Autumn Exercise

Amelia was finding herself more and more intrigued by the boy standing in front of her, and her intrigue was only made stronger when he hesitated to answer her question. With the way everyone was talking about it, Amelia had thought that most everyone of age was entering the tournament without hesitation, but it seemed she had been mistaken. Peter was slow to answer her question, but not in a way that suggested he was thinking of a lie; instead, he seemed to be pondering the right wording to explain his feelings on the tournament, much like she had done a few minutes earlier.

A single eyebrow rose on Amelia’s face as Peter mentioned the stipulation about coming to Hogwarts, although she should have anticipated this condition. Of course foreign schools would not bother to bring students that had no ambition to enter the tournament, that was only natural. Amelia was actually embarrassed not to have put two and two together earlier, but Peter seemed equally embarrassed by the fact that he wasn’t all that keen on being a champion, so Amelia felt her blush creeping downward shortly after it rose.

She tried to laugh along with him when he tried to make light of his statement, but she recognized that her laughter sounded a bit robotic. It was not her intention, but her thoughts were still wandering back and forth from her own thoughts on the tournament to the conversation at hand. When Peter had mentioned the glory and riches, Amelia had realized that those were not her ambitions at all in entering the tournament. With her family situation, she was set for life financially, and she had never really been one for glory. Really, her only ambition for entering the tournament was the same as it had been last year: proving to her parents that she was something more than an automaton through which they lived vicariously. Last year’s fiasco, however, had made it difficult for her to prove that point, because she had caved so quickly under her mother’s pressure to withdraw from the tournament and from classes.

What is going to make this year any different? Amelia had to wonder, and it was this question that kept coming back to her as she debated the tournament. If she entered again and was chosen – and it was a slim chance that the goblet would announce her name again – her mother would certainly have the same response – would she be strong enough to stand up to that same pressure that had come down on her shoulders last year?

While Amelia’s thoughts had wandered away, Peter had continuing speaking, and it took the Ravenclaw girl a few seconds to catch up to what he had said while she was mentally absent. When she did realign herself with the line of conversation, Amelia found herself nodding along thoughtfully, though she likely would not have had the same feelings Peter did. He had mentioned being interested in meeting everyone from the other schools, but if their roles had been reversed, Amelia knew that would not have been her main priority in journeying to a distant school. For the people-watching, maybe, but for the actual get-to-know-you phase? She’d probably have skipped out on that part.

A few seconds too late, Amelia realized that Peter was nervously touching his hair and that his smile was a little uneasy, meaning that her nodding had not been a sufficient enough answer to continue the conversation. She grappled for a minute for a suitable conversation topic, and after scanning the immediate area, Amelia’s eyes fell on the broom over his shoulder and she jumped at the sign of a potential subject, even if it was one on which she was not overly keen.

“How do you even ride that thing?” Amelia asked in a blunt change of topic, nodding in the direction of his broom. Having never actually flown herself, Amelia was not familiar with the feeling, nor was she conversant on the reason anyone might want to fly. As far as she was concerned, it was a rather superfluous talent, especially for someone with two perfectly functioning legs, but it was obvious that she was in the minority in this belief judging by the way the castle cleared out on quidditch Saturdays.

Peter watched Amelia as he spoke, interested to know her response and her thoughts on his words. When it came to have his feelings on the tournament, he was a little flustered and unsure, and he was glad to find any reassurances. However, he had learned enough about Amelia to know she would not easily procure her responses and she was probably not one to reassure.

The fact that she was nodding and looking thoughtful made his heart lighten a little, and a smile flickered onto his face. He somehow knew that she understood what he meant, and maybe empathized with him, though if this was all true, she was not saying so.

She suddenly asked how he "rode that thing" and the smile erupted on his face and he chuckled. "Eet is rather simple. You get on eet, keek off, and go." He grinned, his sarcastic little remark simply a joke, very similar to her blunt response when he has asked what she had been doing earlier. He grabbed the broom and held it out between them.

He knew she had been asking why he rode rather than how. You could look up and see how players rode, but why they did was the real mystery. "Eet is something no one else can spoil for you, eef you don't let zem of course. Many people don't like being up so high, but I like ze freedom. Eet is nice to 'ave your hair flying backwards, your body and your broom in sync. Eet is zort of like running." He grinned. "Ze feeling of ze wind, the connection to the outside, and when you are alone, the freedom to just exist ze way you want to."

He grinned, his eyes traveling over the broom fondly. He looked up. He could tell she did not harbor too many fond feelings for broomsticks, and probably not the sport in which they revolved. He wondered why and looked up at her. "'Ave you ridden a broom?" At Beauxbatons they offered flying classes, but he did not know if Hogwarts was the same.

Amelia was beginning to wonder how much more of this smiling she could take from Peter, who seemed to have just that one reaction, no matter what set of stimuli he was presented with. It was hard not to want to shake him and ask him what was making him happy enough to grin ear to ear on what seemed like no more than a seven-second time delay, but Amelia knew this would be breaking many social rules, and thus kept her hands to herself. She even managed a smirk when Peter’s response to her question turned out to be as snide and sarcastic as a few of hers had been earlier in the conversation.

It wasn’t everyone that could give Amelia a taste of her own medicine, or would even bother to. Usually, when she treated people poorly in order to get rid of them quickly, her goals were easily achieved; no one took her barrage of sharp-tongued comments and cold shoulder responses for too long. But Peter, it seemed, had a thicker skin and about as many comebacks in his arsenal as she did, which was throwing Amelia slightly off her game.

When he pulled the broom down from his shoulder, Amelia took an unconscious step back, as though the bit of wood and twigs might suddenly turn into a serpent hell bent on sinking its teeth through her flesh. Obviously, she knew this would not be the case, but the broom was such a foreign object to her that she did not know what to do with it being so close to her. When Peter continued his response, less sarcastically this time, Amelia was not at all, how did they say it, “drinking the Kool-Aid”? She was much more firmly in the camp of the people who didn’t like being up so high, and the thought of it actually made her visually cringe.

When he compared the feeling to running, however, Amelia momentarily found herself identifying with what Peter was saying. Freedom was one of the reasons she ran, and she did love the feeling of leaving everything behind her, being in her own mind and in control of her own world. This identification was enough even for Amelia to offer Peter a half-smile when she found him grinning back at her once more, the urge to shake him not quite as great this time.

The boy was looking fondly at his broomstick – obviously the snake idea had not occurred to him – and when he turned his eyes back on her, he had a question to go with his eye contact. Although she had hesitated to answer some of the previous questions, this one was easily answered, and Amelia’s response was quick and rather louder than she might have intended.

“Oh heavens no,” Amelia said, shaking her head vigorously and raising her hands in front of her with her palms facing Peter, in case her words alone would not have been enough, “No, no. I like my feet firmly on the ground, thank you very much.”

“It is a required course for all Hogwarts students,” she continued, letting her hands fall back to their normal positions, “flying, that is. But my mother had her own opinion on the usefulness and ladylike nature of flying around on an oversized twig, so I got to take Arithmancy instead.”

This was probably the only bit of personal information she had shared with someone in a long time, and it did not go unnoticed by Amelia. She could easily have stopped after the first sentence of her answer, for it would have provided sufficient information, but instead she had continued. She was not sure what had tricked her into doing so – and yes, Amelia fully did believe it was a trick – but she had a feeling it had something to do with Peter’s incessant smiling.

“H-how long have you been flying?” Amelia stuttered, still a bit thrown by her own uncharacteristic display of being forthcoming with personal information. She had to get the question out, though, in the hopes that she could turn the conversation back around on Peter and let him be the focus for the rest of their chat, however long that lasted. It had already gone on longer than she had initially anticipated, which was yet another thing she could not explain, and without a firm grip on what was causing the conversation to extend itself, Amelia couldn’t really predict how long it might continue.

Peter had earned a smile! He had thought he might have not made any sense when he had been trying to explain why he loved flying as much as he did. And yet, she seemed to have gotten it and had returned his many smiles, giving him a small one of her own. He felt like beaming, but seeing as he already was basically, he did not. Nevertheless, there was a distinct twinkle in his eye.

She took a step back when he procured the broom and he carefully shouldered it again, not wanting to cause her any further discomfort. He half-shrugged, a half smile on his face, his eyes still twinkling happily. "That's alright."

She continued on, affirming that Hogwarts indeed did have a flying class. He gave her a sympathetic expression when she said her mother did not think much of flying. He nodded, "Yes, my mother was not so fond of me flying, eizzer. She was afraid I might get hurt, and zere is certainly a risk, but I just 'ad to promise to be as careful as I could." He shrugged again. "Parents. Eh?" He chuckled slightly.

She seemed nervous again and he searched her face, wondering why. Something about flying, or maybe her mother, had set her up to become uneasy again. He found his curiosity was sparked, though he would not press the matter. He knew that people had things they did not want to talk about. So he simply answered. She seemed more at ease when he was talking. "I've been flying since I was young, but I've been on ze team at Beauxbatons since I was een my first year."

Amelia was surprised when Peter mentioned that his mother was not fond of the idea of him flying, but a few seconds later she reminded herself that this should not be all that surprising. Not everyone adhered to the wishes of their parents as firmly as she did; Raoul was example enough of that. Amelia did not think that Peter’s plan of flying “as carefully as he could” sounded all that promising – it seemed, to her, a bit like saying that you would stay as far away from the dangerous cats as you could when you signed up to be a lion tamer – but she didn’t press the issue for fear that she might have to reveal her own misgivings.

She was equally unforthcoming with a response when Peter made a passing comment about parents being difficult to deal with, because that topic had always been one Amelia struggled with. Her parents were not in any way bad parents; on the contrary, they had given her just about everything a daughter could ask for: the finest things, the best education, private tutors, a head start in her lessons, life skills. They wanted the best for her, but sometimes, the things that she wanted got lost in the whirlwind of everything her parents wanted for her.

But instead of saying all this aloud, Amelia merely allowed herself to laugh breezily with Peter after his comment, not committing herself necessarily to having to add anything to the comment, but acknowledging that she had heard it. Although silence could once again have filled the space between them, Peter seemed to be hitting a rhythm in the conversation, which was lucky because Amelia had about as much rhythm in conversation as a 60-year-old-man trying to dance to hip-hop music.

He mentioned being on the team at Beauxbaton’s, which Amelia assumed meant the quidditch team. She was not aware of any other sport that could be played on a broomstick, but that didn’t meant there weren’t others. Amelia knew that this was the point in the conversation where she ought to ask a question about quidditch, but there were pros and cons to pursing that line of questioning. On the plus side, it would keep Peter talking, and he clearly enjoyed the topic they were on. On the other hand, though, Amelia risked saying something embarrassing, and this downside had great potential of coming true.

After a few seconds of scanning her brain for something quidditch related – there wasn’t much up there – Amelia settled on something she thought would be relatively safe. She hadn’t actually watched any quidditch or ever played the game, but she recalled a conversation she had overheard after one of the games once, and with the awkward silence starting to develop again, keeping Peter talking was starting to get more and more pressing.

“So do you play searcher?” Amelia asked, producing what she thought to be the name of a position on the quidditch team. She was fairly certain she had picked the right term, but not certain enough to keep her from wringing her fingers together, knowing she was stepping into unfamiliar territory.

((Just in case you don’t catch it, Amelia means “seeker” when she says “searcher”. She is just totally oblivious to the quidditch world.))

Peter felt a small grin fall onto his face at her words, finding the fact that she did not know the names of the positions, again, charming. He was not sure why. He usually spoke fluent Quidditch with everyone and had become used to it. Maybe the fact that he was in a foreign place, speaking to a foreign girl, and she seemed to think one of the only things that bound their regions together, as sort of a foreign topic. She seemed to not have had many Quidditch experiences that was for sure.

"I zeenk you mean Seeker, zo Searcher is in many ways a more appropriate term." He twitched his mouth, not wanting her to feel embarrassed or anything. It was an honest mistake. "No, I am not, zo. I play Keeper, ze one who guards the hoops, zo I am also trying to learn more about Chasing, ze ones who play offensive with ze main ball." He smiled, keeping his tone casual, not as though he were educating her. He did not know how much she knew about the sport, and he did not want to assume she did.

"But please," he said, a little warily. "Do not zeenk I am one of ze mongoloids who literally live and breathe Quidditch." He would often joke that Quidditch was his life, but that would be a sorry like, would it not? He was proud to admit that he was a person even if he was not on a broomstick. "My personality is not limited to a silly sport."

He often did not speak like this. He talked a big game about Quidditch to make his team sound more prepared, but he did not believe it was the only important thing in his life. "I also enjoy games and jokes. I am dabbling in chess as well, and I am always looking for an adventure. I also..." He paused, about to cross over into a personal matter. Though if Amelia spent any more time with him, she would find out for herself. "I also really like pirates." A small blush crept into his cheeks.

Although the all-out grin would usually have been the first indicator that Amelia had made an embarrassing error, this response was so common with Peter that Amelia did not know until he corrected her that she had chosen the wrong word for the quidditch position she had meant, proving just how little she knew about the sport, if there had even been any previous doubt.

It’s seeker, stupid… Amelia mentally chastised herself, though Peter had not been nearly so unkind. She was being harder on herself than he had been, which was typical of Amelia. In all honesty, she could not be expected to know anything about quidditch or any other broom-related sports, because she had never invested one iota of time into knowing about them. It was not so embarrassing to her that she did not know about quidditch, but rather that she had attempted to say something about it and fallen flat on her face.

Speaking of her face, Amelia’s had grown quite red in her embarrassment. Peter was still going on, talking about what Amelia assumed to be different quidditch positions, but judging by her previous attempt at knowing one of those, they could equally as well have been pieces of equipment, names of quidditch teams, or even flavors of soufflé.

If she had had the attention span to actually focus on the words, Amelia might have actually learned a thing or two from Peter, who was clearly only trying to help her out, but she was too busy feeling ignorant to absorb any of what he was trying to say. Her hand was at the back of her neck again and she was only really able to mentally re-enter the conversation when Peter was reassuring her that he was not all quidditch. His use of the word “mongoloid” to describe the people who obsessed over the sport seemed especially apt to Amelia, and leant legitimacy to his claim that he was not one of the barbarians. He also had a list at the ready of other things he enjoyed, many of which Amelia had no experience with – jokes, for example. She wasn’t funny. Plain and simple. Sometimes people thought her sarcastic remarks were funny, but let’s be honest. Amelia isn’t exactly a laugh-a-minute kind of girl – but when he mentioned chess, Amelia found herself pleasantly surprised to have actually found something she had in common with the foreign boy.

Although her attention had been distracted by the mention of chess, it was pulled forward when Peter hesitated in his sentence. He was looking around as though what he was about to say was of top-secret importance, perhaps something he ought not to be telling her. Obviously, this immediately made Amelia more curious, wondering what could possibly fit in the series of hobbies that would make Peter suddenly drop his tone like he was talking about a Level Five security clearance piece of information.

With the buildup he had given it, Amelia found herself leaning slightly toward Peter, waiting with bated breath for what he was about to reveal. When his words came, however, Amelia could not help but furrow her eyebrows together, confused by what he had said. He likes pirates? What does that mean? Amelia’s over-analytical, logic-dominated mind didn’t seem to process this information, and her confusion was only compounded by the fact that she had no idea why Peter had thought this information warranted whispering, nor why he was now blushing a blotchy red on his cheeks.

“Do you… personally know any pirates?” Amelia asked somewhat hesitantly, not at all understanding what Peter meant when he had said that he liked pirates, “Or is it a cultural affection? Because I will admit that pirate lore and customs can be quite interesting, but I would not claim to be an expert on the subject.”

Amelia had turned beat red at her slip up, and Peter was not sure how to comfort her without making it seem like more of a big deal than it really was. He had a feeling he stopped his monologue to tell her it was an honest mistake, she would feel as though he were simply taking pity on her or speaking down to her or something, and he did not want that. Instead, he acted completely unperturbed by the fact that she had used the wrong name, acting as though it were everyday he met someone with such a disinterest with the widely mainstream sport.

Peter knew himself to be rather keen when it came to reading people, and he could tell she was still mortified by her misuse of a term, but he was glad to see her seem a little impressed with his understanding that Quidditch was not the only reason to live, and that he recognized that there were fools who believed so. He also saw that his interest in chess had struck a fancy and she seemed to be impressed again. He tried to keep himself from looking too pleased with himself.

At her hesitant question, he was so glad she was not teasing him, he continued on, more timidly than he had in the conversation, "No, I do not theenk zere are pirates left, are zey? If zere were, I would be one." He giggled to indicate he was joking, though not by much. The violence he could not stand; but he had to admit, pirates had a style that was just cool about them.

She said she found pirate folklore interesting and he brightened, the sheen in his cheeks disappearing immediately. "Me too! I do not know every factual tidbit about pirates, but I do theenk zey are very amazzing! Some people like unicorns, or dinosaurs, or zey have their own trademark. Mine iz pirates. I see something remotely pirate-y and I have eet. And I love pirate books." He grinned; what would Adam be saying if he were here?

Amelia found herself smiling somewhat at Peter’s idea of becoming a pirate, mostly in a disbelief kind of way. She had never heard of anyone wanting to become a pirate, at least not in real life anyway. In books, movies, that sort of thing, sure, but it wasn’t exactly a common aspiration for a witch or wizard. Surprising as it was to hear, though, the more Amelia thought about it, the more it seemed to fit Peter’s persona. Of course, she did not know this boy at all beyond surface information – unless you counted the pirate thing, which he seemed to think was very personal information – but from what she had seen, perhaps this was not such a ridiculous pairing.

It would probably make him happy, Amelia thought to herself, observing just how excited the whole pirate business seemed to make Peter. Amelia was becoming quietly astounded by how much Peter did to make himself happy: fly, say whatever he wanted, aspire to be a sea-faring thief; it was all a bit foreign to her. Amelia had spent so much of her life doing things to make other people happy – her parents, her teachers, even Raoul – that she almost didn’t know what made her happy. She had things that allowed her to stay sane – running, chess – but she wasn’t sure those things actually made her happy. She enjoyed them, sure, but putting actual emotions to these activities was difficult for Amelia, who had a hard time identifying her own emotions in the first place.

Peter had continued happily on, his interest showing fully on his sharp features, making his face almost seem as though it was glowing. Amelia wondered if she ever got that same gleam when she was talking, but doubted it very much. Peter spoke passionately and without filter – she was fairly certain if he had a filter, the words ‘unicorn’ and ‘dinosaur’ would not have made it through – but her words were chosen with a more discerning hand, and often the filter removed more than just inappropriate adjectives; it tended to remove feelings as well.

“Have you been to the Black Raven Bookshop?” Amelia inquired at Peter’s mention of pirate books. Although she was not exceptionally conversational under any circumstances, books were a topic she felt far more comfortable with than quidditch, a subject she was all too happy to be leaving behind.

“It is a bookstore I frequent, and they tend to have a wider selection than most. Perhaps they would have some books on pirates for you,” Amelia suggested, “It’s just down in Diagon Alley.”

Amelia seemed, all in all, taken aback by him, which Peter was surprised to realize that this was something he was not used too. Perhaps it was because he hung out with the popular people of Bauxabtons, the fun-loving ones who were often planning the next social event or else at a party. They were all rather bubbly people, who had their own quirks and things, though not quite as eccentric as his. They all loved to dress up, loved to talk, and loved to dance. This usually reflected in their personality, making Peter simply one of a kind.

But this is not the way he felt talking to Amelia. She seemed taken aback, though rather amused too, which pleased him. He felt sort of special in her presence and for this, he sought to return the favor by being as kind to the pretty, young woman before him. He could not help his smile now, it seemed to now be a permanent fixture on his countenance, and there was no shaking it.

She asked him if he had ever been to the 'Black Raven Bookshop' and his eyebrows met together as he tried to identify the name he was not familiar with. He said, "No I do not theenk I 'ave 'eard of eet, so I 'ave not been zere I theenk." Though if she were speaking of some obscure bookshop, there could be the possibility he had wandered into it. He liked little adventures, and secondhand shops, thrift stores, and private book shops were always worth a visit.

She explained that it was book store she enjoyed and that there was the chance that he could find some pirate books in it. His face lightened up a little more. "Oh?" She continued on, stating that it was located in Diagon Alley and he smiled. "Zat iz why I 'ave not 'eard of eet. I 'ave yet to visit Diagon Alley. Zo I would like to soon." He knew that the Hogwarts students had weekends where they were allowed to leave the school. He wondered... He faced her, smiling a half smile again, "Maybe you could show eet to me some time. 'Elp me pick out some books?"