Introducing some new charactersssss. evemiliana requested an appearance by three OCs, and I obliged.
I'M SO KIND.
Just kidding.
P.S. evemiliana, I tried to portray them as best I could. I hope you enjoy.
P.S.S. This took forever to write. I'm shoooo busy :C
"Boom snap clap boom boom snap clap," I said while I was making up beats with my hands. The boredom of sitting all day at a counter had set in early. Not to sound corny or anything, but I had thought a lot about what Victoria said since she said it. Maybe I sort of did enjoy the company and chaos that was brought about by these poorly written-about people. After work, instead of walking straight home, I walked to the basketball court that was around the corner from the record shop.
My mood was in high spirits when I picked up a basketball someone left and shot some hoops, mostly missing the basket. "This shit is hard. I quit."
"I'm not too good at basketball either," said a voice from behind me. I turned to see Maka, with Soul and three other people I didn't recognize.
"Oh, hey," I said and threw the ball at Soul. He caught it, unfortunately.
"Teddy, meet Wolfie, Damien, and Santana. Wolfie saved my life," he said dully.
"Yup yup! Lights out for Knives!" A girl with brown and blue hair bounced up to me. "I'm Wolfie. Damien and Santana are brother and sister, and also my slavessssssss." She laughed. The boy, who looked like an aryan heathen with his blond hair and blue eyes, eyed Maka. The other girl, presumably Santana, looked like she was going to axe murder someone.
"Soooo, are you new here?"
"We're going to keep that a mystery. Don't you go to Shibusen?" Santana crossed her arms and looked at me. I scratched the back of my neck and shook my head.
"I work at For the Record. Heard of it?"
"Oh! The record store, right? Who made up that name?" Wolfie rocked back and forth on her heels. I squinted at her and finally noticed she had... ears. Like, legit pointy fuzzy ears that twitched and moved themselves.
"My manager Ned. Uhh, are those real?" My finger pointed at the perked appendages on the top of her head. She smiled. "Yep!"
"Yeah, and I thought Maka was weird," Soul piped in. Wolfie glared and Maka brought the spine of a book down on his head. I couldn't help but yell, "Repent, you heathen!" Everyone stared. Damien used this moment to crouch on one knee and flip up Maka's skirt with his hand. "Ooh, going with white, eh?"
"I-it's laundry day," Maka stammered and blushed. I stared at the situation awkwardly before Santana brought her hand quickly and harshly across her brother's face. My jaw dropped open.
"Santana-slap! Damien," she began. "May the devil have mercy on your godless soul. Actually, rot in hell." Her hands came to rest on her hips.
"Um, is that my mom calling? I better go." My sneakers scuffed the blacktop before turning my body towards the exit. "See you later."
"Does her mom seem mean to you, Jeremy?" Wolfie brought a finger to her lip cutely. Damien glared at her. "Don't call me that!"
Soul shrugged.
"She doesn't ever see her mom. Just flaking out on us. How uncool." I frowned and looked back at them. He turned to Wolfie to see she had disappeared. Santana had Damien by the collar of his shirt, her black hair mussed from the effort of slapping him. "We better leave too. See you kids later." Damien waved sheepishly. They walked off towards the opposite direction of the Fatale household.
"Sorry, Soul, Maka. I have to run," I said to them. "Bye for reals this time." They didn't respond when I walked away. I didn't head for home, though. I just walked.
"Pitter patter, pitter patter," came a familiar happy voice.
"Stop it, Patty! Rain ruins the symmetry of everything! No! Get away!"
I put a palm to my forehead. "God, they're like ants." But I froze. Victoria's words came back clearly in my head.
"You're lying. I know you like having friends, don't even try to pretend you don't."
In my head, a hamster stopped running in his wheel, jumped off, and punched another hamster in the face. I get it. I'll stop running.
"HEY GUYS," I said cheerfully, and albeit creepily complete with weird grin on my face.
"You're not Teddy!" Patty said before taking me into a chokehold. Liz wrestled her off me and we all fell to the ground in a pile. Kid stared at us when we stood, but I was the only one covered in dirt and the only one with my clothes and hair all messed up, because I was caught at the bottom of the pile when we fell.
God can be funny. After making Maka and Soul mad at me, Patty attacked me, Liz grabbed Patty, and my clothes were torn and dirty. I guess Karma exists, since Death does too. I would picture Karma with a beard, or an amazing moustache. Yes.
Anyways, after catching sight of my appearance, Death the Kid exclaimed that all my balance and symmetry had been thrown out the window. "Liz! Patty! Look what you've done! She looks hideous now!" I tried not to feel insulted at this, because I knew he couldn't help himself. He grabbed my hands - both of them - and dragged me to his mansion.
After a long, long time, consisting of finding the perfect outfit that balanced well with my hair color and skin tone, Kid finally placed a neatly folded shirt and shorts in front of me. During my wait, Liz and Patty treated the scrapes I had acquired as apology, and Patty, the main cause, covered all my unharmed skin in bandaids. They were painful to remove.
"So, what were you doing walking on the opposite side of town from your house? Running errands?" Kid said after I was freshly changed. I sat on the couch with my arms wrapped around my knees. "Oh, that..." I remembered the disdain in Soul's voice earlier.
"Soul and Maka are mad. At me. Because I'm a dick." My eyebrows furrowed together.
Kid remained silent.
"I'm sorry... it's not your problem. I'll, uh, leave. Thanks for the clothes." I got up from my seat.
"Ah! Wait!" He stood up too, and walked over to me. His hands came up and stroked the side of my hair. "There, it's fixed. Your hair was out of place." My face heated up. The only male contact I had up until recently were from Ned and my dad, and it was still pretty rare. At the shop, either Ned or I were running errands, so we barely talked. And my dad lived in Canada, so... letters, pretty much. That make out session with Victoria's partner was a total lie, by the way.
In short, I wasn't used to attention from anyone, much less the kids from Shibusen.
"If you want, you could stay for dinner. Your house is on the other side of town."
I just nodded my head. My vocal chords couldn't function yet from the embarassment of Kid's proximity.
The dinner, unsurprisingly, was balanced and symmetrical, but also delicious. I was enjoying myself immensely when Patty gave me a glass of some dark reddish juice.
"What is this? It's delicioussssss," I said. My cheeks were slightly flushed.
"Grape juice!" She said happily, and drank her glass quickly and vigorously.
It wasn't grape juice. My mind was foggy and clouded the whole time and I was acting like an idiot. Patty didn't act any differently, I think, but I was kind of intoxicated, so I'm not sure. Kid and Liz walked in on us sitting at the table, me with my cheek on the table, and Patty laughing animatedly.
"Hey, Teddy, who do you loveeeeeee?" She inquired. Tears poured out of my eyes.
"I can't love anyone! My heart is so damaged," I blubbered. We hugged eachother from opposite sides of the table and sang rousing songs and swished our glasses back and forth, with Kid flitting about the table, trying to make sure we didn't knock anything over or spill our drinks.
"To the windoooooows," I began.
"To the walls!" Patti continued. Then we sang together.
"Till the sweat drops down my balls! All them bitches crawl! Ahhhh skeet skeet skeet skeet mother-"
"STOP! STOP!" Kid and Liz finally managed to confiscate the wine from us, and laid us both on the couch while they cleaned up the table.
When they were finished, Kid told me to spend the night so I didn't hurt myself on the way home. I sat on the couch all night, and only got up to pee, because the world spun whenever I moved. Basically, I was a lightweight, which is weird because I'm German and Irish. The two drunkest countries in the world. Did you think the Germans just ate schnitzel and sausages? No.
Anyways, all I did was think that night. I couldn't fall asleep because my head kept bringing up images of Soul and Maka, staring silently when I left. It didn't go away until morning, when Kid walked out into the living room and spotted me laying upside down with my legs thrown over the back. My face was red from blood rushing to my head. "Oh heyyy, Kid. Totally sober, woo." I gave him a thumbs up, but since I was upside down, my finger pointed to his carpet.
"Did you sleep well?" He said, his eyebrows raised.
"Nope, too busy trying to have an epiphany. Didn't work."
"I'm sorry to hear that. Listen, we have to leave soon... I have a mission today."
"Totally fine. I'm gone, bro. Thanks for the clothes and food and shelter for the night mister. See you 'round." With that, I left and walked home. On the way, I spotted both Knives Chau and Marylin Friday walking together. I didn't give a second thought about it and walked past them before turning a corner. But I should have given it a second thought, because guess what happened next? They followed me and beat me up.
"So I see that Soul's mad at you. So he won't be mad at me for doing this," Knives said when she kicked my shin. Marylin was actually tougher than she looked and probably fatter than she looked too.
"You think I'll just let you throw yourself at Kid and stay the night at his house? What did you do over there?" She growled, her piercings rattling together.
"None of this is my fault. Leave me alone," I said, but I had no defensive skills whatsoever. Not to mention the sleep I didn't get. It hurt, but oh well.
I walked the rest of the way home with a black eye and bloody nose. It wasn't that bad, considering how insane these people were. I guess I should have been more aggressive or something, but I never was good at interacting with anyone. The beating didn't really impede my daily life, at least until a few people found out about it. Ned seemed concerned, but didn't venture further.
BUT THEN.
A familiar white-haired boy walked in the day after the incident. He brought in some old records to sell, but almost dropped them when his eyes drifted towards my face. "Oh man, what happened to you, Teddy?"
"So you're not mad anymore? People are confusing. I can't deal with you."
"No, seriously. It's not like we'd hold a grudge for this long."
"It's been like a day."
"Well... uh- look at you! What happened?"
"Um, don't worry about it. Probably just karma." He raised his eyebrows, but he didn't bother me about it anymore. He gave me the stack of records and I paid him a fair price and we went our separate ways. The day went by slowly until closing time, when Death the Kid walked down the street purposefully.
I tried to walk home without him recognizing me, but no dice.
"Teddy! Wait!" He ran up to my side when I stopped for him. He put his hands on my shoulders and turned me around. I looked at him sheepishly when he intook a sharp breath. "What happened to you? Soul told me that you got beat up!"
"Ah, it's no big deal, Kid. It doesn't hurt. And I didn't get beat up. I threw a couple punches," I said and crossed my arms. This was beginning to get troublesome. He frowned- no, he pouted.
"Why don't you talk to us? Don't you trust me?"
"Don't try to make me feel guilty! I'm the one who got beat up- er, in a fight!"
His eyebrows furrowed. Suddenly, he dropped to the ground, and grabbed his head with his hands.
"I'm sorry! I'm trash that doesn't deserve to live! Put me out on garbage day," He yelled into the cobblestone street. Embarrassed, I dragged him by the collar to my house.
"Kid, shut up, or I won't tell you anything," I said at the doorstep. He immediately straightened up and brushed his clothes into place. I stuck my key in the upper lock and turned it until I heard a click. We both walked inside and he sat straight in the middle of the couch. My eyebrows raised, but I closed the door and placed myself next to him on the couch.
"Okay. Ask away." He looked surprised, but regained his composure.
"What happened? Who did this to you? Who ruined your balance?"
"Some girls from Shibusen. Um, next question."
"Why can't you trust me?" This question threw me off. I wasn't expecting something so personal, I guess.
"Well, I've never really had any friends. So I'm not too sure how this whole thing works."
"Why?"
"Ergh. Um, how do I explain it? Wait a sec," I said, putting my index finger to my chin. "Okay. It happened when I turned five. A girl that was supposed to be my best friend ruined my party. She ate my cake. My birthday cake. The whole thing. And I could never trust anyone again."
He looked confused. "Was it symmetrical?"
"Yeah." Not really, but for the sake of this conversation it was.
"WHAT AN OUTRAGE!" A fire burned in Kid's eyes. "I would never do anything like that!" I had never seen him this passionate about... anything. My face went slack and my jaw dropped.
"All right. That's reassuring, I guess."
"Ahem. Teddy, are you okay?"
"I'm fine? Are you asking me in general? Or what?"
"I mean, does it hurt? The injuries? They ruined your balance."
My mind processed this. Is that all he cared about? Balance? Symmetry? Why was I asking so many questions?
"So, uh. I'm okay. It's okay. They'll heal."
Suddenly, his hands covered both sides of my face. It heated up when the blood rushed towards my head. His hands were cool, though, and soothing to my bruises and swellings. "You should put ice on these." I closed my eyes.
"It doesn't hurt." I let my head droop, and kept my lids closed.
Kid let his hands drop from my face. He pulled me towards him and wrapped his arms around my shoulders. My face was still heated up, my muscles tight. He smelled like cleaning products, mostly lemon. It made me nostalgic, for some reason.
"My mom... before she left, she cleaned the house with lemon-scented stuff. That's what you remind me of." He smiled at me. "Kid? I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"For calling you gay. You're not, I think."
"I was trying to forget that..." I pushed myself back and smiled at him.
"It actually hurts a little. My face."
"Yeah, it looks horrible. Couldn't they have punched out both your eyes?"
Step by step, we grew closer.