Post by Hadleigh King on Jan 3, 2008 17:18:28 GMT -5
OOC: A few 'guidelines'.
1. Make sure you ask before joining this thread (you can do it over PM or just reply to this.)
2. Please be a Serious/Literate RPer - I don't expect a novel, but some substance is nice.
3. I have no idea what the title means, it's from a song. XD
–adjective
having or showing little or no interest in anything; languid; spiritless; indifferent:
Hadleigh was, by textbook definition, listless. Floating about the Brooklyn Heights Promenade was not an ample cure by an gross stretch of the imagination. He did not deal well in uneventful situations and when attempting to occupy himself usually fell back on the old and trusted mechanisms. Among these was the fateful cigarette. The cigarette was the one thing that made Hadleigh feel as if he was actually doing something as oppose to simply just walking with no direction. The cigarette added an extra layer to his person and purpose. Instead of just walking, he was now walking with a cigarette. So, abiding by his own sense of tradition and general, for lack of a better word, listlessness, Hadleigh took a long orange tipped stick from his pocket and placed it in his mouth lighting it.
There was an amazing amount of guilt that came with the lighting of a cigarette. Not only was one slowly killing oneself, but also powerless to stop it. No amount of bright and bubbly advertising campaigns or snarky warnings on cigarette packets could stop him. Smoking when pregnant harms your baby, smoking kills, smoking causes lung cancer. The truth of the matter was Hadleigh was not pregnant and just at this moment could not care less if he landed himself in hospital or six feet under in a graveyard. He had tried to stop, and had made the progress of not smoking when his son was around, but despite these miniature triumphs he still found that it was one of his only true vices. An indulgence, if you will. It was something he did for himself not anyone else. So much so that he often made a point of hiding it when on campus. He was not proud of it, but he was damn well not about to stop it. There was always a reason behind Hadleigh's smoking, anyway.
The reason today? Well, he had just dropped his son off with his mother. The hour long train trip back to where he 'lived' was always Hadleigh's least favourite part of the weekend. That hour meant that the time he had with Jasper was slowly ticking away until the train would pull into the station and Melissa would be there waiting to take their son home to her house and her lovely new boyfriend (ex-catalogue model and artist extraordinaire), Chad. Hadleigh had pondered long and hard about what kind of name 'Chad' was. It sounded ridiculous and he had come to the conclusion that it was definitely not his real name and most-likely a remnant from a 90's modelling career. He looked like a leftover from the Backstreet Boys with his hair parted down the middle and bleached at the tips. He was not her type, then again, it seemed that her type was (as she had told him recently) "everything you are not, Hads". He hated her for saying that. If everything he was not meant an ageing boy-band superstar with a fake name, then it was her loss.
He was not jaelous, but moreso angry. He hated thinking of him with his son. Jasper being corrupted by someone as shallow as 'Chad'. Hadleigh had always intended on teaching his son Arabic, but now only seeing him once a fortnight all they managed to get in was a few hello's and goodbye's before having to endure that hour long train ride back to Hell. The boy had always been interested in his father and where he came from. Egypt always managed to capture the imagination of a small child. The pyramids, the mummies, the pharaohs. Of course, that was not Hadleigh's Egypt. Jasper seemed to be under the impression that it was still like Ancient times. Egypt now, was, well different. It was a dangerous place and always with the threat of some sort of instability. Growing tensions amongst Africa meant that it was sinking lower and lower on the tourist to-do list. Secretly, Hadleigh was glad for this (he had always hated tourists), but hated to see his home be turned into a poor place.
Stopping at a bench, Hadleigh sat down. He was sick of walking because when he walked he also started thinking. Thinking was a bad thing when in such a disposition. Staying seated was a safer option by far. Leaning back in the bench, he watched as a group of children started chasing eachother in hot pursuit.
[/ul][/size]
1. Make sure you ask before joining this thread (you can do it over PM or just reply to this.)
2. Please be a Serious/Literate RPer - I don't expect a novel, but some substance is nice.
3. I have no idea what the title means, it's from a song. XD
–adjective
having or showing little or no interest in anything; languid; spiritless; indifferent:
Hadleigh was, by textbook definition, listless. Floating about the Brooklyn Heights Promenade was not an ample cure by an gross stretch of the imagination. He did not deal well in uneventful situations and when attempting to occupy himself usually fell back on the old and trusted mechanisms. Among these was the fateful cigarette. The cigarette was the one thing that made Hadleigh feel as if he was actually doing something as oppose to simply just walking with no direction. The cigarette added an extra layer to his person and purpose. Instead of just walking, he was now walking with a cigarette. So, abiding by his own sense of tradition and general, for lack of a better word, listlessness, Hadleigh took a long orange tipped stick from his pocket and placed it in his mouth lighting it.
There was an amazing amount of guilt that came with the lighting of a cigarette. Not only was one slowly killing oneself, but also powerless to stop it. No amount of bright and bubbly advertising campaigns or snarky warnings on cigarette packets could stop him. Smoking when pregnant harms your baby, smoking kills, smoking causes lung cancer. The truth of the matter was Hadleigh was not pregnant and just at this moment could not care less if he landed himself in hospital or six feet under in a graveyard. He had tried to stop, and had made the progress of not smoking when his son was around, but despite these miniature triumphs he still found that it was one of his only true vices. An indulgence, if you will. It was something he did for himself not anyone else. So much so that he often made a point of hiding it when on campus. He was not proud of it, but he was damn well not about to stop it. There was always a reason behind Hadleigh's smoking, anyway.
The reason today? Well, he had just dropped his son off with his mother. The hour long train trip back to where he 'lived' was always Hadleigh's least favourite part of the weekend. That hour meant that the time he had with Jasper was slowly ticking away until the train would pull into the station and Melissa would be there waiting to take their son home to her house and her lovely new boyfriend (ex-catalogue model and artist extraordinaire), Chad. Hadleigh had pondered long and hard about what kind of name 'Chad' was. It sounded ridiculous and he had come to the conclusion that it was definitely not his real name and most-likely a remnant from a 90's modelling career. He looked like a leftover from the Backstreet Boys with his hair parted down the middle and bleached at the tips. He was not her type, then again, it seemed that her type was (as she had told him recently) "everything you are not, Hads". He hated her for saying that. If everything he was not meant an ageing boy-band superstar with a fake name, then it was her loss.
He was not jaelous, but moreso angry. He hated thinking of him with his son. Jasper being corrupted by someone as shallow as 'Chad'. Hadleigh had always intended on teaching his son Arabic, but now only seeing him once a fortnight all they managed to get in was a few hello's and goodbye's before having to endure that hour long train ride back to Hell. The boy had always been interested in his father and where he came from. Egypt always managed to capture the imagination of a small child. The pyramids, the mummies, the pharaohs. Of course, that was not Hadleigh's Egypt. Jasper seemed to be under the impression that it was still like Ancient times. Egypt now, was, well different. It was a dangerous place and always with the threat of some sort of instability. Growing tensions amongst Africa meant that it was sinking lower and lower on the tourist to-do list. Secretly, Hadleigh was glad for this (he had always hated tourists), but hated to see his home be turned into a poor place.
Stopping at a bench, Hadleigh sat down. He was sick of walking because when he walked he also started thinking. Thinking was a bad thing when in such a disposition. Staying seated was a safer option by far. Leaning back in the bench, he watched as a group of children started chasing eachother in hot pursuit.
[/ul][/size]
