Calm before the Storm.

[Rocky†]

((Bridget Connolly continued from Crunch Time))

Bridget needed to calm down. With the incident from the library still fresh in her mind, that proved to be no easy task. It took a lot of pushing to get the redhead angry, but when she did, it took her a long time to bring herself back down. Currently she was walking laps around the exterior of the building, a practice she had started doing a couple years back when something was on her mind. What she needed right now was someone to listen to her vent. Something clicked in Bridget's mind as she recalled one of her closest friends would be off class right now.

With this goal in mind, Bridget started to deviate from her path, heading to the usual places her friend Raina hung out during her time off. She wouldn't be very hard to find thanks to her height, and it had been a couple weeks since the two had hung out for more than a few minutes. The company would help her mood for sure. Just as long as she wasn't forced into playing basketball with the girl.

[Gwbiii†]

((Raina Morales debut))

Raina held the basketball under her arm as she readjusted the sleeves of her shirt. It was a losing battle, but she felt compelled to do it repeatedly all the same. If it fitted better then maybe she wouldn't be so OCD about tweaking her clothing, but she'd long gotten used to it. It gave her something to do with her hands when she was nervous anyway.

Finished, she lined herself up with the hoop again, standing in the freethrow circle. She'd missed a shot last game, and although it hadn't been crucial it had reminded her to practice more. The court was deserted so she was able to concentrate totally on getting her hands and posture right. This time was going to be perfect. She figured if she was a bit better at mathematics she could maybe calculate the perfect throw so that the parabola reached the hoop at just the right angle for it to sail through. She wasn't that good though, and silly ideas like that were distracting her.

She tensed her body a final time before her gangly limbs thrust out, releasing the ball in a high arc towards the hoop. She followed through in a not entirely graceful manner and watched as the ball descended, slowly first as it reached the top of it's arc, faster as gravity caught it and finally plummeted down. It hit the edge of the hoop and bounced awkwardly toward the side of the court.

"Ugh"

She was glad no-one was watching her fail as she jogged over to retrieve the ball and reset. She tried to think what she was doing wrong. Maybe she was trying to hard, maybe she just had to relax. Or maybe she had to rinse and repeat 500 times until it became second nature. The prospect of the latter wasn't too enticing. Maybe she could apply some intricate memory mnemonics to speed up her learning like she'd read in her psyche books but never properly applied.

She scooped up the ball and sighed, walking back to the freethrow circle, it looked like she was going to be there a while.

[Rocky†]

Of course she's at the basketball court, ya dummy. Bridget thought to herself, finally seeing the distinctive frame of her friend. Naturally, it was the last place she had looked, thinking for some insane reason Raina wouldn't be spending her time off outside on such a beautiful day as today. Standing just outside the chainlink fence separating the court from the parking lot nearby, the redheaded girl watched the large girl miss a free throw in spectacular fashion. Even just watching that orange hunk of rubber bouncing was having a calming effect on her. Bridget waited to Raina to line up a second shot.

"JINX!" she yelled as the other girl released the ball. Whether or not it actually effected her was of no consequence to Bridget, walking through the gate towards her friend.

Like every other time the short girl was in proximity of Raina, she couldn't help but be amazed at her height. The two had been friends since was back in elementary school, when Raina was a mere head taller than her. Now it was head, shoulders, and a good portion of her torso. Standing a few feet away so as to not break her neck looking up, Bridget's eyes would meet Raina's.

"Failing spectacularly as always I see." was Bridget's only greeting, her voice a mixture of humour and sarcasm. No doubt she would have an equally witty thing to say in return.

[Gwbiii†]

After settling on not learning how to take the shot by rote, Raina went through the same preparation process as last time. She lined up the shot, this time taking a moment to try and visualise herself making a perfect shot into the hoop, another trick out of her psych books she'd never bothered using. Once again, she tensed her muscles, ready to release the ball in a perfect arc through the air straight into the hoop. It wouldn't even touch the sides this time.

"JINX!"

She tensed up at the last second as she released the ball, and watched as it went sailing over the top of the backboard to the back of the court. She grimaced and glared at the ball as it bounced back in her general direction. But no, it wasn't the balls fault this time... it was Bridget's. She dropped the scowl, forcing a sickeningly sweet smile as she turned to rebut the mild mockery of her friend.

"Oh hey, sup ma brizzle?" she said, being as painfully gangsta as she could muster in the face of yet another embarrassing defeat. Even if she could never be as caustic as Bridget, she could always be at least twice as aggravating.

[Rocky†]

Bridget put on her best sarcastic smile as Raina used her trademark gangsta speak she used whenever she wanted to annoy her. Normally she would have a witty comeback in store for this inevitable reception, but the redhead had been more concerned with finding her friend. With nothing better to say, she resorted to the next best thing: mild violence. Bridget playfully smacked Raina in her stomach, which was as always, exposed. No matter how many times Bridget had offered to get her sisters to make something that would fit properly, she had never heard back about said possibility. Enough of the though, there was serious business at hand.

"Well, believe it or not, I didn't come here just to mess you up." She began, picking up the forgotten basketball and dribbling it a few times. All her years of knowing Raina had made her into a fairly decent basketball player, though nowhere good enough to play on the school team. For one, she was way too short. "I had a little mishap in the library. No doubt the bitch is off crying to the principal. Just looking for a way to blow off some steam. So..." what Bridget was about to say, she never thought she would. "wanna get a game in?"

[Gwbiii†]

She found it odd how Bridget hadn't quickly mounted a verbal counter-attack, she was either up to something or something was wrong or she was thinking up a particularly scath-*OOF*. Raina doubled over slightly as the slap connected with her torso, It seemed Bridge wasn't in the mood for aggravated rapsault.

When Bridget said she hadn't come just to mess up her practice, Raina was sceptical, and it showed in her expression. Chances were pretty high she was going to run off with that basketball, vault over the fence or something and never be seen again. Which would practically define 'messing Raina up'. Of course, when she started detailing how she'd once again let her temper get the better of her Raina relaxed a little. Even more so when she offered to play.

"Sure, Monty." Bridget was so getting suspended, she'd probably decked somone and now they were lying in the first aid room, their face bloodying the pillows. One of the teachers would probably come looking for her and want to drag her off to Kendrick's office any minute now, that or she'd get a phone call from her parents lambasting her for not being sneaky enough. Either way maybe being compared to that bully extraordinaire would help distract her diminuitive friend long enough for Raina to retrieve the ball from her and score first. She sprinted towards her target.

[Rocky†]

"Hey now, I ain't no Monty." was all Bridget was able to get out before Raina barreled towards her, no doubt to try and get the ball from her. The redhead may not be as good at basketball as Raina, but she was faster. With a quick movement, Bridget was able to avoid Raina's aggressive charge. She dribbled the ball in place, smiling slyly.

"It don't be quite that easy this time around Rainey," Bridget said, using her pet name for her best friend. "Ya see, you haven't been to my house lately. My sister convinced our parents to get a basketball net installed, so I've been practicing. I'm gunna beat you this time!"

With that, Bridget took off for the net, no doubt with Raina hot on her heels. grabbing the ball in her hands, she took one last step and pushed off, letting the ball sail through the air towards the hoop of the basketball net.

[Gwbiii†]

With her sneaky-surprise attack's failure Raina quickly slowed her momentum and turned around. She stopped then, poising herself for pursuit while Bridget smacktalked. She was more focused on what was going to happen next than the defeat her friend was threatening. Fact was she couldn't preemptively block her, they hadn't organised which basket was whose.

Raina tried to guess which basket Bridget was going to run for. It was all in the eyes, the subtle unconscious glances she made as she sized up which side of the court to assault. From such small cues as that the master psychologist could tell she was about to run for the right side of the court. As Bridget took off in the complete opposite direction Raina lunged the wrong way and had to awkwardly push off to make up for it. She felt so dumb for even thinking the words "master psychologist".

She was barely keeping up, but that didn't matter, she wasn't trying to catch the redhead. Instead she sprinted straight for the basket, managed to outstrip the ball by a fair way, jumped as it came down towards the basket and swatted it out of the air away from it's target. If Bridget was exploiting her speed, Raina thought it was only fair to exploit her height.

She only had a second to think how sweet that denial had been before she hit the ground moving, and hard. She barely kept balance as she redirected her wobbly center of gravity for the corner of the court; where the ball was bouncing happily to itself. With the headstart on Bridget she managed to reach it first, scooping it up and thumping it against the ground methodically as she caught her breath.

"Heh. Pfew."

[Rocky†]

Hah, I'm going to get the first point for once Bridget had thought to herself as the ball was released from her hands, flying in a perfect arc towards the net, her victory guaranteed on this particular shot as it.... was unceremoniously swatted out of the air by the hulking behemoth that was Raina Morales. Dammit. Where did that speed come from? Raina was by no means slow, but with the head start Bridget had managed to get on her much larger friend, there was no way that she should have been able to catch up. Maybe she wasn't the only one that had been practicing?

Bridget made a mad dash for the ball, but once again Raina made it there first, although the red head probably wouldn't have let her get the ball anyways. Many was the time that Bridget had caught an unfortunate elbow in the face when Raina was "in the zone" as they say. Her face was red enough from the mild burn she had already begun to accumulate from being outside. She didn't need to add the colour of blood from her nose or mouth today.

As Raina stood dribbling the ball, each bounce easily reaching at least chest height of the smaller Bridget, a plan began to formulate in the red head's mind. Today was the day she would beat Raina at her own game. Her plan was flawless, but.... not ready to be executed. That would come later. Generally when the two played one on one, they would play first to ten wins. It was more or less an unspoken rule at this point. All she had to do was keep the game close... maybe let Raina get ahead... yes, it would work. A sly smile came across the red head's face as she began to backpedal towards her own net, waiting for the inevitable massive charge from the giant of a girl with the ball.

[Gwbiii†]

Usually at this point Raina would storm up the court and all but drop the ball through the net. Both in her usual games and those she had with Bridget. Perplexingly, she always seemed to have more success doing it with the former; obviously Bridget must've figured out her technique. In reality she still hadn't realised her performance in this regard wasn't because she was especially good at it so much as no-one was game enough to get in her way.

She could have just repeated the same, it still worked most of the time despite Bridget's tendency to shrug off mild injury. But she'd come there to practice something different, and practice something different she would.

Raina slowly started moving forward, the basketball thumping rhythmically as she did. She gained tempo now, breaking into a run, speeding straight for Bridget before... slowing not far past the middle of the court. As her momentum slowed she tensed her legs, readying herself, bringing her centre of gravity a bit closer to the ground. A moment later she jumped as high as she could manage and released the ball. She stopped to watch, grinning. The lob mightn't actually reach the hoop, but regardless of how it came down she intended to enjoy Bridget's face.

[Rocky†]

Bridget was totally ready for Raina to proceed as she normally did, by barreling up the court, running over the poor redhead and calmly slamming the ball into the net. She was prepared for this, and had tensed her body for this inevitable impact. It was part of what had made Bridget so accustomed to pain. Having a friend who has no concept of her own strength will do that for you. Bridget was running backwards, waiting for Raina to burst down on her and flatten her. So when Raina stopped at half court and took her shot, Bridget nearly tripped over herself trying to stop.

The smaller girl gave her larger friend a quizzical look as she heard the ball strike the front of the rim and bounce off. "You're just trying to mess with me now, aren't ya?" Bridget said playfully as she retrieved the ball, bouncing it methodically. She had a long way to go to get to the other side, and a rather large target to get past. Bridget decided that the best method for her right now would be to wait to Raina to act first, then react to what she does. It was a little trick she had learned before. Due to Raina's higher center of gravity, it made her more prone to fall for simple tricks, which Bridget was more than happy to utilize in this game of skill against her friend.