Brumby's Desk

Hexcode= #507091

As Sylvain walked in front of the Nurse's office on his way to the Great Hall, he saw the sign on @Kelsey Brumby's desk. "Free hugs all day every day," it said as if to entice students to ask for them. Immediately Sylvain felt emboldened by its message. Most afternoons on the weekend were a bit boring, what with activities for the weekend winding to an end and the dread of homework setting in for the next day. A hug would be a pretty nice thing to have right now.

Unsure as to whether or not the nurse was truly available for a hug at the moment, Sylvain walked into the infirmary and sought the man out. As soon as he laid eyes on the new school nurse, and this was the first time Sylvain had met him, the lad felt a kindness behind his eyes and at ease in his presence. Without thinking too much about it, he wrapped his arms around the new faculty member and squeezed him good and tight. The embrace lingered for a moment, Sylvain not saying much rather than a little grunt if squeezed back. The moment left them almost as unexplainedly as the moment came to be, and Sylvain let go of him with only another word, "Thanks," before turning back to his route.

Action: Hugging Brumby and Leaving the Thread

Mentions @Kelsey Brumby

@Sylvain Indarys

@Kelsey Brumby
Paper Trail Date: December 3rd, 2020
Just after Classes

On silent feet, the uncertain, yet dangerously curious boy crept down the hall which had burned itself into his mind hardly a year ago. This corridor had haunted him in what few, yet lucid, nightmares he had experienced, of blood and violence, of shouting and helplessness, of mystery and murder. The Hospital Wing, innocuous and innocent in the common passerby’s eye, was a place that Piérre had wanted to frequent as little as possible, if only for the single, horrible memory that he had had there, and the memory of the madman who had been there alongside him and his Eagle friend, Pericles.

But... Piérre had heard rumors. Rumors that the old nurse Finley had left, whether by vanishing into thin air or by being fired. Piérre assumed it was the former, for if it had been the latter, the man would not only have been on the run from the law, but he would have been tired and found guilty of attempted murder and then carted off to Azkaban. There had been no news of either twin. For all Piérre knew, maybe Finley had returned under the guise of a Polyjuice potion, like what had happened with Mad Eye Moody and Barty Crouch Junior only a few decades before, in 1995.

As such, the Britalian had taken it into his own hands to investigate the new nurse himself, both curious of the replacement and eager to find out if the school was even a shade safer than it had been during the reign of Finley. Outside of the notorious doors, Piérre told a deep, shaky breath, before gently reaching for the door with thin, pale fingers, his pointed, elvish ears slowly lowering and pinning back in preparation for fight or flight. Was he scared? Oh, heck yeah.

Creaking the door open quietly, Piérre poked his head into the Wing, his green eyes flicking back and forth and watching... observing for anything out of the ordinary... anything that could scream danger. Every thing was quiet, and the scent of potion ingredients filled the air, the normal, clean smell of muggle doctors... the antibacterial alcohol that Piérre was actually quite familiar with.

Biting his lower lip, he quietly cracked the door open a little further, padding into the room and clenching his hands tightly, his fists shaking at his side with pent up adrenaline. He felt like a mouse trapped in a cage, a small animal within a room that could at any moment be slammed shut and locked up, entrapping him inside forever. Then Finley would win.

No. Piérre couldn’t let the bad guy win! He would be brave, if only to spite the boogeyman.

Why had he been sorted into Gryffindor, again?

Reducio

Rolled d4 to Determine House Color for the Day:

1- Hufflepuff
2- Ravenclaw
3- Gryffindor
4- Slytherin

Number Rolled: 4
Slytherin

Well, he couldn’t go around wearing Hufflepuff colors again, he would be easy to track, as Pericles lovingly helped the Britalian to understand. Slytherin was more his mood today, and so it was black robes with green trim and a green tie. It was a special pride for Piérre to confess that he had seen the new inseam of green himself, and his needlework was getting to be quite fine, if he did say so himself.

Finally collecting his nerve again, Piérre crossed to the desk, observing the funny sign which offered free hugs on request. A bright smile crossed his face. Aw... if that was genuine, the nurse was a person after Piérre’s own heart. Everyone could use a hug at some point of their lives.

His fingers twitched at his sides again— a nervous habit— as his pointed ears piqued, straining themselves to hear and listen for any disturbance or approaching of a new person... His yew and snallygaster heartstring wand was in its sheath at his hip, and his left hand was hovering nearby, prepared to leap into action at any given moment as a defensive spell began to fly to his lips.

@Kelsey Brumby

Piérre had somehow missed the presence of the nurse altogether, for he had been looking about at the beds and the room itself, imagining it as it had been in his dreams, a sea of blood and stained white linen sheets. It was horrific, and something that Piérre, despite his best efforts, couldn’t wake himself from. Thus was the curse of his overactive mind, compounded with Schizophrenic nature. Everything was surreal and terrible, and even he was unable to tell what was real and what was fake anymore. Yes, he had been taking his meds... well, he had been for a few weeks... you couldn’t expect a twelve year old to be responsible enough to remember to take medication every day on a consistent basis without being reminded.

So when the nurse suddenly shifted position, drawing himself closer to the desk and leaning in, Piérre’s eyes suddenly flicked to the movement, and in the same action, his left hand grasped the handle of his wand and flicked it out, drawing a hasty spiral as in a panicked voice, he screamed. ”FUMO- oh?”

He had been taken aback by the surprisingly chill voice and tone of the man who had now leaned forward and had his hands clasped together, not aggressively reaching or even in the slightest way tensed as if to attack. Um, well, this was awkward.

It was made more awkward when his wand suddenly coughed out a black billow of acrid smoke, as if it were a factory smokestack. It smelled like burning hair, and caused Piérre to choke and hack for a moment as the smoke eventually would distill itself across the room and create a thin, useless smog in the room. Overcome with a coughing fit, Piérre managed to choke out between hacks; “I’m *cough* sorry? *Cough cough* Wha- *wheeze*?”

What was up? Taking deep breaths and trying to put aside his racing heartbeat, Piérre stopped to pick up his wand, which he had dropped when he began to choke on the black smoke that had hit him right in the face. “Oh... um.. well, ah.... not much? What’s up with you?”

Wow, what a great save, bro.

Thank you?

Hey, I can still salvage this, okay?

“I had heard that there was a new nurse... I uh... wanted to pop in and say hi!” Piérre offered a smile, still shy, as his ears lowered in shame. This was not a good way to make a first impression... Besides, with Quidditch firing up again, he would be visiting the Hospital Wing on a daily basis... and he didn’t want the nurse to think him a delinquent. “I’m, uh... I’m sorry... about... that... I thought you were... someone else.” A quaver in his voice betrayed Piérre and he silently chided himself. Who was he to assume that the nurse would anything but a person who would try to take care of everyone in the school to the best of their ability? “I... didn’t have a great reputation with the previous nurse.” And that was an understatement.

Waving smoke away from his face as he held his breath, Piérre abashedly began to turn red. This was not how he wanted to get a bad rep. Paranoid son of a gun that he was. He was already considered an idiot by some, and a downright clown by others. This had been an accident... but perhaps a newcomer would not realized the eccentric boy’s ways and would misconstrue it for blatant disrespect.

Oh... the last thing he wanted was to be signed off as a pain. That would be another thing to beat himself up about.

He had gone silent, shifting his weight back and forth as he kept his eyes glued to the ground, his wand twirling nervously in his fingers. What would be the detention time and task? Pierre was ready to be punished for his actions and the consequences of the smokescreen.

@Kelsey Brumby

The boy's eye would be drawn to the part of the sign that said 'NO SPELLCASTING', and his head shamefully lowered further. He hadn't meant to ignore a rule. True, he was no 'Good Boy', but he usually was respectful and able to oblige the rules for any teacher who knew his habits and his... special takes on skirting the social norm. This was a special case, becoming more and more special the longer that he and the nurse interacted with one another in this awkward scenario.

"I'm... not usually like this, I swear." Piérre whispered. "If anything, I usually try to talk down an opponent as opposed to taking up arms... and I would have never hurt you if I had the choice." This was the first time that Piérre had ever been called 'trigger happy', and despite the proof that had been just evidenced, Piérre couldn't help but quietly think himself a failure for garnering the disappointment of an adult so quickly. "I'm real sorry." His quiet words were followed up by a slow tear which had somehow snuck its way down his cheek.

How long had it been since he had been unable to laugh at any situation that he either started or was thrust into? Not for at least seven years, and back when he had been a nobody and had been moving about with his family like vagabonds. "I'm Piérre Marchonné. I'll never do this again, I promise." Sniffing once, Piérre rubbed his eyes, taking a deep, shaky breath as he finally cleansed his mind and blinked rapidly. "Nice to meet you Mister Brumby!" Finally regaining his sense of humor, Piérre cracked a small smile as a slightly weak laugh left him. "Can I call you Mister Bumblebee? Floats like a butterfly, stings like a bee?" It was a kind of tongue and cheek moment, trying to regain his moxie... but somehow Piérre felt even emptier than before.

"I hope we don't keep meeting like this. You seem like a nice guy." Mister Finley seemed like a nice guy too before Piérre saw the madness.

A thought struck him. "Mister Bumble_ Brumblebee!" A snort left him involuntarily before Piérre cleared his throat and tried to reformulate his question. "Do... Have you... um... When did... Why did you want a job here?" It was only at this point in time where Piérre realized just how little he could divine if the nurse was friend or foe. "Have you ever made-- or used-- Polyjuice potion before?"

@Kelsey Brumby

'You're never the person that you were five minutes ago.' Those were certainly wise words if Piérre had ever heard any. Too bad that most of the wise words that Piérre heard usually ended up like water being collected with a sieve. He would certainly try to make a dedication to try and remember these ones, though, especially since they seemed to align with most of the beliefs that he himself held dear to himself.

"'Fraid I don't write for the Headline, Mister Brumble." Piérre shrugged, rocking back and forth. "I mean, I hardly focus long enough to finish my homework, let alone write a column for everyone in the school to read. The only reason you would recognize my name is because I'm a Quidditch player." And a rather flighty player at that. "Piérre Marchonné doesn't have a long attention span, and he refuses to take his ADHD medicine to remedy it." He pointed at himself and then made a pair of 'coo-coo' signs on either side of his head.
He didn't speak in third person often, but hey, first time for everything, eh?

At the mention of the old nurse, Piérre let an involuntary shudder run down his spine. "Yep, that's the one." He nodded. "I thought that maybe you were him, like, undercover and polyjuiced or something." And he still could be. Don't get too buddy-buddy. Maybe it's all a ruse. Even though Piérre wished that it wasn't, he still couldn't be too careful. "There was an incident on Valentine's day earlier this year... and I can't stop thinking about it. I feel responsible for what happened, even though I couldn't do anything to stop it.
I couldn't do anything to stop it." And that was why he was guilty. He was guilty of being a bystander and being unable to interfere. "I just stood and watched it happen."
He glanced to a bed, near the entrance of the Wing. That had been his. He had hidden under that very cot, and had witnessed the casting of 'Sectumsempra', as well as the blood that had been shed because of it.

"Over there. Under the bed by the door."