Closed Live by the Day PV Aly Salinger

Dated: May 29th, 2022
@Aly Salinger

Ever since the Festival, Flash had begun to reconnect with his friends again. At the beginning of the year, Flash had struggled to handle what was a truly impossible situation. With his distrust of the adults, and his unwillingness to share the burden of his pain on his loved ones, he had deteriorated in self-inflicted isolation. Culminating in a punch to the face by Burnett, Flash was forced to realize how betrayed he and Willow had felt by being cut out of his life. It was not something Flash easily understood, but the threat of losing them triggered a change in his behavior.

He opened up to specific people in private, and endeavored to maintain healthy habits. Eun-ji's gift of a heather flower had been the anchor which pulled him back from the brink of despair, and it reminded him how much he missed walking the grounds. Spring had come and he had not yet traveled the familiar landscape, nor smelled the fragrant and unique scent of the area. During his first year, he made a perfume unique to the wildflowers growing around Hogwarts. This year, he still had what was left of the perfume he made at his brother's cabin in the forest surrounding the Holmwood estate.

Flash had always been attracted to the way flowers were an identity of a place, how their vastly diverse petals, colors, and aromas characterized nature. Even a person was an amalgamation of expressions, smells, and body language. It was something he surrounded himself with as often as possible, as there had always been something about nature that felt more permanent than his problems. Many of the trees living speckled across the rolling green hills of Scotland had endured centuries of fair and foul, alive and yet immune to the curse of consciousness. In short, being in nature made him feel peaceful, and he missed his excursions. Along with becoming more active in social engagements and communication, he would spend the afternoons in which he had free time engaging in sluggish perambulation.

It was not uncommon to see other students out and about on the grounds, doing one thing of another. On the weekend doubly so, which would have Flash take paths he knew would head towards more overgrown and less inhabited areas around the castle perimeter. During his first year he had charted what must have been every inch of the traversable space of Hogwarts, insistent to understand his surroundings, and that obsessive behavior would end up paying off in this unintended way. He had always been told he seemed older than he was, but at this moment he sincerely felt like an old man avoiding the loud children to wearily stretch his bones. Even if being outside was entirely pleasant, he was still in pain. His body ached, he was tired.

Still, with the open sky all around him, he could feel the absence of conflict in his mind. Replacing the incessant, troubling thoughts was calm appreciation for something greater than he was. He was just an animal, a tiny fraction of the myriad numbers across the planet, dwarfed by the number of plant life. He was free to be simple, to enjoy the beauty of it all. Having walked far enough away from the castle that he expected to see no one, Flash would instead come upon a girl amidst the wildflowers he had been seeking.

Naturally intrigued, Flash would watch momentarily to observe the situation, before quickly realizing she was caring for them. She must have been close to his age, and she looks terribly familiar, yet he was struggling to remember how. It was certainly odd behavior, there was no chance that the herbology professor had asked her to do so, they were mundane flowers that grew everywhere in the United Kingdom. He would be enticed to investigate further. After all, the only thing he liked as much as nature were mysteries. Flash would intentionally approach her from her direct line of eyesight, not wanting to startle or surprise the enthusiastic botanist.

"Hello." Flash would announce, a soft and friendly smile as though he had been expected. "Is this a hobby of yours?"

Flash would tuck his arms behind his back, a casual outfit and demeanor clashing with the dark black eyepatch on his face. He would suffer many changes in his life, but the interest in others would never falter. Anyone who stood out, who behaved unusually or betrayed expectation, would attract his attention like a bloodhound. In a way, one could see it as a mouse having unwittingly walked into the den of a snake, but Flash was not dangerous. Not to those who didn't deserve it.