Looking for a change on Pecari Commons

Dana Smythe

April 27, 2011 9:23 AM

Looking for a change by Dana Smythe

The precitable and repetetive nature of Dana's life had been getting her down her a while, but returning to the routine of classes for a while was sufficient to bore her almost to tears. after the first week of classes she's simply had enough. At a similar moment of tedium during midterm break she'd purchased some hair dye on a whim. Now, hurrying back up to her dormitory after the last class of the day, Dana flung her book bag and uniform robes across the room and extracted the pot of dye from her trunk. With it in her hand, she crossed to the mirror, and considered her reflection. She was so dull, in her sensible gray skirt, flat shoes and plain blouse. Her hair was straight, shoulder length, and a pale sort of brown that didn't even have a name of its own because it was just too boring. Well that much she could change.

Marching back down to the commons with a fierce air of determination, Dana considered the group of housemates that were gathered. She needed an extra pair of hands if she didn't want to mess this up entirely, and she hadn't a clue who to ask. "Has anyone ever cut or dyed hair before?" She asked the room in general. "I need a volunteer." In one hand she still held the tub of hair dye, 'Magdalene's Miracle Hair Color' - just one application for up to eight weeks of vibrant color, in a very bright, but dark shade of pink that called itself 'Cherryliscious.'

It had crossed her mind that her mother might kill her, but she doubted her mother would ever find out. The sort of people who might pass around information that would eventually get back to the Smythes were unlikely to mention something as trivial as a sixth-year nobody coloring her hair for a period of two months. Dana was certain it wasn't going to affect her long-term future in any way, and although on one level she found that comforting, on another level she wished she really had the guts to do something that would cause a fuss. It would never happen - she wasn't that kind of girl. She was good, she'd been raised properly, and, despite being in Pecari, she was going to do her family proud. She just needed a brief respite, and a new look for the new year. That was all.

0 Dana Smythe Looking for a change 142 Dana Smythe 1 5

Alison Sinclair

May 04, 2011 6:12 PM

This ought to be interesting. by Alison Sinclair

Alison was flipping through her Charms textbook while giving half an ear to the chatter in the common room, trying to work up the energy to invest in either working or getting into a conversation, when the most familiar voice, to her, in Pecari made an announcement: ”I need a volunteer.”

She looked up, surprised, to find her roommate standing near the commons entrance, a tub of something in her hand. Something about her stance implied determination. After a second of considering this, Alison stood up, letting her book fall closed around her left hand. “I’m game,” she said.

She wouldn’t have just declared her willingness to go along with just anyone, but at this point, she really doubted Dana was going to lead her into an expedition to plant lacy underthings in the headmaster’s office or rig paint to fall on Professor Fawcett’s head as he began a class or anything crazy like that. Not that those things might not have been fun, but she would want to consider who she was working with before she volunteered, because getting caught and getting a detention was no fun at all.

Dana, though, was pretty safe. She was a Smythe, which meant there was only so much she could get away with if she wanted to keep being a Smythe, and just generally not a troublemaker. Alison considered her a good influence, considering how much less potentially deadly her life had become since she’d been running with Dana instead of Tessa. She walked over to her friend, balancing well in her high-heeled boots. “What’s up?”

16 Alison Sinclair This ought to be interesting. 140 Alison Sinclair 0 5

Dana

May 07, 2011 5:45 PM

In a good way, with any luck. by Dana

Alison was perfect. Dana should have just asked her roomate anyway, and she was glad that she'd been the one to answer her plea. "I'm boring," Dana answered to Alison's query. "That's what's up." She looked at Alison's high-heeled boots, and was jealous that she didn't own anything like that. Admittedly she was also a little disapproving that Alison would wear something like that, and just a shade proud she didn't have anything that tacky in her wardrobe, but mostly she was jealous.

"We're going to cut and dye my hair," Dana said. She passed the pot of dye to Alison for her to see it and, closing her hand over her friend's wrist, dragged her back upstairs to their bathroom. Dana paused in front of the mirror and looked at her reflection again. "I can't change much about me," she said, "but my hair can change. I want something shorter." She tugged at the strands around the level of her chin, as if imagining it stopped there rather than just past her shoulders. "Maybe choppy. Maybe with layers. And it needs to be pink." She looked again at the pot of dye. "It last for about eight weeks," she told Alison. "Will you help me?"

In her heart, she didn't think Alison would refuse. She'd always been a perfectly friendly and helpful roomate, and Dana knew that she could be a bit staid for some people's liking. She was quiet, and reserved, and sensible, and none of these were bad traits, but altogether they could make her a little dull, she supposed. Well that wasn't going to happen any more. She would still be herself, but there was nothing wrong with pushing the boundaries; straying outside of her comfrot zone, and all those other clichés.

0 Dana In a good way, with any luck. 0 Dana 0 5

Alison

May 23, 2011 11:56 AM

Here's hoping. by Alison

Alison blinked, a little thrown by Dana’s blunt analysis of what she perceived as the problem here. She had never really had anyone just come out and say that kind of thing in front of her – well, technically; Amy had a few times, but that was Amy, she was special, and there was that one thing with Tessa they’d all just dismissed as a joke, and her brother Anthony had started babbling while drunk last summer, but she’d done as much as he had, and they had never mentioned the incident again – and so wasn’t sure what the right things to say were. Seemed like it should be something encouraging, like they’d say to Amy, but the difference was that Amy’s self-esteem was in negative numbers and talking to her on her bad days involved a certain amount of crisis prevention, whereas Alison had never seen Dana as being nearly as fragile as Amy. That made a difference.

It turned out, though, not to matter, because Dana went on. With a solution to the perceived problem. Alison took a look at the pot of dye as she was pulled along back out of the common room, trying to visualize Dana with pink hair.

Still, she was a firm believer in it being people’s own business what they did with this kind of thing. Besides, it beat studying. Her brain kept misfiring and thinking that she had RATS this year, studying had grown so dull. There was a niggling thought about what Dana’s nice pureblood parents would have to say about all this, and what they might have to say to the likes of Alison Sinclair about it in particular, but she dismissed that.

Upstairs, she listened through her friend’s request. “Sure thing,” she said. “Just warning you, though – choppy? Might end up really choppy. I think I can pull it off, but a professional beautician is not me. Just to warn you.” She smiled so the legitimate warning wouldn’t be taken as trying to get out of helping or something, then shifted into the practical questions of how to accomplish all this. “Okay. Do you think the dye should go on before the cutting, or the cutting after the dye?”

16 Alison Here's hoping. 140 Alison 0 5

Dana

May 24, 2011 9:39 AM

And wishing. by Dana

Alison wasn't arguing, or refusing to help, which was just great. Dana was pleased by this; she felt encouraged to continue on with her plans, because Alison wasn't looking at her like she'd gorwn an extra head. Therefore Dana's plan, while unlike her generally, was at least socially acceptable enough for her not to be considered a true freak. It was just the right balance.

Alison warned her that she wasn't a professional, but Dana didn't mind too much. "I have faith in you," she said to Alison. All her job involved (at this stage) was to make hair shorter - how difficult could that be? Dana hadn't speficied a style, and really anything that was a style, as opposed to her current straight and straight look, was going to be an improvement. Besides, even if the cut was a little uneven, the fact that her hair was shocking dark pink in color might help to draw most people's attention away from the fact. "I think maybe the dye should go on afterwards," she answered after a moment's thought. "It seems a waste to dye hair that we'll then cut off." It sounded plausible to her own ears, but really she was just guessing - she'd never done anything like this before, so how was she supposed to know?

"Thanks for helping me out," she eventually thought to say to Alison. The exhileration of forcing a change into her mundane existence had been so pervasive in her thoughts that technicalities such as politeness hadn't initially occured to her. "I just - life was getting repetetive, you know? I feel like a change will do me good." She looked at her boring reflection one last time, and added, "Of course I'll be back to normal by the time I see my parents, but that'sinevitable."

0 Dana And wishing. 0 Dana 0 5

Alison

May 25, 2011 3:19 PM

And...something before praying.... by Alison

Alison was aware that Dana saying she had faith in her was almost certainly a joke, but she half-smiled in appreciation anyway. Even back in the day, Tess had never really trusted her not to make a mess out of things if she was given any role other than doing-as-she-was-told-while-being-watched, and Merlin knew her parents didn’t. They were still expecting her to blow up the house without even trying. It seemed that, somehow, despite her mom having, unless there was something Nana and Grandpa weren’t telling them, a full sister who was magical, they had never gotten the memo that ‘witch’ was not a euphemism for ‘nuclear bomb’.

“Good thinking,” she said when Dana decided on chopping her hair off first. “Where’s something I can Transfigure…”

She knew, of course, that there were magical ways to accomplish this, but she guessed she was still enough of a Muggleborn in her bones to not entirely want to wield a Severing Charm in the general vicinity of someone’s neck. Maybe it wasn’t true, it might even really be the opposite way around, but she felt like she had more control with a good, old-fashioned pair of scissors than she did with her wand. Plus, she could see the blades, and even if her hand slipped, she could pull it faster than she could a misdirected charm, and so not do damage to things that were kind of necessary for being alive.

She had just gotten that sorted when Dana thanked her, and explained herself a little more. “Don’t worry about it,” she said, touching Dana’s shoulder in what she hoped was a sympathetically friendly way for a second. “Been there, you know?” Her first year here, actually. At that time, she hadn’t been to a formal school since she was six years old, and the repetitiveness of the days had nearly driven her crazy by the end of that year. It was better now, but…”And you can hit it with a growth charm and have it right back, so yeah, no worries on the parents.” She thought about that for a second. “Well, I think you can, anyway.” She had never tried that before. Maybe when, near the end of the year, her hair started to get too long again – she’d just had it cut over midterm, so it was still where it was supposed to be – she’d chop a little more than she liked off herself and then try that to see.

Thinking of that reminded her of what she remembered about the beauty parlor. “I think you’re supposed to get your hair damp or something before you cut it,” she said. Lacking a spray bottle, she settled instead for washing her hands and smoothing them over Dana’s hair. “That should do it. Well, if you’re sure about this…” She decided to start small with her Transfigured scissors, just a piece on the side, ending a little above Dana’s shoulders instead of a little below. “That look all right?” she asked.

16 Alison And...something before praying.... 140 Alison 0 5

Dana

May 30, 2011 12:16 PM

Hoping, maybe? by Dana

Dana thought for a long moment about what Alison meant when she said she'd 'been there.' It sounded as thought she had, at some point, also felt like she was boring, or at the very least like she needed to do something drastic. That concept didn't really fit in with Dana's perception of her roomate as someone who was outgoing and spirited. She supposed the routine of classes might grind on a person who was mor einclined to act on whim, but even so...

"I'm sure," Dana nodded a little when Alison indicated they were ready to start, but stopped nodding quickly when she realized there were scissors near her head. She took a deep breath as Alison made the first cut. She heard the slicing sound as the scissors closed, and saw her hair fall to the floor by her feet. At Alison's prompt, Dana looked up to consider the length of her new cut. "Maybe..." she hesitated a little while she gathered the courage to say, "maybe a little shorter at the front? The back... the back could be that length." She would admit to being nervous about cutting her hair only to have it look dreadful. "I think maybe the front could be shorter." Wow, this was more exhilerating than she'd originally anticipated. In a good way, though, for the most part. Dana felt her insides tremble with excitement even as her inner narrator told her she needed to get out more.

As Alison carried on, Dana thought more about what she'd said earlier. "What did you mean when you said you'd 'been there'?" she asked. "Because you're about the least boring person I think I've ever met." The two of them weren't necessarily the best of friends, but Dana thought they got along well enough and had known each other in close quarters long enough for personal questions such as that to be acceptable.

0 Dana Hoping, maybe? 0 Dana 0 5

Alison

May 31, 2011 7:42 PM

I thought we'd already covered hoping. by Alison

One of Alison’s basic survival tactics was to act a little more certain than she was, and definitely not show it when she was really not certain on any level. She decided to employ it when it came to the look Dana was requesting. She knew that could work, and thought it would work with Dana’s face, but was less sure about her ability to make it actually happen instead of looking like what happened that time she’d read the Barbie Book Club selection where they were in ancient Egypt and then chopped one of her dolls’ hair off with the house scissors.

Barbie had still had a twentysomething face then, she thought, before the age-up and break-up, but one thing, Alison was sure, would have held true no matter what the generation: by the time she escaped the impromptu beauty parlor, Babs had not been nearly as pretty.

“Okay,” she said instead of acknowledging this fear, with its implications for Dana totally hating her for the remainder of their this year and next year together. Dana was more or less like the only friend she’d made at Sonora, and thus more or less like the only friend she had these days, so that would be majorly bad in many ways. But she had been six when she kind of mutilated Barb, and this was nearly eleven years later. It was all good. “I’ll, like, take it at half-inches and you say ‘when,’ okay?”

She couldn’t help but chuckle when Dana declared her one of the least boring people she’d ever met, but mostly, again, as a cover for uncertainty. “It’s just the ‘mysterious transfer student’ thing,” she assured her, resuming work on a piece of the front of her hair. “Instant seems-cool points. I just always followed the actual interesting people around a lot, kind of picked up on some of the lingo….” She shrugged. “And when I came here, you know, the routine just felt crazy crushy. I think it was mostly just being used to having Tess – the ringleader back home – come up with something crazy for us to do after lessons.” She smiled. “But hey, I’m pretty sure my life expectancy’s gone up, so that’s not too bad, yeah?”

16 Alison I thought we'd already covered hoping. 140 Alison 0 5