Haunted House College AU

[worthallthis]

While the army is covering tuition, it doesn't cover living expenses, and temporary work on-campus is better than temporary work off-campus. So when the drama department managed to raise funds for a haunted house in one of the frat houses, James put on his best "I can kill you with my pinky" look, a shabby suit (shabby is really all he has, so, lucky), and his growing out hair loose around his face and "interviewed" for a spot as in-character for a creepy fucky as possible.

He had to refuse the first offer to be one of the ghosts inside. Dropping the character and donning a slightly sheepish smile, "Really not that keen on jumping out an' scaring people. Especially the ones that get punchy when they're scared." When the interviewer looked at his resume, saw his army tour (the whole "captured and tortured" thing isn't on there, but it doesn't have to be), she just nodded and stuck him at introductions and taking tickets. The pay isn't great, but it'll cover meals for a while.

So he shows up for opening night, gets his face done all pale with stage-make up and his suit a little spruced up with a very fancy shirt underneath from the costume department, and takes in the faces of the other people who'd been brought on.

Comments

[worthallthis]

Either someone is considering a joke, or someone is potentially in trouble, stuck on a prop or something. Or possibly found somebody to make out with and is hiding away to have a little fun. James considers a long moment whether to investigate, but the possibility of someone being in trouble (that cute Misty gal, seeing as she's missing and all) makes up his mind. Sigh.

If he walks in on somebody getting a blow-job, he's going to be very disappointed.

He heads down the hall, making sure to make plenty of noise with each step so he doesn't startle anyone.

[shadowsran]

Thankfully, despite any drama major/club stereotypes, he's spared that.

Unfortunately, what waits three doors down the untouched hallway of thud-origin isn't a great deal better. Doubly sad, given the careful setup. Lights had been dimmed. Masterfully repurposed prop wall hangings have been bound together to form a rope long enough to tie around a person twice. Once at the waist, another at the neck, and with the former under a costume it's a surprisingly fair facsimile. Comically pale, dramatic makeup had been crudely rubbed askew. Eyeliner made to run, bluer around the lips. As one does.

She isn't much of an actress, but skittering around in the woods long enough gives one a fairly good impression of truly dead eyes. And she waits, cold and still as clay, suspended with enough space between her and the floor for this to truly be a feasible hanging.

The werewolf was the intended target, or, best case scenario, Bucky and the werewolf. Steps are identifiable as a lone non-rescuer too late to do much of anything. It's less fun with just the one person, she realizes, dimly, once the door opens.

...Oops.

[worthallthis]

Oh Jesus. That is the last thing he expected. "Fuck!" he exclaims, and rushes in to grab her legs and left, taking pressure off her neck. For reference, if she's paying attention, he's clearly very strong, and one arm feels... weird and hard, under his suit jacket and glove.

But he's also yelling, "Hey! Hey somebody call 911!"

He can tell her heart's beating, so she can't be dead yet, which means ambulance and maybe CPR if she's not breathing.

[shadowsran]

There's nothing much else to pay attention to, really. The language is noted, and it would have been amusing were it not so -

That the first action, even in this seeming panic, was to move forward and assist rather than freeze. Which is for the best, because for one long moment that's precisely what she does. Really isn't breathing. Not so much as a twitch or shift at the moving, at his arm, but the command is thankfully a jolt.

Because pretending to have been murdered next to peers is one thing, but wasting real emergency resources is, evidently, where she draws the line. Frenzied blinking will be the first sign all may be well, but not by much. Both hands go to his shoulders, firm as if to exacerbate her liveliness.

"NonononoI'malrightI'msorry--"

[worthallthis]

Ironically, murder isn't even what he'd thought. He'd immediately thought suicide. Interesting how differently their minds must work.

He continues to hold her legs, staring up at her at the words and touch. A few other actors are pounding down the hall towards them, now, skidding into sight through the door just as he says, "Are you fucking kidding me?"

So his first guess, that someone was playing a prank, was right. A really, really nasty prank. He hadn't expected that of Misty, who'd seemed amiable and reasonable. Scowling, he reaches up with the gloved metal hand and rips the makeshift rope from the rafter, freeing her, and sets her down.

[shadowsran]

"I didn't think you'd show up! Or at least not just you--" Sidling out of the outermost layer, the second knot at the waist is immediately familiar to any horror production veterans. Which may well have been why that was the target audience; familiar enough with dumb stage tricks that they might have gone in with more scrutiny.

Not that she feels anything short of miserable about it now, given the expression on offer. Untying the remainder is taken up with zeal if only for being anything else to focus on.

"I am so, so sorry-"

[worthallthis]

"No emergency here, sorry guys," James tells the watching actors sourly, one of whom is starting to snicker-- the afore-mentioned werewolf-- and the other-- one of the zombies-- still looking a little panicked. "Just a bad joke."

He tosses the mangled wall-hanging aside, giving the metal hand's fingers a flex to make sure the glove didn't tear, too. Seems intact.

And he doesn't say a thing to Misty, not yet anyway.

[shadowsran]

Quite the monumentally poor joke. Succinctly said. It's a little vindicating to hear the snicker, but not much. She shoots a meek little shrug toward the onlookers, without quite the gusto required to place a little unspoken jab at her slow-to-rise lupine friend. It's unpleasant that they're there, and as they leave, she notes with some minor panic it's just as unpleasant to think they'll be gone.

There's nothing to relish, here.

"I'm sorry." Broken record could not be more apt.

[worthallthis]

Not gonna get any more pleasant, either. James turns around, hands on his hips, and looks Misty over. His expression is thunderous. He's shaken, his hand trembling, the metal one wanting badly to buzz but he's not letting it. He's keeping it locked down, which means the mad is what shows. "The fuck gave you the idea to pretend to kill yourself?" he demands. "In the middle of a college show? Where anybody could walk in?"

[shadowsran]

And she shrinks. It isn't merely the expression, but the harsh contrast with what little impression she could work off of. A fairly breezy, relaxed person veering right into this.

Of course, being the one in the wrong isn't much of a help. Though confusion cuts through enough for one fleeting quirk of an eyebrow.

"It was a murder," she corrects, not to be a wiseass but because the former, intended read fits much better with the context of...well, college show. Silly, that any of a bunch of loosely connected college kids would have conflict enough to kill over it. His is much. Realer.

Which is even less of a help, if good to know.

She continues reproachfully, "I'd figured more than just one person was going to come over, and I was talking to Jasper before about this kind of thing--" Traitorously late werewolves, god. "--It wasn't supposed to read that seriously, I'm so sorry."

Hardly any proving anything, but there's a non-affected new sheen to her eyes.

"Are you okay?"

[worthallthis]

This. This is why he doesn't fucking socialize with anybody anymore. Fucking stupid-- jokes-- and ideas-- and not thinking things through, and pretending to be dead and--

"Fine, I'm fine, I'm--"

He is not fine. He is rather abruptly not fine, and he has to grope for one of the chairs set to the side of the room and slump down into it, curl his feet up onto the seat awkwardly, and tuck his head between his knees to count his breathing in a space where hair and legs hide the rest of the room and he can focus. The metal arm makes a few mechanical noises under his sleeve, and he can't quite lock it down fast enough to keep it from being obvious.

[shadowsran]

"Hey--"

He's very obviously not fine, which makes her nosedive even harder. It's more familiar than she would like it to be, that gesture, and her stomach twists at the sight of it. And then the noise, which. Isn't at all part of his character. The confusion is latched onto with fervor, because it's better than a nerve-and-sympathy cry. Wonder at, but not question yet. Priorities.

Dropping to her knees a pace away, her voice too drops to something barely beyond a whisper.

"I'm sorry, it's okay, I-I...do you need anything? Water, or-something?"

[worthallthis]

It takes him a minute of breathing, counting, and focusing on shifting the metal arm plates as quietly as possible (which can be kind of calming, in its own way) before answering. "No, I'm. I'm okay. Sorry."

He starts to uncurl, embarrassed and still a little upset about the whole thing, but it didn't need that kind of reaction. He hasn't had a panic attack in public in... months. Mostly because he's been good at managing it, and avoiding potential situations that would set him off. This wasn't one he'd expected to have to avoid.

[shadowsran]

"Don't apologize, you don't need to, this was - my fault."

Painfully concerned is written over absolutely every inch of her, tone and face and body language, though she stays rooted to her current spot on the floor. The evening has taken quite the turn in tone. She can't appreciate it yet.

"I'm so, so sorry, it was dumb and, I really mean it, if you'd be better with something to drink or a lap around the house or something, anything, I'd really want to help. This isn't-- I'm sorry."

Someone's innocent first encounter with the program has been pretty significantly sullied!

Was not her goal, at the outset!

[worthallthis]

"I know. It's fine, I know." Hell, maybe if he'd been somebody else, it might even have been a funny joke. Somebody else probably wouldn't have gone to pieces over it, at least. He's so damn tired, and he's still got two hours left of this show to put on. "You want to help-- how about you get me a beer from the break room, yeah?" They've got something like ten minutes until the second round. He could stand a damn beer, even if it won't do much for him besides taste cold and distracting.

[shadowsran]

There isn't even an answer, she's up and gone from her resting position faster than one might expect of a theater-adjacent-kid. Champing at the bit to be of use, as it were. It's a relief to be given a task. Two bottles are retrieved with no break longer than it takes to throw a firm elbow into a certain fake-furry bicep in passing, and to kick the door closed behind her upon reentry. They're both for him, one offered and the other set at his feet in case it wasn't obvious.

Back to her kneel, then. And, after a beat, caution prompts her to ask, "Not to press if it's personal, but, uh, your - arm?" Some bizarre kind of pace maker or insulin pump seems outlandish, but possible enough. Buzzing prosthetics seem a little more far fetched, but no option is a good option. The new worry is if she'd inadvertently made him strain it in some unintended way. Which is why she continues vaguely. "If I broke something, damaged, whatever, I'll pay for it?"

[worthallthis]

James snorts. "If you damaged it, you'd be the first." He accepts the bottle, and pulls off the glove on his left hand to use the metal finger to pop off the cap. She can get a good look at the fully-articulated plates around each individual finger scaffolding while he drains half the bottle in one go.

"Got it overseas. POW status for a year and a half. Nobody's sure what the hell it is, but can't get it off, so."

[shadowsran]

What the shit is that. What. Christ, she can't even be interested fully, she's so preoccupied with what that information really means. "I-- didn't know." Because maybe this is common knowledge to those who know him, it would be sensible enough he wouldn't mention it to anyone crossing his path. "I wouldn't have done that - at all, if I did. I swear."

He's a veteran, and a POW, and she'd really done this to a goofy evening. God damn it.

[worthallthis]

"Unless the director gal is gossiping, nobody knows," James says wearily. "It's not like I talk about it much. Or know anybody here. It's fine." Expecting regular college kids to be serious and think things through is really too much to ask of them, especially drama kids, especially drama kids on opening night in the middle of a haunted house. Ain't there fault he's a headcase. He probably shouldn't have yelled.

He holds up the beer in her direction. "Hey, I really am sorry I freaked out at you."

[shadowsran]

A polite wave of dismissal; that won't do.

"Don't be, that wasn't nearly as well thought out as it should have been. Exactly because of cases like this, I-- you're not supposed to assume, and especially when it's someone new and their first night on..." Her head shakes, and her hands drop to her lap. "You're within your rights, I'm sorry I put you through that. I hope it doesn't turn you off of these completely, they usually are just fun."

[worthallthis]

He doesn't know if it'll turn him off to them. At the very least, he needs to see this one through to get paid. And he'd said he would.

At least next time, he's pretty sure nobody will try that particular prank. He'd rather have walked in on somebody getting a blow-job.

"Well. You did a pretty convincing job of looking dead, at least," he offers. He could tell she wasn't, but he's already shown her the damn metal arm, he's not going to let on he can hear heartbeats and breathing and shit. "Full marks, there."

[shadowsran]

One hand rubs the back of her neck self consciously. No room for flattery, at present.

"Not something I'll get to show off again anytime soon, I'm thinking. But thank you." Any other day, she'd be quite proud. On the comedown, it's still...too fresh. She'll be wincing about this for years. "The offer's standing, not wasting it on beers twenty feet away. Anything going forward I can help with, really, let me know. This was all. A bad idea, a terrible thing to pull on someone's first go."

[worthallthis]

He considers her a minute as he finishes the first beer. "I'll think about it," is what he finally says, plucking up the second and pushing to his feet. "Gotta get back to work, for now, I think. You here for the rest of the run?"

[shadowsran]

"Yeah." Time has completely gone out the window, so she'll take the shift in focus to mean they're nearly due back to posts, and take it at face value. "The rest of the night'll be. Quiet." Not something she can technically guarantee, but she's a little desperate.

"I'll, uh, check in when we close?"

[worthallthis]

"Sounds good." He bumps her shoulder lightly with the cold beer bottle, then heads on out, squaring his shoulders and looking for all the world like he hadn't been shaking and practicing grounding techniques five minutes ago. He tosses casually over his shoulder, "Better put those curtains back, or your room won't look half as scary as it did for the first half of the night."