This is the Day

"Hey, you've reached A.J. I'm not here right now, so leave a message. Thanks!"

His bags were packed; he was ready to go. A.J. had a hiking backpack, complete with the tent and other camping stuff, and he sighed, pausing at the door to take a look around the room, devoid of all his stuff that had either been shipped to his parent's house back in Jersey or were sitting in the junkyard, maybe for some other aspiring...type to find it and do something with it. He was going to miss this place. A lot. But, at the same time, he knew he got like that about anywhere he'd been, and he'd done this leaving thing with Empire before Fandom, and will probably do it a lot more after this.

All that was left was to swing by Annette's, see if she was ready, and be on their way.


[[ A.J.'s last post! Swing on by and catch him if you want to say adios and all that good stuff~ ]]

A.J. had a habit of getting his hands into one project or the other when he wanted to distract himself for something, but this was not necessarily such a bad thing. In this case, his hands had gotten into tinkering, the usual supplies and items spread around him as he picked away at the finer details of his invention for class. It was kind of interesting, really, how he'd spent so much of the class not having a clue what he was going to make and now he was practically putting the finishing touches on it, well ahead of schedule. That worried him a bit; maybe that meant he hadn't challenged himself enough? But then again, he supposed it wouldn't mattered that much. He was already in for that art school near Boston he was going to go to after her graduated, so it's not like he really needed a good grade or anything.

But he was proud of the work. He'd made something that was helpful, and pretty cool, even if the person he'd made it for wasn't around anymore, it was still a success.

Well, almost. A.J. drew his hands away carefully; he'd settled a book into the device, which looked like a very mechanically enhanced musical stand, a little smaller, with a more defined cradle for the book to settle in; he turned the knob appropriately, cranked the gear. Then he bit his lip before pushing a button and drawing his hand away.

He waited, about a minute, which was what he had set the pace to, and the little arm moved from where it was, pushing along the page of the book until it turned it over, and then retreated back. Another minute passed, and another page turned.

A.J. threw up his arms. "Victory!" It was followed by an accomplished little "Mwa ha ha. Eeeeexcellent."

Now he'd just hook up the reading light to the top and he'd be good as gold.

[[ yup; door, post, they're open ]]

( An artist, a hemipheliac, and a tentacled monster....thing. )

[[ Establishy, and late-ish because work training sucks. A.J. is still there, though, if anyone want to run into him. Or help him. Room and Berthold modded with permission ]]

A.J. laid in the center of his room, where he'd usually be sitting, working on his project for class or maybe some new drawings or painting, but this time, he was definitely laying, flat on his back, limbs flayed out, and staring at the pinpoints of constellations he had painted on the ceiling. Occasionally, he'd remember to blink, but it wasn't often, despite the fact that his mind was practically reeling with thoughts. They were dull thoughts, though, as if, like his body, they were too tired after everything to put much energy into existing. On his chest was still the rabbit, which had served for a good, peacefully oblivious focus for his ranting as he went for a walk in hopes to shake off his less than pleasant morning. He was relatively unaware of the rabbit, though, who sat quietly enough on A.J.'s chest, chewing on the drawstring of his sweater. He figured that he could probably get rid of the animal soon enough; Adah would be back from the clinic, but the last thing he wanted to do was get up. Especially to get up and go to that room, and talked to her, who, even now, he muttered quietly on how much of a bitch she was. As if it wasn't hard enough on him that Beauty was gone, Adah had to go an ruin the last good memory he had of her by punctuating it with the presence of her pale, skinny ass. He supposed he could take the rabbit up to River instead, and have River take it to Adah, but, then again, that meant getting up. So the rabbit stayed, and A.J. ignored her, and she ignored A.J., and he just continued pouting up at the ceiling, wondering how it could still be this hard to think about it all, even though he expected it. Wasn't that sort of thing supposed to guard you from feeling this terrible? Guess not. He drew in a breath, bit his lip. It just felt so unreal, like tomorrow, maybe it'd all have just been imagined and Beauty would come visit him at the diner for a milkshake, and...

He closed his eyes with a soft groan. He had to stop doing this, thinking like this. It wasn't doing him any good. But it seemed all he could really do right now.

[[ door is closed, but post is very open! ]]

It would seem that no room was safe from transformation with A.J. around in it for any lengthly amount of time. What was, not mere hours ago, a simple hotel room had now seemed to have finally been turned into a little make shift art studio. Furniture moved to accommodate the large sheets of canvas A.J. had picked up at a supply store to not get paint over anything, as he stood by the balcony and finally got around to painting that scenery he'd been enjoying so much. Door and windows thrown open to let the smell of the beach mingle with the smell of paint. Everything carefully covered, he had all his paints and brushes and pencil spread around him an a sort of very loose and wide artsy cocoon that left even this resorty place feeling like he was right at home.

He might even miss it tomorrow.


[[ post is intended for two fellow floppy haired boys, but the door is wide open, so anyone's welcome to stop in before them! Just keep in mind that this is up early as I'm not going to be around for several hours, and wanted it done before I disappeared into the world of long commutes for a bit. so responses might be a bit slow/delayed until later today ]]

Apparently, A.J. didn't have anything else to really do this Friday evening but try to bunker down and attempt reading through that book Beauty got him ages ago that he'd really only gotten through the first five pages of.

Unfortunately, he didn't really get more than five more pages into it before he'd nodded off, book against his chest, and occasionally letting out a snore, as the dead weight of his arm flopped off the side of the bed onto the floor.

[[ I know; real inspired. Door is open; post imitates door and is open too! ]]

A.J. was bored. Bored, bored, bored. So he tried to think of some of the things he could do. Let's see. He still didn't have an invention for class; he could work on that. He still hadn't finished reading that book Beauty gave him forever ago; he could read that. He technically hadn't finished his dresser project; he could finish that.

But, nope. He wasn't doing any of those things. Instead, he was being oh-so-productive by laying belly down on the middle of the floor, a sketchbook in front of him, sketching out the angle of various pieces of furniture in the room from this vantage point. And, when he got bored with that one, he'd just roll a little bit to one side or the other and viola! A whole new perspective, a whole new picture to draw.

Such a great use of his time, really.


[[ the door, as is the post, is open! ]]

Waking up this morning seemed to have turned out to be rather nice. Since he was still climbing out of a very comfortable sleep, A.J. wasn't thinking a whole lot about it beyond the niceness. He had a habit of doing this. He also had a habit of failing to remember that, most of the times he woke up like this, it very rarely ended up as well as it had started. All he was thinking that this hadn't happened in a while; he wasn't going to bother trying to think about the fact that there was a reason why he and Troy didn't end up like this in the morning anymore, but he was sure there was a reason. He grunted, slightly nuzzling in comfortably a little more.

That was, of course, when he realized that this wasn't exactly Troy's body. And it sure as hell wasn't Beauty's body, either, so that couldn't be it. In fact, he didn't know who the hell this body was.

At least they were clothed? There was at least that. But, beyond that, A.J. was a little too, uhhh....confused to do anything but slowly retract his arm and staaaaare.


[[ for the other occupant of said bed; room modded with permission, although I must say, I miss 412! ]]

That horrible, hacking, coughing sound coming through the door of room 402? Yeah. That would be the result of picking through trash in a junkyard in rainy, sleety cold weather. It was worth it, though, because it gave A.J. this really awesome cooling unit thing that he, feeling inspired after class, curled up with and idly painted while sniffling. True, having the window open probably really was not helping the cold that left him feeling a little miserable (at least it wasn't as bad as last Saturday), but just because he couldn't smell the fumes from his paints due to his stuffy nose, didn't mean other people had to be subjected to it.

A sudden sneeze with an insane build up left an unintentional streak of red across the cooling unit. A.J. grunted in disappointment for a second before he realized that, hey. That actually looked pretty damn good! Now if only those coughs could bring another beautiful mistake, then he wouldn't feel so bad about being sick.


[[ door is closed, but post is definitely open! ]]

Please, don't ask what A.J. is doing with all that metal, wire, mosquito net, and paint by the dresser. He doesn't rightly know himself.

But, whatever it is, it's fun, and it's starting to look really, really cool. At least, he certainly thinks so.


[[ yup. door and post, they be open. ]]

Spending the day drinking too much coffee and handwavily picking through the junkyard for materials for his dresser project was all well in good; A.J. was feeling like he even effectively hid the fact that he was just trying to get his mind off things when he was talking to Ino earlier at the Perk. He knew he probably should take more time to think about things and sort a few things through, but...he didn't want to. He was enjoying the distraction, like meeting new people. And he was feeling like he was doing a pretty good job of hiding everything.

But then he got back to the room, where he'd hope to just get involved with working the materials he'd collected into what they'd need to be for the project, but found himself distracted by other things, like the rearrangement of the furniture (again), or how quiet it was, or if possibly Troy had been kind of avoiding the room, much like A.J. realized he probably had been, too.

He stared a little at the center of the room for a bit and then shook his head. He picked up one of the foam basketballs on the floor by his feet, tossed it toward the hoop over the door. He didn't bother watching to see if it would go it; it wouldn't. It never did. He just went back to trying to hammer out the dent in the small sheet of metal he was working with.


[[ for the roommate, plz. ]]

Who would have figured that a week of almost nothing but visiting and casually parying with people (and perhaps a shift or two out of the pure hell of it at Empire) could be so damn exhausting? Tossing his dufflebag of clothes and a few acquired presents (mostly art supplies and books) into a corner, A.J. was immdiately drawn to his bed, flopping belly-down onto it with a groan. Mmmm. Bed. Larger and more comfortable than Lucas' couch, that was for sure. Of course, that had been entirely his choice, to stay with Lucas than stay with his parents, but who could blame him? Still, it felt kind of good to be back.

And, yes. His hair was still green. Despite attempts on both Gina and Deb to take care of it, the latter's method a bit more permanent than the former's. And he might have been a little keen on keeping it longer when Corey mentioned that she likes how it complimented his eyes, or something. He was distracted at the moment, too much so to remember exactly what she said, because she'd been playing with it at the same time.

[[ door and post are oooooopen! ]]

A.J. drew in yet another breath. He was looking, again, into the mirror on his closet door, ducking his head, lifting his chin, pretty much testing out every possible angle to see how the hair looked. And every single time, he came to the same conclusion: he looked like a damn Oompa Loompa. Sighing, he pouted at himself in the mirror. This green hair thing...he didn't know if it was going to work. How the hell did he managed to get Ino to convince him to let this happen? He missed his hair. Damn girls and being so cute and influencial and one hundred percent capable of kicking his ass if he said no.

He mussed it up a little, tried a different placement and sighed again. "Damn."

[[ door and post, they be open. Yes. A.J. has green hair now. ]]

After turning in his art project and really hoping that he'd done well, A.J. decided that he should probably lay low for a bit. Avoiding drama, after all, was a good thing, and so was avoiding Ino, a little pit in his stomach making him feel like his grand plan probably hadn't worked and he was overdue for some hair dye. He was laying on his back on his bed, looking at the squares on the ceiling while idly tossing one of the foam basketballs that came with the hoop over the door into the air. He was trying to figure himself with the prescribed green hair, trying to get used to it.

Maybe Ino wouldn't think that his hair should be bleached first, and then the dye wouldn't take, and no one would even notice.

[[ door and post are open! ]]

A.J. really couldn't tell if the cab driver was more relieved that he'd finally rolled up to A.J. and Beauty's destination or if he'd been somewhat amused or if he couldn't even understand the two of them as they, typically, practically did not stop talking about random crap the whole way there. When they pulled up, A.J. told Beauty to hold on a moment as he paid their fare, slid out, and hurried out to the other side so he could hold the door open for his (oh man) date, on offer his arm to assist her over toward the door of the really nice restaurant where he'd gotten reservations. And he couldn't help grinning like a dork the whole time.


[[ for the lovely comelyhonour, of course! NFB because of diiiistance, la ]]

Despite the impending chilly weather, the windows of room 402 were as open as the door which meant only one thing. The inspirational streak that had flourished from the drama with Annette was continuing on strongly, and A.J. sat on a sheet in the corner of the room, surrounded by a plethora of media. Pant tubes and cans, brushes everywhere, pieces of scrap metal and construction paper and inks and pencils and...well, no glitter. Definitely no glitter. Currently, he stood with a pair of wire cutters, attempting to wrangle down some wires to put on the....thing he was working on, which looked like a coughed-up concoction of paint, metal, wire, and PCP piping.

A.J. was mostly convinced it was some of his best work to date. Mostly.


[[ door and post are oooopen; a bit of delicate subject matter discussed in the comments, just to be forewarned ]]

Yeah. So....this morning was...interesting to say the least. A.J. though maybe, just maybe, he could have shaken it off with some work, but only spent the whole time just staring at a canvas, because...dude. Man. That...Realizing the futility of trying to distract himself, A.J. shuffled back into the room and crashed, face first, onto the bed, sprawling out with a groan. Good thing the beds were still shoved together from the night before, because he was feeling the need for a lot of sprawling. And beating his head on the mattress a few times. Because a mattress was soft than a wall, 'cause his head hurt enough already. And that was probably nothing compared to what he had coming once Dick found out.

Oh, maaaan...

But at least he wasn't that thirty seven year old loser he was going to be quite yet.

[[ for ze roommate, plz! ]]

There was the call of an alarm clock, an obnoxious but steady throbbing beeping sound. Normally, this sound in all its annoyance would be immediately silenced and the instrument making the noise would possibly be shoved off a bedstand to ensure that it didn't happen again. Normally. But the groan escaping the lump of blankets and hair from A.J.'s bed soon rose over the sound. He should shut it off, but...ugh, that required moving, and A.J. wasn't sure he could really do that right now. He'd never before woken up feeling this bad before in his life, not even on that one time when he, Mark, and Lucas thought it would be a good idea to finish off three batches of Eddie's special brownies and wash it down with about four pepperoni pizzas. Oh, God, the pulse of the alarm was matching up with the throbbing of his head. He let out a long groan. His hand eventually surfaced to grope around the bed, but not to shut off the alarm. For something more important. For anything nearby that he could possibly throw up in, because he was going to need it soon.


[[ for the roommate please, up early because it can be, and SP is looooooove ]]

There may have been a muffin or two stashed away from this morning for A.J. to bring out and nibble on later. What? They were good muffins! And they were good to give him something to do as he flipped through some of his unfinished work, trying to decide what to do tonight. Maybe go out and do something, or just crash in the room again and try to finish more things? He really should start getting a portfolio together, really, but he had so many unfinished things...

That would probably remain unfinished; nothing was catching his attention enough to really catch his focus.

[[ for someone in particular, but post is open for anyone before her in the timeline, although I do disappear for a six hour shift soonish~ ]]