Jessica Hayles
December 28, 2019 10:35 AM
Willkommen, Deutschsprecher! by Jessica Hayles
Jessica still felt all kinds of wrong even walking outside without adult supervision - such things had been strictly against the rules all her life, both inside school and outside it, before Sonora - but she supposed she was getting used to it, or at least not minding the feeling of having done something naughty as much anymore. At the very least, she felt more giddy than anxious as she strolled out into the Gardens in her heeled sandals and sunglasses, a picnic basket hooked over her left elbow and her backpack on her shoulders. Her wand was in her right hand, and ahead of her floated a painting which had a decidedly resigned look on its face.In the first fountain clearing, she stopped and put her bags and the painting down on a bench. From the basket, she removed a cotton blanket and spread it out on the ground. From her backpack she took several throw pillows and, on a childish whim, actually threw them around the blanket, scattering them. Then she went back to the basket and removed bottles of sparkling apple juice, melamine plates, doilies, paper napkins, hard plastic champagne flutes, a box of chocolates, and two boxes of assorted cookies and popcorn flavors. A little arranging later, and it was done.
My first party. She looked over the scene: the chocolates and assorted cookies and popcorn boxes set in the center of the blanket and wrapped in pretty tissue paper to cover any product labels, the places set so people could choose whether to lounge or sit on pillows as they used their glasses and plates of treats. This was not, she thought, exactly what she had had in mind for her first party. She had expected to have a significant staff to order around, a guest list which had taken weeks to curate, a lot better supplies than melamine and plastic. However, her life had gone all wrong, so she had to make the best of it.
Two days before, she had sent out three invitations to the girls she had shared a tent with at the Bonfire last year. Each had been written in her prettiest handwriting, with the same message repeated twice, once in English and once in mostly correct German:
Please join me for a small back-to-school get-together in the Labyrinth Gardens on Saturday 09/--/----. We can have some chocolate, practice our languages, and catch up from the summer! Professor Schmitt will be in attendance.
Hope to see you there,
Jessica Hayles.
Now, she thought once she had Professor Schmitt settled, sitting down and allowing her feet to slip out of her sandals, she just had to see if anyone would actually show up. Her heart fluttered beneath her white, slightly draped, cap-sleeved top, and her fingers toyed with her full skirt, which graduated from lighter blue at the waist to darker blue at the calf-length hem, with some irregular smudges which Jessica thought gave an impression of flower petals floating toward the ground. Her hair fell in somewhat natural-looking waves which it had in fact taken her almost an hour to achieve, and diamonds sparkled in her ears. Please let at least one of them come, she thought to herself. Please please please don't let me look like a total fool...
16
Jessica Hayles
Willkommen, Deutschsprecher!
1442
1
5
Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
December 28, 2019 11:28 PM
A party! by Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
OOC - Italicized dialogue is in German here and in the rest of Johana Leonie's posts in this thread, unless otherwise noted.IC -
Johana Leonie had spent the past several years just waiting to be pretty. She wanted to wear pretty dresses and she wanted to go to pretty parties and she wanted to maybe kiss pretty people and she just wanted a pretty life. Now she was talking about boys with one of the prettiest girls at school, there was going to be a Ball, and she was being invited to a party by a girl with more fashion sense than most people she'd ever seen. Jessica Hayles always looked perfect, and Johana Leonie always looked like a lump. But at least they were both redheads. Maybe that meant she could glean some ideas from just being around her classmate.
On the Saturday of the party - Johana Leonie was proud to have understood most of the invitation in English - Johana Leonie got herself ready in the closest thing she had to a pretty dress and headed to the Gardens. She was originally planning to walk with Hilda, but she didn't want to make Jessica think there was any sort of pre-party going on that she wasn't invited to, and she was pretty sure Hilda's Common Room was in the Gardens anyway, so it didn't make a lot of sense to meet up someplace else first.
Johana Leonie's dress was hardly good enough; it was a simple white linen shift that came to her knees, and was decorated with yellow and blue flowers. The waist line pulled in, accentuating the fact that Johana Leonie was no longer a child the way she'd been before. There wasn't much to accentuate, but there wasn't nothing either.
Jessica had prepared an entire spread for this get together, and Johana Leonie immediately felt bad. She was not good enough for these things! She was just . . . just Johana Leonie. Hardly good enough at all.
"Hallo," Johana Leonie said in a small voice, wishing she could walk up with the sort of confidence and grace that seemed to ooze from Jessica. "I should have brought something. I'm so sorry. I did not think of it." She let the portrait of Professor Schmitt interpret for her, since it let her hear the correct way to phrase what she'd said in English, and let Jessica hear the English. It was helpful all the way around, even if the content of the comment was admitting exactly how unhelpful Johana Leonie was. Ugh.
22
Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
A party!
1432
0
5
Jessica Hayles
December 29, 2019 3:25 PM
That's what I'm hoping, anyway. by Jessica Hayles
Jessica's spirits lifted slightly when Johana Leonie appeared - there were still so very many ways this could go all kinds of wrong, but at least she wasn't going to be found out here by someone uninvited, hostess to a party nobody had showed up at - but her nerves slammed back into their accustomed places when she took note of the other girl's demeanor. It was a relief, then, to pick out some of the cause from what Johana Leonie said and the rest from the Schmitt translation."No, no," she said, with a slight laugh of relief. "I'm the host, so I bring the treats." She looked to the professor for his translation.
"I'm so glad you came," she added once he had provided it. "Dein Kleid ist schon," she added, looking approvingly over Johana Leonie's dress. "Pick a seat, get some snacks! This is Apfelsaft," she added, pointing to the bottles, just in case anyone thought she had gone far enough off the rails to try to bring actual champagne to school. Jessica wasn't sure she had ever even tasted champagne; she had sneaked a champagne truffle from a box her mother had gotten one Valentine's Day, and had thought it was just like...chocolate filled with chocolate, flavored with maybe the barest ghost of a single strawberry, so she wasn't sure it actually gave her any basis for guessing what real champagne tasted like. "How was your summer?"
16
Jessica Hayles
That's what I'm hoping, anyway.
1442
0
5
Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
January 02, 2020 10:34 PM
Even with me on the guest list? by Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
"Danke," Johana Leonie said, beaming at Jessica for the compliment. If Jessica thought her dress was pretty, then it probably really was because Jessica always looked exactly like how Johana Leonie wanted to look. "You are doing a pretty look, too," she offered, figuring her broken English was part of her character and she may as well start codeswitching from the beginning. She didn't realize she was doing any such thing, but Professor Schmitt seemed to because he smiled and nodded approvingly. Johana Leonie appreciated that the portrait seemed to only interpret when there was some suggestion that it was wanted.She looked curiously at the juice, wondering why anyone would package such a simple drink in such fancy bottles. That wasn't the sort of question she wanted to launch off with though, so she took a seat - tucking her legs carefully in front of her and shifting the dress so that there were no accidental peepshows - and nodded. "Thank you for doing all of this," she said smiling as she poured herself a cup of juice and gave Jessica room to look to Professor Schmitt for an interpretation if she so desired. The juice bubbled and fizzed, answering her question; she was glad she hadn't asked. "Mein Sommer was good. Friederike Albert practiced English and I practiced also." She wrinkled her face, aware that she so far hadn't shown off very good skill improvement. "English ist hard when only people know Deutsch, oder languages from other places, also."
She held up the bottle of juice and offered it to Jessica. "Want you me pour-- want-- you want juice? Do you want me to pour you some juice?" Ugh.
22
Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
Even with me on the guest list?
1432
0
5
Sophia Priory
January 10, 2020 2:57 PM
There are worse people by Sophia Priory
CW-A lack of awareness with regards to gender.Sophia had been pleasantly surprised to get an invite from Jessica Hayles for today's gathering. She had not set out to spend time with the Crotalus initially the way she had the two German girls- which admittedly had been more to practice her German than because of them personally but they were both very nice girls and she might not have otherwise gotten to know them if she hadn't wanted to practice German with native speakers-but nor was she against doing so. Making friends was a good thing generally speaking and Jessica did not set off any red flags for the Aladren.
And it would generally speaking, be a good thing to have a group of friends...even if that did not include Bridget. Sophia thought it might be good for them both to have other friends, separate from each other. It wasn't abandonment, she still could spend time with her cousin and they always would be close, but Sophia needed her independence. Doing her own thing and not what Bridget or Lydia or even Connor wanted was something she'd always desired and this was the start of that.
So why did she feel a little guilty? Like her cousin was being excluded? It wasn't as if the whole class was invited except Bridget. Her roommates weren't here, Zara wasn't here, and the boys weren't here. Nor was it as if Sophia had plans with the other third year.
She brushed those thoughts aside as she came upon Jessica and Johana Leonie sitting together. "Hallo." Sophia greeted them. She turned to the Crotalus. " Thank you for inviting me ." Learning to thank people was probably something Jessica had learned by now so she would probably recognize what the Aladren was saying. Otherwise, Professor Schmidt-or Johana Leonie-probably could translate.
Actually, she had to wonder how Professor Schmidt really felt about being in attendance. Sophia couldn't imagine an adult man wanting to spend time with a group of teenage girls socially. (Well, actually she could but she was giving the portrait the benefit of the doubt.) Most adults of either gender didn't find teenagers particularly interesting. Some teenagers didn't find other teenagers to be stimulating come to think of it. Sophia felt bad for Professor Schmidt and she hoped they could prevent him with a conversation that kept him from being bored. And a conversation that kept Sophia from being bored though she was more optimistic about herself than Professor Schmidt.
She addressed Johana Leonie. " Nice to see you too " She said to the redhead.
OOC-Following suit with italicized words being in German.
11
Sophia Priory
There are worse people
1447
0
5
Jessica Hayles
January 16, 2020 3:17 PM
Only lovely people here. by Jessica Hayles
Jessica beamed back at Johana Leonie when the compliment on her appearance was returned. "Danke, viel," she said, reasonably sure this was within shouting distance of how to say 'thank you very much', even though she was also reasonably sure that it literally meant 'thanks a lot', which sounded rude to her in English. Hopefully, if the literal translation was both accurate and also weird in German, she would be understood on the basis of tone and the allowances made for someone who was clearly learning a language and who had not been learning that language very long.She understood the remark thanking her for doing this, though it took her a moment to arrange the words in her head and translate them into a meaningful sentence. Her eyes went momentarily blank, then brightened again as she made sense of what Johana Leonie had said.
"I'm so glad you like it," she said, enunciating carefully. She gave Johana Leonie a moment to get an interpretation if she wanted one, then added, in halting German, "Ich mag - das - du magst." Her best attempt at 'I like that you like,' the closest she thought she could come to expressing the same idea in German right now. Compliments were definitely something there should be a phrasebook for; she'd try to get one and use it to further her studies.
Johana Leonie's summer had been good. She and her brother had practiced English, despite it being difficult to do where they were. "I'm sure it is," she said with a nod. Her heart felt as light and sparkling as the bubbles in the sparkling juice. This was going so well. Even with the language difficulties on both sides, it was all just...easy. Why had she never really tried having girlfriends before? Even if, well, right now it was just one girlfriend, and anyone who walked up and didn't have an invitation might well think they were on a date...
Her ears went warm and she shook that thought aside. "Ja, danke," she said when Johana Leonie offered her apple juice in return. She held out her glass and then turned her head when she heard Sophia greeting them. "Willkommen!" she said. "Please, come sit. Have some snacks," she said. "We were just talking about - die Sommer," she said, mimicking Johana Leonie's pronunciation as closely as possible. She still had trouble remembering to pronounce 's' as 'z', so taking the opportunity to copy was probably good for her.
16
Jessica Hayles
Only lovely people here.
1442
0
5
Hilda Hexenmeister
January 18, 2020 1:35 PM
Ich bin hier by Hilda Hexenmeister
Hilda should not have been the last one there. She was a Pecari, so her common room was undoubtedly the closest to the designated meeting place in the Garden. However, when she arrived, Jessica was already there with both Johana Leonie and Sophia. And also Professor Schmitt, but she wasn't sure that he counted as a guest exactly, and he would have arrived with Jessica anyway since he'd been mentioned in her invitation. She blamed an aptitude for punctuality in the other two for their presence. Hilda herself wasn't quite late yet, but she was very narrowly skimming inside the point of 'on time'."Hallo," she greeted the rest, hoping she wasn't interrupting a riveting conversation.
She knelt down on the blanket with the other girls. She did not really notice that she was easily the most casually dressed of the four of them. People dressed how they dressed, and Hilda dressed in comfortable pants and shirts, with little to no interest in make-up or fancy hair styles. Her long blond hair was brushed, and that was as much effort as she was going to put into it unless she had a Quidditch game. Then she'd tie it back in a braid that would keep it out of her way.
Jessica had said this was a small welcome back get together for eating chocolate and practicing German and English. This did not suggest to her that any special attention to her appearance was necessary.
"It is good to see you all again," she said, her words coming out very slowly and carefully. Then she smiled because the professor gave her an approving nod to show she'd gotten it right. She also smiled because she liked these girls and she thought she might actually be really making American friends now.
1
Hilda Hexenmeister
Ich bin hier
1433
0
5
Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
January 19, 2020 4:41 PM
Dieses ist sehr gut! by Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
Johana Leonie tried to hide her outright grin behind a more demure expression as their party grew and everyone was so nice and pretty and even Hilda, who was dressed in her signature level of casual, comfortable clothing, looked lovely. Everyone was so pretty. Hilda had the shiniest blonde hair, Jessica always looked perfect, and Sophie looked as radiant as ever. Johana Leonie desperately hoped she fit in.Everything moved sort of fast for a moment, so she let herself be caught up in the flow of polite smiles, nods, and shifting about as everyone got seated together and the apple juice was passed about. Johana Leonie was pretty sure that she had accidentally made friends. Hilda had definitely been an accident but they'd been close for long enough now that they just seemed like friends. They visited each other in the summers and they did homework together and many other things together. They were close enough that it sort of felt like it was her and Hilda infiltrating a group of other people, and that was sort of exciting. At the same time, it also felt like maybe they'd been hugging and now they were just opening up on one side to let more people in on the hug.
Johana Leonie felt warm and she couldn't help continuing to smile at her peers. "How are you?" she asked the group, never remembering whether there was any better way to specify the plural 'you' in English. "Jessica, danke again for . . . ah. . . . for setting this up. Yes, that," she said when Professor Schmidt offered an interpretation. "Thank you for setting this up."
22
Johana Leonie Zauberhexen
Dieses ist sehr gut!
1432
0
5