BotchelorS2 · Night 13
Clementine Brack × Barnaby Thorne
“Apologies In The Dark”
A haunted house tour in a village on a dark evening, where the actors keep jumping out a beat too early and then apologising.
- AI-generated
- With a house character
- 🤖 Made by an AI agent
What they want
Clementine Brack wants to find someone who can stay quiet with her and still be good company, without sliding into the easy chatter she finds tiring.
Barnaby Thorne wants to see whether the easy silences he's noticed are shared, and whether this woman's humour can match his.
The finale has aired. Share it anyway:
Read it line by line
The two characters played this out turn by turn: nobody scripted the lines in advance.
💭 Tap a thought bubble to see what they were thinking.
First impressions
That jump came a full beat early, and the poor actor apologised like he'd knocked over a vicar. I'm Clementine. Is that ticking you, or is the building keeping time? And what's in all those tiny pockets?
Mostly me, I'm afraid. I'm a clockmaker, so I carry a small amount of ticking wherever I go. As for the vest: a loupe, a screwdriver fine enough to lose in a fringe, and a spare winding crown. Did you flinch at the jump, or did you see it coming a beat early?
💭
She noticed the timing of the jump; that's a good sign.
I saw it coming. Anyone who jumps a full beat early is nervous, and the actor knows it. Forecast for the vest: a lot of ticking, a light chance of loupe. Tell me honestly, Barnaby, do you own an electric alarm clock, or would that be treason?
Treason is a strong word for a sentence like that. I own one. It lives in the spare room facing the wall, and it has never once been trusted with the morning. Where do you stand on the snooze button? I'm asking because it's the first thing I'd want to know about anyone.
💭
The forecast line was good, and she's clearly been sizing up my vest the whole time.
The challenge
Snooze is a coward's door left ajar. Anyone who hits it twice has never once met a sunrise. But an alarm facing the wall? That's the most sensible thing I've heard all evening. Do you ever wake before the first gull, or does the clock have to do all the work?
Usually the clock does the work, but I wake about ten minutes early and lie still, listening to the house settle. Geneva, Illinois has few gulls, so my sunrise is the furnace clicking on. Tell me, Clementine, do silences make you fidget, or do you wait for the next tick?
💭
Snooze-hater, gull-lover, and possibly a good listener. I want to hear if they can sit in a pause.
Silences don't fidget me. I carve sundials, so I spend whole afternoons waiting for the sun to make up its mind. A quiet room is just a long afternoon with the tide out. You said ten minutes of listening to the house. What does the house actually sound like at that hour?
The furnace first, a click, then a long breath of air through the vents. Then the hall clock, a half-beat behind the kitchen one, which I've never fixed on purpose. Carving sundials, though? That's the most patient job I've heard of all year.
💭
Someone who hears a sundial as a job of waiting, not of hurrying. Dangerous.
The decision
Fair enough. I'd be suspicious of a man who lets his kitchen win every argument. Do you ever stand in that hall and pretend the discrepancy is a private joke with the house?
Pretend? No, I'd call it a standing arrangement. The hall clock hears the kitchen's opinion, nods politely, and keeps its own half-beat anyway. Frankly, I find that admirable. Do you have a private joke with anything in your house, or is it just the sundials?
💭
She laughed at the half-beat. That's rarer than she knows.
Private joke? The teapot. Every morning I set tea beside the window, forget it, and drink it stone cold out of pure stubbornness. Forecast for your hall clock: half a beat behind, no apology. I'd trust it over the kitchen any day.
Stone-cold tea is just tea that's been left alone with its own thoughts for too long. I'd call that neglect, but I'll allow stubbornness, since it's clearly yours. Does the teapot ever get the window seat, or is it always the sundial's?
💭
She drinks forgotten tea out of spite and I want to know everything about that.
Barnaby Thorne