Take me to your leader (tag Dathan) on Cascade Hall

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

July 07, 2021 10:32 AM

Take me to your leader (tag Dathan) by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

OOC: God-moddy details checked with relevant authors BIC:

Dathan Michael Fischer was, apparently, from the kind of family that put birth announcements in the local paper. Sadie knew it was deeply hypocritical of her to resort to Googling her classmates when she had to hope to heaven they never saw reason to do the same to her, but she hadn’t been able to come up with any other options. She had tried screwing her courage to the sticking spot and asking Jezebel, but the best she’d been able to offer was ‘uh, April, I think?’ Sadie had considered getting Jessica to ask on the basis of it being some kind of prefect thing, but forcing her into throwing mini parties for the rest of the prefects for the remainder of her time at school seemed a little too steep a price to pay for the information. At least, not whilst she still had other options, and so over winter break she’d guiltily typed and deleted his name several times, before eventually hitting ‘search.’

Jezebel had at least been right, in that it was April. The seventh, to be precise. At 2.47pm to be even more precise. The fact that these details, along with birthweight and every other thing, were published in the local paper was testamount to the fact that Instagram really was not a new phenomenon in terms of parents wanting to overshare, it had simply widened the audience. Hopefully, he would assume she’d been able to ask Jezebel.

The discovery of this information also meant she was sort of out of excuses not to give him something she’d bought last summer, and been holding onto ever since. She had considered giving it to him as a back-to-school present—after all, it really had been one of those ‘I saw this and thought of you’ moments during the summer, but then she’d bottled that. Christmas had felt unfair, in case it made him feel bad for not getting her something. And there were absolutely no other special occasions between December and April that she could have considered honouring. None at all, whatsoever.

She had, at least, had a chance to remind him of their in-joke about Muggleborn club badges during one of their conversations, and he’d still seemed to find it worth smiling about.

The gift was wrapped to Insta-levels of #PresentationIsEverything. It was in a small purple box embossed with stars, a garish lime green ribbon holding the lid on, its ends pulled into corkscrews rather than being tied into a bow. The sharply contrasting colour palette was both acceptable for boys and a slight clue to the contents inside. A simple tag white tag with a hand-drawn border matching the parcel’s colours was held in place by the ribbon. It simply read ‘Happy Birthday.’ Again, the present inside would make it clear who it was from.

Sadie had debated giving it to Dathan in person, or leaving it on his plate, but the first was too embarrassing, and the latter carried too high a risk of being overlooked, so she had entrusted it to a school owl. It circled the Cascade Hall, and when the birthday boy arrived, fluttered down to his place, dropping the small box on his plate.

When he opened it, he would find a small enamel badge with one of the vivid green Toy Story aliens, the words ‘Take Me To Your Leader’ above its head.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers Take me to your leader (tag Dathan) 1480 1 5

Dathan Fischer

July 14, 2021 11:01 PM

Can the leader teach me to sound smarter? by Dathan Fischer

Dathan's birthday was...well...a day. The calendar seemed to include a little square for it every year, after all, and the sun had traditionally both come up and gone down on it, and those were the standard parameters for calling something a day. On the whole, though, that was all it really was, especially since he'd come to Sonora. He had never exactly had huge blowout cool kid invite-the-whole-class parties back home, but the occasion had at least been marked by a family dinner with all his favorite foods, plus of course cake and ice cream. Since he had been enrolled in boarding school, though, it had really just kind of been...a day.

For the most part, he was okay with this. It had been kind of weird his first year, but he'd gotten used to it. It was back to feeling a little weird again this year, though. A few days earlier, he'd gotten birthday cards from his parents, and it had occurred to him that if he had still been at home, this would have been one of the Traditionally Important Birthdays. He had no illusions about the odds that he'd have gotten a car or anything like that, but that wasn't really the point. At least, he didn't think it was. He'd have probably bothered getting his license anyway, because that was just what people did, wasn't it? And now he didn't actually need it, so there was no reason to feel any kind of way about it, but...

He had decided, after going in circles like that one for a bit, not to think about it, as there was nothing he could do about it and he didn't even know exactly what he'd want to do about it if he could or even why it mattered. So he ambled into the Cascade Hall on his birthday without much on his mind beyond what was on offer for breakfast, at least until he was suddenly approached by one of the owls.

Dathan looked around in vague surprise for a moment, wondering if it had mis-delivered its small parcel. It was his birthday, though, and this did look like a present...He shrugged and opened it, looked at the contents for a moment in surprise, had a thought, and then chuckled as he pinned it alongside his prefect badge and went over to the Crotalus table.

"Look what I just got," he said to Sadie, pointing it out. "I kind of wish I'd thought to say something like this when I met the wizards. Is it from you? Not that I'd, uh, expect you to get me anything, I mean - or even know that it's my birthday - because it's my birthday," he concluded, feeling very much like an idiot and pretty sure it was obvious. "I just thought, with what we've said about badges and stuff before," he explained himself.

16 Dathan Fischer Can the leader teach me to sound smarter? 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

July 15, 2021 2:59 AM

If they can, hopefully they can help me too by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

Sadie was trying to sit at the Crotalus table and sip her juice like it was just a perfectly ordinary day, even though it very definitely wasn’t. Her stomach was full of butterflies, and—for all the doubt she felt, and all the worry that this was just very, very stupid—she couldn’t help but have a little bit of hope in her heart. He’d like it, right? It was cute, right? ~~He might even think she was cute, right?~~. It would be nice to make him smile on his birthday.

When Dathan entered the hall, she tried really hard not to look like she was looking, even though she wanted to watch his reaction. She might have chosen a seat that very deliberately placed the Teppenpaw table in casual side-eyeing range.

He looked surprised at first, which was completely fair. Even after all these years, Sadie was still a bit surprised when an owl ended up in her face first thing in the morning, and she also guessed he wasn’t really expecting the present, and it was anonymous. But then when he opened it, he smiled. She couldn’t help it, her face burst into a big, warm smile too, so that they were sharing the moment, even though he hadn’t looked up or noticed that fact. He even put it on!

And then he was coming over. Sadie quickly schooled her face into a less obvious expression, though there was still a light dancing in her eyes that said she was pleased to see him when he approached. She just sort of… was there for his first two comments, still processing what she ought to say instead given that ‘you’re welcome’ didn’t exactly fit. He knew it was from her, right?

“Yes, yes it is,” she confirmed, when he stumbled through asking that, jumping in over the end of his own sentences. It was funny seeing him so flustered. He was normally chill. Why was he flustered? He liked it right? He seemed to be smiling and be happy about it. “Happy birthday,” she offered instead.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers If they can, hopefully they can help me too 1480 0 5

Dathan Fischer

July 22, 2021 6:31 PM

To the Leader! And cake! by Dathan Fischer

Whew. Accurate guess had been accurate. That was a relief. If it hadn't been an accurate guess, then Dathan was guessing with extreme confidence that things would be really weird right now.

"Cool," he said, because it was, and because he was relieved he probably only looked just a small bit stupider than he did on his default settings in life. "And, I mean, thanks," he added, taking a seat at the Crotalus table without really thinking about it. "That was really cool of you, I wasn't really expecting much of anything today - and I didn't know you knew when my birthday was anyway," he acknowledged. "Now you've got to tell me yours, too," he added brightly.

This was probably elementary, but felt like a big deal. Someone liked him well enough to have just...given him a present for no particular reason! That was new, in a good way. For most of his time at school here, he felt like he'd sort of floated under the radar. Back at school back home...well, he had a weird first name and violently red hair and wasn't especially good at anything. His social life had been...'eh' at the best of times.

"Hey - when it's supper, after class and stuff - do you want to hang out and - like - eat cake at the same time?" That had made a lot more sense in his head than it did out loud. He had been working through the thought that it wasn't exactly a party when desserts just kind of appeared every night as a matter of course, but it was kind of a party since they both knew it was his birthday, and he had come out with something really weird. Moving on, then... "And do you think we should try to add 'everyone eats cupcakes in class when it's someone's birthday' added to the list of Muggleborn traditions the wizard should really start doing?" he joked, to take attention away from the sounding-dumb bit.

16 Dathan Fischer To the Leader! And cake! 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

July 25, 2021 11:54 PM

Yes! Cake! by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

"You're welcome," she smiled, happy that he seemed genuinely touched by the gesture. He also seemed surprised, and mentioned not knowing that she knew when his birthday was. That was not a question, therefore it didn't need an answer. The one about her own did though, and she was more than happy to answer it than force him to do his own research.

"August 2nd," she answered.

"Definitely!" she agreed, when he invited her to join his birthday dinner. Or maybe be its full guestlist. She would have assumed that, as cousins away from home, he and Jezebel would have taken to honouring each other's birthdays but, between her not knowing when it was, and Dathan's surprise at anything happening at all, Sadie wasn't going to hold her breath on that. If she had been the kind of person to have stern words, she would have been tempted. As it was, she would probably settle for glaring at Jezebel on the inside whilst keeping her face entirely neutral. She couldn't imagine not having someone make a fuss over your birthday. Of course, that fuss went too far sometimes in her case, and was more attention than she wanted, and often revolved around her mother's choices about what she thought Sadie should want in a party- but at least it wasn't ignored. She supposed that was what her mother was always going on about, with how she should be grateful for the attention...

"Well, I can't do anything about it on my birthday, but it's definitely a cause I'm willing to get behind," she nodded, when Dathan talked about bringing the Muggleborn culture of cupcakes in class to Sonora. That one seemed like it might be an easier sell than electricity or health and safety codes.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers Yes! Cake! 1480 0 5

Dathan Fischer

July 30, 2021 6:20 PM

Cake is great, like you. by Dathan Fischer

August second. August second, August second, August second. He now had a friend and they knew each other's birthdays! This was cool. He beamed at Sadie, momentarily forgetting that August second wasn't a date which fell within the Sonora school year.

"August second. Got it," he promised.

Even with that in mind, he was a little surprised by how pleased he was when Sadie accepted his invitation. Yeah, it would have been super awkward and weird had she just...noped out, but Sadie wasn't a person like that. She was all...put together and stuff, the sort of person who, unlike his mother, could wear nail polish and not have it all chipped up by the end of the day, like she had her life in order. She'd have said something nice, like that she would have loved to, except that she had already planned to have dinner with her boyfriend or something. Did she have a boyfriend...? None of his business, he guessed, all the same glad that he hadn't noticed anyone acting overly...boyfriendish...toward her.

"Great!" he said, deciding that was a much better idea than thinking lots of things and trying, inevitably, to even remember where he'd started from at some point. "We'll show these folks how to party! For...one definition of party, anyway," he acknowledged with a grin.

The somewhat inconvenient timing of Sadie's birthday occurred to him at last when she commented on the cupcake proposal. "Yeah, it would be kind of unfair to everyone with a summer birthday...maybe the first week back could be catch-up week, have cupcakes for as many days as there were summer birthdays? We don't really have anything like a homeroom to have them...hm. Maybe whatever class your Head of House teaches, that's where your cupcake day happens? For everyone all year, I mean, not just for catching up over the summer. And now I'm imagining - like - what that would look like in Professor Skies' class., he added with a chuckle. Their Transfiguration teacher was a bit no-nonsense, but also had a lot of chintzy stuff. Would they have to Transfigure their cupcake icing to look like tartan before they could eat it or something?

16 Dathan Fischer Cake is great, like you. 1457 0 5