Audrey, lovely Audrey, who Seymour had gathered from their conversation interspersed with kisses and caresses dreamed of running a sweet little artsy coffee shop after college, getting to college in the first place, and liked the color green, shifted on his lap with an intoxicating, contented sigh before suddenly tensing up a moment later. "...What time is it?" The anxiety of the revelation that Mr. Mushnik might come in and puncture the little bubble of paradise they had managed to forge at any time was significantly, surprisingly mitigated by the rare tranquility it had brought him for Seymour, and he pulled his new, actually decent phone he had gotten with the shop's recent earnings out of his pocket to check. The realization that Audrey's instincts had been spot-on and that they now had a little more than just enough time to get to AP Environmental Science and avert Mr. Mushnik's suspicions did a better job of puncturing the bubble but was far from succeeding completely. Audrey quickly looked at it as well, visibly relaxing much to his relief as she saw the time. "...Ohhh, that was your phone…"
Despite the joking tone of her voice and the enchanting laugh that followed it, Seymour was flustered by this. He missed her as soon as she had stood up, even though she was still in the left wing with him. …Could this be his place in the world he had been longing for? By the side of the most wonderful person that ever lived, doing everything in his power to make her as happy as possible? Audrey tilted her head towards the stage, breaking him out of his contemplations but not the sheer euphoria of them. "C'mon, let's not worry Mr. Mushnik." Seymour stood up obediently to follow her, the rare joy he had managed to find in the left wing scattering to the winds as he saw the long since disposed of box cutter on a table near the bench and the circumstances… the person that had necessitated its use once again claimed his near-permanent residence in his conscious awareness. Orin… Orin was still a problem, and Seymour had no more of an idea of how to take care of him than he had when he had first walked in here today. How could he possibly… He jolted his head upwards, redirecting his gaze to meet Audrey's, as she gently took his hand in hers. "...I know… but it's okay, Seymour; he's been a lot easier to handle with your support."
His expression must have betrayed doubt, because she added a "Really" a moment later. Seymour breathed in sharply as the full, horrific reality of the situation occurred to him. "What if- what if he finds out about this? What if he…" He trailed off, once again stunned into silence, as Audrey squeezed his hand reassuringly. "He won't figure it out, as long as we're careful. He's too proud for that." …That meant she wanted to do more things like this in the future, right? …Maybe even be girlfriend and boyfriend? …But Orin was still hurting her… He had to do something about him, he just didn't know what, or how… Feeling a tumultuous storm of more conflicted emotions than he had ever experienced, Seymour nodded, finally following her outside of this site of her suffering and their perfect, serene shared moment. They hesitantly let go of each other's hands before reentering the hallway… at least he thought it was also hesitant on her end… before making their way to the room for AP Environmental Science, barely reaching it before the bell and Mr. Mushnik. Contrary to what Seymour's anxiety-ridden imaginings told him would happen, Mr. Mushnik's daily ritual of checking to make sure Audrey was in class seemed to go off without a hitch, as did the rest of class, in which he and Audrey actually worked on that project she had pretended to Orin was the reason she wanted to visit the shop.
Life was seeming pretty good for once save for the leather-clad elephant in the room, until said elephant showed up after them to Botany. Audrey abruptly cut off her conversation with Seymour mid-sentence upon hearing Orin's footsteps at the entrance to the room, apparently having memorized the sound of them, and swiveled around and stood to face him while Seymour somehow managed to stop himself from doing the same and potentially making this situation worse. Orin loved to have an audience and seemed to get egged on by having one, especially one consisting of his 'favorite underclassman,' the bastard… He had done a quicker, more forceful, angrier version of his stupid little saunter to Audrey, making it progressively more difficult for Seymour to pretend to be interested in the notes he and Audrey had taken for their project in their last class instead of what was going on right next to him. "What if I just left you hanging by the rigging where Mushnik couldn't save you next time; how'd you like that?!" Audrey's strained response started slightly before he had finished talking. "I'm sorry, Doc-"
Suddenly, her voice was cut off by a yelp of pain and… had he… hit her?! Seymour could barely hear the rest of what they said and the gasps and hushed whispers of their classmates over the ringing in his ears, could barely stop himself from turning around to face them but couldn't manage to get up and pummel him into the ground like he should… he might actually be able to do it in this state, he was so angry, but he felt like he was actually frozen to the ground. He didn't even bother with uh-huhing his way through the stupid shit Orin tried to ask him before class this time, and no, he did not think you had to 'train 'em.' Seymour was only aware that class had ended when Audrey gently tapped him on the arm, alerting him to the students shuffling out of the room. He tried to lock eyes with her… apologetically? sympathetically? reassuringly? what was the game plan there?... but by then she was already being unceremoniously herded out of the room by Orin… who he had a rehearsal with today. At least that meant Audrey would get a break from him… The rehearsal was just as much of a blur as class; Mr. Mushnik never put him in, he had made him an understudy specifically so that no one on stage or in the audience would be subjected to his ineptitude, just like Audrey had been when he hadn't stood up for her today… He thought Orin might've said something to him at some point about how he was too tense and then offered something to 'take off the edge,' he wasn't sure, but at least he hadn't somehow roped him into 'taking the edge off' with him behind the school after the rehearsal like he had roped him into auditioning for this thing in the first place…at least, he was pretty sure he hadn't…
And then he was barely aware that he had gotten in the car until the tense, hostile silence that had filled it during most of his rides in it ever since he had made Mr. Mushnik's entire purpose for taking him in moot by not being able to handle work, school, and the play all at the same time finally broke through to him. He wasn't even angry anymore when he finally got back to the shop and collapsed onto his bed, except a little at himself, just empty inside, as if even his capacity for his characteristic and near omnipresent anxiety had burned out of him in the flames of his fury, leaving only pathetic, petty embers behind in a broken husk. A husk that had already been broken… that had always been broken… of course he had known that Orin was treating her badly, he had seen what he hoped but knew weren't most of the marks and untied her from a ladder in a dark, cramped space he had just left her in just today, but something about him hitting her in front of him and him not being able to bring himself to do anything about it, to help her had just caused something in him to snap. As if either commiserating in his pain or trying to make it worse, Audrey 2 audibly crashed to the floor of the storefront above him. Seymour didn't have much of anything in him right now, let alone blood… he couldn't feed him right now, he just couldn't… but he had to, if he let it and its money-making potential die Mr. Mushnik might actually throw him out onto the street… plus, it'd be nice to not let down at least one of the Audreys today…
Seymour eventually managed to shakily stand up, making his way up to the thankfully now closed and deserted storefront and seeing immediately that Audrey 2 had indeed collapsed. …Had it been that big the last time he had seen it? Whatever breed it was sure would be good for fuel if there was more than one of it in the world and it didn't grow on blood, it grew so fast… did he even have enough blood to keep feeding it? As Seymour unwrapped some of the bandages covering his fingers, trying to figure out how he would do this, he almost thought he heard a low voice say something like "Feed… me…," causing him to instinctively respond with "I beg your pardon?" He heard the voice again, stronger and more insistent this time, and saw that it was… coming from the plant? "Feed me." Amazed and struggling to process this, Seymour moved closer to it, kneeling down slightly. "…Twoey… you talked! You opened your trap and you said-" Suddenly, the plant reared its pod up, causing him to back up in shock. "Feed me, Krelborn, feed me now!" After a pause and an exasperated upwards… pod? head? tilt from the plant, Seymour wordlessly moved back towards it, attempting to squeeze any blood he could out of his cut-up fingers and realizing quickly that little was coming. Audrey 2's adamant "More! More! More!" confirmed that it had been far from enough, but there wasn't much Seymour could do about that right now.
"There isn't any more! What do you want me to do, slit my wrists?" Even at the plant's disturbingly enthused response of "Ahhh…," that alternate plan didn't actually sound so horrible to Seymour… no, he couldn't, if he couldn't even stand up to Orin there was no way in Hell he could do… that… "Oh, boy… look, I've got an idea. I'll pick you up some nice chopped sirloin, how about that?" Audrey 2 leaned in slightly closer to him in its deranged fervor. "Must be blood." He looked away from him at this. "Twoey, that's disgusting." The voice it apparently had continued, more bloodthirsty than ever. "Must be fresh." Seymour covered his ears, not believing or wanting to believe what was happening. "I don't wanna hear this…" He could still hear it despite his admittedly lacking efforts. "Even if it's your only shot at savin' Audrey from that jerk?" Seymour figured out what it was talking about and that it had heard him all those times he had vented to it about Orin's treatment of Audrey after a moment. As mortifying as that latter realization was, it had a point; that would be a way to free Audrey. To get rid of Orin. But how could he finish him off in the first place, if he hadn't even been able to confront him today? "...I don't… I-I can't… how…" Mr. Mushnik did have a gun under the counter in case someone tried to rob the store, not that there had been much to rob before Audrey and the plant named after her had saved it…
Audrey, lovely Audrey… he just had to find a way to make this happen for her, to justify the trust she had placed in him and the comfort she apparently felt with him, cowardice be damned… and it was about time for him and Orin to be getting started on that project for Botany. That would be a good excuse to invite him over, since he certainly couldn't bring Audrey 2 anywhere… not that he would need an excuse, as Orin's apparent 'favorite underclassman…' And maybe, just maybe, having the starring role in the spring musical instead of Orin would impress her enough to at least partially make up for how badly he had betrayed her today… and, even more unlikely, maybe they could definitively be girlfriend and boyfriend with Orin gone and an actually impressive feat under Seymour's belt for once, and he could have his long longed-for place in the world at her side… but even if none of that happened, even if all he accomplished was freeing her from Orin and making a fool out of himself on stage, it would be worth it for her to be safe from him, if he could just manage this. He heard himself say "I'll do it" as if it was being spoken far away from him, as if he wasn't physically in his body right now. Audrey 2's much enthused "Yeah you will! So go git it!" and accompanying likely intended to be friendly but still hard punch against his shoulder with a vine, ironically like how Orin did it, sounded much closer and brought him back into his body, a place that he now wanted to be at least a little bit more than he had before it had started talking.