{boulevard of broken dreams}

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ms. nessa saoirse ashers
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THE Utah sun, merciless and unforgiving in its tyrannical rule, beat down upon it's subjects, the residents of Salt Lake City. Ladies ran around in their short-shorts and tanks while men with bare arms followed after them. With a gasp, Nessa Ashers stumbled out of the air-conditioned Pioneer theater building and inhaled a mouthful of scorching, humid air, bumbling her way across the entrance and into the Salt Lake populace. She spent the first five minutes in a blind stupor, the shocking heat and the complete polarizing difference from the theater all she could wrap her head around. The moisture collected quickly on her sunglasses and she was forced to wipe them clean with the back of her hand, knowing that if she removed them the glare of sun on the white pavement would blind her in the literal sense of the word.

NESSA had never gotten over the difference between her current home and previous one in Nova Scotia. She had, at first, rejoiced over hearing that she would be moving South having spent half of her life previous standing around in seven layers of clothing and snow up to her waist waiting for the school bus. But Salt Lake had presented her with a culture shock she could have never imagined. It wasn't the conservative culture, nor the strict set of faith and values that every family seemed to share. That all deserved little more than a wave of the hand in Nessa's book. No. The one thing that had blown the girl off of her feet and came with the shock of a blow to the stomach was the summer climate. It was heat and humidity like she could never have imagined, and it was the one thing that made her consider, if only briefly and in a °97 F induced coma, that maybe life with Mom wasn't so bad.

REALITY found a place within her head once more after Nessa walked smack into a large man and tripped over his chihuahua whilst she blubbered apologies and attempted to back away form the scene as quickly as was possible. She inhaled another blast of heat, flames licking the back of her throat and drying her tongue, backing up against a light pole in the middle of the sidewalk and pausing. She blinked several times, getting a hold of her head and making quite sure that she was in no imminent danger of collapsing and cracking open her head on the pavement, which would not be good at all. If that were the case her audition for Chorus Line not ten minutes previous would have all been done in vain, and wasted time was wasted time.

TEARING her gaze away from a calorie-soaked fruity ice-drink in a sun tanned woman's hand, Nessa glanced upward at the pole on the street corner, having decided that she would be able to urge at least three blocks worth more of lucidity from her petite body. The sign read 900 S. She stared, momentarily stunned that she had made it three blocks already. But Nessa was familiar with the area and knew that the 900 block held the city cultural center of Liberty Park, which more importantly meant vendors, which meant drinks, which meant not fainting. A big plus in her book.

IN fact, the park was always where Nessa went after an audition. Anyone that knew her was well aware of that fact. The little piece of God's commercial, processed handiwork in the middle of the city was one of her favorite things about Salt Lake, probably because it reminded her of home, her childhood home. The grass was green, the trees were large and -relatively- untamed, and, if she managed to look past the hordes of people, the whole calmness to it added a little bit of much-needed peace to her otherwise mental-beyond-help life.

IT wasn't long until Nessa found herself in front of the stone slab welcoming her to the park. The trees provided a desperately-needed shade and, lo and behold, a hundred meters ahead of her a thin, acne-suffering boy who couldn't be any older than herself stood idly at a little mobile stand, with a pedal-power front echoing of a bicycle pulling a cart of god's nectar. Forgetting entirely the heat and the complete lethargy it gave her, Nessa let out a victory cry and found herself running forward as fast as her short legs could carry her. The smile on her face as she shoved two dollars forward and said 'keep the change' was so wide and grand it left the boy staring momentarily in bewilderment before he remembered his job and retrieved a bottle of water from the ice in the cooler. The container in her hand left her with such a sense of gratitude that Nessa felt there was nothing more appropriate to do than lean forward a kiss the service boy on his cheek. She did just that.

Three minutes later found her lounging on the top of a picnic table beneath a tree, shade covering her completely and in-hand water bottle providing more gratitude than her favorite Christmas present. If ever she had forgot what happiness was, her present situation reminded her thoroughly.

word count; 868. wooo lots o muse
tag; open to any and all
looking; mighty fine and just like this
song; fences! by Paramore
notes; blah, i have enough muse for the world to share right now. I think this went on a few hundred words too many. I hope ye like fluff.

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Caleb Bailey made his way down the street, his hands shoved in a pair of khaki cargo shorts. 97 degrees was nothing to the boy who was southern born and bred. This wasn't overly hot in his book. Maybe a little on the uncomfortable side, but not even enough to make him sweat. It was even drier than what he was used to, hailing from Louisiana, and the lack of humidity had given him a couple nose bleeds upon his arrival, but he'd had no problem adjusting since then. Winter; now that could be a whole different story entirely, and probably would be. The sixteen year old absolutely loathed the cold. He was convinced that if there was such a thing as Hell, it would be icy, rather than fire. Fire, fire was fun and enjoyable, though not, he supposed, when you were being burned by it. But not even that could hold a candle to being cold, as far as he was concerned. Now, however, was not the time to worry about it. Caleb was not one of those people who worried overly about the future. Unless one was considering his soccer career, and then he could look years ahead. Other than that, though, Caleb was all about the present, the here and now, the instant gratification. Winter would come when it would, and he would cross that bridge when he came to it; or maybe he would burn it first. It was hard to know what he would do. Sometimes he crossed them, sometimes he burned them. Generally it depended upon his mood when he reached a bridge.

Sunglasses hid his green eyes from the sun, but they made him look all the more dashing, what with his messy reddish hair and a slim fitting American Eagle teeshirt. But then, he always looked hot, as far as he was concerned. He was a tad arrogant when it came to himself, but he wasn't overly so, not annoyingly conceited or anything like that. He just liked himself. What could he say? It was the truth.

Green eyes covered the area of the park. He wasn't sure how exactly, he had ended up here, as he was still pretty unfamiliar with the area. Being a back woods boy, he didn't really like the city, and it was taking him a good while to learn his way around, but he didn't mind. He liked wandering. Eyes landed on a pretty blond as she took off running toward a vendor. The poor, unfortunately unattractive boy wasn't entirely sure what to make of her enthusiasm. Caleb couldn't help barking out a laugh. The boy certainly had never waited on someone as pretty as the blond.

With a slight smirk, he let his feet meander toward the girl, who had now flopped herself in the shade of a nice big tree. Clearly she didn't deal as well with the heat as Caleb did. The smirk stayed upon his features as his steps carried him slowly over; he wasn't in any fat hurry. In fact, Caleb was hardly ever in a hurry. People who didn't see him on the field had a hard time imagining him running after anything, especially a soccer ball. But those were the people who didn't know him very well at all.

Without invitation or preamble, he settled himself next to the girl, flashing her a brilliantly white smile. "The poor boy didn't stand a chance" he chuckled, nodding his head t oward the vendor, in case she didn't full catch his meaning. "I'm Caleb, by the way" He added, twisting slightly to offer her his hand. "Caleb Bailey" He finished, giving her another dashing smile, revealing two rows of perfectly straight white teeth. Of course, they had been helped along by braces, but he didn't generally tell anyone that. Let them think he was perfect. He certainly wouldn't be the one to enlighten them.

Word Count: 659
Tag: Nessa
Outfit: Too lazy. I get it later. =S
Notes: Too lazy to do a pretty thread thing. lol