Arnold Carey
September 21, 2011 8:28 PM
After Class (Tag: Miss Fae) by Arnold Carey
It was unfortunate when your Head of House's class couldn't be your favorite and you were going to be studying it for all seven years, but Arnold thought his Quidditch record would do enough to keep him from being an embarrassment to Fawcett and the House as long as he could stay Arthur's brother and keep up his grades to a level his family wouldn't kill him for before Fawcett got the chance. Since he didn't plan to stop winning, be disowned, or die, then, he was able to approach the subject and his occasional lapses in enthusiasm or judgment with good cheer.Paintings clambering out of the walls wasn't something Arnold had ever seen before, so his Potions sample suffered a little for his distraction by Tribble and what the dead headmaster wanted with Fawcett, but he was far too intrigued by the prospect of finding out what was going on to care. If he didn't make up the points another day, he'd make them up on one of the occasions when Arthur deemed Arnold's written work so bad at he went in late at night to edit it and they both pretended Arnold didn't know. Without any apprehension to speak of, he followed Fawcett and Tribble out of the room, near the front of the group.
Apprehension would come soon, but Arnold's immediate reaction to what they found in the Mirage Chamber was mild disappointment. They had been pulled out of class for a bunch of old things? Granted, it was still better than class, but....
He followed Arthur until he realized his brother was going to a display of old books like a bee back to the hive, then wandered away a little to look at what looked like a display of old Quidditch stuff. That got a bit of a smile from him. The robes weren't hugely different, since Quidditch gear wasn't really meant to follow the more elaborate fashions, but he thought people in another hundred years or whatever would see a difference between his and these, and most likely theirs. Not to mention his trophy. If he won every game he ever played in, as he planned to do, then he had better get a trophy for Tribble's 680th or something....
"This is sad," Arthur's voice informed him. "Couldn't you be a little interested in something else?"
Arnold forced down his irritation over that comment and having his daydream interruped. Arguing about it was pointless anyway, and arguing with or without a point, especially in public, was kind of frowned on. "Sure," he said. "When you start doing anything besides being smarter than Anthony."
Well, maybe he wasn't very good at keeping his mouth shut sometimes. Everybody was different.
Arthur closed his eyes, shook his head slightly, and, to Arnold's surprise, relaxed. "I don't try to be smarter than Anthony," he said. "I just am. But I guess I deserved that." He squinted at something, the way he did when his eyes were tired, and said,"Fae's looking at dresses. You should go talk to her."
It was phrased as a suggestion, but Arthur's tone didn't make it one, and he had hurried off back toward his books before anyone else could touch them before Arnold had a chance to protest that looking at clothes together was for girls. It was a few seconds later, despite someone rescuing him from an immediate confrontation, that the apprehension began.
On his own, Arnold didn't think he would have really thought very much about a ball. His parents, who were at least mildly opposed to thinking too much about future daughters-in-law when their two older sons were barely thirteen and Anthony not even in school yet, wouldn't have, either. But Grandfather did notice, or at least had it pointed out to him by Grandmother or one of the Sixth's own grandparents, and he had been using one of his tones which most clearly advised Arnold to make no argument when he made it clear that Arnold was to show up at the ball with a proper girl on his arm and his best, most counterfeit-adult manners on display for the masses. And since there was already...something between them, and she was about the most proper girl in the beginning classes anyway, he had concluded it was inevitable that he was going to ask Miss Fae.
Eventually. Not today. Even if it was getting later and later in the year, and more and more people were pairing off and having special lessons for whatever people in the world who didn't learn to dance before school - maybe they didn't have sisters or girl cousins? They were all older, or so he firmly told himself. That made it different.
No, he wasn't doing any such thing today. And yet, as they began to leave, his feet began to carry him treacherously in that direction anyway.
"Hi," he said, for lack of anything more inspired when he reached her. If he'd had evidence before this moment of such a thing as some kind of special twin mental bond, anything at all, he would have turned to deck, or at least glare at, his because he was somehow certain that Arthur was somewhere nearby looking perfectly normal but inwardly howling with laughter. "Do you - " He remembered belatedly that school might be less formal than real life sometimes, but there were forms to follow on something like this. "I mean, would you do me the honor of me - of attending the midsummer ball with me, er, Miss Fae?"
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Arnold Carey
After Class (Tag: Miss Fae)
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Fae Sinclair
September 22, 2011 9:11 PM
Is when strange things happen? by Fae Sinclair
Fae had actually enjoyed herself in the Mirage Chamber. Granted, all she really did was try on the many different robes with Sara, but it was far better than having to deal with her potions catastrophe. She knew that they would eventually have to finish their potions and she’d have to get the dismal grade on it like she usually did with her potions, but for now she wasn’t going to worry about it. Besides, what she couldn’t do with her practical, she could do with her written. She was rather proud of her written grades. It was the practical parts of her grades that had her down. She was even thinking about going to a tutor. Maybe… she’d wait to see what her parents said come summer. If her final grades were poor, they’d want her to take up extra studies.But that was neither here nor there.
She spent her free time enjoying her current area. Sure she was probably being a bit of a girl about immediately going to the robes, but she was the first of her family to go to Sonora, so she knew there weren’t any trophies there with her family’s name on it, she didn’t have any feelings towards Quidditch other than to grimace anytime she watched an Aladren game (both because she worried for Arnold, but was also worried for their opposing team), and she wasn’t into the books on an intellectual level like some of the others. So, she stuck to what she was interested in and what she knew well. Clothes.
But now their time was over and Fae needed to head back into the real world. Or, the real world of Sonora. More classes. More homework. More listening to Alice turn everything into logistical goo in her brains.
Fae was putting the last of the robes away and grabbing her own when Arnold approached her. She had been so involved with things with Sara that she hadn’t thought to look for him to see what excited him. That was probably rude of her. Arnold always went out of his way to make her happy; she could do the same for him. “Hi Arnold.” She greeted back, smiling delightfully at him.
His hesitation and rambling had Fae a little worried. Her smile faltered ever so slightly, at least until he actually finished talking and then she simply looked dubious. He wanted to go to the ball with her? Her/i>? For some reason, Fae had never considered having a date to the ball. Maybe because she was only a second year, but also because she just didn’t think anyone would ask her. But here Arnold ones, one of the few she considered her friend, asking her to go with him.
When his question finally sunk into her, Fae’s dubious expression changed and returned to her usual pleasant expression. “I would be delighted to go to the ball with you, Arnold.” She said after giving herself a moment to figure out how the proper way of accepting should go. “Thank you for asking.”
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Fae Sinclair
Is when strange things happen?
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Arnold
September 26, 2011 9:18 PM
I guess it's as likely then as at any other time by Arnold
Arnold was, despite the best efforts of his father and etiquette tutors, not very good at reading people’s faces, but he could tell the look on Fae’s was not a good one. It was almost as if she thought he was crazy for even asking, though that didn’t make any sense – even if she was already going with someone else, it wasn’t that strange for him to ask if he didn’t know that, was it? They were friends, they were both from…well, his branch of his family was perfectly respectable, anyway, and Virginia and Louisiana got by, and if he wouldn’t place in a contest, he still didn’t look like Edmond…..Then she smiled again, leaving him well and truly stymied by that look she’d had a moment before. Girls. There really was no understanding them. Even Terry was incomprehensible sometimes, and she was his close cousin.
Unless – he thought with a vaguely sick feeling – she was putting on, like Arthur did when he was tired or sick or annoyed and hid it from some adult he felt the need to impress. But he didn’t want to think that at all, so he tried to ignore it.
“Thank you for saying you’ll come,” Arnold replied after a moment of considering what was the best way to respond to being thanked for asking her. As though he’d done her a favor. No, girls really didn’t make any sense. They seemed to vary as much as anyone else did on the surface, but beneath the surface, they had in common that they were all really complicated and impossible for his brain, anyway, to understand.
Feeling his comment wasn’t enough, but also thinking it would be impolitic to promise not to do anything stupid to embarrass her, he added, “I think we’ll have fun.”
It wasn’t much, he knew, but maybe it was better than nothing. Maybe. He hoped. This kind of situation was so far out of the depth of his experience that he felt like he was walking in the dark when there was broken glass on the floor, when that was one dare he wouldn’t take from any of his cousins. He thought. He didn’t mind getting hurt too much, but it wasn’t like he enjoyed it, or did it on purpose. That, he was sure, the family would have disapproved of. He wouldn’t be very useful to them dead.
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Arnold
I guess it's as likely then as at any other time
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Fae
October 04, 2011 9:32 PM
You have a good point. by Fae
“You’re welcome.” Fae commented pleasantly. She never thought she would have a date to the ball (friend or otherwise). She had assumed she would go on her own or with a group of other girls (there weren’t enough boys in this school to allow dates for everyone) and then possibly dance with some of the boys. She hadn’t considered someone asking her. This would be a much different experience than she was anticipating. Not at all bad. If she had wanted anyone to ask her, it would have been Arnold. For whatever reason, Arnold seemed to be the one whom Fae relied on for anything that dealt with males. Her sister, Shelby, advised her that this wasn’t a terrible thing. It was good for Fae to have a male counterpart while at Sonora. If Arnold was around and it was known they were friends, people would likely leave her alone. But, Shelby went to an all girl school and had been seeing the same boy for the last year, Fae wasn’t sure if she could really listen to her sister’s advice on boys or a co-ed school.“Oh, I hope we do.” Fae said lightly as she slipped back into her school robe. “After the Meet and Greet my family held last Christmas, my parents have had me going to all sorts of parties.” Fae explained, looking exhausted just remembering them. “They were European families, so I had absolutely no idea who anyone was and all I did was stand there and smile the entire evening. My cheeks were sore for a week after!” Those parties were unbelievably boring! She couldn’t imagine how her classmates had felt when her parents had thrown one.
“I’m sorry; I’m speaking down about these families.” Fae lowered her voice and looked genuinely ashamed for her behavior. “I’m just really hoping that this ball is more… entertaining than standing around in a room full of strangers.”
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Fae
You have a good point.
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Arnold
October 06, 2011 8:14 PM
It's rare, but it happens by Arnold
Arnold made a face in sympathy when Fae started looking tired just talking about the parties her family had drug her to. The idea of spending the whole holiday that way sounded awful to him. It also sounded a little strange to him that they had all been European families, but after a year at Sonora, he had begun to get the foggy impression that his family was a little unusual, so perhaps it was his relatives who were unusual for not traveling a great deal. Though, it sometimes felt like the family was as good as international anyway, however hard they were trying to be one family now. Over a hundred years of feuding was hard to forget.Then, though, she started to look guilty. Why was that? “It couldn’t be any worse,” he offered. “I – “ he started to say something about not liking to stand around in a room full of strangers, either, but that wasn’t strictly speaking true. “ – don’t think it sounds any good, either,” he finished instead, a little less without consideration of how it sounded than usual with her, hoping to cheer her up. “Mother and Father don’t really take us anywhere yet, though. They don’t like it themselves, especially Mother. She doesn’t really know all the people Father does.” Anthony VII had at least had the advantage of growing up in certain circles, around certain people. Mother, somehow…hadn’t.
It didn’t really make sense to Arnold. She had been married to Father for a long time. Why did anyone remember anything else? It didn’t seem terribly relevant. He could see why she would, but to let it bother things, he didn’t understand it. Mother was who she was now, and was around the people she was around, so what was before, so long before, seemed like it couldn’t have much bearing on her now. And it often seemed like she was the one who had more of a problem fitting in with people than they did with letting her, to him, anyway, in the bits and pieces he’d seen over the years. Though it was also true that he very rarely saw the social side of the family. One of his brothers liked to hide and watch what was going on, and the other seemed like he was going to be able to step into it without a problem, but Arnold just didn’t find it interesting or easy to handle.
“I guess it’ll be more like last year – at least we’ll know the other second years, right?” He…well, he had Arthur, they both knew Arthur, for whatever that was worth, Arthur liked Fae’s roommate’s Alice, they both knew Preston, and that was all without going into the people outside their roommate circles who they knew. “And Miss Raines.” Somehow, both Preston and Fae seemed to have become friends with the diminutive third year, so he included her even though he wasn’t very familiar with her himself. She seemed nice, and if he had been in the third year class, he thought he might have looked for his friends outside it, too.
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Arnold
It's rare, but it happens
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