Room 223, Friday Afternoon

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie was not intending to leave her room today. Nope. Yesterday had been... a lot of things she didn't really feel like dealing with right now. And the way to not deal was to stay in her room. There was nothing cowardly about it. She just wasn't going to leave. Just for today.

Maybe the weekend.

Unable to really concentrate on any of her school stuff, she took a seat by her keyboard, intent on forcing herself to focus on something. Immersing herself into practice seemed to be a thing for that. And she was sticking to strictly classical pieces.

No pop. And no singing.

[ooc: Door closed, post open!]

Comments

[necroslacker]

"Why so harsh then?" Sam questioned. "Not usually your thing."

[whenshewasnice]

"How much do you know about what is or isn't my thing?" Natalie retorted. "I'm not supposed to be intense?"

[necroslacker]

"Fine," he said, holding up a hand and shaking his head. "It's not your thing, I don't know you, I'm wrong, back to stupid, yadda yadda yadda. Did I get it all?"

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie took a step back, looking frustrated.

"I feel like hitting something."

Which was probably key to what was going on here. She didn't get the urge that often, but she was from a world where fights broke out regularly, and yesterday had jostled her enough to feel like doing something physical.

And the fact that she was actually voicing it probably said something about her lack of balance as well.

[necroslacker]

"You know there's a gym with punching bags just for that reason," Sam remarked idly. He still had his back pressed against the door but at least he was focused now.

He didn't know what else to really offer since she apparently didn't think he knew her and a bunch of other things that he was trying to forget about now.

[whenshewasnice]

"Well, I didn't want to do that," Natalie replied, still annoyed. Still feeling like there was something right under her skin. "And stop taking my words out of context."

Alternatively, she could try not talking in a way that left him with negative conclusions.

[necroslacker]

She was just lucky that he didn't get angry easily. Someone else might have started an argument. He just crossed his arms and watched her silently.

It wasn't like his opinions were welcome right now or anything.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie let the silence lengthen for a while, then, forcing a dry tone to her voice, said, "I don't think that's going to work."

They'd already done the silent staring thing once, and she was all out of doorways to yank him through.

[necroslacker]

"I don't know what else you want me to say," Sam admitted, shrugging. "It's not like you're really liking what you're hearing from me anyway."

[whenshewasnice]

"You annoyed me with something you already knew I was upset about," Natalie replied, striving for a calm tone she couldn't quite hang on to. "And then we got our wires crossed even more."

[necroslacker]

"You were annoyed at me but you decided to kiss me anyway?" Sam asked, wondering if she could find the logic in that because he couldn't

[whenshewasnice]

Now, Natalie was just trying to not start feeling embarrassed over this whole thing, too.

"That doesn't cancel out my base level of liking you." Actually, it might have said quite a lot about the strength of said liking. "Besides, the term 'hatesex' is popular in certain circles for a reason."

[necroslacker]

"I'm not having hate sex with you," Sam told her, just cutting that off at the pass right now. "I like you too much for our first time to be like that."

[whenshewasnice]

Oh, yeah, that general sense of embarrassment was definitely starting to creep in now. Again. "Wouldn't have been hate sex anyway," she replied, pushing hair away from her face and glancing away. "More like... annoyed. Mildly."

[necroslacker]

"Do you just want me to leave?" Sam asked, figuring he was just making things worse by being here.

[whenshewasnice]

Natalie let silence fall for a moment, then glanced over at him again, managing some outward calm in her expression even if she wasn't quite feeling it.

"And if you leave now, how easy do you think it will be for you to come back?"

[necroslacker]

"What's that even mean?" Sam asked, raising an eyebrow. "What are you asking me?"

[whenshewasnice]

"I'm asking you," she replied, "how weird and awkward things will be later if we just leave everything like this and you leave now."

[necroslacker]

"I don't know," Sam said after a moment of thought. He shrugged. "I also don't know what you want from me right now. You've said a few things already that make me think you don't want me around. I thought you'd want me to leave."

[whenshewasnice]

"Told you to not take my words out of context," Natalie said, mildly. "Whatever you're thinking, I probably didn't mean like that."

[necroslacker]

"You know, you make that really hard sometimes because I don't know what you're thinking," Sam said immediately, almost sounding frustrated.

Almost.

"So, you can't say that to me like I'm automatically wrong because you don't know what I'm thinking and I don't think you really know how you come off to other people."

[whenshewasnice]

That much was definitely true. The problem was she often also didn't care how people perceived her.

Which made a situation like this problematic.

"I don't think you're stupid."

There, that was one thing she was pretty sure he was thinking.

[necroslacker]

He had been thinking that, yes. And he didn't know his shoulders had gotten tense again until they relaxed minutely after that admission of hers.

"Thank you," he said, nodding. "I appreciate that."

[whenshewasnice]

"I also don't think you don't know me." Well, that one was also easy because he'd already said as much. "You just don't know everything there is to know about me. Sometimes I'm harsh, in more ways than one."

Sometimes she needed to be.

[necroslacker]

"You don't know everything there is to know about me either so that goes both ways," Sam pointed out after a quiet moment. "So yeah, you're harsh sometimes, I get it. But it didn't feel right to me a few minutes ago. Sorry. I didn't wanna do something like that for the wrong reasons."