that's what you get when you let your heart win

[Deleted]

(open open open)

"And she shoots, sheee..."

Dorky Isabelle was acting as her own announcer, mimicking a deep, low "announcer" voice, in the otherwise empty gym. It was her way of making the unpleasant activity that had to be done more fun for her.

As Isabelle narrated, she tossed the basketball from the red free-throw line toward the hoop. Waiting with childishly eager hopefulness for the victorious sound of a swish, Isabelle closed her eyes. This was the moment when all of her persistence would pay off, she was sure. Consequently, she was very disappointed by the anti-climactic noise of the basketball ricocheting off of the backboard and falling right back onto the ground, bouncing a few times, then sadly rolling away.

"... she misses, just like the last billion and five shots, because she's a loser who fails epic-ly at life!" Isabelle finished with a voice of not-so-authentic enthusiasm while going to retrieve the basketball.

The mean coach had told clumsy Isabelle that there was no way that she was going to make a free throw and that she would flunk gym class because of it. Basically, he was saying that she couldn't do anything to change what was already set in stone, and she was extremely stupid for trying.

Psh. Obviously that meant that she had to keep trying until she succeeded, even if her efforts for the past half-hour had proved as futile as the evil, smug coach had promised. Whatever, she would show him! Anyone who knew Isabelle (yes, that included the coach) knew that the fastest, most foolproof way to make Isabelle do something was to tell her that she couldn't or shouldn't. Without fail, she would always set her mind to prove the person wrong. (But that couldn't have been the coach's strategy. No way.)

That very attitude of stubborness, backwardness, and defiance had fuelled her insistence on standing in that gym until she got the shot right, but after so many failures, her usual impatience was getting the best of her.

Having yet again completed the walk of shame to go retrieve the ball and return to the free throw line, Isabelle took another shot and received similar results as the one before. She sighed and gave up, standing there with her hands at her waist.

"Note to self. Scratch 'NBA STAR' off list of possible future careers."

It wasn't Isabelle's fault that she couldn't walk in a straight line, tripped over her own feet, and had less athleticism in her than a squirrel. The doctors said her lack of balance and coordination had somethingto do with her inner ear... or something. She wasn't really listening when they explained it, but there was an explanation, and she took the man's word for it! So the whole make-a-basket-or-you-fail ultimatum was entirely unfair. Unfortunately, her gym teacher didn't really seem to care.

[badwolf]

Will had gotten lost again. Since he arrived at the school this very afternoon, he had managed to loss his way no less than four times. That had to be some kind of record. Speaking to himself he asked in a low voice “well it could be worse, I could be lost and the new guy, oh wait that is exactly what I am” He looked around to find something that could tell him where he was. He saw the entrance to gym. ‘How on earth did I get here’ he thought to himself. ‘Well since I am here, I might as well take a look at the local facilities’ whit that thought he opened the door and entered the gym.

At first he thought that the room was empty. But as he took another look around, he saw that there was a girl in the other end of the gym. She appeared to be practicing basketball, a game that Will had never been able to see the point of. But perhaps that was just a side effect from being able to put the ball in the net with his mind.

The girl started talking, and for a moment Will thought that she was talking to him. She said something about NBA and a list. He was just about to answer when he realized that she had been talking to herself. He walked closer, hoping that the girl could tell him how to find his way around this place, and also because he really hadn’t talked to anyone since he arrived. It was too bad that he did not have his bag with him, he would have liked to change so he could perhaps run a few laps around the gym. As it were he was wearing a pair of white jeans and a black shirt. ‘Well another time’ he thought to himself ‘if I manage to find this place again’

He stopped walking a few meters from the girl and said in a friendly voice “Hey there” He put on a friendly smile and waited for a response. In his experience, though it was very limited, it always paid to be friendly when greeting someone for the first time.

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Isabelle quietly muttered French curses, directed at her coach for his ultimatum, her parents for not passing down any athleticism to their child, and the inventor of basketball for contriving the stupid sport in the first place. If some dude had never attached a bucket to a pole, or something, then Isabelle's afternoon would have been spent causing mischief, exploring frontiers, pushing boundaries! As it was, she instead got to put a ball through a hoop-- or rather, fail to do so. Much less fun. Isabelle scowled with bitter resentment.

Having retrieved the ball once again, the dorky sixteen-year-old swiveled around to once again approach the free-throw line, but this time, she realized there was someone behind her. The scowl on her face abruptly disappeared, giving way to a brief look of confusion, followed by her infamously mischievous smile. Being a "go with the flow" kind of person, a visitor wasn't going to disrupt her momentum very much, no matter how unexpected.

"THINK FAST!" she ordered with a friendly grin, tossing the ball in the newcomer's direction. Unfortunately, with Isabelle's lack of coordination, the ball didn't go as far as the girl intended. Instead, it rolled toward the boy's feet. "That... was totally on purpose," Isabelle affirmed with a slow but steady nod, wondering how this person would react to her oddness.

[badwolf]

Will thought that it seemed that something or another was annoying the girl in front of him. She seemed to be cursing, well at least that was what he thought by the tone, he could not understand or recognize the language. In any case it did not seem as if she was enjoying herself practicing basketball. As the girl retrieved the ball after another failed attempt, Will wondered why she did not just move closer to the basket she was trying to hit. He didn’t have a very extensive knowledge about the rules of basketball, though he believed that he at some point had them explained to him, it was one of the many downsides of having lost his memory.

He saw that the girl had spotted him now, he also noticed the short look of confusion that passed over her face, it was only to be expected, turning around and seeing a complete stranger would certainly make most people a bit confused. But then it was his turn to put up a confused look when the girl tossed him the ball. It wasn’t as much the fact that she tossed the ball that surprised him, but the fact that it landed at his feet. He heard her claiming that it was on purpose, that made him look at her with a raised eyebrow. “If you say so” he said with a smile. Then he picked up the ball and looked at the basket. He aimed and then threw the ball, it was quickly clear that the shoot would miss, so he focused his mind on the ball midair and changed its path to make it go through the net with a satisfying swisssh sound. He looked back at her with a smile “My name is Will nice to meet you”

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Isabelle was a little bit worried when Will raised an eyebrow at her. That was what people usually did in reaction to Isabelle's oddball behavior, right before they walked away from her. Not that Isabelle cared what anyone thought of her, it was just a tad difficult to have maximum levels of fun when no one was willing to play along with her strangeness. Then a smile replaced Will's expression of confusion, so Isabelle grinned with relief as the student picked up the ball and sent it into the hoop with a little help from magic.

The girl's nose wrinkled at the unfairness of it all. There she was, practicing the confounded sport for nearly half an hour, still unable to sink a single basket. Then some new kid showed up and made his first shot using telekinesis. Where was the justice in that! "Isabelle. And I hate you. That is so unfair..." That was when it occurred to Isabelle that she had some rather amazing abilities herself that could also be used to cheat. "... and so brilliant!"

Isabelle conjured an illusion of a basketball in her hand, taking a fraction of a second to adjust the shape, shade, and shadows for a flawlessly realistic effect. Smiling at her own handiwork, the talented illusionist pretended to dribble her illusion for a few seconds, making sure to create the bounce sound effect every time the imaginary basketball hit the gymnasium floor. Even that simple illusion took some coordination, and Isabelle, who was considered an indispensable prefect for her abilities, was capable of far more. Finally, the excited teenager "threw" her beautiful creation towards the basketball hoop, guiding it to sink perfectly with one final auditory illusion, a lovely swish before she stopped coordinating the scene, and the false basketball disappeared from sight altogether just before it fell to the floor.

"YOU'RE A GENIUS!" Isabelle squealed at the stranger, despite having declared her hatred for him a second earlier, and bounced over to Will to give him a tight hug. He was to thank for giving her the idea that would save her from endless hours of repetitive throwing in that gym, and Isabelle hated repetitiveness, so personal space would just have to go out the window.

[badwolf]

As soon as Will had made the shoot at the basket, he noticed the expression on the girls face. Perhaps it had not been such a good idea to use his powers to make the shoot. It seemed like she might take offence, and he was not interested in upsetting people. When the girl introduced herself, and added the fact that apparently she hated him, it convinced Will that he had made a mistake. He was just about to say something when Isabelle spoke again. Now she was saying that it was brilliant. He was trying to understand what she meant when suddenly a basketball appeared in her hand.

Will was amazed by the illusion, at least he thought it was an illusion, if he had not himself seen her make it, he would have sworn that it was a real ball. Even knowing that it had not been there a second ago, he could not find anything that could indicate that it was not real. Even the sound that the ball made when it hit the floor sounded right to Will, and he wondered if he would be able to tell it was an illusion if he touched the ball, or if it was really an illusion or something she had conjured out of thin air.

Still trying to figure out this new phenomenon, Will watched as Isabelle shoot the ball through the basket, even with a little swish sound from the net, and then the ball disappeared right before his eyes. Will was snapped back to reality at the sound of Isabelle’s voice when she declared him a genius; something that didn’t really fit with the fact that she had just said that she hated him.

Will didn’t really know how to react when Isabelle hugged him. As far back as he could remember, which wasn’t all that long, he had never been hugged by a person he had known only for a few minutes. Actually having spent all of his known life with a bunch of government people, he couldn’t recall anyone having hugged him ever. “Well I guess I have my moments. However with a show like that, I have to say that you are the genius, if I had not seen that ball materializing, I would never have been able to tell that it wasn’t real.” He paused for a sec and then added “Tell me, is there any particular reason why you are practicing basketball? You don’t really seem to enjoy it.”

[Deleted]

Isabelle wasn't oblivious to how Will was unsure of how to react to being hugged, but she didn't think much of it. People generally reacted to the oddball of a prefect with uncertainty, and her usual response was to continue her weird behavior. Isabelle just wasn't the type to make any apologies for being abnormal.

At being called a genius, Isabelle laughed a bit. She had been called many things. "Dork," "silly," and "lunatic" were a few popular ones; genius was far, far down the list, but the girl wasn't one to deny any compliment.

"Yes, I could give Stephen Hawking a run for his money, and I hear that's quite a lot," Isabelle chuckled, offering the new guy a friendly wink. As for the question of why Isabelle was practicing basketball, she wrinkled her nose at the mere reminder that the sport existed. Not feeling like explaining her coach's ultimatum and the fact that she was a bit gullible, Isabelle offered her version instead.

"Short version: My P.E. coach is pure evil," Isabelle quipped with a firm nod of her head. Hopefully, the reply would make a little bit of sense, but if it didn't, it wouldn't matter much, since Isabelle didn't give Will much time to ask further questions before she moved on to the next item on her winding train of thought. "I'd much rather be having adventures and causing shenanigans, but, ya know. Girl's gotta pass P.E," she added with a shrug.