Fire&Ice [Scotland]

[ISABELLA MARIANA DIAS]

She was over the winter weather and the limitations that it brought. Being snowed in had been a hassle for Isabella confined to the Michigan town for the last half of her vacation. Having already expressed her irritation to her parents for cutting her trip home to Brazil short compliments of some business transaction that had taken her father away Issy was well at the point of being cranky. It was never a good thing for her or those around Isabella because when she was unhappy she tended to selfishly spread that misery around. Was it the best thing to do? No, but it was human nature at work and Isabella had come to terms with the imperfection of the human condition.

The freeze was thawing out though, something that she had taken note of when she stepped outside that day. Snow still covered the ground with its icy patches making paths risky to walk on. It didn’t help that a particularly rowdy group of boys were making the worst out of the situation and hazing smaller boys with what was available to them. As Isabella made her way through the school and came to the courtyard her gaze landed on the group shoving a scrawny freshman kid onto an ice patch and laughing as he shrieked and flailed about trying not to fall and failing at that attempt landing hard on his side.

Isabella narrowed her gaze at the chortling boys and went over to the freshman extending her hand down to him to help him up and effectively silencing the others from laughing at the misfortune. ”Are you hurt?” The younger boy looked up at her with a scowl on his face and smacked her hand away. Embarrassment apparently had a way of bringing out the jerk in the kid making him scramble to his feet knocking his shoulder into Issy and storming off in a huff. Looking after him, mouth agape and noting that he was limping slightly- clearly hurt- Isabella was annoyed but calmed herself trying to keep in mind that it wasn’t just the boy’s hip that had been bruised but his ego as well and she was the easiest target to take that frustration out on. Shaking her head as the boys picked up their laughter Isabella decided to forget about it and not make their misplaced sense of entertainment her problem anymore. That seemed to suit them just fine because as she was walking away another shriek sounded as another underclassmen was shoved out onto the ice.

[scotland]

Scotland was with a few people, starting snowball fights across the sidewalks. So, perhaps a few underclassmen had gotten in the way. So what? It was all in good fun. He threw a few at a skinny looking kid before noticing Isabella walk by. He called her name once, although his voice was probably drowned out by everyone else laughing. He extracted himself from the group and walk over to her, watching the whole scene unfold. Scotland was rather protective of his friends, especially this one. And the ungrateful freshman that smacked her hand away brought out a scowl from him. Before the child had a chance to scramble any further, Scotland grabbed him by the back of the collar.

"What's the matter with you?" he asked, roughly shoving the kid so he slipped on the ice. No respect for upperclassmen. In this crowd, he would learn fast. Scotland turned, with a grin back on his face, but Isabella was still walking away from him. All the commotion probably distracted her. He suddenly felt weirdly grounded. Since it'd been snowing he couldn't exactly skate very much. That was the main reason he hated winter.

"Izzy," he called her again, hurrying to catch up with her again. "What's up, girl? I wouldn't peg you for the type to partake in snowball fights," he commented, falling into step with her.

[ISABELLA MARIANA DIAS]

Doing her best to separate herself from the chaos that she had walked away from also, unfortunately, had her ignoring her name being called as well. She was beginning to think that her leisurely stroll to keep from being cooped up in her dorm all day wasn’t such a good idea after all. So far it had only ruffled her feathers and keeping herself from fuming over the insolence of some young boy was more effort than she thought was really worth it. She was a Dias though and with that name had always come certain responsibilities that couldn’t be shucked so easily. Handling yourself in stressful situations was part of the gig and throwing a fit over something like that wasn’t really warranted.

She didn’t break stride when she heard her name called for a second time assuming that if it were really important enough to that person they would simply pick up the pace and catch up with her. Her assumption turned out to be right as in a matter of seconds Scotland was by her side. Glancing over at him she offered a warm smile. He hadn’t wronged her so to brush him off as an inconvenience would have been rude. Besides that he had always proven to be a breath of fresh air for Isabella. That off brand humor of his and rough around the edge’s persona were a strange comfort to her. Perhaps it was because he wasn’t someone that she felt the need to be any particular way around. He seemed comfortable with the good and the bad in her and that was a relief that she didn’t take lightly.

”You’d be right. I’ve never been too fond of winter- much more a summer baby.” The sun and heat were kinder to her than bitter winters. This year had been especially cruel it seemed. Looking him over, her smile quirking up into an amused grin she couldn’t help but imagine him rallying up a group for bragging rights in a snowball fight. She leaned forward then back glancing around, playfully. ”Were you just about to mount an ambush?” Isabella rested her hand gently on his forearm giving it a soft squeeze. ”I feel I should warn you that I would sacrifice you to avoid being hit, use you as my own personal human shield.” Joking with him was already starting to make her feel better about her day.

[scotland]

He had a sudden urge to scoop her up and insist that she was the shield in this situation. Used to rough housing with his other friend, Stevie, and his sisters, that was a first instinct. But Isabella seemed more delicate, more feminine than his friend, so he had to think of something else. Maybe he thought too hard, or not hard enough, but what came out of his mouth next made him cringe inwardly, even though it was said with the same self-confident tone he liked to keep.

"I'd take a snowball for you. No big deal," he said. Almost immediately he regretted it. Why was it that he seemed to say the dumbest shit around this girl? He'd known her since probably the beginning of the year on a chance encounter. After all, she was a popular cheerleader, he was just... kind of there. But for some reason she seemed to enjoy his company. He'd take that.

"What're you doing out here then? If it's not for snowball fights?"

[ISABELLA MARIANA DIAS]

Removing her hand Isabella was pleased and humbled by his answer. ”Very much appreciated.” Scotland might not have been anything spectacular in the social pool’s eyes but Isabella’s fondness for him wasn’t about where he fit in amongst a crowd. It was more about where he stood out as an individual. He wasn’t gentlemanly in a traditional sense and yet was more than willing to, apparently, get in the line of fire to save her from a snowball. That action was chivalrous in its own right. What was more was that she doubted Scotland even realized this about himself. He didn’t flaunt it or lead with it to impress and he wasn’t obnoxiously arrogant either.

”I don’t like being cooped up for too long. I thought the fresh air would do me some good.” Taking a soft, deep breath the chill in the air nipped at her lungs making her long for a bit of humidity, preferably accompanied by sun to soak up. ”I was starting to get a tad snappy with my roommate.” Ellen was a perfectly sweet girl though and getting cranky with her wasn’t all that fair. Isabella knew that she could be difficult to handle sometimes, bratty even when things weren’t going her way but she really did try to keep that under control and not be too much of a crazy bitch toward people. Having everything that you ever wanted wasn’t always such a good thing but her parents hadn’t really accounted for the ramifications of that.

She took the liberty of lacing her arm with his to guide them toward the gazebo. The courtyard was supposed to be zen and the gazebo was the central point of that so where better to go? ”Did you manage to get away for at least part of your holiday?” Unfortunately she hadn’t really kept track of who stayed and who went before the storm had snowed everyone in. Of all the things that Isabella could have come back to being stuck in Hadley hadn’t been at the top of the list for favorites. You never realized how much you could do until the option of doing it was stripped away.

[scotland]

"Holidays were alright," he answered vaguely. He had a nice time on Christmas with his family, but after that, he'd gone back to school rather quickly. It was less work being at school during the holidays than at his house with his mother, a very large Jamaican woman, insisting that he babysit his younger sisters all day.

Scotland jumped onto the little curb of the sidewalk they were heading down, balancing on it, now quite a few more inches taller than Isabella. He searched for something to say and jumped off as soon as the curb ended. He had no trouble being almost-flirty with his friends that were girls, perhaps because he was so comfortable around them. But with Isabella he tended to watch his words more closely, be politer... in other words sort of unlike himself.

"So, Miss Isabella, what are we going to do to cure your cabin fever?" he asked with a glance sideways.

ooc;
I had such a hard time trying to come up with something. x.x;;
Sorry for the wait.

[/blockquote]

[ISABELLA MARIANA DIAS]

He didn’t seem all too keen on going into detail about his holiday, which Isabella respected his wishes. Sometimes she did pry despite appearances that she should have left well enough alone but in this case she didn’t see any reason to be too intrusive. The question had been more a formality than anything else. If something exciting had happened on his trip she imagined that Scotland would be chomping at the bits to tell her rather than having to inquire about it. So, she simply figured that nothing all that impressive had happened to him aside from the standard family going ons, whatever that might have been for him. She didn’t talk about her own family all that often. Some things were known amongst the school based on heresy and things like that such as her mother’s family owning a cosmetic empire and her father having an import/ export business, both lucrative and based in her birth country of Brazil. But as for the more private things like her father being a drug cartel and the relationship that she had with her parents was kept to Isabella only.

The slightly quirky behavior from Scotland was well received his curb-hop making her laugh lightly. ”I haven’t yet decided that.” Based on his actions she could imagine that Scotland might be going a little stir crazy himself. ”Looks like you’ve got a bit of it yourself. These conditions are hardly conducive to your skateboarding I would imagine,” Reaching the gazebo she went up the few steps with Scotland smiling over at him. ”How about we help one another out? How would you usually substitute your skateboarding jones?” Maybe whatever Scotland did with him normally would help her out as well and she certainly didn’t mind spending a bit of time with him.

ooc: No worries.

[scotland]

They way she talked was sort of amusing. Hardly conducive to your skateboarding... It clearly defined the line between them. She spoke well even in casual conversations while he seemed to used every slang word in the book. Most of his sentences started or ended with "dude, bro, man, etc."

"I don't really know," he confessed. "Most of the time things just randomly happen. Like once, my friend and I were bored, so we filled up a ton of plastic cups with water and put them all around his sister's bed. There were like a hundred of them." He gave a small laugh at the memory. "I don't know why we thought that was a good idea. Or, once my sisters and I built an igloo. The snow plow on our street makes a huge pile by this one street light, so one year I dug out the middle of it for them. I could stand up in it. That was pretty awesome." Somehow he didn't think that building igloos or doing stupid pranks was her style. Maybe he should entertain her or something. But with what? In the absence of a skateboard, all he could think of showing off with was his amateur version of parkour. From doing tricks all the time, he'd developed a good bit of strength and the willingness to fuck around anywhere.

"We should do some Mirror's Edge kinda shit," he suggested, hoping she got his video game reference. He looked around. There was the side of the building, but not much to climb on. Perhaps the top of the dumpster. That was high enough. "Check this out." Scotland walked off the pathway and went up to the wall. He moved back a bit, and then ran at full speed toward it. Momentum carried him up a good bit before he pushed off and jumped, grabbing the edge of the dumpster with both hands. He lifted himself up and stood on the lid, then sat down and hung his legs off the edge.

"Your turn," he said with a laugh.

[/justify]

[ISABELLA MARIANA DIAS]

Being eloquent was just a habit of hers. Isabella had spent five years of her life learning how to be a proper young lady and with that meant you had to present yourself in a particular light. Impressions came in every aspect of your being. Isabella was to be poised and graceful, if she spoke as most American teenagers might then she would be lumped into that category of just another average youngster. However, with the poetry in her speech people took notice to that, often the older members of society appreciated her while her peers found her methods strange and might not fully grasp her meanings. It was just as well though because when she said something that she shouldn’t it left the students of Mayview puzzled and Isabella could get away with much more than people suspected of her. If you got her fired up though, striking her feistiness she was just like any other ticked off teenage girl.

His recount of antics had her giggling softly. They weren’t anything that she herself would have done going back to the image of a lady that she was to project, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t enjoy the fondness that someone else found it them. Scotland’s pranks weren’t like that of the ones she had just witnessed with the boy being shoved onto the ice- no one got hurt from plastic cups dull of water surrounding them whereas the boy on the ice had taken a rather painful fall. He could have broken his hip or something if he’d landed wrong. Isabella didn’t have an aversion to spontaneity or dangerous situations. In fact she found herself in them from time to time, but it was of her own doing and acceptable whereas bullying someone into that wasn’t.

She didn’t understand his reference but her common sense kicked in when he applied his abilities to leaping onto the dumpster suggesting that it had something to do with maybe ninjas or something like that. Isabella was a tumbler during football season, doing all the flips and grounded acrobatics so was capable of doing some of the things that Scotland’s parkour involved but her upper body strength wasn’t nearly as honed as his. The dumpster wasn’t too high of a jump that she couldn’t haul herself up on there but she did have to consider that sitting in that particular place wasn’t the wisest of things. Isabella exhaled forcefully watching her breath spiral in a plume of white. ”Alright, I’ll give it a go.” She tried to calculate her movements before even taking off but it was useless and she resorted to instinct instead. Getting a run at it like Scotland had she mimicked his actions to the best of her ability, though doubted that it looked nearly as effortless as his did finally pulling herself up onto the dumpster with a small bit of difficulty. Moving over to him she had a triumphant smile on her lips as she took a seat next to him. ”You made that look easy- it wasn’t.” She let out a soft laugh nudging him lightly. ”How did you get into…what is it called, parkour?”

[scotland]

He had to admit, he was impressed. Isabella didn't look like the type of girl who would even try such a thing. And to actually do it was astounding. He gave a small golf clap when she pulled herself up and grinned at the thought of him making it look easy.

"I try. Let's see, I'm not really into it, it just kind of suffices when there's snow on the ground and skating would be too dangerous, even for me," Scotland laughed. How did he even start doing it? Out for a run with one of his friends, they decided to make it more interesting and started jumping over stuff like in that video game. It turned into an afternoon of trying to see who could climb the best, who could jump over the most stuff. Stupid competitions like that. It was just fun.

"I'm more interested in your story though," he said, glancing at her. "You're not afraid to get your hands dirty, but I didn't expect that. I'm impressed."

[/justify]

[ISABELLA MARIANA DIAS]

She bowed her head slightly taking his applause graciously. Isabella had been most worried about her foot slipping on the slick surface of the dumpster as she kicked off of it and lifting herself up. The majority of her strength was in her legs being a dancer, an avid jogger, and the tricks she performed for cheerleading. Making herself comfortable, or as much as she could where they were at, Isabella listened intently to Scotland. People enjoyed being paid attention to and it was a courtesy that she tried to always extend to others, especially, as was the case with her current company, if they were someone that she genuinely enjoyed. Having something to fall back on was a good thing to have Isabella accepted that, nodding.

Having the interest put on her she was a bit of a surprise for people. She had a showmanship about her that tended to baffle those around her. A mystique in her persona that people could never pinpoint exactly what Isabella was and wasn’t capable of. It had been a coveted skill amongst the other girls that she had trained with in her formative years. While they were viewed as predictable and thus boring, Isabella had dimensions to her that kept the girl from becoming stale. She wasn’t perfect of course. Isabella had flaws just like anyone else did and she couldn’t do everything that she set her mind to, let alone do it better than whoever she found herself up against. What Isabella could do was try though and she did it with a conviction that gave people the impression she was fearless. This, of course, was nothing more than an illusion.

She had been afraid to try jumping up onto the dumpster like he had. The moment that her feet left the ground she had been fearful that her foot would slip and she would end up on her back, she had feared that she wouldn’t be able to lift herself up and when she was standing her knees had felt like jello, if not for years of practice in poise she would have been like a newborn deer trying to walk on a frozen lake. ”My father always tells me that show of fear is a show of weakness. If you hold your chin up and act as though you can do something then you’re more likely to succeed.” That explained why she didn’t seem afraid to him but as for getting her hands dirty that was something entirely different. ”I’ve always had to live a life of structure, balance, respectability and honor- but even the most disciplined have rebellion within them.” It was what made the human race so interesting, their fighting spirits. ”I’m no different, Scotland.”