Promise to Take You • •

[quinn skylar merlotte]

Quinn was not a girl who could sit inside and do very little. She had to be out in the world, actively doing something; even if it was just laps through Central Park until she felt a satisfying burn in her muscles. She just needed to be outside, and she needed to be active. Back home in Tasmania, her list of sporting activities had been endless, and she carried more sports kits around than school books, but that was the life she loved. It was just a shame that New York didn’t offer the same things she used to play back home, otherwise everything about the city might have been perfect. Still, Quinn had her spot on the college soccer team, and other social clubs kept her busy at the weekends and some evenings when she didn’t have training. Beyond that it was up to herself to make her own entertainment, and find her own adventures. This, however, was an adventure arranged by a friend, with Quinn merely plotting her own side quests to follow for when everyone else had tired out, or found the heat too stifling for a hike up a mountain. She was used to the heat, and hiking in the middle of nowhere. It had been most of her teenage years with Zach when the school holidays were in full swing and they decided to take a break from the crowded beaches.

Her tent was set up back at camp, where her little group had decided to take the day easy and swim in the lake. Quinn adored the water, but she preferred water that she could ride a wave on. So she had packed up her bag, grabbed a map, and opted to spend her first day of the week long trip walking one of the trails they had decided to skip as a group. It ran by an old mine, and there were a few unstable paths that were apparently unsuitable for beginners, according to a pamphlet someone had picked up from somewhere. They had a total of one beginner in their group, but she was the type who complained enough that everyone would stop what they were doing just so she would shut up. Quinn wasn’t the type to let that hold her back, so she had set off alone, promising to be back before it got dark. She was sure people worried about her because she looked tiny and innocent, like a baby deer. Maybe they purposely chose to forget that she had played Aussie Rules, or that she could take a bad tackle and roll up from it without complaining that she had a bruise the size of Africa on her thigh.

It was definitely hot out on the trail. Quinn wiped a bead of sweat from her forehead and reached for her water bottle at her hip. As she paused to take a drink, she looked around. She could see the mountains in the distance, and the tops of evergreens. It would make a great shot if she could get a higher vantage point. Glancing over her shoulder, she pulled a face when she realised most of the area was flat here. Her eyes drifted to the ancient tree she was in the shade of. It looked easy enough for a girl like her to climb, and the branches higher up seemed sturdy in appearance to hold her. She checked everything was secure and then, with a running start, scrambled up the thick trunk, grabbing the lowest branch and swinging herself up into the tree like she did it on a regular basis. A little higher and Quinn straddled the solid branch, sitting back against the trunk as she carefully removed her backpack from one shoulder to find her camera case. Fixing her bag first, she then pulled free her small, but trusty camera and snapped the shots she wanted. It was then she heard the familiar sounds of footsteps on the trail. She didn’t expect to be alone out here, but she also didn’t want to be the strange girl sitting in a tree should anyone look up. She moved to put her camera away, but fumbled with the light, fabric case – more concerned about keeping a hold on her camera and keeping herself in the tree. Everything seemed to move in slow motion as the case fell down through the branches, bouncing off one and then landing in the centre of a man’s head as he attempted to pass by the tree right at that moment. Quinn winced, and looping the camera lanyard she rarely used around her neck, she made effortless work of descending the tree, dropping from the lower branches to the ground in a neat crouch. “I’m sorry, are you okay there?” She asked, grimacing slightly as she snatched up the now dusty case and brushed it clean before shoving her camera back inside and returning everything back to her bag before she could cause more trouble. So much for an easy hike!

• • •

TAGGED! Jacob Myles Page
WORDS! 840!
OUTFIT! Apologetic Aussie!
LYRICS! As You Are - - - Rag N Bone Man
NOTES! <3

[Jacob Myles Page]

Jake loved being out in the great, big natural world. He would be out there, even if he wasn't being paid to stand around amongst the trees looking outdoorsy. Becoming a model had not been Jake's plan. It hadn't been something he'd aspired to be as a child and in fact, if it hadn't been for the fact that he was approached at the mall, he would never have even gotten into it in the first place. He'd always wanted to help people and for a while, he'd thought he become a nurse or maybe a paramedic. It wasn't until high school that he started to consider becoming a personal trainer. He might not save lives in the same sense but he was helping people get healthier so they could live longer and spend more time with their kids, grandkids and potentially even great-grandbabies.

As a man who came from a loving family, he understood the feeling of sticking around for a long time. Jake wanted a family of his own one day and wanted to be financially prepared for that day. It was why he'd agreed to the modelling contract. It was giving him the nest egg he was looking for and promoting a healthy lifestyle. He would never be one of those trainers who told their clients they couldn't eat this or that because he had a few bad habits of his own and while he was many things, a hypocrite, he was not. He did advocate for a good balance though which he thought was a good compromise. Sure, for himself, he might spend a little more time at the gym but his day job also required he be fit. He was a fitness model, after all, and that generally required some level of activity while shooting.

There was an hour break so the crew could reset the shoot and Jake took the time to take a quick walk around the area. He might have been in an element he loved, doing something that he really enjoyed but even he needed to decompress from it once in a while. A quick walk around a trail he knew wasn't that long and then back to the photoshoot was his plan. He'd been about halfway through it when something hit the top of his head, making him reach up to scrub the area. "Shit." He'd been hit with a falling pinecone and an acorn before, hazards of spending so much time in the woods so he knew what each of them felt like. That hadn't felt like either so he immediately looked down to see what it had been and spotted the soft camera case at his feet. More confused than before, he tilted his head back to look up in the trees and spotted a tiny blonde girl hollering down at him as she tried to make her way down without falling. "No harm, no foul." He admitted, absently rubbing the spot on his head again, though it didn't actually hurt. He'd been more shocked that he'd been hit on the head more than anything else.

♦ ♦ ♦

TAG; quinn skylar merlotte
WORDS; 518
LYRICS; Perfect Storm --Brad Paisley
NOTES; <3

[quinn skylar merlotte]

Quinn had no idea how people worked in offices all day, crammed into metal boxes to get home and then spent a night on the couch or down at some overcrowded bar with more strangers than friends. It drove her mad when she had four hours of classes back to back! She needed to be outside, even if it was just walking between the college and her tiny apartment. She didn’t like being cooped up, and she needed to get out and do something. If she hadn’t made it onto the girls’ soccer team at NYU she might have been driven crazy. Sure, they had the student societies that she was now a strong member of, but in the middle of winter no one in the water sports club wanted to take a boat out. She wasn’t used to the winters either. Coming from Australia her idea of cold was what most New Yorker’s called a good spring day with signs of summer approaching. In Winter she was bundled up like something out of a cartoon and even then she was often still shivering underneath all those layers. She was thrilled when she worked out enough at the gym to build up a sweat during those darker months, since it was the only time she really felt like she was warm. And her apartment heating bill skyrocketed then, too, with friends accusing Quinn of trying to cook them alive with the heat of her tiny home.

Those friends understood her better though when the summer rolled around and Quinn led them through outdoor adventures and found things for them to do that left their muscles aching in the best kind of way. She also joked that it was the best way to get a brilliant night’s sleep and she wasn’t that far off either when she said it. Quinn thrived in the outdoors. She had always been the girl covered in mud and bruises, doing her best to keep up with the local boys. She had never done it to impress them, but rather to prove that she was just as good as them. Sometimes, she was even better, but they were never keen on telling her that.

Quinn grabbed the camera case from the ground, quickly slipping her small camera back inside and looping it around her neck. “Are you sure?” She asked, wincing slightly. It had only been cloth, thankfully, but she had taken enough knocks to the head to know that if something hit the right spot it would always feel like a brick. “I should never have taken it from around my neck.” She admitted, adjusting the strap so it didn’t cut it quite so much when it pressed against the halter knot of her bikini, which she had on underneath her shorts and t-shirt just in case she found a nice spot where she could swim. Awkwardly, Quinn made a joke that only served to remind her that she was much better suited as a sidekick than a star. “If you were Chicken Little, you’d be saying the sky was falling!” She could practically hear Zach shaking his head at her – and he was across the globe right now.

• • •

TAGGED! Jacob Myles Page
WORDS! 540!
LYRICS! As You Are - - - Rag N Bone Man
NOTES! <3