Room 311, Saturday Morning

[wesleynotponcy]

Wesley was going hunting with Katniss later, which fell under the category of Probably A Date, How Weird Is My Life Right Now, so he was getting dressed. Suffice it to say that his hunting clothes were not all that similar to his normal clothes. Normal clothes were button-downs and slacks and sometimes a tie (ahem, Valentine's Day Dance). Hunting clothes were apparently sweatpants, which he didn't even know he owned until he did some digging through his stuff, and a T-shirt that he usually wore to bed. So.

Once he was dressed, he opened the door just a bit and sat down, idly drumming his fingers on the bed.

That was what he was doing when the aghast face of a nine-year-old girl popped up in the hall.

[open! feel free to pop by if you feel like meeting argumentative lilah-child, zomg]

Comments

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Oh, well, drat. Eloise had been wandering, hoping to maybe find a library or something to investigate where she was, and instead she found Daddy. Well. That was a blow to her competence.

What was done was done, though, and she knew she was in trouble from the moment she saw the surprise on her father's face. So she put on her very best innocent little expression and stepped into the doorway. "Hi, Daddy," she chirped.

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Um?

"Er," Wesley said, totally baffled. "Are you lost?"

Not that this child had the look of someone who would ever get lost, of course. In fact, she looked fairly competent and sure of herself. But Wes' gut reaction to anyone who thought that he was their father (admittedly, not something that had exactly ever happened before) was to fix up that confusion straightaway.

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Eloise tilted her head. That was a twist.

Unless -- what if the portal took her somewhere with a different version of Daddy? Oh! That meant that she wouldn't even get in trouble for being here! And that would explain the sweatpants. Daddy in her world wore fancy suits all the time, just like Mother.

"Oh," she said, pleasantly surprised with how this was going. "No. I'm not lost. Ah... thank you for your time."

Seriously, what kind of world was this if Daddy here wore sweatpants?

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Well, that was believable. Wes was instantly skeptical. And also intrigued.

"Wait," he said, reaching out a hand. "Er. Who are you?"

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Drat. Curse Daddy's Watcher instincts. Even if he wasn't a Watcher in this universe, which the sweatpants would indicate. And there were three rules in the Morgan-Pryce household, for the record: Don't lie, don't get caught lying, and don't mention the A-word.

The A-word, of course, being a person's name. Not that other word. That, she could say.

But they weren't home, and anyway, it wouldn't be lying if she just didn't say all of her name, right?

"Eloise," she said, in her very best lawyer voice.

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Oh, right, because that wasn't going to make him suspicious. Wesley narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing her. There was something familiar about this child. He sized her up, then asked carefully, "Eloise what?"

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Drat, drat, drat, the game was up and she was going to be in so much trouble. Very reluctantly, Eloise stood up straight, crossed her arms behind her back, and admitted, "Eloise Morgan-Pryce. I'm your daughter."

It had a very B-movie vibe to it. Not that Eloise had ever seen a B-movie. No, certainly not.

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Wesley blinked. His instict was to firmly assert that no, she was not his daughter, but this was Fandom and things happened and he was vaguely aware of the sound of kids shrieking down the hall. Comprehension dawned.

Yeah, thanks, island.

"Oh," he said.

"And, ah... who's your mother?"

Because that was important.

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Eloise rolled her eyes. Yeah, typical Daddy. Or at least, the way Mother always talked about him.

"Lilah Morgan," she chirped. "You look younger than my Daddy, though. You might not know her yet."

Eloise Morgan-Pryce was intimately familiar with family history. And the way portals worked.

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Oh. Huh.

"Is she... a Watcher?" he asked, maybe a little bit hopefully. Hey, he had dreams, okay? And having a nice little Watcher household somewhere was one of them.

"Where do we live?" he inquired further. Oh, yes, he was totally going to use this child for information.

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Eloise totally knew what he was doing, and she rolled her eyes. "No, she's not a Watcher," she laughed, amused. "Neither are you, for the record. Mother's a lawyer. We live in Los Angeles, which you continually insist is hell. I go to the Westridge School for Girls, where Mother went, and you -- well, you don't exactly have a job title." Helpfully, she added, "You're fond of scotch."

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

A lawyer? Los Angeles? Prep school? Unemployed? Scotch? What?
Wes blinked several times in rapid succession, processing all this. None of that made sense with his career goals, for the record. He was thinking Oxford, maybe some Watching, and then -- well, a job. Not scotch.

"Oh," he said.

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Eloise noted his displeasure with this arrangement, and she couldn't help getting a little bit curious. Daddy back at home hadn't been expecting the life he ended up with, either. She knew because it was something he sometimes mentioned post-scotch, but that was never the time to ask him about it.

Now, though...

"Did you have different plans?" she asked curiously.

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Um, kind of! It was cute that she was curious, though. Huh. Made sense that she would be his kid, with her scrutnizing face and that innocent little question.

"Well -- ah -- I was rather hoping to be a Watcher," he admitted. "I'm only seventeen, you know," he hastened to add, because it seemed like the thing to say. And god, what was this child, like, nine? Weird. Weird, weird, weird.

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

"Mmm, yeah, back home, too," Eloise told him. "Don't worry. You get over it. Like I said, scotch."

She said all this with the matter-of-factness of a child who believes herself the authority on all worldly issues. Crossing her arms over her chest, she peered around the room. "Does someone else live here?"

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Wes' heart went out to this girl. Clearly she had inept parents -- really, a lawyer? And some bizarre version of himself that drank scotch? Okay, fine, he'd been known to have a drink or two, and yes, he had a rather expensive bottle stashed in his trunk for emergencies only, but apparently in the future he was some sort of alcoholic. That was unfortunate.

"Well, yes," he replied, a little awkwardly. "I mean, I'm in high school."

Then a terrifying thought hit him. "Your father, ah, in your world -- he is quite a bit older than I am, yes?"

[nothingbutgrey.livejournal.com]

Eloise laughed again and rolled her eyes. "Yes. Way older." She scoffed, and tilted her head as she considered him. "You must be, what, Connor's age now? Oh. I guess you don't know Connor. Lucky you." That part she deadpanned and then quickly moved on, because even her real father didn't like to hear about Connor.
Okay, that called for a distraction. "Could we get breakfast?" she asked sweetly.

[wesleynotponcy.livejournal.com]

Wes thought about asking, then quickly reconsidered it.

"Yes, certainly," he said, and gathered up his wallet from the table. Except, wait. "We just have to make a quick stop by someone else's dormitory, if that's all right? She's expecting me."

And with that, he led his nine-year-old daughter out of the room and over to Katniss'. This was going to be a weird day.