First Floor Rec Room, Tuesday Morning

[vanillajello]

This was one of those mornings were Kate just woke up way too early and couldn't go back to sleep with the way thoughts were just whirring around in her head. After trying anyway, she'd given up and headed down to the salle for a half-mandatory pre-class practice session, intended to center her again, and maybe reduce her stress levels about whichever way certain people she wasn't even supposed to pay attention to were probably going to be interacting in class.

Even a good while spent attacking dummies hadn't killed all the time she had left before her class that was still hours away, though, and she found herself having a need to just take it easy now. With some video games. And the rec room was the perfect place for that since she'd never gotten around to hauling her XBox to Fandom even though it was just gathering dust back home. Not like Marshall ever played anything without her.

She parked her ass on a couch, controller in hand, and made herself comfortable. Meta for Little Big Planet was totally good practice for her reflexes too, right?

[ooc: Open like a rec room! ETA: There is a good chance of SP until my evening. Today is weeeird for me.]

Comments

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"And?" Nathan asked, shrugging. "Length of knowing you has bearings on what I do and don't know? I'm not stupid, Kate. I can figure things out fairly quickly."

[vanillajello]

"Well, I'd like to think I'm a little more complex than that," Kate said. "I have more facets than you know about."

Or maybe she didn't.

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"And tell me, have I been completely and totally wrong with my observations?" He didn't expect much from this answer. He expected her to lie.

[vanillajello]

"Yes." Well, why let down someone's expectations? "Sometimes I'm a mess but that doesn't mean I can't be normal."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"Oh, you're a liar," he said, shaking his head. "I expected that answer and I'm so pleased that you didn't let me down. Really, Kate, if I was so fucking wrong, you wouldn't get as defensive as you do."

[vanillajello]

"I'm not getting defensive."

Well, not this time. ...Well, not until just now when she said that, anyway.

"Why can't you just let it go? You've made your point. Shouldn't you be persuading me into being how you think I should be instead of telling me I'm not like that, anyway?"

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"Defensive," he said, crossing his arms and looking almost triumphant about being proven right.

"And really, Kate, you might say you don't think I'm stupid but you're certainly acting like you think I am. If I try to persuade you to do anything, you'll do the opposite because you're fucking contrary."

It was what he'd do, at least.

"Besides, I'm not going to waste my breath persuading you to be what you are. That's your job. If you wanna pretend, whatever. Just know that it's pretty see through."

[vanillajello]

Kate sighed, leaning back against the couch.

"If I end up with an identity crisis, it's gonna be all your fault," she drawled, not sounding like she meant it one bit. Mostly because her identity had been in a crisis for a long time. "You can't know if I'd be contrary, you haven't tried."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"No, I know you'd be contrary," he replied and sounded pretty damn confident about that. "You and I are a lot alike except I don't see the need to pretend to be normal. When you're not pretending, you're like me and you want to be contrary and argumentative because it's fun to push other people's buttons."

[vanillajello]

He wasn't wrong. Not wrong at all. "But sometimes it's fun to be easy and just enjoy yourself," she countered anyway. "Pushing people's buttons isn't always the most fun thing to do."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"Yes, it is," he responded with a nonchalant shrug of his shoulders. "Just because you're falling out of practice doesn't seem the allure is gone. You're just getting boring."

[vanillajello]

"I'm all kinds of interesting," she replied, mildly. "Your standards are just all wrong."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"You're interesting? Name the last interesting thing you've done," Nathan challenged, pretty sure anything she'd name would be lame.

[vanillajello]

"Why?" Kate asked without missing a beat. "You never give any examples when I ask for proof of your boasting."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"You've never asked," Nathan pointed out, raising an eyebrow. "And now you're just avoiding the question because you have no answer which, once again, proves that I'm right. If you're so intent on people believing you're still interesting, I think you're going to have to do a little more than just insist upon it. You're dull."

He shrugged.

"I'm sure some people like that."

[vanillajello]

"I've asked several times," Kate replied, shaking her head. "But, whatever. Maybe all the best interesting things about me lately are unpleasant, anyway."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"You have not!" Nathan argued immediately. "Maybe you've asked me once but why the fuck should I answer if you don't? That's a bit of a double standard and I'm not your fucking monkey. You can't make me do things just because you have tits and blowjob lips."

[vanillajello]

Kate snorted. "Ooh, touchy," she remarked. "You don't get to tell me to answer now if I've asked first and you haven't answered then. Also, blowjob lips? What the fuck, Nathan?"

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"What, you're taking offense to that now?" Nathan wondered, raising an eyebrow. "Really? After you fucking bragged about your talents to me awhile back? Seriously, what the fuck happened to you?"

[vanillajello]

"I'm not taking offence, I'm amused," Kate corrected. "And, okay, maybe I find that kind of a unnecessarily limited way of describing my lips. Because they're amazing."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"Eh." He shrugged. "They're all right. You use them to talk a lot more than you use them to walk. I'm sure they could be better but eh."

[vanillajello]

Kate pouted at him, briefly, mostly to pull some more attention to those lips of hers. "Well, that's just because you've never had them on you," she decided then. "And no, that's not an offer. Not a dirty one, at least."

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"I don't want them on me," he decided with a shake of his head. "Your dullness might be contagious and I'd rather say my super exciting and interesting self. It does so make it easier to get attention that way."

[vanillajello]

"Wow, you really are committed to hating on my personality, aren't you?" Kate asked, raising her eyebrows. She brought a hand up to press it against her chest. "Even diassociating yourself from my lips. That really hurts, Nathan."

That couldn't have possibly been more fake.

[tripledmyself.livejournal.com]

"No. I'm committed to disliking this personality you think you want," Nathan corrected, shaking his head. He shrugged and actually looked a little serious. "You know, for all you say you're not like my dad, you're certainly giving me a sense of déjà vu. He didn't want to deal with shit either. Yeah, he ran away and you're just adopting a new personality. It means the same thing. You're still not around in the way you should be."

And maybe that was why he poked this need of hers to be normal so much. She was running away but staying in plain sight. It evoked memories.