21 Dec 2020, 02:12
It's Going In Circles
A whole week. That was the time that Opeila had been handling well, or so she thought. It was a new year, and supposedly the time where she thought about her ambitions, her life, what she wanted to change and achieve... But what would she change? Everything had been changed for her. Half a year ago already.@Anastasia Beckett8th January 2021
Opeila thought she had been over the breakdowns. That she had moved on from the worst waves of grief that came back to her time and time again.
And although all the changes happened months ago, this was different. She felt like she was falling. New year had always been a celebration at home. They had a nice meal and played games together, made new year wishes for one another. None of this happened this year. No one of Opeila's loved ones was there still. They were gone, dead and gone, leaving Opeila behind.
Nothing would ever be like it used to be. It was on a saturday, that the pain returned. A shatp, almost physical pain closing around her heart, one she hadn't felt that strong in months. The bathrooms were close, so that was the place where she fled from peoples looks, where she could fall on the floor and curl up to keep her heart from falling apart.
The first year that Opeila was on her own. It was that mostly, what made the little Slytherin realize what her family would no longer be there for. It was a sort of selfish pain really. The only pain she had left to feel, months and weeks she had been hurting for them. For her mother and for her poor sister. Who were both dead now.
Her grandmother wanted to practice divination with her when she got into year 3, something she told Opeila when she first left for Hogwarts. And her dad... while Opeila had been closest to her grandmother, the most memories she shared with her father. Travelling to far away countries, looking at places built in different centuries. That would never happen again. Her life, her life, that had so many flaws, was gone. She had spent so much time complaining about things that suddenly seemed small.
Opeila would never be able to tell her mother that she made it into her house's duelling team. Never see the proud look on her face.
It was all gone and would never return.
Opeila sobbed quietly for a while, curled up in a corner of the bathroom, before she eventually sat up. Tears were still streaming down her face and her eyes were red, but her expression was empty. She had cried out all the pain inside, now she just had to wait. Wait till the endless stream of tears stopped, wait until every trace of them was gone from her face. The little girl pulled her knees to her chest, hugged them with her arms and leaned against the wall.
4 Jan 2021, 22:23
It's Going In Circles
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Interacting With: @Opeila Winters
Mentioning: Jasmine
Hex Color: #0080FF
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Ana was in a fairly unique headspace upon returning to school after winter break. Her Christmas had actually been happy, which was new but not unwelcome. She had visited her mother's grave and allowed herself to confront exactly how she was feeling about everything. Sure, there had been some more complicated events that she was pushing to the back of her mind, but overall, she was beginning to get her life together. She legitimately believed she had made it through the worst of it, and that she could handle whatever might come next. The pain hadn't lessened like everyone said it would, but she had learned to live with it.
The Saturday morning wasn't a particularly remarkable one. Maybe that was remarkable in and of itself, considering what was considered normal at Hogwarts. One of her ribbons on her braids seemed to have gone missing at some point between the present and when she had exited the Common Room, much to Ana's irritation, and she ducked into the abandoned bathrooms to deal with that, loosening the remaining pale pink ribbon and combing out her braids. She was just going to have to commit to a single braid or something. Her nose wrinkled as she entered. Between the less than inviting conditions of the bathrooms and how much time she had spent crying there the past term, this wasn't somewhere Ana particularly relished spending time. Jasmine trailed behind her, meowing indignantly at the detour.
"Oh, shush, you could have remained in the Common Room, I didn't make you accompany me," Ana chided her pet before noticing someone in the corner of the bathroom, in a position that was all too familiar to the Gryffindor. Biting her lip, her mind began to spin with possibilities. She was terrible at comforting people, especially strangers. She never knew what to say or do and always ended up feeling like she made things worse. An overwhelming part of her wanted to leave, pretend like this hadn't happened. This girl was in the abandoned bathrooms of all places, so clearly she wasn't exactly looking for company.
Except Ana had been the girl in the bathroom before and she knew being alone was probably the worst possible thing. Maybe this girl was crying over something Ana would consider meaningless or maybe it was something massive. Whatever it was, she didn't deserve to be all by herself while doing it. Ana was a great many things - impulsive, prideful, self-centered, quick to judge - but if there was one thing she decidedly wasn't, it was heartless. Try as she might, she did care about others. Despite the fact this was a near stranger, she couldn't help but see herself in the other girl.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked, approaching the other girl slowly so as not to startle her. "I can leave if you want, but speaking from a plethora of experience, being alone makes things more painful." She slipped the lone silk ribbon into her pocket and pulled out a handkerchief. Its lacy edges that all her handkerchiefs seemed to have had always irritated Ana, but she doubted the girl would mind much at the moment. She unfolded it before holding it out as something of a peace offering.
Long story short, I survived
Stats - Strength: 5, Agility: 6, Control: 12, Stamina:7
30 Jan 2021, 23:46
It's Going In Circles
@Anastasia Beckett
Opeila heard the door open and instinctively curled up even more, made herself smaller than before. The bathroom had provided her a shield from curious, condescending and pityful looks, an isolated bubble from everyday school life. And now the bubble burst, and a girl, who seemed faintly familiar, looked at her. Opeila subtly tried to hide her face, looking to the ground. But of course the girl saw that Opeila was crying and handed her a handkerchief. Opeila had an own one and she felt bad taking the girl's. Hers was in her trunk, untouched, barely looked at. The letters O.W. were on it and Opeila couldn't bare looking at it. The gift of a woman who didn't like her.
"Thank you." Opeila's voice was shaky. She took the handkerchief to wipe her tears off.
"I can leave if you want, but speaking from a plethora of experience, being alone makes things more painful." That pretty much hit the point without Opeila having to say a word. She didn't try to hide her face any longer, instead she leaned the back of her head against the wall. New tears flooded her face unstoppable, but Opeila's face was empty. "I guess that is the point. I am all alone. And I am scared." More tears, as if her body was crying out the pain that was not showing on her face anymore.
15 Mar 2021, 04:30
It's Going In Circles
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Interacting With: @Opeila Winters
Mentioning: Jess Malters (indirectly)
Hex Color: #0080FF
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A glance at the girl told Ana she couldn't leave. Her heart ached for the girl and she swallowed hard. Despite all her experience being the one crying, she hadn't the faintest idea as to how to go about comforting the girl. She was already second-guessing even approaching since the girl seemed to be doing her best to shrink into the floor and hide from Ana. While Ana's blonde hair and improved attitude might have implied otherwise, she was still Anastasia Beckett. Her instincts were still far more self-centered than was good for her, and right now, they were screaming at her to leave this awkward situation.
"You're welcome," Ana said in reply to the girl's thanks, her voice uncharacteristically soft and gentle. The acceptance of the frilly scrap of cloth made Ana hopeful that maybe the girl wasn't entirely averse to having company at the moment. Her body language opening up slightly contributed to this hope. While her face was imperceptible, the tears continued to flow.
Ana opted to sit at the wall next to the girl. Not close enough to be overly familiar, but close enough that neither would have to speak very loudly to be heard. The girl's next words cut right to Ana's heart. While she couldn't imagine the specifics, being terrified and all alone was something she was terribly familiar with. "I won't pretend to know what you're dealing with and I won't ask, but if you want, I'm here so you're not all alone," Ana told the girl. Pressing the girl was definitely a bad idea. If the roles were reversed, Ana would have definitely appreciated the offer of companionship, even if it were just from a stranger for a few minutes. Strangers had offered her as much and it had made things seem less bleak for a time.
Long story short, I survived
Stats - Strength: 5, Agility: 6, Control: 12, Stamina:7
16 May 2021, 12:49
It's Going In Circles
@Anastasia Beckett
Opeila was confused. Confused by this stranger who suddenly sat next to her, saying things that made the Slytherin feel as if the other girl was looking right into her mind. Opeila used to read a lot before she went to Hogwarts. Often she read novels that were rated for teens or young adults above her age and at times it had made her feel wiser than the kids from her year. Especially in elementary school, she had often felt like she knew a lot more about feelings and souls and life. For the longest time she had been sure that her soul was broken, because she had compared herself with tragic protagonists.
If not before, she had at least realized in last summer that she knew just as much about pain as the authors of those heroic, fantastic but terribly romantic books she had read.
Compared to the pain she had actually felt in the week after her arrival in Finland, the descriptions in those novels were... incredibly optimistic. Either she was a complete wimp, or the authors had a rather heroic imagination regarding loss.
The girl next to her didn't push her. She didn't even sit down close to her. Opeila appreciated it. If it was Flash, it would have been different- actually now that she thought about it, she really missed his comforting hugs- but the girl kept her distance. Something told Opeila that this girl probably knew a lot more about loss and pain than those authors too.
"Thank you.", Opeila repeated, when the girl said that she wouldn't ask what she was dealing with, but that she was there. That Opeila wasn't all alone. "My parents passed away last summer. I sometimes find it hard to process." After the girl's unexpected friendliness, Opeila at least owed her that much of an explanation. The Slytherin sent her a little smile, only to frown a little. "I think I know you...?", she said, involuntarily making it sound like a question in the end. At least the face was slightly familiar.