The Wrong Kind of Help (Patty & Cecil)

So like, school was fucking dumb. Like really fucking dumb but Patty had to be there by court order so there she was. SO much suck, dude. At least all she had to do was attend and graduate and that'd be pretty easy on its own, it was easy to game the school system. Everyone wanted you to like succeed and junk and they were willing to make certain concessions to make sure ya did. Things like accepting late work and make-up work or retaking tests for half-credit difference, all of which she was gonna abuse the living hell out of so she didn't have to spend as much effort on doing it the first time when she didn't want to. It was like, a major problem of hers that she worked a lot better with a fire under her ass but hey, if it isn't broke don't fix it. Patricia was just going to skate through her last year of school, get off probation, and go do whatever she wanted when she figured out what that was. Sure wasn't college. Screw THAT noise.

So it really really sucked for her to be here, she'd rather just go to work and spend all her time making her own way because she could do that however she wanted. Patty didn't need to take stupid tests to pay the rent, she could find any way she wanted to do it. So to get through the massive fucking ASS PAIN that was the school day she often had a little help. Sometimes a drink in the morning, sometimes something a little stronger. Today she was leaning on her go-to, which was her special "green tea"... which was actually pretty normal green tea. Except it had a couple of Adderalls in it. Honestly it was a pretty damn good feeling, she did a lot better in school with it since she could actually get the work done and it made everything look like it was moving slower and put her in a better mood.

Patricia happily wandered the hallways at school during the assigned break with a spring in her step and a slightly dreamy look in her eyes that was a lot calmer than her normally wild self, sipping from her water bottle from time to time. It sorta sucked because like, Adderall gave her dry mouth so she couldn't not be thirsty but whatever. She didn't care. She'd just get more, it wasn't a big deal.

Cecil found himself...a little more hesitant to wander the halls than before. Apart from the existing need to be able to find his way back to his classes he now dealt with before, there was the matter of what he might see or hear from the people around him. His earphones were firmly in as he tried to find a spot to himself, and he made a point of trying not to pay too much attention to anyone he passed by.
If he felt like there was a barrier between him and everyone else before, now it was a straight up wall locking him off from those around him.

As he glanced about to make sure he didn't crash into anyone else, his eyes flicked out and saw...Patricia, as the posters said.
Or, rather...Wicked, booze-loving witch of the Playhouse.
Fuuuuuuck.
He knew he didn't really have anything to fear from her, let alone in the middle of the school without a bloody suit of armour, but...
He had no idea what to do right now.
And rather doing anything...he froze.

Feeling particularly carefree at the moment Patricia decided to pop her hips and strut her steps as she graced the Seven Stars hallway. She was in a pretty good mood all things considered. Like, she'd found the perfect bar she could go fuck around in and not even pay. The hangover sucked dick but that's what you paid for success, yo. The skinny girl was pretty lightly doped up anyhow so it wasn't that terrible. Like always she went about her business just... talking to random strangers on her break. Sometimes she saw people she knew, sometimes she didn't, but cutting into conversations and just being chill was a good way to make new friends. It really didn't matter who it was, people were fun to talk to and you could just talk about anything and have a good convesation. But she'd see someone she knew from the other day. As Patricia unscrewed the cap of her "tea" bottle to take another drink her eyes would lock with a familiar set. And that was....

....? ....the fuck was his name agai- Cecil! Yeah, that guy! The gamer nerd that kinda sucked at dancing but not really sorta! He was looking anti-social as usual with that thousand-yard school-shooter They took my lunch money so I took their lives stare. Her lips would halt over the bottle but her absent-minded smile would twitch and just a little more light would flare in her easy-going eyes. She twisted the cap back on. So like, them making eye contact made her want to say hey but the way he just dropped his jaw and stood there? Patricia wanted to mess with him now. Like, that's what she did all break and he was easy prey. Like, he sure as shit wasn't gonna get away with pretending he hadn't seen her soooooooo she was gonna go talk with him. Patty gave a loose two-fingered salute in greeting and began to walk up to him with her hand on her hip.
"Yo dance machine, how the fuck are ya?!" she exclaimed probably a little too loud but it was the hallway, everyone was freakin' loud. No wonder he wore headphones some of these people were stupid as hell.

Fuckfuckfuckfuck whatwashedoing whydidhedothat she'slookingrightathim fuckfuckfuckfuck-
He almost leaped once Patty piped up, tearing out his earphones as if they were trying to burrow into his brain as he developed an expression that so perfectly matched his state of being at this very moment.
Namely, Cecil looked like he was freaking the fuck out.
"Hey, I-ah-uh-ay-um-ugh-agh-ahh-um-agh-"
He suddenly cuts off by facepalming hard, practically hitting himself in the face as he groaned loudly and forcefully into his hands. "The fuck am I doing, the hell is wrong with me, this is not how you greet someone and now the FUCKING ticking's-" His fingers press hard into his head as he takes a sharp breath out, and just takes a few more breaths. In...and out.

When he's done, Cecil shakes his head, and looks up with a pained expression on his face. "Sorry...I have no idea what's wrong with me today."

Patricia didn't react at first to Cecil coating the hallways with the spaghetti in his pockets except for her chest to rise and fall in a quiet chuckle. He was like this all the time she bet, dude reeked of awkward nerd. It was probably the headphones, like, someone that went that far out of their way not to interact with other human beings sent up giant red flags. It was kinda funny watching him choke on his freakin' tongue though. Like, he probably didn't know how to talk to girls or something. Even though he was talking to her yesterday, but he was kind of a weirdo then too. Maybe it was school or something? She kinda had a reputation with the popular girls and chicks like them ate guys like Cecil alive. She heard the gossip. Shit, she probably started some of it.

...goddamnit she hoped he didn't have a crush on her or something for asking him to dance. Pain in the ass...

Well, it was amusing up until he smacked himself in the head and started muttering. It looked pretty hard too. The lanky girl's smile dropped immediately as amusement turned into concern. Whatever this was it wasn't healthy. She stepped in to Cecil to softly grab him by the arm while he had his little freakout, leaning closely so she could talk softer.
"Hey hey hey hey it's okay, you're okay," she encouraged. Patricia wanted to tease him and shit but she didn't want him to fucking hurt himself. Like, she could be the queen of all bitches when she wanted to be but she knew when something was up with someone and usually how to handle it and people getting hurt bugged the living shit out of her.
"You okay? You wanna go for a walk? C'mon, let's go for a walk." The delinquent would try to coax him into moving with her with the intent to find someplace quiet where no one else was so he could calm down. Preferably where they could actually, y'know, walk. Walking made it easier to talk about stuff, it wasn't as threatening as pulling someone away and staring them in the face the whole time.

Normally, Cecil would have probably found himself rather uncomfortable with the proximity, especially considering the source and the prior context of such interactions with them, but honestly, he found it nigh impossible to care right now. In the midst of the freakout that he had spiralled down into, that was something that didn't even register in his mind.
What did register was the fact that his stupid antics had actually set her off worrying, and he really couldn't abide by that. All he'd done was see her about in the halls, a person that he knew more than she knew him, and because of that he'd frozen up trying to think what to do - something rather inexcusable, considering the answer was pretty obviously exactly what you'd have done any other time you absolute fucking moron - and then proceeded to do all of THIS when the inevitable happened and she caught him staring like a deer in the fucking headlights.
This didn't need to happen, it shouldn't have happened, and frankly the fact he'd done this and caused problems for the girl was a terrible indication in the first place.

Tick, Tick, Tick. As you are, such a failure was-
SHUT THE FUCK UP, ANKOU!
FUCK! OFF!

He nodded, and followed after Patty, taking shaking breaths as he pushed away and away at these swirling feelings and failed to remove them from where he could feel them torment him. For all he tried to control his features, the only thing he could manage was to tone down the blatant pain for a melancholy sense of self-loathing.
He simply put one foot in front of the other, not really thinking about what he was doing as he followed Patty on auto.

The lanky chick set through the halls taking long steps, walking quickly and with purpose. She dragged Cecil helplessly behind her by the hand, leading him through the flow of students with a serious look on her face. They got looks sure but she COULD NOT give a shit right then, that wasn't important. For the most part she could weave her way around people or they'd just get out of the way, only slowing down once behind a group of prep girls that wanted to take up the hallway but with a scoff and an intimidating Kuh! Move it, bitch! she was able to keep going. Naturally with Patty's thought process and actually some personal experience with this situation she wouldn't take him to the nurse's office but outside on the quad instead.

It was a lot quieter out here, at least away from the main areas like the doors or the outside lunch tables. As soon as they were able to get away she'd slow down to a leisurely pace to let him relax but tried to keep him walking. Like, she did this before. She knew what she had to do to get him to calm down. Patricia let go of his hand and brought her own to his back to rub it in slow, steady rhythm. As she did so she'd also start taking deep, exagerrated breaths loudly so he could match them. What she wasn't gonna do was look him in the face, get in front of him, or tell him to calm down or what he needs to do.

Patty would continue her relaxation technique she always used to help her friend Marcy with her freakouts until he was pretty much in control of himself. It'd probably take a while but she wasn't gonna be demanding. They could always walk along the outer campus for a while, you couldn't really rush this. If and when he could finally catch his breath she'd give him a little bit before asking.
"How ya feel? Feel better? You wanna lay down?"

It was weird. As he was pulled through the halls, Cecil didn't really perceive those around him. It was like they didn't even exist as people, the bodies that inhabited the pathways of the school all blending together as a formless mass. Their faces were present, their voices were heard, but they just didn't...register, really. Just an unintelligible clamour from the mass, punctuated by an ethereal tick.
As the emotions festered and intensified, he couldn't really focus much on even the girl dragging him about now, his breaths becoming more ragged and uneven as he was drawn through the blur.

Outside, though, the rabble was gone. Things stopped blurring by and things seemed to slow. He felt the sensation on his back, was able to pick out the breathing, and bit by bit, things started to calm and come into focus.
...he was calm. He didn't feel good, but he was calm.

Cecil took a few breaths as he put together his response. He wasn't going to say he was fine. He could, but frankly the lie would be obvious a mile off. That could lead to a variety of responses, none ideal.
"...better than before, yeah." He shook his head, his tone solemn and listless as he spoke. "Rather be able to sit back than lay down right now, but...I don't know. Think I just need something to focus on." He laughs weakly. "Maybe I should grab a drink. Something flavourful so I can think about that instead of everything else right now."

Patricia took a deep, shuddering breath of her own. Like, she knew he wasn't 100% yet. She could just feel it, she could feel the panic in him and knew he wasn't okay, at least not all the way. It was like... she could read the tension if that made any sense. Patty was about ready to push on his shoulder to guide him to the grass but he said he was thirsty. She looked at the water bottle in her hand. Nah... nah that wasn't gonna work. Adderall made anxiety attacks worse, they were a stimulant. There was a tiny chance he'd need it and it'd make things better but a MUCH bigger chance it was gonna make him faint or give him heart palpitations or something. Like, she didn't want to make this a thing.

The druggie chick chewed on her tongue as she thought, keeping quiet for a little while. Then she came up with something.
"Okay. So like, you stand around or sit down or something and I'm gonna be back in a second, okay?" she said as she turned to take off toward the outside lunch area. She didn't want to bring him along, there were people there and this was a quiet place so like, it'd be better for him to be here instead. But before getting far she'd turn around with a serious look.


She stalled for a moment to wait for his answer but not for long.
"...Never mind, I got you. Just hang on, I'll be right back okay?" Patricia waved as she broke into more than a jog, less than a run. At the outside lunch area she looked at her bottle pensively for a second and decided to chug the rest. Like, she was gonna fuckin' trip in about 15 minutes but she'd deal with that when it happened. For the moment she needed the bottle, and the water fountain. Patty dutifully washed her water bottle out to make sure it was clean and there couldn't be any drug residue on it before filling it back up and calmly walking it back. As she did so she'd open up a packet of her green tea and sprinkle it in, shaking it really good to mix it.

"Here." The lanky girl handed the bottle out to Cecil. "Drink this, it's gonna make you feel better." Hopefully this was gonna work, giving him the tea should calm him down a lot if it did.

Cecil looks blankly over to Patty, nodding with a half-smile on his face. "Alright then."
He watched her go off, only to raise an eyebrow slightly and give a mildly questioning look as he saw her stop and turn around. At the question, his eyes flicked away a moment, before turning back to Patty as he gave her another nod. "Yeah. I trust you."
A question like that had all sorts of implications, but they weren't worth mentioning. He doubted she'd slip him anything that'd make him loopy or something.

He waved back as Patty ran off, before...standing around a while. Thinking.
Tick, tick, ticking. It was less the little beak chipping away at his psyche than the hand dragging it further in the depths that he'd sunk to at this point. He didn't get him...as much, as before. But it was only more peace. He still found himself listening to it far too much. The ticking clock, growing louder, signalling the end of his peace and the encroach of suffering.
Did he listen to something? Try and cool off a little like that?
...no, she's not going to be long, no point. He'd probably just make himself look worse anyway...and for no benefit, come to think - it wouldn't have helped anyway.

It was...actually harder to enjoy the parts he liked about dealing with people like this, come to think. Did he hang around these people because he wanted to spend his time with them, or just because it would stop the hellish pestering of his mind's manifestation?
Was he letting the both of them think he actually enjoyed being around them when actually he just wanted to use them as a break from the problems that refused to leave him be, with little care for anything else?
A chill ran through Cecil.
He...wasn't doing that to people...was he...?

"Huh?" He snapped out of his reverie to spot the bottle, and took it in hand. "Thanks..." He took a swig, letting the liquid swirl around in his mouth a little as he tasted it before swallowing it down. "...this is nice."

The words had rung out in her head, drifting around her mind as she focused on her current activity of getting Cecil to calm down. I trust you. It was seriously the nicest thing anyone had ever told her since she got to Endymion, she almost wanted to cry a little. People didn't trust Patty but she never gave them a reason to trust her to begin with. She was a thug, she didn't think ahead, she fell through on promises, sometimes she could be a little manipulative... honestly not trusting her was the smart choice. It didn't make her feel any better to know that was the case, it just meant that people kept writing her off. But Patricia wasn't about to think about that right now, it's not like it was going to change for a while and she had more important stuff to do.

As Cecil swished the tea around in his mouth he'd find it to have that familiar tang that most brand green teas tended to have, although with a hint of something more... bitter and artificial. Patty continued to look concerned until she realized she was doing it, and forced her face to soften. Like, he was pretty out of it. He probably needed a couple minutes to collect himself or something.
"What are you doing standing around out in the grass like a crazy person?" she chuckled, lowering herself to the ground, "I thought you wanted to sit down? Aha, c'mon, sit with me." The purple-haired girl would pat the ground next to her to signal Cecil he should take a seat alongside her, but it didn't matter whether he did or not unless he walked away like a jerk.

The delinquent would sprawl out on the grass at first, keeping upright with her hands but she'd eventually fidget her way into laying back with a leg propped up on her knee and her hands behind her head, jiggling her foot in anxiousness. The Adderall was starting to kick in and she really wanted to go do things. Patty could feel her heartbeat quicken even though she was relaxed and the grass crawled underneath her. She closed her eyes so she could sink through the ground. It was a drifting sensation, like slowly going down a slide facing backwards but farther down than the grass was.
"...you can talk about it if you want," she spoke after probably a minute of not doing anything, "Like... you don't have to if you don't want to, but you can if it makes you feel better." Truth be told Patty would like to hear him talk about stuff, but not to hear what he had to say about it. Just to get him to talk about it. She'd understand if he didn't, like she didn't like to talk about the personal shit she was dealing with and didn't expect anyone else to either. That didn't mean that she wouldn't like someone there to talk to about it if she wanted to though and he probably would too.

Whether he would have noticed if he was in his right mind or not, Cecil didn't quite pick up on the look he was getting, taking another sip of the drink he'd been handed. He half-smiled again as he moved to sit by Patty, setting himself down and leaning forward a little. "Hey, you were the one who told me to. Don't prod me on it now."

...what was he supposed to do now...?
He was sat on the grass. He was drinking green tea that almost certainly had something in it, given the questioning and the taste. By his side, a girl he'd managed to worry through his ineptitude was now laid out on the grass, trying to help him out here. Just...why, he didn't know. As far as she was concerned, they'd only met each other once, and he hadn't exactly made the best impression either. Not that he'd done much better during the PT thing...when you're relying on the other person being drunk to not ruin any impressions you make, you kinda have a problem.
Maybe it was just to get him out of mind.
He could live with that. He wouldn't really be surprised.

"Hmm?" He looked over to the girl laying on the floor as he snaps from his inner monologue. "I...ah." He shrugs. "I'm not really sure how I would start anyway. What to say. I...don't really know just what happened back there. Not entirely sure what I'm thinking now." He sighs, and after a moment, takes another sip. "...how come you decided to do this? Probably woulda been easier to just...ignore me and leave me to it."

Patricia didn't open her eyes. She was too busy just living through the sensation of sliding through the floor. She was twisting now, like, rotating backward and to her right. It was like... a rollercoaster, but if you were like dreaming for it or in space or something. If she opened her eyes now she was going to snap pretty violently back into the real world. The druggie chick took powerful breaths, trying to keep her breathing regular through her sped-up heart rate.
"......that's okay. You don't have to explain it," she reassured, "We sometimes do things that can't be explained, or feel things, think things... but they're just what they are, like, you don't need to explain it. It is what it is." The delinquent popped an eye open to look at him, flinching from the introduction sunlight into her freakin' retinas.

"......yooouuuu were having a panic attack, dude. Sometimes those things don't have a reason, they just happen and it sucks. So like... you don't have to really explain it but like I dunno, some people like to talk about it, some people just need to calm down. You're okay." Patricia closed her eye again and tried to summon the sliding feeling back again. If she thought really hard she could imagine she was laying on an incline and trick her brain into doing it again. It looked like the tea was calming him down, so what she gave him was apparently working. She wasn't gonna tell him what it was though, he'd just go back to his freakout.

"Uuuuuum, because I wanted to," she answered to Cecil. Patty honestly didn't know in a specific sense or like a particular sense but she knew in a broad sense why. She was there, he was freaking out. She knew how to help him so she did. Patricia felt like she should of helped him so she didn't really think about it, she just did it. She smirked with her eyes closed. It was a pain being serious for this long, like, it was freakin' draining.
"My guy you were flipping the FUCK out. Like, I wasn't gonna just leave you there to like crawl into the fetal position or something." She'd laugh, but would speak again after a short pause. "I told you I'm not as big a bitch as people think I am." The lanky girl sighed, trying to break the sliding feeling with her eyes still closed and go the other way. Her heart was still racing with no cause except, y'know, Adderall.
"Soooo... liiiiiiiike... you cool?"

Cecil listened along as Patty spoke, continuing to take regular sips. Things without real reasons, things that you just can't explain...thoughts and feelings, actions and events...sure that didn't change what they were, but he wanted to at least be able to articulate it. To at least have the possibility to explain what's going on, to let them understand how it happened.
Or at least to know for certain there was no reason to it.

Because...she wanted to. It would have been nice to know why, though. What drove that want. Did she want to make things better, or did she want some peace?
He laughs a little to himself. Does it really matter? There isn't a lot people can do that you can't concoct a selfish motivation for, nice or not.
Should just be glad she thought this was worth it.
He sighs, and shakes his head, smiling a little more. "I don't exactly know how much of a bitch people do think you are. Just that you don't appreciate being called one." He laughs a little. "Not an amazing measure to go by."

Cecil pauses a little before replying. "I don't know. If I was cool, I figure I'd be a lot more popular right now. Better liked, at least." He looks forward again, and shrugs. "I'm feeling better at least, between your help and...whatever's in here. Not clueless enough to think this is normal green tea."

The lanky girl rolled over onto her front to look up at him. The sensation of just... rolling over was pretty damn far out. When she opened her eyes her vision wobbled a bit and so did she like the ground was gonna move away. But she was decently good at acting like she wasn't high at least, she'd just have to speak normal and not think anything weird like how the earth was always moving and how couldn't they feel it? Like, that was soooo weird though. She bet if she focused hard enough she could feel it movin- oh shit yeah she was doing something.


So like, some of that was a lie. She didn't actually stop talking to her, just for like halfway through the school year. Whatever, it makes the point. She broke into a grin when he started talking again. And Patty thought she went off on tangents.
"Ahaheh no Cecil I meant are you good?" she laughed innocently. Like, she kinda knew he wasn't cool. Like a cool kid. It was pretty obvious to anyone with any sort of social awareness. She wasn't gonna say anything about it though. At least not to him. He was just so freakin' naive, it was actually kind of adorable. Her grin would fall into an evil smirk when he guessed what was so "special" about the tea.


Patricia pulled herself up to her knees and sat back, head kinda tilted to match the ground. She never noticed it was tilted before now, that was pretty strange.
"Ahaheh, it's the Placebo Effect. I made it sound like there was something in it so you'd think there was something in it to help you relax. Soooo... you calmed down on your own. And now that you calmed down on your own you know you can do it, so I can just tell you and not mess it up. The Placebo Effect is seriously just as strong as anti-depressants, I'm not even lying."

The compulsive liar gave him a wide, friendly smile. A lot of people liked to think she was dumb because she did goofy shit and made stupid choices but like, she knew what she was getting into when she made them. She wasn't as stupid as everyone thought she was, and this was freakin' proof yo.