On the fifth floor landing there was a small disused office. Nobody ever went in there anymore, there were cobwebs polluting the ceiling and served as curtains to the frail window panes. The large desk that stood in front of the window had a layer of dust almost an inch thick and bits of mild were beginning to gather around the feet of the table legs. The sunlight that managed to filter through the hazed window was little and it gave the room a gloomy glow. Not that the sun was out today. The rain was pounding against the sheet of glass and the wind has been rustling around the clock tower all day.
That's where Bertie had spent most of the past few days: The Clock Tower. In the past it was a place of refuge, a place where he could engage with his thoughts. There was a large window that let light in and gave a fantastic view of the heavens above, much like the one in the library.
The library was where Bertie had travelled at night. It was his happy place. The home of every sort of book you could dream. One day, Bertie had hoped for a book of his to call Hogwarts library it's home, but now that seemed like a distance memory. Writing had been Bertie's core. It's all he wanted to do. Write and share his gift. Perhaps it wasn't meant to ever happen? Perhaps death had happened for a reason? Unless he was a ghost for a reason?
That part was still unclear to Bertie. He had died right before his friends eyes in the hospital wing. Lay there on the hospital wing bed, dead, for hours. Then in the middle of the night he felt himself 'wake' as though he'd had a long, refreshing nap. Although he wasn't awake. He was dead, an imprint of his former self. Bertie was a ghost.
Ghosts were something he had never thought about too much. Sure he had seen them around the castle many of times but not once had he stopped to think about what it's like to be a ghost, why people become ghosts nor how people become ghosts. Even as a ghost he didn't know.
At night he'd drifted into the library (drifting still bring a concept he was still coming to terms with) to read. He would have done it in the day but having recently died the last thing he wanted was gorping students pointing his way. Since he'd felt his body lighten that dreadful morning he'd made sure to keep out of the hustle and bustle. He needed time to recuperate, try and work his way through the swamp of questions in his mind.
Although right now, whilst the rest of the school was eating in The Great Hall, Bertie wasn't in the clock tower, nor the library; he was in the disused fifth floor office. The new-'born' ghost had stumbled across the room on a night time glide and thought it an ideal place to meet up with someone. Not Vivianna, nor his younger cousin Theodore - neither which knew he was a ghost - but Ryo Hiroku. Bertie wasn't one hundred percent sure he would arrive but the ex-Ravenclaw had placed a note in the staff room asking him to meet him on this day at this time in this location.
In the letter he'd mentioned he needed a spirit specialist to help him, and he's briefly wrote about how he wasn't 'dead', hopefully Ryo hadn't told anybody about this, nobody knew Bertie was a ghost. Originally he wanted to go straight to Vivianna but he couldn't. He didn't know how to tell her, or how she'd react. It pained him but right now he needed an expert.
A ghost would have been his best mentor but Moaning Myrtle was too weepy to talk, Peeves wasn't exactly what you'd call help and the other ghosts would have gave him too much attention. He didn't want a ghost. Bertie needed the perspective of a specialist who wasn't like him yet someone who could still relate to him. That's when Ryo Hiroku, a substitute Professor, popped into his head.
Bertie hovered by an aged bookshelf anxiously waiting Ryo's arrival. It wasn't as though he was pressed for time, he had a lot of it, but he was anxious to try and make an understanding of what had happened. Perhaps there was no explanation? No. Bertie didn't believe that. He believed things happened for a reason and him being a ghost wasn't join a random spin of the wheel.
Ever since Bertie had snuck the note to Ryo he'd contemplated whether it had been a mistake. Ryo didnt know Bertie, didn't know his personality, what he liked, what he didn't like, what his goals were. There were only two people who knew him that well: His Mother and Vivianna Varnes. Neither of which he could have this conversation with. None the less Ryo would be aware of Bertie's passing given he was a Professor. Now. All Bertie had to do was wait.
(OOC: sorry if there are any typos, it's late and I'm on my iPod haha)
by Guest Wed Oct 16, 2013 3:10 am