Room 315, Wednesday Early Evening

[peace_n_war]

"Hey, dad. It's Warren again. I'm starting to wonder if you even have room on your answering machine anymore, but hey, at least if you've run out by now you won't have to listen through three or four lifetimes of me phoning you like this someday, huh? I'm sixteen still, but not for long. Seventeen tomorrow, dad! I've still got that job at the cafe, and I'm still hanging out with that girl I mentioned last time. She's been trying to get me to go swimming with her. Weird, huh? Me. Swimming. I don't even like the beach, except that I can throw fire around. Other than that, seventeen doesn't seem like it's going to be much different than sixteen was. I'm, uh, still not a villain. Not really a hero either, don't worry. I think I want to call Mom sometime, too, but I can actually talk to her. She'll want to know all that stuff I've been telling you, dad. Asking about girls and school and if I've followed in your footsteps and become a criminal mastermind, and if I have then I'm grounded for life. Thanks loads, Mom, right? ... Seventeen tomorrow."

...

"I miss you dad."

Warren hung up his phone, sighed, and reached for a book. Seventeen, sixteen, whatever. Wasn't like any of it made any difference either way.

[Open post is open! I probably won't be about tomorrow for a job interview, so Warren gets to birthday whine today.]

Comments

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Hey, Warren," Lee said, wandering in from a walk into town. "What's happening?"

[at work and slooooooow!]

[peace_n_war]

Warren glanced up from his book, shrugging a little.

"Not much," he decided. "Today I turned in the stupidest newspaper article I've ever written. I have to put some more minutes on my phone, soon. I've been using them again."

Go figure.

"Same old. What's up with you?"

[Slow is fine!]

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"I wrote an article about being tiny again and how I kind of miss it because I didn't have to care about half the stuff I do now" he said, flopping down on his bed. "Went to a party last night, got some swimming in. I'm ready for the weekend though. Who you been calling? Hot date?"

[peace_n_war]

"Answering machines," Warren grunted, kind of noncommittally. "I think I'm going to just quit school, enrol in kindergarten again, and spend the rest of my life rolling snakes out of plasticine or something. Seven years old wasn't so bad, really."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"And you'd be the tallest, most badass kid in the class," Lee decided. "If you're going to enroll at the size you are now. Total class leader."

[peace_n_war]

"All the better for being school bully," Warren decided, almost cracking a grin at that. "Making the little kids eat worms if they want to keep their lunch money is easy when you're twice as tall as they are."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"You're not careful, you'll run into a kid that enjoys eating worms and then your jig will be up," Lee said, snickering. "Though, worms. Ew. I can't even imagine. Not even if I was drunk."

[peace_n_war]

"If they were cooperating, I might offer to cook them first," Warren mused, and then shrugged and shut his book, tossing it onto his bed. "So. The party you went to, was that any good?"

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Wasn't bad," Lee said, shrugging. "It was down in the pool for Turtle, the girl that owns that shop in town. I got to swim and I think I made a girl blush a few times."

[peace_n_war]

"So, really, it was a good night for you." Okay, Warren was smiling now. A little. Not much. Smiling was terribly overrated, after all. "Not my kind of thing, but I guess I can see the appeal."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"It got me out of the room and away from stuff that was making me think way too much," Lee said. "And Turtle on student council so I thought I should go. You should have come! I could have had fun trying to get you to swim again."

[peace_n_war]

"Oh yeah, between the water and the crowd of people, I'm sure I would have had a great time," Warren replied with a roll of his eyes and a faint smirk. "I guess I might have made an exception if I knew the food was going to be good or something."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Well, we could have gone around and pushed unsuspecting people into the pool?" Lee tried. "That'd been fun too!"

[peace_n_war]

... Actually, that did sound like a good time.

"See, now I'm sorry I missed it. When's the next party?"

Not tomorrow. Warren wasn't telling anyone about his own birthday for anything in the world.

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Dunno but I'll keep on the lookout," he decided with a firm nod. "I haven't gotten enough of pushing people this month. Needs to happen more. And if there's no birthdays, I'll just make up a reason for a pool party."

[peace_n_war]

"Really, we don't even need a pool if all we want to do is push people," Warren pointed out. "I mean, there's nothing stopping us from shoving people around just because they look at us funny. Or whatever."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Ah, the proactive approach," Lee said, nodding. "Something lazy people like me don't do often. Got someone in mind to push?"

[peace_n_war]

"Off the top of my head?" Warren leaned his head back, looking up at the ceiling and mulling it over. "Nope. Indiscriminate acts of wanton violence work just fine for me, too. Gets the point across just as well as if I was targeting someone, right?"

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Completely and not looking like your targeting someone makes it harder for anyone to accuse you of such," Lee agreed. "None of this 'oh, Warren was picking on me, woe woe woe!' crap."

[peace_n_war]

"Hey, I'm not kidding when I tell people I hate all of them equally. I don't like to play favorites. People feel left out, that way." Wasn't he so very kind? "Don't take it personally or anything if I give you a shove in the hallways, Lee. Really, I just want to make sure you know that I don't have a lower opinion of you than anyone else."

It kind of made sense, if you squinted at it.

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"If you shove me in the hallway, be prepared for me to start crying and throwing an absolute tantrum on the floor," Lee decided. "I think that'd scare you into not pushing me again."

Or thinking Lee was insane but same difference.

[peace_n_war]

"Dude, if you did that, I'd have to shove you into a locker or something. Noise like that would distract the people in class," Warren pointed out. "Or, you know, I could just make you eat worms, too."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"I'd throw up on your shoes." Such a threat, Lee. Such a threat.

[peace_n_war]

"I'd just have to beat you up for your shoes," Warren decided, smirking. "I think I could take you."

[stupid-toasters.livejournal.com]

"Would my shoes even fit you?" Lee asked, peering down at said shoes. "I mean, you're a giant."

Or close to it.

[I might have to hit you with some more SP cuz I am just exhaaaaaausted.]