February 14, 2022 – 11:35 PM
15 February, 1892 — Greengrass Home
It was Tuesday evening and Ford was in the garden as he always was, with a book on his lap waiting for a ghost to show up and listen to him read the latest chapter of epic poetry. What was different about tonight: in lieu of a bookmark, Ford had a small stack of letters tucked into the pages. One was event scented with so much perfume it had stained the parchment. He was, needless to say, properly annoyed.
"Barnaby Wye," he said sternly as his friend drifted in. "Would you care to explain why my office received a whole stack of love letters with your name on them, courtesy of Witch Weekly?" He must have tricked someone or bribed them into writing the initial ad for him, because Ford certainly hadn't done it, and no one else in the Spirit Division had confessed to it once the letters started arriving. What had he expected to happen? Owls couldn't deliver letters for him to carry on some grand romance via post — he was non-corporeal, and had no established address on file with the Division, so the owls had mostly been confused.
Barnaby Wye Elias Grimstone
Set by Lady!
February 15, 2022 – 10:04 PM
Barnaby Wye — Played by MJ
“Ah, I knew they would reach me somehow!” Barnaby began, expression brightening visibly at the mention of love letters – before he took in the rest of the scene and caught up with Greengrass’ words of chastisement. Oh, no, he did not much care for that tone.
Perhaps he ought to have gotten the owls redirected somehow to Dempsey on his behalf, and kept the Spirit Division entirely in the dark instead – but Barnaby had not thought this far ahead, merely assuming that the world would rearrange itself somehow to his whims. (Much as he always had, even when Alive.)
But Ford was his friend, and certainly a romantic at heart, and Barnaby asked for so little that really he ought to forgive him this. (Easier said than believed, particularly in this precarious situation: with all Barnaby’s prospects of romance now sitting in Greengrass’ possession, so near and yet so far, and Barnaby having no earthly use of his hands.)
“I might... if you would care to read them for me?” Barnaby said, raising his eyebrows hopefully. He had to be at least a little curious, somewhere underneath the crossness.
February 15, 2022 – 11:09 PM
Barnaby could have at least had the presence of mind to look abashed by the accusation. Instead, he looked like the cat who'd gotten into the cream, at least initially. Ford scowled and swiped the book in his hand (with the letters still stuck in the pages) through Wye's chest, as though he intended to dissipate him like an unwanted cloud.
"You can't start romancing women under false pretenses," he chided, dropping the book in his lap and crossing his arms. "People write into Witch Weekly because they're desperate and lonely, and you're taking advantage of them." Not that Ford had any experience with the senders of Lonely Hearts advertisements, but he'd chased down a copy of the magazine after the letters for Wye started arriving. He'd read through them trying to pinpoint which was Wye's, to determine how badly he'd misrepresented himself. Ford wasn't sure which was his exactly, but he knew that Wye hadn't written that he was dead, which was enough for Ford to levy this criticism at him. And everyone else he'd read adverts from certainly seemed desperate and lonely.
Set by Lady!
February 16, 2022 – 12:14 AM
Barnaby Wye — Played by MJ
Well, Greengrass might be somewhat aggrieved, but waving a book through his chest was uncalled for, and Barnaby thought this reaction far beneath somebody who was ordinarily more sensitive. Having anything pushed through his chest, too, was particularly merciless. Barnaby pouted at it; his feelings hurt, if nothing else could be.
He wafted backwards by a pace, hovering there and regarding Greengrass and trying to refrain from shaking his head at him. These complaints were unfounded – Fortitude was not seeing his side. “Tush, they are anonymous missives,” Barnaby pointed out – in as even a tone as he could muster, so that he might not incense Greengrass any further, “everyone is writing under false pretences.” He was sure they were all weaving their way around the truth here and there, and Barnaby had been as close to honest as he dared; he was well aware he wouldn’t have received these responses if he had been any plainer.
“And – in case it has escaped your notice –” Barnaby added, a slight sting of injury in his expression again, “I am as familiar with desperate loneliness as anyone else.” So he could not touch, or write, or physically feel; but he still had some feelings; three hundred years of lingering feelings. Greengrass did not usually think so little of that.
February 19, 2022 – 1:29 AM
Ford held on to his consternation through Wye's defenses, but softened slightly at the mention of desperate loneliness. Of course Wye was lonely; everyone he'd known in life was long since gone, and while many ghosts had friends and relationships and potentially whole social systems with other spirits it wasn't exactly the same. And it usually wasn't romance, which was presumably something Wye thought his life was lacking if he was interesting in placing Lonely Hearts. It was either that or he'd intentionally set out to toy with young women's feelings because he found the idea amusing, but even in the most uncharitable mood Ford could not believe such a thing of his friend.
"Maybe they're mostly lying," he allowed. "But they're all doing it with an eye towards getting married, which you —" Ford cut himself off shy of saying Barnaby couldn't, because of course he could. The legalities of it were a little questionable, true, but Herbert Fudge had done it with his wife, so there was some precedent, at least. Having spent so long considering his sister's prospects, though, Ford was having a hard time imagining anyone would willingly decide to marry a ghost without a prior commitment to them, like Mrs. Fudge had to her husband. What the girls needed from a marriage were all things that Wye couldn't provide — a home to live in, an income to live on, something — either society life or children — to live for.
"If you're trying to seduce someone, this hardly seems like the best method," Ford argued, instead of continuing the thought. "You think you can woo someone by post and then when you eventually meet them they just won't mind that you're dead?"
Set by Lady!
February 27, 2022 – 11:42 PM
Barnaby Wye — Played by MJ
Barnaby could predict well enough what Greengrass had meant to say before he cut himself off: can’t. He narrowed his eyes knowingly. Oh, woe to be him – woe to be a phantom and to have the world continue to exist merely to show him everything he could not do around every next corner!
Barnaby much preferred contemplating what he could do. He could sing in dulcet tones; compose any number of songs to serenade someone; he could speak on a wealth of subjects, could remember great histories and go where he wished and retain consciousness without need of sustenance or stillness or sleep. He could recite sonnets and pay compliments with flair and he had eyes yet and an imagination, which was probably more than some Living men had to boast of.
So wooing people by post seemed as likely an approach as any other. “Well, there is only one way to find out, is that not so?” He gazed back, wide-eyed and cajoling, defiantly choosing optimism in the face of reason. Best not to count one’s chickens, and so on and thenceforth... nevertheless, he made a grabby-handed motion at the book with the letters stuffed within it, imploring Greengrass to indulge him long enough to read the Good Ladies’ Letters aloud to him, at the very least.
For there were oddities in every race; who was to say someone would not dare to love beyond the usual bounds of conformity? Barnaby was exceedingly loveable, if he did say so himself. And if all else failed, at least he would still have been granted a brief window of getting to entertain the delusion. (Indeed, in ghosthood, entertaining delusions was generally about as good as it got.)
