Logs:Of Pictures and Purpose (Or, Regular Everyday Teenager Things)

Of Pictures and Purpose (Or, Regular Everyday Teenager Things)
Dramatis Personae Astrid, Kavalam	2020-10-19 "Not the poster child type, you know?"
Location <XAV> Gardens - Xs Grounds
From indoor gardens to outdoor, though without the protective greenhouse glass the back gardens do not last all year round. Still, the gardens out here are well-tended and well-worth spending time in, as well. The paths wending through the beds of flowers and herbs and vegetables spread out through the school's back grounds, tended by students as a credit class. Benches offer seating and a small pond is home to koi and turtles, as well as a few frogs. At the far back edges of the garden, a droning buzzing marks a few stacked white boxes as beehives. It’s a pleasant fall day and depending on one’s climate preference, could easily be considered just about perfect. Astrid is definitely one of those people, feeling that anything above 20C is far too warm and really wants her weather to hover in the 15C range. Perfect for a light jacket or flannel. Today it is a flannel - black and grey patterned with the sleeves rolled up about mid forearm. Her right wrist is still in a cast, which is starting to take on an off white hue, and her usual black skinny jeans are now torn at the left knee. Her unruly blond hair is kept under wraps of a dark brown beanie which fits awkwardly over the arms of her large black plastic frames. The usual tranquility of the gardens is disturbed today by the sound of small plastic wheels making contact with the winding pathways. Today she isn’t trying anything complex on her skateboard due to the recent injury, but as she moves forward, she’s occasionally crouching down and launching the board up into a kickflip, landing squarely back down on the board each time. Kavalam does not, at first, do much to ruffle the peace any further. Though he's taking little care to be quiet as he moves through the garden, his typical shroud of obscurity keeps him unobtrusive, even when he takes a seat on a bench right by where Astrid is just about to land another kickflip. It's only after he lifts his camera, takes a quick shot, that he appears -- less startling than it might be, his odd psionic aura makes this seem less like he's just materialized out of nowhere and more like he's been there all along, spliced back into Astrid's mind with only a vague sense of unease to mark the transition. A skinny gangling boy with unruly black hair and narrow half-frame spectacles, rust-red button down, jeans; despite both of them having shared the same grounds and classrooms and hallways for weeks now, Kavalam's face is entirely unfamiliar -- not even that mild sense of recognition that comes with passing the same people in the mansion on a daily basis. "Can I keep this one?" There's no greeting to precede this question; he's just turning the digital camera around, displaying the shot to Astrid -- captured right at the point of landing. His words come with a heavy South Indian accent, his scrunched-up eyes looking more at the camera now than at Astrid. "I think it might do well in the yearbook. Maybe a new brochure. Just look at how normal a school we are. Regular everyday teenager things." Back foot is slammed down into the lip of the board, causing the rider to come to a grinding halt. She turns to face the kid sitting on the bench, thinking about the disaster that was narrowly avoided by her last minute decision not to attempt a noseslide across that bench. How did she not notice him sitting there? She shrugs it off to just being too focused on her skating, trying to avoid another injury. “Sure.” Astrid states in a matter of fact way. She squints at the display being shown to her on the back of the digital camera, noting the little scrapes and cuts for a couple weekends ago are starting to heal up on her face. She looks back over to Kavalam, trying her hardest to place him but is coming up blank. “Oh, I’m not sure I should be on any brochure for the school. Not the poster child type, you know?” "Mm." Kavalam nods to himself when Astrid approves the photo, lowering the camera back to the end of the tether where it hangs around his neck. His dark eyes lift, studying Astrid's scraped-up face before skimming down to the rest of her. "No," he answers finally, after an evidently earnest consideration. "I don't know. Why aren't you?" Astrid shrugs again, biting down into her bottom lip and leaving small indentations from her teeth. “Well… I guess you’d want to look at it from the parental point of view, right?” She holds up her right arm, drawing attention to the cast. “Shall we call this, ummm… exhibit A?” She cracks a toothy grin, eyes floating from Kavalam to her busted wrist and back. “And I guess my face would be exhibit B.” There’s a brief pause as she lowers her right arm back down and lifts her left to mess with the position of her glasses. “Probably not the optics the school would want.” "Mm," this time more pensive than the last. Kavalam taps his fingers lightly against his knee, studying the cast thoughtfully. "Normal byproducts of skating," he finally declares. "I make no editorial decisions, though. I only take the pictures. I cannot imagine the brochure would mention the exploding parts." He takes his glasses off, rubbing the lenses slowly with a cloth produced from his shirt pocket. "As for optics, though..." His brows pull slowly together. "Who do you imagine this school likes to showcase? Giant scorpion monsters? Budding terrorists? We are practically a feeder school for the Brotherhood of Mutants, by our standards, skateboarding injuries -- very respectable." Astrid takes a step in front of the skateboard and then drops down, using it as a makeshift bench. “All valid points, but would it be obvious that my injuries were in fact due to a skateboarding injury?” She shakes her head. “I’m not convinced.” Suddenly she looks up at Kavalam as a toothy grin begins to creep across her lips. “Oh… I might just have the perfect person for your brochure.” She gestures towards the camera tether to his neck. “Mind if I see that?” "Well." Kavalam folds the cloth neatly and tucks it back into his pocket. "You were landing a skateboard trick in the photo. That may plant some ideas." His eyes widen when Astrid gestures to the camera; his hand lifts to it immediately, slightly defensive. The quick darting skim of his gaze around the gardens is a touch suspicious. "There is nobody else here." “True.” Astrid says with a nod to her landing the skateboard trick. “But I am not the only one here that would be photo worthy.” She eyes the other kid one more time, before raising her casted right hand up in the air with the index finger sticking straight like a little antenna, gesturing to him to wait. Her left leg is kicked straight as she digs into her jeans pick with her good hand. It doesn't take long for her cell phone to emerge and is held up with the back facing Kavalam. Within seconds the phone emits the generic camera app clicking noise and the phone is flipped around so he can see the photo displayed. “See?” Kavalam glances to the photo only a very quick moment before his gaze returns to Astrid, fixing there a long moment. His expression has quieted into an inscrutable neutrality; his steady stare is hovering just on the verge of uncomfortable before he finally ducks his head, mouth twitching into a faint and lopsided smile. There's amusement in his voice when he speaks, but it's quiet. "Sitting on a garden bench is -- bland enough for advertising, maybe. I never --" For just a second he hesitates, setting his glasses back into place. "Never thought myself so very -- photo-worthy." He rubs a hand at the back of his head, one leg starting to bounce, restless. "I suppose maybe that depends on your criteria, though. What moments are worth catching?" Astrid fixes her gaze right back at Kavalam once enough time has passed that it has far exceeded the point of being uncomfortable, and even then she can’t hold it very long and her eyes quickly dart down to her feet. “Well… Jethro Tull thought sitting on a park bench was worthy enough for a song…” Her eyes are still averted down toward her feet, which are planted firm on the ground as she begins moving her hips to rock the skateboard she is sitting on back and forth. “Never mind…. I don’t know… Why wouldn’t you be photo worthy?” Her head and gaze snap back up. "Who is Jethro Tull?" Kavalam's hand drops to the camera again, not lifting it this time but only tracing his fingers lightly against its corners. "Why do people take photographs? Some kind of memory you want to keep, no?" The side-to-side wobble of his head is uncertain. "I don't think I..." This trails off, changes tack: "How do you know which those are?" Astrid laughs, slapping her phone down onto her left thigh. “Oh, he’s just a cheesy old musician.” She leaves it at that as her eyes follow down to the hand movements around the camera. She shifts around again to shove her phone back into her pocket. “Yeah, for the most part... Though some people do take photos for art or representing a specific idea, right? So it would depend on what reason the photo is being taken.” She continues to jerk the board beneath her back and forth. “So maybe first you need to figure out the exact purpose of the photo.” "Is he good?" This time Kavalam does lift his camera again; it snaps once more on Astrid, somewhere mid-laugh. "I have a purpose in the photos I take," this answer comes with only the smallest of huffs, the amusement in it warmer and eclipsing whatever indignation, real or feigned, is also there. He tips his head towards Astrid's hone as she tucks it back away. "I didn't take that one." “Eh... For me? Not a fan, but you might like him.” She stops rocking her skateboard and rests both elbows across her knees, placing her chin into cupped hands. It looks incredibly awkward as the cast skews her head tilted to the left. “So you have a purpose.” She smiles slightly with a nod, catching the minute irritation in Kavalam’s response. “So what type of photo do you think would convey your purpose? A poorly dressed, broken wrist, scratches up teen on a skateboard?” She sits up straight, eyes pausing down at her knees. “Or…” she stretches the word out, over pronouncing the “r” as her eyes shift back to the teen on the bench. “Or a well dressed, injury free teen with a camera?” Both brows arch up as Astrid is suddenly hit with a thought. “Better yet… think of which picture your parents would prefer. I mean… this brochure is for the school, right?” Kavalam's small half-smile drops away at the mention of his parents, his eyes and camera both lowering. His finger stays on the shutter button, tapping there lightly without hitting it properly. His toe digs slowly against the ground, foot rocking first one way and then the other. "I think," he is slow in his reply, words drawn out uncertainly, "that many parents would like knowing their children still have a life while they are here. Outdoors, active, perfecting a passion. There is something -- one bit offputting in a brochure where all the students look posed." His finger is still toying with the button. "Besides of which. Brochures may be for parents, but, yearbook is for us." “Well… I think you have your answer then.” Astrid’s smile softens as she can’t help but worry she may have accidentally struck a nerve with her last comment. “Should we consider this matter settled? Candid over posed?” She stretches her left hand out intending to seal the deal with a shake. “Oh… I almost forgot. I’m Astrid by the way.” Kavalam rises, taking the offered hand with a small smile, a very brief shake. "Astrid. Yes. Right." He hesitates on the edge of speaking again but ultimately his head just dips, one small bob. "I hope the rest of your practice is -- explosion-free." When he slips off further into the gardens it is as unobtrusive as when he arrived, melting back in among the plants as though he were never there. “See you…” The words barely fall out of Astrid’s mouth, trailing off as her attention slips away from Kavalam and back to the empty bench. She stares at the bench for several seconds, almost as if she has forgotten what exactly she was just doing. Slowly she picks herself up off the skateboard, looking to her left and then her right before hopping back onto the board and kicking off further into the gardens to continue working on her kickflips.