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@oflos3rs
⸻ 𝙾𝙵𝙻𝙾𝚂𝟹𝚁𝚂 , 𝑨 𝑺𝑻𝑼𝑫𝒀 𝑰𝑵 ...
𝗯𝗿𝗼𝗼𝗸𝘀 𝗸𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗿, 𝗍𝗐𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗒𝟩, 𝘤𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘩𝘰𝘤𝘬𝘦𝘺 𝘵𝘦𝘢𝘮.
𝗰𝗮𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗵𝗮𝗺, 𝗍𝗐𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗒𝟦, 𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 / 𝘥𝘦𝘣𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘦𝘢𝘮.
𝗴𝗮𝗯𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗹 𝗮𝗱𝘀𝗲𝘁𝘁𝘀, 𝗍𝗐𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗒𝟩, 𝘤𝘢𝘮𝘱𝘶𝘴 𝘳𝘢𝘥𝘪𝘰 / 𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘤 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘥𝘶𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯.
𝗷𝗼𝗲𝘆 𝗯𝗹𝗮𝗰𝗸𝘀𝗸𝘆, 𝗍𝗐𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗒2, 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘵 𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘢 𝘧𝘪𝘭𝘮 𝘴𝘰𝘤𝘪𝘦𝘵𝘺.
𝗺𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝘂𝗰𝗸𝗲𝗿, 𝗍𝗐𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗒𝟦, 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘯𝘦𝘳𝘣𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘰𝘵𝘣𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘦𝘢𝘮.
𝚁𝙸𝙻𝙴𝚈, 𝚃𝙷𝙸𝚁𝚃𝚈, 𝚂𝙷𝙴/𝙷𝙴𝚁, @𝙲𝙰𝙼𝙿𝚄𝚂𝙻𝙾𝚂𝙴𝚁.
pull your boxers down we need to talk
jacob whiteduck-lavoie by luca kingston
Noemi stared at him. Not with the vacant, absent look people often mistook for indifference or lack of enthusiasm, but with complete, unbearable attention. Their nostrils flared. Their eyes were beginning to burn. Throat closing in on itself. The same unmistakable feeling of you've been caught. Her eyes searched his face as if she were trying to find the exact moment when his jokes turned into something real, a gut punch. It was somewhere around the time his mouth had decided to shape itself around if I'll ever get a thanks.
Around them, Brooks' party carried on with an embarrassing amount of normalcy. Someone shouted from the kitchen. A burst of laughter erupted from down the hallway. The bass from the speakers bled through the walls, vibrating ever so slightly beneath her boots. It made their conversation feel impossibly small against everything else happening in the house. Yet it was the only thing she could focus on.
Her fingers tightened around the plastic cup until it started to crack. For a second, they thought they might laugh, humor him even. Because Joey had always done this. Had always thrown something cruel into the air, in just the right amount of irony that everyone, including himself, could pretend it wasn't actually horrible. If you got hurt, suddenly you were the one who couldn't take a joke. It was a magic trick he had perfected years ago. The same magic trick that, apparently, made him think he had saved her. Made him think he had thrown her some kind of life preserver.
There was a time when she had believed that, and there was truth to it. He was the one who told her to get out before it got too bad, but Noemi could still have been in it. Could have begged to stay. For him to just love her for one more day. To give her one more pill. One more high. She left. He may have opened the door, but Noemi was the one who went through it. It didn't matter that sometimes, on nights like these, or nights where their stress was high, the craving was there. A cigarette. A joint. A pill. It didn't matter that a third person was between them, preventing that. They curbed it without his help, other than some choice words.
Noemi set the cup down on the nearest side table. They didn't trust themselves to keep holding it. "You know what?" A pause. Joey's grin lingered for another heartbeat. Enough to piss her off. "Fuck you." There was no dramatic wind-up. No theatrical warning. Her body moved before the analytical side of her brain could, her fist balling to her side that then collided with the side of his jaw. It was a little clumsy, fueled more by years of compressed feeling than any actual fighting ability she may have had. Which was, certainly, bordering on nonexistent.
The impact hurt, pain blooming in her knuckles. They flexed their hand, stung by how much it throbbed and hurt. "My knight in shining armor." Noemi deadpanned. Their eyes drifted away from him for the first time, landing somewhere over his shoulder. For a moment, she was barely twenty, sitting in the passenger seat outside a gas station, the dashboard glowing from the post lights. Passing things between them. Remembering, convincing herself that because they were doing it together, that made it less lonely. Big surprise that it hadn't.
"I genuinely hope college works out for you." There it was. A little earnest. Noemi was already using that as her out to walk away, shaking her aching hand to relieve some of the pressure. They wanted to be docile, discreet, any word that wouldn't end in eyes on her. Still, she turned back on her heel to look at him one more time, feet away from him. "Maybe they'll teach you how to not push people away!" Noemi shouted in his vicinity before making her exit towards the front door. She needed air. Needed to be away from the party. Away from him.
𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐋𝐄𝐗𝐈, 𝐍𝐎𝐓 𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐑𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐘.
for one impossible, disorienting fraction of a second, joey didn't understand what had happened. there was the sound of the party. bass trembling through the walls. voices layered over voices. somebody laughing too loudly somewhere behind him. glass clinking. music pounding. and then ⸻ impact. his head snapped to the side. a bright, vicious bloom of pain erupted along his jaw, hot and immediate, the kind that seemed to arrive before the brain had even finished registering the fact that there had been a fist attached to it. his teeth clicked together. his neck jerked with the force of it. something inside his ear gave a dull, high-pitched whine. joey just stood there. stunned. his eyes blinked once. twice. his body remained several seconds ahead of his mind, adrenaline already flooding his bloodstream with the obscene efficiency of a chemical fire. his heart kicked against his sternum so hard it felt like it was trying to escape. once. twice. again. what the fuck.
his head slowly turned back. noemi. walking away. his brain seemed to lag behind the image. they hit me. another heartbeat. they fucking hit me. and then reality slammed back into place all at once. heat detonated beneath his skin. it started somewhere deep in his chest, an incandescent, choking pressure that expanded outward until it seemed to occupy every available inch of him. his throat tightened. his hands curled into fists so quickly his nails bit crescents into his palms. his shoulders went rigid. every muscle in his body seemed to contract simultaneously, wired with nowhere to put the electricity surging through him. his jaw throbbed. his pulse was everywhere. neck. wrists. temples. behind his eyes. the music became a distant, meaningless vibration beneath the monstrous percussion of his own heartbeat. they fucking hit me. his breath came sharp through his nose. then another. too fast. too shallow. his chest rose and fell beneath his shirt in quick, furious movements.
and she was leaving. after all of that. after taking everything he'd spent years convincing himself had meant something and throwing it back in his face. after hitting him. and now she was walking away like he was something she'd simply decided to put down. something inside joey snapped. the words ripped out of him before thought could intercept them. loud. vicious. raw. "you fucking pill-popping, bitch!" they tore through his throat with enough force that his voice cracked around the edges, carrying several feet into the surrounding crowd. a few heads turned. a couple people nearby went still. others glanced over with the vague curiosity of partygoers who had caught the movement of a fight but not the dialogue that preceded it. the music swallowed the rest. joey barely noticed. his eyes were locked on her retreating figure. his breathing grew harsher. one breath. another. each one dragged through his lungs like his chest had become too small to contain him.
his vision seemed strangely sharpened at the edges, every detail suddenly grotesquely vivid. everything was happening impossibly fast. and impossibly slowly. he could see them moving. could count the seconds between each step. could feel the blood pounding through his skull. could feel the aching line of his jaw. could feel the heat crawling up his neck and into his face. she thinks she won. his fingers flexed. she thinks she's better than me. his stomach twisted. she did it. that one hurt differently. not like the punch. worse. because buried underneath all the rage was that same ancient, festering wound he'd spent years refusing to touch. she had saved herself. and he'd told himself that meant he'd done something good. that meant he'd saved them. that meant, somehow, there was still something decent inside him. but the realization was unbearable. his eyes flashed toward the doorway, rage burning so brightly across his face that anyone looking closely might've seen the almost childlike devastation underneath it.
but there was no one close enough to matter. and joey suddenly realized he was standing in the middle of a party, breathing like he'd just run a mile, with half a dozen people probably wondering whether they were about to witness something worse. his heart slammed against his ribs. get the fuck out. he swallowed. his throat felt scraped raw. get out. another breath. short. ragged. before you do something worse. his gaze dropped to his hands. they were shaking. barely. just enough. joey clenched them into fists to hide it. then he looked toward the front door one last time. she was gone. of course she was. his jaw pulsed with pain. his chest heaved. and somewhere beneath the white-hot rage, beneath the humiliation and the resentment and the ugly, poisonous little voice insisting that she had abandoned him all over again, something much quieter whispered the thing he absolutely could not afford to hear. this is what you do, joseph. this is the only thing you're good at. joey turned abruptly. and left. END.
“i want to,” she nodded, her lips curving up into a smile. words seemed to be more beyond her than ever. she was so stunned at how intelligent he was, and how she wanted to step inside his brain and examine all of the thoughts like it was one huge book she could dive into.she did want to learn. she wanted to soak in anything that mason had to tell her. because for some reason, the self-proclaimed king of not talking had entrusted her with a piece of himself, and she understood the weight of that. her own vulnerability sometimes stopped her from truly being able to let someone in, but she wanted to. and perhaps it was because emery was so naive, perhaps she was so trusting of the world and the people within it, that she was determined to give him something that proved she was in this, too. whatever this was. a random, happenstance encounter, orchestrated by someone else, that had led her to some exploration of her own confidence and her own power as a person. “yeah,” she agreed, nodding. “it's pretty ridiculous.” ridiculous that out of all of the people at the party that night, they'd been paired up. ridiculous that emery had decided to change who she fundamentally was as a person for a night and it turns out, taking a risk wasn't scary. ridiclous that for whatever reason, mason still thought she was someone worthwhile to spend time with. for now. maybe as he learned more about her, he'd change his mind. she wouldn't blame him for that, but for tonight, he thought she might have liked to see the observatory. and she did. emery swallowed. she knew what she wanted, and frankly the closet had just been the beginning for her. but what she wanted and what could feasibly happen were two different things, and emery knew that. she knew her own soul well enough to think that this was something like a fever dream, and she was waiting to wake up. ridiculous. but he kept looking at her, and she didn't know what to do with that. like she was someone worth looking at, when emery had spent her entire life trying to fade into nothingness. make herself smaller so that she couldn't be seen, or heard. in her head, she resolved to show him her latest journal, the next time they met-- if there was a next time. maybe she'd even play something for him. but for that one, perfect moment, something out of the movies and books that emery had read and dreamed about, she took the step forward. she closed the gap. she wrapped her arms around mason's absurdly tall and chiseled torso. she stood on her toes, and hoped he'd meet her halfway, because he was, in fact, taller than her. “thank you,” she murmured, her lips barely brushing his. “this is perfect.”
for once, mason didn't have an immediate thought. her arms had gone around him, warm and tentative, and her words had barely left her lips before something in him went very still. this is perfect. her mouth was right there. close enough that he could feel the warmth of her breath, close enough that the smallest movement would erase the distance between them. he could think about it. he probably should. mason thought about everything. every variable. every possible outcome. he could spend an unreasonable amount of time deciding whether something was worth doing, whether it was smart, whether it made sense. but there were some things he didn't overthink. football. science. taking charge when there was something that needed to be done. and this, apparently. because there wasn't anything stopping him. they got along. she was sweet. kind. patient in a way he wasn't entirely accustomed to. she had somehow managed to make his silence feel like silence instead of a problem that needed fixing. she'd listened to him talk about something he cared about without making him feel stupid for caring so much.
and somehow, she still wanted to be standing this close to him. mason's decision took less than a second. his arms came around her waist. then he kissed her. softly. there was none of the uncertainty of the first time, none of the awkwardness of a game where they'd been given seven minutes and expected to make something happen. that kiss had been circumstance. this one wasn't. he moved slowly, giving her every opportunity to pull away, but when she stayed, his hold tightened just slightly around her waist. his lips moved against hers with deliberate gentleness, the observatory fell away around them. the telescope. the photographs. the scattered notes and equations. the faint hum of the lights overhead. none of it mattered. mason's hands shifted gradually, traveling from her waist along her sides, careful and unhurried, until his palms came to rest on either side of her face. his thumbs brushed lightly along her cheeks. he kissed her again, still soft, but with more certainty this time. there was no question of whether this was something he was supposed to be doing. no seven-minute timer counting down somewhere beyond a locked door. just a choice he'd made.
"my own name sounds good enough," she replied, reaching to take brooks's phone to plug in her information. there were so many people within the new directions, it was no surprise that this seeemed to be the first time they having a proper conversation. he always seemed to be such a .... ray of sunshine within the club group chat, so it was nice to get to put a name to a face. "weren't you voted number one in the hot or not list? i haven't quite made that list yet, but i'm not really complaining," she admitted. to her, it didn't really matter to her. did she ever truly consider herself popular, even when she was on the cheerios? not exactly - just popular by association more than anything. "you want vocal lessons from me? not from like, stella or anything? i mean, i like to say i have a good voice, i'm not professional trained or anything .... just so you know. i really taught myself not to sound like a goose. but, we can probably work out a deal on that?"
"oh, no, stella?" brooks gave a little shrug, though there was something almost sheepish in the way his shoulders lifted. "she's like, top dawg, man. and i'm new. i'm like the low man on the ⸻" he stopped. totem pole. his mouth twisted slightly as he searched for the phrase he'd been about to use, visibly realizing that maybe he shouldn't use it. not because he knew exactly why, but because somewhere along the line he'd been informed that you weren't supposed to say it anymore. "⸻ oil rig?" a beat. brooks shook his head. "whatever. i'm new and i can't sing and she's got other stuff to worry about, right?" then, almost immediately, his expression shifted. "not that you don't have stuff to worry about." his brows pinched together, sudden panic creeping into his voice. "i don't know your life. i just mean…" he made a vague gesture between them, as though perhaps physically gesturing could rescue the sentence. "well. you know what i mean." thankfully, he seemed content to abandon that entire train of thought before he could make it worse. "but yeah, i'll take lessons from you." he nodded decisively.
"you don't have to be professionally trained. honestly, that's probably better." he took another sip of his drink, considering that for a moment. "because if someone who's professionally trained tells me i'm doing something wrong, i'm gonna get in my own head about it." he pointed at her. "but if you taught yourself how to not sound bad? that's relatable. i trust that." his grin returned. "and i already know you're not gonna make me sing scales or some shit in front of everybody." he paused. "unless you are. in which case, i'm gonna need the deal in writing." he glanced down at his phone, then back up at her. "wait, you said you haven't made the list yet?" he gave her a pointed look. "that's bullshit. we gotta fix that." he nodded once, completely serious. "i'll campaign for you. i'll make flyers. i'll give speeches. i'll stand outside the cafeteria with a sign." then, with the same earnestness he'd applied to the keg emergency: "i'm pretty sure that's how democracy works."
jacob whiteduck-lavoie for 1883 magazine
August's expression softened when he saw how torn up Brooks was over the pizza. "Seventh? I'm sorry, man." A beat. "Seven slices at a party is pretty ambitious. What if you upchucked all of that?" Still, he patted Brooks' shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "Maybe if I'm still able to drive at the end of the night, we'll go get you a little midnight slice."
He followed Brooks down the hallway, nodding along with increasing seriousness as though he were being given a private tour of an exclusive estate rather than a house he had already been standing in for the better part of the night. "Wow," he said after Brooks pointed out the kitchen. "Incredible. You really spared no expense, huh? Very spacious. Great walls." The tour was objectively terrible, but August was having enough fun with it that he wasn't about to complain.
August glanced at the shrine mention, eyebrows furrowed. "You have a shrine to your old roommate?" He stared at the closed door, then slowly back to Brooks. "That's definitely fucking weird." A laugh. A nervous one, at that. "Getting mono is a pretty dramatic way of moving out. When I had mono, I was just down for a few weeks." But he wouldn't harp on that and make Brooks think his roommate willingly left him, which was August's running theory.
The rest of the house tour, August nodded along. Bathrooms. The smoking porch. That was duly noted. But what really piqued his interest was the mention of the basement. "Hold the phone." His excitement was immediate. "You have a basement with a pool table and PlayStation? And we've been standing upstairs beating our shmeat instead of me kicking your ass at pool?" August was already starting for the stairs.
brooks glanced back toward jess' closed bedroom door, then shrugged, seemingly taking august's comment in stride. "yeah, well, jess is dramatic." he said simply. "i mean, getting mono and then just disappearing? he just left me high and dry here." he paused, lips quirking. "but it's fine. i don't hold grudges." another beat. "that's why i made the shrine. so he knows i'm not mad." he nodded once. "it's actually a very healthy coping mechanism." brooks was only halfway into his own room when august's sudden realization about the basement had him stopping in his tracks. he turned around slowly. "hold on." the second august challenged him to pool, brooks scoffed, giving him a look that could only be described as deeply offended confidence. his eyebrows lifted, his head tilting slightly as though august had just said something genuinely ridiculous.
"yeah, in your dreams." he pointed down the hallway. "you don't even know what you're up against." and apparently, what august was up against was brooks suddenly deciding this was a race. "last one downstairs has to rack." brooks took off. not gracefully, either. he practically launched himself down the stairs, laughing as he went, one hand catching the railing while he tried to beat august to the basement like there was an actual prize waiting for him down there. "COME ON!" he looked over his shoulder just long enough to make sure august was still behind him, which was probably a mistake. "you're slow!" he bounded down the last few steps and immediately turned around at the bottom, throwing both arms up in victory whether he'd actually won or not. "that's what i thought." a beat. "this game is mine." he grinned, already heading toward it. "and before you start making excuses, just know i'm a very gracious winner." he glanced back. "i'll probably let you get one ball in."
𝐖𝐇𝐎: emmett callahan & mason tucker @oflos3rs
It was at this point in the night that Emmett had more or less accepted that Brooks' party was going to continue whether he participated in it or not. Their host had miraculously disappeared from the scene, yet bodies kept flooding in, and drinks were still being poured. He had migrated toward the far end of the living room sometime after someone had spilled a drink down his sleeve, settling into the corner of the couch. He wasn't particularly drunk. He wasn't particularly interested in getting drunk, either. Mostly, he was content to observe the steady decline of everyone else's impairment from a safe distance. A character study. Then a girl wandered past.
She was crying in an unmistakable, catastrophic way of someone who had consumed several drinks beyond their reasonable limit, mascara slightly smudged beneath her eyes as she stumbled toward the hallway. Emmett watched as she disappeared elsewhere, probably to a bathroom or to find the nearest exit.
"Her boyfriend cheated on her." He said it so matter-of-factly that it took a moment in his own brain to realize he had invented the entire thing. He glanced towards the nearest body — Mason. It didn't matter whether he was listening or not; Emmett kept concocting his story. "Not tonight. Probably three days ago. She's been pretending she's over it, but she definitely isn't." He took a sip of his drink, eyes still following the now-empty hallway. "They've been dating since freshman year. His name is Dylan, real macho guy. Probably drinks protein shakes instead of actual meals. She's devastated, naturally."
mason stared at him. not because the story was particularly convincing. if anything, it was the sheer confidence with which emmett had apparently fabricated an entire relationship between two complete strangers that gave him pause. mason's eyes lingered on him for a beat, expression settling somewhere between suspicion and the quiet consideration one might reserve for someone who had just announced they could communicate with birds. then, slowly, his gaze drifted back toward the hallway. "you're… weird." it wasn't a question. there was the faintest edge of amusement beneath it, though whether that amusement was directed at emmett or the situation itself was difficult to tell. another moment passed. mason's eyes wandered across the room again, landing on a guy several feet away who was talking with his entire body. hands everywhere, head thrown back in laughter, apparently under the impression that every person within a twenty-foot radius had paid admission specifically to hear him speak.
"he's compensating." a pause. "for something." mason took a drink, continuing to watch the guy with the detached scrutiny of someone observing an animal in an enclosure. "probably peaked in high school. captain of something meaningless. lacrosse, maybe. tells people he was recruited somewhere but never specifies where." his eyes narrowed slightly as the guy slapped a hand against his friend's shoulder, laughing far louder than necessary. "his parents are paying for everything, but he tells everyone he 'works hard for what he has.'" mason finally glanced back at emmett. "and he's going to wake up tomorrow with no idea why nobody answered his texts." another beat. "i could be wrong." he looked back at the guy. "but, i'm not."
"do you consider me a miracle worker now or something?" savannah joked, watching the party host grab for a cup and enjoy the liquid from the keg. his excitement over it working again was enough to bring a smile to her own lips. planning and hosting an event seemed far too stressful for her, especially during sectionals week when it was crunch time. "i mean, you technically only need one working kidney for your body to function. also, only like half your liver too because that is the only organ in the body that can grow back," she pointed out. "i think i need your number first in order to call you though."
"yeah, well ⸻" brooks started, still riding the high of having successfully resurrected the keg, before savannah's last sentence actually registered. he stopped. just for a second. his eyebrows lifted, and he looked at her with the faintest hint of surprise, like his brain had needed an extra second to process the very straightforward request. then his expression broke into a grin. "oh. shit. yeah." as if this were something he'd somehow forgotten was required. he immediately dug his phone out of his pocket, nearly dropping it in the process because apparently even something as simple as retrieving a phone was beyond his capabilities when he was distracted. he caught it against his thigh, laughed at himself, and held it out toward her. "here. put yours in. save yourself as, uh..." he paused, thinking. "savannah. probably. unless you have a better idea." he glanced at her, grin widening. "you can save my name as: hottest guy on campus." he waited for her to put her number in on his phone, taking another drink from his cup while he watched.
then, almost as an afterthought, he snapped his fingers. "oh! and we're in glee club together." he pointed at her like he'd just remembered a crucial piece of evidence. "so i'll hit you up to practice singing on key." a beat. "because that's, like, the one thing in life i can't do." he said it with such complete sincerity that it almost sounded tragic. "seriously. i've got pretty good rhythm. i can skate. i can score goals. i can apparently fix a keg if i hit it hard enough." he gestured toward the now-functioning keg. "but singing?" he shook his head solemnly. "absolutely not. my vocal cords have chosen violence." he looked down at his phone, presumably checking that he'd actually gotten her number, then slipped it back into his pocket. "so, yeah. i'll text you. we can practice whenever. if you're not busy." he paused. "you can teach me how to not sound like i'm being attacked by a goose."
Noemi stared at Joey for a long moment. Just stared. The comment landed somewhere deeper than she would have liked to admit, which was irritating enough on its own. Their fingers tightened slightly around the plastic cup. "Wow." They breathed out. It came out quieter than expected. Not hurt, exactly. More like disbelief. "You really couldn't help yourself." He never could, could he? She took another sip, mostly to give herself something to do. The taste of her soda was suddenly too sweet. Or maybe they were just too annoted.
"If I escaped you, then why are you here right now?" Her gaze lifted again, expression no longer quite as neutral as it had been. There was a faint crease between her brows now. "Clearly unsuccessful." Guess she had jabs in her, too. Maybe it was unfair. She knew that look, his look. She may have said he looked okay, but the Joey Blacksy equivalent of that was still on something. Maybe it was the sight of him, the same sight of him indicating no change. Or maybe it was exhaustion from just seeing him again. Or maybe the fact she was drinking a fucking soda and not alcohol. Fuck, she wanted a cigarette. Infuriating.
"I don't think everything is about me, Joey." They snapped, heart bubbling to the surface of their chest. "I just find it astounding that you couldn't even remember what school I go to." Granted, most of their time spent together never included tell me where you go to college, Noemi or tell me about yourself, Noemi. Was there a word for someone somehow knowing every inch of what made your insides tick, but couldn't even name a childhood pet or basic facts about the other person? "I think you saw me and got scared, and decided being an asshole made more sense." A beat. "Which is fine. Be an asshole." Wouldn't change the glaringly obvious truth; she made it out, he didn't.
"So, whatever. We're good." A pause. "But I'm not going to applaud you for being able to stand in the same room as me." She took another drink of her soda. Grimaced. Then passed it over to him. "It's Dr. Pepper." She said, remembering his previous question of what she was drinking before World War Ex started being unleashed. "Might be good for you to drink something that won't fry your brain."
for one suspended, glittering second, joey just stared at them. not because he didn't have something to say. because he had too much. the pill had burned itself out somewhere beneath his skin, leaving behind only the brittle skeleton of whatever chemical warmth had been holding him together. the alcohol in his cup was too familiar to do much more than take the sharpest edges off. it was socially acceptable, at least. nobody looked twice at a drink in his hand. nobody wondered what was in his bloodstream when it came from a bar. but now there was nothing between him and the feeling. and the feeling was fucking enormous. his pulse kicked hard against his throat. if i escaped you, then why are you here right now? the words crawled beneath his skin. then: clearly unsuccessful. his jaw flexed. once. twice. his expression didn't change. that was the impressive thing about joey. years of practice had taught him how to keep his face beautifully, deceptively vacant while something inside him was clawing its way through his ribs. because she was right.
and he fucking hated her for it. not because they'd done anything wrong. that would have been easier. he hated them because they had gotten out. that was the part nobody ever understood. she had come into his life already standing closer to the edge than she should've been, and joey had been the idiot who held her hand while they both looked over it. he'd given them the weed. he'd given them the pills. he'd given them pieces of himself in the only language he'd ever been fluent in. and then he'd gotten scared. not for himself. for her. because one day he'd looked at noemi and realized she was starting to look too much like him. and he'd told her to stop. stop. like that made him some fucking hero. like he hadn't already dragged them halfway into the same darkness he was drowning in. and they'd listened. that was the part that had once felt like love. the terrible, beautiful little miracle of it. she'd listened to him. she'd chosen herself. she'd untethered herself from him, slowly and painfully, and somehow they'd made it to the other side. joey had watched them go. and then he'd stayed exactly where he was. so, yeah. good for her. seriously. good for fucking her.
his eyes dropped to the cup they were holding. dr. pepper. the little plastic cup suddenly seemed obscene. almost comical. he could remember the taste of smoke on their tongue. could remember pills being passed through open mouths. could remember all the nights that had blurred together until they were less like memories and more like stains. and now she was standing there with fucking dr. pepper. maybe it'll be good for you. his mouth twitched. not a smile. something much uglier. he slowly took the cup from her. "wow." his voice was quiet. flat. he looked down at the soda in his hand, turning the cup once between his fingers. "dr. pepper." a short laugh escaped him. "that's crazy." his eyes lifted back to hers. calm. almost eerily so. "guess we've really changed." there was something venomous in the way he said we. he took a sip. the sweetness hit his tongue. too fucking sweet. his stomach rolled. he swallowed anyway. "you know, it's actually kind of funny." he handed the cup back to them. "you used to have way more interesting shit to offer." a beat. his eyebrows lifted innocently. "but hey. personal growth, i guess." the knife, polished enough to pass for a joke.
joey looked away for a second, tongue pressing against the inside of his cheek as he tried to keep the rage from boiling through the thin membrane of his composure. she thinks she's better than you. the thought came uninvited. look at her. standing there like they had somehow transcended the wreckage. and him? still here. still doing the same shit. still needing something in his bloodstream just to make being inside his own head tolerable. his fingers tightened around his own cup. "and for the record." he said, looking back at her. "i wasn't scared." clipped. immediate. "that's a really cute story, though." his head tilted slightly. "'i saw my ex at a party. it was awkward.' apparently that's now a psychological diagnosis." a pause. "my bad." the sarcasm was surgical. he could feel his heartbeat in his palms now. he hated that they could still do this. hated that one look from them could make him feel seventeen different things at once. hated that some pathetic, buried part of him still wanted her to look at him the way she used to.
not with pity. not with concern. not like they were assessing whether he'd survived. but like she'd chosen him. once. just once. and maybe that had been enough to ruin him permanently. his eyes narrowed slightly. "and you don't have to applaud me." a beat. "trust me." his smile was thin. "i'm not exactly looking for your approval." lie. massive, throbbing, humiliating lie. he leaned back slightly, putting a little more distance between them. "you have a life now." the words came quieter this time. almost sincere. almost. "that's exciting." his expression remained perfectly composed. "except…" joey, don't. his pulse began to hammer harder beneath his skin, each beat a hot, ugly thud against his throat. adrenaline flooded him so quickly it made his fingertips tingle. his shoulders had gone rigid without his permission, jaw locked tight enough that his molars ached. his nostrils flared subtly as he inhaled through his nose, slow and measured, trying to force his body back into submission.
don't. don't say it. don't fucking ruin this. he knew this feeling. knew the precise moment when fear became anger because anger was easier to hold. anger had edges. anger gave him somewhere to put his hands. so his mouth curved. not quite a smile. something thinner. sharper. "i do have to wonder, though..." his voice was almost conversational. almost. he let the words hang there, suspended between them while his heart continued battering against his ribs. his gaze stayed fixed on theirs. "if i'll ever get a thanks." a pause. he tilted his head slightly. the movement was casual enough to pass. his pulse wasn't. "if it wasn't for me telling you you were going down a really bad path..." his eyebrows lifted. "where would you be?" there. the ugly little thing he'd been carrying around for years. he could feel his adrenaline surging now, hot beneath his skin, making every nerve feel exposed. his palms were damp around the cup. his heartbeat was loud enough that, for one irrational second, he wondered if she could hear it. but his face stayed calm.
because joey knew how to perform calm. he'd been performing it his entire life. "because it was really not looking good for you." a tiny laugh. humorless. "you were a fucking mess." he let that sit. then his eyes flicked over her again, almost accusatory in their scrutiny. healthy. composed. everything he'd wanted for her. everything that now made something inside him ache with such vicious intensity that he wanted to tear it out. "and i was the one who told you to stop, so." his jaw clenched. his gaze dropped momentarily, his throat working around a swallow. "you listened. one good thing i've seen from you." he looked back at them. and somehow, that was worse. because beneath all the bitterness was something he would never admit aloud: you left me there. his fingers flexed around the cup. "so, yeah." a shrug. small. dismissive. the kind of shrug that was supposed to make everything sound meaningless. "you're welcome." his smile widened by the smallest fraction. "i guess."
it was usually around three drinks in at a party that jasper decided to play detective. the night was still young, he would still remember everything he discovered, and he was still coordinated enough to pull off a good snoop session. but apparently that night his bullshit calculations had been off. because there was no other reason to explain why he was suddenly face to face with joey when he'd assumed the bedroom was empty.
oops. now, what lie to tell?
"since when?" he questioned to buy some time after their brief staring contest, but the words were soon paired with a lighthearted scoff at the idea that he'd sought out the room for a way lamer purpose. "jasper st. james doesn't hide at parties, so you might be projecting there." he also didn't refer to himself in third person or get caught snooping, but it was a night for new experiences. "where's the other bedroom? i was supposed to meet someone, but she's clearly not here."
joey's eyebrows climbed. "oh, shit. okay." he nodded slowly, like he'd just been handed a fascinating new piece of information. "jasper st. james doesn't hide at parties. noted. terrifying. i'll make sure to put that in my little notebook." he mimed scribbling something into the palm of his hand before glancing down at it with exaggerated seriousness. "jasper st. james. three drinks deep. refuses to hide. has apparently entered the bedroom dimension in search of a woman who has vanished without a trace." his mouth twitched. "honestly? sounds like a case for the fbi." he tipped his head back against the mattress, looking entirely too pleased with himself. his eyes dragged lazily over jasper, taking in the confidence and the suspiciously innocent explanation. his grin widened. "wait." he lifted a finger. "you were supposed to meet someone?" there was a beat. "like, meet meet someone?" his expression shifted into something openly delighted.
"because if you're looking for a girl in this house, i have some devastating news for you." joey pushed himself up off the floor, abandoning his position against the bed with a little groan as he unfolded himself. he brushed absolutely nothing off his jeans, then wandered toward the door, stopping just close enough to jasper to make the whole thing feel unnecessarily intimate. "you're gonna have to narrow it down." his gaze flicked toward the hallway, then back. "height. hair color. distinguishing features. favorite tv show. last known location. did she have a little purse? was she wearing a top that looked like it was purchased exclusively to create problems for men?" he paused. "because, personally, i'm an excellent missing-person resource." another pause. "unless she's hot." joey's grin sharpened. "then i'm suddenly very biased ⸻ you might not get your girl back."
Abilene stared at the cup as Brooks took it from her, watching with a look on her face as if he had just committed some minor but deeply confusing offense. "Did you just drink from my cup?" She asked, though there was no real outrage behind her words. "You know, I'm starting to think you're not actually qualified to be my guide through the world of alcohol." Still, she lifted the cup again, taking a much smaller sip this time. Still carbonated. Still beer. "And I don't hate it," she fully clarified. "I just don't understand why everyone acts like it tastes good." A pause. "Maybe that's why you have so much. You keep drinking it until you forget what it tastes like."
The question about her favorite things caught her more off guard than the beer had. Abilene lowered the cup from her lips, studying Brooks for a moment. Trying to gauge if he was being genuine. He was. "You really want to know all of that?" She shook her head, amused. "Okay. Favorite color is blue. Not blue blue, but kind of that pastel-ish one that borders on being periwinkle." She explained. "Favorite season is autumn. It's the prettiest, the weather is actually bearable, and I like watching the leaves fall." She took another tentative sip. "And vacation..." Abilene trailed off. That would be a harder one. The Perezes didn't exactly take vacations, and if they did, it was usually some kind of missionary work. Mexico. Alabama. Various other parts of the Eastern United States. But never had she been on a beach trip. Never had she seen a Seven Wonder. Never had she backpacked and slept in hostels. Or found a hot spring.
"Somewhere quiet," she finally decided. "Somewhere with mountains, maybe. Or by the ocean where nobody knows my name." That sounded really beautiful to Abilene. It was then she realized how much her life had become surrounded by followers online, a microscope of people waiting to see what she'd do next in her quest to reform the college population. Would she succumb? She took another sip and decided yes. The great big path was leading her down a different world, a different ecosystem to be a part of.
"What about you?" She turned toward him with her own curiosity now. "And you can't say a hockey rink." A beat. "I feel like you'd say that, and if we're going to be best friends, I want real answers."
brooks looked genuinely offended by the accusation, though the grin tugging at his mouth ruined any chance of him selling it. "what? i had to make sure it was good." he defended himself, as if this were the most obvious thing in the world. "that's called quality control, abs." he took another drink from his own cup. "and i'm an excellent guide." a pause. "i've been drinking beer for years." he considered that for a second. "okay, that actually makes me sound worse." her theory about drinking until she forgot what it tasted like earned a loud laugh. "maybe." he shrugged. "i think that's just how beer works. first it tastes bad, then you drink it enough times and eventually you're like, 'yeah, this is fine.'" he nodded sagely. "that's basically science." then he listened while she answered his questions, surprisingly attentive for someone who had spent the last ten minutes treating a keg like an engineering problem.
when she described her favorite blue, brooks' eyebrows lifted. "oh, that's a good blue." he nodded. "i know exactly what you mean." he absolutely did not know what she meant. "like... a nice blue." apparently that was sufficient elaboration. "mine's blue too, though. but, like, blue blue." he held up a finger for emphasis. "not navy. not light blue. not that weird green-blue stuff. just..." he searched for the word, eyes narrowing toward the middle distance. "blue." for once, there was no joke immediately following it. he seemed to realize how earnest that sounded only after he'd said it, and took another drink to cover for himself. "anyway." autumn got a thoughtful hum from him. "autumn's good." he glanced toward her. "i like spring ⸻ and not just because it's my birthday." he added immediately, apparently anticipating the obvious assumption.
"that's just a bonus." he took another sip. "it's because hockey training starts again in a few months." his face brightened at the thought. "like, you've got the whole summer ahead of you and you know it's coming. you can start thinking about it. getting excited. wondering how the team's gonna look. wondering if you're gonna be better this year." he shrugged, but there was something almost boyishly earnest beneath it. "the anticipation is better than the actual training sometimes." a beat. "don't tell coach i said that." when she answered his question about vacation, though, brooks' expression softened a little. "niagara falls." he said it without hesitation. "i used to go growing up." his eyes drifted somewhere beyond the party, briefly distracted by the memory of plane rides and rented cars. "it's not even that far from here, really. i mean, it's still a drive, but..." he shrugged. "close enough."
he rolled his cup between his palms. "i don't know. i just like it there." his voice was quieter now, though not especially serious. "it's peaceful. you've got the water, the trees, all that stuff. and the town's nice." he smiled faintly. "you can just walk around and nobody cares who you are or what you're doing." he glanced at abilene. "you'd probably like it." then, apparently realizing he'd gotten dangerously close to admitting something about himself, he cleared his throat and brightened again. "we should go." a beat. "like, actually. best friend vacation." he nodded as though this was already settled. "we can go see the falls, get food, walk around. i'll show you all the good places." he paused. "and if you want mountains or an ocean, i guess we can do that too." another pause. "but niagara has both." he looked at her. "well. water." he frowned. "water is basically an ocean if you don't think about it too hard."
sometimes, after a few heavy - handed drinks, fontaine can convince himself that he's so close to feeling normal again. that he's still capable of it. if he closes his eyes and ignores the heady bass thumping behind him as he steps into the fucking - cold november air, he can almost mistake the drumming in his chest as some semblance of a laugh he already knows won't come out. makes him feel almost human - not the machine he's made himself out to be; all work, no play, and a routine that he refuses to change despite the way it stretches him out so fucking thin. except for tonight. he can already feel the nausea creeping up the pit in his stomach from the pill he'd forgone that morning, his keeper and his prison - already knows it'll be worse when he wakes up the next day, if he even manages to sleep, because it always is. a cycle fontaine only resigns himself to on designated days, when he knows he can take the careful time to put himself back together again - it's all fucked now. he's fucked himself over, and for what? he'll be a monster throughout class, at rehearsal, during practice - not angry, because that requires a level of emotion he cannot, will not feel - but fucking mean. the tension in his jaw feels as if it could split bone, and he has to force himself to see, to really see, joints clicking annoyance as he begins to count to five.
one, the few remnants of leaves remaining on their branches, too stubborn to fall despite their various shades of red and orange, only illuminated by the brightened windows behind him. two, the dead fucking grass in the lawn, yellowed and sure to crunch wherever he lands his step. three, the darkened sky above him, too overcast to see the moon or the stars, and fontaine almost doesn't want to include it, but he does anyways. four, the cracked pavement leading out to the sidewalk, to the equally cracked road, to a mailbox that looks as if one side's been beaten to all hell with what he can only assume was a baseball bat. maybe a bag of rocks if someone was dedicated enough to the craft, but he can't linger on the thought, on the mundane semantics of what crushes metal just enough to leave smooth indents and sharp, jagged edges, because of number five standing in his way. fontaine's distinctly aware of the ache working itself up his temples, teeth ground so harsh together he may as well be producing gravel to fill the potholes down the street, but he tilts his head to the side in greeting anyways, choosing the kinder path.
"how about high? must test your own product before handing it out like feckin' candy to a baby, yeah?" he's not so drunk that his words slur. a singular beat passes, just enough for his gaze to snag onto joey's in a blank stare. "wasn't gonna say shite about being responsible. just that you look like a fucking peeping tom standing out here. am i gonna go back inside later and find you crawling through brooks' panty drawer?" the music still thumps against his back, furled knuckles pressing themselves between the blades of his shoulders until fontaine's stepping further away from the door, from the noise and the lights, and closer to where joey is illuminated by the festivities neither feel much like celebrating. he doesn't have to reach far to snag the beer out of his hand, uncaring if he presents himself as a challenge or a problem, bottom lip shining wet when he lifts the rim of the beer away from his mouth. "what's drunk enough for you? whole pack down, and half the party already gone? was trying figure out if you were a keg stand sorta fella or a feckin' wallflower."
joey's eyebrows climbed with such exaggerated, theatrical offense that it was almost impressive he didn't put a hand over his heart and stagger backward from the sheer violence of the accusation. almost. instead, he took another drag from the cigarette, the one he bummed from some rando because he most definitely didn't smoke regularly (he did), holding the smoke in his lungs for a moment longer than necessary, as though contemplating whether or not fontaine had just committed some grievous social injustice against him. the cold had begun to creep through the thin fabric of his clothes, the kind of november chill that didn't so much bite as patiently burrow beneath the skin, settling there with the intention of becoming a permanent tenant. joey barely noticed it anymore. between the cigarette burning down between his fingers, the beer he'd been nursing, and the muffled, thunderous pulse of the party bleeding through the walls behind them, there was enough sensory noise to keep his attention from landing anywhere particularly uncomfortable. that was the point of being outside, really. it wasn't quieter, exactly, but it was quieter enough. quiet enough to think without actually having to think. "wow." he breathed at last, smoke slipping lazily between the syllables.
"so this is what we're doing tonight. publicly assassinating my character. at brooks' house. on his lawn. in front of god and everybody." he gestured vaguely toward the house with the cigarette. somewhere inside, someone shouted something unintelligible, followed by a burst of laughter that sounded like it had been dragged bodily through three different rooms before escaping. joey stared toward the noise for half a second. yeah. definitely not going in there yet. the beer disappeared from his hand before he could properly react, and joey's eyes followed it with an almost comically wounded expression. the loss was insignificant. he could get another one. still, something about fontaine casually taking it from him made the corner of joey's mouth twitch. he liked that. which was probably unfortunate. "also, for the record, i don't test my own product." a beat. "that's called quality assurance. totally different. very scientific. there's a clipboard involved. i’m not that guy." he nodded once. the lie came easily. almost offensively easily. it was the sort of thing joey had become good at without ever consciously deciding to be good at it: take the truth, dress it up in something stupid, throw enough glitter on top that nobody could see what was rotting underneath. fontaine knew enough. he didn't need to know much else. how often joey's own pockets became more tempting than his customers'.
his gaze dragged lazily over fontaine in the same way it always seemed to when he was given even the slightest opening. he should probably stop. obviously, he wasn't going to. "jesus christ, if i wanted to get into brooks' drawers, i'd at least have the decency to wait until he wasn't home. i'm not a fucking amateur." that stupid little glint in his eyes that always seemed to appear whenever he caught himself getting too close to something real and needed to throw a joke over the top of it before anybody could notice. joey knew he did it. he knew fontaine knew he did it and yet, still kept him around (probably for the band thing). sometimes joey wondered if that was why he kept trying. tiny fractures in whatever impenetrable fortress fontaine had built around himself. joey was nothing if not persistent when presented with a locked door. the question about being drunk enough had landed somewhere considerably less funny than the rest. joey rolled the cigarette between his fingers, watching the ember glow and dim in the darkness. for a second, he didn't answer. the party continued behind them. he could hear the distant rush of a car somewhere down the street. leaves scraped dryly along the pavement. somebody inside screamed, and then immediately screamed again, apparently for reasons nobody outside needed to understand. he swallowed. don't make it weird.
"i dunno. drunk enough is, like..." he squinted toward the house, as if the answer might be written somewhere on the glowing windows. "when the music stops sounding like someone murdering a speaker and starts sounding like someone murdering a speaker artistically." another beat. "but don't worry. i'm pacing myself." he lifted one finger, as if delivering a profound scientific conclusion. "i'm doing this whole responsible adult thing. next step is probably vegetables, per your suggestion. maybe a mortgage." he let out a small laugh at his own expense. there was something almost absurd about the image: joey standing outside a crowded house with a burned out cigarette, a half-finished beer now stolen from him, and a near twelve-pack at his feet, talking about mortgages like he'd discovered financial literacy sometime within the last thirty seconds. his gaze dropped to the drink fontaine had in his hands, and something mischievous flickered across his expression. "you gonna finish that, or are you just holding it hostage because you like having things that belong to me?" a pause. his eyes lifted again, settling on fontaine's face, and the grin that followed was slower this time, crooked around the edges with the kind of shamelessness joey wore like armor. "because, you know, you could've just asked."
August looked at Brooks for a second, his expression caught between disbelief and amusement. "You know what? Fair. I guess I do come into the duet with significantly more girlfriend experience." Which, saying it out loud, felt strange. Brooks was like the guy of all guys. August didn't have anything that set him apart in any spectacular way other than maybe an embarrassing sense of eagerness. Suddenly, a sense of insecurity flowed in him where confidence should have been. He pushed it down just as quick. "So, I'm the guy." He confirmed. "But if we're doing that, I'm gonna need some creative control. No tragic ending where I get hung up on the phone and cry in the rain or some shit." He took another drink. "We're doing a happy ending. Obviously. Running off into the sunset."
The promise that Brooks was going to look into his eyes had August's grin returning immediately. "Oh, I know." He gave Brooks a knowing nod. "And if people start wondering if we've got somethin' going on, that's no problem. That's like, free publicity." He gestured toward the hand that was still resting against Brooks' chest before finally pulling it away. "See? Branding. Storytelling. We're not just singers anymore, Keller. We're businessmen."
He kept nodding along to the merch suggestions. Hockey stick. Hockey stick. Hockey stick. "And December is you with a hockey stick, and the hockey stick is wearing a little Santa hat, right?" He asked, following Brooks toward the kitchen, pointing accusingly at him as they went. "Of course I'm coming. If we're business partners, I've gotta protect the assets." August's eyes swept across the party, immediately narrowing when he spotted the food. "House tour?" He asked, leading him to where he had found the pizza. "Now that is how you close a business deal." Winning!
brooks nodded along with complete confidence, as though august had just pitched him the most airtight business plan he'd ever heard. "exactly. december is me with a hockey stick, and the hockey stick has a santa hat. we're gonna sell out." he followed august's pointed finger toward the pizza, only for his expression to immediately drop. "...oh, fuck." brooks stopped dead in the middle of the kitchen. the pizza was gone. not mostly gone. not down to one or two sad little pieces he could negotiate for. gone. there was nothing left but a few crumbs and the greasy cardboard staring back at him like a personal betrayal. "they ate it." he stared. "they ate all of it." another beat passed. "that was supposed to be my seventh slice." brooks slowly turned toward august, looking genuinely wounded. "i was gonna have seven. seven is a good number." there was no recovering from this. his party. his house. his pizza (that he bought specifically for partygoers to enjoy).
and somehow he had been robbed in his own kitchen. still, because he was apparently incapable of remaining upset for longer than thirty seconds, he sighed and gestured vaguely around them. "well. house tour." he swept an arm around the kitchen with the enthusiasm of a realtor who had never once been trained as a realtor. "this is the kitchen. we're standing in it." he pointed behind them. "that's the living room. where we were standing." then he turned toward the front of the house, walking slowly enough for august to follow. "front door. closet's over there. bathroom's over there." he pointed to each one in turn, as though august had never encountered either object before. "and this is the hallway." brooks started down it, glancing back every couple of steps to make sure august was still there. "bedroom on the right. it's open if anybody ever wants it. bathroom on the left. very exciting. shower. toilet. sink. the whole thing." he continued toward the end of the hall, then pointed toward the door on the right.
"that's jess' room." his voice became noticeably more serious. "he used to live here." a pause. "then he got mono and left." another pause. "so i made a shrine." brooks looked completely unfazed by this statement. "it's not weird." he opened the door just enough to peek inside, revealing the room that had apparently become a monument to his former roommate's existence. then he closed it again. "okay, it's a little weird." he pointed across the hall. "that's my room. way less weird." whether that was true was debatable. then, finally, he pointed to the door at the end of the hall. "and that's the porch. it wraps around the back. pretty sweet. this is where people come out to smoke even though i don't smoke, so apparently it's just a smoking porch now."
he looked out over the party for a second before glancing back at august. "and that's basically the house." a beat, his hand resting on the knob of his room before turning and opening the threshold. "so, congratulations. you're officially one of the three people who know where all the bathrooms are and won’t have to ask me every fifteen minutes." he considered that. "actually, that's probably important. party gets bigger, bathroom intel becomes crucial." he walked into his room, then turned as if suddenly remembering something vital. "oh! and there's a basement." his eyes lit up. "i forgot about the basement. pool table, playstation console, and random punching bag is set up down there. it's pretty cool."
josie beams when her answer seems to be the right one, grinning from ear to ear at the compliment she's given, already knowing she'll be living off the high of that for the rest of the party. who needed alcohol when gabe's approval existed? "i think he'd probably be really chill about it. like, he might eat us, but i think he'd be apologetic." if she had to sacrifice herself for someone, he seemed like one of the top options.
"okay, so you mean like, regular david bowie, though, right? not a zombie one? 'cause i don't know what zombie david bowie would have to say other than... brains." josie extends her arms out in front of her, doing her best zombie impression. "oh! i wonder what a zombie david bowie would sound like if he sung, though. that'd be so cool." for a moment, she's distracted as she tries to picture it, before her attention is brought back to gabe. "what's your perception of me? do you have one?"
"regular." gabe confirmed, nodding with the solemnity of someone clarifying something of extreme importance. "definitely regular david bowie. i think zombie david bowie would just be... less musically inclined." he paused. "not because he'd be bad. i just think it'd be difficult to sing with, like, half your vocal cords gone." he seemed to consider that for another second, eyes drifting somewhere past josie's shoulder as he tried to actually imagine it. "although maybe that would make it better. like, really avant-garde." another pause. "people would probably say it was a statement." then her question registered. gabe blinked. what's your perception of me? there was a brief, almost visible lag in his brain as he looked at her. not because he didn't know. if anything, the problem seemed to be that he knew too many things at once and had no idea which one was appropriate to say first.
"uh." he took a sip of his drink, despite having apparently forgotten it was in his hand. "you're..." he frowned slightly. "you seem very comfortable being weird." another beat, his brow furrowing as he apparently realized that sounded like an insult. "i mean that positively." he clarified quickly. "it's not that you're weird in a bad way. you're just... not very concerned about whether what you're saying is weird." he looked down at his cup. "which is probably healthier." his gaze came back to her, and, having apparently decided he'd already gone this far, gabe kept going. "i think you're probably easy to talk to. which is kind of funny because i don't think i'm particularly easy to talk to sometimes." his mouth twitched. "that's it ⸻ for now, at least."
