InsaneJournal

Who: Maxxie and Tom
When: Fall, 2094 [backstory]
Where: psych class
What: Thanks to a class project, Maxxie meets Tom (who is stubborn enough to befriend the girl who doesn't want to be friends).
Rating: PG
Status: private/completed log

Great, pairing up. Maxxie was so thrilled by the assignment that she sat completely still for a solid minute, then realized that meant that everyone else had a partner and she didn't. There was Shelly, from her floor, but she'd already partnered up with some girl Maxxie didn't know but who giggled way too much. She started to call out to Evie, who she vaguely remembered meeting during orientation, but just as she did, another girl sat down next to her and stole her attention away. Maxxie felt eyes on her and oh dear God, it was um... oh crap, what was his name? Shawn. That's it. She remembered him, mostly sort of vaguely, and it was only a few nights ago and maybe if she was lucky the rest of those memories would fade and why hadn't she noticed he was in this class before now? Crap. She did not want to partner up with him. And he was starting to head towards her.

She stood, abruptly, scanning the room for someone else -- anyone else -- who didn't have a partner yet. That guy, the one with the big ears, right over there. She threaded through the desks quickly, evading Shawn and pretending she didn't hear the call of "hey, blondie" as she flopped into the seat next to the gangly boy.

"Hi." She pasted on her brightest competition smile, the one guaranteed to fool the judges with the amount of wattage poured into it. "Be my partner?"

Tom startled, almost as if he'd been half asleep, which in truth he had been. You'd think I'd get more sleep with a roommate who goes to bed at ten o'clock, he thought. But hey, cute girl sitting next to him, asking to be his partner. He tried to mentally rewind the last few minutes and finally came up with something about a group project. Or a partner project. "Sure," he said easily, smiling back in a much more genuine way and offering his hand. "I'm Tom."

Maxxie took his hand, rather larger than her small one, and squeezed it a bit rather than shaking. "I'm Maxxie." She relaxed a bit, turning down the wattage on her smile as Shawn veered off in a different direction, called by the professor to partner up with some other guy. "And right now, I guess we're supposed to interview each other for the rest of the period, then write up something on what we've learned about the other person's creative process." She leaned back in her chair, hands neatly folded as she looked at him; she'd done a million interviews in her life, and she couldn't see how this would be any different. Who knows, he might even ask some of the same questions, if he recognized her. "Why don't you start with the questions?"

"All right." He grinned, straightening up in his chair. "So... Maxxie. It is Maxxie, right? How are you today? Enjoying this fine establishment of higher learning?" He held out his pen like a microphone.

Maxxie blinked at the pen, a small smile almost peeking out. "Maxine Jael Delacourt, actually, but Maxxie's less of a mouthful. And college sucks. What about you? Settling in after the first few weeks?" She assumed he was a freshman like herself.

"Another year, another roommate, another set of problems. He goes to sleep practically as soon as the sun goes down, and I'm not allowed to have a light on or type or anything else, so I'm kicked out. It sucks but it's better than living at home or something, and better than having to get a real job, so here I am. Thomas Egan Sturbridge, by the way." The corners of his eyes crinkled as he smiled at her. "So, Maxine Jael Delacourt, but Maxxie's less of a mouthful, do you consider yourself a creative person?"

"You're not a freshman," she said with a frown. "What are you doing in a freshman class? And of course I'm creative. I'm a performer. I take a routine and I have to make it my own, with my own touch. If that's not creative, what is?" She ignored the fact that she didn't do her own choreography, and that had always performed what she was told. The only routines she had ever created were her forms for black belt testing.

"I'm a sophomore," Tom said. "But I haven't really picked a major yet, so I've been trying out a lot of different classes to see if anything really calls to me." He shrugged. "What sort of routines? What do you perform? I'm going to guess dancer. Am I right?" He leaned forward like an overeager puppy dog.

Maxxie pulled back a bit, uncomfortable with just how close he was getting. Her chair scraped on the floor when she edged it the tiniest bit further away. "You don't know? Really?" At the honest look in his eyes, she sighed. "Gymnast." And she really couldn't remember the last time when someone hadn't figured out who she was, between the face and the name... they usually would remember her.

He leaned back, realizing when she shifted that he'd kind of been edging into her bubble. Oops. "Gymnast? Awesome. What was your favorite routine? I mean... what's the word? Exercise? Like the balance beam or the bars? Which was your favorite? Which were you best at? I guess probably your favorite was the one you were the best at but I could be wrong." He laughed, a soft rush of breath. "Sorry. That was a lot of questions."

"I'm best at all of them." Even stripped of her titles, Maxxie wouldn't let go of that simple fact. And she could use her natural abilities (which she hadn't even known she was using at the time) now in the Metahuman league, so that wasn't going to change. "But beam's my favorite. Bars are my least favorite. What about you?" She needed to turn the tables on him now, ask questions, both for the assignment and to stem the tide of the questions he kept blurting out.

"My favorite? I liked the... whatever it's called with the tumbling. Because it had music. Not that I ever did any of that myself. I'm clumsy like you wouldn't believe. Except probably you will believe as soon as I stand up, because I guarantee I'll manage to trip over my own feet or my backpack." He rolled his eyes and grinned. "Unless you're asking if I'm a creative person, to which I would have to say... not really? I mean, I can't think of anything creative that I'm particularly good at. I like writing, and I like talking. I like making people smile, and I don't mind making myself look like an idiot to do it. It's not too hard, I'm pretty sure."

Maxxie rolled her eyes when he started talking about gymnastics, but she latched onto the rest of what he said, because that was what they were supposed to be talking about here. "Not too hard to make you look like an idiot? That I can believe." Oh, well, except maybe not that exactly. She grabbed her notebook and wrote likes to write under his name on the page, then paused to look at him. "Okay, so what do you like to write? And why would you rather write it than do something else?"

If Tom registered the insult, he didn't let it show. "What do I like to write? Words." He smirked. "Occasionally doodles. I took a creative writing class last year and I wasn't terrible at it. I at least know how to use a semicolon. Mostly I just write about life, though. Day to day things. Observations about life, and people. Like today I might write, 'Met a girl in psych class who picked me for a partner because she was avoiding someone else. Wonder why she didn't have any girl friends to pick instead? Also wonder why she was avoiding, but asking that would be too personal upon first meeting. Question held in reserve for later interactions.'" His gaze now was intense, but still good-natured.

Words. Maxxie rolled her eyes again. God, was he ever a goof. A funny looking goof with a sense of humor which wasn't entirely awful. She scribbled notes more than listening until she realized that wait... what? Her gaze narrowed. "Because it's three weeks into my freshman year and everyone else partnered up first," she said sharply and quietly enough to keep it between them. Not that she really wanted to partner with most of them anyway, stupid giggling idiots that most of them were. When she'd complained about Shawn, they'd just said she ought to go out drinking again and do it again because it only got better. She didn't see the point. "And we're talking about creativity. Do you ever make up stories about those real life things you record?"

Because that idea actually made a sort of sense to her. In fact, that was partly why she was looking at psychology as a major. The way the girls acted like idiots irritated her and she wanted to know why they did it. What was so appealing about living like that? Why did they think screwing around in a drunken haze was fun?

"Make up stories? Like take people I see on the street and turn them into characters in a piece of fiction? Sure. One exercise we had to do in creative writing was to basically eavesdrop, and take at least five lines from a conversation we heard, as verbatim as we could make them, and put them into a story. It was interesting, actually, and made for some pretty good stories. It did make me wonder, though, what the actual context of the lines was, because I'm pretty sure that most of us didn't get the situation right. Y'know?"

He leaned back in his chair. "What was really interesting was when I took a year off between high school and college and I was traveling in Europe, and half the time I didn't even know what people were saying. I mostly hoped they weren't talking about me, because what fun is it to be paranoid? But you could pick up a lot from tone of voice and facial expressions, if they didn't catch you staring," another grin, "and it's like... people really aren't that different. I didn't go anywhere like China or Japan, although that would be awesome... have you ever been?... but I suspect they won't be different either. Not completely. Humans are humans and we all have the same emotions, even if we express them differently, and..." He cocked his head. "I'm babbling, huh? Have you ever been to Asia or anywhere? And since I'm supposed to be asking you about being creative, do you do anything creative other than gymnastics?"

Maxxie couldn't remember when she'd ever heard someone talk this much. Maybe Angie, that annoying little fourteen year old who had leapt into the spotlight to take gold when Maxxie'd been disqualified. She had to actually pay attention to even half follow his stream of consciousness rambling. "You're babbling," she confirmed. "And yes, I've been to Asia. I've been all over Asia and Europe. Just for Worlds' and the Olympics alone, I went to Beijing, Rome, Paris, Moscow, and of course, Tokyo."

She hesitated, pen tapping against the paper as she warred with herself over lying outright and answering honestly. "Ballroom dance," she finally said, "and Tae Kwon Do."

"That's really cool. I mostly went all over Europe, and quite a few places in the United States. It was fun." He paused, thinking about what she'd said. "Ballroom dance and Tae Kwon Do?" He couldn't imagine her doing any kind of martial art. But aside from that... "But those aren't really creative, though, are they? It's a preset routine that you follow. You're not creating anything."

As usual, he didn't realize how it might come across until it was out of his mouth, and he grimaced, but didn't attempt to take it back.

Her jaw set, angry and immediate in her reacting scowl. "It's how you interpret it. And yes, I have created something for tae kwon do. Creating my own form was a part of my black belt test." Just because they were the only routines she'd ever choreographed herself was no reason for him to sneer at it.

He brightened. "Oh, really? I didn't know that. When you create something like that, are there guidelines? Does it have to be a certain number of moves? What made you decide to take up Tae Kwon Do?"

"It wasn't so much a choice at first... I started when my brother was born. I took tae kwon do, dance, and gymnastics." Maxxie's voice was a little lower; tae kwon do wasn't something that had ever been a part of her spotlight life, or her interviews. It felt odd to talk about it. "I stopped doing tae kwon do when I went into elite level gymnastics, but I started again after the Olympics. It was a good way to help settle me. And I had a wonderful instructor back home." As if to offer counterpoint to the idea of settling down, the pen still tapped against her paper, and she shifted in the seat, toes swinging and brushing against the floor. "What about you? Ever thought about trying something like that? If you think you need help with coordination, it's amazing how working on something like a form helps you out."

Tom laughed. "I never really thought about it. I guess I've always just accepted it's my lot in life to trip over my own feet. I would be afraid I'd kick someone in the head or something." The corners of his eyes crinkled as he laughed at himself. "Plus don't you have to start when you're young, or you'll never be good at it? It'd just be embarrassing to get my butt kicked by a six-year-old."

He latched on to something else she'd said. "You have a brother? Me too. Is yours... no, wait, that's a stupid question. If you started when he was born, obviously he's younger. Mine is older. His name is Callum, and he's aweome."

"You can start as an adult." Maxxie stuck with the conversation about tae kwon do, which was easier to think about. "They have adult classes and they teach them separately from the kids, since adults learn differently anyway." Her toes picked up speed against the floor, in a soft sweep and scrape as they went back and forth.

"Alex is younger, yeah. He was 14 last August, and I'll be 18 in a few weeks." Maxxie paused, then put on a quiet mask as she smiled. "He's pretty wonderful." That part was completely true. "We weren't raised together, because I was in Colorado for so many years." Also true. "But it's been really great being back in Long Island with him the last couple of years." True, even if it left out a whole ton of information, like the guilt she felt over Alex's Joker when she was so miserable about exactly how her Ace manifested. And for the last part, her expression relaxed enough to show just how true it was. "I miss him."

"Callum is five years older, so he's twenty-five now. He's pretty much my best friend. I was pretty bummed when he went away to college, so it's been nice being back in the same city as he is. So you're originally from Long Island? I'm from Seattle, pretty much. The only time I haven't lived here is when I was traveling."

Maxxie tried to imagine being best friends with Alex, and it wasn't such a bad thought. Being best friends with someone honest, who actually cared, seemed like a nice idea although a bit pie in the sky and not at all like the way the world really worked. "But we're in Seattle. How can you be back in his city if he went away?" she asked, completely confused now.

"Oh!" Tom grinned. "Sorry about that. "We grew up in Renton, which is part of Seattle... sort of suburb but not?... and our parents still live here. When I was in middle school, Callum went away to college. He's a doctor like my parents, and he came back to Seattle to do his residency, but by the time he came back I had graduated high school and was traveling. But now we're both back. He has an apartment with a bunch of other residents, and I live in the dorms. During school vacations I still live at home, but I go and crash on his couch a lot because sometimes I get tired of my father's disappointed sighs."

"Why is your father disappointed in you?" Which was completely off-track and Maxxie was aware of it, but by this point she'd given up on the assignment in her effort to worm her way inside this guy's head.

"Because I have no intention of becoming a doctor. Because I don't actually show any natural affinity for anything in particular, and because I don't have a direction in life, a future all picked out. Because I'm happy to dabble in things until I figure it out. I think sometimes he looks at me and wonders how he could have raised a son so unlike him. He's not mean about it, just... exasperated." His smile faltered slightly, and his intent gaze finally broke. He lifted a shoulder and let it fall.

"You don't have to be a doctor to be successful," Maxxie said plainly, "although knowing what you want to do is a big help towards getting you there." Of course, she'd had goals since she was six, and then had lost all of it. "I always feel lost if I don't know where I'm going. Do you feel lost too, or does he just feel lost for you?"

"He just feels lost for me. I'm perfectly happy to meander. 'Not all who wander are lost.'" Tom's eyes brightened again. "What do you want to be when you grow up? Since you can't be a gymnast forever."

She wasn't even really a gymnast anymore, not the kind she wanted to be, which only made her smile more brightly instead of the bitter expression that wanted to slip through. "Psychology," she said, "or politics. I'm not sure yet, so I'll major in both. I like knowing what makes people tick." And she was good at manipulating them. Sometimes. But that didn't need to be said out loud.

"Psychology would be helpful in politics, I suppose," Tom said, considering. "Although I think a lot of politicians just hire people to do that kind of thinking for them. And they're concerned less with individual psychology and more with the group mindset, which would be sociology." He shrugged. "So you want to know what makes other people tick? Are you trying to figure me out right now? What do you think?" He sprawled back in his chair, lacing his fingers together over his stomach.

"I think you use words as a shield," Maxxie said without thinking first. "You talk so much that I wonder if you're hiding something behind all of it, because you come off as almost too open." She smiled slightly. "Which has nothing to do with creativity which is what we're supposed to be figuring out here."

"No, it doesn't." He shrugged. "But it's interesting, isn't it? And I haven't told you anything that isn't true. Maybe I do hide behind words, but really, I don't have anything to hide. You hide behind your smile. It never reaches your eyes. Makes me wonder what hurts so much you can't let yourself be happy." Which was probably a little too much honest, especially considering they'd only met each other a few minutes ago.

"I am happy," Maxxie lied, and how dare he say that? She'd always had the brightest smile on the floor... of course, no matter how hard it had been, she always had enjoyed performing, so maybe that made it different. "And you don't know me anywhere near well enough to ask anything else." Snap surfaced in her voice, clipping the words. She glanced at their classmates, trying to gauge how much longer they had, then at her notes, which were woefully slim. She wasn't sure what she was going to write up after this.

"That was another thing I learned in creative writing: show, don't tell." Tom didn't have any notes at all, and in fact seemed to have forgotten that they were supposed to be doing an assignment at all, or maybe he just didn't care. "Are you hungry?"

"Do you learn better by doing or by listening?" Maxxie asked, trying to scrape out at least one question for the assignment as people around them started to shift and pack up. Her brow drew together in a frown. "It's lunchtime, so I guess I am. Why?" Food, if she admitted it, was one of the nicest things about not being a nat elite anymore. She knew how well her body burned it and she could actually enjoy eating, as long as she let her body work it off after, rather than starving herself and eating a high protein diet for muscle building.

"I was wondering if you wanted to go get something to eat with me. Maybe finish this up, since obviously I keep dragging us off topic." Easy to blame himself for it so she didn't see it as an insult. She seemed the type to read insult where it wasn't intended. "I promise I don't bite. Vegetarian and all." He flashed his easy smile. "And I learn best by seeing, actually, followed by doing. Auditory least of all. I took a test about that in a different class last year."

"I'm not a vegetarian; does that offend you?" she asked. Finishing the assignment sounded like a good thing; going out to lunch with him was something else entirely. Although better, she figured, than meeting up with him again later. Her lips pursed. "We stick to the questions we need to ask for the assignment. Because I need a decent grade on this since it's my major and all. I'd look ridiculous if I screwed up the first class I took for it."

"It doesn't offend me," Tom said. "Although I'd certainly prefer it if you didn't decide to have a bloody steak in front of me." The corners of his mouth curled in amusement. "I'll leave it to you to keep me on task. Me, if I was a cat, I'd have used up my nine lives already, and then some."