(Untitled)

[turnthebadinme]

At first, being something like half her usual height had seriously freaked Serena out. She was tiny and her clothes, when she'd woken up, hadn't fit, and everything was so much bigger and further away than usual. After a while, though, she'd calmed down. Somewhere along the way, she'd even begun to enjoy herself

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[abaisse_chef]

Enjolras had found the day nothing but frustration after frustration. He had awoken to find himself trapped in an unfamiliar body once again, and this time he could barely care for himself. He was dressed in the same clothing as most of the island's residents usually wore: a white tank top and jeans.

He couldn't reach most of the books on the bookshelf, he had had to climb onto a chair to perform the simple task of getting a banana from the kitchen, and he was afraid he was going to run into someone he knew.

Clutching one of the few books he had been able to reach, some children's book called Le Petit Prince, he stalked outside to find somewhere quiet to read. As he walked past the trampoline without looking around, little legs moving him as quickly as possible, he stumbled over a rock. The book went flying from his hand and landed a few feet away as gravel bit into his palms, tore at his knees through the trousers. Tears welled up in his eyes immediately as he knelt, head down. Oh how he hated this place, some days.

[turnthebadinme]

Serena might have been lost in her enjoyment of the trampoline, but not enough so to let another child in distress go unnoticed. As soon as the boy took his spill, she slowed herself to a halt, clambering off the side of the trampoline and dropping incautiously to her feet. "Are you okay?" she called out, her own eyes gone wide with worry. Soon she dropped into a crouch beside him, tipping her head to the side to see the face more clearly. The book could be tended to soon, but the boy came first. "We should get you a bandaid."

[abaisse_chef]

Enjolras had no idea what a bandaid was, but his humiliation at being witnessed in this state was far more acute than the sting in his hands and knees. "I am all right, I don't need anything," he insisted, the words coming out in a lisping version of his usual accented English. It was disturbing.

[turnthebadinme]

"Are you sure?" Serena asked. "That was a pretty big fall." Despite the faint accent, the words seemed beyond the usual capabilities of the child's age. Serena may not have been the most intellectual of her group, but she was bright, and she suspected this poor boy was another like her, trapped in a too small body for the moment. "You dropped your book." Moving away, she reached to pick it up, looking at the title with a smile before she handed it over. "I like that one."

[abaisse_chef]

Enjolras sat back, peering at his palms with his lip jutting out before taking the book from her and setting it at his side. "It's a book for children." He paused and then added in a small voice, "I couldn't reach anything else."

[turnthebadinme]

"You're not usually this size, are you?" Serena asked, all sympathy. "Me neither. I think it's the island's idea of a Halloween trick." That didn't make her like the book any less, though. She'd read it early on, even before she'd really understood the ideas behind it, and simply because she wasn't a child anymore as far as age went was no reason not to enjoy it. The boy only needed to give it a chance.

[abaisse_chef]

"Non," Enjolras agreed in what would've been haughty tones if he was older. As it was it simply came out sounding sulky. "And I grow tired of this place subjecting us to these ridiculous situations with no warning." If only there was a way to prevent it, but his knowledge of such things as 'magic' was nonexistent, and that was how he'd always liked it. Until now.

[turnthebadinme]

Serena glanced down at the book and up at the boy, and, with a widening of eyes, clapped her hands first together then to her mouth. "Enjolras," she said, her grasp on her accent more precarious now. There was, however, only one small boy who would speak like this, so far as she knew. "Oh, Dieu, c'est moi, Serena. Mais tu est si mignon!"

[abaisse_chef]

Enjolras' eyes widened and he made a sound of irritation. The last thing he had wanted today was to be recognised in such a state. "Oui, je sais," he mumbled, his scowl deepening. "Ce n'est pas mon choix, crois-moi." He looked at her consideringly and added, "Tu sembles t'amuser bien."