The Student Seating Area

[Lily Evans]

.

[Ted Tonks]

Ted had already unpacked and, finding a book he had been reading all summer but still hadn't finished, had settled himself in a comfy armchair.

*cues Lily*

[Lily Evans]

*is cued*

Lily walks in, looking for a quiet place. She has a notebook with her but she doesn't have any study to do, she simply wants a few minutes of peace. When she spots Ted, she changes course from the chair she was headed to and heads towards him. "Ted!" She smiles; it was a long summer without him, and only a handful of letters passing back and forth. "I missed you on the train. And at the feast. And, well, all summer."

[Ted Tonks]

Ted looked up when he heard his name and put his book to one side, standing up and grabbing her in a hug. "Hi Lily! I missed you too." Pulling back from the hug he moved to the sofa there and tugged her down next to him. "So how was your summer? I know I'm the worst pen-pal ever so you'll just have to catch me up now."

[Lily Evans]

Lily hugs Ted as tightly as she can before settling herself next to him on the couch. "What is it with you boys, you can't seem to ever string a simple letter together," she teases, although the big smile on her face and the way she leans lightly against him zaps a lot of the effectiveness. "Well, I didn't really have much to tell, anyway. It was a pretty quiet summer in the end, and really quite cut off from the magical world except for your letters, and the trip to Diagon Alley. You'll have to tell me what was so wonderful about your summer that you just had no head for letters!"

[Ted Tonks]

Ted relaxed against her, arm around her shoulders. "Well actually the good thing is that I was actually busy when I wasn't not writing you letters. I spent most of the time working at a football camp for disabled children. Just a day thing but it was incredible. We had this one legged boy and he could kick a corner like it was nobody's business."

[Lily Evans]

"Really?" Lily says, perking up a little and looking at Ted with pride. It really is not surprising to hear him devoting his time that way, she's always been impressed by his kindness to everyone. "Well, it was for a good cause, so I suppose I can forgive you. It sounds really rewarding actually, I wish I could have spent some time doing something like that. Most of my time was spent reading in the backyard to avoid being bothered, or listening to Petunia going on about some typing course in the city she's going to apply for this year, because apparently that's the best way for someone to get out of Cokeworth..."

[Ted Tonks]

Ted rolled his eyes, "I'm sorry Lily but your sister is a swot. I don't know how you two are even remotely related. And it was amazing working with the kids. I'll probably be helping out there next summer unless something else comes along, and they always want more hands. Promise you don't have to be athletic."

[Lily Evans]

"No arguments there," Lily murmurs. She really wishes Petunia would aim a little higher in her career and education aspirations, but she supposes her sister knows what is best for her and even if she didn't, there is no way she would listen to Lily's advice anyway. "Who says I'm not-" she begins, swelling with indignation, but she can't hold onto it. She breaks, laughing. "Aright, so I'm the least athletic person in all of Britain, you've got me there. But it would be amazing to be able to do that. And there's the added bonus of not having to worry about your inability to send your best friend an owl once in a while!"

[Ted Tonks]

Ted laughed and hugged her, "They always need someone to look after the girls and make sure that everyone stays in their groups and makes it from activity to activity. The problem is that we all technically have a group assigned to us but because each of us does a specific sport it's hard for us to leave our stations." He shrugged, knowing it was great they even got the camp up and running. "So what books have you been reading all summer?"

[Lily Evans]

Lily leans into the hug, chuckling good-naturedly. "Well, I'd really like to help. And I should have my licence to Apparate by then, too, so it's not as though travel will be a problem." She pauses and thinks over her summer reading, her nose wrinkling a little. "Well naturally all my summer assignment reading, and once I got to Diagon Alley I got a head start on some of this years texts, too. Other than that it was a bit limiting, being home. Our local library barely gets anything new anymore so it's not like there was much for me to go on with there. It was when I got down to the point where it was either my mother's Mills & Boons's, or reading the labels of whatever was in the pantry that I decided something had to change," she confesses, blushing at the mention of romance novels. She'd read a couple of pages -it was a combination of sheer desperation and curiosity, really- but had given up after the second of those scenes. She'd been terrified someone would catch her with it, anyway.

[Ted Tonks]

Ted crinkled his brow at the names of the books, "I think I've seen those on my mother's shelves. What are they?" He had in fact noticed her blush and wondered what exactly it was about those books and whether he really wanted to know. "Also reading pantry labels is quite desperate. I think I'd rather read 1,000 Magical Herbs and Fungi, but knowing you you've already read it five times." He smiled at her, loving that she was such a nerd. Having her for a best friend truly was a blessing, even when she was badgering him to do his dreaded potions homework.

[Lily Evans]

"Put it this way; they're more low-brow than the labels I was reading," Lily says, brushing off that portion of the conversation with some relief. She grins. "Well, yeah, I've got that memorised, really. Maybe your Potions homework would suffer a little less if you'd give reading it another go, though. I'll not give up making sure you do it this year, just so you know," she warns, bright eyed and cheeky. She doesn't really know what she'd do without Ted and their friendship based on a combination of badgering, teasing, and caring. She'd likely just become a bit of a recluse if left to her own devices.

[Ted Tonks]

Ted laughed, "Why would I read it when I can just ask you? I think I can soundly blame you as the reason I did so well on my OWL that Slughorn made me continue taking it." He gave her a mock glare, "Then again it could be worse, could be divination." What a joke of a class. Ted was more a transfiguration man, sometimes charms but they were of secondary interest. Herbology was fun if only because it gave him the chance to get out of the castle, arithmancy was his way of keeping up with some mathematics and ruins was just plain interesting.

[Lily Evans]

"Oh please," Lily scoffs, "Slughorn is a pushover and you know it. See, deep down you love Potions, Teddy dear, and you know it. One day you'll just have to accept it," she says sweetly, all the while batting her eyelashes innocently. "Or I could just start giving you the wrong answers and then you'll be reunited with your old friend Divination before the first term is through!"

[Ted Tonks]

Ted gave her a horrified look, "Please don't make me go back to that musty tower with the old bat. She's the only professor in this castle for whom I don't have even a sliver of respect." Ted shook his head, taking her hand in his, "So my Dearest Lily you have to keep giving me the answers lest I fail and spend the rest of my year miserable with the crazy scarf lady."

[Lily Evans]

Lily opens her mouth to respond, but after a moment's thought, she closes it again. She shakes her head at Ted, smiling sheepishly. "Well, given that I can't even get through the 'you should respect all the Professors regardless' speech with a straight face, I guess I don't have much of a choice. Really, though, when we're both out of Hogwarts and you're asking me to brew potions for you since you can't yourself, I'll be charging." She squeezes his hand happily. "And it won't be cheap, either!"

[Ted Tonks]

Ted grinned, knowing exactly what she meant about the respect speech. He didn't want to seem so disrespectful but Trelawney was the only adult he had ever met who he didn't even have a shred of respect for. Ted squeezed her hand back, "I'll pay you in gourmet meals, how does that sound? And who says I need potions brewing anyway, I plan to spend most of my time as far away from anything involving potions as possible." The closest he wanted to get to them was a hearty stew.

[Lily Evans]

"Oh, alright then, it's a deal," Lily agrees, in a voice that would be convincingly grudging if she would stop smiling. "But only because I've heard your cooking is near unbeatable, so naturally I want to taste for myself. And really, Ted, you'll have lots of uses for potions. Even minor medical things alone - you'd be mad just to stick to the Muggle methods," she shrugs. Even the strongest of aspirins cannot compare to a well brewed pain relieving potion, Lily thinks. Since she can't use magic at home, she spends her summers brewing potions just so she doesn't get rusty and they've saved Lily's sanity many a time.

[Ted Tonks]

Ted thinks Lily is absolutely barmy, "But why would I brew my own when I can just by them?" He was no genuinely curious about it, "Does everyone make a slightly different one that makes the mass produced products less functional?" He knew that each chef had his own way of doing something, even if it was as small as a different way of slicing the ingredients, but potions had always seemed more specified and limiting which was his main problem with it.

[Lily Evans]

"The sense of satisfaction you get from knowing you've done something yourself, and done it correctly?" Lily shrugs. "And it is cheaper, really. If you get yourself a good stock of ingredients, you can brew hundreds of different potions." She pauses, pushing her hair back behind her ear as she considers Ted's question. "Well I suppose it doesn't make the mass produced any less functional. But when you truly understand the ingredients and how they interact, you find yourself making small changes here and there, even just with the method, that gets the most out of whatever you're using." Lily is actually surprised by Ted's lack of an affinity with Potions; she'd thought somehow his cooking abilities would transfer over. Not that she really knows the first thing about gourmet cooking.

[Ted Tonks]

Ted just doesn't like potions because until he's seen a potion perfectly brewed there's no way to tell what it should smell like, or look like. And you can't taste a potion as you're brewing it which throws him off even further. "Understandable, but I think I'll just leave all my brewing to you my dear. When we're old and grey I'll still be knocking on your door to get things from you." He laughed and hugged her shoulders, "I have to go now, finish unpacking and whatnot, but I'll see you some time tomorrow, probably in the library tomorrow evening?"

[Lily Evans]

Lily is going to be too afraid to taste test her cooking as she goes because it will be too ingrained into her that if you use something before it's ready it could kill you. She laughs, leaning into Ted for a moment as he slings his arm around her shoulders. "Right, that'll be us. I'll be in the room down the hall from you in the nursing home, and we'll still be trading meals for potions on the sly even when they try and stop us using stoves and cauldrons for our own safety. Looking forward to it." She simply shakes her head, too unsurprised to be horrified that Ted hasn't unpacked and organised himself yet. "You know I'll be there - after rounds, though, so don't be too early. See you, Teddy dear." With a smile, she stands up and out of his one-armed hug and leaves him to go get on with his packing.

[Violet Lockwood]

Violet is here, sitting in the corner reading the book that Walden Macnair had let her borrow. She's completely absorbed in it, ignoring everything going on around her. Her back is a bit to the room and she's got her feet up on the wall, the book on her lap.

[Walden Macnair]

Macnair walked into the library to find another syllabary for the book Emily had leant him. He had already translated a page of it and just needed another few pages to complete the next sections. When he wandered through the aisles he saw a familiar blonde head and walked over to the back of the chair, leaning over it and dropping a parchment onto her book, "How does that look Emily?"

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