Rainy Day Fun (Zooey Tag Any)

[Zooey Segel]

Raindrops pattered against the window, distracting Zooey from her rehearsing. She glanced out towards the sky, frowning at the bland grey blanket of clouds. Zooey much preferred the sun. She turned back to her Suzuki book and lifted the violin. Her bow met the strings and gave a plaintive wail, one that seemed to cry “Stop!” Fed up with her lack of progress, Zooey decided to listen to her instrument's pleas. She packed the violin in it's case, clicked the latches shut, and slid the whole mess under her bed.

The rest of the house was quiet. Her parents were out of town, and though Jay had been left in charge he had vanished almost immediately after school was out yesterday, and had yet to return home. That suited Zooey well. She did not need to be taken care of by any means. She could easily take care of herself. Still, she was bored as all heck. The petite girl flopped down onto her bed, imagining what Cera was up to right this moment. Probably snuggling up to her cutie boyfriend in front of some fireplace drinking hot cocoa. Well, maybe it was still too warm out for such activities, but the air was getting cool and it looked like it was chilly outside.

“Ohmygod I'm so boooored!” Zooey called out to no one in particular. She flopped out of her bed and padded into the kitchen, glancing around for some food that might entertain her. Finding nothing, her mind steeled on a course of action. She would brave the rain and go out. What for, she wasn't sure yet. But she would find something! She threw on her black jacket, grabbed an umbrella, and started out.

The rain was light, and the air wasn't so cold that jeans didn't keep her at a comfortable temperature. She avoided as many puddles as possible, but inevitably her shoes started to get soaked through and her feet began to feel the chill of the cold rain. Undeterred, she kept walking down the street hoping for something that might catch her eye.

It was her ear, however, that finally managed to locate some amusement. The sounds of a mellow saxophone drifted down the street, emanating from a small cafe across the way. Zooey glanced to make sure she was safe and dashed across the road. She opened the door, closing her umbrella as she stepped into the building. As she did, however, she failed to notice the patron standing right in the way. The tip of the umbrella managed to poke the person right in the butt.

“I'msosorry!” She cried, her face lighting up with a mixture of humor and embarrassment. “I didn't mean to- hey, I know you!” She grinned as she recognized the face of a fellow schoolmate.

[Kayla Whitaker]

Kayla's trip to the store and ended in downpour. She was soaked...well getting soaked. And this being LA it didn't rain very often. Kayla didn't even own an umbrella...and her hood had failed her in the heavy rains. She hadn't exactly had any big plans for the night...she had just been planning on staying in and watching the Laker's game with her dad. She'd just ran to the store to grab some snacks which included chips, nachos, cookies, and soda....all the best basketball game foods.

But the rain had alluded her and she'd ended up ducking into a building at random for shelter. Her long brown hair was matted to her head and she pulled it out of its ponytail and pushed her overgrown bangs off of her face, hoping it would dry a little.

She wasn't there too long before the rain let up a little. Finally deciding that it was light enough, she leaned over to grab her grocery bag and ended up getting jabbed in the butt. "Ah!" she yelled out involuntarily as she jumped up and turned around to see just what happened.

Pushing her damp hair out of her face, Kayla looked at the other girl. Right, Silver girl...a year behind her...a freshman. "Oh yeah, hey," Kayla said with a smile. "Zooey, right?" she confirmed. She rubbed her backside. "Ya gotta be careful with that thing," she said lightly, jokingly, really hoping that the other girl didn't poke her butt on purpose. Okay, maybe Zooey was cute, and Kayla mentally scolded herself for noticing, but still, the whole butt poking thing was kind of weird so she still hoped that that part had been an accident.

[Zooey Segel]

Zooey barged into the building, escaping the rain. “I know, I'm sorry. I was just in such a hurry to get out of the rain! Looks like you were, too, you're all wet an' junk, which means you prolly don't have an umbrella so you better hope it stops raining soon otherwise you're just gonna get wet all over again!” Not that being wet was the worst thing in the world, but Zooey much preferred to be dry unless she was swimming or something. “And yes, I'm Zooey. And you're Kayla. We sat at the same lunchtable once, I dunno if you remember, but I overheard someone say you're name so don't worry I'm not like a weird stalker or anything I just got a real good memory, 'specially for names and junk.” Zooey's face was stuck in a wide grin. So far, her adventure idea was going quite well.

The bags Kayla was carrying made a crinkling sound, one that Zooey always liked. It was in no small part why she liked going with her mom to the grocery store. She glanced at the contents, noting their snackiness, and decided to commend Kayla on her shopping prowess. “Wow, you're like the best shopper! You got all the good stuff and none of the bad stuff, are you having like a party or something? That would be super fun, a party right now. I was sooooo bored at home, I was going nuts, so I just decided to go out and find something, then I heard that guy on the saxophone over there,” Zooey indicated the man on stage, “and decided to pop in, which is when I poked you! Sorry, again. I really don't go around poking people's butts, that would be super weird. And I promise you, I'm not super weird or anything.” She twirled a strand of pink hair in her fingers as she gabbed, not thinking that Kayla was perhaps leaving and she may be keeping her. Zooey had a tendency to be oblivious to such things as other peoples wants, desires, and needs. Still, it's not like she was mean.

“So you wanna sit and listen to the sax guy? Is he any good? Maybe if he's not good we could do something else!”

[Kayla Whitaker]

Kayla peaked outside, past Zooey. "Yeah, I thought maybe it had let up a bit, but I guess not," she shrugged. "Maybe I should stick around a little longer. I kind of just ducked in here to get out of the rain," she explained, adding, "It's okay. I remember you," Kayla said, as the other girl babbled on. She seemed to like to talk a lot which Kayla sort of remembered. Kayla was more on the quiet side usually, but she didn't really mind people that talked a lot. It could even be fun sometimes if she managed to keep up.

"Oh yeah, well I was just getting snacks for the game...the basketball game. I didn't have any big plans. I was just going to watch it at home," she told Zooey. "But the snacks...well, I like to over buy so I make sure I have everything that I can possibly have a craving for." It seemed to make sense to her, but she did have to admit that it was a lot of food for not a lot of people.

"Yeah...its pretty good," she said about the saxophone player. "I don't really know much about that sort of music though." Kayla had bands and such that she liked but she'd always been more into sports than say music. She didn't know how to play any instruments or anything like that.


"Yeah, its fine," she said one last time about the whole butt poking thing. She was glad to hear that it had been an accident. "Yeah, I think I'm going to be sticking around until the rain lets up I guess...I didn't have any real plans anyway...just the game, but that wasn't really so much of a plan a default," she shrugged, sort of surprised that Zooey wanted to hang out with her, but then again she supposed that she sort of knew her. "Yeah, well, I guess we can do something else, or if you wanna stick around here...I do have snacks," she offered.

[Zooey Segel]

“Would they let us eat the snacks in here?” Zooey inquired. Her faced scrunched up as she thought about it for a second, but the answer came to her quick. She laughed. “Ha! Probably not, people are always so stuffy when it comes to their business! I had a sandwich I brought into a Starbucks with my dad once, and they wouldn't let me bring my sandwich in so he made a big deal and talked really loudly and then we left. It was super fun!” Zooey couldn't help but giggle at that, it was one of the rare moments when her dad said the rules were stupid, though he said it in a much smarter sounding way. Something about civil disobedience or something like that.

An idea occurred to Zooey. “Maybe we can have a party! We can go to my house and watch the game, and call a bunch of people, and we can all snack on stuff and watch the game and talk and have super fun! I mean, I don't know what basketball game it is but I'm sure it's a good one. OH!” the small girl exclaimed, leaping into the air with excitement. “Is it the March Madness basketball game? I don't really know what that is, but I know everyone get really excited about it. We could have a March Madness party!” Zooey pulled out her phone and looked at it, pausing for a moment. There weren't a lot of people she knew that would be interested in coming to see a basketball game. Perhaps Kayla had a lot of basketball friends...

[Kayla Whitaker]

"I don't know," Kayla said with a shrug. She didn't even really know where she was. She'd just seen the open door and thought it looked like a good place to get out of the rain. "Yeah...I suppose you're right," Kayla agreed when she listened to Zooey's reasoning about why they shouldn't open the snacks. "Do you think they'd notice if we just grabbed like a cookie each?" she started to ask but now Zooey was going on about a party.

"No...March Madness hasn't started yet...but it will be starting soon," she said. "Tonight is just the Lakers...you know professional basketball..." She was pretty sure that Zooey had to know who the Lakers were...after all they were Los Angeles' team...they were one of the best teams too and the people in the city were crazy about them because LA didn't have a football team anymore. Or at least that's how Kayla saw it. She preferred football really, but it was out of season right now. Luckily she was from Philadelphia so she could root for their team, or just watch college football. She tended to favor Vilanova, or 'Nova as she liked to call them and USC is she had to pick an LA team.

"We don't really have to watch the game though...if other people aren't into it. I don't mind missing it. I was mostly going to watch it because I didn't have anything else to do really." She shrugged. She was sort of surprised that Zooey wanted to throw a party with her, or even hang out for that matter, since they didn't know one another well, but Kayla wasn't going to complain. None of her friends were really around anyway and Kayla wasn't one of those people who acted too stuck up and wouldn't hang out with freshmen. Kayla was only a sophomore anyway so it wasn't like she was that much older.

"Do you live close to here?" Kayla asked. "I'm kind of not too keen on getting soaked again...I was waiting for the rain to let up a bit more."

[Zooey Segel]

“Well,” Zooey started after taking a deep breath. “It's always good to have a reason to get people together, and people like basketball, don't they? I just don't know a lot about it, but I'd watch just about anything, like this one time when my brother made me watch this terrible movie and it was like really scary and all I could dream about for the next few nights were like evil sasquatches and ape men and stuff like that! It was horrible!” Zooey gave a big shiver just for added emphasis. She was having a lot of fun talking to this girl. Usually when she started talking to people she didn't know they got an angry look on their face for some reason, but Kayla seemed to enjoy Zooey's presence. “Anyway, whether we watch it or not it'll be super fun to get a lot of people together!”

Muffled songs started to bleat from Zooey's purse, and an audible vibration could be heard. “Ooh, phone, one sec!” The smaller girl dug through her bag, eventually finding her cell phone. She pressed a few times on the touchscreen before scrunching up her face. She wasn't sure if wanted to shout or cry.

“It's my dad,” she mumbled, disappointed evident in her voice. “I don't think I'm going to be able to have a party after all, they're home early. My parents and my little sister were supposed to be out of town but my dad had to come home early cause she got sick. My sister, not my mom. Auugh! This keeps happening to me!” Zooey was quite fed up with her dad keeping her from having fun. He had been getting more and more strict ever since she dyed her hair, and there was no way he'd let her have a bunch of people over to watch a basketball game. “I'm in trouble for not being home and not telling my brother where I am.” The younger girl didn't stop to consider that Kayla might not know her older brother, or at least make the connection that Jay Segel was related to her. Zooey often had a problem only telling people half of a story; oftentimes, her audiences were quickly lost.

[Kayla Whitaker]

"Yeah...I guess so," Kayla said. She normally wasn't so social....but there was something about overly friendly people that sort of forced it out of her. Plus, she did know Zooey from school. It wasn't as if she was a complete stranger. She wasn't really sure what movie she was talking about but she just nodded about it, figuring it would be easier not to ask.

Kayla stayed quiet, fiddled with her phone, nodding when she explained about her parents coming home early. "That's too bad," Kayla said. "My parents are home too so I can't really host a whole party either. You could still come by and watch the game if you want though," she offered. She knew that her parents wouldn't mind her having someone over, they wouldn't even mind her having a lot of someone's over, but it wasn't something that they'd want without knowing in advance. Kayla knew that calling a bunch of people to come over without letting her parents know in advance would be pushing the limit.

She listened as Zooey complained about being in trouble. "Oh...do you have to come home now then?" she asked, assuming that if she was in trouble, she probably had to go home if she was in trouble. She hadn't really put together who her brother was or anything like that, but it didn't seem so important to the story so she didn't really ask about it either.

[Zooey Segel]

Zooey's exuberant mood from just minutes before had quickly turned around. Her eyes seemed to have lost their sparkle, and the grin she nearly constantly wore had become a scowl. It was obvious she was quite disappointed by this turn of events.

She pondered Kayla's question for a moment, imagining what might occur if she didn't go directly home. Every fantasy ended the same, however, with her father locking her in a tiny little jail for all eternity. It was not a good idea to disobey the grumpy old man. “Yeah, I think I have to go or my dad'll go ballistic. I mean, if he isn't happy now, he'd be really peeved if I ignored him. And I'd like to keep my life, as little of it as I seem to get.” Zooey sighed, thinking how little of her time she got to freely spend. Even violin or mellophone rehearsals would be better than going home to the “Warden,” her father.

“Well, it was nice talkin' to you. Maybe someday we'll really throw a super fun party!” This thought finally broke Zooey's sombre mood, and the grin resurfaced for a moment. She had caught on to a great idea, one she wasn't easily going to let go of. “In fact, I'll come find you on Monday and we'll talk about it! I better get going, but I'll see you then!” Zooey waved bye to Kayla, then quickly spun around and dashed out the door, her umbrella popping back up like a quick-blooming flower. She splashed excitedly through puddles as she ran down the street, never one to stay in a cruddy mood for long.


(OOC: Wrap/Tag for Wrap)