Tobias Eaton is a (powerfulname) wrote in dunhavenic, @ 2017-07-30 20:38:00 |
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Tobias nearly collapsed once he reached Wilkerson’s; he bent over in front of the grocery store, pressing the palms of his hands into his thighs as he breathed heavily in and out. He’d run all the way from campus in the blistering heat, and it was a trek and a half from the university all the way down to the grocery store. But Tobias didn’t mind--in fact, he relished running in the heat and the way that it obliterated any other thought than the pounding of his heart, the strain of his muscles, and the struggle to regulate his breathing. Plus, Tobias needed to stay in shape during the off-season, anyway. Before heading in, Tobias pulled a water bottle out of his bag and took a healthy swing of it, then wiped the worst of the sweat off his face and onto the inside of his t-shirt. His baseball practice shirt clung as he pulled it back down and straightened it over his shorts. Sometimes, it still felt weird to be dressed like this; thoughts such as these were the tedious things that running stifled. Replacing the water bottle, Tobias entered the grocery store. He savored the air conditioning for a moment, spending more time than was necessary in the frozen food aisle. Tobias walked through the grocery store at a leisurely pace, grabbing what he needed along the way and allowing his heart rate to return to a normal rhythm. Tobias reached the checkout counter with the typical accoutrements of single, college-boy living when he looked up and was struck by a sudden pang of familiarity once he locked eyes with the cashier. His heart rate instantly increased as the first place his mind turned was that she might be someone from home--but it then occurred to Tobias soon after how ridiculous that conclusion was. He’d probably just seen her around campus. He cleared his throat for any residual, near-panic induced tightness. “Hello,” he said stiffly by way of greeting. During the summer, Bea had been trying to pick up as many shifts at Wilkerson’s as the owner was willing to give her. Once she had to go back to school, she wouldn’t have as much time to make enough money for rent and living expenses. She needed to save as much as she could now. That was why she was at the grocery store that afternoon instead of spending the day at the pool, finding relief from the heatwave outside. Mr. Wilkerson was always cold, hence the perpetual existence of sweaters in the summer, and kept the store at an unreasonable seventy-seven degrees. As such, the loose tendrils of blonde hair that were too short to fit into her ponytail clung to the nape of her neck. Leaning forward on the counter, her arms crossed in front of her, Bea flipped lazily through a Home & Garden, the only thing she could do with inventory done and there only being so many times she could dust the shelves in one day. When the customer who’d entered the store just a few minutes prior, she pushed the magazine to the side and put on her best customer service smile before glancing up at the guy in front of her. Bea’s breath caught in her throat and, for a moment, she felt something tugging at her heart, like she knew in some fundamental part of herself that she knew him. Standing up a little straighter, she cautiously replied, “[...] Hey.” She grabbed the first item and passed it across the scanner and into the bag, repeating the process with the next few items before glancing up again. She took in his features, the way his black hair curled just slightly around his face, his dark eyes, and the way held himself almost too stiff, like the sound of his voice when he’d spoken. Did she recognize those features? She didn’t think she’d ever seen him before, but something about him seemed so startlingly familiar. Finally, she cocked her head to the side and asked, “Do I know you?” Tobias tensed slightly at the question--even knowing he’d just reasoned with himself that he probably knew her from school, he suddenly felt that pang of anxiety again that somehow she was from Chicago. Maybe it was because there was something that felt more familiar about her than just an acquaintance from school. Of course, it’s not as though he’d really known any girls from home as anything more than mere acquaintances. It took him probably a beat longer than was normal to answer her--all the while, he held the gaze of her blue eyes until he realized that was what he found most unnerving about her. He quickly looked down. “I’m not sure...do you go to DU?” Tobias asked. Bea bunched her lips to the side as she shook her head. “No. I’m going to be a senior at the high school next month.” Already, she was starting to convince herself that she had no idea who he was, even if every instinct she possessed was telling her that she did. Part of it was the frustration of feeling like she was somehow failing a test she didn’t know about and hadn’t studied for by not being able to place him. “I’d ask if you were from around here, but I’m not, so that’s not it,” she said, as if she could tell that he was trying to place her, too. “And asking if you come here often sounds too much like a cheesy pick up line for my tastes, to be honest.” Bea chuckled to herself and scanned the last item, placing it in the bag with the others. Tobias nodded, his expression still contemplative--it was strange that they both seemed to recognize something in the other, only for them both to be mistaken. But if she was only in high school, Tobias didn’t see how he could possibly know her. “Oh, well, me either,” Tobias said, his brows furrowing, but the more he talked to her, the more ridiculous it seemed that another kid from West Rogers Park could have left home and wound up in Dunhaven. “I just came here for college,” he added, but supposed after the fact that that was probably obvious. At that, the corner of Tobias’ mouth lifted up slightly in amusement. “I do actually come here often enough. Kind of a necessity.” “Where from?” Bea asked, not incredibly concerned about being too invasive. It was just that he seemed too familiar to be someone she’d seen once, and she was sure that if she’d seen him here at Wilkerson’s she’d have remembered him enough not to be startled by his appearance. Had he been from one of the foster homes she’d been in? One of the kids who’d passed through the squats she’d been set up in when she was in Nashville? Either of those were possibilities. It would have been long enough ago for the foster home for her to forget his face, but significant enough to have a lasting impression of him. “Chicago,” Tobias answered--he generally dodged personal questions, but revealing he was from Chicago usually wasn’t too telling. Funnily enough, people’s first thought usually wasn’t ‘Oh, so did you happen to abandon your Orthodox community in West Rogers Park?’ and more something along the lines of if he liked the Cubs or the White Sox--Tobias rooted for the Cubs, obviously, hailing from the North Side. “Where are you from?” he asked, not entirely sure why he felt so casual or inclined to chat. “Nice,” Bea replied, “I’ve never been there but I’ve always thought it would be a neat city to visit. I’ve heard stories from friends who’ve lived there. Is their pizza really amazing? It’s really the biggest selling point for me.” She pushed the paper bag toward him, gesturing for him to swipe his card for payment. After all, it was part of the job to multitask while she was talking to the customers. “I’m from--” she hesitated. She hadn’t even really gotten around to talking to Josie about where she’d come from exactly but he’d shared his answer with her and it seemed only fair to reciprocate. It helped that she had this gut feeling that it was okay to tell him more than she might tell any other random stranger. In fact, part of her made the connection that the familiarity she felt with him was almost like the familiarity she’d felt toward Christina the day they’d met. Different, but close. After a moment, she finally settled on answering and said, “Nashville, most recently. Different direction from here, so I guess that’s not it, either. What’s your name?” Tobias bit the inside of his cheek imperceptibly. The goddamn pizza--Tobias had actually never had it, since it was a far cry from kosher. Obviously, though, he couldn’t admit to that if he wanted to pretend to be a normal Chicagoan. “Way better than whatever they call that stuff in New York,” he sniped, in spite of the fact that he’d never tried New York pizza either--or even been there. “Definitely worth a visit,” he smiled, lying all the while. Then again, the pizza was probably worth visiting for, he just didn’t have any first-hand experience with it. He missed the hesitation as he swiped his card and signed his name--convenient, that. Tobias looked back at her just in time to hear Nashville. He nodded. “I heard Nashville’s cool,” Tobias said. “Lots of...music, I think?” Another topic Tobias was tellingly ill-versed in, but he was getting better. Slightly. And slowly. “Tobias,” he answered. “What’s yours?” Bea was good at watching people and from the moment she noticed the way his jaw worked as though he were biting his cheek, she somehow knew that she’d steered the conversation somewhere he hadn’t necessarily wanted it to go. She was an expert at lying, too--enough to know that something he was saying didn’t add up. She didn’t want anyone calling her out on her lies, though, and she thought people were entitled to their privacy, so she smiled and said, “Spoken like a true Chicagolandian, huh?” In truth, she had no idea what someone from Chicago ought to be talking about, but it sounded like the right thing to say to convince him that she’d bought it. “Among other things, yes,” Bea laughed, “but it is the city of music, so that’s apt enough.” And then she was jerking her head up to look at him, her hand holding the receipt falling dumbly to the counter. “Wait. You’re Tobias?” To say she was feeling like an idiot just then was an understatement. To think that there had been some special reason why she’d felt so strongly that she knew him, only to realize it was just because she had spoken to him before. That had gone swimmingly, too. “I’m Bea,” she said. “Josie’s friend.” Tobias smiled. “We’re very proud,” he concluded, quietly hoping that if the Chicago line of conversation continued, he could steer it to more universal experiences. Like baseball. Or the wind. Something like that. He blinked when she asked him if he was Tobias, then a look of realization dawned on his face when she introduced herself. He felt pretty ridiculous himself--to think he’d worked himself up into thinking she may been from the neighborhood. “Oh,” he said, still surprised that he could been so thrown by a tiny image on a computer screen. “I guess that explains it--Josie and I are friends as well, her boyfriend and I are roommates and on the team together,” he explained. “Not sure if that really got communicated,” Tobias said, smiling a bit shyily. “I’m not the best at maintaining Internet personas, this is actually my first social media account, and mostly I got one because our coach told us we had to. Town spirit and all.” He leaned back in shook his head, “This place is so different from home, it’s insane. Chicago could never have its own social media network. People don’t even want to talk to each other in real life.” Bea wasn’t sure what she’d expected from Tobias, or what sort of personality she’d assumed he’d have based on their short, strained conversation online. He’d seemed so-- well, she couldn’t quite come up with a word to describe the impression he’d left on her, but she knew the hadn’t necessarily left her wanting to know him, or even wanting to meet him in person by random happenstance. But here they were and Tobias was surprising her. The way he spoke was like they were old friends catching up over coffee and it was hard to discern why, exactly, it felt so inexplicably normal. “You’re not wrong about it being so different,” Bea said, once she’d shaken herself from her hang up on that small, nagging feeling in the back of her mind. “I’ve spent most of my life trying to keep my head down and go unnoticed, which has never really been easy for someone like me, but I come here and everyone just,” she waved her hand to the side, “notices everyone else. Especially us newbies. I think the new social media project isn’t going to help with that whole ‘everyone likes to be in everyone’s business’ thing.” “Oh, I’ve also spent a lot of time trying to keep my head down, but never had much of a problem with it. I’m easy to ignore,” he said with a wry smile, but he could see how Bea wouldn’t be, with her bright hair and piercing blue eyes. He couldn’t ignore her, after all, he realized with a sudden jolt of embarrassment. Tobias nodded in agreement, pushing it down. “Better to avoid it, but I think it will be easier said than done to do so.” With a snorted chuckle, Bea shrugged and said, “Unfortunately, I'm too opinionated to avoid social networks. Like I said, I have a hard time keeping my head down.” As if just remembering where they were, she picked up the receipt again and slid the paper bag toward Tobias. “Anyway, I don't mean to keep you. Seems like we've got a couple of people in common now, though, so I'm sure I'll see you around.” She tried not to sound too hopeful with that last observation. Tobias had to fight his instinct to remain stoic and dispel all thoughts that he’d enjoyed this encounter. Yet, he felt...different around her, so he took the receipt and smiled instead. Faint, but steady. “I guess so,” he said. “It was...nice talking to you,” Tobias said, as he began to step away from the counter. “Bye,” he said, taking a few backwards steps to keep facing her, but then turned to leave. |