

[He's gone over this question with himself a few times.]

I've wondered if past memories could be recovered through hypnosis. But I'm not sure, for my own part, how much I want to know.

I don't know. There's this necklace with a heart on it--like, the kind of heart in a Grey's Anatomy book--that I'm not so sure I'd own, but maybe you're right.

Can hypnosis work like that?

All hearts kind of look like the pictures in the Grey's Anatomy book. [He only half bites down on the grin.] I don't know, sounds pretty cool to me.

[And a nod.]

Hypnotic regression might. If the memories are blocked, not absent, it should be possible to find a way to reconnect.

Sure, to you, maybe. [She's not even pretending that she isn't teasing.] It's neat, just not something I can see me going out and buying. Ever.

[Penny gives this hypnotic regression thing some thought.] And you've never actually tried this on anyone before?

Someone must have bought it for you. Or you had a messy goth roommate.

[Well, anything's possible.]

I've used hypnotic regression in my work. Here, no.

I'll go with messy goth roommate.

Do you think it'd work? I mean, do you think there're actually memories to reconnect to? Or could there be some weird magic going on, or maybe we're all from... parallel universes, or something, and we're not always the same version of us...

I don't know. [Though her guesses make him smile.] Whatever the case, I think weird magic has to come into it somewhere.

How are you at treating patients with weird magic issues?

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