life is a cabaret [trudy]

Travelling...finding magical creatures to study...that sounded like an awesome job. Being away from home for weeks at a time didn't sound so great though, and she felt a little discouraged in her fledgling magizoologist plans, at last for the moment. When Isis considered it again later, she would remember that she spent months at a time away from home when she was at school, and that didn't feel strange or lonely at all.

"Gryffindor..." your houses aren't named after magical creatures..." she mused, thinking for a minute "oh, wait! Are they people? Like, the founders of Hogwarts, like the Sayres and Stewards?" The possibility that Trudy wouldn't have the faintest idea what she was talking about didn't cross Isis' mind, and already she was thinking back to her first day at Ilvermorny. "Well my Dad was a Thunderbird, so he was real pleased that I was in the same house as him. Mom and my brother Lyon are both in pukwudgie, so it's kind of fair, you know?" It felt that way to Isis, anyway "So is your Mom a Ravenclaw too? Or your Dad?"

When their attention turned back to the play, Isis bent over, put one hand to her back and hobbled closer to where Trudy was standing "Aww, that's too bad. I totally forgot" she said, disappointed, but secretly hoping they didn't have to go back and sort through the chest again "though I suppose we could use that black curtain that the clothes rail was behind...oh! Or we could hang that old cloak over the clothes rail! Would that work?" she looked hopeful and eager and added "Like...you know, one side of it is outside in the street and then when we go behind it and out the other side, we're in the house? Would that work if there isn't anything else on the stage?"

“Yeah,” Trudy said, wondering if she hadn't said so before. “Rowena Ravenclaw, Goddric Gryffindor, Helena Hufflepuff and Salazar Slytherin. They were the four founders of Hogwarts.”

She nodded along when Isis talked about the houses her other family members were or had been in. “My father was a Ravenclaw, my mother a Gryffindor,” Trudy explained. “See, that's why I would have been fine with both houses. My parents, well, mostly my mother told me a lot about Hogwarts before my first year so I felt quite well prepared.”

Isis' plan actually sounded rather good, especially considering that Trudy wasn't eager to go back herself and waste more time on this kind of preparation when they hadn't properly set up the plot yet. “Yeah,” she said brightly. “I think that would work.”

She looked at her friend thoughtfully now. “So, we should work out the story line some more. We need a start where we set the scene and introduce the characters,” she began. “Then we need the actual plot to unfold and an ending of some sort. Given that we have an old lady, missing her dog and a young girl helping her find it and an imaginary ghost that only one of them can see… we need to figure out what exactly happens to make this interesting enough so people don't walk out of the theatre while we're on stage.” Trudy wasn't quite sure what the plot could be but she was confident that they'd figure it out together.

Those names were so...cool! Isis listened with as much fascination as if she were in class - more, because this wasn't something that a professor had decided she needed to learn about, it was something she was finding out for herself. She was going to write home and tell everyone about this,  right from when she and Trudy first met up until their brilliant play which, she realised with a slighty twinge of concern, they had so far done very little to prepare for. Well, aside from the fact she was dressed like an old lady and had lost her invisible dog.

Right, time to begin for real! They had costumes, they had plans for the stage, now all they needed was to figure out what they were doing. "How about..." she began, and then realised that her idea of the old lady thinking the ghost was actually the girl wasn't going to work at all. Not without someone to play the ghost, which was invisible...and hadn't they already decided that she was the one who couldn't see the ghost anyway? She thought quickly "...uh, so we begin when I'm holding the dog lead and calling "Scooter? Where are you, boy?" Would that work? Would Trudy mind if she actually started their play?

She thought for a moment, and it seemed that Trudy was doing the same. "We said that only one of us can see the ghost...once we're inside the house, how about you hear a noise and say you'll go and check it out, and we walk round in a circle, and accidentally back into each other and scream? For partway through the play, I mean, not the end. I guess we either want a happy ending or a real scary ending or..." Isis suddenly had a crazy idea that maybe either she or Trudy's character could turn out to be a ghost as well, but she wasn't sure if that was going to make sense. While she was trying to come up with a good ending she walked around a bit more, leaning on her stick and muttering to herself about her supposed lost dog.

"Hmm..." Trudy made, tilting her head to the side thinking about what Isis had suggested. "Yeah, I guess that could work. Then I hop in from the other side of the stage... Do you think we should play strangers or grandmother and granddaughter?" The thought had only just occurred to her and it might work to set the scene and make it easy for people to follow. "I could come in and be all like 'grandma, did Scooter run away again?' or something like that. Then the audience would have an idea who we are and that there's supposed to be a remarkable age difference."

Trudy thought that the start was pretty decent but developing a story that made sense from there still seemed to be a little hard. "Well, we go looking for the dog, then I hear a noise from inside the cabin and... hmmm I go inside but there's nothing? And you come in and startle and stumble out screaming because you see the ghost? But what's the story then? Like... what do we want to say with it? and how should it end? You'd tell me to run for it and I am reluctant because I cannot see the ghost and..."

The girl watched her friend playing the old woman and giggled. "You're great in your role," she admitted admiringly. "Oh! What about I stay in the cabin and go missing like the dog? That could either be the end or... you negotiate with the ghost and... umm you manage to get me free by promising frequently visiting the ghost because it's lonely?  - I could then speak the role of the ghost with a different voice from my hiding place - but what do we do with the dog? It cannot come out of the cabin... Unless! Unless we take Edna my plushy erumpent to play the dog in the end." Except for the part with the dog Trudy was actually rather happy with how the story was developing. It still needed some work, of course, but they had a rough outline that was at least making some sense.

"Oh, I love that!" she exclaimed. It made so much more sense that random people just meeting in the street. And it would mean that Isis' old-lady dress and walking stick and Trudy's cute little pigtails immediately looked right to the audience, rather than them wondering whether they were just dressed up in crazy costumes. She hunched over a little more and said "Yes dear, I really need to get him a new leash, or find a better charm for this one..." she looked at the supposed dog lead and sighed, then added "You're such a good girl dear, helping me find him. Where do you think he could have gone?"

She straightened up "and then maybe you could say you heard a dog barking, and point to the house and we can talk about how it's supposed to be haunted...oh! Maybe I could say something like 'when I was a girl, there was a beautiful woman lived there on her own, but she had no friends . Nobody ever went in or out. I wonder what happened to her'" and you say that you'd heard stories about it being haunted...that might work? Like, if you believe in ghosts and I don't, but I see the ghost?" Isis thought that might be quite a fun way of introducing the idea of the house being haunted. It didn't entirely make sense, because Trudy had clearly met and chatted with ghosts, and presumably everyone could see them...but perhaps some no-majs could see ghosts and others couldn't? They could alway say they were pretending to be no-majs if anyone asked afterwards, she supposed...

She listened to Trudy's ideas, pleased with how this was taking shape. So she came running out - well, running as fast as an old lady
could run, unless she dropped her character for a moment, ran screaming and then pretended to realise she'd done something wrong... No. The idea amused Isis but not everyone shared her sense of humor and she didn't want them to think she'd forgotten her character. "So I run out screaming, but I realise you're still there, so I have to go back in, and I call your name, but instead he ghost answers..?"

"That's perfect! I'm an old lady, so I'd have time to go and visit the ghost and be friends with it!" The thing with the dog was a bit awkward though, If they were using a plushie they could hardly expect it to act a role, and without their wands they would even be able to make it levitate across the stage. That was a pity - it would have been funny to do that. "Oh, how about this?" she suddenly thought "So at the end, after I've talked to the ghost, and I say what about my granddaughter and you say what about me? and you then come out of the house saying "Look, I found Scooter - and you can hold the plushie and it won't matter that it can't move or say anything..?"

Isis thought that all sounded great. Sure, the ending wasn't quite perfect yet, but they'd tied up all the loose ends and made a story, now they just needd to rehearse until they got it right.

"Oh yes, grandma," Trudy replied in a higher voice than she usually spoke, "a new leash is a good idea. You should get a pretty one in cerulean. I've seen those in a shop when I went there with daddy." She smiled at Isis as she went on playing her role. "Naturally I help you finding Scooter," she said brightly.

She nodded at her friend when she suggested that Trudy could hear the dog barking. "Oh yes, and you probably don't hear so well anymore because sometimes old people are like that." she agreed. "I'll call Scooter then and pretend to hear something."

Trudy beamed at Isis. "Yes, I think that would work well. We could expand on it, like make it a story within a story. Just that this one isn't played out but simply told. What do you think?" She paused for a moment. "Maybe I say I've heard stories and you offer the... Well, a bit boring adult version of the story that's all logical and I add all the crazy things that I've heard and then it turns out that it's actually something in between? Like your version is basically 'the owner died, there was a funeral, end of story' and mine is 'the owner died and the ghost of her haunts the house and scares people to death and nobody could ever live in that house again and so on' and then it's a friendly ghost in the end? I'd say to keep it reasonable we should probably both see the ghost but you are frightened while I'm curious. I mean, I already believe in ghosts and children are curious so it might work? We need to flesh this out some more, of course."

Trudy nodded again, this time rather thoughtfully. "Well, you flee, I stay inside, you come back, maybe just to the door so the audience can still you there and you call my name and... oh! I could probably play both the girl and the ghost then if it cannot be seen what's going on. Maybe I convince you to come in and what about if the woman who lived there once and who turned into a ghost turns out to be an old friend of yours? Like a childhood friend. Or do you think that's too much? And regarding Scooter, I can use Edna as a dog or we just leave the dog with the ghost so she has company?"

She paused and looked around. "Shall we take the bush over there as our house for now? and the practice stage stretches from there towards the tree? I guess we should just play this through at least once. So shall we start?”

Isis nearly doubled over as she started giggling. "Sorry" she gasped, regaining control of herself "That's just...really awesome. You sounded just like a little kid then, the audience are going to love that..." She nodded and listened as they expanded on the story a bit more, thinking that they really were going to have a good play at the end of this. "Yes, that works. After all, the more people gossip about stuff, the more it gets added to, even if they don't really mean to."

She was still tottering around with her pretend walking stick as they talked, really enjoying her character. The dress, which after all she was wearing over her t-shirt, was feeling rather hot, but she was reluctant to take it off until they knew exactly what they were doing. Isis felt like she was really in character with this dress and she loved the feeling. "Okay, so maybe you see the ghost after me? Like grandma, what are you screaming at? and then after I run out you see it as well but get really excited and want to talk to it? Is ther a way the audience could see you but not the ghost...like if you stand at the door and say Wow, there really IS a ghost and you say hello to it and step inside?"

She was trying to figure something out in her mind that didn't quite add up, and finally she figured it out. "You know, what we really need is two parts to the house. A little front part where we can go inside and be seen, and then the part we can't be seen at all..." Isis wasn't sure she was making sense, but it seemed to her that if she was really looking for her missing dog and granddaughter she wouldn't just stand at the door of the house, she would go inside, and then see the ghost through a door which the audience couldn't see. She'd wandered down close to the edge of the lake now, and really wanted to take her sandals off and paddle in the cool water. Later she told herself. After they'd got the play figured out.

"I'm not sure it would work if she'd been my friend" Isis said doubtfully "I mean, I would have known that she lived there. But what if...what if the ghost asks who I am, and it turns out she was the Aunt of someone I was at school with? I mean...it'd still be a coincidence, but a believable one, you know? Oh! And we can't leave Scooter, because he needs food, and ghosts don't eat!" she remembered, sensibly.

The mock staging was fine though. Isis moved to where Trudy had indicated and began, hobbling forward and leaning on the stick while she held the 'dog lead' prominently in her other hand. "Scooter! Scooter, where are you, boy? Are you...here?" With her final words she hobbled forwards, as if looking directly into the audience as if the missing dog might turn up there.

[ooc: We now have our chars practising playing other chars. I'm sure there's a word for how meta this has just got...xD]

Trudy nodded eagerly as Isis agreed with her idea. “Yes, and then a story is far from the truth and far more dramatic than it ought to be,” she added. “I just hope the audience will like our play. It sort of has a moral, too. Do always check the facts and do not just believe everything you're told.”

The little Ravenclaw shrugged as Isis went through the order of events of their play again. “Yes, sure, that works,” she confirmed. Then, thinking about the mentioned two parts of the house she looked a little hesitant, chewing on her lip. “Well, I think the only chance we have would be to place the door of the house in an angle to the audience that they can see a bit of the inside but as soon as I step further into it they cannot see me any longer. What do you think? I just hope we find some kind of setting at the theatre area that'll work. There should be something anyway.”

Trudy's gaze wandered around when she heard some other kids in the far distance, hoping that nobody would disturb them but the others were so far away that they were just tiny little figures who had jumped into the lake not anywhere close to them.

Once again the girl nodded thoughtfully as Isis responded to her suggestion. “Yeah, I thought so. Then maybe just someone none of us knows personally. That's probably fine. You've heard of her when she was still alive and I have heard all the odd stories. As for Scooter, I didn't mean to leave him there forever, just to keep her some company maybe. But it works either way.”

As Isis moved to the edge of their outdoor stage, Trudy moved to the side in front of the bush to come into the scene from the other side. She giggled as she watched Isis in her role. Giving her a few seconds to introduce her char, she now appeared herself, walking in with a little bounce in her step. “Grandma! Has Scooter run away again? Shall I help you find him?” She spoke again in a high voice just as she had done earlier.

This was exciting now they were really getting the play figured out! Isis was sure everyone was going to like it; it was fun, it was interesting and it had a good ending, what more did they need? Well, she supposed...it would have been nice if they could have had a dance in it somewhere, but she wasn't going to complain about that. Besides, she planned to dance in the talent show, so it would be a good idea to keep that quiet so people weren't already expecting her to do it.

Isis didn't notice Trudy's hesitation, just seeing that she agreed with the idea. "Sure, that works! That's better, in fact" She didn't share her friend's concern that there might not be suitable curtains and settings to use in the theatre. As far as Isis was concerned, it was a theatre, even if it was little more than a community building with seats, some staging and a decent selection of costumes, and therefore it would be just perfect for whatever they wanted. Even if they ended up hanging old sheets from an upended table, she was confident that everything would be perfect. She followed Trudy's gaze to another group of students. They seemed to be playing in the lake so presumably they were on a different schedule. Isis glanced briefly at the lake and ignored the part of her mind that was saying how lovely it would be just to jump in there herself.

She giggled at the idea of a dog keping company with a ghost - weren't animals supposed to scared of ghosts, or was that a legend, too? - and then they were rehearsing their play. Isis made a good show of trying to look for her dog, even going so far as to peer behind a boulder and ask "Are you there, Scooter?" Then she pretended to notice Trudy for the first time.

"Oh, you're such a good girl dear" she said, patting Trudy on the head even though she was only a couple of inches taller than the other girl "He saw one of those darned squirrels and slipped his leash again, I don't know where he could have gone..." she almost giggled at the daring of her own words, but she supposed 'darned' didn't really count as cursing, though Mom would probably have other ideas. She hobbled a little closer to the bush, asking "Now, where do you suppose he could have gone..?"

Trudy bit her lips as Isis patted her on the head, fighting to burst into giggles as they were rehearsing now and she couldn't just giggle on stage either. However, the situation was just too funny. A soft giggle escaped her but she quickly recovered her concerned face.

“Oh grandma, I'm so sorry. He runs away so often. You should really get a new leash for Scooter so he cannot always get away chasing squirrels.” She spoke again in this high girly voice, opened her eyes wide and nodded to underline her statement.

She walked next to Isis who did her hunched grandmother-walk bouncing a little with every step she made. The girl thought they needed to make the difference between the two of them quite clear. Being the same age and about the same height it all came down to their acting to make the audience believe that they were grandmother and granddaughter.

“Maybe he went in there, the door is wide open,” Trudy suggested, gaping at the bush that was supposed to be the house. She quickly covered her mouth with her hand and turned to Isis. “Grandma, do you know this house? I've heard some strange stories about it...” She took a step backwards, pretending to be reluctant to check if the dog was in there. They'd tell each other the stories they knew about the house first before going in anyway.

"I know, dear... I just get so busy with my knitting that I don't seem to find the time to go to the store" Isis replied, shaking her head and trying to look regretful, as if she really had meant to go shopping but had just gotten so distracted making a sweater she hadn't got around to it yet. They searched their makeshift stage, Isis occasionally calling "Scooter!" and "Here boy!" and tutting when no dog appeared. When Trudy pointed out the bush she seemed to notice it for the first time and looked surprised.

Isis was quite into her character now and would happily have told all sorts of tales about ghosts, but she remembered that wasn't quite what they had planned. It was almost a pity, because she would have enjoyed inventing something scary...hadn't that been her original plan, she thought? But no, this was actually better and made more sense. "Oh, this house has stood here longer'n I have" she said, trying to sound old and wise "When I was a girl, there were tales about this house even then. They said a beautiful lady lived here alone. Nobody ever went in or out, but the garden was always beautifully tended. We used to dare each other to run in and steal a rose, but..." she appeared to hesitate "...just stories, my dear. Just stories."

She made as if to walk towards the house, and then turned back to Trudy "There's nothing there now, dear. See, the door must have blown open in the wind... Scooter! Here, boy!" she added, calling towards the 'house' as if she expected a dog to come running out at any moment.

“Oh!” Trudy exclaimed overly excitedly, “did you knit another sweater for me?” she bounced up and down. Her own grandmother didn't knit. That was maybe the only thing that could be improved on her. Trudy thought that a self made piece meant that a lot. Then again, the memories she had from her early childhood with her grandmother meant more than any knitted sweater ever could.

“I've heard something else!” Trudy said importantly. “Something about a ghost that haunts this house. A ghost that scares people to death. From what I've heard some people have entered this house in the past and either were scared out of it or were killed right in there.” She paused, looking at Isis, her eyes wide open. “Grandma, do you think that ghosts can kill people?”

She tentatively followed Isis towards the house that was actually a bush. “Scooter! Come out of there!” she exclaimed. “Did you hear that?” Trudy then said, looking at Isis again. “I think he's really in there!” She wasn't quite sure if it was up to her or Isis to step into the house / behind the bush first so she waited for her friend to take the initiative.

Isis had to stifle a giggle. They were really getting into their characters now! "Oh dear, that's meant to be a surprise...you won't tell your mother you guessed, will you?" she said, trying to sound...well, however a grandmother whose surprise gift for her granddaughter's birthday had been discovered early might sound. "But I'm not telling you the colour, so don't even try to ask!" she wagged a finger as she said that and managed to look a little stern as well.

Her lips twitched, but she kept that same serious expression as Trudy explained the other theories about the ghost. "Oh you know that can't be true dear. A ghost might creep up on you, but they certainly can't scare people to death. Why, there'd be missing person posters all over town, and...well, if people had been scared and run out, they'd have written a book, or an article in the newspaper about it. People like talking about that sort of thing" she said, deciding that it sounded quite sensible.

"So don't you worry a thing, dear. If there is a ghost, we just wish it a good day and...no, I don't hear anything. My ears aren't so good these days, you know. Did you hear him bark? Do you think he's really in there?" Isis peered through an imaginary open door with a frown, trying to convey to the audience that she was short-sighted as well. Then she took a tentative step into the 'house', then another, looking round and calling once again "Scooter? You in here, boy?"

Naturally the dog that didn't actually exist didn't respond, so she turned back to Trudy and said reassuringly "It's alright dear. There's no ghost here."

“Oh of course not!” Trudy said excitedly. “I'll act all surprised when you give it to me!” The girl grinned widely. “I could always try and guess the colour!” she said but didn't really want to proceed with the topic, seeing how it was not helping their plot at all.

“Well, are you sure?” she asked as Isis said that a ghost couldn't scare anyone to death. “Don't you think that one could get a heart attack when surprised by a ghost?” Well, the ghosts Trudy knew were hardly scaring anyone to death. However, it it was a poltergeist, Trudy assumed anything could happen. Her experience with Peeves had taught her that one could never be sure what the poltergeist was capable of.

“Hmm,” Trudy made, pretending to think about Isis' idea that people were writing about experiences with ghosts. “Maybe they are too scared to write about it though, too traumatised.” The girl felt that they were losing their plot line a little and, therefore, stopped speaking.

“Oh I did hear him bark.”Trudy said, nodding. “I am positive he's in there.” She followed her 'grandmother's' guidance and stepped into the house, passing her on the way so she got further 'inside'.

“Scooter, come here boy!” she said and then froze on the spot. “Grandma… Granny!” she said her voice trembling, stumbling backwards again and looking into open space and to Isis back and forth. “Do you… do you see that?”

Isis had almost forgotten they were acting, she was enjoying herself so much. She pretended to consider the possibility that someone could be frightened to death and thought it was a reasonable suggestion, and then remembered that a grandparent would want to reassure the child that nothing bad was going to happen. "Well, I suppose it could be possible, but only if someone is completely alone, and it's night-time" she said, completely failing to understand what would sound reassuring "So as long as we stay together, everything will be fine!"

They were definitely getting off the plot a little, and she sensed that Trudy wouldn't want that. She was thinking too of Trudy's grandmother and what she would think of their play, and she liked the idea that the lady would hear about it. That thought started to remind her where she was, that she was at camp beside a lake and they were pretending a bush was a haunted house, and for a moment she forgot where she was. Thankfully Trudy walked into the 'house' and they were back on track again.

When her friend stopped moving and froze, it was quite frightening to see, as if she really could see a ghost. "What...what do you see, dear?" she asked in a tremulous tone "Is Scooter alright? Did he go up the stairs and now he can't get down again?" she asked. She supposed that Trudy would take another couple of steps and thus 'vanish' from the audience's view, and then the 'ghost' would appear in between them and she herself would be frightened and run from the house. Then Trudy would have to play the part of the ghost that nobody else would see...

"Do you see him, dear?" she asked again.