Familiar Faces PV Danielle Alden Closed

DATE & TIME ❀───────────❀ Late September, Saturday Morning Hours

OUTFIT ❀───────────❀ Reducio

TAGS & MENTIONS ❀───────────❀ @Jacob Thorley

Danielle had woken earlier than usual. After a few minutes of laying in her bed, she sat up, determining that she wouldn't fall back asleep. Feeling a brisk, cool breeze blow through the open window near her bunk encouraged her to get up and begin her Saturday morning. Making her way to the bathroom in her dorm, Dani began her morning routine of washing her face, brushing her teeth, and doing her hair for the day. She then went to pick out her outfit for the day, being reminded to grab a cardigan for the day when another cool breeze blew through the open window. Tying matching ribbons in her hair, she finished her outfit with some rather expensive pink and silver jewelry before lacing up her white Converse and leaving the dorm.

Danielle found herself wandering the campus, walking through the halls and grounds until she eventually found herself in the Courtyard. Glancing around the area, she found she wasn't alone, and a boy humming to himself on the bench was occupying the area. She looked away again admiring the courtyard before she did a double take on the boy.

He seemed familiar, yet Dani wasn't quite sure where she could've met or seen him before. Squinting her eyes at the boy, she took in his features. He seemed on the taller side. He possessed a slimmer build and paler skin, similar to her own. He also had bright blue eyes and blonde hair that seemed messy, yet in a stylish way. Danielle cursed quietly at herself in French, mad that she couldn't place a finger on how she recognized him.

Deciding to move closer to the boy, she made her presence known. "Hey. Mind if I sit?" She asked the familiar boy, gesturing to the other side of the bench.

@Danielle Alden

Jacob heard the approaching footsteps towards the courtyard, but paid no mind to it, assuming that it was just another person taking an early morning walk, and continued to absentmindedly hum to himself. However, as the footsteps came to a halt, he glanced around, his humming quieting.

As she approached, and asked to take a seat, he budged over slightly, making enough space on the bench, glancing up towards her with a small frown. It was bugging him, but her face was annoyingly familiar. He just couldn't associate a name, or anything with the face. "Sure, I don't mind." He nodded.

He thought back quickly, trying to place her face in his mind, growing somewhat frustrated as he couldn't."My names Jacob Thorley, by the way." His voice dripped with pride as he mentioned his surname. "What's your name?" A name might help him to place the face somewhere, she could very easily be the daughter of some pureblood that his mother had forced him to speak to as a child. Or if she was a pureblood, they simply could have frequented the same ball, or formal dinner. He didn't, however, want to point out that he seemingly recognised her without any certainty as to where he'd recognise her from.

TAGS & MENTIONS ❀───────────❀ @Jacob Thorley

Danielle shot a small smile to the boy, muttering a small thanks as gave her the go-ahead to sit on the other end of the bench. She took a few glances at the boy, trying to place a name on the familiar face. She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath of the crisp morning air, trying to clear her mind before she was startled out of her moment of peace by the boy's voice. Even that seemed somewhat familiar.

She listened to his introduction, sensing the pride in his voice mentioning his name. Dani concluded that he was probably a pureblood. Not many half-bloods or muggle-borns had that much pride when talking about their surname. She began to try and connect the dots. Now that she knew for sure he was a pureblood, she began to filter through all the pureblood parties, balls, and banquets she'd been to throughout her childhood and recently.

"Danielle Alden. It's a pleasure." She said, her voice also laced with pride as she introduced herself and held her hand out for him to shake. She couldn't shake the thought of how familiar he was, and with an impromptu decision, she mentioned it. "I'm sorry if this is strange and straightforward, but have I seen you before? You seem very familiar to me." Danielle inquired.

@Danielle Alden

As she introduced herself, Jacob noted the pride in her voice as she mentioned her surname, reaffirming the idea that he would of recognised her from some kind of pureblood meeting. "Likewise, a pleasure. " He muttered, shifting around on the bench, so that he could face her and extending his hand to give her a firm handshake. Despite everything he'd ever been told, or done, it still felt old for him to shake the hand of someone the same age of him, and a fellow student. Felt far too formal for him.

"I was wondering the same as you, actually." He agreed to their mutual recognition of one another. "Your face is familiar, I just can't place you anywhere, truthfully."

"Either of your parents work for the ministry, at all?" He asked. If that was the case, it likely would be some kind of ministry ball that they had recognised each other from. "My father is an auror, so sometimes I recognise the kids of people my father has worked with, but I don't tend to remember names." He explained.

"Otherwise.." He pondered for a moment. "My mum used to drag me to all sorts of balls, and stuff.. Probably hard to figure out exactly where I know your face from, truth be told. "

TAGS & MENTIONS ❀───────────❀ @Jacob Thorley

Danielle watched as he shifted on the bench to face her, giving her hand a firm handshake. Dani gave a small smile to him sighing in relief as Jacob shared the same feeling.

"Oh Dieu merci." she muttered to herself in French before speaking louder for him to hear. "I thought I was going crazy." she laughed slightly, glad she hadn't made things to terribly awkward.

It bothered her that she couldn't quite place a finger on where she'd seen Jacob before. But now since she knew that he felt the same way as she did, Danielle was determined to figure it out.

"My father, William Alden, works at the Ministry," she said, giving Jacob her father's name incase that was familiar as well.

Continuing to listen to Jacob, her eyes lit up at the mention of the pureblooded balls and parties her family had been invited to over the years. "Of course! My father and mother always took me and my siblings to those balls and parties. We've probably seen eachother at one of the more recent ones," she concluded, "Maybe the past Christmas ball, or one of the summer parties?" Danielle suggested, glancing to Jacob to see if any recognition showed.

Translations

Reducio

oh Dieu merci - oh thank god

@Danielle Alden

Jacob rose a brow as she muttered to herself in French, just about able to make out the language, but unable to understand it. Despite his parents best efforts, languages had never stuck with him at all, besides the odd latin phrase, but that mainly stemmed from trying to translate some older families mottos. "Happens a lot to be fair.. You think you recognise a face in the hallway somewhere, but first time I've actually been able to confirm that I'm not going crazy." He said with a grin.

"William Alden.." He mulled the name over in his head, whilst not an entirely unfamiliar name, nothing particularly jumped out at him. He'd likely been told a list of names at some ball by his mother, incase he had to meet them. "I guess our parents may have met, it's possible then.. What department is your father in?"

"Could of been a summer one.." He muttered. "It'd make sense if your face was familiar, we could of passed each other at a summer party." As he spoke, he grew increasingly confident that it likely was a summer party that they'd of recognised each other from, which is why they recognised one another. "My mother would kill me if she heard me say this, but I'm glad to be past having to attend all of those.. I guess if I go home at Christmas I'll be dragged along to something, and same again in the summer, but I never enjoyed those balls much.. I guess maybe you'd of had more fun, as you have siblings? I'm an only child, so a lot of it was spent with my mother dragging me around, trying to meet people."

TAGS & MENTIONS ❀───────────❀ @Jacob Thorley

Dani laughed at Jacob's words, agreeing with him before answering his question about her father. "Father is under the Magical Law Enforcement department. He's always quite busy." She commented with a sigh. After years of barely ever seeing her father due to his line of work, she learned to not mull over it. She couldn't change it.

Danielle listened as Jacob's voice grew increasingly more confident as he spoke about the possibility that they'd seen each other at a summer ball. She grinned as he expressed his opinion about the balls. She had quite a love-hate relationship with the idea of them. She adored getting all dressed up and getting new, fancy, dresses for the balls, but she utterly despised being dragged along with her mother, and having to accept every dance that someone her age asked her for.

"My mother would do the same. My brother would get dragged along with my father, while my sister and I would be with our mother, and we were always expected to be on our best behavior, so not much fun was involved. Family reputation, you know?" she explained, thinking back to all the balls they'd attended in the past. "I suppose they were somewhat fun when I got to dance with one of the people I knew, but that was always a rare occasion." She laughed softly. "It was practically a luxury when Mother would say I could go spend some time in the gardens of whatever manor we were at, away from the party. But that was always at least a couple of hours into the ball." She smiled softly.

@Danielle Alden

Her father also being under the Department of Magical Law Enforcement made a lot of sense, and it was highly likely that there fathers at least knew of each other, in that case. "Bet our fathers know each other then, considering they'll be under the same department. Do you know what he does in the department?" He held similar thoughts about the hours his father worked, but Jacob had a great amount of pride for his fathers position, so he looked past the long hours mostly, instead making sure to enjoy his fathers company when he was at home.

He was also more than familiar of the expectation to uphold a reputation, always having to be on his best behaviour, not that he'd likely get into much trouble if he was let free. He'd just rather explore these huge mansions, rather than being trapped to one hall, or dining room. "I never really cared much for dancing, but admittedly I don't think I'm particularly good at it." Dancing had always stressed him out far more than he cared to admit, spending then entirety of the dance stressing over where he was placing his feet, or the direction in which he lead the dance, out of fear of stepping onto someone else's foot, or whirling around into another couple.

"My mother rarely ever let me out of her sight, sadly.. The one time she couldn't attend, and my father took me though was great. I was just allowed to wander off instantly, got to explore the gardens, like you said."

TAGS & MENTIONS ❀───────────❀ @Jacob Thorely

Danielle smiled as Jacob stated that his father too, worked in Magical Law Enforcement. "He works as an auror. You think they could've been together on a job before?" she asked him, adjusting some of the hair that had been purposely left out of her hairstyle. If their fathers had worked together on a case before, Jacob's family would've been invited to one of the lavish parties her mother had thrown in the past.

She listened as he expressed his distaste for dancing, opposite to her feelings. She understood where he was coming from. The dances danced at the balls and parties took years of work to learn and perfect with her mother's guidance. Looking back on it now, Danielle cherished the memories with her mother, since they were some of the only ones she had now. "I can understand that," she said, a small smile on her face as she remembered the dance lessons. "It took years for me to be any good at it. But like everything else, the more I practiced, the better I got." For Danielle, dancing was almost second nature. Her mind knew where to step and how to move gracefully without barely even a thought.

After listening to Jacob once more, she found herself incredibly lucky to be let out into the gardens after a couple of hours if she hadn't been asked to dance. She couldn't imagine being forced to endure a whole ball being forced to talk to haughty pureblooded adults. Occasionally, the adult her mother would talk to would also have a child with them, and Dani would engage in polite conversation with them while her mother chatted the night away, but that was rare.

"I think the gardens are probably one of my favorite things whenever I'm dragged off to a ball," she said, even though the number of balls her family attended had gone down after what happened to her mother. "There's barely any noise out there and you're just surrounded by flowers and other plants. It's peaceful. Much how it is right now." Danielle spoke, smiling softly at Jacob before looking around the courtyard, only the two of them occupying the area.