thecapitol | Tell Me I'm Gonna Be Alright [Open]

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Tell Me I'm Gonna Be Alright [Open]

WHO| Howard and OPEN
WHAT| Binge-eating is a public sport.
WHERE| Below Timberline
WHEN| A few days after the rave.
WARNINGS| None yet.

It was a bad idea to give Howard a credit card. At least, unless the Gamemakers intended for him to get himself into ridiculous amounts of debt in record time eating out, which they probably did. As soon as he found a restaurant and the fact that the credit card apparently meant 'infinite money' to him, his mind was set on milking it for all it's worth.

Which is, at the moment, a few plates and some doggie boxes full of food to take home. It doesn't matter that there's foods in the suites. For the moment, he's living in the land of plenty, and he's going to take every opportunity he can to enjoy it. His stomach perpetually aches and cramps with the feeling of being too full, but after too many months of brutal starvation, he'll take that feeling over hunger. After two plates he's even managed to stop eating with his hands and go back to using silverware, although he still brings each plate close to him as if certain the other patrons are going to try and take it from him.

He just wishes people would stop staring at him. He knows it's inevitable, he's a tribute, and while he isn't one who did very well he did bash someone's head in. Every time they look at him, he's reminded of that. He tells himself that Lottie's alive and death isn't real in the arena, but just the idea of it makes the otherwise delicious food seem tasteless.

"There is a limit on this card, you know," someone says as they ring it up for another plate.

"Shut up," he says in return.

And when there's another full plate in front of him he starts on that, too, the taste on his tongue reminding him that here in the Capitol, he's safe. In this place, the bad things are temporary inconveniences until you come back to this life of luxury. He's going to be okay.

Another forkful, he's going to be okay.

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Eponine's eyes widen. She can't imagine that. Guns were rare enough, and devestating - but a gun that could kill one thousand people all together? That was far, far more than Eponine could count or even properly imagine. She runs a hand through her hair without thinking, tugging half of it out of the straggly ponytail she sported.

"Is that a song from your home? It is a nice tune, but... I don't want to be a rat. I wasn't born a street rat, you know? And none of us - think of those who have already been in arenas; this was our first; I saw you entering, M'sieur. None of us deserve it. But there is nothing I can do for you or anyone else. I can only look after myself. I wish it was my cage and other people were the rats."

Howard realizes for the first time just how different his and Eponine's times are - and how difficult it might be to adjust to the idea of being able to blow a whole town off the map. He's had his whole life to get used to the idea of the atom bomb, and over a year to come to grips with the idea that thousands of people can just be gone in a blink. Were just gone in a blink. The whole world outside Perdido, and his parents and teachers and grandparents too.

"Yeah, it's, um, Smashing Pumpkins, I think." He bites at his nail. "I wasn't either. I mean, I'm not even a street rat now, not really, or maybe we're all just street rats back home."

He doesn't like the idea. He doesn't like how this place, and the FAYZ, tamp down the civilized sides of their nature. But he doesn't know how to explain that.

"Got to agree with you, though. I got nothing against you, Eponine, but I'm only looking after myself."

"Still, at least it is nice that you remember my name."

She grins. Usually, it takes more than two conversations before people actually bother to remember her name.

"So, if it comes to it, in the arena? Would you kill me? If it was me or you? Would you do it?"

"That's because it's a funny name. At least, where I'm from, it is." He's about to say that it sounds like a seizure disorder to him, but realizes that she's probably not going to take that well and stops himself.

He bites his lip. "If there was no other option? I think I could. Kill you. Maybe. I don't know." There's footage of him killing a woman from the last arena, but that hardly counts, that was a mercy kill, she'd begged him... "Probably."

Deep down he knows the answer is yes.

"A funny name? Do you really think so?"

Is it really a funny name, Eponine? "I had always liked it. It stayed the same every time, you see? I might be Thenardier or Jondrette or another name through the year, but always Eponine."

She laughs, just to fill the silence really, whilst she digests what Howard tells her.

"Well then, M'sieur. You will owe me a lot of ice cream." She tries to keep the disappointment and bitterness out of her voice, buut doesn't succeed very well.

"Well, unusual. Not funny like haha, funny like...memorable." Which can only be a good thing here. "I guess it makes me think of horses, which, I mean. Generally is a good thing. I give most people nicknames, but I don't really feel like I should give you one."

He doesn't laugh in return. He doesn't want to ask the question back, doesn't want to acknowledge that he's admitting to being capable of stooping to lower levels than her. "If it ever comes to that, you can have my credit card when we're both out."

As if that makes it better.

"Take the money you would make from killing me?"

That makes her laugh all the harder. She's probably coming across as a little mad, but she doesn't care. Doesn't even realise.

"I would not do that for you, if I killed you. I would take everything you had, and I would not give it back when we next met. I will hold you to that, though, when you kill me. If you do."

Howard lets her laugh. It's an empty gesture, really. Money doesn't mean much when the training center covers their base needs.

"Well, we probably won't anyway. Odds of either of us making it to the end are pretty low, aren't they? You won't kill and I'm a skinny little rat who doesn't want to. Not exactly winner material."

"You never know though, do you? Things happen; we could find a good place to hide and wait it out. After all, if you are a skinny rat, then I am no better than you. And rats; that is what we are good at; hiding, no?"

She thinks back to that conversation she'd had with the woman on the magic screen thing.

"I will need a good hiding place, I think, where they can't see me at all. And I do not WANT to kill. I will not kill if there is a way to avoid it. But if someone asked... perhaps."

Or Marius was there. Though she wouldn't kill him herself. But she'd lead him towards a trap, so she could try to save him. They could die together then... and maybe he would love her if that happened, She stands lost in thought as she contemplates Marius. Would she do it? Would she dare?

He laughs, finally. "That's a good point. We're definitely good at hiding. As long as we don't get the toxic plague like last time, maybe we can wait out all of everyone else killing each other."

Then he frowns again, although that's partially the nausea. "If they can't see you at all, they won't bring you back for the next round. And you'll never see Paris and..." What was the guy's name? Mario? "That guy you like again."

"The man that I like?"

She laughs but stops abruptly. "There is no man that I like. Only M'sieur Marius; he is my friend. I think."

She shrugs. "He would not notice if I did not come home. He doesn't often notice. Not many people do."

Eponine again speaks matter of factly; she's not fishing for sympathy or pity; she'd be disgusted at them both if he reacted in such a way. She feels really awkward, and her body language reflects it. Her shoulders hunch forwards, and her knees bend a little, and her hands are clenched into balls by her side. It's her face though, the way she bites on her lip to make sure she can feel something; every time she says that, she feels a little bit more dead inside, and it's her eyes, the way she's suddenly looking at some point over Howard's left shoulder, rather than directly at him.

"That is why you surprise me that you remember my name. Why won't you give me a nickname? It means we are friends, does it not?"

"Yeah, Marius. That guy."

There's a funny expression on Howard's face, a sort of sympathy and more than that, recognition. It's as if Eponine's taken on the pose Howard only takes fully in the dark, that crumpled stance and chewed lip betraying that still waters are full of sinkholes. Howard runs two fingers over his own lower lip, feeling the cracks there.

"For what it's worth, my friend's not going to notice that I disappeared, either." He doesn't imagine that's much consolation to her, but supposedly misery loves company. "And you don't want the nicknames I give people. They usually aren't very nice."

He doesn't really want to call Eponine a friend yet, either. Someone he can binge-eat with and talk to, maybe, but he hasn't had good experiences with friendship.

Eponine starts walking quickly. She sees the sympathy in his eyes and she hates it.

"Do NOT." She mutters it, but it's a vicious mutter. She REALLY doesn't want to have to accept his sympathy. She doesn't really react to his statement about his friend. Perhaps she sighs a little, but she doesn't react otherwise. She doesn't really have friends at all. She calls Marius her friend - but is he really? He barely notices her now that Cosette is here. There. But Howard... he's the closest thing to a friend she's ever had, except perhaps Marius.

"Oh. Then there are lots that are given to me. I wouldn't like you to call me those."

She walks quicker, ignoring the sickly feeling in her stomach.

"What, I didn't - hey, wait up!" He picks up the pace, not quite sure what it was he did to offend her so badly. "Why are you walking away?"

There's a desperate and confused keen in his voice. He never knows what it is he's doing wrong, to push people away when he doesn't mean to. He's not sure what fundamental flaw he's nurturing that makes it so people never stay.

She stops and turns. Her voice, when she speaks, is quiet, but there's definitely anger in there.

"Do NOT look at me like that. I don't WANT your sympathy. I do not deserve it and I do not need it. If you look at me like that, I don't want to speak to you."

It just makes her remember how bad her life is, and quite honestly, she'd rather forget about it all.

"I don't- I didn't..." Howard cringes when she turns, as if expecting her to reach out and slap him. He doesn't know what sympathetic look he apparently gave her. He swallows and bites the tip of his tongue. "Fine. I'll look at the ground."

"Okay!"

She stares at Howard. Did he really cringe? She notices only because it's her own reflex reaction when her parents or 'Parnasse are about. For a minute, she just watches Howard, but then she walks back to him, and slips her arm through his.

"Come. I'm sorry."

She isn't.

"It's just... just don't - please don't. It makes me hurt here."
She points to her throat, "and here." She moves her hand to her stomach.

"This is a place for sad subjects... but I don't like being sad."

"Me too." Though he's still not sure what he's apologizing for. He lets her take his arm, despite not being much a fan of touch.

"Yeah, let's find out if they have an arcade around here or something. Um-" He realizes Eponine might not know what that is, or at least, not by the standards of his world. "A gaming parlor, I guess."

The Training Center seems even less inviting now that they've endeavored to avoid sad things.

"I've never been to one of those."

Eponine grins. "Will you show me? I can do poker and the like! I'm good at poker. The Patron Minette let me play with them sometimes; they are MASTERS at poker, far better than me. They can cheat you out of your money before you can say 'Jimmy o' Goblin!'"

Howard snorts. "I've never said 'Jimmy o'Goblin' in my life, I think, but yeah, if we find people playing cards we can join."

He taps at the sleeve on his wrist. "Besides, I can cheat too."

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Tell Me I'm Gonna Be Alright [Open]

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