Peyton had practically been groomed to care about people's opinions of him since the second he was born - it was pretty obvious from the beginning that Ryden did not, so Peyton figured that maybe there was something about that that made him want to be a bit better about it. He didn't know why, but he just thought it would help in some way if he was the good Avery kid. Maybe it would help himself, maybe it would help Ryden; he didn't know. He just knew he'd been this way too long to look back now. He was too far gone. He frowned at Hayden, who seemed to be coming up with a way to shoot down his every attempt to get out of singing. It was almost annoying, but he didn't care, for some reason he wasn't entirely aware of. "It would help, though," he said stubbornly, staring at her.
As he watched her light up, he almost smiled, practically feeling proud of himself for managing such a feat. He didn't know why, though, to be honest. He couldn't pinpoint it no matter how hard he tried. He watched her suspiciously as she demanded a change of scenery, and he raised an eyebrow. Really? Would his tutoring sessions just involve her constantly trying to get him to sing and run around the castle? Surely there was some sort of method to her madness. At least, he sure as hell hoped there was, or this would just be a waste of his time. He scowled at her comment, managing a quick "I'm not scared" that he wasn't sure she heard before wandering off after her. He could just stay there on the ground and everything would be fine, but for some reason, his feet kept walking along after her.
He came into the room just as she told him to look up, and he once again found himself acting weirdly - he did exactly what she told him to. He tilted his head upwards to look at what she seemed so enthralled by and, to be honest, he thought it was actually pretty amazing. He watched it silently for a few moments, only looking down when he suddenly felt her grab his hands. He almost pulled away, but he didn't want to run the risk of offending her or something, so he just let her hands stay where they were. "What's the point of this?" he asked her, and it came off ruder than he'd wanted it to. "I mean, it's not like it would work," he added - again, ruder than he'd anticipated. For someone who didn't want to offend the poor girl, he was doing a hell of a job of probably managing to offend her without realizing what he was doing.