connyr0​:

✦

as wendy called him out for dissing his mother’s taste in entertainment, he couldn’t help the stupid smile that spread as she so easily jumped on his mother’s side. it was stupid, totally stupid. and her position arguably had very little to do with his mother at all. but a mama’s boy at his core it did warm his heart a little. after a moment he held his hands up in surrender, easily giving up the fight with smile remaining on features. “ i meant no disrespect to hgtv, truly, ” he said, though it was hard to appear genuine when he had that dumbass grin on his features. but it was harder to keep that grin from his face around wendy. “ but i will start preparing now for the property brothers marathon that’s in my future. ” he teased, knowing damn well if he was ever subjected to such a thing it would be the furthest thing from torture he could imagine.

he didn’t like the way he said with everyone. he meant it, of course he wanted to have a fun little movie night with all his friends. he got so lucky at broadripple to quickly find a group of people like he had. but he’d only said it to protect himself. though wendy wasn’t that sort of person he could so clearly see her laughing in his face if he ever accidentally passed that invisible line that revealed his feelings, or even suggested his feelings were anything other than platonic. but she smiled, and as far as conny wasn’t effected by his distinction– which was exactly what he’d wanted. he cringed a little when she mentioned west side story, mostly teasingly. it’s not that he didn’t like musicals, but if the musical numbers were the best part of a film he’d rather just listen to an album. “ i’m not saying no to west side story … but– ” he paused to suck a breath, “ you gotta build up to that sort of thing. that’s like jumping in the deep end of a wave pool when you don’t even know how to swim, ” he reasoned, and if it was anyone but wendy suggesting it he might mention that he’d rather drown in said wave pool than watch west side story. for wendy he’d totally watch west side story. “ how about … ” he trailed off, filing through movies he’d seen and either had downloaded or were available on some sort of streaming service that were musical or music centric that would happily bridge the divide between conny’s favourites like scream and get out and anything from the stephen king universe and wendy and isobel’s desire for musicals. “ across the universe? you ever seen it? ” he suggested. though not a huge beatles fan, he had a major soft spot for evan rachel wood and jim sturgess too. “ i’m pretty sure i have it downloaded but i could always hole up in the library for an afternoon to get it. ” 

it wasn’t something conny ever really put much thought into, but he realised he maybe didn’t know a whole lot about his friends. of course a lot of that ignorance could be excused because he was new to broadripple and broadripple being a boarding school allowed everyone a break from their families and home lives. but he liked hearing the way wendy talked about her family. even if she was joking around. dopey smile tugged up his lips for a moment before he pressed them together again and nodded his head. “ right, of course– you know i’m surprised they even got as far as dropping you off at camp, how they even thought they could go so long without you? it’s shocking to me, completely shocking. ” he played along, trying to subdue amusement on his features but, as always, totally failing. 

when she wiggled her sap covered fingers at him, he gave in easily. swinging bag back over his shoulder and rearranging camera strap so it hung to his side instead of against his chest. unscrewing the water bottle as he stepped closer to her so he could properly inspect the damage.  “ but you did learn something, ” he said, taking her hand into his, gentle with his touch like she was injured and not that he was wary about getting sap all over his own hands. “ watch what you’re touching in the woods. ” he looked up from her hand to her to offer a stupid grin, amused with himself, before he looked back down again. he turned her palm upwards, still being soft with his touch, so he could pour a little water into it. curve of her hand catching a little of it while most of it ran off the sticky surface and onto the dirt between them. “ i have no idea, ” he admitted, rubbing the water into the sap and her skin as he attempted to clean it. “ i think most of them do, it just takes a broken branch or like, a cut to see it for some of them. ” if connor roberts were some sort of poet maybe he could have thought about how sometimes people were like that. that it took something drastic to see what they were made of. instead he was hyper fixated on how soft wendy’s skin was, wondering if he’d ever noticed that before, and completely aware of how close they were for this whole interaction. he paused to pour more water on the problem area, cupping her hand with his free hand as he did. 

◦

Wendy sighed heavily, as if it were a huge burden, then smiled. “You’re lucky I’m soft for that soundtrack. T.V. Carpio singing ‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand’? Slays me.” Which was the truth, but the truth extended beyond that. Wendy had spent an entire summer when she was thirteen watching and rewatching Across the Universe with Nell; in the month of July, they definitely watched it at least once a day. Eventually her dad hid the DVD. "We could make it into a Rocky Horror thing. People sing and act along. I’d be shocked if everyone didn’t know at least one song word-for-word. And Nell and I had that weird choreography during that draft scene memorized. Like, when the weird plastic-faced soldier men are mandhandling all the guys in their underwear? We did the push ups and everything. ‘She’s so heeeavy,’” Wendy sing-songed at the end, now more excited by Conny’s suggestion than her original one.

Her smile softened when Conny took her hand. It was an innocent, helpful gesture—the way the pad of his thumb rubbed gently against her fingers likely both platonic and perfunctory—but it made her heart all fluttery just the same. Wendy’s skin sung with it, and she inadvertently leaned in closer like a moth to a flame. It wasn’t that she was touch-starved really, as Wendy was always slumping against or looping her arms through friends and family alike. She got her skin-to-skin contact pretty frequently, and she wrangled Ella into snuggling with her on more than one occasion. But this was different—and while the feeling of wanting to be touched wasn’t foreign, this time it felt a little revelatory. To be touched and then to want more in a way that was gut-deep and a bit scary. Wendy fantasized about kissing more people than she could remember, and she even managed to make it happen with a couple of them, but she had never stood so close but felt so far away from the action. Her heart gave a quick, sharp twist.

“I was trying to have a Grandmother Willow moment,” she grumped in defense. Though the fact irked her, she figured you probably couldn’t force a spiritual connection with nature. She hummed in acknowledgment of Conny’s following words. They struck her as poetic, and she mulled them around in her head before she tucked them away for safekeeping. She wished she could use her phone and Google what other trees could be tapped, but the fact that she couldn’t still held the rosy-tinted hue of a bygone era in the same way that leaving the handwritten note for Conny had. She wondered how much longer that feeling would stick around. Wendy hummed again as her gaze turned up, looking at the way the trees shot skyward. She remembered reading once that the forests in New England were pretty young by comparison to others. Originally deforested for farming thanks to colonization, the woods they walked were probably teens in tree-years or something. It made them a little less intimidating for a moment. She didn’t know the names of many of them or how to identify them other than the pine tree, but she liked that with the unknown the possibilities were then endless.

When her eyes settled back on Conny’s face, she felt her own warm almost immediately. He was close enough that she could see each individual eyelash, and the birthmarks that scattered across his cheek and down his neck. “Yeesh. You’re always helping me with my messes,” she joked, then watched as the water dripped from her hand down onto the dirt. Once she was sap-free, she let herself linger in his hold for a moment before she pulled back. She didn’t want to dry her hand on her cow-print shirt, in case there was some sticky remnant that transferred, so she shook it in hopes to air dry. “You’re not going to start charging me for labor, are you?” She waited for him to right himself and his supplies before she set off again. “Because the best I can do isssss... haikus? I could totally pay you in haikus. Pretty sure I saw a movie where a guy did that.” Her tongue pressed against the inside of her cheek as she thought: summer, their broad grins, the sap on her hand. “Cheerful summertime,” she started, counting out the syllables on her fingers. “A new, little sticky smile...” She straightened with a smile of her own. “Betrayed by the tree.” She turned the five-finger count toward him. “Five-seven-five. Boom.”

#Hair goals

connyr0​:

✦

connor lowered his camera and looked back to her as she spoke. exhaling a somewhat embarrassed chuckle he looked away when she asked if his mom ever joined them camping in their backyard. “ sometimes, ” he allowed sheepishly, smile spreading as he looked back up. “ she’s a nurse, so she worked a lot, you know, ” she’d also still been studying when him and casey had been very young but he left that detail out. not that he thought wendy would judge, but it was a detail he was used to leaving out, and outside of his small group of friends he knew people wouldn’t be so kind. “ plus, this may come as a shock to you but me and casey are kind of the only big movie fans in the family, mom’s not really into it. she much more a house hunter shows kind of lady. ” but then it was his turn to listen to her talk about her home. and much like wendy had slowly become fond of wisconsin for the fact that conny and casey were from there, conny had become fond of jamaica plain too. simply because of the way wendy spoke about it, and how many memories it bore for her. he smiled easily as he listened, very easily able to picture the scene she painted, upset nell included. “ well, no offence to nell, but she sounds like a total party pooper, doesn’t even know what fun is, ” he mused playfully about to return to snapping shots of their surroundings in the afternoon sun as he had a thought. “ we should do that– well, i mean, we could do that. i mean the cabins are kinda like a big shitty sleepover anyway, right? we could like set up a fort between a couple bunks, have a movie night or something, ” he said, letting it sit for a moment before he added “ with everyone, it could be fun. ” 

“ oh for sure, ” he assured nodding his head, but looking away because he didn’t actually know for sure. “ like, while i agree sister michael could totally take down a grizzly with her hands tied, i’d bet she doesn’t wanna see everyone else try and deal with it. ” he imagined that was the problem sister had with a lot of things. that she could handle them completely but she had to also deal with other people not being able to handle it. he held camera up to his eyes again, clicking away as wendy dealt with a sap situation, totally oblivious. he smiled to himself as she spoke about her childhood. he could totally see her as a brownie, it made total sense. “ seriously? ” he asked, looking back to her, amused by her story. “ i can’t see that at all. seeing as you’re so hardcore now, i can’t even imagine it, it’s impossible. ” he teased gently, grin spreading on his lips. wendy’s softness was a virtue of her’s as far as connor was concerned. then he pointed to her hand, finally noticing the situation. “ what happened here, girl scout? ” he said, letting camera go so it hung from strap around his neck as he pulled backpack from his shoulder, digging out water bottle and holding it out to her. 

•

Wendy nodded. She kind of got it. Her mom was a caregiver for a bunch of old people and spent her days shuffling from apartment to apartment in the Back Bay and Beacon Hill, spoon-feeding them apple sauce and wiping their chins. Or that’s what Wendy always imagined anyway. Sometimes she’d have to stay overnight, and it always stunk. Wendy’s dad was cool but he was pretty strict, and growing up he never got the voices of the characters in Wendy’s favorite books right. Not like her mom did. But Wendy was lucky that her dad was there, and so was her grandpa, and so was Nell. Even if Nell could be a total bore and pain in the butt, she was near-constant company—and while she loudly complained, she always let Wendy dictate what they played as long as she could choose what show they’d watch after dinner. And even still, she mostly let Wendy get her way. Conny and Casey just had each other when their mom was busy. “HGTV is elite. It’s decadent. It’s luxury. One day I will meet your mom and she and I will watch House Hunters together, and we’ll bond over all the gore-filled movies you two make us watch. Just you wait.”

Wendy visibly brightened at the idea of a movie night. They had been at the retreat just long enough that her feelings about the cabins had fluctuated dramatically: from utter despair, to rose-colored excitement, and then a plateaued acceptance of the situation with little spikes elation with every new experience. Movies and a fort would have been enough to churn up any childish excitement, and Wendy was desperate for things to be excited about. She opened her mouth to reply, ready to make plans, when Conny tacked on with everyone. Which—duh, she thought, but it was directed toward herself as her cheeks warmed. She didn’t know she’d be a little disappointed by that distinction until she heard it out loud, and it was clearly an obvious one. “That sounds in-cred-ible,” Wendy replied, imbuing her words with the enthusiasm Conny likely expected. And she was enthused. Totally enthused. She loved her friends and she loved spending time with them and she wanted to do something fun. But still. There was still a small part of her that for a split second fantasized it as a specific Wendy-and-Conny thing. “I’m recruiting Iso to help me bully you into adding a musical into the line-up. Preeeetty sure I saw West Side Story’s still on Netflix. And I am preemptively vetoing more than one scary movie, and the one you are allowed can’t be too scary. Everyone’s already super spooked.”

In response to Conny’s light teasing, Wendy wrinkled up her nose at him. “Watch it, kid,” she ribbed, and took a step close enough to bump into him on purpose. Back then she had just turned nine and had never been much of a crier, but she still cried as soon as her parents drove away. And then she cried through arts and crafts, and then through lunch and woodworking and swimming lessons. She cried until she made herself sick, and then the counselors finally got a hold of her mom on her cell phone. It was Wendy’s first time away from home, and her mom hadn’t been keen on it either. Even her dad’s look of disappointment didn’t kill her relief when their beat-up sedan came rumbling back up the rocky, dirt road. “The poor things couldn’t go six hours without me. Can you really blame them? Besides, I had better things to do. I started a sidewalk chalk club that summer, yunno, and those leadership skills are invaluable now.” Wendy paused in picking at the drying sap and sighed dramatically. She held out her hand for inspection, officially delegating the task of clean-up to Conny. “I’m a hands-on learner, and nature has decided to punish me for it. Just like our education system.” She watched him pull out a water bottle, smiled, and pointedly didn’t take it from him. She wiggled her fingers. “Do you know if all trees make sap? That seems like something they’d teach you out there in Wisco.”

# for conny pls xx

what your muse’s name is in mine’s phone

C💛NNY 👻

what your muse’s picture is in mine’s phone

what your muse’s ringtone is in mine’s phone

♪ Tommy James & The Shondells - Crimson and Clover (specifically the bit in the middle that’s all fun instrumental and “na na na na na naaaa”)

my muse’s last text to your muse

[10:23 AM] bring a leetle soda to me in the library? 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺  

[10:24 AM] i’m crashing mayday mayday sos  🚨🚨💔

[10:25 AM] orange please i’ll love you forever!!!!! 😍👅🤝

orioncarlson​:

“𝐈 𝐃𝐎𝐍’𝐓 𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐖; 𝐋𝐔𝐂𝐊𝐘 𝐆𝐔𝐄𝐒𝐒?” And yet it’s probably all of the things she’d mentioned, manifesting in a certain… flair he knows he doesn’t have. Years of flying under the radar has taught him to avoid people like her, who had a penchant for drawing attention to themselves even when they didn’t mean to — and yet, here he is, engaging in a full conversation. Big personalities tick him off more often than not, but her pep is presented without pretense. A refreshing difference from a world where his classmates are constantly worried about their image, whether everyone else liked them or not. “Maybe because you’re the exact opposite of me, and drama would be, like, the last thing I’d ever do.” Hell, he couldn’t even get up in front of the class and make a proper speech.

It’s a nice touch that she’s so theatrical, considering what she says about his choice in pens. Funnily enough, his mind lands on how multifaceted her words are and he wonders if her words had been deliberately philosophical. “You’re probably right.” Is this why he feels so soulless at times? Because there hasn’t been anything in his life to excite him? That passion had long been sapped away, leaving something mimicking a human? Strange, how one minute he’d been thinking about pens, and the next, he feels seen by her. Soul stripped of its defenses, a look of torment zips across his face, but he quickly hides it with another smile. “So — you wanna help me find me pink flamingo?”

Wendy hummed as she thought over the statement, mostly for show. Exact opposite. She had always liked to picture herself as one of those mysterious, debonair heroines—or maybe one of the intelligent, playful ones. Like Arya Stark or Elizabeth Bennet, but preferably a mix of the two. Though it was tough to be enigmatic or intriguing when she let her mouth run away from her, couldn’t keep a secret, and primarily wore her emotions plain on her face. They leaked, and transparency wasn’t exactly thought-provoking. Her goal had never been to seem cool to her peers but she didn’t want to be boring or totally predictable. Wendy was too impatient for puzzles, but she still wanted to be worthy of solving. She wondered what he meant by exact opposite, and if that was a good thing or bad thing. "Are you a righty or a lefty?” She asked, flippant, then tucked her hands behind herself as if that would actually hide which one she personally preferred. “And what’s your favorite season? I want to figure out how far this opposites thing really goes. I have a B+ in Physics but I’m pretty close to an A-, so I’m basically a pro at data-collecting.”

An expression flashed across his face too fast for her to accurately name, but she hoped it hadn’t been annoyance. She could’ve overstepped, maybe, but she’d really just meant he needed to mosey on outside his comfort zone. Blue ballpoints were a symptom of the run-of-the-mill, keeping-my-head down disease. A blank face and careful words were a classic case of someone who required a teeny tiny shakeup, even if it just came in a form as small as a pen. Anything out of the norm was medicine. Luckily his question gratified her more than she could’ve expected. As a metaphor, helping someone find their pink flamingo was essentially her life goal. “Well, since I’m basically your guru now, I have to inform you that your pink flamingo? She finds you. Yunno, technically speaking. The game’s called Destiny, and we’re all honor-bound to respect it.” She took mental stock of what she had in her pencil case at the moment: a pencil patterned with palm trees, one of those rubbery bendable pencils, and a pen with a cap shaped like a thumbs up. Any of three could suit him, in her opinion. “But I can definitely steer you in the right direction, since returning my pen might’ve been fully kismet.” She reached out her hand again. “Gimme your case. This is just gonna be your introduction to something a little funky, but it’s still gotta be a surprise.”

orioncarlson​:

𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐎𝐒𝐓𝐋𝐘 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐃𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐒; it’s clear that she has a lot more to say about their math teacher than he’d ever have. The guy’s an ass for sure, but he bites his tongue. Vandalism and passing notes isn’t exactly model student behavior, but hey, he’s no saint either. He couldn’t count the amount of times he’d purposefully antagonized his teachers. Mostly in ways where he couldn’t get caught, only because he’s keen on keeping his scholarship, and the prospect of going back to New York isn’t exactly his dream. “Yeah, I can tell,” he replies, nodding along to the resounding emphasis of her words. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say that you do some sort of… drama club? Acting?”

Right — and because his mindset is an emphatic monotone, he’d be assigned the category of the 20-pack Bic ballpoints. She’s right, though because he can’t help himself, he swings his backpack over to his front, pulling out his pencil case. “You would’ve been right except…” Empty. Of course. “I think I’ve lost every pen I’ve had in my life.” Rion grins, the first of the day.  

Wendy smiled immediately at his guess, though the edges of it were a little strained. She liked being involved in Drama, but her fellow students weren’t exactly equally enthused about it most of the time. She and Ella had earned plenty a derisive snort when they practiced their lines in some corner of the campus, dramatic and giggly and loud. She shrugged off the vague sheepishness—it wasn’t really her style, nor the vibe she aimed for—and nodded. “Yeah. What tipped you off? My perfect diction, magnetic presence, or near-blinding star power?” She joked with a flourishing gesture toward herself. In truth, Wendy never aimed for any role that would constitute her as the star of any school production, mostly due to lack of desire and ambition, but it wouldn’t hurt to come off as someone who did. And succeeded.

Her smile turned more genuine when he brandished his empty case without the same ceremony she would have. But perhaps largely unbeknownst to him, he was playing along. “You know where you go wrong there? Pens like that are soulless. They all look the same, perform the same, and therefore all mean the same thing to you: nothing. Of course you lose them when an identical one comes right after.” She reached out for his pencil case but didn’t take it. When she didn’t get an immediate handover, she wriggled her fingers. Her collection of writing utensils wasn’t massive, but she had a few fun pens and brightly-patterned pencils. For the greater good, she was willing to part with one. “What you need is something that will stand out. Something you like. See, I enjoy using my flamingo. In fact, she delights me and therefore she has value.” She was pretty proud of her logic and choice of words. She thought she sounded like she could’ve been in college or something. “You need to be delighted.” 

connyr0​:

✦

conny raised a brow when wendy mentioned his home state, smirk tugging a little at his lips. home wasn’t something he talked about a whole lot. it was a small town in the middle of no where, there was a reason connor and casey loved movies and tv shows as much as they did. the only other form of entertainment they had was throwing stones in the lake and making fun of people that had holiday homes in wisconsin. “ well, i mean, maybe to a city slicker like you, ” he joked, smirk spreading to a grin for a moment. “ i guess it’s pretty heavy on the greenery though– and the cheese, ” he noted with a wave of his index finger before hands hooked back around backpack straps. “ but i mean we didn’t go camping or anything– not properly, not you know, camping camping. set up a tent in the backyard sometimes and a couple people we knew had cabins but it wasn’t like this, ”  he explained, jovial in his tone. he didn’t really know if he meant ‘wasn’t like this’ as a dig to elkhart lake or as a dig to the retreat. both were pretty average in his opinion but elkhart lake at least had reception.  

he chuckled as wendy continued, “ no rubbing sticks together? just straight to the stabbing a battery? ” he teased, “ you know, i like it. very hardcore, very intimidating. ” he nodded, trying to play serious and not let the stupid smile spread on his features. as they passed he bridge conny’s instinct was to reach for his camera. the woods were kind of gorgeous. and while the tree were a little different and he’d denied much outdoorsy activity in his childhood, it did remind him a little of home. a soft pang of missing his mother in his heart but thinking maybe she’d like to see photos of the place so lifting the plastic and starting to snap the scenery. he chuckled again as she brought up smokey once more. “ i feel lucky, very lucky. ” he assured looking to her. he was being a little facetious, but he was kind of impressed  with the amount of outdoorsy knowledge wendy had. “ all i’ve got up here is gotta tie up your garbage real good so it doesn’t attract bears, and hiding in a pile of leaves works for warmth and camouflage ” he counted off his two ‘nature skills’ on he hand before it returned to his camera “ and that second one i don’t even know if it’s true because i only know shaq did it when he was on bear grylls. ” he’d have to pull up that episode on youtube at some point and send it to their group chat– even though with the reception situation at the retreat it could be days before everyone managed to watch it. “ were you in scouts or something? how’d you know the battery thing? ”

•

Wendy liked hearing Conny talk about where he was from, even if she had always dismissed the entire Midwest as the aptly-named ‘flyover states’ for most of her life. Things seemed more exciting on the coasts and weren’t like, a ton of serial killers from out there? Bad vibes all around, really. But she started to like it because she was grateful it bore and bred someone like Connor—and Casey too, obv. Through sheer association with the Roberts twins, Wisconsin endeared itself to her. Plus, she always wanted to know what his life was like pre-Broadripple, and what he was up to when he wasn’t at school, but she also wanted to know that it might all be a little bit better now that he knew her. But maybe that was selfish. She sighed, then shot him a smile as she stepped over a wayward log. Her worst scenario visions of camping out in the wilderness were heavily influenced by the book Hatchet, and she was pretty grateful their experience hadn’t included eating turtle eggs or getting attacked by a porcupine just yet. She liked the sound of a backyard camp out a lot better.

“You camped in your backyard?” She had to fight back the instinct to awww aloud. “Did your mom do it with you guys?” The image alone almost pushed the sound out of her. “My grandpa would help me build forts in the living room when I was little, and we’d put this big purple quilt over the couch to create a canopy and we’d read books and do puzzles and stuff. He always made me clean it up before we went to bed though, but on my birthday one year I made everyone sleep down there with me. Nell complained the whole time. That’s the city slicker’s version of a backyard camp out.” Her grin softened a little as she watched him snap photos of their surroundings. It was easy to love someone when you saw them do something they loved. “I’m incredibly hardcore—you’ve known this about me,” she joked in return. “Plus, I don’t know how to do the stick-rubby thing. Maybe my brain decided to shoot one for the ‘realistic’ team and dunk on me for only knowing the dangerous, maybe dumb way of going about the whole thing. Dream You did give me major side-eye when sparks flew your way.”

Her eyes widened a little at bears. She knew a black bear could very well be prowling deep in the forest somewhere but she liked to think they would like, keep to themselves. That the presence of humans scared them or something. “Do you think our trash is tied up enough and stuff? I mean, I totally trust Sister Michael could K.O. a grizzly, but—” She grimaced in exaggeration. “Big Bear I do not wish to meet.” Wendy brushed her hand against the bark of a tree as they passed and an unexpected sticky substance stuck to her palm. Sap, probably? She looked it over, trying to pick at it fruitlessly. It seemed to spread and stubbornly cling to her skin the more she messed with it. “I was a Brownie for a year,” she answered, a little absently as she rubbed her hand against the fabric of her pants. She frowned when lint was added to the mess. “My troop went to a Girl Scout Camp for a week in New Hampshire, but I had to go back home by the end of Day One. My parents hadn’t even left the state yet. But literally all they taught me was how to make a God’s Eye. Man vs. Wild came through with the battery trick. My dad's totally obsessed.”

connyr0​:

conny couldn’t help but laugh at mention of smokey bear, smile spreading widely across his features. “ i don’t know if i could have handled that, smokey bear could totally whoop my ass. ” he mused, playing along with the image she’d created. “ of all the creatures to make an arch enemy of, i think smokey bear would be one of the worst. he’s cut throat, you know ” he continued, getting stupider with each word. but wendy at least was usually down for the weird shit he said. either laughing or playing along which was a whole lot better than some other reactions. “ like, sasquatch, mothman, i think i could plead my case, make things up to them somehow– smokey? no chance, he wouldn’t take any of my crap. ” he lifted his hand up to his throat, drawing a line across it with straight fingers as he sucked his teeth.

 as wendy seemed pleased with his snack selection, he lifted two fingers to his forehead, giving a quick salute. “ some people are good at sports, or science fairs– not me, i’ve got snack suppling down pat, nobody can do it like me. ” he bragged jokingly, zipping backpack back up and slinging it over his shoulder once more. he hooked his thumbs around the straps, taking a couple small steps along side wendy as she explained the plan for their afternoon. “ my only addendum is that we should get moving, ” he said, knocking his elbow into her arm. “ if our limit is sunset, which i fully agree with, for the record, quicker we get moving the more we get to see, right? ” 

“Wooow,” Wendy exhaled as she set off, her tone bordering on dreamy. She turned and walked backwards a few steps in order to keep her eyes on Conny, then mirrored his previous salute. “This has been a true melding of minds, sir—as per usual. It’s always a pleasure working alongside such a strategic snack-packer. Rather you than some science fair nerd. Gotta be honest.” She spun back on her heel, ready to face the wall of trees. To call her experience with The Great Outdoors limited was an understatement to say the least. And Wendy was usually fine with looking a little foolish—a heavy dose of cringe was a sign of a life well-lived, by her books—but she didn’t want to look... dumb, maybe. Or useless. She was already down one ghost hunting adventure, back when she had gone home for her dad’s birthday. She wanted to prove she’d be up to the task for the next one, whenever it cropped up, and a huge part of that was showing a certain degree of fearlessness. And what better way to face the unknown than by doing so in the broad daylight, with a plethora of snacks in tow? 

“So... Wisconsin,” she started, as subtle as a sledgehammer. “I mean, you and Casey must’ve done tons of outdoors-y things back home, right? It’s just, like—trees trees tress out there, I always imagined. Or like one part cheese to two parts herbage or something.” She slipped her star-shaped sunglasses from the front of her shirt and slid them onto her face, pressing the bridge up her nose with her forefinger. “Don’t get me wrong, JP’s got a lot of greenery. Trees and some parks and stuff, but this whole thing is totally next level. I had a stress dream last night that I was gonna have to go full Bear Grylls. I stabbed a lithium cell phone battery to start a fire so we wouldn’t freeze to death... in the summer.” As they passed beyond the treeline, the temperature dropped a little. It was cooler in the woods, and the sun left a dappled yellow pattern on the forest floor as the creek continued on lapping musically against the rocks. It was pretty nice, but made nicer by the company she kept. “Worse comes to worst, at least you now realize I’d know how to keep you warm, right? I mean, I’m a provider.” She straightened suddenly with a grin, glancing over at Conny. “Actually, you’re pretty lucky Smokey would have to get through me first before he went all feral on ya. I’ve got more tricks up my sleeve.”

Summer Camp | Better Off Without You

orioncarlson​:

𝐀 𝐒𝐄𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐃 𝐎𝐅 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐂𝐊, 𝐁𝐄𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐄 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐒 𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋, relief crossing her face. Rion sees it all, a small smile pulling up the corners of his lips, hand extended with the ridiculously pink pen in his hand. The grin widens when she mentions Henderson, the old fart that taught the upperclassmen math classes. The man had a habit of turning a nasty shade of purple at the slightest inconvenience or unexpected noise in the class. The thought elicits a little chuckle from his mouth, nodding once. “Right. And what did you do to deserve his wrath?”

Angel. Rion’s eyes narrow, lips still curled in amusement, only because he can’t remember the last time someone had called him an angel, as if there’s anything heavenly about his behavior. A snippet of a warm fuzz spreads through his chest, and he wonders if that’s how kind people felt all the time, going around doing good deeds. He pockets the feeling for later, free hand tugging at his hair, he nods in lieu of a you’re welcome. “Yeah, it’s… quite the pen. I don’t think I could pull it off, you know?” As always, his signature deadpan makes an appearance, not quite sure how to match up to her theatrical way of speaking.

Wendy let out an aggrieved groan, her eyes rolling back to really round out the performance. “Ab-so-lute-ly nothing,” she insisted, zipping her bag close with one resolute flick of the wrist. “He literally has it out for me for no reason. I am basically the picture-perfect student. I just had a few slip-ups, is all. Like I accidentally ‘desecrated’ a desk with my gel pen one time, but I was seriously checked out. I had no idea what I was doing until he called me out in front of the entire class. And I got caught passing notes once, but I had an important message to pass on. Some would call it an emergency.” Really, news had just broke that Gigi Hadid was pregnant with Zayn Malik’s baby and Wendy needed to tell Ella right away or she felt she felt she was bound to implode. “I can’t be blamed for being unable to dedicate all of my attention to his monotone. I need more things going on, yunno? I need stimuli. He’s giving me zilch.”

She grinned, though he remained relatively straight-faced by contrast. Wendy had what her mom called elastic features, they bent and twisted and turned with every emotion—and sometimes into multiple expressions over the course of a single sentence. Inscrutability wasn’t her style, but she tried not to begrudge those who did ascribe to it. He had all the makings of a Byronic hero, by her judgement. “Well, anyone can pull off just about any outfit. It hinges on how they wear it. And a glittery pink flamingo pen? See, that comes down to how the user holds it. You need confidence. Pizzazz. An unflinching appreciation for theatrics. It’s fundamentally a state of mind.” She tapped at her temple. “Alllll in here.” She righted her backpack, looping her arm back through the strap. “What’ve you got in your pencil case? My guess is a collection of ballpoints. Those high roller twenty-dollar packs.” She rubbed at her chin, feeling unnecessarily philosophical in her guesses. “Black ink? No—Blue.”

connyr0​:

seeing folded paper on his pillow was a delightful surprise for connor as he returned to his dorm room. quickly dropping backpack at the end of his bed in favour of scooping it up and unfolding it as he sat down. it was even more delightful when he discovered it was from wendy. unknowingly stupid smile spread on his lips as he read her words. even through a letter, she was so vibrant. he so admired that about her, and it made him feel very warm to think that she’d taken the time to write the letter for him, even though it probably hadn’t been that significant for her. he really didn’t even think that she’d only done it because they couldn’t text at the moment. stupid cell phone signal. he was part way convinced that some asshole was pulling an extremely elaborate prank and that some point they’d find a janky cell jammer stuffed in a tree somewhere nearby. but he wasn’t thinking of that now, only of wendy’s note and the fact that three o’clock really wasn’t that far away.

after another second of admiring the note, probably paying too much attention to the little heart she’d drawn, he pushed himself off the bed again. he folded the letter neatly, placing it in the front pocket of his bag before he shifted. pulling duffel from under his bunk and curating a small selection of gas station snacks he’d stocked up on once he’d found out about the retreat. candies, chips, hell, he even threw in a pack of pretzels. he grabbed two other things before he left for the bridge. first a water bottle, which he threw in the backpack with the food. hearing his mom’s voice in his head about how he and casey were rotting their teeth with the amount of soda they drank. and second, trusty canon eos. pulling camera strap over his head as he slung backpack over his shoulder, the camera and bag bouncing against his skinny frame simultaneously. 

when he saw her on the bridge, stupid smile returned. if he was smart he might have used the camera around his neck to snap a photo of her looking over the bridge. afternoon sun warming her skin and defining each curl atop her head. but no one – absolutely no one at all – said  conny was smart. “ i did, ” he replied happily, hooking his thumb around the strap of his backpack. he gave a chuckle at the lemon comment, not a fact he had ever considered. “ don’t you need heat to see invisible lemon ink? ” that was what national treasure had taught him anyway. “ i probably would have accidentally burned it, and then burned the cabin down, and then got in trouble for having a lighter– a whole lot of trouble. unless you left me a hair dryer too, which, kinda ruins the whole mystery of invisible ink, ” he mused playfully, leaning his forearms on the rail of the bridge but keeping his attention on wendy. when she asked about snacks he stood up straight and pulled the bag from his shoulder so he could unzip it and show her the collection proudly. “ look for yourself, ” he said, holding it open so she could peak inside. “ the 7/11 didn’t know what hit ‘em, ” he joked, grin spreading on his features once again.

“Oh,” Wendy let out on an exhale. She scratched thoughtfully at the side of her nose. Admittedly, she didn’t think much beyond the exciting concept of invisible ink—the manner by which Conny would end up deciphering it didn’t really cross her mind. Once something was out of her hands it was usually out of her mind as well. With a great shrug, which brought her shoulders up toward her ears and then back down again, she shot him another smile. She already felt a little giddy with him by her side. The Retreat had been a challenge in how long Wendy could inhale insect repellent fumes until a migraine took hold, but the slight twinge in her temples gave as soon as he approached. Her dad would have said it was all in her head, but since when were the things in her head not real? “Well! Then I’m glad I used Ye Olde Trusty Bic instead. You could’ve made a lifelong enemy of Smokey Bear. Can you imagine the scandal? I’d’ve never forgiven myself.”

When he offered a peek into his bag, Wendy leaned into his space to get a good look, her hands pressed together and her fingers tapping like a conspiratorial villain. Snacks were a serious business in the Arjmand-Sanderson household, and it was a tradition of seriousness that Wendy had always been happy to carry on. “Hmmm.” She looked over the choices, moving aside packages to see what lay beneath them, and then nodded. “You, my friend, have once again gone above and beyond the call of duty. If I am not absolutely twitching with madness due to a sugar high by the end of the night, I will not only be incredibly surprised but incredibly disappointed.” She knocked her elbow against his, or at least she aimed to—the height disparity had the motion came in closer contact with his forearm—and turned away from the railing. “Okay, so here’s my plan. Keep in mind it’s toootally loosey-goosey. You are, as always, free to make any suggestions, addendums, or critiques.” She pointed toward where the creek lead into the woods. “I say we follow the yellow brick road. See what wondrous mysteries Mother Nature has in store for us. Back in time before nighttime, obviously. I am not messing with all this bad mumbo jumbo just yet.”

orioncarlson​:

𝐖𝐇𝐎: Rion & @wendysanderson. 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍: Lunch. 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄: Broadripple Campus.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐇𝐔𝐅𝐅𝐋𝐄 𝐈𝐍 𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐖𝐄𝐄𝐍 𝐂𝐋𝐀𝐒𝐒𝐄𝐒 𝐈𝐒 𝐀𝐋𝐌𝐎𝐒𝐓 𝐓𝐎𝐎 𝐖𝐑𝐄𝐓𝐂𝐇𝐄𝐃 for Rion to deal with; too much inane chatter and kids throwing shit around — it doesn’t take long for him to shove in his headphones, making his way across the quad for lunch. 

Eyes straight ahead, he almost doesn’t notice it; a single item, slipping out from someone’s bag. It’s a quick debate in his head if he’d even bother to pick it up, considering his entire life motto is can’t be bothered, but in the end, he mentally curses as he bends down to scoop it up, jogging to catch up with them. 

Rion taps her on the shoulder, arm extended. “Hey. I think you dropped this.” He holds out the item in his hand, almost sheepish, half impatient, too hungry to stick around for long to chat with this stranger.

As the week plodded along, Wendy started to gain a slowly-developing appreciation for their rustic set-up. While her childhood was irreparably tainted by her fateful reading of Bridge to Terabithia, she had still held a secret longing to find a fantastical place beyond some treeline to explore with her friends for years. Minus the rope swing, of course. And she wasn’t a kid anymore, so there were no plans to create any imaginary kingdoms, but she thought that making the journey across campus and over the bridge to the Retreat was as close as she could come to entering one world from another. Just walking through the hallways now suddenly seemed new and different again, the busting and slamming of lockers at odds with the low-key chatter in the Junior cabin she had grown accustomed to.

Lost in her thoughts, the tap on her shoulder took her by surprise. Her mind quickly conjured up images of her purple-faced math teacher, holding up some kind of concrete evidence that she totally used her calculator under her desk during their last test, and her stomach tightened. She turned, saw the young non-purple face, and exhaled heavily in relief, her shoulders slumping with the force of it. “Oh my God, I was so scared you were Mr. Henderson for like, a hot second there. He seriously has it out for me,” she started, crossing her eyes as she mimed a loop around her neck. Her gaze dropped to the object he held out, and she grinned. Her lucky pen. Ella gifted it to her as a part of a birthday package and it looked totally out of place, feathery and hot pink with a flamingo bobbling on top, between the boy’s fingers.

“You angel,” she enthused, and took it from him. She held it close to her chest and inhaled deeply, as if really luxuriating in the reunion, then redirected her smile toward him. “This thing’s a total hot commodity. Guaranteed B+ on a History quiz when you use it, you know. I’m surprised you didn’t run off with it—a weaker, more selfish man would’ve.” She twisted her backpack around, spotting where her front pocket had been left unzipped, and placed the pen back inside. “Thank you ever so much. I owe you one.”

francismont​:

Frankie turned around quickly when he heard her strangled response. He was a little bit jumpy given his stare down with the freaky looking animal perched in the shrubbery. When he saw that the only affliction was smoke from the fire he turned back around again. “It doesn’t look like an owl,” he interjected but as she went on and explained how screwed they were he turned back around to face her again.

“Why would you tell me that!?” he asked. He didn’t want to come across as a wimp but he definitely wasn’t equipped to battle an angry bird, so he backed up a little and sat down with Wendy in between himself and the bird. “Aren’t you supposed to reassure me and tell me that the bird definitely doesn’t want anything to do with me?” He removed a couple of the shiny, accomplishment boasting badges from his blazer and tucked then away in his pocket, just in case the bird took a fancy to them.

Eyes still stinging, Wendy pressed the heels of her hands against them. It doesn’t look like an owl. Her stomach tightened. If it wasn’t an owl, then she didn’t want to know and she didn’t want to mess with it. Wendy had little to no experience with animals other than pigeons and her Babayi’s cat Shirin, and the two of them were on pretty strained terms considering how often Shirin ‘mistook’ Wendy’s ankles for scratching posts. Colorful static erupted behind her eyelids with the pressure and when she pulled them away they continued to dance in front of her as her eyes adjusted. “I dunno, we’re in the woods. My bits of Neanderthal DNA triggered my lizard brain and now I’ve shifted into survivalist mode,” Wendy babbled, then frowned as Frankie sat beside her, effectively using her as the buffer between himself and the glowing eyes.

“Excuse me, aren’t you British? There’s a little thing called chivalry that your country is like, historically straight up obsessed with,” she argued then got to her feet in a huff to sit down on Frankie’s right, switching their positions. While Arthurian romance and practices were nice to read about, Wendy didn’t actually love the macho-sexist vibes—the Lady of Shalott was totally screwed over—but still, she continued: “You should reassure me. It’s literally your culture.” She leaned back to look behind Frankie and into the trees. The eyes were still there, shining and unblinking, but she could start to make out the shape of the animal in the shadows. She saw the flick of a tail and suppressed a shiver. “You should really make a loud noise. Do a little dance. Freak it out so it runs away.”

@connyr0​

Wendy was pleased to discover that walking right into the Senior cabin was a much less arduous process than checking herself in and out of Conny’s dorm building. Sure, she got a couple sidelong looks from a few students still milling about, clearly clocking her as one of the Juniors who tried to learn a TikTok dance over by the well the other day, but no one spoke up and stopped her from entering Room 3. Conny hadn’t been there—and that’s what Wendy was counting on. His bed was easy to spot, unmade with a Scream poster overlooking it; a crumpled up flannel sat at the foot, and it took a surprising amount of self control not to take it for herself. She wrote a flowery note to tell him to meet her at the bridge at three o’clock sharp with snacks in tow, then ripped out the page, folded it into into a cootie catcher, and left it on his pillow with a little heart scribbled on. For as frustrating it was to not be able to just text him the message, she always said letter writing must’ve been way more personal and she was thrilled to enact the practice. 

At 2:56 PM, plucked dandelion in hand, Wendy peered over the bridge and down at the creek below. She liked the way the sunlight danced off it, twinkling as the clear water rushed over little pebbles and plants. She could see her reflection too, distant and distorted, and smiled slightly. She thought of Narcissus, turning into that pretty flower in a fiery passion, and tried to imagine what a Wendy-flower would look like. She always liked purple—but also yellow, of course, for Keough. Purple and yellow with lots of petals, she thought, like a dahlia. Those were her mom’s favorite. Or maybe like a snapdragon, shooting elegantly up toward the sky. She picked off a few petals from the dandelion and dropped them over the side, watching as they floated downstream, and hummed thoughtfully to herself. At the sound of footsteps, she turned. “I see you got my secret message,” she said. “I really wanted to do one of those invisible ink tricks, but it turns out lemons are not indigenous to the forests of Massachusetts.” Which she knew, but the idea popped into her head nevertheless. Her stomach quietly growled and her smile dropped. “What’s the snack situation?"