I could use a good warm soak... on Sonora Lounges

Nathan Xavier

March 08, 2018 1:34 PM

I could use a good warm soak... by Nathan Xavier

By and large, Nathan enjoyed being Head of Teppenpaw. Overall, he’d say he had good kids. Raine had some academic trouble, but she tried her best and even managed to pull an A in his class. Joe had that one incident with punching the Headmaster, which was terribly unfortunate but the sixth year didn’t generally have a problem with violence so Nathan had ticked that off as an anomaly.

This year on the other hand, this year was trying him. First there was Cleo and the inquest that came from learning about that. That had been distressing on multiple levels.

And then Jozua went crazy (which was probably not related) with at least two spectacular displays in his classes and reports of skipping many others. Nathan had tried to have a word with him about it, but he’d gotten defensive and Nathan hadn’t pressed it at that time, thinking there was maybe something psychological at the root of it, and maybe he just needed some space and a chance to realize he maybe needed to talk to someone and Nathan was a good guy he could trust who wouldn’t push him too soon. So far that hadn’t worked out, even after Nathan gave him an extra sick day the Healer said he didn’t really need. But the extra day off seemed to have helped, and he hadn’t heard of any problems with Jozua since then. So fingers crossed that was maybe solved? Though he wasn't sure he was that lucky this year.

Then there was the trouble maker who had picked on Georgia and used Joe’s teacup to do it; and Gray had mentioned to him that Nathaniel deserved a little extra watching over in class; and then there was the fever that had hit a couple Teppenpaws and was probably spreading through the House even now; and then there were just little pockets of strangeness here and there, certainly not limited to his own House members but Teppenpaws did seem to be at the heart of many of the oddities. It almost made him think the prankster might be from his House, except he couldn’t imagine any of them, even Jozua, doing all of the things attributed to the miscreant. Though, if he had to peg a suspect, the dueling club president did probably feature pretty highly on that list.

So right now he was sitting in the staff lounge, rubbing his head, staring at the ceiling, and taking a break from the year’s trials and peculiarities. He sat up and abandoned his self-administered temple massage as the door opened and another staff member entered.

“What do you think about installing a -“ Nathan stopped speaking abruptly as the side of the lounge opposite the coffee pot, sink, and counter expanded out to make a steaming little hot spring. Had this been MARS, Nathan would have thought nothing of his imaginings coming to life in front of him but this wasn’t MARS, this was the staff lounge. He blinked at the inviting little pool without comprehension, not understanding how it had come to exist here.

“I’m not imagining that, right?” he questioned. “Because I was just thinking I could use a nice warm soak.”

1 Nathan Xavier I could use a good warm soak... 28 Nathan Xavier 1 5

Tarquin Fox-Reynolds

March 18, 2018 12:49 AM

Tea. Need tea. by Tarquin Fox-Reynolds

Today was not going to be a good day. Today was already very bad and wrong in all sorts of ways. He had not been woken up by the voice of their alarm clock, which, for all it used a gentle but firm tone to try to convince him it was time to get up was still one of his least favourite noises in the world, and which he usually then shhed and drifted back off whilst Danny went downstairs, nor had he had his second, much more pleasant wake up call, of his husband bringing him tea (Danny was baffling cheerful and exuberant at ungodly hours of the day and, whilst this was a constant source of confusion to Tarquin, and more than occasionally irritating, it worked out mostly in his favour, in that he got brought tea in bed almost every day). This morning he had been awoken, just before the alarm was due to go off, by Danny waking up, complaining of feeling ill. He had looked it too, pale and clammy, and had a raging fever. Tarquin had dosed him up with fever-be-gone potion, and then it had been time to get up anyway, and he’d had to go and make his own tea, at which point the morning had got even worse because the cups had not behaved as they ought. On returning to their room he had enquired why their crockery had suddenly started whistling the refrain ‘Turn Around Bright Eyes’ from ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart.’ The Danny shaped lump in the duvet had shrugged, explained that it had started the previous day but he hadn’t bothered trying to fix it because he thought it was kind of fun. Tarquin wasn’t going to yell at his husband whilst he was ill but he vehemently disagreed with this assessment, did not think tea making equipment should be treated with such levity, and now had had Bonnie Tyler stuck in his head all morning. He firmly hoped that both his husband and his kitchen equipment would be back to their usual selves by the time he returned home. He didn’t like Danny being sick. For all that he complained about his strange over-cheerfulness, he missed it like hell when it was gone. Danny being all tired and quiet just wasn’t right, and he also felt guilty that he wasn’t able to stay home and look after him.

In all the commotion of the morning, he’d forgotten that he was running low on teabags at school. He had eked out the one remaining Earl Grey bag as far as it would go. He did not really approve of reusing teabags but he had felt desperate. However, it was now getting beyond pathetic, and so he was forced to venture to the staff room in search of further supplies. He had thought about going to see Sophie, his newly acquired tea drinking friend, but she was teaching, and he thought he might stab someone if he had to wait an hour for more tea.

He walked into the staff room, Oscar Wilde quotation mug in hand, and… stopped. A wall had just dissolved and been replaced with a hot spring.

“I see it,” he confirmed, glad to find that his first thought (that he was hallucinating, either due to lack of tea, or due to having caught whatever Danny had), was not accurate.

“I need tea,” he explained, going to rummage in the cupboard before attempting any further interaction or analysis of the situation. There was a good chance that Nathan would think him either cranky or socially awkward over this abruptness but he didn’t care, especially as neither would be entirely inaccurate. Once he had found what he was looking for and filled his mug using the boiling water charm, he surveyed the hot spring again, catching sight of the notice board that was now just behind it. It seemed like he was to be beleaguered by germs from all sides. “Have you got this virus thing that’s going round?” he asked, taking a seat opposite Nathan. “Maybe you should just go see Ms. Kapoor if you’re not feeling great,” he suggested. It did seem to suggest that Teppenpaw was rather a hot spot for the germs.

13 Tarquin Fox-Reynolds Tea. Need tea. 1464 Tarquin Fox-Reynolds 0 5

Nathan

March 20, 2018 10:31 AM

I need a vacation by Nathan

Tarquin saw it to. That was . . . good? It meant he wasn’t seeing things anyway, so that was definitely good. But it did mean there was now a hot spring in the staff lounge. Which was . . . also good? Nathan liked hot springs, and many things could be improved by adding one, especially if they didn’t smell like sulfur, and this one didn’t. But they weren’t really supposed to be here, and he kind of felt like it might somehow be his fault that this one was so that was . . . less good.

While he contemplated these relative merits of the sudden and unexpected addition to the lounge, Tarquin just walked past him to get tea. Nathan barely noticed. He was still too busy being baffled by the hot spring and it’s confirmed existence. He was a little confused that Tarquin wasn’t next to him, keeping him company in his gawping, but then Tarquin probably hadn’t been wishing for a hot spring just before one inexplicably appeared.

“Wha- oh.” The fever. Nathan tried to stop staring at his spring and focus on what his colleague was saying. “No, not yet, but I expect I will eventually. It’s hit a few Teppenpaws already, including one I’d had to talk to in my office for skipping classes just before he got sick.”

His eye was drawn back to the hot spring- because there was a hot spring in the staff room, how could anyone stop noticing it? - “I just needed a break and a chance to relax a bit. But,” he stopped, not quite sure where he was going with that line of thought. “Have there been weird things happening around you this year?”

“I mean,” he gestured toward the hot spring, “not necessarily this weird, but anything more than the usual run of the mill school year weirdness. And did any of them seem almost like they could have been your fault, even if you didn’t intend for them to actually happen?”

1 Nathan I need a vacation 28 Nathan 0 5

Tarquin Fox-Reynolds

March 21, 2018 8:21 AM

Don't think too hard about that... by Tarquin Fox-Reynolds

The fact that Teppenpaw seemed to be getting the worst of it didn’t do much to dispel his suspicions that he was likely to get it too. Admittedly he doubted either of his Teppenpaws had skipped class, they didn’t seem the sort at all, but he had had more contact with them as a group than any other house. Which was rather unusual. He was normally very much an Aladren man, but between Dorian being a diligent library monitor and being an excessively frequent visitor and check-outer of very good book choices, and Kir bringing him pamphlets, he’d had quite a lot of very pleasant conversations with Teppenpaws this year.

He pondered for a moment as Nathan asked him whether unusual things had happened to him that year. He suspected he didn’t quite mean ‘having pleasant social interactions with students’ even though Tarquin regarded it as falling under that category.

“I can’t say they have,” he said apologetically, when he couldn’t really commiserate with Nathan over the strange occurances. “I mean, slightly strange, yes. In that my cups were singing eighties power ballads this morning. But of the two people who live in my house, I know which one I blame for that and it definitely isn’t me.

“I mean…. It is weird that you were thinking it and it happened. It’s weird that it happened at all,” he added, appraising the spring. “Do you think we ought to… try to do something about it? I mean… it’s not like it’s hurting anyone. But it… isn’t right.”

13 Tarquin Fox-Reynolds Don't think too hard about that... 1464 Tarquin Fox-Reynolds 0 5