The Pool; Friday Morning [ 06/05 ].

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine figured she was pretty good at hiding the fact that she'd been pretty disquieted over the last few days. She had multiple theories that easily explained it well enough that she could shove it aside and not directly approach the topic. She was good at that, avoiding something until she was sure it could be useful to her. But the fact that she couldn't quite piece together how what she was feeling could be useful to her lead her to wanting to step back from it all for a moment.

She decided to go down to the pool, figuring it would be quiet in the morning, and she could just sit a while, thinking, comforted by the water and what water meant to her now. She considered ducking into town to pick up a swimsuit that was a little...more interesting than hers, basic and functional, but then settled on the fact that basic and functional was all that was needed. Anything something more interesting would accomplish would be to draw attention to certain aspects of herself...

...and she wasn't quite knowledgeable enough about those aspects to go flashing them around for other people to see, really. That's why she was here now, in the morning after her class, sitting at the edge of the pool and watching her feet trail through the water, enjoying the isolation of the big empty room and thinking about isolation in a lake basin on a raft.

It was a good way to kill the morning hours.


[[ open pool is open! ]]

Comments

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah had been planning to hit the pool for a while anyway, but the last couple days made her think that staying cool and wearing herself out -- um, working off excess energy-- were a good idea before going anywhere. She had her hair in a knot at the base of her neck as she dropped her flip-flops and towel at one end of the pool area and dove in. Fast laps, freestyle, then butterfly, side-stroke.

After three laps, she finally noticed someone else was there first. Whoops. "Hey, Valentine," she said, stopping and resting her arms on the edge of the concrete, catching her breath.

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine grinned a little, mostly to herself, as Dinah finally came around to noticing her. She wouldn't have minded too terribly if Dinah'd taken even longer to recognize the presence of someone else at the pool. She had enjoyed seeming invisible, and enjoying watching Dinah's grace, form, and ability in cutting through the water in her laps.

She lifted a hand in a wave. "Hey, Dinah."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah grinned, treading water as she blew out a breath. "Do you swim much? Or is there not a lot of chances for it in the future?" She wiped water away from her eyes, wishing she'd remembered her goggles. Valentine seemed pretty content here, and Dinah envied her the calm she personally hadn't felt for a few days. "I forgot this was here until yesterday. So should've come down here sooner."

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine smiled down over at Dinah a little, waterlogged with her blond hair clinging wetly to her. She seemed calm on the exterior, probably more obviously observant than she thought was being, but a lot was going on in the head underneath the placidity. She kicked her feet slowly through the water. "I swim a little," she said. "Not much. This morning I think I just felt like enjoying the water. And it's quiet. When there isn't many people like now, you feel like you're isolated in this bubble removed from the rest of what's going on outside..."

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Jack dove into the pool to try to cool off, or at least so he wasn't so... visible.

"Hi," he said, after surfacing, shaking the water out of his hair.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Noooooooes! Peace and quiet gone for the moment, Dinah smiled tensely at Jack, took a breath, then said, "Hi. Must swim laps now. Lots of them. Talk to you later?" Then, before he could say anything else, she sang out, "Bye!" and dove under the water away from him. Not the breast-stroke, noooo. Freestyle. Fast. Fast. Faster.

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Wow. Girl could move.

Stop thinking that, Jack. Just...enjoy the water. And the view. Wait. No. Just the water. Stop enjoying the view. "Good talking to you?" he said, holding a hand out of the water to wave.

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Jack was hoping that the pool would help calm him down. It was like a giant cold shower. With clorine. Great idea.

And there was no way that anyone would be here--"Oh, great. Well, I'm here now..."

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine arched an eyebrow. Oh, great. Well, I'm here now...? Did she even know this person, and already her presence was an annoyance to him?

"Hello to you, too," she muttered back.

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

"Sorry. I've been trying to find a place to be alone, you know? And...there's people."

He looked at her. "Nothing personal. I'm sure you're a nice person."

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

"Maybe you should try your bedroom," Valentine offered. "Or a broom closet. I'd be impressed with the persistence of people if you weren't able to find some alone space there."

[glacial_queen]

Water. Water was good, water was cool, swimming would perhaps get rid of the excess energy that hadn't escaped during her practice bout with Leto. And the cool was clean and artificial, not like the beach. The pull of the land was less here. Maybe that would help.

...And there were people there. Of course. Hell's fire. Still, she had come all this way for a swim, and swim she would. She'd just make the best of things.

With a wave at whoever happened to be there, Karla dove into the water. Perhaps after a few laps, she'd be in a better fram of mind to be sociable.

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Jack facepalmed. He would headwater, but that would just lead to drowning.

[glacial_queen]

Karla came up for air, saw Jack, and froze.

"..."

"..."

"Swim trunks?"

[inthereflexes.livejournal.com]

Jack moved his hand away from his face. "I'm wearing them!"

...

"Nice suit."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah did another five or six laps, before seh noticed Karla was there. She waited for the other girl to finish her own lap at the edge of the pool before saying, "Hey, Karla. How are you doing?" Which would hopefully be fine and totally unbothered by this week. But somehow Dinah thought that if Tahiri was reacting, Karla might be too.

[glacial_queen]

"Hi Dinah," Karla greeted, shaking the water out of her eyes. Then she got an eyeful of Dinah. "MOTHER NIGHT WHAT ARE YOU WEARING?" Even if Karla hadn't been bothered before, Dinah's lack of clothing would have done it.

It should be noted that Karla was wearing a Kaeleeran bathing costume. It consisted of cotton leggings that went to mid-cald, and a top that strongly resembled a sports bra.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah looked down, startled into checking that her tankini hadn't ridden up or fallen down, then blinked at Karla's outfit. "Ohhhh. Right. Okay, I guess you guys really are more modest, aside from those widow's weeds, hunh." She pulled herself up out of the water to sit on the edge of the pool, and shrugged, holding out her arms. "Behold. Tankini. Two-piece suit." She wrinkled her nose and grinned at Karla. "You are so lucky it's not warm enough for this to be the beach yet, with all the shirtless guys and girls in even less than this."

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine gave a faint wave back to Karla, not sure if the girl caught it before she dove into the water, but she figured it didn't matter. The piece of the little bubble of quiet had been disturbed by other people seeming to seek the same thing, but there was quite a lot to be said about just sitting there and enjoying the way people's bodies could move, so fluid and flee, as they cut through the water.

[glacial_queen]

Karla came up for air near Valentine. "Hi," she said, waving. "I'm Karla. You're in a class or two of mine, aren't you? Spy Games?" Sorry, the mun can't remember if they've talked.

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

"And Dr. Brennan's class," Valentine nodded with a smile. "I'm Valentine. Enjoying the water?"

[endsthegame]

Ender had paced down from his room as tentatively as he possibly could; the chances of running into people always seemed to increase during weeks like this, and he wasn't sure if the pool would actually be empty when he arrived there in his swim trunks.

He oversaw the room and its occupants, and strayed towards the back.

He was only looking at Valentine.

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine knew herself well enough that she couldn't deny that a good portion of the reason she came here was Ender, if not just memories of him, so when she actually saw him come down to the pool, she smiled. The pool room no longer had the quiet solitude of that lake basin, but it really wouldn't matter. All the other people would basically disappear from her attention if Ender were to follow her suggestion, in the form of a hand waved a few times to beckon him over, and join her.

[endsthegame]

After a moment or two - he spent it looking around the pool in hopes that no one would actually come at him, because with Val he was safe, but the rest wouldn't do his rolling hormones any good. Eventually, Ender detached from the wall and walked towards her until he could sit, legs down in the water, feet waving aimlessly in the water.

It got busy here at the worst of times, and in that, it was nothing like the Greensboro lake.

[a-demosthenes.livejournal.com]

Valentine just smiled at first, glad he came to join her and just sitting in the silence for a while. The kicking of their feet eventually seemed to take on the same pace, so Valentine gave hers a little skip so that they'd slosh through the water with an uneven cadence again, occasional swirling one foot in a circle to keep it from settling again.

"Those trunks make you look skinny," she said, which wasn't exactly true, but it sounded like a more sisterly thing to tease him about than mentioning that they made him look like an anomaly. Fourteen year old pubescent structure, and hanging on it the muscles of a soldier.