Library, Monday

[intotheout]

Tip was trying to get actual library work done this week, she really was. But every time she focused on it, she kept seeing flashes of something dashing by out of the corner of her eye. She never saw what it was, exactly, and when she asked Bill he just gave her the bubble version of a shrug. It didn't matter if she was at the front desk or in the stacks. She tried just staring vaguely into space for a bit to see if she could track it down, but it only every happened when she was actually working.

"Right," she said. "Either there's a ghost in here who wants me to be a slacker, or I'm losing my mind."

[open!]

Comments

[intotheout]

"Or people who are allergic," Tip pointed out. "Or, like, there are people who are deathly afraid of dogs."

Tip's family had a very large dog. She'd gotten to know pretty well that some people really weren't into them.

[always_someone]

"True, true," Norman allowed. "So make it into an event. Have a dedicated space set aside for the dogs, and make it clear that people should avoid that area if dogs aren't a great match for them."

He tilted his head a little.

"The rec room in the dorms, maybe? Or the pool. A puppy pool party, with little puppy life jackets..."

[intotheout]

"You know, I keep forgetting we have a pool. . . ."

[always_someone]

"I've never actually used it," Norman replied, "but yeah... I found it while I was getting acquainted with the dorms. I heard something about there being a ball pit up on the sixth floor, too."

In case they needed other options for a puppy party.

[intotheout]

"Clearly I need to do more exploring," Tip said. "Is that what you do when you can't deal with the living?"

[always_someone]

"Well, back home I'd usually just watch zombie movies or read comic books," Norman admitted. "But I have a roomie who's a semester away from graduation and I don't think she was in the market for a nerdy roommate who just sits around all day in his plush zombie slippers, reading."

He shrugged. Truth be told, he really didn't know what to do with a roommate, himself.

[intotheout]

"You, my dear Norman, are far too concerned with what other people want," Tip said. "It's your room, too. If you wanna sit around all day in zombie slippers and she gives you trouble . . . send her to me. I'll clock her for you."

She probably wouldn't. Not for that. But Norman seemed like he could use someone who was willing to casually threaten a little violence in his honor.

[always_someone]

Well, that got a little laugh out of him, at least. He wasn't convinced she'd do it, but she was right; he appreciated it.

"I get the impression that Mara isn't very easily clocked," he replied, grinning a little. "But I don't mind being out and about around here as much, anyway. The locals are weird, but who isn't? And only a couple of people have really been outright rude anyway."

So it was already an improvement on Blithe Hollow.

[intotheout]

"Who's being rude?" Tip asked. "Maybe I'll clock them too. I've been in training, I'm pretty strong, these days."

Tip, no.

[always_someone]

Norman shrugged his shoulders, still smiling.

"Some random guy at the coffee shop," he replied. "He was giving the barista grief for getting his order wrong, but I'm pretty sure it was the guy's first day. Started ranting on about how people were supposed to be understanding of other people's differences when he noticed me rolling his eyes at him for clearly being a jerk to the new guy."

It... didn't make a heck of a lot of sense to Norman. How dare he not be understanding of someone clearly being a dick? Ugh.

"Pretty sure he was barking up the wrong tree, feeding me that line."

[intotheout]

". . . I totally lost track of which guy was which in that story," Tip confessed. "But it sounds like someone went to the 'why won't you tolerate my intolerance' school of public discourse."

[always_someone]

"You got the gist of it," Norman confirmed, shrugging his shoulders. "I don't have much patience for that line, but it made less sense than usual when it was just some guy moaning about how his tea was brewed from a bag."

[intotheout]

"Oh no," Tip said dryly. "Not from a bag. That's tragic."

[always_someone]

"Imagine how horrible it would have been if they'd used decaf," Norman replied with a fairly expressive eyeroll. "Pretty sure he thinks I'm a crazy guy, especially once I told him the gremlin ghost I was keeping company with was really sorry he couldn't bite him. But, hey, I don't think that's so much of a loss."

[intotheout]

"Crazy on this island is super relative," Tip pointed out. "I mean, I go around talking to inanimate objects on the regular on the off chance they've developed sentience, so. . . ."

[always_someone]

"So I'm in good company," Norman mused. "How often does it turn out you're right, around here?"

Because he wouldn't be super surprised if the answer was 'really, really often.'

[intotheout]

"I don't actually have any proof here, yet. But my sword teacher totally talks about his sword like she has a soul, and the music shop guy thinks I'm nuts but I'm betting his stereo is nicer to him now." Bill blew an anxious wreath of bubbles around her head. "Also there's Bill. But I met him before I got here."

[always_someone]

Norman chuckled a little and waved hello to Bill. It was hard to deny something had a mind of its own when it was right there communicating, even in its own way.

"Bill totally counts," he decided. And then paused. "Sword teacher?"

Oh no. Was Tip officially basically the coolest person Norman knew, now?

[intotheout]

Tip would be absolutely astonished to hear that. She wasn't a cool person, she was intimidated by cool people!

She was learning to sword fight, though.

"This guy who works at the diner is teaching me fencing in the park." Tip blinked. "It is much less sketchy than it sounds. He's totally a nice guy. You know, um. Mostly."

Sorry Kanan. At least you'd graduated back up to "mostly"?

[always_someone]

Well, 'mostly nice' was still more than Kanan would have wanted even a year ago, so it wasn't half bad.

"Mostly?"

Norman, meanwhile, was now minorly concerned that this fencing teacher was a 'nice guy,' as opposed to a nice guy.

[intotheout]

"There was this whole . . . thing. With these evil slugs. . . . It's kind of a long story."

[always_someone]

"I'll take your word for it," Norman decided, glancing toward one of the library windows. "I see the slugs around from time to time. The big ugly things with all the teeth? They kind of say it all."

[intotheout]

Tip frowned, blinking rapidly at him for a few moments. "Oh my god, you mean slug ghosts." She shook her head sharply. "It never even occurred to me there would be slug ghosts."

Her eyes shot wide open. "There aren't any, like, really big weird monster ghosts, are there?" Like, say, a giant statue ghost near the post office. Tip wasn't sure she could handle the idea of her other self leaving a ghost behind.

[always_someone]

"Uh." Norman looked faintly perplexed for a moment at that. "You might need to narrow that down a little. This morning I passed by a dinosaur fighting some kind of... half-pony, half-monkey thing, just going to get a coffee."

Fandom Island was full of weird monster ghosts.

"There's a big dragon I sometimes see near the park that I'm pretty sure is made of Jello?"

[intotheout]

". . . Jello?"

Yeah, that one was well before Tip's time.

"I mean, like . . . that weirdly resemble people here. I think one of them was a giant ship shaped thing that used a student's body as a lure? And I heard about a big spider with a teacher's face."