Barways Martin - Aged 10 and a half

[honestlyapilot]

Martin sits in a booth, half a sandwich lying on a plate, forgotten at his elbow. A glass of coke, swept out of the way of his construction space, sits dripping condensation onto the table top. He's rather too busy playing with Lego to bother with food.

Martin is building an aeroplane. He's not really that good with Airfix models yet, though his Dad is teaching him a bit, but he likes to build with Lego. If you get it wrong you can always start again.

Comments

[not_the_hero]

There is a toad under Martin's chair that wasn't there before.

Not too far away, there is a pudgy eleven-year-old boy with a mess of floppy dark brown hair (Gran is going to cut it, but not until tomorrow) and the laces of one shoe undone, who might just be hunting for exactly that same toad.

(He only got Trevor yesterday, for his birthday. He can't have lost him already, he just can't, or Great-Uncle Algie will shout for days and days and days and it'll be just like his ninth birthday, even if that was much more Cousin Parthenope's fault, not that anyone really believed that.)

Well... looking for his toad and falling over his own laces.

Much more the latter than the former, if we're honest. (Even if he's not really sure he should be here, and is trying to be sneaky.)





"Oof."

[honestlyapilot]

Martin is somewhat busy with his Lego, and doesn't especially notice the toad beneath his chair or the boy looking for said toad right away. It's only when he drops a vital piece of the fuselage that he finds the toad crouching unhappily in the shadow below his table.

He doesn't really want to touch the toad. He's heard they give you warts, and all sorts of things, but he hasn't got any more of the flat plating to cover the underbelly of his plane, and he's determined to finish it. He reaches in and grabs for the piece. The toad lets out a loud croak and Martin jumps, banging his head on the table and failing to retrieve the Lego.

Martin rubs the bump on his head and frowns, plotting against the forces of toad.

[not_the_hero]

His eyes might meet those of someone else who's hit something involuntarily - though in Neville's case, it's the floor.

Well, being on the floor can count as being sneaky, right? Right?

So Neville huffs and scrambles forwards, also hunting for toad. And perhaps rather red, because he's horribly certain the other boy saw him fall.

[honestlyapilot]

As it happens, Martin did see the boy trip, or at least he caught the motion of it in his peripheral vision, and noticed the boy on the floor in that vicinity as he looked up. Martin pulls a face, a sort of grimace of solidarity, he's forever tripping over things just at the moment. Mum says it's because he's going to start growing again soon.

The other boy doesn't seem too inclined to get up again though, so perhaps he did do it on purpose, even if the pink across his cheeks doesn't really make it look too likely.

Martin nods at him.

"What are you doing down there?" He asks, in as nice and not-teasing a way as possible.

[not_the_hero]

Spotted!

Neville jumps guiltily at being addressed, feeling oddly as if he's been caught out, and nearly smacks his head on the underside of a chair.

Oh well; it was worth a try.

"I was looking for my toad," he admits finally. "I only got him yesterday and I've lost him three times already."