Feet Firmly on the Ground (for now)

As Amelia had expected, Bane saw through her multi-flawed proposition that flying and running could be equal substitutes for one another. He knew as well as she did – and probably better, since he had actually tried flying – that running was constricted to the ground, while flying could take you to new heights (literally). The excitement in his voice once again betrayed his reverence for flying, and Amelia could see the spark in his eyes when he talked about the lack of limitations.

Amelia wasn’t sure how she felt about living without limitations. As attractive as it sounded in theory, Amelia knew it wouldn’t be as glamorous to actually live that way. Living without limitations meant living without rules – and Amelia was all about rules. She made rules for herself, had high expectations of others, and obeyed nearly every word which fell from the lips of an authority figure. Living without limitations would mean that there would be no limits on yourself, but to think what would happen if everyone were without reservation was scary to Amelia.

Just think of how the questions would fly if no one was scared to approach you, Amelia’s subconscious warned, Amelia mentally agreeing. Amelia was a guarded person, and she made a point of keeping people at by to avoid too much inquiry. If people lived without limitations, that would definitely undermine her attempts to keep her past and thoughts to herself.

But then again, if you did not have any limitations, you might not want to keep those things private, her mind rationalized, but Amelia did not as readily agree with this statement. She was already delving too deeply into hypotheticals, and as a individual rooted very deeply in reality, t his was not a place Amelia felt comfortable treading.

As Bane dismounted, Amelia took an instinctive step backward, but he quickly closed the distance. Amelia was not entirely comfortable when people invaded her personal space, because without a physical barrier between her and another person, she found it more difficult to maintain her mental and emotional barriers. This proximity, combined with the hushed tone of Bane’s voice, threatened to overwhelm Amelia’s mind and for a moment she was frozen to the spot as her mind struggled to fall back on track.

Collecting herself, Amelia took a step back from Bane, both to see him more fully and to regain her personal space. After a minute of surveying him, Amelia reached out and grabbed the handle of the broom he was holding, pulling it toward her to examine it more closely.

Amelia had never held a broom before, at least not one intended for flying. Her parents had always considered quidditch to be a frivolous sport, and flying to be a pointless endeavor. If you could apparate, what use was flying as a means of transportation? Without the inspiration from her parents during childhood, Amelia had never developed any interest in flying, and none at all in the sport of flying. After running her fingers through the straw of the tail end of the broom and examining the handle, Amelia let her eyes rise back to Bane.

“It doesn’t look all that sturdy,” Amelia observed bluntly, wondering what had even made her consider this in the first place. She had come out here to run, hadn’t she? So why didn’t she just run her way away from this conversation?

Bane let out a smile. "It'll hold more weight than you think, its the magic, well of magic." Bane paused after this and let her examine the broom a little bit more. He was excited that she was even considering putting her life in just a few feet of wood. Throwing away fear, and taking in adventure.

Bane then gently took the broom and stradled it. "Hop on, It'll take both of our weight." He said, In an almost encouraging tone.

Bane had a point about the broom being magic and thus being deceivingly small, but Amelia still had reservations. Nothing so far in her six years of school had ever made her want to ride a broom, but then again, she had never really had the opportunity. Her mother had removed her from the first year lessons, which in turn exempt her from even thinking about joining the quidditch team – like she would have had time for that anyway – and she didn’t really have friends who would want to have a pick up game for fun. On the whole, she had been thoroughly removed even from the possibility.

But now she stood before Bane, who seemed to be giving her the time she needed to think about it. That was probably a bad move on his part, because the longer she thought about it, the more likely she was to analyze her way out of actually trying it. Amelia was not a spontaneous person by any definition; she was calculating and rational, making almost no decisions without having a logical way to back them up.

You are basing your dislike for this on fear rather than fact, her subconscious reminded her as her fingers raked across the polished wood of the broom, careful to stay away from Bane’s hand lest he interpret this as something it was not. This was likely going to be the strongest argument Amelia could come up with; as a woman of rationality and logic, she relied on facts to make her decisions. If she was honest with herself, the decision not to fly hadn’t been made based on facts of experiences. She was merely doing what her mother told her.

Amelia wasn’t much for defiance, but her mother would likely never find out – she doubted Bane’s family belonged to the elite inner circles that her parents deemed worthy of their presence – which made the prospect that much more achievable. When she thought of it as a scientific experiment intended for gathering information on the subject of flying, she found she could almost justify giving it a go, despite her fear that she would end up back on the ground quite quickly, but not all in one piece.

When Bane pulled the broom back and swung his leg over it, his invitation should have fallen on deaf ears. But now, Amelia seemed to have rationalized her curiosity about the sensations he described, and it seemed she was actually prepared to do it. Eyeing Bane one last time to make sure he wasn’t some kind of crazy, Amelia swallowed hard and solidified her decision. Slowly, she moved toward the broom, holding Bane’s shoulder with as little physical contact as she could in order to maintain her balance while throwing one of her legs over the broom handle. She was behind Bane, and she placed the other hand on his other shoulder, still working to keep their contact minimal.

“Nothing too crazy, okay?” Amelia insisted from behind him, nervous now that she was actually carrying through with her plan. Amelia pressed her eyes closed and felt her heart rate increase as she waited for him to do whatever it is one does to start flying.

Bane smiled as she slipped her leg over the boom. As she placed her hands on his shoulders his hart fluttered. Yet this feeling lasted for less than a second, this reaction had been forced by his teenage self, and he felt nothing more of it. He nodded at her request, and obliged to do nothing crazy.

"1...2...3!" Bane said, and on three, he pushed off strongly, against the ground. They began to rise slowly into the air, and Bane willed the broom too stop when they were 20 feet off the ground. "Nice and steady," Bane said, and he leaned forward. He accelerated until he was going faster than one could spring but not much faster knowing he should respect Amerlia's request.

He took turns slowly, and at soft angles. He did not dive, or feint, and he mad sure his speed remained constant. He turned back, and realized that Amelia's eyes were closed. He smiled. "Its a whole different experice with your eyes open."

With her eyes closed, the rest of Amelia’s senses were heightened. She could smell the chill in the air – that is, if winter had a smell, as Amelia was convinced it did – and feel the rise and fall of Bane’s chest. His breathing was far smoother than her own, and with her index fingers resting against his carotid arteries, she could tell his heartbeat was also steadier than her own fleeting one. She felt the reverberations through his chest as he started his countdown, his voice sounding three times louder than it actually was because she was so nervous.

As he reached the penultimate number – Who decided it was three, anyway? – Amelia felt a jolt and then a curious sense of weightlessness as she felt her feet leave the ground. Although she wasn’t in any real danger of falling, as soon as her feet left the ground Amelia felt as though she had completely lost her balance, immediately moving her hands from Bane’s shoulder and wrapping them firmly around his chest. Who cares if he can’t breathe?

Although Bane assured her this was “nice and steady”, Amelia didn’t feel that way. Her heart was racing in her chest, and she didn’t dare open her eyes for fear that the minor freak out she was having would escalate into a full out panic attack. Amelia wasn’t sure she was prone to panic attacks, not ever having had one except for once at one of her parents’ parties when she was feeling overwhelmed by the number of people she was being forced to talk to, but she didn’t want to risk it. Instead, she tightened her grip around Bane’s torso as she felt them begin to move forward at what was probably a reasonable pace, but to Amelia it felt like a death trap.

“I thought I said nothing crazy!” Amelia shrieked, her voice slightly muffled because she had buried her face in the folds of Bane’s robes, as if closing her eyes would not be enough to block out what was happening. Bane seemed to respond to what she had shouted, though not quick enough for Amelia, and she felt her heart accelerate several more beats per minute before their forward motion ceased and she felt him turn himself around, presumably to get a look at the woman who had suddenly turned into a baby koala with the way she was gripping onto him.

“Is it less terrifying that way?” Amelia inquired crossly of him, still not opening her eyes, though she pulled back from him a little, ashamed of the way she was behaving, but not enough to actually let go. She could not believe she had somehow agreed to this, but she had definitely validated her fear of flying; what she was currently experiencing was definitely as bad – if not worse – than she had imagined.

"Because this is terrifying," Amelia added, probably not needing to eloquate that because he had probably gathered it from her death grip and refusal to open her eyes.

Maybe he was being a bit rude, but Bane laughed. But it was a playful laugh. He slowed down untill they werejust barely moving through the air. He she had voiced her emotion, telling him of her fear. "Alright I'll slow down." He said with a smile. He turned again, so that his upper half was facing her, but not enough so that she though he had lost control of the broom.

"You'll be fine, you can trust me." He said. He then pondered his words. He realised that he was asking this girl, whom he had just met, to put her complete trust in him, and her well-being in his hands. Of course she would survive a fall at this height, bu not without injury. "No fear." was all he could muster.

When Amelia heard Bane erupt in laughter, she wanted to sock him in the gut. Her hand was already poised for such an attack. But A) that would mean letting go, if only for a split second, which she was not at all interested in doing, and B) attacking the only person who knew how to fly this god-forsaken bit of wood while in midair was not likely to preserve her safety.

The fact that he was making so light of a situation that was so thoroughly petrifying Amelia was frustrating enough, but in addition to that Amelia hated the idea that she had turned out to be so atrocious at flying. Amelia was someone to whom most things came naturally; she was a naturally bright girl, she played several instruments, she spoke several languages, and she was athletic. Although she was admittedly poor at making conversation or forming relationships, Amelia had never really considered these to be skills that were all that beneficial. Sure, it could help you get in with the right people and make good first impressions – both of which she usually failed dismally at – but when it came right down to it, people wanted to be around people who knew what they were doing.

And when it came to flying, Amelia quite obviously did not know what she was doing. Even as Bane’s laughter died away and he agreed to tone down the “crazy” flying, Amelia’s frustration did not wane. But the object of her frustration did change, moving from Bane onto herself. She had gotten herself into this mess by being overly curious and somehow managing to rationalize riding on a twig. And now, instead of accepting the consequences of that choice, Amelia was behaving like a small child.

After taking a moment to calm herself down slightly, Amelia took a deep breath, telling herself over and over again that she needed to be an adult about this. Lots of people flew on brooms every day. Almost none of them die.

Almost, her subconscious reminded her unhelpfully.

Pushing the thought aside, Amelia had finally managed to regain some semblance of self-decency when Bane spoke again, this time to encourage her to trust him. Once again, the urge to physically attack him sprung up, but this time it escaped her even more quickly than the first. This boy was like so many of her peers at Hogwarts: he believed in trusting people until they give you a reason not to, instead of the way Amelia saw it: not trusting people until they give you 100 reasons to.

It was an impossible thought that she should trust Bane after having known him for less than an hour. Amelia didn’t even trust people she had known for the better part of her entire life. She was fiercely independent and trusted next to no one. She had been disappointed too many times. She found that when you don’t rely on people, don’t trust them, it is much easier when you are eventually let down. Bane hadn’t come anywhere near earning her trust, but telling him that while she was still depending on him to bring her safely back to the ground wasn’t going to improve matters any. She definitely didn’t trust him, but for the moment, she needed him.

“No, actually,” Amelia muttered sarcastically into Bane’s back, still not having worked up the courage to actually open her eyes, “Actually there is a lot. A lot of fear. Now if you would kindly return me to the ground…” Amelia started to request, her voice rising in pitch near the end of her sentence as a gust of wind off the lake jolted the broom to the left, resulting in Amelia accidentally digging her fingers into Bane’s ribs in a desperate attempt to avoid falling off that bloody, good-for-nothing broom.

This is quite possibly the stupidest thing you have ever done… her subconscious piped in again as her heart caught in her throat, enlightening the already very aware Amelia of how moronic the decision to fly had been.

Bane winced as Amelia's fingernails dug into his sides. "Relax, relax." He said calmly, hoping he could work Amelia's mind in some way, so that she would stay on the broom. His mind raced, and he sought for reason, knowing that nothing short of briliance, would convince her to stay off the ground.

He opened his mouth and spoke. "Listen, maybe I'm just some little adventure seeking third year. Maybe a complete lack of fear is, well, stupid. But so is complete isolation. I don't know, hell sometimes I isolate myself too much." He was suprised that he swore, it was something he didn't do too often. "But one thing I don't do, is overthink things, I don't reach into the labyrinth of my mind and ask myself, why? what type of risk is this, what could go wrong? Sometimes, every once in a while, YOU, need to say, why not." Bane finished, hoping what he had said took a little bit of affect on Amelia.

He began to slowly creep back to the ground. "But if you truly don't want this, then I can't force you to feel what I do."

((Bane, don’t take what is about to happen too personally. This is Amelia’s personality. We can have another thread after this one if you want where Bane and Amelia get along better, or you can have Bane be really offended by her and they can be quasi-enemies. Amelia’s personality can sometimes make people bitter, which I understand. So it is really your choice as to whether Bane is persistent or just dismisses Amelia because of her cold shoulder.))

If Bane had hoped telling her to relax was going to somehow force her into Zen mode, he was sadly mistaken. She knew that she was likely hurting him by gripping so hard, but now on top of being panicked about flying, Amelia was also angry at herself for being so foolish as to fly. And not only to fly, but fly with someone she had only just met, with no one around to rescue her if something were to happen.

Amelia was never impulsive; she took only calculated risks, so why when she crunched the numbers had she determined that this was a risk worth taking? What had she gained? Nothing except an increased heart rate, self-loathing, and likely a bit of Bane’s robes stuck underneath her fingernails. Oh, and a valid reason to never fly again.

While her mind was finding every possibly way to tell her how stupid this whole endeavor was, Bane had started speaking, his voice far calmer than Amelia was feeling. It seemed that even though he hadn’t seemed all that perceptive to Amelia, he had caught on to quite a few things about her in their short – and in her opinion, terrifying – time together. He could tell that she was isolating herself, but that wasn’t all that surprising; most of the school knew Amelia loved her solitude, thus putting the “Ice Queen” in her frozen castle. What made him perceptive was that he could tell that she was over analyzing. Most people wrote off her cold and calculating actions as part of her personality; no one usually bothered to give them reason. But Bane had seen past what she was doing to why she was doing it.

Although Amelia knew Bane had meant this little speech to be a comfort, Amelia took it in another direction completely. The fact that he was seeing through her defenses only added to the danger of the situation. Now she was not only physically close to him and depending on him to get her back to the ground, but Bane was also stepping into the protected realm of her thoughts and emotions. To Amelia, the danger of someone getting too close to her was far greater than falling off a broom from any height, for she feared emotional connections even more than possible dismemberment.

“Please put me down,” Amelia said quietly, but forcefully, leaving no question in voice about whether Bane should continue to try to convince her. If there had been any hope of Amelia staying in the air with Bane, it had been lost as soon as he let on that he was seeing through her façade.

(None taken, it'd be great to rp again in a different thread. Bane is the more persistant type, so he'd probably try to get closer to Amelia as a friend.)

Bane simply shook his head at Amelia's comment. He was more than frustrated, yet less than disgusted. He continued to spiral downward until their feet rested "safely" on the ground. He dismounted the broom and stood it up in his hand. HE didn't know what he could really say. "Well... I guess I'll see you around?" he said, almost as if asking, but not stressing it too much.

He paused and looked at her, with an interested look on his face,he was curious, he wanted to get to know Amelia just a little bit more, but that would have to wait. "I'm sorry that this whole... flying thing didn't work out, just not for everybody I suppose." He said, mounting his broom once more.