The Other Real World (open)

[Indigo Noble]

Indigo's gaze had lifted at that light, feminine laugh, and he would have been grateful that she wasn't looking at him had he been thinking properly. Rather, he was taking the opportunity to look at her half-turned face while she wouldn't be aware of it. Only the chime of the computer pulled his attention back. He typed in his password as he let what she'd said filter into his mind. Cute. His face heated, despite the fact that cute wasn't a description any guy wanted applied to himself. Hot or effing badassed would be preferable. Cool, she said cool, he reminded himself.

"I have a lot of stuff to catch up on," he said, as though that explained his excitement all on its own. "Haven't been on in a week, and I know there are people wondering if I died." He paused, staring at the screen as though intensely interested, though for the moment he was trying to think of something intelligent to say. "Uh, so, like, do you go online a lot?" He squeezed his eyes temporarily shut. Good one.

[Annabelle Hennessy]

"Well, I do all my ordering with muggle vendors online." Annabelle knew that wasn't telling the truth and she doubted he'd believe it anyways. "...Which take all of five minutes. Then when I don't have customers I check the muggle news, my blogs, catching up with people, and this Vampiire App game I play that's pretty stupid, but really addicting. What about you?"

[Indigo Noble]

"Yeah, I blog," Indigo said, though his voice was low enough that he hoped she wouldn't be able to make out the words. He kept his blog anonymous, and talking face-to-face about it would be painful, at best. "I send e-mail and stuff, you know?" He couldn't actually think of what he did. He checked his sites, wrote, and looked stuff up.

[Annabelle Hennessy]

Annabelle nodded in understanding. The immediate chill was gone so she went to grab her own laptop. "I'm sure you have loads to catch up on, I know I did when I logged on the first time here. I'll leave you to it and check what they have to say about this storm." She wasn't about to ask what he blogged about. Sure, she was curious, but then he might ask the same question of her in return. She could just tell him about the book review blog that she did, it wasn't a secret, but it would paint her as an even bigger nerd. Plus, she wasn't a good liar and he might somehow know that it wasn't the only one she kept.

Annabelle came back and settled on the couch directly in front of the fire. It was in the seat nearest him, but the way their computers were facing neither would be able to catch what was on the other's screen. She was perfectly fine with sitting there doing their own thing, they had all night to kill after all and they'd exhausted most of the common small talk. Besides, if he was going to type away on his computer, it would give her the opportunity to update one of the blogs that she'd decided would have to wait util tomorrow.

[Indigo Noble]

Indigo was silent for a short while as he plugged in his earbuds and got some music going. It was a relief to hear it, after so long with nothing but the wizards' wireless one of the other guys kept in their room. He loved the Weird Sisters and all, but he was starved for Muse. He paid no attention to any slight shifting with the music that he might have done, but typed away, only partway through his Facebook messages when he glanced up and over at Annabelle, his gaze flickering quickly back down at his laptop. He turned down his music. "So, like, what's that Vampire App you play?" he asked, hoping it didn't sound creepy or anything.

[Annabelle Hennessy]

"It's um, Vampire Wars. It's on facebook. Most people play those farm games, or Mafia Wars, but I thought it was more interesting." Annabelle looked over to Indigo with a sheepish grin. "It's silly right? But I'm so close to getting this set of wings I've wanted...." Her parents had told her years ago that computer and video games held no purpose other than to rot children's brains, but she figured she read enough to make up for her idle time playing.

[Indigo Noble]

"I have some friends that have been trying to get me to play that," Indigo said. He'd been ignoring the requests, though. He was busy collecting Flair, and it wouldn't be anything like real vampires. Still, she was a witch, and she was playing... "Maybe I'll give it a try." He was silent a moment, thinking, and his heart pounded heavily as he forced himself to speak. "Do you like getextrapointsforinvitingpeople?" he asked, all in one breath. He stared resolutely at his screen.

[Annabelle Hennessy]

"Pardon, what?" Annabelle asked after a moment of trying to figure out what he said. Perhaps it was the accent, although she'd never had nearly this much trouble making out what Markise had ever said, or Dare for that matter, or even Brindle when they'd talked. Was she that distracted, or was he simply talking fast? Annabelle chewed on her lip as she glanced down to pull up facebook. If he'd asked her something about the game, it wouldn't hurt to have it pulled up to reference.

[Indigo Noble]

Indigo's face heated, and his head dipped a bit lower over the laptop. "Uh, just wondering if, like... if you invited me if you'd get extra points or something? But you totally don't have to, I mean, I was just wondering." And he'd already said that. Was he a skipping cd or something?

[Annabelle Hennessy]

"Well it never hurts to have more clan members in fights. A lot of people add random players to make their clans strong which sucks for those of us that don't want to have thousands of friends we don't ever talk to." Anna typed in his name, thankfully she'd remembered it from having to type it on the receipts, and managed to find the profile she thought was him.

"My parents have facebook too and I'm sure they check out who I have on my page even if I am legally of age and on my own. So I try to keep things normal looking. There! I sent you a friend request." She quickly went to her page to make sure there weren't any other stupid app posts or anything embarrassing that would make her look bad.

[Indigo Noble]

Indigo blinked and looked up, his gaze quickly locking onto Annabelle. "What?" he asked, trying not to sound as panicked as he felt. He refreshed, but there was nothing, so he opened another browse to check his other Facebook account. Oh my God, please... And there it was. She'd looked him up and found his 'real' account, the one he had a picture of himself from Thanksgiving up as his profile image. Crap. He looked like a friggin tool in that picture, wearing clothes his mom had picked out and everything. He tried to breathe. "Uh... I didn't get it," he said. "I don't use my real name online." And my family would give me 20 questions if some random girl was added to my friends' list!

[Annabelle Hennessy]

"Really? Okay....uh, what's your email address then?" Annabelle opened a new tab with facebook so she could type it into the search box as he gave it to her, not really believing his story. She'd thought for sure the picture had been of him, how many Indigo Nobles could there be about his age, with his color hair and all? She'd go back and look at the account more closely after she sent him the new request.

[Indigo Noble]

There were a litany of curses running through Indigo's head as he debated. He could give her his Drowning Spirit account, and let her into a hell of a lot more of his life than his parents got, or he could let her see the one he'd put up for his family. And let them see you playing some Vampire app? he asked himself. Hell. No. He took a breath. "Drowning—x—Spirit—at—example—dot—com."

[Annabelle Hennessy]

"Drowning-x-spirit......dot-com" Annabelle repeated softly, or more accurately mouthed, as she typed the words and hit search. There was only one account that popped up and she looked at the name as she clicked to add him as a friend. Drowning Spirit. The picture was completely different than the other profile she'd friended first. This one did seem to fit him better, what with the guyliner and the way his hair fell. "Annnnd, Sent." She'd tried to check out his page before sending, but everything was blocked. She'd just have to wait the few seconds for him to add her before she checked him out. Look at his profile, not check him out!

[Indigo Noble]

(All god-moding in the previous post pre-approved by Indigo's writer.)

Indigo was still debating as he refreshed and found the friend request. He could always put her in the group with the high privacy level so she could only see the app stuff on his wall. He clicked accept, but didn't say as much, going instead to find her in his friends' list and stick her in a group before she noticed. He was in a bit of a hurry to do so, however, and instead of clicking his invisible wall group, he clicked intnl wiz, thereby leaving his wall, interests, and photos wide open. He didn't hide anything from the tiny group of computer-literate wizards he'd found online.