Currently the moon is in the waning Crescent Moon phase (39% full).
It is currently 23:44 Pacific Time on Sat Jul 14 2001.
Currently in Saint Claire, it is mostly sunny today. The temperature is 73 degrees Fahrenheit (22 degrees Celsius). The wind is currently coming in from the north at 7 mph. The barometric pressure reading is 30.03 and falling, and the relative humidity is 41 percent. The dewpoint is 48 degrees Fahrenheit (8 degrees Celsius.)
Sophia's Apartment(#4128RAJ$)
Small, bare, and uninviting, this little apartment is clearly not the dwelling of a homebody, nor of a person accustomed to entertaining. The sitting area has only bright white plastic lawn furniture that looks as if it might have been manufactured by Tupperware. Makeshift shelves of cinderblocks and 1"X8" boards bow with the weight of scores of books. Titles like "Rescuing the Bible From Middle America" or "Zarathustra: Modernism in Antiquity" can be seen here, along with dozens of dime-store paperbacks.
The kitchen looks as if it might never have been cooked in. A small microwave on the counter is still blinking "12:00", no one having bothered to set the clock. Beside it is an electric can opener. The only evidence of use is a single glass in the stainless steel sink and a few fast-food bags in the trashcan. The sole decoration on the refrigerator is a postcard bearing a photograph of a monstrous, grimy power plant with "Come to Hanford!" printed on the bottom in fluorescent green.
Through a door opposite the kitchen, the tiny bedroom looks slightly more lived-in. On top of a black particle-board dresser sit a hairbrush, a few hair-ties, and several plastic hairclips, along with a small pile of cheap costume jewelry. A frame designed to hold several of snapshots is hung squarely on the wall. The small writing table is bare, nothing on top, nothing inside. The bed is made, a bright yellow bedspread bravely trying to cheer up the room.
Sophia sits in her apartment, tapping her feet. "C'mon John, pick up the phone," she says to no one in particular. She runs a hand through her hair, trying to get it out from between her ear and the phone, which is ringing.
Sophia says "It's me, Sophia. Look, I don't mean to nag, it's not my place. But I've been worried about you. I didn't hear you come in last night. Are you still upset with me?"
Sophia says "John, you... you don't sound like yourself. Why would I need to teach them the litany? I thought you didn't want me to... um... No. There's nothing I needed, but John... are you in trouble or something? I could call the others for you, or if you don't want them to know, I'll come out myself..."
Sophia frowns. "John, if you're so busy, why... are you /drinking/? I don't understand."
Sophia sighs into the phone. "Alright, but look. I'm not as defenseless as you think I am. You need help, please, /please/, fucking call me. And if you don't need help, give a cub a call! I'll talk to you later."
Dizzy comes in to the living room, recently dressed from a shower, a towel rapped around her head. "Who're you talking to Sophia? We have guests?"
Dizzy glances at the phone and silently ohs.
Just as Dizzy comes in, Sophia is hanging up the phone. "No, I was talking to John. He's been gone since our fight yesterday."
Dizzy tilts her head slightly to the side, "Been gone? Does he stay around here too?"
Sophia lowers her eyebrows and nods like she can't believe Dizzy didn't know. "Oh yeah. His apartment is just down the hall. Didn't you know that? Well anyway, he didn't come home last night. And I know he didn't, because I was listening for him, hoping to talk to him about something he said. And apparently no one has seen him today, either."
"I heard you ask if he's drinking," Dizzy notes, gesturing to the phone. "Is he getting himself into trouble?"
Sophia nods. "Not that he admitted it, but yeah, he is. I'm almost sure I heard him take a swig while he was talking to me."
Dizzy frowns and walks over to the kitchen, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but wandering around town drunk sounds like a bad idea for an angry garou-type guy, right?"
Sophia shrugs. "He's not drunk. The only reason it worries me that he's drinking is, it means he's doing something that makes him nervous. And he's not the jittery type, if you noticed."
Dizzy shakes her head, "Nope, he seems to be more the perpetually angry type." She spins and opens the fridge. Looking in she adds, "He's a big angry type, you guys have a fight, slaps you around, goes out drinking, stays out and doesn't come home." She peers out, "Sounds like a domestic dispute. You want some milk?"
Sophia laughs grimly. "It does, doesn't it. Yeah, sure. Milk would be great." She walks into the kitchen with Dizzy, getting a glass out for herself. "Only it's not. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm not about to go hunt him down. Only it's not because I don't think it's a big deal. It's because I'm pretty sure I'll sleep better tonight if I don't know what crazy thing he's off doing."
Dizzy nods her head. She's heard enough. Typical wife-of-a-drunken-lout response. She sets the carton on the counter and takes the top off. "Is this also typical garou society behavior?" she asks, looking straight in her roommate's eyes with a quizzical stare.
There's a light knocking on the door from outside.
Sophia gives Dizzy a sideways look that says /Who the hell could that be?/ She leaves her glass in the kitchen and heads to the door, looking out the peephole. "It's just Jeremy." she tells Dizzy, unlocking and then opening the door.
Dizzy sighs and pours both glasses of milk. "Well, let him in then. Maybe he can talk sense into you."
"... I'm usually not the best person for advice." The young man softly mummurs as he adjusts his glasses, carrying a new laptop bag at his side. He looks to be in full techno geek effect tonight. Cell phone and Palm attached to his belt.
Sophia shuts the door behind him and walks back into the kitchen. "You want some milk, Jeremy?" she calls over her shoulder. When she gets to the kitchen she gives Dizzy a /look/.
Dizzy hands Sophia a glass and takes the other for herself, asking Jeremy, "How long have you known about garou Jer?"
"Since ah' was six." The kin mummurs as he takes a seat on the floor, minding of the devices attached to him. "And I'm eighteen now. I was clued really young."
Sophia takes her glass into the living room, settling down in one of the lawn chairs, waiting to see where Dizzy is going with this.
Dizzy nods, and continues the questions, "Okay, and do garou generally go around beating up cubs for something that was obviously another cubs fault?"
"Garou don't need a reason to beat anyone up, they just do it because they know you'll heal in a few minutes anyways." Jeremy takes out his palm and starts to click away at it. "It depends on how the Elder sees it I suposse. You piss one off enough and they'll hit you for just breathing weird."
Sophia nods at Jeremy's words. "He didn't hit me because you were a jerk. He hit me for saying so."
Jeremy blink sonce. "... who was a jerk?"
Rolling her eyes, Dizzy tries a different approach, "Okay, Jer. Say there is a woman and a man. They get in a fight, the man hits the woman, leaves, doesn't come home, goes out drinking, and the woman sits at home and sulks. Are these two people married?"
Sophia points at Dizzy in answer to Jeremy's question. "Threw a drink on a Cliath for dressing wrong." She's not angry about it, it's a simple matter of fact.
Jeremy shrugs his shoulders. "No.. I wouldn't think so. Maybe the guy was the woman's brother and they live together. Or perhaps they are room mates.. an um... You did?" He blinks at Dizzy, raising a brow. "Why the hell did you do that for? You are lucky you are still alive."
Dizzy takes a drink of her milk, sets it down and shrugs, "Even though I probably shouldn't have done it, she still deserved it. And when I saw her today, low and behold, she was dressed in more acceptable attire. Isn't that my job? See a wrong, teach a lesson?"
Sophia glances at Dizzy, exhales hard, and turns back to Jeremy. "I'm sure you'd probably like to know what we're really talking about, right?"
"No, that'd be the job of a half moon, and I don't believe there is anything wrong in the way people are dressed, or I would be in jail years ago for my horrible fashion statement." Jeremy says, motioning to the pair of slacks he wears and a microsoft shirt. "But yes, I would like to know what is going on, that is, if I'm allowed to know."
"I just think," Dizzy says, "That young women should not dress _and act_ like they are trying to turn a trick."
Sophia reacts to the words as if shaking off a slap to the cheek. "I'd let Dizzy tell you what happened, but she'd squirm out of it. From what I understand, she got pissed off at that Child of Gaia who healed Rina, Alicia, the one who just made Cliath. For not wearing quite enough, apparently. So she threw a drink on her. Am I right so far, Diz?"
Dizzy nods and takes another drink of milk, Sophia is telling it as well as she would have.
Jeremy glances to Sophia and Dizzy and shrugs. "Who doesn't dress like that these days? Look at.. Britney Spears.. or well." He pauses in thought. "Just anyone in general. Its just the style ya'know? Skin is the thing these days I guess. Everyone has to feel attractive 'some' how."
Sophia takes a sip, careful not to leave a milk moustache. "Anyway, so I guess Alicia didn't do anything about it. So Dizzy comes home, and while I'm busy bitching her out for a totally separate thing, which," she glances at Dizzy, "I apologize for, by the way, it comes out that she's done this. Now, I consider Alicia a friend, and all of this doesn't sit too well with me, right? So I'm having to dig my fingernails into my hands to remind myself not to slap Diz, when lo and behold, guess who shows up."
Dizzy comes out from the kitchen area and rather than sit in a chair, she just stands, leaning up against the wall. "Yeah, and bridge-jumping is in style too. Everyone is doing it," she says facetiously.
Glancing between each girl, Jeremy turns his attention back on Sophia as he listens, tappin away a few things into the palm device.
Sophia pops her neck absent-mindedly. "It's Alicia. I shouldn't have even let her in. But part of me was hoping she'd come to make Diz answer for what she'd done, so I opened the door, like a friggin' idiot, and tell Diz that someone's here to see her. And of course /Alicia/," Sophia's tone is angry now, remembering the day before, "...just wants to have a nice little chat. What a let-down. So I'm trying to stay out of their shit, and Dizzy's trying become part of the couch, when John comes in. Just long enough to hear me arguing with Dizzy over whether a person has the right to dress like they please, and whether being young is the same as being foolish."
Jeremy nods his head as he listens, then taps another two keys on his palm, placing it off to the side.
Dizzy just listens, drinking. Milk, it does a body good. In doing so she learns something she didn't expect. Alicia is a pacifist? Are garou allowed to do that?
Jeremy tilts his head a bit. ".. Well.. She is a Child of Gaia.." He points out like you said. "They don't tend to physcially punish their cubs, or other cubs. It is just not their way."
Sophia glances at Dizzy to make sure she's telling the story right. "Ok. So all this passes on without incident, and we come up here to put a second bed in. Dizzy goes off to run some errands, which pisses me off, but that's a whole other story. Ok. So it's just me and John, and he's watching while I'm getting the room set up. And I'm just talking, to him, no big deal."
Dizzy gives a nod to her roommate, the story meshes with what she knows.
Jeremy continues to simply listen without interjection.
Sophia blows a stray hair out of her face and continues, mimicking John where appropriate with raised shoulders and a low, gruff, almost dopey voice. "I tell him the cubs are going to drive me nuts, and he's all 'Did you join my rank while I wasn't looking?' And I'm all, 'No, but I bet you won't be looking when it does happen. And if it weren't for the other cubs, I don't think I'd care how soon I rited.' He raises his hand like he's gonna backhand me, and tells me 'Don't you /dare/ say that.' and I'm like totally clueless as to what he's talking about, so I say 'Ok, what shouldn't I say?'"
Dizzy winces, scrunching up her face. She knows what is comming and doesn't like it. Garou or not, this is _wrong_.
Sophia raises an eyebrow at Dizzy, not seeing what the big deal is. "He tells me no one is more concerned about my Rite than he is, and that he's holding me back because of the way I treat the cubs. Which is just one more thing I really don't understand, because he didn't see me griping at Dizzy, and I can't imagine what exactly I did to the cubs around him that was cruel or petty. But anyway. He says Dizzy is an adult now, and that it's not my place to teach her stuff or correct her mistakes. So I tell him Ok, I'll stay out of Dizzy's shit, cuz, ya'know, she is a lot older than me and everything. But then I tell him," She looks apologetically at Dizzy now, "I tell him that just him saying she's an adult doesn't mean it's the truth. And then he /does/ smack me. Not with a closed fist or anything. It sent me across the room, but that's only because I had improper stance, wasn't balanced."
Dizzy nods with closed eyes, sympathetically accepting the apology. She understands where Sophia was coming from on that one.
Jeremy raises a brow at that and frowns. "Honestly.. " He trails off with a shrug. "In our soceity, Dizzy is /not/ an adult. I'm not sure where John is from, but obviously he hasn't taught cubs before. At my Sept, it wouldn't matter if you were twenty nine, if you were a cub, you had no rights, simple as that because you weren't trusted to roam the real world in your state, not until you learned who you were and you had control." He is to the point about that. "But then again, Portand was a different world compared to St. Claire, and the family there was 'organized.'"
Sophia holds out her hand and nods as Jeremy talks about the difference between age and status to Garou, silently thanking him for validating her point. "That's pretty much the whole story. He asked me what I thought an adult was, I said something about respect and responsibility, and he went off on a nihilistic trip, saying basically that adults were creeps. I told him I'd rather stay a child, and he left."
Surprised at Jeremy's reaction, Dizzy walks into the kitchen so as not to be noticed and takes one last drink from her glass before washing it out. Sure, she may act immature, but no dorky little kid is gonna deprive her of being an adult.
Its obvious that Jeremy has had it harder then both of them. Maybe one day, they'll see the scars on his back. Being a kin can just be as hard as any cub. Raised in tradition, he can't help but be blunt and speak the truth of which the Garou have placed before him.
Sophia takes a long sip from her milk, soothed by it as if it were whiskey. "So, Dizzy, I really don't see what your problem with all of this is. It wasn't your actions, it was mine that got me slapped."
Dizzy comes back out of the kitchen, "Yeah. I just set off the chain of reactions that set it off." She frowns with a heavy sigh, "Part of me wants to stuff a couple hundred bucks in your hands and tell you to get going. But..." She pauses, giving Jeremy a quick glance, "You seem to want to do this garou thing, like this."
Jeremy doesn't offer any words to them, his attention quickly drawn back to his palm device, tapping away quickly.
Sophia holds out her hands and shakes them, trying to get ahold of Dizzy's logic and wake it up. "Look, Dizzy, he may be like my father, but first and foremost, he's my /boss/. We're soldiers. Gaia's soldiers. Being a cub is like bootcamp, and you don't talk shit to your drill sergeant when he's already got his hand raised to you. You've got to understand, it's not abuse, it's discipline. Despite the fact that I was right, I still deserved it."
Quite annoyed by the incessant tapping sounds, Dizzy turns to Jeremy. "Jer-dear. What are you doing?" she asks with the high, too-sweet voice people use when completely irritated with someone else.
"Something quite complicated which would take an hour to explain." The kin says softly as he continues to tap away. One would notice that he has his springboard modem attached, sticking out of his cell phone.
"Would you please," Dizzy continues in the same tone, closing her eyes to calm herself, "Either stop it, as it _is_ quite annoying, or explain why you must be doing it _while we are having a conversation_!"
"Because its a project that I've been working on for quite some time, and if I don't get it done, then I end up letting down those who deem me 'useful'." Jeremy finishes off with a flurry of taps, then starts to unhook everything.
Sophia's lips tighten to a thin line. "Look, Jeremy? Why don't you just use the freakin' computer? You can put it up on the desk now and everything, since I moved the books off of it. Look." She points to the computer, which is still sitting on the floor next to the empty desk. "I plugged in the phone and everything. But Jeez, why do you come visit if you can't visit?"
Dizzy looks to Jeremy for his reaction.
Glancing to Sophia, the kin simply lifts up a brow. "Maybe I should leave." He says in a soft voice, fidgeting a bit. This is 'obviously' a bad time to come and visit. Pushing himself up, he simply shoulders his bag and heads for the door.
Sophia sighs. "Don't go on my account. You know you're welcome here. I just don't see why you come over here to work."
"You don't live with Roger." Jeremy says as he opens up the door, slipping out it, closing it behind him gently.
Dizzy nods in agreement, "We like it when you're over. Just try not to work so ha..." She stops as he attempts to leave. Dizzy shoots a glance at her roommate.
Sophia shrugs. "Sorry. I didn't mean to chase him off. I just thought he'd be able to work faster on the computer. Sheesh. I think PMS gets worse when you're a Garou."
Dizzy nodnods and looks toward the door, "Should I go grab him?"
Sophia nods. "Yeah. We'll tackle him and forcefeed him broccoli till he gets some color in his cheeks." She jumps up, nearly spilling the rest of her milk, and moves toward the door.
Dizzy walks over to the bathroom, taking off the towel from her head. She flings it over the tub and returns to pick up the discarded glass.
Sophia walks in, dazed. There's an odd little grin on her face, but she's staring off into nothingness. "He said he loved me, Diz...."
Dizzy turns away from the sink and blinks, "What?" She runs over to Sophia, "He said what?" Her grin is so apparent a blind man could see it.
Sophia laughs a little and rubs the back of her head, anime-style. "He told me he loves me!" She looks around the room, searching for an explanation on the walls of the apartment.
Dizzy squeals with delight as she gives a little clap in celebration. Alicia was dead wrong. So far, being a garou is _exactly_ like highschool. "That's great! Wonderful even!"
Sophia grins. "Yeah, it is kinda, isn't it?" She smiles for a bit, entertaining thoughts of names and little baby groo, and then her face falls. "Oh, God, Lianne was right."
Dizzy tilts her head a bit to the side as she brushes her hair back behind her ears, "Lianne said? What did she say?" For a second, she tries to remember exactly _who_ Lianne is. The name sounds familliar...
Sophia lowers her eyebrows in thought. "She knows a lot about what kin go through, of course, since she is one. Plus she's pretty old. Not to be mean, but she is. Anyway, we were talking one day, and she really made it sound like Garou go from dating to mating in like a matter of weeks. I like Jeremy, I really do. But even if I weren't a cub, I'm not ready for that kind of stuff."
Dizzy remembers the old lady now, she shakes her head at Sophia going from a sideways motion to a vertical one, culminating into affermative nodding. "Dating and all that stuff are very important, but you are still young. Don't take things too fast, please." She almost sounds as if she's talking from experience.
Sophia laughs. "I think this is one of the few areas, Diz, where age really does make a difference. I mean, look at me. I'm a kid still. I mean, sure, we've made out a little, but jeez. John tells me 'no nookie till you rite'. What, does he think I'm just going to jump right in the sack with Jer? God." She rolls her eyes. "If I even halfway thought that was what Jeremy was after, I wouldn't be speaking to him, let alone dating him."
Dizzy grins, relief showing on her face. "We should celebr-," a yawn interrupts, "-ate. Oh, sorry. It must be late." She gives her fellow cub a weak grin, "We'll have to celebrate later."
Sophia chuckles softly. "Yep. It's getting late, and I'm thinking of tracking John down tomorrow if he doesn't show up. Not getting involved, just watching him. 'Course, it'd get me into a whole shitload of trouble, but I think I'm going to do it anyway."
Dizzy nods, "If you want me to drive, just ask." She pauses, thinking about something, "Or call me. I'm probably going to the farmhouse again. Again, again that is. I went earlier today."
Sophia changes into her pajamas and climbs into the newer bed, carefully moving a sleeping Samantha out of the way. "G'Night, Diz. And I really am sorry about jumping down your throat yesterday."
Dizzy shakes her head as she completes the nighttime ritual as well, "Don't worry about it. I see where you were coming from, now." She climbs into her bed, "Good night Sophie."