"Jay, I can't-- I'm in the library, please-- p-please come."

The fae had been sitting in the studio tinkering with stuff for his latest independant film project when his cellphone had started playing 'cherry lips' and he'd opened it to an extremely uneven call from Taryn. who had barely been able to make out where she was, let alone what she wanted. Let alone what was wrong.

Now, dressed in dark khaki cords, a light khaki shirt striped with pink pinstripes to match his pink hair, and black dress shoes, the fae is on the second floor of the library, still looking for his friend.

He rounds a corner.

And I hope he's ready to catch a hundred and thirty pounds of sobbing human. Because as soon as Taryn spots him, she's out of the chair in which she's been huddled since that... thing... left and launching herself towards him, face tear-streaked--the one day she bothers with a little bit of makeup...

"Oh, Jay..."

More incoherent sobbing. It's rather impressive that she managed to remember his number, let alone tell him where she was. Or... her general area. It's a big library, after all.

"Oh, honey. Oh, honey, what's wrong? Shhh." He hugs her, holds her, pats her hair-- guides her to a bench where they can both be seated. It's good he's not wearing his light-up shoes today-- they'd be horribly inappropriate for this.

I'm fairly certain that Taryn wouldn't notice the light up shoes.

The sobs slow, eventually, and turn into hiccups, which Taryn tries unsuccessfully to swallow and end, and she tries to tell him something of what happened. Only, that's kind of hard, you know?

"There was... a man... I think... and... he... Jay, he scared me... and then... he was a she... and..." More tears. This could take a while...

Taryn was frightened by a transvestite?

Jay digs a handkerchief out of one pocket (an oldfashioned habit he picked up from his Grandmother) and dabs the sobbing human's face with it.

"Shh. It's okay. I know kung-fu."

Jay is clueless. And, for some reason, his attempt at a joke--that was supposed to be a joke, right?--makes her angry, rather than making her smile.

"No, it's not okay! Jay... he. She. It. Knew things about me. Stuff no one knows. I don't know how, but it did!"

Well, at least she's coherent.

A little light, a little worry, flares in the back of Jay's mind. She could mean something mundane-- probably did mean something mundane... but maybe he knows something she doesn't.

"What did 'it' know?"

"Things. Stuff... you don't know it. Nobody knows it. How did he fucking know!?"

It should here be noted that Taryn has never before cursed aloud, or at least not where Jay can hear. She doesn't curse. She just doesn't. At least, not usually.

She's never even used the fae thing that he taught her that one time.

The suspicion grows a bit brighter, a bit bigger.

Obviously, taryn is very upset-- he tightens his hand on her, in comfort, and asks, "What did-- he-- look like?"

For an extremely brief instant, she tenses as his hand tightens, but it passes. Most of her defenses are down, and her facade of cheerfulness is well and truly shattered.

"Tall. Pale. Freaky eyes. And he was cold..." She shivers in memory.

Is she sensitive enough to notice his slight stiffening?

"White eyes?" he asks, worry lacing his usually carefree voice.

She looks up at that, feeling him tense...

"Uh-huh... How did you know?"

If he knew this guy was around, he should have had the decency to say something!

"He's... I know who he is."

Never met Him, himself-- thank. Well, thank something.

He pulls her into a hug. "I'm glad you're okay."

"Okay? Do I sound okay to you? Some random stranger I've never seen before in my life comes up to me and grabs my book and sits down next to me and freakin' changes sex and knows things about me and you call that okay!?"

Of course, she doesn't know what he was. She might be grateful if she did...

Unlikely.

He leans back, hands on her shoulders, and inspects her critically.

"You're the same shape as last I saw you. You've got all your limbs. You don't appear to be turning into some sort of crustacean. I'd call that okay."

Flippancy aside, he softens and gives her a concerned look. "You don't know how well you got off, Taryn."

Presumably he'd be able to tell if she'd been cursed... right? Fae have a feel for magic.

"So why don't you tell me, then, oh Wise One? So I can be properly grateful."

The anger is still in her voice, but there's a quiver that says she's not really angry, just very, very frightened.

After all, you don't spend half your life hiding something, then have a stranger come and play on it as if he knew all the horrible details...

Jay frowns, caught. He doesn't damn the god for putting him in this position-- like a number of his kin, he thinks of the gods in the same way as forces of nature. Dangerous, unpredictable, but not necessarily cruel.

"Ryn... I don't know. You probably wouldn't believe me."

Ah, the old fallback. 'He was a god.' 'How do you know?' 'I'm fae.'

Yeah, that would go well.

"Jay... he knew me better than you do. And he played on that just like Josh--" She claps a hand over her mouth. Oops.

"I mean, like it was some kind of sick game to him. I've got some kind of right to know, don't I?"

He rubs her cheek, obiously thiking on this. He'd told Jasz, not too long ago, about the gods and such...

Come to think of it, it had been the same god who;s forced his hand that time, too. That was annoying.

He glances away, then back again.

"Well, honey, basically, he was a God. They don't think much of we puny mortals. And semi-mortals." Let's be honest, now.

"A... god..." Little G, for her. Christian background, remember?

Then again, she does have a tendency to read fantasy books... but...

"God isn't like that." That one's a big G.

"And stop touching me."

Jay frowns, and draws his hands back.

"I didn't say God. I said a God. And it sounds like him, anyways."

He reaches up and rotates one of his earrings around in its hole.

She should probably apologize for that, and usually, she doesn't mind, because he's gay, but... Jay is a man, and she just got out of a horribly freaky situation with that man/woman/thing...

"I don't understand."

God's supposed to know your inmost being, though, right... and maybe gods, in the plural, can do the same... So, maybe it makes a little bit of sense, but...

"You're Christian, right?" Sometimes he forgets, since she's willing to be friends with him instead of tell him about the evils of his ways.

"I guess it'd be hard to understand... gods exist." It's plain from his expression that he's searching for the best way to put it.

"For everything. I don't know why. They're just sort of there. Some have more power than others. He's-- the white-eyed one-- a powerful one. Not good to run into."

I didn't say she was a good Christian, did I? Anyway, you're also supposed to love the sinner and all that.

"Sort of Christian... and I noticed."

That flippancy and sarcasm is a defense mechanism. It doesn't come into play around people she likes often, but it's there now.

"Yeah, well, that's why you're lucky. Some of the stories I've heard... well..."

He shakes his head.

"You're lucky."

"I hear that way too much to believe it, Jay. And if that was a god..." She shivered and hugged herself. "He's just as much a sicko as the rest of them."

'Them' being men. Or something like that.

Jay isn't sure what them refers to, but to him, it sounds like the rest of the gods, or supernaturals. He frowns, a bit uncertain.

"It was a god. And if you see him again..." What's the best advice?

What his mother had always taught him to do. "Don't run. Don't act scared. Be polite, be respectful, and try to avoid provoking him. That goes for anyone with white eyes like his."

He glances away.

"Actually, that also goes for anyone with silver fingernails, blood-red eyes, eyes speckled with stars, skin that glows faintly like a glowworm, electric blue eyes, without pupils, or a maroon stripe from here," he looks back at her and indicates one cheek, "to here."

The don't run bit, she can handle. Same for the polite bit--she was saying please, after all--but...

"Don't act scared? Hah!"

She shakes her head and shivers (again), cocking her head and grimacing. "How many of these things are there?"

"Gods? Lots. Seven powerful ones-- most of which have been spotted in this city, making it just that much more dangerous. There are a lot of less powerful ones, though."

He knows an awful lot about this.

Yes, he does.

"Since when do you know all this stuff? Why didn't you ever warn me?"

"Hey, hey, hey--" he lifts his hands to defend against her wrath. Well, sort of wrath.

"I'm sorry, Ryn. But I couldn't. Can't."

"Why not? Friends don't keep secrets."

Er. Taryn, let's try not to step on our own metaphorical feet, shall we? Who is it again who has more secrets than she has friends?

"Yes, friends do. Besides, I'd get in serious shit if I went around to every unnie telling them to watch out for the gods. it's just not something you do."

"Unnie...?" That doesn't sound like that weird language he goes into sometimes, but it's not a word she's familiar with. "What's that mean?"

"You. Most people." He shrugs. "People who don't know about the gods... and stuff."

And stuff indeed. Poor uncomfortable Jay.

"Then... what am I now? 'Cause I know about them, now..." Sort of can't help knowing about them, now, after all.

It doesn't sound like it's a terribly complimentary term, though. Oh, that's a nice thought...

He smiles.

"Still kinda unnie, Honey."

Because she doesn't know about other stuff-- but he doesn't want to mention that.

"You rhymed," she points out irrelevantly.

"Only kinda? What're you, then?"

He reaches out and flicks a strad of her hair off her shoulder.

"Innish."

She flinches slightly, but doesn't say anything.

"So... why aren't I?"