The Person in My Spot - FunnyBunny Human AU - Chapter 1 (WIP)
There is a person in his spot.
She’s curled up into a tiny ball and surrounded by marked-up sheets of paper and open textbooks full of more numbers than Jax has ever consented to seeing. He has half a mind to be offended at the audacity of this stranger, polluting his corner of the stairwell with math absolutely everywhere, but then she lets out a pathetic little sneeze and the next thing he knows, he’s given her his favourite sweater to use as a blanket.
He doesn’t know why he does it. Maybe because her sniffling would keep him up all night, and he is in desperate need of some sleep somewhere that isn’t his own house. He has no choice in the matter, it’s one of those doomed if you do, doomed if you don’t kind of things.
The cold air seeps through the thin fibres of the salmon-coloured shirt he has on underneath and he shivers; the sun’s been down long enough that all of the warmth absorbed during the day has long dissipated, leaving the cement landing cold and devoid of any small comfort it could have provided otherwise.
Jax scowls. Thanks to this random ass nerd, he’s freezing and has been left with nothing but iron railing to use for a pillow. Her face is pressed into the buttons of a calculator, and hey, at least her pillow is squishy.
He slumps down on the floor besides the night-ruining girl and leans onto the railing. It’s just as cold and twice as hard as he imagined, the uneven paint digging into his skin— he mourns the loss of his hoodie. It’s been a long, 30 hour-without-sleep day, and now he can’t even sleep in his corner of the stairwell. Seriously, he asks for so little.
But then again, it’s been a long, 30-hour-without-sleep kind of day; once he pulls the fabric of his shirt up to cushion his cheek, it’s practically game over, and no amount of complaint from the bruises across his body is enough to dissuade his exhausted mind from finally shutting itself off.
Honestly, it’s one of the better sleeps he’s had in a while. He doesn’t even dream. The universe loves him. It loves him so much that when he wakes up, his hoodie is fucking gone.
The stairwell is stripped bare of papers and pencils and godforsaken numbers, the girl is nowhere to be seen, and the hoodie he’d lain over her in a moment of weakness is gone. This is what being weak gets him; math and stolen hoodies. What an idiot; he can hear his father’s screaming voice in his head. Act like a weak little girl and have your girly hoodie stolen by a girl. This is what you get.
The bruises on his chest ache.
At least the sun is up now, warming up the stairwell to an uncomfortable degree. What a shit building, no heating when it’s cold, no air conditioning when it’s hot. He isn’t cold anymore, but the damp heat isn’t really any better, and getting his hoodie stolen would put anyone in a bad fucking mood.
His phone buzzes in his pocket and he peels his face away from the railing with a disgusting, sticky sound, like velcro that’s been seeped in warm honey. His cheeks sting, there’s probably a dent on them, and on top of that, he’s definitely covered in germs. Who knows what kind of disgusting things this iron bar has seen? Then again, this is an incredibly unpopular spot, so if he’s lucky, maybe he won’t catch some kind of debilitating illness and drop dead tomorrow— or actually, maybe if he’s lucky he’ll just drop dead right here.
He imagines what his tombstone might look like. Here lies Jax. Idiot son, dumbass human. Cause of Death: Being the Worst. Kaufmo and Ribbit would probably get a kick out of it, he snorts, pulling his phone out of his pocket.
A piece of glass is hanging on at the corner, and it wiggles around with each vibration. Is it possible for a phone to shake itself into breaking? Would he be able to convince some poor sap at the Apple Store that it was definitely a malfunction and not because his poor phone takes a beating every time he does and more? He swipes a thumb across the spiderweb of cracks, watching his 1:00pm alarm fade into the background. His work schedule he has set as his lock screen stares up at him, and even though he knows he isn’t scheduled for weekends in the summer, he double checks anyways. It never hurts to check.
After turning off all his other alarms, he sets his phone to do not disturb, sending a quick text to a group chat so his friends don’t think he’s dead. His stairwell is nice and toasty and clear of the eldritch abomination from last night, so he scoots over until he can feel the sun on his back. The cement wall is an absolute upgrade from the cold metal prison bar pillow he had last night, and he doesn’t have to worry about leaving a dusty footprint on a piece of cursed paper as he stretches his legs down the steps.
Just as he’s about to fall asleep, he hears the incredibly unusual sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. They’re as quiet and soft as you can be in an empty stairwell, but his shoulders hike up nonetheless, entire body tensing as he prepares a glare for whoever decided to use the stairs to get to the top floor of a thirty story building instead of the elevator like a normal person. Jaw clenched, eyes narrowed, hands balled up into fists at his sides, even though he knows he could never punch someone.
Bit by bit, a head of choppy black hair reveals itself, followed by a pair of giant, circular glasses. The moment she sees him, she flinches back with a gasp, round blue eyes blinking in rapid sequence as she scrambles with the pile of cloth in her arms.
“O-Oh! Uhm. You’re— you’re still here,” stammers the girl, fidgeting and flushing pink. She’s fucking tiny, dwarfed in a horrendous red and blue sweater. She’s got a blue backpack slung over one shoulder; it looks more like a mace than a backpack, to be honest, with corners of what he assumes are textbooks poking the canvas fabric. Jax has never felt sorry for a backpack before.
“You’ve sure got a lotta nerve coming back here after stealing my hoodie.” He drawls, unclenching his fists and shoving them in the pockets of his pants. He levels her with what he hopes is an intimidating look, not entirely sure what he’s trying to accomplish. The girl looks three seconds away from bolting and she’s so short that he’s not sure her head can even see the top of the stairs.
She jumps at his words, panic settling in as her blue eyes go wide. “N-no! I… I was— I was returning it!”
Jax scoffs just because he can. “Sure,” he lets the vowel drag between them, “likely story.”
“No! I mean yes. I…” she trails off, her blue and red glasses slide down her face. She fidgets and sucks her mouth into a flat, lipless line before blurting out. “I drooled on it, okay? I drooled all over it and then I felt bad and then I went home and then I washed it! And— and then I realized I forgot to leave a note and so… Uhm. I’m not a thief! I promise!”
Maybe it’s because he’s tired, maybe his dad knocked a few screws loose during his last beating, but three seconds into trying to keep up his intimidation act, Jax can’t help but burst into laughter.
Her glasses are halfway down her face, warping the lines of equations she has inked backwards onto her cheek. He can see her hands bunching up his sweater. She’s three whole heads shorter than him and dressed like she just stepped out of a kindergarten art class that she failed. He’s delirious, probably, from the bruising and the heat and whatever disease was plastered to his face, but she looks so fucking ridiculous that he can’t help but laugh.
At first, her face pinches, in panic, then confusion, and Jax watches, more amused than he has any right to be, as her expression finally relaxes. There is a fraction stamped on her forehead in blue ink that un-wrinkles along with her brows. It says 97/100.
She laughs with him, forced and awkward. “H-haha,” she breathes out, smile wobbling as she makes her way up the steps towards him. “Here. Sorry about everything.”
His sweater is thrust into his face, and he snatches it with a grin, letting it crumple into his lap as he leans back. She stands for a few seconds, blinking at him owlishly.
“Uhm. B-bye?” Just as she’s about to cross onto the landing below them, Jax speaks.
“Wait,” he calls out. The girl turns, looking like a deer in headlights. “You know. You’ve got…” he gestures to his own face with a twirl of his finger. “Math. All over you.”
There’s a slap sound that echoes through the stairwell as she slams both her hands to her face, wiping furiously at reddened cheeks. Her hands come away stained with ink, and she stares at them in horror. “Oh my god.” She says, and then she keeps wiping.
Red, blue, black. The numbers on her cheeks smudge, looking like waterlogged paper. Jax can’t help the snicker that escapes him. “I’m. I’m so sorry,” she stammers, “if… did… did it get on your sweater?”
It did, there are a few dark blobs marring the lavender inner hood. “Nah, you’re fine,” he lies, but her eyes flicker towards the sweater bunched in his lap.
“It did! Oh my god. I’m so sorry! I’ll. I’ll pay you — Uhm— oh god— how… how much is it? Or. Or I can replace it? Where is it from?”
“Relax,” he yawns, “It’s just a sweater. It would’ve gotten dirty eventually.”
“But…” she protests weakly. “I… still… I’m sorry.”
It really didn’t matter, but the girl looks so broken up about it, and so sad and stupid with all the smudged ink on her face, that Jax feels a little sorry for her. He sighs. “Okay, okay— jeez. Stop… stop making that face. How about this; in exchange for ruining my favourite hoodie—“ a flinch, “you. Don’t sleep in my spot. Deal?”
“Your… spot?” She repeats.
Jax nods. “My spot. Right here; stairwell on the 30th floor, second landing, right next to the wall… ringing any bells?”
For a very long moment, no words are exchanged between them. Then, she speaks, voice soft. “Are you… homeless?” She asks.
Jax sputters. “Excuse me?”
She backtracks. “I-I mean. It’s just. You said—“
“I know what I said— how did you even— Do I look homeless?”
“Uhh…” She gives him an appraising look. “It’s just. You were sleeping in the stairwell and uh… it looks like… you’re still sleeping here?” She trails off, wincing. “And your pants have holes… in them.”
Thoroughly unamused. Jax crosses his arms across his chest. “You were also sleeping here!” Unbelievable. This primary colour looking ass nerd is insulting his fashion sense. “These are ripped jeans! It’s fashion!”
Technically, that’s not a lie, but she looks unconvinced. Jax groans into his hands.
“I can’t believe this. This is so much worse than what you did to my hoodie.”
“What— I— Okay. Then why are you sleeping in a stairwell?”
“Because I’m cool. All the cool kids hang out in stairwells. Why were you sleeping in the stairwell?” She looks affronted by his accusation.
“I— it was an accident! I was studying!”
Jax leans forward, resting his chin in his hand. She’s fun to tease, the red on her cheeks having travelled up to her ears, round blue eyes flashing defensively. “Oh so that’s what that was. I thought you were summoning a demon.”
The guilt and panic melts off her face as her lips twist into a smile. “That was calculus,” she laughs, her shoulders dropping.
“So that’s what they’re calling it. Back in my day, we just called it Satan.”
The joke elicits another laugh from her, the sound soothing a tiny, pathetic part of him. He pushes it down vehemently. “So…” he starts, and not because he’s curious, he asks, “what’s your name?”
Her face is back to being guarded, eyeing him with suspicion. “…Pomni.”
“Seriously, relax.” He rolls his eyes, “I’m Jax.”
They stand in more awkward silence. Fuck he sucks at socializing.
“Are you colourblind or something?” he asks, and lets himself smile when she snaps back a sharp retort. The sun shining through the window makes the dust particles sparkle, colouring this memory a warm yellow. She’s fun to talk to, and they slip into an easy banter that dulls the cold ache in his limbs for just a fleeting moment.
Later, with new bruises blooming across his skin, Jax lays on the cold floor of his room. He can feel blood seep out of a wound on his arm, and he pulls his hoodie off with shaking hands. The garment turns inside out, light lavender lining that he definitely didn’t pick on purpose— scattered with spots of dried blood, the colour dark and brown and ugly. There are two new stains: one is a deep, dark blue on the hood, and the other a bright scarlet slowly seeping into the once-purple fibres.
He thumbs at the blue stain, thinking of the girl covered in ink with her face pressed into it. The memory of laughter. His sweater smells different now; another family's detergent, another person's scent. For a moment, when he buries his nose into it, he pretends he’s somewhere else.
