Fyo raised an eyebrow. "Miles can't hurt him," he said, going defensive at once. "He hasn't done anything, has he? Besides, Tor badkitty has me, and I'mma gonna EYE anyone who tries to be bad to him." Yeah, like that was going to help Torin's case. But it was fun, you know. Yawwrrr!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Whitterz

Well, that was a relief. He liked this Uncle Henry dude already, though he refrained from commenting. Instead he just smirked. Hugging would be something that slightly nauseated him, but at least Fyo wouldn't be sucking on her face in front of him.

"So you wouldn't snog her even if Uncle Henry wasn't around? Well, tell me that you at least snogged her before." It would be a sad thing to find out that he had kissed Alice more than her own boyfriend had ever done.

Speaking of Miles..... Here the guy was.

"Hey," Fyo said - to Miles, obviously - before turning his attention towards THE BADKITTY! Err.... Torin Baked Alaska Kane, that is. "Why would I need to snog her?" he asked, looking a little - errr - unsettled. He wasn't up to this kissyface talk, y'know. "I mean, of course I've kissed her, but...." He trailed off, feeling almost as sick as he had felt after writing that Professor Bunbury love poem. BAD Torkitty, BAD!

He snorted. "How could you not have snogged her? She's a pretty girl who is crazy about you."It was a sad sad day when Torin got more action with Fyo's girlfriend than he did. "Bad FyoLion. BAD!"

Okay, Dani had never told Jake that... in fact, she had planned to get Lawson with waterballoons with Clark... Jake had tried to stop them. And succeeded. Chyeah. "I dunno, you seem pretty fatherly," he mumbled, picking three long strands of grass and braiding them with flicks of his fingers.

"Meh, if agreeing when I really don't agree will keep other people happy, they can be miserable for all I care," Jake shrugged, twisting both ends of the grass braid so it wouldn't unravel.

Holding his creation up as if to admire it, Jake glanced at Lawson. "I didn't stress you out much, did I?" he asked, kind of knowing the answer but wondering how Lawson would reply. To keep busy, he tied the braid around his wrist, making himself a nature bracelet. Tralala.

Marcus looked at Jake in surprise, he had been pretty sure that the boy would have agreed with him on that. They'd had their fair share of run ins during the year and Marcus knew that he had not handled most of their encounters very well at all. But then again Jake, had grown on him like no other kid had. "I guess I have my moments."

He watched as Jake started to braid pieces of grass and he plucked a few blades of grass from the ground and attempted to do the same. He chortled softly at Jake's comment. "When you get older and females become the most important thing in your life, you'll change your mind. Believe me they have a way of doing that and they do it without using magic too." he shook his head as he continued to try and braid the grass without much succession. Women were still a mystery to him even now.

Aww Jake's braid looked awesome. Marcus held up his creation and frowned, his looked like a dog's breakfast. He stared at it for a moment before replying to Jake. "I would be lying if I said that you didn't cause me some stress Jake but you weren't the only one. I guess because you are one of my favorites..."he trailed off a little surprised at his confession. He cleared his throat and looked at his handiwork again. "I'm not very good at this" he admitted with a sheepish grin on his face.

Kiri watched Emiliano handle the s'mores for a few more minutes. When he showed no inclination to stop, she excused herself and, taking a batch of the tasty camp fire treats with her just in case her belly decided it had additional room, wandered off. The sky was pitch black by now, and she was pretty sure that if she put a bit of distance between herself and the roaring fire, she'd be able to see the stars.

It took her eyes a little while to get used to the darkness after she'd stood close to the fire for so long, and Kiri sort of stumbled her way past laughing and chatting groups of students. Everyone seemed to be having a good time. And she herself was, too, Kiri was pleased to discover. Pretty much all of her exams were behind her now, and while she was sad to leave Hogwarts for what would most likely be a boring and uneventful summer, just now September did not look that far off.

At the edge of the camp-out perimeter, she sat down on the grass and, nibbling on a s'more, stared into the night reflectively. She'd already be a fourth year next term. Almost half of her time at Hogwarts was over!

Raiden had been lurking about, just watching all the goings on of the camp-out. He had yet to really spot anyone he felt inclined to talk to; really, at the moment most of the things coming out of his mouth either upset people or made everything feel awkward. So he had stayed away from the groups of people.

But now Kiri had broken away from the crowd as well and had sat down directly in the path he'd been following unconsciously for the last fifteen minutes or so; a circular pattern, all the way around the edge of the groups of people. He'd walked it without looking where he was going, eyes trained instead on the sky. The sound of someone coming nearer, however... made him shift his gaze.

"'lo Kiri," he said softly, hands in his pockets as he followed his path closer to her. Avoiding her now was probably impossible as... well she might've seen him already and turning the other way would be rude and might make her sad. "How've you been?"

"Yessir," Jake nodded, grinned mischeviously up at the guy. "Then again, I wouldn't really know, I only lived with my dad for 8 weeks of my life... 5 that I can remember," he explained, by means of explanation in case he was wrong.

Raising his eyebrow at the statement that females would one day be the most important thing in his life, Jake focused on watching Lawson's grass progress. "The few girls I'm like real good friends with are weeeeeeeeirrrrrrrrrd... Like... Dani slapped me, Shana tries her hardest to annoy me even though she apparently fancies me, and I ripped Reese's hair out last year, and then she was all nice, then mean..." Then again, Reese was his sister now, so it no longer counted.

WOAH! Favourites...? "You..." Jake started to say, before trailing off and eyeing the grass. "No... no it's g-... okay, it looks like it was attacked with a lawnmower."

Honesty is the best policy... right?

Kiri was startled by a voice close by. Had someone sneaked up on her? The sounds of the students and the crackling of the fire were loud enough though to masquerade anyone, whether they were consciously walking quietly or not. She turned. And felt startled yet again. It was Raiden!

For a moment, she didn't know what to say. Raiden and her had hardly spoken to each other in weeks. Kiri had sometimes spotted him with that Gryffindor girl, or the one from Ravenclaw. It didn't feel great. "Er... hi," she managed to fumble out, just to stop the silence from becoming too oppressive. How strange that now, after they'd spent so much time with each other at the beginning of the year, she was not able to find anything to say to him. The last thing Kiri wanted to do was upset Raiden. Or herself. The evening was much to nice for that.

"Um... sit down," Kiri ventured, gesturing - pointlessly - in the darkness. It was difficult to make out his face, so she had no idea if he was all right or not. "Want some, er, s'mores? I helped someone make a ton of them, and they're really good." She held one out to him, trying to think of an answer to his casual how-are-you that wasn't dramatic or whiny or destructive of this last event before the end of the year.
"I've been okay," is what she settled for, smiling self-consciously into the night. "How are you? Why are you all by yourself, hmm?"

Apparently she hadn't noticed him walking around in circles, because upon closer scrutiny, the look on Kiri's face was of slight shock. Oops?

"Hi," he repeated, slightly awkwardly now. He folded his legs beneath him and sat on the ground next to her, staring at his hands. His face felt warm now. Kiri seemed... like she didn't want to ask him to sit down. "Ariga- er, thank you. Smores are good, they have... chocolate."

Obviously. Raiden kicked himself mentally. A moment ago, he'd been able to think clearly, but... as soon as he'd sat down, his brain had halted completely and gone all muddled. Absently he took the offered smore and bit into it; the marshmallow was all melty and it immediately stringed out over his bottom lip. MESSY. Chewing the bit in his mouth quickly, he swallowed and smudged at his bottom lip with his thumb. The problem with marshmallow was... it was really sticky.

"Er... okay, too," he managed to said as he continued smudging. Stubborn... marshmallow... mess. "I was just... I dunno. Wandering around thinking. I could ask you the same."

Kiri continued chewing on her own s'more. "They have chocolate," she confirmed. "Not sure what kind, but it's good. Oh, you, er..." She pointed at his mouth, but Raiden had already noticed the... spillage, and he was busy cleaning it up. Kiri swallowed the rest of the s'more quickly. Why, she thought, does he have to play around with his lips like that?
She told herself to knock it off. Luckily, the darkness hid any sign of blushing. An electric tingling, reminiscent of the ones she'd experienced months ago when they'd been at the Lake together, or out in the Grounds, pulsed through her.

She smiled again. "I've just... come here to watch the stars for a bit. And it was getting kind of warm next to the fire. My sleeping bag and everything is close to it, too. What, um," she added gently, "were you thinking about? 's something wrong?"

"Well gee thanks Jake, for a moment there I thought I had made a good impression on you" Marcus replied wryly but he was grinning. He knew he had a lot to learn when it came to kids.

Females were weird even Marcus had to agree with that and they didn't necessarily get better with age either. Of course he had once been in a band and had been quite weird himself so he couldn't really talk. "Don't bother trying to work them out Jake, just go with the flow. That's my advice. Of course I have the worst track record when it comes to females so maybe my advice might not be the best." He looked at Jake and then burst out laughing, he was sitting here talking about girls with a soon to be thirteen year old. He really was weird.

Marcus looked at his dismal attempt at a braid and then threw it at Jake laughing. "Well I can't be good at everything now can I?" He snorted as he flopped back onto the grass and looked up at the sky. "Man I haven't been in camping in years. We should do that when we go to the beach."

Feeling slightly less worried as Jake disconfirmed her question, Wesley still was pretty unconvinced. Allergies could be life-endangering... For a minute she considered persisting, but then figured it wasn't going to do anything good. Just make Jake angry. And then where would they be? Back to square one with him hating her.

Taking his offer and joining him on the ground, knees held up close to her body with her chin resting on top of them, Wesley stared at the fire, thinking about nothing and everything in between.

So when he asked her how she was doing, the Hufflepuff was caught a bit off guard, "Ummm...I guess I’m feeling…okay?" It wasn't as though she was good, still a bit jittery after the incident, and she wasn't awful either. In the back of her head, something seemed off about his question, but she was too tired to analyze it any further.

And then the DADA professor appeared. Returning his smile with a shy, close lipped, one of her own, Wesley turned her eyes to the ground. She really liked Professor Lawson, he was very nice, but…he was also kind of scary. So tall and big and professional and intimidating. He was a giant compared to her, plus he sort-of had this rugged out-law look that set her on edge.

Obviously she hadn’t been looking at the grass as well as she thought she had, because when Jake pulled out his knife to cut an apple the small Hufflepuff went rigid. Knifes where very frightening; in fact, on a list of things that scared Wesley most, they where probably right around broomsticks, heights, snakes, and the letters D and Q. Shoulder’s clenched forward and resisting the urge to run, Wesley remained still, looking anywhere else but Jake. Anxiety shooting through the roof, her fear was now spreading beyond the idea of being cut herself by the thought of her accidentally bumping Jake and cutting him. Just. Stay. Still, she told herself carefully.

Too busy trying to stay safe, Wesley hardly heard much of the conversation until Jake mentioned getting slapped. Looking at him out of the corner of her eye, she couldn’t quite see the bruise because he was showing it to the teacher on his other side. Biting her lip, her stomach hurt with the worry she had been trying to ignore. She still thought he needed to see the nurse. Or something. Almost ready to continue her observation of the grass, which appeared to be slightly dull green and not too overgrown, Wesley still managed to somehow catch the professor’s look aimed right at her. Face beet red, she felt ashamed and awfully embarrassed. He assumed her to be the attacker. Not blaming him, after all she had almost thought it had been her fault before she learned it had been Jake’s girlfriend, Wesley could only blame herself. If she wasn’t always hurting her fellow Hufflepuff, people wouldn’t always be assuming the worst.

Shooting Jake a grateful look as he shook his head, misinterpreting it as: “No she didn’t hit me” instead of “No she’s not by girlfriend” (even if the two where one in the same- all this relationship business went straight over her head unless bluntly stated); Wesley was relieved to at least have him to back her up. Obviously since he denied the fact that she hit him that would be enough proof for the teacher.

Eager to move on to the next topic (and almost 100% positive the knife was out of the picture), Wesley listened as Jake and Professor Lawson talked about hair. She liked Jake’s pink hair. It was very…pretty. And it made it easy to tell him apart from all the other boys. She was still so overwhelmed by the vast student population, it was probably going to take a AT LEAST year or two to meet everyone. Switching her general visual intake to the professor’s head, Wesley tried to spot the gray hair he was so positive existed. She didn’t see any, but maybe it was just the smoke from the fire that clouded her vision.

That was a topic she could at least follow, but this next one, it was WAY out-in-orbit. Trying to follow these kinds of complex things was like trying to figure out why some people’s second toes where bigger than their big toe and why some people’s weren’t. Wesley didn’t get it. And more importantly, she had a strange feeling she didn’t want to (not that it wouldn’t be nice to understand the difference in second toe sizes). And this thing about girls being so important, she didn’t like that. She didn’t like the idea of being revolved around like the sun. It was creepy. But Professor Lawson was referring to boys, not girls. “Umm, sir? Is it the same way with ladies?” . Wesley hoped not. It was bad enough worrying about everyone. Worrying even more about males would make life so much more complicated. And it would give her a big headache. Wesley didn’t like headaches. They hurt.

Listening to Jake’s comment on the subject, Wesley didn’t mind in the slightest she wasn’t on the “list”. Just as long as he didn’t hate her she was good. But she did feel some conflicting emotions on the whole hair-pulling thing. Wesley really liked Reese. And she really liked Jake. She couldn’t figure out why he’d want to yank out all her hair. Unless she did something mean. But Reese wasn’t mean. She was nice. When Wesley grew up, she wanted to be just like her. And Mariel. And Sarah. And her Arithmancy professor. And Brenna at Gringotts. And that girl named Cela who shared her book. They where all so amazing. Maybe one day Wesley’d be amazing too.

And if that topic wasn’t slightly awkward, the next one was on a whole other level. Now they where talking about favorites. Wesley didn’t like this. It wasn’t because she wanted to be the DADA teacher’s favorite. That would be so uncomfortable. It was because she felt bad for all the others who wanted to be but weren’t. She was glad nobody else was listening to this conversation. The tiny girl was good at keeping secrets, but that didn’t mean other people weren’t. And what about that gossip thing, Asparagus was it? Boy, if they heard about this the whole school’d be in an uproar. People would probably be jealous of Jake. Which leads to hatred. Which leads to him getting hurt. The almost-13-year-old had enough on his plate. He didn’t need any extra drama. Or at least, Wesley thought so.

"I knooow," he mumbled, rubbing his bottom lip harder as a blush crept up his face. It wouldn't come oooooff. "Marshmallow's... sticky, I can't get it all off." He made a face and abandoned it, settling on sucking on his bottom lip instead to see if that could work. The silence stretched for a moment as he did this, as talking was kinda counter-productive for this venture. But soon it was mostly off and he couldn't be bothered to try and find the rest. "Eh. I can't get it all. Why does it have to be so sticky."

He took another careful bite of the smore, and this time managed not to add to the mess he'd made before. Hooray for that, at least. Kiri was starwatching? He'd been... doing that too, kinda. While thinking. Multi-tasking.

"They're brighter out here than they are at home. I think because we live in the city, and the lights make them disappear from sight. There's so many more than I was used to seeing. They look a lot different from out here rather than from the hosp- window."

What had he been thinking about. He scratched the back of his head and considered that. Muddled thoughts had replaced whatever it was.

"I think I was thinking about that, actually. The stars and how they look different. That and how much I'm gonna miss my friends this summer."

"'s called light pollution," Kiri mumbled, struggling inwardly. She... yes, she had been a bit disappointed, and sad and angry that Raiden and her had spent so little time with each other. During the flooding of the school, Kiri had ended up in the Hospital Wing twice, and she wasn't even sure Raiden knew about that. She was pretty sure he hadn't paid her a visit. But it did not, she discovered in this instant, matter. The camp-out was just that much better now that Raiden was here.

"Er... want me... to clean your lip?" she whispered, more grateful than ever for the darkness. "And... I will miss you, too."

still sitting on the edge of the camp site Lukus watched as they all continued to gossip about the rumors and new they had hard over the past couple of days.
sitting down on the floor he drew his wand slowly
"lumos" he said quietly as his wand light up.
Quickly covering with his hand, as not to draw attention to himself he got up and tiptoed around the camp site hope they wouldn't see him.


Pulling his hood of his ropes over his head he stood very still behind a tree and waited for the student to talk slightly louder so he could have a good look around and find out where he was.

"Light pollution," he repeated. He'd... known that. Forgotten it, but he had known. He shoved the rest of the smore in his mouth to keep himself from mumbling more, and that immediately proved to be a bad idea as Kiri...

Lips.

Immediately he attempted to swallow. He hadn't... chewed it enough, however, and his throat protested. Cough. Cough. Bug eyes. Thank goodness for the darkness, because she wouldn't be able to see how red he'd just turned.

"If... you want?" he said tentatively, rubbing his throat gently as he finally managed to get the last of the smore down. "You don't... have to."

Something told him he'd miss Kiri more than he'd miss... most of his friends. Especially since he'd been missing her all term. It was amazing that she didn't seem particularly sore with him for avoiding her... but he'd had no choice in that. His brain hadn't allowed for him to be around both her and Cela, and Cela had... constantly shown up.

Kiri dropped the rest of her s'more when Raiden started to cough. In the relative silence of the warm night, where the noises of the fire and the students had, curiously, faded into the background, it sounded like a misfiring Muggle car. She didn't feel like searching the grass for it, but she did look for something else she'd brought along. Her half-empty bottle of pumpkin juice. "I-I'm sorry," she stammered, unscrewing the tap and proffering the bottle to Raiden. "Er, here... have some pumpkin juice."

She watched him closely as he tried to get rid of his cough. Unfortunately (at least for Kiri), soon Raiden was done spluttering and gasping, and he was looking at her in a way that made her want to crawl out into the night and hide because she was sure that he knew, knew! Kiri's own throat was very dry, and she regretted having suggested it in the first place. "Mmm," she managed, head spinning. She scooted closer to him. Now they were much closer.

"Hold still..." she murmured. She pulled the sleeve of her robes over her right hand and raised it to his face. Her left hand came up, too, trembling slightly. Kiri grabbed his chin gently. It felt as if her skin was being burned away from the flesh. She could not meet his eyes. A quavering sigh escaped her.
Then she rubbed the robes sleeve over his lips slowly, wiping the remaining marshmallow stuff away. Whenever the cloth moved, Raiden's lip was moved to and fro. In other circumstances, it might have looked funny, but Kiri's mind was, in essence, a complete blank.

"Oh... sorry," Jake mumbled, unaware that Lawson may be speaking to him trying to inject some wit. Bleh. He shrugged and picked a few more blades of grass, turning them over in between his fingers. Grass was... so blissful. Ohhhhhmmmmm.

"Hey! Why do you keep throwing grass at me?" Jake giggled, trying to sound indignant and failing miserably. He followed Lawson's gaze up to the sky and nodded. "I hope so. I... well, this is the first time I properly camped out. Like, technically..."

Hahaha, let's steer clear of that conversation.

Glancing over at Wesley, Jake realised a little too late that they'd been having the 'woman conversation' with one in the vicinity. Like... mega close.

Oops.

Well... he hadn't said anything too incriminating... riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight?

Reaching for the bottle, Raiden took it before realising what Kiri was saying. Pumpkin Juice. He couldn't have that. He set the bottle down and shook his head slightly.

"I'm allergic," he explained, before his entire body froze up. Touching. Touching. Touching. Kiri was touching his face. "Uhm-"

Holding still was something he could do very well. Especially right now. Stomach churning, Raiden closed his eyes instead of staring at Kiri, who seemed to be determined to not stare at him as well. Natural reaction to the stomach flailing was to bite his lips, but as they were the main focus of Kiri's attention right now, he fought the urge.

After waiting for a while and walking about for a bit Lukus thought it best to asks the camper not that he really wanted to because he knew that talking was going to be a challenge.

holding his wand infront of him he walked towards the campsite.

Kiri tried to avoid it, but in the end, she couldn't help herself, and she looked into Raiden's eyes while she dabbed away at his mouth. His eyes were closed, though. So he wasn't looking at her! That was a relief. His whole body seemed to be tense and rigid. Kiri thought for a second that she'd been too rough, but then she remembered. Raiden. Girl allergies.
More memories decided to stage a little reunion tour in her mind. What had that woman told her in Diagon Alley, nearly a year ago? Kiri's face felt even more flushed than before. Raiden's slow breaths were noticeable on her own skin.

This, she was sure, was the proverbial it. She'd either... kiss Raiden now, or leave it and berate herself over it for the rest of the summer holidays. Or she'd do it, and Raiden would be terribly upset, and she'd be even harsher on herself.
Kiri knew that if she spent any more time thinking about it, she'd chicken out. And for once in her life, it was certain that thinking would not be to her advantage. She moved her right hand away from Raiden's mouth. It was trembling so badly that the sleeve of her robes she'd used slid back on its own. A second later, she was holding his chin with both hands and sliding as close to him as she could.

"Raiden," Kiri breathed, practically out of her mind with fright and excitement. "I..." She didn't know what to say. She leaned forward and gently brushed her lips against his for a moment.

Raiden's entire body had tensed up so much that his stomach muscles were starting to hurt. He'd thought he'd grown used to being around Kiri; her gentle, accidental brushes against his arms had ceased setting off the weird electricity that had seemed constant in Diagon Alley and the beginning of term. Apparently, however, he was wrong. Little shocks were resonating from her fingertips, into his skin, making his entire face turn pink with a tingly blush. Apparently he was still just as 'allergic' to her as he had been before.

Or moreso, as she proved to him a moment later.

He opened his eyes when she said his name, and immediately realised that her face was far closer than it had ever, ever been before. And it kept getting closer-

...

...

Some kind of mental death had just taken place. Everything in the world had very briefly gone fuzzy and white. His lips were... touching Kiri's lips. That was... that was... KISSING?!

Right?

He stayed stone-still for a moment before leaning back ever-so-slightly. All the thoughts in his head were traffic-jammed. Only two escaped: Kiri had just KISSED HIM.

And Celandine Toussaint was never, never wrong.

What was... what had... how... Sentence fragments and confused thoughts bounced around in Kiri's mind. In a way, she was still aware of what was going on, her brain was still working. But...

Her lips were only touching Raiden's for a very brief moment, but she could taste the marshmallow she'd been trying to get rid of. Later, it would be the only thing she'd remember. And it must only have lasted for a second or two, but time, as everyone said, had definitely stopped. It felt real.

And then Raiden shifted slightly, and Kiri's thoughts slammed into her head with the force of a hammer. They were full of shock and doubt. She was convinced she'd done something wrong. What was Raiden going to think of her? Oh, they were never going to be able to look at each other again.

Kiri moved her head back a bit so she could look at him. She also removed her hands. Her fingers twisted themselves into worried knots. He was going to say something now, that, she knew, would turn this whole enjoyable evening upside down. She breathed out deeply, forcing herself to keep eye contact. "Raiden, I... I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."

The second Kiri's hands moved away from his skin, all the thoughts that were jammed together in his head rushed out in one. For a moment he was completely overwhelmed by the flood of unwanted mental work.

When it finally stopped, he remembered to breathe. Breathing was a good... good idea. Yes. Very good idea. He leaned back slightly, putting one hand behind him to keep himself from rolling backwards onto the ground. Breathe in. Breathe out.

...Kiri was talking. Focusing on what she was saying, however, was surprisingly easier than it had been before. Which was nice. It seemed like listening was effortless again, hooray. But... surely he was mishearing the words she was saying.

"Wh-What? You're wh-" he stopped speaking, swallowed, then tried again, his tone confused. "Why are you apologising?"

Startled for just a moment when the young female Huffie spoke, Marcus turned to her and gave her a cheeky grin. "Not too sure I am the right person to be asking about the female mind." Cause you know he had such a great track record with women. Hence the reason why he was still single. "But I did notice when I was a teenager, you know way back when the dinosaurs were still roaming the earth..."he snorted softly as he looked between Wesley and Jake..."that girls did tend to notice boys a lot when they got to about sixteen and that was all they seemed to talk about."

Yep that about summed up his knowledge of females when he had been a teen, of course Marcus always had other things on his mind at the time. Mainly causing as much trouble as he possibly could at school without getting caught.



He pulled up a bunch of grass and flung it at Jake and laughed like a mad man. "Because I can and because it's funny." Marcus grabbed some more for good measure and threw it at Jake again before looking back up at the sky. "Dude, this is not camping. I will show you camping. But not like when I was an auror and was staking out some dark wizards because that's not fun at all." Yeah sitting around for hours, sometimes days with not much to eat and not being able to move from his position, really sucked.

"What else have you got planned for the summer Jake?"