Divided Attention

[Alana Finch]

It was rare that Alana went into the library and remained there for long, but she had really been looking forward to crossing some assignments off of her ever growing to-do list. With getting ready for the final match of the year, Alana had found herself with little time. When she did have extra time, all she wanted to do was sleep to avoid thinking about her crazy love life. It was still weird to even think about it as a thing. Alana had never expected to find herself involved in so much...drama, yes that was the word for it. She'd tried to focus on an essay, after she'd spent several long moments writing her name beside Matthew's surname. Alana Cosgrove did have a nice ring to it. It was too bad that she'd probably end up as Alana Zhefarovich though. She mouthed it, her frown growing at the harshness of the name. The teenager had been reading as many books as she could about famous wizarding families to see if there were any mentions of marriages within the Zhefarovich family and how to get out of them. Time and again, she'd seen the name but never with any useful information. The teenager hadn't given up hope yet. Her life and her marriage, especially, would be her choice. She knew that somewhere, there was something that would help her. And if not, she'd just do whatever the hell she wanted in the hopes that the Zhefaroviches would reconsider her as a match.

Crumpling up the piece of parchment, Alana got back to work. Someone behind her was making noises that caught her attention. She lifted her head slightly, hearing the soft noise again. It wasn't loud at all, but seeing her name written beside Chaos' surname had riled up her anger and she needed an outlet for it. Her red eyes narrowed and Alana reached for the crumpled parchment beside her. She turned and quickly threw it at the person's head. "Can you shut up?" she hissed. "I'm trying to concentrate" she added in a sharp whisper. The blonde whipped her head back around and began to read again, thinking that the person had been so rude to interrupt her studying.

 

[Sadire Ting]

Sadire Ting was by no means a nerd but he had been spending a whole load of time in the library these past few days. In all honesty, he was much more knowledgeable in making salt and fishing rather than reading itself. He knew how to read, it was understanding what he was reading that he was having trouble with. Especially since it was not in his native tongue. If it were in Ilocano, he would have been able to understand things flawlessly. Filipino, he could still handle that one too. But English? He was sure he had failed English several times back in muggle school when he was in his little cramped school in his little town in the northern Philippines. He knew education was important but then he had six other siblings and he would have rather stayed to help with his parents' work but he had to be sent in a foreign country to study what he thought existed only in myths.

"Su-su-peeer. Super. Supercaaaa... Cale... Ca-liii.. Su-super-ca-li," Sadire had been trying to read this long word from a book that he had randomly picked. Reading had been going a bit well, until he came upon the word "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" that had promptly twisted his tongue thoroughly and confused him to no end. "Cali-pa.. Calipra.. Supercalipa.. Choopercaligapri? Ha?" the teen had scratched the back of his head as he stared down at the word that had been refusing to be read. He jumped though when something had suddenly hit his head and he turned to look at the source. It was a pretty girl. That was obviously not happy with him. He didn't get much though except the part where she wanted him to shut up. "Sorry po," he said with a sheepish smile, his accent hard and thick. And then it hit him! Maybe she could help him with reading that one word. Surely, it would not be much trouble. She must be used to those big words after all. "Uh.. Excuse me po.. Help please.. Uh.. Help me reads these word please. I shut up after," he said after he approached her bringing his book with him and offered. He really would keep quiet as soon as he managed to get it after all.
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Out of Character:

"Po" is just a word that is added to sentences/phrases to show respect from time to time. He'll use it occasionally but I don't think there's an English translation..

 

[Alana Finch]

Alana had already turned her attention back to the book she'd been reading, forgetting about the boy that she'd just hit with her parchment. When he came up to her, the teenager took her time looking up. Eventually, when it didn't seem the boy was going to go away, Alana looked up, her red eyes taking the boy in. He looked vaguely familiar in the way that most of the students in the school did. She'd probably passed him in the hall once or twice. It took the Slytherin a second to figure out what the boy was asking her, his accent was heavy and much different from her own. When she finally did get it, Alana smiled. All she had to do was help him with one stupid thing and then he'd shut up. It seemed like a fair trade. "Promise?" she asked as she pulled the book he'd held out towards her.

The Slytherin stared at the word on the page. It was long and difficult. Alana had been home schooled as a young child and she'd always had a tough time with reading. She licked her lips. "Uh...super" that part was easy. "Supercal-ee no supercal- ah" she really was trying to sound out the word but was growing frustrated...and embarassed. "Why do you need to read this stupid word anyway?" she asked sullenly. "It's not even a spell so why bother?" she added, looking up at the boy as if she expected a prompt answer.

 

[Sadire Ting]

At first, Sadire was quite nervous that he had said something that was far from understandable. The pretty girl was not answering after all. Maybe he had said something wrong somewhere. He had been trying to come up with several ways of calling the girl's attention when she finally looked up at him and stared at him for a bit. He felt slightly uncomfortable in her scrutinizing stare, especially from those eyes of hers. He wondered if she was some sort of mythical creature from the horror stories back home because of her red eyes. But that was rude. She was far too pretty to be a part of those horror myths. Maybe red eyes were natural in other countries. He had always believed it was only either blue or black for the eye color. Apparently not. When the pretty girl finally smiled, Sadire grinned. Now that one word he understood! "Promise! Cross my heart! Hoop to die!" he said, one of his hand held up and showing an open palm as if he was doing a pledge before he handed the book over.

Sadire watched as the pretty girl also seemed to have trouble with reading the particular word he couldn't read. He didn't know whether to feel bad or feel relieved through. Maybe it was a little bit of both. He felt bad because he was giving the girl a hard time and he was causing her a bit of trouble. And he felt relieved because at least he knew that the word was really a hard one to read if this pretty girl couldn't read it. Suddenly she had asked him two questions although with the speed of her speech, he had barely gotten a word he understood except 'why' and that was not really enough of a context to go by. "Uh," he started lamely before deciding that she was probably asking why he was reading the book. "Practice," he said with a small embarrassed smile as his left hand rubbed the back of his neck in slight discomfort. Discomfort at barely being to keep up with her speed of speech and discomfort at not being to be able to provide an English answer that was remotely acceptable or understood. He was never going to get through Hogwarts if he couldn't even get one girl to understand him. He understood her, it was getting his own words out in English that was the struggle he was facing.
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[Alana Finch]

Alana continued to stare at the boy even after he'd spoken. Practice?, she thought to herself. It didn't make any sense to her for a moment, then she realized what he was actually practicing wasn't spells. "You're practicing English aren't you?" she stated, though she was sure she knew the answer. It was pretty obvious that English wasn't his first language. "Well, that," she pointed to the word, "is a stupid word. So, stop trying to read it" she added in a bossy tone.