Match to... Match? PV: Logan Blackwood Closed

All through the day, the boy Logan Blackwood couldn't be any more excited with his transfiguration lesson, today they were going to practice a particular spell that sounded awesome, turning a matchstick into a needle. He made sure to listen to every word as they came out of Professor Cypresse's mouth, the woman seemed to share a passion for the subject, just like Logan!

Although, admittedly, that very well could've been the boy's mind making him see things that weren't there.

Nevertheless, theory time was over and practice time was starting; Logan eagerly got his wand, matchstick and book, placing the object in the space between the pages, where it fit nicely, perfectly open to one of his first attempts at magic. Logan took a deep breath, closing his eyes and remembering his professor's words, he lifted his wand and uttered-

"Oh no!"

A sharp cry exited the mouth of one of the children in the Slytherin side of the classroom, everyone stopped what they were doing and looked to see a girl with teary eyes pointing at one of the open windows, her hand trembling. Turns out, she was playing with her wand a little too close to the window and, of course, she dropped it. Now, this wouldn't concern Logan too much, but Professor had other ideas, after consoling the child, telling her that her wand was most likely safe and sound, as well as reprimanding her for her reckless behavior, of course, she instructed "Mr. Blackwood" to accompany her to look for the wand, looking for any prefect or staff along the way to make sure they didn't get lost.⠀
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With his wand held in front of him and slightly trembling, Logan closed his eyes and exhaled from his nose, "...Yup", he murmured, stuffing his wand in his pocket and following the girl to the door outside the classroom.⠀
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The journey itself wasn't too eventful, one of the prefects from his own house was rightfully curious about the intention of two first years wandering around, one teary and the other looking like he wanted to go to the bathroom. After learning what happened, he swiftly aided the pair, much to Logan's delight, as he made the search much easier thanks to magic and a certain spell called "Accio", which admittedly did catch his eye for quite some time. As for the rest of it, it mainly consisted of Logan moving his head around, jumping a little on the spot when waiting for ladders to move into place and pursing his lips, he was very impatient, a bit too much to not be noticed by his companions, the prefect instructing him to go to the bathroom if he so needed it.

[-]

The door of the classroom practically flew open as Logan entered once again, followed by the girl, now delighted at her unbroken wand. He made a bee-line for his desk, almost forgetting to make a small report to the professor that everything went smoothly. But that didn't matter anymore! He was back, and with his wand in hand, matchstick in book, page of book in full view, nothing was going to- Oh no, not again!

Another cry was heard, "AH!", this time from a boy and lower, only being noticed by some of the other students close to the desk of said boy. Though alright considering ignoring the noise, Logan's common sense made him glance and see something much like what he was doing, a boy in black robes with blue details, a Ravenclaw. It wasn't strange, Slytherin was sharing this class with them after all, but Logan couldn't but look at the match, now burned and almost rolling off of the table, but also his wand, it looked strangely familiar to his... Perhaps the wood?

In any case, Logan was clearly staring, his common sense was failing him and being overshadowed by his thoughts on the aftermath of what had transpired, "How did he fail, why did he fail?", these thoughts floated through Logan's mind, not wanting to make the same mistakes at his attempt.

Reducio

Apologies for the length of my post, I got a bit too excited writing this haha
edit: changed some details to fit with classroom rules

There were a plethora of factors contributing to Calvin's failure to complete the transfiguration. At the beginning of the class he was far from concentrated, and as a result he largely failed to note the key details in successfully completing the spell. With that lack of crucial knowledge, he struggled with everything else. Wand movements, enunciation, everything just was a bit off as he tried to cast the spell. Plus, on top of it all, his lack of success was downright frustrating. Cal's mood greatly affected his precision, only making the process less effective and more taxing for the boy. From the beginning, Calvin had struggled with Transfiguration. It was the precision, the complexity, the attention to detail, all of these factors coming to blows with his genuine lack of interest in the subject. Between it all, he struggled to no end.

Disgruntled, accepting the fact that this was yet another spell the boy would have to excessively practice outside of class to get right. Calvin was demoralized by his time at Hogwarts thus far: barely even convinced that he was a wizard at all. He was a normal boy from a normal family; his magic potential just felt so... Stunted. Dejected, he took a deep breath, casting his eyes around the room to see if he was alone in his failure. Of course, the boy noticed a few failed attempts at casting. However, whether it was his pessimism warping his outlook, or it was a reflection of reality, to Calvin it seemed like there were far more successful students than ones who were struggling. He felt like an outlier, a failed statistic. It took all of his willpower not to be visibly depressed by the sentiment, forcing a look of determination in his eyes as he looked back down at the match suspiciously. Glaring at the charred wood as if his look could turn it to metal like Medusa's petrifying gaze, he gave the spell one last attempt!

Unfortunately for Calvin, he wasn't exactly fortuitous. For a moment, it seemed like the match was starting to transfigure, but the transfiguration stopped as the match was warping in shape. The Ravenclaw boy now had a slightly pointy wooden stick on his desk; it could've been a toothpick if one squinted at it long enough. He let out a defeated sigh, slumping back in his chair and setting his wand on his desk. At least some change had been effected, although it was clear that the spell wasn't successful in its totality. Praying that his failure had gone unnoticed, he caught the eye of a Slytherin boy sitting near him. Oh crap. This is so embarrassing...

Wishing he could crawl into a hole and sit there for quite awhile to escape his shame, Calvin's cheeks went bright red upon realizing that he had an observer. While he wasn't an overly egotistical boy, having people watch you struggle was never a pleasant experience. "Um. Hello. My name's Calvin, what's yours?" Hopefully, with an introduction, his inability to effectively cast the spell could be ignored for the time being, although there was a sinking feeling in his chest that suggested otherwise. Well, the staring suggested otherwise as well, but Calvin elected to ignore that faux pas for the time being.

Reducio

No worries at all! Long replies are always a treat, my friend!

Thanks to his careful watch of the Ravenclaw boy, Logan got a good look at the matchstick as it morphed slightly, losing volume on the wooden end, becoming pointy and much like a toothpick. He smiled as the wood changed, but seeing it stop at just that made him frown, "Gah, close", he murmured to himself.

His murmuring did bring attention to him however, as the Ravenclaw boy saw to him, turning bright pink and being surprisingly okay with the staring. Instead of getting angry, he greeted him, he was clearly uncomfortable of course, but nevertheless, it was a surprisingly nice act. It took Logan a second to realize both that the boy was looking at him, and subsequently that he had been staring for a while now, "Oh gosh! I-I'm so sorry-", he stumbled backwards in surprise, and for a second it looked like he was about to fall from his chair.

Recovering his balance from the shock, he tried to come up with an excuse, "I was just... Um, y-you were doing it wrong!", he suddenly blurted. "Wow, smooth as butter Blackwood", he mentally criticized himself, as the least he wanted to right now was not only seem like he had no manners, but also was a total egotistical douche.

He got up from his chair, grabbing it and dragging it slightly towards the Ravenclaw boy, what did he say his name was? Caleb? He didn't quite catch it and he prayed he got it right. He glanced at the Professor to see if what he was doing was somewhat forbidden, but it all seemed okay so he basically sat with Cal, "Right, h-hi, sorry about... Well, all of that", he extended a slightly shaky hand as his way to reciprocate the previous greeting, "I'm Logan, it is nice to meet you".

Introductions concluded, Logan looked at the charred toothpick and went back to his original point, "Right, so, you seem to be having some trouble", the boy grabbed burned and pointy piece of wood, "I don't wanna pretend I'm some kind of amazing wizard, I only just found out I am one less than a year ago!", he blushed, remembering his first reaction being back to reality from his intense analysis, "But I've been hitting the books, maybe I could help out?", he gave a wary smile, he wasn't against the idea, not at all! Making new friends seemed like a total positive to be honest.

Calvin's body language eased considerably as Logan introduced himself, visibly less tense now that the awkward staring had come to a conclusion. The Ravenclaw raised a brow at the comment about doing it wrong. That much was obvious to Cal, stating the obvious not only seemed like a waste of time, but also maybe a bit rude. Not that he could complain much; it wasn't as if Calvin was much of a genius when it came to social norms himself. Rather than retort back, he was content to remain quiet, letting the Slytherin boy conclude what he had to say.

Instead of taking offense to the boy's offer, Calvin's expression brightened a bit at the mention of help. The burden of potentially failing his first year exams had been weighing heavily on the Ravenclaw's mind for awhile now, and while he was deathly afraid of approaching any of the professors for help, someone in his year was significantly less intimidating. "Nice t'meet you too, Logan. As for the help," he paused deliberately, pointedly looking at his failed transfiguration before continuing, "yeah, I could use some. Thanks for the offer, by the way." Laughing a bit at his own struggles to emphasize that he didn't take offense to Logan's behavior, he smiled a bit sheepishly before looking at the boy more directly.

"I'm more of a visual learner than an instructional learner... Y'mind showing me the ropes, a bit? I think I might've spaced out while Professor Lian was explaining things proper." His tone was reverent as he spoke about Cypresse, making it evident that he respected her greatly. Calvin held a lot of respect for the faculty at Hogwarts simply by default; his flighty attention span wasn't a result of disregard or disdain, just an earnest lack of focus that was nearly insurmountable.

Logan smiled at the easy-going nature of the person in front of him, it seemed he was going to make a new friend! He happily raised his wand with determination on his face at the prospect of helping Colin (wait, was that his name?), anything to dump some of the words he had absorbed while reading page after page of his books, "Right, so, con-moo-toh-cus, crooked wand movement, visualize...", he repeated to himself all he remembered from the lesson.

Raising his wand, the wooden tip traced an arched pathway across the air, ending in a swift flick pointed at the resting matchstick. In front of both children, the stick started to change, although not in the expected way, instead of growing thinner on the edges, it stayed pretty much the same form, but the color changed drastically, both the yellowish brown of the stick and the red of the head shifted into the same grayish-silvery tint: metal.

After a while, this stopped however, and Logan was pretty confused. He grabbed the thing and tried squishing it to check its toughness, followed by a hardness test where, with both indexes and thumbs, tried to split the thing in half to no avail, "Well, its metal alright, but no edges, huh...", his face was starting to resemble the Ravenclaw's back when he attempted the spell.

Logan turned to him, "I'm sorry, I come from... What did you call them? Muggles? Normally I get by, but sometimes I can't shake the feeling that I'm somewhere I don't belong", Logan looked at the now metallic piece in his hand and smiled, turning to his buddy, "Then I remember, I just turned a matchstick into steel!", his smile faded a bit, "That usually does it".

He left his matchstick on the table and grabbed the charred remains of the other, showing it to him, "So, wanna try again Carlos?"

Cal listened intently as Logan described the incantation. He watched the wand movement as well, making sure to note the subtle differences between what he'd been doing, and what his Slytherin classmate just demonstrated. Con-moo-toh-cus. He could certainly attempt to remember that. When instructed on a one on one level, the Ravenclaw boy found it easier to pay attention, so he caught the details he missed during the original instruction. Turns out his wand movement was a little off, as was his pronunciation of the incantation. Between those factors and his lack of focus, it was no wonder that his attempts at transfiguring the match were going poorly. Calvin smiled apologetically as he realized his mistakes, continuing to listen.

When Logan's transfiguration failed, and his hurried explanation came out, Calvin jumped to reassure the boy. "It's okay, I'm a 'Muggle-born' too. You're doing a lot better than I am, you don't have to worry about it." He looked a bit relieved, happy to have found someone who wasn't a Pureblood to talk to. It seemed like a lot of the people in his classes who excelled were of that blood status, which made it all the more intimidating to ask his peers for help. Cal didn't want to get embarrassed, after all!

"And that's Calvin, by the way," he corrected, a good-natured smile on the boy's face. Cal retrieved his match, concentration plain as day on his face, and he attempted the transfiguration again. With an appropriate wand motion and incantation, focusing as best as he could with the process, he actually managed to get a bit closer this time with the spell! The match was now hard and metallic; half transfigured into the needle. It was an odd thing to see, but in the world of magic anything was possible, and Calvin had already grown used to strange sights in the wizarding world. "Look at that! Progress!" He was pleased, even though the spell didn't fully succeed, primarily because now it seemed like he was getting somewhere.

Reducio

Sorry this took so long, I've been really busy!