Vicky stood in the kitchen of the diner, leaning on the bar with her head in her hand. The woman's uniquely colored pink eyes were focused on Timmy, who sat across the room. The teen was hugging his knees close, a pained, almost defeated, expression was sprawled across his features. To the redhead he looked fragile, almost broken. This wasn't the first time Vicky noticed this expression, it first appeared on his face just a little over two months ago. Right after his sixteenth birthday. Leading up to his birthday, Vicky noticed that the brunette twerp was making more of an effort to be happy and excitable, but she knew he was anxious underneath that mask. Then his birthday had gone and passed and the look on his face was permanently contorted into an array of sadness.
Whenever she came over she'd note that he never went to his room. She thought it unimportant at first, but as days turned to weeks and weeks into months she noticed a huge shift in his demeanor when he thought he was away from prying eyes. He wouldn't show emotion, he looked dead. He'd avoid his room like it was the plague, opting instead to sleep and hide away in his treehouse that still stood in the backyard. The teen wouldn't eat anything either, no matter what. Vicky ordered food for the two of them, but then he'd say the same thing she had grown so used to hearing. "I'm not hungry right now." He would say in an almost monotonous tone. Secretly this attitude shift ate at her, but she pushed it down low. She never cared before, why start now?
"Because the twerp's never been sad." Victoria had answered her own thoughts aloud unknowingly. "Because even when you were at your absolute meanest, he stood strong. Now though..."
Her pink eyes returned to Timmy's form. He was staring at some textbook and paper in front of him, but he wasn't focused on it. His eyes were glossed over, deep in thought and she knew he was doing everything in his power to keep himself from crying. Vicky knew almost everything that went through that head of his, eight years together and she could read him like a book.
"Hell, I spend more time around him than his parents!" She stated. "Guess I should try and make even more of an effort to be...nicer."
Timmy stared at the homework in front of him, he couldn't focus, the world around him kept blurring as his eyes glossed over. He pushed the tears away and tried once more to focus on his assignment, but he couldn't. Thoughts buzzed around in his head, an endless cacophonous noise that he tried to drown out using music and responsibilities. It was futile. His brain practically screamed at him about his failures, but they weren't coherent, just noise. Only two trains of thought managed to break through the threshold, though. They were strong and dripped with malice and self loathing. The first was anxious.
"Don't cry. Soon we'll be home and can alleviate this pain in other ways. Besides what would Vicky think? What if she tells Tootie? You'd become even more of a twerp to the both of them!" He fearfully screamed at himself. The other train of thought was nothing less than pure, unadulterated hate.
"Look at you." He screamed at himself. "Unable to do the most basic of assignments. With intelligence like this, is it truly any wonder why people keep leaving?"
The logic was flawed, but hatred never really needed a good argument to win. It simply needed to be heard. Timmy listened.
"Chester and AJ left you, Tootie left you, even your ow-" his thoughts were cut off as he snapped backed to the here and now.
"Here ya go, twerp." Vicky stated as she placed down Timmy's order on the table. A chocolate shake, large order of fries and a plate of bacon. Timmy raised an eyebrow at this.
"I didn't order that." He stated confused, not bothering to take out his earbuds, his voice was hoarse. Vicky could almost feel the sadness within his vocal cords.
"It's on the house." She stated. "Extra crispy and not too fatty, how you like them."
"T-thanks..." Timmy trailed off, his confusion growing.
Timmy's eyes finally met Vicky's as he looked away from his food. His eyes were like a frozen lake, cracked and ready to spill. Vicky looked at him with pity. What happened? Everything was fine, normal, up until that week, but once his birthday had gone and passed it all changed. Vicky tried to think of every possible scenario, tried to remember if there were any clues, but she found nothing. She was left with that one question and no answers, no hints. She hated it. Vicky wanted to know what was wrong, she wanted to try and help, but she was in no position to do so.
"Why would he accept my help anyway?" Vicky thought to herself as she walked away from the boy. "He'd probably think it was some trick, some scheme to get at him." Victoria sighed and slumped her head onto the counter. "Any other day and he'd be right on the money..."
She watched the brunet eat, it was the most she's seen him eat anything as of recently. She was glad he was eating again, but she could tell it was because this was comfort food and not something he actually wanted to do. The Twerp, as Victoria always referred to him, was a brave, arrogant, headstrong kid with a heart of gold. He didn't deserve whatever was eating away at him, withering him down into this whispering, saddened fool who hid away from the public using a mask of poorly concealed normalcy. She wanted to help, but she also knew that she wasn't the one to do so and even if she was he'd have to come to her. She'd make him come to her, somehow, as long as it meant things would get back to normal.
Victoria, when she was in her sixteenth year of life, wanted nothing more than to crush Timmy's spirit and have him do everything she stated without complaint or objections. Now that she had just that, she absolutely hated it, it wasn't correct. Victoria stopped and turned around, heading for Timmy's table. The teen noticed and took out his earbuds as she sat down next to him, an eyebrow raised. Victoria kicked her feet up and let them rest on the table, her usual laidback demeanor.
"Your parents are leaving again, asked me to babysit." She stated. "Leaving for a week...or three"
"Y-Yeah, I assumed. I saw the sh-shot glasses were missing and knew some text was inevitable." He stated, growing uneasy from Vicky's nearness.
"My shift ends in about...two hours." She stated after glancing toward the analog clock that hung above the bar. It was shaped like a cartoon cat. "If you're willing to wait I'll drive ya home, no point in walking."
"I...okay." Timmy stated, glancing away uncomfortably. He was confused at her niceness, when she calmed down she was simply apathetically amicable, now she was showing genuine kindness. It was weird, but not unwelcome.
Vicky opened her mouth to say something, but was called away by someone in the kitchen. She quickly and silently got up and started walking to whom ever it was that called her, but she looked back and noticed that Timmy was playing with the cuffs of his jacket. She paid it little to no mind and continued on her way. For the remaining two hours at the diner, Vicky had kept herself busy with her responsibilities, but made sure to always glance Timmy's way whenever he came into view. She was worried, that much was clear, but she didn't know why. She knew it went deeper than just his attitude, but didn't give much thought to it, him and her sister were the only people she allowed herself to worry over and she chalked it up to time. Time was what healed her and Tootie's relationship, maybe the same could be said about her and Timmy? She had hoped so.
Timmy scratched at his wrists guilty, before he gathered his textbooks and papers and dropped them into his backpack. He cleared his trash best he could and simply sat patiently, waiting for Vicky. He wanted to walk, wanted to avoid the redhead, but with the morning he had a drive seemed nice. Eventually the aforementioned woman had came up to his table, she no longer wore her yellow waitress get up. Instead she wore a green, leather jacket that stopped just below her ribcage, the jacket was worn atop a black band T-shirt, some 70's metal band, named after a torture device with a weird mascot. Black skinny jeans hugged her legs nicely and under those sat red, high-top, rubber toed sneakers. The color scheme was nostalgic and iconic, green, red and black, those were her colors. Somehow it comforted Timmy. Some colors always seemed to comfort him, pink, green, purple, but... red and black? He didn't know, he didn't care.
"Ya ready to go, Twerp?" Vicky asked without a negative inflection on his nickname, seemed more like a term of endearment than the insult he grew up with. He liked it more that way, but he wouldn't admit it.
"Y-yeah." Timmy stated, before having an internal struggle about his stutter. He wasn't a kid anymore, he didn't need to cry or fear the woman in front of him. It didn't help.
The taller woman motioned with her hand for him to follow her, he did wordlessly. He didn't like his height, he didn't grow much and was just smaller than average, it made him feel insignificant. The world grew around him and he stayed the same. The redhead and brunet had walked out and behind the diner, almost immediately had Timmy spotted her car. It was so obvious, it was so obviously her. The car was a 1970's Dodge Dart, the exterior was a fiery red, the interior was black leather, a bench seat in front, no center console. Vicky was always one for vanity, but this, Timmy could get behind. Timmy always had an appreciation for older cars, maybe it was because he spent the most time with his parents inside their 1965 Station Wagon, he didn't dwell on that.
When it came to his parents, Timmy didn't let them stay in his mind long, he didn't know why but he somehow felt like the longer they stayed in his thoughts, the more he'd be hurt by them. He was already numb to their absence, no use opening old wounds he should have gotten over a long time ago. Timmy hopped shotgun and quickly buckled his seatbelt, surprised by the fact this car was a lot cleaner than her old one. Victoria copied his actions and quickly got behind the wheel before peeling rubber and leaving as quickly as she could.
The streets were clear, the yards were neatly trimmed. A suburban utopia to some, a dystopia to others. Timmy rested his head on the passenger window and gazed at the cookie-cutter housing, it was all so boring and he had grown tired of the sight. AJ had moved to New York City, Chester had moved to Washington, they got to experience the new while he stayed in the old. He was envious of them, but was angrier at the fact he couldn't see them anymore. No more could he invite them over to watch Crash Nebula or read The Crimson Chin. They were alone now and it was hitting Timmy the hardest. Timmy let out a sigh through his nose that fogged up the window. They had their parents at least.
"Whatcha thinking about?" Vicky asked, glancing out the side of her eye at the boy.
"Just..." He wanted to tell her about how he couldn't stop thinking about his parents, about how he missed them, loved them, hated them, but he couldn't. How would she react? Would she lord this over him? He didn't want to risk it. "Nothing."
"Well if you need a sounding board, I can listen." She stated nonchalantly, before returning her attention back to the road.
Timmy studied her, her pale skin, her freckles that sprawled across her cheeks and nose. He could go to her, right? She had changed and she could offer some advice. He wanted to talk to somebody, anybody, but he'd choose to bite his tongue for now, but he needed someone.