Valentine Duell
January 30, 2021 6:12 PM
Everything is fine. by Valentine Duell
Valentine awoke to find herself feeling much better. That wasn't saying a whole lot, everything still hurt an awful lot. Moving her head, or anything for that matter, hurt so she looked around the room with just her eyes. It hadn't been terribly familiar the first time she'd woken up here, but by now the hospital wing was getting all to familiar. She'd been here at least an entire day already and she was bored. Visitation was very restrictive even though she was totally fine.She'd been very relieved to learn that Bonabelle had been okay after the attack. And that it hadn't actually been an attack. Even though she'd known it wasn't an attack and it had just been someone's memories of an attack? She sighed, which only hurt a bit, and tried to think of anything other than the situation and her actions that had brought her here. Bonabelle would be happily doing homework in her head if she were in this position, Val couldn't do that and she was very happy that Bonabelle was not here in this position. It wasn't a fun position.
So, what else could she do in the meantime but work on plans for her game. this only somewhat worked to her liking. The story was easy enough, but without her notebook and writing instruments, she couldn't work on any of the numbers and such. She'd really prefer to be writing story bits down as well so she didn't forget them, but... you worked with what you had. This didn't go on for very long before someone approached. Val raised her head up in excitement, her eyes shining before everything on her face turned into a grimace of pain and her head flopped back down onto the pillow. Ouch. "Hi!" She said though the brief swirl of vertigo as she closed her eyes and tried to refocus.
2
Valentine Duell
Everything is fine.
1490
1
5
Marissa Duell
February 03, 2021 6:39 PM
I think we'll have to agree to disagree for now. by Marissa Duell
It was fortunate, perhaps, that issues of bureaucracy and security prevented ready access to the school, that they kept Marissa Duell from rushing directly to Val’s side after she was informed there was a problem serious enough to warrant the school contacting her about it. Without those issues, she might have simply flown out of the house in any state she found herself in, up to and including that of wearing a bathrobe and no shoes.Since she could not do that, though, she had a chance to process the information before seeing Val but after the hard-but-brittle shell of composure she had instinctively thrown around herself upon receiving the information had cracked up and she had proceeded to react to the information. She could have probably refrained from crying a little longer, in a pinch, but she very much feared she might have been reduced to babbling in public, and that was not at all dignified. Or, more importantly, helpful.
It was strange, really. She had belonged to the wizarding world now for far longer than she had ever belonged to that of her parents, but she could never totally internalize the casual view she had gathered wizards usually took of danger to children. Perhaps it was just something about her nature – something that would have made her like she was even if she had been born to the longest wizarding lineage in the States – but she could not look at it like that, whatever her intellect told her about how even Muggle children were harder to kill than they looked like they were, and that Val had the advantage of magic, which made her sturdier yet. Intellect was all very well and good, but her instinctive first reactions where Valentine was concerned tended to be emotional, and that was why she had, at the first opportunity, blurted out, “I want to come see her.” Her manners had kicked back in almost immediately, and she had added, “I’m sorry, I know it’s inconvenient,” but even that statement had been followed by, “but I still want to see her.”
Due to the inconveniences, she had had time to have a cry and to rant, at length, to Andrew about how completely and utterly stupid the wizarding custom of boarding schools was, how it was all that system’s fault that they had lost Giselle for so long, and that it would have been that system’s fault if Val had been dying, and so on, and then she had recovered proper composure. She looked tired and strained as, with a strange feeling of déjà vu from her own student days, she entered the hospital wing, but was calm enough that she was no longer very worried about accidentally frightening Val through excessively open worry.
Her pace still abruptly picked up, though, when she saw Val try to sit up and fail. “Hi yourself,” she said, searching every bit of Val she could see for signs of trauma even though logically, she knew that wasn’t likely. “Don’t sit up, I’m guessing you have instructions to be still.” Both Val’s state and the fact that she seemed to have some kind of head injury supported that idea, making Marissa comfortable making the guess. “And that looked like it hurt – do you need anything? Should I find the nurse? What happened?”
16
Marissa Duell
I think we'll have to agree to disagree for now.
147
0
5
Valentine Duell
February 04, 2021 5:45 PM
I guess that's better than disagreeing to agree by Valentine Duell
A whole wash of feelings rushed through Valentine when she was finally able to focus on who had approached her. Mama was here! Oh... Mama was here. She was overjoyed to see Mama again, but if she was here... how bad were things? They weren't going to send her home were they? She was fine! Had she really caused that much trouble? She hadn't meant to do anything bad...Mama didn't sound angry, and Val couldn't do much more than nod in response to Mama's guess that she was supposed to be lying still. "I'm.. I'm fine." She tried to say in a good, strong, convincing voice. She wasn't sure that she'd succeeded. Then Mama asked the inevitable question that she hadn't realized she'd been dreading.
"What happened?"
What had Aunt Giselle already told her? What had the professors or the nurse already told her? She hesitated a bit to think about the words she needed to use. This may get tricky. "I'm not entirely certain," she started off slowly. She didn't want to lie, she didn't like lying, it was bad. It was also definitely not something she ever wanted to do to Mama. That would be very wrong. "I was out on the pitch, practicing my Seeking." Mama knew she was trying to claim that elusive spot on the team that Mama had once held. She tried to smile but it turned into a wince about halfway. "It was just for a few minutes between other activities, I was going to meet with Bonabelle afterwards."
Along with not lying, she didn't want to get into any trouble. She was being good like Mama had told her, short practice sessions weren't against the rules. Right? "While I was flying around..." she hesitated here, because she also really didn't want to get anyone else into trouble either. That would be worse than if she got into trouble. "I saw something... odd?" That was true, the apperations about school all year had been odd. She just didn't know what was going on with them, and how much people knew and what would Mama think if there were weird things going on and would she blame the professors for not doing more when they were doing lots and their best to deal with things that weren't really harmful?
Valentine tried to reign in her swirling panicked mind and made sure her expression was innocent and neutral as well. Everything was fine. "It... startled me, I guess and I lost control of my broom and hit the ground." On the plus side, she did get the chance to sing out some accolades now. "Bonabelle found me and helped get me up here. Everyone has been great and nice," other than that 'limited visitation' thing. "Aunt Giselle..." her voice trailed off again. This may take some more careful wording. "Has been here a lot to make sure I've been okay." She let out a little sigh, "I think she's upset at herself for not.." what was the word she wanted? "For not knowing what was happening, for not being there to stop it." She gave Mama a pleading look, "Don't be mad at her, please?"
2
Valentine Duell
I guess that's better than disagreeing to agree
1490
0
5
Marissa Duell
February 10, 2021 9:57 AM
That does sound like it would prolong our disagreement. by Marissa Duell
Marissa raised an eyebrow when Val announced that she was fine. She did not feel the need to say anything.She did, however, feel a flutter of guilt. She had always taught Val to be polite, in the same way that she had been taught, and her mother had been taught, and so on, world without end, as far as they were all concerned. To her, answering I'm fine to a casual inquiry when one was somewhat less than fine was not a lie, it was just manners. She had never actually told Val this, though...so had Val seen her do that before, and thought that was what she was supposed to do even with Marissa, even in extremities? Marissa could remember times, as a teenager, when she had been angry because she felt like her mother wanted her to pretend things were fine when they weren't, and she had always wanted Val to understand that honestly ranked above appearances in the family...just as she often thought now, as an adult, that her mother might well have also done....
Why had her own mother had to die, she thought despairingly. Or if not that, then why had Marissa never thought to ask her - so many things - when she was still alive? Val had been four when Elizabeth Stephenson had died. In the modern world, Marissa being in Greece for part of that time had put only relatively minor obstacles to communication. There had been time, and she hadn't taken proper advantage of it, and now there was only so much regret and uncertainty to work with. A poor substitute.
"Poor baby," she murmered when Val explained what had happened, though she felt some unease about it just the same. Val losing control of her broom? What in the world had she seen? She wasn't sure, though, that it would do any good to press. Val's hesitant speech and vague qualifications made it seem likely enough that Val might not even remember it fully, and that she might also just find extended talking difficult right now. "Thank goodness for Bonabelle, I'll have to be sure to thank her too."
She couldn't help but chuckle a little at the earnestness of the intercession for Giselle. "I'm not mad at Aunt Giselle," she promised, taking Val's hand. "Even she can't foresee everything, or necessarily prevent what she sees." Marissa knew less than many, but she had done some reading when Giselle was younger, trying to understand the then-child's difficulties; even Seers, she had gathered, didn't seem to really know if what they saw in their visions and trances was a possibility or, once someone was aware of it, a given, a thing prodding the future toward a conclusion. "I'm just glad she's been here for you." One more thing she owed Giselle...at least this time, it wasn't something she owed to make up for parts of the past she still felt guilty about, but a debt of gratitude instead. "I don't want either of you to think you did anything wrong, it seems it just - happened. Though I hope you won't practice alone outside if you can help it. Practicing is good, but if Bonabelle hadn't come to find you, and you'd been out there alone for a long time...Thank goodness you're going to be okay."
16
Marissa Duell
That does sound like it would prolong our disagreement.
147
0
5