Finding a Friend

who: Tad and Kaysen
Where: MSHS / Tad's house
When: after school...

Tad should have gone around the gym, but it was cold and he didn't want to bother. He probably should have remembered that practice of whatever team got out the same time as detention. But after sitting through two hours of detention for something he didn't even know happened, let alone do, his brain was fried and he wasn't thinking clearly.

So it worked out that he rounded the corner just as the jocks shuffled out the gym, hopped up on testosterone and needing to prove their manhood after just showering together. It started with, "hey queer" (painfully inaccurate) or whatever they'd said, and then his back was slammed against the lockers.

"Come on guys, the circle jerk couldn't have been that bad," Tad sniped because what else could he do? If they were going to kick his ass he might as well have fun with them. The comment earned him a few upper cuts to the rib cage and a left hook to the eye. That last hit flashed stars in front of his eyes and he could tell from the feel of it that it was going to leave a solid bruise. The kind that turned four colors before it finally healed. "That ought to leave a mark," he commented afterward. "Which works out great because the split lip from last week just healed." They proceeded to split his lip again. His grandmother was definitely sending him to the shrink again for this beating.

Kaysen had been staying after to look up shit for some stupid report she didn't want to do. Fucking research papers. She was doing it on a subject she deemed appropriate for herself, anyhow, which was the witch trials over in europe and shit. That was some fucked up piece of history. But there was still only so long she could stay inside MSHS without wanting to unreasonably torture and kill people herself, so she was on her way out. Since the corridors were mostly empty, she was on her board, going around a corner. She slowed, not because she needed to because of the corner, but because she heard the sounds of a fight.

Rounding it, she saw a whole mess of guys, and of course, at the bottom of the pile, some guy. Which, as she caught a better glimpse, she recognized. She hadn't formally been introduced or some shit? But she knew him. He was about as unpopular as she was, so yeah. There was no escaping that noise. She didn't like the odds there, what with the many-on-one of it all, and it wasn't like Tad over there was a big guy or anything. plus there was that whole bleeding thing happening. So, Kaysen acted without going through the thought process part of the equation, which really was what she did best. Thinking shit through wasn't her forte. Getting all pissed off, seeing red and cracking some asshole in the back of the head with her skateboard? That was far more likely, and incidentally, what happened. Crack went the first guy, and then as she swung her board around again, she hit the one on the other side of her in the back of the knee, which sent him down just as fast as the first one.

"Everyone fuck off or we're going to start seeing if douchbag basketball players burn as well as skank cheerleaders!" she threatened. After all, there was that whole rumor about her possibly trying to set the girl's bathroom on fire after she'd put a girl's face through a mirror. She wasn't above using that. Not that she'd really set them on fire. ...probably.

The two she hit were looking up at her and one made a grab at her, but her board swung again. The other saw her and recognized her, and the group was starting to break up. She probably wasn't about to get her ass kicked instead of Dude there. Most of the assholes there knew if they actually tried to hurt her physically, her brother would kick their ass. Possibly Thom, too, who knew. It was a mystery, and not one a lot of people wanted to start second guessing. Plus, so far as anyone knew she was still with Chance, too, and Chance sure as fuck didn't shy away from a fight. Just because she didn't really know if they were still together or not didn't mean the threat wasn't there.

As soon as Tad realized a skateboard and threats of burning were what was distracting the jocks from kicking his ass he realized who it was who was attempting to kick theirs. Excellent he thought as she swung the board around a third time and he covered his head with his arms. He got saved by not just a chic, but a bat-shit crazy chic who could at any time unleash on him. Whatever she was doing was working though and the jocks were leaving. Probably because she was one of the only girls in school with a reputation worth being afraid of. Plus that older brother of hers, and Thom, his best friend, who always seemed to step in at the right moment when she was involved. Or that crazy boyfriend of hers.

The last of the jocks wandered off Tad lowered his arms and looked up at Kaysen. "Please tell me you're not planning on hitting me too." He chuckled but that hurt his apparently bruised ribs so the laugh fell off. Using one arm to prop himself up, he managed to get up to a standing position even if he could barely stand up straight. "I didn't need it, but thanks for the help," Tad offered then started to hobble away.

Kaysen rolled her eyes at that and dropped her board back down with a clap. "Way to just walk away before I even have a chance to say anything. What the fuck ever, Ghostal." she said, and she pushed off to skate past him, not about to chase after the guy to offer to help him out or some shit. She definitely would have if he hadn't just all but said 'hey thanks, fuck off now dumb bitch, I didn't need you'. This? Was why she didn't fucking get involved. It wasn't worth it. Seriously, why bother if she just helped out, risked getting her own ass kicked, and then not even get like, hi, bye, kiss my ass or anything? Bullshit people. She'd even wanted to give him a shot, since she knew how it was, how things worked for her, which was they didn't. But whatever. Guess that wasn't the way to go. "Should've fucking known better." she muttered on her way past him towards the door.

"Ghostal? What the hell kind of slang term is that? That's got to be at least two decades ago." Tad wouldn't normally be the type to blow off a helping hand, because no one bothered to help him, but Kaysen was well known for being just straight up nuts. It wasn't completely unreasonable that she'd completely turn on him after beating the crap out of some jocks.

"So it is. Whatever. It's a Space Ghost thing. Your name is Tad, yeah? Well, Tad Ghostal. What the fuck do you care?" she asked, looking back over her shoulder at him, slowing up slightly, but only enough to spin her board beneath her and roll backwards for a few, to keep him in sight. "Get some fucking ice on your eye before it swells shut." she said. Then paused. "Go lay in a snowbank for five. That might do you better." That sounded snotty but it was real advice, actually. It probably would do him better to do that for just a few minutes.

Tad stopped walking (not that was he was doing was really walking, it was more like limping). "Wait. How the fuck do you know my name?" And she knew his name. Not Charles like Dean had mustered off the board early that day, but Tad. He'd take batshit crazy if it meant she actually saw him. His breathing was a little strained and he was beginning to think her snowbank idea was a good one. "Seriously, Kaysen, stop. How do you know who I am?"

She turned in a circle, clapping her board wheels down as she stopped, facing him. "Dude--you're like the only person in this school who's about as hated as I am. What, you think that I don't hear shit, just because most of the time they're talkin shit about me? I still hear." she told him, tone very 'what the fuck?' "What, am I not supposed to?" she asked. "Like, you don't think I'm stalking you now, right?" she asked warily. She glanced around, sort of half wondering if the joke was on her and she hadn't noticed or some shit. It was possible.

He stared at her with furrowed brow, the kind that made his nose crinkle a little at the top while he thought about what she'd said. "No I doubt you're stalking me. It's just that most of the people who kick my ass don't bother to learn my name. Fuck the damn teachers can't even remember me long enough to try and keep the bastards off me." This afternoon was evidence of that. Two other kids got into some sort of stupid argument next to him while he was zoning out and when the text book bouncing off of him and smashed to the ground he'd gotten detention for rough-housing. Worse was she actually had to reference her roster to remember what his name was (and called him Charles). He picked up a few steps to catch up with her. "At least people know you and hate you. I'm just invisible. Except in situations like back there where showering together turns them on and they have to blow off steam."

"Well, the teachers suck ass." Kaysen said. "And I wasn't kicking your ass, thanks, I was trying to save it, and I think I did a goddamn good job." she added, crossing her arms over her chest and huffing slightly. She stopped dead after a few moments. "You did not just tell me that you have it worse because you're in-fucking-visible." she said, gravely insulted. "Whatever, save yourself next time. I don't need pissant little bitches like you whining and shit about being invisible. Trust me, for the past ten fucking years in this town, I've been hated. You wanna know who they talk about? They talk about me. So fuck. You. if you're going on that riff. I'd take invisible." And in reality, she would. That was what her spelled hoodie made her, and she loved it. All the people who wanted to hurt her just...couldn't see her. They looked around her and it was the best thing to happen to her in ages. She whipped her board around again to keep going, head down as she tried to stop feeling like a kicked puppy over that.

Tad laughed. The big solid kind of laugh that only comes out of a kid who's sense of humor has been his defense mechanism for longer than he can remember. It hurt like hell, but he was bent over laughing. "You've got to be kidding me. Kaysen St. James the most feared girl in this school, who just took on four giant steroided up jocks wants to switch places with me? This is too good to be true." Tad was having to wipe tears out of his eyes. "Worst yet, you're the first girl to talk to me in like years, and you call me both pissant and Ghostal and save my ass." His laughter has subsided to giggle but he was still shaking from it.

She glanced back over her shoulder and kept her eyes narrowed. "I can give you a black eye on the other side." she told him calmly. "And I'm not feared. If I was feared, then maybe people would shut the fuck up about me." She might have said more, but there was the whole gigglefit going on and she was just confused over that. She couldn't tell if he was just laughing in general, if she didn't get it, or if he was making fun of her and she just couldn't catch it properly. So she pulled up short on her board, and kept her eyes on him as he laughed. "If you're making fun of me, Ghostal..." she said, hand balling into a fist--not that she was even remotely close enough to him to hit him. But she could make up the distance in like, no time. That's what skateboards were good for. Well. Besides braining jock assholes. They were good for that too. Besides, it was a Daredevil skateboard. She might as well do super hero shit with it.

He was still giggling a little when he answered. "No, I'm good with one black eye. This is going to get me an express ticket to the therapist as is. My grams keeps thinking it's something wrong with me that gets me beat up and not closet homosexuality mixed with 'roid rage." Tad closed the distance between them. Once he was next to her they were about the same height while she was on her board. "I'm not making fun of you either. More laughing at myself." Once he was next to her he shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. "And yes, I think they fear you. It's why they talk about you. When you're invisible, like moi," he took his hands out of his pockets to gesture towards himself dramatically. "You hear an awful lot. If they aren't afraid of you, they are terrified of pissing off your brother or your boyfriend. And then there's that dude, Thom, no one knows what to think about that, but they are determined not to fuck with him." He left off the part where he himself had been afraid of her and her laying into the jocks like she did, didn't really help the situation. She didn't seem like that bad of a person, so people being afraid of her made way more sense than them hating her. But how could he hate someone who just saved him from a broken rib or two?

Kaysen thought that Tad didn't quite know the score on things. But whatever, she also didn't want to argue it so much. So, she wound up shrugging. "Well, whatever. I don't agree, but perspectiv'es all subjective or some shit, so whatever. You going to get something on that eye, or what?" she asked, eyeing it from weirdly close up. She wasn't used to people being very close to her. That was just how it worked. They kept their distance. So...weird. Not bad, but strange.

Tad gently touched the space around his eye, feeling it start to swell already. "Yea I suppose. I won't be able to see out of it tomorrow otherwise." He thought about his meeting with Dean tomorrow and wondered how the kid would take his new bruises. As if he wasn't already nervous about that whole thing, now he had this to worry about. Hoping she'd follow suit he started walking towards the door of the school. "What are you doing here late anyway? You weren't in detention."

"No, I wasn't." Kaysen agreed, rolling her eyes slightly, but she did go with him, falling in next to him, keeping pace on her board. "I have a stupid fucking research paper to do." she said. "I got to pick the topic and shit, but it's bullshit. It's not like I'm really going to need to know about the burning times and shit when the church wigged out on everyone and like, burned people alive for no good reason. And like, set up these test things that people couldn't actually win on anyways. like, hey! They fucking drowned, but they weren't a witch! Oh well!" she said, rolling her eyes as she hit the door, and she pushed it, shoving it open to get outside. The whole show situation on the steps wasn't conducive to skateboarding so she kicked it up, and walked over to the side to grab up a snowball, and she handed it to him. "Here."

"Thanks," he said taking the offered snowball and putting it against his eye. "That definitely blows. I just found out I have this huge ass history project to work on with some kid who I'm lucky showed up to class today. He seems cool, but it's gonna take like the rest of the semester to finish. And it's on local history. Like who even gives a shit right?" The ice was cold as hell, but it felt good against the swell. "Wanna trade projects? You'd probably prefer to work with my partner, he's all mysterious, brooding, good looking and has an English accent. Feels like it's wasted on me." His smile was crooked but mostly because of his split lip.

"I think I know that guy." Kaysen said. Not well, or anything. But she recalled someone of that description helping with the mine bullshit before they oh, went fucking missing in fucked up mirror land when everything sucked and she was actively considering if it was going to be better to get killed first by the big german, or like, later. "Don't remember his name, but I know him. Hung out with the chick who got killed. Lullaby." she said. That she remembered. They'd been in the same grade, and her parents had gotten all weird after that happened. Guess that's what parents did when they heard about other kids their kids' age getting gunned down in the street. "Not too many guys sportin british accents around, so I bet it's him. Sucks, the whole...dead friend thing."

Tad had remembered Lullaby's death. Not so much because he knew her, outside of just seeing her around and now that he thought about it he'd seen her with Dean a few times. "Yea I remember that," he said in reference to the incident. "Grams about lost it as a result. More visits to therapy to see if I was a target for getting shot." It was good thing he knew about the Lullaby thing, he didn't want to walk himself into something odd with Dean tomorrow or any time between now and when he was done with the stupid project. He started down the stairs of the building hoping she'd follow. "You've got to tell me something Kaysen, WHY do you have Daredevil on your skateboard? I mean of all superheroes to go with?" There was always the possibility she'd hit him the board, but he had to tease.

She did head down with him. Then she sighed. "Because I didn't get it. Porter did, because he's a guy who can't fucking listen for the life of him. He was like, in my way when we were down at lower harbor, and I wound up ditching, and my deck, my baby got thrown in the drink, and I went to go get it but I almost fucking drowned, and he like, jumped in to get me and shit, and I don't know. We tried to go get it, but it's gone. Like, I'd need scuba gear and shit, and by now it'd be mush. But anyways, he bought it for me cuz he felt bad because it was him who lost me my deck in the first place. He said something about daredevil reminding him of me or some shit. Or it went with skateboarding or something, I dunno." Then she paused, glancing over at Tad. "Which was way more information than you asked for. But like...that's it. Porter got it for me, I didn't pick it."

Tad smirked at her answer, mostly because it was so long winded. He was pretty sure he knew who Porter was, but didn't know he knew Kaysen. Not that it mattered. "For having such a kick ass name, Daredevil totally blows. He got blinded as kid and then totally developed like super hearing or something. And now he can see like a bat sees. Sleeps in a coffin or such nonsense. Total freak." He tossed the snowball over the edge of the railing since it was starting to melt. "But if you didn't pick it, I can't fault you for it. At least you can use it."

"So overcoming horrible detrimental crazyness trauma and shit to become a super hero makes you a freak?" Kaysen asked, arching a brow at that. Remind me never to tell you that I can set things on fire with my mind. And like, move fire around and it listens to me n shit. Pretty sure that lands me in 'freak' territory. Not that I don't live there already. Since she did. That was one of the more common terms thrown her way, if one overlooked the whole 'skank slut whore' thing that was totally untrue.

"Touche." He chuckled again. "Maybe it's just that his movie was so terrible. Ben Affleck shouldn't be allowed to play a superhero. Ever." It was a really terrible movie, one of the worst he'd seen and they killed off the hot chic. "What are you up to now?" As soon as the words left his mouth it sounded like Tad was trying to hang out with her, which was probably not going to go over well. Not that he didn't have anything to do on a Friday night, but he wasn't about to start asking girls he just met, in possibly the most unmanly of ways, who seemed to hate him.

"Oh, I ignored the movie. I pretend that didn't exist." Kaysen said firmly. "Because it was massive amounts of shit. Plus, Jennifer Garner should just like, eat a dick and disappear into obscurity. We'd all be a lot better off." she said. She wasn't a fan, clearly. "I dunno. Nothing much." she answered him, watching him out of the corner of her eye. In that manner that suggested she was still waiting for the punchline, and she was. Kinda.

"At least she was hot. Not the best, but she looked good in the plastic outfit." Tad was actually kind of a Jennifer Garner fan, but he kept that to himself since Kaysen obviously didn't agree. It was a little hard to shake the sight of her bashing that jock with her deck and at the moment she was still holding the deck. Which meant she could still swing it at him. "Yea, same here. Friday nights are the worse nights for Halo online. Mostly just fifty-something losers who live with their mothers and drunk frat boys. Barely even worth the effort." He raised his hands like shooting a shotgun and took a couple of shots at the horizon. "Like shooting fish in a barrel." Not that it mattered, he'd still be there playing because it was Friday night and that's what he did. Online they feared "lonehunter." Sadly in the real world his ribs hurt. Tad shrugged and looked over her with a half smile on his face.

"Guess 'hot' never did it for me. Like just because someone's pretty doesn't mean they're a good actor or whatever. And Halo online, huh?" she asked. "Haven't played much of that." she admitted. She was a video game girl, but she was a survial horror video game girl. Give her res ev or silent hill. Anything with darkness, atmosphere and monsters to shotgun in the face. "I'm more a zombie-killing girl." she told him. "I like horror shit. Kinda...y'know. Across the board." Which included books and movies too.

Tad smiled. There hadn't been a video game yet that he hadn't tried. "I get that. Zombie killing is always fun. Fallout, Resident Evil and the like. I've got all those too. I mostly just play Halo cause you can play online. I've beat all the others so playing online is the only way to change it up. Especially with Grams' stupid new game moratorium she's got me on." When you don't have any friends there's a lot of time to get through video games. "I will say though, one of my favorite games is this stupid bunny game where you shoot plungers at alien bunnies. Not even kidding." Tad got the horror stuff, he read a lot of books on the supernatural, more than he'd admit. But all the supernatural stuff seemed too real, or well it could be real. He didn't want the real in his fantasy worlds.

Kaysen blinked and looked over, eyes wide. "....you. Aliens and bunnies and plungers." she repeated. "You're shitting me." she decided. Though she had to admit it sounded absolutely ridiculous. She'd try it. Though she'd probably not own up to trying it. Which made her think that maybe he deserved a point or two due to actually saying that shit out loud. To a girl no less.

With the split lip and the swollen eye his grin looked rather grotesque but he couldn't help it. "Nope not shitting you at all." Tad laughed at himself and ducked his head musing up his hair. "It's not glamorous but a load of fun. You should try it sometime." Oh God, he seriously need to stop sound like he was asking her out. She was going to get the wrong impression. Not that he was entirely apposed to the idea of her, cause face it she was sort of cute in her own punk rock kinda way, but she wasn't the type of girl who would take being asked out lightly.

Kaysen was actually not catching any of the vibe that he might be asking her out. But then again, she was massively oblivious about things of that nature at the best of times. She was the girl who literally figured that the only boyfriend she was ever going to have in her entire life was Chance, and when that was over, that was it. If it was still even going on. She still was unclear on that. She didn't know. "Not much for the 'glamor' shit anyways." she said after thinking about it for a few. "What's the game called, even?" she asked. "You got it, I'm assuming?" You were talking about your grand-fill-in-the-blank-person, they haven't mass murdered anyone have they?

Tad was relieved, she kept talking, didn't hit him, or accuse him of hitting on her. Which meant she didn't take it that way (or didn't notice) and that was a blessing. He was not in the mood for what could only be an awkward conversation with her about her boyfriend and his complete lameness. "I do. It's Rayman's Raving Rabbids. It's actually a bunch of smaller games in it but the most fun is shooting alien bunnies with plungers. That's kind of shooting zombies isn't?" he quipped.

"Nope. Sounds way more like shooting alien bunnies with plungers." Kaysen said, smirking faintly. "But I'll give it a shot. Killing aliens has worked out for me before. So whatever." Then she paused. "I mean. If you were like...offering. Or something." Because suddenly she was paranoid that he hadn't been and she'd totally misread. They could have been talking hypothetically.

"Hey, if you want to come over and hang out, then I'm cool with that." There of course was Grams who was going to want to buy him a new outfit because a girl was coming over and would want to take pictures. "I'm all for introducing people to new stuff. It's good for you to add some variety to you life." OK so that was a total lie. He'd never introduced anyone to anything. "When were you thinking about coming by?"

Kaysen shrugged one shoulder. "I dunno. When's good?" she asked. It wasn't like she was well versed with the whole having friends thing. She'd had Charlie, but she'd moved. Thom didn't count. He was Isaac's best friend anyways, and she generally just barged into his house when she wanted something, but they weren't necessarily friends. Porter? Maybe. The jury was still out on that one, and she hadn't even remotely come to a conclusion there. He was nice and stuff. So that was cool so far and shit, but yeah. It wasn't like they hung out on a regular basis or anything. And then there was Chance. Who she probably loved, yet might not even be together with anymore. She didn't know. She missed him like her soul was dying, but...there was his mom situation and she still didn't know what to do with that. Besides she was sending in information to get her ass thrown in jail. Not the best girlfriendly activity in the world.

Damn. Tad was hoping she'd have an idea of when she wanted to come over because otherwise he had to admit that he had no life and was always at home anyway. "Um. Whenever really. Dean's coming over tomorrow at some point to work on our stupid project but other than that..." He didn't really know how to address the whole thing. Dean was going to be the first person who wasn't one of Gram's friends to come over in a long time. And now he had to figure out what to do with another person. "Grams has bridge on Sunday if you want avoid her," he suggested realizing that missing Grams might be the best idea so she didn't get any ideas about Tad friends and girls. Oh God, what if she decided he needed to have a sex talk?

"...well it's your house and your game, so how about you just make a fucking decision, and I'll show. Or we go now, and just skip over the apparently agonizing decision process entirely." Kaysen said, fighting not to roll her eyes again. She was going to get a headache doing that, and she guessed he wasn't actually doing anything that was like wicked eyeroll worthy. So...yeah. Skipping over shit, that was the way to go.

Tad just stared at her for a few seconds before answering. "Um, right, now works." He fished his pump out of his pocket to check the time, which seemed to have done some weird stuff with it's clock but he'd adjusted to it. Grams wouldn't be home from work for another hour or two since she usually worked later on Fridays. That would work out alright he supposed. "I walked, think you can keep up on that thing?" he asked Kaysen when he looked back up.

"Well, I'm sure if I try real hard and start praying to baby angels and shit I can somehow pull through." Kaysen said. she noticed the pump thing, and it looked weird. She thought maybe it was a pager, but that didn't seem right. "What's that?" she asked, since she didn't know. Asking worked out better for her than guessing, most of the time. The worlds greatest guesser she was not.

He was the one who might be needing to pray to baby angels or something because things were still hurting like mad. The pump was almost back in Tad's pocket when she asked, so he kept it in his hand. "My tether," he answered realizing he'd used the joke twice in the same day. Talking to more than one person a day was going to be harder than he'd ever imagined. "It's my insulin pump. Keeps me breathing. I usually end up checking it for the time instead of my phone cause this sucker's always attached. he lifted the edge of his hoodie so she could see where the tubing ran into the back of his jeans. Briefly he wondered if his site was still in good shape, but judging by how he felt blood sugar wise he thought he was alright. I'll check it when I get home. "I've got type 1 diabetes," he explained.

"No shit." Kaysen said, looking curiously. "You know I only vaguely know what that actually means. I know it has something to do with like...blood sugar. Does that hook in directly somewhere?" she asked. And then vaguely wondered if maybe she shouldn't be so in his face about asking things like that. Maybe he was sensitive about it or something and she was being a bitch. Not that she was trying to be, for once.

"Yea, the tubing plugs into the site which is like...I dunno an IV? it's just a little needle and pump feeds the insulin through there. I'd show you, but you know that's a lot of skin. And I just met you. I'm not that easy." Tad winked at her and started walking away from the school towards his house. "The gist of it is that my body doesn't make insulin. Which is what breaks down sugar in your blood. So I have to add the insulin to my system to keep my blood sugar in check." His disease didn't really bother him. It was annoying, it freaked some people out, but for the most part he'd been living with it for so long, he'd just gotten used to it. Sure insulin only maintained it and there were tons of complications that could be issues when he got older, but for now? He was doing just fine.

When he said the bit about skin and winked at her, Kaysen flushed dark red. She couldn't help it, for a girl who was as mouthy as she could get, she was, essentially, shy. So it took a second for her to follow him, but she finally did, listening to the rest of what he had to say. "Crazy." she commented as he explained, though she did actually note what he told her. "All I have is y'know. Social diseases." Then she winced internally and backpeddaled. "I mean! Not like for real, I know what you've probably heard and I'm not a slut and stuff and all that other shit and I don't actually have any diseases at all, just like, people hate me an shit, that's what I mean, not like...whatever, just...yeah. Whatever." She ducked her head down and reminded herself not speaking worked out for her. Being quiet might be cool.

Tad laughed again. He'd missed the flush, but that was probably for the best; that would have totally thrown him for a loop. Sure he'd heard the rumors, but she just didn't strike him as the slut type. Even less now that he'd actually talked to her. "I find it hard to believe that people just hate you. I can't see what's really that wrong with you." Which was true. Tad felt liked he'd found a kindred spirit with Kaysen. Even if she did seem abrasive. At least she'd stopped calling him Ghostal. "But people fucking suck, so I guess that makes sense. Good to know you've not go the VD as well."

"I dunno why they do, they just do." she said with a shrug. Which was true. She'd arrived in town, and it was like there was some black cloud over her head even if she had no clue why. It happened, she still didn't get it, she never would, and the best she hoped for was that she got left alone occasionally. Mostly that happened due to Thom's white magic, but whatever. "But yeah, they do." she agreed. As he knew, what with the impressive shiner he had gonig on. Even with the snow he'd put on there and stuff, it was puffed out. In the back of her mind she wondered if it would be weird if she offered to help clean him up properly when they got to his house. Probably.

"Yea i've spent the past seven years or so trying to figure why the hell I look like the kid who deserves to have his head shoved in a toilet or whatever else they do to me. It's not like I'm wearing loafers and carrying an attache case." Tad ran his hand through his hair again. His face fucking hurt now that it'd puffed up and his sore everything else had slowed down his pace significantly. Thankfully it wasn't too far to his house, otherwise he might not make it. "For what it's worth I've decided I don't hate you. Didn't really before but can't now that you kept me from another set of stitches. As embarrassing as it is to be saved by a girl."

"Oh please, you're not one of those assholes, are you?" she asked, watching him out of the corner of her eye. "Like, the type who's really gonna play the 'sucks you dont' have a dick and helped me out' card? That one blows. Find a new one, Ghostal." she said. "Get over it. But cool you don't hate me. I'll take it, I guess. We'll work on anything else." She didn't say yet if she'd decided if he was cool. Obviously she at least had thought him good enough to yank his ass out of the fire and such.

Tad raised his hands in a sign of surrender. "Not at all. I'm not really in a place to judge the help I get." Feeling awkward he shoved his hands in his pockets. "My pride's just a little bruised. But it would be if anyone had come to my rescue. I'm not usually keen on bystanders seeing how pathetic I look when I'm kicking the shit kicked out of me." And there'd been the part where he'd cover his head worried she'd hit him next. That had been completely awesome. "It's up around here," he said motioning to the next street corner.

Kaysen was quiet a moment, looking where he was gesturing but figuring she'd just follow him til they got wherever. And if it turned out to be some crazy trap, she'd just...whip out Kurt's lighter and blaze something up. Not that that sounded like the best plan ever. In fact, as plans went, it was pretty damn weak. "I didn't think you looked pathetic." she said, after what was probably a little too long a pause from her. "I saw someone who was getting ganged up on, and that shit's never cool. I saw a bunch of assholes I hate anyways being their usual dick selves, with no teachers around to make them pay for it, so...at least a couple of them are going to have a wicked headache for a while." She shrugged eyes down on the sidewalk mostly. "But naw. I didn't see anything pathetic. Least not on your end."

"That's good then." Tad wasn't sure if he believed her or if she was just being nice. She didn't really seem to be the 'just being nice' type but when it comes to inciting pity in people he was sure in his current state he'd be great for that. Plus she'd hesitated before she said it. He trudged on along the sidewalk in silence, turning at the street corner. His house was the second one on the side of the street they were already on. There wasn't much about it that was that fancy, it looked like every other house on the street and was of that older style of houses even though it looked like it might have been overhauled recently. "This would be it," he told Kaysen as he headed up the front walk that lead from the sidewalk to the porch.

She kicked her board up to catch the front wheels, and followed along, looking at the place. She didn't do a whole lot of judging about people's houses. Mostly because her own was pretty damn well to do. That and it wasn't like she spent a ton of time at people's places. She didn't get invited anywhere, so yeah. She didn't see a lot of them, period. But she noted it, in case she needed to find it again sometime. "Cool." she said, since she didn't know what else to say, really.

Tad glanced back at her to make sure she was following and then focused on getting up the front porch steps with hurting himself more than he already was. Once he'd made it up with only minimal wincing he dug out this house key and unlocked the front door. "Come on in," He told Kaysen, holding the door open for her. "It's nothing too fancy, but it's just me and Grams so we don't need a ton. You hungry or something? I'm sure I can find something." They actually hadn't lived in the house that long, at least compared with how long Grams had lived there. They'd moved when Tad was in middle school, mostly to be closer to the high school for when he got older and because the other house was much too big for just the two of them. This one had a bedroom on the first floor which meant Grams didn't have to climb up and down the stairs as much.

She walked in, and kicked off her shoes, and propped her board up against the wall next to them. Then she ditched her jacket on top of them. "Nothing really needs to be fancy. I mean, I know I live in a big house n shit but I'm not really...y'know. Like that." she told him. Which was true. She knew some people were, though. The snobs who paid attention to things like how much parents made. She never paid attention.

He nodded to response to her statement. Sure there had been some concern, but she was the first person he'd had over since they'd moved. He dropped his shoulder back next to her stuff and unzipped his hoodie, pulling it off to hang it on the hook next to the door. "Food?" he offered again, bending down to grab his glucose monitor from his bag. One day he was going to convince his endocrinologist to put him on one of those wireless glucose monitors so he could stop carrying so much crap around. He kept his monitor, lancet and everything else in a little black pouch. "Kitchen's back here," he told her and started down the hall of the middle of the house.

She followed. "How about a first aid kit?" she asked. "You still look like you need it." she pointed out. Food she could probably do with, she just didn't know how that worked. If it was okay or if it was one of those things people were supposed to offer, but might be rude to take them up on. Yeah, she wasn't real well versed with the whole being social thing.

"Both? I'm starved." He led Kaysen into the kitchen. The first aid kit was under the kitchen sink and he put that on the island in the middle of the kitchen. Most houses would just have a collection of band-aids or whatever in the bathroom, but Grams had gotten proactive after a while and just put the kit there for easy access. Then he moved to inspect the tupperware container sitting on the counter. "Chocolate chip cookies ok with you?" he asked, but still set them on the counter next to the first aid kit. He pulled two diet cokes and an ice pack out of the fridge and freezer and handed one of the Cokes to Kaysen. "Hope diet is ok. That's sort of a diabetes thing." He set the monitor pouch on the counter and pulled out everything to check his blood sugar. About half a second before he did though he stopped. "Is this going to bother you?" what was protocol with that sort of thing? Tad had never been in a situation where he he'd had to check around someone who wasn't his grandmother or doctors. "Cause I can go in another room or whatever."

Kaysen took the coke, not really caring if it was diet or not. Then she hopped up onto the countertop next to the kit, him on the far side. "No, it won't bug me." she said. She was actually curious, and she was sort of half watching like a hawk, wanting to know what it was all about, and at the same time trying not to look like she was watching that closely. That was something she failed pretty miserably at, though, she looked like she was watching, and she was curious. It was sort of belatedly that she actually opened up the kit and sort of half assedly looked through it for things for him, though she kept looking back at him to see what he was doing.

Tad noticed her watching, and moved a little closer and went through the process of pricking his finger and squeezing he drop of blood onto the strip coming out of the monitor slower than he normally would. "I imagine it would bug people sometimes, blood and all. But if you can get over that part it's interesting." The monitor beeped after a few seconds and he tilted it so she could see. "Ninety-eight. Damn near perfect." Doing the math in his head he reached for two cookies then pushed the container towards Kaysen. "Anything of use in there?" Tad asked motioning towards the first aid kit and taking a bite of the first cookie.

She blushed a little bit when he said the bit about it being interesting, because she figured she was doing a crapass job of hiding the fact that she was obviously interested. When he tilted it so she coudl see, she looked, not even knowing why since it wasn't like the numbers would mean anything to her. But she looked anyhow. She took a cookie when he pushed the container towards her, and took a bite. "I dunno. You still need to ice your eye and you should probably get the little cuts cleaned and stuff." she said. "Like your lip." she pointed out, eyes pointedly falling on the swell there and the cut she could see.

He lifted the ice pack he'd grabbed and pushed it against his eye. "Are you offering to help? Cause that would be nice." Tad's tone was joking but he certainly wouldn't mind. It wasn't every day he had someone besides his grandmother to help patch him up. "If you have questions about the diabetes thing, you can ask you know." It was just a hunch she was interested, but he figured at the very least it brought down that barrier. Knowing about something made it much less scary.

"...if you want, okay. I ditch enough, I know how to patch shit up." Kaysen said. She patched herself up all the time, so...yeah. She could do it. She was pretty old hat at it. Which he probably was too, now that she thought about it, but she'd already said okay. She slid off of the counter, and went to the sink to turn on the cold water. "C'mere and sit down." she said. "And what's the numbers mean?" she asked. Since he was offering and all.

"Yes m'am." He was smiling though as he did was she said and sat down. The numbers are my current glucose level. The target range is like 80 to 100. Which is where yours would stay normally. Sometimes you need it a little higher, like if your running around a lot or playing sports or something. Anything too high is all sorts of bad, and anything too low is all sorts of bad. Trust me, I've been on the wrong side of both."

Kaysen shot him a Look at the ma'am thing. "I can still add to the black eye situation." she told him, holding up her fist as she let the water get to an acceptable temperature. "What happens when it's out of whack?" she asked, getting a clean cloth out of the kit to wet down, then she pushed herself up on her tiptoes to start dabbing lightly at the blood on his lip. She sort of wondered how she'd got where she was at the moment, but didn't think too hard about it.

"Ok, ok. No more being polite from me," Tad teased. "As for what happens, it's different for everyone. I know when I get too far on either side I get really lethargic. You get that overwhelming, I feel like shit feeling." He was trying not to talk too much, even though she'd asked an intense question because he was painfully aware at how close her hand was to his mouth. "If you're too high you end up having to piss all the time and can get sick from high levels of certain chemicals, but low you run the risk of seizures and comas and stuff."

She made a face as he answered, keeping her eyes on the cut on his mouth, as she carefully dabbed at it, trying to be gentle even if gentle wasn't really a part of her nature. She could try, damnit! "Don't people get kinda...I dunno. Confused and act drunk n stuff? Or is that different kind of diabetes?" she asked, remembering only vaguely what she was talking about, even. So she could be entirely off base. "But comas--that's never good. Seizures I'm pretty sure fall under the 'bad' collumn too."

He thought about it for a moment before answering. "Yea I guess it's like that sometimes. Not the words I'd use but, I mean you get a little nuts when you're low, sometimes really spacey or whatever. Some people can get really violent, but that's not so much them, that's their instinct taking over ya know? Like the body perceives it's being attacked and fights back." He tried hard not to wince while she touched his lip. It didn't hurt a ton, but that mixed with the general nerves of her being so damn close was making it hard. Could he seriously be any worse at being around people in general?

"That's weird. The violent thing, I mean." she said. "But I'll keep it in mind." she added. "If you do happen to be like, flipping out or something, what's the best thing to do?" she asked, trying to sound casual about it. She hoped he didn't think that she was asking because she planned on being his new bff or something. But it was good to know anyways, right? And if she did happen to be around, she'd want to know what to do to help. Plus she knew he didn't have any friends or shit, so...whatever, it made sense for her to know in her head. And to cover her feeling flustered over her own question, she went back to the sink to rinse the blood off of the cloth for a moment.

"What?" Her question didn't quite process right and when it did he sort of floundered for an answer. "Um well if you get really low, to the point where you can't really force feed sugar, there's a couple of things. This nasty-gram gel which you have to squirt into someone's mouth, you know like along their gums? And then we've got some glucagon in the house which is like high powered shit that you can give the person an injection of and get them back up." Was she asking just because she was curious? Or did she plan on being around more often? "It doesn't happen often if your careful," he offered. The last thing he needed was her worrying about him. "I'm usually lowest in the morning, right when I wake up." There's no way she'd be around then.

"Well, when was the last time you were crazy-low?" she asked. She glanced up at him really uber-briefly, just a heartbeat before she was back to looking at the water, and attempting to figure out if she was going to try and put anything else on the cut there. Lip-cuts were kind of a bitch to really do anything to. She also noted the other things, but thought the whole gel stuff and the injection thigner were useless to her. She didn't have access, and even if she did come to the house for some reason, she didn't know where they were kept. But she still wanted to know just in case. The town had been attacked by various creatures in the past few months. The possibilities of long sieges weren't exactly out of the question entirely.

God her life was just never going to get any less weird.

Tad was staring at her. He caught her brief glance at him and assumed she was probably looking away because he was staring but he couldn't stop. Yes, he had no idea what it was like to have a friend, which was probably why he couldn't figure out why she gave a damn. "Um I haven't been that kind of crazy low in a while. Six months? It happens maybe twice a year." When he had the crazy bad nightmares where he was chasing monsters through the dark with his parents. Mornings where he woke up and actually felt like he'd been running through his dreams. "I mean last week it got really bad, but not like glucagon bad. But I was late to class cause I felt like shit. Grams still makes me carry the stupid gel around with me at school, 'just in case.'" He made air quotes in the air.

Kaysen noted that too. That he had it on him, so if it happened... Whatever, idiot. It's not gonna. But she noted it in her head anyhow. "Put the ice on your lip." she told him, half reaching up to move his hand but in the end she thought that would just be way weird, and so she didn't. Instead she wet the cloth again and started getting some of the dried blood off of his chin. "Not often...right." she said, for lack of anything better to say. She was also kind of half noticing that he was staring, and she flushed dark red again.

As instructed Tad moved the ice pack down to his lip, but left space so she could keep cleaning him up. He noticed he blush and assumed that might be his fault as well and changed his staring point to his pump which he pulled out to correct for the cookies. "Yea, I'm actually pretty good at managing this stuff. Which is good as Grams was being weird enough about me going to college anyway." Not that he was sold on college. It just seemed like the right thing to do, because that's what you do. You ignore that pull that keeps you up late at night, telling you there's more out there, that the weird shit that goes on in this town means more to you than you realize it and you go to college and major in something practical.

"You going to go? Like, around here?" she asked. NMU was right in town. She never did decide if she was going to go. Part of her thought it was a big waste of time, plus it wasn't like she had any idea what she wanted to do with her life. Another part of her wondered if she shouldn't just do it, and like, go to a university somewhere that was massively Else. Somewhere no one had ever heard of her. Where she could start over. It was a nice thought.

"I imagine I'll go somewhere. What else am I going to do? As for going to school here, I dunno. I mean college is supposed to be better than high school right? I'm not sure when most of the high school goes to NMU." He shrugged. "I think Grams wants me to stay around here, but the idea of leaving this town, going somewhere where I might actually have friends, that's just an awesome idea." Currently he had stacks of information on his desk upstairs from a variety of schools, scattered all around the US. Not that his grades were that great, but they were good enough to get him in to a state school. "But I'm not entirely sold on the whole idea I guess..." Tad trailed off trying to think of how to word the next part. "Do you ever feel like there's something going on that you're completely missing? Or more like, there's more to your life than what it is right now?"

Kaysen was getting some of the blood off of his chen when he asked that, and she pulled back a little, biting at her lower lip. "You mean like..." she started, not even sure where that sentence ended. She fidgeted a little bit, then pushed on. Because she did know what that felt like. Only she was on the other end of it. She knew a bunch of shit that other people were missing. It was just way recent that she knew about it. "...like...like okay with the spirits? Like that kind of missing something?" she asked. "Where y'know, people totally didn't believe in ghosts n shit then all of a sudden bam! They're like everywhere?" As for the more to her life thing...there was more to her life, it was just massively weird and possibly pointless.

"Well yea, the ghost thing is definitely one thing." Tad though again about where he was going with all of this. "It's just that, you know I always felt like I'm supposed to be doing something more than just being a kid who's painfully good at video games and notices everything. Like, my parents? I have no real idea what they did. I just know they couldn't be here, and I couldn't be with them. Grams tells me stuff, but I can tell she's keeping things to herself." He sighed. It was hard to explain what was going on, especially when he had no basis for it outside of a collection of nightmares.

Kaysen leaned against the counter, propping her chin on her hand as she regarded him. "That's weird." she said. "What stuff were you told? Are they like, international spies or something? Or like, crack dealers?" she asked. As for feeling the need to do something more with one's life...she'd had that feeling. And then she'd wound up setting the sky on fire, and dropping herself practically into a coma for a while. That hadn't been fun. Plus, screaming vampires still haunted her dreams.

Tad leaned back resting his head against the cabinets behind him. "Nothing that interesting, at least I don't think. Grams has said they were like traveling salesmen or whatever. Almost like gypsies or whatever. But she doesn't like to talk about it, like it's something to be ashamed of." He'd asked more often, now that he was older and having an existential crisis at age seventeen. "She seems too afraid all the time for it to be just something simple like that. Plus I do remember them, and nothing about them seemed 'salesmen' at all. They seemed much tougher than that." He shrugged. "No matter what they did though, there has got to be more out there for me than surviving high school with no friends."

Kaysen considered that, thinking that sounded...weird and confusing. And did she mention the weird? Like just crazy vagrants? "Well, the world's a weird place." she said hesitantly. She knew that a little too well at this point. That it was dangerous. "But cool they're tougher? Maybe you should try and contact them. See what's what. If they're around or...I don't know, ignore me." she said in the end. "If you want there to be more out there, then find it. There's gotta be something." she agreed with a shrug, and she got the last bit of blood off of the bottom of his chin.

"If I could contact them I would. They're dead. Have been for a while." Tad's voice wasn't upset, it was just stating fact. He'd dealt with his parents' death years ago, now it was just another crutch he had to live with. "I'd be looking at some serious voodoo magic to get in touch with them now," he quipped, falling back on humor again. He noted what she said about finding more. Maybe she was right. His mom had grown up around here, someone had to have known them. It might something worth looking into. "How am I holding up as patient?"

The first thing that crossed Kaysen's mind wasn't helpful. It was that with all the ghosts running around, they might still be contactable. That was probably bad taste though, wasn't it? Or was it just the way the world worked now? She didn't know. "I dunno...with all the ghosts running around and shit..." she said hesitantly. "They might just be hanging out somewhere." Then she stood straight, and eyed him. "You've been pretty good, actually." she told him honestly. He hadn't been too squirmy or anything, and also didn't seem to be like, playing up the hurting.

"I'd thought about that. But they didn't die around here, so I'd have to find out where they died right? It's not like we had a funeral or whatever." There hadn't been anything more than a teary and pained phone call from his mother, she told him she loved him and then told him he'd be safe. The hospital wherever had called his grandmother the next day to let her know his mother had died overnight. "Plus there's no guarantee they are ghosts anyway. What if they've already moved on?" He looked back at Kaysen, meeting her gaze. "You aren't so bad as far as nurses go yourself." It came out as a tease, but he meant it so he paired it with a genuine smile.

Kaysen thought that if it was her parents, she would take the time to find the hell out but it wasn't her parents, so, she didnt' say anything. When he said the last bit, that got a little half smile out of her, shyish in nature, though that was because he was smiling at her, and it seemed like a real one. Plus, she was being teased, but in a not-bad way, which made her a little bashful as well. "Well, don't go expecting it all the time." she told him, to cover for things. "I've only got so much good will and you used up an awful lot of it today, Ghoastal."

Tad winced at the nickname. "You're going to keep calling me that aren't you?" He had enjoyed the little half smile she gave him. It almost seemed like they were friendly. Well up until the lack of goodwill comment. For all of his time noticing nuances, Tad was downright terrible at realizing what any of them actually even meant. The shy smile, the fact that she'd stopped swearing, seemed more comfortable and had been interested in his diabetes stuff, that had to mean something. He'd noticed it, but he had no idea what it meant. Being socially retarded was really starting to frustrate him, but if she didn't tell him point blank they were going to be friends he'd never be able to figure it out on his own.

"Yeah." she told him honestly. "I can't resist. You're called Tad for fucks sake. I have to. It's a far too obscure reference for me to pass up." she informed him. "So, get used to it. You have a nickname." Even if she was vaguely aware that 'Tad' was a nickname as well. Sorta. Or something. But Ghostal was a proper nickname. You didn't get to pick those yourself, nicknames just came naturally.

"Awesome. Just what I always wanted." The statement was dripping with sarcasm, but it was honest. Having a nickname was a good sign in the getting friends department right? "Well since I'm stuck with it you might as well explain your obscure reference so I'm at least clued into the joke." And so he could weigh just how terrible of a nickname she'd given him.

"I told you earlier. It's a Space Ghost thing." Kaysen said, starting to put the first aid stuff away to give herself something to do. "Like he had the talk show on cartoon network? It was great. It was like a fifteen minute show, and was really silly. He had an evil twin brother that was just like...space ghost with a badly drawn on mustache? That was Chad. So it was Chad and Tad Ghostal." she explained.

"You really weren't kidding about the obscure were you?" Tad laughed. He'd seen the show a few time because they'd show re-runs in the middle of the night. Of course the show comes across as a social experiment to prove exactly how crazy the staff over at cartoon network was but it was entertaining for the most part. As far as nicknames went it could be significantly worse. "Ghostal it is then. I guess." Tad slid off the counter and made a move to clean up the cookies and help put the kit back together.

She got most of it done, then nabbed another cookie and remembered her soda, so she took that up and drank some as well. "You don't get a choice. Deal." she told him, then flashed him a rare grin for a moment.

The grin was contagious and Tad found himself grinning back at her. "At least it's not lard ass or something." He grabbed his soda off the counter and put the top back on the cookies. "Don't I have a video game to show you? Or did you just come over to nurse me back to health?"

Kaysen arched a brow at him. "I'm pretty sure there'd need to be like...three or four of you to even start on being a lard ass..." she said. When he said the last bit about nursing him back to health, she blushed again, dark and immediate. "The game!" she insisted immediately. "I'm not some bleeding heart little nurse betty wannabe, and don't you forget it! I came here to shoot plungers at alien bunnies!"

"The game it is then. Follow me." Tad led the way out of the kitchen and up the stairs grinning to himself about making her blush. It wasn't really intended but her blush was rather amusing, mostly because it seemed so intense. He pushed the door open to his room, which was one of two on the second floor. Since Grams had taken the downstairs room, he'd been given the master bedroom which was appropriately decorated as any teenager would decorate his room. The bed was a mess, appropriately unmade and with random articles of clothing tossed on it. There was a desk on one side of it, with an impressive desktop computer sitting on it. Scattered around the computer were piles of papers, drawings and game guides. The bookshelf on the other side was crammed full of books. So many that they'd spilled out on to the floor next to the shelves. Across from the bed was a decent sized tv, but more importantly the entertainment unit it sat on was littered with different gaming systems: a PS2, XBox360, N64 and GameCube, what looked like an old Sega, a SNES and of course a Wii. It was a gaming nerd's dream set up (well minus the original NES but he hadn't found a working one yet).

"Welcome to my humble abode," he offered as ushered her into the room. "It's sort of, um in guy mode, but I don't get guests often. Just you know, ignore the fact that its messy or whatever."

Kaysen glanced around, and had to smirk. Especially when she went to flop on his bed, and found a pair of boxers there. She held them up between two fingers and just grinned at him for a minute. "Yeah, I can see that...." she said, flinging them onto the floor. "I suggest cleaning your room like, once a year at least."

"Well if I'd known you were coming I'd have at least left my good underwear laying around to impress you. I'll also have you know I'm on a very strict, twice a year cleaning schedule." He turned to the entertainment unit to set up the game and grab the controllers for the Wii. "You've used one of these before right?" he asked handing it to her as the game loaded.

She shook her head. "Nope. So you're going to have to explain." she told him. "And you have 'good' underwear? That's supposed to be impressive, even? Are we talking superman undaroos and shit, or like, james bond undies with secret buttons that slick oil out the ass or something?" she asked, because she couldn't let the comment go.

"Mostly just leather and lace actually. But I'm going to look into the James Bond underwear, that could come in handy." He dropped onto the bed next to her and went through a brief tutorial on how to hold the controller and what the buttons meant. "The whole thing is really simple actually which was their goal when they made it." The game had loaded at this point and he set up the mini-game with shooting plungers at bunnies. "Alright, let's see what you got."

Kaysen arched a brow at the leather and lace comment, but then got distracted by controller things. Then she got pretty into the game, something that wasn't ever hard to do with her. She liked her video games, and this one was pretty simple, but amusing as hell. So she was all kinds of good with that, and shortly she was laughing and being a fairly animated bunny-shooter.

Tad was enjoying watching her play and at one point had just leaned back on the bed to laugh with her as she jumped about. He was realizing quickly that if this is what having friends is like he could get used to it. When the current round was over he looked up at her smiling. "So what did I say? You laughed, but what do you think now?"

She grinned, laughing a little as she flopped back down again. "I think that was great." she said. She could give credit where it was due. It had been fun, and she didnt' have enough of that these days. She had a lot on her mind at any given time, and...well. Yeah. Badness. But this had been nice and non-stressful. Silly, but cool.

"Told you. I wouldn't lie." He leaned over and poked her in the side gently. "And you haven't even played the exploding burps game yet." The whole thing was fun, and left Tad feeling good about making someone else smile. Hell, even his face and ribs weren't hurting too bad. "You know you could come over again if you want."

Kaysen made a little half laugh-squeak sound when he poked her, and she immediately swatted him on the shoulder. "Noooo poking me!" she told him. "I have controllers attached to my wrists, they can easily become weapons!" she warned, not that she'd do that. She wasn't above violence, but only when people deserved it, and being poked in the side wasn't really a hittable offense. "And...alright, maybe sometime." she said, not being necessarily commital about it. "There's this guy I know. Porter. You might like him too." she added. "He's the one that got me the Daredevil board." Which she'd told him earlier, but whatever. "He's still new in town n shit."

Tad made a mental note that if she was going to make that noise every time he poked her, it was going to be something he made a habit of doing. "Ok, ok!" He held his hands up in surrender. "You think you'd lay off threatening me with violence as I've obviously already had my fill." He pulled his feet up under him, resting his arms on his knees and chin on his arms. "Porter eh? I think I know who he is. It's getting hard to keep track of the new people. But yea, I'll try and look past the craptacular taste in super heroes and meet him if you think that's a good idea." A second later he realized something and had to ask "You aren't trying to set me up with him are you?"

Blinking in confusion for a second, Kaysen sort of gave Tad a 'eh?' look before it dawned on her. "Huh? Oh! No, why, are you like...thinking of going that route?" she asked. Sure, Kaysen had no problem with anyone's sexual orientation or the like, she just was a girl who'd lived most of her life in Marquette, where that was still kinda strange. So it didn't occur right away and such. Then it occurred to her that in the rumors she'd heard about the guy, that was one of them. It just hadn't occurred to her that it might be true or not.

"No!" It came out far harsher than he'd intended. "No, I mean nothing against people who are it's just, no." Tad briefly put his forehead on his arms hiding his face while he got his shit together. Breaking down in front of Kaysen was easily going to guarantee that she'd never come back again. Mostly Tad had a pretty positive look on life, but the queer thing was starting to get under his skin. When he looked up again he was much calmer. "I was just worried, since that's usually what people call me when they start swinging." And he'd heard the rumors himself. "But yes, def prefer chics."

She sort of didn't know what to do there for a few moments, watching him flail over things. She'd dealt with the same, really the whole lesbian rumor thing only started to lose charm for people when she'd started going out with Chance. Then it just held less weight, and so it had faded a little. And for Kaysen, she'd never actually fully decided on orientation, really. It wasn't something that she'd sat down and had a long think over and landed firmly on one side or another. Or in the middle as the case may be. "Oh. Well...no, that wasn't what I was getting at, Ghostal, so...sorry if I stamped on a nerve or whatever. I just thought maybe he'd be a cool guy to hang out with n shit. If it makes you feel better, I think he's got a chick or something. So it'd probably be harder for people to start spreading rumors about you two."

"Well that's good then. Although I can't imagine my presumed love life being the hot topic around the halls." Tad really wasn't sure where they went from here. Video games played, food ate, wounds patched up and sexual orientation sussed out. Now what? "What do you wanna do now?" It really was starting to be silly how awkward he was around people. This didn't even have to do with Kaysen being a girl, it was just him being so used to being anti-social that being social was like a foreign language.

"I dunno, it's like, people's default when they aren't creative enough to come up with anything else. That's my theory anyways. Like they're not actually bright enough to come up with something that might at least be an interesting kind of rumor? So they stick with 'ugh. me cave man. durrrrfag'." She commented, shrugging. "Get revenge. Find some hot girlfriend and make everyone wonder. I could write you a really insane note and pin it on your locker when no one was looking. Leave like, some big lipstick kiss-print on it for all to see." she added, really not above fighting fire with fire on the rumor front. She'd dealt with it enough, if she could actually help someone else out with that? She would.

Tad chuckled and ran his hands through his hair. "A smoking hot girlfriend, eh? I could sure use one of those. Not even kidding." He thought about her offer to pose as his fictional hot girlfriend. "You actually think we could pull off me having a fake girlfriend? Because that would be quite amusing."

"Wouldn't be that hard." Kaysen said with a shrug as she sat back, leaning on her arms behind herself as she regarded him. "All you'd need is enough to make people fill in the blanks. I mean, sure, it'd have to be massively blatant and stuff, but a note with lipstick on it and girl's handwriting should at least get people wondering." she said. Really she'd never thought about trying to decieve people on a mass scale, but after brief thought--she decided she was for it. Yep. Those assmunches could bite her, and Tad, and they could all just wonder.

Tad thought about it, considering what it would take to pull off. Faking a boyfriend would much easier, flowers, balloons, candy and that shit, but a girlfriend. That was going to take some creativity. "I think we should try it," he told her leaning back like she was but he just laid all the way down, crossing his arms behind his head. "What's the worse that could happen? No one notices?" After a moment he turned to look at her. "You sure Chance would be ok with you helping me out?"

Kaysen winced at that, something that was visible and immediate. She looked away and down. Wow, what a fascinating mess on the floor. Was that a book she'd read, or just one with an interesting cover? Yep. Fascinating floor. Really. Great carpet. In the end she shrugged one shoulder awkwardly, and neglected to say anything. Mostly that was because she had no idea what to say. If she had to guess, she would guess that Chance would have a huge problem with it. But then again, with everything that was going on with his mom and all, she didn't even really know if they were still together. It still felt all kinds of up in the air. She didn't even know how she felt about things, besides torn on it all. She missed him terribly, she didn't want to be apart from the guy--but she also couldn't just hang back and not do anything about his mom being a crazy ass mass murderer. So...to say it was complicated would have been grossly understating it.

He watched her flinch and then take a sudden interest in whatever was on his floor to the side of the bed. When she did say anything after a while, he sat up, moving the tiniest bit closer to her. "Kaysen, you ok?" What on earth had he said to make her just go so cold all of a sudden. Was it something about Chance? "If I said something I shouldn't have I'm sorry. I'm not good with people unless their old and don't mind losing at bridge." He half reached out to touch her shoulder but stopped and brought his hand back. "Can I do something?"

Kaysen wasn't sure what to do there, because she wasn't used to people being all weird and accomodating. Most of the time when she threw a weird little fit into things, silent or no, she got ignored, or made fun of. So, this was newish. She was slightly better at dealing with it because of her experiences with Charlie and Porter and stuff, but still. Weird for her. "It's okay. Not you or anything, you didn't do anything, so don't be sorry." she said, internally flailing now about things again. Only this time things with Tad, because she hadn't meant to get all wacko on him. Though really, if he hadn't already picked up that the rumors about her being pretty erratic were true, he was oblivious as hell. "So...don't...yeah. It's not you. Shit's just...weird right now." she attempted to explain, even if that didn't even begin to cover things.

Tad might have noticed she was erratic but he wasn't sure how much of that was who she was or just general awkwardness of new situations. He knew he wasn't exactly the most suave of guys and so he typically just assumed that he was just assessing the situation wrong. "Oh, ok." If shit was weird then there wasn't much use in pushing it. Part of him was relieved that that he hadn't messed up big time. "I know we just met, but if you need someone to talk to or whatever, I'm always around. Nothing else to do with my time."

She gave him a little half smile that was very awkward indeed. "Thanks." she said. And the sentiment was genuine. But she'd already told Porter and that was one dude that wasn't Thom too many. Thom wasn't going to say anything. But yeah, she couldn't keep spreading it around. That just was going to be all kinds of bad. Plus, Tad had his own crap to deal with, he didn't need hers too, right? Right. "I'm sure it'll be okay." Only she wasn't. And really, her tone even gave away the fact that she didn't think that in the slightest.

"I'm sure it will, but you know if you do. I'm here." Tad really wasn't sure if it would, but it sounded like Kaysen wasn't sure either. For a little while he just watched her, enjoying having someone close. And it wasn't an attracted to thing, which wasn't to say that he didn't find her adorable, it was just about having a person there. Sitting on his bed, having a conversation that mattered. "I'm new to this friend thing, but I want to try and be a good one."

Well, there was the F word. Only not one that was the most common in Kaysen's vocabulary. She supposed she didn't mind it so much. It wasnt' like she had many, but they were pretty cool. "You realize that if anyone catches onto the fact that we hang out or something, that it might actually make everything worse on you, right?" she asked, needing to put the out out there for him.

"Kaysen, you beat two guys with your skateboard to save my ass. Things are already worse. At least if we hang out sometimes, I'll have an ally somewhere." Tad really wasn't concerned with his current situation. He'd already planned on just enduring it for another few months until graduation and then it would be over. This way though, he'd still have to endure it, but at least there was someone he could talk to about it. "If you don't want to hang out, or don't want anyone to know, whatever I get it. I'm just saying that I'm not really gonna let the fear of things getting worse keep me from doing something I want to do. I mean look at my face? It can't get much worse than this."

Kaysen eyed him when he said that, and she sighed. "Dude, it can always get worse." she said. Cynical, yes, but true. Hell. She'd burned up vampires. She'd been stalked by crazy shadow demons and shit. Things were always able to get worse. She knew it, she just didn't figure he did. But whatever. There was also not much else she could say. She'd given the warning, if he didn't take it, it wasn't her fault. "But if you say so..."

"Sweet." Sure it could get worse, even if he didn't really have a clue about the sort of things that Kaysen had been through, but right now it was pretty awesome. It was impossible to contain his grin. "So anything else you want to do? My entire collection is at your disposal."

She glanced over towards his games for a moment, then gave a little half smile. "Hook me up with some zombies." she said. She didn't know what he had, but there was a lot out there that was zombie-related. She was sure he had something. And spending the rest of the afternoon doing that? Well, that was fine in her book.

He bounced off the bed, probably a little too excited, because the pain in his ribs made him lose his breath for an instant. "Zombies it is." He scanned the titles on his shelf and eventually pulled one down. "Here try this, zombies in a mall." Tad ejected one game out of the Wii then loaded the new game into the XBox360 and switched the input on the tv. As the game loaded he sat back down next to Kaysen handing her the new controller and taking the Wii controller from her. "Let's see what you got tough girl."

She smirked at him, handing off controllers. "Oh, prepare to be astounded." she told him, more than happy to hit up the video game awesomeness. This she could do and do well. She could forget about any awkwardness things, and just drop into killing zombies on a mass scale. It was her element, really, something she could completely relax in doing.