Getting Back Into Routine

Who: Herbert and Charlotte.
When: Third period gym class.
Where: Schooool.

Charlotte was relieved to be back at school, vampire apocalypse seemingly... well, maybe not over, but moved on to somewhere else. She felt kind of badly for being glad it had moved on, but... what could she do? She'd put her attention towards organizing the meetings they'd all talked about before things had gone crazier. She still had to text people, which she figured would be easiest to do at lunch. During gym, she headed over to Herbert to pair up so she could talk to him.

Spotting her on her way over, Herbert broke into a huge grin and waved happily. Yes, he was focusing on the "it's over! things can get back to normal!" aspect of things instead of the "normal for a while" aspect of things that Olivia had been so adamant about. He didn't even want to think about it, he just wanted to give Charlie a hug and be glad she was okay, and move on to something happier.

The hug he did, albeit briefly, when she reached him. No sense getting the teacher mad at them, but he just had to.

Charlotte grinned and hugged him back, figuring the teachers were probably used to people trying to catch up when they saw each other. She still stepped back to start her warm-ups to show she was at least partially paying attention. "How are you, Herbert?" she asked.

"Really, really glad school's back in session," Herbert answered fervently. School meant routine and routine meant normal, or at least getting there. "Otherwise okay, though. I got a duckling!" He thought she might appreciate that where Olivia hadn't. "Sammy had duck eggs and he kind of made sure one... implanted on me, or... whatever they call it."

Charlotte smiled brightly. "So it thinks you're its mom?" she asked, more than a little amused with that mental image. "That's great. Did you name it?"

"Sammy named her, after a gryphon in a book he's read? Her name's Elda. And she thinks I'm her pa, thanks," he added with a grin. "Decided Sammy got to be the ma, since he's littler and has longer hair and stuff. I don't make a very good ma, I think, anyway. Dyou want to meet her sometime? Maybe over the weekend?"

Charlotte giggled over the ma and pa debate, looking pretty amused with the idea. "That'd be fun!" she said. "Maybe I can talk to her." She hadn't tried connecting with anything that young since her advancement, so it'd be a good experiment. "Do you remember those meetings I asked you about, before the, uh... vampires?" That last word she said very quietly, and after looking around to make sure no one was listening it.

Since the idea had crossed Herbert's mind to see if she could talk to Elda, he grinned and nodded. The second bit, though, he didn't smile quite as much for, but he nodded. "I remember. We talked about it when I came over, eh? Gonna get those set up, now?" Not today, he hoped. He didn't want Jordan to think he was canceling on her, or anything.

Charlotte nodded. "I'm aiming for tomorrow during lunch, out on the sidelawn - like we did before the mines." she said. "I figure... the sooner the better, just in case. Do you still want to come? And your friends?"

Herbert relaxed a little and nodded. "Tomorrow works, and yes, I do. I never actually got a chance to ask Stacey or Sammy...." Everything had kind of fallen apart before he'd had that chance, and after that he'd mostly forgotten. Other things had just been more important. "I'll hafta do that today. I'm supposed to see Sammy after school, so I can ask him then." He had various things to talk to Sammy about. Maybe he'd better take the time to write them down, or else he'd probably forget something....

"Well, if you don't get a chance or they can't come tomorrow, they can come to the next one. I'm sure we'll figure out tomorrow how often we want to do this." Charlotte offered. "Hopefully the time will be okay with everyone. If anything changes I'll be sure to call you tonight and let you know."

Herbert nodded, and dropped to sit for the sitting stretches. "I can't figure that a Friday at lunch'd be a bad time. I bet it'll be fine and everyone'll be able to show. Who all have you asked to come? Just the mine folks?"

Charlotte nodded again. "Dean and Joshua, Isaac, Chance, Thom... I think Isaac's girlfriend. Kaysen's not going to the first one, but hopefully the next one." she answered. "So that should be good. I'll feel better once we figure... something out."

"Peyton!" Herbert had to grin again. "Oh, good, that's probably a good thing. She's only just learned about... y'know, stuff. I told her about me and she wasn't too bad about it." Actually, she was really good about it. Herbert had been relieved. "Soon enough, there won't be anybody who doesn't know about people like us," he added, mostly joking. Mostly.

Charlotte smirked a bit and nodded slightly. "In a place like this? As crazy as things have been over the past month? It's amazing anyone remains... oblivious." Not that she said it like it was a bad thing. "I don't think I ever met Peyton - she wasn't at the mines, was she?"

"Nope. She didn't know then-- she thought I was crazy when I told her about all the dreams, back then." He was so glad she'd finally come around, even if it might've been hard for her. Not that he really knew whether it had been or not-- he hadn't really talked to her about it, except a little bit about himself and Geo being weres and about the mine stuff. He wondered briefly if he ought to ask her. "She's got red hair and kind of bright blue eyes." Which he could see properly!

"Well, I guess I'll meet her tomorrow, if she goes." Charlotte replied. "I have to ask Kaysen if she's getting a hold of certain people or if I am." She probably should have done that when she saw Kaysen yesterday, but she'd been trying not to get her hopes up on school starting back up. "I'm kind of glad so many of us were involved in the mine stuff, even if I didn't really talk to everyone during that. It shouldn't be too weird."

"Me, too," Herbert agreed. "It's like I met all these people already, so at least we kind of know each other, eh?" He stood up again and offered her his hands to pull her up, too. "Though haven't talked to a lot of 'em since.... How come Kaysen isn't coming?"

Charlotte took his hands and pulled herself up, debating momentarily on how to answer that one. "Kaysen is..." She almost said shy, but that was nowhere near the right word. "She has it rough." she finally answered. "People pick on her a lot and she's grown up as like, the school outcast. Which is stupid. But she's afraid if she's at the first one it'll make things go bad, or someone might be mean to her. I told her if anyone was I'd kick 'em out and stuff, but... she just wasn't comfortable with it. But Isaac will probably be there, and Chance maybe, and she knows Thom really well... so if everything goes okay the first time, hopefully she'll show up the next time."

"Peyton told me about that," Herbert agreed. "I remember she said something like... don't believe anything I might hear about her, because she was fine and not what people said. I hope she does come." He'd kind of like to get to know her better; he knew he'd never treat somebody shy and picked on poorly.

"Yeah, that." Charlotte agreed. "So... I understand why she feels the way she does. I just hope we can talk her into coming in the future. It was half her idea. Hopefully things will work out." she said, shrugging. "She and her brother were the first people I met here, they live across the street from me."

"Really?" Herbert hadn't known that. Apparently now he knew where Kaysen and Isaac lived, too! "That's pretty neat, and you're friends now, and you can just go across the street to say hallo whenever you like." He pretty much had to go halfway across town to see anybody, not that he really minded.

The teacher blew the whistle for jogging and he gave one final stretch before nodding towards the door out and the track. "I'll run with you," he suggested. It meant he wouldn't be going as fast as he could, but he'd rather stay with Charlie.

Charlotte smiled a bit at him and nodded as she took a slow start. "Thanks. You don't have to. My legs are... um... short." Though most people's probably were compared to Herbert's, and she couldn't help but look amused.

"Then I'll look really silly keeping back with you, but that's okay," he grinned, trotting along beside her with teasingly tiny steps. "You're much cooler than the people up at the front of the pack with the longer legs."

Charlotte laughed, not sure anyone had ever described her as cool before, but she was happy to take it. "Well at least I'm worth looking silly for." she said, smirking. Still, she tried to take longer strides for his sake. "So how did Sammy end up with ducklings?"

"He and Fallon found an abandoned nest," Herbert explained, his voice a little bouncy as he jogged along. "Fallon was gonna be the pa, but he kind of had to leave." Herbert still kind of wanted to hunt down whoever had chased him off and give him a stern talking to and then some, but he really didn't have the gumption anymore. "So he called me over when they hatched, instead, seeing as Fallon had told me 'bout them." Or had it been Sammy? He didn't remember, anymore, but one of them did.

"So you guys are playing mom and dad to ducklings." Charlotte replied, sounding immensely amused with that. "That's sweet." she added with a giggle. "How many are there?"

"Three," Herbert answered. "Elda, and his two, whose names are... I really don't remember, actually. Blade, maybe, for one of them?" Yeah, completely forgot, because that probably wasn't the name. "Well, there's three. I ought to take Elda over there sometime soon so she can spend time with her brothers. There just hasn't seemed like there was time...."

"Things have been a little apocalyptic." Charlotte agreed, doing her best attempt at a solemn nod whilst running. "At least it was just a temporary sort of apocalypse." she said, shrugging. "Or the traveling, location-specific kind. Whatever it is."

"A little apocalyptic," Herbert laughed a little. Oh, man, he wasn't sure whether that was funny, sad, or both. "That really fits. Traveling or otherwise." Maybe he'd just go with both. "I don't think I'll tell me pa that when I write him next, though."

Charlotte had to think about whether or not that was a good idea. At first, she thought that if he heard about it anyway, he'd worry. But would anyone outside of Michigan hear about it? She had no idea. "Probably a good idea." she agreed.

"I've had a hard time trying to figure out what to tell him," Herbert admitted, a little unhappily. "About everything that's gone on, not just the apocalypse stuff. I mean, I don't want to lie, but I don't want him to worry, either." He'd never really been in this kind of situation before, where he had to censor something to his pa, of all people.

Frowning, Charlotte had absolutely no idea what sort of advice to give. "That's... not a fun position to be in." she said. "I don't know what I would do in your situation. Have you guys ever been through anything... uh... weird, before?"

"Just my ma dying... and his cancer, I suppose was 'weird', but it's a really different kind of weird than... this." Really, their little homestead had been remarkably quiet. "Maybe I'll just try to be really vague and stuff. Then maybe he won't phone me up and tell me to come home immediately."

Charlotte smiled softly and nodded. She didn't want Herbert to leave, even if she felt a little selfish for feeling that way. "That works." she said. She realized she should probably be grateful that her mom knew about things that happened around town, though Charlotte hadn't told her about the mines. Her life would be so much more difficult if she had to try and hide things from a parent.