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Anrea stopped following the bulb the instant she saw another person, and once again, froze right where she stood. She had managed to survive months in this town with minimal social contact, and she planned to keep it that way. People were just too much of a bother to deal with--she didn't understand them at all. And then they didn't like it when she did something that normal people just didn't do. No, she would be much better without dealing with this girl.

But Azhar had followed the blacklight bulb over to his owner, and now the ceiling lamp bulb stood right next to Conrad.

Anrea stared at the two bulbs. How could she get Azhar back without the girl noticing? She wasn't about to leave Az. But she wasn't quite to the point where she would risk social contact to get him back, either. Stalemate.

Shoot. Spotted. Run? No, running was bad. You didn't run away from people. That was one of the unwritten social rules she had found out the hard way.

And she couldn't just leave Az there, anyway. What if the other person was some sort of crazy lightbulb abuser? So maybe she didn't look like it, but you never knew with people...

Oh, people, right. The other girl had said something, and now Anrea was supposed to say something back. Even if she didn't want to.

"Yeah..." Anrea muttered, staring at the floor. One arm drew across her chest, and then clung to her other arm, hanging at her side. Let this be over soon, let this be over soon, let this be over soon... she mentally chanted. Or prayed. Or something like that.

Azhar hopped around in a smaller circle, within the circle Conrad was rolling in. The ceiling lamp bulb was quite enjoying being around another bulb, even if the other bulb kept going around upside down.

Not bite? Biting wasn't what she was worried about. Biting made sense. You did that to hurt someone else. It was people that didn't make any sense.

But she couldn't think of a good way to get out of this, so she shuffled over to where the other girl was. You were supposed to be close to people when they talked to you. But not too close, because that freaked them out. And you must absolutely not touch their hair, no matter how funny it looked gelled into all sorts of different shapes that just begged to be touched.

The girl. The present. Right. Had to focus on that. People sometimes didn't like it when you spaced out, too.

And you were supposed to say things. People got uncomfortable when it was quiet.

"Hi," Anrea said, not able to think of anything better.

As soon as Conrad turned the right way up, Azhar turned so he was upside down. It felt so weird, balancing on something else!

Azhar, still upside down, hopped over to Conrad, and bumped the other bulb, causing Azhar to fall over.

"Isn't that a boy's name?" Anrea asked, without thinking, and immediately regretted it. That was something else you weren't supposed to do--say things about people's names that could be taken in a bad way.

She turned her head away from Jasper, blushing slightly behind the hair she was using to cover her face, and mumbled a barely understandable "sorry".

Azhar rolled around, managing to get himself right side up, and then started hopping around under the table. He bumped into the table legs one or two times, but stopped when they didn't do anything interesting. So he hopped over to his owner, bumped into her legs, and was confused and disappointed when she didn't pick him up like she usually did. Azhar sulked, because now his owner was ignoring him.

She thought about fleeing. That was something else you weren't supposed to do, but if Jasper--Jas, told her she could, then why not?

Or was that one of the things people said because they had to, and they weren't really serious about it?

Although why Jas would want her around, Anrea couldn't really think of. She was sure she was providing horrible company. Quiet and nervous and skittish--probably more like a cornered animal than...well, whatever normal people were like.

"My name's Anrea," she finally offered in return, after a few minute's internal debate. She wasn't sure if Jas was serious about her leaving, so she would stay, and try to interact, until she had gotten that figured out.

Azhar hopped back over to Anrea, hopped onto her foot, and blinked slowly, unhappily, trying to convey that being ignored by her was the reason he was sulking. He wanted to see what was happening on top of that table, and usually she would pick him up when he wanted to, but not now.

Azhar blinked slowly again, in a slightly different pattern, trying to say he was confused as to why she was ignoring him.

"Yeah." One word answers were bad, they didn't move the conversation anywhere. But she couldn't think of what else to say, besides turning the one word into a sentence: 'yes, I like reading'. But that wouldn't help.

And maybe if she halted the conversation enough, Jas would get bored and go somewhere else?

Of course, there was always that maybe serious, maybe not offer of fleeing...

She was so confused, and lost.

Azhar blinked back rapidly, excited. Climbing the table sounded like a great idea! He blinked a question: how exactly were they supposed to climb up it?

"Mythology is cool." Not quite what she was into, though. Most mythology books she had seen got too into the background and the why and everything, and just didn't tell the story well at all.

"Science fiction and fantasy," she said, fidgeting a little. She might be pretty socially clueless, but she knew those two genres ranked high on the 'nerd' scale.

Although, she was probably giving off some pretty nerdy vibes. Or something else bad like that already.

Her right hand moved to her hair, and she started twisting it, playing around with the pony tail it was trapped in.

Azhar looked at the bookcase. The bookcase definitely looked a lot better than trying to climb the table. But the shelves were all one right on top of another. They could get to the bottom shelf, but how were they supposed to go from the bottom shelf to the next one up? Azhar blinked questioningly.