String of Pearls [open]

[margaret]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellSpacing,0,true][atrb=style, width:350px;,bTable] It's fucking cold. Why'd I come out here again? In hindsight, going outside at the barest hint of snow melt to go run wasn't Margaret's best decision. In fact, the senior regretted the trek to the soccer field with every soggy shoe pounding the turf. Seriously, her pumas were soaked with muddy field water and bits of grass protruded from her socks. She was crazy, it seemed. But Teu's dedication was what had gotten her the captain spot this year. By golly, she was going to do her best, even if it meant running knee deep in mud and slush on the abandoned field early that saturday morning. Actually it was more of her alarm freaking out and not shutting up. Of course, Teu put her alarm across the room, so after stumbling around at six in the morning on a saturday to find her alarm clock blaring Dancing Queen, she had already jarred herself awake to where she couldn't fall back asleep. So after a cup of tea and about five minutes lamenting over her phone's low battery, Teu decided it was time to go do something productive, and eyeing the surprising snow melt off of her window sill, she figured that running for soccer in the offseason would be a good idea. It wasn't. After about 15 minutes of stretching and thinking over her decision to completely disregard an essay on Hess's Law for her advanced chemistry class, Teu started to jog, and she sank lower with each step. Good thing I remembered to bring a ball; I could practice that side kick from the left. After two or three laps around the field and a bit of jumping jacks, Teu considered herself sufficiently warmed up, and jogged to retrieve the ball from her bag off of the field. It took one kick of that wet ball to send her flying on the ground, face first in slushy mud. After laying on the ground squishing into the very wet mud that she now wore all over her workout attire, Teu let out a very loud and aggravated groan. Of course, it was also followed by several colorful expletives that one would think a sailor would use, not a petite soccer girl covered head to toe on her left side with mud. Slowly she pushed the palms of her hands down into the earth to help push the rest of her up, suddenly thankful for all of the pushups and strength training they did during the season. "Fuck you, stupid mud. It's gonna take weeks to get rid of all of this! Why did I even bother to do something with my day if this is how Karma's gonna get back at me. Damn." Teu angrily kicked the muddied ball; it flew to the south, bouncing a bit before it slowed to a stop near some other pair of sneakers. Just great. "You come to laugh too?"

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Words: 000, Tags: open broski!
Notes: first post come make fun of Margaret's mud face oh boy.

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[TARIQ IBRAHIM ARAIN]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=width,170,true][atrb=cellspacing,0,true][atrb=cellpadding,0,true][atrb=vAlign, top][atrb=style, background-color: #eaeaea; margin-top: -20px; border-left: #cdcdcd solid 1px;] I don’t mind if there’s not much to say: Sometimes silence guides our minds to move to a place so far away.

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellspacing,0,true][atrb=cellpadding,0px,true][atrb=vAlign, top][atrb=style, background: url(http://i.imgur.com/DfhFz.png);] IT'S TOO COLD FOR YOU HERE, AND NOW —so let me hold both your hands in the holes of my sweater   Tariq had never felt like the first of January held any more significant meaning than the start of a new calendar. It was just another cold day to make it through on autopilot - or, at best, the first mark of the no-man's-land transitional period between the winter and the spring. No, it was the first appearance of new leaves that, in his eyes, heralded the new year. The crisp scent in the air, the lengthening days, the shortening nights: it all gave a sense of potentiality that did wonders for the motivation. So with the end of February in sight, Tariq had ambitiously resolved to replace bad habits with better: he would quit smoking and start every weekday morning with a run. Except on this bleak morning, when the ground was still ghosted with wisps of fog and frozen dew alike, facing the elements seemed like enough of a punishment in itself. He knew his willpower would cave if he didn't take the sting out of the early start by stopping for a cigarette. He could almost hear his cardiologist mother's voice castigating him in Urdu. Still a little lightheaded from lack of sleep, Tariq jogged from his dorm to the track, only to slow down as he saw another indistinct figure already there. It was too early to bother with contacts, and his thick-rimmed glasses still lay folded on his bedside table. Well, whoever it was, a commiserating conversation would give him an excuse to catch his breath. Freshman year track suddenly seemed like a very long time ago. He was approaching just in time to witness the unwise kick that overbalanced her - and he couldn't help it: maybe it was the mud, maybe it was surprise, but Tariq instinctively let out a sharp bark of a laugh. He recovered his manners as he heard the flood of curses streaming out from that familiar voice. The ball skidded into his nikes and he bent to pick it up before closing the last few yards between them. He stood in front of Teu, rolling the ball over his fingers idly as he looked at her with an expression of concerted sympathy, lips pressed together against the amusement that threatened to ripple into a grin. "No, just to ask about that karma. What kind of shit d'you do for it to get you back so bad?"

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=width,489,true][atrb=cellspacing,0,true][atrb=cellpadding,0,true][atrb=style, margin-top: -10px;] — made by ayu of btn

[margaret]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellSpacing,0,true][atrb=style, width:350px;,bTable] I'll never play soccer again. It was that simple. Avoid the action or thing that caused unpleasant reactions, ignore the existence, and soon enough things would just go away. After all, that's how she dealt with depression, by ignoring the fact that she even was depressed. That year, she had forced herself into more activities, more social things, anything to get other, uncomfortable subjects... or persons, off of her mind. Maybe if she ignored the mud and her failure, she'd be able to salvage some sense of dignity before crawling into the shower; defeated. Of course, ignoring things was not the proper way of dealing with unwanted feelings. Teu liked to control the emotions she didn't understand, so putting a lid on them; squelching them had to be the way she dealt with them. Anger, she could do. Everyone and their dog knew she had a temper and could fly off the handle. But rejection, failure, confusion... those plagued her with indecision, and made it so much harder for her to just shove everything under a rug and act like it didn't happen. Like the boy walked up near the ball for example. She wanted to just ignore him, but... who could ignore Tariq? She hadn't met one person, including herself, that could ignore him completely. Even when she acted like a total bitch to him, he still managed to catch her off-guard. That was one of the qualities she liked about him.... back then. Of course that was all ancient history now. No need in bringing up the past. If she couldn't ignore him, she might as well acknowledge that he spoke in the first place. Sure, she was fuming at her new mud coat, but she let her expletives die down. After all, if at least two students were out this early in the morning, there had to be some athletic-nut coach out for a 47 mile jog or something. "I probably kicked a little kid or slammed the door in someone's face too many fucking times. You know... the usual. " Teu half-snarked and half-growled. Okay, so maybe she wasn't so calm from her blunder. It was a work in progress. Wiping some mud from the crevices near her eyes, Teu sighed. It would take a century at least to get all of the mud off. Part of her wished that no one would have seen her like that... so defeated for a bit, but the other part was glad that someone was up to share in her misfortune. Even for a girl like Margaret, solace can be found even snarking to someone else. Teu watched the ball roll around in his hands, not wanting to meet his gaze. For some reason, it felt like new territory once more. They hadn't spoken in so long, like real civil people, it was foreign, and something like that was uncomfortable for Teu. "I bet this is only the tip of the iceberg. Karma and I have a long, hate-hate relationship. "

[/color] Teu commented again... for lack of anything better to say.

"What pulled your ass out of bed today? "[/color]
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Words: ?!?, Tags: Tariq
Notes: I don't even know how late this is and I'm sorry that it is crap as well.

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[TARIQ IBRAHIM ARAIN]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=width,170,true][atrb=cellspacing,0,true][atrb=cellpadding,0,true][atrb=vAlign, top][atrb=style, background-color: #eaeaea; margin-top: -20px; border-left: #cdcdcd solid 1px;] I don’t mind if there’s not much to say: Sometimes silence guides our minds to move to a place so far away.

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=cellspacing,0,true][atrb=cellpadding,0px,true][atrb=vAlign, top][atrb=style, background: url(http://i.imgur.com/DfhFz.png);] IT'S TOO COLD FOR YOU HERE, AND NOW —so let me hold both your hands in the holes of my sweater   It hadn't been by accident that Tariq had left both glasses and contact lenses in his dorm. Giving in to the diluted version of the world his myopia lent him had been the only way he could tempt himself out of bed this morning; at such a horrific hour, the empty grounds were somehow more bearable if he couldn't see them too clearly. He was spared the frost and dew still littering the grass that belied the early hour. The details of Teu's expression were more than a little blurred; he could discern her face and general aspect, but without moving closer, the individual features remained in soft focus. The lack of eye contact was certainly beyond his notice. Without seeing the facial expressions that accompanied her tone of voice, her annoyance felt distant and impersonal, completely separate from him. But then again, Tariq had always been good at dissociating himself from the emotions of those around him. "A very late New Year's resolution to get fit," he said. "I was gonna go running. But if fate's got the same in store for me, well... maybe I better pull my ass right back to bed before it gets the chance." He mimicked Teu's phrasing. The sight of the mud streaking her face and clothes was enough to make him forget the idea; the weather was cold enough already without adding insult to injury. He still held her ball, passing it from one hand to the other. "But who knows," he said, "I haven't picked on any unsuspecting freshmen lately, so I should be all right. Maybe it's a sign you need to tone down the violence. After all, the earth itself is rising up against you."

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=width,489,true][atrb=cellspacing,0,true][atrb=cellpadding,0,true][atrb=style, margin-top: -10px;] — made by ayu of btn "47 mile jog". i laughed~