joker, smoker, midnight toker

On campus, no. Off campus, yeah.

Not when the whole, no shoes no service thing comes into play.

Bamba and Jillian ||

Jillian wiped away her tears again, fumbling with crossing her arms and trying to maintain herself in front of him. “You know what I want, I just.. I want you to want it too.” She shook her head and grunted at her lip quivering again. “Why won’t these damn tears stop!” She yelled, shaking her head and rubbing her cheeks with her sleeves again. She looked up and sighed, attempting over and over to stop being so vulnerable. Because god dammit, did being vulnerable hurt. “I’m sorry, I just-” She sniffed, “I don’t know if I should give you time away from me or if we should spend more time together, in Africa, in Ireland, to see how we feel. Or if those are both just terrible ideas and I”m rambling on like a fucking idiot.” She wiped her eyes again, dropping her hands to her side. “I don’t want to not try, Bamba, but I also want do to what you want to do.”

"Jill--" Bamba sighed, taking the steps forward and pulling her into his chest. He couldn't take seeing her cry anymore, it was killing him. "Again, I don't have an answer," He leaned his bristly chin atop her head, nuzzling her gently. "But, we'll figure it out somehow. "I do know though, that you are not and idiot and your ideas aren't wrong. But, I feel like we've spent enough time apart for now and whatever ends up becoming of this I've still been really fucking missing you so I'd much rather you just stay here a minute."

Bamba and Jillian ||

"What you want," Jillian said, defeated. "I can’t keep you if you don’t want to stay, Bamba. It doesn’t matter how much I love you or how much I believe in us if you’ve already made up your mind about what we’ll become." The tears kept streaming down her pale cheeks even though her voice was more steady. She was still trying to hard to be strong. "And I understand, Bamba, what you’re trying to do, but it doesn’t make you going away from me any easier. It doesn’t make the thought of me living the rest of my life without you seem like feasible thing to do." She crossed her arms and shrugged her shoulders, her lip quivering steadily. 

"What I want is for you to do what you want," Bamba sighed. "And whenever you want to and however you want to," He ran a hand through his messy, bedhead hair. "I've had some time to think about it," He quipped, his mouth shooting off things he didn't really meant. He was just upset and unsure and wanting to do right. But every answer felt wrong. Selfish vs. Selfless, the two words rang back and forth in Bamba's ears. "There's no right answer," He sighed. "This isn't me trying to give up on us. It's me trying to keep us from not being us," Bamba chuckled bitterly. "Only problem is that I don't know who the fuck I am without you anymore."

Bamba and Jillian ||

Jillian wiped the tears from her face, her stomach knotting and reknotting itself. What was the point of getting better if on her journey things just crashed around her worse than before. “You’re leaving then..” Jillian asked, wet eyes looking up once more into his, her shoulders shrugging weakly. “Again?” She felt so weak, so fucking weak. “And that’s it?” 

Bamba pinched the bridge of his nose and pressed his thumb and his forefinger into his eyes until he could see stars shooting behind his eyelids. He could hardly form a real, feasible thought anymore. He didn't want to think, he just wanted to be. "I don't know--I know that's not a real answer but I just--don't--know," He shook his head, sighing as his hand fell at his side heavily. "What am I meant to do? You've got to understand where I'm coming from--," Bamba watched her, his eyes giving the pleas that his mouth couldn't muster.

Bamba and Jillian ||

"This isn’t the first time you’ve said things like this, Bamba." She said, speaking softly so not to stutter. "That you’ve been confused over me. At first I thought it was because you weren’t over Kylie-" She admitted, her heart plummeting at her name. "But now," she said, her lip quivering, "I just wanted to fix things and look where it got me." She looked up and into his eyes, unable to care now if he’d seen her cry or not. It wasn’t about looking strong anymore, it was about being real. "And I come back, every time, like a moth to a flame. Bamba, I love you. I don’t know what else to tell you because all I know how to do is tell you the truth." She sniffed, "And I don’t want this to be this way. I want you, beside me when the sun sets and rises wherever we end up. I don’t care as long as you’re there." She shook her head and wiped her nose with her sleeve, trying as hard as she could to compose herself. "But only if you want that too because I want you to love me as deeply as I know you have before.. and I want you to let me in, Bamba, but I can’t make your heart do something it won’t." She swallowed hard and breathed out shakily, admitting things far too gone. "We should have always talked more. 

"And this isn't the first time you've let without a word," Bamba countered, equally as quiet as she. "Neither of us is perfect," He said, a little more strongly. He wanted to follow her in her fantasy, but, his mind would only walk so far before it started to question everything. "But what about it when you get sick of being rooted down? What if we're just having this same conversation two, ten, I don't know, a hundred years from now?" He sighed. "What about when I'm meant to be a shaman? I couldn't watch you root yourself down just for me. It's too selfish," As much as he would want to be with her, he knew it wasn't right. "Neither of us is that great with words, either," He chuckled.

Bamba and Jillian ||

Jillian could feel the lump in her throat growing larger even yet. “You just have to believe me..” She nearly muttered, already feeling defeated for just trying to fix what she worried she’d bruised. She sniffed and wiped more tears from her face, quickly as if Bamba didn’t know she was crying. “But if you can’t..” She tried to hold herself back from breaking, but her heart was shaking. “Then I shouldn’t force you to be in something you don’t believe in.” As soon as the words left her tongue she could feel her back crumble and her hands reached up to cover her face, tears slathering the inside of her fingers. She stood there, quietly melting into herself, wanting to tell him she loved him but too afraid to move anymore than she already had. 

"I don't know what to say," Bamba sighed. "I just don't know anything anymore," It hadn't come down to being happy versus being unhappy. It came down to circumstances. He just wanted Jill to be free to live. "I love you, you know that," He murmured. "But, I've got to believe that if you keep going off then that's what you're meant to be doing," He explained heartbrokenly. With a few steps, Bamba took his hands out of his pockets, leaning his lips onto her forehead. "Please don't cry."

Bamba and Jillian ||

Bamba ran his hands over his face before sticking them into the pocket of his sweatshirt. Within it, he wrung his hands, feeling an aching in his chest that he'd thought he'd long forgotten. "I just--I can wait for you to be ready. But I can't ask you to be ready to settle. It's not in your blood," Bamba explained, his tongue betraying his heart with its beliefs. "I don't know how to believe that I'm not holding you back," Bamba admitted weakly, his eyes casting down. He watched the grass as it was blown by the leaves, as each of the blades moved only as far as their roots would allow. 

Bamba and Jillian ||

"Bamba, of course I do." She frowned, the corners of her lips instantly turning downwards at the thought of not coming back here to find him. The thought of him up and leaving without a word. How would she feel? "You’re the reason I do come back, and I.." She sighed and looked down. "I need that." She sucked on her lips nervously before swallowing hard and looking up. "I’ve never had to face the thought of growing old, growing up, but I have to Bamba. I have to, just.. I’m over two hundred years old and sometimes I act like the stubborn brats I chase back home, you know? And I don’t wanna do that. I mean, I’ve still got a temper, I can’t fucking help that. I wish I could-" She started rambling before she rubbed her eyes, frustrated. "I’m sorry. I know this must have all been so sudden and it doesn’t make sense, I’m just.. I’m trying to do better:" She let out another heavy breath and looked up, "I’ve been in Neverland and Ireland. Seeing Blake, or my Father and Smee. Dad asks for help with the ship sometimes and it’s so hard to keep track of time there. I don’t mean to be gone for so long, but it’s no excuse. And you’re not a weight on my shoulders, Bamba. You are one of the only things that makes me feel weightless.. light." She began biting down on her bottom lip, her eyes drifting back to her feet. "I’ve just never been in love before. I’m still learning." 

Bamba and Jillian ||

"Oh nothing, I just-" She swallowed thickly and closed her eyes. "Okay," she reached down and took his big hands, watching how easily her fingers slid into his. She finally caught her breath and looked up, her bright blue eyes meeting his jades. "I love you. I love you so much, and I’ve been.. for a lack of better words.. shitty." She squinted as her nose crinkled. The truth was never easy for her to handle. "I’m not pulling my weight here, in this, and it’s bullshit. It’s bullshit, and-" she raised one of her hands to her forehead and scratched it. "I hadn’t realized before. And I’m trying to get better, Bamba. I wanna be better for the people I love and for me, and Davey Jones knows how damn much I love you." She sighed, "I want to be the girlfriend you deserve. I wanna check on you, I wanna carry you like you’ve carried me, I wanna be patient with you because your feelings are more important to me than my own.. I don’t want you to block me out, Upendi, but I don’t blame you for with the way I’ve been acting." Her tongue felt so dry as she spoke, her heartbeat racing. "I wanna do better, Bamba. Let me know how to do better." 

"I love you too," He murmured back. Bamba watched her with confusion. He'd never seen Jill act so--sentimental. It made him nervous, to say the least. Surely something had to be wrong for her to just be acting like this. "You haven't been shitty, you've just been gone," He shrugged, trying to act like it wasn't as big a deal as it was to him. "Do you though?" Bamba asked. "Do you really want to have to come back for me?" He never knew where she was anymore. Hell, he'd been convinced that her absence was her way of saying that she was through with him. And while that hurt, he could understand. She had the heart of a traveller, while Bamba had roots for toes. "Because lately I've not got a clue where you are or who you're with and I mean--I can guess, but--" He sighed, his head falling loose. "I don't want to feel like, I dunno, like some sort of weight on your shoulders," Bamba sighed, licking his lips.