ax_main | Beau and Jester

Beau and Jester have detention together.

While Jester was very put out about having been caught, the fact that she got assigned detention with Beau made up for it. She'd been trying to strike up a conversation with the girl who had kidnapped Nott and then ended up helping out, but Beau had never seemed all that interested. So if she was going to have detention, at least maybe this would be a new opportunity for friendship! Jester had been watching Beau, and it didn't seem as if she had many friends.

Fortunately, the detention was with Mr Cassidy, which meant it wasn't writing a boring essay. Instead, they got to sort out the art supply closet. Easy enough, and the art teacher wouldn't mind if they had a quiet chat, Jester was certain. Not as long as they kept working.

"So what landed you here?" she asked quietly, as they sorted pencils from crayons.

Beau was busy staring thoughtfully at a jar of blue paint rather than sorting the pencils in her left hand when she heard the girl next to her speak up. The accent was honestly kind of adorable, but Beau was distracted, and it took her a moment to look up and raise a brow. "Sorry?"

"What did you do to get detention?" Jester rephrased, giving Beau a friendly smile.

Beau huffed softly. “Look, anyone in their right mind would want to take a swing at Ms. Frost.”

"You did what?" Jester's voice went all high-pitched in excitement on the last word, and she glanced at Mr Cassidy to confirm that he didn't mind. He didn't seem to, and she turned back to Beau, dropping her voice again. "...did it hit?"

"I'm fast, but she's a mind-reader," Beau lamented, twirling the pencils in her hand. "She said I was lucky she didn't take a swing back. So I dared her to try. And...well yeah, it went downhill from there."

Jester wanted to know everything, and mostly how come she hadn't heard about this yet! She needed to meet more people, so gossip would reach her faster. Detectives needed informants, after all.

But careful professional reflexion was for later. Giddy excitement was for now! "Why did you try to hit her in the first place?" she asked in something between a squeal and a whisper.

"Well she shouldn't have put me on the spot and forced me to stand up there at the board in the first place! Fuck knows, the woman can read minds, so that should have been a no brainer, right? But no, she has me doing some stupid math problem, and I messed up on the subtraction, and said something like, 'shit, I can't do reverse math,' and then she has to sit there and give me this ten minute lecture about how 'reverse math' is incorrect and how I'll never be able to 'do' any math if I can't even get that straight, and the longer it went on, the more I wanted to punch her." Beau shrugged. "So I tried."

Jester listened to all of that with a rapt expression, eyebrows climbing higher and higher. Reverse math was a very valid phrase, if you asked her. But, perhaps more to the point, "Do you often try to punch people like that?"

Beau shrugged a little, and dropped the colored pencils into the appropriate jar. "Not really, but sometimes I can't help myself with people like that. She reminds me of my mother."

Jester looked, and sounded, horrified. "You want to punch your mother?"

"Yeah, I'm guessing by the look you're giving me that you don't," Beau surmised.

"People have to be real assholes for me to want to punch them," Jester explained very sagely, she thought. "And my mom is the opposite of an asshole!"

"Lucky you," Beau smirked softly.

Jester's features fell into a mask of sympathy. "I'm really sorry your mom is an asshole, Beau."

"Yeah well," Beau smiled sideways. "I'm glad yours isn't. You know, this place needs more people like you."

Jester grinned. "Thank you. But I kind of like being, you know. Unique." This she said with a flare of her tail behind her, fangs flashing in her smile.

"I don't blame you," Beau agreed. "I like being unique too. I mean. You're more unique than me, obviously..."

"It's okay, Beau, you're still very pretty," Jester cut in, completely earnest but also very casual about it. "I really like your hair!"

Beau did not point out that Jester was clearly implying that in order to be pretty you had to be unique, which, she supposed had a sort of truth to it. Instead, she smiled sideways. "Yeah? It's not blue."

"No, but it is badass," Jester replied, clearly delighted by the notion. "Like you!"

Beau raised a brow, but found herself smiling anyway. "Thanks. I work hard at it."

"You're doing a great job!" Jester confirmed. "You have amazing guns!"

"You.... are a really positive person, you know that?" Beau found herself saying as she reached for some markers.

"Thanks!" Jester sunnily replied. Then she leaned in closer to Beau and dropped her voice to a theatrical whisper. "Don't tell anyone, but I work hard at it too."

Despite every inclination to the contrary, Beau found herself liking the girl. She was unbearably, almost disgustingly cheerful, but somehow it wasn't annoying. Or at least, it was more endearing than annoying, anyway. "I think I can keep that one under wraps," she agreed. "So what did you do to land in here?"

"Nothing!" Jester exclaimed, and looked forlorn. "They caught me before I did anything, anyway. I was only going to paint a little on those Greek statues out front. Make them a little more... fun, you know? Gods should be fun."

"I don't know. They're naked. That's pretty fun," Beau pointed out.

"But they're so serious!" Jester protested. "Even their dicks aren't that funny."

"Are dicks usually funny?" Beau asked, tossing a couple of markers into another jar.

Jester chortled. "Yes, have you seen them?"

“They’re not really my thing,” Beau told her with a smirk. “But yeah, I’ve seen a dick or two.”

"Then you know!" Jester concluded brightly. "They are funny!"

Beau tilted her head. "I suppose, when you put it like that, they are pretty funny."

Jester beamed and nodded emphatically. "They really, really are. Anyway. I guess the statues will stay boring one more day."

"What exactly were you planning on doing to them?" Beau asked, setting her chin in her hand as she listened to Jester. Might as well give up pretending she was getting any work done at all.

"I don't know, just draw stuff on them," Jester replied distractedly, going back to their task as Beau stopped. "Mustaches and funny eyebrows and googly eyes and oh! Maybe some really nice tattoos!"

"I'm not sure I want to know what constitutes a really nice tattoo with you," Beau grinned.

"That's an idea," Jester said, with a growing smile. "I should get a tattoo machine!"

Beau opened her mouth, then closed it, trying to think of an appropriate way to- nope, she said it anyway, "That's a terrible idea."

Jester frowned. "What are you talking about, it's a great idea! I'm really good at drawing things!"

"Jester, you can barely hold back on doodling all over statue dicks. If we get you a tattoo machine, the students here will never be safe," Beau told her.

"Please," Jester told her with a look. "Like I'd limit myself to the student population."

Beau held back on the instinct to facepalm, and just found herself smiling wanly. "Right. Silly me."

"You are a little silly, Beau," Jester confirmed, her tone playful as her tail patted Beau's shoulder. "But it's okay. I like you."

“Yeah?” Beau didn’t react to the tail, but she found herself smiling a little more. “You just met me.”

"You're right," Jester agreed. Never mind that she had been watching her for a while, and that she had already liked Beau for helping get Nott out of that stupid place she'd kidnapper her to. "There is room to work up to really liking you."

"You know what? I like you too, Jester," Beau decided, tossing a small piece of molding clay at her new friend.

Jester giggled at the clay, then looked back at Beau with a bright smile that registered surprise, for a brief instant. Then it was back to Jester's usual mega-wattage. "I'm very likable."

"You are," Beau agreed ruefully. "You wanna finish this up and get out of here?"

"For sure!" Jester agreed enthusiastically, turning back to their task with renewed motivation. There was so much more trouble they could get into out there, and getting into trouble with a friend always beat the alternatives.