[The Red Ties]

[sadladsalad]

​

According to a popular myth in Japan, the gods tie an invisible red thread to you and your soulmate's pinky finger. No matter how knotted up it gets, it will never break. This is a popular myth told in your profession. What kind you ask? Matchmaking. You work with your partner in order to match people up, and every time it's (hopefully) a success. It's nice job to be honest, to see people work so earnestly, become enraptured, marry one day, and be happy together. But it's funny. You don't believe in love.


[WIP]

 

[Authorian]

(I'll begin then)


I crumpled up the last, but empty, jug of milk, ignoring the horrid stench that rocketed from it at the initial clench. After tossing it into recycling, I maneuvered past the maze of junk on the ground to the main room, where Ashling was, as usual, typing away at her computer.


"Okay, so we've got this whole REDKNOT company, what now, genius?" I asked, slouching onto the couch and glaring at her wavy brown hair.

 

[sadladsalad]

"Shush." She begins to tack away at the keyboard of the computer, the speed of her fingers so fast you could barely see her hand move. "I'm working on it..."


Well. She was. It's more like she's posting away on reddit, 4-chan, and other useless forums on the Internet. She snorts, but clasps her hands around her mouth soon after trying not to reveal anything, but c'mon. It was so obvious.

 

[Authorian]

I stood up at her sudden chortle. She wasn't working in it, that lazy...


"Hey!" I reached forward, grabbed her shoulder, and spun her around. "Is this some sorta game to you?" He gestured with his cereal, splash in milk and cornflakes on the both of them. "If I don't pay back these guys," he gestured to himself, then her. "Like you said you'd help me do, I'll go to jail. Now I don't mind all your 'red strings' bull, but I need money. So I don't care how many people we match up wrong..." I poked her with each word for emphasis. "But I do care how much time you spend delaying! We need a site, a Facebook page, anything. But we need it soon, or we'll both starve."


(You wanna change it a bit so that Ashling owes my character something and that's why she's helping? I think it'll make more sense than her just saying she would since she's already jobless...)

 

[sadladsalad]

"C'mon don't be so hasty. Love takes time you know. So does perfection," she brushes his fingers off, tapping alt+tab pretty quickly to reveal a pretty decent website. It looked quite minimalistic that it looked actually looked modern and appealing.


"The thing is that no one will go to a no-name website and pay money for some no-name buisness with no experience at all. We need to get out there you know?? Strut our stuff. Show them what we can do."

 

[Authorian]

"Okay..." I said, looking over the minister with interest. "So, what should we do? A free service to get reviews? Stand on the side of the road and hand out tracts? Wait outside bars and talk to one nightstand pairs about their possible future?" I chuckled at my own joke.

 

[sadladsalad]

"That is exactly what we're going to do," she clasps her hands together excitedly, "Give a free service. A sample, say if you will. Once we do a good job, they'll talk about us. They'll represent REDKNOT. We'll hit the bars."


She jumps off her chair, grabbing her winter track coat off the the rack. She slips it on with ease, grabs her keys and almost leaves. But she stops before hand in order to stare back at you.


"You going?"

 

[Authorian]

I glance from my cereal to Ashling, who'd quickly moved to the door. With a loud sigh of disappointment, I set it in the computer desk and walked over to the door with her, slipping into a light hoodie over my tee shirt. "Sure, why not. Anyway, gotta make use you don't mess anything up."

 

[sadladsalad]

It was still winter, so it was obviously cold out and it was already getting too dark. The walk to the bar wasn't long, just a few blocks away.


The bar itself wasn't impressive, but it managed to last though the years. Unfortunately, the age of the bar was obvious. There was not a lot of people in there as well. The bartender was wiping the counter dry, with an impressive amount of alcohol behind him.


A couple was adjacent to the door, talking about depressing manners. Three guys in the back were drinking a beer or two. There was also a guy at the bar and a woman smoking outside despite the late times. In the booths was another large group eating appetizers as they watch the TV, enjoying the night out.


"Perfect. See that guy on the bar by himself?"

 

[Authorian]

"Yeah..." I said, distracted by the dirty ceiling and sickening smell of chemical cleaners. The guy looked to be mid to late twenties, and I couldn't tell if he was drinking off a relationship, or trying to find one, but he definitely looked the part of the first if the two. "So what's the plan?" I waved my hands to the next sentence. "Oh great witch of red string."

 

[sadladsalad]

"There's no such thing as witches. Only gods," she presses her glasses back on over her nose, "Here's the plan you'll go talk to that guy whose drinking away his sorrows. He probably got dumped. Sympathize with him, order him a drink or two. Keep on talking with him and just gather information and stuff, okay?"


She looks with you with expectations.

 

[Authorian]

I squinted my eyes, I could totally do this, yeah, no problem. "I'll try," I said, in truth, I had no clue how this would go. I walked over to the man, and as I was about to sit down, looked over my shoulder at Ash. She fixed her glasses and nodded slightly, and I couldn't hold back an eyeroll.


I slid into the seat next to the man, who looked at me with tired eyes. He was in a suit, haphazardly loosened in various places to make it more comfortable. I smiled at him, and then called over the bartender.


"What can I help you with?" he asked, polishing a drinking glass with his rag.


"Umm..." I leaned in. "Do you have any, like, milk? I don't drink," I chuckled nervously, realizing how dumb that'd sounded.


The bartender glared at me, unamused. "This is a bar, sir." He clearly thought I was playing a joke. I smiled broadly.


"Just some water, please," I said with a nod, the bartender rolled his eyes, going to get me my order. "So..." I trailed of, turning to the man and brushing my hair out of my face. "You got dumped, didn't ya?" I said.


The man looked at me, but I couldn't tell what he was thinking. "No kidding," he said finally, taking another sip.


"Ah, I see." I stared at the counter and an uncomfortable silence wafted between us. "Was she pretty?" The words left my mouth of there own accord, and the man sneered slightly. "Ca-cause I can totally, like, sympathize with that. I've gone out with tons of pretty girls, and been dumped by all of them." I made a sweeping motion with my hand as the bartender set down my drink.


I glanced back around to Ash to see how I was doing, the stupid grin on my face begging for encouragment.


((Oh my word it's so fun writing an awkward character ^-^' ))

 

[sadladsalad]

"Oh Jesus Christ," Ash face palms, obviously not intrigued with conversation, "Excuseme-"


She sat to the otherwise of the guy, whom was obviously not comfortable with this. What happened to the every other chair rule? The stranger combs back his blonde hair, looking at the both of us with a suspicious glare.


"Look. What this guy is trying to say is that some times... sometimes you will meet girls that was never meant to be. It'll be hard now, but trust me. There is 4 billon women on this planet, and I am pretty sure you could find the one."


He starts to slowly back away from ash,"Sorry, but I'm not interested."

 

[Authorian]

I glanced around, trying to think of a solution, when I noticed a loose thread coming off my red shirt. I ripped it off and turned the mans towards me roughly. "Here, look," I said as I tied the string around the mans pinky. "In Japanese culture, it is said that all people are connected to their soulmates by red thread." I gestured to the knot. "Me and my affiliate are in the business helping people find the person at the end of their own." The man seemed still unsure, but interested in what I was doing. I held up his hand, so the thread was between our faces, which were too close for even my comfort. "Would you like us to help you tie the red knot?" I asked, his eyes glowed a little at my words, but it could have just been the alchohol hitting him.


"Well, err, how?" the man asked, I turned to Ash for help.

 

[sadladsalad]

"Here. Let me." Grabbing the string from Fin, she tied the red string around his pinky finger. "There we go. Hold on, as we bring you to the other end."


She basically pushes the guy off the stool, and out the bar, string still attached. She heads towards the corner, where the local convenience store was.

 

[Authorian]

I hopped up, following Ash as she pushed the man towards the convenience store. He hardly struggled, but I was curious. What did she have in mind?

 

[sadladsalad]

She throws you a thumbs up when the guy wasn't looking, "Holly shet, Finny! Awesome job. Owe you for this one!"





She pasts the auto doors of the convenience store, the smell of spilled Gatorade and coffee hitting her nose. She heads to the back of the store. There, a woman who had her yellow hair tied up into a messy bun, shoved all the cartons of ice cream in her crate.


"You know how guys drink away their problem?" She mentions, "Same thing happens with girls. Except with ice cream."

 

[Authorian]

Beamed at her thumbs up, I did something right!


I couldn't help but chuckle at her words. This was going better than expected.

 

[sadladsalad]

The guy looks at her confused.


"Well? What are you doing? Go talk to her."


"But-"


"No buts!"


Ash shoves the guy and nearly pushes her crate of ice cream over, spilling the entire thing.


"Just watch it tie itself, Fin."


"Oh crap, I'm sorry...!" He rushes to pick up the pile of ice cream back to the crate. She crouches down as well, sniffing, her eyes noticibly red.


"I-It's okay don't worry about it."

 

[Authorian]

I watched in awe as the chemistry happened, how had Ashling found someone so quickly? I turned to her, wide eyed, and she gave me a wide smile.


"Err, well, you don't seem okay," the man said, lifting another handful of icecream boxes into the cart.


The lady chuckled, sniffling again. "I could say the same for you."


"Do you have a car?" he asked, setting the last of the icecream back into the cart.


"No..." the lady said, she stepped back, somewhat uncomfortable.


"Well, I could, uhm..." he rubbed the back of his neck.


The ladies eyes widened for a sec, and then she smiled, wiping away tears. "Would you mind walking me home?" she interrupted his stuttering.

 

[sadladsalad]

"See, man!" Ash trotting around them, "Told you. Give me your pinky."


Ashling grabs the red sting and retrieves the untied end of it. She brings it over to the other girl.


"Would you give me your pinky too?"


The girl with yellow hair, looks at the guy with us and back to ash, confused but amused.


"Uh. Sure."


Ashling smiles, tieing the other end of the sting to her pinky.


"And with this, this is the person at the other end of the red string. The person who you'll be with. No matter how knotted up it is" She pulls out a black sleek card out of her pocket, a red line in the middle of it. She hands it to the both of them, "It'll never break..."

 

[Authorian]

I smile and stick my hands in my pockets, following Ashling out of the store with a grin on my face. I stretch, letting out a yawn. "Well, that went better than I could've hoped," I said. The sun was beginning to duck under the horizon, and, mid stretch, a single thought crossed my mind. "Aww, my cereal is definetely soggy by now," I complained.

 

[sadladsalad]

"Dude, just put the bowl in a Baggie next time, I don't know." She shoves her hand in her pockets," It was lucky that there was random chick there wanting to drown out her sorrows with ice cream, to be honest."

 

[Authorian]

"That wouldn't work..." I grumbled, turning slightly away from her. "And I suppose it had to have been luck... I mean, there's no way you could have followed an actual string, so..." I trailed off, thinking about the entire evening. "Hopefully they tell their friends."

 

[sadladsalad]

"See this?" She draws out the same card from before, having the same minimalistic look from the site. You have come to realize that it was a business card, "I had it printed out the day you told me you joined me. Look! Look how pro this looks!"


She shivers over its pro-ness.