fandomhigh | Horror 101, Monday

"I'm not going to show you any films this week," Mitchell announced, a little wary, but still full of that pumped-up, somewhat faked enthusiasm he'd started on last Thursday. "Sorry for missing out on class last week. I had to help a friend move flats." He clapped his hands once. "There's food, if anyone wants it, and coffee - just take whatever you'd like. I got that," point at the cake, "From JGoB's. There's plenty more where it came from."

He leaned back. "We've had a weekend," he started, which was enough to darken his mood back down to Earth a little. "Now normally I'd be going into some genre or monster, but I think you've all suffered enough horror. That is one of the bases of it, not just the films or the books but the reality of it. Losing yourself, losing track of where you stand, losing your boundaries. The fringes are terrifying, and many of you were tipped over these past few days."

He rubbed at his fingers. "The search for what we are, for what humanity is, is one of the primal forces in fiction, in fear. We try to wrap our minds around all the things humanity can do, the horrors that are worse than any monster could dream up, the triumphs better than anyone could aspire to from the shadows. But first we have to define what it is we are, who we are. Which one of you already knows? Who here has a sense of identity strong enough to shake off the intrusion of another?"

He surveyed the class thoughtfully. "Because trust me, you can throw away lifetimes trying to figure out who you are, what the essence is of what you can do and what you want to be. Maybe right now you're frightened. Maybe you're in denial. Maybe you're having trouble adjusting to the realities around you." Not that his eyes went looking for Kate, or anything. "All of this is human. Even if you made it through the fire and shrugged it off like it was nothing. Does it belong to you? Do you own it? And who do you need to sustain it? People are always looking for a tribe, it's what keeps them from spinning off into the dark. Have you found it?"

Finally, he leaned back. "You can't really start to live until you know who you are," he said. "See this weekend as a test, if you have to see it at all. You lived through that brand of horror and came out on the other end. How do you define yourself now?"

There wasn't any further lecture incoming. That, it would seem, was that.

[[ and have at ]]

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"No, but maybe you should decide whether you want to weapon yourself and barge into this nightmare or stick to a distance so you won't lose your mind like you're so afraid of," Mitchell replied. There was something barely restrained in his voice. "There are some things only the dead should know, Kate. I'd rather you don't."

Edited 2010-03-08 17:44 (UTC)

This feeling of getting slapped by mere words was becoming a little too familiar. It seemed to be what you got for trusting people with your darker thoughts.

"I already barged into it. If I'd have had the slightest fucking idea of what I was getting myself into, I wouldn't have." Not necessarily true. "It's not like I'm looking to just jump into your fucking world. Jesus fucking Christ, Mitchell, I'm not that stupid."

If Kate had a problem being confronted by her own hypocrisy, maybe she shouldn't go shoving it into other people's faces. "Then why would you have wanted me to tell you?" he asked, getting up. "Trust me, if I'd known you were coming for me I would have phoned."

She gave him a look that questioned his intelligence. Same one she'd gotten from Jack last time they talked, pretty much.

"If you'd have told me, I wouldn't have come for you." Probably.

"That hardly stopped George," he pointed out, "And it doesn't take away that you didn't want to know."

"I'm not George! And I didn't know there was anything to know, so don't you dare try to make it sound like this was my choice."

"No, it was my choice not to tell you, and you know what?" Mitchell asked, "I still wouldn't have if you hadn't wandered off into the middle of it!"

Yeah, okay, maybe losing his shit a little now.

"If you want an apology for dragging you into it, you can have it, Kate," he said, running his hand through his hair in frustration. Again. "But I'm not apologizing for keeping my mouth shut about something you never should have known."

"I don't want your apologies."

She had no fucking clue as to what it was she did want.

She drew in a deep breath, then let it out, glaring at him. "Anyway, it's too late. I know now."

"Yeah," Mitchell said, meeting her gaze for a few seconds before looking towards the ground by her fee-- well, behind her. "You know now."

Not that he could see it, but the glare softened, disappeared, and then Kate, too, was looking away. Biting on the inside of her lip without even realizing it.

There was a silent 'so, what now?' hanging in the air.

She had no answer to it.

"You haven't run off and called in the torch and pitchfork crew yet," Mitchell observed, dropping a few words into the silence.

He had his own cues on hand to figure out what her so, what now really meant.

Edited 2010-03-08 19:24 (UTC)

"I don't know anyone with pitchforks," she replied. "I'm from the city."

Light years away from any of her usual tones, more tired than snarky, but still.

"Just forks, then?" he offered, sticking his hands into his pockets. "Or one of those over the top blendery things you lot sell on TV."

"Spoons. Dull ones." Beat. "And a knockoff StairMaster."

"Oooh," Mitchell said, pulling a face, "Not the StairMaster. You think those adverts are bad now, you should've seen the old ones."

She snuck a glance at him, and let out a very quiet laugh. "Well. You'd know, wouldn't you?"

"I was very bored in the 80s," he admitted. "Well, the punk rock scene wasn't bad, but."

She stayed quiet for a moment, then brought a hand up to rub at her temple. "One day, you're going to have to tell me about that." It was relevant to her interests! "Once I stop being weirded out."

"Once you stop being weirded out," he agreed, quietly, and shrugged. In a friendly way. "That works, right?"

He was like a walking encyclopedia on the past hundred years of counter-culture (it was the corner towards which he flocked naturally), so maybe the possibility of poking through that would keep her from running off.

"Yeah. That works."

She looked properly at him for the first time since... the argument had stopped. Blinked a few times, then instinctively wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand.

"So I should probably..." She waved vaguely in the direction of the door.

"You know where to find me," Mitchell echoed, his voice as kind as it got.

He had fleeting thoughts about giving her a hug, but that didn't seem--- well, right. (Appropriate wasn't a word he'd ever use in a serious context, so right it would have to be)

Instead, he extended a hand. To shake on it. You know.

Kate looked at his hand, then gave him a stern look of 'are you fucking kidding me?'

Then went for a hug.

... Mitchell wasn't going to protest if she was the one going for a hug.

So she got a firm, secure-in-his-masculinity hug on back. She'd earned it after the past few weeks, definitely.

She thought so, too.

There was a hint of desperate clinging thrown in for good measure. Then she let go, and showed him a lopsided smile. "And now I have to go apologize to Professor Algren. I'll see you around, Mitchell."

"I'll see you, Kate," he agreed, giving her a smile that wasn't, in fact, lopsided.

Horror 101, Monday

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