OK, time to start forming some subplots, add a couple of minor conflicts that will soon get resoluted as time goes on. Maybe imply some things while leading you on with others. ^.^ Ah, well, let's just see how Simone's holding up after the attack of the dodgeball game.
Jack-
The door is still open.
-Simone
P.S. I'm in the basement.
"Okay, then," Jack sighed as he tucked the paper into his pocket. If Simone was still leaving him a note saying that he could come inside, then her emotional state wouldn't be too bad. Or, at least, that's what he told himself.
He opened the door, then stepped inside and wiped his feet on the doormat before closing the door behind him. The house was as eerily quiet as usual. Jack was beginning to wonder if the rest of Simone's family even existed as he walked down the hall. There were no pictures of family, the house never seemed to be even the slightest bit messed. It could have been a a wealthy old lawyer who lived here and Jack would have been none the wiser.
Guessing that, since he didn't see any door besides the patio door in the living room, the basement door was in the kitchen, he passed underneath the white archway to the right. He walked through the stylish kitchen, noticing all of the fancy household appliances, but couldn't find a door. What he did find, though, was a hallway to the part of the house that he hadn't been through yet. He hesitated, then walked through it.
Portraits of people he didn't recognize hung from the wall, either a black-and-white photo or an extremely well-done painting, though he noticed similarities between them. All of the posers had long, oval faces, their eyes wide yet slanted. And almost every single one had blue eyes, or at least a variation of blue. Two of them even had Simone's grey irises. These were Simone's relatives, Jack realized. Most of them were grinning, their faces alight. A couple had done cheeky poses, like blowing kisses or throwing up a peace sign. Little symbols painted a strange light blue colors were written just above the golden frame. Jack supposed that this was each of their names in Atlantean, though he could barely tell it apart from Sanskrit.
His eyes sliding from one face to the next, at first didn't register the last portrait as he turned away and exited the hallway. Then he whirled around and looked again, thinking his eyes were playing tricks on him. But he had been right the first time- it was a portrait of Simone.
She looked significantly younger, with not as many creases in her face. Her face was exactly how Jack remembered it from Hohenzollern Castle, and their trip through the land of the dead. She would have still looked like a young woman, though, if it weren't for her smile. Jack stared, his memory of her smile having dulled and kept only by a sketch of her.
The sketch did not do her justice.
Both corners of her lips were upturned, though the right side was up higher than the left; her cheeks made her look like an adorable chipmunk with freckles, and the brightness of her eyes could not be contained by the black-and-white photo. He examined the picture more closely then he did the other ones. Her hair fell in wild waves down the sides of her face and shoulders, and disappeared below the frame. She was wearing a loose black shift, with her crystal pendant snuggled in the hollow of her throat. She had light-colored(Jack couldn't identify the color)gem earrings that made her eyes seem even brighter. She looked beautiful.
Jack stared in disbelief and awe. There was next to almost no mistake in the picture. Not even a coffee-stain-on-the-Mona-Lisa mistake or anything to even hinder the beauty that she seemed to so easily radiate. She wasn't even showing teeth in her smile, for snowflake's sake!
His eyes traveled downward, intending to read what the cryptic message on her portrait said, then caught on something on her chest. It just barely showed above her shift, but Jack could definitely see it. What looked like a dark scar peeked out from underneath the tip of the V-cut, then disappeared into her shoulder sleeve. In the black-and-white photo, it was easy to mistake as part of the shirt at a glance. But now, he could see the raised tissue and the inflamed skin around it. He had seen it on himself in many places. Jack wondered why he had never seen the scar before, but then again, he had never seen her show so much skin.
Jack couldn't help but raise his hand and gently slide his fingers against the scar, mesmerized by how it seemed to fit so well into the picture. It wasn't the coffee-stain-on-the-Mona-Lisa. No, it was the Mona Lisa's smile. It didn't hinder the picture, it completed it. Now he knew what had been missing, even though he hadn't been aware that it was until he had found it. A personality. Something that gave the portrait a story, a hint of their lives.
Oh great, I'm starting to becoming philosophical. He stepped away from the picture and shook his head. Then he turned and left the hallway, determined not to look back at the portrait, whose eyes seemed to follow him as he walked away.
There was something funny about Simone, Jack realized. Besides the obvious, of course. Over the past three years, he had calmly acknowledged a woman's beauty, then moved on, thinking that no one could outshine Tooth. But there was something about Simone...he shook his head again. She was getting into his head, in more ways than one. And not in a way that Jack liked.
The room on the other side had actually turned out to be what looked like a family room, with a huge flat-screen TV mounted on the wall, with a Wii, PlayStation3, and even an Xbox Kinect on the shelf below. A comfortable auburn couch and several cushy armchairs and beanbags were spread out around the room. While the rest of the house looked like it had never been touched, this room actually had the feeling that it was used. Consoles laid on the nightstands in the corners, while Jack could see a Wii remote poking out from behind one of the couch pillows. A bag of chips that was still half full rested against the desk against one of the walls.
Just when Jack was about to salvage the remains, he hear a sudden clanging noise. His head whipped around at the noise to see a closed door. He hesitated, then stepped forward and wrapped his hand around the knob. He took a deep breath, then turned the doorknob and pushed it opened to a long flight of stairs. Candles tucked in little holes in the wall were lit, giving the corridor an eerie look. But there looked like there was light at the bottom that actually came from florescent bulbs. Eager to get to Simone and out of the creepy hallway, he hurried down the stairs, continuing to hear loud clanging noises.
When he finally reached the basement floor, Jack found the source of the noises. Simone had taken off her PE sweatshirt and shirt, and was in a half-length-sleeved top, showing the raised scars that danced along her skin. She was furiously attacking a mummy in medieval armor with a long broadsword, though not without style. In swift, fluid motions, she drove the sword through all of the cracks in the armor, then through the metal plates themselves when she couldn't find anymore. "Nice to see you found your way," she grunted as she rolled on the floor, then sliced off the dummy's leg. The sack of hay fell to the ground with a thump.
Jack didn't reply. He was too busy gaping at the room. It was almost like the training room from the Hunger Games, with weapons and training stations all around the place. Spear-throwing, heavy lifting, archery with metal arrows, climbing nets that stretched over their heads- there was even a station to practice how to shoot strange-looking guns. "They didn't have that in the Hunger Games, now did they?" she asked before running at the mummy. Just before she could run into it, she put her hand out on to its shoulder, and she was doing a front flip over its head. She twisted in midair, and drove the sword through its chest, the tip of her sword pointing out from the other side, along with a couple straws of hay. Anger was evident in the way she moved, and Jack guessed that her talk with the principal had not gone well.
"So...what happened?" he prompted, resting his staff against the wall.
"They didn't believe me until they watched the camera tape." She grunted as she roughly shouldered the dummy, making it swing around on its revolvable pedestal. When it turned to face her again, she slashed her sword across its chest, spilling more hay on to the floor.
"So they saw what they did, right?" Jack said hopefully. "That they attacked you first?"
"Nope. Victor fed them some cock-and-bull story about how I had provoked them. I'm now suspended until Friday."
"And them?" Please expulsion, he begged silently.
"A week's worth of detentions!" At the last word, she swung her sword, and the head rolled off of the neck and onto the floor. She raised her arms, as if about to slice it in half, and for a split-second, she looked insane, her face contorted with rage. She bore no resemblance to the girl in the photo. Then something crossed over her face, and she shook her head, and lowered her sword.
"Of course, what was I to expect, when Victor's dad practically owns the place?" she said as she gently placed the blade of her sword on her open palm, then turned to one of the open cases embedded in the wall. She laid the sword inside tenderly on the red velvet cushion, and then closed the door. Jack could see other deadly looking weapons inside the other cases.
She exhaled angrily as she opened the one to the right of the sword, and pulled out a long, beautifully crafted bow made out of polished golden yellow bark. She hung it on her shoulder, then pulled out a hand-woven quiver out of what looked like cedar bark, with about fifteen or twenty arrows made out of the same wood as the bow. The tips, though, weren't made out of obsidian arrowheads. As she slung the quiver over her shoulder and pulled out an arrow to load into the bow as she stalked over to the targets, Jack could see that the arrowhead was actually made out of the same crystal as the pendant in his and Simone's necklace.
Jack jumped on to one of the seemingly-random desks and sat down, watching Simone storm across the room. Without stopping, she fired her bow, and it immediately lodged itself into the dummy, right in the center of the target in the middle of its chest. She twisted her torso and she wasn't even at a good angle when she shot. But the arrow still made it somehow made another bulls-eye. Suddenly, she stopped in front of the dummy she had just hit, and lifted her bow, her other hand sliding back into the quiver to retrieve an arrow. Jack was strongly reminded of Merida as she pulled back the string, her eyes fixed on her target.
No way, Jack thought. There was no way she could hit that. Katniss and Merida could never hit a target from the side- and he had actually watched Merida try. With a predatory look in her eyes, she released her string, letting the arrow fly. It whizzed through the air before somehow lodging itself freaking sideways into the target.
Yes way. The corners of her mouth twitched as she lowered her bow.
Jack whistled. "You're like a present-day Katniss Everdeen."
"Katniss Everdeen?" she repeated, scoffing. She shook her head, then suddenly reached back and loaded three arrows into her bow at different angles and turned it sideways. Before Jack could even realize what she was about to do, she had let the string go, and the three arrows flew through the air. Each one sliced through each of the arrows that were already in the bulls-eye, cleanly slicing them in half.
She let her arm with bow fall to her side, and she turned to Jack, a smirk on her face. He was suddenly struck with the fact that it was the first time Simone had actually allowed her lips to turn upward in his presence. It had been two years ago, but suddenly the image came back to him in HD clarity. It was the exact same look, the exact expression of smugness, the exact mischievous twinkle in her eye. Almost everything was the same.
Almost.
"Katniss Everdeen got nothing on me," she informed him, still smirking, before turning around and heading back to the glass cases.
"You got that right," he chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck. "How'd you learn-?"
"To do all this?" she finished as she laid her bow on the floor, then pulled out four knives, the blades the same as the tips of the arrows, the handles beautifully crafted out of some type of dark red stone. She positioned herself, standing on her left leg, her right curled up underneath her, both her arms held to her chest, then, with a flash of movement, threw one of the knives. It hit one of the dummies attached to the wall in the head, right between its painted eyes. "My mom taught me," she replied as she drew herself back into her stance.
"An Atlantean thing?" he guessed.
"When you live in a place as desired as Atlantis-" she grunted as she threw another, this time hitting it in the chest "-you have to learn how to protect yourself."
Jack noticed that her right leg was out and her left hand was outstretched, instead of the opposite. "You're left-handed?" he asked in surprise.
She turned back to him, mild surprise on her face. "Ambidextrous, but I'm dominant on my left side. I thought you knew," she said as she turned back to the dummy.
"I thought you were right-handed!"
"Where did you get that idea from?" she asked before throwing another knife. It lodged itself with a dull thud into its stomach.
He racked his brain and tried to remember whether or not he had ever seen Simone use her right hand, but couldn't ever recall her using it. He also didn't know why he was so surprised that she was left-handed. "I just thought you were," he said finally.
"Yeah, well you thought wrong." She threw her last knife, and it stuck to the dummy's groin. Jack suddenly felt a flash of pain in his upper right arm. He frowned, and lifted his sweater to see a red welt that was already beginning to fade away. Confused, he dropped his sleeve, then froze when he saw the knife embedded in the dummy. Instead of hay coming out, he could see little drops of blood dripping off from the tip of the blade. He glanced over, and saw that Simone was staring at the knife, transfixed at the sight of blood, not noticing the huge gash in her sleeve.
"Simone!" he said, alarmed.
"Hmm?" She turned to him, her eyes a little unfocused.
"You're bleeding!" he cried, yanking at her arm, then tensed, expecting her to do some judo moves or something. But she only slowly looked down, her eyes taking a little while to focus on the cut in her arm that was already beginning to make streaks of blood down to her hand. He was seriously beginning to worry. "Simone?" he said nervously. "Simone, can you hear me?"
"Of course I can hear you." Her words were slurred, and she was swaying from side to side.
Okay, he was seriously worried now. "You're bleeding. Come on, we'll get you something-" He moved to drag her back upstairs, but she shook her head and refused to move.
"But I don't have to," she protested, weakly trying to wrench her arm out of his grip.
"Simone, that needs to be bandaged up-"
"No it doesn't. Look." Suddenly, she started to grope at Jack's sweatshirt. He yelped, and tried to get out of her way, but she kept a surprisingly strong grip, and yanked down the front of his sweater.
"Woah, woah!" He pushed away from Simone, who stumbled away drunkenly. "Dude, what's wrong with you?"
She rolled her eyes as she put out a hand against one of the sword-fighting dummies to steady herself. "Fine, be like that." She reached down and grabbed the corners of her shirt and yanked it off. Jack had opened his mouth to protest, and had decided since she had reached down to pull off her shirt that he would immediately leave and wait for whatever was wrong with her to end. But as she tossed her shirt on to the floor, leaving her in a tight black tank top, only one thing registered in Jack's mind. Boobs.
He suddenly understood her reasons for wearing such heavy clothing. Even though she was wearing a thick cotton top- and a probably even thicker bra-, he could easily see the outline of her four-pack, the curve of her hips that suddenly looked good in sweatpants, and her...breasts. He stared, completely transfixed by their round shape, until something along the ridge of her tank top caught his eye. As soon as he found it, the large scar that he had seen upstairs seemed to jump out at him. He realized what he was doing, then hurriedly looked away, his cheeks flushing blue.
"Pervert," she muttered, though she didn't really seem too offended. Jack glanced out of the corner of his eyes, then saw her fiddling with her necklace, struggling to get it over her head. "Can't get it off with all that crap on," she muttered to no one in particular. When she finally got it off, she pressed it to the cut, wincing as Jack felt a slight pain on his arm. Suddenly, the crystal began to glow a luminous blue color. Jack turned to her, forgetting the boob situation, and stared in amazement as, right before his eyes, the skin began to crawl over the wound, until the streaks of blood seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, the cut gone.
Simone sighed as she pulled the necklace back over her head, suddenly seeming a lot more like herself. Then she glanced at Jack, then down at herself. "Couldn't you have stopped me from taking my shirt off?" she demanded as she bent down and picked up her shirt, though her cheeks were beginning to redden in embarrassment.
"Don't go trying to blame that on me!" he exclaimed, pointing at himself. "What the heck was that?!"
"Nothing, just a quick way to get drunk and high at the same time," she said as she pulled her shirt back over her head.
"What?"
"Didn't you see the stone of the knives? That was made out of the same crystal as this." She gestured to her necklace. "When exposed to the bloodstream, it's fatal to regular people- it actually turns them into the stone themselves- but it just causes the same effects as having about five shots of pure vodka to Atlanteans, just that it's an immediate reaction instead of an hour delay. I should have chosen a different knife," she admitted. "I have that problem, where I'll accidentally cut myself while throwing knives."
"Right." A thought suddenly occurred him. "Wait- you have all those scars and stuff on your arms, but you don't have one from just now."
"These?" She lifted her arm, showing the black scars that gave Jack shivers. She saw the look on his face, and immediately dropped the sleeve. "These are from poisoned wounds. The crystal can't completely restore the tissue that the poison reached, so it leaves a scar."
"So...all the ones that weren't poisoned..."
"Those people are dead now," she said flatly, her eyes hard.
"Ah." Jack glanced away, then his eyes caught on to the dummy that she had been throwing knives at. He hadn't had a chance to admire her handiwork, since she had gotten 'drunk'. But now he could see how each of the knives were almost perfectly aligned, like a linear equation. "Shame you can't do that to any of the guys back at the school," he remarked as she made her way back over to the weapons' cases.
She glanced at the dummy and nodded. "Shame," she agreed as she pulled her quiver over her head and slid it inside, then bent down to pick up her bow. "But we can't always get what we want, now can we?" Her voice was soft as she said the last sentence, and the tall, regal way that she held herself vanished, her shoulders drooping ever so slightly.
Jack watched her as she fingered the string of her bow, noticing, for the first time, that there were scars in the middle of her knuckles, as if the skin had split when they had punched it something too hard. Jack felt a pang in his chest. "This isn't the first time, is it?" he asked softly. "That they've gotten you in trouble like this?"
She hesitated, then shook her head as she placed the bow inside with the quiver and closed the cabinet door. "I try not to get in anybody's way, but I'm not going to let some coward who get's his jollies off of torturing kids who are smaller and supposedly weaker than him walk over me," she said firmly.
"I don't get it, though. You have all of these awesome moves- and they know this- but you just let them attack you?"
Her head whipped around to face him, glaring at him. "I don't let them do anything."
"Simone, if you can do all of this, then why on Earth are they treating you like this?" he demanded.
"Because they're stupid." She slammed the door case, then began to make her way back upstairs.
Jack grabbed his staff and hurried after her. "Maybe if you just showed them what you could do- could really do- they would leave you alone," he suggested.
She shook her head as they reached the top floor. "It doesn't work like that."
Jack was now struggling to keep up with her fast pace. "Why not? I mean, it could totally work. You, showing off your powers and stuff, threatening them to kill them, and they'd totally leave you alone. Otherwise, you're just letting them walk all over you."
"I'm not letting them do anything!" Jack noticed that she was beginning to clench her fists in frustration.
They were now speed-walking up the stairs. He had completely forgotten to ask Simone about the picture. But it was too late now; he was more focused on why Simone refused to stand up for herself. "But if you just let them get you in trouble like this for something they do-"
She whirled around, and he saw a mad glint in her eye. "I'm not letting them do ANYTHING!" she roared. Jack had only a moment's warning, spotting the blue flames around her. He threw up his right arm instinctively and closed his eyes just before the wall of fire was upon him. White-hot pain seared at his skin, and he felt himself cry out. The fire seemed to shoot straight to his bone, and set everything, every nerve, vein, tendon, on fire.
He was barely aware of his back hitting the wall and sliding down to the floor. He gasped, cradling his burnt arm. For a second, there was a weird buzzing in his ear. It slowly faded away, and he could faintly hear the sound of footsteps. They weren't moving towards him; they were moving away. Jack, somehow managing to think through the pain in his arm, was confused; did she think he had deserved it? No, no, he could feel guilt and even shock and horror at herself. She clearly regretted burning him. So where was she going?
Jack forced himself to take several deep breaths, trying to ignore the smell of burnt flesh, before opening his eyes. He first glanced down at his arm, then had to suppress a groan. The usually pale skin was a bright shiny red, the center a hideous black, and covered his forearm like a red-and-black glove. He lifted his eyes, then froze. Simone was only a couple stairs down, facing him. Her eyes widened when she saw that he had opened his eyes, and she had apparently been in the motion of going back to him. He was still confused, though. But then his eyes landed on the icepack that was already in her right hand, then understood. He lifted his eyes, and their eyes met.
For the first time ever, Simone looked unsure of herself. Her eyes wide, her limbs frozen, she looked like a deer caught in headlights. Then she puffed her cheeks and shook her head, before returning her face back to a unfathomable mask. She jogged up the remaining steps, then knelt besides Jack and took his arm and gently pressed the ice pack to it. He gasped at unexpected burning, then gritted his teeth together and pressed the back of his head against the wall.
"Relax." The word slipped out her mouth as soft and as gentle as Jack never imagined it could be. He glanced at her, but she was looking determinedly at his arm, not meeting his gaze. Instead, she was sliding her hands up and around the ice pack. Jack was about to tell her that ice wasn't good for a second- or third-degree burn, but suddenly the ice seemed to stretch, lengthen. Jack stared in amazement as the ice began to melt, but keep its shape, and even gasped when the ice pack was suddenly a pack of water. The water was slightly warmer, and felt more appealing against his skin. Simone inhaled deeply, then closed her eyes. It began to wrap around his entire arm, enveloping the burn. He let a low hiss escape through his teeth, but sighed at the blissful feeling, and let his head rest against the wall.
I'm sorry.
Jack opened his eyes to see Simone looking sincerely back at him. "I know," he said softly. She nodded, and looked back down at his arm. They were silent for a while, neither quite sure what to say. Jack, never one for silence, finally said, "I thought it was impossible to have a Water affinity and a Fire affinity at the same time."
"I never said it was impossible."
"You implied it."
"Miscommunication on your part." He gaped at her, then saw her lips twitch, and realized what she was doing. "Believe it or not, I wasn't always like this."
He decided to lie. "Like what?"
"Don't pretend, Jack. You know what I'm talking about," she said wearily. "I don't know why I'm like - why I'm like this. So angry and so...closed off. No, that's a lie, I do. But I don't think I'll tell you yet," she added, already sensing his question. He pouted, but nodded for her to continue. "I'm not like other people in some ways, but I think being raised in Atlantis does that to you. But I remember...I remember being happy once. Laughing and smiling. Maybe that's why I have my water affinity. Then, as I grew up...I just stopped laughing and smiling as much. Then I remember becoming more and more angry." She bit her lip, and Jack was once again reminded of the picture downstairs. "And then I stopped being able to use my Water affinity correctly. Because of...what happened. But it happened so long ago, and I don't know why it's still affecting me. All I know is that I'm angry, all the time, and I don't even know why. The only thing I do know is that I hurt people when I get angry. Either physically or emotionally. And I don't mean to. I don't want to. But I just do." She sighed, bowing her head.
Jack watched her for a couple seconds, then asked, "Do you do yoga?"
She lifted her head up, surprise on her face. "Yeah. Every morning."
"How about long baths?"
"Uh, a lot. Why?"
"Well, clearly, all this fighting and fire-blasting isn't helping you out with your temper, now is it?"
"Well, if I didn't have you to challenge me, it wouldn't be a problem, now would it?" she countered smoothly.
He grinned. "Touche. But what do you do when you get angry?"
She shrugged, slipping her necklace into the floating water. It began to glow a slight blue light, and Jack could begin to feel the dead tissue fall away, the new skin already forming underneath. "Hold it in. Let it stew for a while, then go and destroy a couple things in the basement. The usual."
"That's not good. If you keep it in like that, then you're bound to explode every once in a while. Sometimes, when you keep things in like that, then just take it out on something or someone else, the problem's still there. It's still brewing behind the surface. And it's going to just keep adding up until you end up like Mt. St. Helens."
"Oh no, you're going all philosophical on me."
"Simone, I'm serious."
"And the one time I'm not, you're upset."
He stared at her. She was avoiding his gaze, avoiding the question. She had always seemed to face things head-on, with a punch or a quick kick with it. She was never one to jog around it and keep on going. "Simone, what happened?" he asked.
"Nothing that concerns you," she said flatly.
"Um, in case you haven't noticed, we're- as unfortunate as it is- bonded. Which, as far as you told me, makes your problems my problems."
Her lips were pressed into a thin line. "Who says it's a problem anymore?"
Your mental state. Jack bit on his tongue to keep the words from coming out. But it was plain that she was clearly unstable, her mind not as calculated and steady she seemed in public. "Maybe I should take you ice skating," he suggested.
"Ice skating?" she scoffed. "Isn't that how you drowned?"
"Yeah. So?"
"Just thought you might try and avoid another death. Since I had to bring you back the last time."
"And I thoroughly enjoyed your company that time."
"Did you now? I recall a moment afterwards where you had drawn of picture of me, then cried for about ten minutes."
"And I thoroughly remember that."
She pinched her lips together, and didn't say anything as she handed him back his arm. The skin was pale and shiny and new, like a baby's. He slid his fingers along where the burn was, but instead of feeling dead nerves, each one was alive, the senses raised, each touch ten times more sensitive than the last. He glanced up at Simone, who was dumping the water into the potted plant in the corner. He cleared his throat, and she looked up. "Thanks." She shrugged, and turned back to the pot. Jack knew that she wasn't going to say anymore. Unless... "Do you want to go ice skating me tomorrow?" he asked as he stood up.
Simone raised an eyebrow. "I beg your pardon?"
"Ice skating. You know, skating on ice. With ice skates. On ice."
She squinted at him. "Are you trying to be funny?"
"Kind of. But I'm serious too."
She looked down again. "I've never been ice skating, so I'd probably be a drag."
He squinted at her. Her face and tone seemed sincere, but there was something...off. "You're lying," he realized.
"No I'm not."
He opened his mouth to persist, but then closed it when he realized that it would be useless. "So what you haven't been ice skating? I can teach you," he offered. "I'm pretty good at it without skates."
"Sorry, I don't want to get frostbite." She began to jog down the stairs. Her hands were by her sides, her fingers not clutched into fists, but tensed to the point that he was worried that she would begin to cramp- and then so would he. "Shouldn't you be leaving by now?"
Jack shook his head as he followed her down. "Nah, I'd rather stay here, make sure you don't do anything crazy."
She stopped at the bottom of the stairs, then sighed, pressing a hand to the right side of her face. "Fine. You can stay. But I'm warning you, I won't be much fun. I'm rather-" A loud yawn interrupted her, and she leaned against the wall, her body suddenly drooping with weariness. Jack blinked at the sudden show of weakness, and stopped about two steps above her, unsure what to do. She turned her head, so that the right side of her face was pressed against the wall, and tilted her head upward so that their eyes could meet. Her irises were a light gray, and they glinted in the light of the sun shining through the skylight. Jack felt shivers go up his back, though they felt good, in a way. "Are you sure you still want to stay?" she asked softly.
He hesitated, then nodded. "I'll stay."
"Okay. But- could you do me a favor?" Her voice sounded eerily faint, her eyelids drooping slightly. He didn't need the bond to tell him that she was struggling to stay awake. He remembered when she had told him that she hadn't slept in over a day yesterday, and wondered if she had slept last night.
"Yeah, sure."
"Could you go up to my room and grab the book that I showed you yesterday, Nashataku Bonjkumon?" she asked. "'The Secret of Nash Valley'?" she said impatiently, to his blank face.
"Oh right!" He hurried up the stairs, and entered her room. The redness of the walls didn't seem to bother him as much as last time. He glanced around the room, then caught sight of it on her desk. He leaned over and picked it up, and was about to leave when he noticed that something was sticking out of the pages. Curious, he pinched the flap between his fingers and pulled it out, expecting a bookmark.
To his surprise, it was a photograph- and even more surprising, it was of a boy. He had recently began to think that Simone was asexual, that neither sex could attract her. He studied it with more interest than he would have if it had been someone's else picture. He was a good-looking boy with chiseled features. He was about thirteen or fourteen, who looked Hispanic, with his tanned skin and sparse facial hair that most people would find sexy. The only odd thing about him was his eye color, which were an odd shade of blue. They were the same blue that he had once seen Simone's eyes been when they had first met, who, incidentally, was also in the photo.
Her expression shocked him. Her face was full of pain of being in the process of laughing too hard. Jack hadn't even been sure that she could laugh. Her eyes were squeezed tight, tears beginning to form at the corners. Her hands clutched at the boy's arm playfully, her head nestled on his shoulder. Jack was surprised at the position he was holding her. His left arm was around her shoulders as, the right around her waist to pull her close. He was laying the side of his face on hers, and their cheeks would be touching if it weren't for her long hair that were in the same wild, wavy curls that he had seen earlier. Whoever he was, he seemed to know her...intimately. The boy was grinning broadly, though not at the camera. His eyes were focused on Simone, his eyes soft as they gazed upon her laughing face.
Jack stared at the picture for a little more, then hurriedly stuffed the photo back into the book, worried that somehow Simone would know that he was looking at something that was probably very private. He tucked the book in his pocket and jogged back down the stairs. "Got your book!" he called, when he reached the bottom landing, then frowned when he saw that Simone still wasn't resting against the wall. "Simone?"
He glanced around as he walked into the sitting room, then spotted her laying on the longest couch. "There you are! I got your book." Jack was about to tap on her on her shoulder when he saw that her eyes were closed. He retracted his hand, and shook his head, chuckling softly. She was asleep. Jack laid the book on the nightstand, and sat on the arm of the couch, watching her. Even as she slept, she seemed tense, her fingers clenched into fists under face, her muscles taut. Her face was tight, drawn. Her body was curled up into a ball, as if shielding herself from the rest of the world.
Jack sighed. He knew what it felt like to gain no peace from sleep. There had been a period of time, after Pitch had attacked him, where he would sleep for days at a time, and still awake feeling as if he had only napped for five minutes. He sighed again. He couldn't leave her down here. He slid off of the couch arm, then slid his arms under her body, and, as best as he could without waking her up, lifted her off of the couch in a cradle position. She was heavier than he had expected, and he staggered under the weight for a second. Once when he managed to regain his balance, he checked to make sure that she was still sound asleep, then began to fly back upstairs.
By the time he reached her room, he was puffing, and beads of sweat were beginning to bead along his hairline. He breathed a sigh of relief when he was finally able to lay her on her bed. He stepped back, still trying to catch his breath, and sat on her desk. She was still sound asleep, and didn't seem to be disturbed by their flight to her room. He tilted his head, noticing that she was also beginning to sweat. He leaned down to touch her forehead and almost leaped back. It was searing hot, so much that he was surprised that her skin wasn't smoking. Jack wasn't familiar with the affects of having a Fire affinity, but he was sure that fiery hot skin wasn't a good sign. He hesitated, then placed his full palm on her forehead, ignoring the heat, and struggled to push his own cooling powers into her.
It took a while, but finally, she stopped sweating, her skin having cooled down. Jack took his hand away, and glanced at Simone. As he looked at her, he felt something odd in the pit of his stomach, something that he hadn't felt in a while. He stared at the sleeping figure, then abruptly turned around and down the stairs, trying to ignore the conflicted feelings that were battling inside of his chest. As he closed the door behind him as he exited the house, he glanced up, and, in his mind's eye, saw Simone's sleeping figure. What am I going to do about you? he wondered.
This chapter is called The Poisoned Portrait because Jack sees two pictures of Simone. But when he compares it to her, it's like a pretty portrait gone sour. Just for anybody who's confused.
Also, I have now added in another original character! :D Who you think the mystery boy is? What do you think he is to Simone? And where do you think he he is now?
That review button is looking pretty lonely down there. Why don't you tell him all of your opinions and make a lonely old author happy?
