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 Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2011 9:19 pm
The puppy gave a very decisive nod. Yes, they were going to stink up Ren's room, get him bathed properly, and then perhaps Jove would acquiesce to more pettings. Perhaps! If Ren didn't smell quite so badly after a good wash.
He snorted and abandoned the shoving now that Ren was moving in the right direction, and then trotted up ahead so the scent was no longer wafting his way. However, he was careful not to go too fast, or get so far ahead that Ren would have to catch up. The last thing he wanted was to embarrass himself with another freak out.
As he walked, Jove tried to hold his breath. As a ghost he could just stop breathing for an indefinite period of time, and he had good reason to believe he did stop breathing when he slept at night, but as a puppy, scenting the air was a hard habit to break. There was just so much information available to his nose... Although for the moment very little filtered through the overwhelming smell of burnt FEAR.
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Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2011 9:34 pm
Once he had confirmed that they were indeed, heading back to Ren's room (though he really had no idea why; the boil was still a bit difficult to read, though it was becoming steadily easier to read those facial expressions of his), Ren fell into a light, meandering gait behind Jove, humming softly to himself. He wasn't particularly offended by the fact that the puppy wanted to walk a few feet in front of him to get away from the smell; Ren had rapidly deduced that, as a foxfire wisp, Jove had a very sensitive nose, and it was probably making him shrivel up inside smelling him constantly.
After a few moments, the two of them reached the monster dorms, Ren obediently padding after Jove. They went up to the second floor (there were a few gagging noises, as well as several hacking coughs before people hastily slammed their doors shut), and Ren stopped at door number three, pushing it open and stepping inside of his room. Then he turned around to face Jove.
"So?" he said curiously. "What're we doing up here? Did you wanna play Scario Kart or something? Have some cookies? Take a nap?"
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Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2011 9:45 pm
Jove didn't reply to any of the questions once Ren let him in, instead he set to scanning the bedroom until he saw a door. Not likely the one he was looking for, judging by the pillows haphazardly piled up in front of it. Unless Ren simply used the bathrooms everywhere else in the school, Jove had to look elsewhere. He was given to understand that living creatures sort of needed to do things in washrooms every so often. What things, he had no idea, just that there were things done in there.
Looking in the other direction, he finally found the door to what he was looking for. A shower.
With a no-nonsense expression on his face, Jove pointed stubbornly towards said shower. There was no way he was going to sit down and play Scario Kart, or eat cookies, or even be able to stop breathing and nap if Ren didn't do something to prevent the terrible smell from accumulating in the dorm room.
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Posted: Tue Mar 01, 2011 10:02 pm
Ren watched Jove glance around the room, leaning against the desk as he waited. The puppy seemed to be looking for something - though what exactly that was, Ren was not entirely certain. On his bed, Usa lifted her head briefly to see who the newcomer was, then turned her head shyly away, burying her nose into Takashiro's side. The incendia merely looked bored, opening one eye briefly as if to say ho hum, and then yawned, seeming to fall back asleep once he saw his owner was there.
Jove was pointing somewhere. Ren's eyes followed his finger until he reached where the puppy was gesturing: the shower.
He blinked, momentarily nonplussed. "The...bathroom..?" he said slowly, looking first at Jove, then back to where he was pointing. "Why..." Oh. Comprehension dawned on his face and Ren laughed, shaking his head as he shut the door to his room, kicking off his shoes.
"You want me to take a shower," he clarified with a nod. "To get rid of the smell. Right. Okay. I can do that, though I can't guarantee it'll work."
Ambling into the bathroom, Ren turned on the hot water. He let it run for a few moments, then straightened, stripping off his clothing. He did not bother to close the door; it was not as if he were shy or hiding anything, and besides, it was only Jove - and then stepped into the shower - hot hot hooooottt.
After scrubbing mindlessly for several minutes, Ren switched from the shower to the tub, sinking down into the water and dousing his head beneath the surface. He let his fingers run through his still pink hair (it did not show any signs of fading out), and ran soap down his arms and legs, attempting to dispel the acrid odor. After repeating this process several times, Ren raised a hand to his nose, taking a sniff.
"Jove?" he called, eying said hand somewhat suspiciously. "I'm not sure this is working too well..."
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 5:22 am
It was a good thing the puppy was, well, a puppy, and didn't see nudity as downright indecent. It was a very awkward state from the point of view of one who wore such a lovely fluffy coat all the time in his natural form. He had once seen a pet foxfire with it's pants taken off, and had been told it was a "Lion Cut", and the little ghost had been terribly embarrassed on the dog's behalf.
So when Ren started undressing quite unashamedly in front of him, the pup was not shocked or traumatized, just uncomfortable. He set down his bag and turned to look around the bedroom as Ren showered, a light blush creeping up behind his freckles, and one ear swivelled backwards to listen to the sounds of water and scrubbing while idle thoughts drifted through his head.
His other ear turned to listen briefly when the shower stopped, and then again when Ren spoke up. This was not good...
Jove whirled around, scenting the air as he trotted over to the tub. Sure enough, the smell still radiated from his friend, piercing through the pleasant scents of soap and shampoo in the humid air. With a determined frown he kneeled down beside the tub and grabbed the soap himself, completely ignoring the water soaking into his sweater sleeves as he rubbed it against Ren's shoulder. He had to be absolutely sure and see for himself that it wasn't working.
Finally with a despairing huff he gave up and slumped in defeat, forehead bumping against the wet ceramic of the tub, sleeves and one end of his scarf dangling into the soapy water.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 6:17 am
"Jove," Ren said again as he mused over the shampoo bottle, reading the label. "I really don't think - ack!"
A small hand had reached around him, plucking the soap from his fingers. Jove was kneeling beside the tub, and Ren lifted a brow. "You know you're going to get those wet," he pointed out, but it was obvious the boil was determined because within a few seconds Ren had a little puppy scrubbing at his shoulder. He sat there comfortably, letting Jove try, but whatever it was that had caused the smell in the first place - damn that Minipet class! Ren thought - nothing they were doing seemed to work. The smell had lessened, but only by a little bit. The soap and floral shampoo that Ren used merely set to rest overt the acrid burnt FEAR, not dissipate it.
There was a soft thump, and Ren twisted around to see Jove with his head against the bathtub. He reached out, patting the top of his head (and dripping water on him in the process), then rested his arms on the edge of the tub, his head on his hands.
"You did your best," Ren said and let out a small laugh, shaking his head. "It seems as if my laziness did more harm than good this time. Or perhaps Professor Malcolm was just trying to make a statement about learning to work together in teams, rather than standing around awkwardly waiting for everyone else to do something first."
Pushing strands of pink hair from his face, Ren glanced down at Jove's now soaked sweater, the end of his scarf trailing into the bathwater. He lifted it up, wringing it out, and carefully unwound it from around Jove's neck.
"Better hang this up, or it won't dry," Ren said lightly. He set the scarf on the floor, and tugged his towel from where it sat on the sink. Standing, he shook his head, sending droplets of water spraying across the room, and tied the towel around his waist, letting the bathwater out. Then he hung Jove's scarf from the shower curtain rack, gently propelling the little puppy back into the room.
"And let's find you some dry clothes to wear, shall we?"
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 6:39 am
Jove gave his friend a curious head tilt as his scarf was unwound, and then scrunched his nose as Ren not only stood up completely naked, but shook more water onto him as well. The pup gave his own head a shake, and unsuccessfully tried to wipe the water off his face with his wet sweater sleeve.
He was still trying to rub at his face as Ren nudged him out of the bathroom, his sleeves dripping water onto his pants and the bedroom floor. At least his friend wasn't wearing those stinky clothes anymore. Either the removal of the clothes or the bath had made a slight difference, or Jove's nose was just becoming numb to the terrible stench, he could sort of tolerate it without covering his nose.
After a second he broke free from Ren's touch and ran back to the bathroom, picking up the discarded clothes with his fingertips and holding them at arms length like one would a venomous snake. He ran to the door and dropped them all out into the hallway. Just to be sure.
Now he would submit to whatever it was Ren wanted to do with him and his clothing.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 7:02 am
"That's not really going to get rid of the water, you know," Ren said with a laugh as Jove attempted to brush the drops from his face. It might have worked, were it not for the fact that his sleeve was already soaked, so all he was succeeding in doing was smearing more water across his freckled face. Stepping out into his room, Ren only gave an amused tilt of his head to the other when the boil dumped his clothing into the hallway. Oh well, he thought, moving towards his dresser. Whatever makes him feel better. And it DOES smell a bit nicer in here now...
Rummaging around in his drawers (there was a carrot in one of them - Rhys had clearly been in here again; that dang lepus was going to be the death of him), Ren glanced back at Jove once, then back at his clothes. Jove. Clothes. Jove. Clothes.
"All right," he said finally, pulling out a black, long-sleeved sweater and a pair of gray sweatpants out. He handed them to the little puppy, gesturing towards the bathroom. "Here," said Ren with a small smile. "Feel free to change out here, or you can change in there, if you'd like. But you can't stay in those; you'll catch a cold."
He supposed he should find clothes for himself now, and so Ren moved to his closet. Slipping a towel from one of the shelves, he absently toweled his wet pink hair until it had stopped dripping and then slipped into a long sleeved black shirt and his favorite pawprint pajama pants. He laid the damp towels over the back of his chair and crawled into his bed where it was nice and warm, stretching out on top of the covers and hugging a pillow to his middle as he waited for Jove.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 10:29 am
Jove did feel better having dumped a great deal of the smell's source outside the room. MUCH better.
He trotted back over to Ren contentedly, and hovered behind the gryphon while he watched the rummaging. However, by the third time Ren looked at him, Jove began to wonder what was up. Was his hovering being distracting? Or did Ren not like him dripping on the floor? The pup folded his arms loosely in front of himself, so the water simply soaked into the front his sweater rather than dripping onto the floor.
Jove rolled up the long sleeves of his sweater before taking the dry clothes Ren offered him. That was probably the point, being dry, although the pup didn't think it was possible to catch a cold in his current state of death. But he did like wearing clothes, and if it made his friend feel better, he would take off the wet ones. He trotted to the bathroom and kicked closed the door, finding a dry place to set down the clothing he was given before slipping out of his wet sweater. The plain white t-shirt he wore underneath was still dry, as were his shorts, but both the sweater and trousers were bundled up wet towards the inside and set on the floor as he examined the clothes he was given.
Pulling on the pants made him snort. It was a logistical failure, attempting to wear those long pants, even with the stretchy sweatpants waistband he would have been slipping right out of them. And tripping over them. Jove folded them back up and shrugged into the black sweater. It, on the other hand, was very comfortable, falling to about mid thigh on the little pup. He had to push up the sleeves for his hands to stick out, but what were hands to a kid who was more familiar with paws?
Satisfied that he was dry and all the important parts were covered, he scooped up the pants and trotted back out to offer them back to Ren.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 12:22 pm
Fingers tugging the blue and white striped fabric of the case, Ren rested his chin atop of the pillow, waiting for Jove to come back out. The boil had seemed worried about getting water on his carpet, but in all actuality it was not that big of a deal. And now that I think of it, Ren mused, humming absently to himself, picking at a stray thread. Jove's a ghost, isn't he? So chances are he won't be getting sick, either...
"By the way, Freckles," Ren called through to the boil in his bathroom. "I have a feeling those clothes are going to be a little - "
The door opened and Jove padded quietly out. The sweater was too big for him, falling a bit above his knees, and he held the pants balled up in his arms. Ren blinked.
" - big for you," he finished dryly and laughed, shaking his head. He took the pants from the wisp and tossed them lightly onto his pillow pile, then patted the spot on the bed beside him. "Come on, hop up. I'll give you some cookies and then maybe try to convince you to talk," he added teasingly, though he wasn't entirely serious about the last thing. Ren rather liked how Jove did not speak aloud.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 12:44 pm
The pup gave Ren a look as if to say "Of course they are too big, you are a giant," but he still didn't look displeased to be wearing the sweater. Quite the opposite, he rubbed his sleeved hands together, enjoying the unfamiliar feel of the sweater around him, and pressed his nose against them. The sweater smelled strongly of his friend, unlike the rest of the room at that very moment which smelled more like soap and burnt food.
Jove scrambled up onto the bed and wagged his tail in anticipation of cookies, crawling on all fours until he reached the place Ren wanted him to sit. Somehow he avoided kneeling on the long sleeves of the sweater as he crawled. When he sat down next to the gryphon, the sweater seemed to pool around him and emphasize his scrawny stature.
For a minute he tried to play it cool, like the cookies were no big deal... But when he glanced in Ren's direction his eyebrows went up slightly, the universal puppy sign for wanting food. He couldn't help it any more than the living could keep their chest from rising when they breathed.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 1:00 pm
Ren gave a nonchalant, vaguely sheepish shrug. "Hey, I can't help it if I'm a lot bigger than you are, Freckles," he said cheerfully, and suppressed a squeal of you are so totally cute when Jove began nosing the sweater. It was one of the ones he rarely wore, made of a fine cashmere that felt buttery soft to the touch. His parents had gotten it for him, but Ren hadn't worn it on principle.
"That looks much better on you than it does on me," Ren said, smiling at the boil, then stifled an amused laugh at that look. That look was similar to the one Ren gave Gabrian when he was pleading for something - the wide eyed, almost begging look that was undeniably adorable on Jove. Ren shifted over slightly to make room for him on the bed and then leaned over to his bedside table. Sliding open the drawer, he pulled out a box of chocolate cookies and plunked them beside Jove before pulling out another box, this one with colorful candy cooked into them. Alessa had made those, and they were Ren's favorites. He settled back down against his bed and pillows, munching happily on one.
"So, little one," Ren said. "We good now? No more being afraid of me?"
He wasn't really sure it had been him that Jove had been afraid of, but that little side of him that wasn't sure was making him a taaaad anxious. Though he tried to play this off, casually chewing on a cookie.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 1:15 pm
Jove blushed sheepishly, he was not given to paying attention to his looks, short of making sure he was dressed properly and his hair was presentable, so he couldn't quite tell if Ren's comment was all a joke or if it had some truth to it. But it didn't matter that much when he was only half-dressed to begin with, and Ren seemed to enjoy playful teasing as much as he enjoyed the cookies that always seemed to be floating around his room.
But speaking of cookies, Ren seemed to have pulled out something special this time around. These cookies didn't look quite as edible with the bright little flecks of colour decorating them, but it was clear from Ren's body language they were on a whole other level. Jove gave a tentative sniff, detecting the scent of cooked sugar through the pungent odour of burnt FEAR. So it was candy in those cookies, rather than chocolate? He eyed them curiously, but wasn't sure if he should take one seeing as they were special to his friend in that unknown way.
Although his eyes kept wandering back to the cookies, he found his own comfortable place to sit and snorted as if to say "Like I would ever be afraid of you." If he had been keen to verbalize the situation, he would have insisted something had just startled him. Maybe he would have brushed it off as seeing a bug he didn't like. Or some other unbelievable excuse would have come to his lips, because the last thing he wanted to do was admit he was freaked out by something as silly as a hand reaching towards him.
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 2:03 pm
Ren saw the faint tinge of red that spread across Jove's face, but chose not to comment on it, at least not out loud (however in his head he might have been awwwww cuuutteeeeee - ing a bit). The puppy was peering curiously at the candied cookies in Ren's hand, his eyes round with interest and an expression that read something along the lines of "WHAT are THOSE?" Ren smiled.
"Want one?" he said lightly, depositing one of the cookies neatly in Jove's lap before taking another one for himself. "My ghoulfriend made me these," Ren continued, looking at the cookie closely, as if examining it. "I'm not entirely sure what it is she puts in them, but they're amazing. Got some sort of chocolate and candy and sugar. Whatever it is, it makes them delicious."
He took a bite, savoring the sensation on his tongue and watched Jove shift around, getting comfortable. The derisive snort indicated that Ren was not, in fact, the reason for the scare. But if that were true, than what was? Ren did not want to pry, but seeing as how he had already grown stupidly attached to Jove unintentionally, there was really no helping his concern or worry for the puppy.
Reaching out, Ren gently took the boil's chin between his fingers, tilting his chin up so that he could look into his face. "Hmmmm you're a curious one..." Ren murmured, scrutinizing him for a moment before dropping his hand. "I'm not sure why you don't speak, but...I kinda like it. And your expressions give away a lot too."
He munched quietly on a cookie for a moment, then added "You know, if you're ever scared or something you can always come here. You know, to sleep or snuggle or anything." Ren perked up a bit, shrugging rather sheepishly. "I always find that snuggles make me feel better."
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Posted: Wed Mar 02, 2011 2:51 pm
Oh... They were from his ghoulfriend... Jove's nose wrinkled unintentionally at the thought, he was still at a point in his un-life where ghoulfriends were a bit icky, and he didn't understand the point of relationships other than family and friends. That Ren was actually interested in all that mushy romance stuff was a little hard to comprehend for the little pup, but he was able to understand why that made those cookies special. When you get stuff from someone who's special, it makes those things special.
He snuggled into the sweater he was wearing, case in point, and was contemplating the cookie now on his lap when Ren reached for him. A wave of ephemeral adrenaline rushed through him, but before he could be startled further physical contact had been made, and it was as harmless as Ren's hand on his chin. The vulnerability that had been in his eyes earlier that day returned to haunt his expression despite his continued attempts to hold it back.
Jove's cheeks flushed brighter and he looked away from Ren's gaze. This was the first time someone had said out loud that his lack of speech was anything other than a handicap. Although he was clearly touched by Ren's comments, he once again snorted and turned his head away at the mention of being scared. That was silly, he wasn't scared... And he was most certainly too old for snuggles! With an almost sulky expression he nibbled on the tasty candy-filled cookie.
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