Headmaster Brockert
November 03, 2017 5:12 PM
Returning Feast by Headmaster Brockert
Coming back to school after midterm was always a relief. The holidays were always jampacked with parties being crammed into a tiny two week space. It was a social whirl and Mortimer hated social whirls. Or being social period. If it weren't for the flow of drinks, it would have been intolerable. It felt like hardly a vacation at all.At least so far, this year was going much better than last year. No catastrophies major or minor. No staff quitting though Professor O'Malley was on maternity leave and they still hadn't found a permanent Defense Against the Dark Arts. No dealing with any violent unruly students-though Mortimer still couldn't entirely blame Joe Umland for wanting to hit his brother, he didn't want to have to deal with such thing. The good news was that, he really hadn't had to deal with any students who weren't his granddaughters.
He hoped the second half of the year would go just as smoothly. Mortimer sat at the staff table in his usual place as the students filtered in. Once everyone seemed to be present, he stood up. "Welcome back to Sonora. I hope you had a good break." Hopefully that was starting to sound more believable and less forced and awkward. Truth be told, he could have cared less if they realized he didn't care one way or another about how their breaks went, but he had to give the impression that he did because he was supposed to act like he cared. Why he didn't know, but that was what was expected of him,
But then Mortimer was a pureblood and used to having to do what was expected of him. Whether he liked it or not, such as was the case in dealing with dull functions with dull people when all he really wanted to was read or make models of torture devices. In fact, he'd gotten an actual Chair of Torture, a chair covered in spikes as a gift from his wife for Yule this year. That was the highlight of the entire break. He'd actually felt something akin to excitement.
Mortimer continued. "There are no announcements at this time." With that he sat back down and began to eat.
Subthreads: Falling back on old faithful by Winston Pierce
I wasn't staring by Kir McLeod with Ben Pierce
Glad to be back by Dorian Montoir with Ruby Brockert
Looking forwards (tag a seventh year) by Ginger Pierce with Lauren Song
Keeping it real by Jozua Sparks with Joe Umland
Trespassing (tag Georgia) by Zevalyn Ives with Georgia Kirkly
Good mood by Jasmine Delachene
Asking the usual questions by Isaac Song with Kyte Collindale
Coping. by Lily Spencer
A Bird Fish? by Parker Fitzgerald - Pecari with Ingrid Wolseithcrafte
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Headmaster Brockert
Returning Feast
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Headmaster Brockert
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Kir McLeod
November 05, 2017 5:53 AM
I wasn't staring by Kir McLeod
Kir rarely regretted his sorting. He liked Teppenpaw, and the qualities it represented, and he liked sharing a room with Sawyer, who was a really cool friend and someone he might not have otherwise been as close to. But he felt that it had been a close run thing for him between Teppenpaw and Aladren, and he was currently regretting the sorting potion’s ruling somewhat, over the very un-Aladrenish and unintellectual reasoning that it was where all the really hot girls in their year were. Well, most of the girls in their year were pretty nice looking actually, but Aladren contained the only female members of the species in their year who he thought likely to give him the time of day, as neither Amelia nor Zevalyn came from Pureblood families. And it was where Kit was who, whilst she came from that kind of family, he couldn’t fully give up hope on….Even though the returning feast permitted mixing between the tables, he had chosen not to go and sit with the Aladrens. He thought it might be safer to play it cool. Potentially so cool that none of the girls actually noticed his existence, much less his interest. Although, if any of them happened to look over, they might have noticed his gaze drifting rather frequently over to the Aladren table…
He snapped to when he heard a voice beside him asking for a dish. As if it needed it, but to emphasise the point that he’d been miles away, it took him a moment of confused scanning their immediate surroundings to locate it.
“Um, here,” he smiled sheepishly, handing the requested dish over. “How were your holidays?” he added, hoping to divert attention from his diverted attention.
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Kir McLeod
I wasn't staring
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Kir McLeod
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Ben Pierce
November 08, 2017 11:47 AM
The Teppenpaw invasion continues by Ben Pierce
Ben loved being a Pecari, he got along with nearly all his housemates. Kyte was his best mate, and Tess could now cheerfully be classified as his girlfriend, and basically he had no reason at all to venture beyond his own House table for the feast, but somehow he found himself walking along the Teppenpaw one.He greeted Raine as he passed by her, and wished her a Happy New Year, but he kept walking. It was only when he saw Natalie Varth that he realized that who he’d unconsciously been looking for wasn’t around anymore. He made a mental note to write to Gabe later, tell him he’d be missing the bonfire again this year. That must have been what made him think of Gabe again; they’d hatched the idea of the Sports Club together at the last bonfire. Or at least, that was how Ben remembered it.
He was about to head back to Pecari when his eye landed on Kir. He was the kid of one of Aunt Bel’s friends. He wasn’t as involved in DISCUSS as others in his family, but you didn’t grow up as a Boston Pierce without doing some fundraising for groups like the McLeod Foundation. On impulse, he dropped down into the seat next to the younger boy . . . who seemed to be staring at a pretty Aladren girl instead of paying attention to who was claiming the seat next to him. Ben grinned in amusement.
The food appeared after the briefest of greetings by the Headmaster and Ben saw some delicious looking roast beef on the other side of Kir, “Hey, can you pass the beef?” he asked.
It took Kir entertainingly long to figure out where the beef even was before he passed it over, and Ben wasn’t even trying to hide his grin. “Thanks,” he said when the platter of meat did make it him. He speared a few thin slices onto his plate and gave it back so it could return to its spot. “I had an excellent midterm,” he declared cheerfully. “Christmas parties, got to see the family, went skiing. It was awesome. How was yours?”
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Ben Pierce
The Teppenpaw invasion continues
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Ben Pierce
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Kir
November 10, 2017 1:33 PM
We'll show you! (Our wonderful hospitality) by Kir
His Teppenpaw diplomacy skills were coming in pretty handy. They had saved him from blurting ‘I wasn’t staring,’ when his attention snapped back from the Aladren table - an assertion that would have been very incriminating, given that the main subject under discussion was beef - and they also prevented him greeting the Pecari next to him with ‘What are you doing here?’ He only looked mildly surprised.“Hiya Ben,” he smiled. Ben was one of those people that he would have liked to know better - his aunts often asked after him (to which Kir could mostly give uncommunicative shrugs, or mention that he ‘seemed to be doing fine,’ if he was feeling like putting it into words). He was, by virtue of his name, definitely the Right Sort of Company - a notion that amused Kir in how he could phrase it to parody the Pureblood notion. The Pierces at school fell into three categories: Friendly Pierces, Unfriendly Pierces, and Our Pierces. Ben was one of theirs, and Kir thought his aunts and his parents would have liked him to make more effort to foster that connection. However, Ben already had a solid set of friends, and he was a whole two years older than Kir. Where, for adults, that gap was fairly negligible, at this age, it seemed awfully big. Ben ran a club and would be sitting exams this year and had a girlfriend. Kir wasn’t convinced that he wanted to hang out or hear about what the Foundation was up to. And yet, here Ben was.
“Kind of similar,” he nodded, when Ben asked about his holidays. “All the way up to Christmas is completely mad with everyone doing fundraisers - some of those are fun, like they’ll do coffee mornings, and there’s always good cake, but it’s everything from fancy big events to standing in the street shaking collecting tins - and guess which ones they find they need our help with more. Family time over Christmas, then the Foundation’s New Year party which is always a laugh - has your aunt ever told you about them?” he asked. He could not truthfully remember whether Ben’s aunt had ever been to any of them. He knew she was frequently invited to such things, but everyone had such busy schedules over Christmas that she may not have made it, and he got introduced to so many grown ups at these things that it was hard to keep track. He knew he hadn’t had a specific conversation with her this year, but that wasn’t to say she hadn’t been there…. “And then yeah, once all the madness settled down, we went skiing too. Where do you go?” he asked.
OOC - see paths thread with Amelia for description of said parties.
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Kir
We'll show you! (Our wonderful hospitality)
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Kir
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Ben Pierce
November 15, 2017 1:31 PM
It’s like a warm cozy fire at a ski lodge by Ben Pierce
Ben nodded in understanding and acknowledgement as Kir talked about his holidays. They sounded pretty similar to his own, though Ben hadn’t been recruited for bell ringing this year, thank Merlin. He’d also missed the fancy fundraising shindigs - he thought Aunt Bel and Gramelia might have gone to a couple of those, too, but it wasn’t really Ben’s immediate family’s scene. Mom was too busy doctoring most of the time, and Dad was just glad to be disowned so he didn’t have to go to those things anymore. Ben was quite happy to avoid the suit wearing.“Yeah, I think so,” Ben confirmed Bel’s presence at the New Years party tentatively. “She said she’d take me when I’m 21 and not a day earlier.” He grinned at Kir, “Some people get all the luck.”
“Seriously though,” he added, “that’s when Uncle Four takes me out to the mountains, though, so I get a good New Years party at the ski lodge. My aunt Reggie’s dad has a cabin in Colorado they like to rent together for a week over New Years, and they know I love skiing so they invite me along, too. Do you do your skiing mostly in Vermont, or do you travel, too? When I was younger, we’d ski in New England more, but now I only have two weeks at home in winter, so I’ve just been hitting the Rockies lately. Reggie and Four haven’t been making it out much either, because my cousin is still too little for it. So out in Colorado, we swapped off playing with Cole and skiing. There were enough of us to make that work out. Do you have any cousins?”
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Ben Pierce
It’s like a warm cozy fire at a ski lodge
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Ben Pierce
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Kir
November 18, 2017 7:17 AM
With hot chocolate by Kir
“Well, I’ll look forward to seeing you then,” Kir grinned, amused at Bel’s ruling on when Ben would be allowed to attend their New Year gathering.“That sounds fun. We’ve been all over. My dad and aunt only moved to the US when they started school, and then they were back in Scotland every holiday. Well until... until Auntie Catriona ran away with Aunt Lola, and then my dad followed a few years later,” it felt comfortable talking to Ben. Not that Kir hid his family details or background from other people, but he didn’t always feel he could be so direct about it all with some people. “So, anyway, they’re pretty keen to see lots of different parts of it, and Canada too. And no, no cousins… I guess Auntie Catriona and Aunt Lola could adopt, but they have the foundation, and they have me and Nessa - my sister. And my mum’s an only child. I mean, I guess I might have second cousins or whatever they are back in Scotland, but not ones that would acknowledge our existence. Sometimes it’s great - we get all the attention. And sometimes it’s a bit much - we get all the attention,” he smiled wryly. “I guess it’d probably be nice to have cousins,” he acknowledged. He sometimes was a little envious of other people’s families, but he had what he had, and it was awesome in its own ways, “but we get the company of other kids by coming to school,” he shrugged, “Or hanging out with other foundation people’s kids. And my parents know some pretty cool adults. Is Cole your only one?”
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Kir
With hot chocolate
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Kir
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Ben
November 22, 2017 11:21 AM
And cookies by Ben
Ben grinned back and agreed, “Absolutely,” to Kir’s encouragement to come to the Foundation’s New Years party when he was 21. He suspected he could probably cajole Bel to take him once he was graduated from Sonora, but Bel could be a bit of a prude sometimes and an auror always, so maybe not. If he drank even a sip of alcohol as a minor and her guest, she could get in trouble, so he supposed he understood her reluctance.He nodded in sympathetic understanding to Kir’s woes of not having cousins. Cole was only a year and a half old, so he’d been in the same boat when he’d been Kir’s age, and he hadn’t had the advantage of a sibling to share some of the attention with. And he had three grandmas to be tutted over by. Four, if you counted Great-Aunt Lauren, which he did. Three, if you didn’t count Gramelia, because she didn’t tut.
“Yeah, Cole’s my only cousin,” he confirmed. “Uncle Four and Aunt Reggie might have more later - Cole’s not even two yet, but for now he’s an only child. Aunt Bel . . . thankfully has no offspring.” He grinned wryly, though that would surely come as no surprise since Kir probably knew her well enough to realize she rarely dated (and when she did, it was with girls) and wasn’t exactly, ah, good with kids. "And Mom's an only child."
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Ben
And cookies
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Ben
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