What Are You Afraid Of?

[Polka]

(ooc: July 26th. For now it's open only to Wilbur and Polka, but this might change after a page or so.)

What had started as a journey to do something with her short life had quickly devolved into Polka going inward upon herself and reverting back into a quiet, seemingly anti-social girl. She hadn't meant for it to turn that way, but fear had set in quickly and she hadn't been able to stop herself from avoiding people. Admittedly, she preferred the quiet that came with being a loner. It allowed for her to think about things uninterrupted. At the same time, Polka was kicking herself for being so afraid. What was there to be afraid of aside from the inevitable rejection that would come if anyone found out about her disease? She realized it was silly to worry about that, especially when she was the only one that knew about it, but there she was worrying anyway. What more could she do when she was so convinced that people would hate her just for existing and having something she didn't even have any control over?

Polka had retreated to the library long ago. It had turned into a sort of sanctuary for her when she had determined that she couldn't go through with attempting to befriend anyone. She was too afraid to even try, and so she had sought comfort in the many books that had been provided after gaining the knowledge that it was okay to touch any book she desired. At that present moment, Polka was hidden in a secluded corner toward the back where she thought she would be perfectly safe. No one would want to retrieve a book from a dusty old corner like that, would they? Polka was convinced that this was the case, and so she had buried her nose deep in a book she had found on one of the shelves nearest her. She was just getting to the end of a chapter when something caught her attention. Blue eyes went upward from the page she was on and darted around the library. Who was there?

[Wilbur Robinson]

Darn it, you took a wrong turn again. 'Video games and books are not the same, you've learned that before.' Wilbur thought as he made his way through the huge library. How had he managed to get lost in here was beyond him. He would have never done it before. "How does one find their way along here anyways?!" he mumbled before noticing a girl reading. He gave a tiny smile and wave before nearly knocking a shelf of books over. "Stay!" he muttered pointing to the shelf. "Stay, good bookshelf."

[Polka]

Polka's heart skipped a beat. There was someone there and... and he was acknowledging her. Waving at her, even. She hardly knew what to do in that case. No one ever acknowledged her in such a manner before, so the little blonde was rather uncertain of how to even go about returning the acknowledgment. Before she could even begin to try and work it out, though, Wilbur accidentally bumped into a bookshelf and almost knocked it over. That got a soft gasp to escape Polka, but when it looked like things were going to be okay she relaxed again. Then he spoke, and she silently admitted that what he had said was rather funny. It was difficult to suppress the laughter that was bubbling up within her, but she almost succeeded. The only thing that gave away that she was amused was the faint smile on her face that disappeared as quickly as it had come.

Don't get attached, Polka! He's probably just pretending to be nice.

Negative though her thoughts were, it was true enough in her mind. She hadn't met many people that were willing to be nice to her. So even though it wasn't the best course of action, Polka shrank back and hoped that maybe the boy would forget he had seen her and move on. Knowing her luck, though, this wouldn't be the case.

[Wilbur Robinson]

Wilbur gave a bigger smile. At least he had gotten a smile out of her. That was what he had been good at, the raven haired boy was just thankful she just wasn't a cheerleader or something trying to fake him into getting a wedgie. Or maybe that was her act? 'No, you are overreacting, she doesn't seem liek the kind of girl who would laugh at you getting beat up.' he thought.

His brown eyes noticed her expression said she was shy. "Sorry about that." he muttered quietly. "Did i disturb your...you know...reading?"

[Polka]

He's talking to me. He's talking to me. He's talking to me.

That thought alone seemed to have shaken Polka's whole world. All her doubts about people wanting to acknowledge her and the built up fear of rejection were telling her to pretend that it wasn't happening, and yet... she sort of liked it. For once she was being acknowledged. It felt nice, a lot nicer than rejection, and she shouldn't be afraid of it. Despite that, she still found herself doubting it was a good thing. She was still afraid of rejection. Still afraid of getting hurt.

In spite of that, she knew it would be rude to not offer some kind of reply. She had to say something before she gave the entirely wrong impression and made him think she couldn't speak at all. So, at long last, she shook her head a little in response to his question.

"N-No, you didn't disturb me. I was almost done with that chapter anyway." Polka replied. Her voice was still fairly soft, almost as though she were afraid of speaking too loudly, but she felt she had gotten her reply across in an all right manner. She carefully put a bookmark in between the pages and closed the book, deciding to at least attempt putting her full attention on the foreign concept of a conversation with a stranger. "You... did kind of startle me, though. I didn't expect anyone to come this far back here."

[Wilbur Robinson]

"Well...I kind of got lost. I was looking for the Game Room." Wilbur said slightly embarrassed. Great. now she was going to think that he was just a total loser that just wanted to play video games all day. "And I kind of got...well lost." he said. "I wasn't expecting this library to be so big yeah know." He wasn't much of a reader in general, well unless you counted comic books but no one ever counted those as "real" fiction.

"What are you reading?" he asked. "Is it any good?"

[Polka]

On the contrary, Polka didn't think he was any different for admitting that he had gotten lost. With so many books, it was a wonder that Polka hadn't gotten lost herself when she'd been looking for something to read in the hopes that she could forget the reason she was there. Then the topic shifted to what she was reading, and of course she was more than happy to tell him. It was a more comfortable topic for some reason.

"It's called Great Expectations. I'd never read it before, so I thought I'd see if it was any good. It's actually pretty interesting, but that might just be because I've never had the opportunity to read anything like it before." she admitted. It felt awkward, admitting that she hadn't really read many books before, but Polka knew it was the truth. There hadn't exactly been a wide variety of books that she would have access to in Tenuto. "This might sound... odd, but I've never even been in a big library like this. Everything back home was so small and familiar." Polka said.

...Wait. Why are you talking about home now?

Blue eyes grew a tiny bit wider when she realized that she'd let something about her home slip out. Would Wilbur know anything about Tenuto? It was doubtful, but on the off chance that he did Polka could only silently hope that he didn't know anything relating to her disease.

[Wilbur Robinson]

"I've never been much of a reader...I don't know it just never appealed to me. Never understood what was such a big deal about it." The boy didn't realize that it was kind of mean to say, but he never really understood it. "Can I ask what's so special about reading in the first place?" The raven haired boy hoped that she didn't mind that he had decided to sit next to her. "I mean the libraries at my home aren't that big but...i don't know."

[Polka]

Well, at least he hadn't wanted to ask about Polka's home. That much had relieved the blonde a little. However, the question he asked made her hesitate. How much could Polka say without divulging that this whole time she had been afraid to interact with people? She awkwardly looked away, her brow furrowing a bit as she contemplated what to say, before finally deciding how she should answer. Polka wouldn't try to dance around the issue, but she would try not to blatantly say she was anti-social or anything. Whatever worked was fine by her, and she thought she had a sufficient answer.

"Reading is just something I enjoy doing. It lets me go to places I could only dream of seeing. I... guess it would be best to say that I'm not really used to the idea of traveling, so I'm sort of a homebody. At least, I was before now..." Polka found herself trailing off. Had she said too much? She hoped she hadn't. There was only so much she could say without blatantly saying she was afraid of being hurt by allowing people to grow close to her.

[Sayaka]

"So...its kind of like time-traveling?" He asked curiously. Why did you say that? Why did you say that?! Now she is going to think you are a complete idiot. What kind of messed up fool are you? Those thoughts swarmed Wilbur's brain as he spoke to her. Why was he making an idiot out of himself. "Is it you know...fun?" he asked. "You know...to read?" Wow. way to sound like a little kid.

[Polka]

Instead of speaking, Polka offered a little nod in response to his questions. Being a withdrawn individual, Polka quite enjoyed reading. It was something fun that allowed for her to meet people without actually meeting them. The encounter with Wilbur, though, had definitely been something out of the ordinary for Polka. She didn't even know how she had managed to hold her own in the conversation thus far without losing her resolve. One thing was clear, though. Polka didn't know how much longer she could go on in the current conversation.

Another thing that struck Polka as odd was the fact that neither of them had introduced themselves yet. She thought that maybe it was a good thing, just in case they never saw each other again so that they wouldn't have an awkward moment where they would end up trying to remember who they were, but at the same time it just felt very strange not knowing Wilbur's name. Maybe it was time to take the first step toward coming out of her shell.

"Um... I don't... I don't think either of us ever said who we are..."

[Wilbur Robinson]

Wow. He was just making stupid mistakes all over the place today. "I'm Wilbur, Wilbur Robinson, but you can just call me Wilbur, i would prefer it that way anyways." he said with an easy-going smile. At least he could talk to her normally without the fear of getting picked on. "And who are you?" he asked curiously

[Polka]

So far, so good. Wilbur was a name that wasn't all that common where Polka was from, so it was safe to say she was intrigued by it. Now all Polka had to do was owe up to her end of the conversation and introduce herself. Easy! "P-Polka. My name's Polka." Polka replied. Whether she was aware of it or not, her voice had gotten just a little louder since beginning the conversation. Perhaps it was confidence slowly making its way through her system, or maybe it was just her growing tired of speaking so softly. Whatever the case, Polka seemed to be making progress.

[Wilbur Robinson]

"Polka huh. That's an interesting name. Better than mine anyways." The boy smiled. Though where he was from, polka was a type of dance. A really strange dance to be exact, he would have laughed at the name, but it was rather surprising to hear someone actually named Polka so he was a bit intrigued by the girl already.

[Polka]

"Interesting?" Polka repeated. She didn't know if that was a good or a bad thing. The fact that he hadn't made fun of it was a good enough relief in Polka's mind, but still... she was uncertain. Lots of people where she was from had names relating to music and dance. It was strange, but that was the way it was. Polka had never questioned it before. Now, though, it made her wonder just how different things were outside of Tenuto. "That's... not a bad thing, is it?" Polka finally asked. She sincerely hoped it wasn't a bad thing to have an interesting name.

Don't you think you're being a bit too cautious about this? He might have just meant it in a good way.

For once her thoughts weren't negative. Even she thought that perhaps she was being overly cautious. Still, with how things had been for her back home, she felt she had some right to be. Just in case.