Rabbit Will Run. (open)

This was quite the site at which to find one's self stationed. The rolling grounds. The impressive buildings (though a good number were closed off). The fresh air most of all was the stark contrast that Lucky was looking for. York wasn't exactly smog filled, far from it, still the crispness of the air was something she craved. As if every molecule of it had just been born straight from the trees around them. She couldn't imagine how air like that had no effect on these kids. Surely it calmed them, purified them like it did her. There was something about air like that, it cleansed and refocused. A powerful tool for kids like this. Kids who'd lost their way so profoundly.

Lucky had only just arrived, movers were taking her things in. So she was taking the moment to explore her new home, a walking stick in hand. Her mobility was very good, but on uneven terrain she still would the assistance of a prop was invaluable. The Farm was lovely. There was a peace and a quiet productivity there that appealed to her. She moved quietly along the animal pens with a little cheerful smile on her face. Stopping outside of one empty pen she began to hum a little song, eyeing the little shelter in the corner where the pen's inhabitants were likely hiding.

The nurse had come to Highgrove looking for a new phase to her life, which she felt to be stagnating. She'd spent the last handful of years trying to build a stable life that was the grown-up thing to do. She was a well-respected nurse in a large hospital. She was in a long-term relationship. She was blonde haired, brown-eyed and outside of the plasticy sheen when her legs hit the right light she looked the very picture of white picket fence normality. But Lucky was never that ordinary and something had to give. That nice, respectable job felt suffocating and that long-term relationship felt more and more like a hopelessly empty shell as time went on.

The approaching new year was the breaking point. Lucky kept looking at her life and kept feeling unable to fathom how she could handle another year of it. It all looked nice from the outside, but the inside felt forced, inorganic. Lucky couldn't handle it anymore. She started with handing a month's notice off to the York Hospital. They threw her a little going away party. The night shift nurses got together and pooled some money to buy her a nice new suitcase. Tim was dumbfounded. How could she give it up? She was the nightshift supervisor, where did she think she'd find something better? That was when Lucky bit the bullet and told him she was applying elsewhere. But what about his job? She simply replied that it didn't matter, she was going alone anyways. Tim 'fought' it as much as he could. Protested and offered logical reasons why not. But it was hollow. They'd run their course and Lucky knew that like she knew her name. She knew he realize it with time. That was what counted. They needed to move on, so that's what she did. He didn't fight after that night. The futility dawning even on him, as dense as Tim could be sometimes.

Seeing another human being, Lucky smiled and gave a little wave with her free hand, covered with a plum coloured leather glove. "Hello There!" She called out, cheery and ready to embrace her new life at Highgrove House.

There’s no such thing as ghosts. No matter how many times he said it, thought it, sang it,
and wrote it, A.J. couldn’t escape that nagging feeling. The feeling that told him no matter he did or said, there was such a thing as ghosts and he’d encountered, or been haunted...or whatever it was called...by one during the snowstorm. There simply was no other explanation for what happened to him the in the solarium that night. If there were kids in there playing a prank, they were pretty damn good at special effects. No. There was someone, or a couple of someones, in that room but they weren’t...regular people. Plants just don’t move on their own like that. Doors don’t just slam shut like that. It was the kind of thing that happened in horror films. The solitary security guard wanders into the deep blackness of the giant haunted house, looking for stray kids. He wanders into the seemingly harmless, darkened solarium and is eaten alive by ghostly driven, flesh eating plants. And all that’s left behind is a bloody flashlight. A chuckled escaped slipped out of his chest, at his terribly narrated scenario. It was followed by a deep shudder. What if that’s what would have happened to him if he hadn’t left the room? He didn’t want to think too much about it. Focus on the job, A.J. Focus on the job.

At the moment, the job consisted of doing his rounds. Make sure that everything was going smoothly. No residents hanging around where they shouldn’t be or doing things they shouldn’t be doing. It also meant making sure that the staff was safe, too. But who’s going to make sure that you’re safe? A scowl formed on the security guard’s face at the thought. He didn’t need anyone to make sure that he was safe. He was a big boy who could take care of himself. Now. He didn’t need his big brother to leave the nightlight on for him, or his shrink to reassure him that the monster wasn’t going to looking for him, again. No. That person was far behind him. The scars, and even the faintest remnants of a stutter, were all that were left of that boy. The man that had taken his place was strong and fully capable of dealing with whatever came his way. The medication doesn’t hurt, either.

Shoving his hands in his pockets, he continued along his route along the farm grounds; getting closer and closer to the barn. The smell of the animals was a strong contrast to the crisp, cold air. He contemplated taking a deep breath to absorb it all, but he changed his mind. The last thing he wanted was the taste of cow and horse dung in his mouth. A lesson he’d learned the hard way when he was a kid. The memory of it brought a smile to his face. Those were simpler times. Safer times. They were also past times and had nothing to do with his current situation. Focusing himself back to his present work, he suddenly wished he hadn’t forgotten his gloves. Forcing his hands deeper his the pockets of his coat, he set his eyes forward and tried to keep his mind on the task at hand.

He thought that he was doing a good job of it, until a voice calling out startled him. Blue eyes immediately focused on the person just a few feet away in front of him. Had he been that occupied in his own head that he completely missed the woman standing there? He doubted that she just appeared out of nowhere. Unless...Just let it go. No such thing as ghosts. Relax. He realized that the way he was staring could be considered just a bit rude. Returning the smile, accompanied by a quick wave from a gloveless hand, he waited until he was a bit closer to speak. “Hello.” He also realized that he didn’t recognize the woman. While he couldn’t remember the name of everyone employed at Highgrove, he was good with faces. And hers was a new one. “I don’t recall seeing you before. Are you new here?”

Lucky always had a smile a mile wide. It was probably her best feature if she really thought about it. And thanks to some blessed genetics her teeth had even come in more or less straight. Then there was the general aversion to coffee that kept them pretty white. She grinned as he came closer, leaning on the fence in from of her. Her walking stick laid across the top between the wood and her arms. She was feeling just right, the cool nip in the air, the scenery, the excitement of a new place. It was all just exactly what she'd been wanting. Needing really.

But even more than that. There was the excitement of meeting a new person. All through her life, no matter what had happened, what had changed there was one thing that never changed. Lucky always loved people. She thrived on the energy of her fellow human beings and anyone she could add to her contact list was a boon. At least this was the largely the case. It wasn't as if she had never met a person she didn't like, but to her it seemed like it was never much of a big deal. She was happy to let them go on with their lives as much as she moved on with her's. Generally people tended to have a natural guilt in them. They all knew there was little way to win if you were the person picking a fight with the amputee.

"Yes, I've just arrived in from York." She said, picking up her walking stick and planting it firmly and she stepped forward and extended her hand to be shaken. "I'm going to be one of the nurses on staff, my name's Lucinda Marsh, or Lucky if you'd prefer. No Lucy though, I've never been a Lucy but people always just use that as the go to." She released his hand and eased back into a more comfortable stance with a little more personal space. She was a talker alright. Hopefully the young man wasn't bothered by it. Lucky could help but wonder what he did at the home. He seemed so baby faced to her, but maybe it was the accent she was detecting, lending him a little bit of a fish out of water feel perhaps.

"Have you been on staff here long?"

A.J. couldn’t help but smile. The women in front of him had a nice smile. Kinda contagious, I think. It was the kind of smile that could brighten a fellow’s dark mood. It certainly helped with the one that he had been wrestling with for the past few hours. Paranoid thoughts about ghosts in the solarium and ghosts of his past had definitely put a little, black rain cloud over his head. So the appearance of this new face was a welcome change from his own solitary, circling thoughts. He studied the newcomer’s face for a few seconds. She reminded him of the girls that he used to see in passing back when he lived in California. The kind of girls who seemed to have no worries at all and lived the perfect life. The kind of girls who didn’t mind offering a happy smile to the shy, tall boy sitting at a lunch table all by himself. He’d been terrified of those girls, back then. They seemed so perfectly put together; so flawless. It made him wonder what horrors lurked beneath the beauty? What depraved and vicious plots were simmering just below the surface of that perfect smile? They’re not all like that. Some of them are really nice. Just relax.

He noticed the walking stick as he got closer. His mind instantly began to wonder why she needed it. There were probably a hundred reason why someone would need a walking stick. The most obvious and generic, big picture reason being that she had trouble walking. But why? It wasn’t a deep burning question that he needed to answer, but it did make him curious. You could just ask. But that would be rude. Whatever the reason, he decided that he wouldn’t make any snap judgments about her based on it. He’d be no better than the people that used to think him stupid just because he played sports or stuttered. Different doesn’t mean wrong, A.J. She was just another new employee; another new co-worker. He shook her hand firmly, but not too tightly.

Nurse Lucinda Marsh. Lucky. Not Lucy. Got it. Easy enough to remember. Her name, if for no other reason, made her interesting. A.J. had never met anyone with that name before. He wondered why she preferred Lucky over Lucy. It sound more interesting. Very cool. He didn’t that she was a talker. He was used to it. After suffering from a severe stutter for so long, he’d gotten into the habit of doing more listening than talking. After various therapies, he had a certain level of control over it now. But every now and again he found himself doing more listening than talking; especially in the presence of a talker. He smiled and gave a small sweeping wave with one arm towards their surroundings. “Welcome to Highgrove, Lucky. My name's Aidan-Jeffrey Corrigan. A.J., mostly. I’m a security guard.” Slipping his hand back into the warmth of his pocket he paused for a few seconds. How long had he been on staff? A month? It felt longer. Maybe it was because he’d settled in rather quickly. How could he not? Anything was better than his hovering, over-protective mother and brother.

“I’ve been here just over a month, I think. It’s...interesting. I like it, so far.” Except for the blind-side hitting snow storm and the ghost in the solarium...but that’s not exactly first meeting conversation, it is? “Have you been up to the house, yet? Met any of the kids?”

Life in York, Life with Tim had been her favorite fruit gone rotten. At first it was certainly sweet. He had that kind of crooked smile that made her melt, he had a good job, a good head on his shoulders, he wasn't setting the world on fire, but he was fun enough. Perhaps it was that 'enough' that was the problem. Lying in wait since the beginning. It seemed as sweet and sensible as a proper, realistic romance ought to be. Lucky had never been much of a dream, sure when she was a young girl she thought about running away with some handsome guy. Maybe a bad boy with a motorcycle and a leather jacket. A girl could dream right?

But Lucky grew out of being a girl fast. Nothing like loosing your friends, premature independence, and recklessness in one shot to pull a girl into adulthood. Once she was in the state of mind to consider men again her needs had simplified. All she wanted was a good guy-like Tim-nice, stable, sensible. He'd even had a bit of a hero-complex: sweeping in to save the poor, pretty amputee. Which wasn't was Lucky was, of course. But it mean he treated her well, real well. Almost too well really. Luckily for the most part that inclination in him faded off after a bit of time past. That and the fact that she started poking him in the ribs with whatever she could reach: cane, broom handle, spare leg-whenever ever he started to get over-zealous about it.

Letting people know about her legs was always a bit of a foggy question. Lucky never tried to hide it but at the same time it wasn't really the sort of thing that came up easily in conversation. There was a time when she'd bring along her cane despite not needing it, just as something to open up the conversation. But she'd left it behind a few times by accident and gave up on all that. A short skirt was an easy way of going about it, but sometimes that attracted attention she didn't really want all that much. Most days, she just kept her ears trained on looking for an opening. She preferred to get it out of the way sooner rather than later.

"Noooo. actually. I literally just arrived. The moving men were taking my things in so I just wanted to get out of their way. I tried to stick around but I just felt like they were tripping over me, yeah? I wanted to see the sights a bit first. I was really looking for a place to work in the Lakes District. It's so beautiful out here.

"I only saw a couple kids from a distance on the walk out here. I'm excited to meet some of them though. I've always loved working with adolescents. It's such an interesting time."