milliways_bar | (no subject)

YT knows there's something wrong with this woman. Sometimes you can just tell. She's sitting on the floor, legs and arms drawn in like she's trying to make herself as small as possible, and even when YT comes within two feet of her on her way to the couch, the woman gives no sign of noticing. Not a look, not a twitch of the head, nothing.

Putting her oatmeal and orange juice down on the end table by the couch, YT walks around Sarah Jane so that she's right in her two o'clock position, not directly in front of her, but quite prominently within her field of vision. YT lowers herself down into a kneeling position, so that the two of them will be eye-level to each other. "Hey." YT absently pushes a stray lick of hair behind her ear. "Are you okay?"

Because with this place being what it is, the woman could be hypnotized or enchanted or something. Best to check.

"Oh."

Sarah looks up at the woman, somewhat surprised that anyone would even notice her here. It's not a bad thing though. Sometimes conversation is a wonderful distraction.

She forces a smile on her face and nods, lying. "Oh, I'm fine. Just doing some thinking."

"Looks like you were doing a lot of thinking," YT remarks. She has a somewhat disconcerting habit of not simply playing along with little white lies. "Probably more than's healthy for you. And you'll give yourself a cramp sitting like that." God, she's turning into her mother. Or someone's mother, anyway - YT's mother doesn't really pester her all that much, and hasn't for years.

Sarah eyes her. It's a bit of rather doubtful eying. "I don't believe thinking can be anything but healthy for you. It at least prevents you from jumping in to things too rashly."

Sarah Jane and James can use more thinking in their lives. Much more thinking.

"It's not always, 'cause there's different kinds," YT says. "there's the straight-on, smart kind, which most people don't do nearly enough of. And then there's the runaround thinking people do to avoid the straight-on kind, which everyone does way, way too much of." YT's had a lot of experience getting her friend Hiro out of the going-nowhere second kind.

"Oh, most peope certainly don't do enough of that first kind," Sarah murmurs dryly. "Far from it, in fact."

It's what gets her into situations like this, isn't it?

She shrugs, offering a hand. "Sarah Jane Smith."

Sarah Jane Smith? That name sounds so bland and normal that it loops around into weird from the opposite side.

"YT," she says, accepting the offered handshake. Since the kneeling position is getting uncomfortable, she scoots around so she's sitting next to (but not uncomfortably close to) Sarah Jane, with her back against the couch. But she's more relaxed about it, with only one leg drawn up and the other sticking out.

"How much of your name do I actually say? Like, is it just Sarah, or Sarah Jane?" She honestly doesn't think that the correct answer might be 'Miss Smith.'

"Sarah or Sarah Jane is fine," she answers. "I'll answer to either."

Just as long as it isn't SJ. She detests that name.

"What does YT stand for?"

Most people around here don't ask that. "It means Yours Truly," she says. "Like the way some people sign letters. But mostly it just stands for me." And she goes by it pretty much exclusively. Only two people in the bar know the name on her birth certificate and neither of them are allowed to use it.