capeandcowllogs | Listen son, said the man with the gun

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Listen son, said the man with the gun

WHO: Snape and whoever wants feelings
WHERE: Various places in the City
WHEN: Today, March 8th
WARNINGS: Snape. Feelings. This is going to be hideous.
SUMMARY: Snape runs into people and, against his will, listens to them fess or fesses to things himself.
FORMAT: WORDS; i will match tagger's style!

Since the morning, Snape had felt-- off. Something about being alone in the house sat poorly with him, and the lab offered him no consolation or peace. So he set everything to stirring, fed the cat and the plant, and left the house to find something resembling company, though he could not fathom the idea why. People were fallible, foolish things and normally he avoided them. But today, today--

--something was wrong and he needed to let it out.

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Mike is usually so good at keeping his emotions in check.

...

Okay, that's not entirely true. Mike is usually very good at keeping his negative emotions in check. But today, today he just can't seem to repress them the way he's used to.

Cooking usually takes the edge off, and when that doesn't work he hits things. Now he's done the baking, and then some, but for some reason the hitting? The hitting just didn't occur to him. Maybe a walk would serve him better. Yes, a walk with a satchel full of freshly baked bakedgoods.

...those smell goddamn delicious.

Snape stops, where he is, that generous nose enticed by the smell of ...something tasty. Normally you don't just smell fantastic baked goods on the street, but-- there.

There's somewhere near by.

Now if he could just find out where. He starts to follow his nose.

At some point Snape will find He Who Holds The Baked Goods, and that place will be a bench in a park, holding court over a bunch of pigeons.

"It's just...I can't shake the feeling that I'm a side character in someone else's story. You know?"

The pigeons don't know, but they're willing to listen so long as he keeps tossing them some of that banana nut muffin.

"Yes," he says, surprising himself with how easy it came. It was like he was-- inexorably drawn to sit on the bench.

Maybe even nod and listen.

Why?

Mike was looking down, and so didn't see the somber wizard approach. Which is why when he looks up he at first believes that one of the birds is the source of the voice. It's only after he's stared at the birds in confusion for a second that he realizes there's someone else there.

"Oh! Oh I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."

Pause.

"You do?"

"Of course," he says, and he doesn't even know why, but it feels safe to share. "Cast as some two-bit red herring villain. Like personal tragedy is some bloody backdrop to someone else's story. I exist to give someone else something to hate, to be distracted by... to reveal the harsh truths that better men than I can ignore."

Yes, yes he feels like this very often.

"...somehow I doubt you're in the same role, however."

"Not as much, no," he says gesturing to the open spot on the park bench. Please, Creepy Wizard he once met at the Green Grocer, have a seat.

"I'm just...the baby. You know? Youngest of four, despite the fact that we're all exactly the same age. Because I'm the one who doesn't let our circumstances dictate my every move, I'm the one that gets saddled with the baby name. And then it's all Leo and Raph fight and Don goes off on his own, and Splinter is all mystical and Asian. And when it all goes to crap, I'm the one that has to bring everyone together. I'm the one holding the family together.

Yeah, sure, I don't always remember everything, but somehow I'm the only one who seems to pick up on the fact that Don doesn't eat meat and hasn't since we were like nine. And Leo? Leo hates cilantro. Splinter puts waaaay too much sugar in his tea.

But I'm the bad one for not putting my game controllers away just so, and I'm the one that's immature because I like cartoons and comic books."

Snape didn't quite know what to make of it all; but he nodded and listened.

"You sound like a Weasley," he notes. So many siblings and defined by who they are. "Ronald Weasley in the City. I'm sure he could empathize. Second youngest, and youngest son. Ginevra, his sister, too -- they know very much about being the 'baby' of the family. But they managed to do great things, the both of them, despite it all."

Something Snape couldn't empathize with, being an only child-- but that was that. But even know he can be honest: without Ron, Harry would have been doomed, 'baby boy' Weasley or not.

"Yeah? I don't know them, maybe I'll look them up."
It's not something he'd have considered before, but today? Today seems like a day to consider everything.

He pauses in this thought to toss the birds some more baked goods.

"Well, if it makes you feel any better? I don't hate you. I think you're kind of cool. Your voice alone is awesome. For serious."

Sanji was feeling the itch as well, all morning he had been weirdly unsettled and couldn't put his finger on why. Nothing had really been different, lately, not since his birthday. Cooking and preparing to cook usually took the edge off whatever was bothering him, so he hit the streets to take a long walk to his favorite small markets to pick up unique ingredients. He had an unusually strong craving for satsumas, moreso than usual, and only one place had them.

He walked briskly without a coat on this gorgeous day, the cigarette in his mouth trailing smoke behind him. The market was around the corner, so he would have to make a decision within the next few steps - stop and finish his smoke, or put it out and save it for later. Tough choice, indeed.

The grocer near his shop is a fantastic place and Snape is quite fond of it. A wonderful variety of foods to feed his strange urge to occasionally create something new in the kitchen instead of in the lab.

He was near to the shop as the -- man with the strange eyebrows and most ridiculous soul strip ever (and in a city that had Megamind and Tony Stark, there was quite the bar set for facial hair). He stopped, glancing at the man before he flicked a hand--

--and a breeze carried away the smoke. Mostly back into Sanji's face, but-- it just happened that way, really.

Sanji was more than used to his own cigarette smoke, but the abrupt breeze, well, that made him flinch just enough and flail an arm. "What the...dammit!" He stopped, almost positive that the tall guy in black had waved at him, coincidentally or not. He didn't recognize the fellow, though, and merely stopped to peer back at him. "What the hell are you looking at?" he snapped, taking out his irritation as needed.

Snape fixed Sanji with a look, brief and steady. He's seen you before, little man, all smarming it up in Callie's various posts. Hrmph. Barely more than a boy. He's not jealous-- not like that, at least. Still, he knows a headstrong stripling when he sees one, and that? He disdains it simply for it being too Gryffindor.

"Probably just the average fool," he replied. "Why, do you think you're more than that?"

"Well more than average in more than just foolishness," Sanji retorted. He turned up his nose slightly at the overall look of the guy, greasy hair and all. "But the only one allowed to call me a fool is myself, you know."

Huh. Funny. He'd heard that line before...

"If you've got a problem, let's hear it," he said smoothly, "or else I've got a date with a half a pound of satsuma mikans I ought to get to."

"Problems? I've so many problems right now I cannot even begin to count them. There's a boy in danger and there's nothing I can do without compromising my own life and safety -- again -- and I have been rendered unable to be true to my own self -- again -- by circumstance. But in the end, the worst of it is... is I know I still only have myself to blame. If I had made one different choice, said one different word, twenty years ago..."

He shook his head, lank hair falling back into his eyes. "No. No matter. Things are what they are, and they are a sad sight indeed. Albus is rolling in his great white tomb somewhere at the foolishness we all perpetrate on each other."

For a moment Sanji was completely taken aback, even speechless. He didn't know this guy, why was he spilling such intimate information about his problems all of a sudden? But when he opened his mouth, the witty retort he had on the tip of his tongue was not what came out.

"Well, you've got to look after your crew, that's just the way of it," he said instead, completely serious. "But why can't you be true to yourself? Lies never become us. Trust me," he added with a snort, "I know. I've been lying to myself so long it's become second nature. I don't know what I really feel anymore."

Thankfully, Tom had someone around to talk to when he ever felt he needed it, even if that someone was a snake. And there really had been plenty to talk about with her today. So while he's felt a little more open, he'd chalked it up to excitement and a sense of achievement.

But he couldn't stay in all day, much as he would have liked to. He had things to do.

Which was, at the moment, now that he was stocked back up on food, to head for one of his more favored bookstores. And if he were the type to show his excitement in some other way than a small perpetual smile and a slightly faster walk, he would be doing it.

"Mister Riddle," intoned Snape; he was fond of bookstores, and what they held-- the shop saw him at least once a week, and his appetitte for the written word was voracious. At least here he had not begun to wire bookshelves to the doors of his home -- he had more room and less magical tomes. "You seem remarkably... chipper."

That was cause for worry. Tom Riddle shouldn't be happy. It wasn't allowed. "What has you in such good spirits?"

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Listen son, said the man with the gun

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I feel like this needed to happen

it is going to be beautiful and hideous.

♥!

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let's do this o/\o

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