[maidstone] keep off the grass [jari]

He couldn't get out of that house fast enough. Literally. He almost tripped on the door jamb as he stomped his way out, the cool night air hitting him in the face and it would have been refreshing if it hadn't made him feel a little nauseous. Great, just another drunk teenage stereotype, he thought as he took the stairs down and walked away from the house, the noise and the din of voices and the music fading away a bit.

Jae saw a group of people on the grass and saw a familiar figure. Jari? Who the hell were all these other people then? Oh wait, was that Aaron? He looked like he was going to pass out any second. But then as he walked closer, maybe this whole group looked a little worse for wear.

"Where the hell have you been all night?" he asked, standing over his dormmate, his cup gripped in his fingertips by his side. Then he blinked and got another look at his friend. "You alright?" It wasn't exactly a bad look on Jari 'cause the guy seemed happy enough, but it was vastly different than the kid he usually hung around. Guess tonight was the night for temporarily becoming different people and regretting life decisions come morning. Well, if you even remembered what had happened. Jae, for one, didn't want to remember a thing.

@Jari Trickett

Jari had been out here for a while, but the exact amount of time was utterly lost on him. One second he felt like he’d only been here for a few minutes; the next, it felt like a few hours, and the tailspin of time made his head hurt if he thought about it for too long. So, instead, he took another puff from the joint that was being passed around. Jari blinked slowly, trying to hold the smoke in for longer like the older kids had told him to. Eventually, it burst from his lips, chased by some rough coughs, and Jari wished he’d brought something to drink out.

He’d been five minutes (or five seconds?) into considering getting up for snacks when he heard Jae’s footfalls and then a voice. Jari craned his neck to look up at the wizard, leaning back and swaying slightly, and gave him a lopsided grin. “Pretty much… right here….” He pointed lazily to the ground he was sitting on and then smiled again. “Yeah, I’m good. You wanna sit with us?” Ever the Hufflepuff, even under these new conditions, Jari scooted a little bit to one side to make more of an opening for Jae to sit down.

“Have you ever smoked before?” He asked as he got distracted by a few blades of grass that were poking him in the ankles. Jari spent a good thirty seconds patting the ground by his foot, tucking the edges under his sneaker, but they kept popping up again. Ripping them out seemed mean, so he just decided to endure the itchiness instead.

Jae started to shake his head. No, he didn't want to sit in soggy grass and get his pants damp so it'd look like he peed himself when he got up. Thanks, but no. But with another glance around at the various students (and hell, who were some of these people? Were they even students?), there was a strong, sudden pull to reckless indulging.

The fifth year sat down and tried to ignore the squish beneath him as he gave his dormmate a nod. He had been curious enough about it to have tried it before and had access to enough kids that it had been easier than he thought. It was one tick in the being a wizard box since Jesus only knew the shitstorm he would be in if his mum knew. But whatever. He gave Jari a nod and then held out his hand, silently asking for the joint and only half wishing that he could completely forget everything from tonight.

Jari blinked a few times, waiting for what felt like twelve minutes for Jae to decide if he wanted to sit and then leaning further away than was required when the other Hufflepuff finally joined them. Jari offered him a lopsided grin, and then as the joint came around, he took his turn and handed it to his wizcast radio co-host with an even bigger (and closed-lip smile).

Three, two, one… and then Jari coughed for about thirty seconds straight.

A few of the circle patrons clapped, one laughed, and an older girl passed him a bottle of fizzy soda that Jari had never had before, and he grinned sheepishly. By the time he had finished coughing up a lung, his eyes were red and glossy, and he felt tingly all over. His throat was still scratchy, but the drink helped, and Jari passed it back with another smile, less shy the more tingly he felt. The Hufflepuff turned back to his friend and ran his hand over his hair, pushing it to the side, but it fell again. It was long in the front row, but he was sure Abby liked it, so he didn't plan to cut it any time soon.

A thousand thoughts filled Jari's mind, racing from alien conspiracies to the war with the pixies to whether or not the Chupacabra was real until finally, every one of them escaped like smoke, and his mind went blank. Instead of saying anything, any number of the things he could have had an hour's worth of conversation about, Jari stared awkwardly at Jae. His mouth even hung open a little; it was embarrassing and also hilarious. And when he realized what he had been doing, Jari burst into laughter.

Jae watched, his gaze apathetic, as he watched his dormmate choke for what seemed like a long time. He heard titters of laughter and it made him bristle, both at the idiots who thought they were so much cooler that they had never coughed front a joint or from Jari who had clearly been out here a while and was still coughing. Jae stared at the joint between  his fingers, weighing how much he thought this would maybe lift him out of the dark abyss he had spiraled into the moment he saw Mavis making out with Killian and how much he didn't want to be like Jari even in front of these practical strangers.

He hated the indecision, but he finally made up his mind and brought it to his lips, trying not to think of the facts like how many other people's mouths must have touched this already and how many germs that equated to, how many simple illnesses were easily transmittable through-- He tried to to stop his stupid brain and took a drag, feeling the smoke fill him up and trying to hold back the cough. Which he failed at, but at least it wasn't as bad as Jari,

Passing the joint on quickly to Nathan, another Hufflepuff who hadn't even seemed like the party type (hell, what was he even thinking, he himself wasn't the party type) before he glanced back at Jari. Who was staring at him, his mouth open like a fish. "What?" he asked lightly turning his gaze away from his friend and to the night sky as if trying to read some life answers there in the stars. No movement from Jari had him taking a double look. He was still staring. "What are you staring at?" Jae asked, his voice harder as he self-consciously touched his newly dyed blonde hair.

But then he started laughing and Jae hated the sound. Normally he got along pretty well with Jari, well mostly, Jae never thought he got on well with anyone, but Jari didn't seem to hate him so that seemed promising. But right now, he really just wished he would shut up. "Stop laughing, it's not funny," he said tightly as he looked away, even though he honestly had no clue what he was actually laughing about, only jumping to conclusions based on the evidence.

Despite his desperate (and feeble) attempts, Jari couldn't hold his laughter in. The more he tried, the more he laughed, until he felt like his cheeks were burning and his throat was raw. It was probably only about thirty seconds worth of giggling, but to the stoned sixteen-year-old, it felt like at least five minutes. Jari covered his mouth with one hand, and when the chuckles escaped, he covered his first hand with his other and swayed a little.

Eventually, he calmed down, but only just barely. The sparkle in his eyes was a clear indicator that Jari was living on a short fuse, one spark, and he'd be back to giggling out of control. "Nothing, nothing," he finally said between deep breaths. His entire body was tingling now, and Jari felt like his heart was thudding so loud it might have spun up its gravity and rose in his throat.

Regaining his composure was pretty much out of the question, but Jari managed to take a few deep breaths and keep himself from another fit of laughter long enough to ask a solemn question. Well, it was serious to the budding conspiracy theorist, anyway. "Hey, Jae," —oops, cue more laughter, "—that rhymed!" Jari spent another fifteen seconds with a gigantic smile on his face, and eventually, he gripped his sides. They ached from the laughter. "You ever heard of the chittering four-eyed beast of Wannanmal?"

"Shut up," Jae bit out, each word enunciated with his anger and annoyance. He knew that glassy look in Jari's eyes meant he probably couldn't help himself, but Jae didn't care. He hated being laughed at.

Hey Jae. "Yeah," Jae said shortly. "A real rocket scientist you are," he told his friend sarcastically. Then he wondered if Jari even knew what a rocket scientist was. The wizarding world was so ignorant sometimes and it made Jae feel like an alien. There were nights like tonight where he wondered what his life would've been like if he didn't have magic. If he had just been like any of his other siblings, still going to regular 'muggle' school, not having to see Mavis with another muggle-turned-wizard boy. Tonight sucked. He shouldn't have come, he decided.

Anddd of course, Jari would want to talk about his conspiracy theories of creatures he was pretty sure have the time were made up. This one included. He shook his head and glanced away from Jari, taking the joint that had come back around. "No, I haven't," he said shortly before taking a short drag, wondering why he was doing so even as he did it. "And I'm 85% sure you just made that up." Then he passed the joint to the next person, skipping Jari entirely. He seemed like he had had enough at this point.

“85% is not 100%, you know,” Jari answered as if he was cracking a great, big mystery when really, he was stating a fact. However, considering Jari had a penchant for the unbelievable, stating fact was like a big deal. The Hufflepuff reached for the joint and then gave Jae a forced frown as he passed it over him. Sure he’d probably had enough, but it didn’t matter. The wizard made a disappointed sound deep in his throat and then continued. He’d forget about being passed over in about two seconds… one… two… it was gone.

“For real, though, the chittering four-eyed beast of Wannanmal is a legend,” Jari acted like it was common knowledge, and Jae was the crazy one for not knowing. No one asked for more information, but Jari hadn’t noticed, “So the story goes: it was a cool spring night, not unlike this one, in a small town outside of London, not unlike this one,” Jari made sure to layer on the commonalities, for dramatic effect. He leaned back on the palms of his hands and continued the made-up story of a five-legged beast that skittered along the ground like a crab and made clicking sounds with his jaw as he hunted. Jari told the group about the glowing green eyes, fierce smell, and stories of him abducting teenagers from groves of trees. Not unlike this one.

When he’d finished, the joint found its way back to Jari, and he took a triumphant puff from it. He pretended to be cool, which lasted two seconds… one… two... cough, cough. “So I thought maybe we could do the next wizcast about that creature?” He said directly to Jae, covering his mouth as he coughed between words.

"I'm very aware that there is a 15% difference, thank you," Jae told him, his foot tapping a beat against the grass, annoyance in his voice. He got along well with Jari usually, but right now? He couldn't understand how the other Hufflepuff, ugh he hated even thinking of his 'housemate' in categories like that, seemed so easy-going all the time. And Jari had a girlfriend. Didn't she drive Jari as crazy as Mavis drove him?

No, he told himself with a shake of his head as he ignored Jari's sound of complaint. (Honestly, who was taking this kid home?) Jae didn't care about the Gryffindor girl with dark eyes and dark hair who had been sitting on another Gryffindor's lap all night and-- forget it. Jae stood, rather suddenly, his feet almost slipping in the grass as he shook his head at Jari, interrupting him hallway through his 'story'. He hadn't even paid attention, but he could guess at the tale because he knew his friend that well.

Except tonight, he couldn't be the stalwart friend everyone expected of a 'Hufflepuff'. "I have to go," he said, waving a hand in front of his face as Jari coughed smoke out and it drifted up towards him. "I'll talk to you later," he dropped before he left abruptly, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. He veered back toward the house, but as he got closer and the music got louder, he decided he didn't want to chance seeing Mavis with Killian again. He really wished he could just apparate home and it was like another slap in the face that he could do magic, but not enough of the right kind of magic to get him out of this. Instead, he just started walking, using the light from his wand when it got too dark in the countryside, feeling a fool for the way he felt as if even the stars overhead were laughing.

He only returned much later, no sign of Jari on the lawn, to search out one of Isaac's friend for a ride back home.

/end

Jari had probably made up more "facts" than he meant to as he recounted the harrowing tale of the beast, but that was how legends were made, right? Someone, somewhere, decided to expand on a story until it caught someone else's interest, and then they built upon it too. Jari loved exploring the intersection between truth and myth, fact and fantasy, and he'd made his entire life around that intersection. Jae, however, seemed less interested. And typically, Jari would have picked up on that. Even though he lived with his head in alien-infested clouds, Jari was rather good at understanding how others were feeling, even if they hadn't explicitly mentioned it. He could usually tell when a conversation went sour or when his audience had lost interest, but Jari wasn't usually stoned, so he barely noticed.

He nodded when Jae stood up abruptly, but it hadn't registered, and he continued the story until finally he turned to ask Jae about the wizcast and realized his friend wasn't even there. "Where did… he go?" Jari asked, his eyes red and glazed over as he turned toward the rest of the group; there was smoke in them, obviously. And the group laughed, but Jari didn't join them this time. He worried something had happened, worried that somehow the beast had come for Jae and he'd been too preoccupied to notice. Jari was concerned that he was a terrible friend, which made him feel less chipper than before.

"I'm gonna…" he said softly, waving his hand in a circle around him as if that would easily indicate he meant he was getting up to leave. And if he had gotten up right then, maybe the group would have understood the unspoken cue, but it took him a good five minutes to decide to get up was way more work than it was worth. And by the time he came to that conclusion, Jari had forgotten all about going to check up on Jae and another fifth year had arrived at the circle.

He was a terrible friend, indeed.

/end