assassinwithahairpin

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Billy Rocks never went to school. He had some schooling, one could say; his mother had taught him how to read and write in Korean, and when he went away to Washington, he'd learned arithmetic and composition and a hundred other, smaller things, that the master's son would teach him when they were allowed alone together. His reading was not the best, but especially with Goodnight, it had improved in his adulthood.

To take classes at the college, he had to have a diploma or equivalent. To get those, you had to go to school or take a test. Classes had already started--he knew that--but the tests we a couple of weeks into the term, for some reason, and the people he had spoken to at the college had assured that the program he was looking at had a later start date than the standard classes.

So here he sat, a study book open, pamphlets and papers and his sketchy hangul in the margins of everything, feeling a bit out of place. He was going to be thirty in the summer. Wasn't it a bit odd to be thinking about schooling so late in his life?

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Goodnight came back in and nudged the door shut once Beau was in. The dog shook and stopped to check in with Billy before finding one of his toys to gnaw on. Goodnight stood by the door a moment, unwrapping his scarf and removing his coat.

"What's all this?" he asked when he saw the spread on the table. He hung everything up before making his way over, curious.

Billy looked up when the dog comes over, but only briefly, to ruffle his ears before he went to behave himself with his chew toys. He looked over at Goodnight then, and then down at his array.

"General Educational Development," he mumbled, and put on a slightly distasteful face. "To take courses at the college."

Goodnight lifted his eyebrows and he tried not to get excited in a hurry. "College?" Despite his better efforts he smiled. He let his hand slide across Billy's shoulders as he moved around him and sat at another chair. He tugged one of the pamphlets closer. "What prompted all this?"

He wanted to be excited. But he wanted to see if he could gauge how Billy felt about all this first. He didn't look particularly thrilled, but that could be something to do with the study book.

The pamphlet that Goodnight grabbed was one of the ones on the police academy in Darrow. There were no police academies back home; sheriffs were by election, and their deputies by personal selection. Nepotism and corruption ran deep.

They'd seen it in Rose Creek, and a hundred other places. Billy wasn't sure why it called to him, but it did.

"One of us needs a job," he said, giving Goodnight a mild work. "I don't think we can keep running schemes, when we can't skip town."

"Trust me, it's been on my mind," he assured. He'd been thinking about it for a few weeks now. Money showed up but he couldn't depend on that, refused to. The pamphlet, though, was awfully distracting.

He couldn't help the small smile that appeared. "You thinkin' about turning law-abiding on me?" Most of their schemes had not been strictly illegal, Goodnight made sure of that. Working in gray areas was something he was fairly good at, and Billy could play the straight man as the day was long.

"Who said anything about law abiding?" Billy asked, plucking the pamphlet out of Goodnight's fingers. He leaned back in his chair, content to ignore his work for the moment in favor of resting his foot against the edge of Goodnight's seat.

"Besides," he said, and let himself scowl momentarily at his study materials, "I have to pass this damn test first, before anything else."

"And you will." Goodnight picked up the study book to peruse through it. Some things he might need to brush up on if he was going to be helpful, but he absolutely wanted to help. He dropped his hand to squeeze Billy's foot. "I have all faith, cher."

Billy frowned a little again. Not because he doubted Goodnight's intention or his faith, but because Billy doubted his own intention and faith.

"I never had schooling, not proper." Goodnight knew that, but it bore reiterating in this moment.

"I've had enough schooling for the two of us. We can get you wherever you need to be, Billy. And I know how damn stubborn you are once you decide you want to see something through."

Goodnight reached to give him a push. "So hush with that. You've got more to work with than you give yourself credit for."

Billy rolled his eyes a bit, but he supposed, that was reasonable enough. Goodnight was right; he had considerably more schooling, formal and fancy. He nudged Goodnight's leg back with his foot, and sighed, ruffling his hand back through his hair for a moment.

"Have you thought about it? School?" It was a curious question, maybe. "You were at college, before the war."

"No," he answered honestly. It felt like apart of a life he'd left behind the moment he volunteered. He'd left college, like all the other young men his age were, to go fight for ideals he wasn't even sure he believed in. Goodnight had not looked back once the war ended.

"I don't even know what I would go for, never mind actually doing it." At least Billy had a path, a plan.

Billy nodded a little bit. He couldn't remember, in the moment, what Goodnight had gone to school for in the first place; he was sure Goodnight had told him at one point or another, a passing trivia point in the tapestry of a life Billy had only glimpsed in letters and memories and one Christmas spent at home.

"We're living history here, anyway," Billy said, and laughed a little. "Anything you might have learned, it's probably bygone."

"Don't remind me," he said dryly. Goodnight knew exactly how little he knew at the moment. What good was he in a place like this, a relic of a time long past. Billy at least had the gumption to pursue something. Goodnight didn't want to see that dream dashed.

"Let's get you past this test, first. Then you can think about what an old man you're saddled with."

Billy snorted; old man. Goodnight wasn't even a decade older than him, and he hardly qualified as old, any more than Billy did. He nudged him gently in the thigh and sighed, then shook his head a little bit.

"The test is in a few days. I think, at this point, I just pray and hope." It wasn't so bad, he supposed. Just a stress that he was hardly used to.

"We could focus on just a few things," he offered. Goodnight got up from the table to make each of them a drink. Well if they were going to study, might as well be lubricated. He wondered if this was the sort of test one could take again if they failed. On the one hand, failure might be worth it, if only for the experience of taking it. Billy would know what to expect next time. On the other hand, Goodnight was not entirely sure how his partner would take an academic failure.

Billy took a huge, steadying breath, and then pushed it out with no small amount of exasperation. Not at Goodnight, but definitely at the text booklet and materials and over a hundred years separating him from his very basic knowledge and what was expected of him.

"I'm fairly sure," he said after a moment of thought, "that I can do the reading, writing and maths sections alright. But all this science, and the civics? Some of these historical things the study guide gives are things that happened a generation after us."

"Then we'll cover those together. God knows I've been reading since I got here." It had started slowly, unsure he could bring himself to read about things that had happened after his assumed lifetime would have ended. But eventually he bit the bullet and worked in earnest on catching up.

Goodnight got up and dropped a kiss to the top of Billy's head, hand on his shoulder. "You're gonna get through this and you're gonna qualify, cher." And he was going to make coffee, because he had a feeling they'd need it.

Billy leaned back into the touch. It was rare, to let these doubts out, but when they came they were with Goodnight. He trusted him so utterly, after so long, that there was really no one else he could be this honest with. Even, sometimes, himself.

Once the coffee was made, they studied. Billy was quite civic-minded, but that was mostly because, realistically, you had to be when you worked in the gray areas of the law. He knew most of the geography. History was a mess, and he wasn't hardly any good at most of the science subjects.

Goodnight was happy to help him through history, supplying what he'd learned thus far and consulted the stack of books he had from the library for anything neither of them had come across yet. He was even a fair hand at some of the science Billy was working with, but not all of it.

At some point he ended up talking back and forth with Henry on his phone; he was at least adapting to texting.

When Billy's sounds of frustration were becoming a bit more frequent, Goodnight ordered them food. "Take a break, cher. Slammin' this all through in one shot is only gonna give you a headache."

Edited 2017-02-18 19:13 (UTC)

"I already have one," Billy grumbled, but he shoved the books and things away. Then he grabbed Goodnight's phone, and gave a stumblingly typed thank you to Henry--he was still getting used to the thing, and wasn't nearly as adept with it as Goodnight was.

He got up from the table and tracked down Goodnight, leaning his weight into him.

Goodnight reached back to rub the back of Billy's neck as he leaned into him. He'd been at the counter, consulting one of the study booklets and debating another pot of coffee.

He turned slowly and slid his arms around Billy. "Time to give it a rest then," he said gently. "Food'll be here soon enough. That you've been at it this long without eating is travesty enough."

The closeness, as always, steadied Billy. He suffered less than Goodnight did, and he knew that, but the short-breathed panic that was living under his skin right now was only calmed by the fact that Goodnight was confident in him.

He missed their old cigarettes. While he'd managed to purchase marijuana in Darrow, it wasn't the same as the opium cigarettes they'd indulged in from time to time. He was out of them now.

"Wasn't hungry," he murmured. It was a big thing to admit for Billy. The stress was chewing at him.

"I'm hopin' that changes when it's in front of your face," he said. He kissed Billy tenderly, cradling his face. "You'll do fine, cher." He knew it would give Billy no comfort to hear that failing a first attempt was not a major set back so he kept it to himself. "C'mon, smoke with me until dinner gets here."

He moved away from the counter and tugged Billy across the living room to their small balcony. Maybe the night air would help settle Billy a bit more.

Billy came along, more than willingly. They stepped out onto the balcony, and the bite of the air cleared his head for a moment. He kept leaned into Goodnight, close, despite the relative publicity of a balcony. They'd been this close on private balconies and porches before; he wasn't worried about it.

"I have to pass all the sections," Billy said, "and then there are other tests I can take throughout the year to prove that I know certain things. The preliminary classes. Academy. It's a lot of work for something that used to just be a badge."

"One step at a time, mon cher," he murmured as he kept Bill close to him, arm comfortable around his waist. They could still afford some intimacy out here; it was quiet. "We'll worry about this test first, the rest as it comes."

Goodnight kissed him, squeezed him close for a moment. "Maybe it ain't gonna be easy but you're one of the most stubborn people I know."

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