PSL: Jamie in New York City

[electro_kinetic]

It was one thing to live alone in the metropolitan jungle that was New York by oneself: it was entirely another to be doing it with the sudden addition of a better than six-foot Scot from Ye Olden Days who had a lot of ideas about how people should behave. Noriko, case in point, was spending more and more time bemused at James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser's continual learning curve and decided she'd take it easy on the guy for a night, and actually walk him through modern socialization.

So she came back to her apartment in her work clothes and changed into something comfortable and moderately stylish, being leather skinny jeans with a raspberry tunic and boots, leaving the shopping bag with clothes of a similar nature for Jamie by the door. "Come on," she called, coming back downstairs to pick up a jacket. "Come out with me, I want to take you to see someplace you'll like." It was quiet--not a club after the first try of that had gone sideways--and outdoors, somewhere he could at least feel a little more at home. She figured the Loch in Central Park was as close to the Highlands as one could get without leaving the island.

"Do you trust me?"

Comments

[hatesredcoats]

"Me... My kilt?"

Jamie did smile a little wider when he glanced up at her. The thought of him wearing his kilt in the city made him feel both excited and nervous all in one feeling. It would feel almost welcome to have the kilt back on, but in this city? How would people gaze upon him?

"I'll wear... Anything you want me to." Jamie took her hand and raised it to his lips. Gently, he kissed her knuckles. "I'll get better.... It will just take some time, aye lass?" Rising to his feet, Jamie took her clothes and headed back into the bedroom. It wasn't long before he joined her again, wearing the clothes she had bought with his kilt, boots and long socks.

"I think I'm ready?"

[electro_kinetic]

"You look good in your kilt," she reasoned, watching him lift her hand and smiling. She also liked how at ease he was in it, and wished she could give him that feeling no matter what he wore. Noriko was prepared to tell off anyone who looked at Jamie funny for the plaid, but since the advent of everyone else wearing canvas kilts (-ish, she had yet to introduce Jamie to the concept of a utili-kilt and had no idea what he'd think of it) she doubted he'd get much flack.

"Yeah," she said when he appeared again and smiled at him in his kilt, "You're ready. We can walk to where we're going, it's not terribly far." Certainly not for him, who was not used to cars and traffic. Nori offered Jamie her hand, lacing her fingers with his and keeping pace with him as they made their way across blocks in the general direction of Central Park. Getting to the park was one thing; getting to where she wanted to go in it was another.

"I like the way you walk in that," she murmured. "In your kilt."

[hatesredcoats]

The more that they walked, the more Jamie clung to her and held her hand tight. Every noise, every honk of car and bustle of people had him on edge. He was trying very hard to remain calm in such a situation. He never thought he'd be in something that scared him more than war, but he was wrong. Moving and walking in the kilt was no problem, at least not compared to everyone else around him. Moving among the people was the more problematic event to him.

"You are a bit biased, lassie," he said with a smile. He knew that she liked his kilt and therefore couldn't be impartial. "It's easier to move in it. Freer. And, I feel more at home in it," he murmured above the noise. Gently, his thumb brushed against her knuckles. "How do you live here and not want to just throttle everyone?"

[electro_kinetic]

"I grew up in Tokyo, and it's...even more crowded than this," Noriko says. "There's no park in the middle of it, none of the dirt like here. It's like something that's not even real." She likes the feel of New York, the solidity of it and the grit.

When his hand clasped hers to stroke her knuckles, and stepped closer to walk beside Jamie, taking the gentle ribbing of her liking his kilt. "You look like you in this. That's the important part." They crossed the last street to the Great Park still holding hands, and the moment they stepped on the green the noise seemed softer, more able to be ignored. "It's hard to explain if you haven't been someplace like it, but here people have to interact with you. They have to see you as a person, not just a face in a skirt they can grope."

[hatesredcoats]

Jamie looked over at her, raising an eyebrow. "You are lucky I like you, especially when you call it a skirt." He chuckled, shaking his head as he squeezed her hand. "I get what ya mean, though. It's not the same in a pair of trousers. The kilt is from home, from my clan." He smiles, thinking of back home. "I like feeling like me."

Once they enter the park, his face softens. He lets go of her hand to kneel down, running his fingers along the grass. There were so many little green spaces in the loud, noisy city. "It's... It's a field. Here, among everything." He looked up at her, eyes wide. "Why do you not just camp here?"

[electro_kinetic]

"I meant me in an actual skirt, not you," she laughed, linking their fingers so they wouldn't be pulled apart until he knelt. "It's not just a field, you know. Come on, we're not there yet."

She brushed her hand over his shoulder and shook her head, smiling as she gestured over her shoulder to where they were going, intersecting with a paved path further away. "I like heat too much. It gets cold out here in the winter."

[hatesredcoats]

Rising to his feet, Jamie took her hand and let her pull him wherever she wanted him to go. As much as he wanted to stay with the grass, she clearly had somewhere she wanted to take him. And he would trust her judgment. "Good. Not a skirt," he teased.

He smiled as he looked up in the direction she motioned to. "You need more layers, then."

[electro_kinetic]

"I'm wearing four of them counting the jacket, that's plenty for me," Noriko teased, walking with him towards the edge of where the forest started. It was, she supposed, a little odd to have a wild forest and meadow in the middle of such an urban city, but she enjoyed the expanse of untamed growth. It felt natural to be here.

It didn't take them long with Jamie's strides to reach the tiny stream and bridge, secluded from sight by a dense cluster of trees and boulders, all scattered with the falling coppery leaves. "Here we are," she said, letting him step in front of her to see the little waterfall and the stream it fed, and listen to the quietness around them.

[hatesredcoats]

"If you're so cold, then why did we come out here?" He turned to her, raising an eyebrow. "At least you can say when you dressed like a Scottish lassie, ye didn't get cold. Between the layers and the thick textiles of the cloth." He raised an eyebrow at her. "Mock the dresses ye didn't want to wear, but they would have kept you more warm that that."

As they approached the clearing, Jamie smiled a bit wider. Stepping away from her, he moved closer to the boulders, stepping off the bridge to get to the stream. He had no qualms about sitting on the ground or getting dirty. "How did you find this place," he whispered.

[electro_kinetic]

"I came out here despite the temperature to show you this place," she replied, teasingly swatting his arm.

"It's not that I mocked them because of how they looked. It's that I felt too constricted to move--the stays an the petticoats and the layers of skirts made it hard to be myself," Noriko said, sinking down with Jamie to sit on one of the rocks edging the stream. "They call it the Loch. I didn't know it was here until I went looking for somewhere you couldn't hear the city outside."

And as they sit together, the noise has faded away, leaving only the burbling water and skittering leaves to interrupt their conversation. "It made me think of that stream I'd fallen into when we met. It was just as cold." And she'd been considerably less clothed then.

[hatesredcoats]

"And aye, lass, I am grateful." Reaching over, Jamie took her hand and squeezed it, reaching down to pick up a stone with his other hand. He glanced back and forth between her and the stream as he listened to her, nodding his head in agreement. He could hear where she was coming from and he understood her discomfort, but it was a different time back then.

At least, in the here and now, she could wear what she wanted. Even if he was amused by how much less she wore. "The Loch," he murmured. "Reminds me of back home. There are a lot of Loch's in Scotland," he said lightly. "It's perfect. I could sit here all day. Could make camp here."

He laughed. "You were quite drenched, lass." Looking up at her, Jaime gently lifted her hand to his lips, kissing her knuckles. "And yet, if ye had not fallen, we'd never have met at all." It was a sad day, a terrible thing, but it had brought them together. "Are ye glad to be home?"

[electro_kinetic]

"I'm glad to be...somewhere I can be myself without fearing repercussion," she decided on, threading her fingers with Jamie's as they watched the water swirl past. "I really liked Scotland, though. I kind of miss it, all the space and the trees."

It was a strange time she'd been stuck in, sure, but the place itself had been pretty, all the mountains and trees and openness. "We could go back, you know. To Scotland, if you wanted to."

[hatesredcoats]

As much as Jamie hated to admit it, he knew that she was right. She just wasn't from his time period. It wasn't what she was used to and she never would. If he wanted to be with her, he would never get to go back to his time, his people. Maybe someday, maybe he'd see Scotland again, but his clan? They were long gone now.

Reaching down, he let his free hand play in the water, feeling the cool damp against his fingers. "It was bonny, wasn't it," he murmured.

Jamie blinked. It never occurred to him that they could go back. Mostly because he didn't think she'd want to. Slowly, he turned to look up at her, raising an eyebrow. "I doubt it's the same as it once was," he said sadly. "Would ye really want to go back?" He was sure she meant just for a trip, an adventure, not to stay. It wasn't her home.

[electro_kinetic]

"Jamie," she chuckled, squeezing his free hand reassuringly. "Of course I'd want to go back. It's your home, just like New York and Tokyo are mine. And nothing says we have to stay in one place forever, no one can keep us where we don't want to be."

Even Noriko isn't sure when the two of them stopped being a 'he and I' and started being a 'we', but she doesn't find herself caring about it either. "It was beautiful there. And even though it's not the same time, from what I know not much has changed about the highlands. We could go."

[hatesredcoats]

"I'm pretty sure that the mountains won't go anywhere." He laughed, looking up at Nori, before looking back down at the water. He wouldn't even know where to begin in terms of how to get there. Or where this Tokyo place was that she kept mentioning. This world was new and different, like nothing he'd ever seen.

Jamie inched a little closer to her, reaching up to cup her cheek and stare into her eyes. "We should go, aye."

[electro_kinetic]

"Not just the mountains," she said, eyes bright as he came closer to her and cupped her face. "I've been reading about it, and a lot is the same. I found the castle you took me to. It's still there."

His smile was so earnest she couldn't resist being happy that he liked the idea. "We can go and see it."

[hatesredcoats]

"Castle Leoch?" He stared at her, his mind wrapping around what she was saying. He knew that anyone he knew and loved would be gone, but the chance to see the castle again was amazing. To know that it was still standing made him feel good. He sighed, nodding his head in agreement to her.

Leaning in close, his lips hovered over hers. "Let's go, then," he murmured. And then he kissed her.

[electro_kinetic]

"Castle Leoch," she echoed in agreement, smile growing on her face. "It looks beautiful in pictures." Noriko was surprised he kissed her, blinking at first before she relaxed against him, paying no mind to the bright, happy glow from her chest.

"Well, you know how to show appreciation."

(should we do something new?)

[hatesredcoats]

"I do. In fact..."

His voice trailed off as he pulled away from her, smiling softly. His eyes widened when he glanced down, also seeing the bright, happy glow from her chest. "Um, Nori, lass..." He blinked, swallowing slightly. "There's, I mean, um... You... You're a bit, well, glowing."

One hand lifted, pointing at her chest. "Do ye' do that often?"

naaaaah

[electro_kinetic]

Noriko pulled back at the look on his face, confused for a moment before he pointed to her chest and she looked down.

And laughed. "Oh, that. It's...sometimes it happens, if I'm happy or scared." It shouldn't be a huge guess as to which she is right now.

"It's just a side-effect. Like ET, you remember that movie?"

Re: naaaaah

[hatesredcoats]

Jamie was quiet a moment as he thought about it. He vaguely remembered her showing him the movie. He had been confused by a lot of it, but he'd watched it all the same because she wanted him too. And it was nice to sit beside her, even if the rest of it was lost on him.

"I didn't know... I just have never seen your magic up close before," he murmured. One hand reached out, fingers trailing down her chest, staring at the glow.

"We should get going," he said before looking back up at her. "Thank you for showing this to me. It means a lot."

Re: naaaaah

[electro_kinetic]

Nori honestly hadn't expected him to sit through it all the way, much less remember any of it, and she smiled as he thought back, trying to remember. It was a jumble of pop culture references he didn't get, most likely.

That was okay. She was having to learn how to communicate with him too. "It won't hurt you," she said. "It's just a little light." Said light came in many forms, some as trembling and ethereal as a flickering candle, and some as radiant and powerful as the wave before a nuclear blast. "We don't have to hurry away. It's okay to just sit here and be still. We're allowed."