01-04-2021, 06:01 PM
Jude's silence was criminal. He was certain that anything he said would reveal the true precarity of the moment, and so the best thing to do was let Near talk and play off his conclusions. When Near said nothing, and only stared at the book on the floor, there was nothing Jude could add to clear his name. His gaze shifted around the room, checking their shadows, the shadows cast by the lamps, the darkness in the corners of the room. Everything was playing nice now, for the moment. It was Red Light Green Light, and right now, the light was red.
Something was wrong with the book. Jude mentally waffled on whether he actually hadn't somehow knocked the book over -- either himself, or adjacent to his game of Hide and Seek. Maybe it was her. Maybe it was them. Maybe it was simply that the book had been in an odd position and had just taken that poorly timed moment to fall. He still favored the latter conclusion, but now something was wrong with the book, and so the odds might be turning against him.
Typically, Jude would have used his powers to catch the book, but the combination of drunkenness and his required stillness prevented him. Instead, the book thudded open and spun a half circle, lying open. Then Jude leaned over to pick it up. "Noooo," he said, once more in the fashion of children and drunks poorly trying to keep secrets. But he hadn't. He was just keeping another secret. His eyes scanned the top line of the shelves. "Not now, and not before." Not while he was young either. He was well-behaved.
Something was wrong with the book. Jude mentally waffled on whether he actually hadn't somehow knocked the book over -- either himself, or adjacent to his game of Hide and Seek. Maybe it was her. Maybe it was them. Maybe it was simply that the book had been in an odd position and had just taken that poorly timed moment to fall. He still favored the latter conclusion, but now something was wrong with the book, and so the odds might be turning against him.
Typically, Jude would have used his powers to catch the book, but the combination of drunkenness and his required stillness prevented him. Instead, the book thudded open and spun a half circle, lying open. Then Jude leaned over to pick it up. "Noooo," he said, once more in the fashion of children and drunks poorly trying to keep secrets. But he hadn't. He was just keeping another secret. His eyes scanned the top line of the shelves. "Not now, and not before." Not while he was young either. He was well-behaved.