Notes: This is a side-story for Grasping Liquid, featuring a series of connected one-shots about Marilyn's actions during Act Two. The first chapter is set during Chapter Ten of Grasping Liquid, when Marilyn & Louis walked off together to talk about Louis's family situation. Sadly this story probably won't make too much sense if you're reading this entirely as it's own thing, so if you do want to read it then I'd recommend having read up to the end of Act Two of Grasping Liquid.
Louis was unusually quiet as he made his way with Marilyn back to her family's market stall. She picked up on this straight away, although it wasn't exactly a genius observation when it came to Louis. The scouser was well known for his gossipy ways and usually the only times he wasn't talking were when he was listening to scandalous news that others had to say. That was not the case right now though. As he walked he seemed sort of dejected and there wasn't anyone around for him to listen into the conversations of as a form of distraction. It was just the two of them.
Naturally Marilyn was concerned about this, but she knew that she'd get him to talk soon enough. The two of them had been best friends as far back as she could remember and if anything was bothering Louis then Marilyn was usually the first to hear about it. All she had to do was wait for him to open up. And maybe provide a bit of prompting for him to do just that.
As they reached the stall itself Marilyn went through the motions of setting up; she hauled the wooden containers into place, before filling them with some of the groceries her father had left covered behind the stall earlier that morning. It wasn't an easy life between getting the fresh fruit there each morning and then returning to care for her mother, so Marilyn didn't begrudge him for not setting up himself. Besides, it would have been foolish to leave the wares on display when Marilyn hadn't yet got there to guard the stall. Perhaps the market wasn't busy at this time, but it was still home to many opportunists. Marilyn knew that from being one herself.
She felt a little bad that she'd got there later than usual this morning, not that her dad would know either way. If it was down to Marilyn then she'd have set up much earlier, but she'd needed to talk to Crow and the leader's movements could sometimes be so erratic that it was often a case of grabbing him as soon as you found him if you had something you wanted to say.
But she was here now and that was what mattered. All being late meant was that she'd have to push her sales pitches to sell extra, which she wasn't worried about being able to do. This was her trade. She was an expert.
The same could not be said for Louis, however, who although helping set up was doing so by merely lifting one small punnet of strawberries at a time onto the counter.
"Come on, Lozza! Lift any more than that and people might accuse you of doing some work," she goaded.
Louis dropped a punnet onto the counter and put his hand over his heart; "Wouldn't wanna ruin my reputation, like, would I?"
"Why spoil what you've spent a lifetime building up," Marilyn agreed.
"Yeah..."
That reply hung in the air for far too long. It wasn't like Louis not to follow up with another quip. Something was definitely wrong today and she needed to get out of him what it was.
"All right, let's not mess about here," pressed Marilyn, "What's wrong with your face?"
"Nah, you're not gonna win that way, Mal," huffed Louis, suddenly sounding more like himself, "Tell me what you were talking about with Crow first and then I'll think about letting you know what's bothering me."
Marilyn tutted, "Well, I was going to tell you about Crow anyway. But if you're going to be like that then I guess I'll just talk to everyone else first and get back to you later."
"You can't do that! You know how much I hate being the last to know!" whined Louis.
"I do know, which is why I wouldn't do that to you," Marilyn assured, "So I'll tell you about Crow now, but you need to promise that you'll talk once I'm done."
"Will do," vowed Louis, with a small nod, "It wasn't gonna be a secret anyway, not for long, like..."
She hated when he acted cryptic like that, it didn't suit him. But she had made a promise to go first, so Marilyn took a breath and started her story.
"Wren's been writing to me for some time," she informed, "Lately she's been talking about having some of us come up to stay with her and Socket in Northumberland, so I thought it could be a good chance for Crow to make up for what he did the last time he went up there."
Louis winced, given that he had also been part of that plan.
"Yeah, that was deffo a mess, like," he agreed, "I reckon us lot that were involved should go say sorry for real. Though, um, I'm not sure I'll be able to..."
"Why's that?" Marilyn checked.
"Nah, I said you need to finish your story first," huffed Louis.
"Very well, inviting you wasn't part of the plan anyway," Marilyn dismissed.
"Charmed!" Louis snorted.
"It's nothing like that. It's just that Crow was the one who messed up. The rest of you were caught in his whirlwind like you always are, just following along and hoping that he knew best," continued Marilyn, "There's really no stopping him once he gets an idea into his head."
"That's our Crow all right. But you weren't planning on sending him up there on his tod now, were you?" asked Louis.
"No, that would go terribly," Marilyn answered, "Especially given how poor Wren feels about him. She must be so confused and shaken up after last time, even if she doesn't show it... But I thought about who to send up and I reckon we could kill two birds with one stone on this trip."
"That's... very practical of you?" replied Louis, completely lost to what she meant.
"Well, Badger's been just as hurt by what happened, maybe even more so," Marilyn went on, "I think that he wants to connect with Crow again, but it's kind of hard to do that when they've got the failings of the black market hanging over them every day and each of them thinks it's their fault. A break from Misthallery could be what they both need."
"So you're saying you want just Badger and Crow to go?" checked Louis.
"That's right. This morning I was tricking Crow into thinking it was his idea," Marilyn chuckled, "But anyway, now you know what I was talking to him about, so spill the beans on what's been bothering you."
The face that Louis pulled was almost glum enough to turn the fruit at the stall rotten, but regardless he did concede defeat that they had agreed to this.
"I don't wanna tell you, Mal. Like, really don't wanna tell you," he sighed.
"Nothing you do can surprise me," Marilyn insisted, "I've known you since you first moved here and I reckon that I've seen you try almost everything in that time."
"Moving's sort of what I need to tell you. As in we're moving back the way we came..." mumbled Louis.
"Back to Liverpool...?" Marilyn asked.
"Yeah, that's right. It's been on the table for a while now, but I was never sure we'd go through with it," answered Louis, "But, like, Dad's not getting any better. We all know that. The Black Ravens more than anyone. So Mum finally put her foot down and decided that getting out of this town and back to our roots might help him sort his priorities out."
"This is just it then? You're leaving?" she pressed.
Louis smirked; "Betcha didn't see that one coming, did you?"
"No... I didn't. But why are you smiling? What could there possibly be in this to smile about?" snapped Marilyn.
"Because you didn't know it was going to happen," Louis clarified, "In this town you know everything that happens to everyone, sometimes even before they do. Crow's the one who fancies he's pulling the strings, but only because you let him think that. You can tell what almost everyone's going to do and here I've managed to do something that you didn't guess was coming."
"That's no reason to be glad about it. You're still moving!" Marilyn reminded.
"Yeah, and that's awful, don't get me wrong," agreed Louis, "But I know you as well as you know me and I worry about you, Mal. You're so good at what you do and you work so hard for everyone's sake that sometimes I think you forget to just be you. So I'm glad that in this town where you've got everything figured out that there's still some things that can surprise you."
"Look at you, getting all deep," Marilyn evaded, "They're going to be impressed at how much you've changed if you go back to Liverpool spouting stuff like that."
"I learned from the best," he hummed.
Marilyn nudged him with her elbow; "Leave it off. You know your charms don't work on me."
Before Louis could make any sort of retort a customer came over to inspect the stall. He stepped away, since he knew it was off-putting to have someone loitering around the stall like he was when the customers were looking at the wares. Fortunately the woman was a regular and didn't pay him much mind, checking over today's selection of tomatoes while listening to a sales pitch from Marilyn. By the time she went on her way Marilyn had managed to sell her a bunch of carrots, two heads of lettuce and a cucumber on top of the tomatoes she'd originally dropped by for. As well as making money out of them, Marilyn liked to believe that she kept the residents of Misthallery eating healthy greens.
Louis waited a few moments before scooting back across to the stall. Though even with some time to think about it Marilyn wasn't quite sure what to say to him.
"...I'm sorry you're leaving," she settled on.
"Yeah, me too," Louis replied, "It's going to be hard. And I'm still not sure how to let the others know. Except for Badger, I already told him."
"I should be insulted that I'm not the first to know," Marilyn joked.
"Well you were off arranging your master plan to save Crow and Badger from themselves," reminded Louis, "...But seriously, Mal, don't get so caught up in helping everyone else that you forget to help yourself."
"I'm sure I'll manage," Marilyn replied. It came out a bit colder than she intended to say it.
"Yeah, you will. I know you will," assured Louis, "Heck, I don't even know what I'm gonna do without you, like."
"Probably get into all kinds of trouble and not feel bad about it," Marilyn predicted.
"That sounds like me," Louis laughed, "Anyway, I can see that more people are starting to hang about now, so I better let you get on with your work. Gives me a chance to tell everyone else about what's happening."
"Good luck with that," said Marilyn. And she meant it.
"Maybe later when the stall's closed we can go grab a couple of shandies and go sit up on the rooftops," Louis offered, "Talk about the future or whatever."
"I'd like that. But not the talking about the future bit. There's still too much uncertain to talk about that," Marilyn replied.
"Even to you?" teased Louis.
"Yes, even to me," Marilyn confirmed, "But if we just talk about the times gone by then maybe that'd be nice. The future's going to come whether we want it to or not..."
"Sometimes it's best just to run head first into it," Louis suggested.
"You would say that," Marilyn retorted.
"It's the tried and true Lozza way. So... yeah, I'll be off now. Meet you here later," he mumbled, sounding a lot less sure of himself than he usually did.
"Wouldn't miss it," she promised.
After that she expected him to make some joke about how no girl could turn down meeting up with Louis. That was the sort of thing he'd normally come out with. But this time there was nothing. He opened his mouth, closed it again and then turned away from the stall.
"Th-thanks for being my friend..." he whispered.
"Don't get all mushy on me," Marilyn warned.
"Nah, I'm... I'm not. Well, best be off then. Catch you later, Mal!"
"See you around, Lou-"
He darted off before Marilyn could even finish that. She wasn't surprised though, not really. Louis prided himself on his ridiculous ideals and to be seen crying in public wouldn't be great for him. Deep down Marilyn knew that Louis would miss her, the sentiment came across.
She'd miss him just as much. The two of them were the eldest of the Black Ravens and had been thick as thieves for a long time. He was easy to talk to and underneath his lazy teenager exterior, Louis was about as sharp when it came to the others as Marilyn herself was. It would be a shame not to have anyone to talk to about them now, especially when there were so many troubles on the horizon. But at the end of the day he needed to sort of his family's problems first and foremost. She wasn't going to argue that it would do his dad good to get away from the temptations of the black market.
So it would just be her from now on, single-handedly working the lives of the Black Ravens into a better place. Even if Louis said that she shouldn't. She had to. What other choice was there?
Marilyn sighed, stood up and smiled out to the world.
"Come on, everyone! I've got red apples, green apples, any kind of apples you can imagine! 50p a bag! You won't find a better deal than that this side of Misthallery!"
And, as always, she ploughed on.