[Davison/OPEN] A party...

[Fenrir]

((OOC: Oh, that’s a lot to catch up on… you take your eyes of a thread for one minute (several months) and this happens))

Since they had been dating all of a couple of days and that this was really only the second time they had met – they hadn’t even had a first date yet unless this counted – Shawn was discovering new things about his girlfriend all the while they spent time together, and he hoped this would continue throughout the night.

The first thing he had found out about Anastasia so far? Other than the fact she looked amazing in red? He had a hard time keeping up with her.

That, or maybe the situation was just moving faster than normal. With seemingly no intervening time between his suggestion of heading to the kitchen to meet her friends and them being there he was being introduced as Anastasia’s “boyfriend”. That took him kind of by surprise by itself; not that he didn’t think they were dating but, it was nice to hear her say it.

Shawn looked around at the assembled party guests, hoping to see somebody he knew already or someone he could get along with. As much as he wanted to he couldn’t just spend the whole night with Anastasia, he had to give her time to be a good host as she said and he did want to make an attempt at making her friends his friends, if only to make the act of dating her easier.

Looking around the room he could see he was right in his earlier guess that not many people had turned up; there was Sebastien of course, probably best to avoid him if he could. There was Will whatshisname, good guy, but friends with Sebastien so probably not many chances to talk to one without the other would come up. A possibility though.

There was also Lisa… whatshername. Shawn had a passing acquaintance with her, as in she occupied the admittedly small pool of girls who fell between the categories of ‘no idea who she is’ and ‘hit on her/dated her, didn’t work out’. If he had to guess she was the one who had cried out about boats or ships earlier; she had always seemed like the quirky type. He could see why she and Anastasia were friends.

He might be able to talk to her at some point, maybe get to know Anastasia a little better in the process of making a new friend. He would just have to try and remember how to talk to girls without flirting with them.

Just pretend she’s like your sister, only less antagonistic.

Then there was Lu-SHIT. Lucia. Oh, she was maybe the worst person who could be at this party; excepting maybe one or two others. It wasn’t that Shawn had anything against Lucia, quite the opposite she seemed like the kind of person he would want to get to know. It was just that there was that incident… when he had tried to ask her out when she first came to the school… only she hadn’t quite grasped the language yet so… some of his flirting got lost in translation… very lost.

It hadn’t gone well. It had been ugly. Shawn regretted that day ever since, the way he had handled things hadn’t been the best. He had considered apologising a couple of times afterward, but she had seemed to go out of her way to avoid him since then and he had left it alone.

In any case there’s was the kind of dynamic where knowing they were in the same room, the same building, could ruin both of their evenings and probably the evenings of whoever was around them as they purposely avoided each other.

So, yeah.

Shawn was just about to introduce himself to the group when several things happened in succession that just distracted him. First of all a new party guest arrived – Chris… something. Another member of the whatshisname family – with a literal bang as he collided with the doorframe in his haste. He seemed ok though, with no permanent harm. Then Anastasia started talking; possible random blackouts, no parents or sibling in the house, free food. Some of that was more alarming than the rest, but before Shawn had a chance to ask about any of it Sebastien got there first, revealing in the process that Anastasia had apparent hurt her ankle at some point.

That was news to Shawn, he frowned and looked down. Was she limping earlier? He hadn’t noticed. But before Shawn could ask about THAT, there was another distraction.

"I must poo," and there Lisa went, with what must have been the bluntest statement of purpose that Shawn had ever heard.

After that, everyone sort of went their own way, leaving Shawn with not much to do.


Shawn spent the next indeterminate amount of time trying to get into the party spirit; eating, drinking, being mostly merry, but there wasn’t much he could do in such an environment with such limited social potential. Will had disappeared sometime after Lisa and hadn’t reappeared. Lisa, thankfully, had reappeared so nobody had to spend any time wondering what was taking so long and why, with any mental pictures that might come with that.

Damn that girl and her brutal honesty.

He flitted about where he could, talking here, joking there, but with him purposely trying to avoid a third of the party guests he could only do so much. This led him to the present, leaning against the kitchen counter with a cup of the god-awful, both in name and flavour, SOTF Drink in one hand and the other tracing the outline of the playing cards in his pocket.

Too soon to break out the magic tricks? Yes, too soon to break out the magic tricks. No-one is near enough drunk for that yet. Magic was always more impressive when you were drunk; even more so if the performer was drunk.

Looking around the room there didn’t seem to be anyone around either, so he got up and took a walk around the house. If nothing else he could explore while he looked for someone. Unfortunately, the first person he bumped into was not Anastasia, Lisa, or even Sebastien, but Lucia. He stopped in his tracks, debating whether he should just turn around and walk away or just carry on past her… neither of which seemed like very nice things to do.

After a couple of seconds he’d made his mind up. Had to do this at some point, why not now? He let out a sigh and walked up to Lucia.

“Hey.”

[backslash]

Sebastien sighed as Will gushed at him. Yep, definitely playing designated driver tonight.

He dug his phone out of his pocket and made a note to himself of who all would need rides. Will's name went at the top of the list, of course.

Hm... did anyone else actually drive? He'd been one of the first ones there, and he hadn't really bothered to look outside since then. He didn't know where most of these people lived, either. His parents probably wouldn't mind one or two kids crashing in their living room overnight, but five or six would be a bit much.

Then again, I can barely get straight answers out of them when they're sober. Good luck getting coherent directions to someone's house when they're drunk.

Sebastien stuck his phone back in his pocket and turned back to Will - wait shit where did Will go?

"...Will?" Sebastien glanced around, not discounting the possibility that he might be waiting to pop out of a cabinet somewhere.

"...Dammit." Ugh, it's way too early to be chasing drunk people around.

[Lord_Shadow]

"What the hell just happened?" Amelia-Marie asked no one in particular. She expected the usual actions of people older than her. Instead she was privy to that. And before she went in she was pretty sure someone stumbled their way outside and into the night. Sister must've broken out the drinks quicker than expected. And it didn't seem on the parent-understood moderation.

More ammunition to use against her, or more bribery. Either was fine. Her party was lame anyway. Not like a few drunks could make it any worse. If this is what she had to look forward to a few years from now, then it was even more pointless and stupid than she imagined.

When she was back inside she made her way to the basement to wait for the blackout. Realistic but fake weaponry, chloroform rag sans chloroform for effect. Psychotic killer persona channeled and ready. Ana's party may have been dumb and stupid, and this plan was even stupider. But at least she would have some fun screwing with High School Juniors. Make a middle schooler's day.

---

So this was a disaster. The worst thing of all was that it was all her fault. Boring party, boring food, no drugs, injury, massive failure to indicate time, tiny attendance. AND GODDAMMIT TONY WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU? So when she had a chance after the awkward chuckling at her not joke, she went straight for the alchol cabinet. Grabbed a bottle and just drank. Fuck cups, fuck reading the label.

Somehow she didn't immediately regret that. No, for now it was all good. She took a few swigs every now and then, made her way back to the others. Will was gone, no idea where he went. Lucia was with Shawn. Lisa was back from purgatory. Seb was still... off. Anti-happiness detected. Happiness production protocols engaged.

"So Seb, tell me something doc. Alcohol numbs people mmrite? Ergo, downing this bottle like it's water should help me ignore bruised ankle. Hrmm, how much booze do you need to ignore what seems to be ailing you?" She smiled. Feeling a lot happoier about all this herself. Good drink; doing it's job.

"Wh- Why you seem so down. Don't like my party? Don't enjoy the tiny crowd? What's the dealz Doc?"

Maybe he was the reason it was going so bad. Ever since her sorceror showed, Herr Doktor was just kinda exuding negative energy. What was that all about?

[Pippi]

Things had very quickly gone south. That was a phrase Lucia’s dad said quite a lot, apparently having picked it up off of a student of his. Lucia hadn’t understood it at all at first. Things never went south when the phrase was mentioned; they stayed in the same place. Gradually, she’d worked out that it simply meant things had gone bad, just like saying that things had gone downhill.

Wallflower. That was another phrase Lucia had heard often and still didn’t completely understand. She guessed it would accurately describe her right now, though. Standing off to one side in a big, new house with a drink secured in both hands? Yes, that sounded about right. She knew people here, and she thought everything would turn out alright because of it, but everyone seemed to be preoccupied. Sebastien was currently being talked to by Anastasia, Lisa was flitting about somewhere, and Will... where on earth had Will gotten to? Lucia sighed, took a sip of her drink, and waited for something to happen.

As soon as she heard the voice directed at her, Lucia’s heart sank. She looked to the side, and sure enough, there was Shawn, trying to talk to her. Lucia hated herself for thinking it, but she couldn’t help wondering whether Shawn was planning something. It was a stupid idea; he was going out with Anastasia right now, wasn’t he? But the sight of Shawn just brought forth bad memories. Still, she couldn’t just walk off now, not after he’d initiated the conversation.

“O-oh... Shawn. Um... hello...”

Sometimes you just had to grin and bear it. Another phrase she’d learnt.

[backslash]

And then just like that, he was being mobbed by Ana. Sebastien just sort of blinked at her for a moment while his mind caught up with her barrage of questions.

"I- no, there's nothing wrong with the party. The party's great." He wasn't very convincing, but he continued talking before Ana could call him out on it. "I was just looking for Will. He had a drink and then just sort of... disappeared."

Sebastien rubbed the back of his neck and glanced around once more, just in case Will decided to jump out of nowhere. No such luck. Ana had him on the spot.

"Um, if you're going to really drink all of that, you should make sure to drink plenty of water too. And don't run around too much even if it makes you feel better, your ankle's still hurt." He had some success returning Ana's smile. "Nothing's ailing me, I don't need a drink. I drove here anyway."

[Lord_Shadow]

"Are you suuuure?" She asked. "Because I think you have something you want to say, but are too shy to say it." She grinned, took another swig, and came closer to him. "What is it? What do you want to say to me?"

Anastasia could feel her frustration fading away. Man she felt good right now. Extremely good, in fact. So much so that she wanted everyone to feel this way. And none more so right now than S-Bast over here.

"Whatzit gonna take to loosen you up? C'mon, live a little. Have some fun. Go crazy!"

Fix him up and get him to go wild, and maybe this can all be salvaged. Maybe.

[backslash]

"Heh. Go crazy in what way?" Sebastien blatantly dodged Ana's first question as she closed in on him. Aaaand there goes my personal space.

Ana seemed distinctly more bubbly than she had a few minutes ago, and Sebastien had to wonder just what was in those drinks. This was concerning.

"You're not saying that you threw this party just for me, are you?" Ana ought to get brownie points just for being a good sport about his sad, sad attempts at humor. "Your boyfriend... I mean Shawn, might have a problem with that."

[Lord_Shadow]

Anastasia grinned and leaned in to whisper into Sebastien's ear. "What? Don't believe in polyamory?" She giggled as she drew back. The Doctor was right of course, Shawn might not approve. But it wasn't like they were established right? Boyfriend was just a descriptor at this point. What was the harm in having some fun on the side?

Damn, whatever she was drinking was in-fucking-credible. Entertaining these thoughts would have been so much more difficult otherwise. And more panic inducing. Like Panic Attack. Good song, old song. Long, but cool.

She pushed away from Seb a little. Tried to play it cool. Emphasis on play. He was fun to play around with. His reactions to her actions always brought her smiles. "Well, 's not like I threw it just for you. I'm here to service everyone!" She waved her arms in the air.

"You must have something you want to do. I'm a happiness ambassador remember. So..." She locked eyes with him. "What can I do to make you happy."

[backslash]

Oh god oh god oh god oh god oh god oh god-

Sebastien didn't need a reflective surface to know that he was well on his way to scarlet all the way up to his ears. He was experiencing a feeling similar to when you come down a flight of stairs and expect there to be one more step than there actually is; off-balance and like he was probably about to hit his head on something. How exactly did one go about responding to a girl who possibly just suggested that you be her side piece?

He needed backup. Better yet, he needed an out, so he could find somewhere to hide for a couple days or so until he and Ana could have a nice, sober conversation, possibly with some Fire Emblem or something thrown in to distract them. It was so much easier to have a cool head under pressure when you were guiding a fictional army than when confronted with a tipsy girl.

"I- I should... mymomneedsthecar." Sebastien babbled. "I... yeah. It's getting sort of late. My mom's on call, she might need the car in a hurry." He straightened up and took a deep breath to try and regain his composure.

He placed his hands on Ana's shoulders, trying to steady both of them. "What you can do for me is have a good time at the rest of your party, and be safe. Okay? We can talk about... things, sometime when you're not so busy." He gave Ana's shoulders a brief squeeze. "Don't beat yourself up, okay? The party was great."

Sebastien stepped back, edging around Ana and towards the door. "I'll see you in school, then." He made his escape.

((Sebastien Bellamy continued in Glamazon))

[Lord_Shadow]

Sebastien blurted out something or other about a car and some shit. Not important. What was important was him grabbing her shoulders. She tuned out everything but that wonderful feeling, closed her eyes, and readied herself.

Instead of going in for a kiss, Seb left her there, promising to talk about things later. He hastily made his exit. Ana opened her eyes and blinked in confusion. She started to get angry, narrowing her eyes. Why would he just leave when they were so close to—

And then the thought came. She just tried to cheat on Shawn, with him right there in the house. Her eyes went wide, and she stumbled. She held out her hand to the wall for support. The glass bottle shattered on the ground, having been let go to free that hand.

Ana laughed nervously. "Oh my god. I'm a horrible person." She hadn't mentioned her views on exclusivity to him. So, regardless of her views and feelings, this was essentially cheating. Attempted. F—

She needed an out. Oh yes. Blackout.

"Nox Ex Machina!" And with that she rushed to the rigged switch and cut the lights.

---

And the lights finally went out. About time Sis. Boredom was almost to the point where literally stabbing people was starting to sound good.

[CondorTalon]

Um...

Maybe Christopher had come in at a bad time...?

He looked around at the party, noting everything that was going on, and kinda

sorta

maybe he should leave?

Things didn't look like they were so well... dammit, why had Christopher even come, then? He wanted to have fun, but right now this was looking more and more perilous by the second. Christopher debated maybe getting out when he heard the glass shatter.

He whipped his head to see Anastasia leaning against the wall, with the broken bottle around her feet.

"H-hey, are you... can somebody-" he didn't manage to finish before Ana shouted something and turned the lights off.

"What the f-"

He had no idea what was happening anymore.

Also, his head still hurt.

[Fenrir]

Shawn liked to think of himself as likeable. He liked to think that he was the sort of person people just took to and a lot of past experience had led him to believe this was the case. He was forward, confident, people liked that; perhaps he was overconfident but it hadn’t come back to bite him as much as it maybe should have.

It sounded arrogant but when he met a new person he just expected to be liked.

Lucia hadn’t liked him. She seemed like a shy girl naturally and his forwardness had probably made her uncomfortable. On top of that the language barrier had meant that some of what he had said hadn’t made sense to her and he had probably come off sounding more than a little weird.

Worst of all though, was the fact that he hadn’t noticed any of this, he hadn’t seen how uncomfortable or confused she was at the time and had just kept on going regardless. In the end he got the feeling that he had probably scared the girl more than anything else. Not the best first week at a new school.

Time didn’t seem to have made things any better and even now she didn’t look all too comfortable to be alone with him.

“So… where did everyone else disappear to? I don’t think I’ve seen Anastasia anywhere in the last hour or so.”

He was picking his words carefully, but he also wasn’t saying what he wanted to. He was beating around the bush and not getting to the matter he wanted to talk about.

“I’m surprised there aren’t more people here by now. From what I heard Anastasia invited just about everyone in school. I’m surprised to see you here too; I don’t think I’ve seen you at any other party before.”

Shawn wasn’t really sure how to go about talking to Lucia, but he was fairly sure calling her unsociable wasn’t helping in his attempts to patch things up with her.

“Urm… we haven’t really spoken since that first time we met. I never got a chance to… apologise...”

[Pippi]

Lucia didn’t want to maintain eye contact with Shawn if she could avoid it. But alternating between staring down at the floor and the contents of her cup didn’t exactly give off a good impression, either. There was some bile desire to hear what exactly Shawn had to say, but Lucia felt as awkward as she always did when he was in the vicinity. Her eyes flickered from floor, to Shawn, to cup and then back to floor, hoping this would either be brief, or... well, less terrifying than last time would be a decent start.

Shawn started off by asking where Anastasia and everyone else was. Lucia wished she could have answered the majority of his question, but she had as little a clue as Shawn did. Everyone seemed to have just disappeared, leaving her on her own, stuck to the wall. She did know where Anastasia was... or had been, the last time Lucia had seen her.

Before Lucia could reply, however, Shawn had started speaking again, questioning the sheer lack of people at the party. Again, Lucia had no real answer for that, but she did wish more people had come, especially if Lucia had invited as many people as possible. She worked better in groups, she felt. Plus, it had meant there was a greater chance of there being people she knew here. It was a little late for wishful thinking, though. The ‘unsociable’ implication hardly bothered Lucia; she knew she wasn’t the sort of person who regularly went to parties. It had just seemed rude to turn Anastasia’s invitation down.

Then Shawn mentioned that he wanted to apologise, and Lucia finally made eye contact with him. After all this time, Lucia hadn’t thought he’d cared about that. She’d sort of built up an image of him in her head, of someone who just moved on to the next girl with nary a care in the world. Maybe if she hadn’t avoided him ever since their first encounter, then she’d have known more about him...

“Um... well, um... I...” Lucia stuttered, slipping up on her words. She took a sip from her cup, using the pause as an opportunity to start her sentence over from scratch.

“Well, um... to answer your first question... I do not know. I have not seen Will and Lisa for a while... although I saw Anastasia speaking with Sebastien recently... I think...”

Lucia ran a hand through her hair, her earrings lightly swaying as she brushed past them.

“And... no. We haven’t really spoken... I’m sorry. I never tried to get to know you better, even after my English had improved, and...”

Wait. Why was she apologising? She hadn’t done anything wrong, aside from avoiding Shawn, but her actions were understandable, right? Lucia took another sip, this time to stop herself from saying anything else unnecessary.

[Fenrir]

Nervousness when talking to a girl wasn’t something that had really plagued Shawn since he had got over the whole puberty thing. But he had to admit that talking to Lucia right now – well, mainly the fact that she wasn’t talking back – was nerve-racking.

That probably had something to do with the fact that there was more at stake here than just a potential date. He wasn’t looking for dinner and a movie here, he was looking for forgiveness. He felt guilty about how he had acted that first time he and Lucia had met, it was a particularly big black mark in his past as far as he was concerned and making up with her now would lift a noticeable weight from his otherwise carefree shoulders.

If he was looking to make up with Lucia though, it wasn’t looking good for him right now; Lucia wasn’t even looking him in the eye. Not in the ‘too shy to make eye contact’ way either, her eyes were darting from him to the floor to the cup in her hands and everything else in between.

But then he had apparently said the magic words. As soon as he said the word apology she was looking him in the eye and Shawn let out a little mental sigh of relief as this sigh on progress. Whether it was progress in the right direction remained to be seen, but at least this was going somewhere.

With the first obstacle apparently breached Lucia answered all rambling questions in turn. He’d was a little… not exactly surprised, but uneasy to hear that Anastasia was apparently talking alone with Sebastien earlier and maybe still now. He still didn’t know what relationship there was between those two; Anastasia and Sebastien being alone could be nothing or it could be something he should worry about. Either way it would have to wait for a while first.

Then Lucia was actually apologising to him. She said she was sorry for not trying to get to know him, until apparently catching on to the ridiculousness of what she was doing and stopping herself.

“Trust me, you really don’t need to apologise to me. It was my fault; I didn’t make a good first impression, a really terrible one actually, and… I know what people say about me. I don’t blame you for avoiding me.”

There was a silence of a couple of seconds that could probably have been called awkward without anyone objecting, before Shawn spoke again.

“I’d like a second chance to get to know you, if you’d let me.”

[Lord_Shadow]

((Well this scene escaped me. Apologies for lack of direction.))

On cue, the lights in the entire building turned off. The middle school girl, her eyes already accustomed to the level of darkness from staying in the unlit basement all this time, readied her tools. She crept up the stairs, and slowly opened the door. It creaked loudly, setting the mood for the rest of the affair.

---

"Crap! This isn't any better." Now she couldn't see. And she wasn't in position for the plan. Dammit. Ames would definitely not know that. She was probably already going for it. Ana hobbled her way over to the basement.

At least she thought she was heading that way. Hard to tell in the dark, and with the wobbling room. Maybe if she stopped wobbling, the room would follow suit?

She stumbled her way around. "Dark, dark, dark. Why does darkness have to be so dark." She remembered the broken bottle. Well, hopefully no one would step around there.

---

"Death approaches." Amelia-Marie hissed softly. This was stupid of course, but if it worked like her sister said it would, then she would get to see older kids react even more stupidly. That lifted her spirits about the situation.