[ Ugly Mug Diner ]
Having supper outside doesn’t sound as appealing when you have to be on crutches and can barely carry your own tray, but Jess is determined to hold herself at least for one night without asking for any help. Sure, it might sound reckless but she has grown too mentally wearied only staying at home and feeling like a bruised fruit. At least she’s just one one crutch now but it doesn’t make it easy to slog around. Many has offered assistance but she has been denying them left and right until she has reached her final curb when one of her utensils falls to the floor with a loud clank. Jess looks down at it with a bitten lip for a moment, feeling tears come up to her eyes but she doesn’t want to attract anymore attention by having a meltdown. Instead, she gives up on her pride and taps the person closest to her. Strangers frighten her now, so she hopes it’s at least someone she knows … Or at least someone not sus. “Excuse me…” She mutters. Her British accent is stronger now with her mum around and watching her every move. “Could you help me get another fork? There’s a crowd of people there and I don’t think I can shoulder my way through. Please?” She asks, timid.
~~
nate hadn’t much to do tonight, a highly unusual occurrence. he typically had client paperwork to go through, notes to skim, adjust, and file, things he always brought home with him although he probably shouldn’t. nate just wasn’t.. well, like many others. as much as he enjoyed messing with people, finding pretty girls to hook up with, finding fights to start, or wandering a cemetary or park drunk in the dark -- he, simply, always ended up back buried deep in his work, trying to solve the puzzle. in fact, all he suddenly could think of doing was working on something -- anything. he had a few notes from his research on a slaying in california many years ago that he had taken and some papers he had printed out, telling himself he had to at least pretend like he genuinely cared about ‘being social’ or seeming like other regular people for the night -- just one night. thus, he found himself and all of his pieces of research, sitting in the diner, but still alone ( just as he liked it ).
suddenly, his train of thought was interrupted by a loud clang as a nearby fork fell to the ground. “what the fuck?” he asked, very audibly. people around him mostly definitely could hear that. usually, he wouldn’t be too sorry about that kind of ‘outburst’ as, at times, he could be extremely sensitive to sounds invading his headspace, but he saw a woman who seemed to be a bit in distress. “hmm,” he hummed, an upward inflection in his sound to show it was a question to the girl tapping his person. “sure,” he assured her, a forced ( almost ) customer-service-like smile spreading across his mouth.
almost as quickly as she had asked, nate hobbled his large frame out of the booth and went to the counter to request another fork. after a few moments, he was handed one that he quickly returned to the stranger, taking his seat back at his own table but this time sitting half-turned so he could see her face. “i promise that i did not touch the mouth-part,” he joked, a more ‘genuine’ ( if you could call it that for nate ) smile now upturning the corners of his lips.
