fandomhigh | Brooding for Dummies, Friday, Period 2

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Brooding for Dummies, Friday, Period 2

//Morning, class,// Jono greeted, the lesson for today set up in a classroom. //Have you eaten today?//

It was an important question, okay? Yesterday's activity in the park had given him another idea for class today, and while there wasn't necessarily such a thing as a good brooding food, there was such a thing as a good comfort food.

//When people fall into a particular state, they sometimes get so lost in it that they forget to take care of the essentials,// he explained. //Maybe they don't eat, or shower, or tidy up as much as they ought to. Hell, it can be difficult to even leave the house when it gets bad enough. And... there's not much I can do about the rest, but today we can at least lean into eating.//

Well, you all could. Jono was going to have to spectate for this one.

//Here, I think, the trick is to find something easy. Make sure that easy thing is always an option, even when you've got other things to... feel. Think about. Whatever.// He shrugged. //There's a certain point where you don't even have to worry about it being healthy, just worry about it being food. Get delivery, keep some energy bars in the cupboard, just eat a block of ramen noodles dry, if that'll keep you going.//

... He'd resorted to a few of these things back during his, ah, blue period.

//Anyway, we're ordering pizza today. Figure out what toppings you want and let me know, and I'll pay.//

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With Food!

Astrid Magnussen

Breq

It's entirely possible that 'brooding for dummies' is slowly transforming into 'self-care for the depressed' and Jono doesn't particularly care.

'Self-care for the depressed,' indeed. For such an absurd class, it was doing a pretty remarkable job of digging into Astrid. She tried not to shift to show her discomfort. Forgetting to eat for yourself was one thing, but Astrid's mother, in her highest highs and lowest lows, would also forget that she had a small child that needed to eat as well. Comfort food for Astrid ended up being those rare moments when Ingrid was lucid enough to be nurturing, tamales and elotes in Guanajuato, raw and smoked herring in rainy Amsterdam, croissants and coffee in little Parisian bistros. It was kind strangers who could tell by looking at her that she was far too skinny; it was walking to the store after stealing some money out of her mother's purse because Ingrid had forgotten to get groceries again...

Just worry about it being food. Beggars couldn't be choosers.

It's pizza day. Pick some toppings. Hopefully something you can all agree on. Jono's treat.

"A Buddhist special," Astrid offered, finding a faint grin. "Make me one with everything."

Hey, if they were getting free pizza, might as well go all out.

"Is that really tasty?" Breq had to ask.

"It's...filling," Astrid said after a moment, shrugging slightly. "Pretty good if you like everything. It can be a pain if you don't, though, because you end up spending more time picking out what you don't like than you do actually eating it."

"I mean, it's not just about the number of different topics you add," Breq said. "It's the quantity. I could just add a lot of each, and make sure they go together."

Astrid shrugged again; that's what was nice about just one with everything. She wasn't picky...you couldn't really afford to be picky when you didn't know when your next meal would even be...so it seemed way easier than trying to just decide on a select few.

But rather than explain all that, she just turned the conversation onto Breq. "Which toppings would you pick?"

"I might go with all of them too, just to try."

She remembered to smile here.

It was an effective smile, considering Astrid smiled back, albeit just a little. "See? Might as well go all-in."

"I actually haven't had a lot of pizza before, really," she added, tucking her hair behind her ears, almost embarrassed, definitely shy, unaware that Breq would probably have no idea why someone would be worried it would be weird to admit that to her peers.

"Neither have I," Breq said. "I'm from a different universe."

One where ancillaries weren't given anything resembling pizza.

Of course she was. Astrid's lips pressed together a moment, trying not to react, because, really, wasn't this just par for the course these days?

So she handled it the way she handled it when anyone else said they were from a different universe or had aliens for best friends or never seemed to take off giant shark-person costumes. She just went along with it.

"Yeah?" she asked. "Is it...really different?"

"I suppose it is," Breq said. "Then again, people aren't that different, or if they are, they are different in predictable ways. I'm guessing you're from Earth?"

"Oh, yeah," said Astrid, with a little emphatic breath. "Definitely. Los Angeles. I mean, I've lived in a few other places, too, but L.A. will always be home."

Which she missed to an almost excruciating extent, but she was trying to not let it bother her if she could help it. But the point was that she was from a place that actually existed that wasn't here or outer space or other dimensions or anything like that.

Edited 2018-07-22 11:31 (UTC)

"I've seen it marked on a map of this planet," Breq said. "You speak the same language there, don't you?"

She assumed that was the case, since Astrid didn't have an accent that told her otherwise.

"But it's the other coast of this continent?"

Astrid nodded. It was simple stuff, sure, but it was almost like how some people would repeat facts to themselves, to make sure their grip on reality remained strong enough to hold on. "That's right," she said. "Mostly English, but there's a lot of immigrants there, so you hear all kinds of languages."

She thought about talking about her own multilingual tongue, but stopped herself. It always felt like bragging, in a way, knowing it was a little unique. She also knew it would only make her ache for the way things were, so why even mention it?

"I haven't seen much of the rest of this planet, and I've only heard some of the other languages here in songs."

She made sure to smile. "We have space travel in my universe. I'm used to travel between planets, and I can't say I'd call any of them my home."

"You travel around a lot, then?" Astrid asked.

See, there was the thing. If she just ignored the space travel part, it could easily just be a conversation between two totally normal girls. She might have been able to suspend her disbelief longer, too, if she hadn't gone and asked a follow-up question that would make it hard to just brush it off. But letting people go on with their wild tales was still preferable to talking about herself.

"Do you have a favorite, though?"

"Before coming here, yes," Breq said. "And... favorites depend on the people there. Or the songs. I really couldn't name one place."

All of them came with good and bad memories.

"You like music?" Astrid ventured; she couldn't help noticing songs being brought up twice in their short conversation already.

"I do," Breq said. "I collects songs. Do you like music?"

This was an important subject to her, and she forgot to make sure her face expressed that adequately.

He's here if you need him.

No, he's not sharing the pizza.

Please, don't let there be leftovers.

"That don't sound much like my syllabus," Ino noted from the doorway. "Yo."

//It's important to eat between broodings in order to fuel more brooding, naturally,// Jono replied, shrugging his shoulders easily. //A properly sustained brood requires sustenance, you know.//

You couldn't deny that logic, could you?

Of course she could!

"'Cept the slightly hungry look is also part of the brooding aesthetic," she complained. "You're so bad at this."

//I suppose I am,// Jono replied, shrugging his shoulders. //I'm not going to teach them anything that might hurt them, though.//

He refused. Flat-out.

"I weren't suggesting that," she said, very mildly.

And was rather offended that he thought she might.

//Didn't figure you were,// Jono replied, looking at the pizza order form resolutely. //Hell, Iris, it's just...//

He waved a hand at the page, vaguely.

//My own brooding, th'days I couldn't get myself out of bed,, the whole bloody reason I got a reputation for it... It came from a bloody terrible place. If there's even the faintest chance anyone took this class because that's where theirs comes from too, I want to make sure I'm doing right by them. Couldn't live with myself if I did anything but.//

He'd done a fair bit of brooding about it, in fact.

She was still offended, but... ah, hell.

"I didn't sign you up for this class to mock those days where you couldn't get out of bed," she said, frowning. "And I'd hope you know that. It were a joke. Maybe one in bad taste, but I weren't expectin' a serious class out of you, and from radio, neither were your students really. I ain't--I mean, I didn't do this to hurt you, you dumbass."

She loved him.

//I know,// Jono muttered, shoulders bunching up a little, head ducking low. //But... you know Fandom students.//

Astrid came to mind, for one. He fidgeted a little.

//There are real problems hiding under th'surface in more than a few of them. I want them to know that brooding is fine, they can even play it up for th'fun of it. But if it isn't coming from the fun place, they need to think of themselves too.//

Free pizza is my kind of lesson.

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Brooding for Dummies, Friday, Period 2

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