Take Me to Church

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His father had been a religious man. Catholic, to be exact. Lorenzo's childhood had been filled with bibles and rosaries, with bedtime prayers and early Sunday mornings at the Church with Father Julio and the rest of the congregation. Lorenzo didn't really remember the sermons, the homilies were vague in his mind and he had never gotten the hang of the confusing Latin phrases. What he remembered was getting dressed in his Sunday Best- button-up shirts with stiff collars and dress jackets that matched his dress pants perfectly. Shiny black shoes that were only for Church and absolutely nothing else. What he remembered was his father teaching him how to tie a Windsor knot when he was five-years-old, how proud he had been to be the one to wake up Amara the next Sunday morning already ready for Church, tie lopsided and shirt buttons only partially done. What he remembered was donuts and milk with the congregation after mass, or sometimes Denny's or IHOP with his father where Amara would try to explain the homily in words his son could understand. He remembered ice cream socials and roller-rink parties with his Sunday school classmates and his father taking him on retreats in the woods. He remembered his father teaching him how to say goodnight prayers that would keep him safe from monsters and devils.

Lorenzo was not a religious man. He hadn't said a goodnight prayer in years, and his last visit to a Church had been a tagging expedition, not a religious visit. Still, he had his father's bible and rosary on his desk in his tent, right next to the sword he could admittedly use more practice with and 3DS he could spend less time with. It wasn't as though he didn't keep himself fit- he shined in hand to hand combat. Still, he who lived by way of the sword killed he who still used fisticuffs. At least, that's what he had been told by one particularly snarky Mars kid.

And yet still, here he was, on the battlefield without his sword, wearing his father's rosary, and practicing his hand-to-hand. He would practice with the sword later, it just didn't feel as right. This was as close to Church as he'd ever get again. Barefoot on the dirt, free of armor or anything weighing him down, simply training every muscle in his body to work together, flipping him around the battlefield, snapping his fists out at imaginary enemies and kicking the dummies that were meant for melee practice. It was exhausting, it was exhilarating, and for now at least the field was his and his alone.

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The thought of physical combat, to Regan, was little more than a fleeting moment of displeasure and a shrug that translated into “I’m too good for that”. While camp may have been a physicality-oriented place, with countless teenagers rehearsing the executions of their imaginary foes, Regan had never put much thought to it. To her, the sanctuary camp offered had always been about honing her own craft. It was about the hours that ticked quietly by in the softly lit Apollo cabin as she bruised her fingers with strings and made sure her vocal tones were resonant and clear. It was less about the angle of the blade and more about the honeyed autumn mornings spent with a pencil and scratch paper.

And, of course, she was content that way. This very morning had been lightheaded and unassuming, the buttery morning light wrestling Regan awake before her alarm could. It had ended up serving her well, and before noon, she had started a new page in her sketchbook: riddled with depictions of weapons and isolated doodles of different campers’ facial features, it was something like a stream of consciousness. She didn’t have enough energy for prose, but there was something freeing about hurried drawing: Regs didn’t care about it enough to frustrate herself, it seemed. By noon, after a piece of avocado toast and three outfit changes, there was only one thing she needed to add: a dummy. Maybe some kind of blade stuck through his imaginary eye. The dummies used for combat training made her itch: there was something vulnerable about them, or so it felt to her. Anything humanoid was something all too uncomfortable.

Tracing the steps to the battlefield felt something like a walk of shame to Regan. It was something she should be more familiar with after such a long time, but it was nevertheless alien: maybe combat training was something she should look into. After all, she could probably count the hours she’d spent training on one or two hands. It wasn’t that she was textbook lazy, it was just that it wasn’t her forte. Physicality had never been Regan’s strong suit; she could fake her way through dancing, but a violent form was another thing entirely.

Ordinarily, the battlefield was more crowded: even someone as oblivious as Regan was aware of this, and she was wary as she approached. Squinting her naked eyes to make out the face of the lone warrior, but not quite recognizing who it was without her glasses, she took a seat just removed from the edge of the area. Dummies already littering the browning ground, Regan slung her backpack off of her back and began rummaging through it for her pencil case. An odd spot to draw, no doubt, but she wasn’t about to disturb anyone.

ooc: sorry this feels kinda rushed, but i hope this works!!
outfit

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It didn't take long for his acrobatics session to come to a stop. One misstep, a wobbly landing, and Lorenzo was flat on his face in the dirt. It stung, definitely, and he was sure either his beautiful face or his shoulders or his collar would be bruised, but he'd survived much worse and much stupider self-inflicted injuries. Anyways, he was already getting tired. He was somewhat surprised at his luck, no one was around to see his epic fail. At least, almost no one. Scanning the fields he saw a girl sitting with a sketchbook. Not exactly what he expected to find in the battlefield. Hopefully she had been looking down at the time. He walked over to her, picking up his water bottle along the way. 

"Hey there....Reagan, right?" He asked. He had seen her in passing a few times, but never at any moment when it would have made sense to stop and chat. Might as well start now.

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”Hey there… Regan, right?” The question broke Regan from her passive reverie, prompting her to look up into the eyes of a boy she had never quite carried a conversation with before. For some reason, she could recall his full name: Lorenzo Lafayette. She couldn’t quite remember where she had first heard it, and it seemed to be a mouthful, and yet oddly fitting for this bright-eyed vessel of a demigod.

Nodding absently, Regan set down her pencil and looked back at him. ”Yeah. Regan Wyebourne. Lorenzo? I’m right, right?” Smirking slightly at her unsureness, the daughter of Apollo took one glance at her partially finished sketch. Rife with rough lines that poked out and brushed against each other, it seemed less of a dummy and more of a scarecrow. Maybe she could skewer a pitchfork through his heart. ”Got kind of beat up just now, huh?”