Magical Hogwarts

A pout was starting to form along her lips at the sheer level of, well, non distraction occurring. If this was a normal sort of exchange with a friend she knew exactly what she would do. Flirt shamelessly and drape herself all over them, to start. She knew how to make contact quite distracting, thank you very much. Fact was she just... did not know Harlan that way. She wasn’t sure if he’d take the tactile manner in which she held herself with friends as a different sort of invitation.

(Wasn’t sure herself if the lines wouldn’t blur. There were moments where she questioned quite a few of her motives with men who were closer to her than perhaps they ought. That kind of thinking led to madness and she was quite content with not examining those thoughts and just quietly tucking them away, instead)

Point was that she couldn’t just grope the man in the middle of her mother’s bookshop. That’s how you got brought up on harassment charges. It was important to know ones audience. Most of her distraction methods were... not appropriate for the audience was the problem. But she couldn’t bloody loose! Giving up wasn’t an option.

Still. His response was rather insulting. She raised her own eyebrow in response, letting the silence rest before speaking. “I need more incentive than the price any other interested party would end up paying for the book.” She quipped, smiling cheekily at the man in front of her. It was true, of course. “Didn’t take you for a quitter, Bellamy.” she added, eyes sparkling merrily.

Even if she couldn’t win this, she’d still try.

In his peripheral vision, Harlan could see that Roslyn had started toward the bookshelf, and toward him by proxy, but he kept his focus firmly on the titles before him. The wall was seemingly endless, still with no sign of rhyme or reason. His dedication to finding the novel on his own was both an attempt to keep himself busy and to prove himself as correct.

The witch didn't stop at a normal distance though, instead, she took another deliberate one beside him so that he could feel how close she was again. It was clear what was doing— more attempting to do— and a grin pulled at the corner of his lips. His eyes following belatedly to look sideways at her, eyebrow slightly quirked in question. She had to have expected that using his own tactic against him wasn't going to work in her favor. Particularly when he was the one trying to make the transaction.

"A couple hundred of my galleons, to start," Harlan's eyes narrowed on Ros briefly, trying not to linger on the thoughtful sound that she had made. If she thought she was hard-headed, she had another thing coming when it came to the level that he was willing to go to in order to be right.

Aurora loved spending the holidays at Hogwarts where she could study in peace. She figured out the theory to many of the spells she was learning in class and was close to getting them down with the practical side. She was excited though that Patty was back and that she was getting the chance to hang out with Patty's friend Jeva. This was her chance to make another human friend.

She ran after Patty to the lake. They were going to go ice staking since part of the lake was frozen. It made Aurora worried about the giant squid but the professors assured her that the giant squid was alright and could handle the cold. She had went ice staking once with her parents but wasn't very good at it. She laughed a little at Patty's excitement as she pulled on her own stakes.

Charlie laughed and avoided Sam’s gaze; third time was the charm for finally knocking some sense into him, more like, but it was easier to keep the focus on his pretty face instead. “Fuck off,” he said through another grin. “You’re the one with the trifecta: face, muscles, and you’re Irish.” Nobody hated the Irish, everybody hated the English.

Sam had zeroed in on the mathematics and Charlie shrugged. “We were out of the country August,” he said, not deigning to clarify any further (mostly because he didn’t want to start keeping track and spook himself out of an arrangement that was mutually beneficial). “Not like I see her every day,” he volunteered, because he was too busy having a parallel conversation with himself in his head and finding it difficult to keep the two separated. He realised then that he had potentially opened himself up to admitting they had a weekly recurring meeting, but he shrugged again; “It’s just shagging."

Charlie met Sam’s eye and breathed out through his nose, glanced away as the other man got to his feet. He drummed his fingertips across the table again and turned in his seat to get another look at the gaggle of girls in the corner -- one caught him looking and smiled. Charlie half-smiled back.

Sam returned with fresh beers and a depressing toast. Charlie laughed, then sighed. "Surely I can only go uphill, but you're fucked," he grinned and had a swallow of beer. He set the glass back down and looked out the window as it started raining outside. He knew Sam had been joking--which Charlie appreciated, considering the lecture he could have provided instead--but it did bare thinking about: surely his twenty-eighth year couldn't be worse than his twenty-seventh? Subconsciously, Charlie brought his beer to his lips again for another drink. "You think we'd already be, like, you know, settled by now if we hadn't gotten the deal?" Charlie asked, belatedly turning back to look at Sam.

Beyond an indignant splutter, Nastya found that she couldn’t respond to the stream of idiotic words flowing out her sister’s mouth. Aglaya was so stupid, and infuriating! She growled slightly under her breath, half hoping Aglaya didn’t hear it, half hoping she did, as her jaw clenched. She found the only response she could make was an angry glare in her elder sister’s direction.

Nastya narrowed her eyes slightly, as she tried her best to figure out what Aglaya’s reactions to her words meant. It was almost impossible to tell what her elder sister was thinking, especially after she had admitted that their mother probably had been too busy dealing with her mess to check in on Aglaya so much as normal. Was Aglaya angry at her? Disappointed? Jealous? It was so hard to tell. Nastya didn’t think she could really blame her sister for feeling any of those things though. She chose not to say anything, just looking at Aglayka curiously. Her sister really was a total mystery to her.

There was silence for a few seconds as they sat together on the sofa, just the sharp, ragged breathing of Nastya and Aglaya’s own sigh, which made Nastya glance in her sister’s direction. Anastasiya felt her heart skip a beat as she worried that her sister didn’t believe her and would press her further. She no longer had the strength to defend herself in a verbal combat. If Aglayka pressed her even just a little bit more, made one more probing question, Nastya knew that she didn’t have the energy to lie anymore and would reveal everything to her sister. She really didn’t want that.

She closed her eyes as a few tears trailed down her cheek, listening to Aglaya’s reply. Her sister’s voice was cold and Nastya shuddered, feeling very unwelcome again. She guessed that perhaps her sister would even be so rude as to ask her to leave. So, forgetting about the poor dog temporarily, and in preparation for such a request, the younger Tikhomirova sister opened her eyes, and desperately tried to get her breathing under control before she’d attempt to stand and… somehow make it home without any help. “Okay…” Nastya managed after great effort, though she wasn’t sure if she’d been loud enough for her sister to hear her.

“Mm-hmm,” Nastya hummed weakly, as Aglaya added she wanted to take a nap. That was all she wanted to do in that moment too. However, where Aglaya was successful in getting to her feet, Nastya was not. She barely moved her head, let alone the rest of her body, and she could feel her eyelids getting heavy quickly as her breathing calmed down. Panicking, she tried to flutter them open but was fighting a losing battle. She knew she was still pretty weak, considering this was her first day out of bed, but she didn’t think the tiredness would have been so bad. She could faintly hear Aglayka address her, and Nastya felt the sting as the insinuation that her sister didn’t want her there anymore seemed painfully obvious to her, but she quickly remembered Bronislav’s existence and instinctively knew that she couldn’t leave without knowing he’d be okay with her sister. If her sister was going upstairs, Nastya guessed it wouldn't be long until she found out.

Her lips parted, trying to reply, but finding herself unable to beyond a soft noise. Part of her wondered if she could somehow get Aglayka to summon their mother to help her home through that handy mirror her sister had, but Nastya had a distinct feeling that the older Tikhomirova sister would not take that so well. It wasn’t as if she was in a position to be able to ask that of Aglaya either.

She hoped that her sister wouldn’t mind her taking her time to recover on the sofa, already feeling her body slowly tilt sideways, barely conscious as her cheek connected softly with the seat of the sofa. Nastya couldn’t even lift her legs up onto the sofa, as her eyes remained tightly shut, completely unaware of her sister’s movements anymore.