this isn't what we planned on

[Reese Jacob Moren]

been through a lost in the last year
it's like everything i love is slipping away
and every time i come home
some more of me isn't there
i gotta get it together

"Yeah, mom. I'm fine." The sarcastic tone rolled through his voice. "You send me to an academy, where I can't protect you anymore. I can't protect my brother. I can't effing do anything anymore." His voice got louder and louder as he spoke into the cell phone. "You didn't even bother to take the time off of work to come drop me off at this damn place, and you tell me expect more of me?" he questioned, angrily. "Yeah, right." He hung up the phone, without giving his mother a chance to say goodbye. He was over it. Couldn't believe her. He had been making money. And working his way into getting what he wanted out of the people he was around. Sure, they weren't the best crowd, but they were helping him with what he needed.

He looked around at the den in front of him. It was quiet, but there probably had been people who had heard his conversation. He wasn't quiet about it. And he didn't really care either. He slipped his phone into his back pocket, and walked over to the pool table. He set it up, and began to play by himself.

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn was careful of how much weight he put on his ankle, judging if he was in enough pain to need to go an see the nurse, and possibly have to sit out of a couple of days of training, or if it was just an annoyance and he could deal with that when he returned to his room. He had been an idiot when dismounting and landed wrong, so he decided it was the latter and ignored it for now.

Approaching the den, his eyebrows rose when he could hear the sound of a raised voice coming from inside the room, and just because he'd had enough conversation like that with his father, he decided to wait until the conversation seemed to be finished before he entered the room.

"Sounds like your entrance to the Academy is a riot." He commented when he saw that the voice belonged to a boy he didn't know... he wasn't on the gymnastics circuit either so he was no competition to Finn. Grabbing a bottle of cola from the fridge he walked over to lean against the wall near the pool table. "I'm Finn."

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese focused on his shot, careful not to clip the eight ball. He hit the cue ball, and sent the solid purple ball into a pocket. Pool was one of his favorite pasttimes. He usually hussled people back when he was in Chicago. Maybe he'd get away with it here. He figured he would have to try sometime. He'd either do well, or get sent to the principal. He didn't really care either way. It's not like he really wanted to be here in the first place, but things happened.

The boy looked up as another approached him. He nodded in response. "Yep," he stated. "Lots of fun." He kept his focus on the pool table, and used the cue ball to smack another solid into the pocket. "Reese," he said, finally looking up from the table at the boy. He kept the pool stick in his hand, and didn't offer his for introduction.

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn sipped his drink, nodding his head to the boy's name, pleased to have skipped the whole handshake thing, as Finn shook hands as little as possible; unless of course the person was a judge awarding him with a new medal for his collection, as they didn't seem to mind the callouses on his palms.

He watched as Reese played pool, the boy might even be descent competition at some point, just not today. Finn, wasn't stupid enough to put money on pool games here, not when there were other things he could use for payment of a game; barn chores, homework... It was school so the world was your oyster. And the fact that getting someone else to do his chores for him wasn't as likely to get him in serious trouble as taking money off another student would. "Do you have a horse?" If the boy was as good as he was playing, he should be able to carrying on a conversation that had nothing to do with the game.

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese had never been afraid of serious trouble. After his older brother was shot, he did anything he could to protect the rest of his family.
And that included serious trouble. Drug dealing was his number one issue. It's what got him sent to Blue Ridge. His mom wanted him off the streets and into something that could be good for him. He was a smart kid, but he had his mind in the wrong place. According to his mother, anyways. He always figured he was doing right. Getting revenge for his brother and protecting the rest of his family had always been number one for him. And if it caused trouble, so be it.

He shot another solid ball into the pocket, with ease. Obviously, he wouldn't be able to hustle Finn even if he wanted to. The other boy was watching him sink the balls in with no problem. He was going to know how good he was at the game. "I do," he said, not looking up from the table. "He's a Trakehner." Horseback riding was the one thing that saved him from ending up in juvie or military school. He had been riding the same horse for awhile now. His uncle had given the gelding to him when he arrived at Blue Ridge. A present for sending him away from where he was. "Yourself?" he asked, slinging another ball into the pocket.

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn pulled a face as he finished the drink. Why was it always the last little bit that always reminded him of how much he hated the stuff? And pitched the bottle into the nearest bin. "Nothing but net." He said softly as it skimmed the edge and fell in. He nodded to the question. "Yeah, I've got two." He replied. "A PRE/Andalusian, Mustang Cross and a Cheval de Selle Français." If the other boy wanted to throw breeds out there, Finn had no problems doing the same.

He fell silent as he continued his observation and then pushed off from the wall. "A word to the wise; don't make it look so easy when you're playing alone. Unless of course playing alone is the only way you are good." After all, Finn wasn't one of the best here because he won every game. He'd gracefully loose the odd game, just to make sure that people would still want to challenge him, even if that meant sinking any odd ball while playing alone at times.

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese wasn't sure about the rules when it came to horse-people. His background was entirely different than most of the people who grew up around horses. He had been around horses since he was seven, sure. But it was just for the summer, and then he would return back to the ghetto of Chicago, where he grew up learning how to steal, and avoid certain streets so you wouldn't get mistaken for being in the wrong gang. Horses hadn't been a priority of his. They had been a hobby. He was never competitive. He'd never even shown his horse.

Reese nodded. He wasn't exactly sure what half of what the guy just said meant, but he wasn't going to show that. He chewed on his lip, and focused on another shot. He looked up at the guy, getting a little ticked off. "Think you can do better?" he asked, and held out the pool stick to the other guy. If he wanted a competition, then so be it.

[Fionn Paquet]

If this were a western tv show, Finn was sure that a tumble weed would have just blown through the room, which told him more than he needed to know about this boy's ability with horses... about as much as his own until a year before he started here, back when he had lived and breathed gymnastics. Back when horse riding was something he did to get out of the house when his father had his business buddies around and he needed an escape.

He shook his head to the offered cue. "I probably could, but I forgot my gloves." He replied with a shrug and then looked at his hand. It wasn't too bad anymore, which is why he didn't have the bandage on anymore, but he'd ripped it during gymnastics, and holding a stick that had been touched by god-only knew how many people didn't appeal to him; that and he didn't think his ankle would handle the pressure changes either. "Some other time, and I'll make sure I have my hands wrapped." The last thing he needed was an infection in his rips - which was worse than his rips getting rips.

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese brought the pool stick back in, and scoffed. "The hell did you do?" he asked, bluntly. He obviously couldn't handle a pool stick. There was no way this guy was going to be any good, even with bandaged hands. It really wasn't his business to know where the other boy's hands had been. Nor did he really care, but the utter shock of seeing someone's hands so tore up made him ask the question. What sort of hard work was this boy getting into? And maybe it could be of some interest to him, if it meant any trouble was involved. Reese was always looking for trouble. He already resented the fact that he had to be at Blue Ridge. Why not cause a little hell to go with it?

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn laughed at the reaction he got. "I was stubborn in gymnastics, and wouldn't wear my grips on high bar." He replied, his shoulders still shaking in amusement. "And then I went riding. I did wear gloves for that, but it didn't help that Enfant was pulling." Rips weren't a problem in gymnastics, as Coach would still expect him to train with them.

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese shook his head. Gymnastics? This was not the type of guy he was used to being around at all. This place was way different than Chicago.
He wasn't quite sure if he'd ever be able to get used to it. When Reese thought of gymnastics, he imagined the girls in leotards doing the flip things on the bar. Not this guy standing in front of him. And he would have never imagined that gymnastics could cause that sort of damage to someone's hands. "That was dumb," he said, and turned his attention back to the pool table.

He sunk two striped balls into the pockets, and then looked back up at the other boy. He shook his head, and then looked back at the table. "Gymnastics..." he muttered. "What kind of man would do that?"

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn couldn't help but laugh, as it seemed that this street-tough nobody had just dished him an insult. "Ah, one who is on his way to Olympic glory." He replied with a self-confident shrug. "There are a number of actors who have had gymnastic training. At least I'm not a dancer." He laughed at that though, knowing his father would likely have an aneurysm if he said that he was giving up gym to become a dancer... He then gave the idea serious thought, at least then his father wouldn't think him doing photography was so bad.

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese shook his head, still unsure of gymnastics. There were better sports to get into the Olympics with. Baseball, basketball, hockey...And those were about the only sports he could think of. He never really watched the Olympics. Never even thought about them. His life revolved around so much more. More trouble that was. But that's what he was. Sports were never a thing for him. He didn't have those kinds of opportunities. The opportunity to be here was only because of his uncle, and what Reese had gotten into. Otherwise, he probably would have ended up in the same place as his brother. "I mean, whatever you say, man," he blew it off. He didn't give a shit why the boy was in the sport he was in.

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn laughed as it seemed that he wasn't making a friend here, and with only a few months left of school, he really couldn't care less. "I can benchpress twice my own bodyweight, and have the muscles to pick up most other sport easily." The self-confidence to do it too. "I like spying on people and taking photos of them too." He doubted that Reese would be one of the people he'd be spying on, the younger student didn't seem to be that kind of person, the kind that was stupid enough to get caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

"What do you do with your Trakehner?" Ride it, obviously, but Reese didn't seem dense enough for him to have to spell things out.

[Reese Jacob Moren]

Reese shrugged, but then kind of looked taken aback. Spying on people? That could be a normal hobby? Reese almost snorted. "Spying on people?" he repeated his thoughts. Now that was intriguing. He hadn't really cared about the first part of the boy's sentence at all. "Now that's something I could get into," he said. He hadn't been much for spying back in his hometown, but he had experience trying to plan revenge secretly, so that's got to be close to the same thing.

"Cross country, eventing, and show jumping," he replied. "Mostly cross country, though." Unfortunately, he hadn't shown very much. "Yourself?" he asked.