* SICK LIKE THIS WINTER GIRL,, taze

[NELL DOE DALE]

Nell sat on a bench in the courtyard, distracting herself from work with the music coming from her i-pod and the tiny flower she was twining around her pen. It was nice to sit out and work instead of being confined to a classroom. Of course, she didn’t mind the library too much—Josh was there a lot, and she did like the places from childhood. But today, the sun and weather was beckoning her outside. It was cooling off, thanks to the crawl closer to September, and so she wore jeans more than shorts now. One thing that stayed the same were her t-shirts however. Of course, she mized it up with cardigan and tank-tops, but she was a plain girl, even when she was spending as much of her father’s money as she could.

With a sigh, she returned her attention to the notebook on her lap. Math problems. Though she did not like the subject, she wasn’t one to give up in the middle of something. She could barely even move on from a problem that she didn’t understand without her mind returning to it and trying to figure out the answer. So it took quite a bit of time for her to finish one math problem, and she’d been sitting on the bench for quite a bit of time, her legs itching for her to get up and move somewhere. She wasn’t necessarily an antsy person, but she liked to move around. Especially since it was so tempting, with everyone outside and lingering and so many oppurtunities to have fun. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea for her to be trying to work out in the courtyard. When inside, she could solely focus on her work, especially when in the library.

Will I need this in my life? she wondered while staring at the last problem. If her life would be going past December. Oh, don’t think like that. It was amazing how optimistic about everything she could be save for her future. The law, the government machine, was a big and scary thing. It could tear her apart so easily, and that was a terrifying thing to consider. She knew that she was only one person, with her entire family against her. Except for her father, and she didn’t even like the man. He’s trying. León just didn’t understand anything, really. How to be a father, what his daughter wanted, how to go about the trial thing. He didn’t even realize that Jane’s sole intent was to harrass Nell—he was almost naïve in the way he liked to see the best in others. She might have gotten that from him. But she understood that the two most likely despised each other.

She finished the assignment with a soft, ”Aha!” Finally, freedom. Stuffing her work into the bag, earbuds still in and music playing, she shrugged it onto her shoulder and started heading across the grounds. She could head home, but she wondered if any of her friends were milling about. With this thought in her head, she noticed Taze. ”Hey, Taze!” she called out, waving her hand over her head before going over to the girl. With a bright smile and cheerful tones, she took out one of the earbuds to say, ”How are you doing today? Are you going home now?”

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[tayslynn]

Tayslynn had decided to take a walk to clear her head. Writer's block was awful in itself, but she was trying to come up with a melody and a set of lyrics, and nothing was working out. Hopefully fresh air would have done her some good. Silence wouldn't hurt either. It was easiest for her to come up with music if there weren't many sounds around her. After a few minutes of walking, she began to hum. In a few more minutes, the melody was down. Her creative process may have had its quirks, but it was fine as long as she managed to get good results. She was naturally a good musician, something that she'd inherited from her mother. It didn't take much to get her to think of a good song, and since she played a whole variety of instruments, she could write pretty much any genre of music and even record an entire song by herself if she had the studio technology (which she didn't) in the style of Prince or Nine Inch Nails. She had just started to head back to the dorms when she heard someone call her.

"Hey Taze," a voice called out to her. It wasn't hard to tell who it'd be. Even her friends didn't greet her with that level of enthusiasm. Rolling her eyes, Tayslynn sighed. She wasn't sure whether or not she wanted to deal with the Nell at the moment. They weren't really friends, but Nell and Noly were pretty much best friends forever, so she was around more than enough for the two to know each other. Chewing her gum with her mouth opened, she walked toward the girl. Taze realized that she probably wouldn't hear the end of it from her sister if she just decided to walk away now. Really, it was more worth it to just talk to the earth girl for a few minutes than to have Noly upset with her for god knows how long. Tayslynn didn't need that kind of trouble at the moment. Or ever. She had enough on her plate already, and she didn't need her darling sister to get upset over nothing.

Taze gave a halfhearted smile to the girl. "Hey Nell," she greeted the girl in a friendly manner. She may not have been the biggest fan of the girl, but that wouldn't stop her from being civil, after all, Taze wasn't one for burning bridges. "I'm alright," she stated. She was as alright as she could be, being much of an emotional wreck as she was. It wasn't hard to believe that she was doing well if one were to judge from simply the surface value, after all. No one saw the inner destruction. That was fine though. She didn't need an audience to her break downs. "How are you?" she asked. "Yeah, I'm heading back to the dorms to write a song. Where are you headed?" The dorms weren't really home though, neither was the orphanage where the twins spent their summers. Really, nowhere felt like home without their parents. There was no warmth. No heart. Nothing. Just a kind of emptiness. Just like in her. Something was always missing in her life.

Tagged:: Nell
Outfit:: Click
Count:: 537
Notes:: So pumped that I finally get to thread with Nell <3

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[NELL DOE DALE]

Nell was blissfully unaware of Taze’s disinterest in her. She liked to see the best of people, liked to believe that if someone didn’t want her around they’d come out and tell her. There were many reasons for this, so deeply ingrained into her that even if she tried to trace their lengths—which she never did—she wouldn’t be able to find the root. And there was a root to almost everything, like with most people. There was a reason she smiled at Taze the way she did, because the route was her own twin. Identical and dead. She’d told Noly about Till, and the Earth girl was glad to notice that it was becoming easier to do so. Less of a wound and more of something to take pride in—“my twin was so wonderful, you’d have loved her.” And Nell knew a bit about the DeVrois family from their grandmother’s journals and Noly’s whispered words. So it was safe to say that she felt close even to Taze, who couldn’t care less.

Just as she was optimistic about people’s intentions, she was optimistic about people. Even though she learned to doubt from Josh—because when he said that he was ‘fine’, nine times out of ten he was the furthest thing from fine. But there was something else she also understood—everyone liked to be seen as fine until they needed help. So Nell didn’t pry, just said, ”Cool,” in the most cheerful tone in her repertoire. Waving her hand, the Earth girl said, ”Peachy keen. Just finished up homework, so I’m home free.” And that was as much as she revealed about her personal life to even those she liked. No one needed to know about the murder trial or her father or her aunt. She needed to Nell, cheerful and friendly to a painful extent. Nell Doe Shepherd was not the kind of girl who killed her mother and ran from the law.

Taze’s response to her was lukewarm at best, but in usual Nell fashion, the lack of an outright rejection encouraged her. ”A song? Got any inspiration for it or did it just come to you?” She’d heard a lot of people with talents like writing say that they didn’t get their inspiration from anywhere. It just fell into their lap from the sky, so to speak. It was something that interested Nell, who didn’t think she really had anything going for her. Gardening, flair bartending, card games, food consumption, cars—all she could get from that was horticulturist, bartender (which she already was), dealer at a casino, and mechanic. Not like she could eat for a living, unless for competitions, but she decided not to despair over that. Instead, she didn’t think about the future. It was difficult to do so when you figured that your future would be one behind bars. That was where optimism fell flat. ”Eh, there’s nowhere I really need to be. Was planning on going home, but do you wanna hang out? I can wait while you write your song.” She was like a child in the way she was always optimistic in the face of possible company and adventure.

[tayslynn]

Tayslynn absolutely hated that Nell knew about her history. It was great that Noly had friends and all, but the twins history was obviously a shared history, and it was ridiculous that someone who Taze didn't really even enjoy spending time with knew more about her than her friends did. It made her feel awkward and vulnerable, which were the exact feelings that she tried so hard to avoid. Taze wasn't such a closed off person for nothing, she didn't just wake up one morning and say that she wouldn't show emotions anymore. No, she decided a while ago that it was better for her to not appear so fragile, because some people just loved to break things if they knew they'd shatter. Nell obviously wasn't out to get Taze, but it was certainly awkward when you didn't know someone, but they knew all of your secrets. That must have been how celebrities and politicians felt. The paparazzi rooting through garbage and taking pictures of them eating. They may have seemed insignificant, but they always seemed to get some dirt that would humiliate one of the bigger stars. Tayslynn could only imagine how that must have felt, to have your flaws sprawled out on a tabloid. Journals were almost as bad. Grandma had made a mistake with that one, but if it helped Noly, it helped Noly. And that was good, because it took a lot to recover from knowing that you killed your mother. Because in Taze's eyes, her sister was completely to blame.

Peachy keen. That was a phrase you certainly didn't hear anymore. It was kind of cute though, and maybe it was making its resurgence just lie the way fifties style was coming back into fashion nowadays. Everything was cyclical after all. People were too dull to always be creating new things, so they just used what was already made, and as long as it worked, everyone would be fine. Maybe there'd be some other fun slang thrown in today. Tasie couldn't help but hope that Nell would use the phrase twenty-three skidoo when leaving. Maybe she'd say golly-gee if she got excited. Sure, she doubted that Nell would do something that ridiculous without coaxing, but a girl could dream. Taze gave a half-smile when Nell informed her that she'd finished her homework. "Good to hear," she said with as much kindness as she could muster. Taze was great at being fake-friendly. She could have been a Walmart greeter or something with the amount of false affection she could throw at people.

Tayslynn had to admit, Nell was certainly trying to start a legitimate conversation, which was really admirable considering the somewhat cold responses that Taze had given. Usually that meant that Tasie would just have to try harder to turn on the ice, but Nell was Noly's friend. That meant that Taze would be nice for now, unless the earth student did something to upset her, in which case, Taze would become the ice queen. "It's inspired by the fact that I'm uninspired, I guess," this song wasn't going to be a hit anywhere ever. It wasn't her best, and it may possibly have been her worst, but that was because she was trying too hard to write something good. To ease that need, she had to write something that was bad, but it'd definitely relieve her at least a little but. There was always a sense of tranquility when a song was finished being written. It was a moment of perfection. Taze needed that, but if Nell wanted to tag along, she wasn't going to stop her. "You know what? Sure," Taze said in an actually pleasant mood. She needed something to do anyway, so if Nell was offering to do something, Tayslynn wouldn't turn her down.

Tagged:: Nell
Outfit:: Click
Count:: 633
Notes::

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[NELL DOE DALE]

Nell pursed her lips in consideration at Taze’s word, then tilted her head with a thoughtful look. ”Sounds profound,” she said, her lips growing into a smile. She was a creative thinker—logic wasn’t her forte, that was for sure—but she still didn’t think she had any talent for music or writing. No, that wasn’t true. She didn’t want those talents, because those were Sinclair talents. Her aunt was a musician and there were quite a few composers if one traced the family tree back. And with her desire to distance herself, from the family, she decided that whatever she did, she wouldn’t get involved in the music industry. Okay, maybe she did really, really like music, but she just strictly listened to it. With Taze’s approval—she was terribly oblivious, it was a sin—Nell began to say, ”Awesome, you wanna go to Timmies or—“

Her sentence was cut short by music, her ringtone actually, Dickhead by Kate Nash to inform her when the bane of her existence was trying to contact her. She closed her eyes for a second, remembering how she’d promised to come over her father’s house after school. Well shit. She had to stop doing that, being soft and all. Because now when her father asked her over, it was usually to get her and Jane together and that wasn’t good for her psyche. The woman took great delight in tormenting her niece in any way possible, and Nell only had so much patience. Being in the same room with two of the people who managed to make her life hell were probably her limits. She couldn’t even remember the excuse he told her to get her to come to the lavish mansion that she was constantly hiding things in. And if her aunt was there, what would have happened? There would have been talk about the trial and how the weather was going to be like in winter and flights, and then Jane would go all To Catch a Predator and try to lure her back to her hotel. Which was always met with, “Stranger danger.”

Without taking the phone out of her back pocket, Nell said, ”Sorry about that.” She really was—she considered those kinds of interruption rude, even though she couldn’t control when someone was calling her. ”Anyway, screw Timmies, how about we find something more interesting to do.” Taze would be effectively saving her in a way, now. Even thinking about her family made a sort of panic rise in her chest, bubble to the surface. She didn’t want that. She was stalling her fate for a reason, and that was because she was a pussy. Just like her father, just like her aunt said. ”So do you feel like a walk while we try to find something to do?” she asked, shifting the messenger back on her shoulder, music still playing in one ear. Don’t think about your family, idiot. A master of repression, she was.

[tayslynn]

Tayslynn couldn't help but smile at Nell's calling her inspired uninspired gibberish profound. She showed the earth girl a toothy grin. "Thanks, but it's probably going to suck," the girl said honestly. It wasn't that Tasie minded the fact that a few of her songs would never be best sellers, but she was honest with herself. It was just the act of polishing everything until it became perfect though. Song writing was like putting a rock into a tumbler. It took a while, it took a lot of refining, but it was pretty afterward. Taze felt that if her songs were awful, then the next song would come out a little better, and so on and so on. She thought she remembered reading something that Benjamin Franklin wrote about a speckled ax being better than one unpolished or something like that in school once. Tayslynn guessed that was true. As long as she was a little better than the day before where music was concerned, she'd be fine. She was bound for musical perfection somewhere down the line, but it would take some work.

Taze was about to tell Nell that she was willing to go anywhere when Nell's phone went off and her sentence stopped. This was Tasie's cue to grab her own cell phone and start going through her texts. It was a compulsion that Taze had to constantly be in tune with everything going on in her social circle, and while she usually heard the phone, she always had to check and make sure nothing life altering was going down. No new calls or messages was a good thing in this case, though she usually loved the attention. A text meant that someone else was thinking about her, and she liked that feeling. Tayslynn liked feeling that someone cared about her, and really she only got that from Noly and her grandmother now, and both were less than welcome. Taze loved them both, but she didn't get along with her grandmother as Noly did, and Noly had been the one responsible for killing her mom. So she wasn't really high on Tasie's favorite people list, regardless of family relations or the twin factor.

Taze smiled politely when Nell apologized. "It's cool," she replied casually. It wasn't like Nell could have controlled that her phone had gone off, and on a more social day, Taze would have been texting throughout their entire conversation, no matter how long that ended up being. Taze was good at multitasking like that, and didn't even think it was rude to have her attention turned to her phone as long as she payed attention to whoever it was that she was talking to at the time. Something more interesting to do? That was always promising. Even if it was vague, it sure beat going to Timmies like every other kid in this town. Walking was fine too. She just needed something to keep her busy until people started trying to contact her again. Tasie needed to be a social butterfly. It kept her happier, and feeling more in control. Talking to Nell was a good start, but it was uncomfortable knowing how well she knew her. Nell knew Taze's whole life story, and even if she didn't bring it up, it had to be an elephant in the room. It was a reason why hanging out with her was so difficult. "Walking sounds fine," Tayslynn replied obligingly. Hopefully they wouldn't be walking long before they found something better to do, but going for a stroll didn't seem all too bad at the moment.

Tagged:: Nell
Outfit:: Click
Count:: 600
Notes:: I'm really sorry this took so long. Taze muse was hard to manufacture for a while. >.<"

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[NELL DOE DALE]

Nell could understand how knowing Taze’s past was uncomfrotable for the girl, if she really thought about it. But she did it. She never wanted to talk to the girl about her mother’s death or anything like that—she knew about pasts. Hers was constantly being pushed away for the sake of her psyche, while the media bought into the fabrications of her family. And soon (so soon) she would have to speak the truth in a courtroom full of strangers. That, too, was something she didn’t think about. So if she didn’t want to think about it, she didn’t want to bring it up around Taze. Besides, it wasn’t something that affected her view or relationship with the girl. If she knew that Nell was a murderer…? They were on friendly terms—as far as Nell saw—but she knew that would change things. Of course it would. Murderer was an ugly word for ugly people who did ugly things. Nell believed it suited her well.

Lips in her constant state of smiling, Nell was glad to hear that Taze would like to tag along with her. She definitely needed distractions right now, but her friends were more to her than that—and she considered Taze a friend. She put all her energy and focus into them, so that she could see them happy and smiling. ”I’m sure we’ll find something, there’s always stuff going around here.” Maple Hollow was big, maybe not as big as New York City with all its boroughs. But still, she always found something to have fun with, even when sometimes it was her own odd version of fun that may not seem that way to other people. Quite like when her friends got hammered and thought the most inane things to be interesting and worthy of exploration. In any case, she’d find something that she and Taze could find fun in together.

She started off, hands in her pockets as she hummed in her head. No thinking today, or ever. Thinking was never good for her, she learned. It took a bit of a walk to actually reach the city, but she kept up small talk, involving people driving by and commentary on the things they thought the could get away with. ”It’s like he thinks the windows make him invisible,” Nell said when catching a man picking his nose at a stop light. She giggled. ”Hopefully he’s not getting his boogers all over that Aston Martin. Looks like a ’58. Don’t think it would look good with snot.” From there, it took a little longer to reach the beach. She didn’t think there would be too much going on considering that fall was arriving with its cold weather and warm colors, but there were a group of people piling up firewood. She wondered if having a bonfire on the beach was legal around here, but she stopped and turned to Taze. ”Wanna check it out?” Nell didn’t have many reservations about crashing a bonfire party. It wouldn’t be too long before it got dark, and it was always cool watching the fire at night. And she liked meeting new people anyway. She wondered if they had booze, even though she wasn’t too focused on that. Nell stayed as sober as possible so not to jump off any more roofs.