if_inconvenient | (no subject)

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Sherlock does not want to be at school today. For once in his life he is something less than indifferent to the occasional stare and snicker, the looks of familiar contempt from those who have been around long enough to get used to him. His mood has been fluctuating wildly between rage and despair since yesterday morning. He knows his self-control is good enough to keep him from reacting to any taunts with violence, but nothing will stop him from wanting to. Which is unsettling in itself.

He has a duty, though, one that cannot be ignored. And if he is going to show up at school again, he may as well do the job properly. He is on time for every class before lunch, polite if not friendly when circumstances call for conversation, crisply dressed—in trousers, thank you; he does not think he could bear the reactions to another skirt. The only signs that anything is wrong are the dark circles under his eyes and the tension that stands in sharp contrast to his usual indolence.

At noon on the dot he is in the cafeteria waiting for Bella Swan.

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"'Cause she doesn't know about vampires and shit," Tony fills in, "and you don't wanna look like a whackjob. Well, she asked to talk to me instead of calling up the nuthouse, so I think you're doing pretty good so far. Sure, put her on."

"I don't want to—" he starts.

"Yeah, I know exactly what you don't want to. Sherry, it's fine. We're all a little fucked up about this. I'm okay to talk to this chick if you're okay to ask me."

He closes his eyes again, briefly, and exhales a soft, relieved sigh.

"Thank you, Tony," he says, and holds out the phone to Bella.

She takes it.

"Hello, Tony. I'm Bella Swan."

He sounds fondly amused when he says: "Yeah, so I heard."

She laughs a little.

"You've also heard what I'm looking for," she says.

"...yeah," he says, quieter and more serious.

"Okay, so what d'you wanna know? Sherry already told you the basics, right? Creepy ghost thing, tries to make like it's dead people you know, except it sucks at impersonations."

(But it didn't, for a minute there. For a minute there it had him completely. His voice reflects the fear of that.)

"I just want to hear your take on it," she says gently. "Someone else telling another person's story won't get all the nuances of the experience, no matter how factually accurate they are. I might not get anything new, but you might make me think of something I haven't already, or just provide some depth."

She hesitates briefly, then adds,

"And - really, this is the sort of thing I would like to hear from as many people as possible. More witnesses help build plausibility."

"Jesus Christ," he mutters—not annoyed, exactly, but tired. "You want plausibility, check out his bite-marks."

But he sighs and continues in more normal tones, "No, sorry, I totally get it. Weirded me out too. Okay, fine. This thing, it showed up in my room, looking like Obie. Acting like him too. Spun this whole story about—" he cuts himself off, his voice wavering for a moment "—fuck, never mind, anyway, he dropped it pretty quick when I got the idea he maybe wasn't who he was pretending to be. And then he turned into my dad and ragged on me for not living up to the family name and turned into my mom and called me an ungrateful little shit."

(At the mention of Sherlock's bite-marks, Bella glances over (http://favorite-three.livejournal.com/1195.html?thread=24491#t24491) at him, but keeps her focus on Tony. She'll think about that later.)

Tony's account is - persuasive. She's watched news clips of him speaking. He can deliver a prewritten speech, he can banter with the journalists, but when someone asked a question he didn't like it was written all over his face and came through with equal transparency in his tone of voice. Sherlock may be an actor; Tony is not. Even over the phone, without his expressions visible, his story conveys exactly the kinds of emotions one might expect it to.

The details he offers are likewise convincing, made all the more so for the part of the story he makes no secret of omitting. It's slightly uncomfortable to hear, a level of intimacy she wouldn't usually expect from a perfect stranger. He must have a lot of faith in Sherlock to share them with her so willingly.

It could be an elaborately planned virtuoso performance . . . but she really, really doubts that.

She pauses for a moment, waiting to see if he's going to continue with anything before she speaks herself.

Apparently he's all talked out.

"Thank you," she says seriously when it becomes clear that he's done. "That is very helpful."

She glances at Sherlock again as a sudden and obvious realization clicks into place.

"You both seem very matter-of-fact about the idea that this thing exists," she observes.

"No shit we are," Tony says, reasonable rather than impatient. "You would not believe some of the shit we've seen, I mean that literally, Sherry's not telling you because if you don't see it for yourself you'll just think we've both gone off the deep end. Which would be bad 'cause you're Sherry's friend and that's kind of a big deal. And you know he's totally got a crush on you, right?"

"Um."

Bella flushes bright red, immediately forgetting anything else she might have had to say.

Sherlock's eyes widen slightly, and then he looks extremely rueful in that way only Tony can ever manage to invoke.

Tony laughs, a warm, friendly sound.

"I'll take that as a no."

"That's not - relevant," Bella manages, after a few seconds of staring at Sherlock.

"Nope, but it's true. I mean, he didn't tell me or anything, I didn't even know you existed until five minutes ago, but when you get all analytical his eyes turn into little hearts, don't they."

That would be Sherlock's cue to blush—a pink lighter than Bella's, but no less apparent for that.

Bella eyes him.

"I . . . hadn't really been paying attention to his eyes," she says, lamely.

"For heaven's sake," he says, somewhat muffled by the hand he is pressing over his face. "Bella, I am sorry, I admit I had not anticipated this particular turn to the conversation."

"Okay, I'll stop now," says Tony, only half apologetically.

"It's . . . fine," Bella says to both of them. She pauses to tease out in detail exactly what she means by that, then adds,

"Of all the things I've heard today, it's by far the most agreeable."

Considering what else is on that list, the phrase damning with faint praise barely even begins to cover that remark, but without having had the benefit of thinking through her own feelings on the matter, it's also the most accurate conclusion she can offer for now.

"Oh good."

Beat.

"Except you've heard a lot of shitty things today, which isn't good. I'm sorry."