saturday night and the moon is out

[feel_human]

Tucked 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’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.

 

Comments

[feel_human]

"Catch me makin' a guest get his own drink," she says, scornful, and nods to the table, which is spread with a slightly faded but clean and pressed tablecloth of ditsy blue floral. "Have a seat, Sam."

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."

[gavemea_45]

He sits down at the table and is quiet, watching her. "I'm okay. Sookie..."

He's not entirely sure where to go first, and starts with, "I'm sorry."

[feel_human]

"For which part, exactly, Sam?"

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."

[gavemea_45]

He curls one hand around the glass and holds her gaze, his own steady. "Mostly I'm sorry that you're having to deal with all this. I know it's hard to accept. And I'm sorry if I scared you, earlier."

[feel_human]

She meets his gaze and extends her power as far as she can, trying to pick up any sort of lie, but there's nothing. From what she can tell, he's sincere.

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.

[gavemea_45]

"Not just vampires," he murmurs. It's harder to get the words out than he'd thought it would be, given how ingrained this secret's been for him and Dean for as long as he can remember.

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."

[feel_human]

Her head hurts, from the combination of work and keeping her defenses up and the long night. She reaches up to undo her tight ponytail and lets her hair spill down over her shoulders, sighing as she scrubs her fingers through it to mitigate the ache. "Well, let's stick with vampires for the moment," she says, practical, one the initial ache's been rubbed away.

Folding her arms on the table, she looks over at him. "You were expectin' him to attack me. Why didn't he?"

[gavemea_45]

She's really, really pretty. Sam catches himself staring as she runs her fingers through her hair and makes himself look down at his glass, quick, while he thinks about her question.

"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.

[feel_human]

A sliver of his thoughts nudges into her mind – no words, just a feeling of shy appreciation, and her mouth rucks up at the corner before she hears the rest of what he's saying. "You didn't know he was here?"

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?"

[gavemea_45]

Sam shakes his head. "No. I didn't. I didn't come here on a hunt. I really was just following the road."

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."

[feel_human]

"Turn me? Into a..."

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?"

[gavemea_45]

"He would. And he didn't." Sam reaches out to cover her hand with his, impulsively trying to comfort.

"I'm not going to let him get you, Sookie."

[feel_human]

His hand is large and warm and gentle, even though she'd seen him holding a gun and a knife earlier, even though there'd been the threat of violence in every line of him when he was defending her from Bill. And she can tell, from the brush of his thoughts she can hear, that he means every word.

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."

[gavemea_45]

"I heard him. So?" Sam searches her face, trying to read her expression, not sure where she's going with this.

"You think you know what he meant by that?"

[feel_human]

"I..."

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."

[gavemea_45]

His mouth falls open slightly in shock, and for a few stunned seconds Sam can't think of anything but the white noise of static due to shock.

"Really?"

[feel_human]

She nods, slowly, wariness seeping into her eyes. It's an awful risk she's taking, spilling her most closely guarded secret like this, but... vampires. And if he grew up learning about worse, then... maybe he knows a little something about what's made her this way.

But she still holds herself stiff and wary, waiting to see which way the wind will blow.

[gavemea_45]

"Huh." He gathers himself, trying to think it through, trying to figure out what it could mean. "I've heard about psychics - ones who weren't faking it, I mean, but I don't know if any of them were telepaths."

John had always been willing to give credence to psychics, at least long enough to see if they were running a con, although Sam doesn't know why.

[feel_human]

"I'm not psychic," she snaps, more curtly than she means. It takes a second for her of breathing deep to push back all the old, sore memories. "It doesn't work that way. I can't read minds, I just... hear. And I try not to, honest to God, only..."

She reaches up to rub at her head, the ache worse than ever despite taking out her tight ponytail. "Only I can't always help it. And it's exhaustin', tryin' to keep it all out."

[gavemea_45]

"Hey," Sam says, a little surprised. "Hey. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you."

Gently, he adds, "I guess it would be. And, uh, loud, I suppose?"

[feel_human]

"Like you wouldn't believe."

She breathes again, counts to five, and exhales before she meets his eyes. "I've never known why I'm like this. I just have been, ever since I was born. Everyone's thoughts, if I'm not careful. But then, tonight..."

Sookie shakes her head. "When Bill came in, it was like it all just shut up and went away. I couldn't hear him at all, not even a little. It was like there was nothin' there."

[gavemea_45]

"I wish I had an answer for you." Everyone's thoughts. And she's still talking to him. Sam takes a moment to be glad he hadn't been lying - well, too much - or otherwise a problem, given how pretty she is, and reminds himself to be on his best behavior in his mind, too.

It's weird to think about, and he decides not to. She's still a person, just special. (Like a psychic, even if she doesn't like that comparison.) She's not a monster. She's not trying to hurt anyone.

"You couldn't? Huh." Sam frowns over that. "I wonder if he could tell. I guess maybe he could, so maybe he got curious."

That could be a problem, or would if he weren't already planning to deal with him.

[feel_human]

"Maybe. Could be why he couldn't... what'd you call it? Glamour me. But, Sam..."

She leans forward, watching him closely. No doubt this'll come as a huge shock, but he deserves to know. "There's somethin' different about you, too. I can't hear you clear at all. Maybe if I were really tryin'... but it's weird. I've never come across anyone like you before."

[gavemea_45]

Sam stares blankly at her. "You can't? You haven't?"

That doesn't make any sense at all.

[feel_human]

"I mean... I can get a little," she admits. "But I haven't pushed or pried, I promise. It's nothin' like Bill, either, it's... it's kinda like hearin' through cotton balls."

Her mouth presses into a rueful line as she studies him. "I'm sorry. I know it's an awful thing to hear. And it might not mean anythin' at all. Like I said, I've never really been too far outside of Bon Temps. Could be there's lots of people out there I'd have a hard time hearin'."