All is Lost PV Ruka

Ruka had had a good day.
He thought himself to be a very positive person so pretty much every day was a pretty good day, but today had been particularly good.
He had exchanged some friendly banter with his friends at breakfast, had done decently well in his classes and had gone to the grounds to practice some flying and bring the Giant Squid his daily peace offering of bread.
He was twirling around himself, as he walked through the corridors, a big grinn on his face.
He was on his way to the Common Room so could get out of a wet cloak that he had drenched in the lake when he was feeding the Squid, but just as he was about to steer for one of the staircases, someone rounded a corner and, before Ruka could do anything about it, ran straight into them, the force knocking both of them to the ground.
He looked around himself, a little dizzy with disorientation, and was about to apologise to the girl who had also fallen, but before he could she had already snapped at him like it was his fault that she had ran into him.
"I don't have X-Ray eyes," he pointed out with a deep frown on his face, but he still got himself off the ground and walked over to offer the other girl some help with getting up. "I didn't see you coming round the corner." He took a glance at her wrist which she was holding in a slightly peculiar way, biting his lip in guilt. "Are you hurt? I can bring you to the Hospital Wing, they can fix that in a second, it's only half bad, I promise!"

Moray closed her eyes, trying hard to flex her fingers but the shooting pain running up her left arm made her almost think about her wand, she held her hand she barely registered that he offered to help her. “Bring me to the Hospital Wing? I am capable of walking there myself, I don't need you to bring me like some helpless child.” The irony was almost lost on her since she was still a child and felt helpless.

She looked over at him, “Why are you soaking wet?” She scowled slightly, trying to take her mind off her wrist, “And why do you smell like the lake, have you been swimming in the lake? The water is freezing right now, you're going to give yourself hyperthermia.” The angrier she was getting the more prevalent her Scottish accent was.

Something caught her eye, placed on top of a painting, something that looked like. “My wand.” She scowled as she rushed over to the painting, “Why would someone put that up there?” She asked herself shaking her head, she reached up trying to take the wand but, despite her height, she couldn't quite reach.

Ruka really didn't mean any harm to the girl he'd just met, and he just wanted to help, but clearly the young Slytherin - he could see the emblem on her cloak - didn't appreciate that.

"I didn't mean it that way," he said, frowning at the girl for the way she was talking to him like he had attacked her.
He looked down at his soaked cloak, feelimg himself blush a little. "I was feeding the squid," he explained meekly, biting his lip and tilting his head at the girl in front of him.
For some reason she seemed genuinely upset about his entire existence and he couldn't say he'd ever had to deal with someone lile that. "You know, I didn't exactly get my cloak wet to annoy you." His words kind of drowned out a little bit when the Slytherin girl found something on top of one of the portraits, and all of a sudden the state of his cloak didn't seem to bother him that much anymore.
He followed her, staring at the tip of a wand poking over the edge of the portrait frame, and he watched as she tried to reach for it, still missing a few inches to actually reach it.
Being a complete midget compared to everyone else he'd met so far, Ruka couldn't say that he was really able to help, and considering how this girl had treated him so far, he shouldn't even want to, but his dad had always said that his kindness was almost a flaw, so he found himself linking his hands together and kneeling down a bit, offering the girl to step on them. "Here," he said encouragingly. "I can give you a lift, just step on, you should be able to reach it like that!"

Moray rolled her eyes as he said he was feeding the squid. “You know the squid's been alive for many years before we were even born, I think it can feed itself.” Her inner bitchiness was coming out with every moment she was around him, there was just something about him that pissed her off.

“I gave you an out to go back to your dorm and yet you're still here arguing with me.” She reached up a few inches short to almost reaching her wand, who would put a wand on top of a painting, it made no sense.

She looked to the side seeing him kneeling down beside her, “What are you doing kneeling? Are you proposing?” She shook her head rolling her eyes. “Since you're determined to help me despite the fact I've done nothing but belittle you, how about you hand me something to knock my wand off the top, I don't know perhaps a quill.” She asked shaking her head at him.

“It's a good thing you're not a Ravenclaw.” She held out her right hand, keeping her left hand close to herself.

Ruka frowned, growing more and more frustrated with this girl. He had never really experienced any negativity from other people, had never really been socialised enough to know how to deal with it, so his frustration was just accompanied by confusion about why someone would be this mean.
"It almost killed me a while back," he said, thinking back to his nightly adventure with Donny on the lake. "So I like staying on good terms with it." He surely didn't want for the Squid to try and drown him again, once had been more than enough. Sometimes he thought he was still coughing up water from that night.
He sighed, looking at the girl with increasing annoyance. "I don't want to argue with you," he pointed out, biting his lip as he watched her trying to reach for her wand. "I just want to be friendly. I haven't done anything to you. You were the one running into me, and I definitely didn't put your wand up there either; I'm like half as tall as you!" He frowned at the way she reacted to him wanting to help, and he angrily fumbled around in his pockets to look for something she might be able to use to get her wand down from there.
After a few seconds he wrapped his hand around his own wand, carefully offering it to her. It was definitely long enough to help poke her own wand off the edge of the portrait. "Here," he said, eyes narrowed in annoyance. "Maybe you could at least say 'Thank You' once you got your wand back. Not a lot of people would have stuck around to help you out after the way you just talked to me!"

Moray stopped what she was doing to look at him as he said the squid almost killed him. “Did you ever think that maybe staying away from the giant cephalopod might be a good idea. I never thought the stereotype was true but Gryffindors really are all the same, reckless.” She shook her head, any form of niceness she might have extended to him was gone, instead, he just irritated her, every word he spoke enraged her ire.

“You don't want to argue with me, so why are you? Why are you even still here?” She asked as he kept biting his lip, did he want to say something to her? “I can tell you want to be friendly, but you must not be able to pick up on social queues this isn't exactly the right time for tea and a chat.” She sniped still not able to reach her wand.

The boy before her fumbled into his pockets, she could almost see the anger rising inside of him as he looked for something, yet he was still here, still stood beside her helping her. He offered his own wand, she raised an eyebrow at him, she took the wand from him gently, she knew what her wand meant to her she would never want to damage his. Reaching up she carefully knocked her wand down catching it in the crook of her injured hand.

She offered him his wand back she took a deep breath trying to calm herself from the anger. “Thank you.” She realised her tone might have sounded sarcastic but she was being entirely sincere. “You've been a great help.” She fumbled around with her wand putting it safely into her pocket.

Ruka could feel something rising inside him that he'd only ever heard his dad talking about; childish behaviour. Having grown up the way he did, Ruka barely ever had the opportunity to be childish, but this girl made him want to give the pettiest responses and throw his arms up in the air to have a proper tantrum. How did she judge him so harshly when she didn't even know him?
"Just because you have no sense of adventure doesn't mean I have to stay locked in the castle day and night to make sure I don't get into trouble," he said bitterly, his bare feet shuffling on the ground as they started to feel a bit cold. "And I'm still here because you ran into me and then started talking to me like I'm responsible for your bad day!" He sighed, taking a deep breath to calm himself down again.
There was no use in getting himself all worked up over nothing, it was just not worth it. "And I'm still here becauss you clearly need help with that," he added, much calmer now than before as he watched her take his wand, uncharacteristicly careful, and use it to make her own wand fall off the portrait frame.
"You're welcome," he said, nodding at her with a slight smile. She sounded sarcastic in her gratitude but he didn't want to sink down to that level, so he decided to treat her calmly and with as much friendliness as possible. "Look, I'm sorry if I was annoying you," he said carefully, hoping to clear some of the hostility. "I didn't want that, I just wanted to help, so... don't worry, I can leave now that you've got your wand back. I'm sure you'll keep yourself busy trying to figure out who put it there."

Moray rolled her eyes at him as he rationalised his reckless behaviour. “I'm not saying that you shouldn't go out and do crazy things but being near the lake and giant squid just seems like you have a deathwish.” She shook her head. “You could have left, I gave you many chances to leave, but you decided to stay.” She frowned to herself.

Once she had her wand she felt better, he apologised for being annoying she sighed softly shaking her head. “I wasn't exactly being the nicest person, I'm not always like this.” She offered with a weak smile. “Well, I am Slytherin.” She moved her fingers more, the pain was starting to lessen, it didn't seem as bad as it previously had.

“You probably should get changed before you get ill.” She shrugged slightly. “But seriously, thank you.” She smiled again her tone turning more sincere than before. “If you want to steer clear of me I'm Moray.” She smirked slightly as she turned away from him.

Ruka had never really understood anger or frustration in his life, but this girl really brought his emotions up to a whole new level. He wasn't so sure if ahe was actually this snarky or if she was just doing it because she was having fun riling him up.
"I don't have a deathwish, I wanted to find some Grindylow," he said, thinking about when he fell off the boat, searching for sea creatures. "I just happened to find the Squid instead." He ran a hand through his hair and looked away for a moment, trying to come up with why exactly he was still here, talking to this girl.
Truth was that he didn't really know either. He just couldn't bring himself to walk away from her without having her say at least a few friendly words to him. He hadn't realised it before, but he had an obsessive need to make people like him. The Slytherin girl in front of him clearly didn't and he couldn't understand why.
Instead of saying all of that he decided not to answer her question.

Instead he just waited until the girl had her wand back and had returned his to him, the mood lifting a little bit. Clearly, having her wand back in her hand made her a lot more patient and a lot more content, and Ruka smiled in relief.
Yes, she was still a little snarky but at least she wasn't downright mean anymore, and he appreciated her concern about him getting ill of he didn't change out of his clothes soon. "It's fine," he said with a shrug. "It's already drying a bit." He watched as she turned away from him, clearly ready to leave, but as she told him her name, Ruka had a distinct feeling that, maybe, she was warming up to him a little, and he just had to take that chance.
"Ruka," he called after her, completely aware that he had to sound like a complete idiot considering his name barely sounded like a name to most people here. He took two large steps to be on the same level as her.
"My name is Ruka. In case you wanted to stay clear of me as well when you're having a bad day. Or in case you need help getting your stuff off portraits again, whichever is fine by me."