Chapter twenty-one- Caffeineand Competition
It wasn't long until Jack and Jamie came back with a heap of card and board games. It was a surreal experience. Jessica was watching her son, who seemed unfazed to say the absolute least. She had been able to see Jack, yes, but she hadn't ever imagined his world would be so off-the-wall. That wasn't what struck her most though. What was most impressive was how calm Jamie was. How he was unfazed by everything, so able to look past the fantastic and even scary things happening around him to focus on having fun, it was beyond her.
She was proud.
North was smiling through a cloud of intense nervous energy. He was terrified that he was losing a battle for their oldest and newest Guardian. He was needed and he felt his failure creeping up on him. He was the wizard in the room and he couldn't even come up with the simple spells needed to bind an entity! He was sure his teacher would be rolling in his grave by now. He was struck by how much trust was being placed on him and he was more than determined to never let them down. Mrs. Bennett was giggling at them and Tooth had calmly sent Baby Tooth to do her thing short-notice/term at Tooth Palace so she could stay. He prayed with everything in him that the trust placed in him was not ill-placed and focused on his work. Pages and words started to blur together and he was forced to work at a snail's pace.
He was about to fall over from exhaustion.
Tooth had come back with espresso and handed the warm semi-sweet liquid over to James before settling down beside Jack and Jamie. James decided to sit this one out, helping Tooth play instead as he understood the game much better. It was a welcome distraction. Jack and Jamie managed to get Monopoly set up and after a few rounds of being utterly befuddled Jamie looked to Jack.
"Um…maybe Monopoly is a bust." He teased.
"Well it is a bit complicated." He chuckled his agreement.
"Bigtime." Tooth agreed. Mrs. Bennett was still sitting beside Pitch, not really liking the game herself and freely admitting at the offset that no one wanted her trying to do math.
"Why don't we pick something with a bit less thought involved?" She suggested.
"Go-Fish?" Jamie offered.
"Hey, yeah! That can get intense though, can you guys handle it?" Jack smirked, Jamie mirroring the boy without even realizing it.
"Oh you're on." Tooth grinned in a way that could be compared to a silent movie-villain. A bad one. Super crazy cliché bad. Mrs. Bennett thought of a particular bad b movie villain and couldn't contain the snort she gave which spewed coffee, which made James do the same thing.
"EEWWW! MOM! YOU SNORTED YOUR COFFEE ALL OVER ME!" Jamie yelled in indignation and slight disgust. He was laughing, of course, but he was still upset. A little. It was the principal of the thing. That coffee had been in her NOSE. Seriously.
James, Pitch and Jessica continued to crack up.
"Well, you might need a shower now…" Jack sputtered.
"Just give his mom some water and challenge Tooth again." James suggested. Tooth huffed indignantly, managing to hold on to her serious expression for all of three more seconds before cracking up.
North couldn't help but chuckle.
Meanwhile Sandy curled up on his cloud of sand having flown just outside of the Pole to distribute his dreams. He found that Pitch-no, James-had outdone himself with the good dreams and although he would probably deny it later had taken the job more seriously than even Sandy himself did sometimes. The children's dreams had been overflowing with so much Joy and patience that Sandy wondered how he hadn't passed out ever few hours from the power drain. Then again, he didn't know that at all. He did his best to make sure the children weren't let down by the dreams he gave. He had been at this much longer than James, as he had been transformed into the Boogeyman early in his career, so it wasn't as much of a drain.
He still needed a nap when he was done. He wasn't the only one either.
He tapped the larger man's shoulder when he came in, smiling widely as he saw Jack's effect on the group. North almost didn't notice him for a moment.
"Oh, Sandy." He muttered as he shook his head. Sleep was calling to him but he wouldn't have it.
Sandy formed a golden bed, an image of his symbol (candy canes), and a clock.
"No, not yet. Must…must find spells first, then sleep. Here, have not looked at this pile." North Handed him a second copy of the notes he had been taking and turned back to the book he was searching through. A pit had settled into the jolly man's stomach that twisted painfully every time P-James would flinch away from the voice only he heard, or wince ever so slightly from a shooting pain. The others didn't notice, he wasn't even sure James himself realized it, but he did. It was ripping him apart.
Sandy's hand on his shoulder snapped him back to reality. He formed a medical symbol, and gave North a stern look.
"No, Sandy I-" Sandy outright glared at his friend. He decided to take a more direct approach. Picking up the notebook he had provided him with he started to scribble in a neat but looped and elegant script.
'North, you need to sleep. I'm not asking, I'm telling. You are going to go to sleep for a while because nearly killing yourself isn't going to help. You can't think straight to search. You're doing your best, that's more than enough. Just relax and let me take it from you for a while. I know you don't want to rest when he can't, but the more clearly we think the faster we can help him heal.' Sandy explained. He was going to protest but quickly deflated, looking beaten.
"Alright." He agreed, standing to head to his office, which was closer and had a pullout couch. He didn't want to go far in case something happened. Sandy caught him once more on the shoulder, question mark bouncing.
It was clear he was asking why North was so sad to leave and sleep.
"Am…failing them." He offered almost at a whisper. Sandy shook his head adamantly.
A family, a shield, and a check mark bounced quickly before dissipating. His old friend, his oldest actually, understood his message and relaxed. He nodded, returning Sandy's sad smile before heading to sleep. Sandy didn't need to knock him out and his sleep was too deep for his dreams to reach his fried, exhausted mind.
As he settled in a chair to research he noticed something that widened his eyes and flipped the whole plan they had on its head.
So, I'm so very sorry for the wait and this is one of my shorter chapters but we don't have school in the morning and I couldn't sleep. I've been on more of a reading kick recently so the updates were a little neglected but I'll fix that! I'd like to thank my reviewers/followers again for being awesome people! Thanks for stickin' with it! Feel free to PM me suggestions/comments/critiques! (PS-, it's somewhere around 11:16 in the AM where I am and I've been up since seven, and I just fabricated this because I felt like I needed to get this idea out of my brain and to y'all before it died, so please let me know if there are any continuity/grammar/overall errors and I'll be happy to addressthem!)