RP: Fresh Air Stirs the Appetite

[rar_shelby]

Date: Monday, April 22, 1999
Characters: Shelby Fawcett, anyone?
Location: Lake at Hogwarts, lunchtime-ish
Status: Public
Summary: Shelby's trying to come up with another article idea.
Completion: incomplete

Comments

[rar_reed]

Reed looked down and saw Shelby sitting on a rock. He must have missed the beginning of lunch again. He was still riding the wave of euphoria from yesterday's race for the Quidditch Cup and he'd had such a hard time concentrating through Double Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts this morning that he thought he'd use his free period before lunch to work off some of his energy with a fly about the grounds.

Landing nearby, he called out a greeting. "Hi, Shelby. Nice day for eating outside, isn't it?"

[rar_shelby]

She looked up and saw Reed, broom in hand, approaching. "Hello, Reed. Yes, it's definitely one of the nicer ones, though any day it's not wet out suits me fine." She cocked her head at him. "Something the matter?" He looked wound up, not an unusual state for Reed, but he was positively vibrating compared to usual.

[rar_reed]

"Nah," he said. "It's all good. I'm still a little keyed up from yesterday. It was a wicked match even though we lost in the end. I was having a hard time staying on point in Potions and Defense, so I decided to have a fly before lunch."

He looked sheepish. "Might have something to do with all the chocolate Cam had to cheer up the team last night too." Reed really had too much.

[rar_shelby]

Right, there'd been a Quidditch match. Shelby had gone, but was distracted by a pattern she'd not mastered for Ancient Runes, so she was a bit half-hearted in her cheering. Not that she was overly energetic anyway.

"Oh, right. See what you mean." She nodded. "Did it help? Flying?" She wasn't a fan, but maybe Reed could explain it in such a way that appealed. Good reporters gleamed knowledge from anywhere they could.

She snorted. "The truth comes out. Death by chocolate. No one is immune."

[rar_reed]

"It helped a little. Usually it helps more, but since flying is Quidditch-related I might have done better having a jog or something instead," he laughed at himself.

"Did you know Muggles have a cake that called that? Death by Chocolate? My mum has a recipe. It doesn't really kill anyone," he added that quickly because he wasn't sure she'd know that given the awful things he heard people were being taught about Muggles last year.

[rar_shelby]

"Well, its still cold enough that a brief swim would do you as well, though I think the Squid might take exception to being woken up." She said a bit dryly. This small talk thing wasn't so bad. At least not if you know the person well enough.

She gave him a strange look. "Is it considered a good thing, dying by chocolate? Granted, I'd think it better than the Killing Curse, but why on earth would anyone name a dessert that, much less eat it?"

[rar_reed]

"I got in trouble in first year for trying to swim in the lake. I had to help Mr. Filch," RB wrinkled up his nose. "I try to avoid that."

He shrugged. "Actually dying, no. But I think it's supposed to because it's so rich and good that they call it that. Muggles have an idiom that something 'is to die for' which means it's really good. I don't know where the expression comes from." He'd have to see if he could find out. Maybe Madam Pince had an idiom dictionary. "Do wizards have any idioms like that?"

[rar_shelby]

She smirked a bit. "Filch hates it when I have detention with him. Or he did. Haven't had that problem this year. Too busy with schoolwork." And really, it had been Eddie's ideas that got her in trouble half the time. She frowned a bit at the, then bit into her pear.

"Hmm." She finished chewing, and swallowed. "Muggles must place a low value on death if they think something like chocolate is to die for. Rather die for something big and important, if I have any say in it at all." She shrugged. "Not that I can think of. But really, when you can talk to ghosts, you learn to keep that sort of thing out of your vocabulary, since they'd get really offended easily."

[rar_reed]

"I've been trying to avoid detentions because I really like having home visit weekends even though I've had to miss a couple for Quidditch. It's nice to get out of here and see my family," and Mandy, but he didn't add that part aloud.

RB considered that, "Hm. I don't think that's it. I think it's more related to dark humour. The Brits... Muggle Brits are brilliant at it. Even William Shakespeare -- I've noticed most wizards and witches know about Shakespeare -- wrote things full of dark humour. I suppose the difference could be in us because of the ghosts but I think it may have more to do with the media imagery of Muggles making them less sensitive to death."

[rar_shelby]

She took a last bite of her pear, in part to hide her smirk. Really, Reed wasn't fooling anyone if he thought people didn't know he was head over heels for Mandy. She banished the core, and stood, wanting to stretch a bit.

"How'd you mean, media imagery? Like we have a false view of them, or vice versa? Professor Manning has gotten into some of the more basic philosophic differences between us and Muggles, but it seems incomplete somehow. Like this death idiom. They don't fear death, not the same as we do, but they do fear things like disease, yes? Which, with the right application of potions and spells, can be mostly eradicated."

[rar_reed]

"Oh! Well, you know that Muggles have newspapers and magazines, those are considered media. But they also have entertainment that's sort of media too. Films, television programs and other things, like computers -- if you know what those are -- and the Muggle version of the wireless, are all media too. And the Muggles show in pictures and tell in words about things like death, catastrophes and violence, both real and pretend. My mum says it makes people less sensitive to it because it isn't as shocking to them. Mum uses that sort of thing a lot in her books to help show how some of her characters can do the things they do." He thought for a moment, "I was talking more about how Muggles view things themselves than how wizards view Muggles, though

[rar_shelby]

"Oh." Shelby thought a moment. "So they see the story played out, and that makes them less easily shocked? That's....interesting." And highly unsettling. "And it doesn't bother them to not react to that sort of thing? I mean, as bad as it got here, I never got used to seeing someone do the Cruciatus Curse on a classmate." She paused, awkward because in all likelihood Reed had had it worse being at Azkaban. "What's it like, then? Straddling the two perspectives?" There might be a story in there somewhere.

"We've talked a bit about Muggle religion. It seems fascinating, if somewhat at odds with itself. At least, having so many different factions makes it hard to know which is right."

"What's cancer? Professor Manning mentioned it, but didn't go into great detail." She might try it for one of the remaining essays, since it was tied up with a lot of Muggle beliefs, or so it sounded.

[rar_reed]

Reed thought about how it was to see both worlds. "It's odd. Has been from the beginning. Things are okay at home and okay here but I feel a little like a foreigner both places. I understand things well enough for the most part but then something will come up that puts a spanner in the works. That's another idiom which means messes things up. It's hard sometimes. I imagine it would be similar if I were to go work in a different country with a different language and culture

[rar_shelby]

She didn't know what a spanner is, but Reed explained it in really understandable terms. She wondered if he ever considered teaching; he was rather good at it. And she had less qualms about small talk when it was so educational and not so frivolous like so many other students around them. "Would you ever chose between them? The Muggle or the Magical world?"

"It doesn't, does it?" She thought a moment. "People can stand that sort of contradiction?" She honestly felt sorry for Muggles; so many mixed messages coming and going, no wonder they couldn't just wrap their minds around magic and accept it.

She shuddered. It sounded awful. "I'll check the library, see if there's anything there."

[rar_reed]

"I prefer not to have to. I'm really close to my family. I think I'll eventually become more and more of a stranger to the Muggle world though. I want to be a magizoologist so that means I'll be working with magical creatures. I'd like to live in Hogsmeade after I'm out of Hogwarts so I'll be living in the Magical world. Eventually Muggle things won't be as familiar to me as they are now."

Reed decided he'd best run in and grab an apple or two for later. "I'd better go grab some snacks for later and stow my broom before Herbology. It was nice talking to you, Shelby."