saturday night and the moon is out
Sep. 19th, 2022 04:35 pmTucked away off the road in Bon Temps, there's a road house. Warm light spills from its windows, and the sound of a jukebox playing drifts out into the muggy Louisiana night. The regular assortment of trucks and Hail-Mary-please-keep-this-lemon-goin'-just-a-little-longer cars sit in the dirt parking lot; what amounts to about half the town's small population... or, at least, of those of the 'drinking age and above' persuasion.
Inside, it's a bar of the type scattered all across the American South: homey, no-nonsense. Booths and tables. A man in a plaid flannel shirt wiping the bar; a crossdresser in the kitchen singing Gospel hymns and rolling his hips in time with the words just to scandalize the prep cook. A handful of waitresses, bustling about.
Sookie makes her way briskly through it all, a tray balanced on her palm and her eyes kept stubbornly front, as voices swarm around her. Aloud, and... less so.
...I cannot wait to get the hell out of this podunk town...
Inside, it's a bar of the type scattered all across the American South: homey, no-nonsense. Booths and tables. A man in a plaid flannel shirt wiping the bar; a crossdresser in the kitchen singing Gospel hymns and rolling his hips in time with the words just to scandalize the prep cook. A handful of waitresses, bustling about.
Sookie makes her way briskly through it all, a tray balanced on her palm and her eyes kept stubbornly front, as voices swarm around her. Aloud, and... less so.
...I’m just going to have one beer tonight Jesus one beer that’s all...
...better not gripe about me eating fries not after what I did for him last night...
...I cannot wait to get the hell out of this podunk town...
"Well, make sure you do, and before it’s too late," she responds, thoughtless, to the young man. "Because every year you wait? You just get more and more stuck here. Believe me, I know."
He stares at her. So do his parents.
So does the other table. And she realizes, too little too late, that he hadn't said that out loud, not at all. She laughs, uncomfortable. "I’ll get y'all some ketchup," she says, brightly, and flees, ponytail swinging against the nape of her neck as she goes.
Stupid, Sookie, she chides herself. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
He stares at her. So do his parents.
So does the other table. And she realizes, too little too late, that he hadn't said that out loud, not at all. She laughs, uncomfortable. "I’ll get y'all some ketchup," she says, brightly, and flees, ponytail swinging against the nape of her neck as she goes.
Stupid, Sookie, she chides herself. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
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Date: 2022-09-21 11:18 pm (UTC)"Sure," Sookie says, easily, and smiles at her grandmother. "Gran, why don't you show him up to the room? And then you oughta go to bed. I'm sorry to keep you up so late."
Adele pats her cheek, fondly, and looks at Sam. "I'll just show you where everything is," she says. "And then you should come down and have a bite to eat. My, but you're a tall thing! I imagine you have quite an appetite."
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Date: 2022-09-21 11:33 pm (UTC)He moves to follow Adele upstairs, but shoots a look over his shoulder at Sookie, trying to convey that she shouldn't go anywhere.
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Date: 2022-09-21 11:38 pm (UTC)Adele leads the young man up the staircase, still fairly spry, even for her age. "I hope this nastiness won't put you off our little town," she tells Sam. "Bon Temps really is a nice place, though I suppose we get our share of trouble, just like anywhere."
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Date: 2022-09-21 11:43 pm (UTC)She's got a will of iron, it seems, and a sweet sort of kindness about her that's the kind of thing he used to dream about when he was a kid, trying to make up imaginary family members to fill in all their missing pieces, before he gave up.
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Date: 2022-09-21 11:50 pm (UTC)She points, showing him. "And plenty of extra blankets in the chest just over by the wall.
The room isn't large, but like everything else in the house, it's sparklingly clean and arranged by someone with more of an eye for comfort than for style. The old wooden bed is spread with a handmade quilt, and the windows look out over the smooth expanse of lawn, fireflies visible at the edge of the woods beyond. Adele leads him into it, then beams warmly at him. "I hope you'll be comfortable."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:04 am (UTC)It's nothing at all like the motel rooms that are most of his lived experience. Was this anything like what their house looked like in Kansas, before, he wonders?
"Please don't worry about me, Mrs. Stackhouse. Thank you so much."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:08 am (UTC)She shuffles to the door and turns to give him a warm smile. "You have a good night, and rest up, now. Let Sookie know I've turned in, will you?"
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:11 am (UTC)He gives it a couple of minutes, long enough for her to make her way down the hall, then backtracks downstairs to the kitchen, looking for Sookie.
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:15 am (UTC)"Do you like sweet tea?" she asks, glancing at him as he comes in, but not stopping in her movements. She finishes drying the plates and carries them to the cabinet, then turns her attention to the silverware. "Or there's a couple beers in the fridge; we keep some for when Jason comes by."
It's nerves and reaction, she knows; if she stops, if she slows down, she's going to have to think about what happened and what it means. But as long as she's going about the familiar motions, her hands stay steady and sure, and her voice doesn't shake.
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:22 am (UTC)"I can get it, if you tell me where the glasses are."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:25 am (UTC)She goes to the cupboard and takes out a couple of glasses, then heads to the fridge to fill them with ice. "Are y'hungry at all? I could put together a sandwich, quick."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:29 am (UTC)He's not entirely sure where to go first, and starts with, "I'm sorry."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:32 am (UTC)She opens the fridge and retrieves the pitcher of sweet tea, then fills the glasses. Setting the tea back again, she picks up the glasses and brings them over, placing one on the table in front of him before she looks down into his face, her expression solemn. "You tell me which part was your fault, and I'll accept an apology. But I don't believe you can."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2022-09-22 12:37 am (UTC)After a moment, she nods, and comes to sit across from him, her hands around her own glass. "Seems like you know an awful lot about vampires, considering they're not supposed to exist."
But neither is... whatever she is, she's sure of that much. For the first time, she wonders whether or not he might consider her a monster, too.
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:42 am (UTC)This is different, he tells himself. She's being threatened by a vampire. She already knows the world isn't safe.
It still feels like he's ripping something away, from her and from himself, when he continues,
"There's a lot of other things out there, too. I grew up learning about them."
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:47 am (UTC)Folding her arms on the table, she looks over at him. "You were expectin' him to attack me. Why didn't he?"
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:51 am (UTC)"I don't know." He looks back up at her. "I didn't know he'd -- I didn't know any of them were around, either. Not until I saw him, when he came in. I thought he'd spotted you as ... as prey. I don't know why he didn't. Unless..."
He cuts himself off there, cursing himself for a fool.
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:55 am (UTC)So... maybe he really had just stopped in at Merlotte's, and decided to stick around for a few days.
She can't look at that thought too hard, not yet. "Unless what?"
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Date: 2022-09-22 12:58 am (UTC)He takes a swallow of the tea to wet his throat. It's sweet, all right, but it's really good. He takes another, then sets the glass carefully back on the table and makes himself meet her eyes again.
"Unless he wanted to - to recruit you. Turn you into one of them."
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Date: 2022-09-22 01:03 am (UTC)The thought is too horrifying to contemplate. She can feel the blood rushing out of her face. "But... he'd still have to... to bite me to make that happen, wouldn't he?"
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Date: 2022-09-22 01:05 am (UTC)"I'm not going to let him get you, Sookie."
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Date: 2022-09-22 01:10 am (UTC)Which means... he deserves the truth. She turns her hand and curls her fingers around his, allowing herself a brief moment of contact before she regretfully pulls her hand back to herself. "There's one other thing it could be," she says, her glance falling to the table.
It's covered in that cloth that she herself had laundered and ironed earlier in the week. Comfortingly everyday. Reliably normal.
Nothing like... whatever she is.
She takes a breath and meets his glance again. "You heard him. He kept asking what I am. Not who, Sam. What."
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Date: 2022-09-22 01:14 am (UTC)"You think you know what he meant by that?"
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Date: 2022-09-22 01:18 am (UTC)Sookie folds her hands in her lap, tight, and looks down, not wanting to see the way his face will change when she tells him, not wanting to hear how his thoughts will change. "I have a... disability. It's why... why I get so distracted all the time. And why people here think I'm... why they call me crazy."
She wets her lips and forces herself to meet his eyes. To tear off the bandage. "I can hear people's thoughts," she says, low. "What I am... is a telepath."
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