Room 227 | Sunday Morning

[necroslacker]

Sam hadn't slept last night. Usually, that wasn't a huge deal since he tended to sleep alone but now that he was living with his girlfriend, it was kind of hard to hide that from her at the very least. He'd laid there for awhile and then he'd gotten up and puttered around the room and eventually went for a walk.

Look, he'd been trying hard to make sure those ghosts didn't appear at night, okay? It was either not sleeping or wearing the pouch and he chose...not sleeping. Because he was an idiot.

But, he was awake now. He had a bowl of cereal in front of him, his skateboard laying wheels up next to his hip and his back against the foot of the bed. A few records were near his feet and one of them was on the record player, filling the room with quiet music.

But hey, he hadn't been entirely unproductive this past weekend. He'd gone into town, gotten himself a job, and now he was eating cereal and was about to fix up his skateboard.

So, things...could be worse.

[Door closed, post open!]

Comments

[whenshewasnice]

Hey, at least those could largely be blamed on Jace. If it had been just her, she would've preferred to just repress those thoughts.

"I've consciously not been thinking about what happens once the summer is over," she admitted, "but no."

[necroslacker]

"My comment still stands," Sam said, shrugging. "I still don't wanna be an ending even if you don't have a specific end date in sight. You asked what I wanted to be. I told you."

[whenshewasnice]

"You're not an ending, Sam," Natalie replied, a little more softly than before. "But even you don't think this is forever."

[necroslacker]

"Nothing is forever," Sam pointed out, shaking his head. "You should know that too."

[whenshewasnice]

"I do." Hence the earlier statement 'everything ends'. She was fairly secure in her knowledge of that, yes. "So what is your point with that?"

[necroslacker]

"Never mind," Sam said quietly, shaking his head. "I just see things in a weird way, I guess. Not important, though. It's cool. We're cool."

[whenshewasnice]

"Are we?"

Well, she hoped they were. She just wasn't so sure.

[necroslacker]

"Why wouldn't we be?" Sam asked, shrugging his shoulders again. "I'm fine."

If a little sad but he was bottling that up.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie could kind of guess that, though she wasn't going to prod at it. Not right now.

"Okay," she said. There was a moment that she didn't know what to do, there. Then she turned, and went to start making the bed.

Not the greatest decision, probably, but. Awkward.

[necroslacker]

Yeah, Sam knew she was doing that just for something to do, really. He sighed again but it was quiet and he barely heard it himself. He finally got his feet moving and picked up his cereal bowl. There was still some milk in it so he swirled it around for a second.

"Gonna go wash this," he told her back before heading towards the door. "Be right back."

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie exhaled an "Okay" that was barely more than a breath, and kept doing what she was doing.

At least the bed would probably look pretty neat once she'd be done.

[necroslacker]

It didn't take Sam too long to wash his bowl and dry it. Before long, he was stepping back into the room, clean bowl in hand. Man, he hated things got like this because he wasn't sure how to fix them especially when he was dealing with sadness to boot.

He hated moments like this.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie hated them too. With a passion.

Done with the bed, she'd moved on to hunching over to dig through the dresser for something to wear that wasn't a dressing gown. Clearly it was a task that required much focus and effort.

Or she was still at a loss for anything useful to say.

[necroslacker]

Being silent at each other was not Sam's idea of a nice, relaxing Sunday. But, he didn't want to leave because he knew she'd take that badly because he'd take it badly if she left.

So, he looked at her back a little longingly, trying to think of something to do before he picked his skateboard up and took it over to his desk. He dropped it on top of the desk and rolled it idly back and forth against the surface.

[whenshewasnice]

Well, there were different kinds of being silent. The kind they'd had before, when he'd been having breakfast and she'd been on her laptop, that had been fine. This, on the other hand, sucked.

But Natalie didn't feel like breaking it, yet. Instead, she picked a shirt and a pair of pants, and started undoing the belt on her robe.

[necroslacker]

Sam wanted to break it. He just didn't know how. And so he gave his skateboard a frustrated shove off the desk and listened to clatter against the floor. He left it there and came over to sit on the bed, back to her and elbows on his knees.

Yep. Sucked.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie fliched a little at the sound of the skateboad hitting the floor, but refused to acknowledge it otherwise. Instead, she went on to take off her robe, then slip her tank top off, too.

She had probably never paid this much attention to the simple action of changing clothes, ever.

[necroslacker]

At this point, Sam was close to giving up. He didn't know what to say, he'd told her his thoughts and now they were stone walling each other. So, whatever. Fine. He could do that.

He stayed where he was and pulled his phone out of his pocket. There were a few messages from Ramon and he started responding to them for lack of anything else to do right now.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie pulled the new shirt on – it hung off her like something about a size and a half too big – and moved on to the pants. Once those were on, too, she went to go hang the robe up.

In pressing silence. Joy.

[necroslacker]

At this point, Sam was getting annoyed. At himself, at her, at their fantastic ability to misunderstand each other, at everything. He kept his attention on the phone though, trying to channel his frustration into texting Ramon to see how Seattle was.

He kept his back to her.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie was much better at repressing her frustration, anyway. She wanted to break the silence, kind of, but she didn't have anything to really say that hadn't already been said.

Still, once she'd hung up the robe she turned to look at his back, and wondered whether she should try anyway.

[necroslacker]

Sam didn't look close to breaking the silence, at least. He was hunched over his phone, arguing with Ramon about something stupid because he was irritated and trying not to let it all bleed out over their very, very pleasant silence.

Ugh.

Ramon called him a name and Sam scowled and texted an insult right back at him. So childish.

[whenshewasnice]

Yeah, he really didn't look like he was about to do anything useful about this situation, either.

Natalie closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then let it out as a sigh. See, this was why she didn't have trouble understanding the points of view of some of her friends. Life would be easier without moments like this.

[necroslacker]

And Sam, unfortunately for her, was picking up on some of her feelings of reluctance without really meaning to. He couldn't help it, of course. It just happened and he hated it at times like this.

His back went a little rigid and tense. He didn't turn around.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie opened her eyes and tried not to sigh again when she saw the change in his back. So, it was more of an internal sigh, this time.

She moved, though. Coming over to the bed, getting one knee on it, then the other.