I Hate Shopping (Salem!)

[Connor Anderson]

Connor was by no means a fashion expert. 90% of his wardrobe at Hammel leaned towards having holes in it, either from wear, or in some cases, from Thoroughbred teeth or hooves. Even his boots had seen better days. Still, they were the comfiest things he owned, and more importantly, were still appropriate for when he was able to get out and ride Sona.

He still couldn’t quite believe that his gelding was in Vermont. The trip had been a long one for an antsy horse, but he had arrived at Lahja’s farm with little to no harm done. Sure, he had exploded a little in his pasture once he’d been led off of the trailer, but he seemed to have settled in.

Lahja had given him the day off from his duties, though he planned on heading there in a bit anyway. Sona needed exercise, and not much was going to stop him from giving it to the gelding.

But first, he was supposed to be on a mission. His mother had pointedly told him before he’d left for Hammel that he was to throw out half of his ratty clothes from the farm and invest in new ones. It had been almost eight months, and... yeah. He still hadn’t done it.

It had been mentioned during the last Skype sessions with his family that he still had his rat-tacular threads. Curtis had ragged on him mercilessly until he’d finally given in. Fine. He would go... sigh.

Shopping.

Of course, all that was dangling from his arm in bags right now were more jeans and a few hoodies. He liked his racetrack shirts, and most of them were hole-free. For now, anyway.

He was stood lingered outside one of the bigger stores, which looked like it sold a lot of music and DVDs. Well, it wasn’t clothes, and he could do with a break from clothes. That decided, he headed inside to browse around.

[Salem Hirch]

What was he at the mall for again?

Salem pondered this and glanced down at his phone. The text from his mother was very clear, he was supposed to buy new clothes for the Yearbook pictures. Though he protested and argued that the photos were months away, his mother insisted.

How he loathed buying new clothes. On the plus side though, she didn't tell him not to buy anything else. With a heavy sigh, he pushed his way into the crowded mall. Instantly wanting to run from the sheer amount of people, but he stood his ground and made his way through the food court and to the first clothing store of his choice.

The young man never really cared what he looked like, his shirt was wrinkled, his jeans were a bit worn through in places and his hair was a mess. This was after he spent almost an hour trying to find something "decent" as his mom would put it, to wear. Now he stood in the store and was just staring at few shirts. They all looked almost exactly the same, but were very different prices. With a shrug he grabbed the cheapest one that was closest to his size, paid and headed out.

As his shoes squeaked on the shiny floor, he made his way to buy a tie. Suddenly he just stopped.

"Why the heck would I honestly buy one of those?" Salem thought to himself. Noticing the music/movie store brought a wide grin to his face. "Ah, who needs to buy one, I'll just borrow.." Nodding at his own brilliance, the young man proceeded into the store and headed straight for the music. This wasn't going to be such a bad shopping trip after all.

After gathering a few cd's he turned and saw someone. A younger man that looked sort of familiar. Was it another Hammel student? Shrugging he looked down at his phone and started walking.

[Connor Anderson]

Connor still didn’t quite grasp what was so wrong with holey clothes. Yes, he was aware that his mother didn’t like him looking like he was steps away from being homeless, but really. They were just... broken in. ... Okay, well broken in.

At least she hadn’t dictated what was acceptable and what wasn’t. If she protested the fact that he’d just dragged home more of the same things he had at home in droves, well, he’d just point out the simple fact that she hadn’t given him guidelines.

If he wasn’t careful, she’d probably set him up for that stupid ‘What Not To Wear’ show.

But she was in Kentucky, and he was in Vermont. It was a long, long distance (at least it felt that way), and he felt safe in his decisions. Now that the worst was over, he was looking forward to non-clothing themed shopping.

He was more interested in browsing the DVD’s than the music, which he happily busied himself with doing. Most of his movies were still back at home, and he had a few he was missing being able to just pick up and watch. Sure, his parents could have mailed them to him, but they were also busy and he didn’t want to make them go out of their way to find the things in the first place and take time out of the farm to mail them.

He already had Secretariat and Seabiscuit in his hands, and was turning to look for a copy of Dreamer when he accidentally stepped into the path of another boy and promptly dropped the DVDs he had been carrying. “Oh! Shoot, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that.”

[Salem Hirch]

Something was gnawing at Salem's stomach. What was it? "Did I forget something?" No, that wasn't it. His mind was caught up in his own head and on the game that was on his phone. A simple game, but it seemed to keep him at least somewhat attached to this world. Then it hit him.

"Look...up..."

It was too late however and he winced as the younger boy and he collided. DVDs scattered to the floor and his face turned a bright pink. "Shit.." He thought to himself and immediately bent to pick them up for the other, who was apologizing at the moment. "Nah, it was my fault...I wasn't paying attention in the slightest."

For a moment Salem was distracted by the boys DVD choices. All horse movies? The kid must like horses. So they had something in common at least. "Like horses huh?" He asked as he stood and held out the movies to him. "So do I." Salem added with a flash of a smile.

Having a bit of horrible timing, he didn't fully wait for him to answer before asking another question. "You look familiar...do..do you go to Hammel?"

[Connor Anderson]

Connor bit at his lower lip at the brushing off of his apology. In all fairness, he hadn’t been watching where he was going either, so... fine. At least he’d still apologized. He felt a little better about it.

Before he could stoop to pick up the lost DVDs, the older boy was doing it for him. The question made him flush slightly. Horses tended to run more towards females in terms of liking them, but when you grew up on a racing farm... it was inevitable. He did, however, smile when the blond boy admitted to liking them too.

He opened his mouth to answer, but before he got a word out, another question was asked. Blinking, Connor redirected his thoughts to the new question as he took the movies back. “Yeah.” He nodded. “I do. For...” He had to think about it for a moment. “Almost a year.” Wow. “You do too?” Well, duh. He hadn’t quite thought that one through. Whoops.

As for the movies, he glanced at them before tucking them against his side. “And yeah, I do like horses. I grew up on a racing farm. Kinda... mandatory to like them.” Not that it had been hard for him, or for his brother. “I’ve got one, too. My parents finally let him come to the farm I volunteer at, so I get to see him on weekends.” It was hard not to be excited about it, though he quickly realized that he was probably talking the older boy’s ear off. “Oh! Sorry. That’s... yeah. Sorry.” He peeked up at him before smiling again, this time a bit more shyly. Mostly because he was trying to not run his mouth again. “I’m Connor, by the way. Hi.”

[Salem Hirch]

Salem smiled a little as he watched the younger boy. It was, in a way, almost like looking in a dark haired mirror. The boy would flush and stumble over his words, just like Salem. Though as the boy answered his second question first, he felt bad. He hadn't meant to ask two questions in a row like that, but as usual, he had gotten a little nervous and just blurted it out.

"Why do I do that?" He thought to himself as he ran a hand through his hair, making it messier than it already was. "Oh, so I'm not going crazy and I have seen you around." Salem chuckled a little. Of course he had no clue what the boys power was, but he was going to ask. "Yeah, I've been there for three years myself." For a moment he paused and thought about how to explain his own power. "I can make projected illusions." He nodded. "Basically, I'm like a human movie projector, but you can touch and hear the things that I show."

Hoping that was enough explanation, he listened to the boy go on about his horse. It was nice to find someone else who grew up in a similar life to him. "Racing farm huh? That sounds fun. I just grew up on a normal one. Ya know, cows and chickens and stuff. Nothing special." For a little bit, Salem's mind traveled back to his home. He had been missing the farm for awhile now and talking about it made him miss it even more.

"Wow, really? They let you bring your horse here? That's awesome. My horse is actually my dad's so...he had to stay home." Once again Salem chuckled when the boy started to apologize for talking too much.  Well, he assumed he had been talking too much. "No worries, I like talking. Well, when the person isn't rude or trying to push me into doing something I don't want to..." As Connor introduced himself, he actually slapped his forehead. "Sorry for not introducing myself sooner. Hello, I'm Salem."

"So, got plans after this?" Even he wasn't sure where he was going with this question.

[Connor Anderson]

Connor honestly thought that the vast majority of older boys would act along the lines of his older brother. While they were as close as could be most days, they still ribbed each other, and still bickered. But Curtis always let Connor know when he was running his mouth, as he tended to do when he was excited or nervous. He was also quick to let Connor know when he was being a baby pest. A very small part of him half expected the older blond boy to be just the same.

Thankfully, he wasn’t.

Relaxing a little, Connor smiled and shook his head. “Nope, not crazy.” Hammel wasn’t a huge school, so he was sure he’d probably passed the older boy in the halls from time to time, even if he hadn’t realized it. “Three years?” Did that mean he was going to be away from his family for that long too? How long did it normally take to graduate high school? It wasn’t like he had to control his powers like everyone else did. His was just sort of... automatic. Like a reflex. He couldn’t control it any more than he could control the weather. At least the older boy had an interesting power. “Really? That is so cool.” Why did everyone else have something useful, or fun? (He still disagreed with the Bishop twins on that one. His power was so not cool.) “I just... heal. My trainer keeps calling it cell regeneration. It’s... creepy.” And not useful. Healing other people? Useful. Healing only yourself? Not so much.

At least he was happier talking about the farm. He nodded eagerly at him. “Yeah. My parents breed and train and buy and sell Thoroughbreds. It’s really cool.” Even if it was a working farm. “We never had anything else. Except dogs and cats, but they don’t really count. We didn’t have like... chickens or anything.” They’d never have had the time to deal with them if they did. “Were they all like... working animals too? Or pets?” Apart from the dogs, pony, and Sona, all the animals had jobs back home. Even the cats, who happily kept the barns mouse-free.

“Well... it took a lot of begging. But he wasn’t really getting much attention at home, and he’s kind of a pest. I just had to promise my parents I’d keep my grades up. I might owe them a soul too.” He managed a less shy grin. “I used everything I could think of. They sent him here all the way from Kentucky.” He’d just had to swear up and down that his grades wouldn’t fall, and that he’d still honor his word to Lahja and keep volunteering and helping her with her farm and carriage business. So far, so good. “What’s your horse like?” Because now he’d found someone close to his own age that understood, he was going to take full advantage of that. At least until Salem told him to buzz off and stop being a pest.

Plans... well, yes, he had plans. “I was going to go see Sona after this.” Making a face, he held up the bag he’d been carrying. “My mom made me get new clothes first.” And he had been raised to respect and carry through promises he made, no matter how ridiculous. “... It’s not that far from the mall. The bus stops pretty close. ... Do you... wanna meet him?” Stranger danger? What was that?