Making semi-normal plans. on Aladren Commons

Alicia Bauer

April 04, 2013 2:44 PM

Making semi-normal plans. by Alicia Bauer

The jewelry box opened with a faint click, and Alicia glanced around one more time, just to make sure the door wasn’t about to abruptly open, before she lifted the top compartment out to check on what was concealed beneath, just to be sure that, in spite of all her precautions, nothing had been disturbed since she had last used it. Seeing that they hadn’t, she put the top compartment back and picked up a gold chain, holding it up to her neck and examining the effect against the dress she had on.

“Nah,” she said, and dropped it back into its little compartment before closing the jewelry box altogether with another click and putting it in a concealed compartment in the bottom of her trunk, which she then covered with a stack of folded robes. Precautions were always good, even if even she thought she might be going a little far, considering that if anyone who wasn’t her tried to open her jewelry box, the whole thing, as of the end of midterm, would burn them.

Alicia liked fire magic, to which this was related. She had discovered she had something of a talent for it.

That done, she closed her trunk, picked up a folder lying on her bed, and went down to the common room with it, finding a seat near an empty table she could spread things out over. The application deadlines for most of these were in March, so she wanted to be done by the beginning of February, just to be safe. The rest of this year was going to be exhausting, draining, in spite of the precautions and backup plans she had spent much of midterm making – the spring was always worse than the fall, with exams and end of the year events to think of on top of everything else she had to do to stay on top, doing her homework three times and being in the groups around the challenges and playing a different part with every other person she knew, too – but she was determined to stay busy during the summer anyway. For one thing, it helped build a good profile, and for another, she didn’t see staying at home as an activity which would reduce her stress levels. Even this midterm, so giddy she had been nice to Isaac, they had annoyed her more than a little, and she had been set on staying occupied with something else this summer ever since she’d heard about the lit course Henny took last summer. Depending on what she was doing, she might have other problems if, say, Cepheus decided to throw another party in England or whatever, but she couldn’t count on that kind of thing. She had to have plans of her own in place and then work around it if someone else came up with some as well.

The applications were all shorter than she had expected, somehow, whether for academic classes or internships or an art class in Mexico she was keeping as a reserve option, since she didn’t have many art skills or, maybe more importantly, speak Spanish. It had only taken four hours at the library at home to copy them all out and even write up letters to her friends about ‘stuff they might think about looking into’ (she had decided that actually sending them copies of the forms might be going a little far) and then be on her way. Filling them out, though, was going to take more time, and the very start of a new semester was the only time she had time, so she spread them out and tried to decide where to start.

The internships were what she really found interesting – the thought of working in the courts, or a government office, for most of the summer, seeing the process up close and so hopefully making connections and spotting any ways into the system which were there. If she could do that for her remaining summers, she would have a good thing in place by the time she graduated from Sonora, but it came with risks, too, especially if she did anything in the Cabinet.

Not, of course, that the east was substantially better, just a little different in how it presented things, and there, she wouldn’t have much of what influence Jeremy and Gramma Alma could bring to bear. Instead, she would just be with her grandfather, who was…well, nobody. His connections were all sideways. Ultimately, she guessed it would come down to a combination of what she got accepted to, hopefully what her friends were doing, and, if they weren’t doing anything, maybe a coin toss.

First, though, she had to fill out the applications, so she loaded her quill with ink and started writing. It felt comfortably far away for now, but summer, she knew, would be here before she knew it.

16 Alicia Bauer Making semi-normal plans. 210 Alicia Bauer 1 5

Thaddeus Pierce

April 11, 2013 12:45 PM

Making semi-formal plans by Thaddeus Pierce

After the Princeton's party, Thaddeus Pierce had returned home with his parents. Well, inasmuch as the Heir's House, filled with the spellotaped boxes containing all of their earthly possessions, counted as home. The next days passed organizing his new room - he had deliberately chosen one that had been vacant when Derry Four lived there - and helping his parents put the library back together.

Most of the conversation revolved around book classifications and the planned timetable for sorting out the rest of the house, so it wasn't too hard to not bring up the one topic weighing most heavily on Thad's mind. He was giving his parents time to mull over Alicia's obvious qualities, he told himself when his self berated him for cowardice and procrastination.

The golden opportunity to bring it up came a few days before midterm ended. An owl arrived from Alicia bearing just the kind of initiative his parents respected. So it was during dinner that evening that he broached the subject sideways.

"I got an owl from Alicia. She's applying to some summer courses and internships. Do you think that would be something I should do, too?" They agreed immediately, of course. It was in part, he was sure, due to how obviously lonely and bored he'd been on the mountain during breaks since Four left, but they would certainly also see the longer term advantages as well.

They spent most of the meal's remainder discussing possibilities, and they both promised to help him collect all of the applications he might need over the next days before he returned to Sonora. During dessert, however, he had pushed the important part.

"I know what you said about Alicia's grandfather, but she really is the best prospect in our class. She's ambitious and driven and brilliant and has a strong sense of initiative, and she's rich enough through her stepfather, and the other families respect her. She even got invited to the Princeton's ball! And, a few years ago, two daughters of the Brockert and Smythe families were very close with a muggleborn girl who otherwise matched all their values. Alicia is two generations removed from the nearest muggleborn in her family and never speaks of him. Just like Aunt Jessica never spoke of the one in her tree. Merlin, even your father was no gem either, Father, and nobody holds him against me. I believe it would be entirely within the realms of propriety for me to ask Alicia to the Midsummer Ball this year."

He had then stopped talking and may have even stopped breathing while his parents processed the sudden rush of information. The mention of Grandfather Pierce was especially risky. In his fourteen years, Thad had never once heard anyone speak his name and had been given the distinct impresssion the subject was taboo.

It had taken years of reading old family journals to even find his first name, and though he had been able to find that the man's official cause of death had been a splinching accident, Thad gathered there was rather more to the story. Grandfather came from a time when 'disownment' and 'death' were synonymous in more than a metaphorical sense.

Also, given the divorce and how her two sons turned out, Jessica probably wasn't the best name to drop either. But there was precedent, even if her muggleborn ancestor was two centuries dead before she was born.

And, of course, there were the Californians. But they need not be mentioned. They always sat in the room, the giant white elephant which nobody acknowledged but everyone was aware of, during such discussions as this.

The Pierces were an imperfect family already riddled with scandal. The Boston Pierces flouted it. The California Pierces relished it. Even the New Hampshire Pierce family tree had nearly as many limbs cut off of it as it had branches remaining. And all three branches could trace their roots back to a single man who was only one generation further removed from Thad than Alicia's grandfather was from her.

"The Smythe and Brockert girls did not have romantic intentions toward their muggleborn friend," Mother opened the opposing arguments.

"And Jessica was clearly unsuited to the family," Father bolstered them.

Thad pressed his stronger point. "Jessica was eighteen years old when she married a forty year old widower she had never met before who was more interested in her bank account than her. She had other issues for why that did not work out than the blood status of some ancestor she never acknowledged."

Father pressed his lips together but conceded the point. "Thaddeus, we want what is best for you, and you know Wesley has designs on your birthright already. A proper girl..."

"Father," Thaddeus interrupted, something he almost never did, but this was essential. This was his ace in the hole. He needed it to make an impact. "Alicia Bauer is as Pierce-ish as Druscella."

Thesius Pierce had sat back in his chair and looked quite poleaxed. "You think so?"

Thaddeus nodded. "I do."

It was not just any woman who could become matriach of a partiarchal family when there were no shortage of male heirs. To Thad's knowledge, nobody had ever even challenged any of her decisions, nevermind her rule as a whole. She hadn't even been born a Pierce. She held exactly the kind of ruthless determination and cleverness that would be needed to thwart and counterattack against any of Wesley's scheming.

"Very well," Father conceded slowly. "I will speak to Druscella about this, but you have provisional permission to take Miss Bauer to your school event."

Now in the first days back at Sonora, Thad saw no reason not to make good on that, before something happened to rescind that permission, or, worse, somebody else asked Alicia out.

Approaching her in the Commonroom, he recognized the format, if not the precise forms, of the papers that covered the table in front of her. "Oh, right," he remarked, momentarily distracted, "I need to work on those, too. Mind if I join you?"

"First, though," he added quickly, remembering his original purpose, "There was another thing where I was hoping you might be agreeable to my presence. Miss Bauer, would you do me the honor of attending the midsummer ball with me this year?"

0 Thaddeus Pierce Making semi-formal plans 0 Thaddeus Pierce 0 5

Alicia Bauer

April 15, 2013 2:44 PM

It seems we both have trouble committing sometimes. by Alicia Bauer

Pick five words which describe you the application said. Alicia had to fight not to roll her eyes, and found that it helped to pretend the person who’d written this had deliberately designed it to see how good candidates were at figuring out which lies to tell and when to tell them. A little, anyway.

She still felt, seeing this after a page of what she deemed equally relevant and intelligent questions, a brief upswing in frustration. She already had small stacks of supplemental Charms and Transfiguration books out of the library to go through, and if she wasn’t doing this, she could have been taking notes right now. That, though, could be done any time, and this had to be done while she was alert and thinking clearly, with the greatest possible chance of making a good impression. It was harder when she had to make her first one entirely on paper; in front of people, she could charm her way in, but paper was cleaner. More objective. She had to be really good enough, rather than just faking it.

She had just picked her pen back up when Thad approached her. “I suppose I could stand the company,” she said with a smile, and swept her papers into one stack. They were probably no longer organized by priority except for the one she had been working on still being on top, but immediately, she felt a little better. It seemed so much neater this way, so much more manageable, now that she couldn’t see it all. She made a mental note for future projects.

She meant to ask for help picking adjectives, but Thad said he had something else to say first and she looked up to hear it just as he made his invitation. For a split second, all she felt was surprise, which registered on her face, but then spots of extra color hit her cheeks at the same moment the corners of her mouth rose again of their own accord. So this was what it was like, the difference between assuming someone would eventually do something she wanted them to do and seeing them actually do it, completely voluntarily, without her having to drop hints or suggest it through another channel or twirl around the common room in her dress or….She tried to cut herself off, realizing she was on her way to doing or saying something unforgivably stupid, but it was hard.

At least she didn’t giggle. The only times that was permissible was when dealing exclusively with other girls or when on a truly staggering number of drugs. As she was neither interacting with another girl nor on, for the moment, any amount of drugs, giggling, though an instinctual response to the situation, was Not Acceptable.

“The honor would be mine, Mr. Pierce,” she said, mimicking his tone composedly enough.

You have no idea, she added silently. That helped steady her up a little. She could always count on that to keep her grounded, she thought, no matter what else happened. She thought she could have the Philosopher’s Stone in one hand and the Deathstick in the other and, why not, an entire worshipful army standing behind her, willing and able to smash up anything she told them to smash at a moment's notice, and still, she would have some sense of perspective, just because of that. Maybe she owed her father something after all.

Or not.

“I promise to be better company then than I probably will be today,” she added. “Provided you don’t ask me to pick five words to describe myself or anything like that.” She had a sudden, very unwelcome thought. "That was a serious invitation, right?"

16 Alicia Bauer It seems we both have trouble committing sometimes. 210 Alicia Bauer 0 5