Awkward. (John and Maverick)

Maverick walked along the rows and rows of vegetables that she had planted and she hoped that she would be able to see some shoots soon in the little homemade greenhouse that she had placed over it when she had first turned over the garden, she of course has added to it afterwards to make it more sturdy and more safe than before. There were a few green shoots popping through the dirt, and it made her smile gently, oddly, she enjoyed gardening...it made her feel good to have these plants depend on her.

Pouring some of the water form her watering can on the plants, not needing to give up the pure drinking water to use on them. Maverick used as much as she needed, which was a lot, seeing as there were an awful lot of plants to get watered in the first place.

"Hey there little guy," she whispered to one of the plants, showing her more vunerable side now that she was all alone with the plants, she had been so angry lately, it was getting her so tired and she didn't think that she was going to be able to put up the fight against John for much longer, she had been trying to avoid him at all possible costs, not having needed to team up to go anywhere else since the trip to Costco.

With a small sigh, Maverick sat down on the grass and looked up through the greenhouse roof at the grey cloudy sky.

John had been alone in the palace more times than he had been in the same general area as Maverick. It was stupid but they were both avoiding each other since the fight. As if by unspoken agreement even. They both avoided areas where they were and that was it.

He had dedicated a lot of his time to working on practical traps that he could pack up and take with him to deploy on the scene. It was hard work but he'd taken over one of the rooms with a large table to work on.

It was dangerous work though. Just this morning an experiment to test to see if he could do more damage by running a current through cheese wire. He had left it on for ahile and it had become red hot. Then he had gone back to his notes and blindly reached for something.

The red hot net of cheesewire had fallen directly on his lower right arm, burning the criss-cross pattern into his flesh almost instantly. As it was now he was in the garden walking towards the large barrel used to collect rain water, his sleeve rolled up to air his angry red wounds before putting his arm in the water. He winced before sighing,

"Good morning Maverick." he greeted her, slightly awkwardly, "How are the plants doing?"

Maverick raised and eyebrow and she looked up at John, immediately her eyes were drawn to his arm and they widened slightly, what on earth had the stupid git done to himself now? She thought to herself but although she wouldn't admit it she was really quite worried about his wound, he was normally so careful about things like that...

"What have you done?" she asked quietly, not allowing herself to return his greeting only focusing on the matter at hand.

Getting to her feet, she wandered over to John took his arm out of the barrel and she quick marched him back into the palace, she needed to treat the wound properly and she decided that she needed to make sure that water hadn't effected him.

"That water isn't clean, you shouldn't have put your arm inside it." she muttered "I have something that will make it better, you should have just told me." Maverick frowned lightly, letting her long slender fingers run through her backpack.

John was tempted to give a joke-y comment about what had happened to 'hello' but he could read the mood well enough to know that it wouldn't go down well. Instead he merely raised his arm out of the water with a wince, showing her the bright red burns along his arm,

"It was an accident." he defended sheepishly, not wanting to be known for doing this to himself on purpose, "I was running a test and the test fell on my arm. Could have been worse... if it had been under tension it would have sliced through me."

He raised an eyebrow but allowed himself to be marched back towards the palace, ignoring how the air stung his burns,

"I didn't know where else had the same amount of water." he replied before raising an eyebrow, "I had no idea where you were Maverick."

Maverick wasn't much in the mood for John's raised eyebrow, it just showed her that he was in the same mood that he had been in since they argued and she really didn't want to talk with him any more than she had to while he was in this sort of mood. With a small sigh she took out some aqueous cream and she handed it to John with a small hum escaping her lips as she did so.

"Well here you go, put this on the burn and it will soothe it, it will itch at first but it will be fine if you just leave it alone. make sure you cover the burn so that the air doesn't infect it that badly." Maverick instructed and she zipped up her bag again.

With a small sigh she turned and walked onto the balcony of the palace, there were no zombies that she could see outside, and she took a deep breath, knowing the only way that John and she would stop being like this together, was if she told him more about herself, and vice versa.

"Before you ask how I know that, I had to help my mother and brother out a few times when they got cigarette burns." she sighed.

John could tell that Maverick was annoyed with him again and he had no idea how he had antaginised her this time. Perhaps she just hadn't gotten over what they had talked about? He couldn't really blame her if that was the case considering how long he spent in the palace avoiding the world experimenting. He took the cream with a small, grateful, smile,

"Thanks." he said as he began to apply the cream. It stung like hell when he first put it on but he gritted his teeth and covered the burnt areas in the cream. He sighed slightly and took a roll of bandages from his own backpack. After wrapping his arm up tightly he flexed his fingers, "You're a life saver Maverick. Infection would not have been fun."

He followed her slowly onto the balcony, moving and twisting his arm to make sure that the bandages were in the right place. The area below and around the balcony were clear of zombies and any other life, or unlife. He paused,

"I wasn't going to ask how you knew, I've realised that you'll tell me things when you're ready." he smiled faintly, "Like now. Thanks for telling me. Are cigarette burns worse than these?"

Maverick looked over the stone work and she nodded her head, she knew that he needed her to tell him some things, but then again, he was an intelligent man and hopefully he would be able to tell her some things that she herself didn't know, but then again it was street smarts that was really important now.

"You're welcome John." she stated with a small smile on her lips, the slight breeze ruffling her hair as she stood out on the balcony, she was slightly cold, although she wouldn't tell John that, it would make her seem weak.

Nodding her head, Maverick was glad that John had picked up on her less than subtle hints from last time and he wasn't going to push her to tell him things that she wasn't ready to tell him yet. With a small shake of her head she answered;

"No they aren't as painful, they aren't as hot or nearly as big as the burn you just suffered, but the same principle applies." she muttered "I appreciate you waiting for me to be ready John, as you can tell, I'm a delicate person really."

John found that when it came to dealing with Maverick what he needed to do was to rely less on his magnificant intellect and more on his common sense and more on his heart, his emotions and feelings. Perhaps it was his lack of experience in either field that had brought them to this form of disagreement? If so then he hoped to avoid any more problems by focusing on thinking emotionally instead of intellectually. It was probably going to be safer that way in the new world,

"I owe you one yeah?" he called out to her as she stood on the balcony. He was attaching the bandages in place with some medical tape. The stuff was going to sting when he pulled it off but the burns would sting anyway so it didn't matter, "Anything I've got that you need then it's yours."

He nodded and filed the information away for later. Right now cigarette burns weren't as interesting as the type that he had on his arm right now. Of course it would be in the future though. You never knew when it might come in handy,

"You're a diamond, Maverick." he told her with a smile, "You're perhaps the hardest person in the world in some ways but there's still a certain vulnerability and softness to you. If you don't mind me saying."

Maverick smiled lightly once more and she nodded her head she was glad that John would give her some of his items, just because she had done something so simple to her, maybe it was because of the connection to her other family members, the tender connections she had that made her feel a little bit more mellow than usual.

Her father was a sore spot, but she often enjoyed thinking about her brother and her mother. They were both integral parts that helped form her into the person that she was today.

"I don't mind you saying." she chuckled lightly "After all, I'm hardly going to come out with some metaphorical comparison myself am I?"

Looking out over the horizon, Maverick decided that she would share some more information; "I guess I'm good at looking after people, I learnt how to deal with lots of different things growing up, its how I learnt to help you with your seisures."

John could tell that Maverick was realising that what was simple for her was far from simple to him and what he found simple was not neccessarily easy for her. Together they were much better than they were when separated. He wanted her to see that they were better together than alone because, honestly, this was perhaps the best setup that he could have thought of in a zombie invasion.

"Well then my comment stands since you'll let me say it." he replied with a chuckle of his own before he shrugged a little bit, "Yeah well mataphors and shit like that can be my job. You know... school-type stuff that we don't ever need in this new world. You can be the street smart one who gets us the information we need to survive."

Moving onto the balcony, John rested his arms on it as he looked out over the shell that was London. It had to be a shell, all the people were either gone or zombies now after all so it had no filling,

"I noticed that you seemed to have experience when you were calming me down." he agreed before shrugging, "It didn't seem right to ask how at the time and it doesn't now unless you want to tell me."

Maverick laughed lightly and she nodded her head she thought that this would be a good idea, after all school had never really been her strong point, she had merely gone so that her parents didn't get in any more trouble, or be investigated and found out for their mass of other crimes that they had hidden under their roof.

"I think that one day we will need your smarts again." she muttered quietly "I...I hope that the world might go back to the way it was, in time. Although I hope that I might be able to find my place in it better than I had done before."

Humming to herself, she thought that it wouldn't do any harm to tell him what she had gone through in order to learn to help people who had seisures, hopefully she would be able to be more open now, now she felt like she wasn't being pushed too much. Maverick hated being pushed.

"My mother often overdosed on cocaine, I had to help her through her seisures, my father was out, my brother too, so it was just me and her in the house." she sighed gently, a soft but sad smile appearing on her lips "I like looking after people."

John smiled wider when she laughed. It was a musical sound that was made all the better by the fact that he very rarely got to hear it. But the arrangement that he had suggested were not a joking or laughing matter. He honestly believed that it would help them both greatly to cover each other's bases,

"One day might as well be a million years away considering I could die tomorrow without someone, you, with street smarts keeping me alive." he told her honestly before smiling and giving her shoulder a gentle squeeze, "It'll go back to the way it was soon Maverick. The zombies won't be here forever but human beings will. As long as their even two people, mankind can rebuild better than ever."

He could tell that she was thinking about something, contemplating almost. It was probably something about how she knew how to work with people having seisures considering the conversation topic. When she told him he flinched slightly,

"I'm sorry to hear she overdosed on cocaine, I had a friend who did that once. Before all this." he smiled a little bit, "Well I can tell from the way you looked after me that your mother was probably in the best of care with you."

Maverick was all set to smile again, and she began to do so, but when John squeezed her shoulder, even that simple touch, sent her into a shock and she jerked herself away with a small gasp on her lips, it was so strange to her to be touched by anyone, and she couldn't help but gaze at John with her eyes shimmering;

"Please don't." she asked, in an almost hurt tone "I...I don't like being touched without knowing, s-sorry."

When he flinched Maverick tilted her head to one side, wondering why he did so, maybe his notes weren't as complete as she thought, however, she felt a little better, talking about this with someone, she had never talked with anyone about her family life...

Blinking softly Maverick decided that she would continue telling him about her past;

"She was. Until I decided to stay behind in school and do some homework that I wouldn't have gotten done at home. She'd...she'd overdosed again while I was away and she died of her seisures before I could get home." she whispered.

When she was beginning to smile again John was smiling too but when he touched her it seemed to immediately destroy the moment. She jerked away, causing him to wince in pain as the movement jerked his arm. In the future he'd have to learn not to use his right arm so much. He flexed it slightly when her met her eyes. John immediately pulled his hand and arms away from her in case she didn't appreciate it,

"Alright then I won't." he told her, a little bit hurt that she wouldn't even let him reassure her but having a good guess as to why. He put on a strained smile, "My fault."

There had been nothing in the police file about any of this but then again why should there have been? It was a file that literally only contained the information that would be used to take her father to court for his actions. When she told him about how her mother died he wanted to give her a hug but he couldn't. Instead he just looked at her sadly,

"You couldn't have known about what would happen in the future Maverick." he told her gently, "You know it's not your fault... don't you?"

Maverick, for some reason, felt suddenly very bad that she hadn't allowed John to touch her when he had reach out to reassure her, and she bit her lip, suddenly she was acting like the vunerable person that she really was underneath it all, it was strange to show someone that side of her, especially when it was going against the rules she had set herself in life, after her experience at 13.

"If you want to...to touch me, j-just do it slowly, and l-let me know." she told him with a faint blush on her cheeks as she did so, she realised how odd that must sound, but she couldn't bring herself to condition herself to normal touches just yet...it would take a lot of time and bravery.

When he told her that it wasn't her fault, Maverick felt herself getting oddly more emotional and she blinked out a few tears, gently she touched her cheek and she brought a few tears away with her. Taking a deep breath she hurriedly wiped away her tears and she shook her head, almost slapping herself to stop her tears.

"I...I should have just done the homework at home." she whispered "T-they didn't even ask for it! I was supposed to look after her...and I didn't."

John was a little bit hurt by the fact that she hadn't let him touch her in an effort to reassure her but when he switched on his intellectual brain it was clear to see why she was uncomfortable about it. After all she had had to endure the touch of old men wanting young flesh when she was only 13. She couldn't be blamed for being a bit sensative when it came to being touched, in anyway, by a man. Especially one like him, who was essentially a stranger.

"You mean it? If you're not uncomfortable I would like to touch you. Just..." he reached out slowly with his hand, his fingertips lighty brushing against her cheek as he cupped it softly in his hand, "Just softly..."

When she began to cry, the emotional dam having broken if he had to guess, he stroked some of her tears away with his thumb, gently stroking them away. He looked at her sadly for a few more moments before an urge from not long ago became too strong to ignore,

"Maverick... you need a hug and I'm going to give you one." he told her before slowly wrapping her up in a soft hug, "It's alright Maverick... it wasn't your fault. You couldn't have known."

Maverick looked nervously at the hand that John was stretching out towards her, and she backed a little bit away as she felt it coming near to her skin, however she whimpered a little when he eventually touched her soft skin, it was strange to be touched, and John's skin was different to how she would imagine it.

"Ah..." she murmured softly when he cupped her cheek, and she gently let herself lean into John's touch, enjoying the feeling of his skin against her own, her cheeks were less sensitive than the other parts of her however.

With the promise of a hug, Maverick's eyes widened and she braced herself for the touch, as if she was bracing herself for a whip or a measure of pain, however she was oddly looking forward to the sensation to see if it was going to be as bad as she thought. When he reassured her, Maverick felt herself feeling more hollow than she had before.

"You're the smart person...I suppose you would know." she whispered quietly before blinking and she gasped again stiffening in the hug that John gave her "I...I don't know h-how I feel about this..." Maverick whispered, in reference to the hug.

John was unable to find a way to banish the similarity he could see between Maverick's behaviour and that of an abused animal. She was backing away from his hand, which was just open and neutral, because she had had bad experiences with being touched by hands in the past. It was purely instinctive and reminded him of the dogs that were rescued from puppy farms,

"It's alright..." he whispered to her softly as she leant into his touch. Apparently she was enjoying the touch more than she thought she would do because she wasn't even aware she was doing it, "Not too bad is it?"

He could tell that the hug was going to be a bit of a stretch, it was a big leap to go from cheek holding to hugging within two minutes of each other. Especially when he was sure that she had reason to hate this show of affection even more than others. But it was a universal way of conveying good feelings and he thought that she might enjoy it,

"I'm not asking you to let go Maverick... just to accept the fault wasn't yours." he told her with a small smile before he smiled a little bit, "How about a deal? We keep hugging until a minute has passed. If you're too uncomfortable tell me and the hug ends. Deal?"

Maverick blinked and she felt herself getting a little too uncomfortable with the touching especially at the same time as the hugging, but as she looked into Johns eyes she couldn't help but feel her heart skip a few beats and a small blush grow on her cheeks. It was nice to be touched, but she couldn't help but feel like she should walk, before she could run when it came to this.

When he said that he just wanted her to accept that the fault wasn't hers, Maverick looked at the ways that it couldn't be, it was her mothers fault for taking the thing in the first place? It was her fathers fault for allowing the drugs in the house, for creating that business that harmed her mother...yes, he was to blame.

"O-okay." she whispered quietly "I will make sure to remember, that it wasn't all my fault."

Shaking her head she gently began to back away from the hug but she wanted to keep the small touches going, she wanted to be able to learn how to cope with touching once more, just normal everyday things.

"P-please no. I...I d-don't want any more!" Maverick squeaked and she stepped out of the hug, her eyes wide and she seemed more frightened than she would have normally allowed herself to be, but she was trusting John more than anyone now...for some reason.

John could see the nicknamed "deer in the headlights" look coming across Maverick's features as she tried, and failed, to get used to the contact with another human being. It was to be expected but it still wasn't nice to see that your hug, an action meant to show affection and good will, was being seen as something that constricted, something that hurt and contained.

On the plus side he could see her thinking when he asked her to remember that it wasn't her fault that her mother had overdosed. It was true after all, there were dozens of people much more to blame than Maverick ever could be. She shouldn't have ever been put in the situation of reviving her overdosing mother anyway,

"That's all that I ask Maverick."

When she began to shake and pull away it was obvious that the hug was starting to get too much for her, that she needed it to end otherwise she was going to have a mini freakout. Maybe not even that mini. He nodded slowly,

"It's alright Maverick... no more hugging for now." he assured her, taking a step back before he paused and held out a hand, "How about I just hold your hand for a bit instead of the hug?"

Maverick smiled shakily when John let go of her, she didn't know if she would be able to go back to the way that the relationship had been before this session together, the friendship that they had together, however she knew that whatever they were after this, wherever they progressed to, she would be happier with them there.

She trusted John now, she had let him touch her, and he hadn't hurt her. So she trusted him implicitly.

"I...I would like that." she whispered softly.

With that she held her hand out to John, a little shakey while she waited for him to touch it, her other hand clenched into a fist and she held it under her chin, her heart beating faster in her chest while she waited, with baited breath.

"Why don't you tell me something about you, when you were growing up?" Maverick asked quietly, eyeing up the scar underneath John's eye and wondering how it got there.

John could see that her shaky little smile was a sign of support, a sign of trust. If she had not trusted him to touch her, or he had gone too far, she would most likely have become violet by now. Or at least loud. With this level of trust in him he doubted that they would go back to the way that they were. At the moment he could only see this as a good thing.

The fact that he could touch her now was a huge step up from what their relationship had been like in the morning that was for damn sure,

"I'm glad that you would..." he said as he took her hand gently in his own, holding it steady as it shook in his light grip. His thumb gently stroked the top of her hand as he smiled at her, "Because I rather like holding your hand Maverick. Can I hold it more often?"

When she asked him about his childhood he decided that it was a fair enough question. After all, they'd been talking about her past so why not his? Of course his past was nowhere near as interesting,

"Not much to tell really..." he told her quietly, looking away, "As a genius I scared the other kids away. Got bullied. When I... when I developed my phobia both my mother and father just... stopped caring as much. Treated me with the same love a family pet gets, not an only child. When it became clear I couldn't follow in their footsteps they all but abandoned me."

Maverick's slender fingers slotted themselves inbetween Johns when he held her hand and she wondered if they were going to hold hands more often, she became wary, that was a sign of affection wasn't it? Did that mean that they had other feelings for each other than friendship? If they had ever really been friends?

When he told her that he liked holding her hand, Maverick blinked and she gently squeezed his hand in her own, relaxing her arm when she realised that he was okay.

"Why do you like holding it?" she asked quietly "But...you can hold it more often...if you want to?"

Hearing about what happened to John as a child, Maverick was understanding that he had a hard time, but compared to her, he had it reasonably nice in his upbringing at least he wasn't being threatened every two weeks or so.

"It sounds as if we both have less than wonderful childhoods..." Maverick whispered quietly "How...how did you get your scar...?"

John liked the feel of Maverick's fingers slotted in between his. It made it feel like he wasn't the only one involved in this hand-holding. After all, if her hand was just held out flat then it was just like he was the only one interested in holding hands. But with her finger weeved in with his own it was like a silent commitment, that she wanted to hold his hand as well.

He squeezed her hand back gently, thankful that his burns seemed to have stopped stinging now thanks to her cream and the bandages that he'd wrapped them up in,

"I like holding it because it's so very soft and because... well it makes me feel trusted to be allowed to do so." he told her honestly before smiling a little bit more, "I would like that Maverick, thank you."

Of course his childhood wasn't anywhere near as bad as Maverick's was, hence why he didn't go into any details. She would only get upset and think he was trying to compare their experiences. It had happened in the past. He shrugged,

"I never wanted for much so I chalk mine up as good enough. Yours...." he trailled off before his looked away, "I went fishing with my father. He was careless and the fishing hook caught the skin below my eye, my upper eyelid and my eyebrow. There was... a lot of blood. It was all I could see for five hours straight, and all the while with the pain. It was the start of my phobia."

Maverick blinked at John and she wondered if he was feeling the same way that she was when he held her hand, his touch, which she was getting used to was something that made her feel hyper sensitive like every little movement of his skin against hers was something that would make her gasp quietly.

"You should feel trusted." she whispered quietly looking up into his eyes from under her eyelashes as she did so "Nobody has touched me for a very long time. I#ve never talked about my family with anyone before...so in a way, you know me better than most people...ever did." Maverick admitted, with a wide eyed realisation dawning on her face.

Hearing how he had gotten his scar, Maverick gently took her other hand, and tentatively reached out to his eye, to trace the scar that lay there, but before she got too close her hand faultered in mid air, and she stopped;

"Can I...can I touch you too?" she asked quietly, unsure of her boundaries "I...I understand if you say no."

Maverick's expression softened slightly; "I know how painful scars can be to touch."