R | WARM BODIES (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shambler) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thecapitol2013-12-11 09:27 pm
shambler) wrote in thecapitol2013-12-11 09:27 pm
Entry tags:
The date.
WHO| R and Julie
WHAT| R's on his gradual road to almost-humanity. He finally asks Julie out on a date.
WHERE| A coffee shop and park. Big wide open space.
WHEN| After Timaeus's party and this
WARNINGS| Mentions of zombie stuff
He must be having a good day: his feet don't seem to drag as often, his spine feels slightly less crooked. That, plus the way his stomach flip flops instead of lies there like a lump of meat, and R's starting to think that medication might actually be....working. He doesn't understand how it does. They could've gotten tired of his shuffling from Arena to Arena for all he knows. Or they could've taken his moans to Peeta and Shion to heart and decided to try curing the uncurable. Maybe it doesn't matter.
He asks Julie out.
R thinks he means a date, like...an actual date and not just them hanging out, hoping the other zombies (or Tributes) mind their business. A date date. It might be months and Arenas late, but still. He asks. Finally.
To his shock, she says yes. He wonders if she knows about Perry because back in that jungle, it seemed like Zombie Charades wasn't working out between them. Then he catches himself worrying about his groaning, his shoes, his hair and for awhile, there's no room for Perry. This is probably what it was like during life Before.
R's waiting by the coffee shop. His hair looks a little less brittle, a little less straw-like, and there's something that could be almost mistaken for a flush in his face. It's probably just a trick of the light. The smile that spreads behind his muzzle when Julie crests the small hill is more natural, less jerky as if the muscles are fighting off rigor-mortis. Julie's always brought that out in him. Smiles and even topping his old syllable record.
"Glad...you can make...it," R groans as his face lights up. There's still some pauses in there. He'll have to work on that. "Hi."
WHAT| R's on his gradual road to almost-humanity. He finally asks Julie out on a date.
WHERE| A coffee shop and park. Big wide open space.
WHEN| After Timaeus's party and this
WARNINGS| Mentions of zombie stuff
He must be having a good day: his feet don't seem to drag as often, his spine feels slightly less crooked. That, plus the way his stomach flip flops instead of lies there like a lump of meat, and R's starting to think that medication might actually be....working. He doesn't understand how it does. They could've gotten tired of his shuffling from Arena to Arena for all he knows. Or they could've taken his moans to Peeta and Shion to heart and decided to try curing the uncurable. Maybe it doesn't matter.
He asks Julie out.
R thinks he means a date, like...an actual date and not just them hanging out, hoping the other zombies (or Tributes) mind their business. A date date. It might be months and Arenas late, but still. He asks. Finally.
To his shock, she says yes. He wonders if she knows about Perry because back in that jungle, it seemed like Zombie Charades wasn't working out between them. Then he catches himself worrying about his groaning, his shoes, his hair and for awhile, there's no room for Perry. This is probably what it was like during life Before.
R's waiting by the coffee shop. His hair looks a little less brittle, a little less straw-like, and there's something that could be almost mistaken for a flush in his face. It's probably just a trick of the light. The smile that spreads behind his muzzle when Julie crests the small hill is more natural, less jerky as if the muscles are fighting off rigor-mortis. Julie's always brought that out in him. Smiles and even topping his old syllable record.
"Glad...you can make...it," R groans as his face lights up. There's still some pauses in there. He'll have to work on that. "Hi."
no subject
Her dad would have a shitfit. People walking arm-in-arm with corpses.
Yeah, she's glad, too. Glad enough that she watches him as expectantly as the hostess, waiting for the wheels to click together. Mostly because Julie's still on the recovery train, and she can admit she likes seeing him. You know. Get the human things right. It takes some really awkward amounts of time, but he gets it.
Julie doesn't waste a second, letting her foot slide in between his. If she'd had her way, there wouldn't be a table between them. Booths are better. She remembers booths. Not... white tablecloths and folded napkins.
With his question, she laughs. Really? A couple of deaths and running from zombies and this is their first date ice breaker? "Don't blow a gasket on me, R." He's not exactly the suave type, but he's more nervous than she remembers. This is like, first-meeting levels of jitters. When she'd been too afraid she was gonna be dinner to even give a shit if he was just as freaked out. "I dunno. I usually eat whatever I can get in the training center, you know?" She looks around. It's a little hoity-toity. A little. But the flowers that brush against the window brighten it up. In a non-obtrusive sense. She props her chin up on her hand, staring out through the glass. "It's weird. Going to a restaurant."
no subject
When she tosses back her head to laugh, she bares her neck at him. He drops his eyes before they go straight to her jugular, instead opting to stare at a little whorl in the table.
"No...waiters....back home," R says tentatively. He's a little hesitant to talk how much their shared world's gone to shit but he doesn't want to shy away from it either. Julie deserves better than that. "You...remember them? Restaurants."
He surprises himself both by getting that word out in one shot and also by asking her about life before Perry Kelvin breathed his last. He hasn't made a habit to groan about what Julie's experience of the post-apocalypse life was and he has no idea if she was old enough for the actual apocalypse (pre-apocalypse?) part, either. All he knows is it wasn't a wave all on one day - it was slower, a steady push city by city, state by state. More fences. More curfews.
Somehow he doubts restaurants were open that long: too many windows to cover, too many points of attack. It was safer to eat at home.
At least this one has a relatively high vantage point. Julie can look out the windows and see who, or what, comes up that hill.
no subject
Bet Nora would be flipping her shit, sitting in a restaurant. Getting served like a person.)
"I remember some. Bright yellow booths and sometimes the food came with little toys. The real battles back then were for the toys."
Plastic crap that sometimes she'd come across herself, scavenging. Sometimes she thought it was kind of a miracle she hadn't gotten all hoarder-crazy like R.
Julie turns to him with an amused smile. "I wish it was likewise, you know? I'd be into hearing your childhood antics. I mean, hoping you weren't stoner braindead by the time you hit twelve or something."
no subject
(He’d let the kid have the choicest bits. Then she’d gotten shot the next morning).
"Wish...could tell," R says, and not just because the lack of memory gapes in the back of his head, the absence almost painful. If only he could share who he was to Julie. Give her his take on the pre-zombie thing. “Think…I was…”
He turns shy again. He’s had theories about who he was, but they’ve always been personal. Just wishful thinking to pass the time.
Julie’s eyes are on him, a little smile tugging on her face that makes him want to sag back into the seat and just enjoy it. Instead he concentrates on the words, the scraps of memories he has. “Normal. Boring. Maybe had…pictures….”
They’re probably gone by now, between time and looters and zombies.
no subject
And sometimes she just kind of wanders off mentally or stares at his lips, wondering what they'd taste like. Then she shakes herself and tries to force disgust down her throat.
"Normal? Sure. Boring?" She picks her head up again. "Not a chance. No one's boring. I mean, no one back then. Everyone had their weird sparks. I guess I only noticed after most of them were dead." Pictures. Reminds her she needs to get a camera to bring with her everywhere. Something small. Will the Capitol print them out for her? "You've still got it, tiger." That spark. It's what sets him apart from the other shamblers. It's why he's got friends, even here, despite the muzzle.
"We gotta make some pictures, R. Just in case." There's her mind floating off again, getting caught in something else. Something to distract her from the Games. From dying. "I could get some paint. I haven't painted in months. You want a portrait? It'll be crap, but I bet I could sell it to one of your adoring fans."
no subject
R perks up at the suggestion. "Your...art would be..." He stumbles over his words and they have nothing to do with his undead status. Creating? Pieces of you on a canvas? His mouth stills behind the muzzle for a minute. "Love...it. But...don't sell."
Keep it. Maybe he's greedy or idealistic or romantic or all off the above, but her paintings are her and he doesn't know if the Capitol should have that for any price. The idea of Julie painting distracts R from the flowers, or the date location or even the menus he's supposed to be (faking) reading.
He looks as tickled as a zombie could get at the suggestion. Perry saw her art. But he'd seen it through a tarnished lens, one that just gave a little bit less of a crap every day and they'd gone from wonderful, amazing things to just paint on walls, paper. Environment. Filed away under won't penetrate a skull and forgotten. R doesn't want to fall into that pit. With a mind of its own, his hand creeps out toward hers as it rests against the table. Julie's studying him again, as if she's close to picking up the pieces and putting him together again like a jigsaw puzzle. It doesn't seem to matter to her if most of the pieces are missing.
His eyes still on her, R gently brushes his finger tips across her cheek and trails them down until he can clasp her hand and squeeze.
no subject
"It'd be pretty crappy." She grins, though, totally high from his admission. Love it. Really, huh? He must've not seen the paintings in her room. Probably for the best. The one of mom was especially bad. "But I won't sell it." He could hang it in his room or whatever. Or hide it under the bed.
As far as a restaurant date, it's not going that great. Usually she just eats something small when she feels a pang of hunger. There was a while where she was grabbing everything she could while in the Capitol, but she learned. Starving and gorging on and off might kill her. Besides, she'd been sick more than once and she'd like to go back to being some kind of normal weight. Something healthy, maybe --
She pauses. Her eyes might've gone wide, her smile might've turned a hint shy. Look, it's. It's just different with R, that's all. She's not exactly blind to the fact this is a date. Formal and everything.
Still. Huh. She turns her hand over and holds his back, rubbing a thumb over his knuckles. Like this is normal, she doesn't bat an eye once the surprise passes. "You still don't have an appetite for the human food, do you?"
no subject
"Not..." R pauses. If he was truly alive, the pause would've been theatrical, for effect, to gauge reaction. For him, though, he's busy trying to line up his words. "Yet. Maybe...soon..."
He knows Julie will have questions. And because this is a date and the sun is gleaming outside and her thumb is caressing warm circles around his skin, he purses his lips and gears himself, something that must be courage swelling until his chest feels like it'll burst. The first syllables come out in a flood:
"They gave me a...Cure," R struggles gamely on, his mouth working behind the muzzle. "Said..I'll be...different for...Arena. Be like...you. Wanted...to tell you."
He looks at their entwined hands, her pink against his grey, and looks back up at her face. She's smart, she'll figure out what that means. He's hoping it's a one-way trip back to life and the Cure won't reject him. Maybe one day they can hold hands and they'll both be the same pulse, the same skin flushed with blood and he won't look at her and have the hunger muttering in the back it wishes it could kill her already. Julie smiles at him, light reflects off the glass of water that's appeared next to her courtesy of a waiter, and he supposes this is what love with the Living must be like. Confusing. Hopeful. Looking forward to the future for a change even if Perry's suddenly on the horizon.
no subject
Everything drains out of her all at once. She barely blinks, staring at him across the table. Her hand stops moving.
"What?" A feeling rolls in her heart, turning it over, but -- look, they know better. As many times as she's prayed to every damn deity she could think of, there's no cure. (So why was it she was wondering that, when he somehow got into the stadium to find her? Why was she thinking he was more human every day?)
"There is no cure." She says it lamely, robotically. Julie's more than a little shaken by the fact that she knows Perry's said the same thing to her the exact same way. "I mean, R. I know they have some amazing stuff here, but -- but a cure..."
The problem is she wants to believe it. Not just for R's sake. Then again, she never thought she'd ever see a city filled with people again, did she? Untouched by the apocalypse?
Julie gets out of her seat so quickly that it scrapes loudly on the floor. Just a touch of his hand isn't enough. Her hand comes to his chest, right above his heart, the same way he's touched her before.
Is that...? No. Can't be.
no subject
Then it sinks in and Julie's suddenly up on her feet and leaning over the table.
His eyes meet hers as she touches his chest: it's warmer than before, only a ghost of a heartbeat but not that corpse cold either. Instead of stiffness, there's give. It's too bad his heart isn't thudding louder, he thinks regretfully. Would've be nice to surprise her with that. These days he worries it'll just stop, give up.
"Those I...infect...come back," R says, picking his words with care. His voice seems less hoarse than usual, almost...human. "Why...not my...turn? Escort said...change's...good."
He creaks out a smile, tentative, thankfully not showing too many teeth behind his muzzle. Hopefully one day, he'll be able to walk, not shuffle, to Julie and say what he really thinks in his head without worrying about syllables or decomposing on her. She's held out hope in the post-apocalypse life they've both shared, met a zombie who can groan words. There must be a little more room for this.
R's hand reaches up to touch hers, to remind her that what's happening is real. It's not some pipe dream.
no subject
But his skin gives. She can press it and it feels alive. A little warmth underneath it. Julie's pretty sure she's right. He'd be blue-eyed. Funny thing is he's had pretty eyes even as a corpse.
"Jesus, R," she sputters, a little choke coming up and stealing more words from her. Are we still home? Someplace where they have the cure, where this isn't a problem anymore?
No. She knows better. But. Goddammit. The whole world. A little give in skin at a time and -- how do they know it works? How do they know he won't just be a faster zombie?
"Change is great. Change is. Awesome." She smiles and rubs at an eye nonchalantly, though her other hand lingers on him. She's not gonna choke here. Not where there's people who'd kill to film her crying. Give other tributes the idea she's weak. But -- Dad. And the stadium. Field trips outside the walls. "You better survive that Arena for a bit, huh? You gotta enjoy this."
no subject
It's his first date with Julie Grigio and he's maybe made her almost-cry. Hard to tell.
On a whim, R reaches out and touches her cheek with a finger, grey against her pink, his nails still grubby because no matter what his Escort does, she's never been able to get years worth of grime and gore out. R tries to keep the worst of it from touching Julie's face as a matter of principle. Okay, don't poke her eye out. Not the best pep talk he's ever given himself. He's already committed to this.
He brushes against her eyelid, wiping away the barest hint of moisture. Tear? Wishful thinking? It's too hard to tell.
...Is she wondering about all the people she's lost? What if they could've been saved?
The thought rings in R's head, clear, cob-web free. His hand drops away from her face as he stares at her. Like everyone in the new world, she's lost people, and it wasn't just Perry. Some might've been saved from the infection but others...maybe not. R suddenly catches himself wondering about those, about the parts of Julie Grigio that Perry's never seen.
The appetizers arrive then on gorgeous porcelain plates. R's forgotten about food entirely, forgotten about the muzzle and the date. He shifts and gives Julie's hand a pat, aware the moment's fading.
no subject
And it spreads. One half-alive boy and her head spreads to those outlands around the stadium they could reclaim. The fact they wouldn't have to live in a goddamn stadium. Nora and her -- Jesus, her brother.
She takes her hand back and plops down in her seat. Even through this she can't forget that she's hungry all the damn time. Still, instead of eating she just picks at it on her little appetizer plate, watching him. "I'm glad you told me." Yeah, glad. Understatement of the year. "And the date's going well, so don't worry."
Tear aside and all. She's playing it off like that never happened.
no subject
He plays around with his own appetizer, swirling it around with his finger. He’s being daring and try to mix in raw steak with what might be sautéed asparagus and mushrooms. There’s probably some fancy name for the sauce that’s dripped over it, artsy and darting across the plate. Knowing his usual reaction to human food, R suspects he’ll be throwing it up later.
Or maybe not. With the Cure, who knows?
“Julie, I…” R opens his mouth after he’s choked down some of his own appetizer. He should bring up Perry now instead of sitting on it. But then he sees Julie look at him, expectant, and he loses his nerve again. His mouth flops, feeling particularly zombie-like today. “Wanted…say like…being…with you. Thank you.”
no subject
One of the best reasons to avoid the televisons. As much as she can, of course.
She chews the leafy bits of a piece of asparagus, soaked in juices and seasonings she doesn't even know the name of. Butter she recognizes; she remembers globs of it on baked potatoes at a cook-out. When people could hang out in a fenced off backyard and not have to worry if the barbed wire will hold.
Once she looks back up at him, she blinks. Flattery wars with that warm sense of, hell, embarrassment that he hasn't felt since Perry started flirting with her. She smiles, though, pleased and a hint flustered. "Yeah, me too." Maybe it's kind of nice, having a bit of freedom. No dad looking down to see if her new boyfriend was good with a Glock. Even if a very small, idiotically idealizing part of her wouldn't mind introducing them. (Thinking maybe Grigio's first reaction wouldn't be putting a bullet between his eyes.) "I mean, it... it helps. Being in there, knowing you are too."
Which is a shitty way to put it, but there you go. That's all she's got. Even if she lost Mom, she's always had someone. Dad, then Nora. Perry. Rosso. Now she has no way of knowing if they've survived the day.