Post by ripley on Oct 13, 2007 19:26:50 GMT -5
What Never Was, and Never Will Be
The sun was just barley rising over the pine and oak trees outside the Yosemite cabin. Light eased in through the window, on an empty neatly made bunk, with a Boston Bruins throw folded at the bottom, and a black build a bear with a Bruins jersey propped on pillows. The sunlight settled on the spoke B of the throw. The bed was empty, but still warm from a body.
Soft footsteps stirred no one as Ripley Todd walked out of the bathroom in running shorts, and a tank top, no one ever saw her early in the morning; unless it was the team, and they were on the ice. She dug into the duffle under the bunk were someone currently slept under pink blankets. Unlike the other girls in there she wasn’t prep, hell she wasn’t exactly quiet either, but it worked out she supposed, but she would never be part of their world. She pulled out her MP3 player, and pulled on sneakers. Once up on her feet she snuck out letting the door shut softly behind her.
There was a light mist on the forest path, but the sun was quickly burning it off. She could smell the dew, with a mixture of breakfast cooking up at the main house. She stretched on the small porch like contraption they had. Putting the small ear buds in, she selected her hockey play list, a mixture of heavy rock, and plan rock that would get her hyped for a game. With that she began her two mile run. This was her time, as she ran past the other cabins as quietly as she could, nodding once to a counselor who looked half asleep. This was where she liked to be. In nature, by herself. Given she wouldn’t have minded a skate with the guys she had grown up with, or a day by herself, either one.
Ripley turned onto a path taking her through the Maine woods, dew soaked into her sneakers from the grass on the trail, and she was certain she would have to check for ticks. She went off the trail onto the mile long beach by the lake. She let out a brief little whoop, and broke into a sprint for part of it, walk, sprint, walk, and sprint. She had to work on her skating muscles if she wanted to get ready for the season. She was eighteen, but about to become a senior. She had stayed back in fourth grade, she can’t remember why, but it happened and that was all that mattered. She walked part of the way back to the cabin, it was nearly seven by then, and she had left the cabin at 6:30 according to her watch. She was sweating quiet heavily considering the humidity the day was going to bring. She hated the humidity; she would’ve preferred five below zero anytime.
She jogged back on the trail she had started out on, back through the woods, and onto the pebble path heading towards the cabin. She looked towards the Sequoia cabin, and almost smiled. She didn’t much care for drinking, or smoking only because it would interfere with hockey, but she was definitely the troublemaker. A misfit in a good girl’s cabin was annoying, though she did like to read. Sneaking back into her cabin she gathered up her shower caddy, and grabbed the two towels she used, one for her short hair and the other for her body. Leaving her MP3 she left the cabin and jogged over to the shower room hoping for it to be unoccupied. Finding a shower stall on the end near a window she set her things down and looked into the mirror. Brown eyes observed the slightly red and sweating face. She sighed. She would never be beautiful, why try? She twisted one of the knobs in the shower stall on, and let it run.