3rd Life:

[idomore]

I wanted to show Scully how the cookies moved, when Millie figured them out.

We can still try it, right Millie? I think Klartch would like it. Though I don't know if he should be eating gingerbread.

...

I should If anyone would like a good chase after some gingerbread men, I think we'll have plenty.

[ooc: ): Still super stressed but ... hi,

Comments

bumbling back into the apartment with groceries or something sob

[iseemore]

[ YOU CAN HEAR HIS NETWORK DEVICE FALL ]

Drat it...well..

...

[ SOUND OF the door being toed shut as he stumbles in with armfuls of grocery stuff ]

That's all of the allowance...er...mine...I'm afraid I didn't get ingredients for gingerbread---we could go back though---Cat?

[ talking at his device....on the floor....it is....far from him standing above it, with...bags of stuff ]

LMAO GOD CONRAD.

[idomore]

[Looks at him talking at the device from the chair in which he's sitting. Klartch looks, too, and nudges Cat's leg. Suppressing a grin, he gets up an walks toward him.]

That's okay. Give me something?

HE IS A SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE...only not

[iseemore]

"Erm..."

Conrad eyeballs Klartch--who he likes--and Cat--who he also likes--before sort of ambling in far enough to get to the kitchen where he half drops half sets the bags down. Then he pokes his head back through the kitchen doorway and peers at the pair again.

"What did you want? Food... or...?"

He blinks.

GET ON AIM.

[idomore]

"..." Cat watched Conrad walk past him, looking a little confused.

"I... thought I'd take a bag."

The sound that they are hearing is a baby griffin's snort of laughter.

ANYTHING FOR YOU, OKAY?...../zoom

[iseemore]

"...Oh," he blinked at the blond boy before beginning to unpack.

"I should have realized. I guess I'm just used to doing it myself...though Uncle Alfred usually did the shopping," he half says half talks to himself, going through a whole bag of...meat. Yes. That's right. And then more normal things, you know, for the people. Sigh.

They need to find a new way to account for the expenses, but he's not sure what to do.

DAHLING

[idomore]

Klartch is at the counter before Cat, lured by the scent of the meat, his beak clicking, claws scraping the ground. He rears, lifting his front to try for the counter.

"No, get down." Cat said, and received a reproachful look in response. But, the griffin listened.

He knows Conrad takes too much onto himself, and goes along often when bossed by Christopher. The fact that Cat isn't inclined to help with this sort of thing makes it harder to offer when Conrad doesn't ask, and as such, he watches.

"Is it hard?"

LOVE!

[iseemore]

Conrad doesn't really feel put upon, not here, because it's a little different, this dynamic than the one he had at home or at Stallery. Still, he wonders if this isn't also a result of his Evil Fate that the others are so convinced he does not have. He remembers being sure he had been lied to by everyone, but now he has come to be less sure of that. Wouldn't it be nice, almost, to have them be right after all

[idomore]

"Right," he answered, as Klartch scratched across the tiles and dropped his hind quarters to the floor beside Cat. His tail whirled against Cat's ankle, and the griffin leaned against his leg. Cat let his hand rest against his feathered neck, and fought to manage a pang of guilt. Of course Klartch had jumped. Of course he was hungry.

Just for a moment, standing there, looking at the meat Conrad had bought with all his allowance, Cat felt ill. It wasn't enough. His fingers curled into Klartch, and the griffin made no sound.

"Right," he said again, to ground himself, and offered a tiny smile. "... Probably not, but..."

[iseemore]

Brow furrowing, he realized he must have forgotten a few things, but put the meat away in the refrigerator first, pausing again, leaning back against the counter, looking between Cat and Klartch, because he did feel, from the very beginning, it was best to give them both the proper attention of a person who cared what was going on.

"Are you quite alright?" he peers down now, leaning a little.

[idomore]

Cat blinked at the suddenness of the topic change. He had, after all, been asking about shopping. Glancing down, he quickly pried his hand from the griffin.

"Huh?" he muttered at his chest. Feeling annoyed that he'd been noticed made it easier to cover, and he looked up cool as a -- well, as a cat.

"Yes, I'm all right. What's for dinner?"

[iseemore]

Conrad found himself a little annoyed as well, but more than that, confused, because he would be the firs to admit he did not entirely understand Cat's way of going about things, his quietness that somehow spoke of calm and a contradictory youth all at once.

"Sandwiches," he replied though, turning back to the foodstuffs. "I think those have proven to be," he stopped, thinking. "Well, it's sandwiches," he then backtracked, glancing down at Klartch. "You've quite the appetite," an off-hand remark, he didn't mean anything of criticism by it, just sort of a fact. "I don't suppose you'll suddenly have a preference for salad one day." This, he said almost wistfully, but his expression was as non confrontational as one might imagine, just considerate, curious, and somewhat confused as usual.

He really couldn't get his head around a lot of what this City brought together, even people of his own reality, apparently, but that didn't mean he wouldn't try in his own way, usually.

[idomore]

They did eat sandwiches a lot, didn't they? Cat could understand why. Normally, he might have been sick of them by now. But his stomach had been twisting with anxiety for so long that he had had little appetite for days now. He ate because he knew he should, and because it was there.

"Hungry," agreed the griffin, his beak bobbing. Then: "Salad?" his head tilting inquisitively.

Cat knew better than to hold it against Conrad. The older boy obviously meant well, and he could empathize completely. But it was difficult, too.

"He could," he mused, trying not to feel sulky, "He has vegetables with his mince... but he needs meat, too."

[iseemore]

Though he tried, and was, admittedly, fascinated in his own way by Klartch, Conrad couldn't begin to 'understand' the various requirements of such a creature, though he could note them and remember. He wondered if this would ever come in handy at Stallery only to immediately suppose it wouldn't, and then he had the sudden and inexplicable sinking notion he might be stuck as an Improve there forever. All he wanted, or had wanted, as to go to school with his friends. He hadn't planned on any of this, though in all truth he was glad to have met Christopher, and in this case Millie and Cat, Klartch and Syracuse as well. It just left him a little muddled though, on what to do or how to feel. Every once in a while it felt normal, when he could retort at Christopher like they were arguing over some task given them by Amos or...whatever. Other times he felt more nervous, like he had first going to Stallery, on the train and watching all of the other kids, knowing he was just one of many, and what good was that when he had an Evil Fate to

[idomore]

"He's a baby," Cat answered, a little blankly. He was saying that a lot, lately. "So he's often hungry."

The second question was a little more difficult. They'd been doing all right, until the butcher cut them off. Cat was doing what he could, but it was hard to know if it was enough while taking so little. Clearly it hadn't been last time, and Klartch had gone and ransacked Lady Yuuko's, and now he might become a statue.

His stomach twisted. "I think -- I think it's--"

Klartch interrupted, "Hungry!"

Cat couldn't blame him, but he still felt miserable.

"You'll eat soon," he muttered.