Title: dusty eyes;; as .c.o.l.d. as {{clay
Description: Pour Constantine.
Caroline Keith - January 3, 2008 11:52 PM (GMT)
If there was one thing Nimbus didn’t have that Aura did, it was empty space. Admittedly, she hadn’t seen all of it at first, what with all the people crowding around the campus, but in time she found places that nobody ventured; beneath the bleachers, just outside the gateway, just about anywhere around three in the morning, and (her personal favorite) the abandoned building. So maybe it seems peculiar for her to be collecting places to be alone- and normally she wouldn’t- but lately she felt the need to be uninterrupted. It was a new feeling to her, since the Caroline Keith she knew loved being around people; that girl liked people in general. But nowadays she couldn’t think straight in the slightest crowd. She had to wait for the hallways to clear before dashing to her next class, and when she got there she sat in the back.
She wasn’t happy being this anti-social, especially since it put her right back where she started. She’d started wearing long sleeves and gloves again because for some reason her control was ebbing steadily away. All this mental stress was finally taking its toll on her in the worst of ways: she couldn’t keep the visions out any more. Whereas before she could switch from negated power to seeing anything she wanted on command, now she was constantly trying to drown out memories of herself in whatever clothing she’d chosen to wear that day. It was painful to be back at the starting point again. Too painful to handle any longer…
She pushed the door of the abandoned wing open and stepped in, pausing for a moment before sliding off her gloves with the utmost care and slipping them into her pocket. She didn’t trust her problems to the superiors here at Aura. She had to take care of herself. So with her free time she’d chosen to try and discipline herself again. It was probably just a problem of concentration, she mused, rather than deterioration of actual control.
She walked a little further into the building and chose a door at random; taking the handle with her bare and hand pulling it partially open before the memories it held washed over her. They were mundane, mostly images of kids filing into class, but a frustration nonetheless. She winced and released the doorknob, her hand hovering uncertainly over the bronze knob. She closed her eyes, took a steadying breath and gripped the handle again, pulling the door fully open. This time the image only flickered through her head before disappearing. Carrie sighed, partially in relief, partially in annoyance. She wasn’t what she used to be. Supposedly, she could blame all this on the fire… but it didn’t seem right. It was all this emotional baggage she wanted to get rid of. And still only one thing she knew of could keep it at bay- but she couldn’t go there again. Exercise would have to do until she could properly regulate her ability.
She walked slowly into the room, which was flooded with late evening light that revealed a mass of dust mite flitting through the air. Every surface was fuzzy and indistinct from years of disuse, but it gave the room an almost friendly feel, despite its cold exterior. A messy grey chalkboard adorned the closest wall, and beyond that the desks still stood in careful (if slightly crooked) rows. She took a few careful steps forward until she was standing beside the nearest desk, her back to the door, which still stood ajar. She ran a tentative finger across the wooden surface, tracing a clean line through the thick dust.
These images were fainter, as if viewed through an obscured glass, and all were of varying insignificance. Dust, she’d come to find, traveled further than one might expect. These mites in particular had been to such exotic locations as the top of some kid’s head and the ceiling of this building. Fascinating. She wiped her fingers off on her jeans, still more than a little perturbed by the continual apparitions. She ran a hand through her hair, pleased at least that she wasn’t host to visions of her own past. She’d had enough of those to last a lifetime.
Constantine Vance - January 4, 2008 12:32 AM (GMT)
Constantine Vance sometimes considered how much easier life would be if he had a different power. Selective amnesia would have been nice, if there were such a power--the ability to forget and remember things on will. No more dealing with memories you'd rather not have, memories that sometimes weren't even your own. Just floating through life, blissfully ignorant of what everyone else was thinking. And the perfect ability to touch someone without consequences--a tap on the shoulder, a playful blow to the head with friends. Sports.
But Constantine never dwelt very long in dreams, especially when they had no chance of happening. There was no reality other than this: he was psychometric, stuck in a school that wasn't helping him control his powers, and completely without the ability to touch anyone or most objects without seeing someone (or something's) memories. No amount of dreaming could change that.
Earlier this year, Constantine wouldn't have worried about being psychometric. Nimbus had been teaching him to control his powers, and he had almost had the hang of it--block the memories out, don't let them into your mind. On good days, he had actually been able to touch the doorknobs of some rooms, or stand within arm's length of his friends (or, as they were probably more aptly described, friendly acquaintances) without being afraid.
Then Nimbus burned to the ground quite suddenly, and Constantine's control had come crashing down with it. For a few days, Constantine blamed it on the shock of his sister's death. After that, he had gone to see the doctor, thinking his thought processes may have been screwed up by the knock on the head he received from a falling beam during the fire. After a few weeks, he finally had to admit it - he could no longer control his power. Something about that day had reversed it completely.
As Constantine thought about this, he wandered the grounds of Aura Academy, not really caring where he went. He felt it was time to explore the grounds - he had gotten to know the ins and outs of Nimbus after only a couple of weeks, so he figured it was time to get acquainted with his current surroundings. He had learned the inside of the building already, so his only place to go (he'd get to knowing the town later, perhaps when he could actually drive) was out.
As he walked, he noticed a building to his left. He immediately switched tracks, recognizing the place as an opportunity for silence and solitude, two of Constantine's favorite things. Crossing a bit of snow to get to it, Constantine finally reached the place.
For a moment, the freshman hesitated. A lifetime of psychometrics had taught him not to touch doors unless he had to - they were an excellent source of memories, people always going in and out of them. He had once described it as being like memory space in a computer; doors seemed to have more space, for some reason, than some other objects did. Constantine raised his hand up nervously and then sighed in relief, having forgotten he was wearing gloves. Ryence had suggested them, and though the idea had seemed silly at first, it had grown on Constantine until he had gotten himself a pair--black leather, so they didn't look too out-of-place on Constantine's hands.
He opened the door, taking a breath as he caught a few stray memories, mostly insignificant things, and a few memories of people sneaking into the place, planning to do things Constantine wouldn't want to repeat to his mother (though she wouldn't blush to think about it, she'd obviously had enough of that on the side, hence her "late nights at work"). Thankfully, he didn't have to see anything he didn't want to, because this room was incredibly boring.
It took him a moment to realize that there was somebody else in the room, someone he recognized instantly. "Carrie," he said, one of his lopsided grins lighting up his face temporarily. She wasn't usually as... well, as anti-social as Constantine, and he hadn't expected to see her here, of all places.
"I didn't expect to see you here, of all places."
[[ 0___o what the?!--well, that was long, wasn't it... 0___0 ]] Caroline Keith - January 4, 2008 03:30 AM (GMT)
She turned perhaps a little more quickly than she’d meant to, having been startled by his voice, however quiet.
“Constantine, hi.” She said hurriedly, her face a little flushed. She was suddenly very conscious of how light her hands felt without her gloves. Constantine was the one person she expected to notice things like that- that she was alone and gloveless, touching foreign objects for no immediately apparent reason. The dust had blackened her fingertips, and she continued to absently wipe them on her jeans for a couple seconds before she realized how odd it must look.
“I didn’t expect to see anyone here,” she professed, sighing a little, “but I’m glad it’s you and not some stranger.”
She smiled softly, perhaps even a little apologetically. It hadn’t been the nicest greeting in the world, and she didn’t want to appear rude. She glanced at his pair of black gloves, which were clearly new. She wondered suddenly how much that would have cost him, considering his situation… goddamn it, it was so hard to think about people without delving into what she’d seen of their lives. She knew all about his parents thanks to her careless brush with Drake, and now she couldn’t help but think about him in the same way.
“So what brings you to the abandoned building, hm?” she said, casually perching herself on the dusty surface behind her (and no doubt blackening the seat of her jeans). She folded her hands and set them in her lap, wincing almost imperceptibly as a flash of her own drunken liaisons slipped through her mind. She tried to write it off as a simple lack of concentration, but it made her feel entirely too fragile. She couldn’t even keep her own skin from causing a reaction. She needed to practice… she needed to perfect this again… she needed to get the visions of the wreckage and of her friends’ colorless faces out of her nightmares in order to get her normalcy back. But it was impossible.
And there she went again, drifting off into her own world and leaving poor Constantine just standing there. Now she thought of it, though, those gloves had more meaning than just a price. It meant that she wasn’t the only psychometric survivor having trouble with power restraint.
“Wait, scratch my last question. You don’t have to tell me that.” She said suddenly, studying him with an expression of interest on her face ”Constantine, have you been having trouble with your power lately?”
[A little, yeah. xD]
Constantine Vance - January 7, 2008 01:07 AM (GMT)
“So what brings you to the abandoned building, hm?”
Constantine grimaced, turning away slightly to look around the room. He knew Carrie would see it as his normal behavior and not think he was being rude - the question she had asked fell under the category of "personal questions," things he never answered if he could help it. He glanced back at her, noticing her looking at his gloves. Were they so ostentatious? He was lucky, he reflected, that he'd managed to find them on clearance; they had been little more than ten dollars with a sixty-percent discount.
He also watched Carrie wince as her hand brushed her own jeans. The nearly-imperceptible movement was slightly shocking. He had always thought Carrie had infallable control over her power, an ability to block anything out. Perhaps this was a foolish assumption - had he just witnessed a loss of control?
He found a table and sat down on it, resting his head against the wall. Immediately, he regretted that: a sudden vision of someone sitting alone in the room, sobbing, brought his mood down several notches. He sat back up, leaning forward slightly.
“Wait, scratch my last question. You don’t have to tell me that. ...Constantine, have you been having trouble with your power lately?”
Should he tell her? It was embarassing, having to admit that he'd lost all control since the fire, that he could no longer touch anything without having some sort of memory about it. That he had had to run from class the other day, into the bathroom, tearing up because of a particularly disturbing series of memories from a girl who'd absolutely had to tap him on the hand to get his attention.
"I haven't been able to control it since the fire," he admitted quietly, his voice falling softly in the room. "Hence the gloves - I can't touch anything without seeing something." He looked her in the eyes as he said this, trying to keep his face expressionless, but knowing that the pain and depression he had felt since the fire were probably showing. He had tried to hide it, but it wasn't easy to hide things from a psychometric--you got savvy to people's emotions after a while.
Caroline Keith - January 7, 2008 02:42 AM (GMT)
She watched him sit and then recoil from the wall before speaking, feeling more than a little foolish despite what she’d just seen. That one reaction was, in a nutshell, how she felt every moment of every day recently. She knew he wouldn’t have wanted her to see it, though. She was the same way.
In a way, she regretted there being another psychometric student being a part of her life; they were too similar in adverse ways. For example, both had the unfortunate talent of being able to read people’s emotions. This wasn’t something either had attempted to gain (hopefully), but a regrettable side effect of being able to sense the emotions of everyone in their vicinity to some effect.
She was a specifically over-analytical when it came to body language. Her own, for example, was decidedly overcome and deflated-looking. Her shoulders slumped dramatically in comparison to her usual prim stature, and her hands lay limp in her lap, curled protectively over each other. Small lines around and under her eyes were proof of one too many sleepless nights, and even her hair was a tad too wild (again, in comparison to its typically flawless state) to be completely ordinary. She, looking at herself in the mirror, could translate each detail into an emotional stressor. It was simply the way her mind worked. She didn’t know if Constantine was the same, but she had seen his expression just after she flinched, and knew he’d caught her eyeing his gloves.
But at the same time it was almost comforting to have someone else feel as overwhelmed and frightened by this ability. Nobody could really understand- you tell others what you can do and they brush it away, comparing its damaging nature to that of one of the more physically gifted students. It was idiotic of them, really, trying to compare mental damage to physical destruction. Only those who had been through it could really identify with how agonizing it was to be a vessel for others’ emotions and memories.
She couldn’t help thinking this hard about how life changed since the fire. She’d lost her control in more than just this one way- so much so that she’d started hiding some of her self away whereas before she’d have been absurdly open about how much ached inside. But no, she went against her own ideals and locked her emotions up. It was so unlike her not to cry, not to react to something as huge as this…but somewhere inside her she was afraid to react for fear that she might sink so far into her sorrow that her power would run completely free. Her reins on it now were straining and weak, but she at least had something.
"I haven't been able to control it since the fire," he admitted quietly, his voice falling softly in the room. "Hence the gloves - I can't touch anything without seeing something."
Their eyes met as he said this, jarring her out of her reverie. She considered him for a few seconds before slipping her hand into her pocket (thankfully without any visions) and pulling out her white gloves.
“You’re not the only one,” she said softly, her tone tinged with shame, “That’s why I’m here. I’m trying rein it in again…”
Her voice drifted off and she set the gloves beside her on the table, sighing heavily as her stormy eyes drifted back to his. She wanted to explain that she wasn’t usually like this, that without control her life fell apart… but she couldn’t. Her own pride and fear was keeping everything bottled up.