Closed The Wheels On The Train Go Round And Round OPEN

Interacting With: @Lucia Fox | Dialogue Hex: #143314

The identity of Leonard Oaksworth was a peculiar thing, filled to the brim with contradictions and chances of circumstance that could only be comprehended by way of ethereal enlightenment even Leonard Oaksworth himself was evidently unworthy of. Years of studying psychology handbooks not at all meant for the stubby hands of a child and perennial reviews of bad vampire high school romance novels very much meant for the mind of an intellectual looking for a supposedly ironic read had revealed the, in colloquial terms, generally sucky nature of the adolescent years when it came to figuring out oneself, but he’d always hoped that he would be a miraculous exception. There were the contradictions, plain as day and sure as night: he stocked undeserved pride in surplus despite a self-esteem dipping deeper than the Mariana Trench, his borderline paranoid scepticism of anything good constantly fighting against his exhausted desire for everything to be alright. And, yes, everything had been alright as the Slytherin had awoken from an unrestful final slumber in his dormitory, as he’d brushed his teeth and eaten breakfast and baulked at the table manners of the incoming upperclassmen and had to brush his teeth again because of the sheer disgust garnered from the experience, but for Merlin’s sake was he completely unable to shake the feeling that something was going to go wrong right until the moment when he stepped onto the Hogwarts Express. Maybe he was right, maybe something would always go wrong. Maybe he and his ridiculous neuroticism were what was always wrong, maybe the train would crash and prove his wrongness right.

Leonard kept up the soliloquy to the best of his abilities, procrastinating as much as he could in lieu of emotional stability. Oh, but shouldn’t he check on whether or not his professor had truly given the final grade for that Divination assignment? Drat, didn’t he have to feed his beloved animal companion multiple times per morning? Had he really returned that book to the library on time, or did he need to take a cross-continental jog to get the money required to repay his debts? Of course, the excuses ran dry eventually, and he couldn’t deny he was on his last drop of patience with himself as he finally entered the train and would again fall victim to the hustling, bustling excitement so potent when shoving an entire school’s worth of students into what was essentially a narrow corridor leading to their friends, their enemies, and everything in between.

Much too hurried and harried to look for his fellow dragon tamer and follow him around like a lost, pessimistic puppy, he’d followed after a raven-haired girl he might’ve seen in Astronomy or Charms once upon a time, though he wouldn’t put it past the late-night setting of their sessions to have caused him to mistake a shadow for a classmate of some kind. He’d been bumped out of this route a few times before reaching his destination, but he really did want to sit somewhere that wasn’t in the direct path of the food trolley and its vengeful wheels.

“Hope I’m not interrupting any sort of thestral court case you happen to be the stenographer of.” The sheepish smile that accompanied the quip betrayed not of the fact that he’d rehearsed his delivery of the line to the pet lizard sat still on his shoulder, but did make his awkwardness as apparent as the Scottish’s sky’s summer blueness. It was a given, that his supposed nerves of steel would immediately melt in the face of an actual person, and yet he hoped this would be an exception. “I’m Leonard Oaksworth, any chance I could sit here? Testify on behalf of the invisible man, maybe?”

And so he stood with his trunk at his side, taking great care to not look at the girl’s parchment and gain any information not meant for his eyes. While he was usually, for lack of a more flattering term, down to spill the proverbial tea, he didn’t want to be exiled from respite due to his inability to not be nosy.

It wasn't until she put quill to parchment and carefully penned the words that she'd written so often in the last few terms that Lucia realised what she'd gotten them out of her bag for. Dear Alexa, she wrote, not really thinking about what she was putting down. When Lucia began writing these letters a little while after Alexa died, she'd thought about every word and crossed things out often, just as she did when writing an actual letter. It had taken her a while to undo her perfectionist training when it came to the perfect language to use in writing, but once she'd managed it she began to find these letters peaceful to write. It was a sort of therapy, pouring out her feelings onto the parchment without any worry that they could be discovered. Lucia never re-read her letters, instead keeping them safe in a box under her bed. What had started as a way to adjust to life without her best friend in it had become a diary of sorts, as well as a way to honour and remember Alexa's life.

A minute or so went by in relative silence: the only sounds were the scratching of Lucia's pen on the parchment, the murmur of the crowd of student outside the door, and - if you listened very, very closely - the soft rumble of River the pygmy puff's breathing as she slumbered in Lucia's pocket. As often happened when she wrote letters to Alexa, Lucia had ended up straying from her original topic and had moved from a description of the empty compartment to the fourteenth birthday that Alexa would never reach. In any case, she began, and then was startled into jumping a little (prompting a sleepy, muffled squeak from her pocket) when the door slid open, revealing a pale boy with dark hair. Lucia looked down at her parchment and was disappointed to see that she'd accidentally traced a line from the end of the comma all the way across the page. Ugh.

While she did recognise that the line messing up her letter wasn't the boy's fault, Lucia still couldn't help but feel a little annoyed at him for interrupting her little bubble of privacy. But then she noticed the tilt of his head, purposely looking away from her parchment as he spoke. That was nice of him, and probably made up for his bursting in here. Lucia had to pause a moment after his opening line to figure out what he was saying, though. She may have been an avid reader, but she had no idea what a 'stenographer' was. Not that she was going to tell the boy that. "No, you're fine - don't worry about it." The perfect all-purpose answer. Lucia was quite proud of herself. After his next words, Lucia gestured to the five empty seats in the compartment. "Sure - there's plenty of space." Unsure how to respond to his comment about the 'invisible man' (there was no invisible man here, after all... unless Lucia just couldn't see him- because he was invisible) she just ignored it for now, but resolved to come back to it later, if only to prove that she knew what he was talking about (even though she didn't).

If the boy - @Leonard Oaksworth, as he had introduced himself - moved further into the compartment, Lucia would stand up and move out of the way in order for him to put his trunk up onto the rack. If she'd had any strength, she might have offered to help, but the Hufflepuff doubted she'd be of any use. As she stood up, she quickly blew on her parchment as a last prayer for the ink to dry before rolling it up and putting it back into her satchel, along with her quill and ink. "I'm Lucia, Lucia Fox." While she waited to be able to sit down again, she found herself replaying the boy's first words over and over again in her head. Court case... Invisible man. "And you should know," Lucia began, hoping she didn't sound as unsure of her words as she felt, "that the invisible man already" - what was the phrase? - "pleaded guilty." Another pause. "So you're a bit late."