(no subject)
With a month and a half to go until the end of the school year, graduation, and all the drama that was definitely going to detail John was not expecting a sudden summons to the school counselor's office. Still, he went, and refused to sit down when he saw Charlie Dixon, the school's principal, the current school therapist and someone who made his brain scream cop all waiting for him.
"Someone want to give me the twenty words or less version of what this is all about?" Was John's answer to "Please have a seat, John," from the police officer.
Charlie looked almost as annoyed at the police officer as John did. "Something happened to your mother, at the diner. She...had some kind of episode. She's in the hospital."
John sighed. Whatever the other people in the room were expecting: panic, fear, worry, what have you, was not present on John's face. He simply shut his expression down once he processed all that. "Whatever questions you have," and this was to the police officer who was watching John like he thought the boy was going to pull out a gun, "can wait until after the weekend." Legally. And the office nodded, noting that "Mr. Dixon has my contact information," and John turned on his heel and walked right back out the door.
Charlie almost didn't catch up with him. "John!"
The teenager shook his head. "Not here, I'm not talking about whatever happened to her here, in this building." John stopped, and then Charlie could see some of the emotions he was trying so hard to shove down. "Where's your car?"
Charlie pointed it out in the parking lot, and didn't blink much when John asked to drive. When the teenager did finally stop the car they were several miles outside of town, in the most least-trafficked area in the county by Charlie's standard. John simply put his forehead against the top of the steering wheel and asked Charlie what happened; what started it, who got hurt, had she killed anyone and Charlie realized that there was a whole lot more to this than he'd feared.
He told John what he knew; that the owner of the diner had installed cameras without telling the staff and when Sarah found them...something happened. Two of the staff, including the owner, were now in the hospital in stable condition. There was a minor explosion in the kitchen, which Sarah apparently caused. She also claimed that the owner wasn't human and that David Young was an infiltrator attempting to kill her.
Never mind the man was at work when all that happened, anyway.
John almost laughed at that last bit. Almost. "Jesus fuck," is about what he managed, instead, and he still hadn't moved his head from the steering wheel. "That's great. Wonderful. Really." Then John sighed, again. "I'm sorry. There's...I was really hoping this wouldn't happen. She was going to leave, you know. In June, July. Not because...she doesn't love you, I think she does. But because of this. Because she believes that, yeah? She believes it. It's real." To her, anyway. John was currently debating it, not that Charlie knew that. "And that means things like this happen."
"You...she...what?" Charlie shook his head. "I thought it was impossible for this day to get any weirder."
"Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast," John quoted in reply. "Look it's...they'll send her back to Pescadero State by the time it's all said and done, hopefully. I think. I'm sorry. There's a lot to tell you but I don't think I can, right now, I just need to wrap my head around this." And make sure that Sarah hadn't done anything to the Youngs, because John wouldn't put it past her.
"Fine. Monday." It was Friday; Charlie thought he could wait the entire weekend to figure out how much he wanted to know and how vivid of an imagination he actually had. "I have to work until 3AM this week, and I'm hoping they'll...let me visit."
John nodded. "Monday. I can do Monday." Then he sat up. "I have to go get my car, from school." Even though that was certain to be...interesting, to say the least. It would be all over the news by 5PM, John was sure of it. He switched seats with Charlie, so he could stare out the window for a while as they made their way back to town. "Call me, when you've seen her? So I know that...everything's okay." Charlie was fine with that, and gave John a somewhat awkward hug in the parking lot before driving off.
John, for his part, got into his car and went right back to putting his forehead against the steering wheel.
How long before Allison's father calls her, frantically trying to make sure that she and her mother are okay? How long before Allison spends time walking around the parking lot, trying to piece all of this together in her head? And how long before she sees John at his car, and walks up. Knocks on the window? Pounds on it, really.
Not long. Not long at all.
"Jesus fucking christ!" Allison that is so not a kind thing to do, you damned near gave the poor boy a heart attack and his day has already gone to shit. But if John rolls down the window, will you stop banging? Please? "You want to get in? Go somewhere?"
She does, in fact, stop banging on the window. And she does, in fact, get in. Allison is more than a little freaked out, so she may just let him drive a bit before she says anything.
Well John sure as hell isn't going to start this conversation. Everything he can think to say he's fairly certain will culminate in being slapped for not being more honest about things before, so. Unlike his drive with Charlie, however, John sticks to public areas.
Does 'I'm sorry' even fit in this situation?
Probably not. Almost definitely not. "I don't understand what happened. What was she doing? Was she going to hurt my dad?" Apparently, Allison has found her voice, and it is 'tense and shaky'.
"I don't know." And with 'tense and shaky' we've got 'paranoid and edgy' in the driver's seat. "She never said anything to me about him." Which is true. But John is also aware that Allison's dad failed subtlety classes and is at the diner. A lot. "What was she doing? I don't...that's hard to answer. Really, really hard."
"How can you not know? She's your mother." Turning to stare at him? Difficult when you're wearing a seatbelt. "Why is that hard, John?"
"Yes she's my mother. She's also fucking insane, maybe you missed the memo." This? Is probably more emotion than anyone's seen out of John in three years. Definitely in the time you've known him, Allison. "It's hard because it's not new. None of it. Not a single bit." He's...looking at the road. Fee free to stare.
Oh, she will, John. "Yeah, I think I missed that memo since you never told me your mother was crazy." Oh, Allison. It's not like you or your father didn't think something was up with her.
She may be taken aback by all this emotion, John. Give her a bit. "You have to tell me what's going on. Please."
"I'm trying." He is. He's also holding onto the steering wheel like he thinks the car is going to suddenly turn around and drive them off into NeverNeverLand. "I did the best I could! What was I supposed to say, oh, hi, my name is John and my mother taught me to shoot the same time she taught me to read'? Yes, that would have worked."
John swallows, sighs. "Where are we going?"
"You could've said something!" She is now taken aback by all of...that. What, John? "I don't care. Just drive." As worried as she is, as scared as she is, she does not want to go home.
"What, exactly, could I have SAID? What? What could I have said, that wouldn't possibly backfire, and get me arrested and get you hurt?" See? This? This is why he does the quiet thing around everyone else. Because he has no fucking clue what he's doing and his life is fragmenting as you speak. "What was I supposed to do?"
Okay, John. That? That's going to freak her out a lot more. "Pull over. Pull over, now."
John will do just that. Safely. Silently. Find a well lit street or parking lot and park. And sit there. Staring out the windshield. With his hands in his lap, attempting to pull himself together.
Seatbelt off so she can turn and face him. "Why would you get arrested, John? Why would I get hurt?" Her father, she can kind of understand. He was always hanging around the diner.
John still can't meet her eyes. "My last name isn't Baum." Answer! ...Kind of. Maybe he has some kind of plan for all this. "When I was ten, my mother attempted to blow up the offices of a computer company near San Diego. You would get hurt because people get hurt. People who know my mother get hurt."
She just stares at him. Because...that is a lot of information to take in, and she thinks there's more on the way. "What is your last name? Why would you get arrested for something she did when you were ten?"
"My last name is Connor. My mother's last name is Connor. I don't have a birth certificate, a social security card. My CA state ID and Driver's License are real, but John Baum isn't. When I was ten, my mother was caught. Got sent to Pescadero State Hospital. I got sent to a foster home. I hacked into ATMs because I hated it, hated being away from my mother, hated not having a purpose. She got out, and everything went to hell, but I believed her. Everything she said, I believed. I wanted to beleive her. So we move here, finally, some 6 years later, and things calm down. She calms down. Meets a guy. Let's him convince her to let me go to school, for the first time ever. The more things change, the more the stay the same. There are guns in the house I live in. Guns that Charlie doesn't know about and come Monday I am going to have to either tell him or get rid of them all, somehow. I've hacked into police files for her, bank accounts. Whatever she asked. That's why I'd get arrested. I'm not a kid anymore, they won't just send me to live with yuppies in Cerritos."
Forehead, meet steering wheel. Again. "Only now more people are hurt, and I don't believe her. I don't think I believe her. What she believes in. My purpose, my goal in life, the great end of the world she thinks is coming. And the cops are going to ask me, and Charlie is going to ask me, and you're asking me and I have no idea what the fuck to do."
She was confused before, scared before. But she didn't have details before. She has details now, and that maks all the difference. She's thinking, processing. Going over every bit of information that he's telling her, finally telling her, in her head.
"Will they arrest you now? Will they know who you are, who she is?"
"She has a record. With the police, with the FBI. My mother is a terrorist." John makes some weird little choking sound. "I don't. There is nothing on me, at all; just less than a year in the foster system and I disappeared again. They'll probably ask. They've probably guessed at a lot of things, with me, with her. But if there was more proof I would've been arrested today, at school. They'll ask me, they'll ask Charlie, and they'll try to scare me into confessing something. Anything, really."
She stares at him, watches him. Thinking. Always thinking. "If there's anything you did for her, anything she made you do...tell them you were with me. I'll tell them you were with me."
That gets a sharp look from John. "No. No no no no. There is no way in hell I'm dragging your further into this."
And he'll get a sharp look right back. "Your mother was going to kill my father." She's guessing, based on what she said. What happened at the diner. "So you tell them you were with me."
John rubs his eyes. "Don't...why are you helping me? I don't want you to lie for me." What he wants is to get lost this weekend. Vanish off the face of the planet. But he won't.
And she touches his shoulder. And punches his shoulder. Ow. "Idiot. Why do you think I'm helping you. Start the car."
John just Looks at her again. He doesn't flinch from being punched, which...can't be healthy, one assumes. He does, however, start the car. "Where are we going?"
"I don't know. West. Just drive." It can't be healthy to be this focused on details, but maybe this is why in another life Sarah is convinced she's an infiltrator. "You tell them you were with me, if they ask. I will lie for you, I will help you. You can't tell me what to do. I don't know why you lied to me, but I will lie for you." Omission is still lying, she thinks.
"Is this why you won't come to my party? Why you don't really talk to me?" She thinks more. "Are you going to run?"
"I am cursed to have my life dictated to me by women I love." ...How good is your Spanish, Allison? John doesn't know but he had to say it. "You're telling me what to do, right now. I lied because I was worried of what you'd say, what you'd think. Because I was hoping she'd be all right for a while." All of which is true. He was hoping and it didn't work. It could've been worse, he knows that much. Which is frighteing.
"I don't talk because I hate lying to you. I wasn't going to go because we were supposed to leave, in the beginning of July and I have never, ever told her about you. I'm not going to run. I want to. I could. But I'm not."
"Do I sound like I'm judging you?" Maybe a little bit. "You should've told me something." It kind of hurts to kow he was going to leave. That he wants to leave. "Why aren't you?"
"Yes, you do. Something is dangerous, you know that. If I had said 'I'm going to tell you this one thing and you can't ask me questions or try to find out about it on your own,' you would've slapped me. And then proceeded to find out as much about it as you could."
John's grip on the steering wheel tightens, a bit. "Because I've upset you enough in the last month. Because I'd contact you anyway, so what's the point of hiding?"
"I wouldn't have slapped you." That much is true. She won't say she wouldn't have tried to find things out. She knows she would have, with her obsession for detail. "Why would have contact me anyway?"
So, clearly, her spanish isn't great.
Another Look. Hey, they're on the freeway. Heading West. "You would've been upset." Oh, sighing. Obviously. "Because I love you, that's why." Admitting this couldn't possibly make his day worse as far as John's concerned so he might as well get it out there.
Between her father and John, everyone is always so worried about upsettng her. Maybe it's a little annoying. Oh, hey. The freeway. West! But wait. What? "Oh. You do?" Confusion!
It might be annoying but Allison upset is slightly terrifying. Just a bit. "Yes." Why would he lie about that now? Though it might help if he actually looked at her. Or smiled. Then again, he's a little emotionally overwhelmed at the moment.
"Oh. Go south." What, Allison? Where are they even going? Does she even know? "I love you too." It's okay not to smile. She can't manage it either.
"South. All right." He will get off at the next exit, then, and find the freeway southbound. Good? As long as they don't drive into the ocean, or into any buildings really, John is fine with this.
"...That's good." He damned near said 'good to know' and decided that was a bit ridiculous. Even for this conversation. "I'm sorry. This can't be the best way for this conversation to go." Don't girls have standards for that kind of thing?
"It's fine." Girls have standards for that kind of thing, sure. But when the guy that girl likes has been through hell and that girl's dad had narrowly avoided a murder...well, standards go out the window.
And now she opens the window. "I'm sorry she did that." Good God, why is she sorry?
"What? Sorry she did what? Why are you sorry?" John's brain, it is breaking, but at least he stops himself from yelling. Yelling just reminds him more and more of Sarah which might be one of the reasons he's so...emotionally distant, to most people.
"...Do you want to go home, tonight?" That isn't intended to be as much of a come on as it sounds like.
It gets a look anyway. And she's not answering the sorry question, John. "Yes. No. No, I don't." Because her dad would ask her questions. And she has no idea what she'd say.
All right, then. "I still don't understand why you're sorry, for the record." But he isn't going to push it. He feels crazy enough already. "San Francisco is about...ten hours from here, tops."
She looks at him, and then nods. "Okay." Geez, guys. Maybe you oughta call someone.
John will call Charlie. Well, leave a message, once they stop for food and gas. "Do you want to call your folks?"
"Not really." But she will, while he's pumping gas and she's getting snacks. What follows is a rather loud and terse conversation with her father and then her mother. So, that's great.
Well, that's...good? John's terse conversation, he knows, will come around 4AM, so they've still got a while to go. He'll wait, with the car gassed up and a bag of things that he suspects taste a hell of a lot better than what's in the refridgerator at home. Arms on the hood of the car. Watching her talk to her parents. Wondering if they're going to call the cops on them. Knowing what they're doing isn't illegal and being oddly comforted by the fact that there are no weapons in the car and it's in his name.
Since what's back at home is probably half full of drugs, that is no doubt true. After about ten minutes of arguing and five minutes of calm conversation, she comes back with her own bag of snacks. "We can go now."
Great!
Yes. Great. "All right." He's not going to figure out the drugs thing until Charlie finds them, in Sarah's things. That'll be a fun conversation for the boys. "Do you mind telling me what they said?" Since...he's fairly certain he's going to have to deal with them, later, next week. And Charlie in about 10 hours from now. The car is started and back towards highway 5 they go.
She turns on the a/c, and leans her seat back a bit. "They were pretty mad. At me, not at you." Which she thinks is weird, but she's not really mad at him either. "They yelled a lot, but I talked them down. Mostly they're just worried."
Add another to the 'that's weird' train of thought. "Why are they mad at you? I'm the one driving." Granted, he asked, but this was more or less his idea. He asked her to get in the car to begin with.
"I told them I told you to go." Oh, Allison. Right down the path of lying you go. So maybe it isn't THAT weird that they're mad at her. "I told them you needed to get away from all the crazy and think, and that I didn't want to leave you alone."
"You told them what?" John might want to amend that earlier statement to CRAZY WOMEN he loves, because...what the hell? "Ffs. You shouldn't do that." Lie when it's not necessary. "We should get to SF around...2AM or so. Charlie will call a couple of hours after that."
"I did do that, so deal with it." Oh, Allison. Crazy women indeed. "Fine. That's fine."
"I'm not telling Charlie that you told me to go." He really isn't, Allison.
"I did. Technically. I told you to go south." She pulls out a bottle of root beer. "So, technically I did tell you to go."
"...We're going North, now." Allison. You're breaking his brain. "...Why do you love me?" And apparently that's what he wants? Who knows.
"Whatever. It's still a direction." Poor, poor John. "That's not fair. You first."
"Fair. We are so not going to be able to have a conversation about fair." Or are they? John sighs. "It's difficult to explain. I still don't know why you talk to me, sometimes." Sometimes being now. And yesterday. And the day before that. "But we're friends. And I'd be...really upset if anything happened to you. And I hate making you upset."
"I talk to you because I like you. Because I like talking to you. It makes me happy to talk to you. You couldn't upset me if I didn't like you."
"Talking to you makes me feel normal. Like I could be a regular person." So, there's that.
"You can be a regular person." She never thought that he wasn't. "Regular people run away." Is that what they're doing?
"...I have a Spanish presentation on Monday." Are they? "So if we're running away, can it just be for the weekend?"
"...you're going to do homework." Are they? Good question. "I told them I was coming back, so yeah. That's fine." God only knows what they told her when she said 'the weekend'. Something inexplicably bizarre for their family.
"Considering the fact that I heard more Spanish than English until I was 5, no, not really. I don't need to do the homework, the presentation is done. What else did they say?" John is trying to wrap his head around this. He keeps failing and attempting again.
"...Where are you going to college?"
"Um. Nothing you need to hear about." She's not blushing, all right? Oh. College. Hm. "Caltech, I hope. But I don't know. I might take a year." Because why not, right? Right. "Where are you going? Are you going?"
Isn't she? The glance John makes at her suggests otherwise. "Is this along the same lines as what your parents did instead of going to graduation." What? Like he couldn't guess. "Where I go depends on where you're going."
Maybe a little bit. "Something along those lines, yeah." Allison likes math, okay? She has also noticed that she is 18 and her father is 36. She can do that math equation too.
And now she gives him a weird look. "So, if I go to Caltech...?"
John clears his throat. Really? Really really? Don't her parents think they have better things to do (worry about) than that? Besides John is utterly and completely terrified of the idea of being a parent. Seriously. "Caltech accepted me." Ask him who else did. Go ahead. Ask.
They're her parents. Of course they don't. It gives them something more real to worry about than 'what if John's mom had killed me'. "Really?" Jeez, John. "And if I went somewhere east?" That's kind of like asking where else, right?
"Really." John thinks that's a real worry, what the hell. "MIT accepted me. How far East?" Kind of. Maybe.
Thinky, thinky. "I don't know. Japan. What if I went to Japan." Allison, there is no way he meant that far
"If you went to Japan we'd both be screwed because I can't speak Japanese and neither can you." So, there Allison.
"Fiiine. Florida. If I went to Florida."
"Florida Tech would accept me but I didn't apply there." Allison you are getting the weirdest Look right now. "Do you want me to just tell you the places that accepted me?"
She is pretending not to notice this weird look. "That would be considerably easier, yeah."
"Fine." John sighs a bit. "MIT, Berkeley, Stanford, Caltech, UCSB, San Diego State, Perdue, Georgia IT. I might be forgetting a couple."
"Where do you want to go? Out of all those? Or anywhere else?" Somehow, she's gotten the impression that no one's ever asked him.
Does Charlie count? He might have just lied and told him he doesn't want to go. "I'd rather stay in California, I think. So, not MIT, Perdue or Georgia." He can't imagine himeslf in the South. Even Georgia. "Probably Caltech, Standford, or Santa Barbara."
Charlie counts. Even if John lied. "Why would it matter where I went?"
Another Look. Did or did the boy not admit to being in love with you? "Because I want to go where you're going. Since I have the option, now."
Love does not, neccessarily, mean the same college. "Oh. All right." Something tells her, they'll be at Caltech. "If I take a year off, will you take a year off?"
John may have never considered that it wouldn't. In the last few hours. "Yeah. I don't see why I shouldn't."
"Well. Okay then." She won't lie, she does like that idea more than a little. "Do you want me to drive for a bit?"
A shake of the head. "No, I'm good." Something Allison will learn: John doesn't sleep well, or very much at all. He's used to being awake. "It's better when there's someone to talk to. You to talk to. Have you ever been to San Francisco?"
She sleeps more than he does. She's never had any reason not to. "Not since I was eight, nine. No. Have you?" She's thinking yes.
Thank God for that. "I drove up last summer, after I took the SATs." That had been an awesome argument. Sarah had not been pleased. "I guess it's where I run away to, or something."
Sarah, one imagines, probably damn near had a heart attack. "Why there? Why not somewhere else?" Like where, Mexico? Canada?
John shrugs. "Vegas is boring if you can't drink. I spent a lot of time in Mexico growing up so I don't really need to go back there." A pause. "My mother doesn't know that many people in San Francisco." ...Aha.
"Vegas is boring if you can't gamble." Math tricks + Vegas = money.
Aha indeed. "Do you know people in San Francisco?"
"Not that many." Smirk. "Less than a dozen, all told."
She wonders, exactly, what he's smirking at. "Are you going to visit them?"
The fact that this feels...kind of normal. "Ahhh, nope." Because of that dozen, he can think of three that would ask if he's planning on getting Sarah out. Yeah. No dice, with that.
"Okay." Sip of her root beer, and some pixie stix. Blue. "What're we going to do all weekend?"
Dear good. Sugar. Blue flavored sugar. "I don't know, I hadn't planned that far ahead."
Careful, John. She might make you have some. "How far ahead have you planned?"
Oh, that'll be amusing. Or terrifying. "Just to the hotel I was going to suggest." Glance. Does that pass the Okay by Allison test?
Or both at once. "What hotel?" Apparently, it doess pass the Okay by Allison test.
"Kabuki Hotel. It's in Japantown. Nice." Since she suggested going to school in Japan, it popped out in his mind. "You never answered my question, earlier."
"Okay. Kabuki Hotel it is." More sugar! "What question?"
"Why you love me." Okay now that they're on the part of Highway 5 that is about as empty as all get out, John's going to speed a little bit.
"I thought I did." Another sip of root beer. "Because I like being around you, because you make me happier when I'm around you. And you know how to talk to me."
"You said that's why you like me. I wasn't aware they were the same reasons." John frowns. "There are people who don't know how to talk to you?" He may have been so deep in his own little bubble of a world as to not notice these things.
"Why wouldn't they be the same reasons?" They aren't exactly the same reasons. "Of course there are. I ask a lot of questions."
"Don't ask me things like that, I don't know." He really, really doesn't. The whole lack of prior friends and context comes into play. "...That would be because you're smart," says the boy whose own SAT scores he originally thought were some gross processing error.
"Well, I know. Trust me. They can be the same reasons." She shrugs. "Smart means people don't always know how to talk to you." Is that all it means?
"I kind of have to." Trust you, he means, but he doesn't particularly seem like he's bothered by it. "...Does it?" John doesn't know how to talk to people. It's kind of the other way around, for him.
"Sometimes. I talk to people first, then they have to talk to me." And it works, for the most part. Worked with John, didn't it?
"Huh." That's about all he can think to say to that. "I'll try to talk to you, more. I can't promise that I'll suddenly start...laughing around strangers."
Now he gets a weird look. "You don't have to do things you don't want to."
Shrug. "I didn't say I didn't want to talk to you more." Laughing around strangers, he thinks, would just be odd. On so many levels.
"I know that. You sure you don't want me to drive?"
Another Look. "Do you really want to drive or something?"
"I don't know. Are you tired?" She'd be tired if one of her parents went crazy and locked up.
John shakes his head. "...I don't sleep much. I'm used to it." Also that kind of happened once, already.
She shrugs. "Okay, if you say so." He clearly does say so. "What else can we talk about?" That isn't about his mother and crazy stuff.
"I don't know. Whatever you want to talk about is honestly fine by me. Why did you think I wasn't going to your party?" Which falls under both the barred categories. Whoops.
Whoops indeed. "I don't know. I thought maybe you didn't like me." Right. Because that's why he does homework with you, and spends time with your family.
Startled facial expression is a go! "I didn't mean to give you that impression." He really, really didn't. "Your parents are okay with...this? With us?"
Generally, John, if a boy refuses to come to your birthday party you start to wonder. "With us going off for the weekend?"
Is John used to living the world of 'generally'? Let's think about that for a moment. "...Yes. And all that implicates." Since neither of them are the 'let's run off with each other and never speak again' sort.
"They're not exactly okay we ran off. I don't know about anything else. They like you."
Apparently that's...surprising. "Even after today?" He's not sure her parents would ever be okay with the idea of them running off. Or Allison running off, in general.
"It's not your fault there's something wrong with your mother." She thinks that might've been the wrong thing to say the second she says it.
"I wouldn't be so sure." Funny how hindsight works that way.
"What does that mean?" Weird look ahoy.
"My mother was normal before I was born." He's seen the photos. Severe lack of crazy.
Another weird look. A continuation? "That doesn't make it your fault."
It could be the night of a million weird looks. "I have no idea whose fault it is. All of it surrounds me, and machines, and AI that is going to take over the world."
Oh look. More weird looks. "You're gonna have to explain that."
Sigh. "Can you hand me a soda?" Either one of hers or one of his, he doesn't care. But with all this talking his throat feels off.
She will, in fact, hand him a soda. One of his. Then, the rest of her pixie stick gets mixed into her root beer.
Tasty.
Sugar. Fiend. Yay soda. "My mother believes that an AI, called Skynet, is going to take over the world." Glance.
Well, that's...interesting. "Do you?"
"...Sometimes. Not today." Oh the look that gives him. A very confused, what the flying fuck self, kind of look.
That gives her pause. "But you do sometimes? Why?"
"Sometimes she's very convincing." The frowning, oh the frowning. "Sometimes it seems easier to believe her. I am not talking to a therapist about this."
"Didn't say you had to." Sip of her weird drink mix. "Do you want to talk abut something else?"
"I'm just letting you know, for future reference." John shakes his head. "This is fine. You need to know, anyway."
"Okay. So tell me more. About skynet, or whatever." She is, for what it's worth, collecting all this data in her head.
"Skynet originally was some kind of military targeting device. That decided that human beings and their wars weren't any good in the larger scheme of things and so, as these things go, it decides to wipe humanity off the face of the planet."
Allison nods, watching him and listening. "How did it do that without anyone noticing and shutting it down?"
"It was expected to be militaristic. It wasn't expected to PLOT." John shrugs. "How many people seriously check a computer relay program to ensure it's not randomly ordering things? How often does the military? Everything chain reacts in a matter of days, and by the time it's over you've got...25%, 30% of the of the population on the Western seaboard remaining. Most of them aren't military. So who is going to shut it down if it takes over the entire defense system? Central Intelligence?"
"Okay. And your mother thinks this is going to happen? So, why are you talking like it already did?"
John sighs, tightening his hold on the steering wheel for a moment. "It's easier, that way. For some reason."
"Why?" Always asking questions.
"I'm not really sure. Probably because that's the way we've been talking about it my entire life. Not as something that might happen, but something that will."
"And you only sometimes believe it." Huh. "Is that why she called my dad an infiltrator?"
The weird little noises, John can has them. "She called your dad an infiltrator because he spent entirely too much time, at the diner, trying to figure her out." More soda. "Infiltrators are...machines that look like people. Meant to kill other people."
So that's interesting. "If she'd told you my dad was one, would you have believed her?"
John shakes his head. "Infiltrators are always harder to swallow, for me." As far as what he believes his mother about and what he doesn't. "Besides, I've talked to your dad. If he'd wanted to kill her, or me, he'd had lots of opportunities." ...Yay, John. That's the sane and rational way of looking at things.
She nods. "Okay. Are you scared?"
Odd, slightly confused look. "Scared of what?"
Of what. Annother look. A million. "Of her."
Oh. "...A bit. If I go visit her, I'm not sure of how well it would go."
"Do you want me to go with you? Drive with you, I mean. Not inside." That? Would never happen.
"...Let me think about it?" John wouldn't ask her to go inside in a million years.
"Okay." And now? She offers him some of her sugar-soda.
John laughs, but he'll drink it. "...Wow."
And she smirks. "Wow?"
"It tastes like blueberries high on sugar drowned in your soda." John shakes his head but then makes an odd little face at one of the highway signs. "We're closer than I thought we'd be. We might get there early."
"Maybe I like drowning blueberries." She hmms. "Do you want to be early?"
"Apparently." A small smile. "Early is fine. There isn't a lot between here and Tracy, anyway."
Her turn to look mildly confused. "Tracy?"
"Tracy is the city where we change freeways." Did she think he meant a person?
"Aha." She totally did, not that she'll say that.
Slight glance. "Okay."
"What're we going to do when we get there?"
"I hadn't really thought about it. Depends on how tired you are. Also it's going to be after midnight, either way, and there's not a whole lot open that we could get into at that hour. Eat, maybe?" John usually does all of this more or less by ear. Find a place to crash and store things, then figure out what he's up for doing and what he's not.
She thinks about it. "If I nap now, I won't be tired then. Will you be tired?"
Slight frowning and a pause. "I get an average of three and a half hours of sleep a night. I won't be tired until after 5AM."
"That doesn't sound like enough sleep." It really doesn't. "You should try for more."
"I will. I don't...I don't know why I have so much trouble with it." Here's a clue - REM sleep is a lot more restful when your nightmares don't almost give you heart attacks.
She will, no doubt, discover that this weekend. "Some people do."
It'll be fun. And slightly traumatic. "Yeah, I guess."
What isn't in John's life? "I'm going to take a nap, though. If that's okay."
He nods. "Yeah, that's fine." In about 3.5 hours they'll be in San Francisco.
"Someone want to give me the twenty words or less version of what this is all about?" Was John's answer to "Please have a seat, John," from the police officer.
Charlie looked almost as annoyed at the police officer as John did. "Something happened to your mother, at the diner. She...had some kind of episode. She's in the hospital."
John sighed. Whatever the other people in the room were expecting: panic, fear, worry, what have you, was not present on John's face. He simply shut his expression down once he processed all that. "Whatever questions you have," and this was to the police officer who was watching John like he thought the boy was going to pull out a gun, "can wait until after the weekend." Legally. And the office nodded, noting that "Mr. Dixon has my contact information," and John turned on his heel and walked right back out the door.
Charlie almost didn't catch up with him. "John!"
The teenager shook his head. "Not here, I'm not talking about whatever happened to her here, in this building." John stopped, and then Charlie could see some of the emotions he was trying so hard to shove down. "Where's your car?"
Charlie pointed it out in the parking lot, and didn't blink much when John asked to drive. When the teenager did finally stop the car they were several miles outside of town, in the most least-trafficked area in the county by Charlie's standard. John simply put his forehead against the top of the steering wheel and asked Charlie what happened; what started it, who got hurt, had she killed anyone and Charlie realized that there was a whole lot more to this than he'd feared.
He told John what he knew; that the owner of the diner had installed cameras without telling the staff and when Sarah found them...something happened. Two of the staff, including the owner, were now in the hospital in stable condition. There was a minor explosion in the kitchen, which Sarah apparently caused. She also claimed that the owner wasn't human and that David Young was an infiltrator attempting to kill her.
Never mind the man was at work when all that happened, anyway.
John almost laughed at that last bit. Almost. "Jesus fuck," is about what he managed, instead, and he still hadn't moved his head from the steering wheel. "That's great. Wonderful. Really." Then John sighed, again. "I'm sorry. There's...I was really hoping this wouldn't happen. She was going to leave, you know. In June, July. Not because...she doesn't love you, I think she does. But because of this. Because she believes that, yeah? She believes it. It's real." To her, anyway. John was currently debating it, not that Charlie knew that. "And that means things like this happen."
"You...she...what?" Charlie shook his head. "I thought it was impossible for this day to get any weirder."
"Sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast," John quoted in reply. "Look it's...they'll send her back to Pescadero State by the time it's all said and done, hopefully. I think. I'm sorry. There's a lot to tell you but I don't think I can, right now, I just need to wrap my head around this." And make sure that Sarah hadn't done anything to the Youngs, because John wouldn't put it past her.
"Fine. Monday." It was Friday; Charlie thought he could wait the entire weekend to figure out how much he wanted to know and how vivid of an imagination he actually had. "I have to work until 3AM this week, and I'm hoping they'll...let me visit."
John nodded. "Monday. I can do Monday." Then he sat up. "I have to go get my car, from school." Even though that was certain to be...interesting, to say the least. It would be all over the news by 5PM, John was sure of it. He switched seats with Charlie, so he could stare out the window for a while as they made their way back to town. "Call me, when you've seen her? So I know that...everything's okay." Charlie was fine with that, and gave John a somewhat awkward hug in the parking lot before driving off.
John, for his part, got into his car and went right back to putting his forehead against the steering wheel.
How long before Allison's father calls her, frantically trying to make sure that she and her mother are okay? How long before Allison spends time walking around the parking lot, trying to piece all of this together in her head? And how long before she sees John at his car, and walks up. Knocks on the window? Pounds on it, really.
Not long. Not long at all.
"Jesus fucking christ!" Allison that is so not a kind thing to do, you damned near gave the poor boy a heart attack and his day has already gone to shit. But if John rolls down the window, will you stop banging? Please? "You want to get in? Go somewhere?"
She does, in fact, stop banging on the window. And she does, in fact, get in. Allison is more than a little freaked out, so she may just let him drive a bit before she says anything.
Well John sure as hell isn't going to start this conversation. Everything he can think to say he's fairly certain will culminate in being slapped for not being more honest about things before, so. Unlike his drive with Charlie, however, John sticks to public areas.
Does 'I'm sorry' even fit in this situation?
Probably not. Almost definitely not. "I don't understand what happened. What was she doing? Was she going to hurt my dad?" Apparently, Allison has found her voice, and it is 'tense and shaky'.
"I don't know." And with 'tense and shaky' we've got 'paranoid and edgy' in the driver's seat. "She never said anything to me about him." Which is true. But John is also aware that Allison's dad failed subtlety classes and is at the diner. A lot. "What was she doing? I don't...that's hard to answer. Really, really hard."
"How can you not know? She's your mother." Turning to stare at him? Difficult when you're wearing a seatbelt. "Why is that hard, John?"
"Yes she's my mother. She's also fucking insane, maybe you missed the memo." This? Is probably more emotion than anyone's seen out of John in three years. Definitely in the time you've known him, Allison. "It's hard because it's not new. None of it. Not a single bit." He's...looking at the road. Fee free to stare.
Oh, she will, John. "Yeah, I think I missed that memo since you never told me your mother was crazy." Oh, Allison. It's not like you or your father didn't think something was up with her.
She may be taken aback by all this emotion, John. Give her a bit. "You have to tell me what's going on. Please."
"I'm trying." He is. He's also holding onto the steering wheel like he thinks the car is going to suddenly turn around and drive them off into NeverNeverLand. "I did the best I could! What was I supposed to say, oh, hi, my name is John and my mother taught me to shoot the same time she taught me to read'? Yes, that would have worked."
John swallows, sighs. "Where are we going?"
"You could've said something!" She is now taken aback by all of...that. What, John? "I don't care. Just drive." As worried as she is, as scared as she is, she does not want to go home.
"What, exactly, could I have SAID? What? What could I have said, that wouldn't possibly backfire, and get me arrested and get you hurt?" See? This? This is why he does the quiet thing around everyone else. Because he has no fucking clue what he's doing and his life is fragmenting as you speak. "What was I supposed to do?"
Okay, John. That? That's going to freak her out a lot more. "Pull over. Pull over, now."
John will do just that. Safely. Silently. Find a well lit street or parking lot and park. And sit there. Staring out the windshield. With his hands in his lap, attempting to pull himself together.
Seatbelt off so she can turn and face him. "Why would you get arrested, John? Why would I get hurt?" Her father, she can kind of understand. He was always hanging around the diner.
John still can't meet her eyes. "My last name isn't Baum." Answer! ...Kind of. Maybe he has some kind of plan for all this. "When I was ten, my mother attempted to blow up the offices of a computer company near San Diego. You would get hurt because people get hurt. People who know my mother get hurt."
She just stares at him. Because...that is a lot of information to take in, and she thinks there's more on the way. "What is your last name? Why would you get arrested for something she did when you were ten?"
"My last name is Connor. My mother's last name is Connor. I don't have a birth certificate, a social security card. My CA state ID and Driver's License are real, but John Baum isn't. When I was ten, my mother was caught. Got sent to Pescadero State Hospital. I got sent to a foster home. I hacked into ATMs because I hated it, hated being away from my mother, hated not having a purpose. She got out, and everything went to hell, but I believed her. Everything she said, I believed. I wanted to beleive her. So we move here, finally, some 6 years later, and things calm down. She calms down. Meets a guy. Let's him convince her to let me go to school, for the first time ever. The more things change, the more the stay the same. There are guns in the house I live in. Guns that Charlie doesn't know about and come Monday I am going to have to either tell him or get rid of them all, somehow. I've hacked into police files for her, bank accounts. Whatever she asked. That's why I'd get arrested. I'm not a kid anymore, they won't just send me to live with yuppies in Cerritos."
Forehead, meet steering wheel. Again. "Only now more people are hurt, and I don't believe her. I don't think I believe her. What she believes in. My purpose, my goal in life, the great end of the world she thinks is coming. And the cops are going to ask me, and Charlie is going to ask me, and you're asking me and I have no idea what the fuck to do."
She was confused before, scared before. But she didn't have details before. She has details now, and that maks all the difference. She's thinking, processing. Going over every bit of information that he's telling her, finally telling her, in her head.
"Will they arrest you now? Will they know who you are, who she is?"
"She has a record. With the police, with the FBI. My mother is a terrorist." John makes some weird little choking sound. "I don't. There is nothing on me, at all; just less than a year in the foster system and I disappeared again. They'll probably ask. They've probably guessed at a lot of things, with me, with her. But if there was more proof I would've been arrested today, at school. They'll ask me, they'll ask Charlie, and they'll try to scare me into confessing something. Anything, really."
She stares at him, watches him. Thinking. Always thinking. "If there's anything you did for her, anything she made you do...tell them you were with me. I'll tell them you were with me."
That gets a sharp look from John. "No. No no no no. There is no way in hell I'm dragging your further into this."
And he'll get a sharp look right back. "Your mother was going to kill my father." She's guessing, based on what she said. What happened at the diner. "So you tell them you were with me."
John rubs his eyes. "Don't...why are you helping me? I don't want you to lie for me." What he wants is to get lost this weekend. Vanish off the face of the planet. But he won't.
And she touches his shoulder. And punches his shoulder. Ow. "Idiot. Why do you think I'm helping you. Start the car."
John just Looks at her again. He doesn't flinch from being punched, which...can't be healthy, one assumes. He does, however, start the car. "Where are we going?"
"I don't know. West. Just drive." It can't be healthy to be this focused on details, but maybe this is why in another life Sarah is convinced she's an infiltrator. "You tell them you were with me, if they ask. I will lie for you, I will help you. You can't tell me what to do. I don't know why you lied to me, but I will lie for you." Omission is still lying, she thinks.
"Is this why you won't come to my party? Why you don't really talk to me?" She thinks more. "Are you going to run?"
"I am cursed to have my life dictated to me by women I love." ...How good is your Spanish, Allison? John doesn't know but he had to say it. "You're telling me what to do, right now. I lied because I was worried of what you'd say, what you'd think. Because I was hoping she'd be all right for a while." All of which is true. He was hoping and it didn't work. It could've been worse, he knows that much. Which is frighteing.
"I don't talk because I hate lying to you. I wasn't going to go because we were supposed to leave, in the beginning of July and I have never, ever told her about you. I'm not going to run. I want to. I could. But I'm not."
"Do I sound like I'm judging you?" Maybe a little bit. "You should've told me something." It kind of hurts to kow he was going to leave. That he wants to leave. "Why aren't you?"
"Yes, you do. Something is dangerous, you know that. If I had said 'I'm going to tell you this one thing and you can't ask me questions or try to find out about it on your own,' you would've slapped me. And then proceeded to find out as much about it as you could."
John's grip on the steering wheel tightens, a bit. "Because I've upset you enough in the last month. Because I'd contact you anyway, so what's the point of hiding?"
"I wouldn't have slapped you." That much is true. She won't say she wouldn't have tried to find things out. She knows she would have, with her obsession for detail. "Why would have contact me anyway?"
So, clearly, her spanish isn't great.
Another Look. Hey, they're on the freeway. Heading West. "You would've been upset." Oh, sighing. Obviously. "Because I love you, that's why." Admitting this couldn't possibly make his day worse as far as John's concerned so he might as well get it out there.
Between her father and John, everyone is always so worried about upsettng her. Maybe it's a little annoying. Oh, hey. The freeway. West! But wait. What? "Oh. You do?" Confusion!
It might be annoying but Allison upset is slightly terrifying. Just a bit. "Yes." Why would he lie about that now? Though it might help if he actually looked at her. Or smiled. Then again, he's a little emotionally overwhelmed at the moment.
"Oh. Go south." What, Allison? Where are they even going? Does she even know? "I love you too." It's okay not to smile. She can't manage it either.
"South. All right." He will get off at the next exit, then, and find the freeway southbound. Good? As long as they don't drive into the ocean, or into any buildings really, John is fine with this.
"...That's good." He damned near said 'good to know' and decided that was a bit ridiculous. Even for this conversation. "I'm sorry. This can't be the best way for this conversation to go." Don't girls have standards for that kind of thing?
"It's fine." Girls have standards for that kind of thing, sure. But when the guy that girl likes has been through hell and that girl's dad had narrowly avoided a murder...well, standards go out the window.
And now she opens the window. "I'm sorry she did that." Good God, why is she sorry?
"What? Sorry she did what? Why are you sorry?" John's brain, it is breaking, but at least he stops himself from yelling. Yelling just reminds him more and more of Sarah which might be one of the reasons he's so...emotionally distant, to most people.
"...Do you want to go home, tonight?" That isn't intended to be as much of a come on as it sounds like.
It gets a look anyway. And she's not answering the sorry question, John. "Yes. No. No, I don't." Because her dad would ask her questions. And she has no idea what she'd say.
All right, then. "I still don't understand why you're sorry, for the record." But he isn't going to push it. He feels crazy enough already. "San Francisco is about...ten hours from here, tops."
She looks at him, and then nods. "Okay." Geez, guys. Maybe you oughta call someone.
John will call Charlie. Well, leave a message, once they stop for food and gas. "Do you want to call your folks?"
"Not really." But she will, while he's pumping gas and she's getting snacks. What follows is a rather loud and terse conversation with her father and then her mother. So, that's great.
Well, that's...good? John's terse conversation, he knows, will come around 4AM, so they've still got a while to go. He'll wait, with the car gassed up and a bag of things that he suspects taste a hell of a lot better than what's in the refridgerator at home. Arms on the hood of the car. Watching her talk to her parents. Wondering if they're going to call the cops on them. Knowing what they're doing isn't illegal and being oddly comforted by the fact that there are no weapons in the car and it's in his name.
Since what's back at home is probably half full of drugs, that is no doubt true. After about ten minutes of arguing and five minutes of calm conversation, she comes back with her own bag of snacks. "We can go now."
Great!
Yes. Great. "All right." He's not going to figure out the drugs thing until Charlie finds them, in Sarah's things. That'll be a fun conversation for the boys. "Do you mind telling me what they said?" Since...he's fairly certain he's going to have to deal with them, later, next week. And Charlie in about 10 hours from now. The car is started and back towards highway 5 they go.
She turns on the a/c, and leans her seat back a bit. "They were pretty mad. At me, not at you." Which she thinks is weird, but she's not really mad at him either. "They yelled a lot, but I talked them down. Mostly they're just worried."
Add another to the 'that's weird' train of thought. "Why are they mad at you? I'm the one driving." Granted, he asked, but this was more or less his idea. He asked her to get in the car to begin with.
"I told them I told you to go." Oh, Allison. Right down the path of lying you go. So maybe it isn't THAT weird that they're mad at her. "I told them you needed to get away from all the crazy and think, and that I didn't want to leave you alone."
"You told them what?" John might want to amend that earlier statement to CRAZY WOMEN he loves, because...what the hell? "Ffs. You shouldn't do that." Lie when it's not necessary. "We should get to SF around...2AM or so. Charlie will call a couple of hours after that."
"I did do that, so deal with it." Oh, Allison. Crazy women indeed. "Fine. That's fine."
"I'm not telling Charlie that you told me to go." He really isn't, Allison.
"I did. Technically. I told you to go south." She pulls out a bottle of root beer. "So, technically I did tell you to go."
"...We're going North, now." Allison. You're breaking his brain. "...Why do you love me?" And apparently that's what he wants? Who knows.
"Whatever. It's still a direction." Poor, poor John. "That's not fair. You first."
"Fair. We are so not going to be able to have a conversation about fair." Or are they? John sighs. "It's difficult to explain. I still don't know why you talk to me, sometimes." Sometimes being now. And yesterday. And the day before that. "But we're friends. And I'd be...really upset if anything happened to you. And I hate making you upset."
"I talk to you because I like you. Because I like talking to you. It makes me happy to talk to you. You couldn't upset me if I didn't like you."
"Talking to you makes me feel normal. Like I could be a regular person." So, there's that.
"You can be a regular person." She never thought that he wasn't. "Regular people run away." Is that what they're doing?
"...I have a Spanish presentation on Monday." Are they? "So if we're running away, can it just be for the weekend?"
"...you're going to do homework." Are they? Good question. "I told them I was coming back, so yeah. That's fine." God only knows what they told her when she said 'the weekend'. Something inexplicably bizarre for their family.
"Considering the fact that I heard more Spanish than English until I was 5, no, not really. I don't need to do the homework, the presentation is done. What else did they say?" John is trying to wrap his head around this. He keeps failing and attempting again.
"...Where are you going to college?"
"Um. Nothing you need to hear about." She's not blushing, all right? Oh. College. Hm. "Caltech, I hope. But I don't know. I might take a year." Because why not, right? Right. "Where are you going? Are you going?"
Isn't she? The glance John makes at her suggests otherwise. "Is this along the same lines as what your parents did instead of going to graduation." What? Like he couldn't guess. "Where I go depends on where you're going."
Maybe a little bit. "Something along those lines, yeah." Allison likes math, okay? She has also noticed that she is 18 and her father is 36. She can do that math equation too.
And now she gives him a weird look. "So, if I go to Caltech...?"
John clears his throat. Really? Really really? Don't her parents think they have better things to do (worry about) than that? Besides John is utterly and completely terrified of the idea of being a parent. Seriously. "Caltech accepted me." Ask him who else did. Go ahead. Ask.
They're her parents. Of course they don't. It gives them something more real to worry about than 'what if John's mom had killed me'. "Really?" Jeez, John. "And if I went somewhere east?" That's kind of like asking where else, right?
"Really." John thinks that's a real worry, what the hell. "MIT accepted me. How far East?" Kind of. Maybe.
Thinky, thinky. "I don't know. Japan. What if I went to Japan." Allison, there is no way he meant that far
"If you went to Japan we'd both be screwed because I can't speak Japanese and neither can you." So, there Allison.
"Fiiine. Florida. If I went to Florida."
"Florida Tech would accept me but I didn't apply there." Allison you are getting the weirdest Look right now. "Do you want me to just tell you the places that accepted me?"
She is pretending not to notice this weird look. "That would be considerably easier, yeah."
"Fine." John sighs a bit. "MIT, Berkeley, Stanford, Caltech, UCSB, San Diego State, Perdue, Georgia IT. I might be forgetting a couple."
"Where do you want to go? Out of all those? Or anywhere else?" Somehow, she's gotten the impression that no one's ever asked him.
Does Charlie count? He might have just lied and told him he doesn't want to go. "I'd rather stay in California, I think. So, not MIT, Perdue or Georgia." He can't imagine himeslf in the South. Even Georgia. "Probably Caltech, Standford, or Santa Barbara."
Charlie counts. Even if John lied. "Why would it matter where I went?"
Another Look. Did or did the boy not admit to being in love with you? "Because I want to go where you're going. Since I have the option, now."
Love does not, neccessarily, mean the same college. "Oh. All right." Something tells her, they'll be at Caltech. "If I take a year off, will you take a year off?"
John may have never considered that it wouldn't. In the last few hours. "Yeah. I don't see why I shouldn't."
"Well. Okay then." She won't lie, she does like that idea more than a little. "Do you want me to drive for a bit?"
A shake of the head. "No, I'm good." Something Allison will learn: John doesn't sleep well, or very much at all. He's used to being awake. "It's better when there's someone to talk to. You to talk to. Have you ever been to San Francisco?"
She sleeps more than he does. She's never had any reason not to. "Not since I was eight, nine. No. Have you?" She's thinking yes.
Thank God for that. "I drove up last summer, after I took the SATs." That had been an awesome argument. Sarah had not been pleased. "I guess it's where I run away to, or something."
Sarah, one imagines, probably damn near had a heart attack. "Why there? Why not somewhere else?" Like where, Mexico? Canada?
John shrugs. "Vegas is boring if you can't drink. I spent a lot of time in Mexico growing up so I don't really need to go back there." A pause. "My mother doesn't know that many people in San Francisco." ...Aha.
"Vegas is boring if you can't gamble." Math tricks + Vegas = money.
Aha indeed. "Do you know people in San Francisco?"
"Not that many." Smirk. "Less than a dozen, all told."
She wonders, exactly, what he's smirking at. "Are you going to visit them?"
The fact that this feels...kind of normal. "Ahhh, nope." Because of that dozen, he can think of three that would ask if he's planning on getting Sarah out. Yeah. No dice, with that.
"Okay." Sip of her root beer, and some pixie stix. Blue. "What're we going to do all weekend?"
Dear good. Sugar. Blue flavored sugar. "I don't know, I hadn't planned that far ahead."
Careful, John. She might make you have some. "How far ahead have you planned?"
Oh, that'll be amusing. Or terrifying. "Just to the hotel I was going to suggest." Glance. Does that pass the Okay by Allison test?
Or both at once. "What hotel?" Apparently, it doess pass the Okay by Allison test.
"Kabuki Hotel. It's in Japantown. Nice." Since she suggested going to school in Japan, it popped out in his mind. "You never answered my question, earlier."
"Okay. Kabuki Hotel it is." More sugar! "What question?"
"Why you love me." Okay now that they're on the part of Highway 5 that is about as empty as all get out, John's going to speed a little bit.
"I thought I did." Another sip of root beer. "Because I like being around you, because you make me happier when I'm around you. And you know how to talk to me."
"You said that's why you like me. I wasn't aware they were the same reasons." John frowns. "There are people who don't know how to talk to you?" He may have been so deep in his own little bubble of a world as to not notice these things.
"Why wouldn't they be the same reasons?" They aren't exactly the same reasons. "Of course there are. I ask a lot of questions."
"Don't ask me things like that, I don't know." He really, really doesn't. The whole lack of prior friends and context comes into play. "...That would be because you're smart," says the boy whose own SAT scores he originally thought were some gross processing error.
"Well, I know. Trust me. They can be the same reasons." She shrugs. "Smart means people don't always know how to talk to you." Is that all it means?
"I kind of have to." Trust you, he means, but he doesn't particularly seem like he's bothered by it. "...Does it?" John doesn't know how to talk to people. It's kind of the other way around, for him.
"Sometimes. I talk to people first, then they have to talk to me." And it works, for the most part. Worked with John, didn't it?
"Huh." That's about all he can think to say to that. "I'll try to talk to you, more. I can't promise that I'll suddenly start...laughing around strangers."
Now he gets a weird look. "You don't have to do things you don't want to."
Shrug. "I didn't say I didn't want to talk to you more." Laughing around strangers, he thinks, would just be odd. On so many levels.
"I know that. You sure you don't want me to drive?"
Another Look. "Do you really want to drive or something?"
"I don't know. Are you tired?" She'd be tired if one of her parents went crazy and locked up.
John shakes his head. "...I don't sleep much. I'm used to it." Also that kind of happened once, already.
She shrugs. "Okay, if you say so." He clearly does say so. "What else can we talk about?" That isn't about his mother and crazy stuff.
"I don't know. Whatever you want to talk about is honestly fine by me. Why did you think I wasn't going to your party?" Which falls under both the barred categories. Whoops.
Whoops indeed. "I don't know. I thought maybe you didn't like me." Right. Because that's why he does homework with you, and spends time with your family.
Startled facial expression is a go! "I didn't mean to give you that impression." He really, really didn't. "Your parents are okay with...this? With us?"
Generally, John, if a boy refuses to come to your birthday party you start to wonder. "With us going off for the weekend?"
Is John used to living the world of 'generally'? Let's think about that for a moment. "...Yes. And all that implicates." Since neither of them are the 'let's run off with each other and never speak again' sort.
"They're not exactly okay we ran off. I don't know about anything else. They like you."
Apparently that's...surprising. "Even after today?" He's not sure her parents would ever be okay with the idea of them running off. Or Allison running off, in general.
"It's not your fault there's something wrong with your mother." She thinks that might've been the wrong thing to say the second she says it.
"I wouldn't be so sure." Funny how hindsight works that way.
"What does that mean?" Weird look ahoy.
"My mother was normal before I was born." He's seen the photos. Severe lack of crazy.
Another weird look. A continuation? "That doesn't make it your fault."
It could be the night of a million weird looks. "I have no idea whose fault it is. All of it surrounds me, and machines, and AI that is going to take over the world."
Oh look. More weird looks. "You're gonna have to explain that."
Sigh. "Can you hand me a soda?" Either one of hers or one of his, he doesn't care. But with all this talking his throat feels off.
She will, in fact, hand him a soda. One of his. Then, the rest of her pixie stick gets mixed into her root beer.
Tasty.
Sugar. Fiend. Yay soda. "My mother believes that an AI, called Skynet, is going to take over the world." Glance.
Well, that's...interesting. "Do you?"
"...Sometimes. Not today." Oh the look that gives him. A very confused, what the flying fuck self, kind of look.
That gives her pause. "But you do sometimes? Why?"
"Sometimes she's very convincing." The frowning, oh the frowning. "Sometimes it seems easier to believe her. I am not talking to a therapist about this."
"Didn't say you had to." Sip of her weird drink mix. "Do you want to talk abut something else?"
"I'm just letting you know, for future reference." John shakes his head. "This is fine. You need to know, anyway."
"Okay. So tell me more. About skynet, or whatever." She is, for what it's worth, collecting all this data in her head.
"Skynet originally was some kind of military targeting device. That decided that human beings and their wars weren't any good in the larger scheme of things and so, as these things go, it decides to wipe humanity off the face of the planet."
Allison nods, watching him and listening. "How did it do that without anyone noticing and shutting it down?"
"It was expected to be militaristic. It wasn't expected to PLOT." John shrugs. "How many people seriously check a computer relay program to ensure it's not randomly ordering things? How often does the military? Everything chain reacts in a matter of days, and by the time it's over you've got...25%, 30% of the of the population on the Western seaboard remaining. Most of them aren't military. So who is going to shut it down if it takes over the entire defense system? Central Intelligence?"
"Okay. And your mother thinks this is going to happen? So, why are you talking like it already did?"
John sighs, tightening his hold on the steering wheel for a moment. "It's easier, that way. For some reason."
"Why?" Always asking questions.
"I'm not really sure. Probably because that's the way we've been talking about it my entire life. Not as something that might happen, but something that will."
"And you only sometimes believe it." Huh. "Is that why she called my dad an infiltrator?"
The weird little noises, John can has them. "She called your dad an infiltrator because he spent entirely too much time, at the diner, trying to figure her out." More soda. "Infiltrators are...machines that look like people. Meant to kill other people."
So that's interesting. "If she'd told you my dad was one, would you have believed her?"
John shakes his head. "Infiltrators are always harder to swallow, for me." As far as what he believes his mother about and what he doesn't. "Besides, I've talked to your dad. If he'd wanted to kill her, or me, he'd had lots of opportunities." ...Yay, John. That's the sane and rational way of looking at things.
She nods. "Okay. Are you scared?"
Odd, slightly confused look. "Scared of what?"
Of what. Annother look. A million. "Of her."
Oh. "...A bit. If I go visit her, I'm not sure of how well it would go."
"Do you want me to go with you? Drive with you, I mean. Not inside." That? Would never happen.
"...Let me think about it?" John wouldn't ask her to go inside in a million years.
"Okay." And now? She offers him some of her sugar-soda.
John laughs, but he'll drink it. "...Wow."
And she smirks. "Wow?"
"It tastes like blueberries high on sugar drowned in your soda." John shakes his head but then makes an odd little face at one of the highway signs. "We're closer than I thought we'd be. We might get there early."
"Maybe I like drowning blueberries." She hmms. "Do you want to be early?"
"Apparently." A small smile. "Early is fine. There isn't a lot between here and Tracy, anyway."
Her turn to look mildly confused. "Tracy?"
"Tracy is the city where we change freeways." Did she think he meant a person?
"Aha." She totally did, not that she'll say that.
Slight glance. "Okay."
"What're we going to do when we get there?"
"I hadn't really thought about it. Depends on how tired you are. Also it's going to be after midnight, either way, and there's not a whole lot open that we could get into at that hour. Eat, maybe?" John usually does all of this more or less by ear. Find a place to crash and store things, then figure out what he's up for doing and what he's not.
She thinks about it. "If I nap now, I won't be tired then. Will you be tired?"
Slight frowning and a pause. "I get an average of three and a half hours of sleep a night. I won't be tired until after 5AM."
"That doesn't sound like enough sleep." It really doesn't. "You should try for more."
"I will. I don't...I don't know why I have so much trouble with it." Here's a clue - REM sleep is a lot more restful when your nightmares don't almost give you heart attacks.
She will, no doubt, discover that this weekend. "Some people do."
It'll be fun. And slightly traumatic. "Yeah, I guess."
What isn't in John's life? "I'm going to take a nap, though. If that's okay."
He nods. "Yeah, that's fine." In about 3.5 hours they'll be in San Francisco.