Plucking from the Courage Tree (ATTN: Mew)

[Phil Lim]

Phil shrugged and headed outside, “What a ridiculous notion!” He scoffed, when Dare admitted to his fashion insecurities, “It’s very whimsical, but whimsy has a place in the steampunk world. It isn’t all gritty post-apocalypse.” He sniffed, “don’t let other people bring you down, it’s a very Do-it-yourself fashion and anyone who tries to impose rules on you should be ignored.” Should he have taken that philosophy into the rest of his life? Perhaps, but though he was book-smart and conscientious, he didn’t always stop to consider the internal inconsistencies in his own life philosophies.

Once outside (and an appropriate distance from the school doors) he pulled out the pipe he always carried in his pockets. “I know it isn’t good for me, Maggy reminds me constantly.” He stated before sticking the pipe stem in his mouth and puffing away at it.

“The park won’t be a bore,” He assured Dare after several minutes of silence, “Annie is excited, and I’m sure that Delilah and Finlay are, too, they eat up this kind of save the planet thing. And just because cleaning a park is worthwhile and a responsibility doesn’t’ mean we can’t have fun doing it. Some people may shun it simply because it isn’t mindless, but don’t let them get to you.”

[Dare Madison]

Dare listened to Phil carefully, mainly because he really liked the other boy and Phil always seemed so sure of himself. Dare nodded as his friend talked for he believed what he said, at least when it came to other people. It was a bit harder when it involved himself and looking ridiculous. In other words it was a great philosophy, but practicing it was harder.

"At least it smells better than cigarette smoke and looks cooler as well," Dare said with a grin. He thought Phil looked dashing. "But I agree with Maggy and if God made your body aren't you supposed to take care of it?" One of the few other Christians he had known had said something to him about the Body being a temple and that God wanted it pure. That was why he had turned vegetarian in fact.

"Well I am going to enjoy it... I have looked forward to it for too long to let a girl ruin it for me. She can go shopping or something else shallow instead. I hope Mew still comes though. I really enjoy his company," Dare said, trying not to show how much her opinion had affected him. It bothered him a great deal, cause he truly never wanted to be a popularity seeker.

[Alexia Dashwood-Dune]

Alexia froze when Mew asked if she was sure she didn't want to sit. Mew...wanted her to sit down. And he was approaching and as his voice started to get closer, her heart pounded and she immediately regretted her decision to turn around because the moment she did, she bumped into him and her head slammed into his face and knocked his glasses off.

"Oh my God! Mew I am so sorry!" She squeaked and went down on her knees to find the glasses and when she found it, she cradled it carefully in her hands, using her top to wipe off the stains on the lenses before handing it to him.

"I'm so sorry about that." She was blushing furiously as she thought to answer him. He didn't know about bowling? How could he not know? It was an open invitation. She couldn't look him in the eye as her voice thinned out while she replied. "Uhm Sunday at two at the 9 Pins. Hope you can make it." Her voice was barely audible as she stared at her shoes.

She wondered how Mew was reacting to all this. Would he be thinking that it was absurd for a girl like her to even talk to a guy like him? She wouldn't be surprised. Mew probably had other things to concern himself about than girls like her talking to him. She mentally slapped herself and forced herself not to think too much about it.

Finally, she plucked up all the courage she had left and looked up at Mew. Her eyes wide and her smile uncertain, she looked at Mew with her heart thumping like crazy. "Will you come?" she asked softly, her head tilting slightly. Please say you'll come, she thought to herself repeatedly as her smile turned a bit gooey as she stared at him.

[Phil Lim]

Phil shrugged when Dare spoke up in support of Magdalena, "True," He admitted, in a tone of voice that said he didn't care very much, which happened to be incredibly hypocritical of him considering the rationalizations he used for staying (more or less) in the closet. He wanted to do the right thing, but he put much more stock on sexual morality than he did on physical health. Perhaps the social nature of most sexual deviations -- as he believed them to be -- made them seem more perverse in his mind. Smoking was a solitary vice, but homosexuality meant involving someone else. The idea of admitting he liked other men made him nervous, even as he saw how socially accepted it was. It was all very well and good to stay in the closet because of societal pressure, but what if you were the one with the problem?

"Exactly!" He shoved one hand in his pocket, "Do not let her worry you, the combined might of the Environmental Club and the Young Republicans will have that park looking splendid again in no time!" It was nothing short of amazing that the two clubs could agree on a cause; if only actual politicians could be so bipartisan.

[Bartholomew "Mew" Fischer]

Mew grunted when Lexi ran into him, knocking off his glasses so that the world was suddenly blurry. "It's....it's okay..." He assured her, trying to hold very, very still for if he moved an inch he was sure to trip and probably take her down with him. He couldn't help but emit a sigh of great relief when she placed his precious glasses back in his hands. He carefully placed them back where they belonged, and the world was clear and bright again, no longer veiled in fog. "Umm, yeah, sure, should be fun." He agreed, though he still wasn't sure why she was asking him. This was the second time that a girl (or girls) had asked him if he was going to some social function, and he found this entirely inexplicable. He wasn't handsome or popular or interested in anything remotely popular -- unless one counted fishing, which he liked largely because he liked boats.

He gestured back towards the lunch table, "Umm," He said again, "I uhh haven't finished lunch. You really can sit with us, unless you're worried that the nerddom is contagious." He added, though if that were the case far more people would be nerds than actually could claim that title.

[Alexia Dashwood-Dune]

She could barely contain her excitement when he agreed to go. She didn't know what would become of them if he spent more time with her though but she was willing to do anything to make sure their acquaintance would not end just at the fact that Mew knew her as Lexi, part of the swimming team. She was ready to show him that she was a fun girl that he could hang out with.

Then, he invited her back to the table and the comment about nerddom being contagious, she laughed as she shook her head. "If me playing World of Warcraft and Pokemon in my spare time is not evidence that I am already part of the nerddom then I don't know what will and besides. Nerddom should be contagious. The popular people don't know what they're missing."

She followed Mew to the table again and sat opposite Mew, nearer to Maggy. "Hi...I'm sorry for embarrassing myself in front of you earlier. I'm Alexia Dashwood-Dune. But uh, call me Dash. No one's really called me Alexia since like...second grade. And yes. My acronyms are ADD. I don't know why I told you that but...don't tell anyone. Hi! I'm Alexia!" She extended her hand towards Maggy and smiled widely to hide her embarrassment. She should slap herself for humiliating herself further yet again. It wasn't surprising that she doesn't have a lot of close friends.

[pip]

Pip happened to be passing when Lexi began to spew out a bunch of ridiculous nonsense about her name. "The reason she told you that is that she has diarrhea of the mouth and she simply can't help telling everyone any thought that happens to come to mind. That's why we don't tell her any secrets," she said with a warm smile as if she was just teasing and ruffled her twin's hair.

"I am Lexi's older sister, Pip. Well only five minutes older, but in someways, I feel so much older than that. I am constantly having to pull her out of scrapes. It's like taking care of a puppy that just can't seem to find the paper every time. If you know what I mean..." Pip waved a hand in the air as if there was no verbal way to really explain her annoying sister.

Alice and Mabel, two of her friends giggled and nodded. "Same mistakes over and over," they murmured. Pip sighed, and handed Lexi a lunch bag. "You left without this again, I swear you would starve without me," she said and began to walk away towards the table where she and her clique always sat. "Try not to get in anymore trouble today, Lexi. Keeping your mouth shut until you're sure what you want to say, might help with that!"

[Bartholomew "Mew" Fischer]

Mew hadn't realized that Lexi played World of Warcraft. Had they really been on the swim team for almost three years and he'd never realized she was a fellow geek? He's always assumed she was just sort of shy! Then again, he was frequently rather caught up in his own group and their doings, so perhaps it wasn't that unlikely that he didn't know her interests. "You play WoW? I tried it, but....I really prefer Tales of Pirates," He admitted in a low voice. "I did Ragnarok Online, up until it went gold. The parents refused to pay for the subscription." And there were so many fun freeware MMOs, why bother with the paid ones?! Sure, the English translations were questionable, at best, and as all the servers were international at least fifty percent of the time he had no idea what the other players were saying -- the majority of them spoke Spanish, which he didn't take; he took French.

"Okay, Dash it is." He agreed; he was used to nicknames that were clipped oddly from real names, as that was something his family was particularly fond of. "Yeah, nerds are cool, or at least, there always seem to be lots of them at the cons."

Magdalena shook Lexi's hand -- very limply -- but dropped it quickly when Pip and her friends sauntered over, apparently for the express purpose of harrassing the poor girl. "Nice to meet you, too." She mumbled after the other girls were out of ear shot, though she did give the three of them a glare.

Mew felt a bit bad for Lexi, having to deal with the popular twin sister. At least in his case his brother was older, and as he was already in college didn't overshadow him quite so much this year as he had in the past. "I uhh don't think you embarrassed yourself." He told her once Pip had left, trying very hard to think why Lexi would think this.

[Dare Madison]

Dare had no idea of how divided Phil was in his own mind, he might have felt better about himself, but as it was, he thought he was the only one that was so torn apart by his own feelings. He had just discovered he had feelings for someone that he had no chance in ever winning and for the most part felt far too inferior to be even considered a candidate for good friend. Despite all this he had this insane desire, no… need to please Phil. He really liked Mew, even finding him attractive in a cute kind of way, like a teddy bear that had been dragged around a bit too much. Perhaps if he hadn’t met Phil first and been captured by his somewhat neurotic charisma, he might have asked Mew out at some point.

Now though, he felt he was trapped by his own loyalty and devotion to a quixotic God with soft silky brown hair and warm chocolate eyes you could drown in if you weren’t careful. He longed to drag Phil’s hand out of his pocket and capture it in the net of his fingers, but Dare knew that would put more strain on their teeter totter relationship. “I can’t wait for it. I hope we get a lot of people that will enjoy it and want to make such outings a regular thing. There is so much good that can be done in Los Angeles. Parks, even Beaches need tending and then there is the occasional emergency like when whales are beached.”

[Alexia Dashwood-Dune]

She couldn't believe it, she was finally having a proper conversation with the boy she's had a crush on for years. "I've never heard of Tales of Pirates though it sounds interesting. I tried Ragnarok for a bit but I couldn't quite get into it because I had already started on WoW by then and was kinda addicted." She chuckled sheepishly as she settled in her seat with her lop-sided smile which dropped instantly with the sudden appearance of Pippi Longstocking.

Her cheeks flushed deeply as her twin sister went on and on about her flaws and she further stoked the fire with the hair ruffle. Her friends' comments about her took the cake but sadly Alexia had never been one to fight back. She never had the guts to so she kept quiet, almost on the verge of running off. Like it wasn't enough she was already feeling so shy around her crush and his best friend. Her sister had to come and make it even more awkward for her. She was so embarrassed by what her twin had said that she hadn't even realised that Mew had agreed to call her by her nickname.

When Pippi Longstocking finally left with her lemmings trailing behind her in a cloud of intoxicating perfume, Alexia was about to get up from the table when Mew reassure her that she hadn't embarrassed herself. She looked up and smile at him gratefully. So she hadn't blown her chance with him after all! Score!

"Thanks," she replied shyly only to open the paper bag of food and thanking whoever loved her upstairs that it wasn't anything gross her twin had put in there. Not knowing what else to say, she took out the container of garden pasta salad and a mini cupcake and set it on the table. "Would you like some pasta salad?" she asked both Mew and Maggy, pointing to her container that she was about to open up.