Continued from yesterday:
“As for actual FTL travel, there’s a possibility that one may have trouble with dimensional instability… assuming one finds a wavelength boundary defined by the word ‘light’, of course. Wormhole travel is far more…” Sara trailed off when she saw Todd.
He was pale. Shaken. Relieved to see her.
“Trouble?” she asked as he slid back into place by her side.
“…meh,” he said.
His hands were red-raw and covered in blisters. “Darling… what *happened*?”
He was shaking, glimpsing back the way he had come. He looked like he’d seen a ghost… or a Dragon. “Don’t worry 'bout it?” he begged.
“You’re hurt,” she said. “It’s natural to worry.” She reached into her bag for the 'carry pack’ of Hank’s miracle skin goo and, holding Todd’s hand as gently as a butterfly, carefully applied the balm. A forensic fragment of her mind took over, cataloguing his injuries.
Even as Todd sighed and snuggled up to her, she could guess what had happened.
“How’d you manage to soak your hands in hot allergen?”
“I… I was stoopid, yo. Washed my hands wit’ soap.”
“In scalding-hot water?”
Todd looked up at her. Pleading. “Don’t ask. Please.”
“But–”
“There’s stuff you just don’ need t’ hear, sweetness. Not here. Not now.”
Sara treated his other hand, where the fingers poking through the plaster just had allergy-blots and minor scalds. “I’m just going to worry until you tell me, you know.”
He was struggling with it, turning over and poking a newly-opened wound. “Later,” he said. “Just… later. When we safe. Okay?”
Interesting choice of words. What, if anything, was unsafe *here*?
Duncan Matthews and any of the Senior Thug Squad was out. They wouldn’t know about Todd’s sensitive skin, and they lacked the necessary fine motor control to hold a struggling victim’s hand[1] under a hot tap without getting at least partially burned, themselves. Teachers, as a rule, didn’t physically torture their students[2]. So who could possibly have a motive for entering a schoolyard and torturing a student?
And what on *Earth* would the motive be?
Alternately, there was deliberate self-injury. Except that Todd had had enough of pain inflicted upon him to not court enduring pain himself. Self-injury was… illogical.
Not *him*.
“All right,” she finally decided. “When we’re safe. But the *instant* we’re safe, I want some answers.”
[1] Remember Todd broke his left hand? I barely did.
[2] Yay irony
~
Todd chewed a corner of his lip, feeling a distant burning in his gut. “Sure sweetums,” he said, though he wasn’t really keen on giving those answers, even when they were safe. There were just some things a man should never have to tell his girlfriend. But he’d already said he would and he couldn’t bring himself to lie. _What’s the problem, yo?_ An inner voice chided. _She trusted yo with all her secrets._ But somehow, this secret among others just wasn’t the kind best let out. Todd thought he understood why.
This kind of stuff wasn’t supposed to happen to men. And if it ever should, men weren’t supposed to talk about it. With anyone. They were instead supposed to track down whoever did it and beat the crap out of them with a tire iron. Then go have themselves a beer.
Whereas it could happen to women. And women could cry, rant, rage or talk about it all they wanted. They weren’t just expected to, they were entitled.
Case in point, popular media. Todd had sat through a couple of Lifetime movies when Tabby had control of the remote. Of course he’d focused on his sketchbook while he sat on the floor or couch, but occasional snags of dialogue filtered through to his attention. The Lifetime channel was a network that took real-world issues, from the street and from the domestic apartment, and applied them to beautiful actors and actresses so the audience would give a shit.(1) And of course after they botched things, they tacked on a superficial happy ending to minimize nasty calls to the network. Couldn’t have people thinking the justice system was flawed or anything.
Nothing ever happened to men in those movies (not that Todd sat through a whole lot of them to be sure). On TV, whenever a sex offender hurt a little boy in their family, the parents would magically believe the kid against the grown up’s own word. Todd knew for a fact that some parents just didn’t want to know. Papa Tolensky had belted him one when Todd had tried to tell him about Uncle Manny, yelling that he didn’t want to hear about his son’s faggot fantasies in the bathtub. And Todd had approached him in one of his good moods.
After that he’d never told anyone, not until he got sent to the hospital and Uncle Manny was arrested. Todd hadn’t wanted to, but he babbled the whole story when it became apparent they wouldn’t let him go home until he did. Of course since the police hadn’t taken an official statement, had manipulated him for information, and since Todd was too much of a wreck to even sign anything, the testimony was practically useless. They did, however, find a bunch of child pornography and videotapes in Manny’s bedroom on a raid. Some of them costarring Manny. Unfortunately, the method the police had gotten this evidence by was against his civil rights and also could be thrown out of the courts. For a while that was the defense’s main and only argument. However, since Manny worked part time at a daycare center and since one of his duties involved diaper changing, the parental outcry was louder than the defense. The evidence was not thrown out, and Manny was thrown instead into state prison, where he could be expected to get the full treatment.(2)
And, as he’d expected, Todd got the shit beaten out of him for telling the truth when he came home.
_Try to put that on TV,_ he thought. _I dare ya, bunch of fucking cowards._
Todd shifted against Sara, and looked down at his hands. “I wasn’t even paying attention to the pain back there,” he muttered at random. At least they didn’t hurt anymore. He looked up at her and smiled. It was faint, but it reached his eyes and it was genuine. “But thanks, sweetums. It don’t hurt no more."
"You mean your hands? Or you?” Sara asked, putting her arm around his shoulders.
“My hands,” confessed Todd as he leaned in to her. He closed his eyes and focused on her voice, only her voice. The echoing clatter and clamor of the cafeteria faded somewhat. “I’ll be okay,” he promised.
(1) You can tell how much I *love* the Lifetime channel. </sarcasm> ^_^;
(2) Most inmates in prison have been molested at some point in their young lives. So when a sexual offender gets sent to prison, he can expect to be either raped, killed, or beaten any day of his sentence. I’m sure Manny had oodles of fun.
~
Dragon wounds. Sara knew the signs. This was something for a private moment away from the maddening world. Just like no-one here could possibly overhear what it was like to be six years old and have one’s mother absolutely loathe one.
Sara gave him what comfort she could, and felt much relieved to see his usual hue restore itself.
Todd’s answers - even the thin reassurance that he didn’t hurt any more - only lead to the question: what was so awful that he wouldn’t notice scalding-hot water?
She knew from personal experience that it took quite a while for the hot water taps in the school to 'warm up’, as it were, and deliver anything resembling hot water. It would take *effort* to burn oneself - or someone else - in those sinks.
“If you say so,” she allowed. She wanted nothing more than to whisk him away from any trouble and wrap him up and keep him safe… but there were *obligations*. And on a Wednesday afternoon, that meant AP Chem and study hall. Which meant, once again, facing Mr Hinkley.
Who now blushed and stammered a lot whenever he glimpsed her. And appologised when he still accidentally used the wrong pronoun.
Evidently, the fact that she now wore clothes that made her look feminine had him flustered. As had the knowledge that she always had been female.
The bell rang, making each of them moan for their own reasons.
“See you in detention, love,” she said.
“As if I’d miss it,” Todd grinned.
Mr Hinkley wasn’t in AP Chem. There was someone new.
He wore the sort of cheap suit that tried valliantly not to look cheap, but couldn’t help the unfashionable cut of the inexpensive fabric that gave it away. He was greying, clean-shaven and reeked of Old Spice. His face… struck Sara as being oddly familliar.
She’d swear she’d seen him somewhere before…[1]
“Good afternoon,” he said with a fake Germanic burr to his accent. “I am Mr Haufmann[2]. I vill be your teacher for ze rest of de term.”
_Oh boy. I should tell Kurt about this guy. He’d have *fits*._
“I vill now be calling ze roll.”
The rolls had been altered, evidently, to contain the students’ first name and last name. No more avenues for confusion - or so they hoped. Sara answered her name with a “Jawohl.”
Some students giggled. Jean Grey did her level best to pretend she didn’t know her.
“Sprechen zee Deutch?” Mr Haufmann mangled the phrase.
“Ja, Ich verspreche Deutche,” she said in perfect German. “[And how is the weather in Stalag thirteen?]”
_Cut it *out*,_ Jean 'said’.
_Aw, come on. Everyone knows that’s a fake accent. I can almost hear the _Hogan’s Heroes_ theme…_
“Wunderbar, wunderbar,” said Haufmann. He had no clue what she’d just said. “Moving along, if we please.”
Okay. So he was very bad at pretending to be German. She had to wait and see if he was any better at being a teacher.
[1] Unca Manny doesn’t have a broken nose, so that’s throwing her off.
[2] Assumed name, family connection - you decide.
~
Todd got into his Alegbra class with a sigh of temporary relief. He hadn’t seen Manny in the halls upon leaving the cafeteria. His muscles had yet to relax from the tension of walking alone through to class. Mrs. Grear called roll and launched right into upcoming test announcements, including what would be on it. Todd already knew what would be on it - a bunch of math questions that forced one to solve a problem a certain way. Why they were pressuring students to learn this and not something actually useful - like how to budget and understand tax forms - was beyond Todd’s ken. But it was something to concentrate on to get his mind off more pressing matters.
He got his book and notepad out of the backpack with one hand. The other didn’t hurt as much as it would have without Sara’s skin medicine, but Todd was now aware of what he’d done to it. Mrs. Grear took one look at his hands and announced that he needed a partner to help him take notes.
“Ke-hrist,” Todd muttered under his breath. “No thanks, I can manage alone,” he protested. She paired him up anyway, having the insight at least to choose a student who turned in homework and actually passed most of the tests.
“Harley?” Mrs. Grear called into the back of the room. A girl with long blonde hair that most cheerleaders would kill for and a figure they would most certainly not, squirmed down in her seat as heads turned to look. Mrs. Grear smiled at her and motioned her to the empty desk near Todd. “Why don’t you come a little closer to the front today?”
She nodded and grumbling, acquiesced. Harley sat beside him amid the teasing hoots and snickers.
“Cheating on your boyfriend? Ooops, I meant your girlfriend?”
“With Harley the harlot no less."
"She’ll write her number somewhere in those notes you know."
Harley sneered without looking up and muttered something that might’ve been 'bunch of witless asshats’, but Todd couldn’t be sure.
"Ey, don’t pay them no mind, yo,” Todd tried, guilty she had been made the centre of attention on his behalf.
“Easier said than done, you know.” She pushed up her glasses and sat with her shoulders hunched, scribbling down notes as Mrs. Grear began her lecture. Todd officially had nothing to focus on now save for the pieces of plaster flaking off of the cast and even those lost appeal. Soon enough he was going to have to explain things to Sara and then came the chore of trying to find out what the fuck Manuel was doing here in his school. Todd figured he could go to the office after school and ask the secretary -
[Plip]
A rolled up ball of paper bounced off Todd’s shoulder and landed in front of him. He stared at it. Harley looked over at it, rolled her eyes and bent her head back over her notes. Sighing, Todd opened the ball of paper and read. He boggled and read again in disbelief.
There was something insidiously torturous about being near the front of a classroom when it was this hard to keep a straight face. Noticing his attempts, Harley raised an eyebrow. Todd let out a quiet snicker, wrote something beneath the scrawled stupidity and passed it over to her. She frowned briefly at the fact that he was passing notes, but read anyway. Then she had to look away with a smirk.
Written was:
“Your gf is cheeting on you. With some chick named Ilene. I herd her talking about taiking her for a ride. Must have swiched teems. So sorry."
Underneath it, Todd had written:
”(Eileen is her BIKE) XD"
Sometimes a complete fucktard could be a most welcome distraction.
~