If Only, If Only (Mathis)

[Ashley Engel]

Ashley still wasn’t sure if she liked the pond on campus or not.
It was outdoors, more secluded than the packed courtyard with it’s busyness and volume. But it had a certain set of emotions tied to it for her, and coming to it again brought those up. Still, there wasn’t really a better alternative for when she wanted to be outside but still alone.

Much to her relief, this time her search for a quiet place was answered without pre-existing company. There were no smartass teenagers lounging in the grass, and the secluded space offered up what she wanted from it. Peace and quiet.

Unceremoniously her bag was dumped on the ground, where her boots were soon to join it. Free of socks and shoes she moved closer to the water, watching the careful lines of creatures within moving beneath the surface. She’d never seen fish, or even bothered to read about them. They, like moose from her hometown and the chameleon in her dormmate’s room, were silent company. No conversation, and no thoughts.

Ash eased into the atmosphere easily. No sooner had she gotten there then she took up a spot at the pond’s edge. She didn’t dare touch the water and break the veil between her and living creatures. Instead she let it be, occupying herself with her cell phone intermittently. Cain was up early, providing her the only company she wanted electronically. Every time she sent a message she set her phone down and stared into the water, thinking about how much nicer things would be if she could just get up and walk off. No more school, no more stupid powers, no more people.. But walking away wouldn’t solve anything. Logically, she knew that. But it didn’t make her any less envious of the fish in front of her. All they had to worry about was nutrition and procreation. How simplistic.. She was envious.

[Mathis Reeves]

There was something about physical activity that always attracted Mathis. It cast a spell over him with the simple repetition of steps and breaths, broken only when the pleasant burn in his limbs turned into something well.. not so pleasant. It didn't really matter where or when the physical activity occurred (so long as it was outside the bedroom and not... that kind of activity) since Mathis was happy either way.

So, to celebrate this love of activity, Mathis often went out running whenever he didn't have school or club activities. Which meant he either went running in balls o'clock or he went in between classes and activities ((and when he remembered, on weekends)). This happened to be one of those rare times that Mathis found an afternoon free from friends, clubs, classes, and teachers breathing down his neck about homework so that he could go out running. Mathis found himself taking another path through the grounds, avoiding his usual route in favor of exploring. Not that he hadn't explored every bit of the grounds he could during his earlier years, but it was still nice to pretend so he could explore once again.

His rather heavy footfalls crunched the fresh green grass as he headed towards the pond, planning on ending his run by jumping into the water. Which probably wasn't allowed but Mathis had never bothered asking about it to anyone, so he figured as long as no one told him no then he was free to do it. Breaths were rushing out of his body like they were running from him instead of him doing the running. However he was ignoring that in favor of looking at the nature surrounding him, smoky blue eyes sort of rushing from place to place as he tried to register everything. Birds whistled overhead, squirrels raced from branch to branch as they chattered, a splash echoed from pond up ahead. Everything to remind of him of being home. Of course, as long as he didn't focus to hard on the cool breeze rather than heat or on the fact there was no heady scent of horses nor the sound of the horses speaking.

As he came closer to the pond, Mathis let out a loud "YEA!", effectively disturbing the tranquility of the nature around him. Two more frantic pounds of his feet and the mimic broke into the area immediately surrounding the pond. He was so focused on his goal he didn't really notice the kind of pale girl on the other side of the koi pond. What he did notice, however, was that the koi pond was significantly smaller than he’d remembered it to be which didn’t bode well if he planned to jump in. So in a last minute decision, Mathis twisted some and skidded to a stop at the edge of koi pond before flopping into it.

As he stared up at the sky from his new position he couldn’t help but grin. After all, he still got the refreshing water just like he had planned. Something in the corner of his eye though, had the mimic sitting up and shaking the water clan of his face before looking across the pond. A girl sat across the way, looking like she had been disturbed by his antics. Mathis raised an arm and gave her a rather over exuberant wave, his face splitting into a wide grin.
“Hey there! Sorry ‘bout that! I’m Mathis!”

[Ashley Engel]

Speaking of simplistic..

The boy’s approach hadn’t gone unnoticed. But the speed of him left Ash with little to do about it. One minute she’d been enjoying the ease of solitude and the next some stranger was bounding up, shouting and clumsily hitting the water. She flinched, not at the spraying water but at the sudden noise.

By the time the stranger was up, looking at her and waving, she was scrambling to retreat. Briefly she scowled at the boy before snatching up her phone and standing. Her phone, she verified, was fine. A little wet on the front, but otherwise safe. Which was good, because covering up a murder on campus would have been difficult beyond words.

The boy spoke less than quietly, which seemed to match the sound of his thoughts. Everything about him hit Ashley as energetic and booming. She groaned inwardly and retreated back a few steps to her bag and boots. Pulling socks and shoes back on kept her eyes off the crazy stranger.

Part of her wanted to ignore him entirely, but it just wasn’t going to happen. She was too irritated and too obliged to give a response to his greeting. Shoving one foot into one of her boots and lacing it up, she spoke without looking back at him.

“I don’t care what your name is.” She called bitterly.
“You’re rude and noisy. And you disturbed the fish.”
She wouldn’t outright say anything about it, but she felt bad for the koi. Having a full human being invade personal space was unpleasant enough for her, she couldn’t imagine how creatures living in the body of water would feel.

[Mathis Reeves]

Mathis stared in wonder as the girl he'd just noticed was already retreating and gathering up her things. He hadn't REALLY meant to disturb anyone's peace and quiet with his run. Except, maybe the fish. But really that was just sort of how things went. It's not like he was being malicious or anything like that. In fact Mathis would probably just end up hating himself if he did something with the intention to do someone harm.

Another shake of his head to dislodge water Mathis stared up in the girl in disbelief, running his hands into the water as it began to still. "Well... I'm sorry to disturb you, Ma'am." He gave her a small grin, trying to push away the urge to point out she's the one being rude. But that wouldn't be nice to say to a lady, even if she wasn't being nice.

The mimic stood up slowly and walked over to the water's edge where she was still pulling back on her shoes rather hastily. "Y'know, Ma'am. I don't mind heading out if you are too disturbed?" he offered rather amiably, cocking his head to the side as he waited for her response. Maybe she'd retract her earlier rudeness and offer up a name... And a new friendship.

[Ashley Engel]

Ma’am.
It ran over and over again in the back of her head. Surprisingly, no one had ever called her that before. She’d either been too young or too small to people to warrant it. She’d always been girl or dear or miss. Never ma’am. It felt somehow complementary and insulting all at once. She grimaced.

When he said it again she froze in what she was doing to just stare at him.
She was seated, hands around the lips of one boot that was halfway tugged onto her foot. The laces were undone and hanging messily and altogether with her blank expression the scene looked almost humorous.

The fact the boy offered to leave struck her blind.
She’d been expecting an argument. Laughing, idiocy. More rudeness, or possibly fish abuse. An apology and offer to leave were.. well, frankly, she had no idea what to do with it.

Her mouth opened, then shut again. She fumbled mentally to put something together.
While the boy was loud he was also.. gentle. At least he sounded that way. Nice and friendly and almost uncomfortably harmless.

After a stretch of silence there was a soft thunk as she stuffed her heel fully into her boot. Her hands didn’t move to the laces. She just continued to stare up at the boy. Up at Mathis.

“Mathis is a french name. A derivation of Matthew, meaning Gift of God. Do you spell yours with a t-h-i or t-h-y?”
It was about as close to a formally hello as she could get, given the situation. At the very least, she wasn’t trying to kick the poor boy back into the pond.

[Mathis Reeves]

Mathis grew up under the harsh reign of a southern lady. She had her nice moments, as did every mom, but the minute you stepped out of line you could be sure she'd be there with a wooden spoon to whoop your ass. So, from an early age Mathis was taught you respect your family, you respect your elders, but above all you respect women, and above them (only slightly) was your Mama. Which, if you didn't respect your Mama then she'd put the fear of God into you until you did. The moral of this would be that Mathis was taught, by force, that woman were Ma'ams regardless of age. A little three year old would be ma'am, or lil' ma'am, or occasionally lil' miss if you had a lenient Mama.

The mimic cocked his head to the side in confusion when the girl just stood there frozen, not exactly sure what to make of her lack of movement. If he'd had any indication of the thought process going on behind the icey face he might have said something. But since he didn't he just stood there, waiting to be dismissed. Just leaving her would have been considered rude and even if she started the rudeness then.. Well it didn't actually matter because Mathis wasn't going to fight fire with fire when it came to a girl.

Why fish abuse? Seriously? Mathis might have been a bit... much. But he'd never purposely abuse a fish. Unless he was fishing and even then he just caught the things to eat them. He didn't purposely try and cause them pain. In fact her observation of his being gentle and harmless was the closest thing to his core being as she could have come. Though... Mathis wasn't entirely without his teeth. He'd still put up a fight if he needed, and only when he needed. He didn't believe in needless violence unless he was sparring and that was a completely different sort of beast.

He blinked rapidly at the girl's sudden words, but he smiled nervously in case that was her way of initiating a conversation. "I spell it t-h-i." His words came freely, with a nervous but still friendly lilt to them. "That's kinda funny. 'Bout Mathis being derived from Matthew. 'Cause that's ma older brother's name. Matthew Reeves. I'm Mathis Reeves. Ma lil' sister, her names Maria Reeves. She don't go to school here though..." He was rambling towards the end and nervously reached up to scratch the back of his neck.

"So what about you, Ma'am? Gotta name?"

[Ashley Engel]

She hummed slightly. Nodded.
T-H-I Mathis. Noted. The spelling didn’t really mean anything to her, she just liked knowing. Name Etymology had been one of the many past time books she’d cracked open before, and ever since the importance of names had been recognized. Even if she didn’t like people, there was a lot to be said about their names. Parents’ wishes, ideas. Suggestions of personality, or glorious irony. In Mathis’ case Ash didn’t have much of an opinion. Religion was not a subject she enjoyed.

Matthew. Maria.
Gifts of God, and another derivation. Maria, form of Mary. Meaning largely unclear, though commonly debated between rebelliousness and bitterness. Offhandedly, Ash wondered if Mathis’ sister fit her namesake at all. Ultimately, it didn’t matter. She let the thought go. There was something more interesting to consider over a sibling’s name. Mathis’ accent.

“Ashley Engel. Call me Ash.” She didn’t say it like some would an invitation of familiarity. She said the words like an order while moving to extend a hand for Mathis to shake. Contact wasn’t pleasant, but it was due manners. Even if she hadn’t appreciated the boy’s intrusion and his getting water on her, she knew how to act when there was conversation engaged. She’d been practicing lately, after all.

“Your accent. You’re from the southern region of the country, correct?”
Ash knew very little about the south. She’d been born and raised in north country, and her only time outside it was spent in upstate New York. She was a yankee through all of her blood, and the only thing she’d learned about the rest of the country was sparse particles. The west was flat and hot, the south had viciously unhealthy food, and any weird accent was either the fault of Boston or lower country residence. As such, meeting someone from an area she’d yet to hear anything good about was equal parts curious and concerning. Her grandfather rarely spoke positively about the south. As a result, Ash didn’t have a naturally high opinion of it or Mathis in turn for potentially being from there.

“What is it like, where you’re from?”

[Mathis Reeves]

Mathis was still busy pondering what the girl said about the meaning of his name. Gift of God. Did his parents know that when they poured over the baby books? Did they expect they would be getting someone different? Someone admirable? A son they could be proud of instead of the two dead ones they had gotten. Did they realize the possibility their son(s) might be gay? That their sons might turn out to be metas? Or did they just think they'd be getting two normal boys who would both go out for football, be the best brothers there were. Go to prom, date girls, get married, give them grandkids.

It didn't take long in this line of thinking for the mimic's face to fall. A lump had formed in his throat as he thought about his family. Despite four years having passed, Matty still wasn't over the fact he'd been abandoned by his family. It didn't often connect in his mind that his family would likely never speak to him again. That he'd probably die without ever hearing his mama's laughter again. After a few more moments of this self-pitying thought train, Mathis pushed it away and scratched at his neck nervously to cover up the fact he might have been close to tears again.

When the female spoke he looked up quickly, not realizing that at some point in his little inner monologue he'd begun looking at the water. "Ashley...Angel?" His pronunciation was probably all wrong but he smiled helplessly as though that would make up for everything. Reaching out slowly he took her hand, giving it a fairly gentle shake. She was a female, after all. He didn't want to accidentally hurt her even if she was a very unladylike lady.

"I'm from Texas, actually. 'Bout as South as y'can get!" He grinned, not at all ashamed of where he came from. Even with the faults of his hometown, he still loved his home and his family. He still wished that they would finally pick up the phone for him. That they might read one of his letter before returning them. Maybe even open one of the presents Matty sent them, even though his brother disapproved. A small frown pulled at his lips again before he covered it with a smile.

"It's real hot for starters. But it ain't so bad... They just... What're y'wanting to know specifically?"