Friday, April 11th, 2008 Who: Keagan and Astrid Where: Starts in her bedroom and literally migrates out into the common room When: Friday evening, around 5 or 6 What: Keagan makes a slip and that's all she wrote. The truth comes out and it gets nasty. Status: COMPLETE
The whole week had been kind of crappy for Astrid. Even with hanging out with Summer and chatting with Rae and Jack, she just hadn't seen much of Keagan and he was... really acting odd. Distant. She didn't quite know what to do, but, one thing was for sure, it was FRIDAY and she was done with class and so was he and goddammit, she was not gonna let him get away from her now! They were GOING to talk and hang out! So when she caught sight of Keagan after dinner, she didn't even think twice before she jogged over to him and looped her arm in his and grinned. "Hey, you! Guess what? It's Friday!"
Keagan had tried to keep busy with helping Duncan and pouring himself into his school work, but it was getting increasingly hard to avoid Astrid. He wasn't even sure why he was trying to avoid her, other than he felt they might have gone a little too far too fast. And suddenly, when trying to sneak back to his room, Keagan was cornered and glomped. "It is Friday indeed. Did you have a good week?"
"It could have been better." Astrid cooed as she held onto him, putting on some false cheer so that she could hopefully get him back to her room and maybe they could talk things out. Or at least get the impression that they were okay. "I was suffering from withdrawal of you. We have the weekend now, though." She kept marching him towards the common room, and she was totally planning to keep marching him right into her room.
"Yeah, I'm sorry about that. Professor Boyard needed help on a pet project." Keagan let her drag him to the common room. He had hopes that they could maybe sit on one of the couches there and watch TV and he could avoid any intimacy beyond holding hands.
"Right. I gotcha. Buuut, that's okay, because now you're here, and I'm here and I'm thinking we should go for some movies and ice cream... and, uh, other stuff..." Astrid grinned as they made their way into the common room.
"Hmmm Movies and Icecream sounds fun." Keagan flushed a little. He tried to ignore her hint. "Maybe we can see if someone else can join us. He started to gesture to the room at large, as he put forward the idea as they walked into the common room.
"Ummm, I was thinking..." Astrid turned and stopped him for the moment, reaching up to grab his shirt and play with it, walking backwards and slowly dragging him towards her room. "That we could spend some time alone, since we haven't seen much of each other..."
"Uh... okay.." Keagan sounded unsure, but he didn't know how to say no. Besides, being alone wasn't nessisarily a bad thing.
"I mean, I've really missed you..." Astrid grinned, genuinely glad to have him there. "I couldn't even sleep a few nights because you weren't there. I didn't know how spoiled I was." Astrid made her way to her room and quickly opened the door, ushering him inside.
"It's been hard for me too," Which was one of the problems. This kind of.. co-dependancy was dagnerous for a man of his age.
"Well, we should fix that." Astrid giggled as she closed the door behind them, playing with the hem of his shirt.
Keagan flushed some and pushed at her hand a little, "I thought you wanted to watch movies?"
Astrid frowned a little, and she pulled her hand away. Wow. Summer had been right. He was uncomfortable. "I... um... I guess I thought that... " She cleared her throat. "Did you just decide that now that we've had sex we just don't need to again or something?"
Keagan frowned some, "I just.. Sex isn't something that I think about all the time."
"Wow... um... " Astrid cleared her throat, really not sure what to make of the situation. She was hurt, though. She really, really was. She felt kind of like she'd just been punched in the gut. "Didn't realize I was that much of a let down. Hooray."
Keagan's eyes went a little wide, "This isn't about you or anything, I just... It's honestly not something that... Hmm.... " He took a deep breath, "I think we might have taken things a bit quickly."
"Quickly? A bit quickly?" Astrid couldn't quite believe she was hearing this. "Jesus Christ, Keagan, we're dating because we were attracted to each other! Sex is kind of a HUGE part of that!"
"So is knowing each other and... and..." He was clearly getting frustrated.
"We do know each other!" Astrid snapped, crossing her arms over her chest. She really didn't know what to say or how to not take it personally, and she was trying not to but couldn't help it. "I like you, I like knowing you, I like the things I Find out about you, and I like being with you and YES, that includes sleeping with you!"
"You wouldn't like everything about me." he said before really thinking about what he was saying.
"You've been an open book since we've met, Keagan! I like everything about you!" Astrid didn't know how far off from the truth she could have been, and Keagan wasn't helping her, but she'd started to get that feeling in the pit of her stomach like there was something big he just wasn't telling her.
It was dawning on Keagan that the reason why he'd felt on edge all week was because he knew he was not being honest with her, and she deserved that if they were going to have sex. Words started tumbling out of him before reason or logic could stop them. "I've been lying about my age."
Astrid's first reaction when he said it was that he must have been under age or something. She didn't even have a clue what he really meant. "So, what, you're seventeen or something? BEcause that's not really an issue, it's not like my parents are gonna find out - "
"No... I'm older than that.. Older than... than you." Keagan could feel his heart trying to stab it's way out of his chest in it's best imitation of Robespierre crying 'VIVE LA REVOLUTION!', "Older than anyone at this school, I think."
Astrid stopped and had to look at him, then. She didn't quite know what he meant. It was almost like she couldn't quite comprehend what he was telling her. "What? You're... Keagan, we're the same age."
"No... I only look it. I've looked this old... for a very long time. I dont.. age. Well I could age but it wouldn't be pretty..." He was babbling. Sense was gone or else he'd have just slept with her and dug his grave a little deeper.
"Please tell me..." Astrid was trying very hard not to scream. In fact, she was still pretty well put together. "Please tell me that this is a fucking joke and that you're NOT telling me that you are some old, OLD mage who decided he'd gotten laid and suddenly decided to come CLEAN!"
"No, I'm an old idiot who should have told you from the start but didn't want you to treat me like an old idiot" Keagan was talking quickly, "Can we please talk about this rationally?"
"Rationally? What, you want me to talk about this rationally? What the fuck makes you think I'm irrational?" Astrid was pissed, and she had every right to be! She'd been lied to, she was hurt, and the last thing on her mind was being rational.
"Because you are yelling like a child!" Keagan had a very frustrated tone in his voice. This was exactly what he was afraid of.
"What?!" Astrid yelped, more stunned that she'd even heard it rather than anything else. Astrid stood there, flat out stunned and hurt and not knowing which way was up for a second. This had to be a joke. IT felt like a joke. "I can't... Oh my god, fuck this, I'm out." She hissed, brushing past him and heading right back out the door to the hallway. Did she care she was leaving her own room right now? No, she just needed out.
Keagan followed her, mostly because he wanted to fix this, but partially because he knew that this fight shouldn't leave her room. "Astrid, wait. I just meant that you're yelling and not listening to my explanation..."
"NO, that is definitely not what you meant!" Astrid laughed a little, in that 'I'm laughing to express my incredulity and my anger' kind of way as she made her way back into the common room. She whirled on him, not even thinking about whether or not people are in there. "You said I was being a child because you're trying to tell me you're some centuries old FOGEY who Pretended to be a student! What kind of fucking explanation do you have?"
"That the only thing I lied about was my age, and that I was raised in a commune. I really do no nothing about the modern world, that's why I said I was young. People wouldn't question my not knowing the proper customs." He was talking quickly, his accent changing very slightly to something more english sounding."
"Customs? Customs? Wow!" Astrid laughed, in a clearly sarcastic manner, bringing a hand to her chest. "I am SO GLAD that I could be your damned tour guide BARBIE!"
"That was not my intention!" Keagan's frustration level was higher than he could recall it being in nearly 30 years. "Astrid, please..."
"Please what? Please don't be mad at you that you've been LYING to me, lying to EVERYONE so you could, what? Go play with the natives or some shit?!" Astrid could feel that she'd gotten angry enough that there were tears in her eyes, but she didn't really care at this point. "You ASSHOLE! If you'd just been honest from the get go, maybe, maybe I could believe what you said!" Astrid paused, and grit her teeth. "How old are you." She asked, not really a question.
He could see her crying and felt a sharp pain in his chest again. "If I had been honest, you would have never been my friend or treated me the way you did!" He was avoiding the not question.
"Odin's beard, just tell me how old you are, Keagan!" Astrid snarled, not even giving a damn what stupid excuse he might have had.
His shoulders dropped some, and he looked something more akin to his age, "Three thousand, one hundred and fifty nine..."
Astrid wanted to scream at him, but instead, her hands went to her face and her fingers rubbed at her temples a little as she tried to wrap her head around it. "So... so wait... wait..." She gave another little chuckle, sad and completely without humor as she shook her head and looked up at him. "Lemme get this straight. You wanted me to believe that in 3000 years you never got fucking laid and that I was anymore than a piece of ass you wanted?"
"You are the first time I've ever let myself get close to a woman..." Oh... many warning alarms were going off in Keagan's head.
Astrid's hand went out way before she could stop it, and she slapped him across the face fast enough to give anyone whiplash. "Don't! Don't give me any of that! You can't possibly expect me to believe that!" Astrid sniffed, letting the rage full build as she shook her head. "You know what, Keagan? Why don't you just fess up. You came here because you just wanted to play at being the young stallion again, didn't you? Well, I hope it felt GREAT! And I'm sorry your conscience screwed it up for you, but you know what? You just wanted some pussy. And ha, you wanted it, you got it, and now it's gone." With that, Astrid turned and stalked back to her room, slamming the door shut before she could be tempted to say anything more.