* NOT ALL THERE [rin]

Though she wasn't the fondest of her job, she had to admit that she preferred theatre days to classroom days. It was boring for her to instruct the students in the history of Shakespeare and theatre and other things relating to it and she was sure it was boring for most of the students as well. At least when she had them acting out skits or performing monologues and soliloquies it was bearable. Some of the students clammed up and got nervous—she did her best not to roll her eyes or look sour, at least when she was in a good mood. That only made it worse and she figured that the administration would notice if more people in her class were passing than failing on a regular basis.

Some of the kids had it in them. She could see it, the spark in their eyes when they performed or the special flair they had on the stage. Rin couldn't exactly say that she adored every kid that tried hard in her class but she was certainly a lot more patient and tolerant with them.

Maddie was one of those few.

Hers was the last performance and usually by the end of the day Rin was simply wishing for it all to be over, but she forced herself to avoid the temptation of zoning out. It helped that she wasn't irritated by the girl—if Maddie had been one of the kids she didn't like, she might have done just that and given them a bad mark simply because she knew that's what they'd probably get anyway. People are predictable.

She was familiar with the play and thus knew what to look for in the performance. Her gaze was critical as she narrowed it and took in everything with a half-scowl on her face, looking displeased. She wasn't, it was simply an expression she often wore when she was analysing things. Caterina nodded to herself and wrote a few observations down for later consideration, then looked up in surprise when a shadow fell across the page. She blinked at the student she'd just been marking as if deciding whether to pay her any mind, then lowered the pad of paper. "Madeline," she said by way of greeting. She didn't sound too enthusiastic but neither was she scathing or detached. Her favourites got a little more slack for sure. "Something you need?" She glanced at the clock. Eh, she had plenty of time for lunch, no use sending the girl away.

At first she thought it was going to be a question about her performance and Rin was preparing a brief reprimand about how she didn't tell anyone their marks until it was time for her to hand them out. She didn't like showing that she played favourites in such an obvious manner. It turned out to be about the school play, though, and she lifted her brows briefly. "Oh, that." It made sense that Maddie would come to her about the play, she supposed. Rin wasn't head of the drama department (didn't she wish she had that much control) but she did know her way around. "Shakespeare again. Typical." Now, she didn't hate Shakespeare, she just wished they didn't default to it for everything. Sure, the guy was great. He wasn't the only playwright out there. "What did you want to know? Are you thinking of an audition?"

Though she was rather irritable and cynical when it came to her job, outside of work saw a completely different side of Rin. She didn't do a complete one-eighty and turn into a compassionate, selfless doormat but she definitely wasn't unhappy or unfriendly. Rin was a bitch but she embraced it and managed to find a balance between being friendly and speaking her mind in a not-so-nice way. She found people interesting and liked to be around them, it didn't mean that she liked them. Just their antics.

Maybe that was why she enjoyed theatre so much. You got to use all of the information you gathered from people-watching to transform your identity. Ironically enough, playing pretend hadn't been something she'd done a lot as a child. She'd not had a mother to play dress up with her or friends to play dolls with. No, Rin had found her love of putting on a different face through a high school drama class. It had clicked. Now she got to watch other people act instead of doing it herself. You'd think that someone with a passion for acting would love to teach an acting class but not Rin. She wanted to be famous, wanted to be a star, wanted to be in movies.

It wasn't happening.

Those were the things she often thought about when watching her kids perform so the look on her fact was more automatic than anything. It shifted slightly after class to a more neutral expression as she talked with one of the students that didn't make her want to kill something. "When I said something about it they pulled some bull out of their ass about wanting to make sure everyone understood what they were watching." Speaking of watching things, Rin probably should have been watching her language. She didn't bother. This was after class, she'd already held her tongue the rest of the day, she needed a break. "It's not like you understand everything about a movie before you get around to watching it but whatever. I don't have much of a say." She rolled her eyes. Maybe if they trusted the play assignments to the college professors she'd get lucky but it was usually the school board that decided things in the end, decided what was 'acceptable'. Feh. It was bullshit.

Her icy eyes glinted as Madeline scolded the narrow horizons of the board and she smirked. "See, I knew there was a reason I liked you." With an exasperated sigh, she said, "It's not that Shakespeare is all bad or anything, it's more like... ugh, I can't stand people who claim to understand everything about Shakespeare because they covered one play in the seventh grade." She'd actually gotten a few ninth graders like that and it was enough to make her want to shoot herself. Metaphorically, of course, because Rin had the mindset that suicide was for pussies. She thought that a lot of things were for pussies. "It's whatever. We're stuck with it. At least it's not Romeo and Juliet again." She couldn't handle that two years in a row.

Rin considered Madeline's request for a moment, then nodded. "Sure. They could use some decent actresses. Did you see the bitch they cast as Ju—ahem, never mind. Yeah, I'll give you a hand. Leg. Whatever." She kept having to remind herself that just because it was after-hours, she couldn't say everything that was on her mind. One off-colour comment made its way to the administration and she might be out of a job soon enough. "What can I do for you?" She'd put in a good word but it seemed like Maddie wanted more than that.

Caterina laughed at Madeline's irritation. "A lot of people." People like Rin who'd been forced to understand the guy for years in order to get a foot hold in the theatre community. She hadn't wanted to go into theatre, though, and that was what most people didn't know about her. Rin had wanted to be an actress on the big screen, broadway musicals and the like held no appeal. Still, she knew about them from her own days of taking theatre classes simply to exercise her love of acting. They wouldn't have given her the job if she didn't know what she was doing. "That one's not so hard," she countered. "It's good enough to cure deafness. At least he didn't say it would cause deafness. " That would be unfortunate for whomever was being addressed. An insult. Then again, if someone ever told Rin that her tales would deafen others she'd probably just laugh. Arrogance was bliss. She seemed amused when Maddie almost swore but didn't say anything about it.

Both brows were lifted at Madeline. The man had a lot of plays, that was a pretty impressive feat to brag. Multiple times? She was either exaggerating or simply a fan of theatre. Made sense, actually, being a fan of theatre and taking a theatre class. Have to remember that most of the kids like this stuff more than I do. Oh, bitter feels. "Guy's been dead for hundreds of years, I bet even his mother didn't understand him." No one was in Shakespeare's head and so no one could claim a true understanding. "He was an ugly fu—an ugly guy, too, ever seen a picture?" Filter, Rin, god damn! At least she could still cuss in her thoughts, they'd never take that away from her. Rebel 4 Lyfe. "Yourself? No, no, do me a favour and shoot the one making the decisions... and in the face, too, for good measure." Then she'd be all over the news as the next teen who'd snapped and Rin would whistle innocently and claim she knew nothing about it as she enjoyed a year free of the most overdone Shakespeare play ever.

She appeared to have very little shame as she grinned in response to the laugh. Hey, Rin had never really claimed to be a perfect angel. If Madeline didn't have a problem with her calling 'Juliet' a bitch then there wasn't a problem, enough said. She thought about the request for only a moment, then shrugged. "Yeah, sure, why not," she agreed. "If you were anyone else I might have said no but you don't make me want to drive pencils into my brain and that's good enough for me." Huh, where had she heard of that tale? Thousand Ways to Die, maybe? No... Urban Legends...? Yeah, maybe that was it... She snapped herself out of it with a blink. "When do you want to start? Ah, and what part are you trying for?" She knew that some people tried out for a lead role and got a supporting one instead but she figured that Madeline would be able to score the part she actually wanted, be it supporting or leading, with enough practice. She had faith in her good kids.