1.39 Dreamscape

Jet prepares to think about doing his homework in his own special way.

“Mom's going to be pissed at you!” Jyo calls on the way over to knock out hers.

He conveniently doesn't hear her.

Looks like dad's got this one-

Nevermind, he's feeding the koi. He really doesn't like discipline. No wonder Meghan goes so overboard when she catches the bad behavior. It's her v. world in this household.

Harmonious.

Summer has been awesome so far. Relaxing, peaceful, and Jyoti has a 'sort of' boyfriend. As in, they agreed to try dating and have only managed a few friendly text messages. But the tone is nice, and she gets the feeling that he chooses what to say carefully, which is kind of refreshing considering that most of her friends are rowdy and boisterous, and don't care at all about how the things they say effect the people around them.

Makin' the most out of it.

Oh yeah and the game lost Dustin's car. He's been driving it more in the nice weather, and for some reason it ended up getting cleaned up by the Master Controller mod at 3 am or something?

So I plunk down another junker and play three days with aging off and no skill building for him to refinish it. (It happens three more times in the future, too). Not sure why. Eventually he's not allowed to drive it anymore. :/

I hope nothing bad happens to you again baby!

Jet and Christian celebrate a no-homework date on the weekend. He thinks they should find an overpass and make the world a nicer place to look at. She will bring the soda pop. And throw away cups that they can litter all over the place to let them look even more like the popular careless teen image neither of them really project.

Jet's always home on time in the evenings to write or draw, he prefers to do his hood rat shit during broad daylight. Typical rich kid denial syndrome.

Jyoti spends the afternoon out of the house, and not being athletic. She's been out shopping but can't find a dress or anything to wear for the upcoming fall dance. Maybe the consignment shop? She's kind of feeling girlish at heart, and doesn't want to admit that she wants to find something to match her eyes. Something that even shy Malcolm will notice.

...that's the kind of thing people do for their boyfriends, right?

Instead of a new-gently-used dress however, she finds a free sketch (thank you very much I love this one),

...and one confident-as-usual cousin Everet.

She chooses to ignore him at first. The consignment shop is a part of his area of influence in local business, because of course it is. All kinds of things are bought and sold here without ever being officially recorded by the owner and staff. Even the grabby machine is rumored to have unsavory items in it, when one knows how to play the right way, and which items are loaded.

Jyo is interested in playing the normal way, for dumb kiddie toys.

Everet is over at the front hitting bullseyes. Ugh. She doesn't even feel bad that she's watching to see how many he misses so she can cherish each one.

“I'm not going to mess up just because you're looking over my shoulder.” He says, reading her mind.

“I can hope.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “Not everything is a competition.”

“True,” she agrees.

Odd, she's being agreeable today. “What's wrong?” He asks her.

“Nothing.” She replies quickly.

“You sure about that?”

“Yup.”

He counts to something like fifteen in his head.

“Well, since you're here...”

“Yeah?”

“Well you're always dating different people...”

He stops for a moment. “Yeah?”

“What is the reason for that? I mean, what are you looking for in a girl?”

“That's a loaded question.”

She grabs a dart, steps up to the line, and throws- well- not a bullseye. “Humor me.” She says.

Christian and Jet's date heats up ...because they're playing hopscotch in the late afternoon in longsleeves.

Here we see Jet being a bad sport.

She cheers for him though.

“Why should I humor you?”

“Because some people scroll on their phones and we can't talk about this all day. It'll fall off the page.”

“Oh, right.” He steps away from the board again with another high score.

“Girls... are like motorcycles.”

She smacks him on the arm before he can say anything else.

“Don't hit me! You asked, so you should listen.”

She rolls her eyes dramatically and sighs.

“Thank you,” he continues, “Girls are pretty but expensive to maintain. Some are flashy and exciting, some are stronger than they look, some are nice to brag about but not that fun to be with. It's fun while it lasts, and I just want the thrill of having a new girl to be with every so often, but the thrill dies down and they get comfortable and before you know it there's nothing new to discover about them, or myself.”

“You'll find someone you want to stay with one day.”

“I doubt it, I don't really want to be with anyone long term. Also, take this advice from me. Never ask someone like me for relationship advice.”

“If it's all boring in the end, why go through it over and over again?”

He shrugs. “It fills a void I guess. It also makes my work a lot easier if I don't have a visible weakness. A close relationship would be that.”

She's too nice to tell him how sad he sounds. Instead she asks, “Are you happy, right now?”

“Sure. Why wouldn't I be?”

She shrugs. “I don't know you sound kind of over it.”

“Well why did you ask about this?”

“I don't know Ev, you were here. I was out looking for a homecoming dress and I can't find anything that makes me feel...” she can't bring herself to say the word pretty.

“The right thing to say here is that you'll look great in anything.”

She raises an eyebrow.

“I just told you never to take my advice about this stuff. Do you have a date for it?”

She nods.

“Do you care about this guy?”

“Sure. I don't know. We haven't really gone out yet.”

“Then choose something that makes you feel good to wear- if you're happy and feel you look nice, it'll come out in your actions. Think about what you like first, that way he can see your personality out of it instead of what you want him to think you are like.”

“That's... surprisingly good advice.”

“I know, right?”

I find her boyfriend across town out with his mom; Danielle Luck, and Zombie Robbie Platt who happens to be living in their house just to annoy me with his hideousness.

No idea why, but they've been standing awkwardly at the fair like this since noon. I thought there would be some value in recording this for story purposes, but no, I've got nothing, and this is all just useless.

Jet and Christian have been outside for hours just hanging out, and playfulness has turned softer, more serious. Christian is petite and cute and precious and fun to be around. He finds himself without pride or pretense when she's in his arms and doesn't want the night to end after such a great day with her. "I wish we had nowhere to go, so that we could go anywhere together."

She blushes. “That sounds romantic. You writing that into a story?”

“I will if you want me to.”

He does his best to show her how he feels from here on out. She's a harsh critic in their circle of friends, and comes to quick conclusions about people depending on how they dress, what they say or what she thinks their families are like. With Jet... that all kind of melts away and he can sense keenly the real person behind the mask of caring about what's socially acceptable. They are beginning to blend together, more and more each day, like a ven diagram made of only two circles inching closer together until no one is wiser that they were ever separate. 

Fresh off a great pep talk with her cousin to follow her heart, Jyo decides to see what's going on at the fair (because it's nearly impossible to get Malcolm to be available to hang out ever as he must have fifteen part time jobs, which actually fits the 'poor kid in a rich neighborhood' scenario I've written him into perfectly, but is also perfectly annoying as it leaves Jyo alone a LOT).

She does this idle when she gets there, but there is no moodlet associated which is confusing.

She lights a firework because she has to, it's in her path and that's the rule...

Before I invite everyone on the lot to a hotdog eating contest. To make sure they weren't all stuck, really.

Really great chemistry here.

Hi, Robbie Zombie. Did my game do this to him on purpose?

They are joined by Noemi (the future Mrs Kevin Shift, actually), whose face you cannot see and is absolutely non-impressive and so does not matter.

Jyo walks right up to Malcolm after he wins (which also fits the I-have-a-million-part-time-jobs-and-am-still-starving role he also is boxed in to here).

"Where have you been lately?" She asks.

"Uh- I work a lot, but today- hanging out at the fair with my family. We've been here most of the day. I was kind of hoping to see you here actually, since you like being outside so much."

"You could have called me, I was just out shopping." She will not admit at all that she was hoping to find something he might like to see her in, should he ask her to the fall dance. Last year's prom was such a disappointment that she's really hoping the next school-sponsored event will be better.

"Uh- yeah. I think I will next time, thanks."

Wait, had he been waiting for permission to call her? She's too extroverted for that to make any sense at all.

He tries, he really tries to talk to her now, bless his simulated heart...

But he has to excuse himself to get sick instead. I'll have to check his personality to see if he's unlucky. I feel like he really may be.

Jyo gets a snowcone and tries to wait him out, but he has to leave because he still feels unwell. She tries to stamp down her disappointment, but they still have no plans to see each other soon so when will the next time be?

These two get to a serious conversation about the future. Jet and Christian both know what they'd like to do as adults, and they both can see being with each other long term. It just feels natural somehow. She loves reading, he loves writing. She's a snob, he's rebellious. Both of them are on the fringe of 'normal' just enough to be alike. More importantly, they respect each other.

Feels nice, if that's enough of a word. To be accepted by someone you think is worth it.

They get all kinds of moodlets for making out under the full moon.

If his mom knew Jet had a girl over, she'd be in chaperone mode. But he didn't want to tell her and ruin her research. I mean, lookit that faaace. So she works in peace underground.

Doubt needs to be chased away. She tells herself she's running towards her problems, not away from them. Even when the reality is that she got left alone at the fair. It wasn't a date, but Jyoti and Malcolm see each other so little that every interaction counts. It's not like her to internalize it, think he didn't want to see her. It just feels as if that's true.

Jyoti spends the rest of the night running, sorting her thoughts and trying to conquer her general feeling of loneliness.

It's been weeks of that dream- or series of dreams, and it still feels all too real, even when she's awake. And her thoughts about her real relationship are now only serving to add fuel to the fire of her unease.

She's felt like someone was watching her before, but it's rare. She always figured it was animals and not people. Owls or some such. She only ever felt it for a flash of a second. Always when she was outside running. Maybe a part of the runner's high?

Certain nights just had that feeling. It never made her afraid to run, it made her curious. Was there such a thing as a sixth sense, an instinct, or was it just on nights like this, that were peaceful and quiet and not even the hissing of wind interrupted her thoughts? A feedback to the inner ear that told her the vastness that surrounded her in the bright, evening cityscape was far too quiet compared to the brilliance of the billboards and neon signs? Probably.

Jyoti is much more practical than her parents, there has to be an explanation for everything.

She was not alone, and it was not someone she knew in waking life, she was with. But it was rare, being with someone who could keep up with her. Someone who reminded her of the cold moonlight, and warm nights permeated by mist in the middle of summer.

It was summer now, it was a full moon, her mind was fully recalling that amazing trip to China where she jogged through quiet villages under the bright morning star, pausing only to watch the wildlife or feel the warm breeze tickle her skin.

Many of the dreams were simple, an extra presence on the edge of her waking that was forgotten by lunchtime unless her sleep was interrupted. The subject matter became largely forgotten and was categorized in her mind later as the 'fantasy boyfriend dream'. Just a random guy who didn't look like one of the losers from class, could be on the beach with a surfboard, tan and self-importance, but for some reason cared about fitness and her inner turmoils instead.

That was the main reason she knew it was all cowshit and easily put it all out of her mind in daytime.

The dreams were more vivid and more clear each time she had one, but  would still fade mostly with the morning. In them things that made no sense seemed so familiar. This person seemed familiar, particularly. This was not someone she knew, had ever known. But in the dream they were close, comfortable, at times a little too intimate.

There was pressure this time, he was looking for an answer. There was melancholy, she was unhappy even in this most beautiful seclusion. In her heart she knew that she wanted to run, and keep running, just to see where they ended up on the other side of it. How life would be away from the hectic city tangled in it's own self-indulgence. But that didn't mean that leaving her family wouldn't be gut-wrenching.

He wasn't saying anything that wasn't in her mind already. 'You're made for better places than this. The people here don't understand you.' She nods. 'You can do better than Starlight Shores.' She knows.

But- better at what? There's nothing I'm actually good at.

“Ask me again tomorrow.” She said, still not ready to make such an important decision.

And then, he was gone. In the dream she sat for hours, contemplating. The pressure wasn't gone, it was coming from within her.

She woke up in the middle of the night having to go pee.

Regardless of how the last dream had ended, the next would always come, ushering in more questions, feelings, and bringing with it no more clarity.

“I don't have an answer for you.”

“But you know you don't belong here.”

“I don't know anything yet. There's still too much to figure out. I have my whole life ahead of me, you know.”

He didn't always talk to her, often it was a series of feelings. He was talkative now.

“You know that you're unhappy. You want more out of life. When we leave together, you can figure things out along the way.”

“I can't, I don't want to leave him.”

“Leave who?”

“Malcolm, he'd never recover, he'd never understand. He would think he had done something wrong, that I was mad at him.”

“He's not someone you need to worry about. I am.”

In her dream she laughs loudly at this, but it feels hollow to her, it feels... true somehow.

“If I need to leave to go on some kind of journey of self discovery, it'll be by myself.”

She senses his disappointment as he withdraws from the dream. “Jyoti- Life is short. You won't have this opportunity forever.” Her mind melts him into Miura the cat as he goes. Flighty, self assured.

“See you tomorrow...” His fading voice echos. Miura is left to bob her fluffy orange tail through the flowing bushes at Jyoti's feet.

She wakes up dazed, three hours before school even starts. Weird. She doesn't think Malcolm even likes her that much in the first place.

The dreams continue, on and off as the summer drolls onward. Jyoti isn't really worried about them, most dreams are vague and useless, the defragmenting of the mind's worries and memories as the person sleeps. She comes to look forward to the dreams and what they might reveal about herself.

She doesn't consider herself to be unhappy, either with Starlight Shores, her family, or her (whatever he really is) boyfriend. She just considers herself to be a sailboat with no wind, dragged along by the rudder in the current of whatever is happening around her. Honestly it just feels like she's outgrowing her childhood, looking for the challenge of growing up, trying to figure out how to steer somehow. But in the moments where she is having the recurring dream, the questions posed seem like the most important questions in the world.

Another night, another encounter. She can never tell in waking what he looked like in the dream, but she always recalls the bleached blond hair the most. Whenever she's with him, she always finds him at the worst compelling, and at the best feverishly attractive.

She snidely laughs. “You know what, I'll do it, I'll run off with you. Just for tonight- wherever you'd like to go.”

“You are a horrible liar.”

“So you can read my mind.”

He chuckles, the sound is unusually deep for his boyish frame. “Your mind creates me, of course I know what is in it.”

She's slowly realizing that all this time they've been meeting in a graveyard. Ominous? Should it be? But it doesn't bother her until she's awake again. Her beautiful garden retreat was the place where death dwelt all along. The end of an era, or ideal...? She doesn't know.

For now she says, “I think I'd remember creating you on purpose.”

The uneasy smile again. “You might've had my help.”

“That makes no sense.”

“... does it have to?”

There's one stretch where she goes three weeks without a dream. It doesn't make her uneasy exactly, but she does wonder if her mind was able to resolve something.

When it returns she finds herself more peaceful than before. A decision has been made.

She gives in, for a moment. He shows her what it could be like; her worries fade, her mind melts away into the depths of the dream...

Her heart beats out of her chest.

What begins in tenderness quickly gets out of hand.

She comes to her senses.

She feels a sudden stab of panic- she runs. She always runs.

In the dream she feels his eyes on her, no matter how far she makes it- knows he is not chasing- she's running from something in herself.

This time, as she leaves the garden and the boy behind, there is a sense of clarity. Refreshment. She's not going to have this dream again, at least, not in this way. Something in her has been answered, but she knows she had asked herself no questions... there's a distant feeling that she can't make out- it's behind her now.

When she woke the final time from it there was a new sense of separation, from her showy, dazzling city and the endless sparkling shores, from her tight knit and accepting family- it feels as if she has fought herself and won.

But like most dreams, they are even more impossible to figure out when one is awake.

All this running is just making the headache worse. Time to call it a night. Plus there are a bunch of weirdos outside for no reason.

Not admitting to herself why, Jyo begins to work out in the lab more often.

But the dream doesn't come back. At least, for the rest of the season.

She runs in the valley during the day for a while instead of at night. Maybe Kevin was on to something after all. Not that she would ever tell him that.

Next time on the Sparrow's Random Legacy Challenge Blog... the Tales of Eugene's Revenge...

And whatever this is...

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Five points to Gryffindor for anybody that has recognized the few scattered screenshots, we've almost concluded them as hints from a long past update. If you're not sorted into the Gryffindor house, your points will still go to Gryffindor. The system is broken, and they will always somehow, magically, get all the points.

Everet Sparrow, local thug lieutenant, 15 minutes into a serious conversation.

“If you were a steak you'd be filet minion.”

“I prefer something with veggies, like pot roast.”

Behold the downfall of this legacy. Mister 'Fantasy-boyfriend' keeled over from Jyo's sweatsmell and couldn't jog next to her for more than one frame. Typical.

He won't actually matter for a while. Please be kind to me when that day arrives.