Participants:
| Scene Title | Knock Next Time |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Samara wanders into Aaron's apartment and gets a conversation she was not expecting. |
| Date | February 27, 2011 |
(Peyton and) Aaron's Apartment — Upper West Side
Another day, another dollar.
Even in the climate of the day, and his evolved status, Aaron has managed to hold down a job. Despite all arguments to the contrary, it is yet another retail job. Rather than handling a till, though, he has stuck to less personable duties. This clerk returns home after yet another day of tedium, a few groceries in hand.
As he enters the apartment he once shared (at different times) with three other people, he finds solitude once more. "One of these days," he says to the empty space, "You and I will have words." He kicks off his boots. "Maybe." His coat's next, and he then takes the groceries into the kitchen and puts them away. Bare necessities.
He prepares his microwave dinner, delicately placing the repulsive meat-like replicate upon fancy earthenware alongside nuked peas and mashed potatoes. His fork is set to the right and his knife — for a knife is absolutely required to cut such an unsteak piece of meat as such meals provide — on the left. They're precariously placed just so that their tips align at the bottom of the uppermost eighth of his plate.
He pours himself a glass of red wine and then takes his seat at the table to begin consuming his meal, however dreary it is. Each cut is done with precision, the knife set aside before he takes a bite. The meat, lacking in flavour as it is, is washed down with a sip of Bordeaux before Aaron's sense of flavour is once again assaulted by dreary insulation-like mashed potatoes and crispy, nuked peas.
She said she would visit again.
It's been longer than Sam had intended. Much longer.
Three quick raps against the door interrupt the dinner, announcing Sam's presence. But then, thanks to Brian's thoughts on phasing, she walks through the door. No reason to make Aaron get up. When she appears on the other side, she issues the man with the meal a lopsided grin. "Hi Aaron!" It's bright, chipper, happy. Content. It's an unusual thing to find these days; someone with such vitality and life that she exudes.
There's a curious raise of her eyebrows at the dinner ritual, but that's all it is, a raise of her eyebrows. Her hands disappear into her pockets as she treads a little closer, her gaze turning up to the place that she knows well enough. Well enough to know where to expect.
"Sorry for walking in— didn't want to make you get up…"
Fingers grow rigid against the table, fork set down though knife still gripped in hand. Aaron taps the base of it against the table a few times before looking up. Then he returns his gaze to his food and resumes the masticating of the most-definitely-not-Salisbury-steak. Once he has finished and washed it down with a sip of wine, he remarks, "You have the most atrocious manners."
He sets his knife down and works on the mashed potatoes before dabbing at his mouth with a cloth napkin and deciding he is finished with the mostly uneaten meal, as evident by the displeased smacking of his lips. "The mere idea of anyone surviving on this sort of garbage is impossible to comprehend. It is not food."
"Oh come now!" Sami counters as her hands move to her hips defiantly. "I was saving you trip to the door." She shoots him a brilliant smile, evidently Ms. Phaser capitalizes on what she has. Cuteness. It's how she rolls. A glance is cast down to the meal as her eyebrow quirks upwards, "You're eating it though. You must be able to survive it, right?" she asks quietly.
"The nuthouse had better food than this," Aaron says, though he does in fact resume eating in in institutional style. Save for the knife. They were plastic back then, provided there were any in the first place. And there weren't always. "But then, that food was supposed to be nutritious. I can't say the same for this … meal."
After 'surviving' another bite, he asks, "So, how are Brian and Gillian, anyway? Good, I hope."
"Brian is good," Sam answers with a smile as she edges a little closer. "Well. Goodish." Evo flu had hit the children. That'd been enough to unsettle everything. Her throat clears a little tersely at the thought of Gillian though, unsure whether to deliver the not-so-good news. There's a small frown that edges her lips, just a clue that she's about to say something unsettling.
"Gillian is sick." She swallows hard around the growing lump in her throat. "Evo-flu."
"Pity."
Aaron takes another bite, and it's not until he's had another sip of wine that he goes on to say, "Well, best keep your distance then. No point in getting yourself sick, too." Then it's silence, save for the scraping of his knife as he saws through the faux Salisbury steak.
Well that's unsettling. Sam all-out frowns at the callousness of the statement, even if she knows where it's rooted. Her fingers splay in front of her in a what position before she lets them retreat back into her pockets again. It's just safer that way. She sighs quietly and nods a little, "I'm not allowed to see her anyways. They don't let evo people close. Otherwise— " she doesn't finish the thought, choosing just to shake her head.
"I thought you were friends. You and her. Even if you can't feel you should feign some emotion for those around you," it's a simple statement. "Being a good sociopath means pretending that you can feel things." She learned that from television. Best. Educator. Ever.
"Perhaps that's true, I could feign emotion. It's an intriguing idea." But if he acted on all of his intriguing ideas, they would would be having an entirely different conversation, if conversation at all.
His fork and knife clank onto the earthenware plate as he finishes his meal, the plate more or less clean, save for some remaining drippings he felt were not deserving of entry to his palate. Instead, he stands with his wine glass, topping it up from the bottle.
"Perhaps you're right, I've been going about this so terribly, terribly wrong, holing myself up here so. If I cared, I wouldn't continue to live in this empty apartment, yet another reminder in my life of all of the things that have been taken from me. It would seem I am in need of some new roots."
The wine goes down his throat in one fell swoop—definitely not the proper way to drink wine. But whoever said Aaron was proper?
Sami lifts her chin while her eyes narrow at Aaron a little, not quite sure of herself or Aaron, for that matter. Her hand rests on the counter and she props herself against it. "Yes. See? Pretending to feel things is better than not. Think of that world out there! It's good to be out there and meet people and see things— you should be doing those things!"
"Knock next time," Aaron says as he moves past her and enters the living room. "It's improper to go walking through people's doors, you know, even if it is to save them the trip." His eyes affix on a letter he's left sitting on the coffee table since he found it there the other day. He wanders over to it and picks it up, folding it back the way he found it. Then he tucks it under the keyboard.
"Perhaps I should get out and do certain things."