Ridgefield no f*ckn fun

It was cigarette's today, unusual for him but easier to smoke on the side of the street than the good stuff.

The tall mop-head was loitering outside a corner store some time after nine, people watching with a haze of smoke around his eyes. Life recently had been... annoying, kind of scary but he kept that to himself. He'd found himself in more and more of the classic haunts, a ghost seeking some sort of normalcy. Everywhere he went though, the rat was with him, always wanting something. It was exhausting, the dark rings under Rigby's eyes were more sunk than usual.

He took a long drag to finish off his cig then flicked it onto the sidewalk.

Looks+Outfit*hair is blonder and pulled back in a braid*

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Maeve was just exploring, learning these new places and all around, just trying to see if there were better jobs that didn't require a higher learner level. Oh well. She huffed a bit, walking around as she pulled out her own rolled up joint as it was one of the last five that she had currently.

Drugs barely worked on her but she really enjoyed the relaxed feeling she got from them so, even short lived, it was worth it.

As she searched for her lighter though, a small groan left her while she looked around and couldn't find it. Great; there goes a dollar.

Still, she couldn't magically make fire as much as she wished, so she went to the person with the lit cigarette, "Can I borrow a light? I lost mine. " she asked him, not even putting it together yet that they were rather similar.

Of course he had a lighter, he always carried one around just in case. However he didn't like sharing, she could run off with it if she so chose. It wasn't just that though, something else had him narrow his brows and frown as she neared. The rat was displeased, and it was displeased like all the time, but this felt a little more valid than usual.

He gazed up at her through golden curls then shook his head no and shrugged.

Well that sucked. Maybe...oh, she noticed something. He smelt like something she'd eat, almost rodent like honestly. She then opened her little fold that held her weed smokes and then showed him one.

"Smoke for a light? " she assumed that he had to have one, he was friggen smoking -.-

He'd expected her to move on and pester someone else, but instead she stayed put. The familiar scent had him on edge, he glared at her as she reached into a fold in her clothing but couldn't help trying to crane his neck to see what she might pull out.

Oh shit, a blunt in exchange for some lighter fluid? Honey brown eyes flicked back to her greys, then he reached out to grab the roll from her. He pulled his lighter out of his butt pocket and passed it to her, gnawing lightly at the smoke between his teeth. He then scooched over just a bit in case she meant to sit, she'd already paid her dues.

Ah ha! She seems to have spoken to the inner beast in a sense by offering the well made blunt.

Trading, she put her blunt into her mouth and lit it, inhaling and holding before exhaling for a second.

His offer to sit was met with a small nod, moving to plop down next to him as she returned his lighter, "Thank you...no idea how much I need this, " she told him as her head leaned against the wall as she took another long pull and just held it in her lungs for as long as she could before slowly dragon breathing it out of her nose.

As she sat Rigby held out his hand, expectant of the return. When the lighter hit his palm he stashed it away again, settling once more in a cloud of smoke.

He would’ve usually been happy to let her comment linger and sit in silence, but something gnawed at him and it wasn’t just the impatient rat.

"Have we met before?" he asked unable to ignore the uneasy feeling that having her next to him brought.

Took a long drag and breath again, her eyes closing as she let the drug work around her system a little bit. The high never truly lasted long but long enough for her to relax some as she looked over at him.

Her brows furrowed at him a little, trying to understand a bit.

"Maybe...what's your animal? I know mine ran into a smaller were earlier in the month, " she told him as she took a small drag again, looking at him as she just stayed relaxed now.

He might've remembered those specific details had he been a more experienced were. Rigby was only two and a half months in, he knew that he turned into a rat sometimes but he never remembered what it did. Just remnants of it's instincts, of it's emotions that bled into his human life. He had no clue if he was 'the smaller were', but he wouldn't be surprised.

"Rat," he replied, brows still furrowed as he watched her. He reached up to scratch at an itchy spot on his hairline, letting a little ash fall on his curls like it was no big deal.

Ah...so he was the one she tried to eat...ok scratch that, that Rainie tried to eat because she did not want to deal with digesting a person.

"Ah, I did run into you then, " she told him as she took another drag, "I'm a boa...you can imagine what my ass of a boa tried, " as an apology for an attempted eating, she pulled out another and handed it to him. She hadn't meant to try and eat him, it was just animal instinct at that point really.

Huh, so the rat had apparently almost gotten him killed. Cowabummer. At least he got something out of it, a second free roll. Rigby shrugged, blowing smoke as he reached for his apology gift.

"You're not gonna try to eat me again right?"

Laughed and shook her head, "No...hell no, I don't eat others...she just was more stupid because it was a full moon and was just being a dumb ass snake. You're safe with me, " she promised him as she let him take the apology joint. Welp, at least she didn't eat him. Imagine telling that to Red that she ate a wererat and now had the worst tummy ache.

Rigby nodded, it was an answer that satisfied him but not the rat brain. That part of him still wanted to hiss and run.

"Why are you talking in second person?" (third person, he’s not school smart). He hadn’t talked to many weres, he didn’t know how they referred to their animals. For all he knew she was talking about herself omnisciently.

Smiling some, "How else do you refer to your animal? Mine's a she...so she and her...she's a pain in my ass but we've been together since birth so I mean...I can't see not having her around, " she told him innocently enough.

It didn't occur to her that he might not take the news of a born were well but that was due to the small high she was getting.

Rigby hadn't put much thought into who the rat was, he thought it was just him but in rat form. She described hers as another beast entirely, and that made sense. Human Rigby was rude, hungry, and angsty to, but the rat was an extreme. Fuckin' Ratby.

It wasn't this thought that interested him much though, it was the other thing she said. He held his cigarette down, "You were born a snake?"

Nodding at the question as she took another drag, her body uncoiling almost as she leaned back and relaxed more now.

"Aye...kind of strange...I grew up fast- really fast...by the time I was six I was a full grown adult with a kid brain," she said laughing a little, her head shaking some, "But don't worry, I'm an adult by normal standards now. You were bitten I'm assuming? " she asked him curiously, her head turning so that she could look at him.

Rigby's jaw dropped when she put in those numbers. Six years old and she looked fully grown? That sucked, was she gonna die early?

"Like three months ago," he answered, and as she uncoiled he shrunk back down, crouching in on himself to bring the cig back up to his mouth and draw in.

"Oh...so it's only been a short time- has anyone given you a hand in it? " she asked curiously, a brow raised as she looked to him. There was no judgment on her face or in her tone, she was just curious if he'd had any help. Maybe she could offer some if he was wanting any.

He hadn't gone looking, but help had found him.

"I'm good," came his simple reply, smiling faintly behind his cigarette. And since she'd already tried to eat him and everything (a fact that'd come so bluntly but still knocked around blaring alarms in his brain), he wasn't sure her help was what the rat needed.

"Just stay away from me on full moons alright?" he said, though his tone was no serious warning, more a sarcastic jest.

Nodding as she took another hit, holding and just letting it hurt her lungs for the moment before breathing it out and then laughing some.

"No...more than that...silver will hurt you- can really mess you up actually so avoid it and plants, belladonna. Those are the two big things to worry about really and the fully moon...eh just let your animal out in an enclosed space, you won't wake up in anyplace weird like behind a bush...or in a parking lot or up in a tree. " that last one was mostly her since she always seemed to wake up in dang trees.

He hadn't expected the info dump, but it was stuff he hadn't known. Not that he had anything made of real silver, and he would forget the name belladonna in approximately a minute or so, gone with an exhale of smoke.

Rig snorted at the advice about where to go. It was hard to keep something as small as a rat enclosed. "I've woken up in a dumpster both times," he said, smirking sideways at her.

Grimaced a little but smiled at the spot.

"Fun place...I mostly wake up in trees...though the weirdest one was on the roof of a house with my foot stuck in a drain pipe...that was a unique one and hard to explain, " she said with a small face and laugh at herself. You had to be able to laugh otherwise you might go nuts.

Rigby huffed, shaking his head.

"Ouch," he replied to her drainpipe predicament, taking and tapping the ash at the end of his light.

Laughing a little, she nodded, "Aye...not a fun wake up. It does get better...you start to remember and have control even but you still need to wrestle it from your animal friend, " she told him as she shook her head a little to that.

Her smoke was slowly dwindling and that made her sad.

He listened quietly, glancing away as she spoke, watching people on the other side of the street walk by. He still had a bit to go it seemed before he could even remember his shifts, much less control them. But whatever, as long as the rat didn't get him killed.

A random thought, "You'd think we could keep our clothes." He'd actually been thinking about this one for a minute. How come there were vampires and psychics who could make fire from thin air and teleport and float, and he couldn't at least have underwear on in a trash can?

Nodding to that one, "Oh I wish...you know, vampires, when they get their animal form they get to keep everything on them. Us though? Our clothes either get shredded or left in some random pile that we have to hope doesn't get stolen, " she said with a groan at that.

Being a slightly small were at least saved on tearing clothing though, so it was a small win.

Vampires could turn into animals too? The fuck was the point of being a were then?! He snorted, because his situation sucked and bad things were always best approached with sarcasm and indifference.

"It's so stupid," he said with a shake of his head and a toothy smile around his cig.

Nodding in agreement to that one, a small snort laugh leaving her.

Sticking the joint in her mouth, she held a hand out to him, "Maeve by the way, " she told him as she introduced herself finally to her new smoking buddy. She could at least consider him that since they were chilling and smoking, talking shit about things.

Rigby glanced down to the hand, incapable of hiding the slight pinch of his nose that betrayed his reluctance. Ultimately, he didn't reach back to take her hand, giving a name was enough right?

"Rigby," he replied. The roll between his lips didn't give him that thrill anymore, so he spat it out onto the ground and smashed it with his rubber sole.

No handshake, that was fine, she used that hand to pull the smaller joint from her mouth to puff out some smoke.

"Cool...why do you smell like a bakery by the way? "

A bakery? He'd never gotten that one before, usually it was weed. "I work at Krispy Kreme," he replied, figuring it was probably that.

"It sucks," he said with a cynical chuckle, everything sucks man >:I

"So...if I wanted to bribe you for doughnuts...what would it cost? " she asked, a brow raised and a little grin on her face.

Laughing some, she nodded, "I work as a waitress...sucks- people are assholes, " that part wasn't a lie but she didn't need some strange rat judging her for being a dancer.

Bribe him for donuts, now she was talking. He glanced her way, squinted, then gave a crooked smile and held out his palm as if asking for something, patted his pocket where he'd stashed the other blunts she'd given.

He couldn't imagine waitressing, let alone sitting in a restaurant to eat instead of getting take out. "Yeah they are." Big agree Maeve.

Smirked some, "I bring you a whole pack of those I get two dozen fresh hot stickies...also will throw in an edible if I get lucky to score some...how's that sound? " she didn't mind sharing with like-minded folk.

Finishing her joint now, she crushed it with her fingers and let the little remains crumble to the ground with a sad puff from her mouth.

A whole pack? He wondered how many grams she meant by that, a pack wasn't super specific. But then again, he wasn't convinced she was serious about the trade either. He smirked back, "Deal."

With that he stood, exposing a pale stomach as he stretched his arms up behind his head. Nowhere particular to be, but with the urge to smoke sated he'd made room for a new urge, to eat.

"I'll see you," he said to the snake with a nod her way, before he dove his hands into his pockets and started off down the sidewalk.

"Then I will see you around, " she told him with a bit of a grin at that.

She stood up, tugging her coat around herself more as she looked around and then to him.

"See you, stay safe rat-man, " she told him, a teasing grin on her face as she waved and headed off to go home now. She needed to get warm.