  
ClubFloyd Transcript:
The idea behind ClubFloyd is that each
week at a pre-arranged time, a group of
people meet online to cooperatively play
a game of interactive fiction.
|
|
ClubFloyd Transcript:
The idea behind ClubFloyd is that each
week at a pre-arranged time, a group of
people meet online to cooperatively play
a game of interactive fiction.
|
|
ToyShop & Floyditorium
|
#ClubFloyd Discussion
|
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| Roger asks, "What's on the menu?" | ||
| DavidW says, "Map by Ade." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Okay, that means we're all back for sure." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "load sleepmask map" | ||
Floyd ] Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The white door in the hallway is new. You can't remember having seen Floyd | it before. After the children left home, you had expected the house to Floyd | be quieter. You hadn't expected it to grow. Now, with Brady gone, Floyd | Samantha living with her boyfriend one town over, and everything being Floyd | packed for the move, unexpected doorways and passages are the norm. Floyd | Just yesterday morning, you had been vacuuming the bedroom and noticed Floyd | a small archway behind the wardrobe leading to goodness knows where. Floyd | Floyd | Sometimes, on the nights when Derek doesn't come home, you imagine you Floyd | can hear the creaks and groans of rending wood and stone as the house Floyd | tortuously shifts itself into new configurations. Floyd | Floyd | When Derek arrived home from work last night, you tried to tell him Floyd | about it, as you do most nights. Floyd | Floyd | "You should be glad of the extra space, Elaine," he said, "you've Floyd | always wanted a workroom." Most of the time he just sighs and turns Floyd | the TV on, only half listening to you. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue. | Roger says, "Could be promising" | |
| DavidW says, "a house that grows? yeah." | ||
| zarf arrives, full of fun, but no funk. | DavidW says, "(please have a batpole, please have a batpole)" | |
| Jacqueline says, "heh" | ||
| Jacqueline presses the yellow enter button. | ||
Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue. | ||
| Jacqueline pushes the green 'space' button. | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | Map Floyd | A Deconstructural Fiction by Ade McT Floyd | Release 1 / Serial number 150926 / Inform 7 build 6L38 (I6/v6.33 lib Floyd | 6/12N) Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Monday Floyd | Floyd | The week starts like it always does. Slowly. It was an effort to get Floyd | out of bed this morning. Derek had left before the morning light Floyd | spilled half-heartedly into the room and from the coolness of the Floyd | sheets on his bed, you judge he had left early. His coffee cup was Floyd | still warm, though. You imagine he had taken his coffee out into the Floyd | garden. Floyd | Floyd | Some mornings, especially in summer when the weight of light on your Floyd | eyelids wakes you early, you come across him in the garden staring Floyd | across the expanse of lawn. At these times especially you try not to Floyd | intrude but occasionally you will watch him through the kitchen Floyd | window, wondering what he is thinking about. Floyd | Floyd | But today all that's left of Derek's morning routine is a half-empty Floyd | coffee cup and a few toast crumbs on the sideboard. A week can go past Floyd | when these remains are all you see of him, and this morning, like Floyd | every morning, you begin your day by wiping away this evidence that Floyd | Derek was ever here. Most of the rest of the morning is spent doing Floyd | those little things that are done on auto-pilot, and, once done, Floyd | forgotten until they need to be done again. Floyd | Floyd | It's not until you are on the upstairs hallway, dusting the leaves of Floyd | the rubber plant, that you see the white door you noticed yesterday Floyd | stands open, light spilling from it into the darkened hall. Floyd | Floyd | (Note : Even if you are experienced with interactive fiction, Floyd | typing "help" will get you started with some special commands.) Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed. Pictures line the walls, barely Floyd | illuminated. To the south of you is the spare room, opposite it, Floyd | Brady's room and the hallway stretches toward the east side of the Floyd | house. A flight of stairs leads down into the entrance hall, and the Floyd | new white door hangs open next to the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "I can never recall the difference between the yellow and the green buttons, but at least I have a 50/50 shot." | |
| DavidW says (to Jacqueline), "I don't remember the colours either. I just 'push space' or 'push enter'." | ||
| DavidW says, "I have not played Map before" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Nor I." | ||
| Roger says, "I'm not sure even rubber plants can survive in a space with no windows, but it's a magical space, so sure" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Roger), "Full spectrum lighting." | ||
| Deesix arrives, full of funk, but no fun. | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "help" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > HELP Floyd | Floyd | Some special commands in this story are: Floyd | Floyd | If you wish to end a day and move to the next day, simply type Floyd | "tomorrow". Floyd | Floyd | If you forget what day it is, type "day" for a reminder. Floyd | Floyd | If you want to wait until a particular time, try the command "wait Floyd | until" for example "wait until 2:30 pm" Floyd | Floyd | The command "about" will give you more information about this story Floyd | and its contributors. Floyd | Floyd | Please note - this story contains images, and is best read in a modern Floyd | interactive fiction interpreter like Windows Glulxe which you can Floyd | download from here: Floyd | [LINK] Floyd | ersXglulxe.html. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "oops" | |
| Jacqueline asks, "Well, hm. Anybody here know if missing those images means missing plot?" | ||
| Doug says, "I've played it before but only got a few endings" | ||
| verbalK says, "No idea" | ||
| Jacqueline asks (of Doug), "Are the images mandatory?" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Or icing?" | ||
| Doug says, "I think it gives you a replacement description if you don't have images" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Okay." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "about" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > ABOUT Floyd | Floyd | Map is copyright 2015 by Ade McT (mikepreston99@outlook.com). Floyd | It may be distributed for free, but not sold or included in any Floyd | for-profit collection without written permission from the author. Floyd | Floyd | The vast proportion of the bug free story is due to the rigorous Floyd | proof-readings of: Mandy Evans, ChrisP and J. Floyd | Floyd | Map was developed using Graham Nelson's most excellent Floyd | inform7 and is powered, at least in parts, by the extensions of Emily Floyd | Short, Eric Eve, and Ron Newcomb. Floyd | Floyd | > | Doug asks, "but maybe only if it can tell that you don't have images?" | |
| Jacqueline says, "It should be able to tell that here, I would think." | ||
| Doug says, "the images are just maps of the house that show you where the new room is." | ||
| Doug says, "so otherwise you just have to explore" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x pictures" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > X PICTURES Floyd | Floyd | You don't really enjoy having your picture taken. You haven't for Floyd | years. If the camera comes out, it's always you who is holding it, or Floyd | trying to blend into the background blur, looking away. Floyd | Floyd | When you were first married, it was fun, and you still have the black Floyd | and white passport sized set of linked photographs from the Floyd | photo-booth in which you and Derek made funny faces at the camera, Floyd | laughing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "i" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > I Floyd | Floyd | You are carrying: Floyd | a map Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x map" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > X MAP Floyd | Floyd | You started drawing the map on the day you noticed the house start to Floyd | grow. Now, your drawing seems to have taken on a life of it's own. Floyd | Each morning, it has changed. Sometimes, when you are walking around Floyd | the house, the map seems to come to life in your hands. Floyd | Floyd | You see that since yesterday, there is a new door on the west wall of Floyd | the hallway, and a new door east of the Main Bedroom. Floyd | > | Doug says, "ah, yeah, with images you don't get that last paragraph" | |
| Jacqueline nods. | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x me" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > X ME Floyd | Floyd | You don't often look at yourself. It's difficult to pinpoint the Floyd | moment when you stopped looking in the mirror, or glancing at your Floyd | hair in a handy reflection in a shop window. How would someone else Floyd | sum you up? Elaine Paterson. 40 years old. Dowdy in a neat and Floyd | unassuming sort of way. Quiet. You wear thick jumpers when it's cold. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "sweet automap" | |
| Jacqueline says, "Man, this game was making the woman sound like she was 60." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "But I guess that's just from my perspective." | ||
| zarf says, "40? Kids these days" | ||
| Roger says, "I would have guessed older too, but that seems fine." | ||
| DavidW says, "I am old, I am old, I shall eat my porridge oats rolled." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "So, I guess on this first day we should explore all the presently-existing house?" | ||
| Roger says, "I guess we could creep around our kids' old bedrooms but I personally don't care all that much either way" | ||
| Roger asks, "DW you still driving the ship?" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x white door" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > X WHITE DOOR Floyd | Floyd | You see nothing special about the white door. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "I'm wondering: do we explore 'new rooms' first? Or should we look at rooms that Elaine knows but we don't?" | |
| Jacqueline says, "Hm. So don't go west yet." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x plant" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > X PLANT Floyd | Floyd | Perhaps it's where you put it, but for some reason, over the years, Floyd | this plant has grown slowly, the leaves small, the trunk pencil-wide. Floyd | Floyd | You remember the day you brought it home. "It won't grow flowers, you Floyd | know," had said Derek as soon as he saw you come in the door. Floyd | Floyd | You nodded and smiled. "Yes," you had said, "It says so on the label." Floyd | You remember having a cold, coughing, the wind outside had made your Floyd | fingers feel like they belonged to someone else. Floyd | Floyd | "You know," he had said, "Malcolm and Judy were thinking of inviting Floyd | us to dinner tonight." Floyd | Floyd | "Oh?" you replied, unwilling to commit, a vague feeling of dread Floyd | creeping over you. Floyd | Floyd | "We should go. Maybe you could try and make an effort this time." Floyd | Floyd | You didn't answer him, but you felt bright spots of red appears on Floyd | your cheeks. He turned, losing interest in both the plant and you, and Floyd | walked away. Three steps. You had been left holding the plant, Floyd | uncertain. Floyd | Floyd | "Where shall we put it," you had said to his back, your voice small. Floyd | "It might look nice in the lounge." Floyd | Floyd | "Good Lord, no," he had snapped. "What's the point if it will never Floyd | flower? Ugly looking thing anyway. Keep it out of the way somewhere." Floyd | Floyd | You had burst into tears right there in the middle of the entrance Floyd | hall. It was the first time you had ever cried in this house. Maybe Floyd | that's why you remember it so clearly. So you had stuck it away in the Floyd | upstairs hall - out of sight. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "I actually think that's a sound plan, tempting as the new room is." | |
| Roger says, "We've still got important dusting to get to, I'm sure of it" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I know, I love this woman. So clean." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed. Pictures line the walls, barely Floyd | illuminated. To the south of you is the spare room, opposite it, Floyd | Brady's room and the hallway stretches toward the east side of the Floyd | house. A flight of stairs leads down into the entrance hall, and the Floyd | new white door hangs open next to the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I think... if she could only get a nice bagel, she might feel better about her day." | |
| Jacqueline asks, "Ready to explore? DW, out of curiosity, are you making a map?" | ||
| DavidW says, "I'll try to make a map, yes." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to DW), "Thank you." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the spare room door) Floyd | Floyd | Spare Room Floyd | The work bench, so recently unpacked and painstakingly pieced Floyd | together, sits unused in the corner. The vast expanse of empty floor Floyd | is intimidating. Floyd | Floyd | Over the years, the function of this room has changed and evolved Floyd | alongside the family. It used to be a playroom for the children. Then Floyd | it was an office when Derek worked at home for six months. Then it was Floyd | a spare bedroom for visitors. But it was used so infrequently that Floyd | Derek suggested you use it as a workroom "to do all those things Floyd | you've always wanted to do." Floyd | Floyd | It was a good idea, but now you've cleared the old bed away and put a Floyd | workbench in here, it still remains almost entirely unused. It's as Floyd | if, when confronted with all this space and opportunity, your mind Floyd | went blank, and everything you thought of seemed a waste of time Floyd | somehow. It's like you're paralysed by indecision. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x bench" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X BENCH Floyd | Floyd | The wooden surface of the workbench is entirely empty. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "gosh. No art supplies at all?" | |
| Roger says, "A bit clumsy to take the narrational telling that far, but he almost stopped in time, and it's harder than it looks." | ||
| Doug says (to Floyd), "dismantle bench" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > DISMANTLE BENCH Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "That's all that's in here, eh?" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look under bench" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > LOOK UNDER BENCH Floyd | Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | Floyd | > | Doug says, "sorry, just checking :)" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "stand on bench" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > STAND ON BENCH Floyd | Floyd | You get onto the workdesk. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "down" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > DOWN Floyd | Floyd | (first getting off the workdesk) Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "stand" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > STAND Floyd | Floyd | But you aren't in anything at the moment. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "get off bench" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > GET OFF BENCH Floyd | Floyd | But you aren't on the workdesk at the moment. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "get off bench" | ||
Floyd ] Spare Room Floyd | > Floyd | > GET OFF BENCH Floyd | Floyd | But you aren't on the workdesk at the moment. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "(We'd gotten down successfully, I see.)" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. The Floyd | door in the north wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Floyd | Derek's room, and the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a Floyd | doorway leads into the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I think the bench might be a pushable thingy for a future attic." | |
| Jacqueline asks, "Wait, So both Brady's room and the hallway were east?" | ||
| Doug says, "Brady's room is opposite the spare room, i.e. north" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Ah, now that I reread, yeah." | ||
| Doug says, "the lack of oxford comma strike again." | ||
| Doug says, "+s" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Unhuh" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Okay, I'll go back to that." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | (first opening Brady's bedroom door) Floyd | Floyd | Brady's Room Floyd | Brady's room remains in the state it was when he moved out. You've Floyd | left it untouched in the hope that one day you will hear a knock on Floyd | the door and it will be Brady there, his tall thin frame slightly Floyd | stooped, leaning against the doorway, a five day scrag of beard Floyd | covering his habitual cheeky grin. Floyd | Floyd | The posters on the wall, reminders of winning sports teams and fading Floyd | rock bands, are further apart than yesterday, as though spaced out and Floyd | shifted by some unseen hand, showing acres of cream wallpaper. The Floyd | bed, stripped of sheets, is only a textured mattress, the desk, piled Floyd | with hockey trophies from his schooldays. Grey light from the window Floyd | filters into the hallway behind you. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Derek had said that Brady wasn't going to be back, and you should Floyd | remove his things - sell them maybe - empty the room. You had shaken Floyd | your head. "He'll be back," you said, "he'll always come home." Derek Floyd | had disagreed. Privately, lately, you have been doubting it also. It Floyd | wouldn't hurt for him to call, you often find yourself thinking. When Floyd | the message light blinks on the answering machine, you always have a Floyd | moment of hope. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x posters" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X POSTERS Floyd | Floyd | Brady's tastes always ran to...loud. The posters seem to be mainly Floyd | long haired men shouting into the camera or clean cut young men, Floyd | heavily muscled under hockey armour. Floyd | Floyd | > | Doug says, "clean cut hockey hair" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x trophies" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X TROPHIES Floyd | Floyd | Golden plastic reminders of all Brady's hockey injuries. Floyd | Floyd | It wasn't something you and Derek had pushed him into, hockey. One day Floyd | he had come home from school, face flushed around a wide grin and a Floyd | black eye and had announced he was going to play hockey. On the ice. Floyd | You hadn't even know they did ice hockey at his school. He had been Floyd | good at it, too. Floyd | Floyd | The first time you went to see him play, his slim build standing out Floyd | amongst his stockier team mates, even your uneducated eyes could see Floyd | he had something - some sort of grace that floated him over the ice Floyd | and lifted the game somehow. Whenever he had the puck, a palpable Floyd | excitement seized the crowd - an unconscious reaction to his easy Floyd | elegance. Floyd | Floyd | It only made the times he was brutally crushed into the barrier or Floyd | mowed down by a lumpen opponent all the more unbearable. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks (of Doug), "Is that another band name?" | |
| Doug says, "an album cut, perhaps" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "So, the game is set in Canada. Got it." | ||
| verbalK exclaims, "Yay !" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Oh wait, not Canada." | ||
| Roger says, "No Canadian alive talks about 'ice' hockey" | ||
| verbalK says, "True that." | ||
| verbalK asks, "Is there any other kind of hockey ?" | ||
| Doug says, "I think it's set in the US but the author is British" | ||
| DavidW says (to Roger), "heh" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "No Canadian mother would ever say, 'I didn't even know they did ice hockey at his school.'" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to vK), "Field hockey." | ||
| Doug says, "hence hockey 'armour'" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x window" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X WINDOW Floyd | Floyd | Through the window, you can see the garden. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "Alright, so Mom's being spending some quality alone time with my old Gretzky posters." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x garden" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X GARDEN Floyd | Floyd | Brady's room overlooks the lawn. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "This house reminds me of the Deadline house for some reason" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "time" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > TIME Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "Anything else we want to do in here?" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x desk" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X DESK Floyd | Floyd | The wooden desk is battered and dented and completely covered by Floyd | Brady's old hockey trophies. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Doug says (to Floyd), "day" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > DAY Floyd | Floyd | It's Monday today. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x drawer" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X DRAWER Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x bed" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X BED Floyd | Floyd | More of a futon. Brady always insisted he felt more comfortable Floyd | sleeping closer to the floor. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look under bed" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > LOOK UNDER BED Floyd | Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I guess I'm done here for now." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Brady's Room Floyd | The posters on the wall, reminders of winning sports teams and fading Floyd | rock bands, are further apart than yesterday, as though spaced out and Floyd | shifted by some unseen hand, showing acres of cream wallpaper. The Floyd | bed, stripped of sheets, is only a textured mattress, the desk, piled Floyd | with hockey trophies from his schooldays. Grey light from the window Floyd | filters into the hallway behind you. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "exits" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > EXITS Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "So no to the new room, going east." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. The Floyd | door in the north wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Floyd | Derek's room, and the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a Floyd | doorway leads into the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x pictures" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > X PICTURES Floyd | Floyd | It's like a history, this hallway, or a story. Black and white becomes Floyd | colour. Hairstyles change from long to short and then long again. Floyd | Young people become middle aged. Babies appear and disappear, becoming Floyd | children. Through it all is the constant presence of Derek: A frowning Floyd | boy; a serious looking young man with neat hair; A harried young Floyd | father balancing two small children in his arms at some seaside Floyd | resort; A middle aged man sat at the kitchen table. Floyd | Floyd | At this end of the hallway you are part of the tale, but your story Floyd | seems to end somewhere in the middle. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "Only having one bathroom for all these people is the root cause of her ennui" | |
| Jacqueline says, "heh" | ||
| DavidW says, "There might be a master bathroom too." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "There is certainly some odd mechanics in the writing of this game, and odd turns of phrase. Are we sure the author is British?" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | The pause before you enter Sam's room is almost subconscious. When she Floyd | was at home, you were always an uninvited presence there and with both Floyd | of you in her room, resentment hung thick, turning most interactions Floyd | poisonous. Now, even with the room vacated there's a sense, at the Floyd | doorway, of unwelcoming. It's not something you've been able to shake Floyd | off even after these last two months without her. Floyd | Floyd | (first opening Sam's bedroom door) Floyd | Floyd | Samantha's Room Floyd | The bed under the window seems further away today. The floor, Floyd | uncluttered with Sam's possessions, has stretched slightly during the Floyd | night. You used to be able to touch the empty desk from the door, and Floyd | the walls, bare of brightly coloured posters, appear taller - the Floyd | ceiling more distant. Floyd | Floyd | After Sam left, Derek had piled everything remaining into black Floyd | plastic bags and, shaking with anger, had dumped them in the garbage. Floyd | You feel now that maybe this had been the wrong thing to do - that you Floyd | should have taken Sam's possessions from the trash and stored them Floyd | somewhere. But, at the time, you had been angry too. Floyd | Floyd | It had been the first time you noticed the house's growth. As Derek Floyd | removed books and posters and CD's and plastic figurines or furry Floyd | jumbles of cuddly toys, the walls of the room had expanded. Walking Floyd | across the floors had taken longer. Not much, but enough to be Floyd | noticeable. Eight years living in the same house, vacuuming the same Floyd | floors, has made you sensitive to any small change. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Doug says, "I've met the author and he did have a British accent..." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Huh. Okay." | ||
| Doug says, "the 'sat' thing is a particular colloquialism that drives Miseri crazy" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "heh" | ||
| DavidW says, "I wonder why the kids are so estranged from their folks." | ||
| Roger says, "The fantasy of a growing house does seem particularly apt to the British" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yes. For me it was the 'had said Derek' construction, the capital letters after semi-colons, and the lack of commons in places I expect them." | ||
| Roger says, "Ennhhh I think this narrator's sense of estrangement is somewhat unfounded, as is stereotypical" | ||
| DavidW says, "Neverending Story has a growing house. I think one of George McDonald's stories does too." | ||
| Doug | Bloody hell. LEARN TO SAY "SHE IS SITTING" AND "SHE IS STANDING" OR YOUR ENGLISH TEACHER WILL VOMIT BLOOD. | ||
| Doug | Pardon me. "Your English teacher will have been vomited blood". Does that work better for you? | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It seems the house was distant in a different way when the children were at home, but while it might make more sense for the house to shrink after their departure, that might make for a less interesting game." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Doug), "hee" | ||
| Roger says, "Like an opportunistic infection" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x bed" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X BED Floyd | Floyd | You bought this bed when Sam was only eight. You had just moved here. Floyd | At the time it had been a princess bed with a pink gauze canopy. Over Floyd | the years, Sam had grown out of the canopy, but she had refused to let Floyd | the bed go, even though, as she grew, her feet stuck further and Floyd | further over the bottom. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x posters" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X POSTERS Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x desk" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X DESK Floyd | Floyd | Just a plain wooden desk but, over the years, Sam has decorated it in Floyd | graffiti, sequins, and vari-colored crepe paper, depending on her Floyd | moods. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read graffiti" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > READ GRAFFITI Floyd | Floyd | You see nothing special about decorations. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Ah - 'bare of posters' - I misread." | |
| Jacqueline asks, "So that's it in here, eh?" | ||
| DavidW asks, "bathroom next?" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the bathroom door) Floyd | Floyd | Bathroom Floyd | The bathroom is all in pale green. The toilet, sink and bath were here Floyd | when you moved in, and there never really seemed to be a reason to Floyd | change them. The mirrored cabinet above the sink steams up when anyone Floyd | has a shower and because of the poor ventilation through the small fan Floyd | in the window, the grouting between the tiles has always had mold Floyd | problems. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "There was a window in Sam's room too, but I assume it isn't special." | |
| Jacqueline says, "We can check after the bathroom, I guess." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x window" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X WINDOW Floyd | Floyd | Through the window, you can see the garden. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x garden" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X GARDEN Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x cabinet" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X CABINET Floyd | Floyd | Your face, in the mirror, appears care-worn. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x mirror" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X MIRROR Floyd | Floyd | Your face, in the mirror, appears care-worn. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "open cabinet" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN CABINET Floyd | Floyd | You open the mirrored cabinet. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "look in cabinet." | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > LOOK IN CABINET. Floyd | Floyd | The mirrored cabinet is empty. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "This woman is *really* good at cleaning." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "close cabinet" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > CLOSE CABINET Floyd | Floyd | You close the mirrored cabinet. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "Guess whats-his-name isn't going bald." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x toilet" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X TOILET Floyd | Floyd | The toilet is old, but serviceable. It's supported the whole family Floyd | for eight years. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "(literally supported the whole family)" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "use toilet" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > USE TOILET Floyd | Floyd | You have no need at the moment. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x tub" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X TUB Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "Where's the photo of that." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x shower" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X SHOWER Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x bath" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X BATH Floyd | Floyd | The bath is empty. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "take bath" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > TAKE BATH Floyd | Floyd | You're not really sure that there's enough hot water. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "..." | |
| Jacqueline says, "In truth, I was hoping we would be able to pick up the bath." | ||
| DavidW says, "If there's only two people living here, there ought to be plenty of hot water." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Nothing else? Go look at the window in Samatha's room, then go to our loveless master bedroom?" | ||
| DavidW says, "no, go straight to bedroom." | ||
| DavidW asks, "We'll probably be touring everything each day anyway, no?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Prolly." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the main bedroom door) Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | The beds are new. It had been your suggestion. You had surprised Floyd | yourself one night, when, after a couple of glasses of wine, you had Floyd | said to Derek, "Shall we get single beds, do you think? You need to Floyd | get up so early, and you know how I toss and turn and keep you awake Floyd | sometimes." Floyd | Floyd | Derek had looked up, surprised. "I suppose we might as well," he had Floyd | said, after a pause, "it's not as though we need a double at our time Floyd | of life." Floyd | Floyd | It had been a strange feeling, that first night, when the new beds had Floyd | been unpacked and covered in freshly bought linen. Twenty five years Floyd | of sleeping next to a warm, breathing body, and space to throw out an Floyd | arm or a leg and still feel supported, replaced by open space each Floyd | side of you. It had been a strange feeling, but not an unpleasant one, Floyd | and you had slept better that first night than in a long time. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "How did I know there'd be separate beds?" | |
| verbalK asks, "Is this game about depression or... depressing by itself ?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It's a paradox, vK" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Don't think about it too much, lest you be caught in the depressive spiral." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x detritus" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X DETRITUS Floyd | Floyd | Just your accumulated personal items that seem to have built up over Floyd | the years. A small avalanche of lipsticks and mascara bottles, Floyd | hairbrushes and curlers, foundation and pins. Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK says, "It might be a tiny bit too late..." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x pins" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X PINS Floyd | Floyd | Just your accumulated personal items that seem to have built up over Floyd | the years. A small avalanche of lipsticks and mascara bottles, Floyd | hairbrushes and curlers, foundation and pins. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x window" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X WINDOW Floyd | Floyd | Through the window, you can see the driveway. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x driveway" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X DRIVEWAY Floyd | Floyd | From here you can see over the driveway and a little way along the Floyd | street. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x street" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X STREET Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x bed" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X BED Floyd | Floyd | Which do you mean, your bed or Derek's bed? Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x my bed" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X MY BED Floyd | Floyd | A single bed. It's quite small, but comfortable. After twenty years of Floyd | sharing a bed, you had forgotten how pleasurable it was to be able to Floyd | sleep in your own space. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "Time to flip those mattresses, lay" | |
| Roger says, ",lady" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x derek's bed" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X DEREK'S BED Floyd | Floyd | Derek prefers a much harder mattress to you. He says it's good for his Floyd | back. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "flip matress" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > FLIP MATRESS Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "change sheets" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > CHANGE SHEETS Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "dust" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > DUST Floyd | Floyd | You rub the map. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "heh" | |
| Roger says, "That's why we can't have nice things." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x wardrobe" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X WARDROBE Floyd | Floyd | A large wooden wardrobe in the corner of the room. It is closed. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "open wardrobe" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN WARDROBE Floyd | Floyd | You open the wardrobe, revealing your and Derek's clothes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x clothes" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X CLOTHES Floyd | Floyd | A thicket of greys and green, the clothes hang listlessly. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "See no sign of a master bathroom. Hence the crushing banality." | |
| DavidW says, ">x narnia" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "look behind clothes" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > LOOK BEHIND CLOTHES Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says (to DW), "Indeed." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "enter wardrobe" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > ENTER WARDROBE Floyd | Floyd | You get into the wardrobe. Floyd | Floyd | In the wardrobe you can see your and Derek's clothes. Floyd | Floyd | > | Doug says, "'You rub the map' is nm's next poem" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | You would have to get out of the wardrobe first. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "So, you've noted that there's a new room behind this wardrobe? But we want to explore known rooms before these?" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "out" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > OUT Floyd | Floyd | You get out of the wardrobe. Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "The new room is east, actually." | |
| DavidW says, "Or, one of them." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yeah" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "That room" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Go there, or to rooms that existed back before our life had completely lost its meaning?" | ||
| DavidW says, "I'd like to see all of this floor, including new rooms before heading downstairs." | ||
| Roger says, "Sounds good to me" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | As you walk through the entrance, the air seems to shimmer Floyd | somehow. Floyd | Floyd | You recognise this room. It's the downstairs hallway in your Aunt Floyd | May's house. It has the same musty becalmed air, smelling of age and Floyd | dust. Floyd | Floyd | Short Corridor Floyd | The old clock in the corner punctuates the seconds with its deep bass Floyd | ticking. All the pictures are still on the wall - lined up ancestors Floyd | and forgotten relatives mixing with cheap reproductions of Monet's Floyd | landscapes. A musty old sofa against the wall is lit up by the one Floyd | window. A door to the south leads into your Aunt's front room. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You were here only last month. Just before your Aunt was finally Floyd | shipped off to the old folk's home. It wasn't a pleasant visit. Aunt Floyd | May had been quiet, pensive, sad even. She had spent the whole time Floyd | staring out of the window into her garden and hardly speaking. When Floyd | you came in, Aunt May had been sat ramrod straight in her armchair. Floyd | She turned her head when you entered the room, but hardly seemed to Floyd | recognise you. Floyd | Floyd | She had been upset. Your Aunt Anna was taking her to an old folk's Floyd | home because she was getting too frail to look after herself. When she Floyd | had asked you if she couldn't come and live with you, a big part of Floyd | you wanted to say yes. But, with the move, and everything that was Floyd | happening with Samantha, it just seemed as though the fight with Derek Floyd | would be too daunting. Floyd | Floyd | So you had made some excuses. Floyd | Floyd | On your way out she had looked up at you. "Remember me," she had said. Floyd | "But not like this." You hadn't known how to respond. So you had left Floyd | quietly, closing the lounge door behind you. Your mother's younger Floyd | sister, Anna, had taken May to the home two weeks later. You haven't Floyd | seen her since. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "With luck, there'll be a bagel and sudoko puzzle in the kitchen." | |
| Jacqueline asks, "To cheer her up, you mean?" | ||
| DavidW says, "Maybe? I dunno. She doesn't seem to have anything planned for her day." | ||
| Roger says, "Peter Parker is really bummed out these days" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "There is cleaning to do, DW." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x pictures" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > X PICTURES Floyd | Floyd | A brief history of your maternal family tree. Uncles and aunts you Floyd | have a passing acquaintance with mingle with more distant relatives. Floyd | Dotted here and there are Monet prints. Your Aunt May loved Monet. Floyd | Floyd | > | Doug says, "ah, I missed this room when I played" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x sofa" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > X SOFA Floyd | Floyd | Your Aunt May has had this faded old thing for years. It was in her Floyd | caravan when you were a child. Floyd | Floyd | She always told you it was a wedding present . When you pointed out Floyd | that she had never been married, Aunt May would tap her nose and wink. Floyd | As a young woman, you pretended to be annoyed but secretly you were Floyd | delighted that this woman had so many secrets. So many hidden sides to Floyd | her. You always hoped that when you reached her age, your life would Floyd | have been as complicated and interesting. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "Wasn't Anna Mary Jane's aunt or mother?" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x window" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > X WINDOW Floyd | Floyd | Through the window, you can see the vegetable garden. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x garden" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > X GARDEN Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's garden used to be beautiful. And productive. She grew all Floyd | kinds of vegetables and fruit. When she visited, it was always with a Floyd | basket in which were unlikely combinations of odd vegetables. Floyd | Aubergines mixed alongside purple french beans and baby turnips. Now, Floyd | with her advancing years, she has let it become overgrown and wild. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "The genre of growing spaceships is sadly neglected" | |
| DavidW asks, "How's the house bring the other place's outside area here with it?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Because they're not real, I suspect." | ||
| DavidW says, "oh wait. The shimmer." | ||
| Roger says, "Now you're thinking with portals" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Oh. Or that." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "But really I think we're losing our mind and that Derek is just playing along." | ||
| DavidW says, "Aunt May's rooms haven't moved. We simply got a new portal to them." | ||
| verbalK says, "I am so lost right now ..." | ||
| DavidW says (to Jacqueline), "We never had kids. Or they died a very long time ago." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "So, deeper into her home?" | ||
| Roger says, "Sure she doesn't need all this crap any more" | ||
| DavidW says, "I'm hoping there'll be something to pick up. I'm getting antsy." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x clock" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > X CLOCK Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May has had this clock forever. Its tick is like a constant note Floyd | in your life. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says (to DW), "Heh" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "look behind clock" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > LOOK BEHIND CLOCK Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "hmph. No batpole there, I guess." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Have heart, little hobbit." | ||
| Roger says (to Floyd), "x map" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > X MAP Floyd | Floyd | You see that since yesterday, there is a new door on the west wall of Floyd | the hallway, and a new door east of the Main Bedroom. Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | Despite her age, Aunt May keeps her home spotlessly clean. The window Floyd | allows her to watch the comings and goings in the street from her Floyd | strategically positioned armchair. An old dresser holds brass Floyd | ornaments and a selection of glass flowers. The only door leads back Floyd | out into the hallway. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On the dresser is an old folk's home leaflet. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sits in her chair, hands folded quietly in her lap, staring Floyd | out of the window. She looks up and smiles wanly. It seems to take her Floyd | a while to recognise you. "Hello, Elaine love," she says, eventually. Floyd | "It's nice that you could drop in, especially now I'm not going to be Floyd | here much longer." Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Aunt May(!)" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "talk to may" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > TALK TO MAY Floyd | Floyd | To engage in a conversation, try to ASK Aunt May ABOUT something, TELL Floyd | Aunt May ABOUT something, or SHOW Aunt May something. Or, even, try Floyd | saying "hello". Once you are chatting, you can just use "ASK ABOUT Floyd | something", or if you are feeling confident, as a short hand, just "A Floyd | something". You could also ask Aunt May to do things using: Aunt May, Floyd | GO SOUTH for example. Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK asks, "Wait.. what? Is she dead ?" | |
| Roger asks, "Are we?" | ||
| DavidW says, "She's moving to a home." | ||
| verbalK asks, "The home we are in?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "No. She is in an old folks home, but we are remembering the past or lost our minds or something." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask may about may" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT MAY Floyd | Floyd | "Hi, Aunt May," you say. Floyd | Floyd | "Yes, dear?" she asks. Floyd | Floyd | "How are you, Auntie May?" you ask. Floyd | Floyd | "I'm fine, thank you," she assures you. "Not that any of you care." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sighs heavily. Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK says, "Or portal." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Possibly" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x leaflet" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X LEAFLET Floyd | Floyd | "Shady Willow Retirement Community". The photographs make it look Floyd | quite nice. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May shifts in her seat, and clasps her hands in her lap. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask may about me" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT ME Floyd | Floyd | You prattle on for a while about your life, and the move, and Derek Floyd | and the kids, but it's not long before you run out of things to say, Floyd | and the enormous silence in the room reasserts itself. Floyd | Floyd | "Sounds like things are going well," says Aunt May, but she shakes her Floyd | head slightly. "I'm surprised you've got time to come and visit." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May lets out a sigh that seems to come right from deep inside Floyd | her. ""Oh, Elaine," she says, "they're wanting me to go to an old Floyd | folk's home. I don't want to go. They're saying I'm not right on my Floyd | own because of the fire." Floyd | Floyd | The call with Aunt Anna had been difficult. After the fire, she had Floyd | wanted you to take Aunt May "for a few weeks while we get her sorted Floyd | out". You had thought at the time, with some justification, that it Floyd | was unfair of her to ask at such short notice. Anna is only just older Floyd | than you. She has plenty of space in her house now her kids have left Floyd | home. She blamed her husband. "He's always working," she had said. "I Floyd | don't think I can cope with her by myself." You had demurred, making Floyd | some excuses about moving house and Samantha being difficult. "You Floyd | could at least try, Elaine," Anna had ended the call by saying. "We Floyd | don't ask you to do much for the family." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask may about fire" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT FIRE Floyd | Floyd | "Did you have a fire?" you say. Floyd | Floyd | "Just a little accident," replies Aunt May. "I nodded off while my Floyd | dinner was on the stove." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May turns her head slightly to look up the street, but you can't Floyd | see what she is looking at. Floyd | Floyd | "I know I can't stay," says Aunt May, and her voice catches for a Floyd | moment, "but it would be nice to live with someone I loved rather than Floyd | all those strangers." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May had stayed with Anna for just a short time. She moved back Floyd | into her flat despite Anna's protestations. Anna wanted to sell May's Floyd | house. To do it up and use the money to fund May's final years in an Floyd | old folks home. Your other aunts had disagreed. They wanted to get May Floyd | a nurse - to let her stay here amongst all her things. The Floyd | conversation had passed you by. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask may about anna" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT ANNA Floyd | Floyd | "How is Aunt Anna?" you ask. Floyd | Floyd | "Don't talk to me about her", says your Aunt, her voice raising Floyd | slightly. "She's no sister of mine. Forcing me into that Shady Willows Floyd | place. It's a place for old people. Not for me." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May looks at you directly. "I know you've had a tough time Floyd | recently, Elaine, she says, "and I don't want to put on you, but Floyd | you've got all that spare space now Brady and Sam are gone, and I know Floyd | you're lonely what with Derek working all the time. Perhaps I could Floyd | come and stay with you? We could be company for each other, and I Floyd | could help out a bit around the house. What do you say?" Floyd | Floyd | Do you tell Aunt May "yes" or "no"? | Jacqueline says, "huh" | |
| Jacqueline asks, "Yes?" | ||
| Roger says, "ok" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "yes" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | Do you tell Aunt May "yes" or "no"? Floyd | > YES Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | "I'd love to have you, Aunt May," you reply. "You're welcome to say as Floyd | long as you like." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May smiles, and a tear trickles slowly down the side of her nose. Floyd | "I knew you'd come through, Elaine," she says. "You've always had the Floyd | kindest heart." Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "I want to say yes, but this is really something where we ought to talk to Derek first, no?" | |
| Jacqueline says (to DW), "It's time we stood up to Derek" | ||
| DavidW says (to Jacqueline), "that too" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "hug may" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > HUG MAY Floyd | Floyd | You place a kiss against your Aunt's dry cheek. She smiles, but Floyd | doesn't turn to face you. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "If it doesn't work out, May will probably forget this conversation anyway, so no harm no foul" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Roger), "You are horrible, sir. But I know you do it on purpose." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "So, what now?" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT DEREK Floyd | Floyd | "Derek's been working hard," you say. "He says he is up for a Floyd | promotion" Floyd | Floyd | "I remember when you met him," replies Aunt May. "You two looked good Floyd | together." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May coughs, and dabs at her lips with a small handkerchief. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "Err whoops I whispered that" | |
| Roger says, "Just hoping she'd badmouth him or something" | ||
| Roger says, "So yeah I dunno; let's get going, I guess" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about garden" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT GARDEN Floyd | Floyd | "Your garden's a bit overgrown," you say. "Doesn't Mr Turner come Floyd | around anymore?" Floyd | Floyd | "No," replies Aunt May. "I can't really afford him these days on my Floyd | pension, and I don't get out there much anymore." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "tell may about house" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > TELL MAY ABOUT HOUSE Floyd | Floyd | "We're moving house," you say. "Derek has picked us a little bungalow Floyd | up cheap. It's going to be much less work now the kids have left Floyd | home." Floyd | Floyd | "Does it have a garden?" asks Aunt May. "You always loved gardening." Floyd | Floyd | You don't answer, because you realise you are not entirely sure. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "huh" | |
| Jacqueline says, "So we're moving." | ||
| DavidW says, "That was unexpected." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yeah" | ||
| DavidW says, "Maybe that was meant for a future day." | ||
| Roger says, "Come over and live in our newer, tinier house" | ||
| zarf says, "mutable houses always fetch a premium in today's market" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Also, seems silly to sell now, before all the new rooms and portals are added, upping the resale value." | ||
| zarf says, "timing" | ||
| Doug says, "there are moving boxes downstairs but you haven't been downstairs yet" | ||
| Roger says, "Aunt May shows up, finds some completely different family living in the house, but she just moves in anyway because it's too awkward for anyone to say anything" | ||
| DavidW says, "I think we should say goodbye to may for now and keep exploring." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Sure" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "may, bye" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > MAY, BYE Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May just shakes her head. "I'm sure with your young legs, you Floyd | could do that," she says. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May wipes a weary hand across her face. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "?" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | Despite her age, Aunt May keeps her home spotlessly clean. The window Floyd | allows her to watch the comings and goings in the street from her Floyd | strategically positioned armchair. An old dresser holds brass Floyd | ornaments and a selection of glass flowers. The only door leads back Floyd | out into the hallway. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On the dresser is an old folk's home leaflet. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sits in her chair, hands folded quietly in her lap, staring Floyd | out of the window. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "That was >TELL MAY TO BYE" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x flowers" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X FLOWERS Floyd | Floyd | You used to play with the brass ornaments as a child. They are a mix Floyd | of circus animals and ancient horse brasses. The glass flowers are Floyd | your Aunt's pride and joy. She has collected them for years. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "Game misinterpreted it as an order to May." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x dresser" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X DRESSER Floyd | Floyd | A chipped white antique dresser. Floyd | Floyd | On the dresser is an old folk's home leaflet. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | On your way out of the room, Aunt May looks up at you. "I'll see you Floyd | soon," she says, with a wide smile, "just give me a call when you're Floyd | ready for me." Her smile turns slightly wolfish. "I'll call Anna and Floyd | give her the good news." Floyd | Floyd | Short Corridor Floyd | The old clock in the corner punctuates the seconds with its deep bass Floyd | ticking. All the pictures are still on the wall - lined up ancestors Floyd | and forgotten relatives mixing with cheap reproductions of Monet's Floyd | landscapes. A musty old sofa against the wall is lit up by the one Floyd | window. A door to the south leads into your Aunt's front room. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "How did the kids ever tear themselves away from this barrel of laughs" | |
| Jacqueline says, "Well, they're all a lot like you I suppose." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | The window is shut: you'd break the glass. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "west" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Yeah, had to scroll back to see." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "North to Hallway, then go west once or twice to the rubber tree." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "D?" | |
| DavidW says, "no, west" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | White Room Floyd | The walls and floor seem to glow, as if lit by something inside the Floyd | very fabric of the building. The only exit is back out to the hallway Floyd | to the east. Floyd | Floyd | In the centre of the room, an old fashioned movie projector sits atop Floyd | a plinth. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Oh right, you wanted to do all the new rooms on this floor." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x projector" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X PROJECTOR Floyd | Floyd | It looks exactly like the projector your Aunt May used to have. Maybe Floyd | she still does. Floyd | Floyd | When you were a child, every time your Mum took you to Aunt May's, the Floyd | projector would make an appearance. Aunt May delighted in showing Floyd | films of the family and films she had taken on her travels. Year after Floyd | year, new footage emerged. It seemed never ending. You favourite movie Floyd | was of your Mum as a young girl, playing on the beach with her Floyd | sisters. It's a sharp, clear memory. Your Mum looks at the camera for Floyd | a moment with a half-smile - distracted by something happening just Floyd | off screen - and it was like you were there with them. Floyd | Floyd | The projector is currently switched off. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "turn on projector" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > TURN ON PROJECTOR Floyd | Floyd | The projector crackles to life, the reels beginning to whirr and spin. Floyd | On the wall opposite the door, silently, a white square of projected Floyd | light appears. Floyd | Floyd | The white square is split and slashed by the visual crackle of Floyd | fleeting imperfections and the number three flashes up, surrounded by Floyd | a dark circle. Then this disappears and is replaced by the number two. Floyd | Then the number one. The countdown stops, and the screen shows only Floyd | pure white light. Floyd | Floyd | The film ends, to be replaced with crackles and dashes of visual Floyd | noise. There is a clatter from the projector, and then a high speed Floyd | whirring as it rewinds itself to the beginning. With a click, the Floyd | white square disappears as the projector switches off. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "ah. The film is a WIP." | |
| verbalK asks, "WIP ?" | ||
| DavidW says, "Work In Progress." | ||
| Roger says, "I'm not sure I can take even one more day of this" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x plinth" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X PLINTH Floyd | Floyd | The plinth is a twisted, organic looking column leading up to a small Floyd | platform, on top of which is an old-fashioned movie projector. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "Let's head downstairs and see if there's a bagel." | |
| Jacqueline asks, "That's all that's here, though, right?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Okay, I'm not sure why you're fixated on bagels, but let's go look." | ||
| DavidW says, "yeah, no sofa or chair or anything." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "d" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > D Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "Elaine just seems like a bagel person." | |
| Jacqueline says, "If you say so." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x answering machine" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > X ANSWERING MACHINE Floyd | Floyd | The display on the answering machine is blank. The play messages Floyd | button is right next to the display. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "push button" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > PUSH BUTTON Floyd | Floyd | You take the play messages button, but there's really nothing you want Floyd | to do with it, so you put it back where it was. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline blinks. | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x phone" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > X PHONE Floyd | Floyd | A slim plastic phone in its cradle. Floyd | Floyd | > | zarf says, "hrm" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x table" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > X TABLE Floyd | Floyd | A small wooden table you bought to stand the phone on. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Lounge Floyd | Sometimes you think this room is made entirely from memories: the Floyd | barometer on the wall that has indicated rain for years; the picture Floyd | of your daughter, staring defiantly at the camera, flanked by the Floyd | peaks of mountains; the wood paneling, a forgotten texture below the Floyd | bookshelves; the books themselves, all green and blue leather - Floyd | alphabetised soldier-sentries; a balding sofa and chair where Derek Floyd | spends most of his evenings staring at the TV mounted to the wall. Floyd | The too-small window overlooks the front driveway and lets in only Floyd | just enough light. Floyd | Floyd | When you came to view the house, eight years ago this coming May, the Floyd | first thing you had noticed was this window. A south facing room Floyd | should be bright, sunlit, welcoming. Over the years, you had always Floyd | meant to change it - to get the builders in and make it larger. Maybe Floyd | a bay-window in which you could sit and read while the sun warmed your Floyd | shoulders. Floyd | Floyd | But for some reason you had never got round to it, and now, if you are Floyd | being honest with yourself, you are glad. Some days, you spend all day Floyd | in here, curled up on the sofa, welcoming the tepid light. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Huh. And here they do the capitalization after semi-colons differently." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x sofa" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X SOFA Floyd | Floyd | Over the years the leather of the sofa has become shiny and worn. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x barometer" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X BAROMETER Floyd | Floyd | This was your Aunty May's. It's never worked. The needle has always Floyd | been stuck halfway between rain and drizzle. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May gave it to you for your sixteenth birthday. It was an odd Floyd | present, being broken even back then, but you had dutifully smiled and Floyd | accepted it. Your father had hung it up in your bedroom where it lived Floyd | on the wall between (and occasionally covered by) posters of Pink Floyd | Floyd and, later, Nirvana. Floyd | Floyd | When she gave it to you, your Aunt had said "It's always useful for a Floyd | sixteen year old to know the weather." She had said it with a wink, Floyd | before planting a hairy kiss on your cheek. According to your mother, Floyd | May had always been the strange sister. The oldest of six, she let her Floyd | grey hair flow long and wild over her shoulders and had lived most of Floyd | her life in a caravan. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "Maybe it's just me, but I get the sense that for some reason the author considers eight years an unfathomably long period of time to live in one house" | |
| DavidW says, "heh. maybe." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I am trying to do the math on us having Nirvana posters in our room but now being 40 with an empty nest." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x books" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X BOOKS Floyd | Floyd | Derek joined a book club. It sent him one blue leather bound classic Floyd | per month for two years. Then it sent him one green bound work by Floyd | Dickens. Now it's sending him red bound works by authors in their Floyd | "American Masters" series. Neither he nor you have every actually read Floyd | one, although you did start "Little Dorrit" once. The text was so Floyd | small and dense though you kept drifting off to sleep and reading the Floyd | same paragraph over and over again. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "I guess it makes sense, but it feels odd somehow." | |
| DavidW says, "I'm guessing the barometer will do *something* before the game's over." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X TV Floyd | Floyd | A large flat screen attached to the wall opposite the window. Derek Floyd | insisted on getting the largest. It is currently switched off, and the Floyd | darkened screen shows a weakened reflection of the room. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "turn on tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TURN ON TV Floyd | Floyd | You switch the TV on. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X TV Floyd | Floyd | A large flat screen attached to the wall opposite the window. Derek Floyd | insisted on getting the largest. It is switched on, and a game show Floyd | desperately tries to gain your attention. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x photos" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X PHOTOS Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x photo" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X PHOTO Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x pictures" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X PICTURES Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "'Pat, I'd like to buy a vowel? Is there an A?'" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X TV Floyd | Floyd | A large flat screen attached to the wall opposite the window. Derek Floyd | insisted on getting the largest. It is switched on, and a news program Floyd | desperately tries to gain your attention. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X TV Floyd | Floyd | A large flat screen attached to the wall opposite the window. Derek Floyd | insisted on getting the largest. It is switched on, and a talk show Floyd | desperately tries to gain your attention. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "I knew it. We are subconsciously changing the channel with our mind." | |
| Jacqueline asks, "What now, folks?" | ||
| DavidW says, "'a bagel program desperately tries to gain your attention'" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "haha" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "That program is probably on in the kitchen." | ||
| Roger says, "I dunno. I'm happy enough to hit Tuesday" | ||
| DavidW says, "no, no, no. Kitchen!" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Lounge Floyd | Sometimes you think this room is made entirely from memories: the Floyd | barometer on the wall that has indicated rain for years; the picture Floyd | of your daughter, staring defiantly at the camera, flanked by the Floyd | peaks of mountains; the wood paneling, a forgotten texture below the Floyd | bookshelves; the books themselves, all green and blue leather - Floyd | alphabetised soldier-sentries; a balding sofa and chair where Derek Floyd | spends most of his evenings staring at the TV mounted to the wall. Floyd | The too-small window overlooks the front driveway and lets in only Floyd | just enough light. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The TV spills sounds and flickering images into the room. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn off tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TURN OFF TV Floyd | Floyd | You switch the TV off. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Oops, I meant to do S." | |
| DavidW says, "I'm sure the kitchen is connected to the dining room. Houses work that way." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Anyway, dining room." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yeah" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. Floyd | Floyd | It hadn't been your idea to sell the house. Now, with the move only a Floyd | few days away, the sheer volume of things you have accumulated as a Floyd | family is entirely daunting. You have tried to pack, but instead, half Floyd | way through filling a box, you find yourself wandering around the Floyd | house with an ornament or a lamp or a small table in your hands, Floyd | wondering where to put it. Floyd | Floyd | When he gets home from work, Derek doesn't say anything, but you can Floyd | sense his frustration that the pile of packed boxes in the dining room Floyd | hasn't grown. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "We'll just shove everything into May's house" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x boxes" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X BOXES Floyd | Floyd | The boxes are taped shut and give no clue as to what is inside them. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x sideboard" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X SIDEBOARD Floyd | Floyd | This was your mother's, who had got it from her mother. It covers most Floyd | of the wall against which it stands. You can't remember a time in your Floyd | life when it wasn't present in your home. Floyd | Floyd | Your mother gave it to you when you were first married, and had moved Floyd | into the little flat over the shop. "A good start," she had said, Floyd | "something to build on." Floyd | Floyd | It had been far too big for your tiny new home, but you and Derek, Floyd | laughing, had maneuvered it into place. You remember it had covered Floyd | half of the kitchen door, so you both had to enter the room sideways. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "They didn't label the boxes?!?" | |
| Jacqueline says, "hee" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It makes it more fun later." | ||
| DavidW asks, "How is that going, btw?" | ||
| Jacqueline glances at the boxes by the wall in her real room (which are fortunately all lablelled). | ||
| Jacqueline says (to DW), "It's... going. I'm nearly done unpacking the bedroom, actually." | ||
| DavidW says, "oh good" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I'll be unpacked by the end of the year, I think." | ||
| DavidW asks, "Any barometers from eccentric aunts?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Nope" | ||
| DavidW says, "oh well" | ||
| Doug asks, "did you try PRESS BUTTON on the answering machine?" | ||
| Roger says, "yes" | ||
| Roger says, "No, we tried PUSH, sorry" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "exits" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > EXITS Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "There were no messages, though. I suspect later there will be." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | The kitchen in the new house is smaller than this. That's OK, though. Floyd | You don't spend as much time in here as you used to when the kids were Floyd | at home. Derek usually doesn't get home until after he's eaten. The Floyd | last time you cooked a proper meal was probably a couple of months Floyd | ago. Before Sam left. You had cooked her favourite, lasagna, because Floyd | she said she didn't feel well, and she had looked so tired and Floyd | unhappy. You wanted to cheer her up. Straight afterward, she had run Floyd | to the toilet to throw it all back up again. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline | On the counter, you don't see any bagels. | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x post-it note" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X POST-IT NOTE Floyd | Floyd | "I'll be home at 7.00 pm. Derek." Floyd | Floyd | That's so like Derek. To put his name. As if you wouldn't know who had Floyd | written it. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, ">read note | Took the last bagel. See you tonight. Pack something. -- D." | |
| Jacqueline says, "ha" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "hahaha - That would have been awesome." | ||
| Roger says, "Sorry I ate the last of the bagels from the icebox but they were so doughy and so cold" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x clock" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X CLOCK Floyd | Floyd | The clock reads 3:13 pm. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x calendar" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X CALENDAR Floyd | Floyd | Today your only job, according to the calendar, is to pack. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x fridge" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X FRIDGE Floyd | Floyd | The fridge has become Derek's filing cabinet. It's where he puts all Floyd | the unpaid bills and reminders and bank statements, all held in place Floyd | in some sort of order by a magnetic alphabet. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I saw no empty boxes to pack with." | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "open fridge" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN FRIDGE Floyd | Floyd | The mostly empty shelves remind you that you need to tell Derek to go Floyd | to the supermarket on his way home from work tomorrow. When you let go Floyd | of the handle, the fridge door closes by itself. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "Can we 'pack books' in the lounge?" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "open cabinet" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN CABINET Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "open door" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN DOOR Floyd | Floyd | You open the back door. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Garden Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Garden Floyd | High fences surround the garden, giving it an air of privacy, Floyd | sheltered from the street and any watchful eyes peeping from behind Floyd | curtains in the neighbour's windows. A small patio area, attached to Floyd | the side of the house, on which is a table and a set of peeling wooden Floyd | chairs gives way to scrubby grass that you haven't quite got around to Floyd | cutting for far too long. Floyd | Floyd | Derek calls this your "little patch of wilderness". That's his Floyd | half-joke that isn't a joke at all, but instead, really it's a cutting Floyd | indictment wrapped up in humour - contempt masked with levity. Floyd | Floyd | "You can't even look after the bloody garden," Derek snapped at you Floyd | once, after an argument about something you can't even remember. "It's Floyd | what you wanted. It's why we moved here for goodness sake." Floyd | Floyd | When you were first married, gardening had been your passion. You Floyd | inherited it from your mother, you suppose, whose own garden was, each Floyd | year, a wondrous mass of colour and life. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "I can't wait until he gets home so that we can give him a great big ol' hug." | |
| zarf says, "heh" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I wonder what he does for a living." | ||
| zarf says, "cutting indictments" | ||
| DavidW says, "heh" | ||
| zarf says, "clerk in a judge's office. Works the paper-cutter." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "sit" | ||
Floyd ] Garden Floyd | > Floyd | > SIT Floyd | Floyd | That's not something you can sit down on. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x chairs" | ||
Floyd ] Garden Floyd | > Floyd | > X CHAIRS Floyd | Floyd | The wooden slats aren't too comfortable, but you have spent more hours Floyd | sat out here than you can count. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Gosh, I'm realizing we're not even through day one yet." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Two hours hin" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "er, in" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "What now?" | ||
| DavidW says, "I'm curious if we can 'pack'" | ||
| Roger says, "Bury Derek in the garden, call it a good day" | ||
| verbalK says, "And I still don't get this game..." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pack" | ||
Floyd ] Garden Floyd | > Floyd | > PACK Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says (to Roger), "yay" | |
| Jacqueline asks (of DW), "Okay, to the ... what was it? A lounge?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Where the books were." | ||
| DavidW says, "'pack' doesn't seem to be a verb." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Except it doesn't even know the verb." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Well, that's our issue." | ||
| DavidW says, "I suppose we could tell May about the projector." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "We'll just have to tell Derek that we don't even know *how* to pack." | ||
| DavidW says, "Or go out front, check the mailbox." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK says, "Mailbox seems like a good idea" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "close door" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > CLOSE DOOR Floyd | Floyd | You close the back door. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "oo, package from 'Bagels of the Month'." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x clock" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X CLOCK Floyd | Floyd | The clock reads 3:23 pm. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the front door) Floyd | Floyd | Driveway Floyd | Bounded by small grass borders that, via some unseen line down the Floyd | middle, demarcate your house from the next, the driveway stretches out Floyd | onto the road to the south. The open plan nature of the street is Floyd | disconcerting. Floyd | Floyd | You're still not used to it, this openness of space, and this sharing Floyd | of communal grass. When you grew up, each house in your terrace had Floyd | its own little square patch of front garden bounded by a low stone Floyd | wall. Sometimes with iron railings, painted green, or rusty, or Floyd | shining black. Each garden had been a little statement by the house Floyd | owner or tenant. Some had been lush bursts of colour in the spring and Floyd | summer, some unkempt and weed-choked. Others had only been bare Floyd | flagstones, empty and stark. Floyd | Floyd | It had been a matter of pride for your mother, that little twelve foot Floyd | by twelve foot patch of space. Your father had the back yard reserved Floyd | for his chickens and vegetables. Your mother owned that front space. Floyd | It was hers entirely. She made it reflect herself. Floyd | Floyd | Your car is parked here. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK exclaims, "We have a car !" | |
| verbalK says, "Let's get out of here." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x car" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > X CAR Floyd | Floyd | Just a small grey car. You can't even remember what make and model it Floyd | is. Nor can you remember the last time your drove it anywhere. Derek Floyd | occasionally takes it out for a spin "to stop it seizing up." Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "it's a metaphor, isn't it." | |
| Roger says, "That old grey car she ain't what she used to be" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "get in car" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > GET IN CAR Floyd | Floyd | The car is locked. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "unlock car" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > UNLOCK CAR Floyd | Floyd | You don't have the keys. It's been so long since you've driven Floyd | anywhere that you're not even sure where they are. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Sorry, I had a glitch in my connection. Back now." | |
| DavidW says, "Probably in one of those unlabeled boxes." | ||
| Roger says, "They're probably packed in an anonymous box now. Good work." | ||
| Roger says, "haha" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "heh" | ||
| Roger says, "I guess we could wait until 7" | ||
| verbalK says, "How can she stay in this house? Everything, every single thing reminds her of something depressing or sad or old..." | ||
| Roger says, "After 40 it's all downhill" | ||
| DavidW says, "So we can't pack. We can't buy groceries we need. We can't (sob) even eat a bagel." | ||
| Roger says, "Just marching towards death" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Roger), "ha" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It's a sad slog, yeah." | ||
| verbalK asks, "Maybe we should try to cook something or feed her at least? Or will D bring diner with him ?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "D will come home and ask where his supper is." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "And why have we not packed." | ||
| verbalK says, "Obviously." | ||
| DavidW says, "I can't imagine thinking about one's daughter throwing up everytime I enter my kitchen." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "And we'll say, 'But I don't even know what that word means or how to use it as a verb,' and he'll just nod in a way that's meant to come across as understanding, but really he's wishing we would just die." | ||
| Roger says, "We tried to grow up to become Strongbad but instead we ended up as Strongsad" | ||
| Roger says, "My vote is some waiting" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Do we have more rooms to explore and in which to discover sadness?" | ||
| DavidW says, "I think we've seen all the rooms. We might've missed some because of unmentioned exits." | ||
| DavidW says, "We could ask May about the projector and about the barometer." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Let's wait for smoochyboochkins to come home." | ||
| DavidW says, "Other than that, there's nothing." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "The love of our life and our reason for living arrives hom around 7, right?" | ||
| DavidW says, "I just hope Derek has a large enough box to pack May into." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "er, home" | ||
| verbalK exclaims, "Oh yeah the barometer and projector !" | ||
| Jacqueline asks (of vK), "?" | ||
| verbalK asks, "Asking may about them ?" | ||
| verbalK asks, "Like DX said ?" | ||
| verbalK says, "Sorry DW" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to DW), "See, it's problematic. He can't put us in the freezer, because he's just going to have to defrost it when we move." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Well, when he moves." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Oh, okay." | ||
| DavidW says, "Somehow I think Derek moves out and Elaine is staying here." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "We can hope." | ||
| verbalK says, "Elaine is staying here forever: she lost the keys of the car." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Okay, so you want to go talk to May before we see Derek." | ||
| DavidW says, "yes please" | ||
| verbalK says, "Seems like a good plan to me" | ||
| DavidW asks, "shall I drive us there?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yes, please." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "close front door" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > CLOSE FRONT DOOR Floyd | Floyd | You close the front door. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "u" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > U Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Bathroom Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Bathroom Floyd | The bathroom is all in pale green. The toilet, sink and bath were here Floyd | when you moved in, and there never really seemed to be a reason to Floyd | change them. The mirrored cabinet above the sink steams up when anyone Floyd | has a shower and because of the poor ventilation through the small fan Floyd | in the window, the grouting between the tiles has always had mold Floyd | problems. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Short Corridor Floyd | The old clock in the corner punctuates the seconds with its deep bass Floyd | ticking. All the pictures are still on the wall - lined up ancestors Floyd | and forgotten relatives mixing with cheap reproductions of Monet's Floyd | landscapes. A musty old sofa against the wall is lit up by the one Floyd | window. A door to the south leads into your Aunt's front room. Floyd | Floyd | The room feels empty somehow, as if all the life in it has drained Floyd | away. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | Despite her age, Aunt May keeps her home spotlessly clean. The window Floyd | allows her to watch the comings and goings in the street from her Floyd | strategically positioned armchair. An old dresser holds brass Floyd | ornaments and a selection of glass flowers. The only door leads back Floyd | out into the hallway. Floyd | Floyd | The room feels empty somehow, as if all the life in it has been used Floyd | up. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On the dresser is an old folk's home leaflet. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | The window is shut: you'd break the glass. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x may" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X MAY Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline exclaims, "!" | |
| DavidW says, "She's moved already." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Short Corridor Floyd | The old clock in the corner punctuates the seconds with its deep bass Floyd | ticking. All the pictures are still on the wall - lined up ancestors Floyd | and forgotten relatives mixing with cheap reproductions of Monet's Floyd | landscapes. A musty old sofa against the wall is lit up by the one Floyd | window. A door to the south leads into your Aunt's front room. Floyd | Floyd | The room feels empty somehow, as if all the life in it has drained Floyd | away. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline sniffs. | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "It's called moving on, something we clearly cannot comprehend" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Samantha's Room Floyd | The bed under the window seems further away today. The floor, Floyd | uncluttered with Sam's possessions, has stretched slightly during the Floyd | night. You used to be able to touch the empty desk from the door, and Floyd | the walls, bare of brightly coloured posters, appear taller - the Floyd | ceiling more distant. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x ceiling" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X CEILING Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X Floyd | Floyd | You see that since yesterday, there is a new door on the west wall of Floyd | the hallway, and a new door east of the Main Bedroom. Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Dagnabbit, Roger - I nearly spit my guava juice at the screen when I read that." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Samantha's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. To the east, a doorway leads into Floyd | the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | White Room Floyd | The walls and floor seem to glow, as if lit by something inside the Floyd | very fabric of the building. The only exit is back out to the hallway Floyd | to the east. Floyd | Floyd | In the centre of the room, an old fashioned movie projector sits atop Floyd | a plinth. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "She's not with the projector." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is the spare room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The rubber plant you brought home from the garden centre a year after Floyd | you moved in sits on a small plinth in the corner. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "d" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > D Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Lounge Floyd | Sometimes you think this room is made entirely from memories: the Floyd | barometer on the wall that has indicated rain for years; the picture Floyd | of your daughter, staring defiantly at the camera, flanked by the Floyd | peaks of mountains; the wood paneling, a forgotten texture below the Floyd | bookshelves; the books themselves, all green and blue leather - Floyd | alphabetised soldier-sentries; a balding sofa and chair where Derek Floyd | spends most of his evenings staring at the TV mounted to the wall. Floyd | The too-small window overlooks the front driveway and lets in only Floyd | just enough light. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "She's in the old folks home, decomposing." | |
| Jacqueline says, "And it's all our fault." | ||
| DavidW says, "Anyway, May isn't to be found right now." | ||
| verbalK asks, "So let's wait for the D?" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "pack books" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > PACK BOOKS Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "haha yes" | |
| DavidW asks, "so... wait until 7 pm?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Our son never calls us, our daughter with the eating disorder hates us, our husband has no use for us anymore, and our aunt is wasting away without family in an old folks home. But hey, our house is growing, so that's cool." | ||
| Roger says (to Jacq), "I think she was in the family way, is my guess" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yeah" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Okay, yeah, let's wait until 7... should we save first?" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "clear save" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > CLEAR SAVE Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW looks out the bagel window. Except we never got one. | |
| Jacqueline clears the save counter. | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "push save" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > PUSH SAVE Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline exclaims, "I keep doing that!" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "cf1" | ||
Floyd | > Floyd | > SAVE Floyd | %% Enter a save filename to write: Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > SAVEOk. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "wait until 7:00" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > WAIT UNTIL 7:00 Floyd | Floyd | You wake with a start. Derek is shaking your shoulder. You seem to Floyd | have fallen asleep on the sofa again. It's strange - you can't Floyd | remember lying down, but you must have sat, just for a moment, and the Floyd | soft light through the window from the gathering dusk sent you into a Floyd | deep sleep. Floyd | Floyd | You have sleep in your eyes, and Derek's face in front of you is a Floyd | blurred smear. Floyd | Floyd | Lounge (on the lounge sofa) Floyd | Sometimes you think this room is made entirely from memories: the Floyd | barometer on the wall that has indicated rain for years; the picture Floyd | of your daughter, staring defiantly at the camera, flanked by the Floyd | peaks of mountains; the wood paneling, a forgotten texture below the Floyd | bookshelves; the books themselves, all green and blue leather - Floyd | alphabetised soldier-sentries; a balding sofa and chair where Derek Floyd | spends most of his evenings staring at the TV mounted to the wall. Floyd | The too-small window overlooks the front driveway and lets in only Floyd | just enough light. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Derek perches at the end of the sofa watching the TV. He glances up at Floyd | you and smiles briefly before turning back to the show. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "We got a smile!" | |
| Jacqueline says, "He really does love us." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "We have a reason to keep living." | ||
| DavidW says, "He does." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "kiss derek" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > KISS DEREK Floyd | Floyd | You want to kiss Derek, but he's been so distant recently that you Floyd | can't bring yourself to bridge the space between you. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline frowns. | |
| Roger says, "We should have packed the TV first, out of spite" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x barometer" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X BAROMETER Floyd | Floyd | This was your Aunty May's. It's never worked. The needle has always Floyd | been stuck halfway between rain and drizzle. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "fix barometer" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > FIX BAROMETER Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "talk to derek" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TALK TO DEREK Floyd | Floyd | To engage in a conversation, try to ASK Derek ABOUT something, TELL Floyd | Derek ABOUT something, or SHOW Derek something. Or, even, try saying Floyd | "hello". Once you are chatting, you can just use "ASK ABOUT Floyd | something", or if you are feeling confident, as a short hand, just "A Floyd | something". You could also ask Derek to do things using: Derek, GO Floyd | SOUTH for example. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Oh, right." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "hit barometer" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > HIT BAROMETER Floyd | Floyd | Violence isn't the answer to this one. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask derek about work" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK DEREK ABOUT WORK Floyd | Floyd | "Hi," you say. Floyd | Floyd | "Hmm?" he replies non-commitally, his eyes not leaving the TV. Floyd | Floyd | "How was work?" you ask. Floyd | Floyd | Derek shrugs. "It was ok. Nothing exciting to report." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "tell derek about may" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TELL DEREK ABOUT MAY Floyd | Floyd | When you first told Derek about Aunt May being shipped off to a home, Floyd | he had been furious. "Why didn't you tell me," he had said, barely Floyd | containing his anger. "She could have come and lived with us. You know Floyd | you would have liked that. You and May have always got along." Floyd | Floyd | "I thought you would have been against it," you had said, weakly. Floyd | Floyd | Derek had sighed. "Don't put this on me." You haven't really spoken Floyd | about it since, and Derek looks so tired you're too nervous to bring Floyd | it up again. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask derek about move" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK DEREK ABOUT MOVE Floyd | Floyd | "Are you looking forward to moving?" you ask. Floyd | Floyd | "It will be nice to get out of this place and start afresh," says Floyd | Derek. "We need to hurry up with the packing though. The movers will Floyd | be here next Tuesday." Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK asks, "What if we take D to the room of one of our great kids ?" | |
| DavidW says, "I guess he'll find out when May's using up his hot water." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "heh" | ||
| verbalK says, "That sounds like a deadline." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "initiate the sexytimes with Derek" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > INITIATE THE SEXYTIMES WITH DEREK Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "tell derek about projector" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TELL DEREK ABOUT PROJECTOR Floyd | Floyd | You start to tell Derek about the white room, and the plinth and the Floyd | projector. But something holds you back. You realise you don't want Floyd | to. That this is somehow too private to share with this man, even Floyd | though you've been married all these years. Floyd | Floyd | Derek switches over the channel. Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK says, ""this man?"" | |
| DavidW says, "Elainester, keepin' secrets." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I sense there a gap widening between us, right here on the sofa, as we speak." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask derek about supper" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK DEREK ABOUT SUPPER Floyd | Floyd | Derek doesn't respond, but continues to watch the TV. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask derek about food" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK DEREK ABOUT FOOD Floyd | Floyd | "You need to go to the supermarket tomorrow," you remind him. Derek Floyd | grunts in acknowledgement. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Okay, I literally laughed out loud that time." | |
| verbalK says, "Ask derek about food today, right now" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask derek about bagel" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK DEREK ABOUT BAGEL Floyd | Floyd | Derek doesn't respond, but continues to watch the TV. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline | > DEREK, WHERE THE HELL IS MY BAGEL? | |
| Jacqueline says, "TIMING" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Darn you, DW." | ||
| DavidW says, "sorry, but I need something to defend me against the miasma." | ||
| DavidW says, "And bagels just seem to be the thing." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I feel like there should be a content warning on this game." | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "So, what now, emo peeps?" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "help" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > HELP Floyd | Floyd | Some special commands in this story are: Floyd | Floyd | If you wish to end a day and move to the next day, simply type Floyd | "tomorrow". Floyd | Floyd | If you forget what day it is, type "day" for a reminder. Floyd | Floyd | If you want to wait until a particular time, try the command "wait Floyd | until" for example "wait until 2:30 pm" Floyd | Floyd | The command "about" will give you more information about this story Floyd | and its contributors. Floyd | Floyd | Please note - this story contains images, and is best read in a modern Floyd | interactive fiction interpreter like Windows Glulxe which you can Floyd | download from here: Floyd | [LINK] Floyd | ersXglulxe.html. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "Should we just type 'tomorrow'?" | |
| DavidW says, "maybe the car keys are admist the junk in the bedroom table." | ||
| DavidW says, "but yeah, tomorrow." | ||
| Roger says (to floyd), "ask derek about car" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK DEREK ABOUT CAR Floyd | Floyd | There is no reply. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "tomorrow" | ||
Floyd | > Floyd | > TOMORROW Floyd | Floyd | In your dreams, you are running towards something, but it is Floyd | constantly moving away from you. There is a hand reaching out, but it Floyd | is just out of reach and someone is calling you but you can't quite Floyd | make out if it is a child or just the wind blowing through a partially Floyd | open window. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue. | DavidW says, "I don't think there's dinner to eat, hair to brush, or any sudoko." | |
| Roger says, "I think we all know what we were running towards" | ||
| Jacqueline pushes the green 'space' button. | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Tuesday Floyd | Floyd | The morning has disappeared. You don't know where it went. The house Floyd | continues its inexorable growth. Earlier, when you were dusting the Floyd | upstairs hallway it seemed to take so much longer than usual, and a Floyd | new door had appeared through which you were sure you could hear muted Floyd | voices. Floyd | Floyd | Actually, you had woken late, and, slightly disoriented by the Floyd | brightness of the morning, it had taken you a while to get your Floyd | bearings. The phone had been ringing. You lay in bed and let it go to Floyd | answer phone. Floyd | Floyd | As you drifted in and out of a doze, you listened to Aunt May Floyd | pottering about the house. She tends to rise early. Ever since she Floyd | moved in, each morning, you lie in bed listening to her moving about. Floyd | It's comforting somehow, and, with Derek working so many hours, it's Floyd | been nice to have someone to share the last days in the house with. Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK asks, "A bagel ?" | |
| Roger says (to floyd), "read calendar" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > READ CALENDAR Floyd | Floyd | Today, you need to give the removals company a call in the morning to Floyd | confirm the time for next Tuesday. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x calendar" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X CALENDAR Floyd | Floyd | Today, you need to give the removals company a call in the morning to Floyd | confirm the time for next Tuesday. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Timing, sorry." | |
| Roger says, "s'alright I jumped in there" | ||
| Roger says (to floyd), "x map" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X MAP Floyd | Floyd | On the map, you see the upstairs hallway seems to have grown longer, Floyd | and, in the middle of it is a new door leading north. Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "read note" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > READ NOTE Floyd | Floyd | I have to work late tonight. I'll stay in town. Derek. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Yeah, this is starting to feel more British with its 'removals company' and 'answer phone'" | |
| Jacqueline says, "He's... not even coming home now." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Way to not even go through the motions, D." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Although, truth be told, I am planning to buy a bed for my office. I only plan to use it a couple of times each year, though." | ||
| Roger says, "Mostly during interviews" | ||
| Roger says, "So do we need to drag ourselves around the entire house again, or shall we cut to the new stuff" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "New stuff, I say, completely ignoring your horrible joke." | ||
| DavidW says, "Maybe a new fun coffee mug will cheer Elaine up." | ||
| Roger says, "#1 MOM" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "#1 WIFE" | ||
| DavidW says, "GREEN THUMB ALERT" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "#1 NIECE" | ||
| DavidW says, "MY OTHER BED IS A PORSCHE" | ||
| verbalK asks, "Maybe we should try to see a doctor? Call the suicide line or something ?" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x map" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X MAP Floyd | Floyd | On the map, you see the upstairs hallway seems to have grown longer, Floyd | and, in the middle of it is a new door leading north. Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Oh, Roger'd done that." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Let's go there." | ||
| DavidW says, "yeah. It'll be between the kids' bedrooms." | ||
| Roger says, "The Marauders' Map isn't as much fun when you're old and lame" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. The pile of Floyd | boxes seems to be higher than yesterday, but that's ok, because the Floyd | room seems to have grown to accommodate them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On a plinth in the corner, a rubber plant brushes the ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says (to Roger), "heh" | |
| Roger says, "ohho" | ||
| DavidW asks, "The plant moved?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It did." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x plant" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X PLANT Floyd | Floyd | Since being moved into the sunlight of the dining room, the plant Floyd | seems to have had a new lease on life. Its leaves stretch above your Floyd | head, oriented toward the warming sun through the window. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | It was Aunt May's doing, moving the plant into the dining room. As Floyd | soon as she had seen it on the upstairs hallway, she had cried out in Floyd | horror and insisted that you move it immediately. Derek wasn't too Floyd | happy. He doesn't like clutter. But you have to admit, in the Floyd | sunshine, the plant transforms a little. Leaves that were dull greyish Floyd | green suddenly sparkle in the sun. You could almost imagine it sighing Floyd | with relief. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "climb plant" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > CLIMB PLANT Floyd | Floyd | You don't think the branches would support your weight. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "The game listened to you, Roger. Eerie." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x boxes" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X BOXES Floyd | Floyd | The boxes are taped shut and give no clue as to what is inside them. Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "If this game had 500% more gardening, I might kinda like it" | |
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "open boxes" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN BOXES Floyd | Floyd | They are securely taped shut and there's nothing in there that you Floyd | really want to have to pack again. Floyd | Floyd | In the distance, you can hear the phone ringing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The display on the answering machine flashes with the number 1. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You hear noises coming from the room above. Aunt May keeps Floyd | unconventional hours. Sometimes you will hear her moving about the Floyd | house in the early hours of the morning. Some days she stays in bed Floyd | till lunchtime and the house remains quiet. Most days, she stays in Floyd | her room, sitting in her chair and watching through the window. Her Floyd | presence is comforting somehow, and you know you can always pop in and Floyd | have someone to talk to. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The phone on the hall table rings insistently. Floyd | Floyd | The phone stops ringing. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Sigh. Go get it." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "answer phone" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > ANSWER PHONE Floyd | Floyd | The telephone isn't ringing right now. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Or not." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "push button" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > PUSH BUTTON Floyd | Floyd | You take the play messages button, but there's really nothing you want Floyd | to do with it, so you put it back where it was. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "listen to answer phone" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > LISTEN TO ANSWER PHONE Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Roger says (to floyd), "press button" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > PRESS BUTTON Floyd | Floyd | A briskly impersonal voice says "Hi, Mrs Paterson?" There is a pause. Floyd | "It's Churchill's removals, you were going to call to arrange a time Floyd | for pick up on Tuesday. Can you give us a call please and ask to speak Floyd | to Karen. Thank you." Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The machine whirrs on to the next message. Floyd | Floyd | Derek's voice, made small by distance, says "Hi Elaine, it's me. I Floyd | just got a call at the office from the removals people. I guess you Floyd | forgot to ring them. I told them to turn up at about 10 am on Tuesday. Floyd | See you tomorrow night." Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The machine falls silent. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "play answering machine" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > PLAY ANSWERING MACHINE Floyd | Floyd | There are no messages to play. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "I keep scrolling up to get verbiage, then come back to find it's done. Sorry." | |
| DavidW says, "we just woke up, geez" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Should we go back to our save and rush to do this, just to see if he's nice to us for doing the one task we have for today?" | ||
| Roger says, "I support that" | ||
| DavidW says, "I don't think that'd work." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "restore" | ||
Floyd | > Floyd | > RESTORE Floyd | %% Enter a save filename to read: | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "cf1" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge
Floyd | Ok.
Floyd |
Floyd | >
| ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "tomorrow" | ||
Floyd | > Floyd | > TOMORROW Floyd | Floyd | In your dreams, you are running towards something, but it is Floyd | constantly moving away from you. There is a hand reaching out, but it Floyd | is just out of reach and someone is calling you but you can't quite Floyd | make out if it is a child or just the wind blowing through a partially Floyd | open window. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Please press SPACE to continue. | ||
| Jacqueline pushes the green 'space' button. | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Tuesday Floyd | Floyd | The morning has disappeared. You don't know where it went. The house Floyd | continues its inexorable growth. Earlier, when you were dusting the Floyd | upstairs hallway it seemed to take so much longer than usual, and a Floyd | new door had appeared through which you were sure you could hear muted Floyd | voices. Floyd | Floyd | Actually, you had woken late, and, slightly disoriented by the Floyd | brightness of the morning, it had taken you a while to get your Floyd | bearings. The phone had been ringing. You lay in bed and let it go to Floyd | answer phone. Floyd | Floyd | As you drifted in and out of a doze, you listened to Aunt May Floyd | pottering about the house. She tends to rise early. Ever since she Floyd | moved in, each morning, you lie in bed listening to her moving about. Floyd | It's comforting somehow, and, with Derek working so many hours, it's Floyd | been nice to have someone to share the last days in the house with. Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline asks, "DW, which way to the answering machine?" | |
| DavidW says, "w. s." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. The pile of Floyd | boxes seems to be higher than yesterday, but that's ok, because the Floyd | room seems to have grown to accommodate them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On a plinth in the corner, a rubber plant brushes the ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The display on the answering machine flashes with the number 1. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You hear noises coming from the room above. Aunt May keeps Floyd | unconventional hours. Sometimes you will hear her moving about the Floyd | house in the early hours of the morning. Some days she stays in bed Floyd | till lunchtime and the house remains quiet. Most days, she stays in Floyd | her room, sitting in her chair and watching through the window. Her Floyd | presence is comforting somehow, and you know you can always pop in and Floyd | have someone to talk to. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "call removals company" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > CALL REMOVALS COMPANY Floyd | Floyd | Your fingers hover over the buttons, but you can't bring yourself to Floyd | dial. The thought of speaking to a disembodied voice fills you with Floyd | dread. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline exclaims, "Elaine!" | |
| Roger says, "why must we fail at everything we attempt" | ||
| DavidW says, "We can't bare to talk about something so personal." | ||
| DavidW says, "er bear" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Well, I can't blame Elaine for being depressed as hell." | ||
| Roger says, "I can" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "call derek" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > CALL DEREK Floyd | Floyd | Your fingers hover over the buttons, but you can't bring yourself to Floyd | dial. The thought of speaking to a disembodied voice fills you with Floyd | dread. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "listen to messsages" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > LISTEN TO MESSSAGES Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "listen to answering machine" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > LISTEN TO ANSWERING MACHINE Floyd | Floyd | You hear nothing unexpected. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "it's 'press button'" | |
| Jacqueline says, "Oh" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "press button" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > PRESS BUTTON Floyd | Floyd | A briskly impersonal voice says "Hi, Mrs Paterson?" There is a pause. Floyd | "It's Churchill's removals, you were going to call to arrange a time Floyd | for pick up on Tuesday. Can you give us a call please and ask to speak Floyd | to Karen. Thank you." Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The machine falls silent. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "call removals company" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > CALL REMOVALS COMPANY Floyd | Floyd | Your fingers hover over the buttons, but you can't bring yourself to Floyd | dial. The thought of speaking to a disembodied voice fills you with Floyd | dread. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Okay, so now we wait for Derek to call and chew us out." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Except we'll be afraid to answer." | ||
| Roger says, "Probably not feasible to pester May into doing this for us" | ||
| DavidW says, "He won't call while we're standing here, you know." | ||
| Jacqueline | > MAY, PLEASE DO THE ADULTING FOR US | ||
| verbalK asks, "Sorry I had to leave when we started moving toward the answering machine, what did I miss ?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "We are socially paralyzed." | ||
| Roger says, "She needs one of those Japanese companion robots" | ||
| verbalK asks, "Is that supposed to be news ?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "We have one task today, to call the moving company (or 'removals company' as it's called here), but we can't bring ourselves to do it." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "And so Derek will call to chew us out here in a sec." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "z" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > Z Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "z" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > Z Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "z" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > Z Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | The phone on the hall table rings insistently. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "answer phone" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > ANSWER PHONE Floyd | Floyd | You move towards the phone, but you just can't bear to speak to a Floyd | disembodied voice right now. Floyd | Floyd | The phone on the hall table rings insistently. Floyd | Floyd | The phone stops ringing. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "x answering machine" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > X ANSWERING MACHINE Floyd | Floyd | The display on the answering machine is flashing with the number 1. Floyd | The play messages button is right next to the display. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "press button" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > PRESS BUTTON Floyd | Floyd | Derek's voice, made small by distance, says "Hi Elaine, it's me. I Floyd | just got a call at the office from the removals people. I guess you Floyd | forgot to ring them. I told them to turn up at about 10 am on Tuesday. Floyd | See you tomorrow night." Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The machine falls silent. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "So, people kept playing this game after this. Interesting." | |
| verbalK says, "Omg... The D is so cold." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "As for me, I'm coming close to losing my will to live." | ||
| verbalK says, "He is also clearly fed up with us." | ||
| Roger says, "Yeah I'm not feeling anything worth spending any more time on" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "I guess we should go check out the new room?" | ||
| Roger says, "I guess" | ||
| DavidW asks, "Perhaps there's a playground of happy children in the new room?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Or bagels." | ||
| verbalK says, "Or something depressing." | ||
| DavidW says, "I am not programmed to respond in that area." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to vK), "You are probably the winner in the predictions here." | ||
| Jacqueline asks (of DW), "Will you please take us there?" | ||
| Roger says, "Imagine how grim this game would be if we were playing it alone" | ||
| verbalK says, "I would've stopped long ago." | ||
| DavidW says, "uh ok" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "u" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > U Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices, low and muted, coming through the door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | As you walk through the entrance, the air seems to shimmer Floyd | somehow. Floyd | Floyd | You recognise this place. It's been months since you were here, but Floyd | this is where you brought Samantha after she had told you. There she Floyd | is, sat in the same chair, shoulders sagging sullenly, face turned Floyd | away from you, chin in her hand. She looks so young. Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the reception door) Floyd | Floyd | Waiting Room Floyd | The reception area is painted a clinical light green and smells of Floyd | disinfectant. Rows of chairs line the walls. A reception desk in the Floyd | corner hold pamphlets and leaflets. The only other door apart from the Floyd | one back into your house is in the opposite wall. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You pause at the entrance for a moment. The only sounds in the room Floyd | are the clicking heels of the nurse behind the reception desk. The Floyd | cold air in the room makes you shiver. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist stands behind the desk staring out into space. Floyd | Floyd | Samantha sits quietly on one of the chairs. She barely glances up at Floyd | you as you enter the room. Floyd | Floyd | At first, Samantha had not wanted you to come. Sat at the dining room Floyd | table, she had hid her face behind her hair when she told you. "I've Floyd | got an appointment at the Doctor's," she had said. "I guess you won't Floyd | be coming." Floyd | Floyd | But you had surprised yourself. "Of course I'm coming," you had Floyd | replied. "You're not keeping it," you said, before you had even Floyd | thought what that would mean. The words had come directly out of you, Floyd | an unintended accusation. Floyd | Floyd | Samantha's head had jerked upwards. "It's my baby," she said, "I'll do Floyd | what I want." Floyd | Floyd | The Doctor had been kind, if a little distant. Samantha had trembled Floyd | next to you while he outlined her options, each more distressing than Floyd | the last. When he had asked her what she wanted to do, Samantha, her Floyd | face white and close to tears, had not replied. She had turned to look Floyd | at you, her eyes beseeching you to answer for her. "What do you think, Floyd | Mum?" she had said. You hadn't replied straight away. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "Aha. So, not an eating disorder." | |
| Jacqueline says, "My bad." | ||
| Roger says, "Told you so" | ||
| Jacqueline exclaims, "But ding! ding! ding! We have a winner in vK, who predicted we'd encounter something depressing!" | ||
| Roger says, "Being a grandma at 40 is pretty cool though so let's run with it" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Well done, vK. Here's your prize: a shroud of darkness and eternal despair." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Roger), "snrk" | ||
| verbalK says, "Thank you...." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "ask Sam about baby" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK SAM ABOUT BABY Floyd | Floyd | "Hey, Sam," you say. Floyd | Floyd | "Yeah?" replies Sam. Floyd | Floyd | "When did you know?" you say. Floyd | Floyd | "I suppose I guessed when I took the pregnancy test," replies Sam, Floyd | sarcastically. You restrain the urge to shout at her. There's so many Floyd | things you could say. Floyd | Floyd | Samantha sighs with irritation and rubs her face. Floyd | Floyd | "What do you think, Mrs. Paterson?" the doctor had asked you, Floyd | eventually. "This is Samantha's decision, but I'm sure she would like Floyd | your guidance and support." Floyd | Floyd | You had answered him. Samantha had burst into tears and ran from the Floyd | room. Floyd | Floyd | It's my choice," Samantha had screamed in the car on the way home. And Floyd | then she had left. Gone to live with her boyfriend. When Derek had Floyd | come home, you had hesitantly told him about Sam's condition, and the Floyd | row. Derek had been furious. Not about the pregnancy, that he had Floyd | accepted without comment. He had been furious with her because she had Floyd | left home. "Of course we would have supported her," he had said. Floyd | "Whatever she decided." Floyd | Floyd | You had kept quiet. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "There we go with the Britishisms again." | |
| Jacqueline says, "But I'm assuming this is supposed to be set in the US." | ||
| verbalK asks, "Where? What ?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "'the row'" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I had never really heard that phrase until I lived in the UK." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "But of course it's a common phrase there." | ||
| zarf says, "the Dreadful Rauw" | ||
| DavidW says, "It's in Harry Potter too, I think." | ||
| verbalK says, "Ok thanks" | ||
| DavidW says, "Makes me think differently about hedgerows now." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "That's a different pronunciation, DW." | ||
| DavidW asks, "is it?" | ||
| DavidW says, "oh, I guess." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Yeah. Hedgerows is pronounced the way you think it is, and 'row' (as in a disagreement / fight) is as zarf spelled it above (rauw)" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "So, I'm torn." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Keep playing, or go inflict self-harm on myself." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It's a toss up." | ||
| Roger says, "Ennhhh I'm happy enough to quit here and if anyone wants to see the rest of it, they know where to find it" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Sorry, 'self-harm on myself' was redundant." | ||
| DavidW says, "Perhaps May made cookies." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Roger), "I think I'm with you." | ||
| DavidW says, "Almost certainly there's more film in the projector." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I actually have a lot of self-harm in the form of unpacking that I need to do." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to DW), "Okay. Fine. I will stay to look at the projector." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "But after that I go unpack a box." | ||
| DavidW says, "ok" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Waiting Room Floyd | The reception area is painted a clinical light green and smells of Floyd | disinfectant. Rows of chairs line the walls. A reception desk in the Floyd | corner hold pamphlets and leaflets. The only other door apart from the Floyd | one back into your house is in the opposite wall. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist stands behind the desk writing something down. Floyd | Floyd | Samantha sits quietly on one of the chairs. Floyd | Floyd | "Miss Paterson?" the receptionist says, brightly, interrupting your Floyd | train of thought. "Doctor Bridge will see you now." Floyd | Floyd | Samantha glances in your direction, gets up unwillingly from the chair Floyd | and walks slowly into the Doctor's office. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW asks, "oh, we're probably not done with this location yet?" | |
| Jacqueline says, "It appears not." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "follow sam" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > FOLLOW SAM Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "z" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > Z Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Waiting Room Floyd | The reception area is painted a clinical light green and smells of Floyd | disinfectant. Rows of chairs line the walls. A reception desk in the Floyd | corner hold pamphlets and leaflets. The only other door apart from the Floyd | one back into your house is in the opposite wall. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist stands behind the desk tidying up the desk surface. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I don't know if we have to wait here or not, to be honest." | |
| Jacqueline says, "Yeah, I think just go back into the house." | ||
| DavidW says, "yeah, let's go" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline says, "See, I'm sure this game ends up taking a happy turn that we'll never see because we gave up on it." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | White Room Floyd | The walls and floor seem to glow, as if lit by something inside the Floyd | very fabric of the building. The only exit is back out to the hallway Floyd | to the east. Floyd | Floyd | In the centre of the room, an old fashioned movie projector sits atop Floyd | a plinth. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn on projector" | ||
Floyd ] White Room Floyd | > Floyd | > TURN ON PROJECTOR Floyd | Floyd | The projector crackles to life, the reels beginning to whirr and spin. Floyd | On the wall opposite the door, silently, a white square of projected Floyd | light appears. Floyd | Floyd | The picture coarsens and then slips into focus. Aunty May is sitting Floyd | in a featureless bedroom staring out of the window. As you watch, a Floyd | nurse comes into the room and puts a tray down on the table next to Floyd | her. Aunt May doesn't turn her head. Floyd | Floyd | The film ends, to be replaced with crackles and dashes of visual Floyd | noise. There is a clatter from the projector, and then a high speed Floyd | whirring as it rewinds itself to the beginning. With a click, the Floyd | white square disappears as the projector switches off. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "uhhh" | |
| Jacqueline asks, "I'm going to go cry now, okay?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I'll be back in a week." | ||
| DavidW says, "sorry" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "heh" | ||
| Roger says, "Thanks Jacq! Good luck unboxing." | ||
| Jacqueline exclaims (at Roger), "Thanks!" | ||
| DavidW says, "oo, unboxing is the rage these days." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to DW), "Feel free to keep playing. I'll leave the transcript running. Don't depress yourself too much." | ||
| DavidW says, "good way of thinking about it" | ||
| DavidW says, "I'm hoping May turns the place around." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I like your optimism." | ||
| DavidW says, "She moved the rubber plant; she might fix up the garden and other stuff." | ||
| verbalK says, "I'll be around DW, I am working on somehting at the same time, but I'm keeping an eye, just in case the happy turn Jacq is talking about might happen..." | ||
| DavidW says, "I'm going to check the garden next, I think." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | Roger says, "I might lurk, so you have the con" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "d" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > D Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. The pile of Floyd | boxes seems to be higher than yesterday, but that's ok, because the Floyd | room seems to have grown to accommodate them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On a plinth in the corner, a rubber plant brushes the ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Garden Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the back door) Floyd | Floyd | Garden Floyd | High fences surround the garden, giving it an air of privacy, Floyd | sheltered from the street and any watchful eyes peeping from behind Floyd | curtains in the neighbour's windows. A small patio area, attached to Floyd | the side of the house, on which is a table and a set of peeling wooden Floyd | chairs gives way to scrubby grass that you haven't quite got around to Floyd | cutting for far too long. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | When Aunt May arrived, she had taken one look at the garden and given Floyd | a gasp of horror. "You used to like gardening," she had said, shaking Floyd | her head. "We've got to get this sorted out." Floyd | Floyd | "There's no point, Aunt May," you had replied. "We're moving soon." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May had looked at you shrewdly. "Hmmm...." she had said, "We'll Floyd | see. This new house of yours, does it actually have a garden?" Floyd | Floyd | "Not really," you had said. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK says, "Or maybe the game ends with Elaine finally overcoming her fear of everything to go buy a chair, a rope, a pen and a sheet of paper." | |
| DavidW says, "see! May's noticed the garden." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x table" | ||
Floyd ] Garden Floyd | > Floyd | > X TABLE Floyd | Floyd | You bought the garden furniture set after the patio had been built. Floyd | It's only a cheap wooden affair, now patched and faded from the Floyd | weather. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I wonder where May actually is." | |
| verbalK says, "(dead?)" | ||
| zarf says, "the projector tells us" | ||
| DavidW says, "She moved in with us; she didn't go to the home." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. The pile of Floyd | boxes seems to be higher than yesterday, but that's ok, because the Floyd | room seems to have grown to accommodate them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On a plinth in the corner, a rubber plant brushes the ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Lounge Floyd | Sometimes you think this room is made entirely from memories: the Floyd | picture of your daughter, staring defiantly at the camera, flanked by Floyd | the peaks of mountains; the wood paneling, a forgotten texture below Floyd | the bookshelves; the books themselves, all green and blue leather - Floyd | alphabetised soldier-sentries; a balding sofa and chair where Derek Floyd | spends most of his evenings staring at the TV mounted to the wall. Floyd | The too-small window overlooks the front driveway and lets in only Floyd | just enough light, especially now the room is so much larger. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x barometer" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X BAROMETER Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "huh. The barometer's missing." | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x books" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > X BOOKS Floyd | Floyd | Derek joined a book club. It sent him one blue leather bound classic Floyd | per month for two years. Then it sent him one green bound work by Floyd | Dickens. Now it's sending him red bound works by authors in their Floyd | "American Masters" series. Neither he nor you have every actually read Floyd | one, although you did start "Little Dorrit" once. The text was so Floyd | small and dense though you kept drifting off to sleep and reading the Floyd | same paragraph over and over again. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "u" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > U Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Room Floyd | Your Aunt has put her chair in front of the window where she can watch Floyd | the comings and going of your neighbours. Her old sofa is against one Floyd | wall alongside the grandfather clock that ticks time away in its deep Floyd | voice. On the other side of the room is the dresser, weighed down with Floyd | glass ornaments. Pictures cover most of the walls. Floyd | Floyd | When Aunt May moved in, somehow you managed to squeeze all her things Floyd | into the room. Fortunately, the room has expanded to accept them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sits in her chair, hands folded quietly in her lap, staring Floyd | out of the window. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about garden" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT GARDEN Floyd | Floyd | "Hi, Aunt May," you say. Floyd | Floyd | "Yes, dear?" she asks. Floyd | Floyd | You remember when you used to visit Aunt May years ago. You always Floyd | took away a bag of home gown vegetables. The kids complained in the Floyd | car on the way home, knowing that for the next few days, there would Floyd | always be something green on their plate. "I used to like growing my Floyd | vegetables," says Aunt May. "Frozen veg just aren't the same." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about derek" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT DEREK Floyd | Floyd | "He never seems to have much time these days," you say. "It's like Floyd | he's avoiding being at home." Floyd | Floyd | "Don't you worry, love, he's always loved you deep down." Aunt May Floyd | shakes her head. "It's a funny thing, isn't it. The more you love Floyd | them, the further away they seem to get." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about samantha" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT SAMANTHA Floyd | Floyd | "Sam..." you begin, but it's still too raw. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May looks at you and smiles sadly, "Children are hard, aren't Floyd | they? I never had any, but I watched over your aunties and your mother Floyd | growing up and they never stopped breaking my heart." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about baby" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT BABY Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May doesn't respond. She just shakes her head slightly and purses Floyd | her lips. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May shifts in her seat, and clasps her hands in her lap. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about projector" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT PROJECTOR Floyd | Floyd | You tell Aunt May about the white room, and about the plinth and the Floyd | projector. She looks out of the window for a while, as if deep in Floyd | thought. "I don't know what they are," she says, "but it sounds like Floyd | there's something that can be changed. It sounds like the past is not Floyd | always as fixed as you might think." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about rubber plant" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT RUBBER PLANT Floyd | Floyd | "It's still not doing well," you say, "the rubber plant I bought. Do Floyd | you remember?" Floyd | Floyd | "I did tell you to put somewhere more sunny," responds Aunt May, a Floyd | little acidly. "They like sun on their leaves, a ficus." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about may" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT MAY Floyd | Floyd | "I said I'm fine." Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sighs heavily. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about me" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT ME Floyd | Floyd | "You look nice, love." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about removals" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT REMOVALS Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May doesn't respond. She just shakes her head slightly and purses Floyd | her lips. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask may about barometer" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK MAY ABOUT BAROMETER Floyd | Floyd | "I've still got the barometer you gave me for my sixteenth," you say. Floyd | Floyd | "That's nice," says Aunt May, "I hope you got it fixed." Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "l" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > L Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Room Floyd | Your Aunt has put her chair in front of the window where she can watch Floyd | the comings and going of your neighbours. Her old sofa is against one Floyd | wall alongside the grandfather clock that ticks time away in its deep Floyd | voice. On the other side of the room is the dresser, weighed down with Floyd | glass ornaments. Pictures cover most of the walls. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sits in her chair, hands folded quietly in her lap, staring Floyd | out of the window. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x pictures" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X PICTURES Floyd | Floyd | A brief history of your maternal family tree. Uncles and aunts you Floyd | have a passing acquaintance with mingle with more distant relatives. Floyd | Dotted here and there are Monet prints. Your Aunt May loved Monet. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May turns her head slightly to look up the street, but you can't Floyd | see what she is looking at. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| zarf walks off through the wall; vivid gold light flares briefly around him. | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x clock" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X CLOCK Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May has had this clock forever. Its tick is like a constant note Floyd | in your life. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. It seems to be so much longer than Floyd | yesterday. To the east, a doorway leads into the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Short Corridor Floyd | The old clock in the corner punctuates the seconds with its deep bass Floyd | ticking. All the pictures are still on the wall - lined up ancestors Floyd | and forgotten relatives mixing with cheap reproductions of Monet's Floyd | landscapes. A musty old sofa against the wall is lit up by the one Floyd | window. A door to the south leads into your Aunt's front room. Floyd | Floyd | The room feels empty somehow, as if all the life in it has drained Floyd | away. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | Despite her age, Aunt May keeps her home spotlessly clean. The window Floyd | allows her to watch the comings and goings in the street from her Floyd | strategically positioned armchair. An old dresser holds brass Floyd | ornaments and a selection of glass flowers. The only door leads back Floyd | out into the hallway. Floyd | Floyd | The room feels empty somehow, as if all the life in it has been used Floyd | up. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x dresser" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Front Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X DRESSER Floyd | Floyd | You can't see any such thing. Floyd | Floyd | > | Jacqueline reads what's transpired. "So, you're going to undo all the horrid bits of your life, eh? Good luck!" | |
| DavidW says, "heh." | ||
| Jacqueline goes to unpack a box. | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Short Corridor Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Short Corridor Floyd | The old clock in the corner punctuates the seconds with its deep bass Floyd | ticking. All the pictures are still on the wall - lined up ancestors Floyd | and forgotten relatives mixing with cheap reproductions of Monet's Floyd | landscapes. A musty old sofa against the wall is lit up by the one Floyd | window. A door to the south leads into your Aunt's front room. Floyd | Floyd | The room feels empty somehow, as if all the life in it has drained Floyd | away. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. It seems to be so much longer than Floyd | yesterday. To the east, a doorway leads into the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Main Bedroom Floyd | This has always been your favourite room. The large south facing Floyd | window lets in plenty of light which makes it brighter than the rest Floyd | of the house. However, over the last couple of days, the wooden floor Floyd | has stretched, each pine tile becoming larger and the two single beds Floyd | that used to be separated by the width of the small table are now Floyd | several paces apart. Your dressing table, loaded with detritus, is Floyd | under the window and a wardrobe in the corner partially obscures a new Floyd | passageway that leads out of the eastern side of the house. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "search table" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > SEARCH TABLE Floyd | Floyd | Which do you mean, the small table or the dressing table? Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "dressing" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > DRESSING Floyd | Floyd | You find nothing of interest. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x small table" | ||
Floyd ] Main Bedroom Floyd | > Floyd | > X SMALL TABLE Floyd | Floyd | You bought this a couple of months ago when you got the new beds. Now Floyd | both you and Derek have a reading lamp. Derek likes to read late Floyd | sometimes and at least now the light doesn't spill directly into your Floyd | eyes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | Away from the faint light from the stairwell, the hall is darker, and Floyd | the pictures that continue to line the walls are more indistinct. A Floyd | little more light spills in from the open door. The door in the north Floyd | wall leads to Samantha's room, opposite it, your and Derek's room, and Floyd | the hallway stretches to the west. It seems to be so much longer than Floyd | yesterday. To the east, a doorway leads into the bathroom. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Waiting Room Floyd | The reception area is painted a clinical light green and smells of Floyd | disinfectant. Rows of chairs line the walls. A reception desk in the Floyd | corner hold pamphlets and leaflets. The only other door apart from the Floyd | one back into your house is in the opposite wall. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist stands behind the desk sorting through some Floyd | paperwork. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask receptionist about samantha" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK RECEPTIONIST ABOUT SAMANTHA Floyd | Floyd | "Hi," you say. Floyd | Floyd | "How can I help you?" replies the receptionist. Floyd | Floyd | "The doctor will see you soon," says the receptionist, and smiles Floyd | without showing her teeth. "I'm sure you can discuss any issues with Floyd | him." She turns away. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x pamphlets" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > X PAMPHLETS Floyd | Floyd | Glossy brochures with titles like "Is Adoption for You?" or "You and Floyd | Your Baby". Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "hm" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wait an hour" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > WAIT AN HOUR Floyd | Floyd | I only understood you as far as wanting to wait. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "time" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > TIME Floyd | Floyd | That's not a verb I recognise. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "ask receptionist about time" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > ASK RECEPTIONIST ABOUT TIME Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist smiles at you, but doesn't respond. She just goes Floyd | back to her work. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | You can't go that way. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wait until 5 pm" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > WAIT UNTIL 5 PM Floyd | Floyd | You potter around the house until 5:00 pm. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Waiting Room Floyd | The reception area is painted a clinical light green and smells of Floyd | disinfectant. Rows of chairs line the walls. A reception desk in the Floyd | corner hold pamphlets and leaflets. The only other door apart from the Floyd | one back into your house is in the opposite wall. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist stands behind the desk tidying up the desk surface. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Aunt May's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May's Room Floyd | Your Aunt has put her chair in front of the window where she can watch Floyd | the comings and going of your neighbours. Her old sofa is against one Floyd | wall alongside the grandfather clock that ticks time away in its deep Floyd | voice. On the other side of the room is the dresser, weighed down with Floyd | glass ornaments. Pictures cover most of the walls. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May sits in her chair, hands folded quietly in her lap, staring Floyd | out of the window. Floyd | Floyd | Aunt May coughs, and dabs at her lips with a small handkerchief. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Brady's Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Brady's Room Floyd | The posters on the wall, reminders of winning sports teams and fading Floyd | rock bands, are further apart than yesterday, as though spaced out and Floyd | shifted by some unseen hand, showing acres of cream wallpaper. The Floyd | bed, stripped of sheets, is only a textured mattress, the desk, piled Floyd | with hockey trophies from his schooldays. Grey light from the window Floyd | filters into the hallway behind you. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Still no word from Brady. You had hoped that when the phone rang this Floyd | morning, it was him and it would have been his voice on the answering Floyd | machine. It was still too hard to actually pick up the phone though - Floyd | that's why you stayed in bed. Just a message on the machine would have Floyd | been enough. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I need a bathroom break. bbiab." | |
| Jacqueline says, "This has been a long bathroom break. I hope he's okay." | ||
| DavidW says, "That wasn't that long!" | ||
| DavidW says, "I am a bit woozy now, though." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "d" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > D Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the front door) Floyd | Floyd | Driveway Floyd | Bounded by small grass borders that, via some unseen line down the Floyd | middle, demarcate your house from the next, the driveway stretches out Floyd | onto the road to the south. The open plan nature of the street is Floyd | disconcerting. Floyd | Floyd | Your car is parked here. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "close door" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > CLOSE DOOR Floyd | Floyd | You close the front door. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Driveway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | The street is too open. There are too many eyes - all those blank Floyd | windows reflecting and multiplying the world. Even thinking about Floyd | passing the end of the driveway makes you feel uncomfortable. It's as Floyd | if, unbounded by anything solid, all that space is too big to endure. Floyd | It might dissipate you entirely. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "oh geezus" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | (first opening the front door) Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "close door" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > CLOSE DOOR Floyd | Floyd | Which do you mean, the front door, the lounge door or the dining room Floyd | door? Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "front" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > FRONT Floyd | Floyd | You close the front door. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. The pile of Floyd | boxes seems to be higher than yesterday, but that's ok, because the Floyd | room seems to have grown to accommodate them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On a plinth in the corner, a rubber plant brushes the ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "dust plant" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > DUST PLANT Floyd | Floyd | You rub the Rubber Plant. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Kitchen Floyd | The kitchen is due an update - it feels very seventies, with a faux Floyd | marble worktop, dark wood-effect cupboards and garish tiling. The Floyd | refrigerator is covered in scraps of paper and bills, all held in Floyd | place by magnetic capital letters. The back door leads out of the east Floyd | wall into the garden. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | A calendar on the wall shows a grid of boxes for the month, all Floyd | covered in small handwriting. Floyd | Floyd | On the refrigerator is a yellow post-it note. Floyd | Floyd | The clock on the wall ticks the seconds away into the air. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "open fridge" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > OPEN FRIDGE Floyd | Floyd | The mostly empty shelves remind you that you need to tell Derek to go Floyd | to the supermarket on his way home from work tomorrow. When you let go Floyd | of the handle, the fridge door closes by itself. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "x clock" | ||
Floyd ] Kitchen Floyd | > Floyd | > X CLOCK Floyd | Floyd | The clock reads 5:18 pm. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Dining Room Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Dining Room Floyd | All the bric-a-brac on the sideboard has been packed away for the Floyd | move, leaving only dusty imprints on the wood. It had been filled with Floyd | colourful plates and cups and seldom-used cookery books and odds and Floyd | ends that the family had brought back from various holidays that Floyd | couldn't find another home. Now the brown boxes on the floor and Floyd | table, taped and anonymous, only serve to remind you of how much there Floyd | is left to do before the removal van arrives next week. The pile of Floyd | boxes seems to be higher than yesterday, but that's ok, because the Floyd | room seems to have grown to accommodate them. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | On a plinth in the corner, a rubber plant brushes the ceiling. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Lounge Floyd | Sometimes you think this room is made entirely from memories: the Floyd | picture of your daughter, staring defiantly at the camera, flanked by Floyd | the peaks of mountains; the wood paneling, a forgotten texture below Floyd | the bookshelves; the books themselves, all green and blue leather - Floyd | alphabetised soldier-sentries; a balding sofa and chair where Derek Floyd | spends most of his evenings staring at the TV mounted to the wall. Floyd | The too-small window overlooks the front driveway and lets in only Floyd | just enough light, especially now the room is so much larger. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn on tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TURN ON TV Floyd | Floyd | You switch the TV on. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "watch tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > WATCH TV Floyd | Floyd | A large flat screen attached to the wall opposite the window. Derek Floyd | insisted on getting the largest. It is switched on, and an Floyd | advertisement desperately tries to gain your attention. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "turn off tv" | ||
Floyd ] Lounge Floyd | > Floyd | > TURN OFF TV Floyd | Floyd | You switch the TV off. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "w" | ||
Floyd ] Entrance Hall Floyd | > Floyd | > W Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Entrance Hall Floyd | The glassed front door leads directly south onto the driveway, and Floyd | carpeted stairs angle up to the first floor. Doors lead east to the Floyd | lounge and the dining room to the north. The room is bare except for Floyd | an occasional table next to the front door in the southern wall, on Floyd | which the telephone and answering machine squat. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "u" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > U Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway has no windows. It's always been a dingy place when the Floyd | doors to the bedrooms are closed, but the open door allows some light Floyd | to creep in. Pictures line the walls, barely illuminated. To the south Floyd | of you is Aunt May's room, opposite it, Brady's room and the hallway Floyd | stretches toward the east side of the house. A flight of stairs leads Floyd | down into the entrance hall, and the new white door hangs open next to Floyd | the staircase to the west. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "e" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > E Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "n" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > N Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | Waiting Room Floyd | The reception area is painted a clinical light green and smells of Floyd | disinfectant. Rows of chairs line the walls. A reception desk in the Floyd | corner hold pamphlets and leaflets. The only other door apart from the Floyd | one back into your house is in the opposite wall. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | The receptionist stands behind the desk staring out into space. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "sit on chair" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > SIT ON CHAIR Floyd | Floyd | You get onto the chairs. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wait" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > WAIT Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "g" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > G Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "g" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > G Floyd | Floyd | Time passes. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "wait until 6" | ||
Floyd ] Waiting Room Floyd | > Floyd | > WAIT UNTIL 6 Floyd | Floyd | You potter around the house until 6:00 pm. Floyd | Floyd | > | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "s" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > S Floyd | Floyd | (first getting off the chairs) Floyd | Floyd | Hallway Floyd | The hallway stretches endlessly from east to west through the house. Floyd | The blank white walls are broken only by a door to the north. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | You can hear voices coming through the open door. Floyd | Floyd | Floyd | > | verbalK asks, "What are you trying to do ?" | |
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "listen" | ||
Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > Floyd | > LISTEN Floyd | Floyd | You hear nothing unexpected. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I wasn't sure." | |
| DavidW says, "Sam went to visit the doctor, and we left instead of waiting, and I have no way to tell if Sam's still there or not." | ||
| Roger says, "Now she's stuck in there forever" | ||
| DavidW says, "maybe." | ||
| DavidW says, "I need to lie down for a bit." | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "SAVE" | ||
| DavidW says (to Floyd), "cf2" | ||
Floyd | > Floyd | > SAVE Floyd | %% Enter a save filename to write: Floyd ] Hallway Floyd | > SAVEOk. Floyd | Floyd | > | DavidW says, "I'll come back to this later." | |
| Jacqueline says, "I feel it appropriate to quote KoL. We've been dancing around it, but really, it needs to be quoted." | ||
| Jacqueline | This rainy miasma truly drowns your soul. You're feeling depressed, evil, and depressed. | ||
| verbalK asks, "What's KoL?" | ||
| Jacqueline exclaims, "Sleep well, DW!" | ||
| Roger says, "Sounds about right." | ||
| Roger disappears through an invisible gap in the MUD. You think you may have heard the sounds of chatting before the gap closed again. | Jacqueline says, "Kingdom of Loathing, an old skool MMORPG that used to be quite popular." | |
| verbalK says, "Ok :)" | ||
| olethros says, "KoL was not really multiplayer" | ||
| olethros says, "it just allowed lots of people to log in at the same time" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "It's worth checking out. It is full of great writing." | ||
| olethros asks (of Jacqueline), "is it?" | ||
| verbalK says, "Seems to still be ON: There are currently 573 players logged in." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to olethros), "True, it was more of an online solo game, but it had interaction and cooperation." | ||
| [LINK] | ||
| olethros says, "I can't recall the interaction, apart from that happening on the mud" | ||
| Jacqueline says (to olethros), "Yeah, there were shared houses where we could share resources and stuff, iirc." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "But you're right in that game play was generally very individualized." | ||
| ***** EPILOGUE: LATER THAT DAY ***** | ||
| Doug says, "sorry I missed the last half of ClubFloyd, I was summoned to brunch" | ||
| McMartin says, "The most delicious of cross-planar impositions" | ||
| Olly) Doug says, "I was practicing witchcraft and becoming a lesbian." | ||
| Olly says, "Sorry. Weird mind-bunnies." | ||
| McMartin asks, "With huge, pointy teeth?" | ||
| Olly says, "Thought bunnies." | ||
| Jacqueline says (to Doug), "Look at this way, you are probably still in a good mood." | ||
| Doug says, "aw" | ||
| Doug | Jacqueline says, "I feel like there should be a content warning on this game." | ||
| Doug says, "there was one! in the blurb" | ||
| Doug | [Note - this story contains mature themes and scenes that some might find difficult or distressing.] | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Well, I didn't read the blurb" | ||
| Jacqueline asks, "Was it at the start of the game?" | ||
| McMartin asks, "Which game was this?" | ||
| McMartin says, "Also, that warning is not terribly useful" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "(And I was actually joking, though. My thought was that one should only play it if already stable on anti-depressants.)" | ||
| McMartin says, "Ah, Map" | ||
| McMartin says, "This survived my level of detachment inculcated from previous years" | ||
| Doug says, "I think the blurb was only on the ifcomp site." | ||
| Doug says, "which yeah, it should have been in the game too" | ||
| Doug says, "although probably too vague to be useful" | ||
| Doug asks, "so are you going to continue Map next week?" | ||
| Jacqueline says, "We didn't discuss it." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "Half the people seemed kind of over it." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "They have their mental health to consider." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I have left the transcript running. I think DW plans to poke at it more." | ||
| Roger says, "I just found it extremely dull" | ||
| Doug says, "I think there are 8 days total, and you only saw 2" | ||
| Doug says, "well, 1.5" | ||
| Doug says, "the structure becomes a little more apparent eventually" | ||
| Doug says, "but yeah, no need to continue if no one's enjoying it. the next game is a lot more fun..." | ||
| Jacqueline says, "I appreciate what I think it's trying to do, and if I were playing it solo the experience might have been different. I either would have given up quicker because her life is so terrible, or played more because the game would have gone more quickly playing alone. Not sure." | ||
| Doug says, "somehow the sadness didn't bother me. I thought it was sort of a novelty to have a lonely housewife as the protagonist" | ||
| Doug says, "it is a little weird in that, being a parser game with a map, you'd expect to want to examine stuff and manipulate objects etc, but none of that stuff actually matters. except for setting the mood, which you got in spades..." | ||
| Doug says, "but it's mostly about revisiting scenes from the past and being given the option to make a different choice" | ||
| Doug says, "but, I think it maybe wouldn't work as well if it were just a straight-up choice game." | ||
| Doug says, "anyway, I'm off. see you next week for whichever game we play!" | ||
