Clara Bow Solo Finished

For weeks, now, Aly had been walking on a pin's edge. The young Ravenclaw was no stranger to completely upturning her life and changing some of its largest facets on a dime, but here she was, with two potential big life changes coming her way: the Quidditch team and the Hogwarts Headliner.

Let's start with the Quidditch team. Aly had a long, detailed, on-again and off-again relationship with being a member of the Ravenclaw group - starting first as a first-string Keeper halfway through her second year and immediately getting knocked off her broom. That was followed with getting knocked down to second-string for the last game of that year, though she'd gone back up to first-string in the fall of third year and stayed there for four consecutive games: third-year winter and spring, the summer game against Durmstrang and Koldovstoretz at camp, and the fall of her fourth year. But then, tragedy: her father had passed just before Christmas, and Aly had left Hogwarts - and, obviously, the Quidditch team - for the rest of her fourth year.

Upon her return, she'd considered joining duelling but then reconsidered and went back to Quidditch, her true love - this time signing up as a Chaser. But after serving two matches (fall and winter) as Ravenclaw's second-string Chaser - two losses, at that - the position was starting to remind her too much of her mother, and plus, Aly wasn't as good of a Chaser as she'd thought she would have been anyway. So with the spring match against Hufflepuff looming, and Aly having the common room to herself one day a few weeks back, she'd impulsively signed her name onto the Seeker waitlist.

As for the Headliner - well, that was a different monster altogether. Aly knew a few folks who had written for the campus newspaper at one time or another, and it had always seemed a very interesting group, but not one that she'd desired to join - until recently. What with her recent loss of enjoyment in the Healing path and her acceptance into the Astronomy internship, Aly was finally feeling as though she could find a career she liked through that. Still, it didn't hurt to explore other paths. Writing had always been interesting for Aly, albeit never quite the biggest of her passions, and who knew? Maybe journalism would be her calling.

So here she was, weeks later, with applications in for both the Seeker position and the Headliner. Every morning had gone exactly the same way: checking the Quidditch posting on the bulletin board in the Ravenclaw commons on her way out the door, and then a nervous breakfast spent awaiting the morning mail, hoping that an acceptance letter would show from the newspaper. Each day, her name glared back at her from the waitlist, and each day, she'd either received no mail at all or just junk - the Daily Prophet, advertisements, the occasional Witch Weekly delivered to the wrong person.

Until this morning.

Upon awakening earlier this morning, a Wednesday of all days, Aly had stumbled out of bed a little later than usual - a flashback to her younger years at the school, in which it had been a common sight to see the curly-haired kid whirlwinding around the Ravenclaw girls' dormitories in the morning, often with a brush stuck in her wild bedhead. Bleary-eyed, she'd just managed to get ready with enough time to grab a quick breakfast before morning Herbology, and had nearly forgotten to check the Quidditch listing on the common room board on her hurricane's path out the heavy door with its iconic eagle knocker.

So used to seeing a dark blue Aly Salinger penned in her even, loopy script next to the Waitlist option, she almost hadn't recognised that a new roster had been posted. In fact, she'd scanned over the document and then turned tail to flee for a fast's break before the wires connected in her head and the teenager had slowly rotated back around to examine the parchment more closely.

First-String Seeker: Alyssa Salinger

Even now, later in the afternoon, Aly still couldn't believe it was real.

And then she'd arrived to breakfast, sat at her usual place at the Ravenclaw table, to find a letter waiting for her. Tiny, the thing was - and sealed with the Headliner's official signet - and Aly had felt her breath quicken. Despite the urging of some excited firsties nearby, who apparently really cared if they were in the presence of a new Headliner writer or not, the note had just been stuffed into her satchel, to be worried about later. It was small, after all, and if Aly was going to open a rejection letter as the sinking feeling in her gut believed, it would be only in the comfort and privacy of her own company.

As golden rays of the afternoon sun swept over the Great Lake, they lit up the figure of a young girl perched cross-legged on the rocky lakeshore, her newly crowned Seeker's hands clutched tightly around a small envelope in her lap. A light breeze pulled curls from her ponytail over her shoulder, and Aly didn't bother to flick them back onto her back as she stared down at the name on the addressed letter: Alyssa Salinger.

If it were an acceptance, it would be a much bigger envelope, right? There had only been a few slots open, and Aly knew that to hope she'd made the team - did they call staffs of newspapers teams? - was likely a futile dream, what with everyone who'd applied. Plus, the universe would never dare give her two pieces of good news in one day - this was definitely a rejection, then, meant to bring her floaty excitement back down to a human level. She wasn't a rose to be plucked and admired by all, after all - but, then again, even lilies had their time and their place.

And if mine's Seeker, not Headliner, it won't be the worst thing in the world, she assured herself as, finally, steeling her nerves, Aly slipped a finger between the folds of the envelope and carefully broke the seal. It'll still be fun to read when it comes out, and I can always apply again, I've still got two years here...

Trembling fingers withdrew the folded scrap of parchment and smoothed out its creases on her leg, and barely breathing, the Ravenclaw scanned over its words with hungry emerald eyes:

Hi there... we would like to offer you...

Aly almost dropped the letter entirely.

She'd done it. She'd made it. Seeker acceptance and Headliner acceptance all in one day. The universe seemed to like her very much, indeed. The teenager nearly whooped with joy, but realised quickly she'd sort of forgotten to breathe, and took a deep, healing breath instead, as if she'd been dehydrating in a desert for months and this was her first gulp of water in all that time.

"Holy hippogriffs," she whispered, gently, to herself, reading the letter again, then again, then again. It was real. It was all real. It had better be real, because if I wake up and my dreams were just taking the piss, I'm going to be angrier than a boiled owl.

But then, despite all of the joy racing marathons through her veins and the steel she'd set in stone with her emotions, nerves racked her body like a shiver. Yes - she'd just Done That, and she couldn't properly fathom yet that it had happened to her, of all folks, but also, yes, her life was about to change drastically for not the first time in these past few years. Two new positions all at once. Could she handle something like that? The extra pressure that came with a Seeker job - an entire team relying on your one hand grabbing a ball smaller than a fork, audiences staring at you, waiting on your every move - and this dive into a new activity altogether, this attempt at turning writing into something more, this completely alien step forward into the future.

The match against Hufflepuff was pacing ever closer day by day, and she would be the first line of offence to grab the Snitch and win it for Ravenclaw. The Headliner was calling, waiting on her to pick up a quill and join their ranks. Her future was bright. Dazzling. Almost too brilliant, so that she'd have to squint when she looked at it.

With any luck, this little rose - picked, admired, given the glory she'd waited ages for - could give everything without wilting.