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Post by tedster on Apr 23, 2012 22:30:33 GMT -5
[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, width: 425px;]All things considered, it should be of no surprise that the mall was one of Teddy's most favorite places in Maple Hollow. Especially when you put money in his hand, because it flew out of his hand almost as quickly, doubly so when the mall was concerned. But he had no solid defense against the glistening, transparent windows of his favorite urbanwear store, or the crazy shapes and colors of his favorite accessories place, and the glitz and glam called to him like moths to flame. It's not like he really needed new clothing -- if anything, people would tell him to stop shopping if they ever saw his closet, but he just wanted to look nice and in style! Was there something so wrong with that? He knew that some of his peers at the Academy wasn't really sure what he was about with all his colors and patterns, his style decidedly more street than uber prep, and he knew people probably made fun of him because of it, but they were all just jealous that they couldn't pull off polka-dotted bowties like he could. Or suspenders, for that matter, but regardless, the secret was that everyone could pull of anything if they were confident enough for it, and confidence was something Teddy had in spades, the mall his ego booster. Sometimes -- just sometimes -- he felt bad for those stuck in their mundane plain polos, the brand's emblem neatly stitched to the left of the heart. Everyone only had one shot at life -- why spend it wearing boring clothing when there was an abundance of unique style around, everywhere?
Of course, there were stores at the mall he never had any reason to step into -- lingerie stores, for example, even if he liked flipping through the catalog -- but honestly, Teddy could spend hours upon hours in the mall, and that was exactly what he was planning to do today, his rare day off, and with Nell. It felt like forever since the two of them had a decent shopping splurge, even though it was more like two weeks in actuality. Two weeks without buying anything except food was a long time, though, especially when the world of fashion was changing practically every single week -- it was hard to keep up with a meager steady income, but he knew he had to make it work. (Tim Gunn would not be impressed if he couldn't, after all.) Other people might not get him, but Nell did, for sure. Currently, they were strolling through the mall, trying to decide on their next destination and Teddy was rather distracted by some of the window displays along the way. They had just come out of a weird hipster shop selling ironic t-shirts and cute owl jewelry when Teddy's eyes locked onto a pair of vibrant purple hi-tops, laced up and haphazard like a display should look, but one glance at the price tag left him reeling right in the heart -- the pair of shoes practically cost his entire paycheck!
'It would be so worth it...' he thought, and it would, but he had already spent some of his paycheck and knew he didn't have enough for them. Oh well. Maybe in two weeks, then, Teddy thought and filed away the memory. "So, Nell my dear, where are we off to next? Is there anything you're looking for in particular?" Teddy asked his friend, sipping from his soft drink in the meantime, acquired from the food court earlier in the day. |
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on Apr 24, 2012 20:07:00 GMT -5
There was nothing more gratifying than a paycheck. Nell didn't want to be rewarded for taking car of the little monsters children (you know the adage, it's a reward in itself), but it felt wonderful getting that check. Even after taxes wreaked havoc on it. Of course, this sort of glee was expected when one grew up in poverty. Her mother hadn't gotten checks, just cash. People did things for her, brought groceries, did laundry. Nell didn't know suburbs with cars in ever driveway, she knew the ghettos, the patches sewn into jean knees, electrical tape fixing any leak, five channels on the TV. Her mother didn't realize it, but Nell also knew the streets, tagged and decaying buildings, shaking hands against chain link fences, cracked tarmac with sprouting weeds. "Paycheck" had been as a word as foreign to her as "matricide". But she had to learn it all eventually.
Another foreign thing for her had been the mall. They didn't have a mall. But now it was her number one destination after a paycheck. Such was the result of living in dire straits--once she got a hold of money, she spent it. And Teddy certainly knew how to spend. She went with him in and out of shops, picking up anything that caught her fancy. Literally anything, ranging from paperweights to shoes to miscellaneous pieces of cloth. "I'll find a use," she would say, and she usually did. She liked creating, maybe it was a part of her Earth nature. She and her kin created, birthed. Nell bit into her soft pretzel when she looked up and saw Teddy eyeing a pair of shoes, swallowing the morsel down before saying, "Go on, vato, they'll look nice on your feet." New zapatos, they were always nice. She wore Converses now, something she defaulted to in the cooling weather, but she didn't have much of a collection. It was almost ironic to think that Josh had a larger collection of clothes than she did.
She pulled her phone out of her back pocket and unlocked it, pulling up her notepad app. "Well, I do need some things for Lucille, but I'd be hard-pressed to find a radiator fan here." She'd told him about the Pontiac GTO she was restoring, her pride and joy. She'd considered getting rid of her PT Cruiser. She tapped her finger against the screen, seeing if there was anything else she made note of to get when she received her paycheck. "Oh, I broke a lamp the other day, so we should probably go to Sears. Can jump on the beds there." And the next one made her sigh. "And a book for English Lit. My shopping list is oh so interesting. What about you?" She wondered if he had anything in mind against her mundane list of chores. With her memory, she didn't need the list, but she liked to be organized.
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Post by tedster on Apr 24, 2012 23:24:49 GMT -5
[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, width: 425px;]The thing was that Teddy actually knew the shoes he eyed would look good, because he was Teddy and he made everything work, somehow or another. So perhaps it was less about 'what am I going to do with a pair of vibrant purple sneakers?' and more about 'can I really afford to blow an entire paycheck on a pair of shoes?' Sadly, the answer was no, as he was all responsible and whatnot now and had to pay for things himself, like his phone and whatever else responsible adults paid for, like car insurance. Thankfully, he still had a year and some odd months left to go living in the dorms before worrying about all that other stuff. But no, once he put the shoes on he knew he would have to buy them, so he just shook his head at Nell's urging and deliberately turned away. He'll be back for them someday. Just not today.
He listened to Nell speak and wave around her soft pretzel -- something about a fan, probably for her car as he was sure they could get the regular kind somewhere around the mall. So that was out. He watched as she pulled out her phone and tapped on the screen, and the first obtainable item on her list was a lamp. He looked at her, slightly confused as to how, exactly, she broke a lamp, but decided not to question it so much. "Okay, so we need to hit up Sears and the bookstore. Sounds solid to me," |
[/color] Teddy replied, sucking down the last of his soda before tossing it into a nearby garbage can. He swung his shopping bag around a little, contents sliding across the plastic. He gave her question some thought -- he didn't really need anything, he didn't think. Oh, or actually, he had been thinking about upgrading to a bigger external hard drive, but he wasn't sure if the mall had anywhere that sold things like that. He began a mental list. "Well, I think I need a new external hard drive since my music collection is blowing up. And I'm pretty much out of quality photo paper for my classes -- do you think the craft store would have it? Oh, and socks. I keep losing mine."[/color] He would have lifted his jeans to make a point of his mismatching socks, but he always wore mismatching socks so it was no big deal. But he had lost so many socks by now that he was practically matching his pairs of mismatched socks and that just wasn't right, not at all. "Well, why don't we start with Sears and then work our way back? I think the bookstore's on the way, and I'm sure I can find socks at Sears,"[/color] Teddy suggested, gesturing to the familiar blue-and-white logo, not far from where they were standing.[/div][/center][/td][/tr][/table][/center] |
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on Apr 25, 2012 19:50:58 GMT -5
Nell wasn't going to push the shoes on Teddy, especially when she caught sight of the price tag as well. She couldn't help the low whistle. She didn't think she even had that much money. She never really did have vast amounts, ironic considering where she lived. Coulda done better than me, she thought about Josh, and there was some truth even though it was an ironic pondering. Nell nodded. "Good to get some priorities done, huh?" Not like she didn't have enough bags on her arm, weighed down with some pointless purchases. Not in her eyes, she didn't buy anything pointless. But for others, they may have seemed rather unnecessary. One man's trash is another man's treasure, she supposed.
Teddy didn't need his phone to think of his necessities, and she snorted. "Dayum, guy, how much music do you listen to?" she said, mostly joking. She actually didn't have a vast amount on her iPhone, considering she had a lot of vinyls. Though scrolling through it, there was a heavy amount of opera and classical. "And I'm pretty sure they would, unless it's one of the express stores." The smaller ones in the mall sometimes didn't have everything that the real stores would have. "And socks. I'm not sure I want to ask how you lose those." She often got holes in hers, but losing them? She couldn't judge, really, how much she lost keys. And herself in the mansion.
Nell nodded, finishing off her pretzel and throwing the wrapper away, bags swaying from her arms. The book store was a place she had to be careful in, like...well, all stores. Temptation was far too much, and she already had a stack of books on her waiting list for pleasure, Ayn Rand and David Mccullough. But she was focused on another book, and she could have asked for help, but of course she didn't. She went her own way, considered it a journey. It was one about ancient Greek philosophy, and so it took a little bit of hunting. "Wanna get the Karma Sutra, look up some things?" she teased, waggling her eyebrows when they passed by it. The book was fun to skim through while giggling immaturely. "Anything you wanna get here, though?" she asked as she found the non-fiction section, hoping it was there. She didn't know how big a reader Teddy was, but she figured everyone liked books.
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Post by tedster on Apr 28, 2012 16:18:02 GMT -5
| [atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, width: 425px;] "It's not like...an exorbitant amount. Besides, I also shove other things on there, too, like everything I need for Photoshop, my pictures, anime, illegally pirated movies and TV shows of choice, porn," |
[/color] Teddy joked. Well, at least he was joking about the last one. It was pretty stupid to keep an actual copy of porn on a computer. Everything else was true, though, and he stopped to think about his life and his choices. He figured that one day, he would make enough money to support himself and one of those fancy online streaming memberships where you can watch everything you want for one price and not worry about going to jail for it, but that was hardly in the gameplan for now. It's not his fault that 500 GB wasn't all that much if you stopped and really considered it. Especially when some things you had to keep or else you could never find another download link for it ever again. So, all things considered, he really did need another external hard drive. And the bigger, the better! "Dude, I don't know, they just disappear on me. They probably fall out of my laundry basket while I'm lugging everything back to the dorm, or maybe the dryer eats them, or they've disappeared under my bed."[/color] Teddy sulked, following Nell towards and into the bookstore. Truth be told, he wasn't really an avid reader, and what he did read tended to veer on the 'young adult/teen wangst' category, like The Hunger Games or its comparable counterpart, Battle Royale. Of course, he liked the classics -- Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and he was currently starting the His Dark Materials trilogy, even if it was slow-going. Too much other crap to do. But, Teddy thought they passed the Kama Sutra, there were books about everything -- he probably just hasn't found the right genre for him yet. "Oh, yeah. I should study up, I've got a veritable harem to please when I get back,"[/color] Teddy deadpanned, wandering the aisles after her, emerging in the non-fiction section. Besides being no where true, having a kind of, sort of, weird-in-a-convoluted-way girlfriend (and he stresses the kind of) and not having the attention span to properly maintain a personal harem, Teddy would die of embarrassment even trying to round girls up for one. It would be one giant load of futility. "I think I'm okay -- I've still got a few books left on my reading list. What are you looking for again?"[/color] Teddy asked, pausing to take a look at the bookshelves and their offerings, running his fingers over the pristine, unbent spines.[/div][/td][/tr][/table][/center] |
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on Apr 29, 2012 11:54:03 GMT -5
Nell lifted her head up and nodded. That actually did make a lot of sense, but still, damn. Teddy should be proud. "Right," she said. Then she appeared to think for a moment or two before saying, "So you're a pirate? Sorry homie, but I'm gonna have to turn you in to the fuzz." Never mind the porn, that was completely legal. But then she'd have to think of what she had on her iPhone, and unfortunately she didn't have a lot of money to spare for things that weren't necessities. Fixing up a car took a lot of money, which she oh so recently discovered, and she provided for herself. Sure, she had a rich fiance, but his money was not hers and she didn't want it to be hers. She'd always had this sort of thing with money, the need to provide for herself. For her, it represented having something more than she started with. Rags to riches, that was her story.
She held up a hand to Teddy when he explained his socks to her. "Or, or, hear me out...you have a little troll following you around and stealing them. A sock troll. Call in the Ghostbusters!" If they handled that sort of case, which she doubt they did. Trolls weren't really ghosts, so unfortunately Teddy was SOL on that front. She laughed at his words. "Better not disappoint them." Luckily for Nell, her naivete didn't stretch as far as to not know what a harem was. Thank you, literature. It really helped her case that she had spent most of her time in a library since she was little. She bent down a little as she looked at the shelves. "Uh...some ancient Greek philosophy...junk," she murmured before going, "Aha!" She pulled out the book and made sure it was the one her professor told her to get.
Before paying for that book, however, she had to get a few more, one on Kandinsky she spotted, another children's book she thought the kids might like, and went on her merry way to paying then. It was amazing how much money one could kill with just books, actually, she didn't expect to pay over thirty bucks. A little bit of buyer's remorse, but she knew that literature was always useful. "Now to the wonderful world of Sears," she said, spreading her arms as if it was a vast wonderful land that they were journeying to. It wasn't too far from the bookstore, and when they entered the department she asked Teddy, "Do you know where the socks are?" she questioned him. "...And the lamps, actually?" She was never good with finding her way.
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Post by tedster on May 15, 2012 18:45:07 GMT -5
[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, width: 425px;]As Nell pranced around the aisles of the bookstore, Teddy ambled after her, stopping every so often to pick up books that caught his eye, just based on the cover. Never judge a book by its cover and all that. As he read the back of one of the books -- 50 Shades of Night or whatever -- he felt his side-eye growing the more he read the synopsis, until he couldn't even help but put it down and laugh. And it was a bestseller? Laughable. Now, Teddy wasn't really some great purveyor of classic literature, but he was definitely more advanced than some lady's fantasy involving bondage and sex slaves. The women of the world seemed to be getting a little desperate in their journey for worthwhile literature to read. It sounded even worse than Twilight, and damn was that saying something. "Or maybe it's an army of free house elves, stealing my socks to give them to other house elves that are still captive!" |
[/color] Teddy replied to Nell as she began on her troll theory. Trolls were creepy, unless they were the kind that you could put on top of your pencil. House elves, though, house elves were cool. Plus, it made him feel better to think that his socks were going to a worthy cause, rather than being a harmless hostage in this troll's vendetta against him. What did he ever do to deserve it, anyway? At the thought of a harem, though, Teddy smiled a little wistfully to himself, at the memories of an individually formed fan club for him back in high school. He was honored, really, even though it had only consisted of three girls that had crushes on him throughout their careers at the Academy, and how every week he would go on a "date" with one of them and rotate accordingly. It wasn't really a harem, he supposed. Just an extended dating circle. Since college, though, he hadn't seen any of them, and suddenly he wondered how they were doing. (See? Totally not fit to have a harem. Last he checked, people with harems didn't actively consider them to be equals.) Leaving the bookstore dissolved the past memories from his mind, however, as they tromped towards the ever so lovely Sears. Teddy looked around, hoping to find either the home furnishing section or the men's department, and his eyes first landed on a shelf full of throw pillows -- lamps had to be that way, right? "I'm going to assume that the lamps are over there, where the throw pillows are? I mean...they're all home furnishings."[/color] Teddy began to walk over that way, keeping his eyes out for stray stands of socks lying around -- Sears never had any sense of coherency in where they placed things, after all. It wouldn't surprise him if there was a bin of socks somewhere random. [/div][/center][/td][/tr][/table][/center] |
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 16, 2012 15:01:51 GMT -5
Nell turned to her friend and thumped him in the arm. She'd read the Harry Potter series, so she knew exactly what she was talking about. A part of her was glad that she wasn't so ignorant to the world anymore, that she could get references like that. Of course, there were still things she didn't have a clue of, but she'd get there. She was just working at it. "Ohmygod, that's it." She could believe it, yeah. She still had some childish ideals in the way she didn't let go, but in the way she didn't know the truth behind certain things. It certainly allowed some freedom, and who says she couldn't believe in anything just because there was lack of evidence? She was not very religious, but she liked to believe in possibility. Perhaps it was the result of being her father's daughter. Scientists believed in a lot of things. "Seems good," she chimed, looking around the department store. So much stuff in such a small space, it was another thing that astounded her even nowadays when she'd been going to malls for a while now. She enjoyed seeing all these items--she was used to having nothing, to seeing nothing.
However, she was soon sidetracked by the beds situated next to all the drapes. She looked around evilly, before kicking off her shoes and hopping on one. She had never been able to jump around on her bed much as a child, she usually did it to annoy Tilly because the girl had the funniest reactions. Well, when she didn't kick Nell off the bed or anything like that. Nell tried not to think of her too much lest the sadness take over. She was getting much better, she had the tattoo to prove it, but she didn't like to think too much about the bad things. "Yes, it's real!" Sometimes the display beds were just wood underneath, usually when they were selling the set of sheets. "Let's have a pillow fight," Nell said, jumping up and down between the words. She dropped onto her butt to grab a pillow and grinned at Teddy. "Of course, that is, if you're not a scaredy cat," she sing-songed as she wielded the pillow, throwing it behind her back and over her head like a basketball. A pillow fight in Sears might not have been the best idea, but she liked the sound of it. Sales associates aside, of course.
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