fandomhigh | Library, Monday

Library, Monday

Tip was still trying to work out what big flaw in her writing she was going to try to destroy for this week's creative writing assignment. Maybe she should do something that didn't involve robots?

But robots were cool.

She found a couple writing manuals in the stacks and flipped through those for awhile. One was a whole big thing about birds, which she guessed worked as a metaphor, but it still seemed kind of weird to Tip. Another one had a whole big thing about how adverbs were the devil.

Tip was starting to think that professional writers were kind of full of crap.

[open!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Breq hadn't got around to visit the library. She knew this was the day Tip worked there, which was another reason that she had found her way here now.

She hadn't been in a library in a long time, and tried to remember when it had been last.

[SP?]

[of course!]

"Hey Breq," Tip greeted with a smile. She'd much rather talk to a friend than keep beating her head against creative writing advice manuals. "How's it going?"

"Hello." Breq offered a deliberate smile. "Am I interrupting you?"

"Not even a little. I was working on an assignment for Creative Writing, but I have all week to do that."

Breq stopped in front of the desk. "What are you writing?"

"Nothing, yet," Tip said. "We're supposed to identify our comfort zone and flaws as writers and write something that breaks away from that. It's harder than it sounds."

"I would say it sounds hard, but then I am no writer," Breq replied. "What do you prefer to write about, then?"

Tip shrugged. "That's just it, I've never thought about it that way. I guess I have kind of science-fictiony bent, but robots and aliens aren't actually science fiction in my world, so it's also kind of realism."

"Science fiction?" Breq asked.

"It's a genre. Like, stuff that might happen in the future but isn't real yet. When I was little, before we knew there were aliens out there, stories about space travel was mostly going to be science fiction. And then fantasy is about stuff that's impossible in the real world, which in mine would be, like, magic and dragons and things. But -- yeah, it's kind of hard to think of anything as proper fantasy or sci-fi living here."

"But they must be about more than space travel," Breq said. "Or magic and dragons. Isn't there a story?"

"Of course. It's usually going to use the space or dragons or whatever as an allegory for things that happen on baseline Earths. Like war or race relations or, I don't know, trauma recovery or something."

"So what stories do you like?" Breq asked. Although not her main interest, not like songs, she had come across quite a few stories too during her life.

Tip shrugged. "It kinda changes depending on my mood. Like, sometimes I really want something sort of quiet with a really strong sense of place and sometimes I like things that are actiony and sometimes I just want to read something sweet and funny. Do you have a favorite?"

"I haven't thought much about it," Breq said after considering the question. "Where I'm from romantic love stories are very popular, especially in a historical setting. I've never paid much attention."

"You didn't do a lot of reading back home," Tip guessed. "Too focussed on music, or was it just not your thing?"

"Yes. although I did read some poetry. It's generally more appreciated. The stories like that are more popular as entertainments."

She couldn't help recalling the poetry Lieutenant Awn had received from her sister. They had been of the kind one might expect from a teenager, but Awn had treasured them, not for their quality but as a reminder from her young sister, whose education she helped to pay for.

"Pretty much no one reads poetry where I'm from. They'll listen to it, like at a slam or in hip hop, but reading it is the realm of, like, uber-geekdom."

"...uber-geekdom?"

"Like . . . extra obsessed with something most people don't bother with. You have to be really into it to be into it, you know?"

"Oh! I understand."

Almost very culture had people like that. A similar thing had jokingly been said about her - as Justice of Toren - which had been funny because ships weren't generally expected to take such serious interest in things like music.

"Like collecting songs?"

"Yeah, kinda. Though loads of people are into music without being totally obsessed with it. I think the people who are super into music call themselves 'audiophiles'."

"I see." Breq considered this. "Is there a reason there is very little poetry written here?"

Tip shrugged. "It's just not really in fashion, I guess. It can be kind of . . . impenetrable."

"It can?" Breq asked. "In that case, isn't that true of every kind of art?"

"Oh yeah, totally. There's lots of people who say they don't 'get' visual art, too. But I think with poetry, there's this idea that, like, none of it is accessible, you know? At least with painting, you might not get abstract stuff, but portraits are pretty easy. Or with music, there's lots of complexity that most people never hear, but they can still sing along with the lyrics and dance to the beat. With poetry, in my culture at least, you don't really get that."

"But lyrics are poetry?" Breq said. "And I have read a lot of poetry that the only reason it might be inaccessible is because it was pointless."

She wasn't arguing, just being curious about the reasoning.

"A lot of people I know would say that lyrics don't count. Like, okay, so some of the best poets in, like, fifty years back home are hip hop artists, right? But almost everyone says that doesn't count, because they're rapping about growing up poor or being in gangs instead of writing about pretty trees or whatever. It's this whole racist, classist thing. The only stuff that's real poetry is the stuff you read and don't understand."

"If your definition of poetry includes that you shouldn't understand it, then of course you would," Breq observed. "Or it wouldn't be poetry."

Last week, Summer had been a little overwhelmed with being back and catching up to make it to the library on Monday, and she didn't need to press her luck any further with Ms. Morgendorffer's level of disdain for her, so she popped into the library to hunt down one of the few people she hadn't managed to touch base with yet.

"Heeeeeey, Tip," she said, "how's it going?"

[[ I know this is super late and prone to SP but I didn't want to miss another Monday due to being a flake, doot doot doot ]]

"Hey Summer." Tip had noticed the shift in Summer's demeanor in the last week or so, but hadn't wanted to bring it up. She was pretty sure it was rude to be happy your friend was being less . . . bubbly. "I'm doing alright. Trying to figure out this stupid writing assignment. You?"

"Good!" Summer bobbed her head a little. "Good. Same. And, ugh, yeah, that assignment! I mean, how am I supposed to know what my style of writing is and how to write against it if I haven't even been in the class? I mean, since, you know, there's been a robot here in my place while I was in another dimension, and everything."

She thought it was a super good segue, quirking an eyebrow innocently as she asked, "Did you, uh, hear anything about all that yet?"

Judging by the moment Tip spent just kind of staring at her with her eyebrows raised, that was a "no".

". . . I mean that does kind of explain some things."

Well, at least Tip actually believed her, unlike others in their creative writing class...

Still, Summer groaned a little; it was just so much easier when someone had been all oh, but I knew the whole time!

"Soooo, yeah," she said. "My robot self wasn't too weird or anything with you, was she? I mean, I know I could always listen to radio to get an idea, but I'm almost too afraid."

Particularly of the ones "she" did...

Tip shook her head. "Nah, she was cool. I mean, she kind of talked like she was being written by a Hollywood producer who had never spoken to an actual teenage girl in her life, but -- I kind of just thought you might be going through something and didn't want to mention it." She grimaced. "Sorry."

She would be handling 'I was replaced by a robot for weeks and you didn't notice' way worse than it looked Summer was doing.

Considering that her own mother hadn't even noticed, Summer figured she could kind of cut everyone some slack on that one. She shrugged.

"I'll have to pass that bit of feedback onto my grampa, then," she said. "He programmed me...I mean, her, and I don't think he's ever been a teenager before in his life."

Pause.

"Well, except that one time when he enrolled a tiny clone of himself temporarily into our school to help us take care of vampires, but then the tiny clone didn't want to go back and tried to kill--"

She stopped right there and shook her head, lifting her hands. "You know what, it doesn't matter. I just had to make sure robot me wasn't going around acting like an idiot and tarnishing what little reputation I've built for myself here, that's all."

"I mean, you might be failing all your classes," Tip said. She wasn't sure how much of that 'I must maintain an air of not being intelligent' thing was Summer and how much was Summer's grandfather's assumptions about Summer. "But I think socially you're okay. Is your granddad going to come to Parents' Weekend? Because I can't decide if that would be cool or really terrible."

That small ppfft and wave of her hand at the first part would do well to show Tip that the stunning C average was 100% au natural Summer Smith. After all, you didn't need good grades to fight evil empires in space, right? But it did help to be popular, so she was relieved that the second part matched up with her experience so far in touching base with everyone.

Relief that was short lived, unfortunately, because the third part made her eyes widen like saucers.

"Parents' Weekend?"

Someone didn't know about Parents' Weekend.

"It's this weekend," Tip confirmed. "J.Lo's going to come."

But not her mom this year. Tip was both disappointed and relieved by that fact.

"I'm going to help the Student Council host a bowling night on Saturday."

Also, in case you didn't know, Summer: Tip was kind of a nerd.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Library, Monday

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject