Errand Nurturing Relations PV

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4th May; Campgrounds

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The sun hung law at a perfect slant, which cast a golden bean through trees that crisscrossed the campgrounds, paving a path made of light like slow moving arrows. Prat's boots made a light crunch as he stepped off the gravel and found his footing onto the softer grass, his eyes catching movement ahead of him, someone kneeling by one of the garden beds.

She looked familiar to him, clothing fluttering a little in the breeze with enough sweat on her face to show the work she had been putting in. Seeing so many pompous students who walked these halls with an air of arrogance to now doing as menial tasks of planting was grounding in it's own way.

When her voice reached him, soft and clear, he found his feet already moving towards her.

“Good afternoon,” she said. “Are you helping with the errand as well? Would you like to join me?”

Prat offered her a half smile, the kind that barely met the corners of his lips, "Yeah...I'd love to join you."

He crouched nearby, eyeing a patch of soil. He remembered her as he tugged his gloves tighter around his fingers. He didn't want any of that soil below his nails as he frowned at the prospect. She was at the broom race or was it quidditch? Prat didn't remember, he was much more focused on his snacks then he was at the game. This admission of gluttony carried no shame, it was only calm indifference he had found himself habitual to.

Pressing a hand into the earth as he examined the soil. He mimicked her movements, kneeling and retrieving a small trowel. His hands remained clean and precise, clearly not unfamiliar with the routine of planting. A row of shallow holes, two seeds per pit which he later tamped gently. The method was methodical, a trait he had picked up from his grandmother.

You'd think someone like him would be working towards his future, plotting the downfall of all those who had crossed him but then again, this was good work. Important work, even if it was a little late in the season than what he would have anticipated.

Back to work, he poured a measured stream of water over the now fresh buried seeds. Just enough moisture for them to settle in. He sat back slightly on his heels, casting a glance at the older gryffindor. No longer as quiet as before, "You think they'll actually bloom?" His voice didn't carry doubt but rather just a question he wasn't entirely sure about having an answer for.

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@Evelynn DecipioXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXEvelynn

Once upon a time, Aly Salinger had been a Herbology professor's dream; planting flowers in her spare time had been just about all the young Ravenclaw had dreamed of doing, aside from pulling straight Outstandings on all of her homework assignments and exams, making her mother proud, winning some Quidditch Cups, and one day becoming the best Healer that St. Mungo's had ever seen, of course. You know - easy goals. Now, she was anything but: a troublemaker, a rule-breaker, a malingerer, an astronomer who stared up at the stars more than she did down at the ground. And yet, she found herself out-of-doors more often lately. Returning to her roots, as it were - sometimes, quite literally.

The patch of moly she once tended on the Hogwarts grounds had long since died, and Aly's spirit with it as she wandered away from the wilted flowers towards the lake. She had found herself, as of late, drawn more to the water than to the land, staring out at the glimmers of sunshine (rare as they were in the Scottish grey) twinkling across the ripples of water as she allowed herself to get distracted from article-writing or assignment-doing or textbook-reading at her new favourite spot on the shore by the campgrounds. They were usually abandoned, and she had opened many a good letter here, written plenty of Outstanding papers, had plenty of wonderful days just languishing in the sun - it was a lovely spot and mostly devoid of other people. Here, the lake had brought her more luck than the land ever did.

Sometimes the luck tended more darker than bright.

In this case, the luck in question today was blood-red in colour, forming in scarlet curls that lightly touched the tips of pale ears. Her dress the colour of fresh cream, her unseen eyes no doubt as stormy and grey as a midwinter's sky, Evelynn Decipio was a vision to behold as she knelt to delve her strong trowel and slender fingers into a new patch of turned soil. Even now, almost a year past the first blush of teenage puppy love, Aly had to stop and take in a breath at the sight, her freckled cheeks colouring slightly pink in the sunshine. Most of the time she was, by now, able to convince herself that her feelings for Eve were long since a thing of the past - especially because of everything that had transpired since their first meeting one trip around the sun before - but still, beauty couldn't help but recognise beauty. Even if she knew that there was no chance, that being with Eve was a barrier to walk away from rather than a mountain to climb, it would still take months, years perhaps, for her mind to fully realise that as reality.

It helped to break her out of the trance to notice that Prat was there. Oh. Bollocks. The prickly little Slytherin was nothing short of a character - ideas that were worse than Aly's nonexistent Snitch-catching skills, decorating sense that would have slaughtered a Witch Weekly editor on sight, and the arrogance of an eighty-year-old blood purist type of patriarch, but with a sort of intelligence and charm that probably made all the second-year girls chase him. As if that helped with the ego. Though she'd had very few interactions with the little snake, his very presence put her on edge at first, but she relaxed after taking a moment to take in the scene - the lion and the snake, years apart in age and miles apart in personality, peacefully coexisting. Garden tools as a bridge for the betterment of the human race. A trowel of tranquility.

She smiled, watching.

Prat asked if the plants would bloom. His voice was gentle - methodical. There was none of the bravado or conceit he most often boasted. Evelynn too seemed different - calmer, perhaps. She'd been so on edge this year; it had been clear to Aly, the watcher, the observer, the lover from afar, no matter how much she had tried to hide it. Some of the reasons she knew. Some she did not. Some she would never know, and yet, the peaceful look on her face was enough to calm Aly's fluttering heart. She approached from behind Prat, already pulling her wand. "Professor Toussaint seemed confident they would," she said, not even bothering with a greeting. They both knew who she was. "Normally, I'd cast the Growth Spell to give them a little boost, but I've always thought those that bloomed naturally were the most beautiful, no?"

She used the wandtip to nudge a stray curl behind her ear, subverting expectations, barely meeting Eve's eyes - though when she did, she offered her the smallest of smiles, then sat cross-legged on the ground beside the next bed. She'd brought no tools, not intending to participate in the Herbology professor's little errand, but it seemed she'd stumbled into one anyway. Digging her bare fingers into the earth, she began to till the soil, burrowing out the next hole for a seedling. Quiet, calm, and the dirt between her fingers - sure, she'd have to wash it out from under her crescent moon nails later, but in the meantime, it was worth it to just be here.