There Lies the Line

What was it about winter that was such a pain in the...arse? The massive amount of snow that collected on the ground, waiting to be stomped on and rolled into a small ball and thrown. Sure it was a time of joy and prosperity, but it was still annoying when it came to the sheer cold side of it. Andrew was spending too much time outside, and in a way it was killing him. He was sort of used to the cold environments, yet it was the very low amount of clothing Andrew had. He was still wearing his same sweatshirt, blue jeans, and black and white tennis shoes. Not to mention the large clunky gloves that he had that were transformed into a seemingly warm pair of mittens.

They were not.

Instead, Andrew had his hands deep in his sweat shirt pocket, trying to keep his hands warm and walking very fast to his destination. He was trying to go and see the Herbology greenhouse, to see how it had been since he had last been there with Nerissa Hatts, his ex girlfriend. He was just wondering how the plants were since the entire area had been destroyed to nothing at all. Why couldn't they make a endless-summer-spell over Hogwarts? Andrew thought At least the death ratio would go down.

Andrew was close to his destination when he accidently tripped in a small pothole, one concealed by the camoflauge of snow. Swearing softly, Andrew pulled his foot out of the pothole and pushed himself back up to his 2 feet. Looking down, his entire front body was covered in his. Great, he thought again, looking irritated just fantastic!

It was one of those rare days when Miseria actually came out from the castle to enjoy the day and the snowy views. The fact was that she got quickly annoyed inside, and there was nothing to do in the dungeons.
Besides the bored look in her eyes, Mis hadn't changed after those months when she came back into Hogwarts. She was wearing her black, the most usual clothes what were seen on her. Jeans with chains, heavy combat boots, black t-shirt and a coat. The only color what was bright on her, was yellow, and it was only a part of her scarf, which was wrapped loosely around her neck. Actually, she didn't care about getting cold or anything. Her health was good, maybe even better than some of her housemate's.

When she heard someone swearing, she looked up from the lake. In this lake she almost died. Twice. Once the was trying to commit suicide here, and the second time was when Wilson pushed her into the water. And she fainted. Weak.
It didn't take long for her to recognize the owner of the voice. Slight grin appeared on her pale lips, and she walked closer to Andrew. “Potholes.“ she looked at the hole, trying to look serious. It wasn't funny when someone tripped! “Best things ever, don't you think?“

Andrew continued to brush the snow off of him, trying to make sure every last spec of the white substance was off of him. He sighed, thinking that this all great and magical school had potholes. You would have thought they would have kept a better job at trying to find these things before the snow appeared. But that was just Andrew complaining. Even as he was thinking of things to complain about, he was harshly interrupted by the sound of a familiar entity. At the first sound, he couldn't figure out who it was but as she said the last part, he knew who it was. It was Miseria. He turned around, a slight grin on his face.

"Just about," he replied answering her question about potholes "how do I know that you didn't make that pothole? Trying to make me trip eh?" He chuckled slightly at his own joke and proceeded to stomp some snow in the pothole, to at least try and make some people avoid falling into the pothole. He stomped his foot on the snow until it became a solid entity and then smoothed it over with some other snow. "Clever bastard must've figured it'd be perfect," Andrew deducted "since the snow is all around this time of year." He mostly said it to see if Misieria had actually done it.

“You don't,“ she replied simply, shrugging her shoulders. “I don't need to dig a hole to make you trip.“ she rolled her eyes. If she'd want to see him fall into the snow, she'd rather push him into the snowdrift. But it seemed that he didn't take his complaint quite seriously, and she smiled back at him.
Mis didn't stand there and stare how he cleaned himself. Instead, she looked around to see if anyone else tripped into those little holes. She was lucky one, though. Never fell into one of those. Ever. “Yes, it is perfect. I wonder how many people have fallen for this trick,“ she asked, grinning at him. Of course she knew that she was the main suspect right now. NO one else would come there, and almost laugh at someone's face. But that didn't bother her. Instead. It was always fun to be the first suspect.

“So... Andrew.“ Miseria finally turned her brown eyes back at the young man. “How have you been?“ she wanted to add 'besides all the bad things' and of course she wanted to know where he has been for this very long time, but all in good time. And if he even would like to talk about that with her.

Andrew laughed a bit at Miseria's comment about making him trip. "Good to see you haven't changed," he stated, still smiling and brushed some excess snow off his arm. After brushing off his left arm, he was finally done and began to step over to Miseria. The snow seemed pretty thick though, which again annoyed Andrew a bit. "Probably a lot of people," he replied to her question, seeing his own breath in the shivering cold "have you? Just out of curiousity I mean."

When Miseria asked him how he had been, he shrugged lightly and replied to her "Well I've been better. Just trying to keep myself alive, that's all. Learned a couple of new tricks while I was away. Mostly killing, but y'know." He said that last part a little fast, wondering what she would say after he had mentioned that. He spent time with his father while he was away. His father was an U.S.M.C Special Forces Operative (as you can see, he is a very big muggle supporter) and taught Andrew some moves. It always bothered Andrew for some reason that his father was pureblooded, but had always spent time learning muggle ways. He wouldn't even apparate anymore.

It was good to hear that people actually liked that she was Like this. Sarcastic, and had a strange sence of humor. “Well, actually, that's the nicest thing someone has ever told me in a while. Usually people hate when I'm making fun of them.“ She even knew why.
Thanks to her sence of humor, and the way she looked at the things, she couldn't sometimes stop herself but watch and laugh how some people are falling. “Nope,“ girl replied. Right now, she was actually lucky enough to stand on her high boots, and None of her bones were broken! Yet.

“So... The usual.“ She grinned at him. The usual. She wanted to ask more about what he did when he was away from the school. Actually, she even missed their adventures. But there was no way she'd go swimming now to find a little lake monster. Also, she didn't want to be pushy. If he didn't want to talk, then be it. She won't ask. But as for her – nothing changed in Miseria's life. She was still mother, and she was still the great magnet of The Bad Luck, and she was still best friends with her Enemies. “So, what tricks did you learn?“ she asked, trying to avoid the silence between them.

Andrew looked back at Miseria and said "Well I know how sarcastic we can both get. Kinda weird to must people I guess." He wondered what Miseria had gotten into while he was absent. It seemed like an eternity since they had their battle at the lake...with that one lake monster. Now he wondered what she did with the egg they stole from it after the thing died. She probably gave it away, which in the end was probably a better choice then trying to raise it. It would've been a good attack snake though.

Andrew noticed the slight silence between them and tried to think of some things to say. There weren't many questions however, so he decided not to ask at all. But she saved him from awkward questions by asking one of her own. Andrew thought for a moment about what he should say. Mostly thievery abilities, such as lockpicking and car hotwiring, but he had no idea what she would say. Oh well. "Mostly just lockpicking or car hotwiring," he said "I tried to learn some things that might be important. My brother actually wanted to teach me some of those things now that I think about it."

“Yeah, maybe,“ she said thoughtfully. Actually, she didn't care if people thought that she was nice or mean. Miseria never changed herself because someone didn't like her. That wasn't her problem if they couldn't get through her attitude. And she was acting pretty nicely. “We don't want that, now do we?“ she grinned at him, stepping now away from the potholes. She didn't want to trip into one of these, now did she? No. She hated falling, that made her look even weaker than she already was.

More people explained her about the muggles and what they do for living, the bigger curiosity she felt. Even though she knew that stealing cars wasn't good, it sounded interesting. “Sounds fun!“ Hopefully she didn't sound way too cheerful. But even if she did, she couldn't hide it. She actually was interested in those things. “Do you really contact those colorful wires and the car starts working? Like in the muggle movies?“ Brian promised her to teach her how to drive a muggle car. He also promised her to get the driving licenses. “Dear god, that sounds awsome!“

Andrew looked at Miseria and grinned. Felt kind of nice to be talking to her again, since their last meeting which was...a while ago at that. "Probably not," he answered, a small chuckle emerging from his mouth. Andrew began to look at the ground, snaning the snowy content for any sign of potholes anyway. He managed to find one other one, a couple of feet directly in front of them. Andrew approached the pothole and began to do what he did with the other one- push snow deep down so you could walk across. After the deed was done, Andrew said "There. Now no one else shall trip."

Andrew looked back at Miseria and was quite surprised by her enthusiam. "I didn't know you liked Muggle things so much," Andrew said truthfully, walking back over to Miseria "But yeah, I learned how except I'm not really good at it. It's not like I could practice or anything like that. And some of the newer model cars have a protection against that, so you have to be tricky." He wondered if Miseria had ever actually drove before. It was great to do so, up to the point where you couldn't spend more than 5 minutes out of your car or bike.

"Probably," she agreed with him. If both of them would turn into sarcastic brats, they'd soon become enemies. She would't give up if he'd insult her in some ways and she also knew that Andrew wouldn't give up.
When he started looking for other potholes, she looked away. To tell you the truth, she didn't actually care if someone tripped thanks to them or not. Yes, it was quite new attitude for her, but it was the truth. She didn't say anything anymore, but just looked around. It has been a while when she last got out from the Hogwarts. Even the lake seemed to be bigger now, even though it was all covered in ice, and framed with snowdrifts.
When he finished filling the holes with more snow, she finally looked back at him, and smiled. "Well, good for Them. Yoo're a hero now, I'm so proud."

"Muggle things? I do like them. I mean - all this television, those radios, computers, this so called internet and all those labors and spaceships! Don't you think that this all is fascinating?" she once read about the spaceship, and men who travelled to the Moon. That sounded interesting, because they did all those things without any magic. She respected muggles because of that, and she wanted to learn more about them, and their abilities. It seemed to be really impossible to live without magic.
"But if you want to steal a car, why don't you use spells on them? They don't have protection against that, now do they?" no, she didn't like when people stole stuff, but in this case, it sounded rather interesting.