The Miles Between • •

[lethe anastázia prochazka]

Lethe was not the type of girl who could study all day and night. She needed an adrenaline rush sooner rather than later, and while anthropology intrigued her, she had also grown up with parents who knew the ins and out of the subject, as well as having their own areas of expertise. Lethe wanted to find her own by the time she graduated, but it was difficult when the classes she was currently taking were brushing over subjects she had journals about back at home. It wasn’t the fault of the professor’s, but rather a wicked case of bad luck. Everything on the syllabus so far had been introductory, or had focused on the things her parents had studied when Lethe had been growing up. She had already questioned the department to make sure she wouldn’t spend four years expanding on the comments of professor’s in class, or listening to them repeat things she had listened to her parents tell them over dinner when she had been sixteen. The reason she had chosen to study Anthropology was because it was the only subject that could hold her attention for more than five minutes, but it couldn’t do that when she was only hearing things that she already knew.

Closing her textbook and wondering why she had even bothered coming to the library in the first place, Lethe let out a sigh and slumped back in her chair. She wasn’t the smartest kid around, not by far, but this latest assignment was one she knew she could do without really hitting the books. The topic was one her father had been an expert on, and Lethe had lost track of the hours he had waffled on about it for. She knew the resources to check, the men to quote, and the best places to look to turn that into a masterpiece of an essay as far as her work went. Sitting here was only wasting away a good afternoon in a fashion that was driving Lethe crazy before it even began. She wasn’t a college kid who could pick up the textbook and work hard with a highlighter and notepad. Procrastination and a last minute rush was how the raven haired Slovakian made it through each deadline. It had worked for her so far and she saw no reason to change her ways now.

Shoving the book back into her bag, Lethe pushed herself up and strolled out of the library. It was a waste of time coming there, and she had known that when she arrived. She needed to find herself an adventure; or at least some company. From childhood she had been a social creature, and it was how she survived the daily grind now. Making her way outside, kicking the door open gently, Lethe looked around the quad in the hopes of finding someone she recognised. When her light eyes did pick someone out of the passing crowds, she jogged over to them with a skill mastered only by a girl who wears high heels often, and fell into step next to them. “You are a hard man to get a hold of. Have you been deliberately avoiding me lately?” She asked playfully, glancing up at Darcy as she adjusted the bag on her shoulder.

• • •

TAGGED! Darcy Malcolm Hyde
WORDS! 550!
OUTFIT! Awesome Kicks!
LYRICS! Indiana - - - Jon McLaughlin
NOTES! <3

[Darcy Malcolm Hyde]

Darcy had wanted to be like any other person attending school. He hadn’t wanted special treatment, he hadn’t wanted anything different when he’d decided to take some time away from Hollywood to get himself a degree. He wanted to live a normal life, even if he was still working when he could. Filming didn’t usually take all that long and he managed to get his classwork to do while he wasn’t filming or training for this or that. People didn’t realise just how much work went into getting ready for roles. Depending on the type of movie, there were training sessions with personal trainers, martial arts experts, stuntmen when it worked, there could be driving lessons. Hell, Darcy had even taken cooking classes for a role once! But when it was quiet, it was nice. There was no production assistant telling him he had to be at this place at this time, there was no four am wake up call after crawling into bed at two. Darcy may have kept up with sessions with a personal trainer but he didn’t over exert himself when he didn’t need to.

With school almost over for Darcy, he felt like he’d done a lot in the last four years. He would still return in the fall for a couple classes but it wouldn’t be nearly as extensive; just some things to make sure if he chose to, he could have the knowledge to return and get his doctorate someday. Of course, he had a few more months of actual classes, papers and assignments to get through before he really needed to think about that and while he didn’t have to, Darcy didn’t want to. When class finally let out, he gathered his books, shoving them into the backpack he carried around and waited until the crowd let out a little bit. His fellow students didn't treat him like a celebrity or some famous guy they wanted an autograph from. Well, they had for the first few classes but he supposed that was to be expected when his face was on more than a dozen billboards in New York, more than a few of those in Time's Square alone. But after the initial buzz died down, so did the stares, the looks, the random pictures being taken of him. He'd been so used to it that he hadn't actually noticed the flashing cameras until one of his professor's said pictures needed to be taken outside of class not during it.

For the most part though, Darcy liked being just another person in a classroom. He could talk to his classmates, joke with them and even head over to the student lounge for a drink with a couple of them. All without them batting an eyelash at his name or the awards he kept in a case in the office he had in his apartment. There were a couple in his grade and class that did that but they still had questions all the same. There had been one girl however that for all intents and appearances hadn't even know who he was until he introduced himself that day in the library. It was refreshing to say the least! He was thinking about grabbing a coffee or something before he went off to meet up with Jude for their next training session. It took a lot of hard work to stay fit and without the personal trainers help, Darcy would probably be a lazy ass. "Yes." He said, grinning down at the petite girl in the sky high heels she teetered around in perfectly. He'd seen women on the red carpet falter in those things but he'd never seen Lethe fall once. "How are you, Darling?" He asked, slinging his arm around her shoulders.

Tag || lethe anastázia prochazka
Words || 653
Clothes || Handsome Hero
Music || Drive You Home --Parachute
Notes || <3

[lethe anastázia prochazka]

The only kind of fame Lethe had ever known was in the academic world. Her parents were kind of a big deal in the world of academia, her mother especially. When they were growing up there had been out of town trips to conferences and while Lethe and her brother had got to see some cool stuff at the places they had visited, there had been people interrupting dinner and conversations to congratulate one or both of their parents on a talk they had given or their latest paper. It had gotten annoying and there had been times when Lethe was a teenager when she hadn’t been able to hold her tongue and had sarcastically said something about family privacy. It was sort of funny now that she was studying anthropology herself and was contemplating following in the footsteps of her mother. She doubted though that she would ever be a big deal like her mother. Lethe was far too restless to be able to sit down and dedicate time to writing research papers in the way that her mother had once done, and teaching all of that to students was another thing entirely. People rarely took Lethe seriously so she doubted a room of students would!

She didn’t know what she wanted to do when she grew up. That was a phrase she loved using, despite being twenty-two and having seen a lot of the world already. Well, all of Europe, and a fair bit of the rest, at least. However she had no plans for the distant future. She just knew that anthropology was what she was good at, and what she knew, although the latter was mostly thanks to her parents and her upbringing rather than anything else. It interested her too, but she had no clue how she could make a future out of it if she was honest. Lethe wasn’t letting that worry her right now though. She was the type of girl who lived in the moment, so she was just going to get through college first and then see what happened next. Right now she was looking forward to whatever adventure she could concoct for the weekend and see how long it took for trouble to come knocking at her door, because it often did and she often had to run away from it.

Darcy being who he was never bothered her though. While she liked movies she wasn’t as big on them as others were and she probably couldn’t even name the person she considered to be her favourite actor; he was just the dude in that one movie with the werewolves. Pop culture was not Lethe’s strongest point and she hadn’t even known who the hell Darcy was when other girls were practically gushing about him in class. She could be oblivious at times to so many things, and that had been one of them, which was why it never fazed her in the slightest when he spoke about movies or other celebrities, if they happened to pop up in their conversations about friends. More often than not she would emphasise that she was bored and hungry and ask if they could grab a snack. Lethe was interested in knowing about him, but she wasn’t all that interested in the Hollywood magazines plastered their covers with. Smirking up at him, she habitually curled into his side in a half hug. “That’s so rude, y’know.” She said, feigning hurt, before coyly smiling and looking up at the tall man through her lashes. “Better now I’m in your arms.” It might have seemed like she was desperately flirting, but Lethe’s troublesome personality was the type that came across as being overly friendly and what people would normally consider flirting, she just considered as being playful and mostly harmless. It was also what got her into trouble more often than not.

• • •

TAGGED! Darcy Malcolm Hyde
WORDS! 651!
OUTFIT! Awesome Kicks!
LYRICS! Indiana - - - Jon McLaughlin
NOTES! <3

[Darcy Malcolm Hyde]

Darcy had liked attending classes because he wasn’t treated specially. He was just another student. Just one who happened to also star in blockbuster movies before he’d applied and he would do so after he graduated as well. And in the meantime, Darcy would take on roles that grabbed his attention and ones he could work around his coursework with. He wanted to graduate from the university with a degree that meant something to him. He didn’t need to prove that he was smart, the people who mattered to him already knew as much. But he had wanted to prove it to himself. He knew looks faded and knew it was an excellent idea to have something to fall back on when the roles started becoming scarce.

Darcy was actually one of the lucky ones. He already knew what he wanted to do with his life. H e wanted to act. He wanted to entertain the masses. He’d taken a partial break to go to school but that was almost over now and soon enough he would be back doing what he enjoyed full time. But immediately after he was finished, he thought he might try his hand on the stage. He’d done a few productions back in New Zealand but he hadn’t done much since then and he wanted to know if he could make a genuine go of it or if he should stick to the silver screen. It was something he should have figured out during his four years but he’d known better than to put more on his plate than he could handle. As it was he already did his coursework a little unconventionally because a few movie roles he had taken on took him away from New York.

Lethe had never seemed to care what Darcy did to earn a living. She liked him for him and not for what he could do for her like some other people who had tried to befriend him. He had learned long ago how to tell the difference. And since then, Darcy only kept those who were genuine around him. He didn’t have the time or the patience if he were to be honest with himself, to deal with people who were only after what he could get for them. Lethe was different, she was genuine and Darcy liked that about her. She didn’t criticize his roles or his movies; well, not most of them anyway. And when she did, she was usually teasing him. “What can I say? I’ve finally revealed my true colours.” He joked. He liked that he could do that, too. He could joke around with her, tease her and she knew he was kidding around. “You’re such a little minx.” He said, pulling her closer to his side. “What are you doing now?”

Tag || lethe anastázia prochazka
Words || 498
Clothes || Handsome Hero
Music || Drive You Home --Parachute
Notes || <3

[lethe anastázia prochazka]

Lethe had never had the patience to sit down and watch a two hour movie. She couldn’t binge watch the hottest TV show either on Netflix. She couldn’t sit still for that long and focus on characters, plotlines and all the drama that was taking place. Plus, she usually ended up hating at least one person with such passion that she wanted to see them dead every time they appeared. She didn’t remember the last time she went to the cinema or watched a DVD. Lethe would fidget and fuss and eventually do something that would distract her from what was on the screen. If she had company they’d have to explain what had happened and then she’d still have a million questions about what she had missed. No, popular entertainment was not for Lethe. She got her kicks in other ways that didn’t include the celebrity column of a magazine. That was why she had absolutely no clue who Darcy was until someone had told her and even then she had thought it was a prank. So she had asked him, and then laughed in his face when he confirmed who he was. She then shrugged and said his name meant nothing to her; she’d seen nothing he’d done, though she’d heard of the titles. She had tried to sit through some since then, but usually it was in day stages rather than one sitting.

Not that it would have mattered to Lethe anyway. She liked to keep company with those who could keep up with her. That sort of crowd was a small one since Lethe had a habit of running from trouble in skyscraper heels, often swearing loudly as she did so. She wasn’t the type who meant to get into trouble, but it found her anyway and then she was usually forced to either talk fast, or run fast. She had no clue what she would be doing in five years because she wasn’t the type to think that far ahead. Her professor asked her what her plans were on a regular basis and he never seemed too pleased when Lethe shrugged her skinny shoulders and pulled a face. She didn’t care what the future would bring; Lethe just wanted to live in the now! She wanted to have fun, to see where fate wanted to take her. If there was a plan she was supposed to follow then it could wait for her to be ready.

“I’ll sell my story to the papers; “Hyde: He’s an ass. Like what I did there? Hyde, hide, get it?” Lethe grinned stupidly. She was joking of course. She didn’t give a damn about newspaper gossip or magazine columns. If Darcy told her something in confidence it would stay that way unless she had the best reason in the world not to. And it would be the best reason ever. Her friends were rare though, and she didn’t cast them aside for money or fifteen minutes of fame. She wrapped her arm around his waist as he pulled her closer and smiled wickedly. “So I’ve been told. But you love it really.” She flicked hair from her face and then let out a long sigh, glancing at the quad around them. “Oh, you know, the usual…avoiding studying, looking for fun…I don’t suppose you’re free and willing right now, are you?” She added in a cheeky wink, but her plans were really non-existent. She would take anything from coffee to hitting up a bar right about now.

• • •

TAGGED! Darcy Malcolm Hyde
WORDS! 593!
OUTFIT! Awesome Kicks!
LYRICS! Indiana - - - Jon McLaughlin
NOTES! <3

[Darcy Malcolm Hyde]

Before he’d been scouted, Darcy had thought up a lovely life of following in his mother’s footsteps. He enjoyed his classes and thought that it would be an interesting one to continue with after he’d received his degree. He wasn’t looking for a masters or anything like that. He didn’t need a doctorate. He was quite happy to continue pursuing the career choice that he had stumbled upon all those years ago but he’d promised his parents he would get a degree. They hadn’t cared what it was just as long as he stuck around and got it at the end of the four years it would take. He may have lived on the other side of the planet these days from his parents, but he still wanted to make them proud and he habitually did all that they asked of him because they didn’t ask much at all. Darcy understood that they only wanted the best for him. And if he hadn’t stumbled down the path he had, he would probably be at the same school as his mother, teaching alongside her and loving it all entirely. Hell, he might have an entirely different life, a wife and a kid even! 

But he wasn’t going to think about that because it wasn’t the path he’d gone down. It was a what if that didn’t matter. And these days he was trying to finish off a four year degree in Anthropology to make his parents proud. They didn't care if it was something that was useful or something completely ridiculous, they were just fans of education and wanted their child to have one before he really made any decisions. The only issues he found after starting at the university were the scheduling ones. He was secure enough in Hollywood and his career that he could afford to take the break, people weren't going to forget his name but it helped that the summer months were when he happened to do most of his filming and he could work around a schedule like that. Sure, there were a few things that needed to be done through the school year but he kept up on his assignments and coursework so it was just a matter or getting the work that was assigned while he was going to be away and of course, the permission from his professors, most of whom cut him a little bit of slack. There was one of course, that gave him more than he needed but Darcy liked that about Dr Rivers.

The man didn't seem overly impressed with Darcy's CV and pushed him just as hard as the rest of the students in his classes, which Darc had to admit, was a pretty nice break from the workload coming from the rest of the classes he was in. And when he just couldn't take the pressures anymore, he could count on Lethe to get him out there and living a little. He was lucky, that he'd found her and that she hadn't known who he was, nor did she give a damn that he was a celebrity. He needed normal and that was the whole reason he'd decided on school when he'd done. "Ha, ha. You're hilarious. You should try an open mic night with that comedy gold." He said blandly. She was a sweetheart and Darcy adored the petite comedienne, though she could definitely get him into more trouble than was probably necessary. He didn't mind though, she was always fun to be around. "I wouldn't put up with you if I didn't." He told her with a wink. He had too many serious people in his life, he needed fun and Lethe had come around at just the right time. She helped him relax and he really did love that about her. "I was going to grab coffee and see where that took me. Interested?" He asked, looking down at his petite cohort.

Tag || lethe anastázia prochazka
Words || 658
Clothes || Handsome Hero
Music || Drive You Home --Parachute
Notes || <3

[lethe anastázia prochazka]

Getting out of Vegas had been one of the best decisions Lethe had ever made. She had her brother to thank for it, of course, but she would never give him too much credit in case he was still holding it over her in their final years. Her life could have been so very different if she had stuck around. She might have still been working in the casinos, dealing cards and smiling nice to those sleazy businessmen who flirted their way through five drinks and five thousand dollars. She might have even reunited with Joel, ended up living in some nice house, being a doting housewife and mother. Lethe shuddered at the thought. She had loved Joel, else why would she have given him six years of her life, but she was not that type of girl and she feared that was exactly who he would have turned her into in the end. It was what he needed, she saw that now, but Lethe could not fit into that box; not without going crazy and ruining her own life in the process. She needed to find her own destiny, and it was likely to be at the end of an Anthropology degree, though she had no idea what she would do with such a thing once she had it. She never considered herself to be teacher material and she got into trouble wherever she went.

At least with her parent’s fame residing purely in the world of academia, Lethe’s mishaps were never widely reported. Her face wasn’t smeared across a magazine to shame them. No one even knew who she was unless they recognised the family name and so far the only people who knew that had been the professor’s teaching her classes. They had been giddy at first and then they would make small comments or jokes if any of her parent’s work ever came up as part of the required reading. Lethe wasn’t the type to politely smile though, and she often had a quick comeback ready for whenever they thought they were being cute with her about her parentage. She was here to try to learn by herself, to graduate alone and to then, perhaps, go on and continue the family name in the field of Anthropology but she would not live in her parent’s shadows or behave like some pastel and pearl princess just because someone recognised her family name, or had met her father one time at a seminar he was giving. Her father knew his daughter and he would be stunned to hear she was behaving than to believe she was acting up.

Her troublesome nature occasionally made it hard to keep friends. Lethe didn’t intentionally do anything that could cause problems, it was always accidental. However, with Darcy he seemed to put up with her antics and didn’t mind when she did something reckless without realising it was reckless! If he did he had never mentioned it to her anyway! “I tried; I’m too funny for the people. One man had to be carried out.” She said dryly, feigning disappointment at her failed comedy career. She scoffed and playfully dug her elbow into his hip. “Who says there would be anyone else around to put up with you? I don’t see anyone racing to keep you company.” She teased. The first time people had been staring when she was with Darcy she assumed it was because she had been wearing leather pants and killer heels in July. So she had shouted for the people to mind their own stinking business and buzz off. She hadn’t realised then exactly who he was and now she was convinced people on the campus were scared to approach when she was near him in case she shouted again. It was all a wonderful misunderstanding really. “Coffee can take you many places. Especially with me. C’mon.” She grinned, tugging him to move quicker.

• • •

TAGGED! Darcy Malcolm Hyde
WORDS! 662!
OUTFIT! Awesome Kicks!
LYRICS! Indiana - - - Jon McLaughlin
NOTES! <3