padme_n (padme_n) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2019-02-05 14:13:00 |
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Entry tags: | padme amidala, will gorski |
Who: Will and Padmé
When: February 3rd
Where: Laguna Beach
What: Surfing
Rating/Warnings: None
Status: Complete
There was no point in coming to California, Will had told himself, if he wasn’t going to at least make the attempt to learn how to surf. Surfing had been illegal in Chicago for all of Will’s childhood, and even though the ban had been lifted three years after he’d graduated high school, Will had never tried it.
When he’d told Diego that he was planning on moving to the West Coast, Diego had told him that now he had to learn how to surf. And that he had to send Diego all the embarrassing photos and videos from all his failed attempts. He wasn’t entirely certain how to take any videos or photos, short of dragging someone from the force out to the beach with him, but he figured he could still try even without them.
Problem was, Will just… wasn’t very good at this whole surfing thing. It was probably his dozenth attempt, and once again, the second he attempted to stand on his board, the whole thing flipped over and dumped him into the sea.
After her dinner with Anakin the night before (which she still didn't know if it was a good one or a bad one), she had a lot on her mind. Surfing always helped with thatPadmé had had her own (more successful) run and was feeling pretty good about herself. It was a little bit cold, but that was fine -- she'd more than warmed up on the water.. Setting her board down on the sand, she reached up to wring the water out of her hair while she watched the other surfers. It was a beautiful so-cal kind of day, so there were quite a few, even if it was still colder than she would have liked it.
There were some good ones out there, and some ...not-so-good ones. And then there was someone who clearly had no idea what they were doing, and no one was reaching out to help. Sometimes, surfers got so into their heads, they couldn’t see when someone was struggling. Picking up her board, she trudged through the sand to where Will was and gave a wave. “Hey! Need some help?”
Will was just wondering if he should give up and go home, maybe think about paying for lessons or giving up entirely, when the woman approached him. She was cute, and carrying a surfboard which probably meant she at least had some idea how to make the whole thing work.
“Apparently,” Will said, shooting her a smile. “It always looked so easy on TV.”
Padmé had to laugh at that. “ Everything looks easier on TV. That’s why they have editors. No one wants to see the montage of surfers falling.” She paused for a beat. “Well, except on “America’s Funniest Videos.”
Again, she smiled and extended a hand. “I’m Padmé. How about you set your board on the sand, and get on it? I think you need to learn how to activate those core muscles and use them for balance. As I’m sure you’ve just found out, it’s not so easy to stand up straight, bend at the knees, and then stand up again. I was watching you, and it looked like you were over-compensating, which had you in the water.”
She set her own board on the sand and hopped on, her arms stretched out. “Just like this.”
“I’m Will,” Will said, taking Padmé’s hand and giving it a shake. “Nice to meet you, Padmé.” There was a part of him that wondered if Padmé and Anakin knew one another, and if it was awkward being named after Star Wars characters, but he kept that to himself. No point in making someone feel uncomfortable, especially not when they’d offered to help him out.
He watched Padmé hop up onto the board, frowning in concentration, and then nodded. “Alright,” Will said, laying down on his board. He hopped up, hopefully passably mimicking Padmé, arms extended. “Like this?”
She eyed him critically and shook her head. “You’re too heavy on your feet. Here, let’s try something else.” She stood on her board, and put her hands on her hips. “Now, this sounds totally silly but I want you to jump and try not to make a sound.”
Padmé showed how she went from a sitting/squat position to on her feet, delicately landing on the board. “Now, I had years of ballet to help me with this, which maybe you do too, who knows. Just try to get up from sitting, and keep an eye on the stringer -- that’s the line on the board there. As long as you can keep your feet there, you should be good.” She thought for a moment. “And is this your own board? Or did you rent it? It could also have a balance problem too.”
“I knew I shouldn’t have skipped all those ballet lessons,” Will grumbled, the corners of his lips curling up to reveal the joke. He’d never really thought of doing ballet before, but he was pretty sure that even if he had, his father, a rough and tumble Chicago cop, would have nothing to do with it.
He tried jumping up, though, embarrassingly, still let out a bit of a grunt when he landed on his feet. To his credit, they, at least, were in the right place. “It’s a rental,” Will said. “Don’t exactly have the cash to throw around on something I might not ever use.”
“Yeah, it’s pretty pricey,” she admitted. “Better to rent than to use crap...but if you want to go out again, I can ride with you and you can use mine as long as you promise not to destroy it.” She grinned. “And even if you do, it’s not the end of the world. I have others, this is just my favourite right now. That way, you know it’s perfectly balanced, and if you suck? Well, that’s on you.” Cue a wink and the deepening of her grin.
“How does that sound?”
“Really?” Will asked, clearly surprised by the offer. “I think that sounds great, if you’re sure.” He wasn’t used to people just coming up and offering to help like this. Usually, it was him who was helping everyone. It was a nice change.
“Sure!” Padmé could see he was surprised, so she wanted to make sure he really understood she was doing this because she wanted to. “Besides, everyone could use a refresher course sometimes, even old pros like me. When you get so used to doing things in a certain way, you forget about the basics, or you don’t even bother thinking about a different perspective. This way, I have to actually remember the right way to do something to show you.” She smiled widely and held out her hand for his leash and board, while she waited to exchange her own. “Now if you wanna follow my lead, we can see if we can’t get you to ride at least one wave today.”
Will unstrapped the velcro from his ankle, and handed it over to Padmé, taking her surfboard in time. He attached the leash for her board to his ankle. “Show me how it’s done, Padmé,” Will said, heading toward the waves.