24 Dec 2020, 22:08
Professor's Office
Potions
Tristan walked from the Slytherin Common Room down to Professor Barlow’s office. He was curious about the newest addition to the Hogwarts staff. He had introduced himself as Brian Barlow in Potions the first day. He was always in black and very pale, pale enough to be a vampire or maybe a dhampir.
But then it could be that Professor Barlow was just goth as some muggle people had been.
Well, Tristan decided to use that to his advantage. He wore a black muggle coat that looked quite Victorian that he’d received for a gift by his parents over his robes. Then he’d worn the gothic makeup, black as midnight. He was manipulative and cunning so he always adapted to the situation. He opened the door quietly and viewed the office. It was cozy, there was no other way to describe it. Tristan stared at the room with abject fascination at the potions, and the Professor. Professor Barlow was sitting there reading a book without noticing anything in the world. Tristan couldn’t help but smile.
He walked in. It was quite interesting, In fact, It seemed the Professor was quite like himself. Tristan wondered if he should wait and stand there, or announce his presence. In the end he decided to go with the unexpected. He walked very quietly up to the Professor and whispered in his ear.
“Professor, may I have your company tonight? I have a few inquiries.”
Potions
Reducio@Brian Barlow
26 Dec 2020, 14:01
Professor's Office
OOC note @Tristan Theramin: I will let it slide this time, but I would appreciate it if you did not god-mode my character without permission. If you want to include me and my actions in future posts, please send me an owl beforehand.
It was a cold day, today. Rainy and windy and generally everything that made Brian want to burrow under half a dozen blankets and never come back out again. Unfortunately, he was a professor now and couldn't just hide from the world until the weather decided not to be as awful.
He had to go over the syllabus of each class to make certain that he was prepared for his first lessons. In fact, he should probably refamiliarize himself with the reading material for the First Years. It wouldn't do to skip over something important, just because Brian had deemed it too basic to even really think about it.
He paused, hand half-outstretched to reach for the correct book. He should probably abandon the syllabus for the first lesson entirely. He remembered how lost he'd been, trying to grasp the difference between chop and cut, between crush, grind, and pulverize, back when he'd been a student at Durmstrang. There, they had been expected to know the basics of Potion brewing so they could start on the material right away. Here, while not necessarily expected, the extreme basics didn't seem to be covered in the syllabus. So he should probably make sure that all students could start at the same level.
Decision made, Brian pulled himself up from his chair and, foregoing to reach for his cane, hobbled the short distance to one of his many bookshelves. 'Potion-Making Made Simple' was pulled from where it was squished between larger (and more complex) tomes. Hobbling his way back, he spent the next hour or so reading about ways to make children (and/or absolute beginners) understand the basics of brewing.
Then, suddenly, he heard a voice whisper in his ear.
"Professor, may I have your company tonight? I have a few inquiries."
Cursing under his breath, Brian toppled over in his chair in his hurry to get away from whoever had snuck up on him. Pain shot up his bad knee and his previous serene mood evaporated.
Glaring upwards, he saw that it had been a student that had whispered in his ear. What was wrong with kids in this school?
"Jesus Christ, kid!" Brian wheezed as he used his heavy desk to pull himself back up. "What was this about?! You don't knock, you sneak up on a professor and then you decide that you have never even heard about the concept of personal space to whisper in my ear?!"
Brian gritted his teeth, trying to calm down. This was a kid, he reminded himself, who probably thought it was funny to play a prank on the new professor. He should probably expect other students to try something along those lines. Hopefully without the creepy ear-whispering.
After a few steadying breaths, Brian glanced at the child that had just successfully shaved at least a decade off of Brian's life expectancy. He noticed the child's dark make-up and the clothing that were decidedly not part of the school's uniform.
"I don't even know where to begin with you. And no, you may not have my company tonight . Please have a care of how you word things, if not for decency's sake then at least for my own sanity. Now, it's almost curfew, you are breaking dresscode, and I need at least an hour for my heart to recover from this scare. I'd like to ask you to return to your Common Room for now. You are welcome to return tomorrow, during appropriate Office Hours, and ask any Potions-related questions you might have. And please, for Christ's sake, knock before you enter a room. Not just my office. Any room. That's just basic decency."
With that rant out of the way (and his voice had decidedly not steadily risen in pitch in his attempt not to rise in volume), Brian sat back down in his armchair, scooping up the dropped book as he did so.
It hadn't even really been that long since he had gotten this job and he already needed a vacation.
"I assure you that if you die, you need not hand your homework in"