T.A.L.K. and Get Scared

[Rowan Booker]

First there was the boxing disaster, then the movie madness with Matty and now, well know Rowan just wanted to get back to his roots. His love and one of the only things about Hammel that he loved more than his friends. Dancing. Hip/hop, contemporary, ballet, jazz, lyrical; he couldn't think of one type of dance (that he'd learned) that he didn't love. Each had its own time and place to be used and certain songs just pushed the type of dance, making it a thing of beauty rather than carefully planned out steps and jumps. That was the thing about dancing, it wasn't just a sport or a workout, it was an art form. It was being graceful or edgy, it was expression and emotion. It was everything put into one song.

And as Rowan walked into the empty auditorium, he felt relaxed, like he was finally in a place that made sense to him, one spot at Hammel that made him feel connected. The lights were dimmed since there was no one using it and the stage as usual was empty, save a few random objects used by the drama kids that were left behind. He found himself smiling as he walked down the aisle, his fingers skimming across the tops of the chairs. One day, he hoped that he would be dancing in front of a larger audience, or perhaps he'd own his own company and teach dance. It was up in the air for him, his future, but he knew that somehow he would incorporate his love into what he was doing. Be it performing himself or teaching someone else the art of performing.

Today, it was all about his own performance though. One he'd choreographed back in Boston at his old dance studio. His former teacher had let her class out early one day he was there and offered to help him with it when he told her what he wanted to convey. Playing the song for her, he knew she'd be able to help him get the emotion across and with the steps carefully planned, he worked at it for the rest of his time there, whenever he had a spare moment. Rowan was proud of his dance, proud of his ability to choreograph and his ability to see something more when he listened to a song.

Setting up his MP3 player to the sound system, Rowan smiled faintly before taking his spot on the stage, waiting for his cue to start. The song burst through the speakers and he threw himself in, losing all sense of his surroundings and putting all the pent up frustration and irritation he felt into his dancing. It was edgy, clean and something he really wanted to share with the rest of the dance team.

The song drifted to an end and Rowan found himself on the ground, lying on his back to catch his breath, the song repeating, but this time just for background music. 

[Raylaigh Hawthorne]

Ray descended sharply extending his feet and holding his wings out straining to slow his stride. His foot touched down and he immediately folded his wings and took a step forward and hearing a whistle blow from his trainer he kicked himself up into the air straining to get high fast. He had to admit these nonstop ‘touch-and-goes’ were really helping him to not get his wings in his way when he landed but this was perhaps one out of twenty that hadn’t ended in him stumbling and hitting the ground with his body before he was able to get up and take off again. He really wished his trainer would give him a little bit of a break, really he had a cast on his wrist he didn’t want to be doing high impact things. His trainer reasoned though, that it wouldn’t be high impact if he did it right and well, Raylaigh really couldn’t argue with that. It didn’t mean it wasn’t hard. He heard another whistle and started his descent.

He started his descent and was able to make his landing when he heard the whistle blow again. His trainer had been throwing these at him randomly and Ray was no better at it when he started and when he tried to pull up he strained desperately for altitude scrambling to get himself back up. His legs kicked for the ground to push off of but when his feet didn’t reach it was like swimming and missing the wall on a flip turn. But gravity was still working and his descent was too strong and he ended up hitting the ground and falling back on his rump. He huffed and his wings fluttered frustrated. He looked up at his trainer and huffed unhappily. His trainer reached out a hand and helped the sore flyer to his feet and mercifully declared today over.

More than a little relieved he slumped. He was sore everywhere and his arm ached. He held his casted wrist for a moment and was extremely glad that his trainer had some way of cushioning his falls so he didn’t break further but that only did so much to make the ground softer when he actually hit. He didn’t shatter but it still hurt. He shuffled from the fields to the school feeling as tired as he was after track or swim practice. All Ray wanted to do was take a shower and pass out in bed. Raylaigh was walking past the auditorium when he heard a song start up. Curious Ray pulled the door open. It was someone else on the dance team, Ray frowned, his mind was drawing a blank. It started with an ‘R’ Ronald? Roe? Rowing? Ray giggled a bit that was definitely not it.

He slipped toward the front watching for a moment before taking a seat a few rose from the front to watch. Ray had always admired this guy, he was good and Ray hoped he didn’t mind him watching. Watching him was a treat, especially since he was attractive and really knew how to move. The song ended and started again but it seemed R-man was done. Ray stood feeling bad about watching without saying anything. “Hey! That was awesome!” He kicked a last bit of energy from his wings to get himself up on the stage.

[Rowan Booker]

Rowan's breathing was heavy, his whole body exhausted and screaming at him. He hadn't done any cardio in, well, a long time. He needed to go running soon or else he was going to get fat and even more out of shape than what he was. Boston did that to him though, being around his mother and aunt. It was stressful. Add to that the recent break up and his best friend being hooked on some fuddy duddy that hated him, he turned into a PMSing woman that ate her feelings. He'd been lazy, lounging around his room ever since he got back outside of the boxing thing. Not to mention he hadn't been having sex as regularly as he had been before. It was pathetic. He was reverting back to his old self and that was the last thing he wanted to do.

Rowan's eyes started slipping shut, but he was quickly roused when there was talking and exclaiming and whatnot. He kept one eye open and glanced up when the guy flew his way up to the stage. Hm, not ugly, liked his dancing, c'mon Booker time to get your fat ass up and work that Boston swagger. Ugh but he was so incredibly exhausted. Rowan settled for sitting up and pulling his knees to his chest, resting his arms on the tops. "I'm pretty awesome, what can I say?" He snorted and looked up at the..er..kid? He looked younger definitely. Maybe around...Alex's age. Rowan cleared his throat and along with it, his mind. That wasn't a direction he wanted his thoughts to go.

"You a dancer?" Wait a second, he knew this kid...the dance team. That had to be it, dance kids always came into the auditorium when they were looking for an escape. That's how he'd met little Ellie and her roommate, the babe that graduated. "Actually, yeah. I remember you from the dance team right? I wanna say Ray?" Because well, Rowan was just good with names of people he found attractive. That and people that he didn't like and picked on like an elementary bully. It was just kind of his thing...er it had been with Lucy, but then she started dating one of those people and things were a little different now. Ugh he needed to cut the thinking shit.

[Raylaigh Hawthorne]

The flyer was not going to judge the older boy for not getting to his feet. That had been a spectacle to watch and even Ray with his oodles of energy from his constant eating and constant growing would have been hard pressed to keep up. He was attractive, Ray had always thought so, but he hadn’t always been so free to think so. Raylaigh giggled as R-man gave a cocky response. It wasn’t as if Ray could disagree so he laughed and shrugged in return. What could be said, he was talented and amazing and attractive. Oh dear, maybe Jack had had a point, but Jack was no longer around and the last thing Raylaigh wanted was a relationship, which was making his current friendship with Nao very difficult. Ray shrugged it off, who needed a relationship, he just wanted to have fun.

Already nodding his head, he opened his mouth to answer but it seemed this guy already figured it out. “Yeah, I’m still pretty new at it though,” he replied with a bright smile. He couldn’t help it but his heart fluttered and he felt immediately guilty as this guy remembered his name and Ray didn’t remember his, maybe he could just wing it? “Right, and you’re… Ro…man?” His guess inflected into a question and he made a face that spelled out how sorry he was, he couldn’t help it, he wasn’t good with names. Anything with memorization for that matter he was by nature bad at. And he hadn’t really spoken to R-man before now, so technically it wasn’t his fault, but he was extremely impressed that R-man remembered his name.

Ray didn’t sit but instead made a little spinning motion. “You’re gonna have to show me how to do that.” He smiled down at the older boy and then ducked his head. “Not right now of course, but that was awesome.” Raylaigh himself was still sweaty and tired from his training session and well it probably wasn’t a good idea for him to push it, not when he already had one cast on, he didn’t need another. The wings on his feet fluttered lightly and he looked back down at R-man. “Did you come up with that yourself?” If so, Raylaigh was about to be extremely impressed. Ray could do the dances people told him to do, but coming up with it on his own was always something he fumbled a little bit with. He could practice with no one watching and just do ridiculous things, but not with any sort of plan.