Nori and Julio
Oct. 29th, 2007 10:42 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsAfter leaving the evacuee's movie night last night (log to be posted), Nori comes back to a silent house and her own little discovery. In the morning, Juilo finds her.
Julio was running out of places to hide.
Angel's father's place had to not been all that big to begin with, and with the collection of people and the general crabbiness it was getting smaller and smaller, and he could only spend so long in the bathroom. Especially after Monet took the door off the hinges.
More and more Julio hated the feeling of helplessness. Again, the teaching staff refused to tell them much more than "the threat's been neutralized" and to "stay away for your own safety". Julio alone knew who the 'threat' was, and it irritated him that the staff kept trying to coddle all of them.
It was getting to be that some days all Julio wanted to do was go home.
For now, the basement would serve as a place to stay the hell away from the others for a while. He descended the stairs, and then wrinkled his nose. He could smell alcohol, and he knew that Angel's father had a liquor cabinet down here. Were there rats? He took a few more cautious steps into the basement. Ah, no, just one big rat who was passed out nearby, empty liquor bottles strewn near her.
Noriko was dead to the world - something she hadn't been in, well, months. Ok, so it had taken most of a bottle of vodka, most of a bottle of gin and the beginnings of a bottle of burbon to achieve this state, but that was a sacrifice Nori was willing to make for Mr. Jones. When she'd come back from her walk last night most of the movie watchers had already crashed, and the ones who hadn't, well, it had been easier to avoid them than try to be pleasant. Which had led her to the basement and her wonderful discovery.
Julio knelt down by the snoozing Nori. He waved his fingers under her nose to check that she was still breathing, and then looked at the remains of her drinking spree. He gave a low whistle, impressed. He then folded his legs underneath him, next to Nori and began his tried and true method for waking sleeping drinks. It involved tapping a finger on their temple repeatedly. If they didn't wake fast enough for his taste, it would turn to flicking.
The tapping was not nearly enough to break through Nori's stupor. The flicking, when it started, eventually got a moan as the girl rolled over, curling onto her side away from the source of aggravation, but without waking up.
Whistling a jaunty tune through his teeth, Julio began to flick Nori's other temple. This was much more exciting than living in fear of getting sexually harassed by Jay. If she persisted, he could always poke her in the side.
This time he got a muttered, "Hora, yamete," in response as the girl waved a hand in Julio's direction.
"Ella vive!" Julio said. He grabbed a shoulder and began to shake her. "Oi, Nori, wakey wakey. The adults are coming and they will not be happy with you. Ahora."
"Hoshiku nai yo. Hoshiku nai!" But Nori sat up, looking groggy, although not anywhere near as groggy as she probably ought to, given the bottle count. "Julio... Nori tsukareta. Kita kara hajimete yoku neteita." She rested her elbows on her knees and her head in her hands. "Omae... baka." As her brain slowly started to get up to speed (thankfully a slightly lower pitch than before the binge last night) she finally endeavoured to switch back to English. "Nori is not want. Is sleep. From New York is first good sleep."
"Yes, well, it may be your last sleep if you are caught, no?" Julio picked up the vodka bottle and shook it, sloshing the remaining contents. "Mr. Jones might also have something to say about his vodka." Nori looked like death, and Julio figured if she wasn't still drunk her hangover was going to suck. He decided that it might be enough punishment for her. "Come on, pequeña rata," he put a hand under her arm. "Up. We need to roll you somewhere where there is no evidence."
Nori stood when he hauled her up, not swaying over much. "Is good vodka," she told Julio, leaning into him more because he was there and warm and comfortable (two things the basement hadn't really been) than because she needed the extra balance. There didn't even seem to be any additional slurring or hesitancy to her speaking, although given her dreadful accent it was hard to tell.
"That I do not doubt," Julio said. He wrinkled his nose again. The smell of alcohol was stronger with Nori leaning against him. Drowning out any mild 'Girl! Girl touching me!' impulses he was having. He shifted her so she wouldn't knock him over when they reached the stairs. "You drink much?" he added
The shifting about got him a Look and she straightened up, nose tilting up in the air slightly with a 'fine, be that way' kind of air. "Is not much," Nori informed him, frowning. "Is only two, anou, bottles." Which said rather more than she realized about the situation.
"So that is a yes, then," Julio sighed. A part of him wanted to inform the staff, but on the other. Since they were all about keeping them in the dark, why shouldn't it work both ways? However.
Julio stopped Nori and looked her straight in the eye. "I am going to cover for you this time," he said. "I will not tell anyone, and I will clean up. But I will only do it once. And you will owe me for it. You get caught again, it will be your own fault. Do not be so stupid next time."
Nori bristled - she didn't recognize all the words, but the tone was clear, and one word stood out. "Nori is not stupid," she bit out, glaring at him. "Is to want sleep. Is to want not zap. Omae shiranai. Kore, boku no mondai. Julio no sei jya nai."
"So drinking is the only way you can think of?" Julio said, trying to keep his words slow and enunciated for the Japanese girl. "Not only is that stupid, but it is dangerous. I do not drink. I cannot. My power is to break things. Cause earthquakes. You know San Diego? I did that. Because I was not in control. Who is to say that you will not lose control while drinking?"
The fact that he was at least trying to speak clearly, to hold onto his control despite what was obviously bothering him kept Nori from storming out on him, although the glare didn't lessen as she fought her way through his words. She missed a lot of the specifics, but the general impact got through and then the glare, if anything, intensified. "Nori not stupid, Julio stupid. Julio is not know. Julio always control. Drink is no control. Nori always no control. Drink is control. Sleep medicine is control. Nori power always more more more. Nori head always fast fast fast. Is power lots, is head fast, Nori is zap. Is no control. Drink is head slow. Is sleep. Is control!" By the end of this, which was probably the most English anyone had heard out of her at a time, Nori was shouting, and likely only her anger was keeping her from crying.
Julio looked down at the floor, trying to come up with the right words for Nori to understand. "I am in control, now," he said finally. "But when I first came to the school, I was not. I was just like you, Nori. I could not control myself. I had no control. I broke things. I hurt people." And he would have been no different than Nori, had he been able to gain control through chemicals or drugs. He remembered those first few months, when control was a tenuous thing, the slightest thing would cause him to rattle furniture or windows. Only the terror of causing a repeat of San Diego had kept him going through the worst of it. Nori hadn't destroyed a city, he didn't think, but there was something similar there. No one that desperate for control had a happy manifestation.
"Nori. There will be times when you will not have alcohol. Or medicine. And what will you do? It will always be a problem if you do not learn now. I found a way to be in control. For always. I taught myself how. In my head," he tapped his temple. "You can too. You will learn control. You will learn how to sleep again. You just have to try."
The mood swing wasn't as dramatic as it would have been last night, before the dampening of alcohol, but within moments she went from furious to resignedly distraught. Holding up her wrists she showed Julio the winking electronic bracers that hugged them tight. "Nori is never control. Bitch doctor say. Forge say. Nori always more power, never stop. Nori power out is koko... here no. So Nori power... slow. Is drink. Is not danger."
Gently Julio took hold of her wrist and examined the electronic bracelet. Then he looked in Nori's eyes. "Are you going to let that stop you? Doctors can be wrong. Forge has been wrong. I cannot shut off my power any more than you can. But I can ...como se, I can make it go in other directions. Places where it will not hurt people," he fought for the right words. He scratched his head, and then seized the empty vodka bottle. He pulled off his outer shirt and wrapped the bottle in it, and then held it in his hands. There was a soft crunching sound. When he opened the shirt, there was nothing but fine glass powder. "I can make it go where it does not hurt anyone," said Julio.
Nori blinked at the glass powder - not having any idea what Julio's power was meant this display of control was rather over her head, but Julio seemed to think it was impressive, so she'd have to take his word. "Un," Nori said eventually, looking down at the ground. "Danger room is safety. Kedo... Here, not safety."
Julio shook the remains of the bottle into a garbage can. "I also dispose of the evidence this way," he said cheerily. Then he sighed, looking back at Nori. "I do not know how to explain this to you any better than I have tried. Things will get better. You just have to try for them to get better. The drinking is not trying. It is running away. The drinking is stupid. You need to not go and drink two bottles where someone can find you." He picked up the gin bottle, poured the rest of the contents out and then shattered the bottle the same as the first, burying the remains in the garbage can. "Especially if you end up accidentally killing yourself. I will be most unhappy if Nori were to die."
Noriko moved to sit at the base of the stairs as Julio cleaned up, her arms wrapped around her knees and looking very small and serious as she watched him. "Hai," she said quietly, bowing her head to him. "Nori is think."
Julio was running out of places to hide.
Angel's father's place had to not been all that big to begin with, and with the collection of people and the general crabbiness it was getting smaller and smaller, and he could only spend so long in the bathroom. Especially after Monet took the door off the hinges.
More and more Julio hated the feeling of helplessness. Again, the teaching staff refused to tell them much more than "the threat's been neutralized" and to "stay away for your own safety". Julio alone knew who the 'threat' was, and it irritated him that the staff kept trying to coddle all of them.
It was getting to be that some days all Julio wanted to do was go home.
For now, the basement would serve as a place to stay the hell away from the others for a while. He descended the stairs, and then wrinkled his nose. He could smell alcohol, and he knew that Angel's father had a liquor cabinet down here. Were there rats? He took a few more cautious steps into the basement. Ah, no, just one big rat who was passed out nearby, empty liquor bottles strewn near her.
Noriko was dead to the world - something she hadn't been in, well, months. Ok, so it had taken most of a bottle of vodka, most of a bottle of gin and the beginnings of a bottle of burbon to achieve this state, but that was a sacrifice Nori was willing to make for Mr. Jones. When she'd come back from her walk last night most of the movie watchers had already crashed, and the ones who hadn't, well, it had been easier to avoid them than try to be pleasant. Which had led her to the basement and her wonderful discovery.
Julio knelt down by the snoozing Nori. He waved his fingers under her nose to check that she was still breathing, and then looked at the remains of her drinking spree. He gave a low whistle, impressed. He then folded his legs underneath him, next to Nori and began his tried and true method for waking sleeping drinks. It involved tapping a finger on their temple repeatedly. If they didn't wake fast enough for his taste, it would turn to flicking.
The tapping was not nearly enough to break through Nori's stupor. The flicking, when it started, eventually got a moan as the girl rolled over, curling onto her side away from the source of aggravation, but without waking up.
Whistling a jaunty tune through his teeth, Julio began to flick Nori's other temple. This was much more exciting than living in fear of getting sexually harassed by Jay. If she persisted, he could always poke her in the side.
This time he got a muttered, "Hora, yamete," in response as the girl waved a hand in Julio's direction.
"Ella vive!" Julio said. He grabbed a shoulder and began to shake her. "Oi, Nori, wakey wakey. The adults are coming and they will not be happy with you. Ahora."
"Hoshiku nai yo. Hoshiku nai!" But Nori sat up, looking groggy, although not anywhere near as groggy as she probably ought to, given the bottle count. "Julio... Nori tsukareta. Kita kara hajimete yoku neteita." She rested her elbows on her knees and her head in her hands. "Omae... baka." As her brain slowly started to get up to speed (thankfully a slightly lower pitch than before the binge last night) she finally endeavoured to switch back to English. "Nori is not want. Is sleep. From New York is first good sleep."
"Yes, well, it may be your last sleep if you are caught, no?" Julio picked up the vodka bottle and shook it, sloshing the remaining contents. "Mr. Jones might also have something to say about his vodka." Nori looked like death, and Julio figured if she wasn't still drunk her hangover was going to suck. He decided that it might be enough punishment for her. "Come on, pequeña rata," he put a hand under her arm. "Up. We need to roll you somewhere where there is no evidence."
Nori stood when he hauled her up, not swaying over much. "Is good vodka," she told Julio, leaning into him more because he was there and warm and comfortable (two things the basement hadn't really been) than because she needed the extra balance. There didn't even seem to be any additional slurring or hesitancy to her speaking, although given her dreadful accent it was hard to tell.
"That I do not doubt," Julio said. He wrinkled his nose again. The smell of alcohol was stronger with Nori leaning against him. Drowning out any mild 'Girl! Girl touching me!' impulses he was having. He shifted her so she wouldn't knock him over when they reached the stairs. "You drink much?" he added
The shifting about got him a Look and she straightened up, nose tilting up in the air slightly with a 'fine, be that way' kind of air. "Is not much," Nori informed him, frowning. "Is only two, anou, bottles." Which said rather more than she realized about the situation.
"So that is a yes, then," Julio sighed. A part of him wanted to inform the staff, but on the other. Since they were all about keeping them in the dark, why shouldn't it work both ways? However.
Julio stopped Nori and looked her straight in the eye. "I am going to cover for you this time," he said. "I will not tell anyone, and I will clean up. But I will only do it once. And you will owe me for it. You get caught again, it will be your own fault. Do not be so stupid next time."
Nori bristled - she didn't recognize all the words, but the tone was clear, and one word stood out. "Nori is not stupid," she bit out, glaring at him. "Is to want sleep. Is to want not zap. Omae shiranai. Kore, boku no mondai. Julio no sei jya nai."
"So drinking is the only way you can think of?" Julio said, trying to keep his words slow and enunciated for the Japanese girl. "Not only is that stupid, but it is dangerous. I do not drink. I cannot. My power is to break things. Cause earthquakes. You know San Diego? I did that. Because I was not in control. Who is to say that you will not lose control while drinking?"
The fact that he was at least trying to speak clearly, to hold onto his control despite what was obviously bothering him kept Nori from storming out on him, although the glare didn't lessen as she fought her way through his words. She missed a lot of the specifics, but the general impact got through and then the glare, if anything, intensified. "Nori not stupid, Julio stupid. Julio is not know. Julio always control. Drink is no control. Nori always no control. Drink is control. Sleep medicine is control. Nori power always more more more. Nori head always fast fast fast. Is power lots, is head fast, Nori is zap. Is no control. Drink is head slow. Is sleep. Is control!" By the end of this, which was probably the most English anyone had heard out of her at a time, Nori was shouting, and likely only her anger was keeping her from crying.
Julio looked down at the floor, trying to come up with the right words for Nori to understand. "I am in control, now," he said finally. "But when I first came to the school, I was not. I was just like you, Nori. I could not control myself. I had no control. I broke things. I hurt people." And he would have been no different than Nori, had he been able to gain control through chemicals or drugs. He remembered those first few months, when control was a tenuous thing, the slightest thing would cause him to rattle furniture or windows. Only the terror of causing a repeat of San Diego had kept him going through the worst of it. Nori hadn't destroyed a city, he didn't think, but there was something similar there. No one that desperate for control had a happy manifestation.
"Nori. There will be times when you will not have alcohol. Or medicine. And what will you do? It will always be a problem if you do not learn now. I found a way to be in control. For always. I taught myself how. In my head," he tapped his temple. "You can too. You will learn control. You will learn how to sleep again. You just have to try."
The mood swing wasn't as dramatic as it would have been last night, before the dampening of alcohol, but within moments she went from furious to resignedly distraught. Holding up her wrists she showed Julio the winking electronic bracers that hugged them tight. "Nori is never control. Bitch doctor say. Forge say. Nori always more power, never stop. Nori power out is koko... here no. So Nori power... slow. Is drink. Is not danger."
Gently Julio took hold of her wrist and examined the electronic bracelet. Then he looked in Nori's eyes. "Are you going to let that stop you? Doctors can be wrong. Forge has been wrong. I cannot shut off my power any more than you can. But I can ...como se, I can make it go in other directions. Places where it will not hurt people," he fought for the right words. He scratched his head, and then seized the empty vodka bottle. He pulled off his outer shirt and wrapped the bottle in it, and then held it in his hands. There was a soft crunching sound. When he opened the shirt, there was nothing but fine glass powder. "I can make it go where it does not hurt anyone," said Julio.
Nori blinked at the glass powder - not having any idea what Julio's power was meant this display of control was rather over her head, but Julio seemed to think it was impressive, so she'd have to take his word. "Un," Nori said eventually, looking down at the ground. "Danger room is safety. Kedo... Here, not safety."
Julio shook the remains of the bottle into a garbage can. "I also dispose of the evidence this way," he said cheerily. Then he sighed, looking back at Nori. "I do not know how to explain this to you any better than I have tried. Things will get better. You just have to try for them to get better. The drinking is not trying. It is running away. The drinking is stupid. You need to not go and drink two bottles where someone can find you." He picked up the gin bottle, poured the rest of the contents out and then shattered the bottle the same as the first, burying the remains in the garbage can. "Especially if you end up accidentally killing yourself. I will be most unhappy if Nori were to die."
Noriko moved to sit at the base of the stairs as Julio cleaned up, her arms wrapped around her knees and looking very small and serious as she watched him. "Hai," she said quietly, bowing her head to him. "Nori is think."
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Date: 2007-10-30 12:44 am (UTC)Que?
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Date: 2007-10-30 04:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-30 02:50 am (UTC)I love you so much right now. :)
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Date: 2007-10-30 11:40 am (UTC)Wow, Julio really thinks it's all about him, doesn't he? Couldn't possibly be a national security issue. ;)
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Date: 2007-10-30 02:50 pm (UTC)Teenagers.
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Date: 2007-10-30 03:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-30 04:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-30 04:57 pm (UTC)