Closed Errand Pages and paints

Banner credit to: Elena Clark

June 7th, 2025	Courtyard
“English”	“Gaelic”

The attention span designated to Alyss was rather limited. She often found herself getting bored of any activity or entertainment if it did not make her think, make her excited. She had high standards, and it was not unusual for her to fall bored after the short span of minutes.

Alyss had quickly found her eyes wandering from the book, drifting from the people passing by her seating area to the pieces of artwork that were being created. The book was interesting, don’t get her wrong, but it wasn’t quite capturing her attention. It was fairly predictable, something that caused for Alyss to quickly lose interest. Shutting it down and placing it beside her, Alyss glanced up as another person walked by her— or, actually, walked up to her. His name was Oliver, if she remembered correctly. She’d seen him before, though she couldn’t quite put her finger on when. Was he the boy that exploded the toilets during the Racing Rager? Wait, no— that was another guy.

“Oh, hi!” Alyss offered in response to his greeting, a little confused by his quick hello. She wasn’t quite sure how to interpret his want to sit by her, but whatever. Not like it mattered, right? “I’m Alyss.” she said, before standing up from her beanbag. “One minute. I’m gonna go grab some paint.” Alyss gave Oliver a smile, before beginning her way to the tables. There were a variety of options, with craft supplies on top of craft supplies, enough for any creative genius to get ideas. Alyss began to form a rather complicated blueprint in her head, and she knew just how to bring it to life.

Snagging a small canvas and filling a paint palette along with a handful of brushes, Alyss finally headed back to her beanbag, paint palette in hand and canvas under her arm. She did find herself fumbling with the brushes slightly while strolling back, but she just needed to shift her thumb slightly to the left, and she could… Alyss’ thoughts abruptly ended as the paint palette slowly began to tip, and, as if in slow motion, spilled. All over poor Oliver. The paint consisted of some pale green, blue, pink, and purple.

Alyss gasped, scooping with the palette as if she could undo all the paint that had already fallen from the neat little sections it had originally been ordered in. “OHMYGOSH— I’m so, so sorry!” Alyss gasped, horror lacing her voice, apologetic tone filling the space. Are you alright?” she questioned, shifting to move in front of Oliver, to see his appearance from head on. She placed the palette onto the ground, reaching for her wand. Perhaps a Scourgify would fix the extra color, but not the experience as a whole.

“I can- I can just Scourgify it away!”

Reducio

Pings: @Oliver Armani
Note: Happy Pride Month!! Alyss is closed to interactions currently.

Speech -- Thoughts

When she had first heard of the concept that was pride month, she had not expected it to be this much of a big deal. Then again, she should've seen it coming, after all, it did have a whole month dedicated to it.

She still hadn't expected there to be there whole events held for it. Like a parade, then a fashion show and then the arts activity. It was a lot.

Pam had debated on whether she wanted to show up to the arts festival.

This was because, out of all the three activities that were being held, the art section was the only one which held any semblance of interest to her. Even then, all she could actually do was read, because she had little to no talent in anything related to art and crafts and well.... there did not seem to be options of anything musical here. She'd have to make do with what she had.

Her only available option were the assortment of books. Whoever had set up the event had either taken great care to select the books, or had alternatively picked out the all the books available on the topic. Those were the only explanations to the size of the makeshift library she could think of. She would have to make do with what she had.

She supposed the books section served the purpose of educating people like Pam herself who knew almost nothing about LGBTQ+. She knew some of the concepts, females liking females, males liking males and stuff. There were also some stuff about genders.... Yep, some additional knowledge would be excellent. I don't even know what the short form stands for.

She knew that people at Hogwarts often liked the same gender. She had a friend named Victoria, who was a girl and had pretty much told Pam that she liked her. She had not found it odd back then, not had she pondered about the fact that a girl was liking another girl. But, as she browsed through the books attempting to pick out something for herself, she supposed that there was a section of people who would be less than welcoming to the concept.

After all, there always was.

The selection of books proved to be both difficult and easy. Pam picked out a rather large book which seemed to promise a more of less comprehensive lesson on the topic. The difficult part came after, when she moved on to the storybooks about LGBTQ+.

Look, Pam loved books. Unfortunately for her, she also had very little patience when it came to books. On an average, she gave it about ten pages. Sometimes, if it was a book her dad had recommended her, she'd give it around three chapters. If it did not get interesting by then, well she did have a pretty long list of "books started but left unfinished".

This was probably why Pam's favorite, and most widely read genre included fantasy and detective fiction, and she normally stayed far, far away from romance novels. Interesting from the first page and plot twists? She was all for it. Or alternatively, whole magical worlds with dragons and sirens and werewolves. Either worked perfectly well, really. Mushy love stories? Yep, no thanks.

That was not to say she did not like love stories at all. She had, after all, partly grown up on kdramas, so yes she was a hopeless romantic at heart. However, as she had explained to her father multiple times, story books and kdramas? Two very different entities. Kdrama love stories? Yes, please! Bookish love stories? No, please

So, when she found herself in front of a section of what seemed to be mostly romance books, Pam decided she would just read the informational book she had picked out and run away. That sounds way too boring... However, before she could put the plan into motion, a red and golden book, with an all too familiar name on the top caught her eye, and Pam found herself reaching for the book before she had actually registered the movement. The song of Achilles.... Achilles was into men?

When it came to books, Pam lived off Greek Mythology, so the name Achilles was definitely not a new one. The book though? She had never heard of it. Didn't Achilles... die? Oh this should be fun.

Probably not the best of thoughts.

Pam sat down in one of the very comfortable-looking sofa, setting the two books in front of her. Her eyes kept drifting over to the storybook she had picked out, drawn in by the rather gorgeous cover. With a sigh, she picked up the other book, the one which would teach her about LGBTQ+ and opened it on her lap. Alright, patience. We're saving the best for the last.

She practically flew through the first book, reading faster than she normally did because of the need to start reading this new Mythological book she had discovered some time ago. I guess we can't take these out of here. She thought, looking around at the others who were also reading. It's fine, I'll just come down tomorrow too. She felt super excited as she opened the Song of Achilles. I've got a good feeling about this.

Word count: 880