ten_fwd | Gym

There was a time when Annie was in a gym at least six days out of seven. Ages eleven to sixteen, during her time at the Career Academy (a slightly grandiose name for quite a glorified school club, but it wasn't until Annie was a victor herself that she recognized the self-depreciating humour in the name). Before school and after school, training and training and training. After that, when she was washed out, no gyms, but she kept up the physical activity - and exceeded it, fishing being what it is. As a victor, she ran most mornings, or swum. Worked out. Sparred with Finnick. She'd noticed if she didn't, her mind got worse, her fits of hysteria (anxiety attacks, Beverly had called them) more frequent.

But it's been six months since she's done anything properly physical regularly. When her mood's been stable, she's turned the holodeck into a running track, but that hasn't been nearly anything like five or six days out of seven.

She's twitchy, which goes a way to explain how she winds up in the gymnasium, trailing her fingers over the bo staffs in their rack. She'd been good at spears in the Academy, and although the idea of stabbing now makes her uneasy, she's still good at wielding a staff. She can get her fiancé (tall, built, twice her size and lethal) on his back.

Annie picks up one of the staffs and hefts it, giving it an experimental twirl. It's well-balanced, and she smiles, quiet and shy and delighted.

But despite that delight, and how practically she's already dressed (boots, trousers, simple blouse under her loose jacket, hair braided), she doesn't make any further movements towards any of the practice mats.

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"Of course," Beverly answers with a smile. "You could do it with your staff, but it's easier to learn without anything in your hands."

Motioning for Annie to join her when she's ready, she settles into the first stance. "I'll show you how it goes in steps. After a few repetitions of the entire set, we can try putting the whole thing together."

She'll see how Annie does. They might not make it through the whole plan during their first try, but she has no doubt that Annie will pick up the basics very quickly.

"I don't really need the staff for anything," Annie admits, and puts it back, carefully. She can't spar with anyone not Finnick, and it's not really one of her glassmaking tools to twirl.

She hesitates, and then kneels to take off her boots and socks before slipping her jacket off and neatly folding it on top of them. At least her hair is already in a braid. Then she walks over.

"Do you want me to stand in front of you, or to the side to copy?"

"I think mirroring my movements from the side will be the best option for right now," Beverly answers. "Unless you feel more comfortable mirroring from the front."

It doesn't matter to her, as she has done this both ways before. Her own hair is too short to braid, but she did pin it up a bit to get it out of her face and she's in her Mok'bara clothes. Even after all these years, it still fits.

Giving Annie and encouraging smile, Beverly waits to see what she chooses before settling again into the first stance. She will make sure Annie gets it and then move on to the next, taking it slowly to give her friend time to mirror each of her movements.

"Side."

Front can be useful. Very useful. But the idea of focusing on something in front of her is making the skin between her shoulder-blades crawl. Not much. Just a little.

Annie settles into the same stance as Beverly, adjusting until she's balanced, and then follows.

She's a quick study, and despite all her skittishness, she knows her body and how it moves. She's also been trained in following directions.

It's exhausting, more mentally than anything else, just focusing on slowly moving. But she continues until Beverly says otherwise.

Beverly keeps her demonstration to a speed that Annie seems comfortable with, however slow or fast it ends up being. Once they've made it through one sequence, she pauses, straightening up again and glancing at Annie to see how she's doing.

"You're doing very well," she says with an encouraging smile. "Do you want to go through them individually again or shall we put them together now?"

"Put them together."

It's a flash of her old confidence, the confidence she'd had as a teenager. Learning things and putting them together quickly? That, she knew how to do. Not just training, but an innate skill she'd grown up with. She wants to see if she still has it.

And she does. She can't run through the entire sequence without a mistake, but she does it well enough that when they are done, she's grinning in something like triumph.

They still take the sequence slowly, mostly because that's how it was meant to be done, and even though Beverly had to correct a few things, they were minor enough that she doesn't mind sharing in Annie's triumph.

"Well done! You're a very fast learner, but I shouldn't be surprised. With how quickly you picked up everything else, I should have known you would pick this up just as quickly. A few more repetitions and you'll have this down in no time."

It's been years since Annie's had to learn anything completely new, or even moderately new. The last major thing had been her glassmaking, but that was five and a half years ago now.

The computers in the lab had been new, but she'd been too stressed to really feel much achievement there. But this? This, something physical, requiring her to watch and think and replicate, makes her happy in a way she's finding it hard to remember.

"Maybe you're a good teacher," is what she says, though. Complete a, "Thank you."

It's not a thanks for the compliment.

Beverly just smiles warmly and brightly in response, feeling happiness that she can offer something like this to a girl who so obviously needs even the smallest comfort and support in her life.

"Come on, let's try it again," Beverly encourages. "The more practice you have, the better your form will be and the easier it will be for you to experience the meditation part. When you know the pattern well enough, you'll be able to focus on relaxing and letting your mind rest."

That's how it usually works for Beverly, at least, and how it's supposed to work from what she can tell. She's hoping she can help Annie experience the same soon.

Gym - OTA

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