Scared to Shout

Who: Peyton and Geo
Where: Peyton's house
When: Sometime between ten and eleven, immediately following Vigil.

Geo finally had to admit flying wasn't doing much good anymore. His wings were sore, and his eye was starting to ache from trying so hard to see at night. He shifted his talons on the strap of his backpack, letting the places he'd seen dance on the edges of his mind. He'd gotten a little bit better since things started going mad; a tiny bit better at the not forgetting places quite so quickly, but...he was slightly worried about pressing his luck, and he didn't really want two hours of work to go flying off into the ethereal nether.

He was closer, he realized, to Peyton's house than he was to his house. With that thought, he shifted directions, setting out towards the Marsh's house, mind still burning with thoughts and questions and ideas that threatened to escape before he could get somewhere to write them down. He ground his beak shut tighter, and redoubled his efforts, speeding up over the glowing lights of the houses below.

He slowed just enough to come to a moderately controlled landing on the porch's roof, shifting from battle form to human fast enough to make his head spin. One hand dug into his duster's pocket to dig a small notebook and pen out, scribbling even as he made his unsteady, barefoot way across the roof. Once he was above the door he shouldered his backpack - biting back a yelp at the twinge his shoulder made in protest - stuck the pen behind his ear and the notebook in his mouth. He bent down, grabbed the gutter, and leapt-dropped off the roof.

He landed in a heap, but nothing was broken so he rolled to his feet, and padded up onto the porch, hitting the doorbell before the time really sank in. He was trying to straighten up and look neater - hair finger combed, duster buttoned up to hide the fact that he wasn't wearing a shirt - when he pulled his watch out of it's pocket and checked the time. Ohhh shoot. The watch was shoved back into the pocket, replaced by a fumbling attempt to get the lying pendent out in case it wasn't Peyton who answered.

Peyton was getting ready for bed when she heard the doorbell. It startled her, given the hour and she paused while pulling her tank top down over her stomach, listening to see if Tyler was going to answer. She didn't hear his door open, or any movement downstairs, so she pulled open her bedroom door and cautiously headed down the hall to the stairs to see who it was herself. Peyton was stupidly quiet as she moved downstairs, not wanting to tip off whoever was at the door that she was there. Just in case. Peyton went straight for the front window on her tiptoes to glance outside. She was fully prepared to scream if need be. But the tension she'd been holding in her body eased when she saw it was Geo.

Why he was there so late, she didn't know, but she unbolted and unlocked the front door anyway. If he was there that late, maybe something bad happened. Or was going to happen. Late night visits usually meant bad news, right? Opening the door, her face was full of curiosity and anxiety. "Hey. Everything okay?" she asked immediately, pulling open the door wider in case he wanted to come inside.

"Hi Peyton, I know it's late, I'm sorry, I just...just..." Geo had to reign back on the rambling, sliding through the space she offered and into the house, shucking off his backpack. He stood there for a second, feeling like a scatterbrain in ways he hadn't felt since coming to Marquette. Maybe it was the fact that he was trying so hard not to forget, but this felt almost as bad as the infamous Pacman date. Only more important. "This is gonna sound really dumb but I just needed someplace to stop and get my thoughts down before they all got away again and do you have a computer I could use for just a sec...ond..." Her scent finally caught up with his thoughts and he shook his head emphatically. "Aw, damn, no, no no I didn't...I didn't mean to scare you, everything's ok. Mostly. As ok as it can be this week. I think."

Her brow quirked as he spoke but she was fairly certain she got the jist of what he was saying. She reached out to take his hand and lead him upstairs to her room. "You can use the computer in my bedroom," Peyton said quietly, not wanting to wake up Tyler, or draw his attention if he happened to be in his room playing video games. Sneaking Geo into her room this late would not go over well with her brother at all. "What's going on? Are you okay? You seem really tense and sort of... scattered." That was an understatement. At least when she rambled she could generally get out full sentences. It seemed like he was having a hard time even managing that much.

"I'm..." Geo thought for the words carefully, speaking softly. She had a brother right? And the brother probably knew the boyfriend and yeah this could be awkward if - no. Isaac. He knew Isaac, Isaac was why he was here, and that thought drew his thoughts back together a bit. "I'm...tense and scattered and angry and sad and it's...I just want to be doing something and I think I'm close to doing something and it's trying to lose itsself and I just don't think I can keep all of it where it's needed until I get home if I just keep flying which is why I'm here." He took a deep breath to recover after letting that whole sentence come out at once. "It's like trying to do math, yanno? You fight with it and you fight with it and then there's that click-" He snapped his fingers together, frowning when leather got in the way. He still had the pendent in that hand. He grimaced and shoved it in his pocket before continuing. "Where you just get it but if you don't work at keeping it, it's gone again? It feels like that. I hate it."

Peyton shot him an odd look and pushed open her door to tug him inside. She waited until she'd shut it quietly behind her before she spoke again. "You're not like... on drugs or anything, are you?" She didn't seriously think he was, but the way he was talking - none of it made sense to her, even if it did to him. And he had just started working at some creepy, supernatural bar, right? Maybe that did something to him, or maybe there was something strange in the water. She wondered if Herbert leaving had anything to do with the angry and sad part. On top of everything else, it probably wasn't the best timing - not that it was in any way Herbert's fault. "What is it you're trying to get, exactly?" Peyton released his hand to go turn on the computer for him.

"Safehouses." Safe as houses. "Networks. Places where people can go that are all equidistant, not conspicuous, easy to get to from above, easily defended." Talking was helping his thoughts stay together a bit better. "And me? Drugs? Heck no. You're, ah. You're gettin' to see what I was like durin' most of highschool. Trenchcoat Larry used to be a mess, little sist-" He felt his ears flush suddenly, but it was too late to cut the term-of-endearment out. "-er." He flashed her an apologetic look, careening on vocally as he paced.

"I dunno, I just. Just. I've never been the best at payin' attention to one thing, ever since I was a little chic-kid. Since I was a kid. Then, uh, when I was, like...fourteen? Something..." He waved at his head, pacing back, "Something shifted, I just...other things'd get my attention so easy that I'd loose the thoughts before they were even really completely formed. It's got a lot better since, but every now and then..." He managed a weak grin. "I can't focus on near-anything right now, been spending too long payin' attention to one thing."

Woah. Peyton never really saw him this way. So... spazzy. She slipped into her chair and logged into the computer with her password. She had noted the way he called her little sister which was kind of cute and made her blush a lot, if he had meant it that way. The way he was talking, she wasn't sure he was really aware of what he was saying. And it was kind of bizarre that he had come over so late to look up safehouses. It seemed like something that could have waited - unless that was all part of having to deal with it now before he forgot. "Here you go." She stood up and motioned that he could sit down and do his thing. "So is that like a condition you were born with? Does it have to do with being a wereraven?" Peyton would have asked if there were drugs he could take for it - but given she had been worried he might have been on drugs, it seemed a bit strange to suggest them. "Has something happened to bring it back to the surface again?" Like being wanted by hunters? Hannah had told her everything Geo hadn't - but Peyton didn't feel it was the best time to bring that up. Yet. But oh, she had plans to. When he was less twitchy.

"Nothing's happened. Everything happened." He started a web browser, sent it to google maps. "It's all this..." He waved a hand in a circle, clearly trying to mean everything. "People dying, things hunting 'round at night, looking for people who aren't ready for 'em...people leaving..." He paused for a moment once he got Marquette open on the map, uncertain - for a terrifying moment - why he'd needed a map. "It's, uh. It's a mixture. They thought I had, like, ADHD for awhile, but the drugs they gave didn't do nothin' and mom hated it anyways, so we all just kinda learned to...deal..." He switched the view over to terrain, and started overlaying what he'd seen just the last two hours over things in his head for a moment before he started marking things. He started with Peyton's house, then added Helen and Marek's place. "I had to get out of the house," He started explaining as he typed and clicked away, "So I figured I'd do something productive with my time, went looking 'round town for places to use...was just gonna write 'em all down when I got home, but they were tryin' to escape an' here was closer."

"Oh." So he was popping in this late simply because her house was closer than his and she had a computer. If like, Herbert's apartment had been closer, he'd have stopped there. There was no - hey, Peyton. Haven't seen you in a couple days and wanted to see how you were doin' so I wanted to stop by. It was all about convenience. Pfft. As stupid and childish as it was, Peyton stuck her tongue out at the back of his head before she turned to crawl into bed. She watched him click away as she settled herself and flopped back against the pillows. She decided to let it go, since clearly he was in a dizzying sort of state. And she had no clue what he was doing on the map - looking for safehouses, he'd said, but he was marking houses and she wasn't sure what the whole thing actually meant. Peyton slipped her legs under the blankets. "Speaking of hunting, why didn't you tell me you had hunters gunning for your head? Is that why you didn't want to come by my house over the weekend?"

Had Geo been paying attention the way he was supposed to, he probably would have noticed the miffed sound in her voice, and the change in her scent, but as it was, the framework in his mind was demanding most of his attention. He added the school into the mix, eyes darting from corner to corner of the map. Have to check out those trainyards sometime....

Her statement, though, jerked him out of his reverie right before he had a chance to mark the sector of the woods that he had seen the tallest tree in - shortwave antenna should go there where it wouldn't be noticed. He spun on the chair, gripping the back, his eye wide. "Who. Uh. How...who told you that?" She was in bed. Peyton trusts you enough to... that shouldn't have made him feel so suddenly guilty and happy at the same time, especially not if she was bring up that mess, but it did.

"I'm psychic," she replied dryly before continuing with a quick, dismissive wave of her hand. "Hannah told me. She said she had to like, jump in and save you from that hunter, who was about to hello! shoot you because this collector guy wanted you. And you know how you said his name was Drew? Well, it's Derek." She picked idly at the thread on her blanket for a second before lifting her gaze back to Geo. "Is he still after you?"

"I haven't seen him since he tried to have me killed." Geo was the first to look away this time, staring at his hands on the back of the chair. It was the first time he'd admitted that - that he'd almost been killed - out loud. At least now he wouldn't have to worry about Herbert being in his sights... "But, uh. The...the hunter, I saw her the other morning...she brought my dog - new dog, you'd like him, I think - back." He raised his head to look back at Peyton. "She said she wasn't gonna...I mean, not...I don't think I have to worry about her again." Not that he wasn't keeping his eye out for her. Just in case. "And yeah. That's why. But I...I did come by to check on the house..."

Peyton sat up, just a little bit, to rest back against her headboard. "Well, Hannah told me that Derek guy was pissed. And whether or not that hunter chick brought your dog home, that doesn't mean anything. She could just be doing stuff like that to make you put your guard down. So just please be careful. If it weren't for Hannah..." That thought didn't sit well in her stomach at all. It made her sick, actually. She took a breath and decided not to finish that sentence. Instead she focused on the next thing. "I know you came by, and I know you met Isaac... you could have come inside," Peyton said. "You don't have to ever, like... stay away."

Geo slumped on the back of the chair, enough of his project on the computer that the feeling of desperation he'd had when he'd got here had faded. He rested his chin on his arms, and stared at the floor. "I know, I know, I told myself that a million times. But she didn't smell or sound like she was lying, for what that's worth." He heaved a sigh, wincing. He knew how that sentence ended - him, mounted and stuffed in some psycho's basement. The idea still sent chills up his spine. "I didn't...at the time I didn't...I wasn't thinking straight. I didn't know I didn't have, like...someone watching me or whatever." His voice went about as small as he felt right now, his shoulders hunched. "'m sorry?"

She gave him a look, though it was softer and less annoyed. "You don't have to apologize, Geo. And you don't have to worry about me. I've got some wards on the house that will probably keep most of the bad guys out." Peyton hesitated for only a brief moment before speaking again. "Between Babylon, and hunters, and... and your parents and then your issues with Helen." And his spazzy, scattered-brainness, though she didn't want to say that aloud. "Are you sure you're okay? I really don't want you getting hurt, or putting yourself in the position that you could get hurt. And I don't want to see you like... have some kind of nervous breakdown because you're suppressing stuff."

"I'm fine." Geo protested, sitting up a little straighter and shrugging a little. "I'm not doing anything dumb, and I'm not really planning to..." He shook his head, looking at her sideways. "Aside from..." He waved at his head again. "...an occasional bad spazz, I feel better tryin' to help. As for, like, work, they have wards there too, you can't be violent in there." Or you got a backlash. Whatever the heck that meant. "So I think I'm safe? And I'm not surpressin' stuff. Other than the, yanno...hunter thing. And I won't do that again."

"I was talking about suppressing like... emotional stuff," Peyton said after a moment of silence. Maybe she just wasn't around him enough, but with all the crazy stuff happening lately, especially to he and Sammy - she didn't know how he was handling it. And she said as much. "With everything going on, I just - I don't know. I can't imagine it's terribly easy for you, Geo. I just want to make sure you're okay."

"It's not easy for any of us," Geo replied, dodging the true topic again. "But people are resilient. We can bounce back from a lot more than most people would expect." He scratched his ear, watching Peyton's face. She did smell worried. Worried, stressed...that smell was going around way too much lately. "I just...I'm dealing. We're all dealing."

kinda.

"I'm not talking about anyone else," Peyton told him simply. "I'm talking about you. Like just now? You totally avoided what I've been asking. I get that people are dealing - I get that people can bounce back. I'm not worried about them right now. I'm worried about you. I know you've got a lot on your mind and things probably aren't sinking in too well right now because of your new job, and that asshole collector, and worrying about Sammy... I just don't want to see you in a lot of pain once it all settles and there's nothing else distracting you from everything that's happened in the past couple of weeks."

"I..." Geo sort of just deflated, leaning on the back of the chair again. "...you're probably right, but..." He gave a helpless shrug. "What else am I supposed to do?" Besides invading my best girl-friend's house and keeping her up? "I just...I don't know." Well, he did, but he couldn't have that.

Peyton wished she had all the answers. She hated feeling helpless herself, but at least she could be there for him if he did need her. "I don't know what you're suppose to do. All I know is I can tell you're avoiding. Isaac did the same thing before. It's not healthy, I don't think. Maybe you just need some time for yourself? To be able to think and deal with stuff and not constantly find yourself in situations where you have to block it all out?"

"What if I want to keep avoiding?" The tone in his voice was half defiance, half frustration, though it wasn't aimed at her - just at the whole situation in general. The whole world in general. "I don't want to think about most of it. I don't want time by myself..." he paused, thinking over what she'd said before admitting sheepishly. "You didn't say by myself, did you. You said for."

She nodded. "You don't have to be by yourself. Just... I think you've been keeping yourself busy, just maybe not in the best way?" And she spoke cautiously, because she didn't want to upset him, or get him angry with her. "It's not really good to keep avoiding things. I really think in the long run it makes things worse because things just keep piling up - or atl east it feels that way."

"What would you suggest?" The business wasn't for the sake of being busy, really - it was just the only thing he could do, really. "I mean...some things I can't stop doin', but I guess I could..." He thought for the right word. "...slow down, a little?"

Peyton didn't know what to tell him given she had never been in his position, but she did nod at his own suggestion. "Yes. Maybe slow down a little... steer clear from, er, strange people?" Hunters, included. "And if you need to talk, or something, then you should. I'll always listen, if you need someone."

"I have been steering clear! They're the ones steerin' for me!" Geo had to protest, just a bit. Peyton had points - many good points - and it would be a good idea to listen to them. "But I'll try. And I will." He smiled, a bit. "Been thinkin' about starting classes. Maybe. Yanno. Get out of the house, stop seemin' like a slacker or somethin'..."

"I think that's a great idea. You could always take however many is right for you. Not too many that you can't keep up and concentrate -" Since he seemed to have that problem. "But definitely a good idea." She snuggled a bit lower in her bed, relaxing a bit more against her pillow. "I haven't thought about college in what feels like forever. I keep getting letters... but I just kind of toss them aside." She motioned to the small pile next to her computer. "I think it might be nice to have a bit of time to be able to sit down and think about that again without doom and gloom hanging over us."

"Maybe you should take a break too..." Geo sighed, shuffling his hand through his hair. "I think we all need a vacation. Somehow." He glanced at the pile with a wry grin. He'd used to have a stack that big... "Though I don't think lookin' at those things would be all that relaxin'."

"It's actually more relaxing now because it's part of something normal, which I need from time to time." Peyton smiled a bit wearily. "Though I'm not so sure about leaving town for college now. I may stay here..." For a multitude of reasons. "What kind of break do you think I need? I'm not really running myself ragged with anything. I think what I really need is like... two days of uninterrupted sleep. A week of nothing happening around here would be just as nice too."

"Mmm, uninterrupted sleep..." Geo nodded, only half-teasing. "That'd be such a nice thing right now." Right up there with 'no longer sleeping on my sister's couch.' "I almost forget what that feels like..." He let himself trail off before he paused, looking at Peyton. "....and I should totally leave so you can at least try for that sleep."

Peyton stifled a quick yawn against her hand before she shook her head. "You can stay as long as you want, if you're still wanting to look up things on the computer. You can shift and fly out the window when you're done, right? I'm not too worried about it." She looked at him curiously. "Will you be okay getting home? Do you need to stay here?"

"Nah, I'll be good." He gave a small grin, already feeling his thoughts slowing into more typical processes. "Feel better already, an' yeah. I'll go out the window." He glanced back at the computer, squinting for a second, before he returned his gaze to her. "Sure the light or whatever won't bother you?"

"Nope, I'm fine." She liked having him there, and given how tired she was, she was pretty sure she'd be out the minute she shut her eyes. "Wake me up if you need anything, okay?"

"Will do, cap'n." Geo tossed her a small salute, smiling, before he turned back to the computer, determined to get this finished as soon as he could so he wouldn't disturb her sleep. "Sweet dreams an' all that, alright?"

She nodded, a tiny smile on her face before she pulled the blankets more firmly around her and closed her eyes. It was oddly comforting with him there, so it didn't take long before she drifted off to sleep.