The Morning After (RP for asthenoseonyourface)

[coatandscarf]

You should have some coffee. -JR

...John? How did you...? Nevermind. When you took my phone. Of course. I already had coffee. RH

One cup? Stingy. -JR

All I need is one, Holmes. RH

I like caffeine. -JR

When are you moving into the office? -JR

Well, I'm packing the things I need now, John, but someone keeps interrupting me. RH

Oh. Who? -JR

Go look in a mirror. Or at Jacob. It's close enough. RH

...Why? -JR

Because it's you who keeps interrupting! RH

Well I'm BORED. -JR

You're welcome to help me pack. RH

Really? Why? -JR

Because you're bored. RH

So? -JR

Just giving you something to do. You're welcome to say no. RH

I'm not saying no. -JR

But why are you helping me? -JR

There a reason I shouldn't? RH *attached is her address*

Comments

[asthenoseonyourface]

Roughly an hour later, there was a knock at the door...or, more specifically, there was a muted thud of one shoulder, followed by a hiss and a string of quiet, but very distinct cursing.

When Randy opened the door, she found John standing there with two cardboard trays. One held three cups of coffee and two large chocolate danishes. The other...held four cups of coffee, and was guilty of the cursing as the coffee had sloshed, dampening the tray and turning part of his hand angry pink.

"Nobody wants to help me." he informed her blandly.

[coatandscarf]

"Oh for the love of..." Randy reached out, taking one of the cardboard trays from him carefully. "John, no person can humanly drink this much coffee. I really hope you didn't bring this for just the two of us. And I couldn't help you because I'm helping you now, aren't I?" She motioned for him to enter, leading him into her studio apartment. Setting the coffee down on the bartop, she looked over the cups curiously, noticing they each had different letters on the side. She couldn't hide the soft smile that came up as she quickly realized why. Anyone else, she would almost see it as flirtatious. "You could have asked. Vanilla latte, two sugars. Although hazelnut certainly is a favorite as well." She motioned toward his hand. "Want me to take a look?"

[asthenoseonyourface]

"I mean with boredom." John replied, automatically handing her one of the cups when she rattled off her favorite. "Vanilla mocha latte, no sugars...should be sweet enough. Hand is a first degree burn, not even blistering, I'm fine. Answer my question."

[coatandscarf]

"I can add sugar." Although she took the cup from him, moving around the bartop to the kitchen. "And I'll determine that. Come here. I won't answer your question unless you let me take a look." Setting the coffee aside, she extended her hand for his, facing him, yet not quite able to meet his eyes. She had a near stranger, a self-confessed sociopath, in her apartment, and here she was bargaining with him to give him proper treatment. Somehow, she had a feeling this wasn't her wisest decision.

[asthenoseonyourface]

John narrowed his eyes at her crossly, but his obedience was immediate. She was not only making deals, but withholding that one precious commodity he couldn't live without: information. Data. The thing he needed more than air.

Moving to her side, he offered her his hand, visibly impatient but utterly passive, like a child who knew desert only came after he ate his vegetables.

"Why are you helping me?" he repeated.

[coatandscarf]

Randy quietly examined his hand, noting that the coffee must've not been steaming at the time. The burn wasn't that bad at all. She tugged him toward the sink, turning on the faucet and let the cold water run over his skin. She was careful not to stand between him and the counter, yet she didn't release his hand either, having a feeling he'd run off as soon as he was able.

She tugged a hair behind her ear, responding without actually looking at him. "You aren't the only person that gets bored. And I know that giving you a new place and person to analyze will distract you." A laugh escaped her, thinking of the original intent of inviting him over. "Plus, you might even help me pack."

[asthenoseonyourface]

"But I've already figured you out." John replied, going strangely quiet as he did, standing there, watching her run cold water over his hand, tucking hair behind her ear, and smiling without looking him in the eye...like everyone else, like she was afraid of being seen only she wasn't. Her respiration didn't change and her pulse was steady, barely a flicker in the hollow of her long, delicate throat.

He grew still, he grew quiet...because it was the first time he'd ever told a blatant lie.

[coatandscarf]

Randy looked up as he lapsed into silence, glancing sideways at him. "Somehow, Mr. Holmes, I'm betting on that being a lie. You wouldn't be here if you had. You wouldn't bother. I'd be one more thing you've solved," she informed him, looking him dead in the eyes as she spoke, willing herself to find the courage to do so. She hadn't stood this close to a man in... since... then. Her grip on his fingers tightened reflexively, but otherwise nothing else revealed her nerves.

[asthenoseonyourface]

The eyes she met were open and cool, detached from feeling...but that meant from aggression, from even passion. His gaze seemed to go through her, stealing every bit of data and piecing it together in his head...as if he couldn't truly take her in, visually, until he'd pieced together the rest.

It only made matters worse that she was right.

He understood what was happening, though, he'd read about it. He'd studied it. He'd seen it in his sister when she lit a Bunsen burner for the first time (terrified of fire) and when Jock learned to swim when he was fourteen (fell in the pool when he was three, terrified of water ever since). He knew this was important, he just wasn't sure how.

"I am bored." he pointed out practically. It was polite, not to point those things out...at least he thought so. Was this a time when he ought to, in a gesture of compassion? He was starting to wish Janie was there to help...

[asthenoseonyourface]

"You were injured," he pointed out, "but that's not what I mean. Reading people, reading objects...excluding me, people are objects, but objects aren't people. If you can read my piano off my hands or Jock's law enforcement career off his posture, you can read a plant by the vase it's in or a DVD's ownership history based off its case."

He finally deigned to sit down across from her, still watching her intensely with cool blue eyes. "Excluding me, people are animals, their behavior is predictable."

Once again, he went still and silent. Another lie, at least as he saw it.

[coatandscarf]

Randy watched him for a few moments, mildly horrified at what the context of his words meant. He kept excluding himself from humanity, like he wasn't a part of the race at all. "I don't know that information, though. I'm not a botanist, I'm certainly not familiar with DVD's, or who might own them. I mean, I suppose some DVD's are easily categorized but that's not the point." She shook her head a bit, then sighed. "John, I don't know what to tell you. I'm good with people. You noted I seek the companionship of people. I don't... want to know things. I want to help. Knowing that a DVD belonged to someone... it's unimportant to me. However..." Her voice trailed off, and she visibly gulped. She willed herself to lean forward, her fingers moving to curl around his good hand lightly. She had a point to make, and she needed to touch him to make it. She just wondered if he understood how big a deal it was for her to do so. "...noticing that you feel you're an exception to the human race *is* important. Much more than any plant or DVD."

[asthenoseonyourface]

John was no stranger to human contact, his brother and sister touched him often. He even found it acceptable, to be Janie's human pillow during a movie or hug his brother, be hugged. Janie giggled when he hugged her and kisses on her head made her smile. Those were vitally important things to him, and not just because their behavior told him what he needed to know about social behavior. They were triplets, they were...linked.

But something about the way Randy held his hand was different in a manner he couldn't quite put his finger on. He looked to their joined hands, then up to her face, gaze cool and assessing...confused but not bewildered, focused in his need to understand.

"Why is it important?"

[coatandscarf]

"Because despite being a self-proclaimed sociopath, you *do* care. And you are human. I've never met anyone that wasn't, besides another species. I'm sure you've been called a freak many a time, if your reaction to the name 'Sherlock' is any indication at all, but... you're merely an exception to the rule. It doesn't make you any less human than the rest of us. And that's important to me, knowing now that you don't realize that about yourself." Randy shrugged slightly, giving him the faintest of smiles. "I like to 'fix' things, I guess. But in my case, it's not things, it's people. It's... the eternal argument of the glass, I suppose. Things might try to beat me down, but I like to think that the glass is half full, rather than half empty." She closed her eyes then, shaking her head briefly as she sighed. "I'm sorry, I don't think I made any sense at all. I've never... well, had to describe any of this before."

[asthenoseonyourface]

John didn't answer.

He was no longer quite so still and silent, but John didn't answer when she spoke, watching her instead, allowing his hand to be held. He didn't try to reciprocate...and she was right, he didn't exactly understand what she was talking about.

She was talking, though, and she seemed so intent...the woman who saw like he did, who observed, who could think. She wasn't as smart as him, but she was sharp. She was clever.

Clever enough that she left John thinking, still and silent...John Riley, the man who would outlive God trying to have the last word.

[coatandscarf]

Randy opened her eyes then, looking back at him. He looked restless, but he didn't say a word. It was almost enough to make her nervous, except for the fact that he probably needed a little time to think about her words. She was certain he'd have a flood of questions, once he'd allocated things properly in his mind.

So she simply squeezed his hand lightly, releasing him as she took a sip of her coffee. If he was going to sit there, who knew how long that would take. She could continue packing in the meantime.

[asthenoseonyourface]

John blinked when she released his hand, strangely distracted by it. Squeezing his eyes shut for a second to clear his head, he reached for his coffee again as he watched her, taking a sip.

"So...you're just observant." he mused curiously. "It's nothing..." He trailed off, a little at a loss as to how to explain his problem. Janie told him it was rude to brag about being smart, Jock said no one liked a showoff...how the hell else was he supposed to explain that he was better than everyone?

"I was eight years old when I entered the sixth grade...well, seventh." he began, correcting himself. "Technically, I was only in the sixth grade for two months of the school year, passed and began seventh in the fall."

[coatandscarf]

Any desire to get up and pack stopped the moment he spoke again. 'Just observant', eh? He probably didn't mean for it to sound as insulting as it came off. Social skills didn't seem to rank high on his list of abilities.

Instead, she listened as he explains about his educational past, surprised to hear that he had already been in the seventh grade when he was eight. Mathematically, he should have been in the second. One or two grade jumps were not that unusual... *five* was virtually unheard of. Instead she nodded slightly. "I was in the fourth when I was eight. They had me skip first and second grade, but they were scared of bringing me any further ahead." The isolation an eight year old must have gone through... Her heart ached for the man, knowing how alone he must have been.

[asthenoseonyourface]

For a long second John just stood there, untouched, unfeeling, unflappable...

...and then the smirk was on his face, snapping into existence like a peal of lightning. Quiet, superior, and not quite aloof as it could have been.

John turned and moved to grab his coffee, taking a sip. He smacked his lips thoughtfully, then moved back towards Randy.

"Mocha espresso with a shot of vanilla...I think it's a seasonal thing." he mused, then rewarded her with something John Riley never, ever did. Not for his siblings, not for anyone.

He offered her a sip of his coffee.

[coatandscarf]

She stared at him, meeting his gaze for the longest time, watching as a smirk appeared on his face. Whatever the hell had just happened, she had a feeling she had reacted exactly as he had expected. Had that been an experiment for him? A test of some sort, and nothing else?

What surprised her most was that he continued as if nothing had just happened, and offered her some of his coffee. Randy just stood there, looking at him as if he'd just declared himself the Queen of England. Sociopath. She was seeing it now. It was that simple for him to toss aside everything he'd just done to her and move on as if he'd done nothing wrong.

Without a word, she withdrew then, turning her back to him and withdrawing into the bathroom. What she was about to do, she didn't need him witnessing.

[asthenoseonyourface]

John blinked, startled and confused as she whirled around on him, but it made sense after a second. When she was gone, he set his coffee down and pulled his phone out of his pocket. Three brief, fast, and heated texts later, he sighed and stared at his sister's response on his screen, all in caps.

"Right. Bad idea." he sighed, vaguely annoyed with himself as he slid his phone back into his pocket and began to consider leaving before Randy got back.

[coatandscarf]

It was easier to compose herself than she thought it would be. She didn't really need to cry, so much as a few moments to decompress without him analyzing her every movement. She stood against the wall, steadying her breath to compose herself again.

She had no idea what to make of the man. Because no matter how much he denied it, he *was* a man. She just had to be far more careful about how she reacted to him from here on out.

Splashing some water on her face, she ran a towel over her skin before stepping out once more, half expecting to see him gone. Much to her surprise, there he stood, in the midst of her boxes still. "Sorry. Needed to recompose myself," she said simply. As she walked back towards him, her limp was obvious, and she stood next to him uncomfortably as a result. She just wanted to finish packing. She'd deal with her leg later.

[asthenoseonyourface]

She was limping worse. That was bad. She'd also splashed water on her face, she was badly rattled. Not pleased at all...well, maybe Jane was right.

Fortunately, he had something better to offer than coffee.

"That's okay...I'm just leaving." he explained. "Client, dead body." The pause was barely there.

"Wanna come?"

[coatandscarf]

She didn't look at him as he explained that he was just leaving. She had expected as much. She could imagine it would be easier for him to not deal with emotions by leaving than by witnessing the results of his actions.

He completely floored her with his question though, and her head shot up in shock, her eyes wide as she looked up at him. "You... What? You want me to come with you?"

[asthenoseonyourface]

John nodded tersely, looking at her as if she was crazy.

"Yeah. Dead body. Coming?"

[coatandscarf]

Part of her really wanted to tell him to fuck off. Another part of her was curious. Yet another part of her wondered what she could possibly help with if the person was already dead.

All of these thoughts crossed her mind as she looked up at him, but rather than voicing any of them aloud, she found herself speaking without any thought at all. "Grab the box with the books and give me a minute to grab my coat and cane."

It wasn't far, as both items were right by the door. She slipped the coat on, immediately comforted by the heavy material. Gripping the cane, she leaned on it as she grabbed her keys from the other hook. "After you, then."