fandomtownies | Demon Marcus, Sunday

Entry tags:

Demon Marcus, Sunday

Sparkle had actually decided to show up to work today! This was a big accomplishment for him, what with the fact that just listening to the radio every morning had him paranoid and on-edge. Not that staying in his room was going to change anything if the island's weirdness decided to finally catch up to him, no, but there was that little bit of brain that said staying in was safer. Especially since he hadn't changed yet.

... He hadn't, right?

Oh, god. That was going to bug him all day, now. Instead of actually getting any work done, he was downloading podcasts of the morning news over the past few weeks, because he was bound and determined to prove that he was Original Flavour Sparkle, thank you.

"Parents!?"

If anyone needed him, he was going to be in the back room, burning things.

[Open, OCD-free!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

After researching a bit, Hannibal decided to take a break for lunch and a bit of a walk. With his bag over his shoulder, he headed for the clothing store.

He frowned at not finding Sparkle in the front, but the stench of burning led him in the right direction. "I hope you have good ventilation in here."

"Probably do," Sparkle replied, mostly non-committally as he chucked the computer's keyboard into the fire that he'd built. There had been a burn barrel tucked away in a closet back there. A burn barrel. "Apparently this is something they used to do all the time in this place."

Yeah, the plastic fumes were probably great for him, good ventilation or not. He huffed a little, watched the contents of the barrel smoulder for a minute, and then stuck the cover on the barrel to smother out the whole thing before turning to face Hannibal.

"Have I ever mentioned how much I hate this island?"

Frequently, Sparkle.

"From time to time," Hannibal answered more diplomatically than the narration. He lifted the bag from his shoulder. "Why don't you tell me what's wrong over lunch?"

"Lunch sounds great," Sparkle admitted, nodding faintly (and giving the barrel a kick for good measure) before making his way back toward the front. "It's... you know how the radio station releases the daily news as podcasts for people who have missed it, right?"

Hannibal blinked. "I didn't, actually. I shall have to look them up." He unpacked the heart tartare puttanesca he'd made for today, along with fresh bread and cinnamon coffee.

"What have you heard that has you upset?"

"Me," Sparkle sighed, gathering up a pair of chairs and setting them up, along with a few unpacked boxes to stack into a sort of functional table. "I heard me, doing a broadcast. Which wouldn't be so bad, since... you know... I do radio. It's a thing I do."

Except that it wasn't him.

Hannibal appropriated the cloth skirt from around a display to serve as a tablecloth and set out the dishes. "You heard something you didn't at the time," he guessed.

"I heard someone using my voice to talk about his college plans and his family back in Toronto," Sparkle said, maybe just a touch miserably as he took a seat by the box-table.

That made Hannibal pause for a second before pouring the coffee. "You're saying you were changed," he surmised, "as some of the others have been."

"Apparently, yeah." Sparkle sighed. "Go back far enough, and I sound like me again, but for the past couple of weeks there, apparently there was someone somewhere, waiting for me."

There was a moment's silence, a bit of hesitation, before he added, "It's been happening to... a lot of people."

The 'you too' was left unspoken.

Hannibal heard it anyway, and smiled wryly as he sat. "Ah. Do I need to brace myself?"

"I suppose that depends on how you feel about the French," Sparkle offered, along with a small attempt at a smile. It was still falling a bit short, granted. "I don't know how much I can really bank on, because, you know, drunk squirrels. But it sounds like the island has been at this for a while. Kenzi's got a kid, it knocked some guy's head right off. People are showing up as vampires and everything. It's nuts."

"I lived in France with my uncle for a time," Hannibal reminded him. "I find them to be no better or worse than any other people." He began eating and nudged Sparkle to do the same.

"I've just come from the library, trying to find anything useful about this," he said in between bites. "Perhaps I should be looking at the island's recent activity rather than scientific theory."

He eyed Sparkle for a moment before determining he was unlikely to broach the subject himself. "But it isn't the insanity in general bothering you."

Sparkle shrugged and reached for his fork. He didn't even have it in him to speculate about the heart, today.

"I guess it's not," he admitted. "It's just... weird. It was me. But it wasn't me. It was this kid who talked about home like it was no big deal, and who wanted to apply to theatre school and who went by 'Sparks,' as if he had no idea what it was like to have nothing that was really his except for his fricking name."

He caught himself, took a breath, scowled, and then stopped himself from talking by stuffing a forkful of lunch into his mouth. Chewing. He couldn't rant if he was chewing. It was rude.

"Those who have always had something often take it for granted," Hannibal answered. "This...other you. He had a home, and so it was 'no big deal'. It simply was. If you were to have it, it would be much more important."

He took a sip of his coffee. "Your name is your own, to keep or to change as you like. Theatre school is well within your grasp. A home and a family, those are things you have to make for yourself, although I hope I'm helping you to lay the start of a foundation," he said with a smile.

"It hurts, seeing what you could have had." He shrugged. "It doesn't have to. If those are still things you want, take them for yourself. They will seem even sweeter for the knowledge of their absence."

"That's the thing," Sparkle sighed after swallowing. "I don't know if those are things I want. I mean... I have Amelia, and that's kind of like family, but it's not the same as, I don't know, parents I had all along. I can't just reach out and take that."

He managed to refrain from nudging his food around his plate with his fork, at least.

"And school is complicated too, if I'm keeping her. Getting her back to Toronto is tricky. Getting to keep her...? They wipe my record at eighteen but that doesn't mean anyone out there is going to be crazy enough to let me keep a kid."

Hannibal gave him a smile with just a hint of reproof. "If you want to keep Amelia, we'll find a way. Given this island's daily insanities, caring for a child while taking classes may be one of the more pedestrian things in your life.

"And after that, wherever you decide to go, it won't be difficult to see she stays with you. You do, after all, have a very highly regarded psychiatrist on your side," he said with a small bow. "And records can always be forged if necessary.

"As to family...you're correct. You can't change the fact you didn't have them when you were younger." He took another bite and toyed with his fork for a moment. "Would you like it if I were to adopt you now?"

And that would be Sparkle, choking on somebody's neatly diced heart.

"What, really?" There was a wheeze, and then he reached for the coffee - cinnamon wasn't strictly the best thing for choking, but it was better than nothing. "Like, you really just offered that?"

That was one hell of a hopeful note in his voice, right there, in case the choking gave the wrong idea at all.

"I did, yes," Hannibal answered. He chuckled as he pulled a bottle of water from his bag and handed it to Sparkle. "Of course, it would mean a lot of things would change - you'd have free access to my home, we would speak frequently and spend time together; I might even take you to places like the opera."

He smiled. "If you think that you could handle that."

"I--" Sparkle took the water with a little nod of thanks and chugged some back. At least that gave him some time to piece his thoughts together. If Hannibal was serious about that...

Nobody had ever been serious about that.

His mind was reeling a bit. Hannibal wouldn't lead him on about something like that. He wouldn't. Sparkle didn't trust many adults, but this one adult in particular, he'd trust with his life. Which, he supposed, was pretty much what Hannibal was asking if Sparkle as willing to do.

"I think I could handle that," he replied, and it was funny how his throat sounded dry even after he'd just downed half a bottle of water.

"Excellent." Hannibal smiled at him again. "If you give me the number, I'll call your caretaker this evening. But after lunch." He held up his coffee mug towards Sparkle in a toast.

"But after lunch," Sparkle echoed, blinking and lifting his water bottle, since it was still in his hand.

After lunch. Calling Lewis. Gonna have a home. Yeah, he was like seventeen now but better late than never and this was something he was pretty much positive was never going to happen.

How was he to cope?

"I... yeah. After lunch. That's." His brain wasn't cooperating. Great. "Wow."

Most likely he was to cope by freaking out, worrying a lot,getting drunk, worrying more, then forgetting he had a key and climbing in through Hannibal's window again. If Hannibal had to guess.

Hannibal would call Lewis, research a bit more in the library, head home, start dinner, read, and set out water and aspirin before he went to bed. Just in case.

He chuckled again and picked up his fork. "Lunch goes faster if you eat."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Demon Marcus, Sunday

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject