Reflections of Life

[Ainsley Lynch]

Ainsley had never felt anything like this before. The world around her had always felt so vibrant, so full of life and possibility. Things had changed almost overnight. Everything was dull now, drab, and everything that had kept her going, every ounce of motivation and curiosity, seemed to have shrivelled up and died inside her. All Ainsley really wanted to do anymore was lie in bed and cry. And that had been exactly how she had planned to spend her morning, until her eyes had fallen on the stack of bound papers on her bedside table.

The story that had been so much fun to write now felt foolish, stupid childish fairytales she had been stupid to even think could be possible. It sat by her bed like it was laughing at her, taunting her with dreams that could never come true. Filled with a sudden rush of energy and anger Ainsley dragged herself out of bed and grabbed the book, hurrying downstairs and outside before the lethargy could overtake her again.

Once she reached the lakeside though, Ainsley couldn't quite figure out the best course of action. She didn't want the paper to float close enough to shore for anyone to pick any pages up and read them, she wanted it to sink. Identifying a decently strong-looking tree branch that hung over the lake, Ainsley quickly revised her plan. She scrambled up the tree and along the branch with ease, hanging upside down from her knees once she was as far along the branch as she dared to go. With all her strength, Ainsley flung the bundle of papers into the lake's center and watched as they sank and dispersed, the water washing her ink away to illegibility.

All her energy gone in a single moment, Ainsley resigned herself to continuing to hang upside down for a while, the tips of her hair just long enough to brush the water, tears slowly beginning to trickle through her eyebrows and down into the lake below. With her one task gone, Ainsley felt more defeated and purposeless than ever, swaying in the breeze and crying silently as she watched her story disappear into the depths of the lake.

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Sketchbook under her arm and pencils in her pocket, Hayley wandered down to the lakefront. It was a fine day, for the first time this week, and she desperately needed to get away from the crowded corridors and relax. Ordinarily she would have asked Harley, and maybe even Rory, to come and hang out, but Hayley had always valued her solitude and now was a perfect time to be alone.

Besides, she needed to work on her masterpiece where no one else could see. Rory certainly wasn't allowed to see it yet, not until it was completely perfect and she had captured the exact expression on the Gryffindor's face, and there was no way she would let any of her fellow Slytherins bask in the reflected glory of their daring adventure. Not that she would even tell them about it. This was a tale for only her and her friends to revel in. Friends. Before their midnight adventure, Hayley would have been disgusted at the very thought of calling Rory her friend, but now it came into her mind naturally. What a difference a dare and some ridiculously hot sauce made. Not that she would ever admit as much to Rory, of course.

Hayley decided on a whim to bypass her usual favourite tree, the spot she always sat for drawing sessions with Harley, and continued towards the next tree along. As she moved closer she saw a strange sight: there was a girl hanging upside down in the tree. At least, she assumed it was a girl. With the lacy dress hanging down it was somewhat difficult to make out any features. With long hair trailing into the lake below, it really looked quite cool, Hayley decided. Not her usual aesthetic, but hey, sometimes you had to branch out. Hayley smirked at her unintentional mental pun and called out to the inverted figure. "Hey! You look pretty awesome up there. Mind if I draw you?"

 

[Ainsley Lynch]

Staring through tear-filled eyes out over the lake, Ainsley didn't realise she wasn't alone until she heard someone talking. Actually talking to her. She looked over uncertainly, surprised to see an unfamiliar girl standing there. Addressing her. It took Ainsley a long time to process, to remember how conversations worked in the normal world, the one that was still happening all around while her inner world was falling apart. "Um..." Ainsley swallowed and cleared her throat, wiping her eyes as she tried to focus on the actual question at hand.

Ainsley looked the girl over, eyes falling on her sketchbook. It was almost funny to see, after Ainsley had flung all of her own drawings deep into the lake. "Um, you... sure, you can draw me." She said shakily, clearing her throat and utterly failing to cover all the evidence that she had just been crying. It was hard to figure out if she even cared one way or another about being drawn, but it hardly mattered, in the long run. "Why do you want to, though?"

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Hayley realised with a start that the other girl had been crying. This situation just kept getting weirder. Why someone would be crying upside down in a tree was more than she cared to guess at. "Oh," she said, awkwardly. Well, she couldn't exactly concentrate on sketching now, when this stranger was crying. Nevertheless she couldn't resist drawing a few quick lines to show her roughly the scene she would fill in later.

"Um. Because you look cool up there?" she said in response to the girl's question. Hayley really didn't know how to deal with this situation, and it was making her uncomfortable, but she couldn't just leave. "Hey," she said, trying to be gentle and comforting and failing miserably, "what's wrong?" At least it was better than 'are you okay?' Hayley had been asked that before when she was clearly upset, and it had been enough to bring her out of misery and into anger at the sheer stupidity of the question. Of course she wasn't okay, she was crying! Upside down, in a tree. Hayley doubted the approach that had made her angry would work in this situation, though. Besides, she'd made enough strangers angry lately by her very existence. She wanted to help, if she could.

 

[Ainsley Lynch]

Ainsley faltered a little when the girl said she looked cool. This whole situation was actually surreal enough to distract Ainsley from her anguish, wiping her tears again quickly. "Oh. Do you not play in trees? I didn't think it was very cool." She said hesitantly. Thinking back, Ainsley was fairly sure this was, in fact, the first time anyone had ever called her anything even remotely resembling cool.

But then the girl asked what was wrong, and the weight of the world came crashing down on Ainsley once again, Wrapping her arms around herself uncertainly, she looked out over the lake again. How could she even begin to describe what was wrong to a stranger, when she didn't know what it was herself? Biting her lip, Ainsley hugged herself a little tighter. "I... everything's bad..." She said softly, voice trembling. It summed everything up, at least somewhat, and Ainsley couldn't think of any better way to phrase her situation.

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Hayley was taken aback at being asked why she thought it was cool, but she was pleased to have distracted the other girl from whatever was upsetting her. "Of course I play in trees. I just . . . thought it looked cool." Hayley didn't usually have to explain her artistic impulses, so any coherent discussion of the aesthetic of the upside down girl with her hair draping delicately into the water eluded her.

And then the stranger was looking increasingly upset again, and Hayley wished she hadn't asked what was wrong. How could she have thought that trying to explain your problems to some random would make anything better? Now she really didn't know what to do. "Oh. Uh, I'm sorry?" she tried. Honestly, 'everything's bad' had summed up a lot of Hayley's feelings last year, when the magnitude of Slytherin prejudice had come crashing down on her and Harley had been her only friend in this strange new world. Things were a lot better now, though. Hayley wondered if this girl's problems were anything like that. Hayley hadn't cried, but that was more because she was stubborn than because she hadn't wanted to. "Hey. . . I know it sounds cliche, but it gets better. I had a really rough time last year, but I got through it. I'm sure you can too."

 

[Ainsley Lynch]

Ainsley nodded uncertainly. She wished she could see herself, but after a moment of imagining what she must look like, she felt like she could understand why the girl was so interested. "Oh... that's fine. I suppose I must look a bit interesting. You can draw me if you like, I don't mind." She paused for a moment. "Could I see the drawing when it's finished?" Ainsley wasn't much good at drawing but she loved looking at other people's art, it always gave her a small sense of longing, wishing she could create something so fantastical.

Ainsley listened to the other girl's advice sceptically. It didn't feel like there was any way things could get better. Amber had a boyfriend now, and even if they broke up, one day Amber would have another boyfriend, and judging by how she had reacted when Ainsley told her she liked girls, even if Ainsley ever got up the courage to tell Amber how she felt, surely Amber would just be disgusted. There was no getting better from that. Ainsley glanced at the other girl before looking away and wrapping her arms around herself. She was obviously younger, maybe even a first year, and Ainsley didn't feel like she could tell her what was going on. "I... I don't think it's going to get better." She said quietly, settling on that instead of the whole truth. "I don't have a friend anymore."

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Hayley stifled her amusement at the strange sight of upside-down nodding. This was not the time. For the sake of having somewhere else to look, Hayley shifted her sketchbook into a better position and began filling in more details. "Of course you can see it. I wouldn't draw someone and then just not show them, that'd be rude." Well, apart from Odette, but that was a special case where showing her the drawing would be more insulting than not. "I could even give you a copy, if you like . . . if I can find someone who understands whatever the magic equivalent of photocopiers is." Hayley felt a little guilty at dropping in a reference to her Muggleborn background now, but if this stranger was too snooty to take sympathy from someone like her it would be better to know now. If she even noticed through her mournfulness.

"Oh. That . . . that sucks." Hayley had so few friends at Hogwarts that those she did have were very precious to her, and she didn't even want to thin about the idea of losing one. But losing friends was always hard, no matter the circumstances. Hayley sketched in loose waves of the stranger's hair dipping into the water, and tried not to think how she resembled a bat with her arms wrapped around her like that. The other girl clearly didn't feel comfortable talking to her about this, and neither did Hayley, but how could she change the subject without seeming insensitive? "Aren't you getting dizzy up there?" It wasn't great, but it was something.

 

[Ainsley Lynch]

Ainsley gave a tiny, weak smile, happy that the girl was willing to share her art with her. It felt good to be interacting with someone nice again. The next thing the girl said confused her though, and she wracked her brains for a moment. She had said "magical version", so she was likely talking about a muggle thing, but Ainsley didn't think they had ever had anything like that back at home to her memory. "I've never heard of a photo copier..." She said uncertainly. "Are they a very common muggle thing?" The word muggle still felt strange to Ainsley... she had never felt at home on their rare visits to muggle cities, Hogwarts had always felt far more like a place she belonged, but Ainsley was still technically from the muggle world, even if she didn't feel a part of it.

Ainsley nodded quietly, looking away again. Saying it sucked pretty much summed up the situation. She stayed quiet for a while, swaying slightly as the branch moved in the breeze, holding still as she could hear the other girl sketching her. She wondered how good the girl was at drawing. It would be exciting, maybe, if the drawing was very nice, to see a picture of herself. Ainsley often wondered how she seemed to other people, since other people all seemed so strange to her. Her thoughts began to wander, and she became so distracted she almost didn't hear the other girl when she spoke up again. "Huh?" She asked and paused, taking a moment to consider how she felt. "Oh. A little. It's fine though..."

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Hayley smiled hesitantly at the other girl's confusion over photocopiers. So, she wasn't Muggleborn but she didn't have anything against them either. That was fine, that was good to know. "Um, yeah, they're fairly common. They're these machines where you put a piece of paper in and they'll give you a copy of whatever was on the paper." That was a clumsy explanation, but she'd never had to explain something like that before. "On another piece of paper," she added, in case the wizard interpretation was that it'd give you a copy of the object the drawing was of. Actually, that would be really cool. There probably was some spell that did that.

Hayley continued her drawing, filling in details of the girl's inverted face. Doing so made her realise abruptly that she still didn't know her name. It didn't feel quite right to draw someone without even having anything to call them. "I'm Hayley, by the way," she said casually. Hayley began to sketch the folds of the girl's dress in long, looping lines, as lazy and fluid as she could make them. This would make a great watercolour, if she had the equipment or the expertise to do so. Maybe she would try inking it with her quill pen later.

 

[Ainsley Lynch]

"Oh." Ainsley said softly, processing the information. In retrospect, she supposed it should have been obvious from the name of the device what it did, but the term was still unfamiliar. "We never had one of those. My mum has a printer that can make copies though, so I suppose it's something like that." She shook her head slightly, dislodging a lock of hair that had been bothering her. "Our house is a long way out of the city, so I never saw lots of things people think are normal." She looked over at the girl drawing her, starting to feel curious. "Are your family muggles?"

Ainsley didn't realise until the other girl brought it up that they had never exchanged names. "Oh! I'm sorry. I'm Ainsley. I always forget to introduce myself." She stretched a little, starting to feel the urge to right herself again. It was beginning to get a little uncomfortable, being upside down for so long, but Ainsley wanted to hold on until Hayley was finished her drawing. "What house are you in?"