Jenny Everywhere: Second Date
Jul. 29th, 2021 12:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
scott_sanfordJenny Everywhere in
Second Date
By Scott Sanford; some rights reserved
A young couple walked down a city street, somewhere.
“Where are we going?”, the man asked.
“You’ll see,” his companion said. “Last night we went to places you know and I think it’s time we went someplace I know. Besides…”
She stopped walking and looked up at him, suddenly more serious. “You seem like a nice guy, but I don’t know if you’re ready for everything you’d have to deal with if you hung out with me. If you can’t deal with my lifestyle, I want to know now.”
“Lifestyle?”
“Come on, you’ll see!” She started walking once more, tugging on his arm, smiling mischievously.
“Okay, I know you’re not gay --”
“Not usually.”
“-- you’re probably not a Republican, what am I supposed to be expecting? Anarchists? Radical Vegans? Drama majors?”
“Maybe all of those. This is the place. We’re here.”
He looked at the restaurant she’d brought them to.
“I don’t remember this place. I thought I knew this neighborhood --”
“It helps to know how to find it. For now, we‘re here.” They went inside. She called a greeting and was answered, “Hi, Jenny! Go on back to the garden room, I’ll be with you in a minute!”
“You’re a regular here, all right,” he said.
“I come here a lot. And a lot of me come here.”
“Eh?“ As they passed the kitchen he caught a glimpse of the speaker, a dark haired woman busy at the stove, wearing a light scarf despite the warmth. In the back there was another dining area, full of people, some of them rather exotic.
“So what do you want to eat?” She sat at a booth overlooking the enclosed garden.
“I don’t know; what’s on the menu?”
“Oh, I forgot, sorry. There’s no printed menu. It would be a waste; not everyone who comes here speaks the same languages. Just figure out what you want, okay?”
“Fish and chips, maybe?”
“Sure, that sounds good.”
No menus? It had looked like an ordinary enough restaurant from the outside, although he couldn’t remember what the sign had said. Didn’t all restaurants have menus of some kind? He looked down at the table and noticed that the placemat in front of him had a short passage printed on it:
The character of Jenny Everywhere is available for use by anyone, with only one condition. This paragraph must be included in any publication involving Jenny Everywhere, in order that others may use this property as they wish. All rights reversed.
“Hey, this has your name on it. What’s this about your character?”
“Oh, that? It shows up all over the place. You’d be amazed at some of the places we see that paragraph.”
“It’s on a placemat, with your name. Does your family run the restaurant here?”
“Sort of, yeah. It’s complicated.”
He looked around at the other patrons and nodded, appreciating the number of dark hared women with scarves, goggles, or both in the room. Not everybody; the bushy-haired guy playing with a yoyo was too obviously European to be a relative, despite his long scarf, nor was the deathly pale man with the electric-socket hairdo morosely pondering a ruby the size of a baseball -- but there were women he’d have taken for Jenny’s sister or even twin.
“Complicated, huh?”
He looked over Jenny’s shoulder. A young woman in classic motorcycle gear complete with leather helmet was eating a rice dish with chopsticks. Her long white scarf had something printed on it in Japanese. She could have been Jenny’s sister.
He looked over a the table beside them. A woman in buckskins was eating something he couldn’t identify, mostly meat. She had a fringed shawl over her shoulders and a lever-action rifle beside her, all of it straight out of the 19th Century. She looked like the biker.
Out in the garden a black-clad figure crouched up in a tree, motionless; she was hard to spot except when light gleamed from her night vision goggles. She wore a straight sword and a blood red scarf. Her hood wasn’t important; nobody here would need to see her face.
“You have a big family, don’t you, Jenny?”
“Bigger than you can imagine. Bigger than anyone can imagine.” She got a faraway look briefly but went on, “Some of us, an infinitesimal fraction, come here, or places like it. To meet, to talk - and to eat, of course. See? Our food’s here!”
In his surprise he hardly noticed the waitress who laid down plates in front of them. Jenny’s held a burger; his had fish and chips.
“But…we didn’t order. You may be a regular here, but how’d they know what I wanted?”
“You told me,” she said, as if that explained it. She took his hand across the table. “There’s only one thing you need to know about me. The rest are details.
“I’m Jenny Everywhere.
“In every world, across all creation, there are some universal constants that appear everywhere, like the basic physical forces and the rules of mathematics. And me. I am Jenny Everywhere, The Shifter. I exist in every world and I can shift between them.”
“Every…world?” It was obvious he hadn’t expected a quiet statement of omnipresence.
“Every last one.” She gestured around the room and added, “Sometimes some of us get together. The more, um, abstract versions don’t mingle much, but those of us who are basically human like company.”
“And this explains my fish and chips how?”
“What one of us know, another can know. It’s a knack.” She took a slice of toast that had come with the fish off of his plate and continued, “Not all of us do it, but some have gotten really good at it.”
He gawked.
Jenny glanced down and said, “What? I like toast.”
“I think I’ve burned out my boggling circuits, Jenny.”
“So eat your dinner. Take your time thinking about it.”
He ate, surrounded by Jennies.
Once the idea had been introduced it was impossible not to see them as variations on the same person. Every one was different, often spectacularly so -- but at the same time there was a fundamental shared identity.
It was…weird. Not bad, but definitely weird.
“Excuse me,” said a soft voice behind him. “May I borrow your salt?”
“Sure.” He turned and found himself looking at a furry creature, the size of a human child with the head of a giant rodent, although a rodent in a prim Victorian dress.
Even tonight he might have reacted badly, but the creature was too unthreatening, so calmingly polite when speaking in its cultured British accent. And it was wearing a long knit scarf.
“Uh, you’re…”
“Jhenni. Hello,” the pointy-faced creature said, returning his gaze through small round granny glasses. It seemed friendly. For all he knew, it was smiling.
“Really. Nice to meet you.” He said inanely, “I’m here with a girl named Jenny.”
“Yes, dear, of course you are. I see you’re new. I hope you’ll do well.”
He nodded. The furry Jhenni waited a moment and then asked, “The salt?”
“Oh, right.” He gave her the shaker and turned back to his own Jenny. She was watching them, smiling quietly.
“Was that a test?”, he asked after a minute or two.
“Maybe. I guess it was, a little. But she really did want some salt.”
“And she’s another Jenny?”
“Jhenni? Yeah. All of us like her; she’s a dear. You shouldn’t feel bad about being surprised; she’s pretty far from home.”
“You’re right, Jenny; your life is complicated. But I think I like it.”
Jenny beamed happily.
They ate in silence a while. The food was actually pretty good. Maybe that should be expected; who could say how many universes could be sampled for the best markets?
“This is a pretty cool place, Jenny,” he said, finishing the last of his fish. “I have to ask, though: was this easing me into it or dumping me in the deep end?”
“A little of both, I guess. If you’d freaked out at the idea of shifting between dimensions or when you met Jhenni there wouldn’t have been much point in taking you anywhere else. On the other hand, this is just a restaurant; you may see some strange people you didn’t expect, but it’s quiet and controlled and safe.”
“Incoming!” A grey-haired Jenny with a blindfold over her eyes was pointing their way, suddenly making them the center of attention. “Jenny by the window, incoming from the garden!”
Jenny spared only a glace at the window, quickly snatching her hamburger off the table an instant before the window shattered inwards and a huge green form landed on their table, overturning it and spilling everything onto the floor.
A bulky reptilian form rose up unstoppably from the wreckage, food and silverware cascading off its scaly hide, and roared defiantly as it shook the litter off of its clothes.
“You bitch! I can’t believe you did that!” It looked like a miniature Godzilla but its voice was perfectly human.
An answer came back from outside, something in Japanese. It sounded rude.
“Oh! That’s it! I’m tearing you a new cloaca!” The dinosaur surged forward, leaping back out of the window with its scarf trailing behind it. Noise of a fight quickly followed.
“Controlled and safe, you say?”
“Well, usually. More or less.” Jenny reached down to the overturned table and righted it, burger still in her hand.
“And does this happen a lot?”
“No some nights are chaotic!” She laughed and added, “Seriously, sometimes.”
“And this--” He broke off and did a double take at the window. “Okay, I know this was broken a second ago.”
“Right, a second ago it was. In some worlds it's broken, in others it isn't. Right now, here, it’s intact. The restaurant has ways of taking care of itself; don’t worry about it.”
“If you say so. What about the fact that there’s a ninja fighting a talking dinosaur out there? Should I worry about that?”
“Nah, those two are always up to something.” Jenny grinned at him, stuffed the last bit of hamburger into her mouth, and asked, “So what do you think of ‘The Life of Jenny Everywhere‘?”
“Are you kidding? This is incredible! I love it!”
Jenny returned his smile, stood up and took his arm.
“I was hoping you’d say that. Come on. Wait until you see the next place I’m taking you. You haven’t seen anything yet!”
Second Date
By Scott Sanford; some rights reserved
A young couple walked down a city street, somewhere.
“Where are we going?”, the man asked.
“You’ll see,” his companion said. “Last night we went to places you know and I think it’s time we went someplace I know. Besides…”
She stopped walking and looked up at him, suddenly more serious. “You seem like a nice guy, but I don’t know if you’re ready for everything you’d have to deal with if you hung out with me. If you can’t deal with my lifestyle, I want to know now.”
“Lifestyle?”
“Come on, you’ll see!” She started walking once more, tugging on his arm, smiling mischievously.
“Okay, I know you’re not gay --”
“Not usually.”
“-- you’re probably not a Republican, what am I supposed to be expecting? Anarchists? Radical Vegans? Drama majors?”
“Maybe all of those. This is the place. We’re here.”
He looked at the restaurant she’d brought them to.
“I don’t remember this place. I thought I knew this neighborhood --”
“It helps to know how to find it. For now, we‘re here.” They went inside. She called a greeting and was answered, “Hi, Jenny! Go on back to the garden room, I’ll be with you in a minute!”
“You’re a regular here, all right,” he said.
“I come here a lot. And a lot of me come here.”
“Eh?“ As they passed the kitchen he caught a glimpse of the speaker, a dark haired woman busy at the stove, wearing a light scarf despite the warmth. In the back there was another dining area, full of people, some of them rather exotic.
“So what do you want to eat?” She sat at a booth overlooking the enclosed garden.
“I don’t know; what’s on the menu?”
“Oh, I forgot, sorry. There’s no printed menu. It would be a waste; not everyone who comes here speaks the same languages. Just figure out what you want, okay?”
“Fish and chips, maybe?”
“Sure, that sounds good.”
No menus? It had looked like an ordinary enough restaurant from the outside, although he couldn’t remember what the sign had said. Didn’t all restaurants have menus of some kind? He looked down at the table and noticed that the placemat in front of him had a short passage printed on it:
The character of Jenny Everywhere is available for use by anyone, with only one condition. This paragraph must be included in any publication involving Jenny Everywhere, in order that others may use this property as they wish. All rights reversed.
“Hey, this has your name on it. What’s this about your character?”
“Oh, that? It shows up all over the place. You’d be amazed at some of the places we see that paragraph.”
“It’s on a placemat, with your name. Does your family run the restaurant here?”
“Sort of, yeah. It’s complicated.”
He looked around at the other patrons and nodded, appreciating the number of dark hared women with scarves, goggles, or both in the room. Not everybody; the bushy-haired guy playing with a yoyo was too obviously European to be a relative, despite his long scarf, nor was the deathly pale man with the electric-socket hairdo morosely pondering a ruby the size of a baseball -- but there were women he’d have taken for Jenny’s sister or even twin.
“Complicated, huh?”
He looked over Jenny’s shoulder. A young woman in classic motorcycle gear complete with leather helmet was eating a rice dish with chopsticks. Her long white scarf had something printed on it in Japanese. She could have been Jenny’s sister.
He looked over a the table beside them. A woman in buckskins was eating something he couldn’t identify, mostly meat. She had a fringed shawl over her shoulders and a lever-action rifle beside her, all of it straight out of the 19th Century. She looked like the biker.
Out in the garden a black-clad figure crouched up in a tree, motionless; she was hard to spot except when light gleamed from her night vision goggles. She wore a straight sword and a blood red scarf. Her hood wasn’t important; nobody here would need to see her face.
“You have a big family, don’t you, Jenny?”
“Bigger than you can imagine. Bigger than anyone can imagine.” She got a faraway look briefly but went on, “Some of us, an infinitesimal fraction, come here, or places like it. To meet, to talk - and to eat, of course. See? Our food’s here!”
In his surprise he hardly noticed the waitress who laid down plates in front of them. Jenny’s held a burger; his had fish and chips.
“But…we didn’t order. You may be a regular here, but how’d they know what I wanted?”
“You told me,” she said, as if that explained it. She took his hand across the table. “There’s only one thing you need to know about me. The rest are details.
“I’m Jenny Everywhere.
“In every world, across all creation, there are some universal constants that appear everywhere, like the basic physical forces and the rules of mathematics. And me. I am Jenny Everywhere, The Shifter. I exist in every world and I can shift between them.”
“Every…world?” It was obvious he hadn’t expected a quiet statement of omnipresence.
“Every last one.” She gestured around the room and added, “Sometimes some of us get together. The more, um, abstract versions don’t mingle much, but those of us who are basically human like company.”
“And this explains my fish and chips how?”
“What one of us know, another can know. It’s a knack.” She took a slice of toast that had come with the fish off of his plate and continued, “Not all of us do it, but some have gotten really good at it.”
He gawked.
Jenny glanced down and said, “What? I like toast.”
“I think I’ve burned out my boggling circuits, Jenny.”
“So eat your dinner. Take your time thinking about it.”
He ate, surrounded by Jennies.
Once the idea had been introduced it was impossible not to see them as variations on the same person. Every one was different, often spectacularly so -- but at the same time there was a fundamental shared identity.
It was…weird. Not bad, but definitely weird.
“Excuse me,” said a soft voice behind him. “May I borrow your salt?”
“Sure.” He turned and found himself looking at a furry creature, the size of a human child with the head of a giant rodent, although a rodent in a prim Victorian dress.
Even tonight he might have reacted badly, but the creature was too unthreatening, so calmingly polite when speaking in its cultured British accent. And it was wearing a long knit scarf.
“Uh, you’re…”
“Jhenni. Hello,” the pointy-faced creature said, returning his gaze through small round granny glasses. It seemed friendly. For all he knew, it was smiling.
“Really. Nice to meet you.” He said inanely, “I’m here with a girl named Jenny.”
“Yes, dear, of course you are. I see you’re new. I hope you’ll do well.”
He nodded. The furry Jhenni waited a moment and then asked, “The salt?”
“Oh, right.” He gave her the shaker and turned back to his own Jenny. She was watching them, smiling quietly.
“Was that a test?”, he asked after a minute or two.
“Maybe. I guess it was, a little. But she really did want some salt.”
“And she’s another Jenny?”
“Jhenni? Yeah. All of us like her; she’s a dear. You shouldn’t feel bad about being surprised; she’s pretty far from home.”
“You’re right, Jenny; your life is complicated. But I think I like it.”
Jenny beamed happily.
They ate in silence a while. The food was actually pretty good. Maybe that should be expected; who could say how many universes could be sampled for the best markets?
“This is a pretty cool place, Jenny,” he said, finishing the last of his fish. “I have to ask, though: was this easing me into it or dumping me in the deep end?”
“A little of both, I guess. If you’d freaked out at the idea of shifting between dimensions or when you met Jhenni there wouldn’t have been much point in taking you anywhere else. On the other hand, this is just a restaurant; you may see some strange people you didn’t expect, but it’s quiet and controlled and safe.”
“Incoming!” A grey-haired Jenny with a blindfold over her eyes was pointing their way, suddenly making them the center of attention. “Jenny by the window, incoming from the garden!”
Jenny spared only a glace at the window, quickly snatching her hamburger off the table an instant before the window shattered inwards and a huge green form landed on their table, overturning it and spilling everything onto the floor.
A bulky reptilian form rose up unstoppably from the wreckage, food and silverware cascading off its scaly hide, and roared defiantly as it shook the litter off of its clothes.
“You bitch! I can’t believe you did that!” It looked like a miniature Godzilla but its voice was perfectly human.
An answer came back from outside, something in Japanese. It sounded rude.
“Oh! That’s it! I’m tearing you a new cloaca!” The dinosaur surged forward, leaping back out of the window with its scarf trailing behind it. Noise of a fight quickly followed.
“Controlled and safe, you say?”
“Well, usually. More or less.” Jenny reached down to the overturned table and righted it, burger still in her hand.
“And does this happen a lot?”
“No some nights are chaotic!” She laughed and added, “Seriously, sometimes.”
“And this--” He broke off and did a double take at the window. “Okay, I know this was broken a second ago.”
“Right, a second ago it was. In some worlds it's broken, in others it isn't. Right now, here, it’s intact. The restaurant has ways of taking care of itself; don’t worry about it.”
“If you say so. What about the fact that there’s a ninja fighting a talking dinosaur out there? Should I worry about that?”
“Nah, those two are always up to something.” Jenny grinned at him, stuffed the last bit of hamburger into her mouth, and asked, “So what do you think of ‘The Life of Jenny Everywhere‘?”
“Are you kidding? This is incredible! I love it!”
Jenny returned his smile, stood up and took his arm.
“I was hoping you’d say that. Come on. Wait until you see the next place I’m taking you. You haven’t seen anything yet!”
