[PRIVATE] First Date

Ellie appreciated Jimmy's sentiment - at least she wasn't going to be sleeping outside, but in the morning she was still going to have to call the police, report her bag and ID card as stolen, go to have a new one issued and then use that to prove her identity and get a new school ID... And then there was also the proof of blindness, which was probably going to be a nightmare to get again. The more the girl thought about this, the more upset she was becoming, and despite her subconscious screaming at her to act like an adult all she could do was sob and follow Jimmy to the security guard.

Naturally, the guard refused to let them in. Apparently, earlier that year a hooligan came forward with the same excuse of "I lost my key and card" and then destroyed the first floor bathroom by throwing cherry bombs in all the toilets. The guard assured Ellie that he believed her, but that there was little he could do about it. It wasn't until he offered to call her parents that the blond girl really started bawling. Great, go ahead and press all the nerves, Mr. Security Guard! Pressing her face against Jimmy's side, the girl closed her eyes, sniffing and trying to catch her breath. She was tired, cold, barefoot and losing pretty much everything of value that she owned, safe for her phone which Caroline had convinced her not to take. The young girl couldn't remember the last time she'd been so upset, and the fact that she desperately tried to calm herself down and failed made it even worse.

Hearing Ellie's sobs was a terrible sound to Jimmy for no other reason than how it made him feel. For some reason, he felt like he was responsible for letting her feel so upset and that he wasn't doing enough unless she was happy. He was also pissed off at the security guard who hadn't exactly helped the situation. He held her close and tried to console her.
"Come on, let's go to my room, you can have your shower there." Jimmy said, softly.

"I guess we're moving in together way sooner than we had anticipated, eh?" Jimmy joked, as he brought Ellie back to the male dorms and fumbled for his room key. He opened the door and led her in, sitting her on the bed.

"Home sweet home." He said, laughing, doing all he could to lighten the mood.

En route to Jimmy's home, Ellie managed to calm down somewhat, telling herself that there's no use crying over spilled milk and reminding herself that she wasn't alone. It wasn't an easy feat to pull off, but Jimmy's jokes and attitude did help her put her lost possessions in the back of her mind. She followed her boyfriend silently, chuckling a bit at his remark that they'd be moving in together faster than expect like a little child distracted from her misery by an adult making funny faces at her.

Soon enough, the two were in his room, with Ellie silently walking over to the bed and taking a seat. She forced a smile, realizing that Jimmy had done nothing to deserve this attitude, even if she felt terrible about her lost possessions. "Smells like a guy's room, alright", she tried to kick back into gear, bringing up her bare arm and wiping the tears from her face, which of course didn't work nearly as well as she'd hoped. "Okay, now I look like a mess in more ways than one", she chuckled lightly, standing up. "I think I need that shower more than ever. Could you take me to it? Just so you know, I might need some help with my dress", she spoke, turning over and letting Jimmy see the zipper in the back.

"Hey, I do what I can. I'm not sure if you were previously aware, however, I do happen to be a guy so I think that's to be expected." Jimmy teased back.

As Ellie mentioned that she might need help taking the dress off, Jimmy couldn't help but feel a little nervous. He wasn't well-versed in dealing with situations like this.
"Sure, I'll just grab you a towel first." Jimmy said, scrambling around the wardrobe for the pile of the two spare towels he had recently cleaned and produced one quickly. He had the spares for his workouts, primarily, mixing sweat and towels wasn't always the best, so he always made sure he had at least one clean towel he could defer to when he needed it.

"Right, just this way." Jimmy said, taking Ellie's hand, leading her to the bathroom and handing her the towel.

Ellie grabbed the towel with a smile, discreetly sniffing it to make sure it was clean. "So you mean to tell me that I'll be pressing something against my naked body that you've pressed against yours before? My, my, how lewd!" the young girl chuckled, having put the loss of her items in the back of her mind for now. Quickly stepping into the bathroom, the girl was pleased to discover that it was identical to her own, which wasn't really a surprise - they were living in the same dorm, after all. Still, it made it rather easy to orientate herself, even without being led around.

It wasn't hard for her to sense her boyfriend's apprehension about helping her remove her dress, even without being able to see his facial expressions. Nudity never really bothered her - hell, she'd been naked in front of Caroline for a while as they tried on different clothing in preparation for the date, but at the same time she knew that allowing Jimmy to see her naked this early was probably not the best course of action. "It's okay, just pull the zipper down for me, I'll take care of the rest. The most you'll see is my back", she explained, using one hand to keep her dress pressed up to her chest while holding the towel with the other.

Jimmy chuckled and lowered his voice to a whisper.
"Do you want to hear something that's even more lewd? Don't tell anyone, but... underneath these clothes I'm naked."

"Just the zip? Well, that much I can handle." Jimmy said, relieved, as he undid the zip on the back of the red, floral dress that adorned Ellie's frame. Jimmy wasn't a prude by any stretch of the imagination, but it felt inappropriate to deal with witnessing Ellie's nudity, especially so early and suddenly.

"Well, there's a bar of soap and a bottle of shampoo on the side. I'll leave you to it for now, give me a shout if you need anything." Jimmy said, beginning to close the door behind him.

"Honestly, I'd be very worried if you couldn't handle that much! What about doing all those husband-y things I'll be expecting of you in a few years, like cooking, cleaning, taking Melody to mixed martial arts and helping out with James Jr.'s homework?" she asked with a chuckle, closing the door almost all the way in, leaving just a small gap - not enough to allow Jimmy to take a peek (or so she hoped), but enough to allow their voices to pass with little issue. Sliding the dress off, Ellie let it fall to her ankles before stepping out of it. She picked it up, folding it in half and placing it where she assumed the water wouldn't reach it. Before long, the girl was reaching forward and trying to feel the hot water valve.

"Wait!" she called out once Jimmy announced his intention to leave. "Could you stay with me? Just talk to me, so that I'm not lonely", she begged.

"Figure of speech, you know what I meant. Also, mixed martial arts, huh? Sounds good to me, raise a little badass one day..." He said, laughing.

"Talk? Sounds good to me. What do you want to talk about?"

"Of course! No child of mine shall be unable to kick the crap out of anyone who tries to mess with her! Any bullies will be in for a surprise!" Ellie laughed, feeling the hot water on her skin. Ah, that was the stuff! It almost made her forget about the fact that almost every item in her life was missing. "I dunno... Just something, I guess", she shrugged. "Tell me a bit more about Akira! That was your sister's name, right?" The girl asked cautiously, worried that she could be misremembering.

"Sounds good to me." Jimmy agreed.

"Yeah, Akira's her name. Well, we met when we were about 8 or 9, if my timeline's correct. We'd moved out of Australia to Mexico, and were looking to go to Atlanta so that I could be raised somewhere that was a little safer. I mean, Atlanta's no safe haven, but our neck of the woods was pretty bad, and mom had a job opportunity there that would have been much better. So for those two years or so, we kept making our way up to Atlanta. Somewhere along the way, mom met Rick. Akira was already around at this point, she's a few months older than me. Anyway, while eventually it got to the point where we would stay with Rick and Akira while mom made her business trips and tried to secure the position in Atlanta. I presume it's because the two of them were involved with each other at this point, but the long and short of it is that Akira and I ended up spending a lot of time together, and we just started getting along really well, y'know, so eventually we just sort of stopped coming back home to Mexico. That's how I perceived it, anyway. So yeah, we were just together all the time, we were a unit, she and I. And as we grew, mom and Rick were both getting busier at work, so we learned to fend for ourselves. We'd do our best to cook for ourselves and clean the house, and that time together basically just brought us together like real brother and sister. I suppose having to depend on each other at such a young age does that. But since the aneurysm, she's pretty much the only person to give me the time of day and actually be patient enough to get to know me again." Jimmy explained.

"Maybe a bit overblown, but that's basically it." He added with a chuckle.

Ellie listened carefully, her hands busy washing her hair, and her eyes staring straight ahead. She liked listening to people talking about their families, though she wasn't aware if it was because she never had a real one or because she was just curious. Maybe a combination of both. Either way, learning about Akira did make the young girl want to meet her sometime. Of course, there was no way she could ever tell Jimmy that without seeming incredibly clingy. First date, and already wanting to meet the relatives? If nothing else chased him off, this was definitely going to do the trick.

"She sounds like an awesome person", Ellie stated, turning her head to the door. "I think I'd like to meet her sometime!"

It took a few moments for her otherwise brilliant brain to realize just what she'd said, which almost caused her to slap herself on the face. "Erm, I mean... You know, eventually", she chuckled awkwardly, hoping that the damage hadn't already been done. Sure, Jimmy seemed cool with all this, but what if that was the straw which broke the camel's back? Her paranoid mind kept feeding her horror fantasy after horror fantasy, and her rational one could barely get through, its message to her ("Relax and be yourself") being almost completely lost.

"Yeah, she's great. Sometimes she's a little too much, very hyper and excitable, which is a good thing, mostly, but I'm sure you know how it is, sometimes it just gets a bit much to deal with. After a long day or whatever, she'll just be bouncing off the walls. I like to think of myself as patient, but sometimes it just gets to me after a while. I mean, it's rare, but from time to time I can't help but feel like that. But we're siblings, of course we're going to rub each other the wrong way on occassion." Jimmy elaborated, trying to aid Ellie's picture of his (slightly) older sister.

"Oh, definitely. You'll meet them, don't you worry. I mean, I don't get to see them much, so it'll probably have to be around Christmas or some sort of school holiday. I don't know when I can make it down. Unless they spontaneously come up for a bit before then. Toronto to Atlanta's quite the distance..."

"Honestly, she sounds like my kind of girl", Ellie chuckled. "In most of my foster homes, I've been the one bouncing off the walls and annoying my siblings, so I think Akira and I are going to be getting along just fine", she stated, letting the warm water rinse all the soap and shampoo from her body before turning the valve to stop it. walking carefully over to the towel, the girl grabbed it and carefully dried her hair with it as much as she could before wrapping it around her chest and waist. "I'm coming out!" she warned, not wanting to accidentally hit Jimmy with the door while leaving.

"Man, does that feel, like, a billion times better", she smiled, genuinely feeling refreshed. Sure, there was still the thought about her lost possessions lingering in the back of her mind, which burned every time she came across it, but by that point the young girl had realized that she couldn't do anything about it that evening, so she might as well just try and have fun. And besides, this was an adventure! She'd never been in a boy's room before, let alone naked and only covered by a towel, so the girl thought she'd enjoy the experience while it lasted.

"Say, um, can you fetch me, like, a T-shirt or something? I mean, I can totally hang out in a towel for the rest of the night, but I don't want to tease you THAT much", she laughed.

"I figured as much, honestly." Jimmy agreed, promptly moving out of the way as Ellie announced her exit.

"Yeah, there really is nothing like a good shower sometimes." Jimmy said, directing a beaming smile at his girlfriend, despite her inability to see it. Jimmy himself hadn't been in the presence of a girl wrapped in only a towel, at least, not from what he could gather in his unreliable memory. The scent of Ellie's freshly washed body filled the room quickly. If there really had been any 'guy's room' smell around when Ellie had teased him about it, there definitely wasn't anymore.

"You can do whatever you want. But for the record, I'm glad you're taking mercy on me. I'm sure I have an oversized t-shirt or twelve that should do the trick, give me a minute." He remarked with a chuckle, pouring through his drawers before producing one of his favourites. It was an old, oversized t-shirt for The Rolling Stones that was heavily faded and made of the most comfortable material Jimmy had ever worn on a shirt. In spite of all his efforts to find some sort of duplicate to it, he'd never been able to. Whatever black magic had created the garment had clearly been long-since buried. He placed the shirt in Ellie's hand.
"Treat this one well, it's the best I've got." He warned, jokingly.

"Well, I guess it's my turn now, I'll be back in a minute or two." He said, stepping towards the bathroom.

Towel wrapped firmly around her body, Ellie felt around with her spare hand (the other holding the towel in place, as well as her underwear, which she'd plucked from the bathroom before leaving and folded discreetly) for a few moments before her fingers slid against the sheets of the bed. Sitting on its edge, the girl crossed her legs to make sure she'd retain her dignity, at least while Jimmy was in the room. As the boy handed her his T-shirt, she felt it between her fingers before curving her lips into a smile. "Wow, that does feel pretty great!" she exclaimed. "Thanks! I shall wear it with honor!"

Waiting for Jimmy to head into the bathroom, specifically 'looking' for the loud clicking sound the door made when closed, Ellie removed her towel and began drying her hair. it obviously wasn't going to get dry enough without a hair dryer, but she could do her best to at least make sure she wouldn't catch a cold. Following that, she finished drying up the rest of her body before putting on her undies and the T-shirt. Jimmy hadn't lied - the fabric felt amazing! Ellie didn't know what it was, but she wanted it! After this whole mess with the missing documents got resolved, and once Ellie got her next allowance, she was probably going to take Caroline and go shopping for a T-shirt like that. It wasgoing to make sleeping a whole lot more pleasant!

Jimmy promptly closed the bathroom door with a fresh pair of boxers and towel in hand, both of which he set down on the radiator before getting in the shower. The warm water seemed to soothe his whole body, so he stayed under the water for a while before he reached for the soap and began washing himself thoroughly, lathering his hair with shampoo and scrubbing himself clean. He promptly switched the water off when he was done, vigorously dried himself with the towel, leaving his hair chaotic and messy. He pulled his clean boxers on, and grabbed a toothbrush, squeezed a small amount of toothpaste and cleaned his teeth. Finally done, Jimmy opened the door, carrying his previous clothing and folding them to be placed in his wicker basket for laundry.

"Right. Well, that's me done." He announced, happily.

"Yay!" Ellie exclaimed when she heard Jimmy announcing that he was ready. She stood up from the bed, turning around in a circle and showing off the T-shirt for him. "How do I look?" she asked with a grin before plopping back down on the bed. "Man... I have to admit, I did not expect that this was how our date would end, but honestly? I'm kinda glad it did... Minus the whole 'lost 80% of everything I own' thing. But other than that, I'm actually having fun!"

Her eyes darting all over the room, it wasn't hard to tell that there was something on Ellie's mind. "Describe your room for me!" she asked, glancing up at Jimmy. "I know the basic layout, but tell me what you own. I'd like to pick which half I'll get to keep if we get divorced", she laughed.

"How do you look? Cute as hell, of course." Jimmy replied, as Ellie turned in a circle.

"Yeah, I know what you mean. I wish I could do more to help with the whole bag situation, but somehow I doubt my crappy little torch will do much good. Guess we'll have to wait until morning to see what we can salvage." He said, sitting on the bed next to Ellie. "I can't lie, this is just about the last thing I was expecting to happen tonight, but I'm glad it did. Well, apart from you losing that stuff, but you know... I'm just glad that you're enjoying yourself too."

"Ok, but you can't call dibs on anything until we get engaged at the very least." Jimmy said, chuckling. "In all seriousness, though, a divorce is the very last thing I'd want to happen to us. I've been in the middle of that before, and it isn't very fun." He added.

"Well, we've got the wardrobe just off the foot of the bed." He began, reaching out and knocking on it for emphasis. "There's the desk directly opposite us, my laptop and all the school stuff lives there. There's an old TV there, too. Other than that there's a bunch of posters on the walls, and a basket for laundry. Not much, but it's good enough for me, I'd say."

Ellie bit her lip when Jimmy reminded her that her joke probably wasn't the most appropriate, given the circumstances. She hadn't forgotten about the divorce of her boyfriend's parents, but it had completely slipped her mind at that moment, probably because of all the other things that were happening. "Sorry!" she squeaked, mentally berating herself for being so insensitive. She and Caroline typically had nothing off-limits when it came to jokes. Whenever Caroline was trying to one-up Ellie with some kind of skill or knowledge she possessed, Ellie immediately won the argument with "Well, at least I can climb stairs", or something along those lines. Of course, Caroline rarely allowed Ellie to have the last word, with something like "Aww, sounds like someone's cranky! Why don't you call your parents and complain about me? Oh, wait..." Anyone else would've probably been pretty offended by jokes like that, but for Ellie and Caroline they were just par for the course. The blonde didn't know how Jimmy felt about this sort of humor, but for the time being, she reminded herself to be a bit more careful.

"But hey, the moment you get that ring I'm all yours!" the girl chuckled, lying back on the bed and preparing to listen to Jimmy's explanations. She tried to make a mental note of where everything was, drawing a three-dimensional map in her brain like she always did. "Oh, you have a TV?" she asked, looking over in its direction. "Does it have video or something? Maybe we can watch a movie on it sometime!"

"Don't worry about it, if you can't joke about these things, what's the point? I don't see why we should have to draw stupid lines for things we can't talk about. I just wanted to be real about it for a minute, make sure we're on the same page." Jimmy reassured Ellie. He had played along, after all, and he didn't want her to think he was particularly sensitive about what jokes she made. Her sense of humour had been pretty charming to Jimmy so far.

"I'm afraid I might have to keep you waiting on that one for a while." He laughed.
"Yeah, it's not too flashy, got it second hand and cheap. No DVD or VCR or anything of the sort. But I just stream my laptop through it with a cable, better picture and sound. I'm sure I can search around some dubious 'file sharing' websites to find a movie worth watching. And there's always Netflix, the saving grace of any student."

"Well, Netflix is just as good as video... I think! It is, isn't it?" Ellie looked at Jimmy, a bit unsure. She'd casually heard of Netflix (pretty much just that it was a service where you can watch movies online), but didn't know anything else about it. None of her foster homes had it - most relied on DVDs to keep the children entertained, which was why Ellie was more or less proficient with working those even without seeing a thing. Netflix, though - that was completely uncharted territory for her.

"Say, wanna watch a movie with me?" she asked, turning towards her boyfriend. "I've got a couple of ideas, but I guess it depends on how tired you are... And what's available on this Netflix of yours."

"Yeah, pretty much. It's essentially just a streaming service now, click on a movie, it'll load, and you can watch it. Provided you pay them a subscription fee every month, that is. They have TV shows as well. There'll probably be quite a few things you'd like." He explained.

"Sure, we can give it a shot, I've got a bit of life left in me. What do you have in mind? I can always just search it and see what comes up, it's pretty easy to find something decent." Jimmy said, getting up to operate his laptop and loading up the website.

"Daredevil!" Ellie yelled immediately and without giving it any thought at all. "Released in 2003 and starring Ben Affleck, Jennifer Garner and the great Michael Clarke Duncan, written and directed by Mark Steven Johnson", she enthusiastically parroted the information, unsure of how much Jimmy needed to find the movie. It wasn't exactly hard - 'Daredevil', despite its abysmal reviews and lukewarm fan reaction, was by far Ellie's favorite movie, and honestly, it wasn't exactly hard to see why. Literally the only reason why she'd insisted that her cane be red when she was finally allowed to pick one was because of this movie. She'd seen it a dozen times and could easily see it a dozen more.

"Is it on Netflix?" the girl asked impatiently, leaning on Jimmy's shoulder. "If it's not, then we can just find any superhero movie, but I'd love to show you Daredevil! Trust me, it's amazing!"

Jimmy raised an eyebrow at Ellie's proclamation, but didn't question it. The 2003 film was fairly infamous for having pissed off every fanboy and fangirl around, or so Jimmy had understood. The search yielded no results for the film. However...
"The film's not there. But you know what they do have? A recent TV show about Daredevil. I've heard extremely good things about it, maybe we could throw on the first episode or two?"

"Aww!" Ellie grunted, her lips pouting cutely as she learned that her favorite movie wasn't on the service. She was pretty close to asking Jimmy to retrieve it from the dark corners of the webiverse anyway, but halted when she learned that there was something else there bearing Daredevil's name. "A TV show?" she raised an eyebrow. "Well, sure, I mean, I guess we can give it a shot", she shrugged, leaning back on her palms. "But be warned, I'm gonna be asking you to describe a whole lot of things... Unless Netflix has an option to add a narrator for the blind or something", she smiled. Some DVDs had the feature, but she wasn't sure if Netflix incorporated it. If there was ever a show or a movie which needed it, it was certainly Daredevil, but who knew.