Reverie

Katherine Avery was not at all the picture of a musician, and yet there she sat. In truth, she was more interested in listening than she would ever be in learning about the instruments one could find within the Orchestra room. That, and she was vaguely curious as to why they even had the room to begin with. It felt rather like hiding, sitting there. But Kit didn't see a real problem with it when she did in fact feel like she was wanting to hide away. She hadn't seen Caiden since her return, but that was only natural considering it hadn't been all that long.

She wasn't sure that she could handle seeing him yet. After all, she had only started getting to know him the year before, and had actually started to feel something for him before she became ill. What if he wasn't at all as she had remembered? Now that she knew his secret, she couldn't help but think that there was no way he could be the same. Katherine wanted him to be, though, since she had been so easily accepting of his charms, and had wanted to spend time with him.

Now, everything was different. She was different. She knew more about him, which made him different. And, honestly, different was terrifying for her after all of the changes she had gone through. Katherine wasn't sure she could handle more change. She wouldn't be able to hide from him forever, though. Of that much she was absolutely sure.

Caiden always liked the Orchestra room. It wasn't because he had a habit of playing something in there but because he simply liked being surrounded by instruments, the slight scent of polish for wood with lemon scent in the air and mosaics on the windows. The room had that atmosphere that made him pleased, younger. Innocent.
He always came here whenever something was bothering him and in this room, alone, solution to the problem would came easier than on any other places. The room simply affected on him that way and made him more persistent.

Today he came here unexpectedly, he let the legs to move and they brought him here while he was lost in his thoughts. Before he could think of his hand pulled the door open. Usually, the room would always be empty. Actually Kai couldn't think if he has ever seen someone in here. Many students didn't know that room like this one even exists in Hogwarts, even he found it accidentally, looking for the nearest bathroom.

But this time there was someone in the room. Blonde girl in the Ravenclaw cape. He paused at the door when he recognized the girl. Kit. He thought he would never see her again. Last year, before this whole mess with the marriage process they were close, even friends, he still couldn't admit to himself that he felt something more than friendship for her, it could ruin everything and he wasn't brave enough to take that risk.
And then, during the term, she simply vanished. Gone. He spent months trying to find out where she went but her brothers were indefinite, the older twin would tell him she went in one direction while the other chose completely different direction. Kai wasn't sure who to trust, he knew both of them are lying but he anyway searched for her at all the places they mentioned, with no result. Finally the Averys stopped answering on his question, he thought they got bored, and left him in the dead end.

She's back now. He took a breath and forced his legs to move forward in her direction.
„Kit?“

Katherine's lips parted and she turned her head, hair falling from her shoulder to trail down her back. It always seemed, didn't it, that someone showed up when you were most nervous about seeing them? It seemed to be Katherine's lot in life since she had returned to Hogwarts - or, indeed, since she had been sent back home to her brothers and father.

Staring at Caiden as she was, all she could focus on was the air drifting past her lips as she tried to steady her breathing. Her heart rate seemed to be uninterested in settling, unfortunately, so she just blinked at him for a few moments before dropping her gaze to the floor and standing.

"Hi," she offered lamely, her hands clasping in front of her stomach, a clear sign of being unsure of herself. "Um... It's been a while," Kit added belatedly.

Her eyes jumped back to him, wondering for the millionth time if he had asked after her in her absence. He certainly looked shocked to see her. But if either of them had the right to be surprised, wasn't it her? Kit had just met a relative who told her far more about him than she had wanted to know, after all. "How are you?" She asked, lifting her eyebrows expectantly. Maybe she wouldn't have to bring up what she had learned. That would be much safer.

He closed the doors and for the moment sliding doors and a silent click were the only sounds in the room. After they left leaving them in silence, Caiden still couldn't decide if that was comfortable or uncomfortable one, soon the air was filled with his steps towards her. As he walked her face became more and more clear as the nervous look in her eyes, at least he thought he saw it, she dropped her gaze down before he could be utterly sure.

It was almost unreal to see her in Hogwarts again. He hadn't realized that he believed he would never see her again until the moment he saw her, and the feeling of relief was relaxing. He sat beside her, leaving some space between them, and put his hands in his lap suddenly not knowing how he should act.

Kai's eyebrows went up as she started speaking. A while, interesting way to describe a year of absence, he couldn't help himself but smirk. "Yes. A while." If he could imagine seeing her again, this wouldn't be the reaction he expected from her, the old Katherine would maybe slammed him because he didn't try harder to contact her, but if she wants to play it this way who's he to argue, it's better talking this way with her than not at all.

„I'm well, thanks, and you?“

His expression surprised Katherine, not having truly expected the smirk he sent her way. She shifted her weight, turning a bit to look at him as he sat beside her. Not only did it put a little bit of distance between them without seeming like she had done it out of fear, but it also directed her focus on him. Katherine had learned rapidly upon returning to school that she needed to focus fully on everything individually so she didn't get distracted.

His question shouldn't have surprised her either, but it did. She had heard it often enough, but somehow it was different coming from someone she had been fairly close to before her time away. So she opened her mouth, but it just closed right back, and Katherine blinked at him. After a minute, she let out a little sigh and decided to try again.

"Um," she started, tilting her head to the side as she seriously considered her answer. "Well, I think it's fair to say I've been better." The words didn't come out with the joking tone she had intended for them, so Katherine lifted her shoulders and tried again. "I just mean that I'm not completely myself yet. But I'm starting to get back into how things work here, so..."

A small, tight smile appeared on her features as she looked at him, but in the end, her gaze dropped to the floor. The toes of her flats tapped together uselessly, and in the end, she swung her gaze back to Caiden and gave him an attempt at a real smile. "I, um... I missed you."

Caiden immediately regretted smirking when Katherine shifted her position and expanding a little the distance between them. If anybody else did so he probably wouldn't notice at all but he always noticed everything, even the smallest things, when it comes to Kit. He got a sudden urge to apologize but that would sound awkward so he let it go.

Kai felt weird about this conversation. He couldn't wait to move on from 'Are you okay?' part of conversation. They asked him that question a lot, as well as Katherine. The only difference between them was that they asked her that because he was absent, and when they asked him they ask because he lost his wife. Well, sort of. There was a little fact no one didn't know - he killed her, and he fought really hard to act innocent and keep that a secret.

He could understand exactly how she felt since he completely changed his personality during his short marriage, and he assumed she did that too. Well, he hoped she didn't marry someone as he needed to do, but aside from that he was pretty sure he was right. Big changes change people, before everything happened he would tell that was a total lie but he wasn't so sure now. Kai decided he won't ask her anything about her absence no matter if he's dying to hear the answers, he would let her choice whether tell him or not to tell him when she was ready to do so.

His lips parted into a huge smile as he heard her next words. Hope started spreading in his body waking up every his cell. "I missed you too." He dropped his gaze to the floor suddenly unable to look her in the eyes. He was....shy? That was another foreign feeling Kai rarely felt, there were a lot of traits he had by shyness wasn't one of them. Well, until now.
"So when did you come back?"

Caiden didn't look too pleased with her reply, so when he took her change of topic well, she couldn't keep a bigger smile from creeping across her face, drawing her lips up to either side. Ducking her chin at his reply, Katherine wasn't entirely sure what it was that she was feeling. All of her emotions were jumbled to an extent, but his words made her stomach flip a bit.

Her cheeks colored lightly and she tried to wait until she felt the heat in her face subside before trying to answer his next question. "Well, I came back at the start of the year. But since I'm an extra year behind you now, I guess you wouldn't have seen me. Different classes and all."

She shrugged a bit, trying to avoid the possibility of having to explain that she had been avoiding him. After all, it wasn't like he had done much to try and find out about her was, it? It was just a shame that she couldn't be as open with him as she had meant to be before. Whether or not she ever truly was obvious about her willingness to be that forthcoming, Katherine couldn't be sure.

Somehow, though, she just couldn't stop herself. Maybe it was the fact that it was Caiden, and she wanted to trust him. Or maybe she was just so frustrated that she had been refused answers that she just had to ask.

"Did you talk to Luke or Mes about me?" It came out quickly and in one rush of words, leaving Katherine shocked at herself, blinking at Caiden like she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to know the answer.

She came back at the start of the year? The year started before more than three and a half months, and this is the first time he saw her. Weird. Although Hogwarts isn't such a small castle it isn't that big either; he would somehow see her during past three months. Even anciently. He must have been too preoccupied with his own life drama to notice her, he mentally slapped himself deciding he will be more careful from now on.

It's true that they had different classes now, but they had different classes from the start and that was never a problem for them. Though Kai's a year older than her they would always somehow find some time to just hang out for a few minutes, at least.

He shifted his position making himself more comfortable, now, when they left tricky topic he could relax as long as they stayed away from it as farthest as possible. "That must be because of that." He replied although he didn't sound completely convinced, he could let it go. For now.

Now it was his time for him to blush. Instead of looking into her eyes he found easier to look well anywhere but there so he focused on lock of her hair; it was easier than looking into two blue-gray circles. Her eyes often remind him of sea before a storm.

"Yes, I am." He waited for a moment deciding what he will and what he won't say. Well he could deny how many times he asked them – every single time he saw any of them. Since they were at the same house and since they're only one year older than him it was pretty much of chances to ask. And pretty much of chances to being lied to. "Everytime I asked them they told me you're on some antipodal place. Like Luke would tell me you're in Jakarta while Mes would tell you went to Lima. And then they would start quarrel among themselves who's right and who is not." He rolled his eyes. "Your brothers can be strenuous, sometimes."

(ooc: not sure if I said, but - that sig tho. I dig it.)

Katherine almost had to smile at his description of her brothers. Lucas, especially, could be a troublemaker when he wanted to be. Mesut, the elder of the two, tended to be a little bit more rational, but that, Kit felt, came from knowing that he was to take over the family name and expectations once he became an adult and had a family of his own. Katherine, similarly, had the expectation of marrying into a pureblooded family. But it was hard for people to look at her as a potential marriage option now that she had been missing for so long, and assumed to be dying.

The potential was still there with Kai, she supposed. But that idea was terrifying. She had cared about him before he had married, but now she wasn't quite sure that she would feel safe with him. Not after what she had learned from her cousin. Provided they were actually cousins, of course. Kit trusted Elizabeth, even though she perhaps shouldn't have, but she had no reason not to. She had more reason to not trust Kai than she did Elizabeth. Well, now she did.

Or perhaps she had just convinced herself that Elizabeth was to be trusted because the whole school had been saying the same thing, and the older blonde was just more reliable of a source.

"Look, I'm- I'm sorry I've been so busy. I hear you've had... a rough time lately," she offered vaguely, peeking up at him beneath her lashes. "People have been... talking."

(It's a little blurry, but thanks. )

During his seven years in Hogwarts Caiden Rosier never studied floor as much as he did now. Bitter smile appeared on his lips. People talked. Of course they would, even since he thought they stopped talking, well stopped talking about him at least. Months had passed since Lila died, he was charged for her murder, but his charges were dropped and they decided she killed herself. He thought that would shush the rumors, that students will find other interesting topic, God, he even hoped that someone else will die so they can gossip about that, and leave him, and his dead wife, at peace.

Yet, he couldn't say they have no right for assuming he's guilty even since the jury said he was innocent, because he was. Guilty. He did that. That moment, killing of his wife, wasn't one of the greatest moment in his life, he would rather call it a desperate move, it was a game kill or be killed, and he won, it wasn't something he should be unhappy for, thought he still felt full weight of his guilt, sometimes, he learned how to live with that. He can't undo killing Lila, he didn't know if he wanted to do that even if he could. But he was sure in one thing - he never wanted to do that again,

"Are they?" Even since he's guilty, he couldn't believe Kit would believe the rumors, he thought she knew him better, or that she would ask him if that's true, at least. Of course he would lie, he needed to lie, but till now he was okay with that, a little bit of lying wasn't worse than the thing he did. "Which version of the story did you heard? You don't need to answer, it doesn't matter, every one ends the same way." He tried to mask hurt in his voice but didn't succeed.