some motherf---ing miracles
Thread Topic: some motherf---ing miracles
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Melody was miserable within a few seconds, her hair and her clothes soaked through and weighing her down. This was a vicious downpour, but she couldn't show weakness now. She would change her clothes and get warm at home. All she had to do was push through for now.
It was with a familiarly vague confusion that she felt very suddenly and with no reasonable explanation better. The onslaught hadn't slowed, and her head was still being beat by the falling ice, but the rest of her body felt just a degree safer, warmer. She figured her body had somehow adapted to it and she was becoming immune to the cold, which would make room for further badassery later in life.
Without looking back at the school she was sure she wouldn't be seeing very much of, she carried on, deciding as she went what she would make for she and her mother to eat tonight. -
As soon as she was out of sight, he drove home. He arrived twenty or thirty minutes later, finding that the rain hadn't lightened at all. Fortunately, he didn't have to go back out, since he'd parked in the garage. Then he headed into the house, hoping that his parents wouldn't need anything from him and that the new student had gotten home safely.
Kingsley's family lived in a very modern house, which had a fantastic view from the large windows that took one wall of the living and dining rooms. Though now, with such a storm outside, the magnificent scene had been coated with a dreary bluish grey and fogged up the windows. His hair was still a little wet, and his backpack, which he held by the handle at his side, had likely done a poor job of protecting its contents. Before anyone could find him there, he headed upstairs to his bedroom. He had a lot of homework to catch up on, and the tour had only taken time away from him. -
Melody arrived home roughly an hour after setting out from the school. She was positively shaking by the time she got to the door, and there she stood for a little under a minute, fumbling with chilled hands, first to find her key in her pocket, and then to get it into the lock.
As she closed the door behind her, it wasn't a sudden rush of warmth that greeted her, but the relieving absence of rain and hail.
She took her shoes off quietly, setting them beside the door, and peeled off her shirt on her way to her room. She wasn't concerned about her father seeing her undressed- he wouldn't be home for three days. She changed into a pair of shorts and a tank top, then draped her blanket over shoulders like a cape before heading off down the hall toward her mothers room. Opening the door just a crack and peering inside, Melody found her mother sitting at the end of her own bed, toes barely skimming the floor, as she stared silently out the window.
Melody watched her for a second, trying not to wonder what her mother was thinking about and just wishing she would move from that place without someone else's prompting, then cleared her throat.
"Hey mom. Watching the rain?"
The woman on the bed turned to look at her, brushing quickly at her face with a thin hand but unable to hide the shining in her eyes as she smiled at her daughter in the door way.
"Yeah." she answered quickly. "Did you walk home in that?"
"Yeah. A guy offered me a ride, but he was probably a stalker, so I didn't want him to know our address."
She opened the door further and crept into the room, feeling the texture of an uncomfortably firm rug under her toes.
"Anyway, what would you like to eat?" -
He started on his homework as soon as he was upstairs and out of his uniform. Of course, he would check on all sorts of other things as he worked, as he had a habit of being easily distracted, but he managed to do a lot of it in good time. Eventually, he heard his father call him downstairs for dinner. He headed down and into the kitchen, glancing back out at the weather as he went. It hadn't improved.
Sensing that he and his dad would be having another talk, likely about the boy's masculinity or a similar, nagging subject, Kingsley regretfully informed his parents that he'd be too busy to eat with them that night. He thanked his stepmother for dinner, waved at his stepsister, who was already at the table, and carried his plate of food upstairs. Sure, the boy could've used magic to finish his work in record time, but not doing so allowed him to continually ignore the fact that he wasn't the young man his father wanted him to be. -
(oh no Kingsley)
The mood of the evening had drastically improved once dinner had been made and served. The radio had been turned on to mask the sound of the storm raging outside, but so little were the pauses in between conversation and laughter that Melody couldn't place a single one of the songs it had played so far. A single box of macaroni and cheese had been prepared, with freezer hot dogs chopped up into it, just like her mother had always preferred. The two had started at the table, but had both become uncomfortable. Now, Melody sat on the countertop, swinging her legs gently over the edge as she shoveled another spoonful of food into her mouth. She'd turned the couch in the living room area around to face the kitchen so that her mother could sprawl out over it and tell her stories.
"So he had his hands behind his back the whole time, right? So of course I knew he had something, but I wasn't sure what it was, and he was giving me this huge speech about how much he- aaahahaha!" She'd dropped a piece of macaroni on the couch, which, under the current mood, was absolutely hilarious. Melody tried not to get sucked into the infectious snorting laughter, or neither of them would stop and the story would never be finished. Her mother flapped her hand urgently at her as she tried to make her stop laughing, as if telling her to give her a moment. Her voice was still shaky and breathless when she finally continued. "Telling me how much he loves me, right? And I'm just standing there, staring at him, trying to figure out what the hell that dork had behind his back, right? And then he stopped talking for a second and he just screamed f--- and the entire park froze up, I swear! And he dropped the puppy when he screamed, oh my god, it was a puppy, it was so cute! But it peed on him, and he was soooo mad! Oh, it would be so much funnier if you could have just seen it. His face got so red- he was so embarrassed."
The words had disintegrated into another laughing fit, and Melody watched her with a sort of relief. She'd been really worried that her mother had slipped into another bad week and that she wouldn't be able to pull her out, but maybe it could be avoided if she could keep her laughing.
The night passed pretty uneventfully. Her mother had a couple of her coughing fits in between all the laughter, but seemed pretty content, no less. When Melody finally got to bed, around 2:00 in the morning, she curled up under the blankets and felt safe until she fell asleep. -
(dad: u must be swift as the coursing river
kingsley: father no)
By the time he had finished, the rest of his family had gone to bed. The living room sat as empty as it had when he'd come in, but much, much darker. As he headed into the kitchen to put his plate in the dishwasher, his thoughts wandered back to the girl. Did she make it home safely? Was she... okay? He eventually realized that it might be a little weird for him to be so concerned, as he'd never worried that much about other students, but...
He knew that he could find out if she was okay. It wasn't too late to perform some sort of spell or brew some sort of potion (though he absolutely loathed doing so). But that'd be creepy, and he had no desire to come off as a stalker. He wandered back upstairs, his thoughts scattered from tiredness. When he eventually made it into bed, after a shower and various other means of procrastination, he was out almost instantly. He slept peacefully through the rest of the night. -
(shut up Kingsley's dad)
The morning was just as dreary as the day before, making it all the more difficult for Melody to sit up and get out of bed when her alarm went off. She took the fact that she was able to pull off such a feat as a sign, though, that she should at least try to go today. It was six o'clock in the morning, and as she dragged her feet all the way through the dark house, she did her best not to wake her mother.
She sat through a quiet breakfast of cold cereal and dressed herself in the living room mirror her father ritualistically combed his hair in every morning before leaving. She only had a few minutes at this point before she needed to be out the door, but she despised what she was seeing in the mirror, so it naturally followed that she would take a tardy and fix the uniform.
She stripped back down to the underclothes and started again, donning first a white shirt with the words, "THE WORLD IS A s--- TIP, YOUR CHILDREN ARE f---ED." printed in marbled text over the back, and then a leather jacket, which, unfortunately, covered the text. She kept the tie. She'd never worn one before, and it looked pretty cool. She kept the skirt as well, but used plaid thigh high socks and combat boots instead. She wasn't sure just how much trouble she would get in for dressing so far out of code, but it didn't particularly matter.
Relatively pleased with how she looked now, she came again to her mother's room, opening the door only enough that she could peer in and see that her mother was still sleeping soundly. She listened for the sound of steady breathing before she closed it again and set out, nothing on her person but her flip phone. -
(not stepsister, half sister)
Somehow, the boy had forgotten to set his alarm the night before. When he woke, it was because his little sister suddenly entered the bedroom. "Mom told me to wake you up!" she announced, walking over to his bed as the sleepy figure stirred slightly. He pulled the blankets over his head and tried to block out the young girl's voice. She grabbed a pillow, which he'd knocked off his bed in his sleep, and whacked him. She was definitely having too much fun with this. Eventually, he sat up and tried to grab at the pillow, which she pulled back with a giggle.
"Tabitha, stop," he grumbled, standing and grabbing a pillow to retaliate. Sensing that this wasn't a war she could win, she dropped the pillow and raced out of the room. He immediately reached for his phone, and felt a small pang of panic erupt in him as he realized the time. Kingsley shut the door and immediately started changing. Mostly dressed, he headed into the bathroom to brush his teeth and put in his contacts. Hopefully he could still make it on time if he... wait. He could use magic.
Once he was dressed, he rushed down the steps and dropped his backpack at the door to the garage, then made his way into the kitchen. He hardly noticed that his stepmother was there as he searched for a thermos to make tea.
"Good morning, Kingsley," she said, smiling at him. She was sitting at the kitchen bar, drinking coffee and reading the newspaper. The boy glanced over at her with a brief, distracted smile.
"Yeah, hi. Morning, Lauren." He poured in some water and put the bag next to the closed container, figuring that he'd warm it up at school. He headed over to the fridge to find something to eat, oblivious to his stepmother's slight disappointment.
Their relationship hadn't changed in the decade that they'd been legally related. She was still trying to get him to recognize her as a motherly figure, and he was still completely uninterested in the idea. He decided that trying to find breakfast would just make him later, so he grabbed his tea and headed for the garage. He was gone before Lauren, unaware of her stepson's abilities, could remind him that he should've warmed up the water. -
Melody Harvey arrived half an hour late to second period with no Starbucks vouching for her that day.
With a noncommittal glance at her schedule, she'd let herself into classroom 304- evidently a Language Arts class. The teacher sat at his desk as the students worked quietly at theirs, offering no distraction for Melody to enter on. The teacher looked up the moment he heard the doorknob turn, and Melody accidentally met his eyes within a second.
"Ah. Ms. Harvey." Passing off her name as a greeting, he stood to meet her as she made her way slowly to his desk. Several students had looked up when the teacher spoke, and while most had almost immediately returned their attention to their work, a few were still watching Melody, eyes wide. She had no time to wonder why before she noticed the closest one glaring at her shoes. The teacher, too, had scanned over her outfit, and nodded as if just having had something proven to him. "It's so good to," a meaningful glance at the clock. "-finally meet you. You can call me Mr. Collins. We have a desk reserved for you just over there."
Melody muttered a "nice to meet you" as she headed for the desk he'd motioned to, which was in the center of the front row. She sighed as she slumped into the chair and immediately felt out of place as the students surrounding her worked furiously. She would probably be skipping this class most days. -
Kingsley had made it to class a few minutes late, though it took him much longer by the time he was done with his nervous apologies. His first class went by without any trouble, and he managed to refill his tea for his second period of the day. He knew he had that class with the new student from the day before, so he tried his best to save a spot for her.
Then, for a while, she didn't show up. He had to admit that it made him a bit nervous. What if something happened to her on her way home? What if she was too sick to come to class? What if she was serious about skipping? It was hard for him to focus on his work.
As he was slowly and distractedly making his way through the assignment for class, the door slowly creaked open, causing most of his classmates to look up curiously. He was one of them. Kingsley felt a small wave of relief rush through him before he looked over her outfit and returned to what he was doing.
He decided that he wanted some of his tea, so he reached to warm it as soon as she was sitting in her seat, directly in front of him. He removed the lid and stuck part of his finger in, looking more like he was testing the warmth of it than anything else. The boy was momentarily distracted-- where were her school supplies? did she need to borrow some-- and warmed the tea a little too much, pulling his finger out of the thermos with a small, pained squeak. He knew he'd be feeling that burn for the next few days. -
Melody was feeling, surprisingly, self-conscious here. She was used to not having supplies with her and not doing s--- in class, but she wasn't used to being the only one doing so. Public schools had fostered a mild sense of belonging. She had never been a good student, but there had always been others who slacked off just as much. Here, it appeared everyone was hard at work. She wondered briefly what might cause such devotion to their work. Parent pressure? A Disciplinary system? Rewards?
She was pulled from her thoughts at the sound of a pained yelp from behind her. She turned quickly, already opening her mouth to ask if whoever if was was alright when she recognized Kingsley. She knew what had happened, as well, once she noticed his finger hovering over a thermos of steaming tea.
She stared at him incredulously for a second before speaking.
"Did you just stick your finger in a cup of hot tea?" she whispered back at him, more concerned for his intellect now than his physical wellbeing. -
"I-I...," he stammered, staring at her with a surprised look. By now, almost every student knew that the boy was strange. He had his unusual habits and routines, things that, when confronted, he wouldn't directly confess to or explain. He did them as if afraid that someone else would notice, but at this point, no one really cared. Under any other circumstances, his actions would be met with bullying from his peers. However, most students agreed that Kingsley, while unusual, was too nice to be mocked guiltlessly. Because of that, his secret was safe. Except now, it wasn't.
He glanced at his finger then pulled his hand back to the side of his paper. He had to say something, with her staring at him like that. She probably thought he was crazy, even more so than before. Quickly, he came up with a lie. "Yes, I did. Checking how hot it is. I'd rather burn my finger than my tongue. If that makes sense. I think it...," he paused, realizing that he was rambling, then continued, "Do you need to borrow some supplies?" -
Rigor Mortis NewbieMelody continued to stare at him for a few seconds, a little put off by his tone, but not seeing much more of a reason to be concerned. At the worst- and funniest- he'd made a stupid mistake and was now trying to cover it up. She started to shake her head in response to his offer, but thought better of it.
"Actually, do you have a pen and some paper I could borrow?" -
"Uh, yeah. Sure." He reached into his bag and pulled out his extra spiral notebook and a black pen. Kingsley hated blue ink with a passion, especially when he was writing on paper with blue lines, so he was sure to always have an excess of pens with black ink. He passed them forward with a faint smile. "Glad you showed up this morning."
-
Rigor Mortis Newbie"Yeah, making life a party.." Melody muttered as she took the supplies from his hands and set them on her own desk. She grumbled a "thanks" over her shoulder as she hunched over the paper and started doodling. The pen was probably new- it was smooth on the page and it gave her just a little bit more confidence than anyone with her meager artistic ability should rightly have. She felt faintly guilty knowing he probably expected her to do some work with the tools he had provided, but not enough to stop her. She would be just fine as long as she blended in with the rest of the class, which, so long as no one looked too closely, was exactly what she was doing. She had just put the final touches on a subpar tiny car with clown after clown spilling out of it's poorly drawn door when the bell rang.
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