Room 229, Tuesday Evening

[arsenicmauls]

There were a lot of things that Gert was too stubborn to do. Trying to train Old Lace out of accidentally scratching her when Gert rubbed her belly was one. Getting a newer iPod that didn't have real buttons and the rolling wheel in the middle was another. But the one that caused her the most irritation on a regular basis was her refusal to refrain from reading Internet news article comments. Painful or not, whenever she read the news and there was a comments section attached, Gert felt like she had to read every single one.

Her door was cracked, and that was as close as she was going to come for pleading for a distraction, but otherwise she was just going to be making a grossed-out face as she scrolled through the comments on a Huffington Post article that had attracted so much vitriol in the comments section that she couldn't even remember what the article itself was about. Ugh.

[[method RP? who, me? door/post open.]]

Comments

[justbeingbay]

So Bay's mom and Daphne were doing Romeo & Juliet together, which sounded like it was surrounded by so much drama that Bay terrifically glad she was half a country away.

But. Opening night seemed to be a thing, and since it was during the school break she couldn't even plead homework. She needed an ally, and that brought her to Gert's room.

She tapped on Gert's door. "Hey," she said, deadpan. "So are you doing anything fascinating and important?"

[arsenicmauls]

Gert looked up, immensely grateful for the distraction. "Traumatic and boring, actually," she reported, gesturing to her laptop. "News article comments. What's up?"

[justbeingbay]

"Don't read those," Bay said immediately, making a face. "Unless you need more reasons to hate humanity."

She pressed the door open the rest of the way and stepped in. "So, um, this is kind of weird, but ... wanna go to Kansas City with me for a couple days week after next? The deaf school is doing Romeo & Juliet and apparently it's a whole huge thing for my family."

[arsenicmauls]

Huh. That sounded kind of great, actually. "Like, Shakespeare without all the pretentious Elizabethan-speak?" Gert said. "That actually sounds cool. Sure."

It was better than spending the week in Fandom or trying to go back to LA and just depressing herself, anyway.

"Is Daphne in it?"

[justbeingbay]

"I think the hearing kids have to do a little of ye olde pretentious," Bay told her. "But not as much. And Daphne" -- affectionate eyeroll -- "was supposed to be the nurse and then the actress playing Juliet dropped out. And my mom's directing. So ... guess who's Juliet now?"

She smiled. "Thanks, by the way. I wasn't sure it'd be this easy."

[arsenicmauls]

"Fortunately, I don't have anything better to do," Gert replied. "Ever, actually, but especially since that's the week we don't have classes. So that frees up a whole two hours."

Seriously, she had exactly two hours of class a week. What was with this school's lax schedule?

"Not sure whether it says more about your mom that she doesn't care about being called biased, or that she cast Daphne as the nurse to begin with," Gert added.

[justbeingbay]

"Kathryn Kennish is kind of the queen of living through her kids," Bay said archly. "Plus, I'm not sure how many choices she had for Juliet. I got the sense being in the play wasn't exactly the cool thing to do."

[arsenicmauls]

"A depressing and cliché 'love story'--" yes, she included the air quotes-- "directed by an overeager parent, not the cool thing to do?" Gert snarked, smirking. "Wow, you're kidding."

And yet she still had nothing to do that was even the slightest bit cooler, so. Glass houses, Gert.

[justbeingbay]

Bay snickered. "I know. Shocking, right? But I figure I can sit through it, tell my folks I'm hanging out here for the summer, all of that."

[arsenicmauls]

"Strategic. I like it." Gert nodded. "It's better than being forced to spend the summer at home or go to summer camp or whatever like my parents used to make me do. At least here there's air-conditioning."

[justbeingbay]

"Seriously. Last summer I got to go to Galapogos," Bay said, wistful with maybe a tiny touch of bragging in there. "It was azmazing. Just being away from -- you know. Not having to deal with the real world."

[arsenicmauls]

"Hang on, wait, the Galapagos are on the table?" Bay was so lucky. "You're not passing up a repeat of that to stay here, are you?"

Because then Bay's sanity would be in question.

[justbeingbay]

"Yeah, I think the Galapagos thing was a one-time deal," Bay said. "Kind of a 'sorry you got switched' present. Home for the summer would probably be a bunch of helping with my dad's campaign."

[arsenicmauls]

"My 'sorry your parents were supervillains' present wasn't nearly that cool," Gert remarked, but she didn't sound too concerned. "Your dad's running for office? Dude, your family life sounds busy."

She didn't even know the half of it.

[justbeingbay]

"Just state senate," Bay said, like it was a totally normal thing to do. "I'm too young to vote, but he took one of my designs for some of his campaign ads. So I'm like his poster child. Or his child who makes him a poster."

Bay thought this was funny, yes.

"Oh, but will Old Lace be cool here while we go? 'Cause if not we need to figure out where to stash her at my house."

[arsenicmauls]

Gert thought about it, but her personal inclination to stick as close to her dinosaur as possible wasn't worth the headache of lugging a dinosaur through Portalocity again. Not to mention the fact that John and Kathryn Kennish might be fairly cool parents, but housing a dinosaur, even temporarily, would probably be a bit more than they could handle.

"She should be good here for a couple days," she decided. "I'll check with Maddie. But hang on, that's so awesome that your dad's cool enough for you to want to do that, and he's not just some skeeze who's just gonna get to office and screw everyone over. Go him."

[justbeingbay]

"Great, 'cause my backup plan was we say she's your therapy gila monster and I don't know if I could sell that one," Bay informed her. "And ... yeah. For a Republican he could be a lot worse. For a dad he could be way, way worse."

[arsenicmauls]

"Yeah, both of those jobs come with a lot of dickbags in the selection pool," Gert agreed. She considered herself something of an authority on at least one of them. Remembering what Bay had told her about Angelo being a flake, she offered, "I guess he probably helps to balance out your bio-dad being sucky, too."

[justbeingbay]

"I guess," Bay said, wrapping her arms around her legs. "I dunno. It feels weird complaining about my bio dad, who is admittedly kind of a douche, when your dad was, like, a supervillain."

Besides, Angelo was doing a lot better. Bay hadn't wanted to punch him in weeks!

[arsenicmauls]

"Yeah, I guess I win that one," Gert deadpanned, then followed it up with, "If by 'win,' you mean 'lose,' obviously."

It was kind of a win, too, though. She got to out-whine everyone else she knew! Except for Karolina. And Victor. And everyone back home...

"But whining about my parents is kind of dated, since they can't really screw up more than they already did," she added. "So, the floor's all yours."

[justbeingbay]

"Lucky me, I get two sets to whine about," Bay quipped in return. "Um ... surprisingly, they're actually not being too bad right now. So it's a short whining session. But, y'know. Watch this space."

This wasn't quite true: She knew Daphne thought Regina was drinking. But that felt a little too close to the vest to share, especially with no more than Daphne's word to go on.

[arsenicmauls]

"I'll keep an eye out," Gert promised. "...Wow, I never thought of how gross that expression sounds before."

Anyway.