Maija | Late night munchies [Wendy/Alex]

“Didn’t I tell you to stay off that foot?”

He looks better than he did the day in the park after Matthias got through with him. He’s not wheezing for breath, and the bruises are gone like they never were. God bless supernatural healing, even for those less favored children of Gaia. With one foot is up on the prop, the other gently balancing the bike against the asphalt, he looks relaxed, sure … edgy. There’s an aggressiveness even in the way he chills on a bike; something about him that brings to mind a fighting cock, compact, hair-triggered, preening, vicious.

He sees her wire-rigged glasses and smirks. “Nice. Brings out your eyes.” He doesn’t mean it one bit.

Then Boy’s coming up, this kid maybe ten or more years younger than Alex, and already more than Alexander will ever be. Atop the Buell, Alex unconsciously — or perhaps consciously — shifts his weight a little more evenly between his feet. He rolls his head on his shoulders to crack his neck, then watches Boy address the rather dowdy girl.

He waves the empty french fry container.

“Sorta celebrating with–”

He jerks a thumb over his shoulder, but there’s no one specific in the constant crowd of passers-by. Its a fact that he doesn’t realize until he turns and doesn’t see the person he was indicating. Great. More imaginary friends.

“Man, I hate to tell you this, but I think your friends ditched you.”

He doesn’t look too worried about it though. He shrugs it off but his face is a bit less relaxed. A bit more akwardly embarrassed.

“S’okay. We’ll probably meet up later. Uhm…I’m Boy, by the way.” He says with a slow nod to the guy on the motorcycle.

“Oh yeah? That must suck. Hope they like you enough not to hide from you.” He laughs. It’s full of false camaraderie. “Boy? What kinda name’s that — Indian? I’m Alex, man.”

“Not Indian. Not really. Just my name. Good t’meetchya, Alex.”

He looks to Wendy again for a second, noting her discomfort.

“Oh hey, Why don’t you ask Alex to take you? I mean I know its not that far, but you really shouldn’t be walking.”

Boy responds to him, then, straightforward, simple. Alex considers him a moment, his eyes flickering over the kid who was not a kid, and then he rubs his nose with a sniff and turns to Wendy.

“Where you headed?”

And then he’s looking over his shoulder again. Where was she?

“Thing is, she shouldn’t be walkin around.” He says just as he’s turning back, and facing Alex. “And I just figured, since you had the wheels….”

A better man wouldn’t have bristled up at Boy at all. He wouldn’t have felt threatened.

Alexander is not a better man. And it’s really a toss-up whether or not he would’ve given Wendy a ride any other day, but the confluence of events today means he frowns at Boy for a moment, looks the bony girl over once, and then reaches around to unsling his motorcycle helmet from the back of his bike.

“I was going to get some food myself,” he says, shrugging. “Wasn’t going to be MickeyD’s, but I’m flexible. Get on board, Skinny.”

Where was she?

“Guess we’ll see you around, Boy.”

Maybe that’s when it hits Boy, what’s ‘off’ about these two — or at least one thing off about Alexander. Though Boy’s rage isn’t overpowering, the humans still don’t like to look him in the eye. They avoid it whenever possible, without even knowing they’re doing it. Alexander, though: he looks him right in the eye, unflinchingly, as often as possible, with a wary aggressiveness turning over and over just behind the stares.

Alex says over his shoulder to Wendy, his smirk in his tone, “Wrap your arms around my waist. Duh.” Then he’s footshifting the bike into neutral and backing it out of the space, craning his head around to make sure some idiot car doesn’t rear-end him and kill him.

“Yeah. See you around.”

There wasn’t this kind of inadequacy where he came from. Where everyone knew everyone else. There wasn’t this brand of akwardness. And boy had never felt this kind of…jealousy…before.

“You guys take care of yourselves.”

…yeah.

Which is exactly how this particular street rat, huddled in a sweatshirt at least two sizes too big, her hood pulled up and low over her face, hiding her features, her jeans practically falling off a frame that can only be described as ‘waifish’, the denim off patched, and mended. Her hands are shoved into the ‘roo pocket, and her beat to hell boots are making a languid tattoo across the cement with one thing in her sites.

The golden arches.

Wendy’s probably lucky the trip to MickeyD’s is short and straight. She probably didn’t buckle the helmet on tight; she probably doesn’t know how to balance on a motorcycle, nor how to lean into the turns, nor … any of that, really. Alexander probably knows that. It doesn’t keep him from accelerating hard toward the first stoplight.

A motorcycle’s torque-to-weight ratio is a hell lot higher’s than a car’s. A high-end speedbike like this one goes from zero to sixty in under three seconds; the best supercars take over four. And motorcycles don’t have the buffer of a frame, a windshield, body panels. The ground streaks by underneath. The wind tears at her dress. Wendy’s whiteknuckled grip is well justified, especially when Alexander swerves around two or three slower moving cars, sliding between the lanes recklessly, and then braking hard to pull into a free parking space.

Alexander rotates his shoulders to make her let him go. The torso beneath the fitted, padded black motorcycle jacket — racing gear, not hell’s angels gear — is hard and compact, solidly muscular. He reaches up and unsnaps the helmet, pulls it off, tucking it under his arm.

“You all right back there?” He’s smirking again.

…there’s no resisting that call.

Instantly, Alexander shakes her off, twisting his arm about hers to break her grip. It’s not the reflex of an amateur; he’s trained in some discipline or other. For a second she might think he’ll follow it up with a hard shove — and then he reaches out to counter-grabs her by the forearm and hauls her to a hard stop.

“Watch it there, Skinny.” A beat; then he grins at her, baring teeth. “Another fall and you’ll be crawling home.”

He takes his spare helmet back and locks it onto the back of his bike. His own helmet he keeps with him, rolling the Buell onto its kickstand and dismounting with an easy swing of his leg over.

Standing now, Wendy can see Alexander is a good three inches shorter than her, compact and lean. She’s so scrawny it’s possible his shoulders are a good bit wider than hers; there’s a hard, triangular look to his torso. He comes up on the curb and heads toward McDonald’s.

“Well, are you coming?” Alexander has, miraculously, the good grace to hold the door open for her.

Holy hell she’s huuuuuuuuungry.

She turns to lean back against the counter, watching Wendy and Alex as she gives her elbow a steady workout – grab fry, swirl thorough ketchup and mayo, lift to mouth, chew and swallow, repeat.

In between. “Hey.” by way of greeting.

Alex waves sarcastically? And Maija considers flipping him off – sarcastically. She’s busy though. probably a good thing.

When Wendy’s done, he steps up. He wants a double quarter pounder with cheese. Yeah, the meal. Orange soda. He pays with a credit card, slips it back in his wallet, stuffs the wallet back into the rear pocket of his jeans. Then he goes pump himself a little paper cupful of ketchup.

She’s a protective one – usually to her own detriment.

“Ya’llright?” murmured to Wendy, as Alex steps away to get his ketchup.

She heads over toward the nearest table, setting the trays on top and sliding into a seat before she attacks her fries again. “Ya place liveable yet?”

..and not gaining a pound. It’s an eternal source of wonder for her… well, Wendy calls him her boyfriend. Close enough, for now. “Nah, he ain’t mind. He took me in, ain’t he?”

They were very together later that night, but that’s a different story. “He ain’t mind.”

“He is nice. Way too nice for th’likes of me. He’ll get bored soon enough of my scrawny ass.”

He has a loose, athletic way of walking; a subtle but distinct swagger. Everything about him is a sort of posturing, a sort of showing off. He slaps his tray down on Maija’s side of the booth and tells her to “Scoot over,” before sliding in beside her. Before he starts eating, he unsnaps the collar of his motorcycle jacket, unzips it, and then plunks his helmet down at the far end of the table. Under the jacket, which is fine-grained leather with heavy protective padding, he wears a plain white t-shirt, fitted.

“Girl talk?” And then, because he doesn’t give a damn if he’s interrupting, “You know, I’ve been thinking about how you said you knew Olaf. Know him how?”

Alex decides to join them, and the reach to tug her hood down lower over her face is automatic. Wendy has seen her without the sweatshirt – and those in Chicago that have, Maija can count on one hand. Alex sees only the line of her jaw at best, the hint of her features. She doesn’t allow him more than that.

“Yeah.” she says – answering the first question, before she glances at him and shoves another fry in mouth, shoving over so that he can sit next to her. She wasn’t really given a choice, and the tension that creeps along her spine, settling in her shoulders declares it to be so. But there’s fries, and Wendy, and public space.

“Yeah. Distant cousin of sorts. Way distant. Fucker was all protective an set my ass on a bus home one night – got my ass jumped and fuckin beat th’ shit out of 30 minutes later. Shoulda ignored his ass and found my own fuckin way home. Save myself th’hospital stay.”

He totally ignores the bit about the hospital stay. Nothing to do with him. He jams some fries in his mouth instead, slurps his soda, sets about unwrapping his burger.

mmmmmm fries.

A glance at Alex. “Know a few, yeah. Why ya ask?”

“Are you, y’know. Kin to them?”

She don’t sound none to happy about it, to tell the truth. There’s something underneath that, a tension that heightens even farther as she concentrates on the food in front of her.

In reaction, Maija just says “huh.” Eloquent, she ain’t. Then she steals the burger that Wendy left behind, and goes about unwrapping it. “So. Ya lookin for family, is ya? What branch?” May as well get to the point.

“Glass Walker.”

“So’s she.” Wendy, one presumes. There’s a beat, then. “Ain’t met any true GW. Ya heard of The Brotherhood? Sorta a common meetin’ ground for all branches of the whole fuckin’ family tree.”

She shrugs a shoulder, an swipes a fry through her ketchup. “I stayed there a night or two, till I started fuckin a lawyer.” She says it like it ain’t no big thing, like she ain’t got no feelings for him. Lying to herself is something she’s far too good at.

“Can’t miss it. S’the Brotherhood of Thieves, official like. Ask for Jenny in the back.”

He shovels down the rest of his burger, then picks up his fries and drink. “Thanks for the tip, shorty.” And he means it like that: shorty. Not shawty. This ain’t no term of endearment. “You take it easy.”

She doesn’t call him a nickname, doesn’t invite him to stay, doesn’t do anything other than watch him stand, and then watch her steadily disappearing foot. He’d never guess tonights conversation is one of the longer ones she’s had since coming to Chicago. She doesn’t exactly put off the approachable vibe, that’s for sure.