Logs:Shoot Your Shot

Shoot Your Shot
Dramatis Personae Avi, Roscoe
In Absentia	2024-05-21 "I got time."
Location <XAV> Athletic Center - Xs Grounds
Though fairly new and fully modern on the inside, the exterior of this building has a stately stone exterior that does not jar too much with the Victorian elegance of the mansion proper. Situated near the athletic fields on the grounds, the athletic center host a vast range of indoor sports and fitness endeavors. The most iconic facilities here include an Olympic size swimming pool, a basketball court, and a fully outfitted gymnasium. In addition to these and the boys' and girls' locker rooms, there are an array of smaller facilities upstairs: two studios for dance, martial arts, yoga, or fencing, a multipurpose space that can be configured for various team sports, and a fitness center with free weights and various exercise machines whose upper limits can bet set beyond what would be safe or useful to baseline humans with staff permission. It's quiet, in the gym today. Quiet a lot of places around school, in that too-loud way where there's a lot of people speaking but in hushed whispers that somehow hit louder than the usual boister. In the gym, nobody is speaking; one of the basketball players' lockers on the way in has been turned into a tiny sort of shrine, cards from his teammates, his jersey hung on the door collecting sharpie messages. There's a squeak of sneakers against the floor, the rhythmic thump thump of the ball, a telltale swoosh that, nevertheless, Avi isn't celebrating. Just catching the ball as it drops and pivoting to dribble back and shoot again. Roscoe has been hanging around the athletic center for a while, though he doesn't look like he's gotten much exercise in; he's slouchy and sleepy-eyed, one arm tucked across his chest in a sling, his fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt. He doesn't have to run after the ball, when the second shot comes bouncing toward him slightly outside the court, but when he nabs it out of the air the motion is kind of clumsy with his left hand. After a moment, he just bounces it back to Avi. Avi snags it out of the air, but he doesn't shoot again. He's dribbling the ball slow and heavy. His mouth twists momentarily, together with a sympathetic wince as he looks at the sling. "How long your arm gotta be on lockdown?" "Just till I get the stitches out." Roscoe shrugs his other shoulder, wiggles his fingers in the sling -- "Least it's not broken, this is my test-taking arm." This is not really humorous; the smile that follows it is very wan. His eyes are a little unsteady on Avi's face, and skip away just briefly toward -- who can ever say -- before coming back, with, "You live in the city, right? Your folks okay?" Avi is shaking his head ruefully. His eyes drop. "Oh, yeah, well, my ma'n'em good," is a little too casual. "You ain't got people round here, do you? My ma's up in Harlem, it got a little buggy up there but not near so much as downtown. Aliza was at school still, they locked down tight, she fine too. My aunt and one my cousins they still missing. M'guessing it'll be a bit to --" He shrugs, and bounces the ball again. "-- you think we really gonna have to do finals? Aliens should mean an instant pass." He's hefting the ball again, not actually passing it back to Roscoe yet but lifting his brows questioningly. "-- you know, s'a'couple'a real-real players, they got some broke arm, sprained wrist, and having to learn proper one-hand form made their shooting stronger once they got back in the game." "Oh. I'm sorry." Roscoe's fingers have curled back against his shirt a little uncomfortably; he shakes his head, now mostly watching the ball with darting little glances, eyelids lowered. "Did you all get an instant pass for Lassiter?" he says -- this isn't posed as a gotcha, probably he genuinely doesn't know. When Avi lifts the ball, Roscoe lifts his head slightly, eyes flinching a little wider open before he tilts his head in consideration. "I'm not a real-real player," he points out, but he shifts his posture a little, shakes out his left hand. "You know how to play all one-handed?" "Nah," Avi admits, without seeming particularly upset about this. "But Lassiter was cuz we was straight dumbasses. Ain't none of us caused the aliens." He grimaces, brief. "Not any us at school anyway, lawd, bet there some crackpot on Fox already up there saying mutants did it but I ain't reading none news today." He nods at Roscoe, his tone lightening even if he can't quite manage his usual bright smile. "I ain't never gonna hit the NBA but I do like to put a lil flare in my game, you know?" He's mostly still looking at Roscoe, not the basket, when he half-turns, lifting one arm in seemingly effortless arc to lob the ball into the basket with another satisfying swish. "Got no idea how much effort it took to make that shit look casual, first girl I asked out swear I was practicing that till my shoes ain't have soles yet just so she'd look my way." He's bounce-passing the ball, light, to Roscoe. "You wanna learn a thing or two --" He's glancing briefly at the clock, still early enough in the day they would normally definitely be in class, and his small hff is a little humorless. "We ain't got nowhere to be." Roscoe tilts his head very consideringly, watching the ball swoosh through the hoop with wide eyes. "Did it work?" he says, very seriously. "I mean. With the girl." He catches the ball with slightly more grace this time, more prepared for it, and even manages to dribble it a couple times left-handed, adjusting his stance a little absently. "Sure," he says, his tone not quite as casual as it's striving toward. "I got time."