Open Laces are hard

[Morrie Ayre]

Morrie wasn’t usually keen on these ridiculous dances but didn't feel in the mood for the alternative option of rotting away in the common room today. At least here, there was potential for something not boring to happen, even if expecting fun seemed like a stretch. The exception being if she was to run into Vanity, who could make the night actually fun, or a loser like Eurydice, who could make it fun for a completely different reason.

In the meantime, she decided to give ice skating a go. She sat on a bench near the entrance to the rink, turning the skates she had been assigned over in her hands and looking at them with interest. They had actual blades on the bottom of the shoe. Someone had given Morrie a proper weapon and even she could admit that probably wasn't a good idea. She thought about how much fun she could have slashing all the decorations with the blades. Then she followed her better judgement and slipped the weapons skates onto her feet and began tieing up the laces. She was fumbling with the shoelaces for a while, trying and failing to tie them properly. She never had been very good at laces.

 

[Beatrice Grey]

Beatrice was excited to attend the Yule Ball once more, mainly for the skating rink. It was something that she knew would make her feel normal after the nightmare that was this semester. She wore a white dress with a black bow at the top, some sparkley tights, and a pair of worn in ballet flats. It was a very muggle look, but she didn't really care about fitting into tonight.

As she acquired a pair of skates and sat down to put them on, she noticed a girl struggling nearby. "It's just tieing shoes except you can pull them a little tighter to support your ankles," she said to the older girl as she quickly starting tightening the laces on her own skates.

 

[Morrie Ayre]

Morrie was making progress with her laces when a younger student sat down near her and started lacing up her own skates. Apparently, she also felt the need to explain how shoelaces worked, as if Morrie were stupid or something.

"I know that," Morrie snapped, glaring at the girl angrily. She continued with the laces until they slipped loose again and that was enough to tip her over the edge. "Ugh this is so stupid!" She yanked the skates off with a huff then tossed them away from her. She crossed her arms in full sulk mode. "I didn’t want to skate anyway," she muttered.

 

[Beatrice Grey]

Bea was a little taken aback by the girl being angry that she just wanted to help. As Beatrice finished tieing her own skates, the girl threw her skates away from, shocking Bea. Those things were weapons and could really hurt someone. Bea stood up and picked up the skates, looking back at the girl. "I can help you if you want," she suggested softly, not wanting anyone not get the chance to skate. She loved skating, but she wasn't so sure if this didn't want to skate or was just frustrated, which she could understand. "I've had to have people help me with the laces before. They're really long and especially when I've gotten new skates, you want to lace them a certain way and I mess up almost every time," she added, hoping it would make the girl feel better.

 

[Morrie Ayre]

Morrie doubled down on her sulk, the last thing she wanted was some overly helpful kid helping her tie her shoelaces. The more the girl spoke, the more annoyed Morrie became. "Don't patronise me," she snapped, narrowing her eyes as the girl picked up her discarded skates. "I've changed my mind, I don't want to skate. Skating is for losers." And this time she didn't mumble. Morrie stood up and held out her hands, "Now give me those skates, I need to swap them out for my shoes." As far as she was concerned the whole idea had been stupid anyway.

 

[Beatrice Grey]

Bea held the skates and took a few steps back towards the ice when the girl started being mean to her. The Ravenclaw was completely bothered when she basically told her she was a loser. "Skating is not for losers. People go to the Olympics for skating, you... you meanie!" she shouted back, very uncharacteristically of herself. She didn't know if this girl even knew what the Olympics were, but she wasn't going to let the people at this stupid school ruin the one thing she truly loved.

Bea gripped onto the laces of the skates and took off on the ice, quickly skating to the middle of the rink and dropping the skates in the middle so that the girl would have to come on her bare feet if she wanted them. Bea crossed her arms and stared at the girl before leaving the skates for a moment and starting to skate around them before trying to go into a scratch spin. However, she was very out of practice and fell on the ice, catching her hand on the blade of the skate she'd just laid in the center. She felt a familiar pain and looked down to see blood oozing from the palm of her hand. Bea squeezed it tightly, not wanting to get any blood on her dress or the ice.

 

[Morrie Ayre]

Morrie had been called a lot of things in her time, but she wasn't sure a meanie was one of them, and it threw her a little. She didn't have a quip ready to send back and watched as her skates were taken onto the ice and left there. Morrie sighed as she removed her wand, about to summon them back when the most ridiculous thing happened and the girl fell on the blade.

Morrie didn’t flinch. Didn’t even blink. As far as she was concerned, this was not her problem. She would have walked away right then and there but she still needed those skates back. "Well, that was dumb," she called out, entirely unimpressed. There was a chaperone supervising somewhere and surely they would swoop in and deal with this. Morrie was just glad for once she wasn't responsible, even if she was holding her wand like she might have done something.

 

[Professor Conan Edogawa]

Conan had very mixed feelings about chaperoning the school events. He wasn't particularly against it, it was just that, this had got to be awkward for his kids to have him around in the school and have him around during these events that teens would prefer not to have their parents around. It didn't help that Conan sort of wanted to be around too, because boys were milling about his kids. Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on who was asked, he was tasked with chaperoning the skating rink that had been set up. He was fine with it, but instead of hanging around the outskirts, he'd actually put on ice skates and gone around to check on the students. Even helping one or two with keeping their balance or learning how to move about the ice. He was busy helping a younger student before his attention was caught by another one shouting. He'd turned to look just in time to see a young student fall and an older one with their wand out and calling out to the student that had fallen. His eyes narrowed as he excused himself quickly and skated towards the younger girl to help her up. "Where does it hurt?" he could always approach the older girl after he'd sorted out any injuries with the younger one.​

 

[Beatrice Grey]

Bea bit her tongue when the girl called her dumb. She hadn't meant to fall, but falling was a part of the sport, unfortunately. It just sucked that others had seen her fall. She was about to push herself up off the ground when an adult came by, asking where it hurt. Bea looked around, trying not to cry. This was soooooo embarrassing and crying would only make it worse. Why was she so prone to crying out of frustration? She took the man's help with her non-injured hand to stand and then showed him the gash in her other, wincing as she opened it. "I fell on the ice skates. It's not that bad, I think," she said, looking over at the older girl who had her wand out for some reason. Did she contribute to Bea falling?

 

[Morrie Ayre]

Morrie had to admit that she was a little impressed to see a professor on the scene as quickly as they were. The teachers at this lame school weren’t exactly known for their fast response times or attentiveness. Usually things had to get pretty serious before they took notice and by then Morrie was able to get away with whatever she had done.

Well this time she hadn't done anything and deciding that this was definitely not her problem now a professor was attending to the younger student, Morrie stowed her wand away. There was no point summoning the skates now two people were standing right next to them, even she was smart enough to see the danger in that. Instead, she turned on her heel and started to move to retrieve her shoes without any skates to return.