Like What You See (Avalon)

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"You HIT the bludger, not TAP it!" Briella yelled from her position on the broomstick. She was higher than the rest of her team, keeping a bird's eye view of everyone. "Swing at it as hard as you can! Your job is to TAKE OUT your opponent, not send them a freaking present!" She'd learnt this last line from Owen, the last time they watched a game of Quidditch together, and had been looking for the right opportunity to use it. One had presented itself, as it usually did if you waited long enough, she couldn't help but feel a tad smug at having used it.

Her list of things to use, however, was still long, and as she continued to watch them play, she wondered which she could try to fit in next.

In her pocket, her phone buzzed, the start to a rap song barely audible over the noise of the wind. Slipping out her phone, she tapped the button, then pocketed it again. Bringing two fingers to her lips, she let out a shrill whistle. Once all the attention of the team were on her, she announced, "Practice over! We meet same time next week for group rehearsals. If you need one-on-one, you know where to find me. If you don't need one-on-one, I better see you practising on your own at least once before we meet."

There were nods and agreements from all around, and then, almost collectively, the team landed and dispersed. She was tough on them, yes, but they never seemed to mind; they were all good friends off the pitch. If she ever crossed any lines with what she said, she was never told, and nobody seemed to hold any grudges for it.

She watched as they left, waiting until they were out of sight before reaching up and untying her hair from the ponytail. The strands flapped in the wind, and for a few moments she just sat there, enjoying the breeze and the cool air. When she next opened them, they were sharp and intent, and she very quickly leaned forward on her broom, speeding towards the ground and not letting up until the very last moment; pulling lightly on the tip of her broom and straightening so that she barely grazed the ground with the tip of her shoes.

She did a lap of the pitch, then shot upwards at almost a ninety-degree angle before doing a few barrel rolls, making sure her grip was tight enough that she wouldn't go falling. When she finally straightened, her hair was a mess and she had a serene grin on her face that did not match the excitement of what she'd just done.

Briella practised a few more tricks, then, satisfied she could do them all with her eyes closed should she need to, let the broom hang. There she sat, taking in the sights and the quiet, for a short while, before making her descent. It was only once she landed and had climbed off that she saw she wasn't alone; in one of the stands was a male, apparently watching her, and she flashed him a sly grin. "Like what you saw?" she joked, starting over towards him.

Guest

Avalon was adjusting to life at Hogwarts about just as well as he'd thought that he would. If there was one thing that scared the boy more than anything, it was change. Everything about New York had been so familiar to him; the streets, the people, the smell of bagels that wafted out of that bakery on the corner and Broadway and 3rd every morning. He'd gotten used to passing Carlos at the newsstand on his way to his summer job answering phones at a small non-profit in Brooklyn. The old man would always tip his hat as Avalon walked by, his smile hidden behind the grey of his mustache.

Avalon would always try to hand him a dollar or so, but the man would never accept it.
"Keep your money," he'd say. "You'll need it." The boy would smile. The city was always so full of tourists and bloodhounds that it was sometimes hard to remember that some people could be as kind to Avalon as he wanted to be to them.

Even Ilvermorny had been a home to the boy. It'd been where he'd first learnt that magic was more than a fairytale and he'd be forever grateful to the school for the connections that he'd made. He remembered the first time that he'd learned the summoning charm. He and his buddies had spent an entire week summoning away people's pens and headbands. It was hysterical, but of course Avalon would always return people their respective items and offer an apology and a hug because that was who he was.

But now here he was, thrown into an entirely new environment after he'd grown so used to the one that he had been thrown into before.

He now wandered the Quidditch pitch, the one area of this school that seemed familiar to him. One of his favourite things about entering the wizarding world had been learning to fly. There was something about the special sort of adrenaline rush that came with sports that Avalon found addictive. He wasn’t much of an adrenaline junkie, as most high-stakes adventures worried him lifeless, but Quidditch was an exception.

When he got onto the pitch, his eyes flew towards someone who had beat him to the punch. He saw someone buzzing around the sky like a small firework, flipping and diving upward and downwards. He was impressed, to say the least, and he was also sure that that had been the intention. He walked into the stands to watch as the flyer dismounted their broom.

It was a girl, small (though she appeared as though she wouldn’t want to be called that) and brown haired. She looked over to him and smiled as though she was amused by his presence. He smiled back. Smiling was contagious.

“It was really impressive!” He told her, offering his had once she’d come close enough for him to do so.
“Do you play? Well I mean it’s kind of obvious that you do, but I’d hate to make assumptions.” He was rambling, but it wasn’t nervous rambling. It was friendly and bubbling, exactly as one would picture talking to Avalon would be. “I play as well. I’m keeper for Ravenclaw’s team, though I’m still getting used to your pitch. Some of the slang is different as well, but I guess that’s to expect when you enter a different country.”

“I’m Avalon,” he told her, figuring that it would be rude to not introduce himself.

Guest

She accepted his hand, her grin widening. "Thank you!" she replied, genuinely. "It took months of practise to get those right."

She wasn't boasting; that was when you tried to say you could do something you couldn't. It had been impressive, but had she known she had an audience, she might've not done it so quickly, especially not in front of someone from another house. Those moves were her secret weapon, in a manner of speaking; she used them to throw the opponents off guard. There were a few more that she never practised in the open that she was glad she hadn't tried, despite the temptation. For now, though, Quidditch aside, she was happy to meet someone else. He had a different accent, telling her that he was one of the new transfers.

Giving his hand a hard squeeze, as was habit (males never shook hands, she'd learnt and adapted) she retracted her hand and slid it into her pocket.

His word vomit made her raise an internal eyebrow. People tended to rant when they were hiding something, and for just a moment she wondered if, as a Ravenclaw, he had intentionally been watching her, gathering intel on the Slytherin Seeker and captain. But that was just her being overly suspicious, she knew. The Claw team was good, but they weren't great, and they definitely did not do anything as sneaky as spy on others -- that was a Slytherin move.

When he was done, she nodded. "I do play! I'm actually Captain of my house," she said. Her eyes glinted mischievously, and she smirked slightly at him. "If you ever want to join the winning team, maybe we could arrange for you to switch houses. What do you say, Ravenclaw? Ready to be a Snake?"

Laughing a little to show she was kidding, she shrugged. "Hufflepuff is the one to look out for, honestly. They may seem like friendly little balls of sunshine, but their beaters..." She shook her head. "I could use them in my team. They're savage, and I don't use that word lightly. Mathew and Violet. If they weren't donned in Yellow Yellow Dirty Fellow and Professors hand out points to Huff n' Puff when they answer correctly, I would swear they were my people. The sorting hat really messed up on those two."

The second piece of information he'd given her confirmed that he was a transfer. The more he talked the more she could place his accent. American? There was a slang and lilt to his tone, though, that indicated which part of America. She loved accents (almost as much as she loved insects) and hours of searching up different places on YouTube had made her an almost expert on identifying them. It clicked, then, as she searched her mental database.

"New York?" she hazarded. "You'll get used to it eventually. Why'd you move over here? Other than the fact we trump you in every possible way, pun intended." She grinned. "I mean you have a literal Trump card, but let's be honest he's worse than..." She paused momentarily, trying to recall the 'threat' her brother had made that day to his friend over the phone. "Than a salt covered cactus shoved up your ass."

"Briella-Ashley," she said. "Most people call me Briella or variations of that. Briella-Ashley is for when I misbehave and my dad gets angry. I know I'm in even more trouble when he uses the full name."
She lowered her voice in an obvious mockery of an older male. "Briella-Ashley Charlie Myers," she returned her voice to normal, "is when I run."

"So," she added a short while later, "How do you like Hogwarts and Scotland?"

Guest

Avalon nodded as the girl spoke. He didn't doubt her when she explained that it'd taken months to perfect her moves. He could tell by the way that she commanded her broom through the sky that she'd been flying long enough to have more tricks than that up her sleeve. It always amazed him, how a person could become so emersed in their sport that they were almost one with the sport itself. He felt that connection sometimes when he played Quidditch.

He loved to fly. There was something about being so far from the world but not far enough to where you could be labeled as an Icarus, away from safety but close enough to safety at the exact same moment in time, that captivated him. He also loved how flying provided him with something like an adrenaline rush, but not too much of an adrenaline rush. He wasn't an adrenaline junkie. In fact, something that was too risky or too much of an adventure often drove him to panic. And yet he loved to fly. It was confusing, really.

"I know a few tricks, but nothing like that. I am VERY skilled in the art of loop-de-loops," he smiled. This was true.

The girl went on to explain how she was the captain of the Slytherin team. Avalon gave a nod to show that he was impressed. He wasn't sure who the captain of the Ravenclaw team was, as introductions seemed to be less important to the Ravenclaw team than strategising. They were good, but Avalon couldn't help but think that perhaps if they acted more like a team and less like a well-oiled machine, they'd be better.

"I would," he said, regarding the girl's offer. Of course, he knew she was joking. But it would still be rude to not give a genuine response. "But I think I identify more as an eagle. Birds are naturally better flyers than snakes anyways." The statement was said with a joking tone. Avalon was not one to be rude or snarky.

He was amused by the way she coveted other teams' players. It kind of reminded him of how the boys he used to hang out with would take features from different girls at school and put them together to create the perfect woman. But it made more sense when referring to a Quidditch team. He'd never understood why someone would want a girl for only one feature. Shouldn't someone look for a significant other who had everything?

The conversation then turned from Quidditch to his background.

"My accent that obvious?" he asked at her assumption that he was from New York. No-one had actually been able to place his accent on New York before. Since he was originally from the south, most people were caught off guard by the special combination of New England and Southerner that was his dialect.
"I'm actually from Louisiana originally," he explained. "But I moved to New York when i was around 8... I think. I don't really remember what age exactly. I try not to remember much from before I moved to New York," he laughed. A part of him hoped that the subject would change soon. He wasn't sure if he wanted to share too much of his origin story with a stranger.

Thankfully, she switched the conversation from him to Donald Trump. Avalon shrugged.
"We moved here for my father's work. He was offered a promotion that was too good to pass up. My dad doesn't work, so my father likes to take as many opportunities to support the family as he can." It had taken Avalon a few years to get used to the idea of belonging to a same-sex couple, but around age 10 he'd come to call one father and the other dad. It made some sense, to him at least.

"But I don't really have a problem with Trump," he admitted. "I think that he's doing what he thinks is right for the country, even if the country may not agree. He's just a guy who was put into a position he wasn't ready for. I think he's doing the best that he can." He hoped that the girl would process what he was saying. It wasn't fair that everyone just assumed that Donald Trump was a dick. He didn't think that way. He liked to assume the best in people.

"Nice to meet you, Briella-Ashley," He smiled. Avalon didn't understand why people tried to shorten their names. He liked hearing people's full identies. Nicknames tended to cover up part of a person.

On the topic of Scotland, he shrugged.

"I'm still adjusting," he said. "I miss my friends from back home. I miss the Quidditch team. I miss calling 'soccer' soccer. I miss New York bagels." he hoped that he wasn't droning on. the girl might find his list offensive, as though he was hurting her country's reputation.

"The worst part is the accents," he laughed. "I sometimes find myself making people repeat their words two or three times.

"Are you from here?" He asked, realising that he'd just assumed that she was and perhaps he shouldn't assume things.

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