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 Posted: Wed Apr 18, 2012 4:11 pm
ships passing in the night
♛
A PRIVATE ROLEPLAY IN WHICH
Saint-Cinq's Audrey Starfield and haliekins' Gemma Fossen
meet at Teufel Town High School after class and both are beset by awkwardness.
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Posted: Wed Apr 18, 2012 4:18 pm
Audrey was nearing the end of her rope.
It just seemed like it was getting to be a lot to ask, all of this. Her parents had tried to be as supportive as they could as their eldest daughter's voice slowly degraded and her friends were as cohesive a support group as she could ask for, but for the support and care that Audrey Starfield was getting, she was appreciating none of it. Each time she went out like this, even if it was just to meet up with Carly after her younger sister's field hockey practice was over to walk back home for dinner, Audrey was reminded of everything that she was losing.
She popped a bubble, loud, the smack of the gum echoing down the hallway that lead to the outdoor playing fields where her sister's team practiced. Why did it have to be her? What on earth had she done wrong, what karmic imbalance had she committed in her life? It didn't make sense. She chewed the gum again, viciously, her jaw starting to ache from the effort of chewing all day.
There had to be something that she could do other than live out the rest of her days like this, watching everyone else be good and talented, while she slowly melted into the background, quiet and forgotten.
She stopped before pushing the door to the fields open, her hand falling back. At least there wasn't anyone else in this hallway. She could be alone for a little while at least, before she had to face the public humiliation of seeing her vocally un-challenged sister again.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Thu Apr 19, 2012 1:50 pm
Gemma really wished that people would talk to her more often. This very instance, however, was less about abating loneliness and moreso about knowing that baseball practice was cancelled for the afternoon because of the field hockey team's practice. Like a fool, she had stood at the edge of the field and waited for the sight of a familiar face. None of which had shown up. It was only when one of her teachers had noticed her that the news was given. Walking into the hallway with a bit of a slump to her shoulders, Gemma sighed deeply.
Why had nobody bothered to tell her? She picked at the band aid on her elbow (a token from last week's practice) with a frown. She never thought she was that intimidating, but time and time again she was proven wrong, often in situations like these.
As she moved towards her locker from the teacher's room, a walk on the pier in mind, she heard a loud pop. Gemma turned her neck and spotted a purple-haired girl lingering near the doorway. She did not look familiar, but then again the school was big. There was no way she knew everyone. Taking a moment to futz with her combination and retrieve her bag, she shut the locker door and made her way towards the other girl and the exit she needed. For a moment, she hesitated, but she shook her head and decided to at least make an effort. She normally at least did that much.
"Hey, uh.. need some help? If you're like.. lost or something." Gemma shifted uncomfortably. She was terrible at this.
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Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2012 9:31 am
Audrey's eyes snapped up, out of her reverie when she was approached by a blue-haired girl, who seemed like she'd just gotten finished with retrieving things from her locker. Someone was talking to her.
Most people at Broussard's had heard what had happened and were careful to avoid speaking with her if possible if they weren't one of her close friends. Sometimes Audrey could overhear teachers saying that it was such a pit that such a pretty voice had been lost, replaced with the gravelly undertones and raw, garbed pitch that Audrey now spoke with. She'd heard people say that they were trying to remember how she sounded with her old voice, trying to let that sound live on rather than face the reality of what she sounded like now. Audrey could see it as a sign of respect for how good she used to be, but she never realized how much she'd just wanted to talk normally with someone until the girl approached her and asked if she needed help.
"Yes!" She warbled, her tone excited, but the words coming out mangled and discordant, out of sync with her preppy clothes and clean appearance. "Um, actually, I'm looking for my little sister's field hockey team. Are you one of her teammates?"
She tried to keep it light, but inside Audrey knew that she sounded like something out of a horror movie, and that try as she might, no amount of inflection or smiles was going to make it any better.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2012 9:53 am
Gemma blinked at the gravelly voice and sudden enthusiasm from the girl who had looked so sullen before. A small smile tugged at her lips and she rubbed her arm. People were certainly full of surprises, weren't they? At the very least, Gemma liked that this girl wasn't regarding her distantly, or with wariness - as most of her classmates did. Instead, she peered through the window inlaid in the door, out towards the field. It looked as though the practice was still ongoing in the distant practice fields.
"I'm uh.. not really, no." It was on the tip of her tongue to go through the whole story about waiting for the practice but missing the memo about its cancellation, but she pulled back at the last moment, her sentence hiccuping awkwardly as she did so. That was really unimportant, right? This girl didn't need to hear her whole life story. Again, she rubbed her arm, fingers grazing the band aid at her elbow.
"I think they're still practicing though, at the outer field." She nodded towards the door, out the window. "If you want, I can take you out there. Don't think they should be much longer, now." It seemed like the polite thing to do, right? Especially since the girl had regarded her a little more openly than most. Inside, Gemma felt a little glad to be able to do this. She did like doing nice things for people, but she never had much opportunity.
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Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2012 10:54 am
Audrey noted that the girl didn't seem anxious to end the conversation with her and took that as a sign that she could feel free to go on. She hadn't talked with someone outside her group of friends and family, someone new, for a long time, and as such she was perhaps over-eager to make a connection, use this interaction to prove to herself that she could indeed be normal.
"Not really?" She repeated, her hoarse voice dipping surprisingly into a lower octave as she expressed her disbelief. She noticed the girl playing with her band-aid and cocked her head inquisitively. "Did you get hurt or something and now they're sitting you on the sidelines? Because that really sucks."
It didn't seem like that big of an injury, but Audrey didn't know that much about sports, save for the superficial things, and she was more focused on the possibly that she may have found someone like her, a girl kept from doing what she wanted to because of circumstances beyond her control.
"Let's go!" She responded as perkily as she could, even though it sounded like her voice was fighting a battle to get out of her mouth. Audrey winced when she heard it. She was trying so hard to convince this girl, convince herself that she was normal, still okay, that it hurt. "I don't get to see Carly practice often, so it should be fun. My name's Audrey, by the way."
The diphthong sound of her name's first syllable got caught in her throat and she coughed into her shoulder. She held out her hand for a moment to be shaken, then realized that the other girl probably wouldn't want to touch someone who seemed sick, and so she hastily withdrew it.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 12:07 am
Gemma's eyebrows arched up slowly at the girl's reply, but she softly shook her head. Her hand lowered to instead brush her own forearm, deciding not to pick at her band aid - perhaps that might have been rude of her. Her mother always said picking at things was not very lady-like.
"Oh, uh, no," she replied haltingly. "They, er.." Well, here went nothing. "I'm on the baseball team, see, and I guess the field hockey team had the field reserved today but nobody really.. er, told me." She gave a shrug with one shoulder, already feeling the pinpricks of anxiety creeping up the back of her neck. It's not the end of the world, Gemma, stop complaining, her mind was telling her, and as soon as her companion agreed to go, she swatted off the negative thoughts by reaching over and opening the door into the brilliant sunshine. The girl raised an arm to shield her eyes and blinked a few times to adjust to the change in lighting. She moved outside and held the door open so the other could exit, and turned her gaze back to her once again when she introduced herself. Audrey.. Carly.. she might have heard of a Carly, depending on the last name, but she was better at keeping track of faces. Not that it did much good since she was not particularly close to anyone, anyway. Even so, this girl looked familiar, and her name rung a bell as well. Gemma waited patiently for the small coughing fit to pass, and casually wondered if she was suffering from a very bad cold.
"I'm Gemma," she replied with a slow smile, and offered her hand when Audrey put hers forward, only to blink in surprise as the girl suddenly pulled her hand back. Gemma's fingers curled awkwardly and her arm returned to her side, before both hands were shoved into her pockets. "Well, uh, this way." She nodded her head towards the field, her long legs putting her in the lead easily, as she often did without noticing. The familiarity of this girl was really bothering her, but what was bothering her more was whether or not it was her place to ask. What if she was wrong and Audrey just laughed at her? Her lips tugged down in a puzzled frown. What to do?
"This, er.." she began awkwardly. "This may sound weird.. okay, it is kind of weird.. but uhm.. you look.. familiar." A shaky start, but a start nonetheless. "Were you in the paper by chance?" It had been a while, but Gemma was fairly certain that this was her. She saw something about a competition on the back of a newspaper clipping her brother kept about his school science fair (his best friend had won first place). "It was a while ago.. oh and if that wasn't you, I'm, er.. sorry for the mistake." The nervous pinpricks danced up and down her neck, and all Gemma could do was turn her gaze towards the distant field. How awkward.
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Posted: Wed Jun 20, 2012 2:38 pm
When Gemma related that no one had informed her about baseball being cancelled, Audrey smiled a little. She could relate. "It happens. Sometimes my friends don't tell me about practices anymore either..." She croaked, then looked off to the side. Most of her friends at Broussard's didn't tell her about rehearsals because they thought they were sparing her pain. Yeah, right.
Following along, Audrey cocked her head in thought. "A while ago?" Her voice came out oddly low for a girl, contemplative. She furrowed her brow as she puzzled it out, noticing for the first time that the other girl seemed a little nervous. Audrey wondered why she hadn't noticed it before-- had she really been that caught up in acting normal that she hadn't picked up on things that normal people would notice right away? -- and then the memory hit her.
"I might have been, a while back. Yeah." She twisted her ponytail around one of her fingers. God, she wished she could just pop in a piece of gum and not have to talk, especially if it was what she thought it was. "Broussard's, that's where I go, had a contest and I tied for first in my year. It was a charity benefit, so I think they had someone from the newspaper there to interview us." Audrey laughed, a dull, throaty sound. "I don't know many other girls with hair like mine, so, yeah, haha, that was probably me."
She hoped that the girl didn't ask what the contest had been in.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Jun 24, 2012 6:20 pm
"Oh, Broussard's?" Gemma nodded slowly as Audrey described the event somewhat. That made sense; the girl seemed the private school type with her style of dress. If her companion was uncomfortable at all, Gemma was not sensing it at its fullest, as her own awkwardness was taking precedence at the moment. Even then, she was glad that at least she had not mistaken Audrey for someone else. "That's cool. What's it like there?"
But the girl did not seem that bad, and at least they had something in common with not really being told about things when they were going on (what a thing to have in common!). Gemma idly wondered if Audrey referred to these friends and meant it in earnest, or if it was more like what she did, which was to term the guys on her sports team as "friends," even though they never really did friend-like things. It was a silly notion to her, though, and she was well aware that she tended to overthink things. She hummed once and rotated her shoulders, turning her gaze skywards for a moment.
"Did you guys make a lot of money.. ?" The thought drifted out of her lips as they continued walking. Gemma heard a sharp whistle from far ahead down the field and turned quickly to look out of instinct, but it was just the coach calling out a few players who seemed to be in the throes of an argument. The interruption seemed to make her feel awkward again. "Uhm, my mom does charity fundraisers at her job from time to time so I was just wondering. She usually does them for the older folks in the area." She shrugged. Her mom was very active into charity work, always believing in giving back - it was one of the things Gemma admired most about her, to be honest.
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Posted: Mon Jun 25, 2012 3:07 pm
"It's great!" Audrey stepped in, some of her unease washing away. "I like being able to do art stuff a lot, and they really let you concentrate in your field. The competition can be super-intense, though."
If it hadn't been for the throaty sound that her words made when they came out, she would have sounded like another other teenaged girl, excited about her prospects.
Audrey heard the whistle too, but was preoccupied with her thoughts to try and look for Carly. "Yeah, we did. I competed against the favorite for first place and she and I really dueled it out. My piece wasn't as hard as hers, but she couldn't get her voice to go high enough for some of the notes at the very end, and I think the judges scored her less for that. But a ton of people came in and donated. It would be cool if we could do it more, though." She laughed. "Caroling for seniors could be a lot of fun."
Her face fell, realizing that there were no seniors (short of those with extreme hearing problems) that would want to hear her sing.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Mon Sep 24, 2012 8:22 am
Gemma's lips tugged into her usual clumsy smile as Audrey passionately talked about the competition. Her enthusiasm for what she loved came through very clearly, and Gemma somewhat envied that passion and the ability to perform in front of judges. She had played on sports teams but that did not feel the same, she thought, as standing on a stage alone and singing to an audience. Her head swiveled again as they kept walking, missing Audrey's downcast expression as she stopped talking.
"It.. it sounds like a lot of pressure," Gemma admitted, "but fun, maybe." If it was anything like how it felt to win a close scrimmage, then she could certainly appreciate that. "My mom's fundraisers are, um, more like demonstrations than competitions I guess." Her mother, soft-hearted woman that she was, always volunteered to put on fundraisers. Perhaps it was a bit of showmanship on her part as well, as Elke was a talented dancer and teacher, and she loved to show off her talents. "She teaches dance at Pacific Bay Dance Studio, uh, ballroom stuff, mostly. And she grabs a couple of her best dancers from her classes and does dance performances for charity." The performances were always something to behold, with dancers ranging in age from children in ballet classes to elderly couples who could do the smoothest waltzes. Gemma, however, admitted that she felt the slightest twinge of jealousy whenever her little sister Liesel took the stage with the other little girls in ballet and danced so prettily. It was something that, for all her athletic prowess, that she was never able to do (much to her mother's abject disappointment).
Rather than focus on the negative and put her companion off of any more conversation, Gemma returned her gaze to Audrey. "So what's your sister look like?" It occurred to her that they were close to the field in question and should probably keep their eyes open. Many of the practices were already ending and the players walked towards them in the opposite direction, heading for home.
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