"He's a new kid on the block." Tiffany explained, pointing towards the moving van and the kid on the front lawn.

The afternoon sun was sweltering, but the dry heat meant that no one was really sweating. That and the occassional breeze made being outside tolerable.

"Yessssss!" Anthony pumped his fist in the air wildly and filled with energy, as he was often known to do. "That means we aren't the new ones any more."

"Oh brother!" Bobby exclaimed, leaning against the tree at the edge of Shawn's yard where the kids had gathered. "It sure is gonna be fun to have a big group during the last two weeks of summer, even if school is about to start soon."

"Hrmmph!"  Ralph grumbled. He was in a bad mood today. In fact, a mad mood as of late, as far as Shawn could tell.

Michael sat there looking at the scene unfolding, his face expressionless, his eyes shifting towards the van and then each member of the group.

Shawn watched the moving van, trying to see if there was anything being moved in that could give him an idea of what kind of kid was moving in. He felt fairly certain this might be one of Griffix's 'lost souls'. "I wonder what they're like."

"Oh wow! A new friend!"

"Yes! It's probably gonna be a fantastic end of the summer guys! Just think about all of the fights we're going to have. We should have, like a huge WWF wrestling tournament and I'll be Rick Flair!"

"WHOOOOOO!" Anthony said, doing his best Rick Flair impersonation.

"Eh. That sounds like a dumb idea." Tiffany said between bites of the green apple she was holding.

"You're dumb." Anthony retorted.

"I know you are, but what am I?" Tiffany responded, smiling as she crunched away at her Apple.

"Dumb." Anthony said, answering the question that was asked.

"I know you are, but what am I?" Tiffany said in a louder voice,  smiling even wider this time, bits of white apple in between her teeth.

 “I’d be Ricky Morton, probably.” Ricky Morton always got beaten up, but he was always the bravest man in the ring.

"Oh yeah! Ricky Morton!" Anthony said, approving of Shawn's idea. "That's a good choice."

"You can be Ravishing Rick Rude if you want Ralph." Anthony said, taking on the role of the older kid in the group and assigning Ralph his wrestler.

"I don't want to play." Ralph said in a dull, bored voice. "Wrestling is stupid anyway." He gave Anthony an angry glare, and it looked like that glare extended to Shawn for a second or two, before Ralph looked down again, where his feet were, sitting on the curb.

"Oh come on, Ralphy-poo!" Anthony chided. "Don't be such a baby. Everyone knows wrestling isn't stupid. It's the best! WHOOOOOO!"

Shawn did his best to play peacemaker among the group."Hey Ralph, wanna have some juice? I was going to go get some."

"No." Ralph said in a nasty, snippy way. It was the tone of a child refusing any help that an adult or authority figure would offer. A spoiled toddler.

"No. I don't neeeeeed it." Ralph reiterated, a sense of disgust in his voice.

"Oh sheesh. Now you guys have gone and got him upset. What's wrong Ralph?"

"Eh, you can't blame a fella for trying." Anthony said, giving up on Ralph and pointing out the moving van.

"Look! I see the new kid now!"

He pointed across the road at the moving van. To Shawn's surprise it was immediately clear: Bradford stepped out of the passenger side of the car, adjusting his glasses.

"He's got glasses, he must be smart." Tiffany said, approving of Bradford's appearance from a distance.

Shawn keeps a poker face, even as he squints at Bradford's head. Was his face still scarred? He knew he'd been tattooed to hide it, but this was the first time he'd met him in the 'real' world.

Bradford waved his hand to single that he saw that the gaggle of kids were waiting on the side of the road. He started to walk over. Shawn noticed that there didn't seem to be any adults exiting the large U-haul moving van. Instead, there was just a bunch of workers, pulling out dressers, sofas and other materials to move into the house.

As Bradford came closer, Shawn could see that all traces of the scarred face were gone. Closer still, Shawn saw that Bradford appeared both peppy and happy. It reminded Shawn of how the boy appeared in the cabin so long ago with Ron - ever optimistic, tight up to the point when Shawn had written all of those names down in the Book.

"Hi guys!" Bradford said with joyousness that was on the verge of falseness. He nodded at Shawn, as if to say 'you know me, but you don't know me.'

"I'm Bradford! Bradford Stork."

Shawn kept any glint of recognition from his face. "Hi Bradford, I'm Shawn! It's nice to meet you!"

Everyone greeted Bradford except Ralph, who watched the exchange between Shawn and Bradford with a mix of curiosity and disbelief on his face.

"I'm from the Mid-west. Out in Kansas. We don't have any beaches. So, what do you guys do around here?" he said, looking at Shawn.

"You're from the mid-west too? I'm from Wisconsin!" Shawn just grinned and acted like nothing unusual was going on. "We just, I dunno, do stuff? Do you know any good games?"

"Games?" Bradford repeated in a question. "Oh yeah. We used to play all sorts of games where I'm from. But something terrible happened that ruined my whole life. So we moved out here." Bradford said with joyful voice and smiling face that didn't seem to match the words that came out.

"O......kaaaaaay" Anthony said, skeptical of Bradford's response, treating the newcomer and his answer perhaps like an odd duck that had wandered into an already familiar social situation. An outsider.

Tiffany chewed up her apple and threw the remaining core behind one shoulder where it landed in the grass. "So, what happened to your old life?" Tiffany asked.

"Clowns." Ralph barked, harsh, angry gravel in his voice.

Bradford gave Ralph an angry glare. The creases on his forehead were lined for a moment, nose wrinkling upward in a disgusted scowl. Then his facial features softened. "No, nothing like that." He chuckled, in a fake laugh. "I was just, just joking. Ha-ha. Get it? It was just a joke." Then he looked back over his shoulder at the moving van.

"Well, I gotta help my Dad unload the stuff. His name is Clayton if you see him. We'll probably have a house warming party at some point. I'll catch you guys later."

And with that, Bradford trotted back to the moving van.

Tiffany pulled a jolly rancher out of her left shorts pocket. "That was weird." She said, popping it into her mouth.

"mmm." Anthony said, looking off at Bradford with a face that was devoid of all emotion, but was clearly observing the newcomer with some kind of interest.

"Whatever. I don't like him." Anthony said. "He's got glasses. That's one thing. You can't trust a guy with glasses that big. And, he's weird. What the heck kind of an answer was that? A real downer that's what he is."

"I bet he was just nervous, 'cause he's new. You remember being new, right?" Shawn didn't like the sound of Clayton being Bradford's dad, but among the other kids on his block, he was the nice, sympathetic kid who had a nice word for everyone. He couldn't really badmouth anyone.

Tiffany popped another Jolly Rancher in her mouth, this time a green one. "I dunno. Maybe." She said, on the fence.

"Mmmm..." Michael said, giving nothing away about his feelings.

"I don't think so. That kid is a weirdo, no matter how new he is. I mean, gimme a break." Anthony said.

OOC: To Convince the others, Shawn may rolls Wits + Socialize. Each success represents one kid convinced. Ralph may not be convinced.

OOC: Not sure if Striking Looks counts here, so rolled it separately!

07:50, Today: Shawn Cramer failed (no successes) using 3d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s with rolls of 2,4,4. Wits + Socialize.

07:51, Today: Shawn Cramer rolled 1 success using 2d10 with the World of Darkness nWoD system with a target of 8, rerolling 10s with rolls of 8,3.  Striking Looks?

OOC: Striking looks definitely counts. Thanks for remembering, we'll count that as 1 success.

"Ehh. What do I care." Anthony said, shrugging his shoulders. "Everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt, ay, Ralphy-poo?" Anthony slapped Ralph on the shoulder with a loud thud, that was a bit too hard.

Thwack!!

Should could hear the sound of Ralph's torso vibrate from the blow. And Shawn could see Ralph's eyes water up a bit. He was on the verge of crying, but Anthony seemed completely oblivious to this and just kept right on talking.

"You've got a point there Shawn. Maybe we go over his house and see what's what? Huh? I mean, he can't be that bad. And he probably needs some friends since he's new. It would be like when Rick Flair fought Sting, you know? But eventually they became big time allies and then they were part of the Four Horseman. WHOOOO!"

Tiffany reached into her other pocket and pulled out a Butterfinger candy bar. "I don't know" she sighed as she opened the yellow wrapper while leaning against a tree. "I'm a pretty good at seeing people the first time. I mean, him saying that something ruined his life. That was the first thing he said! That's inexplicable."

"That's not a word."

"What? Inexplicable? Yes it is." She took a bite of the Butterfinger bar. "It's a word. I've taken enough spelling bee tests to know that."

"But that' not what this is about. Stop trying to subtract from what we're talking about Anthony. What we're all saying is that he's a weirdo. That's a fact. Whether he's a bad weirdo or a weirdo that isn't bad...I guess we'll see."

"I still don't like him though."

"Not right now. I'm in a stay and see."
This message was last edited by the player at 02:06, Wed 03 Jan 2018.

"It's wait-and-see. Wait-and-see mode." Anthony corrected. "He seemed nervous is all. That's probably all it was."

This message was last edited by the player at 02:06, Wed 03 Jan 2018.

"hmmmm." Michael said, observing the conversation.

Shawn was glad he'd managed to convince at least one of them. "I mean, he's moved in right here, so it's better if we're friends with him, 'cause we're gonna see him every day."

"That's the spirit!" Anthony said, and he punched Shawn in the arm in a playful manner. Still, it felt hard. Like maybe Anthony didn't know his own strength. After all, he was a slightly older kid.

OOC: Shawn decides whether he liked or disliked being punched in the arm. No dialogue is necessary. Then Shawn decides whether he will allow himself to show those feelings to the group. If Shawn decides to conceal his feelings:

Shawn Rolls Composure + Subterfuge to do so successfully. Only 1 Success is needed.

Tiffany took another bite, and Shawn noticed a bit of the chocolate had melted onto her hand, the summer sunshine still blazing down from a cloudless sky.

"Nope." Tiffany said. "You don't convince me. I'm incovniced. He's weird. Good or bad, we don't know."

"That's not a word."

"Good and Bad are both words!" Tiffany shot back.

"ahhh..." Ralph gasped and at this point he started to cry a little from that slap on the shoulder or back, or wherever Anthony had playsfully hit him.

Shawn didn't mind being punched in the arm, even if it was a little hard. He grinned happily. Though that grin fell away when Ralph started crying. "Hey Ralph, wanna get some juice?"

"Yeah...*sniff*..*sniff*...juice." Ralph said, getting up and agreeing to go along with Shawn. The two separated from the group who was still very much interested in the moving van and speculating on what or who the newcomer was.

Ralph trolled alongside Shawn, shoulders slumped, one arm reaching over to the part on his body where Anthony had given him a rough jostle.

"It hurts." He said.

"All right, let me see..." Shawn didn't think Anthony's play hit would've actually hurt Ralph, but taking it seriously would probably make Ralph feel better. He kept up the conversation as he looked under Ralph's shirt sleeve. "What kind of juice do you want?"

There was a slight, reddish hue to Ralph's skin where Shawn looked, but there was no bruising.

"Orange juice." Ralph said in a grumpy voice.

The boys began to walk, Ralph slightly whining about how rough Anthony was.

"Oh wow, Ralph, you're pretty tough. There's barely even a mark. Let's get you some of that orange juice." Shawn walked with Ralph, trying to keep the boy distracted with happier thoughts. He tried to smooth things over with Ralph and Anthony, mostly by praising Ralph's obviously resilience and maturity as the reason Anthony thought he could get a little rough with him.

Ralph seemed to move on from Anthony, but his dour mood persisted. "I hate this place." He said as Shawn approached the front door.

"I hate Mom. I hate Dad. I hate being here. I hate my Rubba-sucky too."

"There's good stuff, too, though! We're here together, so it can't be all bad." Shawn tried to sound reassuring, friendly. He deliberately was trying not to think about how truthful he was being.

Into the kitchen, Ralph grumbling all the way. "I want my juice!" He complained and demanded at the same time.

Shawn was in front of the refrigerator. Mom was at the kitchen table the harvest yellow-colored phone held against her head with her left hand, right hand twisting the coord in tangles as she spoke with nervousness to whomever was on the other line.

"Oh." She said into the receiver, paying no mind to Shawn or Ralph and not even caring or noticing their presence. "....yes....why yes....uh-huh...yes....of course." She said, fingers still twisting the coord into a ribbon of a knot.

"Well I'm sure that Shawn can make it on those dates Mr. Bronstein....yes...yes he would be fine with doing whatever is necessary."

Shawn heard his name on the phone, and tried to listen in more closely, even as he went to fetch Ralph's juice to keep him quiet too.

"Yes....yes...uh-uh..Well of course...yes. I'm sure he would be happy to take the part....yes. He's a star you know, he just hasn't hit the right movie yet...yes...uh-huh...yes...Yes I understand that this is probably...yes...Well it's better to be positive about his career, don't you think?...yes...yes...OK, well, we'll be there tomorrow then."

Mom hung up the phone and rattles her nails along the table, drumming them anxiously. She didn't even look up or hear Ralph complaining about how he wanted the juice that Shawn was holding in the glass.

Shawn gives Ralph his orange juice, then goes into the fridge to get himself some apple juice. As he goes to get his glass, he's careful to make enough kitchen noise that Mom would definitely hear and realise he was there.

"Oh hi honey." Mom said to Shawn, the chair turning around and screeching. "There's my star. Why don't you come over here for a second?"

Ralph gulped down the juice with lugging sound, his throat moving up and down, the cords on the side of his neck straining as he tried to force the liquid into his mouth as quickly as possible without breathing.

But he stopped as Mom said that. He narrowed his eyes. His hand tightened on the glass, knuckles turning white, the glass shaking.

Shawn caught Ralph's change in demeanour, but he doesn't have any way to reassure him with Mom right there. So instead he goes over to Mom. "What's happening, Mom?"

"Well honey. You have an appointment with Director Bronstein tomorrow. You have to ace the part OK? You just have to." Mom was nervous.

"It's so important honey. It really is. I mean it really is important. It's everything. I know you're a star. And you know you're a star. And I know that Daddy doesn't think you're a star. He thinks that you being an actor is silly. And that you should be more focused on more practical things that make men, men. But we'll just have to prove him wrong."

"OK honey? We're going to prove Daddy wrong." Mom clenched her fist in determination.

Then she placed both hands on Shawn's shoulders and looked him square in the eye. "Daddy doesn't have a job right now, honey. So that means that he really isn't a man. So that means, sweety, that he doesn't get to say what is silly and what isn't. And if my baby boy wants to be a star, that that's what he's going to be."
Mom's voice sounded sweet and filled with syrupy honey as she spoke to Shawn in a way that adults phrase words to kids. But her seriousness was firm and determined. She meant what she was saying. Her eye's never left Shawn's eyes while she spoke.

The way Mom was talking about Dad made Shawn feel a little uncomfortable, but he didn’t show that on his face. Instead, he just looked determined. “I’ll make you proud, Mom.”

"Good." Mom said, letting her hands fall to her side. "Tomorrow, we're going to go and bring you to the set."

"It will be good. Honey. It will be fine." Mom said, voice not very convinced that things would, in fact, be fine.

"OK. Run along now. Be a good boy with Ralph and go play." Mom said, giving Shawn a kiss on the cheek.

"Okay Mom!" Shawn lets Ralph finish his juice, then grabs his hand and leads him outside. He's not entirely sure why, but he feels like he needs to do damage control with Ralph.

OOC: Shawn Joins Thread

Shawn: The Jealous Kind