Noah Poe (mrintensity) wrote in the_dome, @ 2013-08-21 23:35:00 |
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Entry tags: | 04-08-2017, darcy, darcy and noah, noah |
Advanced Game Theory
Who: Noah & Darcy
Where: Classroom
When: Late morning
Noah liked red hair. It always caught his eye but he'd gotten fairly adept at watching it without being obvious about it. A flick of a glance here, a nod in the direction of a rightly answered question in class. He knew from observation that Darcy was a hard egg to crack and so he hadn't attempted small talk yet. If the snarky back and forth with her cousin Avery had any bearing on the possibilities, he knew he'd have to be on his A-game if he ever did talk to her. He pretty much figured leading with the info that he'd memorized the exact pattern of the freckles on the back of her neck and shoulders would get him slapped. Still it was something he'd done to pass the time. Along with myriad other detailed memorizations of his fellow classmates.
So it was on purpose that he deliberated for a long moment before speaking to her finally. He thought he had noticed she was without a pencil and after the study period he knew there was a test. She'd need it. "You need to borrow this?" he asked, holding up a finely sharpened number 2. It was as plain as they came and his expression said no strings attached.
Darcy was completely distracted from school. Her mind was on kissing Liam and her cousins getting home and maybe a little on watching to see if Avery was sneaking out to see her boyfriend again. Of course Avery wouldn't call Finn that, but Darcy was calling him that. When Noah showed up with a pencil, she'd been digging through her bag, sure she was winging it on this test, but not sure what she'd done with her pen. For a moment she just blinked at him, not sure what to make of him or the offer. "Umm, yes," she said, slowly reaching for it. Had she ever even talked to this guy before?
Noah nodded, encouraging her to take the pencil. "Keep it," he said lightly finding it easier to talk to her now the seal had been broken. "I have a few. Any chance you have notes from Friday?" He'd been unwillingly out of class and had almost willingly skipped today considering it was a weekend. But the driving need to ace the test had brought him in. He swept his long, dark hair off his neck and knotted it in a haphazard ponytail as he sat down in his usual seat behind Darcy.
So apparently they were talking. And Darcy was staring, but not just because he was pretty, which he was and even more so in how little he looked like an O'Reily, minus having hair like Aiden. She couldn't quite close her mouth as she stared at him, not sure what was going on. Had he always sat behind her? That couldn't be true. "Um, yeah. I think." She handed over her notebook without thinking about the doodles in the margins that resembled hearts and maybe Liam's name written then scratched out. Not that they were like that really, but it was fun to have a target for day dreaming. "Did you miss Friday?"
Noah was mildly perplexed at her reaction. His eyes flickered over her face and down to her hands. Was she nonplussed because she thought he had no business talking to her? That was a little disappointing if it was the case. Nevertheless, he could use those notes, even if she wasn't interested in conversation. "Thank you," he answered, with a ghost of a smile. He took the notebook with a barely noticeable lift of his brows at the doodles. He could almost make out a name in some of them if he squinted but he chose to give her privacy and simply copy out the notes. He glanced at her again though as she opened the door for further communication. "I was out, yeah. Some big council planning meeting in the town hall and I was needed to take minutes, make coffee." He pressed his lips together, unsure why he'd said so much. What did she care what he was doing if he didn't really care about it too much himself?
Darcy made a little face. "Why would they need you? Is that what you do?" she asked, not able to keep the confusion out of her voice. God, everyone had a more interesting job than waitress at a bar. Liam was a nurse and Noah, she thought that was his name, was a...whatever he was.
Noah cocked his head, strands of dark hair falling in his eyes which he brushed away with a swipe of his thumb. "They need me because they can't be bothered to wipe their asses on their own." It was only a hair's breadth away from being the truth. They put a lot of responsibility on him but he enjoyed the challenge. "I do odds and ends for council members. What do you do besides lend erstwhile strangers your notes?"
Oh. Well if anything, Darcy appreciated the directness and maybe that swipe of his hand to push his hair out of his eyes. That was very un-Aiden like. Aiden just let his hair hang in his face. "Serve drunk idiots their next round of beer," she told him with a smirk. "I wait tables at the brewery bar."
Noah pursed his lips against the comment that was always ready to form when someone mentioned inebriation. "Right, that's right. You're an O'Reilly, aren't you?" He'd known that but he hadn't literally made the connection between Darcy and Avery and the brewery. He gave her a bemused expression, looking over the face he rarely had the clear path to study the way he had her reverse. "Fulfilling work it sounds like." He was slightly teasing but she might not have picked up on it as he deadpanned.
The face Darcy made was something close to a scowl, completely ignoring the fact that it looked like he’d wanted to say something and he hadn’t. “Only by name,” she said, knowing that made her sound married in when she was a direct line but she still hated the name. “It’s not even close. It’s about all I can do though so what the hell else am I going to do.” The edge of annoyance was slipping into her tone, mostly at mention of her family and being one of ‘them’ and not so much at Noah. Well, maybe at Noah for saying it.
Noah shrugged. "Names are just words. They don't mean anything unless you want them to." He'd gone by quite a few of them after his family had all been killed off by the zombies before settling back into his own once in the dome. What he was called never made any difference to him anymore so long as he could get the job done. "Take Darcy, for instance. It means 'dark' and yet you're fair skinned and red haired. Noah means 'peaceful' and 'long-lived' and considering my body count, neither is on the agenda." He tugged down at the cuffs of his sleeves unconsciously to cover the scars there, reminders of how close to death he'd come. "You could always apply for a job in town hall. It's so many types of fun."
“You haven’t met the O’Reily’s,” Darcy said, shaking her head. “They’re all about those six letters strung together.” She listened to his theory, but she’d let it distract her from talk of her family. She smirked a little. “Depends on who you ask about me being ‘dark’,” she said before raising one eyebrow. “Body count?” What was that? And more so what was he pulling at his sleeve for? She reached forward with the pencil, pushing at his sleeve with the eraser. She was nothing if not impulsive. She wanted to know what he was hiding. “It’d make your life more interesting, that’s for sure.”
He nodded, gathering that she wasn't fond of her family but now wasn't the time for a conversation on appreciating them while you still had them. Not even he would be that stuffy. "Body count," he affirmed. "Zombies. You didn't kill any?" He flicked his thumb again, catching stray ends of dark hair back behind his ear again. Was it possible she'd made it through without having to go head to head with the undead? He didn't so much flinch at her questing pencil as he simply moved out of her reach, folding his arms across his chest as he sat back in his chair. "Considering you're not real sweet on your family, I'd say it'd make your life more interesting. But humor me. What would you say about you being 'dark' and 'interesting?'" he asked, curiosity flickering in his dark eyes.
“Not really. Seriously, family didn’t let me do much of anything.” She didn’t have many kills to her name, and really mostly it was just helping out Aiden when they’d been snuck up on during their supply runs. “Probably not like you,” she said watching as he pulled his hand away. “What are you hiding?” she asked, nodding towards his arm before propping her elbow on his desk and smirking. “Me being dark and interesting? See...that you’d have to find out. But I’m not as nice as I look.” She was to strangers, and probably to him, but she knew she could be something else entirely if given the proper motivation.
No wonder she could merely roll her eyes at the drunks at her family brewery. The frivolity didn't bother her, just inconvenienced her. "Your family probably did you right at least there. I wouldn't wish that on anyone," he answered truthfully. He glanced down at his arms and then back to her face. He hadn't meant to draw attention to his arms but apparently she was as observant as he was. "That you'd have to find out," was his reply, the corners of his lips tugging faintly upward. He'd rather downplay and redirect the same way she had. Yet he'd observed her interactions enough to know she wasn't sugar and sweetness. She was intriguing for that. Beyond the red hair. "Oh, believe me, I don't think you're nice. You're more complicated than that, yeah?"
“Maybe, but you’ve seen Avery right? I at least have something to boast for.” She raised an eyebrow at his dare, the simple challenge. “I will find out. You know that right?” Since he did seem to know an awful lot about her. She actually felt bad she didn’t know much about him. She was usually better at noticing people who were so very unlike herself. Maybe it was the hair, too much like Aiden’s to catch her attention. The smile she gave him was almost wicked, downright teasing. “You’d have to find out for yourself.”
Noah's eyes flicked toward where Darcy's blonde cousin usually sat. "We've spoken. Fractions, I believe," he said. "She's not very good at math. Are you any better?" It was a rhetorical question mostly. He didn't care if she was good at math or any other subject.
"What do you figure is in my sleeves other than my arms?" Could she be as tenacious as he was? Noah was beginning to believe he'd met his female counterpart in some respects. He looked thoughtfully at her as his knotted ponytail gave up as it always did, shrouding his face in shadow behind his hair and he left it that way. He sat forward in response to her wickedly teasing invitation. "And how does one go about finding out anything about Darcy the Dark,” he asked, avoiding the use of her last name purposely. “Without risking a stalking violation, that is?"
“I”m better at a lot of things than Avery is.” Maybe not fractions. That would depend on how bad Avery was because beyond calculating bills and tips at work, math was not Darcy’s best subject.
“Something worth hiding,” she said, not letting the wicked grin fade, even as he leaned forward. Actually, she didn’t even flinch. She just stayed where she was, only reaching out with the pencil to pushe part of his hair out of his eyes. “It’s not the stalking violation you have to worry about, it’s my cousins.” Who had worse tempers than usual lately if what she’d heard about the hospital was true. She liked the nickname though, grinning more at it. “You’d have to find me outside of school to start. Then...maybe we see what’s different.”
Noah could bet she was better at any number of things than Avery. He liked Avery well enough, what little interaction he'd had with her, but she was nice. "I'm sure you are," he replied with a knowing nod then said enigmatically, "Girls like you usually are."
His eyes drifted to his sleeves and he shrugged again. "And anything worth hiding is worth finding out, is it?" he asked, his eyes holding a slightly amused expression even if his mouth was a firm line. "You're a dangerous girl, Darcy the Dark. I think your cousins are probably no match for you, whatever you say." He didn't mind the parting of his hair, her push into his personal space wasn't unwelcome. "Outside of school. Good to know. Though you won't catch me in the brewery."
“Girls like me?” Darcy ventured, curious look in her eyes. She wanted to know what that meant for sure.
“Definitely worth finding out. It’s how I found Avery’s first and every diary since we were eight.” Which had been fun. She hadn’t gone on a diary raid in a while. Maybe Avery had one with ramblings about Finn. “I am dangerous, and while I can handle my cousins, I’m more worried about you and that pretty face of yours.” She tapped the eraser of the pencil against her lower lip, considering him. She was enjoying this, the feel of almost flirting, but more matching wits with someone else. Someone that could keep up. Not that Liam couldn’t follow along, but sometimes he didn’t give much back. And Avery was a bitch. “Why not the brewery?”
Noah was impressed she'd passed his little test of character. Not many people could hear that statement and not get defensive as though he'd said there was something wrong with them. He mentally inclined his head to her. "Girls who pay attention and know the right things to say."
He arched a brow at her again to that admission. "Sounds like there's another thing you're better at than Avery. I'm guessing she must be a halfway decent writer if you kept looking? Is there a dark side to her too?"
He canted his head, wondering just what she figured her cousins would do to him if they found him merely watching her at a distance. That couldn't be too threatening if her cousins were rational but maybe they weren't. "My pretty face? I'm almost sure that if I've kept it this handsome for so long, I might be able to scrape by even if dreaded cousins came calling." He relaxed his arms, palms on the desk atop her notebook where he finally caught notice of a clear indication of the name 'Liam' and filed it away for future reference. "That may be one of those things you'll just have to find out."
Darcy had never been told she said the right thing, so she took that as a compliment and ran with it, grin sneaking into her features again. “Avery?” she said with laughter in her voice. “No. Hardly. She’s boring. Or she was up until she started making out with a lumberjack. That’s interesting I suppose. As for dark...I highly doubt it.”
“You haven’t been faced with the wrath of the O’Reily’s yet,” Darcy told him, shaking her head, but sounding like she wasn’t one of them. They’re irrational.” She tapped the pencil again, watching his eyes. “So when do I find out?”
Noah eyed her curiously, trying to tell whether or not she actually thought her cousin was boring or if she was downplaying interesting qualities in Avery so that she herself stood out. Either way Darcy appeared to be in her element and he liked watching her light up. "Yeah, you're probably right. There's nothing dark about kissing lumberjacks. Pyromaniacs or pot growers maybe. But not lumberjacks."
He conceded he hadn't met the O'Reilly adults yet. Just Avery and now Darcy. He almost had a hard time believing they could be any less pleasant than the girls but he said nothing on that. "True enough, I haven't. Nothing worse than irrational people when they're angry. I better take to wearing a hockey mask if I'm to take you up on finding out about your dark side." His eyes were on her pencil. "When you find me outside of school."
Darcy smirked a little. "Trust me, this guy is as vanilla as they come," she said about Finn. "Do you know any pyromaniacs or pot growers besides the guy who runs the greenhouse?" She'd heard rumors about him and that he was a source for pot even if she didn't partake.
"Not the mask," Darcy said with a pout. "Just be careful you don't get caught by anyone but me." At his challenge she raised an eyebrow. "And where would I start with that, finding you?"
"Vanilla, huh? I take it you're more of a chocolate kind of girl?" Noah shook his head and sat back in his chair again. "No, thank goodness. Probably the last thing we need in this place is pyro. And one pot grower is enough." He hadn't realized there was a pot grower in the dome. That was bad news but he kept his mouth shut.
"Stealthy ninja skills aren't exactly my thing but I can work on it." His lips quirked slightly upward at the corners as he imagined them both attempting to look nonchalant while looking for each other outside of school. "Hm, anywhere quiet unless I'm in the town hall," he supposed. He'd be curious to see if she'd turn up in the town hall building.
“Chocolate maybe,” Darcy said, eying Noah, considering what flavor of ice cream he would be. “Still not even sure on the pot grower. Just rumors. He could be selling basil for all I know.” She shrugged a little and leaned more on Noah’s desk. “You really want me dropping in on you at work?”
His eyes darkened playfully. “You can drop in on me anywhere. You’re the one who said it would make my life more interesting,” he reminded her. And it was the truth. She’d already made the annoyance of being in a classroom on a Saturday much more enjoyable. Why not see what mischief they could manage if she popped up at the town hall.
Damn. That look was more than enticing and Darcy felt a grin slip onto her features. “Then I might have to do just that. Shake things up down at the town hall. You could drop in on me too, even though I know you don’t want to be there.”
Noah considered her offer carefully. He could conceivably do that, drop in on her at work, without necessarily condoning the pub. It wasn't as though she seemed to herself. "Entirely possible, oh Dark One," he replied, still contemplating what it would be like for her to drop in on him. It was also entirely possible that her presence would disrupt everything he'd worked for and he almost regretted inviting that possibility. But there was still a part of him that craved something to break up the monotony of life here. That seemed to be Darcy's specialty.
She just kept grinning, tapping the pencil against her lower lip again. “Of course that’s the most likely way to meet my family. So enter at your own risk.” But having Noah show up would definitely be interesting. She could already hear the lectures, but that didn’t stop her from wanting it. Just to shake things up.
Noah canted his head, his expression still a bit playful but now conspiratorial too. "True enough. Lion's den and all." He nodded seriously, his mouth a straight line as he glanced back toward Avery. "Maybe I should slip in surreptitiously," he said, using one of his $5 words. "I could say I'm Avery's math tutor. That should fly, right?"
As good as the first look was, Darcy liked this new one better. "You could," she said, not at all sure what that big word meant, but assuming it meant undetected. "Just in time to run into her brother, which is probably worse than Lochlan just being my cousin." She smirked a little biting her lower lip. "Plus, I don't want to share you."
Noah considered this for a moment. "You don't think I have the chops to impress her brother that I'm the nerdy, under-the-radar sort of guy he could let alone with his baby sister?" He gave her a very studious look, pulling his hair back so that its length was almost imperceptible. "No, you're probably right. So how would you suggest I get past your family? You know them better than I do." He liked the idea too that she didn’t want to share him. It was how he felt about her now that they’d spoken. She was enigmatic enough to very much intrigue him.
Darcy stifled a little laugh and shook her head. “As cute as you are like that, you’re a guy and you’re closing in on Avery. Lochlan’s gonna take offense no matter what I’m guessing.” She considered his question for moment, then her smile broadened. “Aiden. Aiden is your way in. You get past Aiden, you get to me.” Though explaining Noah was going to be difficult considering she and Aiden had just spoken about Liam. Already Darcy could tell Noah was different, but she guessed not everyone was going to see that.
Noah gave her a slight smile to her compliment about his cuteness which might have come off as either unsure or confident depending on her mindset. He hadn't thought about his looks in a long time. Not since the night he'd gotten his scars. He'd had a high opinion of himself but that had changed. Now he wasn't exactly sure how to react to it other than to acknowledge it. "Lochlan sounds like an overbearing jackass. But Aidan? He's your brother or cousin? Why does going through him help me? Is he the weakest link in the O’Reilly family chain?"
Darcy wasn’t sure what to make of the smile, but she echoed it back with one of her own. “He’s not overbearing as much over protective,” she explained shaking her head. “And it’s Avery who you know, it’s more innocent than the rest of us.” She smiled again thinking of Aiden. “He’s not the weak link, he’s the most rational. And he’s a direct door to me. He’s just my cousin, but I’m closer to him than anyone else. If you were friends with him, you could be around and he would get the arrangement I bet.” She’d have to ask, but maybe it would work.
Noah said, "Right, okay. Don't need to plumb the depths of innocence." He shook his head, dismissing the idea that he could sneak in under the Avery guise. Make friends with Aidan. Well… "Kind of defeats the purpose of just dropping in but I can see the merit," he replied with a nod. Rationality seemed promising. He filed that also away for later with the name in her scribbles though it piqued his interest. "Sounds like I might have more of a chance of finding you outside the pub. Which kind of seems like a nice challenge. I'd take it on. Hide-and-Go-Seek in the dome, if you will. What do you think? Should we declare a game?" If they were at large in the dome, that would be good healthy fun and nothing over the top. He could get behind that.
“You could still drop in,” Darcy said. “But you’ll get more out of your waitress if Aiden’s behind the bar.” She propped her chin in her hand, considering his offer of a game. “I think a game would be fun. You get to be it first.” Just to see if he would find her.
Noah had no intention of ever being served in the pub for any reason so getting more out of his waitress held no bearing. Still, it was an observation worth noting. "Thanks for the tip, I'll be sure to take note of the bartender if I wander in." He watched her movements, finding himself drawn back to leaning forward on the desk with his elbows, his hands folded in front of him. "You got it, Ms. Dark One. But you'd better make it worth my while to find you when I do."
Darcy raised an eyebrow at that, liking that he’d moved closer. “Worth your while? Just what does that entail?” She hoped it was something interesting though, something scandalous even. Maybe she was the one getting carried away with thoughts at the moment though.
He took a beat to answer, looking up to the left a bit through the curtain of his infringing dark hair. "I leave that to your imagination, but it should be something you'd want if you were in my shoes." Maybe it was a cheater's answer but he figured it would make his point.
He had to realize he was all but dangling a toy in front of her. Something shiny that Darcy wanted all for herself. The grin she gave him was all but wicked. "You're going to wish you hadn't said that," she warned playfully.
Noah realized he had too long left the wilder side of himself lay dormant and it was threatening to burst free in some way. And this was harmless really. No drugs or alcohol involved. Simply intrigue. And he really liked it when she smiled like that. "Oh?" A brow arched. "You're a masochist then?" he asked darkly humorous. "The things you'd want would be so terrible?"
Darcy kept the smile, pencil going out to play with his hair again. “They say too much of a good thing can be bad,” she said, voice almost dry, her best wicked queen impression. “And I always get what I want.”
He watched her thoughtfully for a long moment, inwardly smiling at how she did, in fact, seem to get whatever she wanted. Hell, she played with his hair like she had a right. Bold. "Too much of a bad thing can be good as well." He gave her a goodnatured, slightly challenging look. "And just what does the Dark One want?"
“Are you saying I’m bad? Or you are?” Darcy countered, looking just a little shocked, even if her eyes shone with amusement and the tease. “I’m still deciding. Currently, I just want you. The details are a little fuzzy.”
"I guess we'll see, won't we?" he answered, easing past her question with a continued, somewhat playful challenge in his expression. He wasn't exactly sure if they'd crossed the line into flirting at this point or not. Whatever it was, he was enjoying it. "I see," he replied, pressing his lips together and nodding. "Let's hope, for your sake, you can find me then. Not sure a disappointed Darcy would be a good thing."
She nodded sagely. “Yes, that’s the last thing you want.” Darcy upset was a force to be reckoned with. “I have no doubt in my ability to find you. Or in yours to deliver.”
Noah had no doubt that her temper was as fiery as her hair. He almost wanted to see though not directed at him. It seemed like watching her out of control would be something magnificent. Maybe he'd get to see that in a good way instead. "I have no plans on disappointing you. But you'd better bring your A-game."
“Gladly,” Darcy told him with a grin, going back to playing with his hair again. “I wouldn’t dare bring anything else.” Whatever it was, it was going to wind up being fun, fun, fun.