Chapter Text
Mama had named her Sophia Evangaline. The Foster was later. Sophia for wisdom her mama hoped she would gain, Evangaline since she was the greatest message she had ever been given. The agencies wanted to change her name, saying ‘Sophie is easier, you’ll get adopted quicker’ and ‘Evangaline is so old school, why not Elizabeth’, as if she would ever be willing to give up anything her mama had given her.
Sophia, not Sophie, was 5 when the flames came. She and Mama were asleep; there was no known cause for the fire. One moment she’s sleeping, the next Mama has her, hair darker than her normal brown, exasperates by matching brown eyes full of fear as she smiles at Sophia, tears down her cheeks as she throws her into the fireman’s arms, and the ceiling comes down.
The wreckage came back with no survivor but Sophia. No documents could be found, no socials, no birth certificates, nothing. So into the system she went, and orphan with a name she ‘chose’, as if she would forget Mama’s meanings. She had the choice of Foster and Smith, as if it was actually a choice.
Small squeaky voice Sophia, so full of grief and anger, went with Foster. You put her in the system, she won’t let you forget it. And thus, the origin of Sophia Evangaline Foster, your local telepath or schizophrenic. At that point it was half and half on what she was.
Sophia, still not Sophie, no matter what her social worker tried to claim, was 6, then 8, then 9, then 11, house after house after house. Some for only a while, some for longer, but none could deny that little Sophia, small squeaky Sophia, was a creature. Eyes brown almost black with grief, with knowledge, able to tell you everything you thought and feared as though she herself was the nightmare. Got quite a name for herself in the system; Sinister Sophia they said, Secret Keeping Sophia they murmured, as though this little girl did not hear them say it, with words or thoughts, she already knew.
She was 11 when she was placed with someone new for the last(ish) time. He was introduced as Mr Forkle, an old man bloated and smelling of feet, always starting sentences with ‘You kids’, as though he had more than Sophia. Her social worker had said that he was ‘new’ and that he ‘wanted to start slow’; giving them Sneaky Sophia was not ‘slow’ and she wondered if he made someone mad at him, but he didn’t mind when she took over the bathroom once a month to dye her hair her Mama’s color (still not right), so he was alright. He didn’t have a basement, and her door had a lock and a chair she could use to double secure it, so he was already better than others just for that alone.
He did demand she get a placement test for the school though, which meant she was in high school as a senior just before she turned 12, which truly reeked. Teenagers already a foot above her at the shortest being shown up by someone who hadn’t even lost all their baby teeth was not a good combination, especially in their part of San Diego, but she had a roof and a key to the house that she had already made sure to hide so no one could take it, so school it was.
(If she sometimes told the front office that her social worker needed her for the day though, well sometimes a little white lie is good for things in the long run.)
Unfortunately, she didn’t think of this idea before this field trip, going to the Natural History Museum in Balboa Park, as she hadn’t heard from Mr Sweeney before it was too late, and next thing you know, she’s doing the lecture since he was so concerned about her music.
'Old people and music, I always wondered why that was a bad combination,' Sophia had thought unbidden, noticing that both Mr Sweeney and Mr Forkle were the same cloth (and age) with similar complaints. Although hearing the ‘know it all’ comment from his head was certainly new, the other comments from the students? Not so much.
‘I do wish there was some creativity happening,’ Sophia countered her own thoughts, hearing Curvebuster and some not so family friendly comments being spouted her general direction, as though she didn’t know that Garwin Chang got rejected from Yale and that Mr Sweeney’s wife was happier with the physical ed teacher than she ever was with him.
Similarly, she could also tell when she was being stared at, and putting her earbuds away, made overly awkward eye contact with a kid with way too blue eyes.
‘Seriously, kinda creepy,’ the thought had occurred, even before seeing the newspaper with her face on it. Apparently, rejecting Yale on a full scholarship (no opinion from her, Mr Forkle and her social worker had conferred and agreed that she was too young) to continue schooling in San Diego with the college and high school program in order to ‘increase her social skills’, her social worker’s words, and to ensure that she would ‘take her studies seriously’, Mr Forkle’s words. And for some reason, it was so monumental that some nosy journalist wrote an article about it, with the wrong name to boot.
‘Local Prodigy Chooses Small Time College Over the Ivy League, Sophie Foster the local 12 year old in San Diego High School’s Senior program for overachievers', or something similar; she had stopped reading when she had read the wrong name. Although it looks like Too Blue Eye Contact hadn’t, seeing as how he’s now walking over with the paper itself.
“Is this you?” he asks, a crisp accented voice inquiring.
Doing a quick up down look, Sophia deigns him with a, “It’s the wrong name used, but yes. Want an autograph or something for it?” This shocks good ole Too Blue, who looks taken aback, before saying in response, “Are your eyes naturally brown?” Which, rude. And also,
“Yes, they always have been. Mama and I have the same shade,” which is a very small comfort on Bad Days, when she worries if she had envisioned her days with Mama were nothing but a potential hallucination and she had always existed solely for the system with nothing but the outside voices for company.
Too Blue makes a humming sound, before facing the dinosaur they were in the room with. Giving it the same look Sophia had given him, he asks “Do you truly believe this is what they look like?”
Giving the dinosaur bones a look as well, Sophia responded, “I suspect they likely had more blood, muscles, and flesh, but the bones I are probably as accurate as they're going to get for a place like this.” Too Blue seemed to do a twitch of some variety with his face, before stating, “It was nice meeting you, Sophie, enjoy your day,” which, wrong name and also, got interrupted by Sophia’s bane of existence; small unruly children.
Now, Sophia had grown up with children smaller than her since joining the system, but while she could ignore their behaviour, their screechy little chalkboard nail needle mental voices (or what she suspected were their voices, she feels like if her brain created the voices, they would be more rowdy than painful) were something she had never agreed to, and could not get use to, and such, when a group of 15 of them go from one door to the next, little voices amped up double time, she couldn’t help but grip onto the bridge of her nose, moving her glasses up with the motion.
She also happened to notice, once the miniature screamatures were out of the room, Too Blue had also had a reaction, although more along the lines of ‘covering the ears’ variety than staving off a migraine with a pressure point move, which, bad move.
“So, you too?” Sophia asks, adjusting her glasses where she had moved them, seeing Too Blue look shocked. “You covered your ears dude, you wanna do a motion less noticeable if you’re trying to stave off the reaction of smacking your head into a wall to stop hearing anything else.”
Too Blue looked a little taken aback by that comment, but seems like he got over it, what with his next sentence being, “You heard it too then?” as if Sophia hadn’t just asked him the same question, but whatever.
“Of course I did, I’ve been dealing with it for 7 years at this rate; you only just get it or something?”
Which, good lord did this dude, who should probably get a name at this point, look like he ate a lightbulb. Rolling her eyes, Sophia grabbed Too Blue’s shirt sleeve, ‘Which,’ she noticed, ‘was a really soft fabric, wonder if I can thrift something similar,’ and dragged the boy outside over to where the park had installed some benches for those taking a walk, though most people have been staying indoors, what with all the arson attacks going on.
“So, my name is Sophia, as I said, the article got the name wrong. What’s your name oh fellow voices hearer,” Sophia introduced, waiting as Too Blue got comfortable on the rock bench, whereas she had just opted to sit on the top half with her feet in the seat location, even though it emphasized the difference in what they wore a little more extensively, with her having jeans she had gotten from a fellow foster sister who had outgrown them and Sophia was able to use a belt and some rolled up bottoms in order to make them work, verses Too Blue’s perfectly pressed slacks with noncreased sneakers and Sophia’s tearing apart thrifted sneakers, already worn but affordable and had the least amount of holes, her hoodie having stains and bleached spots from her wear and tear and contrasting Too Blue’s clean button up.
Sophia knows that the allowance she gets isn’t much, and she isn’t ashamed of what she’s managed to do for herself, but there’s still a little part of her embarrassed by the difference.
“My name’s Fitz, and you aren’t human Sophiiiia,” with a long length on the ‘eeeah’ really told Sophia that this Fitz dude isn’t going to be good with her name any time soon.
“Oh joy, new existentialism routine just dropped,” Sophia said, quoting something she had seen online recently, watching poor Fitz get even more confused.
“Not to concern you or anything Fitz, I could figure it out. It really only has two options, schizophrenia or telepathy, and these voices don’t seem to be how schizophrenics describe the voices.”
Fitz seemed to have released a breath he was holding, and slumped over his knees, “I thought it would be harder to tell you you were an elf,” which HOLD UP.
“Excuse me,” Sophia swallows, choking on spit, “I was all okay with the telepathy thing, that one’s explainable, but an elf? Pointy ears, short elf elf? Helps out at the north pole, makes cookies type of elf? Because that’s just insanity there bud.”
Rolling his eyes, Fitz states, “Not the human description of elves, but an elf. I,” here Fitz pauses, looking unsure, “I really don’t know how to explain it. I could show it, if you’re amenable?”
And you know what? Sophia’s dealt with potential kidnappers before, and granted, normally their strategies are ‘distract, snag, and drag’, but rarely do they ask so politely, and as such,
“You know what Fitz? Sure, why not, could be fun.”
Please don’t tell her social worker she agreed to get kidnapped, it would involve such a lecture.