ceasetoexist: (Try to stay sober)
Pokey Minch ([personal profile] ceasetoexist) wrote2011-11-05 04:03 am
Entry tags:

55 - Let's have a Wreck, Let's have a Train Wreck - Action, Forward Dated to Monday

[Pokey wasn't exactly the best he could be emotionally. In fact, he never was, but the last week hadn't helped matters at all. Having some of the worst parts of himself thrown at him by the doppelgangers of people he knew and had come to care about, to shrinking for a day (which was probably the easiest of the things he went through), to thinking the few friends he had left might be dead had put an additional strain on him he couldn't really deal with. Since then, he had tried to be as scarce as possible, only occasionally leaving the house or bothering to respond to anything on the phone.

On Friday, he didn't leave the house at all.

On Saturday and Sunday, he won't even leave his room. In fact, it'd be hard to tell unless you checked to see if he was in the room at all, considering he seemed absurdly quiet in comparison to how he usually was.

He won't bother to appear again in town until Monday, when, oddly enough, he'll show up not just for school, but early for class.]


[Action - Mayfield High]

[Seeing Pokey bother to attend school isn't particularly odd. He plays hooky often, but he'd still show up. Usually to be obnoxious to the teachers or other students, or to pointlessly end up just falling asleep in classes.

Today? He's unusually polite. The teachers will find he's incredibly attentive, answers questions correctly and without screwing around, and sits quietly, doing absolutely nothing disruptive. For the moment? He could be an ideal student.

At lunch, he sits by himself. Which isn't out of the ordinary either. He'd usually try and sit by himself. But this time? He's tucked himself away in one of the further corners of the lunchroom, like he's trying to hide.]


[Action - Library]

[There's a boy going through each one of the books he can find. He takes one down, reads it for a little bit, and then puts it back. He does this repeatedly, methodically, almost instictively.

Sometimes, he seems to shift his glances to a certain area of the library: a specific table, or spot on the floor. And just stares for a minute or two, not noticing anything else going on around him. After a moment of this weird staring, he returns to the book he has in hand.]


[Action - Park]

[Pokey paces around the park. There's no real pattern to his exact movements, but he does seem to gravitate towards certain spots that he walks over to again and again and again. He mumbles to himself sometimes, low and usually inaudible. Sometimes it sounds like he's just grumbling. Other times, it sounds like he's imitating something someone has said to him. And others? It just sounds like he's talking to himself, saying things, mulling over things, that don't really make sense to anyone but him.

Sometimes he picks up a branch from the ground and swishes it around aimlessly, not particularly caring if he hits someone or not.

He isn't here right now.]


[Action - 502 Ricardo]

[Pokey can be found sitting at the table, studying. Not goofing off. Not having put something else in his actual textbook and reading that instead. Genuine studying and doing the homework he's been assigned, not making a single noise or distraction. Just being a good little student.

The trashcan in the kitchen seems to have been filled up, mainly with notebook paper and graph paper, detailing designs of odd little devices Pokey had thought up on his spare time. Detailing notes and ideas he had had about the town.

There was no point in keeping them. He didn't really need them any more.]

Library

[identity profile] have-your-lives.livejournal.com 2011-11-09 01:45 am (UTC)(link)
[This is one of the few times in his life where Schuldig is actively trying not to read someone else's thoughts...or at least one of the few times since he'd been much younger, and had still had delusions of being able to have some kind of normality in his life if he could shut out the thoughts that weren't his own. But he's desperately trying to keep Pokey's out right now, trying to ignore them - which is the best he can do, since he's incapable of not hearing them.

It isn't empathy that makes the boy's thoughts painful. It's their uncomfortable familiarity. Schuldig's been holding off a breakdown for weeks now - there's an almost superstitious fear that Pokey's own might trigger his. Of course, avoiding the boy's thoughts as though they were plague-bearing puts him at more of a conversational disadvantage than usual.]
I wonder if we're even talking about the same thing.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-09 06:11 am (UTC)(link)
...Does it really matter.

So can I help you with something?

[identity profile] have-your-lives.livejournal.com 2011-11-11 02:20 am (UTC)(link)
Yes, it matters. I have something very specific in mind.

[At the inquiry, Schuldig arches an eyebrow.] Would you actually help me if I said yes?

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-11 02:50 am (UTC)(link)
Good for you.

...It depends on what you're going to ask help with.

[identity profile] brotherseyes.livejournal.com 2011-11-12 02:14 am (UTC)(link)
Are you sure? You don't have to tell me if you don't want to, but you don't really seem fine.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-12 05:42 pm (UTC)(link)
....I'm as fine as anyone can be here.

[identity profile] brotherseyes.livejournal.com 2011-11-14 09:13 am (UTC)(link)
Not so great then.

[identity profile] have-your-lives.livejournal.com 2011-11-17 10:02 am (UTC)(link)
I wasn't going to ask for any help at all. I'm just wondering if you'd really offer any if I did...or if that's just your way of saying "go away unless you've got any business here, and you obviously don't".

[He's still studying Pokey, still with that unreadable expression and those too-sharp blue eyes.] I was actually trying to help you.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-17 07:35 pm (UTC)(link)
It's the latter, in your case man. I have no reason to offer help to you.

[But if it had been someone else? By this point....no. Still not a complete stranger. But anyone he knew, he would probably help.]

Yeah? And how were you doing that?

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-20 12:17 am (UTC)(link)
[She nods.]

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-20 04:36 am (UTC)(link)
[He keeps looking for a moment more before speaking again.]

I haven't seen Slugger lately.

How's he doing?

[identity profile] have-your-lives.livejournal.com 2011-11-25 08:01 pm (UTC)(link)
You've got no reason to deny it to me, either. [Schuldig cocks an eyebrow at Pokey; the fact is that while the boy's wariness toward him is more than justified, at least as far as the sort of things Schuldig is capable of doing and willing to do, he has nonetheless never actually done a single thing to Pokey aside from creep him out. And, technically, he's a fellow member of the Legion...not that Edward has necessarily informed everyone in the Legion of this fact yet.

At the question, however, Schuldig looks irritable. The simple fact is that he's not good at this, acutely aware of it, and not pleased at having this deficiency pointed out. That he's making the attempt at all should count for a hell of a lot, in his mind.]
Thanklessly. But if you're going to be difficult, you don't get to complain about how effective I am at it.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-26 01:13 am (UTC)(link)
[Pokey slaps the book he was reading down, glowering back at Schuldig.]

Look. The only thing I know about you is that Eddie had a fight with you and was dumb enough to compromise all the rest of our security. I'm not sure why you'd think I'd trust you when that's the only thing I know.

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 05:56 pm (UTC)(link)
Fine.

You should talk to him.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 06:02 pm (UTC)(link)
...Maybe.

I don't want to waste his time.

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 09:06 pm (UTC)(link)
I don't think you would be.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 09:38 pm (UTC)(link)
[Pokey shrugs weakly, still looking at the book.]

He'd be better off without me.

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 10:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Why do you think that?

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 10:41 pm (UTC)(link)
...I'm just worthless. And things get wrecked wherever I go.

I'd rather he didn't.

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 11:04 pm (UTC)(link)
Isn't that up to him?

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 11:16 pm (UTC)(link)
....I guess.

Haven't seen him for a while though. So maybe he's chosen. I dunno.

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-27 11:25 pm (UTC)(link)
I don't think so.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-28 12:49 am (UTC)(link)
Why's that?

[identity profile] miss-enma-ai.livejournal.com 2011-11-30 12:48 am (UTC)(link)
Because you're important to him.

[identity profile] godisachild.livejournal.com 2011-11-30 05:05 am (UTC)(link)
Well maybe it's better if I wasn't.

[Just stubbornness. Stupid, unwilling stubbornness.]

...He deserves better.

Page 6 of 7