What About Friends?

[Ailsa Vacarius]

Ailsa Evans had not been having a good term back, sure, she was still having some fun and not really paying all that much attention in classes, but those were just little details. She couldn't however be happy at the quidditch. While she'd made the team, as an alternate, they had not won their first game. She was not happy about that in the slightest. She knew that she could hardly do anything about that. She was just a player, and she was a beater, but in her heart she could feel that had she been playing, had she been flying around and hitting bludgers that she might've helped her team to victory rather than the defeat they had ended up with. Of course this was just a school game, and it wouldn't matter really. Gryffindor was in no position to be winning anything, she was just hoping that perhaps Gryffindor would do better so that her cousin could leave school with that. Essentially not finish last. However, she very well knew that it wouldn't be possible. It was just a fact of life. Not something that was a huge deal, her cousin was smart, he'd move on. She still had time to bring victory to her team. However this didn't actually lighten her mood really. She was still feeling pretty down, and a little bit bored. She did spend time in classes annoying Archie, but he seemed to be doing it less. Seemingly just getting more and more annoyed no matter what she did. Didn't he know that it was no fun when he didn't do anything back.

With that thought, Ailsa was heading up to the Owlery, she'd needed to send a letter to her family weeks ago, but had forgotten. It was frustrating to say the least, she wasn't sure what she would write in the letter, but if she postponed it much longer, she was sure she'd get a letter from them soon, asking if she was okay. Which of course, Ailsa was. She just had been bored, and unmotivated to do anything. Which was why she was now just writing it. She had roughly what she was going to say but not much else. She had planned on writing it in the Gryffindor common room, but there were some fourth years being annoyingly loud, so she'd just decided to write it in the North Tower. A place that was quiet and likely to not be visited by others. She had paper in hand, while her family was magical, she very much loved writing with pen. She loved the way it felt in her hand, and all that. She was just very fond of that. Which was why to her dear family she always wrote in pen, and on paper. Ailsa was carrying those, as well as a hardback book to lean on. And was in her head, mentally writing what she was going to say. The young gryffindor walked into the north tower, and as she did so, a sight graced her eyes. "Archie" She said, a hint of surprise in her tone. "Let any more quaffles into your hoops lately?" despite the fact that Archie in the last game had actually saved the shoots that the Ravenclaws had made, Ailsa thought it would be fun to say this.
​

 

[Archie Renner]

Archie was regularly plagued with the consequences of having a short attention span, so it came as a total surprise when he realized how easy it was to write to Brock. Sitting in silence and focusing on one thing for hours at a time had never been a talent of his, especially not one that showed up in classes but the more often Archie sat down to write to his friend the words flowed more easily and eventually the letters began to write themselves (not literally of course, though Archie could admit that a self-writing quill would be a great addition to is everyday life). What made these letters so easy to write about was that since learning his friend had never been to a real school, nor had they never experienced many things Archie considered to be normal he realized he needed to explain everything. And in the task of enlightening his friend on the way his world worked, it provided him with an endless sea of things to write about that alternately aided Archie in forming his own opinions about the world and see it in a different light to the way he did before. Because writing to Brock who had an entirely new and unusual way of life to his own was something Archie found difficult to wrap his head around at first, however slowly but surely his mind was opening with every letter Brock sent him in reply. Within one semester Archie's mind had opened and his horizons expanded what seemed like a million times over that if he went back in time and told himself how much he could learn from one person and a medium of quill and ink he would have called himself insane.

Archie smiled with this thought in mind as he gave his letter to a nearby owl and sent it on it's way. Another letter, meant another reply in a few days and the fact was obvious how happy the Gryffindor was to hear back from his friend. His smile quickly faded afterwards, as it usually did during the space between each letter, because Brock, Orwell, Kitchen, whatever he called his best friend made him happy to an amazing degree but at the same time it disenchanted him to remember the amount of distance they were separated by. He greatly wished and sometimes even attempted to convince Brock to join him at school but so far the effort had failed dramatically. Archie sighed before finally deciding to descend from the owlery, and continue on with his day though on the way out his eyes landed on one of the last faces he wanted to see. "Ailsa." He greeted her back, not speaking an equally surprised tone and instead one with more resentment behind it. After finally learning her name he made a point to speak it as unnecessarily often as possible. Because even though he had no attention span to react to Ailsa's attempts to annoy him during class this year his immature side could never help mocking her for trying to keep her name hidden for so long. As if he wouldn't have found it sooner or later in the span of seven years. "I really don't care what you have to say, Ailsa." He was hardly in a mood to bicker and silently wished he could walk away from her mid-sentence, but he knew with Ailsa's perseverance and Archie's short fuse that was a disaster waiting to happen. The better option was to wait it out which would unfortunately waste more of his time.​

 

[Ailsa Vacarius]

Ailsa didn't know why she enjoyed annoying Archie so much. Really she guessed it was because of the fact that no matter how much she did to him, he always did stuff back. He was just as bad as she was. He gave back what she gave. It was banter in her mind, it was just them having fun. Which was why she had continued on with it. They weren't quite friends yet but they definitely weren't enemies by any degree of it. Which was why upon Archie's reply, Ailsa was just a little bit startled. It was like he really didn't want anything to do with it or her. And she didn't particularly like the idea of that. She liked Archie, she didn't think he was like others in this school. Those that were mostly boring and in her mind just not great. Ailsa shook her head at him. "What's got your wand in a knot today?" she asked him, slightly annoyed about the fact he wasn't just being his useful self and getting outwardly annoyed and being his normal self. She didn't really what else to do or say to him. She knew that she wanted to keep annoying him and that was their thing. What they did, but she was getting the impression from him, his tone and his stance that he actually really didn't like her. Perhaps she was reading too much into it.

Ailsa shook her head at him, "What are you up to then? Sending a letter to home" she asked, thinking that maybe it was time to just act friendly with her rather than anything else. Perhaps he just wanted to be mature which was silly because they were only kids and they really didn't need to be at all. But, those were the only reasons she could think of, and really she didn't want her and Archie to go back to being nothing to each other. They would just have to be friends. Because that was how Ailsa saw them already. Perhaps it was just that she had to act a little more like it than being so, harsh or whatever it was that Archie seemed to now dislike. Ailsa didn't mind really, she did like Archie and considered them something close to friends but if she no longer had that friendship she would be fine. This year unlike the last she had her cousin, Lydia, who was a good friend of hers. She knew the young girl would likely make more friends that Ailsa ever had, but she didn't mind the idea of spending time with her over others. Most other people Ailsa found really boring. She'd make new friends too. It wasn't like without whatever this was between Ailsa and Archie was the only thing she had currently.
​

Mate, I'm sorry this is so late and just plain awful.

 

[Archie Renner]

Their usual competitive although somewhat playful banter was a lost thought in the Gryffindor's mind, because the only thing consuming Archie's thoughts was Orwell and the amount of distance Archie was from him. The idea of it was daunting to say the least, well and truly taking over his emotions and making him unable to be his regular competitive, energetic self and react to every spark Ailsa handed to him. No, he had absolutely no capacity to be the 'normal' twelve year old boy he was without his partner in crime. In a way the other Gryffindor standing in front of him, attempting to ignite his competitiveness was another one of his partners in crime though Archie never wanted to compare two completely different people or even consider replacing Brock by putting Ailsa in the same role. Even an incredibly dumb twelve year old like Archie could tell that wasn't fair to either of him. On this note, he frowned, realizing the negative (and melodramatic) spin his mind had played on things before he finally remembered he needed to speak to Ailsa instead of leaving her standing in quietness. "It's not a letter home, it's a letter to my friend." He answered late, but truthfully before looking from the floor where his gaze had fallen and up towards Ailsa. "My best friend."

He squared his shoulders when their eyes met in an attempt to hide the heaviness in his chest that was irrefutably caused by Orwell's absence. "What's it to you?" He asked, his tone becoming taunting, and immature in nature rather than sullen like moments before. "Are you jealous that I have a best friend to write to, and you don't?" The temptation to stick out his tongue at Ailsa was there, though he ignored it to defensively cross his arms over his torso instead. No one was allowed to mock him for missing his friend. Not even Ailsa, the one person he had allowed to get on his nerves for fun the past two years. They were weirdly friends but not weirdly friends enough for them to hurt each other more than the occasional pinch, poke or kick during class. "That's probably it." He continued speaking, making an obvious attempt to brush it all off and keep Ailsa from prying further into his emotions than he wanted her to. "You're just bitter, because I have friends and you don't."

i'm the one that's plain awful!​