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A little sincerity is a dangerous thing.
The ladybug continued to trek across the desk and her eyes continued to follow it. A dozen little black spots and an orange shell. Emery always loved ladybugs - they reminded her of home, especially the fall. Once, when she had been dropped off from school by the bus, it had seemed like it was raining the little bugs. She had tried to catch them, but hadn’t quite managed it before her muma brought her inside the house.
She edged a little closer, just a little more out of her seat, and hunched over. Her fingers held lightly onto the lip of the desk and the bridge of her nose pressed into it. The only thing visible where her eyes. She hadn’t even noticed that there was someone else beside her - until she saw, from the corner of her eye, movement. She jerked up. “No!” It was a little too loud; loud enough for those who had (by some miracle) nearest to them turned their heads and for somewhere to her left, someone jerked awake and kicked the chair in front of them. But not loud enough to disturb the still lecturing ghost. Emery, wide-eyed, clapped a hand over her mouth and flushed.
When she heard the shifting of people turning in their chairs, she slowly lowered her hand to answer Bran. They shared a house, and obviously, they shared a year. “No, it’th not..well, I wath jutht watching it and…” Nibbling down on her lip, she saw he had just picked it up. She swore it seemed that he had intended to squish the poor little ladybug.
“I’m thorry,” Averting her eyes, she cupped her hands under his. If Emery would find something to hold the little buggie, she would keep it for the rest of class then release it. They had Herbology next, if she remembered right (the schedule was in her book, on the floor) so a little detour shouldn’t take that much time. “Thank you.”
He paused, looking around to the other students who had heard her. “It’s alright, it just startled me s’all.” He shrugged at her reaction, showing clearly that he had meant to squish the thing, but…”Ma says they bring luck, I could hardly squish it after that.” He smiled at the girl, dropping the ladybug carefully into her palms.
Once the ladybug was out of his possession he fashioned a smile at her again, nodding, “Not a problem. Ladybugs are quite amazing, they have all those little dots on them.” He scrunched up his face at the insect now in Emery’s palm. “Have you ever seen the ladybugs that are black with red or orange dots? I’ve heard those were poisonous, but I don’t actually know.” He shrugged, “What are you going to do with it? Is it to be your pet?”
It was okay - and Emery nodded. Well, she nodded because it was all right, not because she knew the ladybug now being deposited into her hands by Bran supposedly brought luck. “I never heard of that before,” Was that just a wizard thing? She peered into her hands at the bug, watching it crawl over her palm. Being raised in an entirely non-magical family did have it’s drawbacks, but it wasn’t something she could fault her family for. It was all just odd, the world was just odd and odd things happened. And some people believed odd things.
She doubted it was going to bring any sort of luck - luck was only in charms and things you could keep. You couldn’t keep a ladybug because…well, what did they even eat? Leaves, like caterpillars? It couldn’t eat other bugs, because it was just so teeny tiny. She returned his smile but a small frown puckered her forehead. “Really?” Poisonous ladybugs? Just to double check, she looked down at the insect. No, it looked like it was just orange-and-black, not black-and-orange. “But how could they be…” She stopped and frowned, sounding the word out carefully in her head. Po-is-on-ous. And she cringed. No, she was going to sound dumb if she tried to say it, what’s…what’s another word for poisonous? It didn’t have venom, that was snakes. Uhh..she couldn’t think of it and she looked down and to the side. “Poithonouth? How would that work?”
“I’m going to let it go, outthide.” Where it would be out of harm’s way and far from the danger of being squished. “Don’t you think it’th lonely?” Maybe it was missing it’s family.
Pleath - a word Robert had suspected to have actually existed; only, he had never heard it before in his life. (Too many words in the English language anyway, and most of them were synonymous to one another) And then, it was followed shortly by thankth. Thankth. Thanks, he decided. Suddenly, it was starting to make sense to him - whoever was speaking had a sort of lisp.
In return the girl said hi, but even then, to Robert, it seemed less welcoming and a bit more scared than a usual greeting. She remains standing by the door way and Robert remains a certain distance away from her. The cigarette still hangs from between his fingers. He taps it, letting the ashes fall down on the wooden desk before he looks up and looks at the blonde haired girl again.
He is certain that she’s a fourth year - too small for a fifth year - and she’s unusually quiet. The last fourth year he had encountered didn’t end too well and - ugh, he can’t remember her name…. Julia… June…. whatever it was Creevey… - had landed him in detention for doing absolutely nothing. Regardless, that wasn’t a very a good impression that she left on Robert for what fourth years were like.
Don’t they just get dumber as they become younger? he wonders. He can’t even remember how he was a fourth year. Distant, definitely. Didn’t care for much, as always. Picked up his first cigarette when he came home from the holidays. Right. That was how it was like when he was fourteen.
He gestures over at the empty wooden stool across from him. “You can stand there in the doorway looking particularly out of place or you can sit over there,” he finally says, shrugging. “Your choice.” It was a suggestion - a rare one, only because he doesn’t usually suggest people to sit with him. But there seemed to be nowhere else to seat in the kitchens, and for now, he didn’t mind letting her take the empty seat.
Maybe, he thinks. She doesn’t talk much.
Emery always spoke with a speech impediment - a sigmatism. Her inability to properly pronounce the ‘s’ and ‘z’ sounds in words caused her to undergo speech therapy. Where they were generally successful, there were some cases where the lisp remained. Her therapist explained her lisp to her parents when they first caught it - it was a sort of “lateral” lisp where the s and z sounds were produced with air escaping over the sides of the tongue, making what was described as a ‘slushy ess’. Normally, she tried to avoid words with too many ‘s’s in them, but because there are only 26 letters in the English alphabet and more than possibly a million words, then well, it was absolutely impossible to avoid.
She had averted her eyes, clutching her mug tightly in her hands. Maybe she should go, she would find somewhere else to drink her hot cocoa, a lot of somewhere else’s but she was afraid of getting caught out of bed by the old caretaker, Flitch. He frightened her, him more than his cat. She liked Miss Norris, the old tabby. She was losing her hair but some odd days, when she was just walking the halls, Emery would find the cat around a corner lurking and she would stop to pet it. At first, it had been wary of her - with how the many students throughout the years liked to torment her; it wasn’t very warm to her still, after three years of the petting, but that was okay. Tyler was about the same.
Indecisively, she rocked back and forth on her heels. The older student didn’t seem that hostile towards her - he had hello’d first - but maybe he didn’t want to spend his time with a fourth year that couldn’t even talk right. But she really didn’t want to leave - the Kitchens, even though it was a little darker with what the elves mostly gone off to sleep somewhere was warmer than it was in the halls and corridors. And it certainly was brighter than they were, too, even with her small wandlight.
Okay, maybe there was a place she could sit that was out of the way of the older student. What if he wanted to leave and she was still there, blocking up the doorway? Not that she was very big, but the point was she would have been still standing somewhere she shouldn’t. What if someone else came in and knocked into her? Then she would be in their way, too. She stood up to her full height and looked around. No, there wasn’t. There was a corner but the floor didn’t look very comfortable.
But then he talked again. “Oh,” She looked back at him and sucked in the side of her cheek. She hesitantly pondered over it for a moment, then smiled at him and made her way to the stool. She carefully set her mug down before taking her seat, criss-crossing her legs under her. “Thank you.” She gave the drink a small mix of her spoon and tried another careful sip.
WHAT I OWE:
ahhahaha i’m copying kiwi who is coping everyone else who copied me
His least favourite class, History of Magic wasn’t his least favourite without reason. The room was stuffy, not that he cared too much, but it always was, and the class was taught by a dead person. Sometimes magic was confusing, brilliant, but downright scary. Not to mention he constantly got names and dates confused, 1983 turned into 1893 to 1398 and the possibilities were hardly endless, but it was nearly impossible for him to answer questions correctly.
There was a system, and it worked fairly well until the drone of Professor Binns’ voice overtook him and his eyelids felt heavy. He remembered his mother talking about Binns’ and even thought his grandfather Lorcan had mentioned him once or twice. He hardly fought the urge to sleep, and soon he was dreaming. About….home, of course, climbing the castle to the amusement of his grandfather and the absolute fear of his mother. Not that her brothers hadn’t climbed up here, and not that she herself had never, it was a family thing, climbing atop the castle, seeing the fields stretched out before them. Usually, he found his uncle Ronan up here. He was the quietest of all his uncles, and stayed separated from the rest, though he told fantastic stories to Brandon, about birds and creatures in the dark that would come up from behind and eat you as soon as look at you.
He felt something next to him, and a prickling on his hand, his eyes opened and he saw an insect working it’s way over his hand. He moved to strike it, but saw then it was a ladybug. Ladybugs were lucky, his mother had said, if one had landed on you, but that wasn’t all. Someone was precariously leaning towards him. He looked at Emery, a girl in his year and house with brows furrowed. “Is this yours?” He raised his hand to get a better look at the ladybug who probably was a male. Bran wondered why they called them all ladybugs and not gentlemanbug….though perhaps that was too long a name. “Here.” He held out his hand, presenting the ladybug to her.
The ladybug continued to trek across the desk and her eyes continued to follow it. A dozen little black spots and an orange shell. Emery always loved ladybugs - they reminded her of home, especially the fall. Once, when she had been dropped off from school by the bus, it had seemed like it was raining the little bugs. She had tried to catch them, but hadn’t quite managed it before her muma brought her inside the house.
She edged a little closer, just a little more out of her seat, and hunched over. Her fingers held lightly onto the lip of the desk and the bridge of her nose pressed into it. The only thing visible where her eyes. She hadn’t even noticed that there was someone else beside her - until she saw, from the corner of her eye, movement. She jerked up. “No!” It was a little too loud; loud enough for those who had (by some miracle) nearest to them turned their heads and for somewhere to her left, someone jerked awake and kicked the chair in front of them. But not loud enough to disturb the still lecturing ghost. Emery, wide-eyed, clapped a hand over her mouth and flushed.
When she heard the shifting of people turning in their chairs, she slowly lowered her hand to answer Bran. They shared a house, and obviously, they shared a year. “No, it’th not..well, I wath jutht watching it and…” Nibbling down on her lip, she saw he had just picked it up. She swore it seemed that he had intended to squish the poor little ladybug.
“I’m thorry,” Averting her eyes, she cupped her hands under his. If Emery would find something to hold the little buggie, she would keep it for the rest of class then release it. They had Herbology next, if she remembered right (the schedule was in her book, on the floor) so a little detour shouldn’t take that much time. “Thank you.”
He fished out a cigarette pack from his pocket and threw it down on the table before him. He stared at it for a while, actually hesitating to take a cigarette. Now, he couldn’t even smoke in peace because the thoughts that he would rather not think about still remained in his mind. (And those thought he’d rather not even mention out loud) But his nerves were getting the better of him, anxious as always when he hadn’t had a cigarette in a while - his hands shook slightly, and when he placed them on top of the table, the tips of his fingers drummed against the wood. All the while, his leg was bouncing up and down underneath the table.
So, fuck it, he thought, taking the cigarette pack, taking a stick from the box. He knew the elves weren’t particularly fond of him smoking there in the kitchen but he was far off in the corner, away from them. Besides, the majority of them had also gone to bed. When he lit it up, the elves who were still hanging about in the kitchen getting some last minute cleaning didn’t say anything.
The cigarette stuck in between his lips - he inhaled, and then exhaled, allowing for the smoke to rise up. He thought he was alone, of course. Actually, he hoped he was alone. (And by alone, he really meant himself and the elves, where the elves where as good as non-existent or invisible) But he was proven wrong once again as soon as he heard the faint sound of the voice of another.
Her voice - soft. Pleath. (He had furrowed his brows a little as he tried to make out what she was saying because he was certain that pleath wasn’t really a word) He turned his head, turning his gaze over to the doorway and there he saw a girl - blonde haired, small, and definitely fourth year, he thought to himself.
Usually, he’d ignore her all together and just eat the blueberry muffin that was placed in front of him and drink his coffee. A raised eyebrow would suffice (usually) and he would turn back and mind his own business with the hopes that she’d mind her own too. Instead, he did the complete opposite of that. (He blamed sleep deprivation for going against his better judgements)
“Hello,” he said with a curt nod, acknowledging her presence. And because he is Robert Nott, the greeting was flat, with every hint of unenthusiam - definitely not the usually warm, friendly ‘hello.’
The Kitchens were so large - low counters, simple and wooden, lined the walls and beneath were packed with the gleaming pots and pans - brass, silver, plain ol’ metal, copper, stone - and what couldn’t be fit was stacked, almost to the ceiling, against the walls. Four tables were the centre of the colossal room, quite similar - if not identical - to the long house tables above. Currently, only empty plates and silverware was arranged on them. Probably in preparation for tomorrow’s breakfast. Emery wondered what they would be having - French toast? Eggs and ham? An assortment of pancakes? Her da could make amazing pancakes, sometimes making it into different shapes. Her favourite was in the shape of Mickey Mouse, complete with a syrupy smile.
All of this, staring around the room, watching the few elves that were up and about, was done to avoid looking at the older occupant of the room. Was he a seventh year? Sixth? She didn’t want to look again, to figure out, because he just looked…rumpled? Was that the right word? At the very least, he didn’t seem to be in a good mood. Which was explainable - most people didn’t like waking up in the middle of the night.
The elf from earlier came back, this time baring a tray with a large porcelain mug. She beamed delightedly at the sight, quickly sticking her wand in the small band of her nightgown to carefully take hold of it’s handle. “Thankth,” The elf scampered back to its duties. Emery cradled the mug in both her hands, taking an experimental sip. Finding a little too hot, she swallowed and winced as the hot liquid burned the inside of her throat. To soothe it, she licked at the large mound of cream the elf had topped off her beverage with.
She kept looking around her, holding the mug close. It warmed her hands and the steam felt pleasant on her face. She was really just content to pretend the guy wasn’t there, because that’s what he seemed to do, but then he startled her by talking. Emery jumped, almost spilling her hot chocolate, and flushed.
“Hi!” It was a little too loud and she hid behind the whipped cream, taking a sip despite it still being too hot. She could have taken it was an invitation to sit on the stools around him, but no, she just kept standing in the middle of the door way, just a hairs breath away from the actual door.
