forum Apaixonar: The act of falling in love.//OxO//Romance//CLOSED

Started March 29, 2019 by @croccin-champagne

tune

"That's what I'm afraid of. You done?" He asked, starting to stand up and stretch his neck sideways.

"Yup. If I eat any more, my pores are never gonna let me hear the end o' it." Babe said with a laugh, standing and stretching her arms up. "Should I let ya get home?"

"You imply I need sleep?" He checked his watch. "I don't have anywhere to be, but do you need to get home?"

She shook her head with a laugh. "No, I don't. Pretty much everyone's out doing something right now, like spending the night somewhere. So I was gonna wander a bit. Wanna wander with me?"

"Only if your wandering doesn't turn into doing risky, nonmedicated things." He stepped away from his chair and started walking backwards toward the door to watch her.

"Well, dang." She huffed, shoving her hands in her pockets as she followed him with a grin. "Tha's exactly what was gonna happen. There a park near here?"

Henry grinned back at her. "I figured. And yeah, only a few minutes away." He checked his watch, and his grin got a little wider. "Plus, it's late, and I bet all the annoying people won't be there anymore. Y'know, all the middle schoolers who think they're cool because they can stay out until 9:30."

"Ah, to be young and new to what barely constitutes as freedom." Babe said wistfully, looking off down the street. "Middle schoolers are occasionally fun. Let's go t' the park."

Henry lead the way back across the street, and over to an alley between two buildings. "What was middle school like back where you lived before?" He asked, for the sake of conversation.

"The worst." Babe said, her face darkening for a moment. "I try to ignore that period of time." She shook her head, tugging a hand through her hair. "Things weren't too great. What about you?"

He coked his head at her. "Really? Huh. My middle school experience was pretty normal, besides switching between skating and hockey." His eyes lingered on her, curious.

"If you got somethin' you want t' ask, spit it out." She said, rolling her eyes at the look he was giving her.

"Nothing in particular, just curiosity about how you managed to have a bad middle school experience." He looked away and up at the tops of the buildings, an innocent expression on his face.

"Stalkers aren't too much fun." She shrugged a shoulder. "And neither is your family hating your best friend. Just an all around bad time."

"You had a stalker?" He asked incredulously. He was walking sideways now, facing her and still keeping up.

((Fun fact, this is a character from a writing project of mine, and the plot is literally about her dealing with a weird ass stalker and psychic visions))

"I did." She nodded, seeming unconcerned. If one looked closely though, they'd notice the way her fists clenched in her pockets, and her eyes began shifting along the shadows warily.

(I see… Henry's gonna have a whole lotta questions)
He raised an eyebrow at her. "And this stalker just… followed you?" He'd never heard of anything like that happening near his chunk of the world…

"He did a lot more than that." She muttered, hunching her shoulders. "Letters, following me, stealing my things, threatening people I cared about. And the police were functionally useless."

"Seriously? Did he ever get arrested? He'd better have gotten arrested." Henry narrowed his eyes at the darkness.

"Eventually. Took 'em a year, and by that point, Gray and I had hunted him down." Babe said, relaxing just a bit at the memory of the sirens and flashing lights, and the man's bloodied figure being shoved into the back of a copcar.

"That's crazy. I mean… Just wrong." He shook his head, watching the expression on Babe's face with a combination of concern and uncertainty.

"Yeah, well, it happened. And now it's over, mostly thanks to Gray." She said, a small, weary smile flickering onto her face.

Henry took a deep breath. "And that happened all through middle school? And Gray was the friend your family didn't like, right?" He asked, getting his facts straight.

"The Penman showed up in eighth grade." Babe said, nodding. "My last year of middle school, and stuck around until Gray, the friend my family doesn't like, well…took matters into his own hands. Like I said, we tracked him down."

"I'm picturing you as even more of a sherlock now." Henry informed her, raising an eyebrow at her meaning of tracking him down. "But it's good you did something about it."