Watch and Learn PV - Corinna Starling

Reducio

Date: May 12
WC: 996
Mentions: @Corinna Starling

It was in the nature of some things to leave behind traces of themselves before they dissolved into time. Footprints in the snow, the scent of rain long after the clouds' departure, the faint indent left in a cushioned chair from where someone once sat. Even music, in its own fleeting essence, had the habit of embedding itself within a person and intermittently resurfacing at the most inconvenient of times. Like when an object triggers a sort of emotional response that can be matched with certain heartbreaking lyrics that hadn't been heard in years. Perhaps that's why Cirrus never understood why people were so frightened of being forgotten. The world remembered so much more than what anyone ever gave it credit for.

She supposed that's partly why she left her carvings behind. Not for recognition and certainly not for praise, the thought alone made her want to sink into the ground and become one with the soil and worms. But because her pieces were born from moments and moments belonged where they happened. They were like taxidermy animals, she thought. Even though it is devoid of mirth now, stuffed and beady eyed as though fear was its final emotion, they were very much alive and sentient once upon a time. Much akin to her carvings, they didn't belong on a shelf nor in someone's pocket. And in a way they felt as though they were not hers, so it seemed wrong to hold onto them for herself.

As of late, however, she'd been wondering if maybe the world remembered too much. For many months, Cirrus' carvings existed entirely separate from her person while simultaneously being an extension of herself. It was less a skill and more how she viewed the world, an opinion that would cease to be hers the moment it left her hands and found a new home within Hogwarts. They'd become part of the castle, something to be discovered or forgotten. She didn't care much which it was - or at least she thought she didn't - so long as the anonymity was there. That was an infinitely more significant detail than any texturing she could possibly give to the wood. Not because she habitually kept secrets, but because she despised being observed. There was a schism between someone looking at an object she produced and someone looking inside her to view her intentions. The former felt manageable and the latter made her think about the soil and worms again. And unfortunately for Cirrus, Hogwarts possessed the uncanny talent for refusing to let mysteries remain mysteries.

In the last few days, a couple of students had been connecting translucent dots she hadn't realised existed, starting with Max who managed to simply catch her in the wrong place at the wrong time, then Skylar whom she managed to inspire. That idea sat strangely in her chest. Cirrus wouldn't say she was the subject of gossip - not yet at least - but it was more the fact that she was no longer a complete mystery. People now knew her- no. They saw her. That was far more terrifying than someone simply knowing her name and it was enough to make the bile in her stomach twist with discomfort. She didn't regret carving the little creatures nor did she regret leaving them around the castle. She regretted becoming attached to them, for putting too much of herself into them. It was a difficult feeling for her to explain, even to herself, and she wasn't entirely sure she understood it to begin with. But knowing that others could look at her work and trace it back to her was like leaving her journal open and unattended for the whole student body to see. For the whole world to see. And to remember.

Yet, Cirrus hadn't stopped. The opportunity definitely presented itself to her within the confines of her mind, while she was staring up at the ceiling in bed at night, when she would usually be occupying herself with carving until she felt herself tired enough to drift off into sleep. She had contemplated returning the blade to potions class, just as furtive as she was when she had first taken it, and she found herself refraining from collecting as many sticks as usual. She could free the castle from little wooden birds and foxes and rabbits, and the mystery would be lost to time, and the students would move on to other curiosities. Maybe she was starting to understand why people feared being left behind. As such, she found her work to have doubled in production. Perhaps because it was never about the result for her, but more the process that she found solace in. Perhaps she wasn't ready to give up the one thing she found at Hogwarts that truly felt like it belonged entirely to herself.

And because today had offered Cirrus another moment worth preserving. She sat on the roots of a large oak tree she had spent several afternoons learning the name of and took one of the fallen sticks into her lap - she never plucked them directly from the tree - and took the blade to its surface. The weather was mild enough that other students roamed the grounds whenever lessons allowed it, some walking past her on their way elsewhere but too busy with their own lives and schedules to stop and spare her a glance to notice what she was doing. Even if they did, Cirrus wasn't entirely sure she cared much anymore. She only cared about the thumb-sized wren taking shape in her hands. She thought it suited the place, that the other birds perched in the branches of the tree she was sitting beneath could use a new friend. A quiet thing in a quiet place. For the most part, at least. But it felt right when she finished the details on the feathers and sat it atop the ivy curling over the oak roots.