Not happening on Charms

Professor Wright

February 05, 2018 1:59 AM

Let’s lighten things up, Intermediates (years III-V) by Professor Wright

Being a teacher would, Gray thought as he faced the Intermediate class for the first time in the new academic year, have been the perfect gig for a writer not currently earning enough to live off of, if not for the necessity of, well, actually teaching.

Not for the first time, he cursed his teenage self for setting him up for this – first by choosing an utterly impractical, sporadically-paying thing to do with his life, that had been stupid, he should have been an accountant or something, and then by thinking that his teachers had had a pretty easy life. They gave a little speech, they judged who’d put the prettiest pattern on a glasses case, and then they…did whatever adults who weren’t his parents did in the evening. What, the teenage him had wondered, could be difficult about that?

Well, for one thing, Past Me, ties are really uncomfortable. Also, we have to sound like experts on something we might have only just really researched two hours two days ago. Oh, and did I mention that now all these shows of ours are being observed by the prairie elves because one of our students – one of the ones who likes us, even! – is having an Emotional Crisis due to her long-lost mother being a veela?

Admittedly, Gray was pretty sure none of his teachers had had that particular problem, though it was hard to be sure. He had, after all, never noticed a thing out of the ordinary about Cleo except that she did seem to be a bit more of a firestarter than average, unless her being enough of a fan to recognize his name counted. It was entirely possible that his strings were so irregularly tuned that he wasn’t affected by non-humans whose literal powers included supernatural influence over the minds of male humans. The Aladren in him found that rather interesting on some level, though the rest of him had sense enough to still not want to test his theory about his own impervious-to-veela-charm-osity out around a full veela, rather than just a traumatized kid whose father had apparently had a much more interesting youth than a shopkeeper who listened to albums with his daughter all the time really normally ought to have had….

“Welcome back, everyone,” he began as usual. “And to the third years, welcome to Intermediates – don’t worry, it’s not as bad as you’ve probably heard.” Unless it was, but no harm in giving them some hope, he supposed. Particularly the currently traumatized one he knew existed.. “And our first charm this year is one I expect you’ll be glad to know. Its incantation is adlevo. I assume you all know the spell Wingardium Leviosa, so does anyone want to take a guess what this one does?”

Gray let them take a few guesses. “Like Wingardium Leviosa, this spell involves breaking the rules of gravity,” he summarized finally, nodding in agreement with anyone who’d been in the vicinity of right. “This spell doesn’t make things fly on its own, though – it makes them light as feathers. So do be careful if you ever put it on anything important, because it might just fly away from you if there’s a breeze, and any of your Muggle neighbors might be confused by flying luggage. Plus, charms don’t last forever, so you might find yourself in for an unpleasant surprise if something goes over your head and the spell wears off at the wrong moment.

“The leviosa family of charms all uses the swish and flick motion, so no unlearning any muscle memories on your first day back – just an old faithful. Third years, you’ll start with paperweights – I have a box here – and fifth years, you’ll work on ten-pound weights. Fourth years, you can work with stones – these are on average around five pounds – or the weights, as you feel up to it. By the end of the month I expect everyone to be working with heavier objects, but a lot of you will find you have to work your way up to it.”

Gray absent-mindedly took off his glasses and then put them back on just as inattentively as he tried to remember if there was anything else he’d meant to say. “Anyone who deliberately throws an object – lightweight at that time or otherwise – at a classmate is in serious trouble, but I like to assume you’re all old enough to know better by now,” he added. “Raise your hand if you need any help, and begin.”

OOC: Welcome back! For once, I did remember to check the wiki, but it was less than forthcoming with information and so I made up the incantation – it’s Latin for “lighten, raise, lift up, alleviate, relieve, diminish the force.” All posting rules apply, creativity and detail gets you more points, tag Professor Wright if you need him.

Brief deviation from the usual end-of-class-post-announcements pattern: While his author makes no claim to getting everything right, Gray’s digression comparing himself to a poorly-tuned instrument is due to IC ignorance on his part. While far from a Society PB, he grew up in a fairly conservative all-magical background and as such isn’t aware that his own orientation (he’s asexual and somewhere on a spectrum between heteroromantic and aromantic) exists/is common enough to have a name and such. Now that you know enough about their teacher that your students would wish to sink into the floor if this weren’t an OOC note and so something they don’t know about, carry on as you were.

Subthreads:

Not happening by Cleo James, Crotalus

Sorry! I'm sorry, Lily! Help! Professor! by Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw with Professor Wright

Setting A Good Example by Zevalyn Ives, Aladren Prefect

16 Professor Wright Let’s lighten things up, Intermediates (years III-V) 113 Professor Wright 1 5

Cleo James, Crotalus

February 05, 2018 8:50 AM

Not happening by Cleo James, Crotalus

Cleo did not want to be here. Whether here was specifically Charms class, or Sonora, or existing on the planet in general didn’t matter. She didn’t want any of them. She had been excused from the Opening Feast the previous night but Professor Skies had made it abundantly clear that she would have to get up, go to classes and get her meals in the hall thereafter. The tough love approach was not sitting well with her. She did not want to be around anyone. She had skipped breakfast because she was afraid of running into Parker. She still had no idea what she could possibly say to him. Except leave me alone. But she had to come to class. So, here she was. She had one tiny bit of luck in that the far end backrow seat was free, and that the seat next to it was occupied by another girl. Girl on one side, wall on the other. That was about as safe as it was going to get. She slid into the place, not looking at neighbour.

Potential Threat Wright began delivering his class. Until summer, he had been Professor Wright, and been someone she liked. She still did like him. And Parker. And Professor Xavier. But everything was broken and none of it could be like it was before. There were prairie elves in class to slap her professors and her fellow students back to their senses if any of them started trying to touch her, because apparently that was a thing she could make people want to do, beyond the point of them being able to control themselves, and she had no idea how to make it happen or, more importantly, not happen. She couldn’t even look at her teacher as he spoke. She had liked him. Did like him. Had? She had to be on her guard, and how could she continue to feel that she liked someone when she felt like she had to be protected from them? And him from her. Professor Skies had said the elves were there for “everyone’s protection.” Cleo saw it less from the compromising position her professors might find themselves in if something went wrong - their personal embarrassment and the difficulties it would give the school board were too subtle and too adult for her to consider - but the Defence textbook had been pretty clear about men throwing themselves off cliffs and veela being able to throw fire, so she got why she was considered a danger to the general population. She was amazed that monsters like her were allowed to go to school. It seemed like it would have been better for everyone if she’d just stayed home. Or never even been born.

Class started. She didn’t want to do it. She’d probably only burn the school down or something anyway. She stared at the paperweight in front of her. It was glass, and the pattern inside was a burst of bubbles, like an explosion that had been caught and frozen in time. It was much easier to imagine that tiny little world shattering and all that pent up energy bursting out than it was to imagine it becoming light enough to never even notice you were holding on to it.

She got out her wand. She would at least have to pretend hard enough that she was actually participating that Potetnial Threat Wright didn’t have to come within her orbit to tell her off, and then start either doing horrible things or having the desire to throw himself out of the window. But she didn’t want to put her heart and soul into it, because right now those were full of fire. She couldn’t imagine channeling her magic into anything productive at the moment. She made the swishes and flicks, mumbled the word, pretended like she was focussing, played the part of the good little girl. Good student. Good human.

13 Cleo James, Crotalus Not happening 389 Cleo James, Crotalus 0 5

Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw

February 05, 2018 9:24 AM

Sorry! I'm sorry, Lily! Help! Professor! by Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw

The first day of Jozua's last year of intermediates had begun with DADA. DADA had gone fairly normally, as far as first classes of the year went, though there had been an unusual presence of prairie elves there, and it seemed the elves were in Charms, too, he noted as he arrived at his second class of the day. Lily had seemed a bit like she was, well, avoiding him so far this year, and he'd let that pass in DADA, because he didn't want to get on Professor Nash's bad side when he needed that professor for advising, teaching, and refereeing his Dueling Club, but Professor Wright had no such protections.

Instead of saving her a seat like he had in DADA (and ended up passing a fairly pleasant lesson with Zevalyn Ives instead that involved a lot of Dueling Club Talk, which was probably his favorite topic, and DADA related, so that was maybe for the the best anyway), this time, he waited until Lily was already seated before claiming the spot next to her. "Heya, Lily," he greeted her, trying to sound totally normal.

It wasn't totally normal though. This was a ball year. And Lily knew he liked her, and he knew she didn't like him that way, and it was going to be all kinds of awkward, and the more Jozua thought about it, the more he realized she'd had the right idea in the first place, and he should have gone and hung out with Finn and Juniper or something. Heck, he could get into another argument with Kir about how Jozua was or wasn't a homophobe and that would be super fun but possibly better and less awkward than this. But now he was already sitting next to his best friend and it would be weird - not to mention rude - to get up and sit somewhere else at this point.

So he sat through the lesson, only fidgeting a little bit, but not able to concentrate enough to feel comfortable volunteering answers to the class discussion questions. He kind of wished Professor Wright would lecture the whole period, just so his stupid act of Sitting Next To Lily Before The Ball Thing Got Resolved didn't end in another awkward class like the Draught of Peace potions lesson. All too soon, however, he wound up his lesson and told them to start doing the lightening charm.

It ought to be an easy class. He was a fifth year. The lightening charm was potentially the second most useful spell in the world, right after the summoning charm, though he supposed lumos had a good argument going for it as well, so maybe it was number three on The Most Useful Spells Ever. In any event, he had not made it to fifth year without learning it already, so it should have been a simple matter of swishing and flicking his wand and turning his ten pound weight into an object that could be sent across the room with a puff of his breath. (Jozua had totally never done that before in the MARS room because it made him feel super powered.) Then after that quick and easy demonstration of his ability, he could get his passing grade for the class and spend the rest of it looking like an idiot in front of Lily as they Resolved That Stupid Ball Thing and cleared up the awkwardness for the rest of the year.

So that was what should have happened. But what actually happened - before he even drew his wand - was sparks. Worse, this wasn't even the first time this happened recently. It used to happen all the time, back before Sonora, whenever he was nervous. It was why he hadn't gone to the wizard primary school in Aladren but got homeschooled. Why he hadn't had any friends at home. Because every time he got nervous, sparks had started going off around him, driving the people who made him nervous away. And now Lily was getting showered with sparks, just like the shopkeeper in the broom store back home had gotten showered with sparks a few days ago when he'd tried to ask Jozua what position he played at school and chat him up about Quidditch, a topic that Jozua was a bit self-conscious about discussing with strangers.

Usually, the sparks didn't hurt people - not any worse than static shocks anyway - but they were startling and unexpected, and Jozua should have better control over his magic than this! He was a trained wizard now! Not some useless ten year old who couldn't manage his own accidental magic!

"Sorry! I'm sorry, Lily! Professor!" The more upset he got, the more sparks there were . . . and this was just plain embarrassing!

OOC: Apologies for potentially god-modding. Lily's DADA avoidance could either be intentional (as gleaned from her Feast post) or just Jozua reading too much into her innocently sitting someplace else, but I am mostly viewing this as the first time they manage to connect since summer, and needed an excuse for it not to have happened in the first class of the day, which isn't getting RPed.

1 Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw Sorry! I'm sorry, Lily! Help! Professor! 348 Jozua Sparks, Teppenpaw 0 5

Professor Wright

February 05, 2018 9:46 PM

This year is not off to the best start. by Professor Wright

Gray had almost decided that there was not going to be a disaster in his class today (he felt renewed pity and a wish he could do something about the situation when he observed how Cleo had sequestered herself in a corner, but he had to admit that her sitting beside a girl was probably for the best. Of course girls could be attracted to each other, Gray knew this, but his limited understanding of the issue (veela were not subjects that came up often in shows about the secret lives of chessmen) indicated that veela did not work the same way as normal human sexual attractions. This was, frankly, why he was not entirely sorry to find his own class supervised right along with everyone else’s – there was really no way to know what would happen.

Still, the students didn’t seem overly inclined to ask him about the prairie elf supervision and no-one appeared inclined to jump over a desk toward Cleo right now, so things were good, at least until - ”Sorry! I’m sorry…Professor!”

Gray tried not to let his dismay show on his face. Of course. One of the scary Teppenpaws would start acting like, well, a scary Teppenpaw now that they were in separate classes and he almost had begun thinking of the House as trustworthy again….

The actual situation was just…bizarre, though. Weren’t Sparks and Miss Spencer friends? “What in the world?” he blurted out before he thought, bewildered, and then he recovered himself. “Jozua, corridor,” he managed to command. The display appeared accidental, which meant snapping ‘stop that right now’ was actually likely to make the situation worse, but obviously he couldn’t have one student lashing out magically all over the place, so getting that student out of the situation seemed like the best option. “Lily, are you all right? No damage?” He did still generally trust Pecaris to be fairly good at taking a jinx, so he expected he could anticipate those answers, but the questions had to be asked.

Once he had that issue sorted out, he had to address the issue with Jozua. “Prefects, keep an eye on the room for me for a moment,” he said. Not quite how he would have chosen to introduce the new prefects to the art of leadership, but they had to learn sometime and there were four of them plus the elf and he was going to be out of the room for five minutes at most if nothing else went dramatically wrong…

He composed himself to as neutral an expression as possible before exiting the room to deal with Jozua and, hopefully, not any further demonstrations of magic. Gray put some careful distance between them, though, just in case. “Care to tell me what was going on there?” he asked, carefully speaking slowly to ensure he spoke clearly.

An unpleasant thought struck him – that it could be related to Cleo on some level. Logically, however, that didn’t make sense. He’d been apologizing to Lily for shocking her. Of course, they were not exactly dealing with logic here, were they? Should he ask Daniel about this the next time he saw him? This year was not off to the best start….

16 Professor Wright This year is not off to the best start. 113 Professor Wright 0 5

Jozua Sparks

February 05, 2018 10:24 PM

Yeah, I got elected Patient Zero. Tell me about it. by Jozua Sparks

Jozua, corridor. The command was simple and straightforward and utterly humiliating. But Jozua followed it because, well, he was a font of static charge that was snapping at everyone within five feet of him. So he left the room and slumped down against the wall outside, burying his face in his hands. Without anybody nearby, the sparks fizzled out and stopped.

After a while, he heard the door open again and feet walked over to where he was crouched. “Care to tell me what was going on there?”

"No," Jozua answered honestly, but he didn't think he'd be able to get away with that given the scene he'd just caused, so he told Professor Wright about what was going on in there anyway. Still crouched down against the wall with his face mostly covered by his hands, he could pretend he wasn't getting chewed out by a teacher, and so the sparks did not return as he answered, "I don't know what's going on. That's the second time this week I've had an accidental magic outbreak."

He looked up then, and asked uncertainly, "Is this a puberty thing?" Dad never warned him about accidental magic coming back due to hormones, but it was the only explanation he could come up with. "I just started needing to shave." Well, needing was maybe a strong word for the tiny pale hairs he had been removing so far, but there were hairs on his chin some mornings, so that counted as puberty onset and probably indicated more testosterone or something than he'd had before. He wasn't sure Professor Wright was exactly the best choice for asking these questions, but Professor Wright was the one who was here and demanding an explanation for what was going on, and 'puberty' was really the only thing Jozua could think of to explain it. Puberty sucked.

He dropped his head back against the wall and regarded the ceiling as if it had personally wronged him. "I can't believe I sparked out on Lily. Usually it just happened to strangers. Merlin, I hate ball years. They always make things so complicated, but I've never seen anybody else go all sparky asking a girl out, so why am I such a dork?" Then a better question occurred to him. "Is she okay?"

1 Jozua Sparks Yeah, I got elected Patient Zero. Tell me about it. 348 Jozua Sparks 0 5

Lily Spencer, Pecari

February 06, 2018 12:18 AM

I don't remember class ever being this interesting. by Lily Spencer, Pecari

There was no euphemism Lily could think of for the way she'd been acting towards Jozua lately; just avoidance. It wasn't purposeful; she just happened to be physically compelled to sit with other people and not look at him when he was looking at her. She still waved and said 'hello' like a normal person, and she wasn't angry at him. Lily just hadn't been feeling quite like herself and until she trudged through all of the confusion, it was easier to simply not deal with it. And with the ball - she didn't even want to think of the ball yet.

But there didn't seem to be a way to avoid the situation when he popped down next to her. "Hi Jozua," she said, hoping she sounded completely normal. "How goes it?" Was her voice higher than usual? It had to be puberty; Merlin knew she could not wait for this stage of life to be over. She could think of loads of things to say, but it all sounded idiotic with the other 'issue' that needed to be addressed. It was strange, though, sitting there with him in silence, waiting for class to begin. It felt unnatural, but she simply couldn't figure out the right way to approach, well, whatever it was they needed to talk about. Not that they needed to talk about it right away, did they?

Before it could be any more awkward, Professor Wright began class. Her face felt a bit warm as she paid close attention to everything Wright was saying. For once she actually knew what the incantation did, but she didn't raise her hand - participation in class wasn't really one of her strong suits and adhering to that only seemed natural at this point.

The practical portion seemed easy, almost boring, but she was glad for a remedial lesson. It sounded rather fun, actually, making things light as feathers. Would it work on people too? It was too bad Jack had graduated; it would've been great fun to see his things floating around his head for no apparent reason.

"Seems easy," said Lily, testing the waters between them. Maybe it was all over and Jozua didn't like her anymore. She'd never been much of an over-thinker, but she felt in danger of becoming one now. It would be best to just focus on the task at hand. But before she could ready her wand, Jozua started emitting sparks. Lily involuntarily let out a little shriek of surprise. They didn't hurt, per say, but were like tiny little pricks. Lily scrambled away rubbing at her arms and covering her face, her reflexes in motion before her brain could catch up. The irony of the situation only came to her after she was in relative safety. "You're like a bloody firework!" she exclaimed, half in awe, half in horror. Whether that was a good thing or a bad thing, she wasn't quite certain. But it was incredibly interesting.

It took Professor Wright completely off-guard, and seeing a professor bewildered was always entertaining. Lily watched as Jozua went out to the corridor, sparks still flying off of him. "I'm fine, I'm fine," she said. "It was just shocking, that's all, no harm done."

Then Professor Wright left, leaving the Prefects in charge. "Oh, that's me, isn't it?" Lily glanced around at the other Prefects, unsure of what to do. "Continue with your work," she said to the class. "Professor Wright'll have everything sorted soon." Lily herself approached one of the ten-pound weights, but she couldn't focus enough to produce anything relatively close to weightlessness. Was Jozua all right? What were they talking about outside? Were they going to the Hospital Wing?
What was going on?

40 Lily Spencer, Pecari I don't remember class ever being this interesting. 357 Lily Spencer, Pecari 0 5

Professor Wright

February 06, 2018 12:23 AM

Well, you may notice a tendency to make scenes for a bit.... by Professor Wright

Gray was rather glad Jozua appeared to be attempting to sink into the floor (thankfully in non-literal fashion – Gray suspected Selina and housekeeping would be equally displeased in that case) when the fifth year answered the question. Ask an honest question and get an honest answer – Gray should have learned that one from just watching his cousin and her toddler, and he had to suppress a smile at the response.

The follow-up was something that did not amuse much at all, though. It was, in fact, very concerning, given the current situation. ”I don’t know what’s going on.” Those were not good words. They made it sound a lot less like Jozua and Lily had gotten into some minor argument which had gotten out of hand.

“Could be,” he agreed non-committally when Jozua asked if it was a ‘puberty thing.’ Gray really couldn’t speak on the subject with any authority; his own adolescence had been curiously uneventful in that way. This was one of the things which had first clued him in to the fact that it wasn’t going quite the way he had gathered it was supposed to, though at the time he’d just been glad of the fact, as the whole thing everyone else had been doing had just seemed unpleasant. He hadn’t realized then that with those conveniences came eventually realizing that classmates at university thought it was exceedingly strange when he was uncomfortable with the very idea of hooking up with strangers at parties – later, that colleagues thought it was more and more strange, as they all got to know each other and form basic friendships, that he never mentioned conquests on Mondays – that eventually he’d happen to overhear his father awkwardly asking his mother if she thought there was something wrong with him – And, of course, the really good one, realizing that once his parents died, which in the course of nature they were almost sure to do, he was going to then spend the vast majority of the rest of his life alone aside from increasingly-more-and-more-distant-as-they-became-convinced-he-was-gay relationships with colleagues.

As he highly doubted Jozua was going to experience the same problem, however – Gray was not sure he had met anyone else with the same trait, unless that was the real origin of why Jera kept a traveling job and they’d written back and forth on a fairly regular basis for years – it wasn’t really a problem with any particular relevance to the current situation. Particularly when Jozua started babbling about the ball.

“I think Lily’s fine,” said Gray, beginning at the end because that was a simple point. “Though you might want to pick a different seat for the rest of class, and your next class,” he added just to be safe. He did not want Lily seeking revenge or Jozua, as he put it, ‘sparking out’ again at all, but if they had to, he’d rather one of his colleagues have the joy of dealing with it while praying the inmates weren’t trashing the asylum on the other side of the door. “About your other questions – were both of these accidents, both in class, or both with Lily, or anything in common like that?” he asked, as mildly as possible in the hopes of provoking an honest, non-panicked response. If it was class, it was possible there was a problem and Jozua didn’t even know it – and couldn’t be informed, circumstances being what they were – but if it was Lily, it was just one of those puberty and hormones and all things and he’d just hope they went to Rory and Daniel with their problem next time, as he thought those two seemed like fellows who’d be far more capable of answering this kind of question than he was.

16 Professor Wright Well, you may notice a tendency to make scenes for a bit.... 113 Professor Wright 0 5

Jozua

February 06, 2018 10:06 PM

This was enough of a scene for me, thanks by Jozua

Lily was fine. That was good. She'd backed off pretty quickly in surprise and looked more than a little horrified when she called him 'a bloody firework' but she hadn't been hurt, and that was the important thing. He just hoped . . . he didn't even know what he hoped she did or didn't think about that whole thing. It was a mess is what it was. What was wrong with him?

He grimaced at the idea of going back in there when Professor Wright suggested he not sit with Lily again after this for the rest of the day. He could see the sense in it, but how long was this going to go on? He couldn't just not be around Lily for the rest of the year. They were best friends.

"Can't I just, I don't know. Go to the library for the rest of the period? Even the hospital wing?" Even if it had still been Medic Eir in there, who was possibly the most terrifying woman Jozua had ever met, the infirmary still sounded more appealing than facing his classmates again after that display. A spark or two snapped in the air around him just thinking about facing the stares of everybody else.

When Professor Wright started asking logical Aladren like questions about what the two incidents had in common, Jozua shook his head adamantly. "No, the other time was in a Quidditch shop at home. No class. No Lily. The salesguy was asking questions about Sonora's games, and I was getting self-conscious because I'm not really all that great of a player. I guess that could be the commonality? Self-consciousness? Same thing set off the sparks when I was little, too. It was bad enough that it kept me out of primary school, but I never had a problem here at Sonora before."

1 Jozua This was enough of a scene for me, thanks 348 Jozua 0 5

Professor Wright

February 06, 2018 10:53 PM

Me, too, but you asked. by Professor Wright

Gray thought he might have liked Jozua’s idea better than his own anyway, but the sparks which went off around the boy again, though less of a dramatic show than the first time, would have done a good job of convincing him that Jozua’s suggestion had merit.

“That could be for the best,” he agreed, carefully not taking a step further back even though he rather wished to do so. He was increasingly sure Jozua was not just being difficult for the sake of being difficult and therefore didn’t want to make him feel even worse about what had to be a rather embarrassing situation. “I’ll write you a pass to the library, if you think you can – er – not do that again in there – fire hazard, you know. The librarian might get a little cross with me if you left my class and then set his place on fire.”

Plus – and on a considerably more serious note, that second line having been delivered in a tone of deliberate understatement - Anne would kill him, because the library was the library and the library was also attached to the Aladren Common Room. Of course, Gray would be sorry to see the old haunts burned down, too – he had good memories of living there – but Anne would kill him. However, since Jozua was a Teppenpaw, and also a student, he refrained from mentioning these concerns.

“Just spend the period studying Charms theory for your CATS prep,” he concluded instead.

Quidditch shop, at home. That was…well, not good, obviously, but better than the alternative. He almost said ‘interesting’ out loud instead, but remembered himself before he did that and acted Far Too Much Like An Aladren. “That sounds like it could be the case,” he said, carefully. “And I’ve read – “ well, he was an Aladren, and it wasn’t even a secret, he was pretty sure horror stories of his lack of skill were still told around campfires to encourage new Keepers to think that no matter how bad they were, they couldn’t be worse than That Guy – “that it can be part of why accidental magic recurs for some people at puberty, so. That could be that.” That would make everything so much simpler. “If it helps at all, I suspect you’re a better player than I was,” he added, noting the Assistant Captain’s badge on Jozua’s robes as he re-opened his door, scanned the room for signs of damage, and waved a piece of parchment and a quill over to write the promised hall pass. “I don’t think I’ve ever met one who was worse, anyway. It helps if you make a joke out of it,” he continued as he wrote:

J. Sparks has permission to be in the library until 10:30 on --/--/---- he printed, his print still almost identical to what it had been when he was a student, before scrawling Wright, Charms on it in undisciplined script.

"There you are. Try not to worry too much about it, and levitate something heavy for your homework," he recommended.

16 Professor Wright Me, too, but you asked. 113 Professor Wright 0 5

Zevalyn Ives, Aladren Prefect

February 22, 2018 11:19 PM

Setting A Good Example by Zevalyn Ives, Aladren Prefect

Zevalyn got lucky this year. The opening feast had been on a friday, so she had gotten to celebrate her birthday, September second, by not going to class. But now her birthday was over, and so was her first prefect meeting Sunday night, and it was time to hunker down into her last year of intermediates.

DADA had gone fine, and she had talked dueling with Jozua Sparks, so that had been pretty interesting. She expected Charms to follow the same pattern. At first, it seemed to be. But the Jozua started generating some kind of force field around him and got ejected from the class, and she and the other prefects were put in charge while Professor Wright went out to talk to him.

Lily took lead on that, and there really didn’t seem to be much else to do unless someone caused trouble or needed help, so Zevalyn just shrugged and turned to her neighbor. “That was weird. He seemed fine in Defense.”

Figuring she ought to set a good example as a prefect, she then set to her assignment. She swished and flicked at her ten pound weight, and spoke the incantation. A year ago she’d still been featherweighting the paperweights with the third years, but she’d put in a lot of practice and effort since then, and when she hefted up her weight, it definitely wasn’t ten pounds anymore.

It was maybe not as light as it should be after a lightening charm, but there was a notable change, enough to earn an Acceptable, but she was an Aladren. Acceptable wasn’t actually acceptable. And nobody ever got Outstanding at anything without practice.

She cast finite on it and tried again. And again. And again. By the seventh time, she was reducing the weight by nearly 9/10ths, which she was quite pleased by. She looked up and noticed Professor Wright had returned but Jozua had not. She didn’t know what to make of the later, but the former meant she was safely excused to just be a student again and not A Good Example.

Which meant chatting with her neighbor was back on the table. “How’s it going?” she asked, keeping the query open as to whether she meant the assignment or life in general. Whichever interpretation they wanted to answer was fine with her.

OOC: Timeline established in the first paragraph explains some time fuzziness surrounding how the lounge conversation between Zevalyn and Georgia fits chronologically with classes. Zev is NOT infected at this time.

1 Zevalyn Ives, Aladren Prefect Setting A Good Example 380 Zevalyn Ives, Aladren Prefect 0 5