Peer Review PV Breana Oliveire

@George Henry

Whilst George has his side strewn about with notes, Breana only kept one. Despite having all of her thoughts and studies tied up in a single pad, one can easily tell that it is her only notebook. It has bits and pieces of sticky notes and bookmarks popping out from the sides. The notebook isn't the only item in her side, however. A couple of books stacked to one side accompanied the tiny child. The start of the stack had similar themes, such as "Detective Work for Wixxies" or "Most Devilish Heists in Wizarding History." Unfortunately, Breana's stack traveled down into a rabbit hole, leading down to her adding a book to her stack called, "Ella Enchanted," which appeared to be a sort of tween romance fiction book.

Despite her attention span on collecting books lacking in size, she's still a determined little writer, dividing the paperwork evenly among the two of them. This was a heavy start to her writing career here in Hogwarts, considering the first-ever report that she'd have to write about is about a tragedy. What's worse is that said tragedy was also experienced by her current writing partner-in-crime, George Henry. She couldn't imagine what he's feeling right now after the fire, let alone writing it himself. Sure, they chose it, but that's because George lived through it. Is it fair, for him to report on a catastrophe while battling his own demons surrounding it? Is this what the Headliner writer has to do on a daily basis? If it is, then Breana couldn't imagine what she'll do if she'd have to be in George's seat.

She looked down at the current paragraph that she's writing on. One part that she's currently writing on was George's experience, where he tried to fix the flooring but ended up trapping some students instead. Personally, Breana didn't think he was at fault. She would've done something more reckless if she were in his shoes, so the Reparo idea was an honest try. Her train of thought got interrupted as George called for her attention. She perked her curly head up, blinking a bit as she's grounded back to reality. "Uh, yeah George?" She said, setting her quill down. Breana was surprised by George's question. Scarily serendipitous, but not surprising. She's currently writing it, after all.

The surprising part was George self-doubting himself still. A few moments passed as Breana absorbed the question. One can hear the other students, their soft whispers, and some page-flipping from books or writing pads. "What makes ya say that?" Breana said with a concerned expression on her face. "You were thinking on the fly, George!" She said loudly, quickly covering her mouth as she realized her volume. "I mean..." She continued, lowering her tone. "Bruv, you stepped up and tried to save someone! I mean, sure, the Reparo might've been too strong, but ya tried your best..." She said. "There was an explosion, for Merline's sake! Don't beat yourself up, you're not some super-smart wizard yet..." The last thing she wanted to hear is a friend of hers self-doubting themselves. From her own experience (though minuscule compared to George's since hers are more about her own grades than a large fire), that can eat up someone for a long lingering time if left unchecked.

George winced as Breana raised her voice, reaching out at her. Breana covered her own mouth before he could. When she continued again, he tried to take her words to heart - but it was too difficult. He tried to save someone, that was true, but he went about it poorly. She probably would have been fine anyway. Nobody died, as far as he knew, but maybe they wouldn't have gotten hurt if he hadn't gotten in everyone's way. Aaron was helping. Getting rid of George helped. George looked down and saw ink bleeding onto his paper where he'd left his quill tip. He let out a little hiss of annoyance as he set it aside.

"I know I'm not a super-smart wizard," George said, with a dismissive hand gesture. He wanted to get past the platitudes and consolations and get right down to business. Maybe he did poorly by asking a Ravenclaw instead of a Slytherin. They were too nice. He pondered what might happen if he had asked Alexx, wincing as he visualized her blasting him away with a wave of her wand, obliterating him into crumbs of idiot-dust. Maybe that would be the right answer. "But I'm not stupid, right? I tried my best, but it wasn't... it wasn't dumb to try?"

She was giving him all kinds of consolation, but he was searching for confirmation and nothing else. It only made him feel worse that she tried to dodge the question and throw him off with little affirmations like that. He had stepped up and tried, but that didn't make it the right choice. "How was I supposed to know the whole floor would get fixed? I can't even do that much repairing on purpose. How can I do it by accident? I got the whole floor and the wall."

Amid the more frantic whispers, he slipped in a little bragging, as well. His extreme power resulted in him repairing far too much of the Hufflepuff common room. Gosh, the poor boy just doesn't know his own strength. Still, the boy wouldn't let Breana get away without giving a straight answer. "I just don't think... it was a bad idea, or anything, but maybe it was. I don't know. Do you think it was?"

@George Henry

As Breana simmered down after a couple of minutes from giving George a good ol' pep talk, she realized from looking at the young boy's face that he was still mulling over it. Maybe he needs more encouraging words? A pick-me-up maybe? She can probably drag him to the Great Hall and get the elves to cook something for him? Nevertheless, her current short term goal right now changed from writing her first article in the Headliner to cheering up her writer-in-crime. As the little freckled schoolgirl noticed George messing up his parchment, Breana was quick to give him a replacement, taking the inked one to her side of the table. "There... Erm, I can use the ink blotch as a sorta art thing." She said, reassuring the lad of her recycling abilities.

When the Hufflepuff student brought up the question of his knowledge on casting the spell itself, Breana started off with a bit of a sheepish grin. "Ah, well... I dunno if I'm the best person to ask this, cuz I just found out about magic not too long ago, but, er..." As she tried to rack up a decent and reassuring answer, George continued on with various questions considering the incident. She looked around, her eyes catching the sight of a blank page on her notebook. That gave Breana a bit of a lightbulb moment. "Oh, here!

She spread her notebook enough so that George can see. "I'm not exactly the best in Charms or stuff about spell casting, but I admit I did a bit of advanced reading since the class was super fun." She said, writing down Reparo and the details of the spell. After all, the best way a Ravenclaw can do to solve problems is by factual deduction, right? "Okay, so, Reparo is about repairing stuff, right?" She said, circling the description of the spell."Let's say you wanna fix something individual, like a page. Easy thing, easy fix. BUT!" Then she scribbled down a sort of pseudo-equation that would make Professor Cypress feel proud, at least that's what Breana thought so. "What if we wanna fix one page of a notebook, but not the whole thing? That's what you wanted to do, right?" Breana then added the words "magic powers" into the equation. "If that's the case, we gots to minimize our magic powers thing-y, since we wanna focus on the one rip..." Breana then scratched her chin in deep thought, her brain already riding unto this train of thought at full speed. "But there's also the factor of you lot being in a life and death situation, so you couldn't have possibly thought about that..." The girl thought aloud, scribbling down "stress and general emotional suffering" on the page. "Aaaand with that, I can safely say..." She then showed George the page, the bottom of it saying "Not Bad, Just A Panic Reflex" in big bold letters. "I mean, it's just our First Year, after all. I think you did your best, at least." She continued to encourage him, bumping her arm playfully against his and nudging him.

George blinked as Breana moved swiftly to replace his parchment. Her words of reassurance were hardly making a dent in his sour mood, but maybe words just weren't her thing. Not a great quality for a writer, no, but getting new parchment was a sweet gesture. Some people spoke more though their actions than their words. "An art thing?" he repeated flatly. "You can just... throw it away, if you want. I have more." He was a bit embarrassed at how quickly she swept in to clean up his mistakes. She'd probably end up doing the same for the writing, with him in this sorry state. He still felt a bit shaken from recalling the facts. He could feel the heat on his skin when he thought about that night, but despite that, he could still see his fingers shivering.

"Are you a muggleborn?" George wondered, canting his head slightly to the side as he looked up and across at Breana. He hadn't imagined her being one. But to be quite honest, he never really imagined anyone as being one. Anyone with a wand who was capable of casting a spell had earned at least some of George's admiration, more easily than any muggle could manage. An unfair standard to hold, but when you're surrounded by wizards, you start to expect wizards.

A mention of Charms seemed to erase George's sour mood. To know that his co-writer was an enthusiast of the greatest discipline of modern wizardry was a pleasant surprise. She was digging right into the specifics of reparo - maybe she knew something he didn't about the application, some mistake he had made through no fault of his own that could excuse him from the horrible burden of his mistake. But none of the quick fixes on the page were emotional. "Right," George said quietly, listening intently as the Ravenclaw girl educated him. The mathematics of it were laid bare on the page, in terms that George had a loose understanding of. As the girl scribbled in "stress and general emotional suffering," George couldn't help but let out an authentic laugh, reaching up to stifle it and cover his face. "I must have forgotten to factor that in," he supposed, tapping his finger gently on the page.

"Not bad," he said, reading it off the page. "It's- it's concentration. The magic powers thing-y. We learned about it in Charms, it's one of the three rules, remember?"

He paused, letting her recall, if she did. It would be a fair thing to forget. Every class seemed to have their own rules, but the three rules of Charms were about the only ones that George made an effort to obey. "...I.. thanks, Breana," he mumbled. "Sorry. Dumb question."

@George Henry

As the little girl folded up the ink-stained paper, she turned her head up as George said to throw the ruined parchment away instead. "H-huh? Oh, no no! Just... y'know, waste not, want not... 'Sides, I kinda draw as a hobby, so..." Breana reassured her friend. "Just started, actually."She flashed a small picture she drew to her writing partner for a moment, though at first glance it looks like either a deformed anteater or a mouse with a really long snout. Nevertheless, to her, keeping the inky blotched slip was just a good alternative as opposed to just wasting good paper. As a little child who was raised in a less fortunate household, Breana didn't think that saving ruined paper was an odd thing to do.

As she tucked the paper in a tight slit of her notebook, she was again surprised by George, bringing up a blood-related question. "What-born... Oh!" She chuckled, waving herself off as she had a momentary lack of thought. "Sorry, sorry... It's just that nobody asked me that before..." She said. Even though her mother once warned her about purebloods looking down on muggle-borns, at least in her own experience in her younger days, Breana's first year didn't have such blood-related issues. The Ravenclaw looked up, thinking for a moment on how wizard blood relations work. "Now let's see... Me mum's a muggle-born... got born into a muggle family... Dad's muggle through and through... dunno if there are wizards and witches in Portugal..." She said, scrunching up her nose as she thought of her ancestry. "So I think the term for that is... half-born? Half-blood...? Though technically, Mum started teaching me about magic just around a few years ago. It was tough too, since my family's strictly muggle world, so..." She shrugged casually before giving George a soft grin. "Yeah, just... Half-blood-slash-muggle-born...ish? Yeah, I think that about sums it up well, innit?" The Ravenclaw confidently nodded.

She was delighted to see her pseudo-math cheering her writer-in-crime. That was her goal, after all, otherwise she just accidentally made the current paper she worked on another one for her drawing pile. Then George tried to grasp her math writing seriously, making the confused little girl blink a few times. "George..." She placed her hand on her friend's shoulder. "I was just trying to make you laugh." Breana sputtered before bursting out a laugh of her own. "I'm sorry... Hahaha..." She said, trying to push down her laughter to continue to speak. "F-for laughing, but... Listen, bruv... " She said, her gentle expression turning into a more comforting, but still serious one. "Have ya ever encountered one of your classmates getting trapped in broken floor and stuff like that? No! No one would've prepared for that! Much less think of spells for it! So if ya pair that with having to figure out if it's the right spell for this..." Breana then patted his shoulder, pulling away back into her spot of the table. "You tried your best... that's what matters, okay? That's all we can do, at least..."

"Waste not, want not," George repeated, with a little smile. "But that's waste, so you ought to not want it. Lots of fresh parchment if you want to draw, no need to do it on paper I've already ruined. Although, I guess that's how we got this article started, so you're probably quite practiced by now at turning something I waste into something you want."

An unusual comment from the boy who usually practiced such a carefree confidence. A note of self-deprecation, slipped in with a smile. When Breana showed off the little picture of the unfortunate mouse, George leaned in and peered at it, trying to discern the detail. A less talented artist than Jake, but a far more talented one than George, so he leaned back and gave a nod of approval. "That's quite good," he said, with another little nod.

But then the conversation turned toward blood. Her first question gave her away instantly. What-born? No half-blood or pure-blooded wizard would ask that - they would know. To ask the question was to flag yourself as a muggleborn, before another word even left your mouth. But that wasn't a bad thing, obviously. But to George, it was something, which was more than it was to many other people. There was a pause in his thought, his eyes wandering up and to the side as he thought. "There must be wizards and witches in Portugal," he offered, although his tone lacked authority. To be frank, he hadn't considered the possibility that Portugal may just be full of muggles. The most baffling thing she presented wasn't that, however - it was that a half-blooded witch could go so long unaware.

"Strictly muggle world?" George said, in disbelief. He choked on his next words for a good long while, gesturing in the air as if every understanding of the world that he held had been shattered in an instant. What on earth would possess a wizard to let go of their magic? He had only held onto it for a year - less than that - and he would rather lose a limb than his magic. "You're joking. Your mum is a witch and she never even told you or nothing? I'd be raging."

But he was far from raging now, as his friend's contagious laughter caught on him and he gave a giggle back. The hand on his shoulder made him squirm, however - he looked at it for a moment and settled, but it still seemed to weigh on him heavily. Even after her hand departed, the weight remained, leaving his shoulders slumped as he counted the marks at the edge of the table, letting out a slow breath. "Okay," he agreed, looking up and nodding to her. "Let's just forget about it, anyway, I guess. Don't worry about it. Worry about the article, now."

Interacting with @George Henry

Although it may have come off as a little joke on himself, there's a bittersweet aftertaste to George's self-deprecation. Did he truly think of himself that way? "George..." Breana started. The question is, how would she finish it? "Hey, you stop that, get some help?" She never had to comfort someone like this. In fact, it was the opposite. Every scraped knee or sad ending of a book she had to go through, her parents were there for her. Even in Hogwarts, Pericles was the one who comforted her with the whole letter incident. Well, first time's the charm, maybe she can comfort her Writer-in-Crime? "... There's a reason the Editor-in-Chief gots us paired. I mean, I've never written an article before!" She exclaimed though she cleared her throat to lower it back to library levels. "Why'd ya think she chose you? You probably got a few writing notches in your belt, don't you?" Breana smiled. "Don't sell yourself short, okay? You're too tall for that."

Breana chuckled at the small compliment George gave her of her little artwork. "Yeah... I tried my best, but I think this horse still looks good, innit?" She said. Then George brought up the possibility of Portugal magic-users. "Hmm... maybe? But Papa never heard of magic until my first magic accident, so it's probably a squib situation on his side of the family... Though I never met them, so..." Breana said with a shrug. The most interaction Breana had of them were just songs that her father would sing to her whilst they dance in the living room. Nothing distinct, just a couple of Portuguese phrases she can barely understand and then a few classic trills here and there. "They were songs that my family would sing!" Her father would always say.

The little Ravenclaw merely blinked as George was surprised about her family's situation. "Nope, cross my heart that I ain't joking." Breana chuckled a little. "Mama chose to live back in the muggle world... she told me that she wanted to get back to where she was since she's a muggle-born... And since she married Papa, she didn't think I needed to know about magic. They just thought there's a chance I could be a squib, so why give me high expectations if there are odds like that?" As George brought up the thought of Breana having the right to be angry at her mother, she paused for a moment. "I mean... yeah, I was surprised for sure, but never angry... I mean, they told me the minute they realized I started spewing magic, so they tried their best..." Breana then looked at both of her sides before lowering her voice more, crouching forward to George. "Mama even had to smuggle in some wizarding books so that I can get up to speed on the magical lingo here." She then placed a finger on her lips, of course gesturing to her writing partner that it is a secret.

As much as Breana was trying her best to cheer up her friend, there's still the bitter feeling that George was still looking blue. She didn't want to forget about it. She didn't want to stop worrying about it. About George. Sadness can fester inside someone like a weed, and that's the last thing she wants for her writer-in-crime. But what else can the freckled little girl say? Maybe words can't solve this. Breana stood up, her feet almost on autopilot. All she wanted to do is cheer him up. With that, the tan-skinned child wrapped her arms around George, pulling him into a warm hug. It may be a simple act, but one act of kindness can move mountains. Breana didn't utter a word. The silence of the library echoing around the two. Hopefully, this is the comfort the badger needed.

George's eyes darted around the library, making sure the coast was clear for them to continue speaking. It wasn't, obviously. When you raised your voice in the library, everyone looked, and the place was rarely ever empty. George gave Breana an uneasy look that subsided only when she cleared her throat and quieted down. He wanted to minimize the amount of eyes on him. Not only was this an embarrassing moment, but the last thing he wanted was to draw attention to the fact that they were writing another article for the Headliner. No doubt, the ravenous readers would be trying to sneak a peek at what they had written - and that would spoil the whole point of covering 'breaking news'. Then it'd just be outdated gossip by the time it hit the presses. "I did show up on the front page," he boasts, his ego thoroughly inflated by Breana's whispered pep-talk. He did have a few notches in his belt. He had come far since his Christmas articles. The boy's brow furrowed at the comment on his height, but he nodded anyway.

"Looks more like a horse than any horse I'd draw," George offered, in a tone that implies that it was meant as a compliment. The subject of Portugal seemed to be of greater importance, as George spent a few seconds mulling it over before he offered another bit of insight on the subject. "I mean, I didn't know about magic being in Scotland, either - but obviously, there's a lot of it." He gestures around, indicating the stacks and shelves full of arcane tomes that surrounded them inside of the great magical castle. "It hides well."

There was even more processing time attached to the conversation they were carrying on about Breana's upbringing in the muggle world. He couldn't comprehend why someone would want to drop magic from their lives. He couldn't live without it, and he never would. He'd be a wizard 'til he died. Nobody would take it from him. "Well, I'd rather be a squib than just not know," George said - although he wasn't entirely sure of it. Being a squib could be an even worse fate than being a muggle, and being a muggle was already bad enough. "You don't need to be quiet on the fact you're reading wizarding books, Breana. We're in the library. At Hogwarts. That's the whole point of the room."

Any lingering doubt that remained through the conversation was suddenly smothered by a feeling of bewilderment that accompanied the hug that Breana had sprung upon him. It did have an immediate effect on the boy. Parts of him wanted to cry. Others wanted to shove her away. But there was a balance between both desires, so George decided to simply sit there and allow it until Breana had finished the hug.

"...Thanks," he said, wrapping an arm around her and giving her back a gentle pat-pat. How was one meant to react to an unprompted (to him) hug? It was more the type of behaviour that he would expect from a Hufflepuff. It was part of the reason he'd sought comfort in a Ravenclaw - there would be only logic, none of that touchy-feely business. He'd obviously been way off with that judgement. There was no choice now but to take the hug, however, so he stoically took the comfort, leaning back to look at Breana once they had had their hug. "...Shall we finish the article, then?"

@George Henry

The little Ravenclaw beamed so wide one would swear they saw her teeth sparkle. "Y'see? And front page, too! That takes a lotta skill, George..." She said, gesturing a small thumbs up with both of her fingers. Breana chuckled as they gave some compliments to each other with their respective quasi-professions: George with his writing and Brean with her art. Then it moved onto a more thought-provoking topic: Magic in Portugal. What George has pointed out is a good case. Most of the European countries and even the United States has magic. Maybe Portugal has a higher likeliness to have magic hidden under there than Breana thought... Maybe her father must have a magical lineage in his family tree somewhere. "Huh..." She uttered. "Maybe... but it's hiding REALY well, heh..." She said with a light chuckle.

As the conversation made its way to the topic of her mother's own escapade with Wizarding books, the Ravenclaw giggled as she listened to George's misinterpretation. "George, that was before I got into Hogwarts... Mom had to pull some strings to get herself back into the Wizarding World to give me what I needed to learn..." She then sheepishly scratched her cheek. "Though, with how the year has been going on lately, Mom didn't exactly prep me enough for it that well..."

After the hug for her writer-in-crime, Breana still had a bit of a worried expression on her face. A hint of it was from the slight awkwardness of it all, given that the hug unprompted and wasn't fully reciprocated by the Badger lad, ironically enough. Mostly it was due to the fact that she wasn't sure if she fully helped him. But at least it was enough that George would thank her. "I gots your back, mate. Whether in writing or just... well, whatever, I guess? You got a friend with me." Breana said, setting a sort of seal of approval that she sees him as a possible friend. "And yeah! The article ain't going to write itself, innit?"