These people are supposed to be my new family? (Open)

In the interview the therapist had asked how Devon felt about joining the Highgrove family. Looking out at the ragtag collection of biters, bangers, emos, and other mixed nuts from the doorway of the dining hall Devon felt a part of him wither inside. He didn't see anyone here that even remotely reminded him of his old social group; jocks and theater people.

Devon stood in the door way, a slim boy with dark wavy hair, somber brown eyes, and hands that seemed large and puppish compared to the rest of him. He wore a white button down, untucked, jeans and Addias along with a serious expression and a faint air of puzzlement.

He moved from the doorway and stood in line to make his choices; chicken, green beans, spiced apples and a roll before trying to find a seat that wasn't near anyone else.

In the real world you could chat up a stranger, if they were damaged or not was a mystery that you unfolded. Here, there was no mystery. Everyone was some sort of bent, and it sometimes it was easy to tell the bad ones... like the mummy with bandages everywhere, or the one who was more intrested in gnawing on their hair than their chicken.

But a lot of them looked normal. Like him.

With a sigh he sat in the center of the room, most of the empty seats where there, probably because no one wanted the rest of the animals at the zoo behind them. He ate mechanically, nothing had tasted good to him in months, it was all sand. He didn't even really feel all that hungry, but when he'd lost ten pounds the first few weeks of his house arrest his father had said something about putting him in an institution, and not one disguised like a school, but one that had bars and you wore slippers all day.

So he ate, and tried not to make eye contact with anyone here, even though he could feel eyes crawling on him. New person, new topic of conversation. Suddenly his table was jolted, and it forced him to look up.

Sitting in the lunch room with a fading purple splash of hair falling into her eyes and a faded Eagles tee partially covered with a denim vest, Ellie probably didn't fall into Devon's old social group. But then again, she didn't really fall into much of any social group unless the cut class to go listen to your mum's band counted as a social group. Maybe musicians. Kinda like theater people, you know, if they sang or something. Probably more like a hard core band geek that had gotten too big for her head. Not that anyone would say that to her - she was never really around to say anything to.

A passing the two month mark here at Highgrove and she still really had yet to make any friends. Sure there was dreads boy from the therapy session, but she'd forgotten his name and didn't really know how to approach him outside of a group setting. How were you supposed to go and introduce yourself to a kid that had probably forgotten about you? Hi remember me? I'm the chick from that that session where we had to give a bullshit answer to a bullshit question? Oh...that doesn't really narrow it down at all now that you mention it. Most of the sessions around here seemed to go that way. It was like these people were all looking for one magic answer and if you didn't give it there was much scribbling away on a pad of paper like you were getting written up and sent to the Dean's office.

Looking up from her green beans - well they looked more like limp slightly disintegrating stalks of green vegetable matter that were slowly turning into juice - she scanned around looking for said boy with dreads. Unfortunately he was no where to be seen. Either that or she was just completely missing him. Either way she stabbed at the offending vegetable in silent anger. She was seriously never going to talk to that guy again, was she? Well there went that option for a friend.

Her eye caught what she recognized as a new guy headed for the middle of the lunch area. She labeled him new because after a few days it was easy to tell that no one ate near the middle because it would be harder to get out of the way if someone had a spazz attack or a fight broke out. That was the thing that sucked about being new, no one clued you in about anything. Well, normally they didn't. Looking around she saw a few other pairs of eyes on the guy but no one was making a move to inform him about the silent rule. Frowning she picked up her tray and moved over to the table. Bumping it with her hip she smiled at the guy when he looked up.

"Hey there's kinda a thing about eating here. You're kinda bait for a group of sharks or something. Why don't you come sit with me? Easier escape route if things get messy."

...nineteen, twenty... swallow... take another bite... one... two... three...

Mechanics of being normal. That's what he was reduced to. Before he had some freedom, he didn't always have to wear a mask, but now... now it'd be twenty four/seven and he didn't know how this was supposed to help, this suppression without outlet.

Two years of this? He was horribly tempted to stick the fork he was eating with in his eye and end it now.

He looked up at the girl with the pretty almond shaped eyes, blue in her hair, and was that a shadow of a dimple next to her mouth? He felt an answering smile quirk his lips, a habit more than anything else. Someone smiled at him, he smiled back. He was worse than a Pavlovian dog.

"Yeah, I figured." He gestured to the rest of the room. "It's like the Bermuda Triangle of the lunch room, so the shark analogy is pretty spot on."

When she said escape easier if it got messy he looked around the room again. How messy could it get? Oh, right... everyone may look fairly normal now, but gunpowder is just a pile of grey powder until you ignite it. He looked back at the girl, a slightly worried frown line between his eyes. "Anyone get seriously hurt, or is it like... good clean fun?"

Irregardless of her answer he got up to follow her. He had said he wouldn't follow his old patterns, but who was he kidding. His will to change wasn't all that strong, honestly, he had no incentive to do so. "Be healthy and happy." as a reason made as much sense as "Santa will put you on his naughty list."

"I'm Devon." He told her as they moved to a new part of the room. "Don't you like, worry, about what kind of freak I am? It's kind of taking a risk, being nice to the new kid. Who knows what damage I have."

What was the social norm in this place? Was he supposed to label himself? Did everyone know? Was there a newsletter with new kids faces in it and their sickness under it that he just hadn't seen yet?

Now that he was smiling Ellie could see that the boy was kinda cute. Like the type that would be in those shit boy bands that you would never admit you actually listened to but still had a smidgen of them on your ipod just because you had a secret crush on at least one of the members. She vaguely wondered if the boy could sing for a moment before pushing the thought away. That would be a weird question to ask someone upon just meeting them.

She made a chomping action with her teeth before laughing slightly. Who knew what lurked in the crowd around them really? Didn't this place accept people that liked hurting other people? It wasn't like they put up a sign on the door of the dorms saying what all the kids had. That would have been helpful. Two months of this place and she still really had no idea what was wrong with the girls she lived with. Well except like the obvious stuff - the girl with the burns on her legs, who seemed to be afraid of everything. The chick with the fear of dirt or whatever. All she knew what was people told in group discussion, and she hadn't been in group with anyone in her dorm other than Josephine, who seemed just to be a slut. Apparently that was a good enough reason to be put into this place.

She shrugged at Devon's question as they moved.

"I haven't seen anything really. A few kids losing their shit here and there, or a scuffle, but nah no one getting really hurt. Then again haven't seen a real fight here yet. Glad I haven't to be honest, crazy people fighting? That's gotta get ugly fast."

She sat at the new table and poked at an apple before pausing.

"Ellie. Well Eleanor anywho. And I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours."

She smirked and nommed her apple as she shrugged yet again. Typical teenage movement that normally got her playfully shoved because it infuriated her Mum.

"You haven't tried to stab me in the eye yet so I don't really see a problem about it yet."

Devon tried not to be a perv and check her out as she walked ahead of him, but, mental problems aside, he was teenage boy and she was a cute girl. He liked how the sassy attitude she had matched her walk and the shock of blue in her hair.

"That's good to know." He said when she said that she hadn't seen anything too ugly. "I mean, what does someone expect from places like this? All I could come up with was One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Girl Interrupted."

They sat down at a table with six seats and too of them were already occupied, but the two girls were too busy whispering to each other and glancing around the room fearfully to notice them. A sort of oxymoron, Devon thought, until he realized that they were very, very thin and not actually eating, but ferreting food into their pockets and only pretending to eat. He looked over his shoulder and saw one of the matrons or whatever they called them scan the room and that's who the girls were watching for, pausing or putting food to their lips when her gaze swept over them.

"Yeah, well... I'm a pacifist, so you don't have to worry about that." Devon said with a sad smile, poking at his chicken and not entirely thrilled with the way the grease had jelled in a puddle around it. "If I'll stab anyone in the eye, it'll be myself."

He was confused for a moment when she said 'tell you mine if you tell me yours' because they just had exchanged names. Then he understood. "My dysfunction? Self harm." That was the line he was staying with. The rest of it, the why and how of it, that was no one's business but his and his shrinks.

"Do you find it weird that's the first thing people ask you? I mean it's like 'hello, I'm so and so, I'm a werido, how about you?' You're the second person that's been like that. Is it something I should expect from everyone?" He asked earnestly as he pushed the rest of his food away, the conversation was much more appealing than what was on the plate and he gave Ellie his complete attention.