Kayla Chao (mathnerd) wrote in light_of_may, @ 2010-02-09 21:33:00 |
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Entry tags: | 2009-07-03 |
Who: Kayla and Madock
When: Afternoon
Where: The Grocery store
Madock was trying his hand at shopping and it wasn't going over very well. Sure he knew how to make some things, like soup out of a can, or sandwiches, but after a while, one got tired of things like that. He planned to actually try making something a little more than just soup or sandwiches, but somehow, he still ended up standing in the chips and soda aisle. Yeah, this was going to go real well. Junk food was not substantial and he kept telling himself that, but his brains thoughts and his stomach's demands were two separate things.
Kayla had been out at the nearby park, taking advantage of the clearing weather to do some outdoor studying; she was getting a bit of a headstart by signing up for one or two summer-session classes at the university. Online coursework was awesome, and saved her a drive to Ann Arbor, and this physics class was proving to be super interesting. As Kayla often could, she'd spent most of the afternoon studying and, during a brief pause, realized she was starving. There was a grocery store nearby, so she gathered up all her books and laptop, shoved everything in her bag, and headed over for a quick snack.
She went straight to the chips aisle - she had a craving for some kind of pretzel and cheese concoction or perhaps those Ritz sandwiches - and paused to peruse the offerings. Which was when, of course, the strap on her bag broke. Overburdened with books and computer parts, the poor strap just gave out, sending a spill of books out into the aisle. "Crap," Kayla muttered, bending to gather everything up.
Looking over at the sound of both the books and other items in the bag clattering to the floor and the sound of the mumble, Madock stopped doing what he was doing and walked over to help the girl collect her belongings. "Hey." he said as he started picking things up. "Looks like you're carrying a heavy load..." Definitely why the bag broke with all the things that were all around the floor.
"Sort of," Kayla said, looking up with a smile of thanks for the boy who helped her gather her things. "Cheap bag, though, too. It's not the first time it's happened to me." And she proved it by whipping out a small container of safety pins, which she used to reattach the broken strap of her fashionable little messenger bag - she knew now why it had been on sale. To be on the safe side, however, she ended up with a couple of the physics textbooks in her arms instead of in the bag. "Thanks a lot," she said with another smile, blowing a few wayward strands of dark hair out of her eyes.
"At least you're prepared." Madock said. "So you always walk around with safety pins just in case?" Not that it was any of his business, but that wasn't something he tended to think about. "What's with all the books?" Bouncing away from one question and onto the next as per usual, he looked up at the girl and flushed a little. "Sorry... probably not any of my business. I'm Madock though... Madock Korey."
Kayla grinned. "Like I said, it's not the first time I've broken a strap. So after the first one went, I learned to keep something around to fix it. Otherwise I'd be lugging all my crap around in my arms, and screw that." She was used to conversations going all over the place; she was the bubbly question sort herself. "I'm starting at the university in the fall," she explained, "but I decided to get a bit of a head start and take a summer class. I'm studying for a test we have coming up." She extended her hand. "I'm Kayla Chao," she introduced. "Nice to meet you, Madock."
Madock couldn't help but feel like a bit of a loser. He was supposed to start college classes eventually and he could have been doing summer classes like a good little boy and getting a head start too, but yeah, he wasn't. He was too busy getting turned into a werewolf. That was beside the point though, so he didn't bother thinking on it too much. "Nice to meet you too." he said, taking her hand and giving it a little shake. "Sorry you had to break your bag to meet me, though."
"No big," Kayla said easily as they shook. "It was on sale; I'll just have to go out and get something of quality that can handle the load, I guess. I was trying to avoid a full-on backpack, but I guess if I'm going to be schlepping around campus all day lugging a ton of crap with me, it might be best." And she wouldn't have to deal with the risk of overdeveloping one side of her shoulder muscles and not the other. Last thing she wanted to do was look lopsided in a strapless dress. She noticed his basket and grinned. "Doing mom's shopping?" she asked.
"Nah." he said, shaking his head as he glanced down at his basket. "Doing my shopping. Moved out recently and like... I blow at this." he admitted. "Not the shopping type but I wanted real food and then I came in here and my stomach was like 'please. I want some not real food' so I ended up with the not real food... and... you probably don't care." Madock chuckled.
"I would probably be horrible, too," Kayla reassured him. "I'd end up with like, Easy Mac and ramen noodles. And Pringles." But she didn't have to worry about the shopping, which was awesome. Their kitchen staff did that shit for them. Kayla was a decent cook; she'd hung out enough in the kitchens to pick up a thing or two, but she wasn't exactly in a hurry to put her survival skills to the test. Even when her parents were away on business or vacation, there were always tupperware containers full of lunches and dinner with neat labels giving her precise reheating instructions.
"Yeah. That's probably what I'm going to end up with. I can make stuff like soup and sandwiches, but there's honestly only so much ham and cheese I can take before I'm ready to throw my hands up in the air and run out to the nearest pizza restaurant." Which happened a lot more than it should. Of course that sucked because he didn't really have the money to spare nowadays.
"You know," Kayla said, "we've got a couple of one-dish wonders that I could get you the recipes for. Throw everything in a casserole dish and call it a day kind of stuff. It's real food, but it's super easy, too." They didn't get made very often unless the staff had the day off and hadn't prepared anything, or if Kayla wanted to do it herself. "So, did you come here for school?" she asked. "Or just on your own?"
"Yeah?" he asked, a smile breaking out over his face. He could toss some things into a casserole dish and call it a day. Real food, no matter how it was made, would be perfectly awesome. "Nah. I've lived here like my whole life. Just moved out recently though so I'm kinda... getting used to it. Graduated this year and all. What about you?"
"Yeah, just give me your email address and I'll send some over," Kayla offered. "Same here; born and raised in Scarlet Oak, just graduated, starting college in the fall. Well," she amended, "technically I've started already, but one or two classes doesn't really count, I don't think. I'll really be starting in the fall."
"We probably went to school together..." he said. "I'm sorry if I don't remember you. I spent most of my time with my head buried in my football stuff or trying my best to keep my grades from sucking." he sighed. "I'm really not as much of a dick to not at least pay attention to people. Okay... so that's a lie, I don't pay attention to a lot of things, but not because there's anything wrong with you..." This was so not cool. He was talking out of his ass. "Got a pen and paper? I can write it down for you. My email I mean."
"I went to private school in Ann Arbor," Kayla said with a laugh, "so I'd be really surprised if you'd remembered me. You look kind of familiar, though - been to any charity functions or clubs in Ann Arbor lately?" She knew she'd lose a scrap of paper in the mess of her bag, though, so instead just handed over her iPhone after prepping it to receive new contact information. "Just put it in there," she said, snagging the bag of pretzels she was after while he did his thing.
"Oh." Madock said, flushing a little in embarrassment as he took the phone from her and punched in his email address and phone number just in case she wanted that too. Whatever. "Yeah." he said. "I um... went to that thing for the kidnapped people." he explained. "I was one of the kids who was on the trip and my sister was one of the ones who got taken..."
"The Moriarty event," Kayla said, recognition dawning on her face as suspicion became certainty. "I was totally there, too. I can't believe that happened to kids from our town - it was super scary when I saw it on the news, that they'd disappeared. I'm so glad everyone made it back safely." She took the phone back, grinning at him as she snapped a quick photo for the caller ID, though her eyes were sympathetic. "I'm so sorry you had to live through that."
Madock let her take the picture and once she had, he nodded a little. "It sucked." he said. And it had. It still did, thinking that Clarissa had gone through all the things she did when he could have done more to save her. At least he felt he could have done more to save her. Instead he'd been a loser, just like his father always said, and not done enough. And it was Clarissa who had suffered. "But it's over now and that's the best part of it all."
"Definitely," Kayla agreed. "I don't even know any of them personally and I cheered like I'd just won the Super Bowl, I can't imagine how happy you must have been." But it was depressing and kind of rude to keep dwelling on something that had to have been incredibly traumatic, so she changed the subject. "So, are you going to be going to college around here?" she asked. "Playing football for them, maybe?"
"I have that money that the Moriarty's gave..." he said. "But I doubt that I'm gonna go for football. Just... doesn't seem very practical. As much as I love it, it's sorta difficult to think of how that'd pay the bills but then again I have no clue what I'm good at so I don't even know where to start thinking about careers and junk. I really need to talk to an adviser like... forever ago. I'm thinking of maybe just working for a while and then going back later soon as I figure out what to do."
"Well, that's what people go to college for, right?" Kayla said cheerfully. "To figure out what they're good at and learn how to turn it into a career. It's why they make you take all those compulsory classes your first two years or so, so you get a good, solid background in what a university has to offer." She realized she sounded a little nerdy, but good god did she love school.
"Yeah." Madock said with a little nod. "I guess I just figured I'd know what I was going to want to do by the time I started college. Guess it's not so hard... just gotta get into it." he sighed. "I don't know. Feels like I'm so far behind or something." Madock hadn't ever cared much about school, but he supposed that he needed to learn to care.
"I think it's probably more of an oddity to go to college knowing for sure what you want to study and sticking with it than most people think," Kayla mused, certain she was in that strange category. "A lot of people end up changing their majors at least once before they're through, from what I've read." She grinned. "Knowing that you don't know probably puts you at least a step ahead."
"Maybe." Madock smiled. He hoped that this girl was right. Maybe he was smart enough to know that he didn't have a clue. That was surely better than going and thinking he knew and changing his mind in the middle and having to start back from scratch. "Maybe I'll get lucky and figure it out soon." he shrugged. "So... think you'll like college?" he questioned. "Or do you think it'll be totally different than high school was?"
"Oh, I'll love college," Kayla gushed, nerding out for just a moment. "I mean, I was looking over the course catalog and the sheer volume of classes I want to take is mind-boggling. If I had my way, I'd be in college for life. I mean, I probably will be to the extent that I'll probably audit classes from now until I die, but I'm so excited to really get started. I'm doing an online course right now but I'm starting up full-time in the fall and I can't wait. It's going to be awesome. But probably very different from high school. The teachers don't get on your case as much about doing the work - you have to be way more responsible for yourself or it can be easy to fail. But there's also a lot more opportunity."
Madock thought that she was nuts wanting to be in college for life, but he envied her at the same time. Having a ton of things she wanted to do was definitely better than having no clue in his opinion. "I think I'll like not having to listen to the teachers bitch as much." he admitted. "But I'm still kinda terrified of college." Which was lame to admit but Madock didn't really think much when it came to things he should keep to himself.
"I think you'll do a lot better than you're giving yourself credit for. I mean, when you think about it, you've basically been in training the last thirteen years of your life - college is just more of the same. Go to class, study for class, don't fail tests. And," she added cheerfully, "if you ever want a study-buddy, you can always email me, since you'll have my address once I send you those recipes."
That got a smile from the guy and he nodded. "That'd be nice, actually." he admitted. "If you can deal with my scatterbrainedness. Even though I totally don't think that's a word. Obviously I'm going to suck at English, but what else is new?" He knew better than to major in English at least, so there was one thing to cross of his list.
"I'm not bad at english," Kayla said, glossing over her straight-A record, "but my favorites are math and science. But no, I wouldn't mind. We'll probably be taking at least a couple of the same gen-eds; we'll have to email after fall registration and see what we have in common."
"Totally." Madock agreed with a nod. It definitely couldn't hurt to be friendly with a girl who actually knew what she was talking about. Hell, maybe some of her brains would rub off on him and he'd actually do better than just a C average. Maybe. "Sounds good to me. Can't hurt, right?"
"Definitely not," Kayla agreed. She figured it would probably be more one-sided tutoring from the way he was going on about not doing well, but she didn't mind helping out where she could, and who knew? People could surprise you all the time. "Well, I should probably get back to it," she said with a smile. "Test on Monday, and I've got equations to memorize. It was really nice to meet you, Madock. Good luck with your shopping."
"Alright." Madock said, lifting his hand to give her a little wave. "Thanks." he said. "For the uplifting chat. I think I kinda needed it." he admitted. "Catch ya later, Kayla."