14 Aug 2024, 00:21
Reaching Out to 'Him'
september 15th, 2024 wc: 1253 interacting with: pebble the owl
@Sage Willows + zyair ofc lolShe had been sitting in the owlery for at least an hour, eyes trained on the untouched parchment sitting in her lap. In only two weeks of being back to Hogwarts, Scout had already lost all want or will to keep attending school. It was a complete and stark contrast to her first year, she had been pretty excited for a fresh start. All of the friends she'd make, experiences she'd go through, things she'd learn... she had been so excited!
In her second year, she had already picked two fights, lost all confidence in herself, and cried in the bathroom on four separate occasions. Four! That was four more times than she had cried in her first year, and two more times than she had cried in any bathroom in her entire life! To say she wasn't a happy camper was an understatement. She was an incredibly unhappy camper.
She was wearing one of the shirts Ophelia had recommended the day before- not that it mattered, because it was four in the morning and nobody would be awake to see her. But it was the thought that counted. Her mind had struck itself hard in convincing herself that changing her physical aesthetic would somehow make her feel better. Every second she'd be near a mirror or a window or the lake, she'd find herself subconsciously looking at her disinterested face; she'd put on a smile after seeing herself look so disoriented.
Pebble hooted at his owner, seeming to peer at her unmoving hands. "Sorry, Pebs, just give me a minute." He pecks at her red hair affectionately (at least she hopes), and when one of her hands reaches up to pet him back, it brushes against her tearstained cheeks. Her response to the information is heavily delayed, and she continues to pet him for several seconds before she realizes that she had been crying.
How... how long had she been crying for? When had it even started?
For the first time in a few days, her internally whispered words of negative self-reflect had been quiet. It was like a switch had been flicked once her and Asteria had started fighting. Prior to her second year, when she had jinxed Casey, she spent the rest of her summer camp trying to fight off the guilt. It died down almost immediately, though, when she had the opportunity to speak to Zyair. Honestly, though, it was probably because she became more focused on why Zyair recognized her than feeling bad over almost escalating an argument.
But it was impossible to deny that she had felt better after talking to him. He had promised her something, something she couldn't really ignore. 'I will wait.' It was, of course, for her to eventually tell him of the fact that she was a dhampir, but she wondered if that ideology would extend to other things, too. She didn't want to think she was that important to him- they had only met twice- but a part of her wanted to selfishly hope that was the truth. His comfort wouldn't go unwarranted, that was for sure.
How would she tie in that her poor self-esteem issues were because of the secret she was keeping from not only him, but everyone? Scout would rather die than tell anyone the real reason she was consistently in a bad mood was rooted in her vampiric history. Her entire life she had been treated like a monster of some sorts, and now she was acting exactly like the monster the muggle children described her as.
'Now you see? You are who they said you are.' Her own attempts at convincing herself anything different fell on deaf ears- mainly her own. Would there ever be a time where she could tell herself she wasn't a bad person? Well, that didn't really matter; she couldn't now, so any prophetic thoughts of 'could I' were unnecessary.
Monsters couldn't solve issues without violence, monsters snapped at their innocent Potions partners, monsters had to hide who they really were, dressing up as soft and lovely. Scout, do you really believe yourself to be the definition of a monster? There were a seldom few who could convince her that she was anything else. Emily might've been one of them, but how crude it would be to reach out to her friend. Maybe it was her dad, he was the one she had initially planned to write her letter to. But there was no need to drag anyone into her own dramatic and sad feelings. That was all they were, dramatic and sad. Scout hated the idea of making anyone see or feel the things she saw and felt.
Something she hated more, though, was dealing with these emotions on her own. A burden shared is a burden halved, right? There was nobody she wanted to share her burdens with, nobody she wanted to tell how she really felt. It would be too difficult to try and explain the whole situation to someone who knew nothing, but it'd be too awkward to tell someone who understood the situation how she was really feeling. She was in a pickle.
Her thoughts drew back to Zyair. He was a happy medium, he knew enough about Scout that it wasn't like they were complete strangers, but he was definitely not someone who knew everything about her. He had made that clear when they had met at camp. She still doesn't get how someone as smart as him knows as little as he does. There's a small part of her that still wants to think that he knows of her biting habits, but it really is a small part of her. Although Scout shows every emotion on her face, and Zyair has an incredibly good poker face, she thought she could see how he really felt pretty well. Why is she trying to convince herself she needs to reach out to him? She's not so stupid that she doesn't realize what she's doing.
Her fingers cling tightly around the quill, and suddenly a flurry of words explode onto the paper. She had to ask him his opinion, every attempt she made to convince herself that it didn't matter fell once more on deaf ears. The only person she had felt half this passionate about was Emily. While it made Scout feel a little confused about why she cared about his thoughts so much- if he was anywhere close to Emily on the 'I care about you' spectrum... she must really care for him. To her, that was dangerous territory.
While she kept everything about her being a dhampir a secret, she makes it a note to mention her unhappiness, how she wants to be perceived differently than how she thinks she is. When she finished, she didn't even bother penning the letter with her name. He wasn't an idiot, he would know who sent it. Also he'd probably recognize her atrocious handwriting, but she made it a note to only dot one 'i' with a heart. It felt kind of weird to add hearts to a letter where she explained how upset she was feeling.
The only thing left was to see if her owl best friend was ready to make such a long trek. To Africa from Scotland... actually, Scout didn't even know where Uagadou would be. Pebble was smart, and he'll probably figure it out. At least she hoped! Poor guy would definitely be tired, though.
"Pebble... have you ever been to Africa?"
don't look at me; you can't understand, right? i'm just like a monstrous flower that bloomed too soon
scout fu-hai & zyair ona'je