Back to school! [Tag: second year boys, especially Brett] on Pecari Commons

Jaeven Dimitri

December 05, 2007 4:02 PM

Back to school! [Tag: second year boys, especially Brett] by Jaeven Dimitri

After looking almost everywhere in the common room and in the Gardens that he could think of, Jaeven Dimitri still could not find his cat. Needless to say, this made him a bit paranoid; the last time Jae couldn't find a pet, it had been over Christmas break. When Todd the Puffskein had finally been discovered, he had actually been Todd the Deceased Puffskein. That wasn't the best way to start off the second half of a school year, needless to say.

Still searching, Jae made his way upstairs to the second year boy's dorm, where he roomed with the other male Pecaris his age. Jenny usually spent time in the common room or in the Gardens, almost never in their room. He had thought maybe she didn't like the smell or something, because last year she hadn't liked wandering around nearly as much. But that was okay--Jae liked the Gardens equally as much, if not more, than anything inside. There were all sorts of fun things to climb, statues to see, and creatures to look at. The fun potato-heads were always there too, although they bit if you picked them up sometimes. Caedence had said last year to throw them around, but that seemed way too mean to Jae. If any of the animal rights activists around Boulder found out what they did to the potato-heads, everyone'd be in huge trouble!

During his search, his robes had half come off. Unthinkingly, Jae pulled them the rest of the way off and threw them in a crumpled heap atop his equally crinkled mattress, revealing jeans and a Fourteeners t-shirt underneath. The pointy eared janitors (whom everyone else referred to as 'elves', but they seemed to fit Jae's name better, since elves were supposed to be tall and blonde, like in Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit) apparently hadn't been around since he had messed it up less than forty five minutes ago.

"Here Jenny," Jae called, playing with one blonde dreadlock as his green eyes scanned the room, searching for where Jenny could be hiding. He decided to check under the beds first. His--nothing. Next one--nothing. Brett's--

Woah.

At that moment, Brett entered the room. It might have been odd for someone to enter their room, only to find someone hanging upside down off their bed with eyes as big as they could get. Of course, this was Pecari, so it was probably slightly less weird than if it'd happened in Crotalus or one of the other houses.

"Dude," Jae breathed, looking at Brett. "There are definately kittens under your bed. This is so amazingly madcoolawesome."

His usually loud tones were hushed, in awe of the sudden appearance of kittens and his cat in the same place. He got the distinct feeling that Jenny was responsible for this.

0 Jaeven Dimitri Back to school! [Tag: second year boys, especially Brett] 104 Jaeven Dimitri 1 5

Brett Hodges

December 05, 2007 9:45 PM

Back in black! by Brett Hodges

Brett stood at the threshold a moment, thinking he heard Jae wrong, but no, he had definitely said kittens. He closed the door as quietly as he could and let his bag drop lightly to the ground. He was affected by Jae's hushed tones, and tiptoed carefully across the room. Jae was already on his bed; Brett didn't care about that. He crouched down a few feet away from the foot of the bed and lowered one ear to the floor for a look-see.

"Whoa," he agreed, with equal reverence. Glancing up at Jae, an awed smile on his lips, he asked, "They're Jenny's?"

Of course they were Jenny's. Jenny was laying there with the fuzzballs. So, by extension, the kittens were Jae's. He laid down on the floor so he could watch them more comfortably.

"Huh. There are kittens under my bed," he repeated, just to be sure that fact was fully covered. "I was just in here, like 20 minutes ago, and I had no idea."

Brett and Jae didn't spend a lot of time together, but Brett thought they got along pretty well. He was a good roommate. He was fun, fully of energy, and he had a cat. Brett approved of cats and their mad independence and superiority complexes. He was honored Jenny had chosen his bed to nest under.

"If we'd known we coulda found a blanket for them or something," he said. "This is so sweet. How many are there?"

0 Brett Hodges Back in black! 0 Brett Hodges 0 5

Jae

December 06, 2007 8:47 AM

Re: Back in black! by Jae

Jae was still monumentally stunned and trying to put Jenny and kittens in the same sentence. Did that make him a bad responsibilities person because he hadn't known? But Brett was right, it was pretty sweet. "Yeah!" Jae said, a little bit more enthusiastically but still quiet. "Ummm..." He wiggled around a little bit so he could count a little bit better until he saw Jenny's ear's flick upwards and her green-eyed glare found him through the darkness of under-the-bed-ness. Rule one of having a cat was not making that kitty mad, so he kept very still and tried to count the kittens. It would have been a lot easier if they were all gray and white like Jenny was, but they weren't. The first time Jae tried to count, he came up with three. The second time, he come up with four. The third time he came up with seven, which he knew was wrong.

"Either three or four," he said excitedly. Blood had rushed to his face since he had been hanging upside down, and he looked like some sort of very excited red root vegetable. He still managed to keep his voice down though. If they weren't quiet, Jenny might take her kittens away. Maybe. Jae wasn't too familiar with how cats worked with this sort of thing. "I don't know that much about kittens," Jae said. "I didn't even know that Jenny was going to have kittens! You're right, we should have put a blanket down or something...." He tried looking under the bed again. It looked like there was something down there, but he didn't know what. The Pecari also didn't think it would be a good idea to move Jenny and the kittens just to find out.

"So what do we do now?" Jae wondered, chewing on the end of one dreadlock. What did people do when kittens appeared out of nowhere? Did they have to go to a vet? They didn't have a vet here, but they did have Professor K., who was just as good. Plus, Jae knew Professor K. and so he would trust her more with Jenny's kittens than a random vet. Maybe Talitha would know what to do. Or Gwyn. Or maybe even Brett!

0 Jae Re: Back in black! 0 Jae 0 5

Brett Hodges

December 06, 2007 12:26 PM

Back in a snap! by Brett Hodges

Brett considered. There wasn't really anything they could do, was there? With the kittens, anyway. "I guess we just kinda leave them alone, and we could ask around at dinner and see if anyone knows stuff about kittens."

Another option was a trip to the library, and Brett added that reluctantly. He wasn't real big on going to the library and he didn't really know how to find books about cats there, or if they would have any. He picked his belly off the floor and scooted into a sitting position against a conveniently placed bedpost.

"So," he asked, settling into a comfortable position. "Did you get that notice the school sent out?"

He may as well have just asked So, who are you asking to the ball? for all the lead-in he was giving the topic, but that was okay with him. Brett was not really known for his tact anyway.

0 Brett Hodges Back in a snap! 0 Brett Hodges 0 5

Jae

December 09, 2007 7:10 PM

Like the white hotdogs? [WotW] by Jae

Carefully rolling off the bed with as little thump as possible (and profuse apologies to the cats under the bed as soon as he did make a thump), Jae righted himself next to Brett and shook his head to make the dreadlocks stop falling across his face so that he couldn't see. It didn't work, so he shook his head again. Still, no result. Finally, Jae removed the offending collection of hair and moved it out of his way. Seeing was a definitely good thing around here. Actually, seeing was a definitely good thing around anywhere. Although if you were blind, sometimes you got a guide dog. Those were really cute, although Jae supposed if you needed one you couldn't precisely see how cute it was, which was probably a bummer. But you could still be friends with it, which was nice.

And now Brett was talking about the notice the school had sent out, which rather bemused Jae for a few seconds as he idly tapped out a rhythm on his left knee. Then he remembered Aunt Marla coming in with an owl towards the end of the break while Jae and Aunt Cheri had been looking at a new book on magical creatures he had gotten from Santa (who he didn't believe in anymore, not really). He had been right in the middle of explaining the difference between a crup and a real dog, just like Caedence had last year when she had come in with the letter. It was from Sonora, Aunt Marla had said while reading it. Jae had watched the owl flap across the room to land on the entertainment center and peck at one of the ornaments on the Christmas tree while she was talking, getting the gist of it at the very end when Aunt Cheri had said something about getting a girlfriend.

Jae didn't particularly want a girlfriend. Last summer, Nina had gotten a boyfriend and now she wasn't even speaking to him anymore. It was kind of dumb, in his opinion, to ruin a perfectly good friendship by dating. Not only that, but he didn't precisely understand the whole concept of dating; in his opinion, it was rather superfluous (a word he had learned from the madcool dictionary he had also gotten from Santa).

"Oh, the dance thingy?" Jae asked Brett, tilting his head sideways and fiddling with the diamond stud in one ear while thinking. "Yeah, I got it. It looks like it'll be fun, right? What sort of music do you think they'll play? I don't know anything besides normal Muggle stuff--the Beatles and stuff. Plus some music that Nina listens to." Nina hadn't really talked to him at all during break. She had been busy with some project, she said. But that was okay, because Jae had spent some of his break being sad about Todd and some of his break explaining things to Aunt Cheri and Aunt Marla, so half was sad and half was fun, which was a pretty good mix of things if you really thought about all the people who spent their holiday just being sad.

0 Jae Like the white hotdogs? [WotW] 0 Jae 0 5

Brett Hodges

December 11, 2007 8:23 PM

More like Speedy Gonzalas. by Brett Hodges

"Yeah," Brett agreed with Jae's sentiment about not knowing much music, "Me either. I was just getting into it--you know, like listening to stuff my parents didn't listen to--and then I got my letter. So, like, when my mug friends talk music, I am so lost."

A couple of his friends were really into it, too. Most of Zand's t-shirts were band related. Even Tyler knew enough about it to take a trip to Chicago for a concert with a few friends Brett didn't know. Man, he hadn't realized it before, but he found the whole subject of music vaguely uncomfortable and sort of depressing. It was cool that Jae didn't know anything about it either--or at least, didn't know anything about Wizarding music. He was on the same page with someone about this.

"I'd think they'd probably be sticking to the wizarding stuff." All wasn't lost though, "Hey, you know, if neither of us know any of the music, maybe it'd be cool to try to get up on the wizarding music before the dance. You know, so we'll have at least heard some of it before we go."

It sounded like a dumb idea, but if they did it together, and maybe got other people in on it too, it could be fun. "And if the bands are real bad, we can laugh at them," he snickered.

Irene probably knew all about the music of the magic folk. And, since she'd been his girl since the Opening Feast and Brett was definitely taking her (even though he hadn't technically asked yet), Brett didn't want to look foolish in front of her by not knowing the tunes. Or by not knowing how to dance, for that matter.

"We could start by getting one of those wizarding radios for our room," he mused.

0 Brett Hodges More like Speedy Gonzalas. 0 Brett Hodges 0 5

Jae

December 22, 2007 9:43 AM

That sounds like something I would name a hedgehog by Jae

"Yeah," Jae agreed with Brett on the point about not starting to listen to grown up musi...il just before he'd left for Sonora. It was kind of a bummer. There was all sorts of music out there just waiting for someone to explore, but he couldn't do his duty and explore it because he was at Sonora. The Pecari loved Sonora, it was true. There were all sorts of fun people, animal, teachers (who were in a different class than people, because you couldn't talk to a lot of teachers like you could talk to people, but that was all right since they were nice in their own way), and things to do or talk to. The only thing was, there wasn't really any music. He vaguely remembered last year someone trying to get together some sort of band. Or was it this year? It could have been this year. Either way, Jae had heard nothing more of either the band or any other music since then.

"Hey, I might have something about a radio!" the boy exclaimed, forgetting for a bare moment about the cats under the bed and scrambling across the floor to dig around underneath his own bed. It was obvious why Jenny had chosen to lurk under Brett's bed rather than Jae's in less than twenty seconds. There seemed to be the equivalent of a small pawn shop in the cavity below Jae's bed. The Pecari managed to get the upper half of his body under the bed, squirming around as he dug through the junk that had somehow migrated down there. Probably if he hadn't decided to half-empty his trunk less than two hours before and shove the things he didn't need at the moment under his bed it would be cleaner. Probably. After a few minutes, Jae came up with two battered school supplies catalogues.

"This is where we bought my school stuff from," Jae explained. "I don't know if they have things like radios, but they do have things like puffskein food and extra beetle eye and stuff. It's 'cause my aunts are Muggles and didn't want to take me down to the magic part of Boulder. We just picked everything out by catalogue and owled it to the people and they owled us back with the stuff. I dunno where Aunt Marla got wizard money though." he frowned for a moment, then shrugged and handed Brett one of the catalogues with a grin. "Maybe they will have radios though!"

Flipping through his catalogue, Jae quickly became distracted by all the different sorts of candies on page six. There were jelly slugs, acid pops, cauldron cakes, licorice wands, and all sorts of other things! Since it was a wizarding production, all of the pictures moved too. Rather, all of the pictures that ought to move did. The cauldron cakes seemed more than a bit sedentary, but the Drooble's Best Blowing Gum had a picture of a boy a few years younger than Jae and Brett blowing amazing bubbles all over the place with a huge smile on his face. The Pecari rather liked gum. For awhile, when Aunt Marla was thinking about taking him to the orthodontist for braces, Jae was quite upset. He knew from talking to other kids that you couldn't chew gum while you had braces. And even though the only gum that his aunts would buy was the organic sort that didn't blow bubbles too well, if you tried you could still blow some pretty good ones. It was great if you were bored somewhere or just to show your friends.

0 Jae That sounds like something I would name a hedgehog 0 Jae 0 5