He was staring at her like she said something absurd (oops, maybe he wasn’t on speaking terms with his parents), then leapt to his feet with a startled cry and blurted excuses before dashing away, taking the glass of smoothie with him. She pulled out a few dollar notes and left them on the table to pay in case she couldn’t catch up with him and get him to return the glass. Scooping up the art book she trotted out the door after him.

“Hey! Persi, wait up, you left your angels!”

A totally normal thing to shout down the street, and not at all worth the perculiar looks she was getting from random pedestrians on the street. She thought she saw a flash of teenage hair ahead and she made her way for it at a fair pace, trying to catch up, without sounding like she was trying to chase him down.

Persi wasn't entirely sure how he managed not to run into anyone while he hurried down the sidewalk. That he wasn't running helped, though he was moving about as fast as he could without running, and that only because actually running would attract too much attention. Despite that, he couldn't quite see; he could, but the instant he wasn't currently seeing or hearing any given thing the memory of it was completely gone, and his brain only seemed to be interpreting what it saw enough to not run into anyone. All the rest of it seemed to be occupied running in circles and babbling in fear too quickly to even finish a word.

He got a few blocks away before he had to stop at a corner, and the panic almost immediately started draining away. That... hadn't really been justified, entirely. It wasn't like she knew him, he could always have made something up, just said he'd ask his parents to call, and she'd never know the difference. He frowned down at the sidewalk. Yeah, that had been stupid... but he really didn't like that topic. Those topics. School and parents were both just... bad right now.

...And he still had the cup. Persi scowled at it as soon as he noticed. What kind of store gave out actual glasses anyway? Sure it felt better than having his hands frozen immediately because of a plastic cup, but still. It meant that he had to go back.

...That was going to suck. Having to go in and explain that he'd accidentally stolen the glass and could they please not arrest him for it or anything would be horrible even if they decided to actually believe him. And really, who would believe that he ran away with the glass without noticing because someone asked him about school? But even if they did believe him Cara would be there and he's have to explain himself to her... he had no idea how to do that.

...Maybe he could wait until she left. Then at least he'd only have one problem to deal with. It would be rude to avoid her, but probably not ruder considering he'd already run away, so... he couldn't fix that. So he'd go find the store, then find somewhere nearby to wait for her to leave. That would work. Well, as close as it could get to working, anyway. Persi sighed and turned around.

She jogged up to the quickly walking figure with black hair and put her hand out to grasp what she thought was Persi’s shoulder. A girl (with pink and red streaks at the front, not blue and green) turned around, eyebrows and rape whistle raised. As if she would be attacked on the bustling street like this.

“Ooops, sorry, wrong dye-job.”

Cara turned quickly away from the affronted individual and scanned the backs moving away from her for another skinny, hurrying teenager. Bingo. He was a little way away from her, stopped at a street corner, his head tilted just so, enough that his long hair was hanging down in front of his face, shielding her from his gaze and effectively showing off the green and blue stripes. The chances of getting two wrong dye-jobs in the same number of minutes was surely not that high.

She was just within shoulder-grasping distance, her hand in the process of raising to touch his shoulder when he turned, putting his front where his back had been and causing a sudden neck-tap.

“Ah!”

She quickly retracted her hand and held the book out like a shield.

“Sorry! I didn’t mean to push you, I was just thinking out loud. And sorry for the neck-prod just then, that was an accident.”

Nothing quite like chasing someone down and poking them in the neck to make them forgive you for offending them. Nothing at all.

Cara's surprise was matched by a strangled noise and small, automatic jump back from Persi. Where had she come from?

Push? Okay, Persi knew he was weak, but he wasn't that weak. That was a poke, not a push.

...Or she meant something entirely different. Oh. Persi shifted, and his eyes landed on the ground again. "It's okay." He wasn't entirely sure that was true, or even what he was saying was okay, but it was at least the polite thing to say. That put it ahead of the very few other things he could think of to say, which were mostly semi-hysterical demands to know where she'd appeared from.

And... yeah. This was why he'd just decided to avoid her. Persi's gaze stayed firmly on the ground, no matter how he tried to convince himself that was rude, too. "Um... sorry. That I... ran off. I...." Am still really freaked out by being kicked out and my parents wanting to kill me, and panicked at the idea of you finding out about it, because for some reason I thought you might tell my parents where I was. That didn't seem like a good reason. Nor was it one he wanted to explain. "Sorry."

It wasn’t really ok, but once he had said that it was it would have been rude to apologise further. The boy was staring at the ground, hard, as if the pavement would provide the magical solution to soothe away the awkwardness. She gave it a cursory glance. No great awkward-dissolver there.

He stumbled through his own awkward apology and she could hear a great deal of backstory behind the pauses between the words, but there was no way of knowing (without asking, of course) what the story was. She ran her fingers along the spiral spine of the book.

“I’m sorry if I asked something too personal. I would have let you just go but you left this.”

She indicated the book and shrugged, his story was his own, but if there was anything she could do to help him out she probably would; within reason, of course, she was only a student so her funds and swaying power were limited.

“All sorts wash up in New York, you know, I’ve learned not to judge. If there’s anything I can do to… I dunno, make up for it or something?”

Calling the school was definitely off the cards, unless he suddenly asked her to, but she knew of a few youth counselling services, she might even have a couple of business cards if she had the time to rummage in her bag for them.

"It's okay. Sorry. Thanks." There were way too many responses to that, and they didn't fit well together at all. Persi shifted weight from one foot to the other again, and then shifted the glass between hands before reaching for the sketchbook. Maybe if he had it, he could figure out a reason to leave that wasn't rude, or maybe she would; at least, he couldn't leave while she had it. So getting it back would be a step toward ending the awkwardness.

Persi would have brushed his hair out of his eyes. Not because it was in his eyes, really, but just to have something to do as a distraction from the awkwardness. His hands were full, though, so he couldn't, and using the back of his hand would just be awkward itself. "I... don't think so... you didn't do anything wrong." There wasn't anything for her to make up for, and there wasn't anything Persi could think of for her to do, either way. Though he now felt bad for not thinking of anything.

He could, at least, figure out another requirement for escaping the awkwardness. Persi held up the glass enough to gesture vaguely with it. "I should take this back...."

He seemed to be getting more and more uneasy by the second. She felt bad for making him so uncomfortable, but there was nothing for it now but to let him go, she had said everything she could think of. Well, almost everything.

“If you change your mind and need a favour…”

She slipped a business card into the cover of his sketchbook. She usually had them on hand in case she met an opportunity to promote her blog, or her work as a freelance writer, but it was also a faster way than writing out her number to share it.

“If it’s a slow favour, send me an email, if you need it quickly give me a ring, and I’ll do my best to get back to you ASAP.”

She smiled ruefully at the lad, maybe she would see him again, maybe not, but at least she knew he had gotten one dose of fruit in him, the smoothie was just a bonus.

“See you ‘round.”