putting the laughter into manslaughter--- private.

max van de kamp.

Observation one; The pinkish tint to the marble of the cabin did not look promising, and Max could only assume as he approached that he was about to enter into a pocket of the camp which was dominated by girls. Girly girls, at that.

Observation two; The stink of some designer perfume was thick in the air, and only got worse as he climbed the steps. He knew, without a doubt, that if he left much later on, the smell would still cling to his clothes -- it was that bad, that there was no chance of it being lost easily, even if he went on a brisk walk through a tornado.

Final observation; For a man coming from all boys, London private schools, this was a cabin too clean to live in. Everything had a place, and everything was in that place -- that was not something that Max was used to. How high was the mortality rate, for Aphrodite kids who entered into the cabin and dared to move a hairbrush?

This was not a place that Max was going to be comfortable in, and that was something he accepted within moments of entering. He was going to stick out like a sore thumb -- and it was going to suck. For Eleanor, maybe, this cabin was home. The same would never be said for him.

On the piece of paper clutched in one of his hands, Max had two room numbers written. The first was his own, and it was easy to locate, being the first on the left. Peeping inside and glad that it was empty, the dark haired boy took a chance, pulling his rucksack from his back and throwing it across the room to the bed, rather than wasting time and plopping it into place. Though it hit the bed with a soft thud, it immediately rolled off -- not that he was there to witness it. Max had turned on his heel and shut the room to the stifling smell of perfumes, heading to the room listed beneath his.

This was the room he had been assured he would find his sister in, and though he would deny that he had done so, Max had made it his priority to head there quick. Counting the doors, he reached the one he needed, and rapped his knuckles against the hardwood a few times.

Rather than wait for the occupants to open it, he pushed it wide, peeping around the frame. A smirk pulled at his lips when he recognized the only person inside, and there was no hint of hesitation as he pushed the door the rest of the way open and sauntered inside.

"Sister," he drawled, accent dripping from that one word, "No hug? Or did you out grow them?"

ooc: --
tag: twin
words: idc

eleanor van de kamp

Eleanor’s room was her comfort zone, her safe space. It always had been, ever since she was a little girl. Even though her room at her residence in Kensington Square was full of toys she never used (what fourteen year old girl played dolls - seriously) and furniture she didn’t like, the door locked fine and it had become Eleanor’s hide out.

It was the same here, even though Eleanor had little control over the look of her new room, she liked it. It was spacious, grown up in a way she had never been. And the perfume was nauseating, but after a while, she had gotten used to it, and on the plus side, it masked the smell of the weed she had gotten into the habit of smoking in her cabin. And even though she had to share, something Eleanor detested even more than messiness, her roommate didn’t care if she snogged boys in their bedroom, even congratulating her for it, so contrary to the stares she would have gotten from her brother or any of her ‘friends’ at boarding school.

That’s where she found herself, tangled between a boy and her bed, when there was a sharp knock at the door, despite the ‘do not disturb’ sign clearly placed on the handle. Freezing, the teens exchanged looks and Eleanor silently mouthed ‘go’, to which the boy nimbly jumped out the window of the cabin, racing off to wherever he would not be caught. It wasn’t that Eleanor was worried about breaking rules, in fact, she didn’t even know if that was against the rules, it was that she feared getting eaten by a Harpy.

Eleanor’s timing was lucky too, as she would have found herself face to face with a very awkward situation had her brother, of all people, walked in on her. Which he then proceeded to do, without waiting for an answer. Typical, she thought to herself, pulling up her bra strap and adjusting her hair as Max entered.

”I only give hugs to people who don’t enter unannounced, Maximillian.” Eleanor said, feeling very on guard, even with the person who knew her better than any other, whom hours ago she would have done anything to see. She looked nonplussed, but internally, was suddenly conscious of the quickly forming bruise the boy’s lips had left on her neck.

max van de kamp.

"I announced myself," he frowned, turning dramatically to gaze back at the door still swung wide open, and back to Eleanor, "I mean, I knocked. You didn't answer -- I walked in. If you'd come to the door, maybe I wouldn't have... interrupted you."

Max was no fool. Much as he would have rathered not knowing anything about what his sister had been doing, he had his suspicions, gathered from the open window and the way she had rushed to pull at her top. He was a horny teenager once, too (still was, really). And more times than he could count, he'd had a girl in his room who'd needed to make a quick exit. Experience was a great teacher, and he knew the tell tale signs of someone caught in the middle of something.

Crossing the room, letting the door finally fall to a close behind him, the tall boy gazed out of the window -- eyes searching for any retreating back among the crowd of campers outside. They must've been a fast enough runner, considering there was no sign of them, and that caused a heavy sigh to escape his lips. After all, it would have been nice to play the protective older brother card. A fun activity to make up for a rather boring start to life at the Camp.

Turning back to Eleanor, Max scanned her once.

The rapidly forming bruise on her neck was a pretty good indicator of what had been going on, too.

"You let them mark you?" Max made a face, clearly questioning how smart his sister was, and gave a very judgemental shake of his head, "Hickies aren't pretty, Eleanor. They're not a badge of honor -- quite the contrary. I thought you'd know that for yourself, without needing it to be taught."

Last edited by faith lehane on Mon Apr 25, 2016 3:29 pm; edited 1 time in total

eleanor van de kamp

Eleanor sighed as Max began to pace about the room - it just like him to be overdramatic like that, but that was the Van de Kamps for you. ”Perhaps I’ll lock my door next time.” Eleanor said in a snide tone, now regretfully wishing she had. It wasn’t like her to forget something like that, especially not after living fourteen years in her father’s home. Perhaps Max had unlocked the door himself - Eleanor wondered if her brother remembered how to, after all these years.

From the moment Max stepped into the room, Eleanor knew there was no hiding what had happened. It wasn’t that the siblings were close enough to know when the other was up to something (they probably were, but Eleanor wasn’t exactly subtle in her actions either), it was that Max was neither too stupid not to realize nor too polite not to say anything. Crossing her arms but making no move to stop his strides towards the window, Eleanor shook her head. ”Looking for an excuse to beat someone up, brother?” She asked, mocking the tone he had taken moments earlier.

She couldn’t help but feel like she was being screened by a censor as Maximilian looked her over. She had been at camp for months where no one knew her family or cared. For that time, no one really knew Eleanor either. And here she was - now, unable to hide anything. Unable to recreate herself. Eleanor felt strangely helpless, something that she had not felt since her arrival at camp.

Max’s fixation on her neck lead Eleanor to an unfortunate conclusion, which was furthered by his words. ”Don’t pretend like you haven’t had your fair share of hickies.” Eleanor said, swerving from her brother’s view to look herself in a mirror (finding one wasn’t hard in this cabin). idiot boys, why do they always mark necks Eleanor thought to herself, although she didn’t dare say it out loud. ”And don’t forget who helped you cover them up.” She glanced at her make-up box. Had Max not been here, she would have been covering up the mark, out of habit more than anything else, but she was reluctant to after her brother’s comment. ”You’re such a judgmental hypocrite, did you know that?”

max van de kamp.

"Perhaps you should have learned to do that while we were still in school," he replied, nothing if not matter-of-fact. You'd think that an older brother who knew what his sister had just been up to would have been a bit more protective; maybe give her the dreaded talk, warn her away from any boy and knock some sense into her. But, in Max's eyes at least, it was far too late for that.

Eleanor, much like himself, had lost her innocence very young. None of this behaviour was concerning -- destructive or not. It was what he had done, and did, and it was to be expected that she would eventually follow him down the same old road.

There was one thing he wasn't letting go of yet, though, and that was the warning off of boys; if they were anything like him, then he didn't want them within ten feet of his sister. Maybe he appeared as if all he were looking for was an easy fight, and that he didn't really care what she got up to -- but deep down, he was desperate to make sure that the boy who'd disappeared so abruptly out of Eleanor's window knew that she had a brother who wasn't afraid to throw punches if it came to that. "Maybe," he threw back at her, "Wouldn't that be nice? I wonder how quick your boy toy would come running back, after a run in with me... food for thought."

Gods, he seemed like an asshole. He knew that was how he came off; and he knew that Eleanor thought of him as one. That was good. Much as he cared, and always would care, she was about the only thing which made him weak -- and it was better to keep her at arms distance than mollycoddle her forever. Perhaps, that was a harsh way to go about things... but Eleanor had grown up in the same house as he had, and harsh was something they were all too familiar with.

"Oh, I have. Girls are as prone to leaving them as hormonal teenage boys," it wasn't like he hid the fact that he had often walked around littered with hickies, in all shapes and sizes. And there was no difference; it was just that, when it came to Eleanor, there didn't need to be an actual difference. He expected better of her. "You only helped with the visible ones, sister."

"Please, don't let my presence stop you from covering up that hideous mark," he waved a hand to her make-up box, as if inviting her to move in her own room, "We can talk more of my hypocrisy while you powder your neck. And then, perhaps, I can get a word in about how I expected you to act more mature than you've clearly been acting of late."

eleanor van de kamp

Eleanor had been expecting a lecture. No, not a lecture about sex - they were too far on the road to adulthood to even think of that as a possibility, a lecture on morals, behaviors, whatever Max wanted to lecture her about this time. He didn’t care, it seemed to her, he was just looking for an excuse to feel superior. And she let him, because she had no one else to go to. Without Max, Eleanor was no one. She was a popular girl at a rich boarding school, a politician’s daughter, the girl who had everything. The girl who could pass off bruises as hickies. Max had already escaped, and Eleanor knew that, despite the fact that her father had still not cut her credit cards off yet, she needed Max as her one real connection.

”At camp I don’t need to keep pesky brothers out.” Eleanor shot back, her ees averted. She was angry that he was yelling, angry that he expected better. How could he? They were Van De Kamps, it’s what they did. It’s what their father did before them, and both siblings carried on the family tradition of doing things that they definitely shouldn’t be doing. Of losing their innocence and not looking back.

Max’s voice, marked with what Eleanor could only describe as coldness, made Eleanor want to shiver. ”You disgust me Maximilian.” She said, after a brief pause, like it meant nothing more than any other insults that crossed between the two. Eleanor threw a look over her shoulder towards the window and then glanced back at her brother. She was not just bantering. Those words.... Eleanor was disgusted. They were too familiar to her father’s. Max was too much like him for her tasting, and she had forgotten in these absent months.

”How come you say that with pride but I’m supposed to feel ashamed for the exact same thing?” Eleanor asked, a hint of childish frustration in her voice as she adjusted her makeup, her eyeshadow and eyeliner, carefully avoiding covering her neck. No one but Max could make her feel like that, like she was somehow at fault for all those things that he was congratulated for. Before Eleanor even knew what a hickie was, before she had her first kiss, she had dutifully covered Max’s with foundation and then concealer, saying nothing, not judging. She knew what happened when their father saw.

That didn’t stop either Van de Kamp from engaging in their various banned activities, from the partying and drinking, from the sex and drugs. So now, here, Max was going to lecture her on being mature? ”You’re one to talk, Maximilian van de Kamp.” Eleanor said, her words sharp, as if to signal she was no longer open to the idea of a playful banter. ”You run away to Manhattan without a trace, leaving me alone in that house and you want to lecture about maturity?”

Eleanor strode to the door, opening it and gesturing out. ”If I had wanted reprimanding, I would have stayed home. So get out.” Eleanor said, her voice clear and loud, her arms crossed. She starred her brother in the face, doubting that he would actually leave. ”Get out.” She hissed, on the edge of screaming.

max van de kamp.

"Clearly, you do," gesturing at himself as if to make the point that now, she would need to take special care to lock her door before engaging in... unsavory activities. It was pretty selfish of him, really -- as much to save himself from walking in on something worse than he had as it was to save her from embarrassment.

Not that she really would be embarrassed. Not being so, no matter the situation, seemed to be a Van de Kamp trait.

Oh, he picked up on the realness of those four words. There was always a thin line between banter and something worse, when it came to the words exchanged between the two of them -- and he had long since learned to pick up on the exact moment they crossed the line. He knew she was truly disgusted and not just playing it up for the drama of it, but... well, he just didn't care. "And your recent actions have disgusted me, Eleanor," he was so hypocritical.

He was so like his father. That thought, suddenly flashing in his mind like strobe lights, was enough to turn his stomach, but not enough to make him stop.

"You know why," with the patience of someone explaining the sounds different animal's made to a toddler, Max fixed her with a rather pointed gaze, choosing to ignore the frustration evident in her tone, "We -- and by that, I mean men -- aren't looked down upon by anyone for having love bites across our skin. It's a sexist world we live in, sister, and what's viewed as a badge of honor for us... is viewed a lot less nicely for girls." It was obvious how, where he referred to himself as a man, he didn't do the same for Eleanor -- she wasn't a woman. She was a child. A girl. His attempt to make her see the error of her ways was as much to stop her growing up so fast as anything else.

Max had first had sex when he was fourteen years old. Eleanor was ten, maybe younger. A year before that, he'd already been booked by the cops for underage drinking, and in the months previous to that, he'd already had his first joint. Momentous occassions that some teenagers felt were signs of rebelliousness were normal moments from his late childhood, well hidden from the wrath of his father. He'd lost his childhood, lost all the years where those actions weren't supposed to be self-destructive, but adventerous -- and he had tried, hard as he could, to preserve some of Eleanor's young years. Give her something of the life he'd lost out on.

His father had seen to it that he didn't succeed.

And now, knowing what he'd just walked in on... he knew that she'd just ended up as bad as him.

I wanted to take you with me, he thought to himself, I tried to take you with me. But the words never left his mouth -- instead, he set his jaw and chose not to reply at all, crossing back to the window when she moved to the door, defiant against her insistence he leave. From his breast pocket, he pulled a skillfully rolled joint, and held it up to his shoulder when he turned back to face her.

"So, you didn't want to go halves?"

Some siblings played video games. Some, baseball.

And then there was the Van de Kamp's, with joint smoking and alcohol abuse.

eleanor van de kamp

Eleanor sighed. No more makeout sessions with whomever boy caught her fancy at the mess hall, no more drinking on the beach right after sunset or smoking... She would have to be extra careful not to anger Max, so he wouldn’t tell on her. At least here, at camp, he couldn’t kick her out - Eleanor was protected moreso than she was in his apartment. ”Am I supposed to become a nun or something now?” Eleanor demanded, exasperated. She had left home for a reason.

”Oh please, don’t talk like your opinion matters to me.” Eleanor said, annoyed that she was being reprimanded, but lying at the same time. Max’s opinions did matter to her, or at least his presence did matter. He was her brother, of course. But even if that was true, at this particular time, there was nothing Eleanor wanted to do more than smashing her brother across the face.

”We’re not in medieval England, Maximilian. No one cares here.” She said, hastily adding ”except you,” although her tone stayed sardonic. He was - just like their father. Eleanor couldn’t remember their father ever treating her like a girl, from the beginning, she was an adult and was expected to behave like one. Don’t talk too loudly, don’t smile too widely, keep your opinions to yourself. Still, every time Eleanor dressed, the voice of her father interrupted her thoughts - are you really wearing that out? You’re a Van de Kamp, not a common whore. She wore them out anyways, and soon learned that she wasn’t a common whore, she was a Van de Kamp whore. She had followed Max’s footsteps at first and was confused when she was chastised for it, but then Eleanor learned to keep her weed in her makeup box, and how to cover hickies and hide boys in her closet.

Eleanor didn’t get angry often, but this was one of those rare exceptions, and she was starting to lose her temper with Maximilian. How dare he. How f***** dare he. Eleanor walked the line between full on tantrum-esque blowup and keeping her cool and as her brother sat down she could feel her chest bursting. Max was being obnoxious and entitled and very much like a true Van de Kamp, but he was Max, and he had come to see her. For once, maybe he was trying to rectify his own wrongs.

Eleanor tried to give him the benefit of the doubt, only after he offered her half of his blunt. Eleanor didn’t have a supplier in New York and was lonely without it.”Fine. Gimme.” Eleanor said, holding out her hand expectantly. Max had won this battle for sure.

max van de kamp.

"It's a valid life option nowadays," he shot back, and couldn't help but add with a slightly more nasty undertone, "Maybe, living full time in a nunnery would be beneficial. They'd teach you respect... and their strict chastity rules would put my mind at ease."

His opinion had mattered to her once; and hers had mattered to him, too. Though it didn't show, her words cut deep, and Max chose to say nothing rather than say something which might worsen an already sour situation. This was not how he had imagined their reunion would go -- not that he had fooled himself into believing it would go well, by any means. But he'd thought that they'd at least get a bit longer than the two minutes they'd had before all had descended into chaos.

"To think such a thing is foolish of you, Eleanor," was it really, though? He cared, because she was his sister -- the title held little weight as all such familial ties did in the Van de Kamp family, but Max still cared. Did anyone else? Probably not, quite honestly. He had to maintain his opinion, though, to even hope to sway Eleanor. If he let his beliefs fall, then she'd have even more ammunition against him, "Everyone cares. If you've been carrying on as I feel you have been the entire time you've been here at this godsforsaken Camp, then I doubt anyone's opinion of you is a high one."

That's what it boiled down to, really. The Van de Kamp name, and the level of respect that it was deserving of. He was raised in a house where it gave you an automatic head start, an immediate head above everyone else. Opinions mattered -- and while he wanted to care less about her activities, he was stuck in the way of thinking that his father had conditioned him into.

"Patience, dear sister," he chastised, palming the joint so that he could root around in his pocket for a lighter -- and coming up empty handed, "Find a light, and you'll even be able to have the first drag."

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