Book Party [ota]

[myblueskies]

Who: Romeo, Elfnein and literally everyone in the heavens. Even if you weren't personally invited every invite came with a +ALL YOUR FRIENDS and there's also a sign. Strangers are just friends these two haven't met yet.
When: 29th April. Afternoon onwards
Where: Temple Smol (Gegute's library)
What: Just the cutest book party the heavens has ever known! Bring your best book!



Arrival

You might have received an invitation, or perhaps you are just passing Gegute’s library but there is an brightly painted sign outside.

Book Party today!

Everyone welcome! Bring your best book or dress up!

Lots of tasty food!

The doors of the temple are open and once you arrive in the lobby there are more bright arrows pointing the way into the library. If you are still stuck mister Goat is at the help desk, he’ll direct any one who needs it!

Activities

The layout of the library hasn’t really changed at all, except a few tables being moved to accommodate activities and all the comfy reading cushions have been brought to a central location. All the shelves are decorated with colourful paper chains and streamers.

Romeo had really enjoyed Yuna’s birthday party with the activities to do so he had copied the idea for Elfnein’s book party! On one table there is material for making bookmarks. You might want to recut the card strips, they are a little wonky. There is ribbon and glitter and colouring pens and glue.

On another there is a cardboard box puppet theatre, painted in a riot of colours with colourful strips of material as curtains. There is some felt and other material, as well as scissors, glue and wool to make puppets with. A sign reads in childish Hirigana. Show your best book!

Food

The invitations had promised lots of tasty food and there sure was a lot! A whole table filled with tasty treats, Romeo had been very very busy! There was a whole tray of chopped fruit, another of vegetables like carrots and cucumber.

There was bread and cheese and two bowls of pasta with different sauces. Another bowl of noddles with meat and vegetables. There was a huge bowl of rice too with a tray of grilled fish and a bowl of broccoli and asparagus.

An entire part of the table was taken up by apples and things with apples in them, apple turnovers and even an attempt at an apple pie, it was a bit smushed but probably tasted fine.

There was a tray of very misshapen cookies with messy icing and another of even messier cupcakes with far too much buttercream. There were also churos and a chocolate Gateaux, these seemed to have been bought rather than made, Romeo hadn’t even known where to start it making them!

There was an attempt at making books and other shapes out of rice and vegetables packed in the two bento boxes Ebisu’s temple had given him for Christmas, but they were a bit crumbly, misshapen or just plain strange. In the centre of Romeo’s bento attempts was his magical bento box, every time it was opened there were different fancy bento creations, if the children’s attempts left a lot to be desired.

Have fun!

Comments

[nopixiedust]

"No, not like that." Wendy twirls some stray hair around her finger, curling it loosely. "More like bad things sometimes happen. You know... They're bloody, or scary, or mean. That sounds like a lot of fairy tales anyway, people just don't know those versions as much."

[myblueskies]

"Oh scary stories!" Romeo nodded, "I don't mind scary stories! Being scared is fun sometimes as long as it's only pretend scared!"

Real scared was less fun, but Romeo could be brave!

[nopixiedust]

"Then I can show you some sometime if you want. I don't mind. Actually..." Wendy pauses, and starts to fully take in the temple that she's in. She'd kind of noticed it, offhand, but right now she really takes in the sheer amount of books that are in the place. Wow. A book party couldn't have been hosted in a better place.

"Maybe there are some here? It seems like a pretty huge place. But I don't know what kind of books you have exactly here." It would be embarrassing if she tried to find fairy tales when the only books that this place carries are for machines or something.

[myblueskies]

"There might be!" Romeo has not looked at all the books in the library yet! That would take days and days! There are so many!

"We can go and have a look if you want!" It was always fun to explore the library and find new books!

[nopixiedust]

"Well, this is a book party." That's all the justification Wendy needs to get moving, at the very least. She doesn't even hesitate, skipping along and craning her head back to get a good look at the towering amount of shelves. She guesses it's a good thing that she's so acrobatic and good with heights...

"Do you have any idea of where things roughly are?" Wendy turns her head back to look at him. "Or are the books all scattered, like in that crummy library that Heaven has?"

[myblueskies]

"No it's all really really organised! Elfnein makes sure everything has a place where it lives!" Romeo doesn't know all the sections of the library yet, though he is working hard to learn them all!

"For fairy tales we got to go to the fiction bit!"

[nopixiedust]

"Eh, all of it??" Wendy whistles, impressed, as she lets him lead the way. It's not as if she has any idea of what section is what or where. "There have to be hundreds of books in here. I wouldn't think anyone could keep it all neatly organized." She sure wouldn't do it, if this was a place in Hibiki's temple.

"How much time does she have?"

[myblueskies]

"Well she doesn't sleep so she has lots and lots of time!"

And Romeo helps too! Though he does have to sleep, sometimes he helps and helps and then just falls asleep on a beanbag.

"It is really tricky but she has a whole list of where everything goes and it's got to go in the exact right place so we can find it again! Else it will get lost forever!"

[nopixiedust]

...She swears, someone needs to watch over the many kids that are dead or deified around here. Wendy is pretty sure that most of them absolutely shouldn't be allowed out on their own when they're all just a bunch of dumb kids.

Besides her, but, listen, that's not important.

"Hey, she remembers to actually rest now and then, right?" They can get to the book part in a little bit.

[myblueskies]

"I think so." Reading is resting right? She sits still when she is reading or researching, she can sit still for a very long time! Unlike Romeo who gets restless after not too long!

He is a bit worried though, maybe he needed to work harder at looking after Elfnein...

[nopixiedust]

"That's good." As long as she remembers to take a break and eat regularly, Wendy guesses that's the most she can ask for of anyone on this ridiculous patch of Heaven. Reaching up, she flicks a stray strand of hair away.

"The Far Shore really is full of workaholics, isn't it?" So many that she can hardly believe them. Shun is one of the worst, but it seems like he has plenty of company in this bad habit.

[myblueskies]

"Workaholics? Is that people who work really hard?" Because yes, heaven was full of really hard workers! Elfnein was one of them but so was Ebsiu and all his shinki and mister Hakkai and mister Waver and even miss Hibiki worked really hard on her movies!

So many hard workers!

[nopixiedust]

"Nope!" Holding out the sides of her dress, Wendy hurries her pace until she's trotting alongside him, huffing and frowning. "Workaholics are the type of people who are obsessed with work, even when there's no reason to be or it's bad for them! The kind of people who don't eat when they should, or don't have hobbies, or anything besides working!" That's something she doesn't have to worry about Hibiki, at least.

Her god is just dumb in other ways.

[myblueskies]

Oh! Dresses must be trickier to run around in! Romeo slows a tiny bit so she could catch up and listened to her as she explained. So a workaholic worked too much and didn't have time for fun or eating.

"Well I make sure Elfnein eats every day." Because she did sometimes forget! "And we do lots of fun things together!" So he doesn't think he has to worry too much.

[nopixiedust]

"Then you're doing good on that front. I'm glad Hibiki isn't like that, she just overindulges even when it's dumb..." Wendy sighs dramatically. Well, at least this time she's just messing around with the robo-goats. That's more manageable, even if she feels bad for the goats.

"If you know Shun, then he's the worst workaholic."

[myblueskies]

"I met mister Shun before! We helped a little boy who was lost at new years!"

A little while ago now but he still remembers him! "Is he? Does he not eat or sleep much either?"

[nopixiedust]

"Yeah, he's a good guy. He doesn't get along with most people, and he doesn't understand a lot of common sense, and he's so stubborn that he won't listen to you when you try to explain other points of view that aren't his..." In other words, Wendy could go on. But he does have a heart of gold, she knows that much.

He also is an idiot.

"But he once stayed up for days, and refuses to listen to people when they tell him that's a stupid thing to do."

[myblueskies]

"That is a really silly thing to do! How did he not just fall asleep standing up!"

It could be dangerous, especially since mister Shun seemed to like roofs and high places as much as Romeo did!

"Maybe we should have someone teach lessons on how to get on with other people..."

Romeo hadn't ever thought it would be needed, but there are a lot of people who are not good at friendship and team work! They need all the practice they can get!

[nopixiedust]

"I think he keeps from falling asleep on his feet out of sheer spite," Wendy deadpans, glancing casually over at the various books they're passing by. For anyone else, that would be an exaggeration, but she suspects sometimes it's basically what Shun is capable of. One day, of course, he's going to push past what his body can actually do, and then he'll be in trouble. That much she's sure of.

Still... "I mean, that would mean getting people to attend that kind of class in the first place." She twirls a piece of hair around one finger. "Which I guess would be possible during those training days? But it would still be tricky."

[myblueskies]

You can do that? Romeo has never been able to stay awake if he was really really tired.

"Yes maybe on a training day and then more people will come... I guess the people who really don't like friends might not though." In which case there isn't much point to the class...

It's tricky. An idea he needs to think further on.

[nopixiedust]

"You have to threaten or bribe those kinds of people." Wendy probably shouldn't say those kinds of words as easily as she does, but, well. She does regardless. Still, it's definitely a nuisance of an issue, and she can't help but turn it over in her head as she looks over the many books.

"For those sorts... You'd probably have to figure more out about them," she says at last. "If they won't come on their own free will, you have to figure out what exactly would make them come, and that's not the same for everyone."

[myblueskies]

"I don't think we should threaten them!" That would be bad! But bribe... Giving them things they wanted in exchange for them turning up. That might work.

"So we find out their favourite thing and make sure it is there for them to get when they come to the lesson... That might work!"

[nopixiedust]

"Yeah, it would backfire, considering how stubborn people can be, and then it wouldn't end well for anyone." Because that's clearly the problem. Still, she claps her hands together, smiling a bit.

"Food tends to work pretty easily! I mean, a bunch of people probably came to this party because you had free food. That will work especially well for now gods or the shinki they have, because they don't start off with a lot of money."

[myblueskies]

Romeo nodded, "Yes! We can make lots of tasty food so then they will come to the lesson and also have good memories for their first day!"

Romeo's first day in the heavens was definitely made better by eating Churros, after all and he had been very grateful to mister Tsuzuki for buying him then!

[nopixiedust]

"Good lessons, and good food." Wendy flicks them off her fingers in a count. "Well, you can't go wrong with that."

Still, they've gotten a little off track. Wendy pauses to look over some of the rows of books they've passed. "So are we there yet? This library feels as though it could go on forever."