How Charming PV Valerie Laurier Closed

─────Finally, dear lord. Someone understood that maybe a dungeon being the destination for a house full of little eleven-year-olds, crawling around like ants on the ground, wasn't the best idea in the world. It was cool, yeah, obviously. Sometimes Maggie would wake up to see what looked like the tentacles of the infamous giant squid in the lake right outside the big glass window to the outside, enchanted to prevent any sort of leakage into the dorm room. Of course, there was some debate about whether or not it was truly the squid. Possibly just tendrils of long kelp, reaching their slippery arms up against the glass beyond.

Maggie always liked to believe in the unthinkable, however.

"Well, now, it's pretty neat, don't get me wrong. Won't catch me doing much agreeing with a Gryffindor, anyhow," Maggie teased, resting her face in her palms. Palm on each cheek, real friendly-like. Teasing. "Betcha don't have a window out to the great like, do you? Didn't think so."

The suggestion and implication of maths, though, sure wasn't welcome in Maggie's brand new vision of what Hogwarts was. Sure, she had a hard time with the homework and the workload that was weighed on her, along with the fact that you really did have to retain information here, she was quite grateful for the lack of muggle subjects.

Damn you, mathematics. The very concept gave Maggie nausea. "Maths? Ew, no. No, absolutely not. You crazy?" She asked with a guffaw, furrowing her brows. "You gotta be crazy to like maths. Seriously. I can hardly, like, count to ten."

Interacting With: @Maggie Hawkins | Mentions: N/A

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"Hm," Valerie hesitated. What would be easier? Muggle subjects or whatever they were doing at Hogwarts? Perhaps muggle subjects were just less deadly. Kind of.

"I suppose math is a bad example," she shrugged. Val didn't exactly like math either. It was probably her worst subject back home, way lower than all her other grades.

To be honest, Val was doing better at Hogwarts than muggle school. Perhaps the people helped. After all, teachers were always telling her that behavior was just as important as grades, in fact, it helped. A lot. She didn't exactly have good behavior back home, especially since she wasn't the most social person.

But now, here in Hogwarts, she was surrounded by people like her. People who believed in magic and the fact that not everything had to be practical or solved by a math problem. Well, at least most people believed that. She had met a few people who still hadn't accepted the magic this world had to give, but she didn't really count them.

She turned back to her homework. Maybe she just wasn't good at school. But honestly she didn't mind. At least, she didn't mind until her homework got in the way of practically living her life, but that was beside the point. It just meant she'd have to work harder, even if it was an absolute pain. She'd get there eventually.

She yawned, flipping through her book. "Anyways, math or not, this is excruciating," she rolled her head back. "Sooo many ingredients and instructions and blah blah blah. It's giving me a headache."

WC: 263 Words

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MAGGIE HAWKINS

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interacting with: @Valerie Laurier mentioning: @

September 13, 2021

XXXXMath and potions were similar in that, weren't they? The ingredients. Too many things went into too many . . . other things. If that made sense at all. Maggie wasn't one for the details, wasn't exactly known for her immaculate attention to detail. School as a concept, as an institution, was something of a touchy subject. Maggie didn't like to use the word 'dumb' to describe any person, not consciously. Sure, she wasn't the kindest person on earth and oftentimes had her fair share of issues when it came to politeness and being nice to people in situations overall. But if asked to describe herself when it came to school, maths in general, Maggie would say without hesitation, without a shadow of a doubt, that she was dumb. Clueless in classes, downright foolish with equations and piecing together concepts. Things like English and history were perfectly fine! Adept at the arts and things that didn't require critical thinking and equational, linear ideals. And she liked open concepts, liked to answer questions. She liked what she could answer with her own thoughts and opinions, what she could twist up and answer open-endedly. And sure, maths was also open-ended. Not always one answer, not always one way to get there, but that hardly even mattered because how could it? It still required linear thinking and Maggie's understanding of all concepts and possible solutions, ways to do things. "No, really. Half this stuff doesn't even sound appetizing either. People voluntarily drink these potions?" Maggie groaned and slumped back in her seat, chin turned up at the sky and eyes rolling back in a true display of irritation. "I'm not drinking anything with acromantula venom in it."

Interacting With: @Maggie Hawkins

Mentions: N/A

"Oh my God, I know right? Honestly, I never really considered it but how is this safe? Seriously, all these ingredients and these potions don't kill you? It's practically drinking bleach," she exclaimed. Quite a dramatic comparison, she'd have to admit. But she was dramatic, after all. Adding a bit of spice made it much more interesting, plus it really emphasized her burning hate for potions.

Besides, the two weren't that different. She had deducted from her time in muggle school that chemistry was basically the muggle version of potions- not that much different, nor deadly. Basically, poisonous or not, the two were both suspicious mixtures made of even more suspicious ingredients, and that was enough for Valerie. But even a nice cup of mercury seemed nicer than a concussion of magical creature guts.

"If I was told to drink one of these, forced even, I probably couldn't. Even if it was beneficial," she remarked. "Like, I don't care if it makes me rich! This has literal eggshells in it," she gagged, her eyes falling on a list of ingredients from her book.

She never really had experience with potions before her time at Hogwarts, her family was more of the spells type, and it seemed Val had inherited it. Anyhow, perhaps it was her strong immune system built from years of eating dirt, but she never really had to drink potions when she got sick, or anything like that.

That being said, she had never actually tried a potion, considering that the very few lessons the first-years had so far had involved mostly mixing and lots, and lots of notetaking. She wasn't exactly excited to try one though. However, it could be an interesting experience. Perhaps she was too judgemental, she'd never know.

"You know, I haven't actually tried a potion before. I mean, as you said, they don't seem appetizing, like at all, but who knows," she shrugged, turning back to Maggie.

WC: 324 Words

♡

MAGGIE HAWKINS

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interacting with: @Valerie Laurier mentioning: @

September 13, 2021

XXXXPerhaps it was all a slight bit dramatic, yes, Maggie would admit that. But those dramatics were well warranted, in her mind. Why was Maggie expected to honestly, in good health and conscience, drink a potion that had blood in it? Dragon's blood, sure, yeah, semantics, but blood nonetheless. Was it not dangerous, frowned upon, for students to be ingesting large quantities of any type of blood in any form? Sure, maybe the bloody bacteria was cooked out while brewing, or something of the sort, any other stupid little explanation, but Maggie honestly couldn't see herself drinking anything like that in sound mind and heart. Except that wasn't exactly true, was it? No, no, Maggie would. She absolutely would indulge in dangerous potions, drinking things she shouldn't drink, eating stuff she shouldn't really put into her body. After all, it was the little things. You only live once, and all that dumb stuff. It was true, had some merit! You only lived one time and it was imperative to live that one time to the fullest. "For lack of sounding like a jerk, though, lemme play devil's advocate for a second," Maggie suggested, leaning back in her seat and gripping onto the edge of the table with trembling hands, over exerted and struggling with the effort of keeping herself stable in the tipping chair. "Maybe it's dangerous and gross, but maybe it gives me, like, wings or something. Maybe I can live forever if I try it," or, alternatively, she'd die of poisoning and totally blow her chances of being super mega famous. That wouldn't be ideal, but maybe it was worth the risk. "I'll be your honorary taste tester. I'm the potions taste tester, now, and I think that one day I'll be able to fly without a broomstick and everyone will be totally jealous of me." Wishful thinking, perhaps, but thinking that got her further and further away from reasonably doing the homework she'd been putting off their entire conversation. "I haven't even started this. Shut up, I think you're distracting me," this was said with plenty of sarcasm, a healthy dose of joking lightness. Maggie wasn't going to do it and she knew that full well.