"Yeah, he and I swap clothes all the time." Babe said, as though that was a normal thing. To her, it was though. The music upstairs stopped suddenly, and there was a cry of 'Eureka', quickly followed by a thwap. Babe snorted, shaking her head. "Looks like Adrian had another idea."
Apaixonar: The act of falling in love.//OxO//Romance//CLOSED
Henry nodded. Apparently, siblings did that kind of thing. Interesting. "I take it Adrian's the family genius?" He said, a wry smile on his face. "Busy house." She was clearly well adjusted to dealing with a lot at once, the kind of thing only siblings could really teach you.
"Oh, god no." Babe shook her head, gesturing vaguely at the room around them to symbolize the whole house. "That's the thing, they're all geniuses. Adrian and Zach have this business they run, and they're constantly coming up with new stuff. Kai is a tech wiz and inventor, Hugo is an amazing artist, Rico is such a good actor, you'd think he actually became whoever he was playing. And Evan is our resident architect. The things he can build with legos…"
Henry watched her closely. "And when you get out on the ice, you're amazing. You have no idea how awesome it is, to have that kind of talent at your age." She didn't seem to understand it, and he wanted her to realize that.
"I play a sport that I'm not even supposed to play." Babe said, before taking another drink from the bottle of lemonade. "My accident was just the thing mom was waiting for to get me off the ice."
"Your accident?" He'd felt like he'd heard about it before, but he had no details he could think to put with it. Hopefully, it had nothing to do with her ankle. And, when he thought about it, maybe if she felt like she wasn't supposed to play a sport, it didn't count as an accomplishment even when she got as good at it as she was.
Babe, with some minor difficulty, managed to roll up her pant leg, revealing a long and jagged scar. "That accident I told you about. Although, if we're being honest, you don't accidentally chuck an entire skate at someone."
His eyebrows went up. "Whoah. Someone threw a skate at you?" Henry's tone was incredulous, his face shocked. It looked awful, and the idea that someone had intentionally done that to her was horrible.
"Oh yeah. It was part of some plan to end my career and stuff." Babe said with a shrug, rolling the pant leg back down. The back of corn sat next to her on the counter, intentionally forgotten. "The guy didn't plan on my overwhelming spite and ability to do whatever the hell I put my mind to."
Henry shook his head, wonderingly. He watched her closely, remembering the scar well. "That's awful. At least it didn't end your career, and you're still fighting." He kept shaking his head slowly, shocked that someone would ever do something like that to a person like Babe, who had her kind of talent and potential.
Babe shrugged nonchalantly, playing with her locket. "Stuff happens. You just gotta keep powering through, and things'll even out." It was said so casually, about something that could, very well, have ended her career right then and there.
Henry shook his head. She was a tough thing, that was obvious. He finished his lemonade, setting the glass down. "If you're alright here, I should head back. Lots of homework." He added the last bit ruefully, foreseeing a late night.
Babe made a face, and was quiet for a moment. "You could stick around here for a bit. I could help you out with your homework, and get some of mine done."
Henry glanced at her. "Do you understand the complexities of the little numbers they give us?" He was, of course, referring to math. Something about it always escaped him, no matter how hard he tried. "Sure, I can stay. Do you want me to grab anything else?" She probably shouldn't do too much walking.
"I've still gotta go upstairs and shower." Babe said, making a different face at the ceiling. "This'll be fun. You go grab your stuff, help yourself to anything in the fridge that isn't clearly labelled with someone's name. My name is fine." With that, she slid off the counter.
((Psst. I really like rping with you, any chance you wanna join another one of mine?))
"Sounds good. I'll be back, my stuff's just out in the car." He stood, letting Babe make it to a shower herself. It was her house, and she would probably make it safely. He slipped outside and over to his car, grabbing his books. He also grabbed an extra long sleeved shirt, which he put over his first shirt. Henry made his way back to the house.
(Thanks! I would, what's it called?)
Babe managed to make it up to her room with minimal difficulty, and grabbed a change of clothes before limping across the hall to the bathroom. All she needed was a quick shower.
The same boy who had ran past them, Hugo, was currently out on the lawn. He was painting on an easel, occasionally muttering to himself. The sight of Henry made him pause, and he stepped towards the older boy. "Who're you?"
Henry stopped when he saw the boy. "My name's Henry. I'm a friend of your sister's, from school." He paused outside the door, watching the boy. "You're Hugo, right?" Adjusting the strap of his backpack, he leaned against the door slightly.
"Babe has a friend?" Hugo looked a bit shocked at that, but quickly brushed it off. "Yeah, I'm Hugo." He stepped closer, holding out his hand. "Nice to meet you, Henry."
At the boy's shock, Henry couldn't help laughing. "She has lots of friends. Her personality's just too hard to resist. Nice to meet you too." He shook the hand, appreciating Hugo's politeness. At that age, he didn't remember ever shaking hands. "I'm actually here to get help studying from your sister."
"Are we talking about the same sister? The jock?" Hugo studied Henry for a moment. "Wait, are you two-" He was suddenly hit with a pillow, tossed from upstairs.
"If you're gonna talk shit about me, do it quietly and not in front of my bedroom window?" Babe called, sticking her tongue out at Hugo. Her hair was visibly damp, and she had a towel wrapped around her body, like she had just gotten out.
Henry laughed again, harder this time. "I'm not totally sure about where you were going with that, but no." He waved up to Babe, grabbing the pillow from Hugo. He waved a short goodbye to the boy and went inside the house.
Hugo opened his mouth to ask Babe something, and she pointed, cutting him off. "We are not." Then she shut her bedroom window, and threw on a change of clothes. Leggings and a hoodie from her last team, and threw her hair into a loose braid to let it dry. She hobbled her way to the top of the stairs to call down to Henry. "Hey, want to just study and stuff up here?" She wasn't quite sure she could get back up, once she had gone down.
"Sounds good!" Henry called up, finding his way to the stairs and up them. "How's your ankle feel? I can grab more frozen things." He offered, setting down his bag and starting to pull out the thick text books.
"It'll be fine. C'mon, I've got a desk in my room." Babe reached down and snatched his bag before he could say anything, limping back to her room. Her door, like all the others on the hall, had been personalized. Hers was covered in a sort of abstract starry night sky scene, with a few scattered glow in the dark stars.
He laughed, deciding not to argue with her any further. He followed her to her room and took in the door for a moment. "That's really cool. Did you draw it yourself?" How many other talents did this girl have that he didn't know about, and that she didn't talk about? He glanced around the hall again, taking in each of the doors and how different from each other they all were.
"Hugo helped me out with it, which is why it doesn't look as bad as it should. I almost put the blacks and purples first, can you believe?" Babe snickered, as though it was some inside joke. "The glow in the dark stars work as a sort of landmark at night for the others. My bedroom is right across from the bathroom, so they know to watch for the stars."