Walking Down the Line [Winchester]

It was her final year at Hogwarts and it had been such an adventure. From being tortured by the carrows to being forced to a different school due to fires. Now she was finally going to be walking the halls one final time before graduating. While in some senses she was happy to be leaving a school with such horrible memories it had pleasant ones too. Amelia had finally grown a spine and could defend herself now and be more independent when needed. She had discovered things about herself she didn't know and she learned how to play the flute! Speaking of the flute she decided she would pursue the career after Hogwarts. She even found an orchestra company she could try out for that toured around Europe. If she was good enough she would be able to travel and enjoy herself, but she knew she needed to be prepared just in case she didn't make it so completing Hogwarts was a must. Dropping out just to follow a music career without a backup plan would just make her as mad as a hatter.

So that's why she was going to approach Professor Winchester the Arithmancy professor. It had been one of her better subjects these past few years and she needed to secure an O in her NEWTS for her backup plan to be possible. She wanted to work for Gringotts as a curse breaker as it would be a fairly lucrative life option. Though a bit of a dangerous occupational choice if she had to admit to herself, but she had steeled herself over the years and she was ready to embrace the challenge. The main thing is she knew she would need a letter of recommendation from a professor and this is where Professor Winchester came in. Despite his young age compared to other professors he seemed the best candidate to give her the letter she wanted. That is if he agreed of course. Giving a gentle knock on his office door she opened it slightly to announce her presence, "Professor Winchester may I have a word with you?"

Tim's start of term nerves still hadn't calmed down, at least not significantly enough that he noticed a change. But no amount of nerves would stand in the way of him doing what he believes he was always meant to do: teach. It'd been quite a long day already, but there was still much work to be done. There was a healthy stack of paperwork sitting on his desk to be looked over, lessons to be planned, and perhaps most pressingly, supplies to be replenished. Tim had slacked off in replenishing his classroom supplies at the end of the last school year and he arrived to a classroom in desperate need of some restocking. Additional quills, extra copies of the required textbooks, replacement parchment, it all needed some attention. Shortly before the start of the year, Tim made a trip into Diagon Alley and purchased as much as he could afford for the classroom. He returned home, dug out his fathers old handheld portmanteau, and filled it with the replacement supplies.

The trouble is, he had left it sitting beside his desk since the day it arrived at Hogwarts. As he scribbled notes on some parchment, his eyes kept traveling to the portmanteau, almost as if it was taunting him for not having opened it. Tim decided that he'd open it up and take the supplies into the classroom the minute he finished his notes. However, the thought seemed to quickly fade from his mind as he moved right on to grading, not once even making a move for the additional supplies. Just as he was nearing the end of looking over an assignment, a knock came on his door and a voice soon followed it. It was a voice he recognized. Tim smiled and replied "Yes, yes of course, come in!"

Amelia entered the office and gently closed the door behind her. She then approached his desk with her book bag in hand, which was a new fur-lined one she got over the summer. It was brown leather with rabbit fur lining from a march hare or at least the emulation of it as it wasn't real fur. She could feel her nerves coming back again as this was a very decisive moment for the girl. Sure, it was only the beginning of the term so she had tons of time to try and find another recommendation if Professor Winchester said no, but the time crunch would come sooner than later since she still needed to study for her NEWTS.

Taking a deep breath she calmed herself to shake off any lingering nerves. This was not the time to think of what-ifs she needed to get this letter and she doubted someone meek and feeble like she used to be would deserve the recommendation. Amelia needed to prove her character growth to the professor and maybe this would increase her chances of him doing what she wanted of him. Giving him a smile she began speaking, "Since this is my final year at Hogwarts I feel its time for me to make sure of my plans for after graduating are fully set in stone." She opened her bag and pulled out the application for curse breaker at Gringotts she had gotten and filled out and showed it to the professor. "I know its still early in the year, but I wanted to be able to focus on my studies without worry about the application process," Amelia said seriously. "The only thing left I require is a letter of recommendation from a professor and I feel you are the best suited for this letter due to your subject expertise."

"I know this normally is something we speak to our head of house so I should be approaching Professor Flitwick, but Charms was never my best subject," she looked back down at the application in her hand and realized she never said what the application was for. "I want to be a curse breaker or at the very least have it as something I can fall back on if my other dreams don't come to fruition." Amelia took a gulp and stared into Professor Winchester's eyes. This was probably the longest she had ever talked to someone in one sitting and it felt strange. Was growing up a string of new experiences such as this? If she was honest she was feeling very uncomfortable with this side of her, but she needed this more than anything. She needed to put herself out there and grow as a person and this was just one of the tests she needed to pass.

Tim smiled as Amelia came in. He gestured to the chair that sat opposite his desk for her to sit. He put his work to the side carefully, sure not to lose his place, but to make sure Amelia knew that she had his undivided attention. He kept a calm demeanor as he saw her searching for the words she wanted to say. Tim understood the struggle. In his school days, he was quite the social butterfly, but he always seemed to go mute when he was alone with a professor. He never understood why, but grew to assume that their superiority in someway scared him despite himself. He had noticed this same phenomenon in many students. It seemed that there were many in Hogwarts who weren't always comfortable talking to professors. Timothy kept this information in the back of his mind at all times, doing what he could to make interaction with him as painless as possible.

When Amelia did speak, Tim listened intently. "Well, I think it's never too soon to get your affairs in order. Graduation will be upon you before you know it. Getting caught by surprise can put you in quite a predicament." When Amelia handed him the application, Tim took it, leaning back in his chair scanning the document. Indeed it was an application to be a code breaker at Gringotts. Tim remembered carrying an application very similar to this one with him for a time. It seemed to him to be a fine area of work, but it just so happened that the plan for him was to teach, not to codebreak. Still, he carried a lot of respect for the code breakers.

"Code breaking is a challenging, but incredibly rewarding job if you can get it. I tossed around the idea of being one myself. It's a very honorable profession, one that carries a great amount of respect among academics." He sat the application down on his desk. "Yes it is customary to come to your head of house, but you make a good point. Ol' Flitwick is a very kind man but you'd be right for thinking he'd not be too excited to write a recommendation if you were't skilled at Charms. And if he did, well I'm sure you'd get a long lecture about Charms first and that's a rabbit hole I don't think anyone would like to go down."

Tim opened a drawer in his desk and began coming through several files before pulling out one belonging to Amelia. He opened it and took a quick look at the notes on the first page. "Yes, you're just as good at Arithmancy as I remembered you being. Tested well, performed well in class. Didn't speak up much but when you did, it was something worth hearing." He looked absent mindedly through some of the papers in the file, some of her old assignments. "It's one thing to be good at something, quite another to want to pursue it as a career. Tell me, what's caught your interest about being a code breaker?"