Through the looking glass - Anna / Ryan

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

When Anna got a text on her mobile from Charlie saying, What r we doing for dinner tonite? and Anna just found herself a couple of doors from a butcher between their house and uni, she quickly texted back, I'll take care of it and put her phone away in her bag.

The last thing she expected to see was Ryan walking out of the same butcher, but it was a nice surprise to have.

"Didn't expect to see you here," she said with a smile for him.

Comments

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

Ryan was busily putting his change in his pocket, and juggling the bag-o-stuff he'd just bought with his other hand. When he heard, then caught sight of Anna, he was just a little bit off balanced.

"Hi... Anna," he said, returning her smile with a slightly flatter one of his own.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

She stepped forward, thinking to help him. "Do you need a hand with that?" she asked.

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

"No, that's really okay." He was also equally frazzled by the 'conversation' that had just taken place between himself and Idris. Coming out of that, having his vampire side pointed out to him in a place that could have just as easily been overheard by other students had filled him with such a combination of dread and anger that Ryan had just needed something to distract him.

Remembering that he was low on blood at home had possibly not been the best thing to remember right then.

He figured, however, that he was doing a good job of keeping his cool in front of Anna, at least until she reached out to help him and his responding recoil caused him to jolt the bag.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

One minute, she had been looking at him in surprise, and the next, she was staring in shock at the packets of blood that overflowed from his bag, onto the pavement between them. She blinked, thinking surely that she had been wrong in interpreting what she saw. When those same blood packets remained, Anna paused, not really wanting to offer to help him pick them up to return them into his bag.

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

Ryan stared as well. He met her look of shock with his own look of horror. His mouth opened and shut and he couldn't force himself to think any single rational thought, even though his mind all but screamed out speak, you idiot, speak!

"Uh, don't worry about that. It's just for a project," he said. And then immediately mentally kicked himself for worst excuse ever.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

"A project?" Anna laughed, only a little nervously. "Wow, second year must have a lot of interesting subjects that first year doesn't."

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

"Something like." Ryan liked that she laughed, albeit nervously, rather than questioning him outright on his excuse. He breathed out, trying to speed along his steadying of himself. The damned blood packets were still between them on the pavement.

Inwardly groaning that he had to draw yet more attention to them, Ryan bent down to take up the few packets that had fallen. It was alright to store multiple packets of blood at the fridge at home, in the vegetable compartment of the fridge that never, ever got used. It was quite another thing to drop them in the middle of the street.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

Quite able to see that Ryan was more than embarrassed by this little incident, Anna tried to stop making a big deal of it. There were lots of reasons why Ryan could have such a lot of blood, none the least for the very reason he'd given.

As various people stared at the two of them as they walked past, Anna stared back at them, shaming them into looking away again, until Ryan stood up. She watched as he held the top of the bag together in his hand.

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

Ryan noticed the last couple of people that Anna stared at, forcing them with little more than the power of her own will to look away. He smiled at her, now retreating only to mildly embarrassed with his blood again hidden. "Thank you," he said warmly.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

"What for?" she asked, still doing her best to put him at ease. She shrugged. "It wasn't any of their business anyway."

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

"Still." Ryan opened his mouth, about to say more, then thought better of it. Better that he just make his retreat now while he was on a plateau, before he endangered himself of falling further behind again. "I'll see you around," he said.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

"I should hope so," Anna replied, with admonition in her tone for should he decide that it was too weird to see her again. Not that there was anything to be weird about. Especially since that blood was just there for some sort of a project he was working on. "Maybe see you at Chances Are..."

[shadows-sun.livejournal.com]

"Probably," Ryan said, as though just remembering himself that this shouldn't be any big deal.

[thinknotofit.livejournal.com]

He gave her a smile then, a real smile, one that made Anna almost forget about the whole blood situation.

Later, after he'd gone, and after she'd picked up her own purchase from the butcher, Anna texted Charlie on her way home. You won't believe what just happened at the butchers