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THAT MORNING, PARKER awoke quietly. His room was quiet. He yawned quietly. His feet swished through the carpet quietly. Everything in this moment was leisured and calm; he hadn't experienced a sleepy, peaceful morning in God knows how long. For years (he assumed), he awoke to rapping against his cell door, to the buzzing of equipment he could never name, to scientific chatter; then, he began waking to the paranoid colloquy of eleven other vagabonds, to empty promises and half-hearted plans, to a faint crying that he assumed belonged to either the abandoned child or to the childless mother. He could never tell, and never wanted to pry into business that was not his own.
He couldn't remember his dreams, but wasn't even sure he wanted to. He awoke feeling scared for some reason, nervous to start the day. He wanted to have hope towards his mission, but then there was this voice that always reminded him of his tendency to complicate things and fail nonetheless.
Parker, slightly shaky but standing tall, tugged on his loose-fitted shirt lazily. He spent only a fleeting moment examining himself in the mirror beside the dresser, before deciding that there was nothing he could do to fix his own rough appearance. Thinking about interacting with others with knotted, oily hair and dirty clothes made him feel sick to his stomach with anxiety as if he hadn't been doing just that for almost a week now. Maybe, he thought, this time was only different because of the change in crowd. Each member of The Dozen looked like shit and had no room to judge each other. Here, they seemed cleaner and more put together- which Parker was not, at all.
However, he couldn't just hide away in his room all day, as much as he was tempted to. He had things to do. Doing those things would probably just make him dirty if was clean, so it wouldn't really matter either way– or that was at least what he told himself to motivate his nervous hand to wrap around the doorknob and let himself out.
Self-conscious and feeling like an animal in a zoo, he found his way to the lobby, only with the help of people who took pity on him like he was some lost puppy. They guided him with soft voices and gentle tones, but he really just wanted someone to snap at him like Ellie used to, just so he'd feel more comfortable and familiar. Or for someone to tell him the harsh truth like Adelaide always did, just so he'd walk with a bit more motivation to support his weak knees.
He stepped into the lobby hesitantly. His eyes gave attention to the walls and carpet, how they seemed to be so clean compared to what he was used to, until his stare collided with Maxson's own. The older man sauntered towards him and gave him a forceful pat on the shoulder, before leading him to the desk with a playful grip on the back of his neck. "Parker!" he greeted enthusiastically, but with a touch of poison that Parker never failed to recognize. "There you are. Sleep well?"
