-- SLOWLY SPIN BENEATH THE DAY && [samson]

Samson looked at his phone, and rolled his eyes. Beatrice was calling. It was clear that she simply wanted to talk at him and so a response wouldn’t matter, otherwise she’d have texted. Otherwise she was in a dickish mood. He hit answer and she was immediately off. ”Water everywhere, stupid infernal pipe, I cannot believe that they won’t come out until Monday. What else are they doing, it’s their job to fix pipes? Is there some kind of pipe emergency in the Vatican that needs attending to? I mean really?” The boy waited to hear exactly why this involved him, but she seemed very intent on her tirade at the moment, and there was nothing he could do save for sit on the bed in his dorm, turning around the Hummel figure that the woman who was now ranting in his ear had gotten him for Christmas. He didn’t like Hummels, they were tacky and kind of scary, but she seemed to think that his love for antiques and other interesting knick knacks to include the tiny figurines. He didn’t tell her that such was not the case. ”…And I sprinkled some Jasmine over the water.” At this point, it would have been nice to interrupt Beatrice and ask what the hell she thought sprinkling flowers over the water would accomplish, but he did not have this capability. That was how she usually trapped him—there was no way too possibly respond short of hanging up on her.

”I mean, I’m a Water elemental, but this is too much. We have expensive things, here, don’t they know! Never in all my years of owning this place have I ever encountered this problem, and now… Has someone give you the malocchio recently?” She paused as if waiting for an answer, and Samson rolled his eyes as he ran a hand through his hair. Like the audio version of Dora, he thought, by now growing exasperated with the lack of explanation as to why she needed to call him at school for this. He liked boarding, because that meant getting sleep and escaping the woman’s antics and séances. He loved her, but she could be unbearable. Most of the time…all the time. ”Anyway, I need you to help me clean up when you get home, everything is just a mess.” He hung up after that, wishing he’d had kept track of time to see how long the conversation had been. Ninety percent rant, ten percent actual substance—that was Beatrice’s method. He laid back down on his bed, one foot hanging off the edge as he placed the figure on his stomach. There was always the urge to take a nap after speaking to Beatrice.

Instead of falling asleep, he decided he might as well find something to hold his interest, lest he be forced to head home and face a flooded shop. His shirt wasn’t too wrinkled, but he always seemed to have the presence of being disheveled. It was the hair. Samson never had a desire to get a buzz cut as Beatrice always suggested, and couldn’t even be bother with such a thing. Walking out into the common room, he scratched his stomach under his shirt and looked around. He saw Rowena Bennett…doing something. Sewing? He didn’t know the girl too well and therefore didn’t know anything about her hobbies, but he figured that he might as well get a little more acquainted. He might not give the impression of being a very friendly guy, but he did put effort into conversation when need be. Samson snapped his fingers to get her attention, something that would normally be considered room. He waved and then pointed to what she was doing, an inquisitive look on his face as he sat down on one of the chairs, posture relaxed.

His lips twitched into a could-be smile when Rowena greeted him. A long time ago, there were times when he would be envious when someone could reply to his silent greetings so easily, but that was only immediately after he’d been taken from his home and his old life and was forced to adjust to both the change in environment and the changes in himself. He wouldn’t lie and say that it was easy coming to terms with the fact that he’d lost both his parents and the ability to speak—all wounds took time to heal. However, he didn’t feel any jealousy toward others who could speak, not a trace of bitterness for the fact that most took it for granted. If he spent his entire life about being bitter over things that couldn’t be changed, random acts of God, then he’d be a rather pathetic guy. Sam took the book from the girl and looked at it. Noticing that she had gone back to working on this dress of hers, he decided he’d not try for conversation and merely just scanned the pages of the book. Of course, he never had an interest in fashion. Beatrice enjoyed her own idea of fashion, and he had a locked chest full of capes and pantaloons and outfits that he never wanted to be dressed up in again. He stuck to jeans and any form of shirt that didn’t have ruffles, even though the woman was sorely disappointed in the fact that he didn’t even dress up for Halloween anymore. Apparently he was boring. Samson was fine with that.

She spoke again, and he closed the book, shaking his head at the question. Knowing that he couldn’t very well respond easily to her through body language—and he was nice enough that he wouldn’t do that to someone who was not a bother to him—he pulled out his phone and texted away. Over the years, he’d become dexterous enough that it didn’t take very long for him to spit out a decent sized text. ”Can I model it when you’re done?” he asked, his face completely straight. Due to the absurdity of the statement, humor was apparent, even though it didn’t carry through on his usually indifferent features. He deleted those words and filled in the blank space once again. ”How long have you been doing it?” Rowena seemed to be interested in it, so he figured that she would like to talk about something like that. Even though he wasn’t a very talkative person, he would be fine with filling someone in about his interests and hobbies. He had the capacity to be a nice guy, especially when it wouldn’t benefit him to be a dick. That was especially true with the ladies. He supposed it was because both his mother and Beatrice had drilled it into him that women should be treated right. Of course, he showed his respect through merciless teasing.

When the blond asked what he’d been doing, he sighed, scratched the back of his head. God, he did not want to go home and deal with a furious Beatrice. Not only would he be stuck doing most of the work—he was the slave boy, it was a job requirement—but he’d have to listen to her flip her shit. ”Pipes burst at home. Place flooded. Biding time before I have to clean it up.” Even though he was pretty quick with the typing, he also took to subtracting words that he didn’t feel necessary from the sentences he typed out. As long as he got his point across, he was fine. Ironically, he didn’t usually use chat speak or any acronyms—it wasn’t in his interests to butcher the English language. ”I’d rather be here than waist-deep in water with my mother screaming at me.” Beatrice wasn’t really his mother but Ro didn’t know who she was, and ‘adoptive mother’ sounded weird. He never took to calling her ‘mom’ so it was just Beatrice or Bea all the time. It wasn’t because he didn’t think of her like a mother—it was because somehow it would feel like replacing his real mother, and that had been weird for him. He’d been calling her Beatrice for so long, it would be weird to consider calling her anything else. After clearing the screen again, he typed, ”Dress not keeping you entertained?” It showed something that he was bothering to make conversation—it showed that he actually liked Rowena enough to bother.

Even though it was strange for someone like him, he did enjoy making people laugh. He didn’t know why. He just liked watching people’s reactions in general. A lot of his time was spent observing and not interacting. It was easier than trying to get along with people all the time. He was sure his Thunder comrades could relate. ”It’s a good thing for future careers. Fashion people make a lot of money.” ‘Fashion people’ was the term he used because he was ignorant of any industry lingo. Not like he planned on being a designer or anything, after all, and he’d never taken much of an interest in it. Not because of the fact that he was a boy and clothes were for girls and ewww, cooties—it was because he just never had true exposure to it, even if he may have been interested. He was interested in many things, honestly, so saying anything else would be untrue. The idea of a busted piper didn’t seem to please Ro, and his lips flicked upward into a ghost of a smile. He knew of her sister, but made no comment about it. ”Sometimes I wish I could switch places with my mother. Don’t know what she’d do if she couldn’t talk. Probably write in all caps.” It was a testament to how far he’d come to terms with his disability that he could joke about it like that. Some people were made uncomfortable by it, but he didn’t see Rowena as the type. If he was fine with it, he didn’t know why others couldn’t be. It’s not like he mourned the loss of his means of communication every day, even though there were sometimes he wished he could have a voice and give his thumbs a break.

When she asked if he had any Water friends, he nodded slightly. ”Mom is one. I don’t know what she plans to do other than have a conniption.” He didn’t mean to say that the woman was incompetent, just that she was more focused on her rage at the moment and she tended to enjoy overreacting. In his head, he made a joke about women, but didn’t think it would be wise to share with the Thunder girl. He as polite and mannerly—that was Beatrice’s fault. See, not completely incompetent. She’d had a handful in dealing with him, when one considered that he was orphaned and muted at a young age, but she’d done well. Samson hadn’t been a wild child or anything, but he could only guess what his teachers told the woman at meetings. That he kept to himself, didn’t give much of an effort to get along with his peers, didn’t participate in class. Of course, Beatrice took that in stride, and he could imagine she may have gotten angry with the teachers for claims like that, maybe told them off. They knew about his condition and his situation, and those teachers most likely thought that it was a challenge that could easily be conquered. Other than those concerns, he’d been a good kid, and so Beatrice didn’t see any reason to scold or lecture him on that manner. He bet she knew he’d heal all on his own, and he did. However, it wasn’t all on his own. If he didn’t have Beatrice, if he’d been put in a home, that healing may have never happened. ”Don’t know exactly what happened,” he texted, continued, ”Apparently no one’s coming out soon.” He could definitely understand the woman’s rage about that, and thought back to her comment on the Vatican and smirked.

Of course, Samson was exaggerating about the depth of the water. Actually, he didn’t know. He didn’t think that Beatrice had mentioned just how flooded the place was, or maybe he just zoned out at that part. It was clear that the Water elemental hadn’t been enjoying it however, and that actually amused her quite a bit. ”Thanks. I hope you can dance or something. Maybe juggle?” Even though he was kidding, it would be good entertainment. But the dress thing and the fact that she was a designer of sorts was actually pretty interesting to him. That’s how it was with anyone who had a talent—being in their presence made you feel special by association. He didn’t have any real talents, after all. He wasn’t exceptional at sports, he was good academically, but there wasn’t really anything else he was good at that would make people want to talk to him. Some seemed to be drawn to the fact that he was mute, but that wasn’t a talent. ”Jeez, that doesn’t sound fun,” he wrote out, squinting his eyes as he looked at her fingers. ”You sound more like a sweatshop worker than a designer.” If it caused pain like that, he’d probably give it up, but he understood that it was a passion for the girl. You just didn’t give up your passion. As for him? ”Texting.” He smirked before clearing the screen and taking her seriously. ”Collecting antiques. I know, I’m hella interesting, please, no questions.” He always felt like a freak when he admitted to his little hobby, but then again, he worked in an occult shop—nothing was weird for him anymore. ”Working, too. It’s nice.”

Samson didn’t put too much thought toward his future. He wasn’t too concerned about it, and his outlook on everything was to just go with the flow. After all, he didn’t have anything to worry about right now. He was working with Beatrice, and their business was doing well enough that they could avoid poverty. He knew he was going to college, because he was aiming to be as skilled as possible when it came to his element. As for the details—well, he’d work that out when the time came. He just knew that he was going to keep working at the shop in all likelihood, and hopefully Harley would still be around in the years to come. He never really had a girlfriend who he thought about the future with, but Harley was the girl he’d been with the longest, it was only natural to factor her into his life to come. All he knew was that he was only seventeen and there was time to come. ”Judging by your sketches and everything, I’d say yes. It’s also about the people you know. Got any connections?” It was almost always about the people you know when it came to the work force. Connections helped even more than experience, which was the sad case when someone more qualified for something is skipped over for someone who simply knows more people. Nepotism may be illegal, but it still exists, and it may not even be family. Just people who know everyone.

He raised his eyebrows and nodded to show that’s exactly what he meant by typing in all caps. She wasn’t an angry person by default, simply easily excited. By everything. He didn’t even know if it would be a good thing for her to lose her voice. That was really her means of communication, he didn’t think she’d be able to handle it. He was able to adjust more easily than an adult probably would, because he was so young. For someone who’d spent thirty years communicating with the world through one mean, it’s understandable that it might not be as easy to adjust. It almost sounded like she had a bone to pick with repairmen. Sam didn’t mind quite as much as Beatrice. Of course, he was always chill with anything that happened. There was rarely a time when he actually got angry. Such a thing was rare. Even when he did get angry, it didn’t show anyway. ”Well at least we know what plumbers are doing. Eating shrooms and defeating evil, giant turtles.” For him, it was weird to consider the fact that Mario was a plumber, when you consider the one thing he doesn’t do is fix pipes. He goes down them into other worlds, but he doesn’t actually work on them. Or maybe he does, and the games are just an Italian plumbers acid trip. Or maybe he’s just thinking too much into a simple joke. Either way, repairs weren’t happening soon and he wondered what Beatrice would be doing when he decided to go home.

He nodded at her response. Samson wasn’t about to put her to work dancing, and so the words didn’t really mean much to him. Not that he was a dick and didn’t care, just that it was some information not really necessary to him. He wasn’t very talkative, and even though he was open to sharing things about himself, he didn’t see the point of really telling others certain things. Which is why he didn’t really know how to talk about his thing with antiques. It wasn’t something interesting to others, at least he didn’t think so, and so he didn’t understand why Rowena would even care. He nodded again when she asked after it being old furniture and the like, and then shrugged when she asked. Deciding that he thought of a reasonable enough explanation, he texted, ”I don’t even really know. I was just raised by people who liked strange things.” His parents had some odd interests that would seem like stupidity to others, and Beatrice…well, Beatrice liked a lot of strange things. He couldn’t really explain why he liked why he liked. He was sure that when asked, people who collected stamps wouldn’t be able to explain. Or maybe he thought that because he saw that as weird. ”I work at an occult shop that my mother owns. It’s where we live, actually. I’m mainly the errand boy.” Beatrice was fond of calling him her slave, but he was treated much better than that.

It was very hard to miss that Rowena was from Britain—well, as long as you heard her speak. Blond hair and blue eyes wasn’t truly identifiable as British, but her accent was. Of course, he didn’t know of her life back wherever she came from. Didn’t even know what part of Great Britain she was from. He wasn’t familiar with different dialects and the such, so he couldn’t tell off the bat. So it was understandable that she wouldn’t know anyone here in Canada. He tried to remember when the twins first transferred, and her was pretty sure he had a close date, even though he couldn’t pinpoint it. It was a little hard to forget. ”Maybe you should make some.” It was a suggestion, a simple line against the white screen, but he was sure she probably would have thought of this. That is, if she was seriously considering going back into modeling. He didn’t know, he couldn’t get inside her head. But her interest was obvious, even though he wasn’t aware of it before today. There was never the chance. He shrugged, his easy posture suggesting his humor when his face couldn’t. ”Apparently they’re making a lot of money. Gold coins. And hey, good health care too.” If only one-ups existed in the real world, where there were know giant, plumber-eating turtles and creepy…ghost things.

It didn’t surprise him too much that Rowena didn’t know about the shop or where it was. Most people assumed it was in Chinatown, since that’s where most would find strange little shops like Beatrice’s. But who knew, maybe Ro had an interest in the occult and just hadn’t stumbled across the squat little building that was actually much bigger on the inside. There actually was a Chinese restaurant nearby, which he included when he texted out his answer. ”It’s downtown, near a Chinese place and a hair salon.” A hair salon that he believed was a front for drug deals, but he didn’t add that in. He just liked to amuse himself by creating lives for people that lived around him, especially when he was bored. It actually happened a lot. Maybe he needed to get more hobbies. Like fashion. No, he’d never be good with fashion, according to Beatrice. ”My mom would like me to bring in business by telling you about everything we sell, but I like to rebel against my status as a walking billboard.” He tried it once or twice, then he felt kind of like a loon, and people really didn’t enjoy it. Beatrice had ads in the paper and on the Internet and in a lot of spaces she could get her hands on. It cost money, but she managed it well.

Samson did his usual ‘play with the phone until its needed because it’s a hassle to keep taking it out of my pocket otherwise’ game, but his attention was still on Rowena. He sometimes entertained thoughts of a machine that could communicate what he was thinking to other people, and then thought of how he wouldn’t like some of his thoughts to be out there for everyone to hear. He enjoyed privacy. ”Just got back with my girlfriend, trying to keep away from my psycho ex. You know, the usual.” He rolled his eyes to show that he was exasperated by this and didn’t enjoy being embroiled in such lady problems. He wasn’t one of the douchebags who bragged about it, and complained about his psycho exes, because Jolene literally was psycho. She had issues, so he wasn’t going to go too hard into the bashing. Still, he couldn’t help the bitterness he felt toward the girl who’d damaged his relationship so bad and for so long. He didn’t pass all the blame onto her, he was well aware of the shit he’d done, but she played a big part. She was the instigator. ”How about you?” It seemed he learned something new every day, which included her passion for fashion—oh dear, that sounded bad in his head so he didn’t dare text it out—and he wondered what else was going on there. His lips shaped into an almost-smile as he continued to type. ”That’s because I’ve purposely been avoiding contact with you. I ruined that for myself, it seems.”