the pie

[instar]

Gym class is mind-numbing. Bella spends it thinking about introversion - Andi finds it peculiar and kept asking her questions about it. Bella's not an extreme case of the type, but definitely qualifies. Andi always has more friends - needs more friends - than Bella does.

Comments

[instar]

"Is there some reason I'm not allowed to know where you live?"

[aeskhyne]

"Yeah, nobody does."

[instar]

"Why?"

[aeskhyne]

"Skip it."

[instar]

Bella reaches for her notebook.

She writes this down.

[aeskhyne]

"Taking notes?" he inquires.

[instar]

"It's a thing I do."

[aeskhyne]

"Learning anything interesting?"

[instar]

"Insufficient data."

[aeskhyne]

He laughs.

"I'll bet."

[instar]

Bella shrugs, glances at the clock. "I'm going to call in the Chinese food now so it'll be ready when Renée passes the place on her way home from the teachers' meeting." She picks up the phone, dials the number from the takeout menu, and orders all of the listed things, eggrolls included.

[aeskhyne]

Trouble finds a chair to flop into while she is on the phone, and flops into it, closing his eyes and resting his hands on his stomach. It looks very comfortable.

It also incidentally reveals some nasty-looking bruises that were previously hidden by his shirt. One just under his colarbone on the right, one on his left shoulder peeking out from under his sleeve.

[instar]

Bella looks at him.

She looks at the bruises.

She concludes her phone call - "the name is Swan" - and hangs up.

"What happened?" she asks, gesturing at the bruises.

[aeskhyne]

He opens his eyes. "Mm?"

[instar]

"Did you have a violent disagreement with a staircase?"

[aeskhyne]

"Oh." He grins. "Nope. I had sex. Really great sex."

[instar]

"Ah."

[aeskhyne]

He laughs.

"Next time should I just tell you you don't wanna know?"

[instar]

"You could ask me if I'm sure I want to know."

[aeskhyne]

"Okay."

[instar]

"If Renée sees those bruises, she will not in fact want to know, but might feel obliged to ask."

[aeskhyne]

He snorts. "I'll tell her I fell down the stairs."

[instar]

"She'll probably believe you. When I was in the first grade she got some pointed questions from my teacher because I often have violent disagreements with staircases. It blew over, but she's at least aware that there are multiple reasons someone might appear injured."

[aeskhyne]

Trouble laughs. "What was the teacher doing grilling her? If something was up she'd just lie about it, right?"

[instar]

"Well, Renée teaches kindergarten - you can't really work with kids any more if there's an accusation like that out in public, even a false one. And the first grade teacher had met me - she hadn't seen me fall at the time she got suspicious, but she'd seen me use walls for balance, and stumble, and knock things off my desk. Renée told her to talk to my gym teacher, and to call Charlie if she still wasn't sure, and then there's the fact that Andi was always fine. No scandal, Renée keeps her job, I am generally known to be accident-prone."