Oh. Well then. Cat had been sort of hoping Alice would tell her that it had been super pretty at one point, cause right now, it was just a dead garden. But oh well. Maybe it would look pretty come spring time. She could hope, anyway.

After Alice sat, Cat took up her space. She pulled her knees up to rest her arms on them and left the candy bag in the middle of the bench, between them. She did a little digging around until she found a few jelly slugs and tossed them into Alice's lap. They were for her. "I figured this would be a good place since no one else is likely as odd as we are and won't be coming here for a visit."

"Are you okay?" She made some sort of vague motions with her sugar quill that was somehow supposed to represent a boy of the Odessa variety.

Harvey walked into the butterfly garden and looked around at the butterflies "Hi Butter!! How are you all??" he asked the butterflies that were around. He sat down and watched the butterflies fly about as he ate his ice cream, he wondered how people could love butterflies more than ice cream. They were just some flying insects while this lovely cold sugary goodness in his hand was the bestest thing ever in his mind. He looked at the butterflies again and stood up "I don’t understand how people can love you over this lovely amazing thing! " he said looking at his ice cream before looking back at the butterflies "Compared to this lovely thing you are all hairy and stuff, bleugh not something I could try and eat...unless... I dunk you in ice cream!" he then got an idea "Yeah! Lets try dunking you in ice cream " he said trying to get a butterfly stuck in the ice cream. He kept jumping around trying to get a butterfly on his ice cream when he nearly lost his ice cream as it almost fell out of his hand. He instantly stopped as he clutched onto his ice cream "Phew! That was so close! I nearly lost you!" he said to his ice cream "Oh I love you so much I don’t want to you lost you" he said kissing his ice cream and then licking his lips "Hmmm!! You are so lovely and yummy! I don’t know how people can hate you or even love some other things more than you! There is nothing more lovely than you!" he then looked at his ice cream a little more "Who needs girls when you have ice cream in your life! Oh Miss Cream! I love you!" he said clutching his ice cream, he got ice cream on his face which he cleaned up afterwards, he then sat down and started licking his ice cream talking to it occasionally about the butterflies that were around them

What on earth was this guy doing? She wondered as she walked into the butterfly garden to find a tree to 'sample' for her grandr work. Yeah, she was doing her runes work. But, who said she couldn't ask the not-so-mexican-jumping-bean what on earth he was doing in the first place.

"Hi Ha-" what was his name again? He was friends with Ethan he was in her house - and jumping and wait was he kissing his ice cream? Her eyes widened in shock as she saw that. It was too late, she had already spoken.

Maybe she could back out unnoticed? Nope, she needed to do this project. So, she just walked forward and glanced around the room. EYING all the trees in there. Hey look! There was an ELM TREE over there!

"Hello Elmy," she beamed at the rather strong elm tree...but there were other trees too - maple, pines, it smelled so nice in here. And a fluttery thing kept flying at her face. Actually it was using her eyebrow as a seat it seemed. The girl had Butterflybrows. "Happy valentines day to me..." she muttered and sighed, single on valentines day stunk.

Beauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutiful, wonderful day. Saturday, spring was fast approaching and Beezus woke up on the best side of the bed. The fact that their the school was still under tight financial crisis wasn't even putting down her spirits. What more could she ask for aside from a Dylan?

WELL.

She would really want some ice cream right now. Correction....MORE ice cream...granted she had just finished her third extra full bowl for the day. Professor Flamsteed was right. There was just something about the nom from the ice cream machine than the ones she made herself. Sure, she was a proud doo doo for being able to make ice cream that most of her peers enjoyed....but she'd also have to disclose that in comparison, her personally made ice cream was just....missing something. She was determined to find out what it was.

But first, she needed MORE MORE MORE ice cream.

Her stomach was heavy now though, so she was hoping someone would be kind enough to get her more of her precious ice cream.

Any takers?

Tobias didn't respond for a couple of seconds as he thought about home. Did he miss it? "Yeah... I mean this is the first time I've been away from home. And I've never really been apart from my family at all, other than like when I was at school in the day. And I was expecting the school to be kind of different..." he trailed off, still tracing patterns in the snow with his now numb fingertip. "But I mean I'm learning magic so that kind of makes it better so that's a happy thing."

Yep yep. Happy happy happy. Plus he went home for holidays. And it really was awesome at Hogwarts.

When the implied the snowball fight, Tobias grinned to himself and went from disturbing the snow with his fingertips to gathering up some snow for a snowball.

"Yeah, making a cake sounds awesome," he nodded, as the boy pushed himself to his feet, a snowball ready in his hand. Then he smiled slyly as he turned to face the ol' cap'n. "You sure you're ready to face me in a snowball battle?"

Harvey hadn't noticed the girl that had entered the butterfly garden until he had actually sat down to eat his ice cream again, he froze. How much had she seen? Did she call out to him while he was trying to catch the butterflies? cause he vaguely remembered something like that. He hoped she hadn't seen that cause really.. what if she went and told a professor! But who cared! He hadn't done anything! he would maintain a defence that he had only been sitting there eating his ice cream. But then the professor wouldn't be too happy with the girl for wasting their time, maybe it was best to mention not to say anything as it would be best not just for him but for her as well.

He quietly got up and cleared his throat as he walked over to her, he did recognise her afterall they were in the same house so why wouldn't he? She was at the Claw party too.. so he had seen her around just not talked to her obviously! "Ummm Hi! How are you doing?" he said getting closer to her, wait! was she talking to a tree? Looks like Professor Bentley's tactic of talking to plants was being adopted by others too, he remembered when he had to sing and dance for a plant of his which seemed silly then but seemed like a good idea now that he spent most days wandering around the school. Did she say the V word? oh gosh! he had all but forgotten it was that day! he didn't care anymore! for him it was just another day, but what was a girl like Mika doing alone on this day? aren't girls supposed to be having fun with any secret admirers they may have.

Ella listened intently as Tobias talked about home, a small frown forming as he said he thought Hogwarts would be different. "The stuff going on here right now..." How was she meant to explain that Hogwarts wasn't usually so meh? "Well they'll sort it out. It'll be back to its normal self in no time." At least she hoped so. She was running out of money for the turnstiles as it was. The sixteen year old did enjoy the young puffs optimism, though. "Learning magic is definitely amazing." Bright side and all. "Quidditch too, of course." And she nudged him gently, giving him a small smile.

The snowball making? Captain had noticed and smiled to herself. She began rolling one too, just so she was prepared.

"Brilliant," She said cheerfully as she too got to her feet and took a few steps back. The blonde GRINNED at the challenge and nodded her head. "Bring it on, little badger." And she winded up and tossed the snowball at him.

Let the snowball battle commence.

She didn’t even notice the looks that she was getting from the buttlerfly eater in the corner. Nope, she was busy opening her bag and looking through her textbook. Yep, she had carried the heavy thing with her today – like it was an all-powerful amazing device of awesomeness.

SO when someone spoke to her she jumped and kind of threw her rather heavy textbook at their face. Oops, that wasn’t supposed to happen. And she hadn’t meant to scream, or anything.

That was awkward.

Awkward girl was just awkward.

"Fine, fine...I'm fine, did I hit you with the book? And How are you?" she asked, eyes still a bit wide in the shock of her assaulting a student. Textbooks were torture devices as is, they didn't need to be thrown at people.

Oh yes, Quidditch too. Quidditch was awesome. In fact Quidditch was so awesome that the idea of it distracted Tobias for a few moments, long enough for him to be taken by surprise as he suddenly noticed Ella abOUT TO THROW A SNOWBALL AT HIM.

Letting out an odd squeal as he tried to get away, Tobias made to run to the left but the snow and his delayed reaction wasn't helping. The snowball caught him on the shoulder and that was all it needed for the 'puff to go into snowball fight mode. He made a subpar throw of the snowball he already held, but then crouched down as he ran along, scooping up the snow as he went. Taking a moment to pack it all in tightly as he stood, Tobias aimed and launched the snowball at Ella before giggling and running off.

At that point he decided that what he needed was a SNOW WALL and so he dropped to his knees to pile up as much of the snow as possible to make his defence, ready to try and run away if he was ambushed.

Amused captain was amused. The Quidditch distraction technique seemed to have worked and the blonde smirked a bit as she watched her snowball sail towards the younger badger. Cause obviously that had been her plan all along to distract him. Obviously. "Gotchaaaa!" She called out triumphantly as she ran in the opposite direction, gathering snow as she did. She needed to get a snowball stash going.

O____O

Merlin, Tobias was a fast snowball maker. The blonde took the one he tossed at her in the side and let out a squeak. "Heyyy!" This wasn't going to be an easy win, obviously. She should have had more ice cream before this battle!

Seeing that the young puff was momentarily distracted with what looked like fort building, the blonde crept up and launched two snowballs in a row. She then retreated behind a nearby tree, quiet as a mouse.

Heh.

Clearly Tobias hadn't been paying good enough attention. One minute he was frantically piling snow up to build his fort/wall with a good idea of where Ella was, and the next there was silence. The puffer boy looked up, frowning in slight confusion. Where could sh-

"EEEEP."

ARGEHGDIHJGDKJSHSDKJ.

The boy flailed as he was hit with not one but TWO snowballs. And not just hit. Some of the snow went DOWN HIS JACKET. BRRRRRR.

Abandoning the fort for now, Tobias scooped up two moderately sized snowballs and darted towards where the last two had come from. But... nothing.

Standing exactly where he was, the Hufflepuff stared all around him, keeping an eye out for any sign of where the captain was. The second he saw movement he would pelt Ella with the snowballs, ehehehe.

"Do I look not okay? Why wouldn't I be okay?" Jelly slugs. Alice was momentarily distracted, biting the head off one as soon as Cat dropped it in her lap. Much tastier than licorice wands. But she'd been feeling loads better than okay lately. Quidditch match wins were rolling in and studying for OWLs was going pretty well and her mouth had been in very nice places recently. Extra okay, see?

"Are you okay?"

Another jelly slug disappeared down her throat. Mmm, definitely more than okay.

Harvey was standing there when suddenly he saw this book come flying towards him and before he even had a time to react the book hit him and he was completely stunned at being hit by a book, he didnt know how to react,, the pain that was surging through his head. He slowly touched the spot where the book hit him "Have..have I got a bruise?" he said before realising that he had dropped his ice cream and he bent down "NOOOOOOO.. my ice cream!!! My poor...poor ice cream!!" he said not too happy about losing his ice cream. He then remembered that someone was there so he stood up instantly "Oh.. umm.. Im fine.. Im good" he said to her trying to act like none of his screaming had just happened, cause really... it..did...not..happen! You got that book throwing girl! You didnt see ANY of that! AT ALL!! He then braced himself for her throwing another book at him in case he said something wrong.

Ella was stifling giggles behind the tree where she was hiding like the almost-adult she was, eyes on Tobias. He was adorable, Tobias was, and she did feel a bit bad about the snow down his jacket thing. He'd be okay, though. He was young and energetic and surely a little snow down the jacket wouldn't stop him. Nope.

The blonde gathered a few more snowballs as quietly as she could, making herself a little pile by the tree. She then tiptoed out from behind it, ready to go on the offensive.

If she could just. be. stealth...she'd be set.

*Creeeeeeping*

Butterflies!!! Ariana skipped into the butterfly garden and looked around at the butterflies NOT flying around.....

what?

Ariana wanted to see the butterflies.. they were pretty and they aren't here.. and if they were she surely didn't see any.. walking in further she read the scroll and kicked the ground with her new boots "Stupid budget cuts!"


Now she was more upset. No best friend, NO butterflies.. SIGH, this was a bad day man.

She had felt bad about the textbook more that the ice cream – so when the book went flying the girl’s eyes widened and she turned to see (and hear) Harvey cry out for his ice cream. Okay, well, she might have laughed. More because he made a face, a rather comical face then the fact he was basically crying over spilt milk. Frozen spilt milk, but spilt milk non-the less.


Shaking her head no, she finally had the laughter out of her system. ”Sorry, I just…I’m so sorry my initial reaction when I hurt someone is to laugh – nerves.” she bit her lip, and looked at his fore head. ”No bruise that I can see” she muttered. ”Sorry about the book throwing – just jumpy these days…my friend told someone that I liked them and now every time someone calls out to me I fail, drop things, throw things or try to turn the color of my surroundings” which was easy when she was in a bright pink room.

Which didn’t exist in the school – unless it was the room of requirement and then that person would know she was there. And it would be a game of chameleon – walls changing colors and metamorphamagus trying desperately to keep up. Walking over closer to the ice cream she stooped down picked up the book, sighed. ”Sorry about the ice cream – after I get this weird assignment done for runes do you want me to summon a tub of ice cream from the kitchens?” She asked smiling. Ice cream was good, she just wasn’t one of the obsessed.

”Alright,” she muttered and cleaned the book off of snow and little drips of still partially frozen ice cream. Opening it again, she walked back to the tree, turned to Harvey, ”feel free to laugh” she chuckled.

Reading the steps she placed her book back into her bag and placed it by another tree. Stepping under the rather beautiful Elm tree she crawled under the branches. Walking up to the base of the tree and sliding down it so that her back was pressed against the base of the tree she just smiled. There, the tree was supporting her.

Moving the palms of her hands so that they were pressed against the tree’s not-so-rough back. Glancing up above her she watched the way the tree’s limbs and currently non-existent canopy would look. Imagining leaves here and there she just smiled. It was a beautiful tree – so happy looking, and healthy, and living. And the smell of earth and the warmth of the butterfly sanctuary was a nice place for this tree. ”beautiful” she muttered in response to the tree as she was attempting to communicate with it. ”you are a beautiful tree and I’d love to make a Grandr out of you” she smiled.

He just looked at her as she laughed at him "No..its.. its fine. I get the nerves, everyone has different reactions when nerves hit them, yours is to throw books at people’s heads" he chuckled as she looked at his forehead and said there wasn’t a bruise, well that was a relief not that he had anything against having bruises they were a part of growing up. He listened as she explained why she was so jumpy "Do you like that person? The one that they told" he asked her wondering if she did "Well I guess I will be more careful about calling out to you, next time you might end up giving me a bigger head with your backfiring spells" he chuckled as he said this as he imagined this happening to him if he called out to her again.

He raised his hands "No..no..its fine" he then became one of the curious "Whats the weird assignment?" he wondered what the runes assignment was about, what she have to do. He watched her pick up her book and cleaning it she opened it and went back to the tree "Im not going to laugh" he said knowing that depending on what the assignment was he MAY laugh he just wasn’t too sure yet. Talking about summoning ice cream, he couldn’t bear to be without his ice cream "Accio Bertie Botts Every Flavor Ice Cream" he said as he waited for the tub of his most favourite ice cream, he then watched Mika as she place her back by a tree and crawled underneath it wondering what this meant.

He just watched her curiously as she started talking to the tree calling it beautiful and saying how she would love to make a something out of it he didn’t quite catch that word. So he just glanced at her every now and then as he ate his ice cream as it arrived and was just an audience now who was more interested in their lovely ice cream than what Mika was doing.

Tobias wasn't sure whether he heard or saw Ella first. All he knew was that one minute he was standing there super still, the better to pay attention to everything else, and the next minute he had whirled towards a movement he'd spotted from the corner of his eye.

"Aha!" he exclaimed even as he sent the snowball soaring through the air. And it wasn't a direct throw, either. It went high up into the air before falling towards the captain. Meanwhile, he threw another snowball straight at her, turned tail and RAN before he could see if they'd even hit their target.

And ran... straight back to his 'snow wall'. Gather, gather. Build, build.

Being small had a definite advantage; only a small wall was needed.

Ehehehehe.

MEEP!

Ella jumped at the noise Tobias made and flailed a bit, not knowing which direction to run in. The blonde looked up and spotted the snowball that was falling in an arc towards her, unaware of the second one that was heading her way. She was able to doge the first by stepping backwards a bit but the second hit her straight in the neck.

BRRRRRRR!

"That went down my coat, Tobiassss!" She called as she hurried back to her snowball supply. She needed to launch a serious attack.

Heading back towards the fort, the sixteen year old began launching snowballs over the wall and hopefully at the firstie.

Heh.

Quote:

Originally Posted by EW_FAN

He just looked at her as she laughed at him "No..its.. its fine. I get the nerves, everyone has different reactions when nerves hit them, yours is to throw books at people’s heads" he chuckled as she looked at his forehead and said there wasn’t a bruise, well that was a relief not that he had anything against having bruises they were a part of growing up. He listened as she explained why she was so jumpy "Do you like that person? The one that they told" he asked her wondering if she did "Well I guess I will be more careful about calling out to you, next time you might end up giving me a bigger head with your backfiring spells" he chuckled as he said this as he imagined this happening to him if he called out to her again.

He raised his hands "No..no..its fine" he then became one of the curious "Whats the weird assignment?" he wondered what the runes assignment was about, what she have to do. He watched her pick up her book and cleaning it she opened it and went back to the tree "Im not going to laugh" he said knowing that depending on what the assignment was he MAY laugh he just wasn’t too sure yet. Talking about summoning ice cream, he couldn’t bear to be without his ice cream "Accio Bertie Botts Every Flavor Ice Cream" he said as he waited for the tub of his most favourite ice cream, he then watched Mika as she place her back by a tree and crawled underneath it wondering what this meant.

He just watched her curiously as she started talking to the tree calling it beautiful and saying how she would love to make a something out of it he didn’t quite catch that word. So he just glanced at her every now and then as he ate his ice cream as it arrived and was just an audience now who was more interested in their lovely ice cream than what Mika was doing.

Mika glanced over to Harvey as he began to speak once more, she might have frowned a bit. Because throwing things was not her usual well, she wasn’t normally like that. ”I don’t normally do that, to be honest really” she still felt sorry for his face.

Then he was asking her about the liking thing. She blinked a bit, ”nuh-um…yeah he is nice but I don’t like him that way.” she admitted sheepishly. ”the hard thing is that the guy is a friend though, ya’know and it makes things awkward” she mumbled the last bit and bit her lip.

Still sitting under the tree. ”Oh, its Runes” she smiled, ”we have to make our own Grandr’s this term so I’m going to make one out of Elm” she smiled as she patted the tree’s bark.

Standing up from her sitting position by the tree. Clockwise, what was clockwise? She thought for a moment as she used her hands to make a shape and decided that walking left was the best way to get the clockwise circle around the tree.

Carefully stepping she began to walk around the tree not once, or twice, but three times. As she walked she continually let her land brush against the bark of the tree. “Tree may I take some of your wood for a Grandr?” she asked quietly under her breath to the tree as she did so, she could feel a faint warm and pleasant feeling radiating into her hand. Her hand that was touching the bark of the tree.

Oh joy! The tree was happy with her.

“Yay it likes me it really likes me” she smiled to herself and almost hugged the tree, almost.

He then saw her frown ok so maybe he shouldnt have said it like that but still it did seem that way to him, he nodded and smiled "Yeah I know Im just kidding with you, I mean if you did there would be alot more people with bruises on their heads and would have to wear protection from your book throwing. " he chuckled a little, ok so maybe even that was not right and he instantly stopped. He then looked around to see if anyone around had seen that cause it was the last thing that he wanted people to see was Mika hitting him with a book, no one needed to know that she did that it would be hers and his secret.

He listened to her as she talked about the liking thing and he nodded as he could totally understand. "Yeah I know what you mean! I dated my best friend a while ago, we then broke up last year and since then...things havent been the same between us" he said not knowing why it still hurt to think about it, he was over that now...right? "Things have been really awkward between us now.. we cant have a laugh like we used to anymore, I havent even seen her in ages! Im guessing we just need our space either that or she doesnt want to hang out. But I plan to find out since I want to make things right before I leave here" he said nodding "So I totally understand when you say things would become awkward between you two. " he said since he really did understand, he had been through that all before.

He nodded as she talked about runes "Oh ok.. so you just becoming friendly with the tree so it will lend you some of its bark for your purpose. I see how it goes! Good plan!" he said nodding as he looked at the big tree. He then watched her as she stood up and walked around the tree a bit as if she was doing something in terms of preparing the tree for her to take its bark or something. He couldnt hear what she was saying even though he was watching as her lips moved, just as he thought she was gonna hug the tree he sw that she didnt. Not that he had a problem with tree huggers they were good people too! He ate the ice cream that he lovingly summoned from the kitchens before looking again at the tree "Hey Elmster! You want some amazing cold ice cream?" he asked the tree in case it wanted some ice cream too.

She was on a mission today, a mission that involved her finding her darling tree that she would cut a chunk out of. You know, when she said it like that it kinda made it sound terrible but the Professor was the one who said they could do this so it should be fine.

For her, she wanted to find a birch tree--you know how many books she had to look through to find out what one of those looked like??? MERLIN! But no worries because she did find out and was now very much going to go looking.

Lex figured the best place to start would be the butterfly garden so that's where she led Mo. Of course she didn't know what kind of tree he wanted but it would be in here too. Nodnodnod. She just knew these things.

The tree caught her eyes the moment she entered. "This is a good looking one, wouldn't you say? If you don't already have a tree in mind we could share the wood because it has enough to go around." Or was this like the pizza where he wouldn't be willing to share because he wanted one all for himself?? His choice but this was the tree.

It seemed that Lex already knew exactly what sort of tree she was looking for, even down to recognizing on sight what she wanted, but it wasn't so simple for Mo. Merlin knew that each of those trees had their own special qualifiers, and the only ones he was able to rule out for sure were the girly trees with all their feminine mystery.

He needed a manly gandr, obviously.

"Birch, eh? Erm... not for me, but thanks. I'm just going to look around a bit for now." Most of these trees were smaller than the old growth ones in the forest, and Mo had this vague feeling that he'd just know when he came across the right tree. What if the right tree wasn't here, though? What if he needed some big ancient tree that wanted to share its magical energy with him, rather than a baby tree because Lex liked butterflies?

He shoved past the empty butterfly feeders to find more trees.

He didn't want to share her tree? Well fine, he could go off and look for whichever it was he wanted but THIS was the one should would choo--what was that???

Lex drew her wand and began poking at the bark of the tree. That didn't look very healthy at all. Or maybe it was nothing? Who knew?

It wasn't coming off on her wand though so maybe it really was fine but to be sure she hopped to the Birch next to it. This one didn't have anything that could be poked at with her wand so it must have been perfectly healthy and she could begin hacking away at it--er...or would it have been good form to wait until Mo had found his tree?

She didn't know he was so particular about these kinds of things. Ah well. This was her tree, not that other one she deemed sick. Mhm. "Any luck with your yet?" She called him to.

"Could you look more offended?" Mo laughed at Lex quietly as he stomped around in the underbrush, not really making any headway in finding a tree. He saw some weeds that he wanted to pull, and some flowers that he thought... well no. He wasn't picking flowers for anyone currently. Maybe Cat, in time.

He turned to mock Lex again and nearly took off his own head with the branch of a tree. Oops. He ducked under the branches to put his palms against the trunk. Oh, well then. Okay. Without even knowing what sort of tree this was, Mo was sure that this was his tree. Funny how that had happened.

"Hold up." He rummaged for one of the texts he'd borrowed for tree identification, flipping through it in search of anything that looked like his tree. "I think... does it look like a hazel tree to you?"