same as it ever was; [OTA]

[teen_angst_bullshit]

WHO: Veronica Sawyer
WHERE: Front porch of bungalow #22
WHEN: BACKDATED to September 19
OPEN TO: OTA
WARNINGS: n/a
STATUS: Closed to new threads

---

Dear Diary,

I am 18 years old and I am a horrible person.

The words just came out, and now everybody knows: I'm a murderer. I'd like to give you some line about it being a big relief, that my inner turmoil has finally been soothed, but I just wish I'd kept my fucking mouth shut. I'm stuck in this place with an apparent rogue's gallery of broken people, but it still bothers me that they look at me differently now. Like an asshole, I'd spun some prom queen fantasy that only Cougar knew wasn't true, and in true masochistic fashion, I've blown it up in my own face.

But that isn't even the worst of it.

Diary, you exist because today I got a box with my name on the top, and inside were three beautiful, fat packs of paper. So much paper. If I'm careful, if I force myself to write small, it'll last me a long time. There's enough to share, more than enough to donate some to the cause of record-keeping. But I don't want to share.

I told you, I'm a total fuck.

Is this simple greed or sabotage? It's like I don't even know myself anymore, Diary. But I do know this: If I woke up tomorrow back in Sherwood, Ohio, I'd really miss some of the people here.

Oh, and I missed my 18th birthday. I don't even know why I care.

Frustrated, Veronica clamps her fingers hard around her pencil with a low huff and resists the urge to throw everything across the yard. She may be a greedy shit, but the paper is too precious, and too much of her time was spent in sewing it into a little journal to treat it like garbage.

So many things are frustrating her anymore, it's difficult to pinpoint a single one as being the cause for how she feels. The water situation definitely doesn't help, Heather at Veronica's shoulder when she looks at her wilted and greasy reflection every morning, congratulations, I didn't know it was possible to fall this far. Vanity rearing its pointless, ugly head.

Settling the little book and pencil in her lap, Veronica leans back against the steps of the house she shares with Cougar and Jake. What would be really incredible right about now would be a drink. It's kind of, sort of her birthday, right? You'd think the benevolent gods of this place could provide some libations.

Comments

[thecatinahat]

While it's been ages since they forgave each other (and by that, Cougar means that Jake had forgiven him), he'd come out of the meeting annoyed by Jake's insistence on telling so much. He's never minded Jake speaking for them, but the level of detail had been slightly unnecessary. Cold shoulder wouldn't do anything, so he's spent the last hour moving all of Jake's possessions to various parts of the house, finishing with the roof (his boots).

When he descends down the side of the building, shimmying and getting back to flat ground, he nearly lands right on top of Veronica. He curses a little in Spanish, steadying himself when locks of curls fall in his face (the sweat of the effort having made it a mess).

"I didn't see you," he apologises. "Did I hurt you?"

[teen_angst_bullshit]

She'd not heard him until it was too late, and in her haste to move out of the way, her journal and pencil go skittering down the steps.

"No," she says with a shake of her head as she moves to collect them, the sudden jump of her heartbeat ebbing. "You just startled me." Book in hand, she glances toward the roof. "Should I even ask what you were doing up there this time?"

[thecatinahat]

He nods up to the roof as he bends over to pick up the pencil, offering it back to her. "Boots," is all he says. "Jensen will understand why." It's followed by a slight cock of his head to the side, curls slightly bouncing with the movement (he's still getting used to that), but rather than head back inside, he sits beside her.

"Was a very intense meeting," he notes, giving her an opportunity to say more, if she wants.

[teen_angst_bullshit]

The boots confuse her until the mention of the meeting, and then Veronica figures she gets the gist. It's on the tip of her tongue to say aloud her very particular thoughts about Jake's outburst, but Cougar's got his own ways of dealing with these things.

"That it was," she agrees as she accepts the pencil and folds it into the center of her homemade journal. "Looks like we're a whole village of fuck-ups." She hasn't decided yet if that's comforting or disturbing.

[thecatinahat]

He's not sure whether he ought to feel better or worse knowing that he's surrounded by people who have taken justice into their own hands so often or whether he's happy that he knows he will be protected. The children who think this is all some reason to kill each other worry him, but he will always have a knife to defend himself and the household. "Not fuck ups," he insists. "Just broken, a little."

Which had been the whole cause of the fight with Jake, but he's starting to learn. "There are some things that should not have been said," he admits with a grunt. "But luckily, he did not tell all."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

Some days, it was easy to imagine that Jake's mouth was a completely separate entity that did whatever the hell it wanted without a thought for the rest of him. For anybody else, it would have been a flimsy excuse, but with the way he never seemed to stop talking, Veronica had to wonder if it was a truly uncontrollable compulsion.

"He shouldn't have said it," she reiterated, just to be clear what side she fell on regardless. "I mean, as sob stories go, it's not the worst to have blurted out to everyone you know, but he still shouldn't have said it."

[thecatinahat]

Cougar shrugs, because he's annoyed at Jake for babbling, but if it weren't for his talkative friend, then Cougar would never be able to get anything out because Jake's the one who communicates it for him. "It's why boots are on the roof and pants are in the stove," he replies calmly, though beyond innocent pranks, Cougar doesn't intend to be mad at Jake or give him the cold shoulder. If anything, he'll probably go out of his way to thank him with some dinner.

He gives her a calm, quiet look as he watches her. "He did not say the worst," Cougar promises, and it hadn't been his alone to share. "I will heal. Will you?"

[lastofthekellys]

Kate had, once she'd learned about Miss Veronica's missed birthday from Mr Cougar, gotten to work. It'd been an idea she'd been mulling over, toying of when to experiment, because it will be an experiment. From a strictly survival point of view, probably a frivolous one.

And yet, she's often found that it is when the mind and soul are too worn down to care or find joy in anything, that is when the body truly, utterly fails. It is one of the threats she is actively trying to stave off. Starvation of the body, starvation of the mind and joy and hope.

So it is that eventually, she makes her way over to the house shared by Miss Veronica, Mr Cougar and Jensen, carrying a basket. It's not exactly a covered basket, as it's too big for the contents, but there's a tea-towel wrapped around a pillow slip, holding some Mountain Sorrel and Wild Strawberry cakes. Somewhat cakes. More like pikelets, except not flour. And she's not exactly strolling, as there's a crutch to help support her ankle, but still. There's an effort there to be somewhat cheerful and normal.

"Afternoon, Miss Veronica. I was wonderin' if I could borrow your culinary palate for some afternoon tea."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

Veronica has been keenly aware since her arrival that her skills of actual use are pretty slim. She's learning as best she can how to plant and tend the field under Mark's direction, but the only place she feels genuinely useful is in the kitchen with Kate. She volunteers to help cook most days, and when Kate turns up, that's where Veronica's mind instinctively goes.

"Sure," she replies with a smile, and steps forward with a hand held out to take the basket. It's not that she thinks Kate can't manage -- Kate, she's learned, can manage more than most of them put together -- but it's got to be awkward with the crutch.

"Are we taste-testing something for lunch?"

[lastofthekellys]

Kate, long used to deprivation and desperation and seizing any advantage she can, usually has a few motivations for her actions. The actions she actually spends some time contemplating, that is. When she set up her first lunch, when she decided to push for it keep going, every day, it wasn't just about the food. It was about company, about bringing the community together. It was also about trying to find ways for those with not many skills to pull their weight. To feel like they were pulling their weight. To feel like they were being useful, because they were. Because they are being useful.

Miss Veronica is a case in point. Miss Veronica had been, if she admits it to herself, one of the inspirations. What if Miss Veronica hadn't been adopted by Jensen and Mr Cougar? What if the situations and growing culture here was different? Nastier? What if they get more like Miss Veronica, perfectly smart and capable but lacking in the skills needed here and now and in this particular circumstance?

So Kate smiles at her and gratefully hands over the basket. "Not a main meal, exactly," she says. "But an occasional dessert. For special occasions, or just because. The trouble is, I'm not exactly sure on proportions or the exact sequence yet."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

"Okay," Veronica allows as she accepts the basket. There's something a bit off here that she's not catching, and it surprises her a little when she looks into the basket and finds precisely what's been advertised. She carefully unwraps the cake, and thinks that her perspective must definitely have broadened that she's not immediately skeptical. It isn't exactly the sort of food she'd been used to back home, but what here is?

"You wanna sit, and we can try it?"

[lastofthekellys]

"I would love to sit," she says, gratefully. "I don't get all that much chance to at the Inn." It is, occasionally, a guilty pleasure, sitting down in the daylight hours.

The little cakes are still warm, thanks to the pillowcase, firm and coloured from the strawberries.

"Strawberries boiled with Mountain Sorrel, then cooked on a hot skillet," she explains. "Apparently it's something the American Indians did, so I decided to try it.

I'm fairly certain it won't kill us."

That's a joke, but also a cook's pre-emptive self-depreciation in case it turns out bad.

[teen_angst_bullshit]

"You know that you can," Veronica points out as she unwraps one of the cakes and breaks it in half. "Sit down sometimes, I mean." She holds half of the cake Kate's way with a knowing arch of her eyebrows. "You don't have to do everything all by yourself all the time."

There are several people like herself who volunteer to help with the lunch everyday at the inn, but it's definitely Kate who runs the show. And Kate who apparently gets up everyday and feeds the furnace, and Kate who keeps everything spotless, and god knows what else.

"We'll survive if you take a break, I promise."

[igotacrossbow]

Veronica tends to keep to herself. Jake totally understands, and he's usually happy enough to let her, but after the discussion at the Inn where she let it slip that she had killed someone — honestly, they've all killed someone, it seems, and Jake is a broken enough person not to think any differently of her because of it — she's seemed even more withdrawn and moody. He's worried about her, but she's not actually his sister or his child, so he's not sure how much fussing she'll tolerate.

Still, it doesn't hurt to at least try.

He finds her on the front porch, writing carefully on a sheaf of paper that he hadn't seen around before. Maybe she got a gift of her own.

"Hey kiddo," he says, lowering himself down to the porch beside her, close enough to be companionable, but angled so he can't read what she's writing in case it's private. "You okay?"

[teen_angst_bullshit]

Glancing up, Veronica's expression goes pinched with a fond sort of chagrin as Jake sits down beside her. "You know, I'm 18, and that means I'm technically an adult in all fifty states now," she points out with a quiet huff of laughter. It's a Jake sort of thing, she guesses, to appropriate a grandfatherly term of endearment when she's pretty sure he's not even 30 himself yet.

"Have you come for the talk?" she asks with an arch of her eyebrows, seeing no reason to beat around the bush. They'd all been there, they'd all heard.

[igotacrossbow]

He can't help barking out a quiet laugh at the pinched expression on her face; she may be ten years older then Beth, but every now and then he sees his niece in the teenager living in their house, and it's painful but also such a relief, he doesn't know what to do. Well, what he wants to do is pull her into a hug or something, but she isn't his niece either, so he has to restrain himself.

"Well excuse me, Miss 'Technically An Adult In All Fifty States,'" he says with a teasing grin, clapping a hand to his chest dramatically. "I guess that means no nicknames, huh? That sucks. Nicknames are kind of my thing."

He waggles his eyebrows at her as if to say that she's really missing out by not letting him call her by anything other than her name. (Lame.)

His eyebrows draw together briefly after her question, and his lips curl down for a second. "...If you're eighteen, you should have had the Talk already," he replies, and whether he's deliberately misinterpreting her question, or if he's genuinely confused is hard to tell. "And if you haven't... I am definitely not qualified to give it to you. Go talk to Cougar. Actually, don't. He's Catholic, who knows what he'll tell you."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

Veronica's face goes briefly pinched, more irritated at herself than at Jake; she really should have known better than to phrase it that way.

"That's okay, I'm good. And that really wasn't the talk I meant," she says, the segue feeling ham-handed, inappropriate after the jest. "I meant the 'so you're a murderer' talk. Which I assume you're here to give me consolation or advice on, given the paternal look you were trying for when you sat down."

[igotacrossbow]

It seems Jake is doomed to live with people who don't think he's nearly as hilarious as he himself does. Typical.

Shrugging, he leans back a little and rests his weight on his palms, getting comfortable. Even if she doesn't want to talk, he's going to hang out with her on the porch, just to be sociable.

"If you don't want to talk about it, that's fine," he says, although yes, he did come here to offer her advice or consolation. "I'll just say you're in good company. And if you do want to talk about it, Cougs is always a good secret-keeper. Plus I think you remind him of his sisters, so he'll look after you."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

It's weird, Veronica thinks, that Jake completely bypasses himself as confessor and offers Cougar up instead. There's a self-awareness to it that she wouldn't have expected, and almost a domesticity, that intimate and secure knowledge that allows a person to volunteer another for something so personal. She squints at him a long moment, appraising, and then looks back to the journal in her lap.

"Cougar knows. He's known for awhile," she says, and glances back to Jake. "I wish you hadn't told everyone about those kids at the meeting."

[dnr]

After the meeting, Frank doesn't ask. Not in so many words, at least, but there'd been a certain look in his eye when Veronica made her impromptu confession, and it doesn't leave in the days that follow. He's not one to pry, so much as let the question hang in the air until an explanation comes out on its own if she wants to give it, or not if she doesn't, at least for a while. If part of him is worried what that explanation will be, he doesn't examine that emotion too closely.

What he does do is come by the house on a day when the weather looks halfway decent, when the grass isn't too damp, in his now-well-worn grey scrubs and his boots, and nods his chin her direction.

"You wanna do this?" Like they'd been talking about it hours ago instead of days, or maybe it's just been on his mind, and only belatedly does he add, "Learn to fight."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

Veronica squints at him standing there in the sunshine on the front walk, and takes a long moment before she answers, processing the abruptness and whether today, of all days, is the best day for this.

But fuck it, right? If she waits until she's feeling perfect, it'll never happen.

"Sure," she finally says, and tucks her journal and pencil away behind one of the pillars on the porch. "Can we maybe not do it here where the whole world can witness my failure?"

[dnr]

"You're gonna be better than a lot of them pretty quick," he says, but it's as much a complaint about the state the town's hand-to-hand skills as it is an argument. She's not going to better than her housemates that fast, if that's who she's worried about, and he's not completely apathetic to her pride.

"There's some open space over behind the storehouse," with a nod that way. "That private enough?"

(Granted, he may not be the most sensitive, either.)

[teen_angst_bullshit]

"That works," Veronica agrees, and pushes herself to her feet. To think, there's still some natural instinct that wants to go inside and change her clothes for this, as if that's even an option. At this point, it's hard to know whether old life impulses like that help or hinder.

"I should also probably say that while I don't necessarily mind being given a challenge, my coming home with a bunch of bruises will probably create more drama than either of us are wanting to deal with," she says as they step out onto the road.

[dnr]

"Don't worry, I'll take it easy on you," Frank ribs mildly, keeping pace as they walk over. "I know what I'm doing with this stuff."

"We're not starting out throwing punches, anyhow. First you gotta know when to punch."

[teen_angst_bullshit]

"Fair enough," Veronica allows, and chews briefly against the edge of her bottom lip. She's taken exactly one punch in her life, and it had been a doozy.

"What did you do before you ended up here, Frank?" she asks, tilting him a curious look. She knows shit-all about the police or military, but she thinks he must have done something like that to know all of the things he does.