[SCT] Chocolate And Marshmallows = True Happiness

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

Zoe nodded at Quinn's repetition. The question had her smiling, half remembering, half embarrassed that she hadn't mentioned it already. "Like, well, more like a fairy than anything. I guess definitely closer to a butterfly. She can actually fly though." It was still strange sometimes, thinking about Alice with wings like that. It certainly didn't fit the brusque personality. Then again, that was part of the appeal.

Zoe finally had her own chocolate (or at least seemed to finally realize she had chocolate; sometimes Fate gets confused on details). She took a sip while Quinn confessed his lack of project. The inspiration part though, that had her nodding. "yes, there is something about this place, isn't there? I'm hoping to get a few shots myself. There's a trail that weaves through some of the thicker woods,' she said, a little excitement coming in. "It's quite good, if, um, that's what you were thinking."

Zoe paused, her brow furrowing for a moment. She did recall Quinn mentioning photography before; they had the club and all as well. But, well, for all she knew, he took photos of dying animals. "What do you mostly take pictures of?" she asked, licking her lips slightly. "If you don't mind me asking."

[Quinn Wiley]

Of course, Quinn should have thought of fairy instead of butterfly. They weren’t quite like butterflies, their wings. More like dragonflies. Still, they were wings and he thought it was impressive, but also kind of an inconvenient. What was she supposed to do with those wings, were they always out? And her shirts, she had to make holes for them? He didn’t see it as very easy to deal with. It had to strike out. “She can pull them back, right? I don’t remember seeing a lot of fairy girls at the school,” he asked Zoe. Not that he really cared but it was nice to see that you come up to think proved to be right.

“Yeah, I did some skiing there to scout the place. Didn’t get my camera though,” he agreed when she mentioned a spot. When it came to ski down a slope, he was terrible but he was doing fair with cross-country or snowshoes. Looks like, once again, his poor physical skills proved that he should only do some walking around here and leave the rest to better sportsmen. “I was hoping to get pictures of people around here too. You know, when they are themselves, not really trying to show off in front of a camera,” he added. Quinn liked when people were doing things as if unaware, thought sometimes they really were unaware, that he was here with his camera. Their expression then, they weren’t trying to hide anything.

He shifted when she asked what he was doing. “I don’t mind taking models, when I can get some. When you have a concept, it’s great. But I also like to take pictures of them when they reveal who they really are and they rarely do when they know there is a camera pointed at them.” He shrugged, as if her opinion on the matter couldn’t mean any less to him. In truth, he knew it made him a little creepy, close to a paparazzo or something. He didn’t like that. He didn’t think he was looking for scandals or anything. “You should see the pictures I took of this girl playing the violin. I was hoping to get more, with a better set and all, but it never happened,” he told Zoe, almost bragging about it. He was proud of this one, he thought it ended up great. Plus, this was Zoe. He felt he could brag around her a little without fearing she would burst his bubble.

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

"Oh yes!" said Zoe, nodding. She began to gesture at her back and around her ribs, speaking: "She can pull them back and they form a tattoo that--" she flushed, realizing that there was really only one way she'd know about a tattoo along the back and rib-line. Zoe lowered her hand and took a sudden great interest in her chocolate for a few moments.

Though fortunately, they had photography to continue discussing (again). Zoe nodded as Quinn continued: "I often do that myself. I just wanted to give people more a chance to be their best for this," and she did mix a few general shots in, as Quinn himself knew. After all, his shot hadn't really been posed or prepared or anything along those lines.

Zoe only grew more excited as Quinn continued, nodding along, definitely agreeing. "oh, that does sound splendid! I always love it when you catch musicians at just the right time. I did some photos of a friend of mine: she plays in a local punk band, and they turned out just amazing," Zoe smiled at the memory, nodding. "There are quite a few talented people around here, isn't there? I suppose it's because all us mutants are pulled here..."

[Quinn Wiley]

Quinn looked at Zoe as she stopped talking. Her girlfriend had a tattoo on her back. Well, he was not surprised Zoe would have seen her girlfriend’s back but she could also have found an excuse that wouldn’t imply anything intimate to have happened between them. For all he knew, girls might love to do slumber party and end up in bras or something that would show her tattoo without any sex or foreplay involved. Anyway, he preferred not to think that Zoe had a sex life. He had none so no one had one either. Especially not a girl who was probably just as socially awkward as he was. It would suck too much.

“Sometimes, you have a concept and you need the person to be aware of it. But sometimes, it’s nice to capture their emotion when they think no one is looking. It’s surprising what you can discover.” Wow, that sounded almost thoughtful. Quinn was hiding a lot of his personality to people. He never saw why he should bother showing them who he was since they would leave anyway. Pictures were all that remained.

He had been lucky with this violinist. He managed to get some nice pictures before she noticed his presence and did not flip out when it happened. It was too bad he couldn’t do it again with a better setting but he still had this one. It was better than nothing. He stopped thinking about it though as Zoe talked of a friend of hers. Wait, what? “You got a punk friend?” It was somehow hard to believe.

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

Zoe nodded along with Quinn's assertions. It certainly sounded like something that she would have considered, maybe even something that she'd heard in photography class or from some of the people who'd bothered to teach her or something along those lines. It certainly wasn't surprising to hear it from Quinn, not in the slightest.

"Catching them when they're themselves, not when they're the people we think they should be," Zoe reiterated, nodding again. The nod turned into a giggle as Quinn continued, the question certainly making her giggle. Zoe nodded a few times. "yes, her name is Maelea: she plays in a local band and she can summon and sort of control spiders," Zoe gestured for a moment as if her hands was a spider crawling across the armchair. "She's quite pretty too: that's part of how we met. I, ah," Zoe flushed slightly, "had noticed her in a library and took some pictures..."

Zoe flushed and looked down, but she thought she could flip it slightly, or at least alleviate her own discomfort: "Striking people always distract me: you know that all too well."

[Quinn Wiley]

Quinn was not always taking pictures of people without them knowing. It would be too close to being a stalker and some people thought he was a creep enough without adding this against him. But simply by telling someone to hold it right here for a second, that little something you might have seen is gone. He preferred to take the shot and then let them know about it, explain why he just had to take it. If they understood, it was great, if they didn’t... well that sucked. It probably explained why he rarely told them. Totally normal. Not creepy at all.

“Yeah,” he agreed with her as she summed it up. She must have experienced it too. He couldn’t be the only one who walked into a scene and thought it was too perfect like this to have it changed by interfering in any way, he had to take the picture the way it looked now. Besides, she was kind of socially awkward too so he couldn’t believe it was not hard for her to come up to someone at times and explain her ideas to them. Then again, it would appear she managed to get quite a few people for her photoshoot so maybe he was the only socially awkward character left around here.

She even had a punk friend. He had a hard time imagining Zoe listening to punk music. “Spiders?” he repeated. That must be interesting to look at. He wondered how many she could summon at once. When she said she was pretty, Quinn thought Zoe tried to flirt with her or something. What, she was lesbian, was she not? “A pretty spider summoner. That sounds almost like something Marvel could come up with. They’d call her Black Widow too, for lack of originality,” he let out. At least he was glad to find out he was not the only one taking pictures of people in the library. And obviously, by the way she acted, this Maelea person didn’t know at first. It was good to see he was not the only one doing this.

He raised an eyebrow. He knew it? Did she mean to say he was striking and distracted her or that he too was distracted by striking people? He wasn’t sure but he couldn’t believe that one might consider him striking. “I do?”

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

Zoe nodded as Quinn repeated her assertion: "Spiders," she repeated, adding another shy smile. The continuation drew a light laugh from her too, her eyes lowering as if she should feel ashamed of the little gleeful noise. Something about Quinn struck Zoe as being so very somber, and she wanted to try and fit it. Though that didn't seem to quite mesh with his discussing superheros and comics and what have you, something that Zoe knew very little about.

The following question had her blinking and staring for a moment. "Well, I just..." she fidgeted, chewing her lip for a moment, "I was meaning how I sort of, um, took your picture and all. And how I mentioned it. Never mind," she flushed and looked down at her chocolate, as if it could save her. She took a sip and looked away, again wondering how she managed to keep stumbling her way through conversations like this, even with people like Quinn, who was at least willing to tolerate her, if nothing else.

Zoe fidgeted with her cup again, ending up staring, at a loss for what else to say at the moment, but feeling as though she still needed to stick around.

[Quinn Wiley]

Manipulation over animals always seemed weird to him. You’d think that after blowing fire like a dragon nothing would surprise you but there was something weird and slightly unnerving about manipulating beings. You forced them to obey you and even though they were spiders and Quinn interacted with them only to squish them and flush them down his toilet he still didn’t think it was quite right to have the ability to force anything, even those ugly creatures, to do as you wished. Then again, it might just be because spiders were rather icky. Quinn was not scared of them but they sure were not as cute nor interesting as, let’s say, puppies or wildcats or birds. The fact this girl was able to control spiders made her odd to him, more than the fact she was friends with Zoe or a punk girl.

Quinn was no expert in superheroes but he sure read some comics and watched his fair of movies and shows about them. They were starting to take all the place and it was annoying but the fact they might not be all that different to them, stupid names and costumes aside, got Quinn drawn to them. He would still more likely admit reading Jane Austen than comics though.

Quinn believed he was nice to Zoe. In a Tarquin Wiley style but he didn’t think he was being as rude to her as he would most people. So it was strange to him to see her fidget still around him as if she was scared or something. “So you consider me striking?” It sure was not an adjective often used for him. She was playing with her cup and Quinn was trying to find a way to get her to relax for once. Remembering his bag of tiny marshmallows, he grabbed two or three of them and dropped them in her cup. She didn't even ask him if she could get any nor did she consider it might not be his to begin with. “You always have to look like I’m about to lash at you? I feel like a bad guy now and I don’t think I’ve ever been cruel to you,” he told her. Blunt, most probable but he didn’t think he had been cruel to her. At least not to the point of being afraid he might not like any word coming out of her mouth.

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

"Well, yes, I do, though, um," Zoe said, flushing again. She didn't want to lead Quinn on or anything. Though surely he knew full well that she was quite gay and in quite the happy relationship. Zoe didn't want to belabor the point though: she already felt like she was failing miserably at this conversation, just as she did with nearly every conversation she had with normal people.

It seemed as though Quinn noticed too. Zoe's eyes went wide and she shook her head, even raising a hand to wave. "What? No, I don't--I'm like this with nearly everyone, really," she said, flushing. "Even people I know care about me, like my girlfriend. I just... I wasn't great at talking to people before... before I... before I got here," that last sounded lame, and it made Zoe pause for a moment, taking another steadying breath. "And then things happened and I just wanted to pull away from everyone. My power didn't help. And now I'm trying to be more open again to be more myself. And sometimes I just... people make me nervous."

She let out a breath, adding a soft laugh and looking down at her chocolate. "Sorry, my girlfriend says I should just be myself but it's... it's not that easy, I guess," she looked down at her chocolate. No, it wasn't easy at all.

[Quinn Wiley]

Striking, Quinn? He didn’t think that he was. He had a withdrawn and gloomy personality, very few friends and he didn’t think he had any features worth mentioning. His eyes might be of an interesting color, but that was about it. He didn’t think he was someone you could notice. He didn’t mind. Some people naturally attracted attention. Others, like himself and even Zoe he thought, tended to stay on the sideline. He was fine with that. He was an observer rather than an actor. So, of course, he was surprised she considered him striking. “...Because of the fire thing?” he asked her. It was the only thing he believed that could make him striking. He knew she was not interested in him. She talked of her girlfriend earlier.

She said she was always like that. “Really? I didn’t notice,” he let out. She’d have to be really stupid not to get that sarcasm. He didn’t think she was stupid. That didn’t change the fact Quinn sounded like a bad guy when she was around, fidgeting, stuttering and apologizing for everything she was saying. It was impossible to really get mad at her. He bet she was able to apologize for apologizing so much. “Then even your friends must feel like they are being mean to you sometimes. I don’t want to see you when you’re really scared,” he let out as she tried to explain her behaviour.

He looked at her from the corner of his eye. He had a doubtful expression painted on his traits. “I’d say people make you nervous. You just don’t want to disappoint them too much. If you don’t care, it’s a lot easier.” And Quinn knew what he was talking about. He had a master’s degree in not giving a shit.

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

"Um, no?" Zoe ventured, flushing again. "It's... you have... a striking demeanor and expression..." she looked away, again feeling like she was just making things worse. Though if anyone would really get what she was talking about, it was most definitely Quinn Wiley, another photographer.

Though he didn't seem to notice Zoe's tendency to step over herself. No, wait, that was sarcasm. Zoe did pick up on that, though obviously delayed enough that if she'd actually said anything, Quinn would have been able to jump on it. His continuation just made her flush darker than ever. Yes, yes that was most certainly how it was. Zoe couldn't count the number of times she'd had to reassure people that it was just her and not them.

The last actually made her laugh. She shook her head. "Sorry, it's good advice it's just..." she smiled the sort of smile that made those brown eyes sparkle a bit as she looked up, "you sound a lot like Alice then. Saying that you don't care what other people think, that it only matters if you let it... sometimes I wish I were that strong," she looked down. "Other times I wonder if you're missing something, but... I guess it's about who but..." she sighed, "I don't think I could ever really stop thinking about what other people think about me, really," she gave Quinn another smile, this one sadder. "I guess that's my fatal flaw."

[Quinn Wiley]

Quinn never thought he had a striking demeanor or expression. His eyes might be interesting in color and shape. He always liked his eyes but he never thought people ever bothered looking at them. Zoe seemed to think he was striking though. “I never thought I was,” he admitted. He was more the withdrawn type and he thought his disposition made him unappealing to most people. He bet people were more likely to think Zoe was the striking one and she sure didn't look like it. It was not an insult, he thought she was a pretty good photographer and would not deny she was a nice girl and whatever other compliment her friend might want to use to describe her. He just didn’t think neither of them would attract a lot of attention.

He raised an eyebrow as she laughed. He didn’t think he said anything funny. Maybe it was nervous? Most of everything she did came out of nervousness so why not laughter too. When she stopped, he assumed she would try and say something about how important it was to care about people and everything. People seemed to love telling him that. Well, not really, but he sure heard it enough in the past. “People judge you and then you start feeling bad about yourself. Next thing you know, you try to fit in by changing who you are. And guess what, they don’t like you more then. If they can’t take you the way you are, they’re not worth your time.” He didn't say that as a piece of advice although Zoe might think he did. The you there was not in reference to Zoe. In a way, he might as well be talking of himself here, to justify why he was that way. Although there was a big difference between not letting people make you hate yourself and not letting anyone in. He shrugged though when she said it was her fatal flaw. “I suppose though, if you take in what I just said, it means you shouldn’t change that...” Or something like that. Whatever. It wasn’t like he ever pretended to be good at giving advice.

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

Zoe kept her smile as Quinn continued philosophizing. She heard what he was saying, insisting on his own individuality. As he had half-expected, half-dreaded, she did initially take it for advice. The thought of not changing, of being who she was, it did reflect what everyone kept saying, and what Zoe was starting to believe more and more. It had been part of the problem with her relationship with Devyn, after all, a problem that she only just now really got over.

However, some part of her also started to piece together that this was also Quinn stating his own philosophy, as if insisting that this was who he was and that she should just accept it. Zoe ended up staring, even as he continued, seeming to contradict himself.

"I understand," she said, nodding slowly. She offered him another smile, then licked her lips, looking away to take a sip of her cocoa. "You almost sound like a philosopher or something," she commented, drawing her head back up to look at him, "maybe that's your path? Or not. It's not like we have to decide who we are right now. No one does," she flushed, looking down, feeling like, again, she'd put her foot in her mouth.

[Quinn Wiley]

Quinn didn’t really consider himself a philosopher. He did have an opinion about life: it sucked. His feelings for Zoe were as contradictory as the speech he just gave her. On one hand, she was socially awkward, nervous all the time and had a common passion with him, making him feel like he could somewhat relate, to a certain degree, with her. But on the other hand, she was much more popular than he was despite all that. Was it because she was a girl? He had no idea what made her different. No, he knew. Despite how awkward she could be, she still talked to people. Quinn was not doing that and he sure wasn’t as nervous as she was. Still, Zoe could be quite puzzling to him.

For a moment, he almost felt like telling her that but instead he turned his head away from her. He just couldn’t let himself open up. Not even to Zoe. He looked back at her only when she talked again. “I doubt my philosophy of life really interests people. Or that they would agree,” he pointed out with a shrug. He hoped he didn’t have a philosopher’s soul. It didn’t look like something you could live from. Photography now, although also hard to make a living of, was far more interesting.

“I think we’d both prefer to be photographers, no? It depends for what though...” Quinn was not seeing himself taking pictures of weddings and proms. Why would he shoot the happiness of others when he could not share it? But there were many other options. They were all showing up in his head. He often told himself that his opinion in life, that interest led to expectation and expectation to disappointment, should also be about his dream career but the boy couldn’t help hoping. After all, he was only human, it was natural to have a dream of sort.

[Zoe Wallerstein-Smythe]

Zoe nearly winced as Quinn talked about how he didn't really think his philosophy would be all that popular. Part of her was inclined to disagree, though, well, it did seem that nearly every conversation she had with the young man revolved around the way to live life, to think, to handle others, large topics that Zoe usually thought the domain of bearded old men or fiery young people or maybe even wrinkled old women who'd seen it all.

Though as Quinn continued, Zoe found herself flushing and nodding. "Yes, quite right," she agreed. "That's certainly where we're heading," and she had to laugh a little. "I suppose I should have remembered that, what with what we keep discussing," Zoe tapped her mug again, taking another deep breath before looking over at Quinn. "Though nothing says the two aren't connected. Maybe I'm just seeing the artist's soul you have... we have. Not that we have the same soul but... you know what I mean."

Zoe flushed again, looking back down at her mostly cool cocoa. How long had they been talking now? And how much of that had been Zoe stuttering her way from conversation point to point?