A Cracked Lens PV Finished

Alan of course had notice the absence of his friend after the fake Blossom Ball that had turned out to be a disaster. And after the first two days of noticing her complete absence he began to ask around until he vaguely heard about what had happened to her while he was bantering around in the changing rooms uselessly. He instantly wondered whether, if he had been there, he could have prevented her from getting hurt as much as she apparently ended up with.

Asking the nurse however did not do much as she apparently still needed rest, but the nurse mentioned that he could try to come by today and so he did just that. He truly hoped for this to end okay, as the worry for his friend made his stomach churn unpleasantly. He would gently knock at the door of the infirmary, before pushing the door open for just a little bit after having given this fair warning of him entering.

"San?", he would ask, his voice soft and slightly hoarse. The past few days had been rough, even for the usually upbeat child that everyone knew Alan as. His carefree chirpiness was for now replaced for worry and fear for his friends health condition. He would let his gaze drift through the room until he caught sight of the girl he was looking for and a weak smile snuck onto his face, even though it failed to give his eyes their mischievous gleam.

There was a knock at the door, and Santario perked up, wondering who was coming in. She watched the door open a little and then a boy, @Alan Vanes, she had known for a while now entered. His hoarse voice asked her name, and she raised her hand to help draw attention to her position in bed. She was sitting up cross-legged with the blanket draped over her lap. San was tired of lying down, and since she was allowed to go walking about, she had argued the least they could do was to let her sit up under the promise that she would lie down and rest if she got a headache.

“Over here, Alan.” Her voice, while usually light and clear, was always strong and capable of cutting through any din. However, now it seemed like there was a notable weakness to it. She noticed a small smile but not one that seemed to fully touch his eyes as she motioned to a chair for him to come to sit down on. There would be plenty around if others visited and wanted to steal one and bring it over. “How have you been?” She wasn’t sure if she wanted to ask him if he had been at the blossom ball or not, but the boy already looked sad enough, and San decided it might be best to avoid the subject unless he brought it up—an already very likely possibility since that is why she was there in the first place.

@Santario Martin | @Alan Vanes

Bridget had absolutely, definitely, 100% not spent the last three days worrying about Santario. It wasn't like the first year was her friend, after all, so why would she worry? And she'd certainly not laid awake in the middle of the night wondering how her old Quidditch teammate was doing.

Okay, so perhaps Santario had been taking up a fair portion of her thoughts. She supposed it made sense--she'd been the one to get the younger Slytherin to safety and medical attention after she'd been stung by a vampyr mosp and fell off a broom, resulting in what Bridget was pretty sure was a concussion. There was enough to worry about beyond Santario, anyways, what with the disaster the secret Blossom Ball had been. In fact, Santario's condition was one of the few things she didn't really need to stress over with her being in the hands of the entirely capable Hogwarts medical wing who'd dealt with worse before, not that logic had stopped her concern. All things considered, the ball hadn't left Bridget with much damage. Nothing physical, nothing mental... Had she just gotten lucky, or had she developed an immunity to trauma after all the horrible things they kept facing?

Today was not the first time she'd visited the Hospital Wing since the ball. Bridget had actually poked her head in every time she passed, sometimes going out of her way to walk down the particular 3rd floor corridor; even if she couldn't visit, it helped ease her worries to just see Santario. Today proved to be different. As the second year slowly eased the door open, careful so as to not disturb any of the patients, she noticed several variations from what she'd expected. First, the pale girl was not sleeping, instead sitting up on her bed. Secondly, she had a visitor, a third year boy she knew from S.W.A.G. Club. After a quick check with the nurse, her hopes were confirmed: Santario Martin could finally have visitors.

The downside of barely knowing the girl was that it made her approach to the Hospital bed uncertain. Would Santario just want to see her friends right now? Well, since she was already here, Bridget figured she'd just check in but hang off to the side so those close to her could get in anything they wanted to say.

"Hey San. How're you feeling?" Bridget smiled a bit, far from a big, happy grin, but enough to express her relief that Santario would be okay. She didn't pull up a chair, as was offered to the Gryffindor whose name she'd finally learned was Alan, but instead offered her a Chocolate frog. There was nothing wrong with a little candy while you were recovering, right? And, after everything Santario had been through,
she definitely deserved something sweet about now. Hopefully she liked chocolate.

Vincent sat down on his bed staring at the camera bag that sat on the floor next to his Eagle-crested trunk. It looked a little out of place in his neatly cleaned room, as it was still covered in dirt and dust that had been abundantly present from whence it came. Apart from that it faintly smelled like fire, which wasn’t a surprise either considering the fact half the pitch had been on fire at a certain point. This was the first time since the disastrous evening he laid eyes on it. It was not that he forgot about its owner, Santario, in fact he did think of visiting her at the infirmary more than once. Not only did he feel he had to, he actually wanted to, but he realized she probably needed a little time to recover before barging in. The camera bag however never came to mind. Once he returned from the failure that was supposed to be a formal ball, three days prior now, he had stashed it in his trunk and never given it another thought. Until now. The first two days his brain seemed to have to refused to allow his mind to wander off to the events of that night, probably because it was too painful a memory. But this morning at five however, just two hours ago, his brain’s safety measures succumbed to the pressure applied by his urge to take responsibility and face his fears and problems. A restless sleep ended in a nightmare about last Saturday. A nightmare that not only woke him up rather confused, but also forced him to face the memory right that instant. A moment he feared, but he knew it inevitably would come.

The nightmare itself made, as they usually do, ridiculously little sense and it most definitely wasn’t a realistic representation of what had truly happened. Not that it really mattered, it still brought the memory back to his consciousness, leaving him with no other option than to deal with it. It was probably for the best anyway, he had to attend to it one way or the other anyhow and now would be as good a time as any. He had spent the next two hours reliving the entire evening, trying to remember as many details as possible, to get as complete an image of the ball as he could. It hadn’t been the most pleasant hours of his life, on the contrary even, but it actually turned out to be a strangely soothing and relaxing experience, giving him a little much needed mental peace and providing him with what he had to do to finally put this at rest, at least where it comes to the event itself. The guilt… well, that was a whole different matter, a matter that definitely needed attention. A whole lot. Either way, his next move was as crystal clear as it was obvious. See Santario.

Vincent checked the time. It was two in the afternoon and he realized it was probably right in the middle of the resting hour at the infirmary. He still needed to wait a bit before he could set out to see Santario. Not yet ready to decide on what he was going to say to her, he looked for a distraction, which he easily found. He got up, grabbed the camera bag and took it to a sink in order to clean it. He moistened a torn piece of cloth and carefully wiped the dirt and dust from the bag’s old looking exterior that, as he noticed, seemed to be in remarkable good shape. The bag had obviously been taken very good care of. Luckily the dirt came off rather easily, giving the bag its much better fitting semi-shiny look back while with the dirt the smoky smell faded as well. He then opened the zipper to check its contents for any damage and to see if they needed cleaning as well. Being an amateur photographer himself he knew all too well how even the tiniest bit of dust could pose a serious threat to the delicate mechanics and optics of the device. As he moved his hand to pull the camera out, he hesitated, remembering the fierce, almost irrational ferocity Santario had displayed where it came to protecting her camera. “Or the bag.” Vincent thought as he pulled his hand out of the bag. Whatever caused her to be so overly protective was none of his business and in all honesty he had more than enough to attend to himself than to get involved in whatever was going on with the camera or the bag. He settled for a quick visual check rather than taking the bag’s contents out and checking them thoroughly and found the camera, or at least the part he could actually see, in surprisingly good and clean condition. He closed the bag and once again checked the time.

Seeing it was only a quarter of an hour later than when he started cleaning, Vincent frustratedly decided to go for a short walk before visiting Santario, provided she wanted to see him in the first place. He grabbed the bag, put on his cloak and went outside to pay the beautiful lake a visit, even though his mind wasn’t set to beauty at all at the moment. However, he thankfully accepted every opportunity to stall and take his mind off the moment he dreaded so much, so getting a bit of fresh air by far beat losing himself in pointless negative thoughts. If anything it would probably calm his nerves, making him feel less scared to face the girl. Hopefully she wasn’t hurt too bad.

Vincent got up from the bed, swept his hair back, grabbed the camera bag and set off to the exit. He crossed the common room, passing the statue of Rowena Ravenclaw on his way to the large door with the bronze eagle. He mumbled the password, left Ravenclaw tower and descended the impressively large stairs leading towards the front door. It was a bright day and the sky was clear, but that didn’t stop him from walking at a stiff pace as it wasn’t exactly comfortable outside. At least not temperature-wise. As he walked he felt his mind come to rest and before long he found himself ready to go to the infirmary. He quickly retraced his steps to the castle and climbed the stairs to the third floor without hesitating, but as he got closer insecurity struck and his pace slowed down. Halfway the final stairs he grinded to a halt. Was this such a good idea? What if she was so seriously injured she had sustained permanent damage? What if she refused to see him?

Vincent shrugged and proceeded climbing the stairs. No matter what would happen once he got there, he had to face it. He desperately wanted to talk to Santario, even though it might be one of the hardest conversations he would ever get engaged in. Besides, aside from his personal feelings and considerations, he felt he owed it to her. He owed her an explanation and on top of that making sure she’d get her belongings back was the least he could, especially since she was so adamant about not leaving them behind. So he needed to set his personal feelings and fears aside and just walk in. So he did. He opened the door to the hospital wing and entered the large room. He swiftly but silently walked between the two rows of beds until he saw a tiny figure with shockingly pale, almost alabaster skin and sharply contrasting, rather messy black hair sitting in one of them. There she was. Vincent looked at her for a moment, feeling his guilt rear its ugly head even more as he noticed how fragile she looked in that large bed. Though apparently well enough to sit upright, he still felt she looked like she had paid a hefty price for attending the ball, a sight that filled him with compassion for her pain and suffering. Only then he noticed the two other wizards that apparently had come to visit her. One was a boy he didn’t recall seeing earlier, the other, a girl, he knew all too well. Or better, he had seen her before. She was the girl that had flown off with Santario after she and Vincent had crashed from the professor’s broom. The one that had cast the spell on the camera. He stopped in his tracks, unsure what to do. For a second Vincent considered turning around and walk away. He’d have a hard time seeing – or perhaps even more important – talking to her without an audience, having two others around would probably make things way more awkward. Yet he didn’t.

He carefully approached the bed and placed the camera bag softly on the floor at the foot end of the bed to avoid any ruckus. He looked at Santario. Up close her skin seemed even more pale, hardly differing from the dazzling white of the pillowcase and the sheets. He shifted his gaze to the boy and the girl next to the bed, nodded to the both of them and then looked back at Santario. “Hi.” he whispered shyly, not specifically addressing anyone, and then remained silent as he waited for a reply.

His eyes would find @Santario Martin once she would call his name and he would walk over to her side. "Th-The last few days have been a mess," he explained followed by a long drawn sigh after she asked him how he had been. He would have inquired further about her condition if it was not for a girl and second later a boy to enter the infirmary to join them as well. He knew the girl from their shared club activities and dared say he was at least slightly acquainted with her after their short lived alliance on the grounds but the boy he could not remember seeing before. He would nod at both @Bridget Collins and @Vincent d'Arque in a light greeting and glanced at the familiar camera bag.

He was not quite sure why it had been the boy who was in possession of it but could assume that San perhaps forgot or lost it in the midst of the Blossom Ball drama that had happened. "I brought you something," he would let his friend know with a light smile he would reveal a box of chocolate frogs and a small bag with sherbert lemons and placed them onto the nightstand gently. "I assumed you could use a change from th-the hospital foods" he added as his smile warmed up a little. He would have asked how she was doing if it was not for the fact that Bridget had already asked the question before and there was no use to repeat it since Santario would have heard the question already and possibly answer to it.

Santario gave Alan a tightlipped smile when he expressed his sentiments on the past few days. Things were getting crazy in general, with most of her housemates being over the top drama queen delinquents, but all the more to draw attention away from her. She would get attention precisely when she wanted it and no sooner. Those thoughts were better left for another day as Bridget made her appearance asking her how she was.

Bridget had been the savior of the night, not for Vincent’s lack of trying; he certainly did try; the odds just weren’t in his favor that night. It would be very shortly after that, that Vincent made his appearance setting her camera bag and she looked happier to see him and that bag than she did the other two. No offense to them, of course. For the short time that she did see her bag before it was set down, she noticed that is was much cleaner than it should have been. He had taken care to clean it though she did wonder if he had gone through it. Not that he would have found anything but her camera, an extra lens, and five canisters of film one still needing to be spent.

She looked back over to Bridget with a smile. “Hello Bridget and Vincent. I am doing much better now, thank you. The venom was taken care of, and they are keeping under observation until Friday morning. If everything keeps getting better, they said I can go.” Alan than had brought up that he had brought her something setting to the side some chocolate frogs and sherbet lemons, and that brought a real smile to her face. “That was very thoughtful of you, thank you so much.” She looked over at Bridget and Vincent again with the same smile. “Thank you, guys, for everything that you did to help me. And I appreciate you all coming to see me.” While Vincent did more harm than good, the thought was there. He still went out of his way to try and save her when he did not even know her. That would not be forgotten. “Were you at the ball too, Alan?” She asked obviously knowing that the other two were there, but since she never saw Alan in the central area, she didn’t know if he had made an appearance or not.

@Alan Vanes | @Bridget Collins | @Vincent d'Arque

Vincent answered the boy’s nod with a thin, but honest smile. He was to tense to react spontaneously as he waited for a chance to address Santario. He just wanted it to be over with. Santario’s initial reaction to him appearing seemed to be one of modest happiness, which caught Vincent somewhat by surprise. If anything he hadn’t expected her to react so kind to seeing him appear, and the fact she did relieved some of the tension he, in hindsight, had felt since the disastrous evening. He then heard her greeting him and explaining she had to stay put until the end of the week. The fact she at least would fully recover from the ordeal, reassured and, to some extent, relieved Vincent, causing him to relax a little more. He was happy to ascertain the events at the ball, or rather he, hadn’t caused her any permanent damage. Then a pause in the conversations offered him the opportunity to speak to her, so he grabbed it with both hands. He looked Santario straight in the eyes as he shifted his weight from his right foot to his left. The brightness of her blue irises seemed to pierce right through him, leaving him slightly unnerved. Nevertheless he started talking.

"Santario... I... hi...” he stuttered, nervously wringing his fingers. He normally wasn’t so shy around other people, but this was an exceptional situation, seeing as he was responsible for hurting someone else. Not intentional, in fact, he had the best intentions as he tried to help – save – that someone from getting harmed even more, but that didn’t exactly make it any easier. On the contrary even, the fact he had failed to do so and in turn inflict even more damage only added to the burden. He cleared his throat and started over. “I… I was just coming over to see how you were doing and to tell you how sorry I am that I caused you to fall off the broom.” He felt his face turn bright red and he had to swallow to get the grip on his voice back. “I… It really wasn’t my intention to hurt you, I… I just… I don’t know what happened. I... umm... I'm glad you're recovering.” he blurted out and then stopped for a second to gaze at Santario, hoping he could read her state of mind from her face. He couldn’t. “I… I would very much like to talk about it, but now may not be the right time.” He cast a quick glance at the two others. “Perhaps we could talk about this later on, when you have fully recovered?” he fell silent, leaving the question hang unanswered in the air for a few seconds as he picked the camera bag up from the floor and continued talking.

"I brought this, I thought you might want it back.” Vincent’s voice was much more steady now and he felt the blush on his cheeks slowly fading. “I have cleaned it for as much as I could, the smoke and dirt at the pitch hadn't done it any good." A sheepish smile appeared on his face. "I wanted to clean the camera as well, I know that even the tiniest speck of dirt can wreak havoc on the delicate mechanism and lenses, but I wasn't sure how you would feel about me rummaging through your things, so I didn't." He stopped to cast a glance at Santario to gauge her response. "I still can if you want me to, though." he then hurriedly added. He leaned forward and handed the bag carefully to Santario. As he got back up straight he threw a quick look at Bridget. As he couldn't be sure if she wanted Santario to know she cast a Reparo on the camera or not, he decided not to go into too much detail. "It apparently was damaged in the fall, but it has been repaired with magic, so it should be just fine." Though the initial tension had subsided now that he had said what he wanted to say, it all still felt rather awkward. To break it, he turned to Bridget. “Hi, I’m glad I see you here, I wanted to thank you for helping me out and saving Santario.” He said to her with a soft smile on his face. “I managed to get us in quite a mess, I’m glad you turned up and save the day.” He held out his hand. “I’m Vincent by the way, nice to meet you.” He briefly shifted his gaze to the other boy. “And you too.”

@Santario Martin | @Vincent d'Arque | @Alan Vanes

Santario would be okay. That was all Bridget needed to know, really. She supposed she should've assumed a full recovery anyway, but knowing for certain allowed her to finally relax. At least, as relaxed as you could get while feeling out of place among actual friends of the recovering girl. The boy who'd been with Santario at the ball arrived soon after her, and the brunette regarded him with a look that was hard to place. Not a smile, not a frown. Not judgement nor her typical look of indifference. No, it was an expression of mixed feelings and uncertainty. That was what the ball had left her with--a lot of uncertainty. Of how, and quite frankly if, Vladimir Athanatos fit into all this. Of how others were taking it all and how to act around them correspondingly. Not wanting to seem like she was creepily staring at him, she gave him nod of acknowledgement.

At least she'd finally learned the third year's name was Alan and the younger boy's Vincent. "Bridget. Nice to properly meet you too," she offered, shaking the hand he outstretched. She was glad to see the injured girl's camera returned. Catching Vincent's eye, she shrugged. Whether or not Santario knew exactly what had happened didn't really matter to her, but if he thought it was smarter to not go into the full details, she was fine with that.

Santario and Vincent both thanked her for what she'd done. "Don't mention it." Perhaps it would have been easier to just say you're welcome, but she honestly hadn't been all that heroic or anything. Sure, she'd gotten Santario to help. That was one thing. Vincent had almost certainly done more, and the fact he hadn't gotten her out wasn't his fault. Bridget couldn't think of anyone who would crash a broom on purpose, hurting himself and an already injured person, after all, and Vincent, from her incredibly short time around him, was no exception. He'd blame himself anyways, of course, but she didn't need to add to that guilt.

It was time for Bridget to go. Her visit had been quite brief, but she didn't want to intrude on Santario talking with her friends any longer, especially since Vincent wanted to talk to the younger Slytherin alone. Bridget definitely wouldn't be too thrilled if it was one of her friends in that bed and some almost-stranger was hanging around. "Well, I - um - have got to go now. Get better, San." With a quick smile at the three of them, Bridget exited the Hospital Wing with one less thing to worry about.

Bridget Collins had exited the thread.

He was very glad to hear that she could leave the infirmary quite soon adn that she was on the best way to feel better. He had no idea what actually happened to her but it must have been concerning if the healing process had taken such a long time. Perhaps the nurse also was working a little slower than usual because of how many students have gotten hurt the previous night; it had been horrible. What was supposed to be a nice and fun party turned into a disaster and Alan hoped that this would not repeat like that again.

Alan would utter a you're welcome when @Santario Martin thanked him for the candy he had brought her and returned her smile in a warm fashion. Perhaps he should not worry as much now that he knew that his friend was alright. Alan would wait for the unfamiliar boy, @Vincent d'Arque to finish his explanations and then turned back to Santario, furrowing his brows in confusion as he gave her a worried glance over. "You fell?", he inquired, not having heard that part of the story yet and it made him wonder how she could have fallen. Did she trip?

As Santario asked whether he had been at the ball he gave a short nod as his jaw tensed slightly. He did not really want to think about what played out in the changing rooms, but perhaps he could tell her later when she was feeling better. When both @Bridget Collins and Vincent introduced each themselves to each other, even though the latter was introducing himself to both Bridget and Alan, the third year would let the group see another weakened smile. "My name is Alan, it's a pleasure."

Bridget soon would bid them goodbye since she had to leave and Alan nodded at her before he would focus back on his friend in the bed and the unfamiliar boy. He was curious as to how the two could have met and what the camera thing was about. He felt worried even though he was glad Santario seemed better now.