Getting a Feel

This place is so beautiful. Owen had left the initiate dorms after sorting everything out with the office and his parents. He now stood in the courtyard, gazing at the fountain, light sparkling off the water as it tumbled down into the pool below. It was stunning and took his breath away. He stepped around the edge of the pool, tearing his eyes away from the spouting water and studying the flowers that grew around the paths, adding to the scene with their bright colors.

It wasn't long before his attention was drawn back to the light shining off of the water. The spots danced and jumped as ripples swept across the top of the water, reflecting the rays of sunlight, the gold and white contrasting with the slight blueish hue of the water. His reason for being at the school came to Owen as he watched, and he extended his hand, ready to begin learning how to use his powers properly, and excited to see what others could do. As he watched, one of the spots froze despite the water continuing to ripple. It floated upwards, suspended in midair as Owen twisted his fingers, twirling the ball of light. Balling his hand into a fist caused it to shrink, and when he threw his hand wide open, the ball exploded and disappeared into the air. A wide smile broke his face at what he had accomplished.

Madison shouldn't have been looking at it. When she walked by the Courtyard, coming back from a morning's gym routine, she had begun to gaze at the fountain. It became a habit, a nice thing to look at when she passed by every day. She liked the way the water cascaded, how the reflected sun rippled across the pool.

In the middle of the pool, however, there was something new, hovering over the water's edge like its own sun, an orb of light suspended in air. She put up a hand to see more clearly, but continued to look at it, walking forward. Or, so she thought she was walking forward. It exploded, as did the ground from under her, as she tripped over the barrier of the fountain and fell hands-first into the water. Miraculously, she saved her lower half, her arms catching the brunt of the fall in time, but her hands sat deep in the pool, the front of her shirt soaked as she jumped back. Fuck, that was cold! Why did she look that long?

What was that?

The smile on Owen's face quickly vanished when he heard a splashing sound. His attention focused once more on the pool, where larger ripples were reaching the edges. He followed their path backwards until his eyes rested on the source: a girl had fallen halfway in.

Jumping to his feet, Owen raced around the edge of the pool to where the girl was, her front drenched from the water.
"Are you alright? Do you need help?" he cried, hovering over her a moment. He hesitated before reaching forward, making to grab her elbow and help her to stand.

"Um..." she looked up at the boy who had rushed over, eyes a little spotty from the glaring orb. She couldn't exactly make out his face all too well, black dapplings firecrackering their way across her eyes. She rubbed one hastily. "Yes--well, no, um..." A blush curtained itself across her face. She knew people saw her fall in like an idiot. "Did you...see that...thing--that...orb thing, you know..."
She hoped he did. If he didn't, she probably would have sounded crazy. The girl got to her feet, wringing out her vest. She'd need to get a change of shirt. The wind had already made its impression on her, and she was damp and cold.

"Orb thing?" Owen said distractedly. He had watched the blush creep onto her face and his curiosity piqued as he watched the water drip from her vest. "Oh, like a light orb? That was me. Wait, is that what made you fall in the water?" he added as the thought suddenly occurred to him. He was flushed with embarrassment about what he had caused, and he continued to watch her anxiously, no trace of a smile on his face.

"Is there anything I can do for you?" Owen asked. He wondered for a moment if his light could help her, but as he had never tried it, he didn't want to cause more damage.

Madison looked down at her vest. She wanted to cross her arms against the cold, but realized that wouldn't help the problem at all. She wanted to take off the vest, but...the blouse under the vest was soaked too, and she didn't exactly want people seeing what was underneath. The person that was helping her was a boy, after all. He was also the one that made the ball. What an idiot.
Madison realized that she also had a class soon. She needed a vest, a dry vest that wouldn't give her hypothermia. This was her last clean one. She was such an idiot, she should have done wash the night before!
Nicola had to have an extra one. She'd be able to help her.

Madison looked around at the faces staring at her, and with the blush growing stronger, looked up to the boy. "C-can I have your, um, if you don't mind, your jacket? Please...?" She stuttered against the cold. That would fix one of her problems. However, if she had has jacket, that would mean he'd have to walk with her to Nicola's. Gah, she was an idiot! She didn't even know this boy! Her blush erupted into something from the Ring of Fire. Idiot, idiot, idiot!

Watching her shiver, Owen was glad of something to do in order to help her. Quickly, he took off his jacket, throwing it around her shoulders and snugging it around her. He peered down into her face, giving her a small, sheepish smile, as he took a step back.
While he finally looked her over, he felt a slight tightening in his chest, as though something had a hold of his lungs. He suddenly noticed just how much he liked the look of this girl in his jacket. She was definitely pretty, and he felt an urge to get to know her better.
"Say, what's your name?" Owen asked, shoving his hands in his pockets. "My name is Owen. And I'm awfully sorry for what happened, I didn't mean it. I was just messing around, I didn't think about what I might be doing." He hoped he looked ashamed enough that she accepted his apology.

Madison looked at her feet. Jeez, did he have to be so outright? She could have put it on herself. The girl's heart beat like a fleet of war drums, and she felt like it was going to kill her. "Madison." Her voice was lower than her gaze, only piping up when she went: "It's fine!"
Speak normal, you idiot, she told herself. This was not how she talked around D'angelo! This was just a chain reaction, a series of embarrassing events stacked on top of each other. It's not that bad!
"Are you new?!" She forced herself to speak, and it came out a little too loudly. Madison internally smacked her forehead, and hushed herself. "I mean, are you an initiate? Have you taken the test yet?" Maybe she shouldn't have rushed those questions, because they came out like garble. What good was she if she couldn't get out simple questions to a boy? Her mind flashed to her mother asking about a boyfriend. Pallid hands reached out from under their tent, gripping the sides of the jacket tightly.

Madison. It was a pretty name, but not really one of the prettiest ones he had heard. His smile widened as he listened to her stammer. When she asked if he was an initiate, Owen grew uncomfortable, wondering if the other students saw initiates as inferior and wild.
"Yeah, I'm an initiate," he said, his tone more defiant than he meant it to sound. He cleared his throat to cover it up, hoping the strange inflection in his voice was seen as more of a physical mistake, rather than a conscious decision on his part. "Is there somewhere you need to go? To get dried off? I mean, you look pretty cold."

"Yeah, sorry." Her legs hurt as she continued to fast walk, her chest heavy under the sodden vest. "My friend has a vest...or, at least I think she does...her name is Nicola, she's kind of mean. I guess I shouldn't be...telling you all this, though..." Why did she have to add that last part? It was almost a decent effort without that last part! Who cares what her name and personality is!? Madison felt a little guilty that she slandered Nicola like that. Maybe she wasn't mean, per se. She'd only ever done nice things for her.

Owen's brow furrowed in confusion. He wondered why Madison would think of this girl as her friend if she thought of her as mean, but he didn't question her out loud, feeling it would make the conversation turn sour.
"Well, we'd better get there before you get frostbite," he joked, hoping he could get her to smile and relax. He was hoping he would see Madison more often while he was at the school. Maybe they would even be in the same house.

The Summer Dorms were highlighted by red onings over the windows, the occasional sun design etched on a sign or a door or a bulletin board, highlighted on flyers about "Summer Pride" and "Dorm Events." Madison took out her ID from her bag, slipping it through the reader. "I'll, uh, sign you in, what...," she looked down at the paper by the door, already etched with a few names from the day. "What's your last name...?"

The decor of the Summer dorms fascinated Owen, and he was momentarily distracted by it. Madison's voice dragged him from his distraction, and he looked to see her waiting for his response.
"Uh, it's Darcy," he said, a little abashed at having not been paying attention. "Am I allowed to go in there? I mean, I haven't taken my test yet, but I'm also just an initiate." He was a little fearful of getting caught and getting in trouble with some sort of authority.

"You're fine." Madison didn't seem to sure of this, though, and looked around a little to make sure there was no guards, no one to get her in trouble. "They have tours sometimes, um...for the Rosebury children and stuff." She rushed up the stairs, though, a slender staircase they seemed to have half a dozen twists before finally letting up to her floor. Nicola was in 302...she thought. It would be awful to knock on the wrong door, and Madison almost felt this an excuse to not do it at all, but she was sick of being wet. She walked up to the room, and with the quickest glance you could imagine in Owen's direction, she tapped the door lightly with her first. Maybe Nicola would answer. Maybe one of her roommates would. Maybe someone entirely different would answer, and she had the wrong room. She hoped for the first one, looking down at her shoes and scuffing them across the floor.

The day was traveling at snail's pace, and Nicola was going to break something if she had to sit still any longer. She felt exhausted, but at the same time lazy. Restless, but unmotivated to do anything.

She had barely moved from her position on the couch, her fingers constantly clicking on buttons on the remote, changing channels, her eyes dull and completely bored. Here she was, stuck inside because the weather was too high today. That was of course, if she didn't want her skin to be plastered with burns all over and look like a giant red tomato. There was also one moment she was pretty sure that Hieta would just sneak through the wall and stop her if she even thought about leaving the room, and if she didn't want her roommates looking at her like weirdos for talking to the air, she would rather be a coach potato and stare at a screen that was filtering white noise and tunes that filled her head with useless crap that she wouldn't even bother remembering later on.

Nicola wasn't sure how many times she had changed her posture on the couch. She wasn't sure how many times she had changed her activities. One moment, she had been reading a book on psychology and the next, it was on the floor, opened with its spine peaking up like a mountain. Her gigaminx was set on the table in front of her along with some bags of chips and soda, left unsolved after a week or so. It would be a lie to say she didn't regret throwing the manual away on how exactly she should solve it. Her hand stretched above her, her eyes locked on the ceiling as she glanced upward as her mind began to wander elsewhere, trying to entertain herself. Leaning back onto the arm of the sofa, she let out a sigh, bringing her hat over her face as the someone rapped on the door.

A grumble escaped her throat, and swinging her feet over, she adjusted back onto a sitting position. Should she answer it? It wasn't like her dorm received many visitors in the end. She was stuck with some girl she didn't know about, a girl with fox ears and tails, and then fire-breathing guy. Was Destiny coming in to check on her boyfriend or something? Those two really needed to learn to get a room. "Coming!" were the words that slipped out of her throat. Stretching a bit to relieve the aching inside of her body, she reluctantly pulled the handle on the door down without checking through the peep hole to see who it was.

Her hair was only slightly a mess from not being uncombed, strands sticking out here and there. She was wearing a long-sleeved gray shirt with black sleeves, a kitten design etched in the middle with one paw waving up in the air trying to catch a butterfly, the shirt reaching down well close to her thighs. The accompanying skirt was plain black and rather short in comparison and dark stockings were pulled on rather lazily, her cap resting on her head.

Nicola's eyes only seemed to betray annoyance when she saw two people outside, but they immediately brightened once she realized who the intruder was - green eyes and dark hair like that. Yeah, it was Madison. And... she was wet. Blinking, she opened the door all the way. "Do you need a change of clothes or something?" Straight to the point. That was always her thing. Who cared about how it happened or how it was caused? It was the end result that mattered. But that didn't stop her from making a joke. "Were you sweating too much from trying to swing a sword again? Or did some cicadas try and chase you down the courtyard?"

"Oh, new guy. Are you with her, right now?"