Participants:
| Scene Title | Ice Cream Sleepover |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Just because you're grounded doesn't mean you can't have a little fun. |
| Date | February 24, 2011 |
It's a quiet afternoon at Bay House, subdued though the necessary repairs are still being done. Koshka has tasked the younger kids with making pictures, as many as they could scrounge up scrap paper for, using up the last of her candy stash to as payment for the artwork. One day she'll manage to replenish that, likely the same day she's allowed to leave again on her own. Until then, she's on a break from the sweets.
The teenager herself is working in the living room area. She's got a styrofoam cup in one hand filled with paint, the other hand holds a thin paint brush. She's working on the finer details, the missed spots and edge work that larger brushes and rollers don't catch. Koshka has been at the task for while now, paint speckling her hands and fingers, eyes showing a tiredness from the intense attention to detail. Even so, it seems a task she's enjoying.
Having been to Bay House previously, Adisa now knows, somewhat, how to make her way to the house on her own, with her own car. With little traffic out this way, Adisa is fairly sure that she wasn't followed. Something that she's sure is important to places like this. Making her way closer and closer to Bay House, she finally arrives, and parks her car off to the side, under the awning that Brian had mentioned to her the other day.
Approaching the door that she had previously entered the house, Adisa knocks, before entering and finding herself in the kitchen area, like before. "Hello?" She calls out. "Like, is anybody home?" She asks cautiously.
There's not an immediate response, except for a slight pause from the living area. Then, "Adisa?" Koshka's voice rises in question. She hadn't been told the outcome of her conversation with Samara's younger sister, she'd only just found out the sobering news that's had Brian and Sam both on the verge of tears. Thus, the quiet, somber mood of the house at the moment.
Carrying the cup and paint brush to the kitchen, Koshka's gaze finds Adisa almost as soon as she enters. "Hey," she says quietly, shooting a look over her shoulder. "I didn't know you'd be here. C'mon in, I was just painting. Trying to get the place ready, so… Sami and Brian don't have to work so hard."
Adisa doesn't know what sobering news anyone has heard. But then, Brian was acting quiet and strange the other day. Regardless, she puts on a smile and starts to head toward the familiar voice. Only it would seem that Koshka beat her to the punch. "Koshka! Hi!" She says, chirping happily. "I like, totally thought for a second that it'd like, been decided that this place wasn't like, a good place to stay. Or something. It's totally too quiet here. And like, I thought there were supposed to be kids here! Aren't kids like, supposed to be loud and stuff?"
With a shrug, however, Adisa giggles. "Painting? Sounds like fun. But, I'm totally here to talk, you know? Though like…I suppose I could help if you wanted me to?" Starting to move, she pauses. "Oh wait! There's totally ice cream in the freezer for us! Do you like, want it now, or later?"
"They're drawing and doing art kinds of stuff." Koshka shrugs and sets herself up at the sink to rinse the brush. "We can go to my room and talk and have ice cream. It'll be fine and that way… we aren't bothering anyone." Once the water runs clear through the brush, it's placed on the back of the sink. The cup is covered with a bit of plastic and spoons for ice cream, and that ice cream, are both found.
"C'mon," Koshka says again with a small grin, nodding toward the hallway. She leads the way to her room, sparsely furnished with a sleeping bag and pillow and a few extra blankets. "It's not much… kind've miss my room back at Brian's place. But it's home now."
"Art? Drawing? That like, totally sounds like my mom!" Adisa grins. "She like, this artist. And stuff. And daddy's a doctor. Who'da thunk it, an artist and like, a doctor?" She shrugs. "I hope you like, totally like rocky road!" It's an afterthought, more than anything, as the ice cream is taken out of the freezer. Following Koshka, she smiles as the approach the room. "It's totally quaint in here. You should like, paint smiling suns and stuff like that in here. Totally brighten up the place!"
Koshka sits at one end of the sleeping bag-bed spot, motioning that Adisa can join on the other end. "Maybe, I don't know. I'm… I was going to pick out paint for my room with…" She pauses to shrug, setting the ice cream and spoons near the middle, then looks up at Adisa. "Anyway. How are you and …everything?"
Adisa shrugs. Taking the seat beside Koshka, she crosses her legs and turns so that she can face the her. "If like, you totally need help with deciding how to make up this room? I'm like, more than totally happy to help, 'kay?" She rolls her eyes. "I'm like, totally, you know, baffled. I was like, talking to my friend Amy Benson who told me that her sister Francine said that she was told by Jerry Bergmann that he overheard Franky Jackson tell Emily Harris that my old boyfriend Jack Tillman was totally going out with that no good biker chick, Hailey Jenkins." Breath. "I was like, 'Oh…em…gee. He is not going out with her. But then I texted him, and he said he totally was. I just about freaked. Like, total Amy Winehouse freaked."
Adisa sighs and shakes her head. "Anyway, like, how are you? How's like, being stuck in this place day and night? Is it like, totally boring? Is all you do paint and clean? I think I'd like, totally die if that was all I did." She frowns. "And like, what's up with this whole 'stealing' shindig. Like, why were you like, stealing in the first place? Like, yeah."
Koshka only half way tries to follow the story. She's polite about it, though, rolling her eyes appropriately and commiserating without words, save for the mutter a derisive, "Boys." The following questions have her shrugging, a slight attempt at her usual response of deflecting. She rubs a still paint-dirty across her face. "To be honest, it's been the week from hell."
The younger girl looks toward the door, then back to Adisa. "It's not bad here. I can go out with Sami and Brian, but.. not alone right now. Fixing up the place is kind've fun, but a lot of work." She pauses, eyes falling to the her feet, to her shoe laces. "Stealing was… it's complicated."
It's quite a confusing array of names, really. Probably only someone who knew all these people would be able to keep track of it all. Like Adisa. She takes pride in how many people she knows. "Boys. Tell me about it!" She tilts her head slightly, moving her legs around a little, this time bringing her knees up to her chest and hugging her arms around them.
"I like, totally couldn't imagine not being able to like, leave a place on my own. It's like…like…baffling." Adisa shakes her head. "But then, there can't like, be all too many vehicles here, right? So like, you probably don't like, have much of a choice, one way or another." She frowns. "Complicated? Girl, did you not just hear my story. Complicated is like, totally my thing. I've totally got the time. And we've got ice cream!"
"It's a little more than…" Koshka sighs, arms wrapping around her knees. "Um… I… ran away from home last August. Use to steal just to survive, especially after the riots in November made things…" Harder. She's made her stand refusing to register, but it's come with its own cost. With a shrug, the girl continues her explanation, hoping a back story would eliminate some of the confusion. "I got into some trouble just before Christmas and some fishermen helped me out. They took me in, let me live with them for a while."
Lowering her chin to her knees, Koshka's shoulders raise and fall with a sigh. "Brian and Sam asked me to live with them, asked me not to steal anymore. I promised I wouldn't, and then I met Daryl. We… it was just… It was easy to get back into it again, and …It was stupid. I shouldn't have done it."
As she listens to the younger girl, Adisa starts to dish them out some ice cream. The first bowl is passed to Koshka, while the second bowl goes to herself as she returns to her previous position. "So like…ummm…" Okay, to be honest, this isn't the sorta thing that Adisa is used to dealing with. Yes, she helped out at a Ferrymen operation in Chicago, but she did more of the cooking and cleaning and playing with kids. She didn't do anything quite so serious.
"So, like, did Daryl get you like, back into it or something?" Adisa asks slowly, taking a small bite of her ice cream. "What's it like, to steal from someone?" She asks timidly. She's curious, of course. She's never done it before. "Is it, like…you know…" She clears her throat. "Never mind." She takes another small bit of ice cream and swallows slowly.
"We talked about it, and… I mean I told him I'd stolen before." Koshka takes the ice cream, straightening out of her hunch a little. "And… he thought it was cool that I had done it and got me thinking I could still do it. Maybe just once. But it was …it ended up being more than one time and I got caught." Worse, she got caught and he'd made her call Brian.
"Stealing is… it's a thrill." The younger teen won't lie, it's got a certain appeal, the risk of being caught, the adrenaline rush. "It's dangerous though. Even before… I've been hit and threatened for doing it."
Adisa shakes her head. "I'm like, totally sorry to like, hear that, Kosh. But like, maybe if he was willing to, you know, like, let you do it again, he like, wasn't the best guy to have as a boyfriend?" She frowns. "I'm totally sorry we didn't get a chance to go on that double date. But like, maybe we'll get another chance some day?"
There's a bit of perked interest in Adisa's demeanour. However, that's all. She's not about to go stealing from anybody. "But like, you're not gonna steal any more, right? I mean, I like, totally understand that you'd had to do it before, right? But like, now you've like, got a place to live and food and like, people who care, right?"
Koshka shakes her head slowly, her eyes focused on the ice cream. She hasn't tried any yet, the spoon pushing and poking at the frozen treat as though disinterested. "It's… it'll never happen again. I was stupid to do it in the first place and… I put everyone at risk and… it's not happening again. It cost more than it was worth." Like the trust of her guardians.
The bowl is placed on the floor, relatively untouched, and Koshka draws her knees up again, arms pulling around them. "Daryl called me a couple days ago too. We… aren't seeing each other anymore. And… he hates me. Which… I guess isn't as bad as it feels since… he proved Brian right."
Relationship issues. One thing that Adisa knows how to talk about. But first thing is first, "Look, people are like, totally fine now though, right? So like, you don't have to worry about that. No one else at risk and like, all is well…right? Well, not all is well. But like, they're like, not as bad as they totally could've been." She smiles softly.
"But like, as far as Daryl goes? I say, you may've liked him and stuff, but it's totally like my ex-boyfriend, Jack Tillman? If he's like, totally willing to take a walk on that wild side, but like, he totally wasn't worth you. You are so totally so much better than him. He doesn't deserve you."
"I know," Koshka says quietly. A toe stretches out and pushes at the bottom of her bowl. "It still doesn't make it easier. Just… I should've listened, you know? Should have thought and not been stupid. It's not something I'm going to do again. Ever."
Adisa eyes Koshka. "Uh-uh. Ain't no way we're gonna be havin' any 'should'ves' or 'could'ves' or any of that kinda talk. 'Cause it sure as rootin' tootin', owls hootin' don't make any kind of difference." Perhaps she spent too much time with her grandparents, starting to talk like that. "Now, we're gonna have some ice cream and we're gonna have a sleepover. Sound good to you?"
"Yeah," Koshka answers with a nod. She glances up at Adisa, managing a half grin before picking up her bowl of ice cream. "Thanks for.. coming out here. And the ice cream." And for the friendship, her grin says. "I'll show you the tunnels later. They're pretty cool. Go all under the house."