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Post by NELL DOE DALE on Dec 1, 2011 21:14:43 GMT -5
 Nell rested her forehead against the steering wheel of her car, huddled in her jacket, face buried in her scarf. She sneezed as a strand of cat fur found its way in her nose, and she furiously wiped at her already red nose. The Earth girl had turned her heat off when she pulled to the side of the road, and now she was freezing. But she needed it. The ball she’d managed to curl herself up in made her feel secure and safe for once, and she couldn’t help think over and over, it should have gotten better. She was back at the Academy, her life was returning to what had become its natural cycle over the last year, but she still felt ill at ease. ”It doesn’t just go away, her counsellor had told her. Indifferent. Clinical, like a human stethoscope, listening to everything inside her. Doctors couldn’t get attached to patients, no matter if it was a psychologist or a neurologist. ”It’ll still take time. Have you been taking the medication?” She had almost grimaced with guilt. She’d missed a few doses, but now that she was back in school and still working, she wanted everything to fall into place like she knew it should have.
But it didn’t. She took a shuddering breath, surprised that she didn’t see a cloud forming in front of her mouth. Eyes squeezed shut, she placed a hand on her stomach. She hadn’t eaten yet today, and she didn’t know whether her stomach hurt from the emptiness or the constant pain she’d been having lately. Even the visits to the counsellor were wearing on her, which was why she pulled to the side of the road to recover. He asked too many questions. She knew it would happen, but she didn’t think it would be this bad. Even as she skirted around them with answer that could be barely considered as such, she felt a jab at the too-personal questions. Nell sometimes wondered how much her father had told the man—Dr. Warren—about her, but had a feeling it wasn’t much. He only raised her for a few years, he wouldn’t know everything, even if he had bore witness to the trial. She felt nauseous, and was almost tempted to run out into the snowbank to dry heave. The questions Dr. Warren asked were too similar to the trial, and it only made things worse. Didn’t he know? Couldn’t he see?
Brushing her hair away from her face, and focusing on the road, the cars driving by, running tracks throuh the slush, she turned the ignition and Gwen roared back to life. The winter hadn’t been too kind to her cars before, so she didn’t expect much mercy now. It was strange, knowing it was January again, a year since she’d run away. So much had happened. She’d found the Academy, become a student and it was also when she met Josh, and a lot of her other close friends. This month should be a good sign, it should be wonderful that she could see another January, that she was free. But the cold seeped through her skin, weakened her, and she yearned for hibernation. Back on the road, she wondered where she should go, and decided to head to the Academy to see some of her friends. They would take her mind off of everything, wouldn’t they? When she walked up to the entrance, it did feel like home, for which she was grateful.
”Yo, Nelly!” She blinked and turned to grin at her friend as the girl slung her arm around her shoulder, almost knocking the Earth elemental over. ”Hola, May,” she said, snaking an arm around her waist. Nell’s messenger back made it rather uncomfortable to walk this way, but she didn’t mind. ”You stayed for college too?” the girl questioned. She was a Water, overly friendly and helpful and she was a person that reminded Nell of how great the world was. ”’Course. Don’t think I could ever leave this place.” It was true, very true, and she felt her stomach burn for some reason. Couldn’t she be happy? She was almost bitter about her mood. ”Welp, I gotta go move some stuff into my dorm, but I’ll catch ya later. Call me.” May lifted her fingers next to her ear before running into the building, Nell trudging along after, her boots protesting in the snow. She shook herself out like a dog when she finally entered the building, glad for the warmth even though it was rather drafty.
Her first thought would usually be to go to the mess hall, but despite not having eaten, she wasn’t hungry at all. She went for her next best bet, a place she used to consider her safe haven—the library. She was decently well-read and had good memorization skills thanks to how much time she spent in them during her childhood. Her sister had also been wildly intelligent, and it was Nell who read her favorite books to her. The two girls had memorized Shakespeare so they could act out Hamlet with each other, Nell using a blanket for a cape, a ball for a skull, and she knew that she should stop thinking about this. She pulled out a copy of Nietzsche, but when she found a table she smiled softly. She took out her deck of cards, and shuffled out of habit as she sat down and let her messenger back drop to the floor, along with the book she planned on taking out. In the quiet solitude of the library, she started stacking up the cards, forming a house. It managed to take her mind off of things, for which she was thankful.
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Post by nitwit on Dec 9, 2011 20:41:00 GMT -5
Alright, it was a new year, which meant new goals. What was one of Benny’s goals? To get better at school was one of them. The thought of that sent a chill down the wind student’s spine. School was one of the things that Ben wasn’t fond of. It was too much work and really boring. If only he had brought a gun on one of the exam days last year… Stopping his fantasy, the eleventh grader entered the library cautiously. It was so quiet in the room. The atmosphere made him want to puke. Pretty much no one was speaking in the whole entire room. Well, at least he couldn’t hear anything. This was one of the moments where Ben would start playing on his old trusty guitar just to break the silence.
The library wasn’t something that Benny was familiar too, especially the one at the Academy. Now that he thought about it, he pretty much avoided the whole place during the whole entire tenth grade. Maybe he went once or twice to check out a necessary book or something, but he didn’t recall doing much in the library. As soon as the wind student spotted an empty spot, he quickly walked over to it and dropped his backpack on the floor. Zipping it open, he took out a massive text book that he was supposed to read. Ben wanted to have a major breakthrough in school. He wanted to be smart. He wanted to be successful. He wanted to learn everything to know about the wind element. He wasn’t going to add more knowledge to that subject if he got held back a grade. The wind student barely passed the tenth grade. What was he supposed to do if he failed a grade? Have another year at school? Relearn the same old stuff? No, he didn’t want that all. He wasn’t going to repeat the eleventh grade. That required him do some studying. He had to make up for the stuff he learned in tenth grade, did he not?
Taking out his notebook, Ben opened it to a random blank page, numbered it, and titled the notes. What if he actually filled the whole book with notes? Man, would he feel over accomplished. That would be a good thing though, wouldn’t it? Taking out a pencil from his backpack, he lowered the tip of his writing utensil to touch the paper and started to write. He was going to make a difference. He had to.
15 minutes later...
Blowing off the remains of what he had erased, he looked at his finished product. A sketch of his text book it was. It looked pretty realistic to him if he ignored the gray scale. Alright, so he couldn’t resist. It was too quiet, what could he say? For a moment he was writing and then he started to write in cursive. Instead of ending the word though, he continued it and started to draw. It was like he was doing it sub-consciously. What excuse did he have? His artistic mind took over. Benny guessed his mind just couldn’t take the boredom. The wind student found it amazing on how it was so easily to gain muse when everything around him was boring. Oh well, what else could he say…? There was always next time. With that thought, the young artist started another drawing. What would he draw this time? You know what he didn’t draw in a while? A bird… Benny had a liking to birds ever since he was a child. He remembered how he’d complain to his mother in kindergarten about how it was unfair that the birds could fly and he couldn’t. What a silly kid he was.
Looking up, Ben's attention then went to the person who approached his table. It was Nell. Nell and Benny were friends, he thought. Well, at least Ben considered her a friend. He wasn't sure if she considered him one though. They had only talked a few times, but each time they did, they hit it off. She was fun to hang around if he recalled. She was quite nice too. Observing her card stacking, Ben smiled. "I was never capable of doing that when I was a kid. I remember finding it very dificult. What's the trick?"
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on Dec 11, 2011 0:21:32 GMT -5
Nell’s tongue poked out from between her lips as she concentrated on her balancing act, building a house for no one. She couldn’t help remembering her sister—that’s who she used to build these with. And Tilly had been good at it, the careful and meticulous girl she was. She never disturbed anything, her very existence had been a simple whisper in the world. And when it was time to raize the house, Nell would take out the lower level with her arm, and say it had been an earthquake. These were good memories, at least. Even though she could recall how apparent it was that the girl had been ill, the pale of her skin, the small frame. Nell thought she was tiny, but Tilly had been a skeleton as she remembered. However, she tried not to focus on it. If she was going to finally come to terms with her past, she needed to also accept the fact that her sister was now dead. It was a part of everything she was dealing with nowadays, it was a weight on her shoulders.
Good thing Nell wasn’t a jumpy person, seeing as Benny approached her in the still of the library. She took a moment to pause and hold her hands up in the air around the castle, as if keeping them in that space would prevent a fall, before saying. ”Don’t you know, B? I’m a construction worker.” She grinned when she said this, keeping her voice low. Not only were they in the library, but she didn’t want her breath to cause a disturbance. Even the slightest movement could send the structure tumbling. ”The key is balance, amigo. And not making any quick movement.” She took a car, looked at her structure that looked as precarious as it was. ”I’ve seen people build football standiums, so I consider myself an amateur.” She had to admire that, people who had so much dedication that they would take the time to build such an elaborate thing.
She stepped away from the table a bit, so there wouldn’t be any chance of its destruction and said, ”Sup, B? Nice to see you this year. What grade are you in now?” Nell didn’t know him too well, so she didn’t think he’d told her his age before. Otherwise, she would most definitely remember it. Her memory was an excellent thing, mostly utilized for her friends. She could remember he was a Wind student, and that was about as much as she knew of him. She like to learn more, but she was certainly not the pushy sort. That got annoying, she could understand. But she was not easily bothered, even by people like that. ”And what brings you to the library on this most spectacular day?” She always considered the place a safe haven, but she knew not everyone had the same sort of view.
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