Welcome to Gaia! ::

For Khaldun, homework didn't exist. He'd never produced any the past year without someone breathing down his neck in detention to motivate him. He skated by barely on tests, but overall he was not a star student by far in the ranks of Hillworth. By some miracle he'd avoided being caught in his quest for petty vengeance this past week, so this weekend he was actually outside getting some sunlight and air and not writing lines. Being one of the older students in the school meant he had certain advantages regarding being able to leave the school grounds on weekends.

He wanted to swing by the bookstore and flip through some of ones about lock-picking again without having to pay for it. Khaldun was cheap as hell, because he never seemed to have a cent of spending money. In fact, the money he'd spent today had come from a longstanding blackmail threat whose victim had finally paid up. The money had been well spent, in Khaldun's opinion, on a bag full of feeding crickets from a pet shop, and the rest of the cash he'd set aside for the poker game down the hall during the week.

He'd been in the store for ten minutes already, propping his current read up on the shelf and flicking pages along as he grew bored with the technical terms. Never mind this, then. He'd just have to settle for a less reliable method. The book closed with a snap, and he made as if to leave. And stopped.

Oh boy, a cat. Khaldun had seen and heard about way too many cats lately. He was afraid if he was too close to another he'd catch crazy cat person disease. But there was something far more interesting to look at than a cat here, and that thing was bent over in a very distracting way to Khaldun. A girl, probably around his age, maybe a year or two younger at most - he could never tell. But from what he was seeing, he liked her already. Delicately, Khaldun rolled the paper bag in his hands tightly closed, which only served to slightly dampen the chirping coming from within. It was ten or so steps to the end of the row of books where the girl had stopped to pet the cat, and he'd wait until the show was over to say anything. He could do this. Just act naturally, brush the dreads out of his face that kept falling in front. Yeah. And try not to drop the crickets.

Khaldun was, needless to say, not choosy. After all, she was a girl, and she was actually within hand-holding radius of him, which was a change enough from the halls of Hillworth. Freedom from Hillworth was great. Being around women during his freedom from Hillworth was even better. And being around a woman who actually addressed anything in his direction? FINALLY.

Khaldun met her gaze, mind working quickly to pick out the right words and fast. She looked like one of those intellectual types, with the glasses, and being in a bookstore and all. Now of all times he regretted not paying attention in English class - Khaldun's mind was well and truly devoid of the reading of literature. How would he impress her now if he couldn't blurt out facts about some random 'classic'?

"Oh, hah, no. I don't do pets. These guys are for a... friend of mine." The sort of friend that was more like an awful co-worker and professional track nightmare. Keep it focused, Khal, keep it focused. The bag crinked a bit in his hand as he shifted it. "He'll know what to do with them."

"Do you come here often?" As soon as the words left his mouth he wanted to strangle his tongue. Of course she came here often! She had glasses!! He shifted on his feet a bit so that he was now leaning casually against the bookshelf with his arms folded, trying to hide the fact that he just didn't know what to say to an intellectual girl.

Khaldun liked to think he could predict people pretty well, but there was just one area of human psychology he was unfamiliar with. And that was the kind he was currently dealing with - the mysteries of what women wanted in men, and the signs that a woman did not want Khaldun. Even with every warning sign right in front of him, Khaldun couldn't help but keep going. Around a girl, he was simply all hormones and no tact, and never, ever learned. He flashed her a smile. "Why wouldn't I be?"

Khaldun stretched an arm along the bookshelf so that he was creating a sort of leaning human corner in front of her. There was a cacophony of cricket chirps coming from the bag he had in his right hand, preventing the silent part of the awkward silence but leaving the awkwardness to fend for itself in the relatively small space between Khaldun and the girl. His left hand was dangerously close to her hair.

A fatal mistake.

Pleasantly surprised to not be the one making the move this time, Khaldun's eyes never left the girl's face. She wasn't pretty, by normal standards. Kind of a brooding look to her. But from the look in her eyes, she seemed sharp-

Khaldun's finger didn't stand a chance. The bony snap was punctuated by several very choice and crude expletives directed at the ceiling, piercing the otherwise quiet ambiance of the little bookstore. The bag of crickets hit the ground with an unpleasant crunch and some rustling, but miraculously didn't burst open. His good hand was squeezed tightly around his new injury, with blood seeping through his fingers. It felt like his hand was on fire and he had to grind his teeth together to keep from crying out.

Now, it was one thing to have your finger broken in a fight. Maybe you punched a guy with your fist the wrong way or you hit some bone; you might break one of your own fingers. That's tough. You could get your hand slammed in a car door or something - not that Khaldun had a car to do so in anyway - and that's an accident. But Khaldun had just had his finger broken by a girl. It was in Khaldun's opinion perhaps the most awful circumstances possible to break one's bones if one had any intention of keeping a cool reputation in school (and the Negaverse). But he'd forgive her if he could wrangle something out of her, even a phone number. She was a girl, after all. IT WAS DIFFERENT WITH GIRLS.

"I guess... you d-don't go in for... holding hands..." he grunted, clutching his hand to himself as though it would do anything for staunching the blood flow. Even wincing, he managed to give her another smile, though this one could be mistaken for simply a grimace of pain. Khaldun never gave up on women.

"... But you take sonnets, right?" Another grin that was mostly a grimace and did nothing for his already unfortunate face. It wasn't a rejection if he didn't feel rejected yet! Anyway, maybe she was just a little on the feisty side. After all, she was joking around and smiling now.

"Oh, wow." He followed her gaze. She was right; that was a lot of blood all over the floor, and now a disconcerting amount staining his shirt. He straightened up about three-quarters of the way, though he seemed unable to loosen the grip on his injured finger just yet. Slowly, very slowly, he unclenched his fingers. One wrong move and it'd be just gushing blood horror movie style, he feared. In the end he was left with one hand bleeding profusely and another simply covered in blood. Giving the bloody grip hand an absentminded brush along his bloody shirt to do what he thought was dry it, he bent down and grabbed the paper bag orchestra off the ground. "I'll, uh, take care of that right away."

He stood there a moment as though unsure whether to leave and deal with his blood-soaked clothing, or stay here and give the girl yet another shot. His eyes finally alighted on her one more time with an indisputably off-kilter notion behind them. "Y'know, for all that, I could at least get your name...?"