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[bloodiedfeet]

It's been a long day, but to be fair most days are long for Sally. Between getting up extra early to stop by the shop and start up coffee for the guys and bring them bagels ( because if left to their own devices they'd eat donuts every morning), going to school, and going to the shop after school...she wears herself thin. But she likes doing these things every day and wouldn't have it any other way.

Coffee has become a staple in her life and her diet. Sometimes she drinks coffee for dinner, which she can hear Colby fussing about in the back of her head every time. Still. There are very few hours in each day to do everything she needs to do and still have time for homework.

As is quite usual for her she is sitting at her favorite coffee shop around the corner from the shop tonight. It's a pleasant evening so she has grabbed a table outside and has all of her work spread across it. She's on her second cup of coffee and struggling to stay interested in her homework. It's not easy. Math bores her terribly. But she's trying to get it all done and do it well, because she made a promise to Colby that she'd be a good girl and do well in school.

So she's here. Trying. She kind of hopes someone will come by and give her a good excuse to be distracted, but truthfully she doesn't have a lot of friends. At least not many her own age. She's a bit quiet at school. Unfortunately this means little social life and little hope in having a valid distraction.

Comments

[handswillwork]

Where there is a student that needs distraction, there is an Abby! Or something like that. When it's Sally it can be true, anyway. She adores the younger girl, and even though she knows she should encourage her to focus on her studies, Abby has... never been the greatest influence in the world. To anyone, including herself.

She's heading to the garage to see if she can steal her brother away early, or at least get introduced to his newest project, but the drive brings her past the coffeeshop, and when she spots Sally, she changes her plans and pulls into the parking lot. A couple of minutes later she's strolling over to the table, her own bookbag slung over her shoulder, and dropping into the seat across from her.

"You look busy."

[bloodiedfeet]

Sally looks up when she hears the familiar voice and she can't help but smile. She likes Abby, too. It's nice when Abby visits the shop and there's another girl there. Plus Abby is a lot of fun to grab cars with. That's always a bonus.

She sighs and rests her hands on all of her work. "I'm trying to be," she nods. "If I don't get this stuff done tonight I don't know what I'll do." She shakes her head and looks at Abby again. "Life of being a teenager."

[onethingtobelievein]

Alan just wants to sit down for a few minutes. It's a busy hour for the coffee shop; he can't find a seat inside, and as he heads out, cup in hand, and searches, the outside tables look just as full. He frowns down at his coffee, then out at the tables.

He could just go. But he has an hour and a half before his late class. It's not even going to take half that time to get to campus.

He doesn't know Sally, not really. But he's kind of seen her, in that way there is with people who live in the same area. He kind of remembers her from high school, before he graduated last year. He's dropped his car off at the shop before, saw her in the area. She's his sister's age, and his senses scream fellow demon when he looks at her. That's enough to make him head for her table, when he tries to figure out who might let him steal a chair for a bit.

"Hey, um," he starts uncertainly as he hovers in front of the empty chair. Strangers isn't really Alan's strongest point. "Would you mind me sitting here? There's no tables open."

[bloodiedfeet]

She's so sucked into trying to figure out this equation that she jumps when the boy stops over her. She looks up at him, a littler nervously, and blinks. "Uh..no. No, it's fine."

She reaches out to gather up her books a bit and give him some room. As she does she looks around and realizes how swamped the place has gotten while she's been busy.

"Wow," she remarks to herself.

She doesn't exactly recognize Alan, but she doesn't pay a lot of attention to many people at school. She tends to be a little more trusting than she should though, so she doesn't really mind him sitting with her. Her senses still aren't quite refined, so she doesn't recognize right away that he's a demon. She does feel a buzz running through her though and a tingling at her back.

[normalguy]

Peter is on his skateboard. He's a wanderer who has been here for a little while but he was lucky enough to fall through with the skateboard and his Spider-Man suit in his backpack along with the phone that contains the voicemail he never wants to lose.

He started going to the high school in Chicago shortly after falling through the Rift so he recognizes Sally, but Peter's on the quiet side himself so they have likely never spoken.

"Hey, you."

It's the words that throw him off balance, and he nearly slams into the railing in front of him but hops off his skateboard instead, an instinctive reaction. He's used to getting yelled at for skating in school, and he looks back toward the voice, raising an eyebrow as he lifts up the skateboard.

The owner of the coffee shop shakes his head at Peter and Peter smiles halfheartedly before shrugging a bit as if to say sorry. The owner goes back inside, and Peter lets out a long breath, glancing away, with his skateboard in hand until he realizes he is right in front of Sally from school.

"...sorry."

[bloodiedfeet]

Sally is oblivious to all of this until the owner shouts at Peter. When he does she looks up quickly at the commotion. She vaguely recognizes Peter, but only vaguely. She just assumes he goes to school with her because he looks that age.

She watches him hop off his skateboard and a little smirk forms on her lips at the entire exchange. When he apologizes she just shrugs.

"Didn't bother me any," she says. "He's too uptight anyway."

Sally reaches for her coffee and takes a sip from it while still watching Peter. "Nice skateboard." Cars are more her thing, but really she can appreciate any type of wheels. Especially wheels that move fast. She's just not so sure she'd ever be able to stay up on a skateboard without breaking something.

[normalguy]

Peter slides a hand behind his neck as he looks at her, scratching the back of his head a little before he shrugs, looking after the guy who is returning to the cafe. He clears his throat before he sets the skateboard back down. His one foot rests on top of it, but he's not going to skate right here right now. He's not a punk even if he's a teenager filled with teenage feelings and defiance and attitude sometimes.

"Thought the- the yelling might have distracted you from your uh-..." He looks down at the stacks of papers and textbooks in front of her. "Homework. If you were distracted by the skate boarding alone, you'd... never learn anything at Looney."

Aka the hallways and classrooms tend toward noisy especially when you have super spider hearing.

Peter picks it up again when she compliments it, and he holds it in one hand. "Thanks, it- uh, it came with me." From home, except wanderers aren't supposed to admit that to just anyone so he... doesn't. "Had it awhile so gets me from point A to... point B." He nods a little, tiny smirk on his face. "But it's mine."

So it means something to him to have and to keep.

[bloodiedfeet]

Sally isn't the type to look for labels, even though she is a teenager and high school is supposed to be filled with them. She won't think Peter a punk even if he did skate right here and now. She doesn't let a label be the first, or even second, thing she thinks of a person. Mostly right now she just thinks he's adorkable.

"Oh," she looks down at her work before looking back up at him. "I don't mind honestly. This stuff wasn't sinking in five minutes ago, and I doubt it'll sink in now." Her head tilts slightly and her smirk turns into a small smile. "I had a feeling you went there, too."

Sally tends to tune out the hallways at Looney. It isn't rare for her to be walking through them and completely miss someone saying hi to her from five feet away.

When he picks up the skateboard she hears what he has to say and the 'came with me' comment sails over her head. Instead of asking where he's from or anything of the sort, she nods. "Sometimes you need something other than your feet around here. Especially to get around all the idiots that don't know where they're going. And...it's good to have something that's yours."

Not that she has a lot of possessions herself, but what she does have gives her a bit of comfort in the fact that they are hers.

[normalguy]

"What... classes?" Peter asks as he looks over the top of the table thoughtfully. His hand rests behind his neck a little in that awkward way of his before his hand slips up through his hair too. He nods at what sh says. "Ah, yeah. Yeah, I- uh, I do. Newer though, I'm- recent... student."

He has been here a month which is long enough to get used to the city somewhat, get used to being separated from Aunt May, get used to not being able to get back, and start to absorb the information about this place.

"I don't like to walk. It's... not really my thing so." Peter holds the skateboard in his hand as he stands there in front of the table, shoulders slightly hunched in that loner, punk way of his, and he glances over out at the rest of the people at the cafe.

[bloodiedfeet]

She drops her chin in her hand and continues to look up at him. Her pencils teeters between her forefinger and thumb. "Pre-cal. And over there," she points with her pencil to her other open book with notebook, "is French." Neither of which are her best subjects. She nods though. "Yeah we get a lot of new students around here."

Sometimes she wonders if she's really clueless as to who she goes to school with, or if the faces do actually change every day. Either one could be possible with her.

"Walking has it's moments, but I prefer to drive. Or take my bike." And by bike she doesn't mean something with two wheels and a bell. In fact there is a small motorbike parked along the curb not far from where they are, in perfect view of her table.

[normalguy]

Peter leans over further until he is nearly falling over as he cranes his neck to have a look at it. "You want some help or- ah, I don't know," he says before he looks slightly back up at her and then down at the table again. "Not really into French, don't know much about French but Pre-cal? I can do." Not that he is really the most sociable when it comes to doing anything and he might be bad at the actual helping with it part but. "Yeah, something about the location."

The whole Rifts and the monsters and the dying and... all those things.

"Well, yeah, you can drive... if you have a car. I used to live in Manhattan so no one really drove there. You took the subway," he says, and ti's not like Aunt May and Uncle Ben could afford a car for him even if driving was more a thing then.

[bloodiedfeet]

Sally smiles brightly at the offer and nods. "Sure, I mean...if you really want to spend your time doing that, I'd love some help. I should warn you again that I'm clueless with it. And it's okay if you don't know French, it's my third year so I should be able to manage through." She doesn't need him to be social, she's not someone that always needs to talk.

"I think I'd drive no matter where I lived. It just makes me feel better. Especially when I'm on my bike, there's nothing like it." Lucky for Sally, her father-thing owned the shop she hangs out in and was able to give her a car as soon as she was old enough to drive. She treasures it even more so now that he's gone.

"I've never been to Manhattan though, so I don't know. It'd be cool to try the subway."

[normalguy]

"I don't really mind clueless. Just- I'm around so... and I know this stuff. Helping's sort of the least I could do," Peter says with a slight shrug, glancing down before he moves over toward her.

"Well, the thing is, Manhattan's crowded. The streets are so you'd spend most of your time in standstill traffic, not moving at all, but that's what I had my skateboard for and the- the uh, subways. I used those a lot."

It gave him the feeling of not really going slow but having the world slide by him while he made it from one place to the next. His uncle and aunt only had the one car though, and his uncle used that so Peter would sometimes have to walk with Aunt May places when it was late at night.

That's what he failed to do the night- the night his uncle died.

[bloodiedfeet]

Sally pulls her bookbag off the chair beside her. "I really appreciate it." It's nice of him to help someone he doesn't even know. She loves the moments where she gets surprised by the kindness of people in her city.

"That would probably drive me crazy," she admits. "Sitting still in traffic and everything. I hate traffic around here as it is. I like getting out on the freeway whenever I can."

When she's driving she's in another world, a world of her own making. When she needs to fall apart; she drives. Gets on the highway and drives while she breaks. When she's anxious, nervous, or too excited to sit still; she drives.

It's the only place that's hers.

[normalguy]

Peter points awkwardly to the chair as she removes the book bag. "So. ...can I sit.. there?" Yes, he has to ask, because it wouldn't be the first time he was kicked out of a chair he wasn't supposed to be in, but he does walk over. His hand rests on top of the chair.

He smiles very faintly at what she says before he nods in agreement. "Never really liked it. Why I used the subway... or my board," Peter says as he looks sideways at her, pulling his own backpack up further on his shoulder.

That and there was only the one car.