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gooseberryhigh2017-07-31 10:28 pm
quinning) wrote in gooseberryhigh2017-07-31 10:28 pm
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Who: Ty Hawkeswood and Quinn Cunningham
When: March 27, close to curfew (During the overnight camping trip)
Where: A walkway near the campsite
What: Quinn gets Ty high as a coping mechanism for his fear-o'-the-woods, Serious Talks follow. PLEASE BE AWARE THAT DOCTORS DO NOT RECOMMEND MARIJUANA AS A HEALTHY COPING MECHANISM
Warnings: Some language, some risqué talk (actually I don't know the latter for sure because we started it 5 months ago but lbh this is Ty and Quinn, they must have.)
When: March 27, close to curfew (During the overnight camping trip)
Where: A walkway near the campsite
What: Quinn gets Ty high as a coping mechanism for his fear-o'-the-woods, Serious Talks follow. PLEASE BE AWARE THAT DOCTORS DO NOT RECOMMEND MARIJUANA AS A HEALTHY COPING MECHANISM
Warnings: Some language, some risqué talk (actually I don't know the latter for sure because we started it 5 months ago but lbh this is Ty and Quinn, they must have.)
Eventually, Ty and Quinn had parted ways with Dimi for a while, retracing the paths around the campsite while the other boy returned to the fire and the other students. They'd talked for a while and smoked another joint and eventually settled on one of the walkways, sitting with their backs against the railing. Feeling far more relaxed than he'd ever expected he would in the woods with dusk fading slowly into night, Ty slips his arm around his girlfriend's shoulders and leans over to give her neck a ridiculous, playful little nuzzle. "This was a good idea. Did I say that? That you're brilliant? Because you're brilliant."
He laughs at this joke that isn't really a joke (Quinn is brilliant), then sighs contently, and leans his head back against the railing. "But you probably know that. Right?"
Quinn laughs softly into Ty's hair, and rests her head on his shoulder when his goes back. She'd been hesitant (again) to suggest one last round before bed, but when his high started to wear off in tandem with real dark falling it became more intense than she expected, so she figured he had little to lose if he was already going to have that bad of a night. "Mmm, I've heard it once or..." she counts Ty's brilliants by tapping her fingers two times on his thigh, "twice."
Ty grins and laughs and gives his girlfriend an affectionate little squeeze. "Only twice? Seems inadequate," he opines playfully, "I'll work on it."
She looks up, only able to see his chin and a shock of bleached hair, so she lays a quick kiss on his jaw before she settles back into his side. "So, you think it's helping with the... woods thing? Think you'll be able to get some sleep tonight?"
He pauses to consider the question, but only briefly. He feels a lot better than he normally would in a situation like this. No anxiety. No thinking about how the trees and the dark around them seem to go on forever. No thinking about the past. Though, he'd still like to be back at camp and tucked into a sleeping bag with Quinn before it gets to be pitch black. Warm and safe and sleep sounds pretty great anyway. "I think it helps," he agrees slowly, "I think you help. So...I think so. Yeah. I'm good."
Another quiet "Mmm," can be heard as Quinn slides an arm around Ty's waist. Small details feel more pronounced, like the fabric of his shirt that she's twisting lightly between her fingers, or the rise and fall of his chest with every breath. It's easier for her to focus on those things and let go of her usual worries about responsibility, and they can only barely hear the voices back by the fire, so it's quiet. She's relaxed. It's nice.
Thinking about how she's actually kind of okay with camping right now (but only while high!) brings her back to Ty. She's tried not to pry but that hasn't stopped her from becoming concerned for him; it's obvious that he doesn't suffer from City Mouse Syndrome like she does, and they go to camp school, after all. She decides to prod every so slightly, although she currently possesses neither the plan nor the tact that would make her inquiry easier to mask. "It's not as bad back at school, right? Even though we're still in a forest?"
"Hmm?" The silence had given Ty's mind time to wander and he'd closed his eyes, almost starting to doze, but Quinn's voice draws him back. He glances down at her and smiles. "Sure. As long as it's not night and I'm not wandering around in the middle of it, I'm okay. Walking to the Grotto is a bitch, but Raf and Chris and you never make me go by myself. So I can deal. And walking back..."
Quinn rolls her eyes and takes a brief intermission from playing with Ty's shirt to poke her fingers into his side—not enough to hurt, but in hopes that it's at least enough to tickle him. "Because I care about you, genius. Which... fine, yeah, is a side effect of falling in love with your sorry ass." Her tone remains affectionate despite the name-calling, and a smile—half playful, half sheepish—spreads across her face by the end.
Whether or not the jab actually tickles, it is enough to get Ty laughing again. And he obviously doesn't mind the name-calling because his only protest is the plainly cheeky, "Hey. I have a nice ass."
(Ty's not about to get any protest from Quinn either, who nods sagely at the defence of his behind. She's spent a lot of time appreciating it; she's become something of an expert on the matter.)
She uses her free hand to smooth out the fabric on his knee, just as an excuse for something to do, before she tilts her head back to study his expression. "I just want to make sure you're alright." It doesn't occur to her that she may be pushing in a direction he's not keen to explore.
The hazy, mellow, bubbly state of his mind means that focusing on Quinn's more genuine concern takes him longer than it normally would, but once he registers that note of real unease in her voice, his expression evens and he kisses her temple again and he speaks more seriously. "Hey. I'm all right. It's just...bad memories, you know? Sometimes stuff gets in your head and even when you know it's not a big deal it feels like a big deal. Me and the woods are like that. I mean. That thing in the woods and the aggressive hawk population probably aren't helping, but...I'm okay. I'll miss this place when we go. So that has to say something."
The thing about getting stoned before bed is that the delicate balance between 'chill' and 'asleep' can be difficult to maintain. Having momentarily lost the will to stay upright, she slides down to lie on the walkway and rests her head in Ty's lap. Her mind's caught on the rhetorical question 'bad memories, you know?' because no, she doesn't know, and although she wants to ask it feels like crossing a line. "Send me and Hazel in if you see any more 'aggressive hawks' and we'll take care of 'em." She suggests, miming a lazy punch in the air that ends with her reaching up to take hold of his hand before she goes quiet again. 'When we go.'
'When' used to feel far enough away that conversations were about exciting hypotheticals: where everyone will move to, what kinds of houses they'd live in, what they'd eat for breakfast. Now, 'when' is 'soon', looming on the horizon mere weeks away. She's started to resent 'when.' Aimlessly tracing his fingers with her other hand, her reply is somehow at once both noncommittal and thoughtful, "Yeah, I suppose so."
Laughing, though not quite as brightly as normal because hawks are still fucking terrifying (Hawkeswood or no Hawkeswood), Ty nods and strokes Quinn's hair as she settles in his lap. "Come on. I tried so hard to get Hazel off of hawk-punching, don't make me backslide now! It's totally tempting, though." When she goes quiet, he stays quiet too, continuing to caress her hair. It's very soft. He can tell that there's...something more to the length of this pause than just her worry for him. But he can't guess what it is and before he can ask she speaks again.
He nods, then attempts to clarify. His head's so fuzzy, who knows if anything tumbling out of his mouth makes any sense. "If I were scared all the time...I don't think it'd matter how much I liked the place or the people or anything, right? I'd just want to go. I wouldn't miss it. That's what I mean. I guess. But I'm not."
Try as she might not to pry too much, this is still Quinn, and as relaxed as Ty's hand on her head feels, the concern that's been brewing beneath the surface-level Good Feelings is pushing her to ask just one more question.
"Why?" Her approach to sensitive situations is questionable when close friends are involved (such cases are handled with the tact of a freight train), and this evening's lowered inhibitions help her justify her curiosity. "You said the... forest entity and hawks are like a secondary problem with the woods, so what's the first?"
The two of them have been circling the topic for several minutes now, but Ty still isn't expecting the question when it comes. His fingers still in her dark curls and he hesitates...but not for very long. This is Quinn. He can tell Quinn anything. "I've told you about where my family lives, right? The estate? ...It's in the middle of nowhere. Nothing but forest and mountains for miles. And there are wards, old magic, that make it almost impossible to find unless you know what you're looking for." This arrangement has eccentric and solitary and obscenely wealthy pureblood written all over it. But he doesn't say anything about that.
Instead, he exhales a soft note of laughter, though the sound is more tense than amused. Then he says, "I hated being there. And I used to sneak out sometimes to meet my friends from school." A boy no more than thirteen or fourteen, sneaking out in the middle of the night and into a dark, magical forest. It's not difficult to imagine something going wrong.
Ah yes, the estate. Quinn pulls his hand down to her lips and leaves small kisses along his knuckles while he explains. She'd had a difficult time imagining what it might be like, but after seeing the Ramirez summer home last week, it's a little easier to picture—and it's a far cry from her nomaj townhouse (with added alarm plant, thank you very much). She looks up, pressing one more kiss to the back of his hand when he tenses up. "So you'd get lost? Or did the wards mess you up because they thought you were an intruder?" All she'd had to do when sneaking out was bribe the aforementioned plant with special food. It wasn't very exciting.
Ty exhales quietly, the unpleasant experience he's working his way up to softened by the kisses...and the weed, probably. "Normally, if you get through the wards the right way...it's no big deal. You can jump from the edge of the estate to the edge of the forest and back again. No problem. But I was coming back once and I messed it up. And, yeah, I got lost. Ended up wandering around for hours. I thought...I don't know. Nothing good." He shrugs loosely. "Now, I guess, I just think...'what if you get lost again and nobody comes to find you?'. And it freaks me out."
"You can use magic now, so you could send up a flare or use a spell to find your–" Quinn stops herself abruptly; that is not the first response she should have had. Ty's not looking for solutions, especially not when it sounds like years after the fact. She squeezes his hand as a brief apology before she tries again, "I'm sorry, that sounds... shitty. Scary. But if you got turned around again, you know we'd come find you, right?" She starts to pull herself back upright as she tries to reassure him, or lighten the mood, or something. "Between Raf, Hazel, and me, we'd probably burn that fucking forest to the ground."
When Quinn sits up, Ty slips his arms around her and pulls her gently against him, rather than letting her go back to just sitting beside him. He feels close to her right now and he wants to be close to her. "I know," he agrees quietly and smiles, the expression a little lopsided and a little tense but still genuine despite everything, "I've got the best friends and the best girlfriend. Willing to punch all the hawks and burn all the forests just for me. Luckiest guy in the world."
He leans forward to kiss her cheek, then slumps back again with a soft sigh. "I know it's not rational. I know there're probably a hundred ways a wizard, even a shitty one like me, could get out of a situation like that. But it's just...a feeling."
Quinn doesn't protest and wraps her arms around his waist as she leans against him. She's mostly talking to his neck now but she figures her point will get across anyway because she's not about to listen to Ty belittle himself, or his abilities. Hell no. "First, you're not a shitty wizard. You became an animagus at seventeen. That's goddamn impressive. And second," it's her turn to pull him in closer, resting her cheek on the edge of his shoulder. "Fear doesn't have to be rational. One bad experience will fuck you up. You get lost, the woods can become this frightening thing. Especially... you know. With entities and shit." As in, with all that shit going on at school.
Ty laughs a little and gives Quinn an affectionate squeeze; he should've known she'd come to his defense. "Working your tail off (or on, in this case?) until you can do one thing just to impress your parents doesn't make you a good wizard," he points out evenly, "...But thanks. Squirrel-life suits me anyway, right?" Then he goes quiet for a moment, pulling in a breath that the girl pressed up against him might not hear but can certainly feel with the rising and falling of his chest. "Yeah. Yeah, I know it doesn't. And it's not."
He pauses as he considers what he wants to say next. Because Quinn doesn't know. But he thinks he wants her to know. And he doesn't think it's just the weed. "Sometimes, it makes me think about dad too. Because we had a fight after. And the thing in the woods has got nothing on Jovian Hawkeswood." The joke falls immediately flat but that's all right. He's not sure why he even tried to make one. Habit, probably.
Although Quinn opens her mouth to insist Why you did something doesn't change the fact that you did it, the long breath gives her enough pause that, by the time her mouth opens, Ty's speaking again. And the topic shifts to Jovian Hawkeswood. The name brings to her mind images of the tall, handsome, and imperious man from the Parent-Teacher weekend. Mostly, though, she remembers how Ty looked the entire time—unhappy, uncomfortable, despondent. She hated it. "He didn't seem like the 'hug it out' type," she mutters into his shoulder.
This earns a bittersweet note of laughter from Ty, but it comes and goes quickly and he exhales a little sigh. "Yeah. No. Not so much.." He can't even remember the last time his dad had hugged him. But maybe that's not surprising. Given...everything. "Not much alike, are we?"
She brings her fingers up to skim against the side of his neck, arm draped across his chest. Sure, it was a rhetorical question, but now he's got her thinking about what she does know about Jovian... and it's not much. "Neither of you are short," she remarks quietly, and perhaps too lightly for the topic at hand.
A lopsided grin surfaces on Ty's face and he looks at Quinn, shaking his head. Serious topic or not, she always knows what to say to make him smile. Though, the weed might've helped this time too. "That is true. But. It's sort of a coincidence," he says, wrapping his hand around hers as the smile wanes and he finally gets to the crux of the matter, "Since he's...not really my dad. Biologically speaking." His light eyes shift, first looking out into the dark trees and then just down. "That was when he told me. When we had that fight. He got angry and just lost it, I guess. Couldn't stop himself from telling me just how much I was like my 'worthless mudblood father'. I don't know if either of them ever would've told me otherwise."
He shakes his head and finally looks back at Quinn. But he doesn't know what to say. It's been a long time since he told this to anyone.
The fingers brushing his neck stop. Everything about Quinn stops, train of thought included; she didn't know what she expected him to say next but it wasn't that. Her mind feels like a jumble of questions and a giant expanse of nothing, all at once. She should say something, but what the fuck are you supposed to say when your boyfriend tells you his asshole of a father isn't actually his father, like he's on some soap opera?
Her gut wants to punch Jovian in his perfect-fucking-jaw, a plan both impossible and unproductive. She pulls herself up again, eye-to-eye with Ty, and pushes some of his hair back from his forehead. That was supposed to buy her time to figure out what to say but... nope. "Ty..." is lame, but a start. She can't think of a response that doesn't sound like pity or anger, and the only thing that does feel right is being close to him. She leans in to press her lips against his in a deep kiss, an action that feels more honest than anything she'd be able to say in the moment.
Ty doesn't know what a girlfriend is supposed to say to a confession like that either and, almost immediately, he wonders if this was too much to put on Quinn. Especially when she brushes his hair back that gently and says his name that quietly. The kiss, though, is a relief. A reassurance. He welcomes it and presses close to her, staying close to her even when their lips finally part. He closes his eyes and breathes quietly, "I'm sorry. I know it's...I guess I just thought you should know. Wanted you to know." He blinks a few times, slowly, and swallows before finally looking at her again. "...you know?"
"I know," She repeats, resting her forehead against his. "And I'm glad you did." She pulls back just enough to see his face again and runs her fingers back through his hair, this time less utilitarian and more as an excuse for something to do with her hands, and to touch him (as though she needed an excuse?) The trust Ty's placed in her feels profound somehow but she doesn't have a clue of how to articulate it; she only knows that doesn't want to let go of him any time soon — literally or otherwise. There's a deeper discussion to be had here, but not here, not tonight. Not while they're high. She finally remarks, "You've been dealt a load of crap, you know that?" as the corner of her mouth twitches upward in a wry little smile.
Leaning gratefully into Quinn's touch, Ty gives a small shrug and a small smile, "Everybody's got crap to deal with. Right? But not everybody's got someone to listen. So. Thanks. For listening." She's not the first person from school to hear about his family or his situation but it's a very short list and telling her the truth feels...right. More than ready to step back from the seriousness of the topic, he pulls in a breath and teases her quietly, punctuating each point with a light kiss, "...And for watching out for me. And for sharing your weed. Best. Girlfriend. Ever."
Quinn hums and drops her lips to his shoulder, relaxed despite the night gaining a more serious tone than she anticipated. "Mmm, you're simply lucky that you caught me back from a break, when The Great Providers have... well, provided." Her parents may delight in embarrassing her, but being their daughter does have its benefits.
Her focus is easier to redirect than it had been, and for the first time she notices the dark figures beginning to disperse from the campfire down the path. If she's sobering up now, Ty won't be far behind... and so will curfew. "We should head back soon," she makes no move except to glance at her watch — then double-checks that the path is empty of wanderers before she swings her leg over his so she can rest on his lap, a knee on either side. Straddling, one could say, although that sounds inappropriate and Quinn Cunningham is never inappropriate. "... Except," she continues with a mischievous smile, lips close to his and fingertips grazing the line of his jaw, "We still have a little time before my glasses turn to back into slippers, or however the fuck Cinderella goes."
Ty has mostly forgotten about everything beyond Quinn and himself and the past, so when the girl begins to talk about 'getting back' it takes him a long moment to register what she's talking about. He doesn't have time to get disappointed about the prospect of returning to camp, though, because how could he be disappointed with Quinn straddling him and leaning in close and tracing her fingers across his skin? His smile broadens and there's no hesitation in it now.
"It's glass slippers," he corrects, laughing and slipping his arms around her and pulling her close enough to kiss her, "Not glasses into slippers. Ma Cendrillon. You can thank Perrault for that bit..." Nothing like a bit of flirting via obscure literary facts.
"Thank you, Perrault." Quinn mutters, somehow still dutifully as her lips slide closer and closer to his neck. She has no idea who the fuck Perrault is but the French gives her pause and she smiles against his cheek. "And thank you, Professor."
Delighted, Ty grins and returns playfully, "Je vous en prie." Now doesn't seem like the time for more literary lessons or more teasing, though, and he turns his head enough to press another kiss to her cheek. A gentle, grateful gesture that speaks for itself. Then he traces one hand along the familiar curve of her hip and adds coyly, "Either way...Should make the most of it?”
She doesn't say anything at first, but figures that the look he gets when she pulls away and quirks an eyebrow should speak for itself. Namely, I hope that was rhetorical because she's already ducked back to his neck, leaving a light trail of kisses as she moves. Time away from the rest of the pack is rare despite the fact that they go to school in the woods and she's determined to use it wisely — sure, they may break a rule or two, but as she leans into the hand on her hip she figures that Ty won't mind that much at all.
He laughs at this joke that isn't really a joke (Quinn is brilliant), then sighs contently, and leans his head back against the railing. "But you probably know that. Right?"
Quinn laughs softly into Ty's hair, and rests her head on his shoulder when his goes back. She'd been hesitant (again) to suggest one last round before bed, but when his high started to wear off in tandem with real dark falling it became more intense than she expected, so she figured he had little to lose if he was already going to have that bad of a night. "Mmm, I've heard it once or..." she counts Ty's brilliants by tapping her fingers two times on his thigh, "twice."
Ty grins and laughs and gives his girlfriend an affectionate little squeeze. "Only twice? Seems inadequate," he opines playfully, "I'll work on it."
She looks up, only able to see his chin and a shock of bleached hair, so she lays a quick kiss on his jaw before she settles back into his side. "So, you think it's helping with the... woods thing? Think you'll be able to get some sleep tonight?"
He pauses to consider the question, but only briefly. He feels a lot better than he normally would in a situation like this. No anxiety. No thinking about how the trees and the dark around them seem to go on forever. No thinking about the past. Though, he'd still like to be back at camp and tucked into a sleeping bag with Quinn before it gets to be pitch black. Warm and safe and sleep sounds pretty great anyway. "I think it helps," he agrees slowly, "I think you help. So...I think so. Yeah. I'm good."
Another quiet "Mmm," can be heard as Quinn slides an arm around Ty's waist. Small details feel more pronounced, like the fabric of his shirt that she's twisting lightly between her fingers, or the rise and fall of his chest with every breath. It's easier for her to focus on those things and let go of her usual worries about responsibility, and they can only barely hear the voices back by the fire, so it's quiet. She's relaxed. It's nice.
Thinking about how she's actually kind of okay with camping right now (but only while high!) brings her back to Ty. She's tried not to pry but that hasn't stopped her from becoming concerned for him; it's obvious that he doesn't suffer from City Mouse Syndrome like she does, and they go to camp school, after all. She decides to prod every so slightly, although she currently possesses neither the plan nor the tact that would make her inquiry easier to mask. "It's not as bad back at school, right? Even though we're still in a forest?"
"Hmm?" The silence had given Ty's mind time to wander and he'd closed his eyes, almost starting to doze, but Quinn's voice draws him back. He glances down at her and smiles. "Sure. As long as it's not night and I'm not wandering around in the middle of it, I'm okay. Walking to the Grotto is a bitch, but Raf and Chris and you never make me go by myself. So I can deal. And walking back..."
Quinn rolls her eyes and takes a brief intermission from playing with Ty's shirt to poke her fingers into his side—not enough to hurt, but in hopes that it's at least enough to tickle him. "Because I care about you, genius. Which... fine, yeah, is a side effect of falling in love with your sorry ass." Her tone remains affectionate despite the name-calling, and a smile—half playful, half sheepish—spreads across her face by the end.
Whether or not the jab actually tickles, it is enough to get Ty laughing again. And he obviously doesn't mind the name-calling because his only protest is the plainly cheeky, "Hey. I have a nice ass."
(Ty's not about to get any protest from Quinn either, who nods sagely at the defence of his behind. She's spent a lot of time appreciating it; she's become something of an expert on the matter.)
She uses her free hand to smooth out the fabric on his knee, just as an excuse for something to do, before she tilts her head back to study his expression. "I just want to make sure you're alright." It doesn't occur to her that she may be pushing in a direction he's not keen to explore.
The hazy, mellow, bubbly state of his mind means that focusing on Quinn's more genuine concern takes him longer than it normally would, but once he registers that note of real unease in her voice, his expression evens and he kisses her temple again and he speaks more seriously. "Hey. I'm all right. It's just...bad memories, you know? Sometimes stuff gets in your head and even when you know it's not a big deal it feels like a big deal. Me and the woods are like that. I mean. That thing in the woods and the aggressive hawk population probably aren't helping, but...I'm okay. I'll miss this place when we go. So that has to say something."
The thing about getting stoned before bed is that the delicate balance between 'chill' and 'asleep' can be difficult to maintain. Having momentarily lost the will to stay upright, she slides down to lie on the walkway and rests her head in Ty's lap. Her mind's caught on the rhetorical question 'bad memories, you know?' because no, she doesn't know, and although she wants to ask it feels like crossing a line. "Send me and Hazel in if you see any more 'aggressive hawks' and we'll take care of 'em." She suggests, miming a lazy punch in the air that ends with her reaching up to take hold of his hand before she goes quiet again. 'When we go.'
'When' used to feel far enough away that conversations were about exciting hypotheticals: where everyone will move to, what kinds of houses they'd live in, what they'd eat for breakfast. Now, 'when' is 'soon', looming on the horizon mere weeks away. She's started to resent 'when.' Aimlessly tracing his fingers with her other hand, her reply is somehow at once both noncommittal and thoughtful, "Yeah, I suppose so."
Laughing, though not quite as brightly as normal because hawks are still fucking terrifying (Hawkeswood or no Hawkeswood), Ty nods and strokes Quinn's hair as she settles in his lap. "Come on. I tried so hard to get Hazel off of hawk-punching, don't make me backslide now! It's totally tempting, though." When she goes quiet, he stays quiet too, continuing to caress her hair. It's very soft. He can tell that there's...something more to the length of this pause than just her worry for him. But he can't guess what it is and before he can ask she speaks again.
He nods, then attempts to clarify. His head's so fuzzy, who knows if anything tumbling out of his mouth makes any sense. "If I were scared all the time...I don't think it'd matter how much I liked the place or the people or anything, right? I'd just want to go. I wouldn't miss it. That's what I mean. I guess. But I'm not."
Try as she might not to pry too much, this is still Quinn, and as relaxed as Ty's hand on her head feels, the concern that's been brewing beneath the surface-level Good Feelings is pushing her to ask just one more question.
"Why?" Her approach to sensitive situations is questionable when close friends are involved (such cases are handled with the tact of a freight train), and this evening's lowered inhibitions help her justify her curiosity. "You said the... forest entity and hawks are like a secondary problem with the woods, so what's the first?"
The two of them have been circling the topic for several minutes now, but Ty still isn't expecting the question when it comes. His fingers still in her dark curls and he hesitates...but not for very long. This is Quinn. He can tell Quinn anything. "I've told you about where my family lives, right? The estate? ...It's in the middle of nowhere. Nothing but forest and mountains for miles. And there are wards, old magic, that make it almost impossible to find unless you know what you're looking for." This arrangement has eccentric and solitary and obscenely wealthy pureblood written all over it. But he doesn't say anything about that.
Instead, he exhales a soft note of laughter, though the sound is more tense than amused. Then he says, "I hated being there. And I used to sneak out sometimes to meet my friends from school." A boy no more than thirteen or fourteen, sneaking out in the middle of the night and into a dark, magical forest. It's not difficult to imagine something going wrong.
Ah yes, the estate. Quinn pulls his hand down to her lips and leaves small kisses along his knuckles while he explains. She'd had a difficult time imagining what it might be like, but after seeing the Ramirez summer home last week, it's a little easier to picture—and it's a far cry from her nomaj townhouse (with added alarm plant, thank you very much). She looks up, pressing one more kiss to the back of his hand when he tenses up. "So you'd get lost? Or did the wards mess you up because they thought you were an intruder?" All she'd had to do when sneaking out was bribe the aforementioned plant with special food. It wasn't very exciting.
Ty exhales quietly, the unpleasant experience he's working his way up to softened by the kisses...and the weed, probably. "Normally, if you get through the wards the right way...it's no big deal. You can jump from the edge of the estate to the edge of the forest and back again. No problem. But I was coming back once and I messed it up. And, yeah, I got lost. Ended up wandering around for hours. I thought...I don't know. Nothing good." He shrugs loosely. "Now, I guess, I just think...'what if you get lost again and nobody comes to find you?'. And it freaks me out."
"You can use magic now, so you could send up a flare or use a spell to find your–" Quinn stops herself abruptly; that is not the first response she should have had. Ty's not looking for solutions, especially not when it sounds like years after the fact. She squeezes his hand as a brief apology before she tries again, "I'm sorry, that sounds... shitty. Scary. But if you got turned around again, you know we'd come find you, right?" She starts to pull herself back upright as she tries to reassure him, or lighten the mood, or something. "Between Raf, Hazel, and me, we'd probably burn that fucking forest to the ground."
When Quinn sits up, Ty slips his arms around her and pulls her gently against him, rather than letting her go back to just sitting beside him. He feels close to her right now and he wants to be close to her. "I know," he agrees quietly and smiles, the expression a little lopsided and a little tense but still genuine despite everything, "I've got the best friends and the best girlfriend. Willing to punch all the hawks and burn all the forests just for me. Luckiest guy in the world."
He leans forward to kiss her cheek, then slumps back again with a soft sigh. "I know it's not rational. I know there're probably a hundred ways a wizard, even a shitty one like me, could get out of a situation like that. But it's just...a feeling."
Quinn doesn't protest and wraps her arms around his waist as she leans against him. She's mostly talking to his neck now but she figures her point will get across anyway because she's not about to listen to Ty belittle himself, or his abilities. Hell no. "First, you're not a shitty wizard. You became an animagus at seventeen. That's goddamn impressive. And second," it's her turn to pull him in closer, resting her cheek on the edge of his shoulder. "Fear doesn't have to be rational. One bad experience will fuck you up. You get lost, the woods can become this frightening thing. Especially... you know. With entities and shit." As in, with all that shit going on at school.
Ty laughs a little and gives Quinn an affectionate squeeze; he should've known she'd come to his defense. "Working your tail off (or on, in this case?) until you can do one thing just to impress your parents doesn't make you a good wizard," he points out evenly, "...But thanks. Squirrel-life suits me anyway, right?" Then he goes quiet for a moment, pulling in a breath that the girl pressed up against him might not hear but can certainly feel with the rising and falling of his chest. "Yeah. Yeah, I know it doesn't. And it's not."
He pauses as he considers what he wants to say next. Because Quinn doesn't know. But he thinks he wants her to know. And he doesn't think it's just the weed. "Sometimes, it makes me think about dad too. Because we had a fight after. And the thing in the woods has got nothing on Jovian Hawkeswood." The joke falls immediately flat but that's all right. He's not sure why he even tried to make one. Habit, probably.
Although Quinn opens her mouth to insist Why you did something doesn't change the fact that you did it, the long breath gives her enough pause that, by the time her mouth opens, Ty's speaking again. And the topic shifts to Jovian Hawkeswood. The name brings to her mind images of the tall, handsome, and imperious man from the Parent-Teacher weekend. Mostly, though, she remembers how Ty looked the entire time—unhappy, uncomfortable, despondent. She hated it. "He didn't seem like the 'hug it out' type," she mutters into his shoulder.
This earns a bittersweet note of laughter from Ty, but it comes and goes quickly and he exhales a little sigh. "Yeah. No. Not so much.." He can't even remember the last time his dad had hugged him. But maybe that's not surprising. Given...everything. "Not much alike, are we?"
She brings her fingers up to skim against the side of his neck, arm draped across his chest. Sure, it was a rhetorical question, but now he's got her thinking about what she does know about Jovian... and it's not much. "Neither of you are short," she remarks quietly, and perhaps too lightly for the topic at hand.
A lopsided grin surfaces on Ty's face and he looks at Quinn, shaking his head. Serious topic or not, she always knows what to say to make him smile. Though, the weed might've helped this time too. "That is true. But. It's sort of a coincidence," he says, wrapping his hand around hers as the smile wanes and he finally gets to the crux of the matter, "Since he's...not really my dad. Biologically speaking." His light eyes shift, first looking out into the dark trees and then just down. "That was when he told me. When we had that fight. He got angry and just lost it, I guess. Couldn't stop himself from telling me just how much I was like my 'worthless mudblood father'. I don't know if either of them ever would've told me otherwise."
He shakes his head and finally looks back at Quinn. But he doesn't know what to say. It's been a long time since he told this to anyone.
The fingers brushing his neck stop. Everything about Quinn stops, train of thought included; she didn't know what she expected him to say next but it wasn't that. Her mind feels like a jumble of questions and a giant expanse of nothing, all at once. She should say something, but what the fuck are you supposed to say when your boyfriend tells you his asshole of a father isn't actually his father, like he's on some soap opera?
Her gut wants to punch Jovian in his perfect-fucking-jaw, a plan both impossible and unproductive. She pulls herself up again, eye-to-eye with Ty, and pushes some of his hair back from his forehead. That was supposed to buy her time to figure out what to say but... nope. "Ty..." is lame, but a start. She can't think of a response that doesn't sound like pity or anger, and the only thing that does feel right is being close to him. She leans in to press her lips against his in a deep kiss, an action that feels more honest than anything she'd be able to say in the moment.
Ty doesn't know what a girlfriend is supposed to say to a confession like that either and, almost immediately, he wonders if this was too much to put on Quinn. Especially when she brushes his hair back that gently and says his name that quietly. The kiss, though, is a relief. A reassurance. He welcomes it and presses close to her, staying close to her even when their lips finally part. He closes his eyes and breathes quietly, "I'm sorry. I know it's...I guess I just thought you should know. Wanted you to know." He blinks a few times, slowly, and swallows before finally looking at her again. "...you know?"
"I know," She repeats, resting her forehead against his. "And I'm glad you did." She pulls back just enough to see his face again and runs her fingers back through his hair, this time less utilitarian and more as an excuse for something to do with her hands, and to touch him (as though she needed an excuse?) The trust Ty's placed in her feels profound somehow but she doesn't have a clue of how to articulate it; she only knows that doesn't want to let go of him any time soon — literally or otherwise. There's a deeper discussion to be had here, but not here, not tonight. Not while they're high. She finally remarks, "You've been dealt a load of crap, you know that?" as the corner of her mouth twitches upward in a wry little smile.
Leaning gratefully into Quinn's touch, Ty gives a small shrug and a small smile, "Everybody's got crap to deal with. Right? But not everybody's got someone to listen. So. Thanks. For listening." She's not the first person from school to hear about his family or his situation but it's a very short list and telling her the truth feels...right. More than ready to step back from the seriousness of the topic, he pulls in a breath and teases her quietly, punctuating each point with a light kiss, "...And for watching out for me. And for sharing your weed. Best. Girlfriend. Ever."
Quinn hums and drops her lips to his shoulder, relaxed despite the night gaining a more serious tone than she anticipated. "Mmm, you're simply lucky that you caught me back from a break, when The Great Providers have... well, provided." Her parents may delight in embarrassing her, but being their daughter does have its benefits.
Her focus is easier to redirect than it had been, and for the first time she notices the dark figures beginning to disperse from the campfire down the path. If she's sobering up now, Ty won't be far behind... and so will curfew. "We should head back soon," she makes no move except to glance at her watch — then double-checks that the path is empty of wanderers before she swings her leg over his so she can rest on his lap, a knee on either side. Straddling, one could say, although that sounds inappropriate and Quinn Cunningham is never inappropriate. "... Except," she continues with a mischievous smile, lips close to his and fingertips grazing the line of his jaw, "We still have a little time before my glasses turn to back into slippers, or however the fuck Cinderella goes."
Ty has mostly forgotten about everything beyond Quinn and himself and the past, so when the girl begins to talk about 'getting back' it takes him a long moment to register what she's talking about. He doesn't have time to get disappointed about the prospect of returning to camp, though, because how could he be disappointed with Quinn straddling him and leaning in close and tracing her fingers across his skin? His smile broadens and there's no hesitation in it now.
"It's glass slippers," he corrects, laughing and slipping his arms around her and pulling her close enough to kiss her, "Not glasses into slippers. Ma Cendrillon. You can thank Perrault for that bit..." Nothing like a bit of flirting via obscure literary facts.
"Thank you, Perrault." Quinn mutters, somehow still dutifully as her lips slide closer and closer to his neck. She has no idea who the fuck Perrault is but the French gives her pause and she smiles against his cheek. "And thank you, Professor."
Delighted, Ty grins and returns playfully, "Je vous en prie." Now doesn't seem like the time for more literary lessons or more teasing, though, and he turns his head enough to press another kiss to her cheek. A gentle, grateful gesture that speaks for itself. Then he traces one hand along the familiar curve of her hip and adds coyly, "Either way...Should make the most of it?”
She doesn't say anything at first, but figures that the look he gets when she pulls away and quirks an eyebrow should speak for itself. Namely, I hope that was rhetorical because she's already ducked back to his neck, leaving a light trail of kisses as she moves. Time away from the rest of the pack is rare despite the fact that they go to school in the woods and she's determined to use it wisely — sure, they may break a rule or two, but as she leans into the hand on her hip she figures that Ty won't mind that much at all.