T^2 / Livvy + Zander

Thérèse smiled brightly at the boy in front of her, admiring his curly hair--it was cute, pleasant, something exotic to her. There was a lack of connection between their gazes, the blonde's faltering with an inability to understand but every few words of his rapid dialogue. He was nervous, maybe. Or maybe people who spoke English just spoke that fast. Did she speak that fast in French?

"Ah, I know, 'energy,'" she replied hesitantly, "like ebullient."

Her gentle gaze spanned the length of his figure as well as the mount he was riding, a beautiful mare of Arabian blood, she thought. She adjusted her feet in the stirrups as Jest danced in place, head jerking down and then up, then towards a butterfly that equally enamored and frightened him. She turned back to Zander in the same dignified way, soft yet ever professional.

"Zander," she pronounced his name in the most precise, pronounced way, taking care to mimic the way Livvie had said it. "You use other languages?"

As she asked the question, Tyler and Livvie emerged from the barn together. She drew nearer to Zander as Jest would allow, and though the gelding tried to perform a fly-by, she succeeded in growing nearer to him, an enthused look in her deep eyes.

"They are, how do you say, besotted with an other, no?"

The slightest smirk reached her lips, but it faded as they neared. Thérèse grinned that generic but ever-charming grin of hers, gesturing to the open land ahead of them.

"We shall go, no?"

Emily / Tim

"Are you sure you want to stay here? Nothing is really going to happen for a long time, it's just going to be a lot of waiting, and you've had a long day..." Emily had been trying to coerce Cam to spend another night with Kierstan at home, one less eventful than the last with any luck.

"No, it's okay. I want to stay with you," he replied, looking up from his work. She sighed and nodded, slightly concerned about her own ability to keep her emotions in check with her son here. She agreed nonetheless--he was extremely well behaved and lacked any troublesome qualities that would cause her to send him home immediately.

"Fair enough," she replied, "but if you change your mind-"

"I won't," he smiled softly, something he rarely did. He saw the concern in his mom's eyes, and something in him worried.

"Emily?"

"Yeah, kiddo?"

"Is Laurence going to be okay?"

Her eyes got slightly clouded with tears, but she was still awfully calm. The image of him being wheeled around the corner, covered in blood and bruises, was something she couldn't get out of her head. She frowned. "I don't know, honestly. The doctors will do what they can for him, but it might not be enough."

He didn't seem satisfied with this answer, but he turned his attention back to what he was doing, noticing the fragility of her mood.

Not long after, Tim walked through the doors, and Emily got up, feeling the final threads of her cool facade breaking in half at the sight of him. She got up from where they were sitting and walked calmly over to him, crying before she'd even reached him. She clung to him, crying softly as people in the waiting room stared. She couldn't even begin to fathom the words to say, so she didn't, she just cried in his embrace. How did you verbalize the weight of death when it was close enough to touch?

-Heather gently squeezed the mare's sides once more, bringing her up to a canter. Mystery decided to playfully throw her head up in a sassy manner while cantering as the young woman couldn't help but to smile at her colorful mare's personality since it felt like she had done a really good job with her horse. She kept her back straight while keeping her posture relaxed but collected at the same time while the mare cantered confidently, carrying her head quite nicely even though the reins are kinda loose-

-Toby would be staying behind the arena fence, watching in interest as the large Shepherd would be laying down witn his tail happily wagging while he was panting a bit but the dog stayed right where he is, not moving a single inch from his spot while Heather continued to canter Mystery around the arena to warm her up like usual as the mare swished her tail a bit-

Olivia Lancewood | 16 | Therese, Tyler, Zander

Livvie emerged from the barn a few minutes later, proudly riding a calm piebald mare. Her helmet was already clipped on, strands of wildly untied hair already escaping from it after only a few minutes of wear. Her cheeks were flushed from the icy air, despite what the clear skies led one to believe about the weather.

"Oh oh I love your horse Therese! What's his name?" Livvie's ecstatic exclamation rang through the yard, attracting a few bemused glances from the few people in the vicinity. "Aren't you a cutie?" She leaned over to pat Jest's neck softly, her exuberant nature already onto the next topic.

"So where do you guys wanna ride? I have literally no idea where anything is here, so I'll probably get us lost. Not that that'd be the first time, but anyways! Are there nice trails here?" Every sentence seemed to be posed with an exclamation mark, whether it was a question or not. Glancing up at Tyler - his mount was a good halfhand taller, and of course there was his height to account for - Livvie's eyes sparkled, her excitement visible in every inch of her short body.

(well this is garbage xD but it's all you're going to get from me of liv for today, so I'm going to post it xP)

sorry for la delay :) crazy week and rollercoaster emotions, lmao. and my rollercoaster emotion twin is dying and unconscious so i couldn't exactly take that here XD

Therese looked at Zander with a gentle intrigue. "How do you mean is a trade? I didn't know trade." She offered a bright, charming smile again, though it seemed to only fade from her face when replaced with the confusion of an unknown word or phrase. "But, yes, I want a trade."

As they waited for the other pair, Therese scanned the property. Many riders were swarming away from one of the arenas a half-mile or so away, an ambulance leaving the property at a speed she found unsuitable for the amount of foot traffic here. "What is bad? See? Near there..." She pointed at the scene, slightly concerned, but mostly curious. She looked to Zander for confirmation that this was not normal, as if an ambulance and a swarm of people weren't universally foreboding in the worst way possible.

Soon, Livvie returned, Tyler close behind. She and Zander exchanged a knowing glance regarding their previous topic of conversation. The blonde beamed at the other, frustrated in her lack of ability to communicate her adoration of both of their animals.

"These are Jest," she gestured to the paint, who was leggy and antsy, having issues with how close Livvie and her mare had gotten. Therese smacked him as he went to take a chunk out of the pinto, pulling his opposite rein to keep his head to one side but refusing to move, fearing what would happen if both horses' hind ends faced one another. She still struggled to pronounce his name, and grew in frustration each time she attempted to say it.

"I love your horse," Therese gestured to Oasis, "she is very good." She gestured to the bay Tyler sat on, his ears pricked, displaying a regal expression. "I love your horse," she repeated again. "He is very good in addition."

As the question came up about where they should ride, Therese shrugged, glancing to Zander, who'd been fairly quiet in comparison to Livvie. She greatly enjoyed all of these people, though she knew Tyler the least and considered him shy and even slightly distant. He was, surprisingly, the one to speak.

"I studied a map of the place this morning, there's a network of trails that start," he paused, gesturing, "somewhere over there, and are supposed to lead back to a bunch of old civil war houses and stuff on the back of the property. A river too, and supposedly a mine shaft somewhere. It could be fun..."

Emily had desired to stop crying long ago, but found it most impossible to only cry about one thing. Her mind filled with thoughts of Laurence initially, then regarding the fact that Tim was supporting her through this, and her entire life had been spent traversing various traumas and unknowns alone with no help nor support. She found herself then crying about the fact that Laurence could be bleeding out on a table in the other room and she was thinking about herself rather than him. All of this created a prolonged sentiment which felt like forever to her. She never had liked being held while crying, for she felt awful about her tears staining the other person's shirt, her sniffles annoying them endlessly. Yet, she couldn't help herself, she'd reached her end.

"He's...good. Better than me, but I think everyone is." She managed a weak smile, nothing but grief behind her tan eyes. "I tried to convince him to go home with Tristan but he keeps refusing. I think he's trying to support me, but it's hard to keep it together with him here."

Feeling cold, dead, and empty inside, she found herself willingly half-leading and half-guided by Tim towards the empty waiting room seats where she'd been for hours. Camden looked at her suspiciously, perhaps taking on her pain himself. He was silent and intuitive, and Emily knew he absorbed more than he let on. She worried at what point it would be too much, since he seldom vocalized any kind of emotion. She tried to encourage growth in that area, but it was slow and inefficient. He looked up from his intelligent scribblings to offer a look of concern for his guardian, as if he had tons of questions on the matter. Yet, he dropped it as soon as he'd picked it up, leaving his questions unresolved, perhaps thinking it was for the best.

Seconds turned to minutes and minutes to hours, and it felt as if every name had been called except for theirs. One family had been informed of a patient's death, and it only made Emily paler and more fearful. Her desires were split between falling asleep, being blissfully unaware of the situation at hand, or worrying herself awake as she had for the past eighteen hours or so. It was evening by the time there was any news.

"Laurence is not doing well," the doctor explained to Emily and Tim. Camden was asleep now on Emily's shoulder, as innocent and unaware as Emily wished to be. "He's undergone multiple surgeries today to fix yesterday's damage. He had some internal bleeding as a result of the accident, and we were feeling optimistic about the severity of it when he was under our care, but when he left, it began slowly leaking again. He lost a lot of blood by the time we got him, and had to be revived multiple times. Obviously the surgeries were a lot of stress, and there are still several others that will need to be done if and when he stabilizes."

Emily's eyes began watering for the thousandth time that day. "You mean..."

"He may not make it through the night," he answered, "so if there is anyone else that desires to say their goodbyes, now would be the best time. There is no way to tell one way or another, and I don't want to give any false hope. It truly could go one way or the other. I'm sorry to be the deliverer of bad news, especially so late in the evening, but I am sure you know we've done the best we can for him at this time."

Emily only gave a soft nod of numb surrender. She was shaking, feeling dizzy at the news. Camden had awoken during the conversation and looked at his mother with apprehension, then to Tim, wondering how bad this was, and what it would mean for him. The blonde only glanced at her emotional support person of the evening with a look that could shatter the hardest of hearts.

"I don't know how or if it will do any good, but I want to go to the chapel. Do you know how to talk to God, or whatever people do there?"

-Heather continued to canter Mystery around the arena for the warm ups as the mare was very completely relaxed while naturally carrying her head. The red brunette had a lot on her mind as she started to doubt that maybe no one wants to come to Olympics with her this time around, maybe it was just better to go alone like she did when Prince was still alive. After a few minutes of cantering, the young woman slowed her mare down to a walk to cool her off a bit. Heather looked so focused about the lesson but in truth...she had so many things going on in her mind that just sometimes distract her from almost everything-