Taking it all in {OPEN}

[Joel Rodgers]

He laughed slightly as she told him about the fact that he was apparently the nicest person that she'd met. Well that was a pretty good compliment, it was one of the better things that he'd been told. Some people didn't appreciate his trying to help out, actually didn't appreciate was putting it way nicely. "I guess that I'll accept that as a compliment then," he said with a smile at her. And couldn't help but laugh again a bit when she almost ran into a person. It was pretty funny he had to admit. She seemed to think so too as she was laughing about it. He was glad that she could, some people weren't able to laugh at themselves. "Only slightly," he agreed with a grin. "Besides I doubt that the person is going to do anything about it. People have a tendency of running into one another a lot here. And I mean a lot."

He listened to what she had to say with interest. He actually wanted to know what she was saying, he wouldn't have mentioned a comment if he didn't want a response to it. He hated people that did do things like that, ask questions or make comments without really caring about what the other person had to say. He'd rather that they just come out and say it straight out that they didn't care about what he or whoever it was that was talking had to say. Otherwise it was just sort of rude to pretend to care, plus it reflected very badly on that person. Like they thought that they were more important then everyone else so they just didn't have to pay attention to other people. If that were true then they wouldn't 'waste their time' talking to those same exact people.

"Well I think that your brother Matthew probably did a good thing," he said with a smile over at her. "This school is probably one of the best in the world. It's difficult, but it'll be worth it all in the end. Even if you don't stay for the rest of your high school career, it'll still look good if it shows on your record that you went to this school. People here usually end up going on to do some pretty amazing things." He hoped that someday he would be counted among those people that had done some amazing things with art. Actually, he hoped that he would just be able to do something that he thought was pretty amazing with music. It didn't matter if everyone else thought it, but if at the end of the day he thought that he was doing something that was great that would be enough.

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[Ashlynne Moore]

She laughed. "Thank you," she said as he finally agreed to take the compliment she was attempting to give him. She was beginning to think that she was really going to like it around here. It didn't matter about the quanitity of friends she had, but the quality, and so far she was a little low in the quantity of friends, but the quality was through the roof. She shook her head with a grin across her face. "No, that was probably my fault, despite the fact that people are running into each other a lot lately," she began. "I have a habit of walking into people...and doors...and walls," she laughed again. "I drop things too." She shook her head again, still smiling. "I'm just a walking disaster," she laughed again. After about a minute she looked over at him. "I cannot believe I just said that," she said, embarassed, but it didn't really bother her that much. There was just a slight shade of pink spread on her cheeks.

She noticed how attentive he was to what she was saying and it meant a lot to her that he didn't just ignore her like some people would. She smiled and nodded. "Thank you, I think he did too. He's always trying to do what's best for me," she smiled again. "I knew it would be hard, but at the same time it could be easy. I mean, if you're here studying something that's your passion, music, vocal, dance, theater, whatever, then maybe it won't feel as hard, if that makes sense," she said with smile tugging at the corners of her lips. That was another bad habit she had, rambling and rambling until she came to a point that she thought made sense and everyone else would be sitting there wondering what the heck she just said. "I honestly can't wait to graduate, only to be one of those people that go onto something great from this school." Singing was always her passion and she did hope to take it somewhere someday. "Until I came here, I never really thought about taking my music somewhere and making a career out of it, but..." her voice trailed off and she gave a small shrug. "Maybe I will." With her last word she gave a nod.

As they walked, she looked around at the signs and posters hanging on the walls. She noticed a particularly bright one and read it quickly. "So, this homecoming dance...everyone takes it pretty seriously, huh," she asked, realizing just how many signs there were advertising the dance. She'd never seen a school activity advertised so much. "Even the proms at my school weren't taken this seriously and there weren't this many posters hanging up about it."

[Joel Rodgers]

Joel smiled a little as he noticed the light shade of pink that crossed her features when she became embarrassed about sharing the fact that she was apparently a walking disaster. He really didn't think that it was that bad, some people were just clumsy and there was no way around it. He didn't think anything less of those people, he just went along with it. "Walking disasters aren't that bad," he told her with a small grin. "After all people need a little something that will keep them on their toes and alert." It was true the people who usually ended up bumping into other people always kept him more alert about how close he was going to other people, that way he didn't end up running into people at all, and usually that way no one ran into him either. It was a win - win situation for both him and the other person that was involved. He liked to keep things good for himself and for other people, it made things easier on him later and that way it avoided a confrontation with the other person.

"I get that," he said with a nod as she told him about the things they were studying not feeling so hard. He knew for him personally it was because he was going to be doing something that he loved therefore it wouldn't be as hard to devote time to it and it wouldn't feel like he was doing so much because music was what he could spend all of his time doing without a problem, and knowing that fact, it just made things easier to face. Made them make more sense in his mind. Any time when the academic work seemed like it was going to be too much for him to handle he reminded himself that if he didn't do the academics than he couldn't do the music later and that was something that usually whipped him back into shape. He loved the academy for that reason, that it was something that allowed him to follow his passion and call it work. "Maybe someday I'll hear you on the radio," he said a bit teasingly. "And then you'll have to remember the guy who showed you around this huge academy that helped to get you there in the first place."

He grinned a little when she mentioned how many signs there were up for the Homecoming dance, it was something that had amazed him the last year, not for the same reasoning as her though. But he'd always thought that Homecoming was supposed to be a minor dance compared to things like prom and such. "Well all the dances around here pretty much get the same amount of publicity, they all want us there. I personally think it's so not as many kids go out to places like The Hurricane and such at night." It was true that most people in the staff knew that their students snuck out and went partying and drinking quite frequently, but it was rare that they were actually allowed to do anything, which would stand to reason that that was one of the reasons why the dances got so much publicity. "They figure that the more they advertise the more chance people will show up and they won't have to worry about keeping an eye on everyone so much... or we just have a lot of school pride and they want us to be aware of it."

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