To infinity, and beyond! on Charms

A Memory

December 29, 2020 7:32 PM

To infinity, and beyond! by A Memory

The memory was small, easy to miss when one entered the empty classroom. To many of the staff and students, it would also seem very bizarre if noticed: a human shape, seemingly heavily armored…with a Bubble Head Charm in place of a helmet? But what sort of Bubble Head Charm was opaque at the back, and all around the face, so that the face seemed to protrude strangely from a solid mass? And what sort of suit of armor had a pair of wings attached to the back of it? And what sort of wings were…rectangular?

Any or all of these questions might run through the heads of those brought up only in the magical world. For the person who came across the memory and knew more about Muggle pop culture, though, a simpler, perhaps more startled question might have come to mind: what’s the ghost of Buzz Lightyear doing in the Charms room?

At first, Buzz simply sat on the floor, immobile, just as he was supposed to any time he was in human company. After a moment, though, he gave a shudder – then a jerk – then rose straight into the air, face still frozen in its painted grin, hands still rigidly posed, wings still motionless – and yet, slowly but surely, the toy rose into the air, seemingly flying under its own power, until it hovered evenly with the top of one of the desks at the end of one row.

And then, even more suddenly than it had risen, the spectral toy crashed back to the floor again, the echoing plastic clatter all out of keeping with its ambiguous not-quite-liquid, not-quite gas apparent state of matter, as if it were a real toy which had just terrified its young Muggleborn owner, instead of just being the memory of such a thing.

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Sadie-Lake Chalmers

January 08, 2021 7:04 PM

Uh, no thanks? by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

She had definitely had both earrings in during Charms. As with any lost thing, Sadie was desperately tracking back through her memory to the last time she’d had it. It was hard with earrings, because they only started standing out once one was missing. She supposed that meant that they had both been there during all her bathroom visits, prior to the last one, where she had noticed she was suddenly lopsided. Still, she had definitely had them both in Charms, and that was nicer than crawling around on the bathroom floor, however clean the elves kept them. She knew she had been fiddling them a lot in Charms because she had been sitting in the same row as someone kinda cute, and apparently the effect of that was to make her nervous. Unsurprising, but, she suspected, really not very helpful for her dating prospects. And, sure enough, when she’d kept her head down, he’d partnered with someone else. Oh well, it was probably for the best if Charms was when she’d knocked her earring out and started looking stupid for the day.

She made her way into the room, feeling slightly uneasy. It was silly, really, it was just an empty classroom. It was just hard not to feel wrong about being here, like she was breaking some kind of rule setting foot in it when it was so still and silent. Still, she did want her earring. They were a pair her grandma had given her. They probably weren’t super expensive (though her definition of that word was probably substantially higher than a lot of people’s) but they were cute, and she tended to like the things her grandma got her. They felt more like they were for her somehow - like she had actually listened to and noticed what Sadie might like, instead of what was #SoHot right now. This particular pair were little pearl studs (something so classic her mother probably would never have let them in the house) but with the addition of little diamante ears so that they looked like bunnies (something so novelty her mother would only have let it in the house if #Kitsch was trending).

She ducked under the desk where she had been working, glancing to and fro and- Hang on. She was fairly sure that a see-through Buzz Lightyear was something she would have noticed straight away. Which meant it hadn’t been there a second ago. What- she almost jumped out of her skin when it moved. She definitely jumped high enough to bang her head abruptly on the underside of the desk. Ow.

She cowered more than she would have liked to admit, given that she was looking at a children’s toy. She had to admit that, after her initial shock, it was more just confusing than threatening, but a lot of stuff in the magical world could look innocent but try to hurt you. Buzz dropped down, and faded, and on the spot where he had been was her earring. She hesitated. Putting her hand where some strange, unknown manifestation had been sounded dangerous. What would her DADA teacher say? She drew her wand, not entirely sure what spell she would use to fight off the ghost of Buzz Lightyear, if he did turn out to be trying to trap her. But then she recalled what room she was in, and what they’d been working on that day. Maybe she didn’t need to touch that spot after all. Maybe she hadn’t needed to even get down on her hands and knees to search, or even come back here, but she still had trouble thinking in magical terms to solve her problems. And she was pretty sure Professor Wright had said something about needing to know where an object was?

“Accio earring,” she cast, pleased as it zoomed the short distance to her hand. She hastily scrambled out from under the desk and exited the classroom as quickly as she could, throwing one more nervous glance over her shoulder as she did so.

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