the house is too big, the town is too small
who: shane and bethany
where: downtown, main street
when: noonish
Shane hadn't had the best of nights. He hadn't slept, had spun his wheels on a lot, had attempted a journal entry which he hadn't in any way managed to get down, and finally dropped off from what might have been considered an overdose of sleeping meds sometime around six in the morning. They hadn't helped long enough term, and he'd been up again not too long after.
After sticking around in his house for a while, he decided fuck it, he was getting out, and he took off. He'd found the park and walked around there for a while, and by now he'd started up main street, basically looking around at shit and trying to remember where everything was. That, and hoping he ran into someone at the very least vaguely interesting, so he'd have something to concentrate on that wasn't the bullshit continually spinning through his head.
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Since she hadn't had any bad encounters the day before, Bethany had decided that another walk around the city couldn't hurt. She was supposed to be checking out the bar—her newest place of employment—but the urge to just wander was too overpowering. Her steps were lazy and undirected, but there was a certain air of awareness around her, one that had been gained through years of living in Yellowstone. One never knew when they would stumble upon some potentially dangerous animal, as the paired scars on her arm clearly showed.
By the time she realized that she had put everyone else in the city under the category of "dangerous animal," she had already spotted someone else who seemed to be in much the same wandering mood she was, and immediately forgot the misconception.
While not the first person she had seen, he was the first that specifically caught her interest—he looked rather young to have been involved in any sort of experiment, but she vaguely recalled having seen him before. After a moment of thought, she realized that he had been a part of her experiment, one of the countless people she had watched for hours on end, one whose diet she had undoubtedly helped regulate. The realization made something in her stomach clench uncomfortably, but she ignored it, concentrating on the person in front of her, not the person she had seen through a video recording for months. She wasn't the best judge of age, but there was just something about him that struck her as childlike. His physical appearance, perhaps—she remembered her brother having a haircut like that when he was about sixteen, and he had a roundish face, more that of a boy than a man. Approaching others wasn't something she considered a pastime, but she had already decided that in a city such as this, she really didn't have much choice. Humans needed some level of social interaction to live properly, and she would rather start off with someone who looked relatively normal rather than the inevitable drunks she would meet.
Clasping her hands behind her back, the blonde approached him casually. The hardest part would be actually starting a conversation, so she paused a few feet away from him and cleared her throat, letting him know she was there—surprising anyone or anything was never a good idea. "Hello," she said, tone calm and easy. She hoped so, at least—she felt horribly awkward and was sure that anyone would be able to notice the wary tinge to her voice. She hadn't taken any great pains to dress up that morning—just a pair of jeans and a black cardigan over a white tank top. Her shoes, however, were a pair of bright red heels that she absolutely adored and hadn't been able to part with before taking the intern position. In fact, a closet in her new "home" was almost completely full of shoes, some which she had already owned and others she had bought upon arriving.
Shane looked over when his attention was snagged, and he smiled, an automatic reaction as opposed to anything else. It was natural looking, however. Easy. Laid back. "Hello." he said, walking up to her. "What's your name?" he asked. "I'm Shane." He offered his hand, sort of wondering if he was going to treat her the same way he'd normally treat a new acquaintance, particularly an easy on the eyes female. The worst part there was that he didn't know. There was that internal twitch that wanted him to. But should he have it? Really? Was it a question?
'Be normal'. That shouldn't be something he had to think about. Or worry about, for that matter.
The second he smiled, he was morphed from a former experiment to just a normal boy, and she watched the transformation with silent intrigue. She wasn't naturally prejudiced, but spending time at the facility had changed the way she looked at participants—her subconscious decided that they automatically lost some quality that made them human, that they were almost non-sentient creatures. It was a nasty bias, one she wasn't always aware of, but it was still there. To find such a counterexample made something akin to hope bubble up in the pit of her being—they could recover, they could become what they had been before the experiments had undoubtedly ruined their lives.
"Bethany," she replied, taking his hand and giving it a firm shake. The response was so natural—she hardly had to think about it. The notion that such an interaction was so out-of-place in this town was there in the back of her head, but she ignored it. The knowledge that she wasn't usually so forthcoming with her name was present as well, but she shoved it away before she could consider this a mistake. What did she have to lose? The thought had never before crossed her mind, but now that it did, she was on the verge of seriously considering it.
But ah, it wouldn't do to leave him with just a name and a handshake. The next step to the conversation was one she stumbled on without meaning to, supplying the information as easily as if it was written on her forehead. "I'm from Wyoming. Yellowstone, actually. Where are you from?" A flash of surprise swept across her face, and her grey-green eyes narrowed just a fraction at her outburst. She wasn't used to this. It didn't feel right, but there was nothing to tell her that it was a particularly bad idea. Just another tangle to add to the threads of her mind, she supposed.
Shane had been going to pull what he usually did and kiss the back of her hand, but didn't, and was a little glad for it when she kind of looked weirded out that she furthered the conversation. Or...something. he didn't know why. It could have been because she had gas or something for all he fucking knew. "Kind of all over the place." he answered her. "Nowhere in particular." he shoved his hands into his pockets again, and had an easy, relaxed sort of stance. "So, what's a girl from Wyoming doing in Assfuck Russia?" he asked. He wondered if she was a volunteer, or if she was part of the experiments somehow.
An appropriately vague answer, one she would have given herself. One she should have given—but she wasn't going to dwell on how she had already acted out against her nature. That had already begun to happen more and more often, and she didn't like it. A week in this town and she was already off to a rousing start when it came to socializing. The whole experiment business had done strange things to people, and she was no exception.
In light of this, she was better prepared for his next question, and a small smile tugged at her lips. "The same thing as everyone else. Breathing, eating, surviving." That might have been a bit cryptic and overdramatic, but it was mostly true—this couldn't really be considered living, could it? No contact with the outside world, let alone family. She hadn't even been given a new assignment yet, not that she was looking forward to it—she had already caused enough damage to these people's lives, and wasn't very keen on doing more.
He tilted his head to the side some as he regarded her. "Doing that well, huh?" he asked. "So...what's your story? I heard there were other experiments and the like..." he prompted. With the way she'd put 'suriviving' in there, he automatically crossed 'volunteer' off of the list of possibilities for the woman.
She wouldn't have called it "well," but then, she hadn't been locked in a room with no social contact for almost a year. She couldn't really imagine what that had been like, and she wasn't planning on finding out anytime soon. She had never been the sort of person who was spooked by nightmares, but every time she saw that poor girl thrashing around in the makeshift noose, she woke with icy sweat and the shakes. Her sleeping pattern hadn't been messed up too much, but it was enough.
Bethany was a smart girl—she knew that letting on about her position as an intern would likely cause resentment. She didn't want that. Not only would she likely be cast out from this mostly-participant society even more, but she'd know she deserved it. So she shrugged again, pulling the sleeves of her cardigan over her hands and glancing down as if she didn't want to talk about it, because she didn't. "There were," she confirmed. "I don't know much about them, though." Hopefully that would be both evasive and informative enough to sate his curiosity—it was a long shot, but she didn't think he'd appreciate knowing she was one of the many who had watched him suffer for months on end in that godforsaken room.
Shane watched her and kinda had the vague feeling that they weren't necessarily having the same conversation. Such as he'd been sarcastic at first and she hadn't reacted at all to that, about doing 'well', and light jokes usually set people at ease. She didn't really seem to be, though. Then she just sort of skipped on to the other bit, and didn't tell him anything about what experiment she had been part of. Which had been what he'd been getting at. So...were they even having the same conversation?
He didn't show any of that on his features, however, he just kept his eyes on her and had a light, laid back sort of expression on his face. "What experiment were you part of?" he asked, since apparently he needed to be blatant, here.
Wyoming was by no means a part of mainstream society, and Bethany was a perfect example of that. She was well-aware that she had not grown up in the same manner as many of the people she had met over the years, and that part of her showed—the small-town, tree-hugger part. Not interacting with many people her own age until later in life had had a big impact on her life, and in situations like this that was so obvious that it hurt.
But he didn't specifically know that, though she had no doubt that he'd figure it out soon enough.
Grey-green eyes flicked back up to him, and, seeing that he was watching her, the blonde straightened slightly and looked him in the eye as best she could. He was taller than her by quite a margin, and she had always hated feeling small. "The one they called Experiment C." It wasn't a lie, and there was nothing to indicate that she had only given a half-truth; she had been a part of that one, and that was what he'd asked.
"That's the one I was in...I never saw you though." he said. And he watched all the time. However, he also knew that he only got feeds that were what the scientists wanted him to see, so it was entirely possible that they'd just never showed her. "I met another girl from it already...Jillian." he added. Jillian, who he wanted to see again, but was specifically avoiding the shit out of. "What happened with you in it?" he asked. "If you don't mind my asking." he disclaimered, just in case. He was curious, though, just...what had happened to everyone. What people had been through. Especially when he'd never even seen her. What had her experience been like?
She shifted slightly, leaning her weight on her right foot. Even though she didn't mean to, she was studying him, watching for anything out of the ordinary—when she recalled that anything odd about him was partially her fault, she focused her gaze on his face and tried to stop thinking about it. "I don't think we were allowed to see each other at all," she said stiffly. Another slashed truth. She was awfully good at those, wasn't she? Deception—even a small form of it—had never been something she enjoyed. The name he supplied sounded vaguely familiar, but she didn't bother to place it to a face now and filed it away in her mind for later.
And there was the question, the one she wasn't ready for. It figured that the first person she had bothered talking to would spring it on her without so much as a by-your-leave. Bethany raked her brain for just a fraction of a second before dropping her eyes to the ground and leaning away from him slightly. "I do mind," she said quietly, grayish orbs flicking from side to side, maybe looking for an escape. "I'd rather not say."