Pietro Maximoff (seethiscoming) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2019-08-25 18:36:00 |
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Lunch was going okay; they weren't talking much as there was an all-you-could-eat salad bar that they'd both sort of gravitated towards after arriving and Hanna was carefully picking through the salad she'd grabbed while they waited for their actual food to arrive.
She wasn't a massive fan of leafy green things, or peppers that weren't attached to a pizza, but she was trying. It was hard and it wasn't as fun as she'd thought it would be, but watching Peter - Pietro - eyeing the salad with as much distrust as her made her smile a little.
"The service here's pretty quick," she reassured him after a moment, chewing on a green pepper. "So I figure they'll be bringing food for us soon enough."
She tucked her hair behind her ear and tilted her head, watching him carefully.
"Are you okay? I mean, finding out that your name isn't what you thought is, like, a total head trip."
Pietro like Hanna was also not a big fan of leafy green things and his look of distrust was not faked or in any way false as he side eyed the options available to them as part of the all-you-could-eat salad. Eventually he settled on a mixture of things but mostly bread.
He broke the first bread roll and slathered it with the butter before nodding just as he chewed on his first bit.
"It is but... I don't know how to describe it but I feel like I know Wanda and I hope she can tell me more about my past."
"That'd be good," Hanna agreed with a nod of her head, "are you curious? I'd be so curious, like, to know where I'd come from... is she like a friend or something?" She smiled, knowing she was doing that questioning thing again but she knew he didn't mind and he'd tell her if he wanted her to shut up. "How did you even run into her? Also, like, Pietro seems to suit you really well, like, as your name."
"Very," he affirmed with a nod of his head. "Also, a little bit worried as well. I mean, a building did fall on me." And if anybody had survived that in his family then why hadn't they come looking for him? Or why hadn't they been there when he woke up? He had questions, so many questions.
He popped a cherry tomato into his mouth and bit down, crunching away as he poked around at the remainder of his salad with his fork. "By chance, at a small market near the beach front." Felt almost fated but there was no such thing, right? Though admittedly he came from a culture that believed in things like that so he didn't dismiss the thought as easily as some. "And thank you, I think- I think I prefer it to Peter."
"I mean that's a stupid crazy thing to survive," Hanna said, "A building? That's insane. The fact that you're walking is like, totally insane. You're so lucky."
She caught herself a second later, "I mean, like, not lucky that it fell on you but more like, lucky that you survived because that coulda been so much worse and you might not have survived."
She swallowed, cheeks catching a little and she ducked her head, poking at her bread roll awkwardly because she knew she'd run at the mouth again.
"It's cool that you ran into her, but like, again, totally crazy that you'd run into someone who knew you from where you came from who knew you before, like here on the other side of the world."
Pietro was by now very familiar with the fact that Hanna did tend to just say whatever she was thinking and a lot of what she said could be misinterpreted by some but Pietro knew that she didn't mean things the way they came out except when she did. That was different though, he knew what that sounded like, this was not one of those moments. Besides he was known for just saying things how they were so he appreciated the same candor from somebody else.
Too many people wrapped up lies in pretty bows.
"It is very... weird," he said with a nod. "I mean I came to this country and found a community of my people but I did not think I would find them outside of that place they had made for themselves. I look forward to her telling me what she can about my past and maybe it might jog my memory."
Hanna smiled a little. "It's totally fate," she told him. Her phone buzzed in her bag and she shifted uncomfortably, trying to ignore it and she tore her bread roll in half and stole some of Pietro's butter to put on the bread.
"Did she say how she knew you? Like... a friend or girlfriend or something? You had to have been pretty special to her for her to have, like, come to talk to you."
Pietro watched Hanna curiously as she reacted to the sound of her phone buzzing, brow drawing together. "Everything okay?"
"Friend," he shared with a nod. "Apparently she knew me before..." Pietro gestured vaguely in the direction of his head.
Hanna nodded. "Yeah, it's fine, I just- I keep getting these text messages and it's like-"
She didn't think Pietro had started dreaming so she waved her hand. "It's nothing."
Rubbing her fingers on the tablecloth she swallowed. "Well, it's good that she knows you and stuff. 'Cause maybe it'll help you have your memories come back and whatever. And then maybe if you've got like, other people you can look for them and stuff."
"No, no, it's clearly something if it's bothering you," Pietro said, refusing to let Hanna just brush it aside. She also loved her phone so the fact it was clearly causing her anxiety was worrying.
Pietro nodded, finishing up his bread roll. "I suppose the fear is what if there is nobody else?"
"It's stupid," Hanna replied, "especially considering we're, like, talking about you and your amnesia right now. It's stupid and shallow and it doesn't matter." Even though she knew what the message would be, she knew it would be the one calling her the fat girl.
She put her bread down and pushed the plate away for a moment. Whoever this 'A' was in her dreams was a giant jerk.
"I know it's not the same but, I mean, if we- if you find out there's no one else you've got me? And your friend Wanda."
Pietro just arched an eyebrow at Hanna. "You have listened to my stuff enough. It goes both ways." And it did or at least he thought that was how friendships worked but then he wasn't very experienced so maybe he was wrong about that?
"It has also put you off your food so..."
He wasn't about to let her not eat especially when she'd been doing it quite happily a moment ago so he speared a few slices of cucumber and offered them to her on the end of his fork. "True, and I should not need much more than that."
"I know," Hanna told him, though she was not massively experienced in the friendship arena either. "But I just-"
She leaned forward over the table and took the cucumber from the fork, chewing thoughtfully as she returned to her side of the table.
"'S stupid," she mumbled, leaning to the side and reaching for her phone. As expected, there were three messages, each one the same.
Heads up, hon. Hefty Hanna never gets the guy --A.
Heads up, hon. Hefty Hanna never gets the guy --A.
Heads up, hon. Hefty Hanna never gets the guy --A.
She unlocked her phone and turned it around, pushing it across the table.
Further up the message chain were others, in reverse order:
If only she could see how guilty you look... -A
Dead girls walking. --A
I'm still here bitches, and I know everything. -A
Poor Hanna. It's gonna take more than a gloss to keep those lips sealed --A
Be careful, Hanna. I hear prison food makes you fat. -A
Each message had been sent three to five times, a constant barrage of messages that felt menacing, even without the knowledge that, in her dreams, she was being harassed by this A person.
Pietro reached over to take the phone as it was pushed over to him and the more of the text messages he read the angrier on Hanna's behalf he became, brow drawing together to express just how irritated the messages were making him. "Idiotule, who does this person think they are?"
"Have you spoken to anyone about these?"
Hanna shook her head. "No," she admitted with a little lift of her shoulders. "I- I'm pretty sure they're from-" she wet her lower lip and let out a weak laugh. "You're gonna think I'm totally crazy, Pietro."
"Try me," Pietro offered with a lift of his eyebrow.
Hanna sighed. "There's- some people here have these, like, dreams of another life? And I- I have dreams about being somewhere else. I'm still... me, but I'm also not. 'Cause, like, man, this place is messed up. But there's these text messages from someone who's being, like, they're sending these messages to us to scare us or whatever."
She wrinkled her nose. "We think they're from our friend Ali, in the dreams. But she's dead. So, like, I don't even know."
It didn't sound as crazy as Hanna was claiming it did. He had seen numerous mentions of the dreams on the network and it definitely wasn't an isolated event. He wasn't sure what to make of it all to be honest as he barely even remembered who he was here let alone to start dreaming about another life in another place.
"If it is a friend then they are not the sort of friend you want or need in your life."
"Ali was a lot of things," Hanna agreed with a nod of her head, thinking about how some of her eating problems - in that reality, at least - had been directly encouraged by Ali. "I- yeah, I don't know. She's not here, in OC, and I don't know her. I've never met anyone that was in my dreams."
She leaned over the table and took her phone back, locking the screen and hiding the messages away.
"I just kinda think it's gonna get worse in my dreams before it gets better, y'know?"
Pietro frowned and reached across the table to close his hand around Hanna's much smaller one, squeezing softly. "Well, you do not have to go through it alone. If you are scared or worried all you have to do is call and I will be there." And that was a promise, full and not empty like some others might have been.
He did not take kindly to anyone messing with the people he cared about.
Hanna turned her hand to catch his fingers and ducked her head, looking at Pietro through her lashes as she nodded, squeezing his hand back.
"Thanks, Pietro," she told him, pleased that not once had she slipped up and called him 'Peter' to his face.
Her stomach rumbled a little and it made her laugh, though it was aptly timed as their food turned up, the waitress apologising for interrupting their conversation.
"Nice timing," she told Pietro with a little grin and a wink, to cover up her embarrassment at her stomach rumble.
Pietro gave Hanna's hand a parting squeeze before he leaned back so the waitress could deposit their food down. "Very nice timing." His lips tugged into a smile before he thanked the waitress and did his best to bide his time as that was polite after all though his appetite did at times surpass politeness.
"So, we eat and then we go and do something, to take your mind off the asshole texting you."
Hanna nodded, "If you've got the time," she said with a relieved, grateful smile, "I'd love that."
"I have time," Pietro assured her with a further smile before he dug into his food.