hearts that beat underneath [wesley]

[wesley]

Narrowing his eyes at Elsie quickly, Wesley shook his head. “Well, thank you for the compliment.” He slid a rather sarcastic looking smile onto his face a moment as the girl had eyed his items for checkout and assured him he wasn’t fully a schmuck. That was good to know, he supposed. Not like he really cared. He liked who he was and that was about all he needed to know—no need to worry about what other people thought of him… not unless they were someone that he actually cared to hear the opinion of. At the moment, Elsie wasn’t necessarily one of those people. As sweet as she seemed to be and as much as he could see himself getting along with her, he did not want to take any advice from a girl he had just met in the check-out line of the worst place in the world.

Glancing back towards the front of the store, Wesley couldn’t help but yawn. Why was this taking so damn long? Noting that the person in the front of the line looked like someone’s great grandmother and had about six hundred coupons, he understood the wait. Apparently, he had chosen the wrong line. Oh well—eventually he’d get to the front and everything would be just fine. His gaze drifted back towards Elsie as she posed another question, this one more of a joke than the last. Smiling quickly, Wesley folded his arms as best he could with the stuff in his hands. “Bears? No. But I have messed around with snakes before… not the smartest idea, I guess, but they happen to be around when you’re out in the middle of no-where in Texas.” Sure, that hadn’t been one of his best ideas ever, but he’d managed to get out of it all without dying, right? Not even a scratch on him after heading out for camping with his buddies and finding a coral snake mixed in with some of their stuff. Maybe that didn’t really fall into the category of something he did ‘in his spare time’, but it was good enough, as far as he was concerned.

With Elsie’s little comment about her dad, his smile faded into a smirk. Especially when she downgraded the threat from a punch to a lecture. He shrugged a bit, shaking his head. “Hey, I ain’t condoning being a drunk moron. I think it’s safer to teach kids how to actually drink rather than telling them the stuff is from hell; that’s the whole reason they end up going overboard in my opinion.” Welcome to Wesley’s Philosophy on Life: Why Wesley Shouldn’t Be A Father, Volume 1. Either way, it didn’t make much difference to him. As long as all the assholes that didn’t know how to drink properly stayed out of a car and out of his way, they could do whatever the hell they wanted. As Elsie winked at him, he simply shook his head, he was beginning to catch on that this girl was either completely naïve to how to act around men or she just couldn’t help but act like she was flirting. Besides, all attraction was dampened and completely stomped out by the fact that she was a kid.

Wesley’s smirk widened once again at her skirt comment, dropping his gaze a moment before looking back to her. It was true, to a degree, but it was also partially due to the fact that he’d grown up in a very ‘normal’, Texas family. The boys were raised to be gentlemen and the ladies were taught to be feminine young ladies. Skirts just came with that territory, and it’d always just been his preference. He thought they made a girl look more feminine and attractive—same with the hair down. Why hide all that in some kind of ponytail or bun or whatever the hell they were called? “Something like that.” It was just easier to not explain his entire idea of men and women stereotypes to the girl, so he left it at that. Her next question, however, was a bit different than the last. It made him do a double-take, so to speak.

Raising an eyebrow, he tiled his head down at the girl. Was he really going to go into this with her? Hell, why not, right? They’d already talked about everything else. Frowning a bit, he actually had to think about it. Really, he couldn’t remember the last time he was with a virgin. It just kind of came with the territory of sleeping around on the road that the girls you were with weren’t messing around for their first time. Shaking his head a bit, he glanced back at her. “I wouldn’t say no… but it’s definitely different. Honestly, I don’t know that I ever have.” Probably not what she expected to hear, but it was the best he could do.

(Don't know how I got 819 out of that. xD )

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[elsie]

She grinned at Wesley before sticking her tongue out at him. Alright, so she was more mature than the boys her age, but she was still a goof and often classified as a ditz. She didn’t think she was ditz by any means: she was intelligent but just didn’t always feel like showing it. Besides, who liked a person who wandered around thinking they were smarter than everyone anyways? And she didn’t think she was smarter than everyone, not by a long shot. ”I’m just so good at doling them out,” she noted. ”Come to me if you ever need an ego boost. Or a good recipe, I have a lot of those up in here,” she said, tapping the side of her head as she spoke.

Her eyes widened; she hadn’t thought he would take her joke with any grain of seriousness, but she knew that there did happen to be poisonous snakes in certain parts of the country. ”Are you serious?” she sputtered out, concerned for his general well being. ”Why the heck would you go do something like that? You could’ve gotten hurt! Then your poor mother would be beside herself with fright. Darn you, Southern Gentleman, you’re not supposed to make your mother frantic with distress,” she said, frowning at him with displeasure. Honestly she was just concerned that if he got bit by a snake that he would die. That would be sad. She hadn’t known him for long, but she liked to bother him and if he was gone, she’d be sad. Then again, if he had been bitten and consequently died, they wouldn’t really be having this conversation right now, would they? Also a sad note for Elsie to think about.

As hard as Elsie tried, she could not imagine her father ever punching someone out. He was a tall enough man, sure, but he wasn’t very muscular. He had more of the lean body type, which was where Elsie had gotten her own frame from. That and the mild-mannered Christian man wasn’t really the confrontational type. It was a good thing that she and her brother were good kids growing up, otherwise their parents would have lost their sanity in their failure to discipline the Porter children. ”I just think they go overboard because they have no sense of self-control,” Elsie shrugged. ”Plus some of them are just plain dumb, no matter how well they’re taught.” It was a sad truth. ”But oh well, rest assured you’ll never find me with my shirt inside out, lying face down in a gutter somewhere with a tattoo of Enrique Iglesias on my butt cheek.”

Besides, if she was going to get a celebrity tattooed on herself, she wouldn’t get Enrique Iglesias by choice. If she was going to get a tattoo of anything to begin with, it’d probably be a small cross or something. But she had no real desire to get inked. Elsie just had her ears pierced once and that was more than enough mutilation for her.

And alright, she knew that Wesley hadn’t meant for the skirt comment to be taken that way, but there was something about Wesley that just told her that he needed to lighten up a little, have a laugh. She would be more than happy to be the person who could make him smirk like he was doing currently. Of course, her next question probably made him want to squirm, but for once that wasn’t her intention. She was just generally curious. She was going to be nineteen next month, she still had her virginity, and Brodie was twenty-five. One could only assume that a man of that age with that level of attractiveness and relatively loose morals had already slept around a little bit, so if she ever did manage to convince him to go out with her, at some point or another the notion of sex would come up. ”Would you think it’s better if I told him at some point, if I do manage to get him to like me? Or is it something I shouldn’t mention?” she asked, genuinely curious. She did not excel in how to deal with men. She knew how to deal with teenage boys, but men were sort of like a different species. She didn’t want to mess this thing up with Brodie, if anything ever did start. ”Cause I mean, I wouldn’t want him to be weirded out, but at the same time I wouldn’t want him thinking that I just go around doing that with random guys, y’know?”

words: 787 - tagged: wesley - outfit: here - notes: failpost D: don’thateme

[wesley]

Wesley couldn’t really remember the last time he’d had someone stick their tongue out at him. Probably when he was fourteen or something like that. Most likely by someone in his own family. It probably resulted in him hitting them… though, he was fairly certain he was going to have a different response now. Or, at least, he didn’t plan on responding with any sort of violence. Seeing as how he was far older now and this girl was a complete stranger… and a girl, for that matter. If nothing else, he’d been raised not to hit a woman. Nodding slowly, he rolled his eyes a bit and smiled. “I’ll make sure all my ego boosting needs will be fulfilled by you, then.” Hell, he wasn’t even sure he was going to see this girl again after he walked out the doors to his car. But, on the off chance he did, he would be sure to hold her to that.

Wesley’s smile simply widened at Elsie’s reaction to him mentioning the snakes. It always struck him as funny how most women thought that to be a completely ridiculous idea. But, it had to be done, right? Not like he was just going to carry it around in his pack all day. “I think my mother was just fine—she wasn’t even around. And it was only a little venomous. Little guy—has to chew on you to do any harm.” Though, if it actually got the chance to do that, it would probably be defined as just a bit more than a ‘little venomous’. Though, judging by her reaction to him just mentioning a snake, he didn’t really feel he needed to mention that part of it. Smiling, regardless, he simply shrugged. “Besides, I bet my mom would be just as willing to handle one.”

If he thought about it, he could actually picture his mom out there with a broom brushing away snakes like they were yesterday’s trash. If there was one in the world that he truly believed was fearless, it was his mother. Seeing as how he was her son, it was his job to pick fights now and then, but if it came right down to it, she was one woman he was afraid to tussle with.

“Kids of today,” Shaking his head a bit, Wesley let out a sigh as if he felt personally affected by the stupidity in the world, specifically from those eighteen and under. Though, when it came right down to it, Wesley couldn’t care less. Unless one of them decided to plow into him while drunk, he didn’t give a shit if they passed out drunk every night or stayed up late studying. As long as there was one or two intelligent people left over to take care of the government when it was their turn, he was fine. Of course, with her mention of never being piss drunk, collapsed in an alley somewhere with a tattoo, he replied with a mix of a chuckle and a confused ‘eh?’ “Enrique who-now?” Needless to say, if the person she was talking about didn’t have a country twang, he likely didn’t have a clue who it was. And, judging by the name, he didn’t know who that guy was. Though, he was rather proud of himself when he bit back an offhanded comment about illegals.

He wasn’t sure the general attitude in Capeside about that, but being from Texan, he certainly had an opinion on it—and a strong one at that. But it came with the territory of the strong, right side leaning that you found in the South.

Then, of course, Elsie succeeded at once again making the situation awkward. Though, he had to admit, it was a lot less so this time than before. Mostly because this time she seemed genuinely interested in finding out the answer. And, really, it was a question Wesley really had to think about. He wasn’t sure if he’d be more comfortable with someone just saying ‘hey, guess what, I’m a virgin’ right off the bat or by waiting. As he’d started to hint at before, he really couldn’t remember if he’d ever had a virgin or not, anyway. Most of his women came with a certain MO… and it certainly wasn’t like Elsie’s. If nothing else through this conversation, she’d managed to make him think. Maybe not the typical thoughts one would expect to have while in the grocery store, but think nonetheless.

Frowning a bit in thought, he finally shrugged and glanced back to her. “I don’t know about that one. I can see pros and cons with each side of it. Up to you.”


( >_> As a side note, I love Enrique. Very much. )

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[elsie]

Men were irrational idiots and his frolicking with dangerous reptiles was probably more proof than she would ever need. Elsie rarely looked for proof to back up her claims-- which she knew was terrible; you almost always needed evidence-- but most of the time when she was extremely sure of something, the examples sort of came along afterwards. For instance: she knew she didn’t like lobster for her whole life even though she’d never had it. How could she say that? The smell made her want to puke and it disturbed her how you had to brutally take apart the darn thing to suck out its flesh. The fateful day that she had lobster last year, she found that not only did she hate the taste of the stuff, but she was allergic. Swelling up and having an extremely difficult time to breathe was not on her list of fun things to go through. Why was she thinking about lobster again? Oh yes, the reptiles. And Wesley was an irrational idiot who liked to frolic with them. The two points definitely collaborated with each other.

Elsie slowly shook her head at him. ”You are by far one of the most peculiar people I’ve met in a grocery store. And I’ve met quite a fair amount of people,” she added, changing the movement of her head changing to a nod. Elsie was quite talkative and didn’t have all that many boundaries when it came to limiting her topics of conversation, which meant she could talk to just about anyone. She was interested in seeing what other people were interested in, how they ticked, what they liked; anything that differed than her, really. But just because Wesley went around playing with snakes didn’t mean she was going to find herself running off to some Southern state to party with a diamond back. Elsie raised an eyebrow at the boy, something she’d found she would be doing quite a lot in the future, and found herself laughing despite herself. ”I guess your mom would have to be tough to raise something like you,” she said teasingly, throwing in a grin at the end. Somehow she couldn’t imagine anyone’s mother just dealing with a venomous snake without that much thought. But who knew?

Sighing she thought it was best if she just...sung. ”You knew... I can be your hero, baby! I can kiss away the pain! I will stand by youuu forever! You. Can. Take. My breath away!” Now, Elsie was by no means a talented singer, nor was she quiet. This earned her a fair amount of stares from other shoppers but as usual, she had become quite skilled at ignoring them. When she was finished her version of one of her favourite songs, she merely smiled innocently at Wesley and blinked. Elsie frowned. ”That’s such a lame answer; it just means you have nothing better to say,” she decided, wondering if he deserved his wooing cookies or not. ”Hmm, maybe I just won’t say anything ‘til he brings it up.” That sounded like a good idea on her part. She didn’t want to freak him out, though maybe he had some secret virgin fantasy. She had no freaking clue; men were strange creatures who enjoyed strange things. ”You’re next,” she said. She paused for a moment, then pointed to the cash. ”You’re time in line, bud.” She shooed him forward so he could buy his whiskey and coffee, though she thought he needed some fruit along with that.

words: 601 - tagged: wesley - outfit: here - notes: so busy, so little muse D: