herr_bookman | OOM: Jim

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OOM: Jim

Two weeks pass in Los Santos, and Autor finds he's settling in nicely. Buster makes a lot of messes, true, but cleaning them up doesn't take too much time. Neither does cooking for the dog, or himself. He has plenty of time to devote to his studies for premed.

Wilford is rarely home, and when he is, he's quiet, which suits Autor just fine. The man never sleeps in his own bed. He zonks out in a chair or stays awake, staring at his laptop. Autor often prepares German pancakes and bacon with coffee for breakfasts, and Wilford seems to appreciate eating that in the mornings. He eats like a horse, Autor notices, which is also just fine. For a thousand dollars a week, cooking and cleaning is easy enough.

Autor hasn't done much exploring of Los Santos, and for good reason: people dress in chicken suits and drive tanks. He panics the first time someone pulls a gun, and so keeps to the house.

But he's running out of food. He has to go shopping. He leashes Buster reluctantly and leaves the house.

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"Stay the fuck out of my kitchen, dick."

He wants to change, but ugh, so many people are here, and Jim will just follow after him like a fucking creep. So Wilford falls into his chair - the big, wide one he decided on while they were shopping - instead.

"What did he break?" Wilford asks Autor.

Autor stops petting Buster, and follows Wilford into the living room. Buster trots after the boy mournfully. "He touch your music," Autor reports, pointing to the vinyls.

The vinyls are perhaps a bit messy. But he totally didn't break any of them! Jack pouts and sashays over to one of the sofas he picked out, lying down on it like he owns the place.

'And he threatened me with a knife. Or, y'know. Tried to. Nice to know he's fitting right into this world, he'll be killing people in the supermarket in no time.'

Jim waves Buster away when he comes sniffing. He's touched him enough today.

'He'd have no bed to sleep in if it weren't for me. Tell him to be more polite.'

"Don't fucking touch my vinyl," Wilford says.

Fuck around with the TV, sure. But Wilford actually cares about his record collection. It's just about the only material possession he's ever bothered to accumulate in his life.

"I've changed my mind. Shoot him," Wilford says to Autor, knowing damn well the kid won't.

Autor stiffens, looking to Wilford with an expression of dismay. "You do not pay me much to clean up blood."

'Dear oh dear oh dear,' Jim murmurs, Jack melting away in an instant.

'You picked one who's squeamish, darling. Not that he won't kill if he has to. He already has. But it's wrong, isn't it, kid? Unless someone really deserves it.'

Wilford gets a reproachful look.

'If you're not paying him enough to clean up blood, you've brought him to the wrong world. Give him a raise.'

Annoyingly, Wilford's ashtray has been cleaned out, and there's no empty coffee cup nearby. So Jim gets a shiny clean ashtray chucked in his direction. He really ought to invest in some heavy glass ones for next time, if Autor's going to be sticking around.

"It's none of your goddamn business."

Autor doesn't know what the English word "raise" means, except to lift up, but he understands the gist from context. He shakes his head. Ignoring Jack wasn't working very well, but it's the last defense he has, so he falls back on that.

Jim catches the ashtray lazily, and flips it in his hand.

'Are we playing catch?'

He tosses it towards Autor - well, throws - seeing as that's the current game. Never let it be said he doesn't join in!

'Of course it's my business. Because I say so. Tell me his name. I've seen him hanging around with Hannibal, so I could just-'

His eyes narrow. Of course, Hannibal has mentioned a name or two in their past conversations.

"What are you asking me for? It's his name."

No, Wilford is not going to tell Jim. Jim can eat a dick and get out of his house.

Autor catches the ashtray thrown at him and sets the hunk of plastic back in its place. He looks away from Jack, towards the kitchen. Then he checks the time on his phone.

'Oh, I don't think I need to. It shouldn't have taken me this long.'

Shameful, really.

'Hello, Autor. Nice to put a face to the name. Hannibal's told me so much about you.'

The alternative is that he's Sinric, but no. There is no way this kid is shagging Hannibal LEcter.

Wilford rolls his eyes and tries Autor's tactic of just ignoring him. Today was irritating enough, and now he's come home and he can't even relax, because there's a fucking weasel sitting on his sofa.

Autor doesn't respond. He doesn't even look up at Jim. The boy selects the English-learning app on his phone, trying to be boring.

"I want to go to the movie at the movie theater," the app says, in a lilting, female voice, and Autor selects the correct sentence on the screen.

'Well, I can see why you two hit it off so well. You're both tedious.'

Jim rolls up to his feet, barely bothering to glance in Wilford's direction. He keeps his eyes on the boy as he speaks to the boss.

'You're welcome for making you a habitable house, darling. I'll text you my agent's name on Monday. As for you-'

Now he's talking to Autor, and all pretence at normality, good cheer, and friendliness disappear. He steps closer and speaks quietly in German, with no effort at malice. It's just sort of there naturally.

'-you should rethink your tactics. This isn't going to work for you.'

But he has more fun things to do. He only stopped in to discover what this new living situation is about, and now he knows...he'll be back. His smirk comes back, and he slides his sunglasses on as he steps out of the room.

'Ciao, darlings. Don't do anything I wouldn't do. I'll let myself out.'

And he does just that, already moving on to other things in his head.

Edited 2017-11-17 22:25 (UTC)

"Get fucked," Wilford grumbles. He lights a cigarette and takes a moment to calm down once Jim is gone and out of their sight.

"There are guns in the closet. Shoot him in the head next time."

It occurs to him that now Autor knows Jim hangs out at the bar, he might not actually come back from death. But Wilford could not possibly care less.

Autor closes down the app and puts the phone away. "I am relief he is gone. He is supreme asshole."

Just having Jim out of his space seems to calm Wilford's nerves significantly. Jim is great company when Wilford expects him to be there, but having him just drop in like that pushed all sorts of uncomfortable buttons.

"Check that with your app, there," he says, pointing at Autor's phone. Wilford isn't even going to try to be his English teacher.

Autor checks the time again. "I need to feed dog. Do you want food?"

Wilford almost waves him off, since he probably needs to go back to the studio soon. But he's too wound up, and Jim would probably come back if he saw Wilford leave so soon.

"I'm gonna take a shower," he says instead, getting back up. "Do something with the pork. It needs to be used." He heads back to the bedroom to go start getting cleaned up.

Autor nods, recognizing the dismissal. He finds Buster and spends some time lavishing him with attention before preparing Schweineschnitzel.

Wilford is not the sort of person to spend a long time in the shower. He spends just enough time to scrub off pancake makeup and the general funk from sitting under studio lights all day. When he comes back out, he has no intention of leaving the house again, so it's in his pyjamas, with a towel over his shoulders since his hair has a tendency to leave little pink drip stains everywhere.

He's had some time to calm down, and to think. Jim said some things that have stuck in Wilford's mind, and now he's curious. He comes out to collect the cigarette he'd snuffed and left behind before his shower.

"He's gonna come back," Wilford says. "You know how to use a gun, right?"

Autor stiffens. He pauses in dishing up Schweineschnitzel and potatoes. After setting the potato spoon down in the bowl with a clink of metal against glass, he places the bowl on the counter with a clink of glass against metal.

"Yes," Autor says, not looking at Wilford. "I know how use gun. I will not shoot Jack. You can."

"Well, that's a problem. The gate people are coming next week to start surveying the property, but I don't think that'll stop him either."

He picks up some of the mail that's been gathering on the table and starts going through it. He leaves most of it behind, but takes the rest over to the fireplace and throws it in.

Autor sets Buster's plate on the floor for him, and watches him devour the diced pork. "What do I do for Jack?" Autor says, crossing his arms over his chest. "Ignore will not work. And I will not shoot."

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