The Art of Glomping [Hart]

[Jessica Pruitte]

It wasn’t difficult to spot her uncle down the street. Perhaps it was because Hart was the only good part of being a Puritte that Jess knew exactly how he walked. It was unique to her Unk, and because of that, the teen was able to target the man as he meandered harmlessly down the street. Leaning forward, Jessica broke into a run, her sneakered feet slapping the sidewalk as she accelerated. Just a few more feet and she was on him, leaping onto the man’s back. Hart was only an inch taller than Jessica so it resulted in a tangle of arms, legs, and an exuberant cry of , “UNK!”

With her arms wrapped firmly around his neck, when she’d aimed for his shoulders, Jess dangled, her toes dragging on the grey paved walk. “Oh my God, I can’t tell you how glad I am that it’s summer. I mean really. That school, those people. I mean it’s better than some places, but OMG it’s emo central, I’m telling you.” Never mind that she was one of those “emo people” herself, but Jess mostly kept her poetry to herself, and didn’t paint her face white like some other student’s she couldn’t name (but could point out on sight).

It was loads better than being at home, though even that was being chipped away at. Her mother, Hart’s sister. The lawsuit that she’d threatened with… if the email she’d seen scroll through her head was any indication. Some lawyer in town named Kobald. Or something, she couldn’t remember, but she had to stop it. One way or another, she had to sabotage the lawsuit. Hammel was annoying, but it was a sanctuary just the same.

“Let’s go swimming, or rock climbing. Or fooding. Mmm, food.” Oh the joys of quick distractions.

[Hart Kenney]

Downtown Pilot Ridge was so quaint, so tiny and quiet compared to everything he knew. True, there was the boarding school in town, the one Jessica attended, but that didn't lend the surrounding town the same raucous party atmosphere as a college town. It was, simply put, different from any place Hart had ever lived before. Not that different was necessarily a bad thing; he would take different if it allowed him to maintain a job.

And really, although he hadn't been in Pilot Ridge for too long, he liked it. It had a nice, friendly atmosphere. There was a very visible LGB population, though the T part was either non-existent or else preferred, like him, to remain out of sight as much as possible. And there was a large meta population, and he'd seen what he considered a surprising number of Asians for rural America. Maybe people here really wouldn't consider his differences offensive. Maybe. But people who ought to be understanding frequently weren't, didn't parallel his struggles with their own, so he couldn't safely make any assumptions. Still, so far he liked it here.

He was too busy caught up in his musings to notice the small brunette girl trailing behind him, and so when something smacked into his back he was caught off-guard, windmilling to keep his balance. The joyous cry from his attacker told him who had flung herself against him, and he grinned widely.

"Jess!" He greeted, straightening as best he could with his niece on his back. "Nice to see you, too." He managed to get in before she was off on a rant about her school. He laughed aloud when she used the term OMG. "Really? Oh em gee? Sounds like someone's been spending too much time on the computer."

Her plans -- from rock climbing to swimming -- were all appealingly active. "I was just on my way to get some lunch." He told her, "but maybe after our food digests we can go down to the lake, sound good?"

[Jessica Pruitte]

“Lunch?” Jessica wrinkled her nose. She wasn’t hungry, she wanted to go DO something. There was energy to release, lots and lots of angsty energy. Her team had lost, inexplicably lost, and she was still suffering from it. Climbing! Hiking! Doing something was what she needed, not food. Food was for the weak!

Or… not. She needed to eat too, but the bitter loss was suppressing her hunger. Mostly. The flavor craving for guacamole took sudden root. “Mexican. Guac and chips. Maybe a fajita?” Releasing her uncle, Jessica’s toes, then feet touched the ground and she stood on her own. “Something other than cafeteria food. And I am so sick of pizza. Never thought I’d say that. Ever, but ugh I am! And yes Oh, Em Gee, it’s regular language, used by… everyone.” Maybe she used short-type more than most, but when it was constantly scrolling through one’s head, it became normal.

At least she wasn’t spouting out random information or getting completely debilitating migraines anymore. Just the usual ones. And not as often. Maybe the damn training was doing something. Maybe.

“How’s Ouch?” The kitten she’d kept, who was now a cat. One she’d brought with her to Hammel, on the plane. With the recruiter, Hotty McHothawt. Not once was it mentioned she couldn’t keep the cat with her, though why would he? She’d just been through a traumatic event, and he still thought her name was Amanda. All of that got cleared up pretty much as soon as she got to Hammel, but the cat wasn’t allowed to stay. She’d been told about a week later. Her uncle had agreed to take the cat when he got to Vermont, but until then she agonized about not having Ouch with her anymore. A thing she still resented the Hammel staff for. Other kids had pets. Creepy pets. A cat wasn’t creepy, and it was better able to take care of itself than, say, a snake.

APARTMENTS would let you have a cat or a dog, but not a snake. Hammel was so backwards in ways.

[Hart Kenney]

Hart shrugged at Jessica's clear and obvious disdain for lunch. "Some of us have to eat." He pointed out, but then she caved, offering a compelling suggestion. Hart did like Mexican. He hoped that Pilot Ridge would have a decent Mexican restaurant, a real one. Not that bland Tex-Mex stuff that passed for Mexican to most Americans. He had low expectations, though; Pilot Ridge was tiny and it was hard to find real, good Mexican even in the city.

"Sounds great. You know a place?" She was cooped up in the boarding school all the time, and she was expressing weariness of cafeteria food, so she probably didn't, but it never hurt to ask. Maybe she'd heard of a place from someone. If not, they would wander until they found one.

"Ouch is good. He misses you." He had been glad to take in the cat for his niece, glad to move nearby and offer her some measure of familiar support. Her parents certainly were doing no such thing, objecting as they did to her enrollment at Hammel. Tiffany must be beside herself, having a meta for a daughter. Hart's lips twitched into a smile at the thought. Poor Tiff; she was a product of her environment as much as he had been -- and to some extent, still was. She'd simply had no reason to examine any of her beliefs; she'd had no clash between what was expected and who she was.

"So what is it you do again?" He asked. Neither Tiff nor Christopher had mentioned it, more concerned with how their daughter's meta status reflected on them than what her talents were, and the last time he'd talked to his niece, Ouch had been a much bigger concern. If she'd mentioned it then he hadn't been paying enough attention to remember.

[Jessica Pruitte]

"There's a little place not far from here, we can walk it, or drive it, or... well no, I can't fly so we can't fly it." Pointing the way to a hole-in-the-wall Mexican place called, creatively, Little Mexico Jess swung her arms as she walked, still too full of energy.

"Thanks again for taking Ouch, Unk. I don't know what I woulda done... not like Mom would have." Or her dad. Though the house keeper might have cared for Ouch if Jess had thought to ask Miss Ingrid, but she hadn't and at least it meant her Uncle was closer than he had been. "You know she's suing the school? Or trying to. It's so dumb." Disdain, anger, lots of negative emotions were attached to that statement. Tiffany Kenney-Pruitte was a powerful woman in certain circles. She had money. Had a team of lawyers that were more terrifying than rabid sharks--could sharks get rabies? And she had it in her head that if she could shut Hammel down, then her daughter wouldn't be a 'freak'.

As if.

"Huh?" Jess' mind had wandered so far away that she hadn't registered the question Hart asked.

"OH! I have the internet in my head." It was the easiest explanation. "Well, not just the internet, but anything attached to a computer that's attached to the internet. Texts. Pictures. It's annoying as hell, but... kinda useful too. Sometimes." When the headaches didn't weigh her down. "My trainer is so awesome, ohmygodhottie."

Not hot in the same way her recruiter had been, but a hottie just the same. "He looks like he could be in a boy band. He's that hot." Not that she listened to boy bands... openly. But Jess was a teenage girl, with teenage girl whimsy and interests. Boys were always fun to look at, but she hadn't really /talked/ to anyone when she wasn't in a foul mood about her mom, or being emo and writing poetry to cut ones wrists by.

She'd have to change that.

"SO!" Speeding up to walk out in front of Hart and turning around so she was walking backward and facing him, "After food, let's go DO something. I sit around almost all day and... ugh. Just UGH."

[Hart Kenney]

Hart followed after Jessica, shrugging nonchalantly at the gratitude his niece offered. "Hey, no problem, don't want to see poor Ouch out on the street." Or worse, in a shelter, with no guarantee anyone would take him in. "No, your mom isn't much of an animal person." He agreed. If a creature required her to care for it then she didn't want anything to do with it; even her own child had been ignored the moment she realized that babies needed constant attention. From the moment they were born. He didn't understand his sister sometimes.

"I didn't know that." Not that he talked to his sister much, not when she was thoroughly ashamed of him for sullying the Kenney name. He couldn't complain too much, though, he didn't really want to talk to her, either.

"Ha, so that explains why you use internet slang. Makes sense."That did sound like a useful power. "Your mother must not have realized just how useful that could be for her and your dad and their power struggle. Or how dangerous."

His lips twitched into a smile as he listened to his niece gush about her trainer. He'd never been interested in boys, a fact he'd been troubled by when he was her age. When he'd thought he was a cis-gendered female. "Really. Is he a good trainer?"

He followed her down the street, his own self-confident, leisurely stroll a sharp contrast to Jessica's near-bouncing. "Yeah, don't worry, we'll figure something out. Swimming sounds pretty good, there's a lake around here, isn't there? You know if it's okay to swim in?"

[Jessica Pruitte]

It was true. Her mother cared for little other than herself and whatever competition she had going with her husband. It had been a short statement on her Unk's part, but the way it was said, the weariness Jessica knew herself... There was little her mother did that wasn't entirely Tiff-centric.

Pulling her thoughts away from the unpleasantness, Jess bobbed her head. "Yup. It's all rotfl, and omg, and lol, and wtf. No escaping the leetness of my brain." Or rather, the aether that happened to have a direct connection to her brain. It was useful, but it was also a pain in the ass. The migraines that no pill could touch. Not aleve, not tylenol, not codeine. Not that she'd tried the latter on her own, but the hospital out in California had while she was waiting for Hotty McHothawt to pick her up for Hammel.

"Chase? Oh Gawd he's the best." It helped that he was delicious. "He really knows how to connect. I'm still figuring all this stuff out I can /kinda/ put it in the background now, but it's still there. He thinks there's a way to make it less 'loud' if I keep it up. Make it less of a constant." At least that's what Jess got out of it. It was entirely likely that it wasn't at all what Chase had meant, but it was where she was rolling with the info.

Once they reached the restaurant Jess opened the door for her Unk and followed him in. Getting a table for two and automatically requesting guacamole the teen settled into one side of the booth and waited for Hart to settle into the other before answering his question about the lake.

"You know, I never saw any signs posted about not swimming, and there are plenty of folk who do, so I don't see why we couldn't go ourselves." She hadn't used her bathing suit since she got to Vermont, it had been too damnably cold. "Maybe we could get some snorkel gear and see what's at the bottom?"

[Hart Kenney]

"Yeah? That's really great, I'm glad that they have good teachers. So does he have the same deal going on? With the internet and all?"

Hart was quite fond of the internet, but he wasn't sure if he would want it living in his brain; on the positive side, being always connected meant lots of lolcats and other memes. On the negative side that meant being always connected to places like 4chan.

Poor Jessica.

He slid into the booth across from her, picking up one of the laminated menus and perusing the lunch combos offered.

"Yeah? Not a bad idea. You know where we can get some snorkel gear, Miss internet? Either way I gotta stop back by my place to get some swim trunks."

The guacamole dip was placed gently between them, followed by a basket of tortilla chips, and Hart grabbed a chip while murmuring a thanks to the waiter.

"Maybe there's lost treasure down there. Sunken submarines, whaddaya think? Think we'll strike it rich?"

[Jessica Pruitte]

"Naw," Jess grabbed a chip and dipped it into the guacamole before popping it into her mouth. "He does other stuff." She couldn't remember what the rules were about outing other metas and their abilities, and though she knew her Unk wouldn't be freaked out by the mind control thing... there were other people in the restaurant and she really, really didn't wanna be kicked out of Hammel or lose her town privileges.

"Dude, yes! There are a TON of conspiracy theories out there about Nazi subs and land locked lakes. None of 'em make any sense, but conspiracies rarely do, do they Unk?" Another chip generously engulfed in guac disappeared into the open teenage maw of Jessica.

"And of COURSE I know where we can get snorkel gear. They sell goggles and snorkels at the canoe shop. Flippers too." Everything they'd need.

"So, we have a game plan! Food, then adventure!" It sounded perfect to her, and would definitely keep her mine off of things.

"Anyway, what's been goin' on with you? What've you been up?" While she was interested, she wanted an opportunity to eat all the guac while he was busy talking. Greedy gut that she was.

[Hart Kenney]

"Nazi subs. In Vermont." Hart rubbed his chin thoughtfully, "But I thought it was the Mexicans sending submarines up the Mississippi. Or did they get their idea from the Nazis? That must be it."

While Jessica mentioned the canoe shop he unstacked the tiny white dishes intended for the salsa, pouring some for himself and dipping his chip in that while his niece quickly depleted the guacamole. It was appropriately spicy, and he made a note to come here again just for their salsa.

"Me?" He paused, trying to think of what exactly to say about his life up until now. "Not a whole lot." He shrugged, "Lost my job, did I tell you that? I can't remember. But hey, I have a new one, and it's here with you, so nothing lost, right?" He didn't add that he'd been concerned finding employment might be difficult. "One of the officers is foxy." Hey, if Jessica could talk about her hot trainer, he could freely discuss his hot superior. "Feisty, too."

[Jessica Pruitte]

"Mexicans. Nazis. Whatever, a sub's a sub. And treasure's treasure." Another chip disappeared after scraping the sides of the guacamole dish.

Jess wrinkled her nose at Hart when he mentioned a coworker being foxy. Old people shouldn't ever talk about other people being hot, sexy, foxy, lust-worthy, or any other synonym. It just wasn't right. While her Unk wasn't OLD-old, he was older (even if he didn't look it) and for that reason alone should just Shhhhh. That being said, he wasn't like her parents either. Bunnies that they were. Now that was gross.

"Good for you? What are you doing now?" It was important to her that he enjoy his job. Considering the backlash he'd gotten. For being a 'him' and not a 'her'. It was ridiculous, but apparently it made certain people question their orientation and so they hid behind 'rules' and 'disruptive behavior' and 'deviance'. It would please Jess to no end to see them all lose their jobs for discrimination, but her Unk didn't want to be the center of a legal fight.

She kinda understood that.

Sorta.

Abstractly.

It was different though!

[Hart Kenney]

"If the treasure is Nazi treasure we're probably obligated to find the original owners' families and return it to them..." Hart opined. "Morally if not legally."

His Capitalism wasn't quite survival of the fittest; he didn't want to gain at the expense of other's misfortunes, which is what Nazi treasure implied to him.

He noticed the discomfort on Jessica's face when he mentioned Sloane and he grinned wickedly. "She's a babe. Can't resist a woman in uniform. Too bad she wears the standard one and not one of the skanky ones that comes out around Halloween."

He wouldn't object if Sloane took to wearing a mini skirt and midriff top to work.

"Ah, I work down at the police station. Barracks clerk." He explained. Oops. His comments about officers and uniforms might make more sense if he included context. "So if you ever call 911 I'm the one fielding those calls. I know, very exciting. Good thing Pilot Ridge has almost zero crime." As far as he knew, going solely by the lack of calls, "Since there are only three police officers. Some reason the entire force quit a few months back and they've only had these three to replace them. Shame, you'd think the city would try harder to get people in."

[Jessica Pruitte]

"GOD! Unk!" Tossing a piece of chip at Hart, Jess scrunched her nose up. It was great that he had a job and all. Awesome that he was in Pilot Ridge. But really? REALLY with the lusting after a coworker? He was old. Maybe he didn't act it sometimes, which was part of why she adored him so, but he really was. 40s were practically ancient.

"Look at that painting. Isn't it great? All those bright, happy, fully clothed colors." A non-tossed chip darted into the salsa and disappeared into the teen's maw, but the waiter returned to ask if they were ready to order.

Turning her full attention onto the waiter, Jessica promptly ordered chicken enchilada's with extra cheese if they, wouldn't mind, please.

[Hart Kenney]

Hart threw his hands up in a mock effort to shield himself from the chip tossed his way. "Hey!" He laughed, amused by her reaction, "I'm not allowed to notice beautiful women, now? I'm not blind, you know."

He glanced toward the mural she was so pointedly admiring, grin still in place. "I don't know about fully-clothed, that Flamenco dancer's top looks like it's about to fall off." It was a brightly colored, cheerful scene, however. Unless one took into account the fact that the bull being baited had suspiciously red tips on his horns. It was much more cheerful than the mural on the other side of the restaurant, anyway, with the Aztec temples and the smoke wafting from them. Hart was familiar enough with Aztec history to catch the implication of human sacrifice.

He gave his own order in Spanish, in part to show off but also in part because it had always made the waiters smile at the restaurant he'd patronized back in North Carolina and he liked to see people smile.

"So other than hot teachers, how's school treating you? Taking any interesting classes? Band? French?"

[Jessica Pruitte]

Choosing to ignore the ‘hot women’ comment, Jessica purposefully nommed another chip and looked up and around at the ceiling. Her expression and behavior was definitely the “I’m ignoring you, lalalalala” teen thing. She did give her Unk a look when he ordered in Spanish she rolled her eyes.

“Show off.”

He was too. She could get the google translate up, but it’s version of what he said would be laughable. Presuming she could control where her mind went on the internet. Stupid power. It had it’s uses, sure, but not when she WANTED it to. But she was working on that. One training session at a time. Though there were distractions. Namely in her trainer. He was seriously hawt.

“None of the classes are interesting, but apparently I have to listen to an old guy talk about sex in order to graduate. Ever. I am not looking forward to that. I can maybe tune him out with Pandora or Last.fm, but that’s a long shot. I mean really, who want’s to listen to an ancient psychiatrist prattle on about condoms?” She certainly did not. “No band, no French. I just take what they tell me and so far a foreign language hasn’t come up. I think the closest thing to interesting is the English class, but that’s about the same thing as every other school I went to.”

Another chip disappeared.

"It's boring. You'd think a school full of powered kids would be WAY more interesting than it is."