Room 223, Wednesday Night

[life_inshadow]

Four days back in Fandom, and Tara had finally gathered her courage to call her father and explain where she was and, by the way, could he see about arranging transport for Mr. Moxy from one coast to the other?

It was one of the more excruciating conversations Tara had ever had, filled with Mr. Maclay's indignation about daughters who swanned off out of the blue to God-knows-where with God-knows-who and worried everyone and didn't do their duty, and what their mothers might think about it. But in the end, he grudgingly agreed Tara could have her cat back if she paid for the shipping. (Incidentally, he wanted to know, who ever shipped a cat? Was this some dirty witch thing?)

Whatever nice impulses he'd had right after Tara's mother died, it was safe to say they were long gone.

Once she finally got off the phone, Tara flopped onto her bed with her eyes closed and the door slightly open. Two classes down, one to go, plus a day at the Magic Box.

She could do this.

She had to.

[OOC: I worried far too much about what was happening to the dang imaginary cat while she traveled. Open post, either way.]

Comments

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

In a completely weird and probably never to be replicated moment of coincidence, it just happened to be the start of a new school year in Kennedy's timeline too. Not that she was going to school herself; she just happened to be reading an article about the upcoming grand opening of the new Sunnydale High, and it made her wonder if Tara had made it back to Fandom yet.

So naturally, it seemed like a good idea to pick up the phone and call to find out.

[life_inshadow]

Tara sounded muffled as she picked up the phone. Sleepy, maybe, or just generally out of it.

"Hey," she said. "What's up?"

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

There was a lot of background noise on Kennedy's end of the line, muted but evident, and the occasional distant blare of a taxi horn hinted that she was outside. (Private patios at restaurants where people knew her dad were awesome.)

"Hey," she answered. "Nothing really, just thought I'd say hi. See how you were doing and stuff, you know?"

[life_inshadow]

"Hi," Tara repeated into the phone. "I'm ... okay. Two classes down, one to go. There's a class with zombies now."

She leaned back, shifting her pillows to a more comfortable position. "I talked to my dad."

Which might help explain why she sounded out of it.

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

Kennedy sucked in a sharp breath between her teeth, because yeah, that explained it.

"Not so cool with you taking off after all, huh?" she asked, fiddling with her water glass.

After a moment: "Sure they'd have the zombies class now."

[life_inshadow]

"Not really," Tara said, with a bit of a sniffle. "I d-disappointed him. He said. But --"

She was trying to sound braver.

"Anything I do will do that, right? I just have to live my life."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

Kennedy was glad she was trying; it made the impulse (not as dormant as she thought it was) to be the brave one for her less urgent than it could have been; that wasn't her job any more.

The impulse to be blunt was never going to go away, though.

"His disappointment can bite me," she said forcefully. "Pretty sure you could breathe and he'd be disappointed. So screw that."

[life_inshadow]

Tara couldn't help it; for some reason, that made her giggle. "Screw it," she said. "I'll stay here and go to college and never call, and he can just stop throwing my mom at me. Like he understood her."

She wasn't sure how much she meant it, or would follow it, but she knew she wanted to mean it.

"He's shipping out Moxy, anyhow. I m-miss him."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"Atta girl," Kennedy said fondly, grinning out at the traffic through the gap in the patio hedges. "That's good to know, about Moxy. I was kinda worried about that fuzzball. I miss him too."

And you, she didn't add.

[life_inshadow]

"I miss Bailey," Tara said, sounding a bit more grounded. "Tell me what he's doing now?"

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"Figuring out how to get into the linen closet," Kennedy admitted sheepishly. "Which I keep telling him is kinda ironic, all things considered."

[life_inshadow]

"Why would it be --?"

Tara was a little slow on the uptake.

"Oh. Oh! Tell him closets are for sheets,not bunnies."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

Kennedy smothered a laugh. "Tried that. My bunny-persuading skills need work, though. How's the island doing?"

[life_inshadow]

"It feels weird without you or Sookie or Jono or even Emma Frost, you know?" Tara said, wrinkling her nose. "But no biteys, except in zombie class. And my bed turned into a nest the other day. That was nice-weird."

She glanced over to Natalie's side of the room and added, "They gave me a new roomie. She's ... quiet."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"Sounds like a not-disastrous arrangement," Kennedy mused. "So props to the office for that. And yeah-- I miss that kind of weird. I keep waiting for tiny animals to show up, or look out the window and find out it's raining peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and no luck."

She paused for a moment. "Must be weird adjusting, huh? You had a room to yourself for, like, forever."

[life_inshadow]

"I don't even remember when Fiona left for good, but it has to be a year ago," Tara admitted. "Maybe more. The new one...."

She glanced over at Natalie's side of the room. "She likes computers and anime and stuff. We haven't really talked a lot."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"Kind of a geeky type? That's kinda cute. Sadly, my perspective on how long ago it was isn't going to help much," Kennedy said wryly. "But-- hey, how long have you been back, anyway?"

[life_inshadow]

"Um, I got back on Saturday and this is Wednesday," Tara said. "School just started."

A nervous beat.

"When is it there?"

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"...huh," Kennedy said after a surprised moment of her own. "It's actually September here, so like four months since you visited, which means you probably got back to Fandom while I was sleeping last night or something."

Stupid confusing time difference.

"I'm kind of glad to know you're back, though."

[life_inshadow]

"Yeah, I figured you would be," Tara said, closing her eyes again. It was probably bad to talk to Kennedy so familiarly; they were supposed to be broken up, but it didn't feel over when they chatted like this. "And ... I am too. Really. Just overwhelming at first, you know?"

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

Overwhelming? Kennedy couldn't honestly say she knew; they'd always had really different concepts of the word. Still, she thought she got it, and made a wordless noise of understanding.

"Big adjustment." It didn't occur to her, either, to wonder if talking like this was a bad idea-- not from her year-and-a-half-later vantage point, anyway. Besides, if the other option was to stop caring, it wasn't really an option at all.

"Having Moxy around again should help with that."

[life_inshadow]

"Make it feel more familiar again?" Tara tried. "Probably. Plus I just miss the fuzzball."

She stretched her arm, up, touching the familiar wall. Her wall. "It's home, either way. Really."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"Where the heart is and all that," Kennedy remarked-- little cheesy and cliche of her, but that was what happened when she tried to be deep sometimes. "I can dig it. Besides, isn't the purring supposed to be, like, therapeutic and stuff?"

[life_inshadow]

"That's what they say," Tara confirmed. "I think it'd have to be, right? I mean, hard to imagine somebody being all sad and mean when they have a bug orange cat snuggling them."

[brat-intraining.livejournal.com]

"And Mox is good for that," Kennedy agreed, grinning faintly at the memory of him attacking her shoes. "I mean, unless you're a hedgehog but that's more my thing."

A beat.

"My apartment is a lot bigger at that size, just FYI."