#glory.

@damned--irony

Tonight, the Foxes will be in California. It feels unthinkable—and not even because they'll be playing in the Championships.

For so long, Owl's Bend was Glory's entire world. And even then, it was mostly just her family's land. They lived far enough out from what could be called town that going there always felt like a production—enough of one that meant that even when people in Owl's Bend were supposed to go to church every Sunday they couldn't always be bothered. When her father drove away in his truck, leaving them alone with Justice and Glory climbing to the tops of the highest trees so she could know the moment he came home again, it felt like he might as well be going to Mars, but he wasn't even leaving Missouri.

She'd hardly ever left Missouri. She'd learned about running, about piling into the back of a friend's car and pooling all their cash to spend a night in a motel on the side of the highway, just for the feeling of being somewhere else. But she hadn't even left Missouri then, either. Not until she left it for the last time.

And even then she only got as far as Kentucky. Brought into town in the back of a cop after they picked her up on the side of the road, on some long stretch of highway where there was nowhere for her to hide.

She's been more places since, but never to California. And now, instead of seeing the scenery roll by on another long bus ride, she'd going to be on a plane, flying over even more places that she's never been on her way to somewhere else.

It's early, early enough that she still feels only half-awake, but the airport is still busy. It's another thing that feels strange, or used to: where she grew up, strangers were difficult to come by. Now she's surrounded by them, and she wonders the same things she usually does: who they are, where they're going and why.

Tired or not, she'd been too antsy to just sit at the gate waiting for their flight and had made a lap of the concourse, straying into each brightly-lit but somehow almost identical storefronts full of paperback books, electronics, and snacks. She'd been tempted by the latter, and when she comes back to their gate to find her teammates, she has a fairly full plastic bag and a black coffee.

"You better hope you're sitting next to me," she says, holding the bag aloft and giving it an illustrative shake. "I'll share, but only if you promise to hold my hand if things get bumpy."

L O O K  B O O K #338

Hair: Analog Dog - Tiffany(edited) (NEW!) Hairbase: GLORY. - Yana Tattoo: Bolson - Sak Yant Bangs: Analog Dog - bang 3 Top: Semller - LeNoir tee gacha Pants: Rebel Gal x Ec.cloth - Cutout leggings (@UBER) Socks: VALE KOER(top part) & Sweet Tea(applier) Shoes: ISON - Platform Nata heels Headdress: aisling - Efezah headwrap gacha rare Choker: Fonde - Buckle choker Septum: Yummy - Eclipse septum Fur: FAKEICON - SEC02 shoulder fur (NEW!) Bracelets: FAKEICON - Smosh bracelet set Bracelet: SEVEN - Elephant bracelet Earrings: SEVEN - Knock (NEW!) Eyeliner: BLOOM - Simple omega liner Poses/chair: GingerFish - Various poses

@damned--irony

She made it through dinner and speeches—standing on stage next to Claudia and the slimy ERC rep, trying to keep a smile on her face for the crowd and the cameras though she's sure it slipped into a scowl a few times as he cracked jokes at the Foxes' expense—in her high heels. But the boring, formal part of the night is over and she's not keeping them on for a second longer.

Thankfully, the banquet is on the Foxes' home turf this time and she had the forethought to stash her boots in the lounge—though it's not like she hadn't walked barefoot through the streets of Nashville last year when she'd had enough. If Wymack hadn't told her and Claudia that they'd be taking his spot on stage, maybe she just would've worn the combat boots from the start.

It's stupid to think that a pair of heels might make the difference between the Foxes being taken seriously and not—especially not when Glory was still up on stage with her arms full of tattoos, her dark eyeliner, her accent that always seems more pronounced to her when she's speaking into a microphone—but it felt like something she should do anyway.

She guesses she'll see what they say about it, or about her, in the press tomorrow, though she's not looking exactly looking forward to it. She'll watch tape and analyze her play, but watching herself speak on camera is something else.

"If I bombed, don't tell me," she says, sinking down onto one of the lounge couches with boots in hand to pull them onto her feet. "And I thought press duty was bad. At least after playin' a whole game we have a reason to be sweaty and tired."

When she thinks of the things she misses over the summer, over breaks—when so many of the Foxes go home in a way that she can't and leave her in Palmetto—she misses games, of course, like the one they played on Friday, even if it was just a scrimmage. But she also misses things like this.

It was a surprise to her at first, even if it maybe shouldn't have been. She might have grown up with a pack of siblings, but she always thought of herself as a lone wolf. A loner. When she left them all behind, it became even more true: she had friends in Louisville, but they were fleeting, foster kids that moved around just like she did. There was no one who really knew her, no one she really knew.

After everything, she'd thought it was better that way.

And that's how she came to Palmetto. She wanted to play Exy, to keep holding on tight to this thing she discovered in Louisville, this thing that made her feel alive—but she hadn't really been thinking about the team. Not at first. She thought that she'd keep her distance the way she had been. She'd thought that it'd be safer that way.

Two years later, and she's the Vice Captain of the team. She doesn't want to keep her distance anymore, if she ever even really did in the first place.

What she wants is to be here: dressed in all black on a weekday night—though it's not like that part is out of the ordinary for her—running around in the dark with her teammates as they try to shoot each other. They spent the past week on different teams, but this feels different: this time, she really doesn't care if they win or lose.

"You ever done this before?" She asks in between rounds, shrugging off her illuminated vest and setting it aside. "I think I'm real bad at it. I still can't tell when I hit someone."