Lunch for the bored and hungry.

Open.

The cafetorium is a combination cafeteria and auditorium. There's enough space for chairs to arranged to view any kind of assembly or speaking arrangement, but during the day it also acts as a cafeteria, complete with angry lunch ladies and poor food. Vending machines are scattered throughout the place, but this is generally the social centre of the school.
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Rocky†
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Lunch for the bored and hungry.

#1

Post by Rocky† »

(Reika Ishida continued from some "light" reading)

Reika stood in line patiently, watching as the people ahead of her walked off with what could barely be considered food. Still, when you're hungry, you'll eat almost anything, and Reika was hungry. Finally, it was her turn to order. With a smile, she got what she normally did: a slice of cheese pizza, some salad, and a carton of milk.

Carrying her lunch on a tray, Reika searched for an empty seat. There was a sparsely populated table, maybe about 2 or 3 other people, near where she was standing, so she decided to sit there. Smiling at the other students who looked at her as she sat, she took a bit of her pizza, and chewed contently, trying to enjoy the lukewarm, rubbery food.
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MurderWeasel
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#2

Post by MurderWeasel »

((Kimberly Nguyen continued from High Gloss Highs))

It was lunch time once again, and Kimberly, having skipped breakfast in favor of another ten minutes of precious sleep, was absolutely famished. Fortunately, she hadn't been too out of it, and had actually understood everything in her morning classes. Even more fortunately, she'd remembered to pack a lunch the night before, meaning that, instead of being forced to subsist on the disgusting gruel the cafeteria chose to claim was food, she had her favorite lunch: two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on whole wheat bread, a small bag of Cheetos, a cookie, and an apple. Plus a cigarette, in case she got a chance to slip outside for a few minutes. Kimberly didn't smoke heavily, but she did like to have a cigarette available in case of a particularly stressful day.

Giving the cafetorium a quick look-over, Kimberly realized that it was absolutely crammed. She consulted her watch and figured out why: her last teacher had let them out of class late. Cursing quietly, she searched for an empty table.

No luck. Every place had at least two people sitting there, so she couldn't even pretend to be doing something nice and pulling some loner out of their shell. Not that they'd appreciate it anyways. Kimberly was part of the crowd that tended to sit alone at tables with their hoodies pulled over their eyes. She didn't exactly project an aura of friendly openess, especialy since she was wearing spiked boots today.

Then a small figure caught her eye. It was one of Bayview's tiny twins, the ones with the similar names who she could never keep straight no matter how often they were pointed out to her, moving towards a table, where she sat without seeming to acknowledge the people there. That meant that there was at least one table accepting anyone. Kimberly weaved through the milling students and plopped down across from the short girl, then glanced around the table at all the assembled students and said, "Hi."
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#3

Post by Rocky† »

Reika was busily eating her salad, quite possibly the only thing remotely food in her meal, although she would never touch the dressing, when the table was joined by a new student. She had seen her around before, but had never talked with her, mostly due to the fact they never really had a chance. She instinctively raised her head as she was greeted, a half-eaten piece of lettuce hanging out of her tiny mouth. With her slightly chubby cheeks and eyes that looked slightly bigger than they actually were through her glasses, it would probably make for a somewhat comical sight. Reika quickly finished chewing.

"Hello. I'm Reika. Not to be confused with my sister of course." She said with her usual crooked smile. This was her usual way of greeting people she just met. Sometimes she would joke with her sister they should wear name tags so people would stop confusing them.

Going back to her salad, she began picking out the different vegetables, trying to find one in particular. Lettuce, pepper, another pepper, more lettuce... realizing with a bit of disappointment she grabbed the one without carrots. Resigning herself to this fact, she speared a red pepper with her plastic fork, and popped it into her mouth, waiting to see if Kimberly would acknowledge her.
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#4

Post by MurderWeasel »

"Hi Reika," Kimberly responded, "I'm Kimberly."

Kimberly always liked chatting with people over lunch in the cafetorium, mostly because it was far too noisy to read. She was also genuinely interested in Reika; after all, the girl and her sister were one of the more unique pairs of Bayview students. Kimberly didn't even pay attention to the other students at the table, who returned the favor. She didn't care what boring people thought of her anyways.

"How're you doing today?" she asked, while pulling her lunch out of her backpack and setting it on the table. She took out the box containing her sandwiches, opened it, and removed the first, then took a bite. It was absolutely wonderful. As she chewed, she wondered about what life must be like with a twin. It was probably really annoying, actually. It meant always having to share everything, always being mistaken for someone else. Then again, it also meant always having someone to talk to, right? Someone who could at least usually be understanding, having faced the exact same problems.

Plus it meant the potential to be cast as creepy monsters in disguise in cheesy horror movies.
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#5

Post by Rocky† »

Reika finished chewing before replying. After all, it was rude to speak with your mouth full. "I'm doing alright, though this food is terrible. Maybe I should take your example next time." she said, before going back to her salad.

She put some lettuce in her mouth, then grabbed her milk. Cautiously opening the carton, Reika smelt the container, making sure it hadn't gone bad. She learned that lesson the hard way once, and was intent on not having it happen again. Deciding it was safe, she took a sip of the white substance. It was warm, but hadn't gone bad yet. Overall, her lunch hadn't been horrible, but she knew her stomach would be protesting at the poor treatment soon.

"How about you? How are you doing?" she finally said. Kimberly seemed friendly enough, and Reika was always up for a good conversation.
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#6

Post by MurderWeasel »

Reika commented about the quality of the cafeteria food, and Kimberly chuckled a little. She'd never heard of a school having good cafeteria food. It was the strangest thing, too, since almost everyone ate at a school cafeteria at some point in life. It seemed like people would remember how bad things were and, when they grew up and inherited positions of authority, change it. Apparently not, though. She figured it was probably hard to care too much about something suffered in the past.

"I'm doing well," she replied to Reika's inquiry. "I stayed up late last night reading, though, so I'm pretty tired today, and morning math class didn't help."

She took another couple of bites of her sandwich; unlike Reika, she paid no attention to whether she was talking with her mouth full. As long as she didn't spew crumbs, it didn't really matter, right?

"I'm really glad it's already lunch time, though," Kimberly continued, "I can't wait for today to be over."
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#7

Post by Rocky† »

Reika couldn't help but smile as Kimberly talked. Reika was quite possibly the only student in the school that actually liked school, at least that's how it seemed at times. Not that it particularly mattered weather or not others enjoyed it, she wasn't wasn't there to give people lectures about the importance of school and all that.

"Well, the end is just the beginning for me, so to speak." Reika said. "After school is usually just as busy for me as during school."

Reika finished up her milk, and sat there with an empty tray. Normally she would leave and get ready for her next class, but she was enjoying her conversation at the moment, so instead just stayed in her seat, looking at Kimberly.
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#8

Post by MurderWeasel »

"Wow," Kimberly said in reply to Reika's comment about her level of busyness, "That bites."

Kimberly didn't hate school, in fact, she put some work into it, a fact she kept very quiet because her friends weren't the sort who respected that kind of thing. Still, she would absolutely die without a pretty good amount of free time. As it was, she barely found time to do all her guitar practice and reading. She'd just started "The Stand", and hoped to have it finished before college, and since it was over a thousand pages and she tended not to read as much in the summer, that was a pretty tall order.

Having commented, Kimberly took her apple out of her bag and set it on the table. She then cut it with a plastic, disposable knife. She had a small swiss army knife in her pocket, but didn't take it out at school. She resented the sillier school rules, but wasn't willing to risk getting in trouble for carrying a "weapon" just to make cutting a piece of fruit easier.

Finally, after a little intense work, she had cut the apple into four rather sloppy pieces, and removed the seeds. She offered two of the pieces to Reika, as a sort of consolation; after all, the girl had been forced to eat the cafeteria food.

"Would you like some apple?"
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#9

Post by Tythanin† »

(Andrew Mitchell continued from Hunger Pangs.)

It had been a tough day for the young track runner, to say the least. He had overslept since the DS he had used as an alarm ran out of batteries in the middle of the night. It hadn't been too bad, after all he had set it for two hours before school so he could spend an hour jogging around the neighborhood, but it had still thrown him off. He had to run to school with a slice of buttered bread in his hand, too rushed to actually make a decent breakfast. He had made it in time for first period, at least, only to remember that he had forgotten his homework that was due. The teacher, Mrs. Collins (she was a nice one), let him turn it in tomorrow at a small penalty, for which he was grateful. Writing was easily his worst subject and he didn't want to lose any more points in that class.

Then in his math class, his mind had drifted to the new series of books he had been reading recently...a translated Chinese epic if he remembered correctly. It had taken one of his classmates to poke him in the head with her pencil for him to realize he was being called on to answer a problem. He had gotten it right, thankfully, but the snickers and disapproving gazes were embarrassing.

At least he was here at the cafeteria, ready to enjoy his mediocre lunch and dig in. Except he had gotten into the cafeteria too late, it seemed, and all the tables were taken by various groups and cliques. None of his friends seemed to be around so he couldn't just bum a seat off of them which...was unfortunate. 'Dammit...if I had just been watching the time at the library, I wouldn't be in this mess. Still, to think they had an old copy of a Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook. Now that was fun to read. What are they at right now anyway? 4th edition, right? I really should play a game of that someday, but 3.5e gestalt games are way too much fun.'

"Hey, move it!"

'What?' Andrew spun out of the way of a group of sports jocks, probably people on the football team or something. He wasn't sure. All he knew was that they were big, they looked angry, and they could probably pound on his thin frame. Quickly backing away, he decided to just bite the bullet and choose a random table. There was one with a pair of girls chatting with each other. That looked good enough. Hopefully they wouldn't try to shoo him away or anything...did they really do that?

'Now's a better time than never.' Andrew thought to himself as he sat down a little bit away, his cafeteria tray loaded down with some lukewarm spaghetti, a few rolls of bread, and a bottle of Pepsi. Giving a short nod to the two girls, he began to eat. The spaghetti was too salty and the bread was too hard, but who was he to complain? Food was food.

"Hey, you're Andrew, right? On the track team, right?" The girl in black asked, a little curiosity present in her dark-brown eyes. She shifted in her seat a bit, coming closer.

"Huh?" He looked at her, his fork frozen in mid-air as he watched the other girl. "Yeah, that's me. Did you want to speak to me about something?"

"Yeah, I saw you at the last track meet. You were an amazing sprinter! I was cheering for you all the way, you know."

"O-Oh, really?" He blushed, rubbing the back of his head. "I wasn't that good, really. I was just...in the zone, you know? I felt like I could win and so I did it. That doesn't sound too silly, does it? Hahaha...I guess it all comes from training and the support of my fellow teammates. I don't recall ever seeing you in the stands, though...wait, I didn't even run at the last track meet."


Andrew snapped out of his daydream, a faint smile on his lips which quickly turned into a frown. Had he really been smiling the whole time? 'Dammit, now those girls probably think I'm some sort of weirdo.'
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#10

Post by Rocky† »

Reika accepted the slices of apple, being one of her favorite kinds of fruit, second only to oranges. "Thank you." she said with a smile, before taking a big, well as big as she could manage with her tiny mouth, out of one of the pieces.

The apple was very sweet, if a little warm from being in Kimberly's bag all day. The freshness was a nice change from the stale food she had just eaten. Reika was happily eating her fruit when another person, male this time, came to the table. He looked slightly familiar, probably part of a sports team, though she couldn't quite place from which team.

"Hi," Reika said to the newcomer, who apparently didn't hear him at first.

A bemused look came across her face as she watched this strange student smile slightly for no real reason, then seem to snap out of it, his smile quickly vanishing. Trying to stifle a laugh, Reika took a bite of her apple, which turned out to be a bad idea. She inhaled too quickly, and the piece she had bitten off hit her in the back of the throat, causing her to go into a coughing fit. Now it was Reika's turn to look silly as she stretched her hands high above her head, opening up her airways to allow more air to pass through. Eventually the coughing subsided, and Reika let out a small giggle at how dumb she must have just looked. Oh well, awkward moments were a part of life.
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#11

Post by chitoryu12† »

((Chris continued from Pursuit and Retrieval))

Christopher Carlson was, as usual, happy that he had brought his lunch instead of standing in line to buy it. The lines were long, queue jumping was rife, and the food, while filling, was cheap, low-quality, mass produced crap.

Chris looked around, but couldn't find any of his friends in the thick, sweaty crowds. He just shrugged and sat at a table filled with students who were completely ignoring each other; apparently, they all had the same problem as him. He didn't know them, nor did he care to try and attach names to faces. He was perfectly content with eating.

He dropped his huge, heavy blue backpack under the table, put his blue vinyl lunchbox in front of him, and fished out a salami sandwich and can of Vanilla Coke, his favorite. He also had some snacks, including a bag of chips, at the bottom for snacking on the way home.

As the can opened with a hiss and pop, he pulled one of his various novels from his bag. Cirque du Freak 11: Lord of the Shadows. He had gotten into the series around Halloween, and was now a dedicated fan.

He flipped to the next part of the book and began to read.

I was very confused -- hatred for Steve, fear that I might become the monstrous Lord of the Shadows, the pain of the purge -- and in no mood to argue.
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#12

Post by MurderWeasel »

Reika accepted the apple, which was good. Kimberly hoped she enjoyed it.

Then another guys sat down at their table. Kimberly glanced at him, tried to place him. He had some simple, easy name. Those were always the hardest, though, since there was nothing really interesting about them. Still, she was sure she could get it in a couple of seconds, and he didn't seem to be leaping into conversation anyways. He was smiling sort weirdly, but that sure beat frowning and muttering.

As Reika greeted him the name clicked: Andrew. It wasn't much to go on, but it was a start. Besides, the worst thing that could happen was that he'd just sit there smiling all lunch and never say anything, and really, if he wanted to do that, Kimberly didn't give a damn. It was what the other people at the table seemed to be content with. Still, she smiled and said "Hi" too, just to be polite. If he ended up making her regret it, she could always just leave.

Kimberly dug her cookie out of her bag, next. It wasn't very big, certainly not big enough to split up, so she just ate it quietly. There didn't seem to be all that much to say. Glancing around, she noticed a boy reading. Maybe he had the right idea. Maybe it was worth learning to read even with background noise.

"So, how's your day going?" Kimberly asked no one in particular, hoping to spark a bit more discussion.
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#13

Post by Tythanin† »

Oh good, they weren't laughing at him. That was encouraging. Andrew gave the two girls a small nod and a returned "Hi" before returning to his food, stuffing another bite of spaghetti into his mouth. Now that he had taken at least ten bites of the stuff, it really wasn't that bad. Just salty...people liked salty, right? He was just beginning to ponder that when a newcomer came to their table, sat down, and promptly began setting up his food and reading a book. Andrew didn't mind. It's not like he was interrupting anything and by god people should be able to read wherever they wanted.

'Oh right, my pills.' He thought to himself as he brought out a small vial from his backpack, dropping a single white tablet onto his palm. Popping it into his mouth, he swallowed it with a big gulp of soda. 'Good thing I didn't forget about that.'

"So, how's your day going?"

"Huh?" Andrew looked up from his food, surprised that someone was actually trying to make conversation. Still, he'd oblige. It was too late in the year to really make friends, but simply talking and getting to know each other a little wouldn't be that bad. He gave the girl a small grin. "My day's been pretty shitty so far, but things might be looking up soon. Um...sorry for asking, but can I have your name? I recognize you...a little, but the name escapes me. I just think it's rude to talk to someone without knowing their name or something like that. I should probably say mine first...um, Andrew Mitchell. Nice to meet you."
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#14

Post by chitoryu12† »

Chris finally managed to wrap up his book. He didn't have long to go, so it took him only about five minutes to get to the end. The ending was a bit surprising, but Darren Shan liked to pull plot twists at the end of almost every book in the series. May as well have kept to the status quo, eh?

He tossed the book back in his bag and took the last bite of his sandwich. He was a bit tired of salami, as he had been eating it for about a week, but still better than the school's pizza, which was almost like a greasy tire slathered in cheese. The only good thing about school food was the fries. He once actually saw someone offered a tray of the golden strips in return for giving the answers to a test. Chris swore they put heroin or something in them.

As he balled up the crumb-filled ziplock bag to throw away, he heard someone shout "Watch out!"

Chris glanced off to the side, half-listening, and saw something small and orange whizzing toward him. His reflexes surprised even himself, and his head went down so fast it banged against the table. Ow.

The action was unnecessary, as the flying tangerine was about half a foot from his head anyway. He looked up in time to see it skip off a table, narrowly missing a boy holding a small pill bottle, and bounce along the ground. There were several screams from the more excitable girls, along with a great deal of shouting and laughter.

Chris looked down the table to see several guys at the end laughing uproariously at the flying fruit. He glared at them; what if it had hit someone in the face? What if it had hit him?

Chris looked over at the table the tangerine bounced off of. "Sorry!" he shouted. "I swear, I didn't throw that! It was those dudes!" jerking his thumb behind him.
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#15

Post by Rocky† »

Reika was more than happy that people were talking, it made lunch seem alot less boring, and as always, she seemed to have collected a bit of a rag tag group, people you wouldn't normally see converse. That was the nature of lunch it seemed. It was the one time during the day where people could forget about their cliques and groups and what have you, and just talk to people like a normal human being. Kimberly was talking to Andrew, who had asked for their names, a natural step in a conversation.

"I'm Reika. Not to be confused with my sister." Again, same line, different person. One of these days she was just going to make a shirt.

Her attention was then drawn by a rather audible bang from the table, just in time to see a piece fruit flying through the air, and another one of the boys who joined their table rubbing his head. Reika thought at first that the fruit had hit him, but considering that it had been moving in a direction that would contradict that, she came to the conclusion he hit his head on something else.

"Are you OK?" she asked the boy with the concern of a mother who had just seen their child trip and fall, which may or may not come off as slightly odd, considering that the two were complete strangers.
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