halseyrp

[halseyrp]

"Um...." Taylor starts, "Maybe some other time. I sorta just... want to go home." He rubbed his eyes, wasn't it time for his 3pm nap or something? Usually he was already through the doorway and onto the floor at this point, always having paid attention to the bus stops and where he was. He's starting to feel the fatigue of a broken routine. 

[halseyrp]

"Um...kind of," Simon admitted. "I just ride the bus a lot and walk around and I was always getting lost, so Frey--uh, he's my cousin--gave me a map and said, 'Simon, if you get lost again I'm leaving you to the wolves.'" He said this with a deeper voice, to make it clear it was an impersonation, and wagged his finger as one might with a dog, wearing a stern expression. He couldn't hold it for more than ten seconds though before he was laughing. "There aren't really wolves in the city! But eventually I read the map enough to remember it anyway."

He flapped his wings and did a little twirl without missing a step. His mood was utterly buoyant. "Now I know, like, every street in the city. You oughtta try it sometime," he suggested. "Or I could show you."

[halseyrp]

Taylor shrugged and followed obediently. He wasn't worried about Simon leading him the wrong way, or tricking him, which usually was a suspicious he held for a lot of people. Even people he'd talked to before. But there was a vibe; a sense. Taylor doubted that Simon had a single mean bone in his body. 

"So do you just memorize maps or what?" Taylor asked, and he hadn't really been expecting an answer but when the words left his mouth he was sure he wouldn't be surprised if Simon answered 'Yes'.

[halseyrp]

"Yes!!" Simon said definitively. "If you don't cut down Hawthorne,  you'll end up four blocks east, because the bus had to take Brook from Melbourne because it's a one way street. Hawthorne cuts through, but only if you're walking," he explained, once again making things doubly confusing. He seemed to realize that, though, and smiled apologetically. "It makes sense if you look at a map."

He started walking, making sure that Taylor was following along. He was going to show him the way back whether he liked it or not, he decided. Although he'd never say it, he thought that Taylor really needed the help.

[halseyrp]

"Uhhh..." Was Taylor's eloquent reply. He stood and followed Simon off the bus, looking at his surroundings. "Does it matter what streets I cut through?" 

Obviously Taylor had never traveled through any bad or even unoccupied parts of town. He lived in the center, went shopping in the center, and took the bus to bypass any unsavory locations. 

[halseyrp]

"Are you sure?" Simon frowned, looking concerned. The bus was beginning to brake, so he stood up and shrugged on his jacket, grabbing the back of a seat to keep his balance as the bus slowed. "You're not going to get lost or anything? You know you'll have to cut through Hawthorne Street?" Simon had spent enough time traversing the city to have a perfect mental map, but he knew that a lot of other people didn't. He suspected Taylor was one of those people.

[halseyrp]

"It's really okay." Taylor interjected. "I'll just walk back to where it's familiar, it was only a couple of blocks." Honestly, he really just wasn't sure what to do or say. Situations like these were often a bit lost on him, and really, he just wanted to get back to something he knew. It was weird enough he started talking to some stranger on the bus, but then making jokes and acting friendly? Yeah, he really needed to be back among familiarity.

[halseyrp]

"Oh my gosh, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to keep you." Simon looked quite distraught; assuming (correctly) that it was his fault. He patted Taylor's shoulder gently, reassuringly. "Well look, if you get off at the next stop, you can-- but the 32 bus-- oh, hang on."

He reached over Taylor and pulled the "stop" cord, and a bell chimed near the front of the bus. "I'll show you how to do it, ok?" Simon said, although it was clearly a rhetoric question. "We have to ask the driver for a transfer ticket, and then..." He babbled excitingly, making riding the bus sound more like rocket science than it had any right to be.

[halseyrp]

Taylor shrugged and looked down at his feet, "I'm not saying anything but... I may or may not have missed my stop... more than five stops ago." In fact Taylor didn't even think he'd ever been this far. He didn't really go around town unnecessarily, so they were starting to go into unfamiliar territory. 

"I think... I should get off at the next stop."

[halseyrp]

"I've never tried! Maybe I could, that's all I'm saying!" Simon laughed, knowing perfectly well the idea was ridiculous. He leaned a little closer, so he could look out the window, nodding as he took in the street signs. "I'm not going anywhere in particular," he admitted. "But it's almost at the end of the route, so I might stop and get some groceries before I head back."

He sat back and then looked at Taylor curiously. "Do you live all the way out here? Or did you miss your stop or something?"

[halseyrp]

"You? Breathe fire?" Taylor laughed. "You couldn't even exhale smoke!" He turned briefly towards the window and caught sight of unfamiliar territory. This was way beyond where he usually got off; but really he hadn't even noticed how long it had been since they had started talking. "Ah so... where are you headed, then?" He asked cautiously.

[halseyrp]

hi kelsey

'I shouldn't be here, I shouldn't be here' A part of his mind told him. But the other part said no no, it's so comfy here, just relax, really relax, it'll be fine. His head was in Simon's lap and his eyes were closed, and he was too drowsy to give a damn that he was being treated like a cat. Every time fingers scratched behind his ears or rubbed just above his belly it made him yawn and stretch and shift and curl his toes. He drifted in and out of consciousness, cat naps, but never quite falling asleep. 

He was sure Simon was talking about something, but it sort of faded into the rest of the background noises. Something moving in another room, the cars outside, the flutter of birds' wings as they passed by the window. The sun was the best part though. It streamed in through a window much bigger than Taylor was used to, illuminating his face and chest keeping him pleasantly drowsy.

At some point Taylor was aware of Simon moving about, of his head rolling to the side against his other shoulder, and a solid weight against his stomach. Being pressed up against something made Taylor aware his was purring. A steady rumble in his chest, vibrating in his throat and escaping with each breath from his nose. It was so apparent now with a presence pressed against him that wasn't emitting the vibrating purrs. Simon had stopped his chatter, afraid that if he mentioned it, Taylor would cease his purring. But he felt it, against Taylor stomach, felt the rumble from his face pressed into the folds of Taylor shirt, felt so relaxing. Like a massage for his insides. Because it was a noise rather than a touch, so it vibrated from the inside out. 

Taylor knew he should stop, but he was so comfortable and warm. If Simon ever mentioned this he'd never live it down, even just between the two of them. After he was so upset about being stereotyped to doing the things that cats do, even though he was a cat. He liked being pet and comfortable and having his ears scratched and lying in the sun. But in any case, Simon seemed to enjoy the purring for the sole purpose of why humans usually snuggled their pet cats. With that thought in mind, it was easy for Taylor to slip into REM sleep.

[halseyrp]

CUTIE PIE 

i will reply soon just omg what a cute baby.

edit: NO you and taylor are the cutie babies, quit being so adorbs!! taylor is killing me for reals

[halseyrp]

"Um, maybe." Simon agreed politely, but his smile was losing its brightness with each passing second. "Something like that, definitely." He nodded weakly, mumbling.

But after an awkward, quiet moment of thought, he seemed to get into the spirit of things, and started grinning cheerfully again. It was just a guessing game, wasn't it? "Not a tiny dragon! I'm too big for that," he reasoned. "Maybe I'm a big dragon. Maybe I could breathe fire and all!"

[halseyrp]

Unfortunately at times like these, it was Taylor who didn't seem to know when to stop. "Not a bat, hm?" He rubbed his chin in mock-thoughtfulness, attempting to think of other creatures. "Maybe some kind of tiny dragon?" Taylor mused, laughing at his own words. But he wasn't seriously interested, it just felt nice to have the upper hand in their little conversation.

[halseyrp]

"Oh, that's cool." Simon actually did notice that Taylor seemed a bit put off by that, so he acted nonchalant and let the subject drop. Usually he'd rattle off the first thing that came into his head ("That's really cool, I'd sleep more if I could!") but he resisted, and instead leaned forward and gently flapped his wings.

"I'm not a bat!" he corrected, gesturing towards his wings. The 'intrusive' bit slid right off of him, like he hadn't even heard it. "I'm, uh... something else. Not a bat." As if that was remotely helpful. But 'I don't even know what I am, some kind of demonic mutt thing maybe' was not really the type of thing you said to strangers on the bus--even Simon knew that much.

[halseyrp]

Taylor bristled. "A 'cat' thing?" Closing his eyes, he inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly. "Possibly." Said through grit teeth. Sleeping a lot, was in fact, a cat thing. He liked to fall asleep anywhere it was warm, particularly in the sunlight of an open window, and he slept rather a lot at home. Perfectly fine when out and about, but in the comfort of a small studio with central heating, Taylor spend an awful lot of time unconscious.  

"What about you? I've never known bats to be so intrusive."