A follow up to "Websites Are Good". Henley discovers Danny's comments on her website and receives mixed feelings about her former mentor. I own nothing.
Coffee shops were the blood and lifeforce of any good city. They dotted street corners and busy roads, tantalizing customers with the
promise of a warm drink and an even warmer atmosphere. Cozy couches, low glow lighting, and soft jazz music were all the essentials that
came with any good, respectable coffee shop: a personal, homey touch to an impersonal, cold city. Oh and the wi-fi. It would be a
felony to operate a city coffee shop with out some reliable wi-fi.
These following qualities were what attracted Henley Reeves to the shops in the first place. In spite of her now busy lifestyle driving from
city to city, the escape artist found her own personal solace with a cup of coffee and a good book, curling up on one of couches of the shop
amidst the businessmen making deals and couples eyeing each other with love. Coffee shops gave Henley, not only her mid-afternoon caffiene fix, but
allowed her to do one of her greatest tricks: escaping from reality.
However today was slightly different from the other days as Henley now trotted quickly along a busy LA street to reach the Starbucks that lay at
the corner. She was to meet her manager, a prim, purlish woman who seemed more interested in her dating website profile rather than Henley's performances. That was fine with Henley though, being independent and proactive was something that came intuitively. As long as Henley was the heroine of her own story, then she didn't mind the supporting cast. If anything, her manager was great moral support (or lack thereof).
Whipping her flaming red hair over her shoulder, Henley readjusted the slipping straps of her black leather purse further up her shoulder blade. Despite the busy afternoon lunch rush squabbling about the sidewalk, Henley's steps remained purposeful and unmarred by the flight of people all around her. The clicking of her high heels against grainy pavement remained sharp and snappy even as Henley slowed to the front of the shop door. Her red lips curled slightly into a smirk, yanking open the door with a signature gloved hand. The warm smell of coffee instantly wrapped around Henley, unfailingly creating the nostalgic homey aura. The murmur of people and the fizz of the coffee machines made Henley part her lips slightly in contentment as she slid her sunglasses away from her eyes and perched them on top of her distinctive red hair.
Henley stood in line, gazing at the menu board and at the pastry display cases to decide what she wanted to get while she waited. Pressing her knuckles gently against her chin, Henley's eyes gazed thoughtfully at moist looking pound cakes and lightly glazed lemon scones, weighing in her mind what would be the better option. In the end, she decided upon a simple chai tea latte with three of the lemon mini-scones. Just the right amount of caffeine to drive her to her show tonight with the ample quantity of sweetness. Henley stepped up to the counter, only to look up to starry-eyed freckled girl.
"You're Henley Reeves!" she exclaimed in delight, and a bright smile lined the features of the cashier's face. "I went to your show the other night with my
boyfriend for my birthday. You were amazing!" At this, Henley's eyes crinkled with warmth, her famous smile mimicking the girl's face. "Oh wonderful!" she
exhaled in a interval of appreciation. "I'm very glad you enjoyed yourself." Henley beamed at the young girl. Moments like this made her decision to become a solo act all the worthwhile. All the trouble, all the more hardships, and all the strife, was meaningful and worth it to Henley if her performances were able to make people happy. Would she have gotten the same effect if she had stayed with Danny? Absolutely not.
"Yeah, I loved the escape the safe trick. That one was my favorite. My boyfriend loved the one where you-" the girl began, being cut off when the man behind Henley coughed, making a disparaging glare at the cashier. The girl reverted her eyes back to Henley, giving her sheepish smile. "What can I get for you today, Ms. Reeves?" Henley laughed a bit, stating her order in a good -natured manner. The cashier wrote Henley's name on the cup, handing it to the barista before bagging the scones in a brown paper sleeve with the Starbucks logo on it. The cashier girl and Henley exchanged another brief grin as they exchanged goods, money in turn for the scones. A receipt and a flourish later, and Henley was seated at a table near the window, gloves removed, absent-mindedly gazing at the tops of the LA skyscrapers whilst nibbling daintily at a scone in between perfectly manicured fingers. Crumbs fell upon the redhead's lap, at which she brushed away with the back of her free hand without fuss. Henley always took pride in her appearance on and off stage and always held her head high. It was the sign of a true performer.
Nudging the last bit of the scone she was holding into her mouth, Henley pushed a bit of her bangs that fell upon her warm eyes back, and started rummaging in her purse for her phone. Her purse was as every bit feminine as the next. The bag contained all of the standard womanly fare, from a small compact mirror with blush and a tube of lush red lipstick to the usual graveyard of receipts and pens for miscellaneous purposes it may serve. Moving her head in a way to flip the hair that had fallen past her shoulder back to where it was before, Henley leaned in closer in a vain attempt to search for her phone. Pushing her way through all the receipts from purchases past that she knew she should have filed away long time ago, Henley finally found her phone buried beneath the rubble. She snatched it from the purse's depths and clutched the device against her blazer-clad chest sighing in relief. For all her outward perfection and energetic escape acts, Henley still held onto the remnants of a scatterbrained, star-stricken
girl who came to Chicago looking for her own ticket to fame. Becoming an assistant to J. Daniel Atlas wasn't exactly the definition of such, but despite the control that Daniel always relished, Henley, as much as her stubborn self refused to allow, learned and blossomed under Daniel's tutelage. In a twist of fate, some of her success was because of him...
Henley shook her head, still in relief that her phone hadn't been left somewhere, dropped, or even worse, stolen. She batted her dark eyes at the ceiling, silently thanking the heavens, and looked down to click the power button on the top of the device. Her phone background had the picture of a cartoon white rabbit peeking out of a characteristic magician's hat. Making a rabbit disappear, one the oldest yet most stereotypical tricks in the book. It was an eye roller to most experienced magicians, but Henley couldn't resist as the trick had harkened back to her first experience with magic. The magician at Henley's 8th birthday party had left such an impression on her by making a rabbit disappear that she became more and more obsessed with magic as she became older. Henley gazed at the image fondly before unlocking the phone with a slide of her fingertips. She pressed the organizer
app, letting it expand and load her to-do list for the day. Reaffirming that she was on time for her appointment with her manager, Henley added a few more errands to the list, knowing well that she would forget to do them if she did not write them down.
After reviewing her list one last time, Henley clicked the home button to close the organizer app. Motioning to put the phone back in her bag, she stopped instead when the screen of the phone lit up. Upon closer inspection, it was an email alert, notifying Henley that a new entry had been written in her guestbook on her website. Curious, Henley unlocked her phone again, now opening the internet browser button. She typed in the website address, a slight smile forming on Henley's lips when the bright, rougish site loaded in mobile form on her screen. Her thumb pressed upon the guestbook tab and the smile that had appeared on Henley's face reshaped into a confused grimace. Henley's eyebrows knitted together, eyes staring down at the entry.
"I believe that she needs to do a performance in Chicago. People would want to see and critique what she's done. I think people would recognize her as J. Daniel Atlas's former assistant."
It was anonymous, but it couldn't be. No way. Henley gave a little laugh in disbelief. It wasn't even a few minutes later until a new comment had appeared above it.
"There's a big magic community here."
Henley snickered. "If by big magic community, you mean you, don't you Danny Atlas?" she said softly. Continuing to stare at the two entries that she just knew had to be Danny's, she quietly reflected upon the time she left. There was a part of Henley that knew she couldn't stand Danny. In fact all of his assistants couldn't stand him. He was a self-recognized control freak, and had the ego to boot. He was insensitive, blunt and demanding all at the same time. But Henley knew, that when it was just the two of them, whether it was the way he insisted he help her load a particularly heaving item when helping to pack the equipment at the end of a show or sharing that inexplicable moment of something a little more when they looked at each other, that deep down, he cared. And that part was what Henley prided herself most out of all his assistants. That despite her many faults as a beginner, there was the other part of Henley that knew she understood him and thought she mutually cared about him the most.
Or so she thought. The day that Henley quit being his assistant, she hoped that somehow that he would say something to her to make her stay. Or to grab her arm to stop her from leaving. That never happened. Far away Henley went, thinking that he never cared about how she was doing, until now.
"Henley?"
The redhead jumped a bit in her seat, snapping out of her reverie. Her eyes met the dreary ones of her manager, who arrived just in time to relieve Henley of her reverie.
"Oh... Matilda. Hi. I was just..." Henley trailed, clicking the phone off before placing it back in her purse. "I was just looking at the site. New guestbook entries." Henley sighed a little, raising her eyebrows from their scrunched position in exhaust, flashing her manager a practiced smile.
Matilda looked at Henley with a tight-lipped resolve, closing her eyes a bit before sitting down to join Henley at her table. Overlooking Henley's slight befuddlement, she pushed her glasses up with a sigh. "Ah..." she said in a drawl. "I told you websites are good."
"Yeah. Indeed they are."
Thank you for your support from my first fic, and I hope you enjoyed this one as well. Henley was a bit harder for me to write about since I felt she got the least amount of characterization out of the Four Horsemen in the film. I added a bit of my own headcannons as to what I believe her personality to be like (although a perfect performer, shes energetic and a bit scatterbrained) as a foil to Danny who I believe is her total opposite. Thank you to FireLily25 for this idea.
Please review so that I may improve upon future fics! Hope you'll stick with me!