The Kitchen and Hufflepuff Common Room are accessed via the staircase to the right of the main staircase in the Entrance Hall. You follow along a bright corridor adorned with paintings, the most notable of which is the still life of a bowl of fruit (with a particularly ticklish pear). Kte

Evan, looking a bit sneaky, slowly approached to the great fruit painting. He wanted chocolate, cake, fancy drinks... pretty much everything. There should be Hufflepuff Common Room somewhere close, because most of them came down here, and he definately didn't want to be seen. He didn't know if getting into kitchen was alright, he'd been there once, and the house elves looked very welcoming, but still, he didn't like the idea of being caught while getting some food. Thus, checking the corridor once again, he got to his tiptoes and started to tickle the pear.

If there was one thing Jimbo liked about Hogwarts it was it's many secret passageways waiting to be discovered. On his weekly trip 'round the castle corridors he pushed walls and tried all sorts of odd combinations in hopes of finding a secret corridor or room that he could use someday.

He had been working his way up from the dungeon. They key to finding all these secret places, he found, was taking odd turns and getting lost. So, he didn't know where he was. But he did notice some odd behavior. The blond boy in front of him seemed to be tickling a painting. Now, Jimbo didn't judge these odd things but what mostly caught his attention was the fact that the boy was there in the first place. Because Jimbo was somewhere nobody knew about, right?

Jimbo walked right up to the boy and said, "What're you doing?"

The pear was laughing out loud now. One more second, and it'd be--

*GASP!* Someone was here, and saw him entering the kitchen! Evan slowly turned back. Wait... he knew this guy somewhere... He tilted his head to the right. Wasn't he... a Slytherin? Yes, that was all he was. But it was good that he was Slytherin. Slytherins were good at keeping secrets and not sharing.

As if tickling a pear was casual, he said "I'm tickling a pear." in a 'duh' way. Wasn't it obvious? And, with one last finger, the painting finally opened up. "Are you coming?" The kid probably didn't know this was the way to the kitchen, or he wouldn't have asked such a silly question. Though Evan really didn't have any time to explain. A Huffie could see them, and he didn't really want to be labelled as 'glutton'.

A little confuzzled, Jimbo hesitated for like, a mili-fraction of a second. Which can barely be called a hesitation. He had no idea who this boy was or what he was doing, where he was going and what, if Jimbo followed, would happen.

But weren't these sort of moment the best in life? Jimbo decided he'd go.
But really. How odd. He answered him in a way that said Jimbo should have known exactly what he was doing. Which meant that maybe this is something he should have found long ago, because obviously it was a passage Jimbo hadn't yet discovered.

"Okay," Jimbo swiftly walked forward to follow the boy.

Because, really, who thinks about tickling a pear?

Ellie walked by the kitchen feeling quite idiotic. Of course the kitchen! Really? She had been thinking of somewhere to explore all day. Why didn't she think of the kitchen sooner?

She looked around and found what she supposed to be the correct painting. Tickle the pear, her father's voice rang in her head.

She reached up and tickled the pear. She felt quite stupid and looked around to make sure no one was there to make fun of her. Then the pear began to giggle. Yes! she thought.

The painting swung open and... She crawled through.

Scarlett held Travis' hand as they walked down the corridor. "I feel bad that you have to walk all the way back up 8 flights of stairs. Thanks though." she said as they reached the door to the common room.

Travis smiled, "Well I am okay walking up 8 more flights of stairs if it means that I can spend more time with you," he said with a smile, as he looked into her eyes, "well goodbye my dear I will see you tomorrow." He kissed her, and let go of her hand.

Scarlett felt suddenly lonely when he let go of her hand and walked away. She ran after him and kissed him once more. Her head was spinning when she walked into the common room. She heard herself saying good night as she walked through the doors.

Travis smiled as she kissed him again, how did he get so lucky, he grinned as he walked up to the Gryffindor common room and couldn't wait to spend some more time with Scarlett tomorrow.

Rae walked along the corridor that led to the kitchens, this was the first place (other than the common room) she thought of to look for Evelyn. She had never been a baker but really wanted to right now, thinking about maybe she would bake something for someone (but not telling who) that she might never admit she liked. She kept walking, scanning the corridor for her.

So maybe it was a little bit early in the morning, but this was the time Evelyn always went running around the lake and castle grounds. But for some reason, she just had the NEED to bake something! Which was why she was sprinting down the corridor to the kitchen level.

Hopefully she didn't forget where the darn kitchen was...

Slowing down, the dark haired Slytherin stopped and breathed in heavily, trying to get her breathe back and her heart rate down. That, was some serious running. With those hills and such? Yikes. At least the running she did during the summer helped her tremendously. Not that she needed anymore practice in running.

Now, to find that weird portrait with the pear. But...first, time to relax.

Side-ache.

Looking down the corridor, however, when she heard what sounded to be footsteps, her hand immediately went to her wand that was strapped to her leg. Being at school and what happened last year made her slightly jumpy, which only made things worse since it added to her insane happiness, and random anger strikes. Although, one look at the person made her relax her posture again. "Rae?"

Oh, good. She was right in front of the painting. "Hey Evelyn! Wait up," As Rae sprinted into a jog like thing. She slowed when she got to the painting, "I was wondering when you were going to bake, i'd like to join." And maybe bake For that one guy she was thinking of something nice.

How did Rae know she was going to bake? She herself only decided to about five minutes previously.

Finally getting her breathing down to a somewhat normal pace, even though her sides still ached, Evelyn wiped some of the sweat off of her forhead as she glanced from the painting to Rae. Well, she wouldn't mind having someone to talk to while baking. Baking buddies! Might even be fun!

"Umm..." Standing up straight, Evelyn smiled before taking a few steps towards the painting. "Sure! Of course you can join." Now, to just remember how to get into the kitchen...

Rae felt lucky that her guess was here. The thing was she didn't even think she was going to bake for a while, she just wanted to know when... Seems as though now. Rae won't complain she can learn something new too. "Thanks." She said when Evelyn told her she can join. Rae extended her arm and tickled the pear, then gave a side glance at Evelyn while saying "Ended up missing a few meals last year and took some food here afterwards instead." She said as her explanation for knowing how to get in.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Rae pass her and do something to the pear. Well, whatever the older Slytherin did, it definitely worked, because...it opened.

"Ohh." she nodded, hearing the girl's explanation of how she knew what to do to open the portrait. Huh, perhaps the next time Evelyn missed a meal, she could come here instead of sitting in bed with an empty stomach. Now that she knew how to cook too, it would be much easier.

"Well, okay..." she nodded again, before smiling and entering the kitchen.

ooc: too the kitchen!

Scarlett was so disgusted with Travis right now she couldn't even deal with it. She thought he was perfect and he wasn't. She just wanted to be alone right now to think. She wanted to think about why he would do that and how he could even fathom how that wasn't wrong. Just kissing and making out, for fun? With no strings attached? That was just trashy in her mind. Maybe because her mom did that with several guys after her dad left. But she just couldn't handle it.

Travis ran after her, as she ran toward her common room, he had to catch her before she managed to get in, "Scarlett please wait," he said desperately as he caught up with her, "please Scarlett."

"What?!" she snapped her eyes filled with tears. Her knees were weak and her ankles weren't supporting her right. She tripped foreward and fell on all fours. She leaned against a wall and cried. "I thought you were perfect. I didn't think you would ever do that." Her voice cracked a little when she said perfect. She pulled her knees to her chest and looked up at him.

Travis knelt down next to her, it hurt him to see her cry, "I will admit that what I did was stupid, it was just Olivia is the type of girl that would cheat on me once a much hotter person came along," he said, "that is why I didn't want a relationship with her, I didn't want to get hurt, I thought friends with benefits was better....please don't cry I don't want to see yo cry it will just break me up inside."

"Just go Travis. I don't want to see you right now." she said as memories of her mom telling her that the strange men who came into her house were just "friends" and the man would always chuckle and say 'with benefits' She was too young to understand but as she got older she understood more and more. She didn't want to picture Travis as the type of person who would be so skanky. She tried to stand up to leave but tripped as she wasn't focusing on walking but trying to get mental pictures to leave her mind.

"I am not leaving," said Travis as she tripped her caught her, "please Scarlett forgive me I know what I did with Olivia, was dirty, trashy, unmoral, but I promise you that I wasn't thinking when it happened." He looked at her, he didn't want to lose her, he just couldn't lose her, he couldn't,

Scarlett just let her self fall into Travis as she began to sob. She felt terrible about comparing him to her mom's "friends" and she just wanted to stop thinking about it. "I forgive you." she said her voice cracking. She wrapped her arms around his waist and used him to support her weight.

Travis eyes widened at what she said, "You do," he said slightly surprised, he excepted her to yell at him or something, Travis stroked her hair and hushed her, "I am so sorry Scarlett, so very sorry."

She sniffed and sobbed a little more before controlling her tears down to a minimum. Her mascara had run all over her face and on him. She wanted their relationship to be light and carefree but so many things about him reminded her of home. "Can we go to the Room of Requirement? I need to talk to you about something. Let me go change and I'll be right back." she said her voice cracking a little. She squeezed his hand and went in.

She came out a few minutes later in her favorite bermudas and a shirt that belonged to her mom. She wore her new gladiators and took the sweatshirt from him as soon as she got to him. She then held his hand as they walked up to the RoR in silence. She was collecting her thoughts the whole way there.