Vandalising

[Stella Lagowski]

Despite having spent the Christmas holidays with her loathsome twin cousins, Stella's two weeks off had passed quicker than she could blink. Her Father had been caught up in legal affairs regarding his latest film, and she needed to see him like her lungs needed air. It was ridiculously hard to get kicked out of this place. Save attempted murder, which was a performance Stella had no intention of replicating, there was little the Hufflepuff could do to earn herself anything more serious than a lunchtime detention (or a trip to the school counsellor).

Wracking her brain for new ideas, Stella traipsed down the third floor corridor with an air of resignation. If only she'd been brave enough to do something really drastic, she could have been home by now and long since resumed the career she'd been born to pursue. All of this silly wand waving was giving her a headache. A part of her was still inclined to believe there had been some terrible mistake; she couldn't be a witch - she just wasn't good enough at magic.

At that moment, a cluster of notorious bullies rounded the corner and began heading Stella's way. Quickly she dove through a door to the right and heaved the heavy wood shut behind her with a clunk. She barely noticed she was in the trophy room until the thudding of her heart slowed to its usual pace. Once she was certain the bullies had passed, Stella stepped away from the door and into the space of the room. Most of the plaques and trophies were in cabinets, but some were set out on purple clothed tables for the light to catch. As she passed the rows of glittering silver cups, a plan was beginning to take shape. Stella dropped her satchel to the stone floor and rooted around in it, producing several coloured marker pens and popping off the lids. They weren't commonly seen around the Wizarding school, but perhaps being raised as a muggle had its redemptions after all. Trophies awarded to the ancestors of Stella's bullies were first to be redecorated. A particularly large goblet now sported the words 'S***head of the Century' in bright red ink. Another said 'Smallest D**k of the Year Award'. After a while she moved onto the trophies whose winners she did not recognize, far beyond caring that she might be vandalising the pride and joy of respectable Witches and Wizards. She was so absorbed in her handiwork that she hadn't even realised she was no longer alone.

 

[Avie Mitchell]

Avie was as always minding his own business, he didn't have many things to do that day and even less if one considered the fact that he had just finished they only other thing they had to do today, and that was patrol. The teen had found he wasn't very good at it, he often got bored and just messed about with Rockie the whole time, he had even once taken one of his toy cars with him, and just wandered the halls playing with the car instead of actually really patrolling. He didn't understand what his position mean, or why it had come to him but he was trying his best to stay on top of things, trying his best to understand it, he just didn't. The teen struggled hard and he wasn't getting any better. The Slytherin prefect had just finished up and was bored enough that he wanted to do everything but go back to the dorm, so with his toy car in hand he was running about the third floor having the car roll along the walls, a happy smile on his face as he did so, just happily playing.

This was until he came crashing into the trophy room, not noticing the open door, and falling the few steps in, briefly giggling as he lay on the floor, before then jumping back up, about to exit the room, when he noticed Stella, and she was writing on the trophies in pen, "Stella!" he exclaimed happily, not caring about what she was doing but pretty happy to see her, the last time he'd seen her he'd been sitting in the lake, crying over his mother and though he wasn't crying any more he was happy to see her and ignore partly that time, considering how horrible if had made him feel. He bounced over to her and then squinted at the writing, he hadn't really thought he'd get better at reading overnight but he was practicing at least once a week and it just didn't seem to be helping, though it really was, "What are you writing?" he asked, looking back at her, after having glared at the writing sufficiently long enough to know he wasn't going to be able to read it, "Did someone tell to write on these?" he then asked wondering why she was writing on them, and that question, pocketed the little car and brought out Rockie to sit on his shoulder.
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[Stella Lagowski]

When Avie exclaimed her name, Stella jumped so violently that her red pen left a long line across the cup she'd been writing on. "God, Avie, don't do that!" she said, but before she could really feel angry about him creeping up on her, his cheerful demeanour had tugged her lips into her first smile of that day. Under the current circumstances, little could have made the Hufflepuff happier than seeing Avie looking so bright. His presence almost seemed to radiate throughout the room, reflecting off silver and gold and bouncing over glass.

Popping the cap back on the pen, Stella blushed a little as Avie inspected her handiwork. It was hardly a secret that Stella had her fair share of enemies in the castle, but often times she had to wonder if the Slytherin prefect even noticed things like that. He often seemed caught up in his own world. For Stella, this rather leant in her advantage. Had Avie known how unkind she had been to her fellow students, she wasn't sure he'd have greeted her with quite the same grin. The Hufflepuff raised her eyebrows. "You really need to get glasses," she said, moving in front of him to point at the trophies in turn. She read out a few of the more colourful ones, and then sighed, dropping her hand. "These belong to the parents of the kids who have been bul-" Stella stopped herself just in time and shook her head. "I mean, people I don't like." Sighing again, she placed the marker pen down on the tablecloth and sat down on the corner of a nearby pillar. It wasn't fair. She just wanted to go home.

 

[Avie Mitchell]

Avie didn't even expect Stella to jump but he couldn't help but laugh as she left a massive red line on one of the cups and then told him to not do what he'd down, but the teen had a hand covering his mouth to stop himself from laughing, but it was so clear that behind in his hand he was barely keeping it together, "You made a mistake," he told her pointing to the huge red line that she'd made in the cup she was writing on, and he looked more closely at it to run his finger across the line but he focused, or attempted to focus on the writing in front of him, looking at the writing and being unable to read it, and he looked at her and then back at the cup, he didn't need glasses he didn't think, he was just couldn't read it, the teen just shrugged at her, "I don't need glasses, I just can't read," he told her as if it was plainly obvious that was the problem, as if it was a silly notion that he would need glasses but perfectly normal that he might have problems reading, that was the more ridiculous part of it not anything else.

The teen looked at her and just shrugged seeing that she was doing that to the people whom she didn't like, and he looked between the different cups he could see that she'd written on and looked more closely at them, "Why?" he said to her, "Just throw rocks at them," he told her, reaching into his pocket and pulling a handful of rocks and then walked over and placing them down in front of her, as she'd sat down, "That way you can have fun with them!" he told her, "And hurt them a little too, but rocks don't hurt that much," he continued knowing from experience that rocks really didn't hurt that much, or at least he didn't think so, "I can show you!" he told her, pulling out more rocks from his pocket and jumping slightly to get her to come towards the door, "We don't have Bothie's slingshot, but we can just throw them," he encouraged with a happy tone, always happy to do a bit of rock throwing.
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[Stella Lagowski]

Stella's face contorted in a series of expressions. The first was surprise, shortly followed by embarrassment and ending in sympathy. She wasn't particularly bright herself, but she couldn't have imagined what it was like not to be able to read. It was just something that humans relied on. Her mind continued to wander. Had Avie never read a book? She pictured him being read to; able to understand the words, but never to decipher them off the page by himself.

There were several things she could have said in an attempt to comfort him, but in the end she resolved for silence. Her eyes followed him as he approached and dropped a handful of rocks in front of her. They made a satisfying sound against the stone floor. Unconvinced, she reached for a small pebble and turned it over in her hands, reminiscing the day they'd first met and Avie had played that terrible joke on her. She smiled and looked back up. What did she have to lose? She didn't exactly condone throwing rocks at people, but so long as they weren't aiming for head shots, she doubted they'd do any serious harm. Stella climbed up from the ground and followed Avie towards the door. Whilst she didn't move with the same energy and enthusiasm as the Slytherin, her outward posture masked a kindling inner hope. Sometimes, she allowed herself to think, Hogwarts isn't that bad.

At the door, Stella threw the rock a few inches into the air and caught it again with the same hand. A thought passed her. "Professor Stark's going to kill me," she moaned, glancing over her shoulder at the vandalised trophies. Then she waited for Avie to lead the way.

 

[Avie Mitchell]

Avie had no qualms about throwing rocks at people, nor had it ever really gotten him into too much trouble so the teen was fairly certain they wouldn't get into trouble. The teen gathered up the rocks as Stella seemed to agree to throwing them with him, and he stuffed them quickly back into his pockets, not able to stop a few of them from escaping and remaining on the floor. The little rocks he carried around weren't his important rocks, they were the sort of rocks that he liked but had no personal attachment too, unlike with Rockie, a few of the rocks he'd gotten from the mermaid and obviously the prized rock which Lucien had gotten him, these rocks were the ones he almost specifically gathered for rock throwing and so they were the kind of rocks he wanted to throw. The teen had Rockie on his shoulder and once he had gathered most of the rocks he followed Stella to the door of the room, bouncing happily and smiling brightly as he did so, there was really little that would bring down his mood when he was really enjoying himself.

"We can stay here, and throw them at people passing by," he creeped up to the edge of the door and looked round, pretending to sneak around as if a spy and then smiled when he noticed someone walking further away, he motioned for Stella to come look and then took a small rock, "Watch this," he told her before carefully taking a moment to aim and launching the rock at them, smiling happily as he did so. The rock sailed through the air and it hit it's target, hitting the boy directly on the shoulder, and then as the boy looked around to find the culprit, Avie hid behind the wall, putting a hand in front of his mouth and stifling his giggling at it, "Your turn," he whispered, between giggles with a bright smile on his face and a joyous look on his face which easily reached his eyes, today had been a good day, and he was feeling it right to his very core, he was waiting for Stella to throw it with an expecting smile, why wouldn't she do this after all, throwing rocks was harmless.
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