``hell or glory i don't want anything in between``

[ryan lovett cartier]

ryan found something grossly unfair in the fact that the smallest building on this entire school campus was the art room, but hey, he wasn't ever one to complain, and it still had pretty much anything he could want, so it all worked out in the end. and besides, he didn't actually spend much time in the art room--he usually snagged some supplies, tipped his hat to the art teacher, and headed back to his dorm to do all of his creative blah blah blah there. it was easier this way for him, he liked to be alone with just himself and his music. the room itself probably did a wonderful job of harnessing peoples' creative muses: it was brightly colored, delightfully, artfully disorganized, and there was always some type of music playing. different artwork in various mediums and states of completion lay on tables or propped up on easels, and it had that wonderful smell of turpentine crossed with creative juices. overall, to a geeky art-bird (as his mother had always called him, the reason still remained rather vague in his head) like ryan, it was as glorious as any gym was to a jock. (yeck, icky sweaty-smelling places, ryan thought with a wrinkle of his nose).

for reasons unbeknowest to ryan himself, he was dilly-dallying about in the art room today. maybe he wanted some company, and not many people happened to be wandering about his dorm (ha). or maybe it was simply because he was, and always had been, a bit of a procrastinator. it was just one of those charming downsides to being raised by parents who were self-proclaimed hippies. as ryan liked to argue when people brought up his more...lackadaisical ways, "what needs to get done, gets done. what more could you ask for?" not that it was an actual arguement--ryan abhorred conflict and was a firm believer that "anything war can do, peace can do better". another charming characteristic of a flower child. but whatever the reasons, ryan was being positively nonsensical and positively silly in his charmingly lazy ways, but that much was to be expected. because, really, did anyone ever see ryan in any mood other than a positively nonsensical and positively silly one?

he was putting off going back to his dorm, but he didn't necessarily see that as a bad thing, because he was actually doing something productive now. rather than just taking his supplies and retreating back to the familiarity of his room, he'd decided he'd work on his current project. it was a mixed media project, but ryan had always been partial to bright colors (duh), so he'd chosen his three favorite mediums: watercolor, pastel, and colored pencil. he really liked where the picture was going far, but then again, maybe he was biased. but on the other hand (ryan was quite fond of debating with himself, you see), you are your own worst critic, as the saying went, and ryan knew that was true: he usually gave away his projects rather than hang them up in his room because he said "seeing them day after day was torture" because the mistakes (that only he, the artist, could see) mocked him. the art room itself was empty, but that didn't matter one bit to a kid like ryan; like most, he preferred to listen to music when he worked. sure, the art room itself had its own ambience supplemented by classic music playing through a boze stereo, but ryan wanted inspiration, not to be put to sleep. his iPod, his omnipresent companion, was all he really needed to work; he was rather proud of how much progress he was making today.

his piece of artwork was from a picture he had found on the internet, but he didn't really consider that too much of a bad thing--he'd seen some kids march out of here with a sketch of a cartoon character from adult swim and be damn proud of it. the woman in the picture reminded him somewhat of meg, but that was probably only through looks. if he were to base this off of meg, he'd see some symbols in it, and he wouldn't be sure whether they would be honest symbols or ironic ones. namely? the white dress the woman (or girl, he supposed it could be, but the shoes and height seemed to suggest otherwise--yes, he was that contemplative that he could analyze a picture that deeply) was wearing. white symbolized purity in most cases (as it would be fit to stand in this case, should he desire it to). also, youth, virility, innocence, good, simplicity, or that which is sacred. with the current path his thoughts were taking, ryan could see it mean all of the above. he was a bit worried about meg, but he'd never been one to push his opinion on another. megan was a virgin still, but her choices put her smack dab under that category of "tease", and not everyone was a gentleman. he was worried that someone would take advantage of her and he wouldn't be there to protect her like he'd like to be. that was one of his absolute worst fears, but megan wouldn't listen to him. she said she knew what she was doing, but ryan didn't think so. but that was beside the point; the point was that if he could be there to protect her, he would. he may have been a pascifist by nature, but the thought of letting someone who hurt megan get away with it...well, that might just be enough to bring out a side of him he himself had never seen before.

words; 965
tag; ashton :]
comments; none :]
muse music; homecoming queen by hinder
outfit; here!
notes; click here for the project he's working on

[ashton cole johnson]

<sup>Ashton was one of those types that didnt really have a direction. Well really he never let himself have one. He had talent in a lot of things, whether he realized it or not. He mostly dabbled in music and writing, but outside of that he was also a pretty decent artist. He was no expert but he knew his way around the general vocabulary and the different types of brushes and other different things of art. He just rarely did any of the things he did for particular reasons thinking none of his stuff was good enough.

Ashton walked down towards the art room, his head down but yet keeping an eye out at the same time. He mastered this through out his years. This way he was unseen but at the same time could take in who and what was around him. You could probably put him under the category of those creepy kids that seem to know everything that was going on when he was a nobody. He was also the type that if people did happen to see him from time to time they probably lopped him into the group of kids they wouldnt be surprised would one day come to school with a gun and go all ape shit on everybody. Ashton sometimes wondered if that was even far off. There were a lot of times when he felt he could be capable of some pretty sick shit. It wasnt something he liked to think, but ashton had this theory. Everyone had that dark person in side of them. IT just took a certain something to bring that out. Ashton was pretty sure if that ever happened to him it would take a hell of a lot of something to get it to come out. Ashton also sometimes felt like he was a little naive about his own self.

Ashton readjusted his hat. He normally always wore a cabby hat. Not only was it his favorite type of hat and he thought they looked pretty good on him, but they were a part of him. Part of his shield. He felt like less of him was revealed when he wore a hat. Not only could he hid part of himself but when he wanted it could block his eyes. Eyes were sometimes a curse. He personally didnt think he let much out through those, but he liked to look into others. You could really find things out just merely by watching peoples eyes, or their actions. It wasnt always what they said. Some people were really good at lying, but actions spoke louder then words, so they say. Eyes... eyes were windows into people's souls. Not everyone could completely sever their emotions from the looking glass. Even if they thought they had. Or maybe Ashton just usually knew what to look for.

He could imagine that he put off a innocent and shy facade. That he looked like one of those quiet students that hoped to get by without getting noticed by the school bullies. He rarely said a thing to people, was the quiet guy in the back who was usually doodling or writing stuff unrelated to the class on his notebook. He walked head down even though his stride was strong and sure, his back straight. He just looked as though he didnt want to be noticed and that was true but not for the reasons most kids did.

Ashton brushed a piece of lint off of his black vest. Straightening it again. Under his vest he had an offwhite v-neck shirt. The sleeves went down to just above his elbows. The pants he wore accented their length. He knew he didnt have much to him, most people wrote him off as some anorexic twig that would break with the slightest touch. It was another thing people probably pinned him as weak for. Ashton didnt care, he knew that even though he was thin he also had a hidden strength about him and if anyone tried he would show them just who would be the one getting broke.

He didnt take much time to get to the art room. He had already scoped out the place keeping track of the times when most of the students would go there and he found out this was usually the time of day when no one was there. He could go down and work on his art project without being bothered by another persons presence. Ashton opened up the door and stepped in. He took a few steps in and his eyes immediately fell on the other person in the room. Goddammit! Well he couldnt always win.

His eyes were sharp as they took in the other person. He looked familiar and as he took a few more moments to process the person he recognized them as Ryan. His lip curled up just slightly. Great. He took another second to decide if he could just slip out but then he pushed that thought away. LEaving now would make it look like he had a problem and to him that would be weak. He doesnt run away from shit even if he really did not want to share his work room with someone else.

Instead he continued back to where he had his work and pulled it out placing it on a table nearly on the other side of the room so he wouldnt even be near him and then got the necessary items he was going to need to work on it. He never said a word to ryan.


((OOC: Sorry that was shit XD))</sup>

[ryan lovett cartier]

there was something to be said about common courtesies. you know, holding a door open for a lady with her hands full or picking up something if somebody dropped it and didn't notice. not messing with people while they were doing artwork could be another one, but any artist could tell you that sometimes...well, sometimes all you needed was a distraction. especially if the alternative was stepping over that cliff edge into frustration-induced madness, in which things were usually broken and certainly nothing productive was achieved. but that was neither here nor there; it was usually safest to assume that someone was in the zone and shouldn't be disturbed. ryan...well, he was weeble-wobbling somewhere in between the zone and the frustrated-madness cliff edge. he was feeling productive, but he was getting frustrated. the intricacies of this piece were maddening! the piece itself measured three feet by two feet, which most people would think was plenty big, but when you were working with something as small and delicate as trying to paint the keys on a keyboard or the strings on a guitar that, when all was told, measured about three or four inches high? ch'yeah, then things got tricky. ryan was even rocking the whole "i stick my tongue out just barely when i'm reeaaally focused" thing, and he'd be willing to bet the look on his face was comical. but, actually, right now was one of the very very rare moments when he was really hoping nobody came up behind him and scared him, because he might just have to get mad then. he wasn't a fan of conflict, but he'd invested too much time in this thing to just let something like that slip. but then again, the culprit wouldn't have done it to be mean. megan had learned that the hard way...she'd tried to be a cute little sneaky ninja and had let herself into his dorm and snuck up behind him...if it had been anyone but cute little meg with her hugely apologetic baby blue eyes, he might have just gotten mad. but that was besides the point.

setting down the brush very carefully (he'd forgone watercolors in favor of acryllics, screw it watercolors bled too much for such small detail!) beside the canvas, ryan sighed, leaning on his elbows to switch through his songs. iPod shuffle had been a little bit disappointing in its last few selections, so he switched it off shuffle and just set it on a good album (the beatles' abbey road, a classic if there ever was one). setting the black and silver device delicately on the table and taking up the brush again, but something caught his attention out of the corner of his eye. it was pretty much a general rule not to ignore stuff you saw in your peripheral vision--that was how people died in horror films. not that ryan watched that crap. it was too violent, too predictable, too...lame. it disgraced the good name of film (something he'd always admired, even if he'd never partook in adding to it with his own videos. it was just one of those creative passions to check out another time. good ol' procrastination, eh?) a quick sneaky peaky revealed a boy about ryan's age (he was never good at guessing), wearing an admirable hat and determinedly looking the opposite direction. his presence was a complete and utter shock to dear ryan, who had been so blissfully unaware of anything and everything that the thought of another human being having gotten in here on his watch was surprising but not absurd (as the proof was right in front of him). the boy seemed vaguely familiar, but ryan had never actually had a conversation with him (surprising), but he planned to (not surprising). it was just a matter of not upsetting the lad; as stated before, artists could be temperemental if disturbed and this kid was obviously determined to retreat into his own little world. but hey, ryan held no grudges, he'd done the same a moment ago. well, okay, granted he'd been alone in here so his own world had been the most logical choice of worlds to be in, but whatever, he wasn't one to judge. cutting off the music from his ears, ryan looked around for something to start a conversation with, but after failing a little bit, he merely unhooked his iPod from his ears and strolled over, pouring on the "minding my own business" facade in comical amounts, because ryan simply couldn't leave a chance to be silly, could he? nope.

"holy cow you scared me! i must have been really out of it to not have seen you come in," he began with a warm smile towards the guy, because encouragement was always nice, oui?

words; around 875, too lazy to look
tag; ashton :]
comments; bleeh its okay, mine was worse xl muy rambletastic
muse music; good ol' fob...nobody puts baby in the motha-fucking corner! xD
outfit; here!
notes; click here for the project he's working on