Open Swingset Solitude

[Scott Baker]

Scott was used to spending time by himself, he was an only child and hadn't seen his dad since he was 3. He pulled his baggy pants up with one hand and walked through the park. Making his way to the empty swingset, he sat down and began to swing. He looked around the park and saw a handful of kids running around playing.

He slowly pushed himself back and forth on the swing at a casual pace. It was weird to be at the park alone, but he lived close by. Scott lived with his mom at his grandmother's house and his grandma had given permission to go to the park to play. He thought he would be having more fun by now.

 

[Elizabeth Fletcher]

Elizabeth's favorite place to be was at the park and she could be there all day. Sometimes she could convince her twin to go out with her, but today wasn't the day. She skipped around happily in search of something to do.

Noticing a boy around her age sitting alone on the swing set, she skipped her way over there. Elizabeth very cheerfully plopped down into the empty swing and smiled at the boy. "My name is Elizabeth. Do you wanna see how high we can go?" Her voice was daring.

 

[Scott Baker]

Upon the other girl's approach, Scott scratched the side of his face. This was something he often did when he was nervous. "Scott." He said nervously. "I don't like heights too much, but I will watch you." Scott pushed himself a little more on the swing, his feet picking up now. He was careful to maintain speed because he didn't want to get too high.

 

[Lysander Summers]

Lysander had been spending a lot more time in Brightstone as of late, between trying to catch glimpses of the castle in the distance that he would be attending soon enough, and the occasional Pigtrotters events to keep him occupied while he waited. The boy was headed toward the park he had once painted in with some of the other kids in town, and where he'd seen his first ghost up close. It was a fun place to spend his free time, with all of the space to run around, or the fixed equipment to play on.

His familiar soared ahead, a snowy owl he'd come to call one of his best friends over the past few years, and Lysander picked up his walking pace to a leisurely jog in order to keep up with the bird. By the time he'd caught up with it, the owl had settled on the corner of the swingset, giving an indignant hoot toward the two children who were already occupying some of the seats. Lysander didn't mind, given that there were plenty to go around, but his feathered friend was never fond of strange company. It was a point of contention between the two as Sander, on the other hand, welcomed new faces. "Hi there! I haven't seen you guys before. Can I join?"​

 

[Elizabeth Fletcher]

Elizabeth acknowledged Scott and began to pull the swing back to gain momentum. She had never really been afraid of heights and loved being on a swing because it felt like she was soring. Upon hearing an owl hoot, she was mildly startled and slowed down. Elizabeth noticed somebody new approaching, she assumed the owl belonged to him.

"Hello! I am Elizabeth. I am going to see how high I can swing, of course, you can join." She replied.

 

[Scott Baker]

Scott was surprised by the swingset becoming full so quickly. He waved at the boy that approached and listened to Elizabeth talk. "I'm Scott, I don't like heights, so I am watching." He idly scratched the back of his neck as he looked at the owl. They always gave him a little fright, they were always so gigantic.

Scott kept pushing himself at a steady pace, glancing at Elizabeth to see what she was going to do and the new boy.

 

[Lysander Summers]

Lysander grinned as the two kids introduced themselves, and gestured toward his own chest with a jerk of his thumb. "Cool, I'm Lysander. And that's Fuzzfeathers up there!" He responded, now pointing toward the fluffy owl watching over the group, appearing less than impressed. With the introductions over, the boy took a seat on one of the free swings, and patted his knees insistently in order to get his bird to come over and sit in his lap. It ignored him. "So...how high do you think you can go? Sander asked the girl curiously, his eyes trailing up the length of the swings' rope to where it meant the fixture above. "Do you think you could swing so high that you looped aaaaall the way back around?" He didn't think she could, a doubt he conveyed with a glance toward Scott. He'd certainly tried to do the same himself in the past, to no avail, but he knew that anything was possible in the magical world.​

 

[Seraphina My]

Seraphina had snuck away from her nanny once again, but this time, she was rather proud of the scheme she had hatched to do it. She told the awful woman that she was going to the bathroom at the store and then walked out the front door. With any luck, this one would be fired, and then her mother would have to stay home for a while. She hadn't seen her mother in almost a week and was tired of the "running late" owls she kept receiving that brought her mother home after her bed time. She huffed as she walked towards the park, knocking over a flower pot on the way. She noticed a few older kids on the swings and eyed them as they bantered about how high the swings could. Huffing her way towards them, she leaned against the pole of the swingset and countered, "I'm sure she could try to swing all the way around, but she would probably break something. Wouldn't that be fun?" she giggled. She wanted to see the girl go ahead and try to do the impossible; it would be her entertainment for the evening.

 

[Elizabeth Fletcher]

Elizabeth had a grin on her face and looked up at the owl. "Hi Fuzzfeathers!" She loved animals and owls were super cool. "Do you ever wish you can fly like an owl?"A younger girl approached and Elizabeth smiled at her.

Elizabeth was almost insulted by Lysander's assumption. "Of course I could. My cousin did it once and broke his arm." She pulled the swing back and launched herself forward as much as she could go. Thrusting her legs back and forth in determination and dedication, she had a huge grin across her face.

 

[Scott Baker]

"Flying sounds awful," Scott replied. "But, it would be convenient to travel." He wondered how high she could go or Lysander for that matter. Glancing nervously again at the owl, he turned to speak. "How high could you go, Lysander?"

Scott watched as another girl approached, there was a lot of talks about swinging to heights and breaking arms. Scratching the side of his head, he watched as Elizabeth looked determined to soar high in the swing. The newest arrival seemed to enjoy the thought of Elizabeth getting hurt, this made Scott a little uncomfortable.

 

[Lysander Summers]

As talk turned to the topic of flying, Lysander took hold of the chains linking his swing to the fixture and leaned his body back as far as his arms would let him, his feet kicking up stray chips of bark while he turned his eyes to the sky above. Flying was something he'd thought about often. His father worked with magical vehicles and owned a flying motorcycle, and his parents had bought him a broom when he was younger, but that had only let him hover a few inches above the ground. He had a real, proper broom of his own to look forward to once he could finally attend Hogwarts, if his dads would allow him one, but that felt like ages away. "All the time!" He chirped up with a happy grin, though the expression faltered to one of puzzlement when the other boy disagreed. "Uh, why? Flying would be so cool! Your legs wouldn't get tired from walking all the time, and you could fly up to touch the clouds." Sander said, watching the fluffy white shapes drift across the expanse of blue above him. He couldn't help but wonder what they felt like. Cotton balls, he thought. Or candy floss.

When another voice joined the fray, Lysander almost jumped from his seat. So fixated on the sky and his mild swinging, he hadn't even noticed her approaching until she spoke up. The boy shot her a quizzical look, finding her delight in injury a bit odd. Maybe she liked the casts muggles used for broken bones? He'd always been a bit jealous of the attention a non-magical friend of his had received after getting one, and how much fun everyone had had signing their names and drawing on it. Still, he didn't want to have to break a bone just for that. Elizabeth didn't seem fazed, rather, she seemed to take the whole thing as a challenge. "Okay, prove it!" Sander said, straightening up in his seat to watch the girl attempt to swing around, doubtful she would actually manage to do it. His focus didn't remain on her for long though, as he caught the other boy scratching himself for the third time since he'd met them. "Um, Scott, do you have fleas or something?" He asked with no amount of tact. He didn't think anything of it, he just wanted to know. Some of the animals in the Menagerie could get chizpurfles if they weren't careful, and Lysander didn't want to risk getting too close to the other kid in case he was infested, in case it spread through the whole shop when he got back.​

 

[Seraphina My]

Seraphina leaned against the swingset, crossing her arms. For some reason, only the girl on the swing seemed to respond to her comment. She squinted her eyes as the girl continued to swing higher and higher, willing that she would fall off. This was yet another time she wished she could use magic and had a wand. It would make things much more fun. When ones of the boys questions if the one named Scott had fleas, Seraphina laughed out loud. "I thought fleas only bit dogs," she taunted Scott. As the girl kept swinging, Seraphina pushed herself off the swingset and walked right in front of the girl's swing, far enough away that she wouldn't necessarily hit her, but still too close for comfort. "I bet you can't swing high enough to get your feet over my head," she said, holding out her arms and smiling at the girl.

 

[Elizabeth Fletcher]

Elizabeth was angrily determined at this point between the girls taunting and Lysander's banter. She was fueled by his prove it comment. Pumping her legs harder, she was getting higher. They seemed to be taunting Scott about fleas, but Elizabeth didn't get it. She was too focused on proving herself.

The girl was standing in front of her swing now, Elizabeth was concerned about hitting her at first, but now she didn't care. She had two options, prove she could swing higher or 'accidentally' kick the girl. While the idea made her smile, it wasn't in her nature to be mean. Elizabeth kept trying to swing higher in an attempt to surpass the girls head. She swung her legs hard to where they just barely passed over the girls head. "Bet you couldn't even swing that high."

 

[Alec Tricity]

Alec had spent the last few hours strolling down the many paths and roads she could find, exploring her way through the village with a super soaker gun strapped across her chest by a bright orange strap. She was bored as was often the case and it wasn’t like anybody would notice if she went out for a while. The girl had already found a few groups on her travels and given them the treatment, but she barely stopped for too long in one place, there was too much to see to just sit still. ​

​

As she wandered idly down another wide path that opened out into a grassy area, she spotted another gaggle of kids that were hanging out by a set of swings. If they were empty Alec may have played on them herself, but on this occasion she was equipped with a different weapon of choice. Throughout her trip she’d been refilling her super soaker wherever she could find a good water source. The river, the bathroom taps, and on one occasion she’d replaced the water from a dogs bowl that seemed a abandoned at the front door of an old cottage. She was sure no one would mind.​

​

Approaching the kids, Alec didn’t wait for them to notice her or even introduce herself. Instead she stood a short distance away, taking hold of the present her brother had sent her at Christmas, pumping the water through into the plastic chamber and aiming straight at the two boys and two girls ahead of her. With her finger on the trigger, water shot out as she began to spray them mercilessly, only pausing every few seconds to repump more water, the only innocent bystander unharmed in the attack, the fluffy little owl perched above them.​

 

[Scott Baker]

"Flying is terrifying. I am not looking forward to Flying lessons." Scott had no desire to be in the sky and had no care to know what clouds felt like. Magic was exciting, but it still made him very nervous. Scott became very embarrassed with the comments regarding his nervous habit. "No, I don't have fleas." He said with a murmur, again to embarrassed to really respond. Elizabeth seemed to be stubborn enough to play their games and Scott really hoped she didn't actually hurt herself. "You should probably be careful." He said, not sure if it was loud enough for anybody to hear. Scott made a motion to scratch himself again but caught himself trying to keep the focus off of him.

Before he could even think of what to do next, he was being sprayed down with water. He jumped from the swing to see a girl with a super soaker and a grin. Scott decided to take cover behind a tree. He was not a fan of surprises, water guns, or large crowds.

 

[Lysander Summers]

When the new girl made a comment about only dogs getting bitten by flees, Lysander shook his head and puffed out his chest, feeling a sense of superiority in his knowledge of magical pets and creatures. "Nope! Lots of animals can get fleas, it's not just dogs. People don't really get them unless it's from animals, because we don't have fur." Sander informed her matter-of-factly, completely missing how rude she had intended to be by the comment. He was too busy wanting to show off how smart he was to stop and take notice. "Unless Scott was a werewolf, maybe he'd get them then." The boy suggested, glancing back toward the other boy with a squint. Sander's cousin was a werewolf, which he thought was really cool. His cousin and a lot of the adults didn't seem to think so, but to Lysander, werewolves just sounded sort of like animagi in a way. No one would explain them in much detail for him to know just how different the two were.

Both the new girl and Elizabeth seemed pretty brave, judging by how close the former was standing to the latter, and how high Elizabeth was still trying to go. Lysander had been tempted to join in on the challenge, confident that he could swing even higher, but before he had the chance to, yet another person approached their rapidly growing group from his peripherals, and suddenly he found himself with a face full of water. "Thhbbbt pffft." He shouted unintelligibly, barely able to form a sentence without getting a mouthful of the supersoaker's stream. It was all he could do to try and shield his face from the torrent until it died down, a brief reprieve while their attacker recharged. Lysander took that bare moment to scrabble through the muddy ground, his fingertips curling around a short stick that he quickly whipped up towards the girl with the watergun. "Hey! You better watch out! I have a wand and I know tons of hexes!" He lied through his teeth. On close inspection, the stick he'd retrieved couldn't have passed for a wand in the slightest, but he was hoping that she wouldn't be able to tell from further away.​

 

[Seraphina My]

Seraphina watched as the girl started to swing over her and thought about a way to distract her so she would stop swinging. No sooner than she thought this, another girl approached the group and began spraying them with a water gun. Seraphina put her hands in front of her face to block the water, but she was unsuccessful in staying dry. She ran out of the way of the girl's aim and looked down at herself. She wasn't soaking in the slightest, but she was not happy by this unexpected turn of events. She stomped her foot and started screaming at the girl. "What in the world is wrong with you, you jerk?!" She crossed her arms and pushed a few wet pieces of hair out of her face.

 

[Alec Tricity]

Alec was chuckling at the reaction she was causing, as the kids tried to scatter and hide from her stream. Once she was clear of water once again, she rested the fun on her shoulder, grin never leaving her face. One girl seemed particularly angry, although she looked way too little to be getting in such a state. “Oh please, a little water never hurt anybody,” Alec knew it was all just for fun, and if they couldn’t accept that then it was their own fault. Her eyes fell on the twig one of the boys was holding up, curious that he’d called it a wand. Most kids would have called something that fairies or magicians used as a wand, but this one was a little more unusual. “Oh yeah? Go on then.” She asked, curious at to what hexes he could do. Maybe she wouldn’t have to return to a pond to fill up her super soaker, then she’d show them all a round two.​

 

[Elizabeth Fletcher]

Elizabeth was caught off guard with the sudden spraying of water and she realized she couldn't swing her way out of the problem. She was starting to get soaked in water and began to slow her swinging down. "Hey, that's not fair," Elizabeth said flying off the swing as it slowed down. She jumped to the ground and tumbled a little bit. She looked around the park for anything she could use as a defense.

Lysander was threatening to hex her which seemed to catch the super soaker villain's attention. Elizabeth decided her best bet was right next to Lysander and she ran next to him. She wasn't sure what to say, but she looked at him. She couldn't tell if it was a wand or just a stick, but either way she wanted to get revenge. Elizabeth looked down and saw a rock, carefully placing her foot on top so nobody could notice, she held it there.

 

[Scott Baker]

Scott looked back and forth between the kids from behind the tree. How did a casual swing turn into a super soaker versus wand duel? He sat with his back against the tree and looked around, there weren't many places to run to and he wanted to see what would happen. Scott peaked around the tree to watch what kind of magic Lysander would do.

 

[Lysander Summers]

Admittedly, Lysander hadn't thought his plan through in too much detail. Or at all. He had hoped the girl would be scared off by his impressive display of magical prowess, but instead, she challenged him. "Ok, well..." He stammered, looking around at the other kids to see if they'd make any kind of move of their own, but all eyes seemed to be on him. Except for the new girl, who looked more ready to throw down than the rest of them, despite being the dryest of the four. The boy lowered the wand stick, turning away to look for ideas, and quickly found himself struck by one. "I didn't want to have to do this, but you asked for it!" He continued with newfound confidence, dipping his hand into his pocket to dig through its contents. Lint, mostly, but also quite a few little green pellets he'd won from a competition some time ago, just waiting for the right moment to come in handy. Turning back and raising his faux-wand again, he jabbed it toward the water-gun wielding girl. "Stinkio!" It wasn't a real spell - far from it - but as he yelled out the made-up incantation, he threw a couple of the foul-smelling pellets at her feet. They burst into a sickeningly green cloud of noxious gas that quickly began to permeate the air around where she'd stood, and he grinned triumphantly.​

 

[Seraphina My]

Seraphina watched as the boy who seemed to be the ring leader of the band of misfits waved around his stick. It was possible he was old enough to go to school or even have received his wand early. However, he didn't seem like the type (to her, at least) that would risk everything to perform magic outside of school. Even she wouldn't have dared to try that at the risk of being expelled. She moved herself so she had a good view of the two contenders, watching as the boy seemed to determine his next move. Before she comprehend the incantation coming out of his mouth, green smoke exploded into the air, causing Seraphina to break out into a coughing fit. She walk towards the back of the group away from the green smoke and fell to her knees, spitting the taste of the smoke out of her mouth. "Is this really what you all consider fun?" she snarled at them, pushing the damp pieces of hair out of her face.