(no subject)

[opalescents]

Who: Atticus Starling & Pearl Kline
When: Late Break Sometime
Where: Kline house.
What: Just a lil teen rebellion for the road.
Warnings: Teen Nicotine Usage

The Klines live in a big house on an even bigger lot of land, and Atticus is no stranger to the trees that line the back of the yard. There are just enough of them to disappear into, and he spent many hours alone out here before he came to Finchwood. He spent some time here with Pearl, too, back before they got along. Although, to an outside observer, they’d look more or less the same now - standing just out of sight of her parents, huddled in the cold, smoking. The silence is more comfortable now than it was then, though. He likes it here. It hasn’t been his worst foster home by any stretch of the imagination, and Pearl’s the only foster sibling he’s ever had that he has any intention of staying in touch with. And the Klines are decent people - it’s kind of them to offer their home to him until the summer, even if he has no intention of returning once he goes back to school. He likes it here, but he’s not sad at all about leaving. Pearl… might be, he thinks as he glances over at her. This has been her home for her entire life, and real parents are different than foster parents, no matter what your relationship with them is. “I’m going to try to quit,” he says after a long moment. “New Year’s resolution.” Pearl, for once, is very quiet. She’s always liked these trees, too. Atticus’ affinity with her miniature forest, home to dozens of hiding spots for teenage contraband and nooks for reading away lonely afternoons, had felt like an invasion when he first got here. Now that he’d been politely told he had until about July to leave, part of her felt like suggesting they just camp out, a final protest. But that’s silly. Some things happened whether she liked them or not, and they were both going to be out of this house entirely very soon. She looks up at him after a beat, after she pulls her cigarette out from between her lips to contemplate it, exhaling smoke. “I’ll quit if you do.” She offers, almost automatically, but sincere. “I should, anyway. Smoking’s expensive.” “And bad for you,” he adds, also an automatic kind of response and not nearly as sincere. It’s true, but it isn’t his top reason for quitting. Or his second, or his third. Neal’s been nagging him about it lately, almost as fussily as he had when they’d been dating. Atticus tries not to read into that too much. Being co-leaders is a kind of relationship, too, and Neal has to put up with it almost as much as he did before. And even though Neal still hasn’t determined Atticus’s smoking habits to be problematic to the squad, that doesn’t mean they aren’t. “We’re a bad influence on Thalia, too,” he says. “It’s BAD for you???” Pearl lets her face go mock-incredulous, but retreats into a more quietly mischievous expression soon enough. She’s not feeling as much of her usual exuberance tonight, and around just Atticus, that’s comfortable. “You’re right, though.” She admits, because really, he is. Thalia, her darling, will doubtlessly do whatever she wants anyway, but they probably shouldn’t always be ducking out to kill the good work their lungs do in training. “We’ll have to take up running instead, in all our new spare time.” She does not sound enthusiastic. "I can't be a runner," Atticus says, very deadpan. He doesn't have any problem with working out - he does a little bit of it outside of training, although honestly not enough. But getting up before the sun to run laps around campus has never appealed to him, and every time Adam and Scout have managed to drag him along has been miserable. "What if we start a kickball league instead?" he offers. "I'm great at kickball." “I hate kickball.” She says almost before his sentence is out. It’s not kickball’s fault. She’s just bad at sports. The sentiment sounds a little harsh once it’s out, though, so Pearl softens it by demonstrating a very small kick, aimed at his ankle. She makes a show of grazing out of the way. “Buuut I’d try it, if that’s THE only way we’ll ever hang out again.” Which isn’t something she’s worried about, of course. Her smile’s aimed at the dirt and only falters a little at her own reminder that he could now, legally, choose he did not want to associate with her ever again. He probably won’t. But who ever really knows. “We’re still on a squad together,” he reminds her. “And we have class. If we add kickball you might get sick of me.” He’s not so oblivious that he doesn’t realize what she’s really getting at. But they’ve made plans, for after school. It’s not like he’s going to disappear. But he doesn’t know how to bring that up in any kind of way he’d be comfortable with. He’s never liked talking about his numbered days in the Kline household. The fact that they’re coming to an end doesn’t make it any easier. “And there’s Portland,” he adds. “Did you apply to USM?” “I’m not ever gonna get sick of you.” Tonight, especially, it feels important to remind him. But for once, mentioning the future causes Pearl to visibly relax, even brighten. It’s a little harder to imagine Atticus disappearing right after graduation when they’re still making plans to move to the same city. Saying things aloud is a little more solid than what might’ve been jokes in a journal. “And of course I did. There, and University of New Hampshire, in case we go crazy and want to hop one state over. When do you have to start applying for jobs??” “I’ll have to take a certification course first,” he says. He’s been over the requirements and details a million times, and he could rattle them off if he wanted to. But he won’t bore Pearl with that right now. “I’ll start as soon as we get settled.” Whatever that means. He doesn’t know if the Klines are going to pay Pearl’s way through college and isn’t about to ask. But even if he has a little money put away, from working summer jobs and the ridiculous allowance he’s been given here, he knows there’s a chance that it’ll be difficult to make ends meet on their own. For a little while. Unless… “I applied to USM too,” he says after a second spent in silence. “What!!!” Pearl’s face lights up a frankly comical amount, and she coughs on the cloud she’d just inhaled. She recovers quickly but isn’t beaming any less. It’s a surprise, and knocks all of the careful plans for scholarships and savings she’d been about to share straight out of her head. “We could be in the same DORM?” “If we both get in,” he reminds her, but her smile is infectious. This warrants a quick rap with her knuckles to his shoulder. “We’re getting in.” She insists. “You’re DEFINITELY getting in. Are you gonna go for nursing right away??” “That’s the plan,” he says, swatting her hand away as she tries to hit him. It’s kind of a big deviation from his original plan, but it doesn’t feel like a bad back-up when he’s set on following Pearl anyway. “Did you settle on a major?” he asks. She settles on tapping his hand instead, and that’s fine. “It’s a really good plan.” She insists. And it is. Maybe expensive. They’ll have to get scholarships, or she’ll have to go back into her parents’ home and admit that she’d lied to them on this very break. She’s going to college after all, and maybe they could help support her schooling, and she’d find a way to split the money with Atticus. If he wanted. It’s a lot to think about, and they have a little time. For now, she grinds the dregs of her cigarette under her shoe, shaking her head. “No. I mean. Music, maybe. But for music therapy or something. I’ve been thinking. It kinda feels stupid to just...sing or whatever, after everything.” Atticus laughs, but not at her or in an unkind way. He can see her doing that, and he more than understands her compulsion to help people. He’d been a little like that even before he came to Finchwood, but it’s hard to not let what they do at school impact your outlook on life. He’s glad it makes her want to be altruistic. It’d be easy to let it make you cynical. “You’d be good at that,” he says. “Would you work with kids? You’d be good with kids.” His laughter doesn’t do anything to dissuade her. On the contrary, she curls closely towards him, now without even her small flame in the cold. It’s encouraging. It’s not a you’re stupid, Pearl. That’s more than enough. And she values Atticus’ opinions more than maybe anyone’s. “You think?” She ponders, actually thoughtful. “I’d like to. I think kids would be fun.” “Yeah,” he says, stomping his own cigarette out. It’s a damp, cold day and the fresh air stings his lungs a little. “I think you could really help.” His voice trails off, like there was more to his sentence, but he doesn’t finish it. Pearl’s been a good influence on him, since he met her. He wishes it had happened earlier. Maybe they’d both be better off now if it had. But that’s one of those things there’s no point in saying out loud, and he sighs a heavy breath as he looks back towards the house. To follow his sentence to its logical conclusion, Pearl traces his eyes back toward her house, and she bites her lip down, a practiced reaction to having to go back in there and face the suffocating quiet punctuated by biting remarks. On impulse, she links her elbow through Atticus’ and turns them toward the driveway instead. There’s no reason to go back inside. There’s not much for either of them, there. “And YOU can help ME if you read my scholarship essay. I’ll buy you bribe nuggets.” The best kind of nugget. He can’t turn her down, and lets himself be dragged along. Maybe he even smiles, but she’s the only person there to witness it. “You have to help me with mine, too,” he says. “We’re going to need good ones.”

Comments

[unironickylorenfan]

This was very sweet. Love siblingsnotsiblings and their found family a lot.