Still willing to help on Library

Librarian DiAnna Diaz

January 23, 2011 1:14 PM

Helpers Required! by Librarian DiAnna Diaz

“No, Midnight,” the librarian chastised her cat. She lifted the slim black shorthair from the nest it had been making in the returned books pile, and gave her a quick cuddle before dropping her lightly to the floor. Midnight gave a half-hearted green-eyed glare before slinking off to find a new sleeping spot. “Spoilt creature,” DiAnna scolded fondly as she raised her wand and banished the cat hair that had collected on her desk. Her desk – that was a peculiar thought. It was already messier than DiAnna would have liked, so she spent a moment shuffling this and that into place to give the impression of greater organisation. Mostly there were books, papers, and a couple of broken quills. However, since she’d taken the job, DiAnna had added a few more personal touches. For example, between the wooden surface of the desk and everything else on top of it, she had draped a large silk sheet, mostly black with a pattern of purple and silver moons and stars. The majority of her own belongings were in her allocated room, but seeing as she would be spending so much of her time in the library, she had also laid out one amazonite crystal (to dispel negative energy and to improve confidence, leadership and communication) and a wallet-sized photograph of her family sat in the top drawer of her desk, for easy viewing whenever DiAnna need it.

Perhaps finding a first job in a school had been cheating a little, but at least Miss Diaz felt within her comfort zone here. Her own high school library had been a place of refuge for the awkward student DiAnna had once been; she’d excelled in history and astronomy and was dismayed to discover that Sonora academy currently offered neither of these subjects. At college, she had originally planned to study history (much to her parents’ delight – history was a subject they could understand), but then decided that studying history was akin to becoming stuck in the past. She chose the exact opposite path and majored in Divinations, instead, discovering that while she wasn’t a true Seer, she seemed to have some skill in correctly interpreting a variety of signs.

Though fun, her major hadn’t created a huge employment opportunity. So it was the recent graduate looked for work wherever she could. She had discovered the librarian vacancy by chance, and knew the school by reputation; her roommate of four years at Sapienti had attended Sonora, and had nothing bad to say about the school. It felt like fate was pushing her to get the job (and the perks of a free place to live accompanied by practically unlimited reading materials didn’t sound like they would hurt, either). Upon discovering her application had been successful, DiAnna adopted Midnight from a rescue center so they could keep each other company, and within three weeks she had begun work. It was only a couple of days since the students arrived, and the new librarian was still getting her bearings. She had spent the Opening Feast pretty much in silences, doing her best to ignore anyone who stared at her. She was used to staring by now, anyway – her appearance was not often considered the norm. Miss Diaz had long black hair, eyelashes, and fingernails. Throughout her entire wardrobe there was little that wasn’t black, but she did occasionally like to wear purple, and, even less frequently, red. Her feet were always encased in heeled boots, and her eye make-up was not in the least bit subtle. She had dressed this way for years, and she liked it. She wasn’t about to change that just for the benefit of fitting in more easily.

At Sonora, DiAnna wasn’t looking for help settling in, but if anyone offered help in the form of advice for someone who had only recently graduated and was lost in the Real World she would gladly accept it. She felt as though she would need all the help she could get, and luckily there was a scheme in place for just that purpose. The previous librarian had recruited students to assist with basic duties. Having spoken to the Headmaster, DiAnna had been given the go-ahead to continue with the scheme.

Once she had written out a notice in black ink (and refrained from drawing purple stars around the text), DiAnna pinned the sign-up sheet in a prominent position on the library noticeboard. It read, ‘New librarian Miss Diaz is looking for helpers! Library Monitors will help to check books in and out, organize the stacks, answer student queries, and complete occasional errands for the librarian. With fewer responsibilities, Library Assistants will place returned books back to their correct position in the stacks, and help the Library Monitors where necessary. If you would like to be considered for either of these roles, please register your interest by signing your name, year, and role preference below. If you have any questions, please see Miss Diaz.’

Subthreads:

Still willing to help by Daniel Nash II, Head Boy

Can't wait to start abusing my authority by Renée Errant

Looking ahead. by Rachel Bauer

Helping Again by Samantha Hamilton

0 Librarian DiAnna Diaz Helpers Required! 0 Librarian DiAnna Diaz 1 5

Daniel Nash II, Head Boy

January 23, 2011 5:01 PM

Still willing to help by Daniel Nash II, Head Boy

As Daniel crossed through the library early in the morning, his eye was drawn to the bulletin board. A call for assistants and monitors again. He'd been the monitor with the last librarian and had enjoyed the relatively low stress position. Now, though, he was the full Captain of the Quidditch Team and the Head Boy of the school, both of which were titles that were new this year.

He wasn't sure he'd have quite the same amount of time to help out in the library now as he'd had before.

On the other hand, he'd done it for long enough that he felt he'd be abandoning his responsibilities if he didn't put his name on the list to help out, and as a Head Boy now, he could not shirk his old responsibilities just because he had new ones. What kind of example did that set? Plus, well, he liked working in the library. It was quiet here. Stable.

So he dug out his pen and wrote down his name.

Daniel Nash II, Year 6, Whatever you need

1 Daniel Nash II, Head Boy Still willing to help 130 Daniel Nash II, Head Boy 0 5

Renée Errant

January 23, 2011 9:55 PM

Can't wait to start abusing my authority by Renée Errant

It wasn't that Renée loved the library. Because she really didn't. She loved the outside, the wilderness, the freedom of open space... and the library represented none of that. It was pretty much the polar opposite of what she loved. However, Renée did love learning things. She was extremely curious and though she had tried her best, she wasn't learning all she could by simply skipping classes and exploring the labyrinth gardens. Yes, that incident with the weird freaky monkey monster thing was fascinating, and she had worn that gash on her arm as a trophy, but she now realized that, if possible, she would rather that not happen again. So, what better place to learn about the things she loved the most (animals) than the center of all learning?

Renée Errant. Year 2. Library Assistant.

She smiled as she looked at her name and prospective title. The whole authority angle would be good too. A nice boost for her precious ego.

0 Renée Errant Can't wait to start abusing my authority 0 Renée Errant 0 5

Rachel Bauer

January 24, 2011 12:59 AM

Looking ahead. by Rachel Bauer

On average, Rachel guessed she checked out as many library books a year as the average Aladren, and studied them just as intently. People didn’t notice this behavior, though – or at least she thought they didn’t – because she never took out more than two at a time, and with a few days between them, unless it was a real emergency, and a little pre-planning and paying attention to when things were due usually kept real emergencies from happening. She was smart, good at magic, and she had to admit she didn’t do the best job of hiding those things when she felt a challenge or competition was happening, but because she was blonde and pretty and dressed really well and hung out with Veronica Kerrigan, she thought she’d done an okay job of keeping people from really thinking of her that way.

That was usually a good thing. Momma wanted her to be a proper lady, and proper ladies did not make the boys in the class look stupid, much less kick their butts all around the Defense classroom on a regular basis – something she’d been told off for more than once. Right now, though, her dumb pretty girl persona was causing her a problem.

Rachel didn’t want to be a library assistant this year. Nor did she really want to be a prefect next year. The titles would be great, but the responsibility would be a pain to deal with, and her best friend was likely to lose out to Alessa anyway, so it might even be awkward. Unfortunately, however, there was a good chance that if she didn’t get the badge, Raines Bradley would. And that was just not acceptable. That psycho abused the hold over her that his research into her background gave him; what would he do with actual power, handed over by the school and with, she assumed, Coach Pierce’s and the Headmistress’ authority? Sure, she had entertained idle thoughts about dismembering him a few times, but if he went on an honest power trip, she might have to do something violent to him for real.

And then she would be done. Even if he was too terrified to really spill his guts – he struck her as a coward, the kind who wouldn’t know what to do if she just punched him in the face and then kicked him really hard; if there weren’t other things to lose, she might have already tested the theory – Momma would blow a gasket, she’d be disgraced in front of the professors, and Veronica would drop her like a hot potato. Nothing personal, not if Veronica didn’t find out Rachel had been basically lying to her ever since they’d met, but Veronica was a pureblood lady from a family going through some issues with her dad, and she couldn’t risk hanging around a girl who beat up the kind of guys they were supposed to be trying to marry.

The obvious solution, then, was to make sure Raines never, ever became prefect. He could, she guessed, reconcile with her getting the badge once he realized he controlled her and so it anyway, but he would go stone cold crazy if he got real power that didn’t even have to be filtered through the “they’ll start asking questions if I start acting strange, and blackmail is a lot worse than lying, genius boy” defense. He already had her doing his homework and trying to set him up with his desired girlfriend. Who knew what he’d come up with? That was the thing about crazy megalomania people. When a guy thought he could get away with anything, there was no predicting what he might do.

So she had to build up her credibility. She already had good grades, they would know about that, and this library thing was a good chance to build up an appearance of responsibility. She could tell Veronica that it had been Momma’s idea; it wasn’t like it wasn’t known that her mother and stepfather were insanely ambitious, and it wasn’t a big jump from ‘Rachel should marry to improve our family’ to ‘Rachel should do this to make it more likely she’ll be a prefect so she’ll look better so she can marry to improve our family.’ She didn’t think it was, anyway. So she signed up.

Rachel Bauer, Fourth Year, Library Monitor.

16 Rachel Bauer Looking ahead. 154 Rachel Bauer 0 5

Samantha Hamilton

February 03, 2011 9:24 AM

Helping Again by Samantha Hamilton

During her first year, Samantha had been eager to join in with everything, and had signed up for every club and activity that had made itself available. During her second she she seemed to have lacked interested in just about everything, and hadn't signed up to anything at all, until the concert at the end of the year, when she'd really enjoyed singing in the choir. As the rest of the year had caused serious boredom, it was no mystery to Samantha that the cuase for this tedium had been the direct result of not signing up to anything. So, third year was perhaps third time lucky. She had already signed herself back onto Aladren's Quidditch team after a one-year hiatus, and when she saw the sign-up notice in the library she hadn't hesitated to read it.

In her first year, samantha had been a library assistant, and it had helped her to feel even more at home in the place most Aladrens considered to be a second home, anyway. She felt this familiarity with the library had put her at an advatnage, not just in being able to help the librarian out, but also in being able to find relevant books for herself and her peers. The older she was getting, the more Samantha was enjoying reading, and the less that studying felt like a chore. All this considered, she felt she was adequatley prepared and qualified for the next position up this time.

Taking a quill and some ink from her bag, smantha added her name to the short list that existed already: Samantha Hamilton, 3rd year, Library Monitor. This task complete, she put her stationery back away and continued on her way to the commonroom.

0 Samantha Hamilton Helping Again 159 Samantha Hamilton 0 5