(no subject)
It's September again. Hal's pretty sure September isn't supposed to happen every six months, but he's had to accept a lot of things he didn't think were supposed to happen: his mom wasn't supposed to start dating their neighbor, he wasn't supposed to drink, magic islands weren't supposed to exist and dinosaurs weren't supposed to be around to hunt you. At this point, the time lapse is just one more thing Hal doesn't know how to feel about, so he's killing time on the beach, trying not to think about like, that veritable list of things.
Except there's a list of things, and not a lot to do on the beach but think them over. Maybe if he hadn't grown up in New Jersey, he'd be one of those outdoorsy assholes who can go to the beach to like, surf, or dig for clams, or collect weird looking pieces of wood, which probably isn't even a real hobby anyway, just something Earl would do. Collect weird looking pieces of wood and then threaten to end Hal's existence if he touched them, for some reason like destroying the integrity of the shape that only made sense to someone who is crazy the way Earl was.
Earl is on the list somewhere, with the rest of his family. It feels weird to miss people, when Hal is pretty sure missing them is like, the first time he's really known how he feels about them at all. It's like having September come around again and realizing he dropped out of high school without meaning to, except nobody here seems really concerned about him completing the tenth grade as long as he can survive like, the apocalypse that Niko is always envisioning. An apocalypse full of dinosaurs and close-range combat, and assassins lurking in bushes, and running.
Today is clearly not the dawn of that apocalypse, though: it's not even the dawn of getting up early and doing homework again. Hal's finished his run or at least as much of his run as he was ever going to do, and, shoes dangling from one hand, head down, he's letting the water sliding over and away from his feet guide him around the edge of the island. A shell makes him pause, something shiny and the color of an oil slick sticking out of the sand that he frowns at and nudges with a toe, hair flopping down over his face. He almost stoops to pick it up, but suddenly the hair on the back of his neck stands up, and he's afraid to look up to find out why it suddenly feels like he's being watched.
Probably because he's being watched; when he lifts his head and looks up through his hair, his gaze travels up a pair of thin white legs, starting from cloven hooves and ending at--
at the tip of a freaking horn. "Er," Hal says, pushing his hair back with his free hand and wondering what the fuck he's supposed to do now, because they definitely didn't have unicorns in New Jersey either. Having it stand there staring at him is bad enough, but then it starts walking over to him and he lets out a pretty ridiculous squawk, shifting a step back. It doesn't seem like it's coming over to gore him, but a minute ago, it didn't seem like unicorns could exist. "Somebody, like. This is a joke, right," he asks, thinking someone must have spiked the brownies again. Or, you know, the fruit salad he actually ate today. He's totally hallucinating again and the unicorn is going to open its mouth and answer his question in pig-latin and tell him the secrets of the universe while he combs its sparkly mane. He'll wake up later dehydrated and stupid and never, ever tell any-- "Hey," he blurts, trying to shove the rather solid unicorn-face away from his head, as it gets close enough to start snuffling his hair.
Hallucination or otherwise, this is going to the top of the list.
[Afternoon. Beach. Teenage virgin versus unicorn. Usual six thread minimum for my sanity, but ST is fine and tags are accepted through Saturday night.]
Except there's a list of things, and not a lot to do on the beach but think them over. Maybe if he hadn't grown up in New Jersey, he'd be one of those outdoorsy assholes who can go to the beach to like, surf, or dig for clams, or collect weird looking pieces of wood, which probably isn't even a real hobby anyway, just something Earl would do. Collect weird looking pieces of wood and then threaten to end Hal's existence if he touched them, for some reason like destroying the integrity of the shape that only made sense to someone who is crazy the way Earl was.
Earl is on the list somewhere, with the rest of his family. It feels weird to miss people, when Hal is pretty sure missing them is like, the first time he's really known how he feels about them at all. It's like having September come around again and realizing he dropped out of high school without meaning to, except nobody here seems really concerned about him completing the tenth grade as long as he can survive like, the apocalypse that Niko is always envisioning. An apocalypse full of dinosaurs and close-range combat, and assassins lurking in bushes, and running.
Today is clearly not the dawn of that apocalypse, though: it's not even the dawn of getting up early and doing homework again. Hal's finished his run or at least as much of his run as he was ever going to do, and, shoes dangling from one hand, head down, he's letting the water sliding over and away from his feet guide him around the edge of the island. A shell makes him pause, something shiny and the color of an oil slick sticking out of the sand that he frowns at and nudges with a toe, hair flopping down over his face. He almost stoops to pick it up, but suddenly the hair on the back of his neck stands up, and he's afraid to look up to find out why it suddenly feels like he's being watched.
Probably because he's being watched; when he lifts his head and looks up through his hair, his gaze travels up a pair of thin white legs, starting from cloven hooves and ending at--
at the tip of a freaking horn. "Er," Hal says, pushing his hair back with his free hand and wondering what the fuck he's supposed to do now, because they definitely didn't have unicorns in New Jersey either. Having it stand there staring at him is bad enough, but then it starts walking over to him and he lets out a pretty ridiculous squawk, shifting a step back. It doesn't seem like it's coming over to gore him, but a minute ago, it didn't seem like unicorns could exist. "Somebody, like. This is a joke, right," he asks, thinking someone must have spiked the brownies again. Or, you know, the fruit salad he actually ate today. He's totally hallucinating again and the unicorn is going to open its mouth and answer his question in pig-latin and tell him the secrets of the universe while he combs its sparkly mane. He'll wake up later dehydrated and stupid and never, ever tell any-- "Hey," he blurts, trying to shove the rather solid unicorn-face away from his head, as it gets close enough to start snuffling his hair.
Hallucination or otherwise, this is going to the top of the list.
[Afternoon. Beach. Teenage virgin versus unicorn. Usual six thread minimum for my sanity, but ST is fine and tags are accepted through Saturday night.]