So....um..... we are...? [tag Dathan] on Labyrinth Gardens

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

March 11, 2022 7:58 PM

So....um..... we are...? [tag Dathan] by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

OOC: Abusing fuzzy time, and setting this on day one of term, before the OF BIC:

She and Dathan had had a date. That fact was certain. She was fairly sure it had been an enjoyable date too, for both of them, even if it had been kind of awkward at times. And they both wanted more dates. Or had wanted that, at the end of term. There had been a summer in between, and he might have changed his mind. And also, having more dates and dating… Was that the same thing? And did that make them boyfriend and girlfriend? She hadn’t even kissed him at the ball, much as she’d wanted to, so they probably weren’t boyfriend and girlfriend. She had tried to google some of these questions, but there hadn’t been any real, definitive answers. It just went on a lot about talking about what you each wanted. Which was easier said than done.

She knew what she wanted, and it involved a lot of kisses, so (in incognito mode) she had googled how exactly to do that too. And, as she was going to be away from the computer and its awesome question answering abilities for a while, a few other things. Most of which had seemed sort of gross at first, but then weirdly intriguing… So, on the plus side, she was returning to school feeling pretty well-informed about the theory side of things. But, like most of her school subjects, that was a very different thing from the practical. Though normally it was the other way around, and the practical made sense while the theory was mind-boggling. This time, it made sense in theory, but she still didn’t feel confident to bring up any of the subjects of whether they were on dates or dating or what that meant, or how to actually go about kissing him.

She waited for his wagon, whilst trying not to look like she was waiting. She took a seat near the drop off point, reading a book, her eyes flicking up every few seconds to check for his arrival. When he arrived, she had planned on letting him head towards school, then falling in behind him, so they could cross paths without it seeming like she’d been sitting waiting for him. Except, as she watched for him getting off the wagon, she accidentally caught his eye. She lifted a hand, waving, and stood from her seat, glad to have the book in her hand, hoping it provided some cover and meant she didn’t look like a totally creepy stalker. Maybe she should have stayed seated, like she was just casually hanging out here? But she didn’t want to look unenthusiastic. Why was it such a fine line between those two extremes? She didn’t rush forward, hoping that the throng of students exiting the wagon seemed like reason enough not to go rushing in, and hoping that he’d come say ‘hi’ instead of carrying on with them.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers So....um..... we are...? [tag Dathan] 1480 1 5

Dathan Fischer

March 12, 2022 6:13 PM

Great question! I...am as unsure as you. by Dathan Fischer

The last night of school last year had been...weird. Fantastic in a lot of ways, but also very...weird, especially after the nerve-wracking parts had mostly resolved and things had been going pretty well. Dathan's memory of the occasion felt a little surreal, almost, if he was to be honest - it just didn't seem like it could have really happened, not to a random nobody of no distinguishing traits like him, and yet...it had happened. It had been kind of awkward and not at all how he would have planned it and also awesome anyway in its own way, but it had happened.

For most of the summer, that had been just about the coolest thing ever. Then, all of a sudden, it had become late summer out of nowhere, and then -

It had still been awesome, of course. The memory wasn't flipping terrifying, it was just...kind of the gateway into thoughts that were flipping terrifying. Late summer meant he was close to going back to school, and going back to school meant that whatever that last evening had been would...probably...not just be a one-off heat-of-the-moment kind of thing anymore. They'd...go forward from there, one way or the other, and do so as part of everyday life. It was one thing to have the nerve to sort of admit you liked someone when you were about to go home for two months, but if anything went wrong at school, it could be months that it was just part of life as normal. So....

Stepping off the wagon, he looked around - and there Sadie was. She was kind of waving and smiling, so he also kind of waved and smiled, hoping he wasn't turning any absurd colors as he did so and then made his way over to her.

"Hey," he said. And, after that brilliant beginning, his brain promptly stalled because oh god what were people supposed to do in these situations, why had he not Googled it while he was at home.... "Want to go for a walk with me?" he said, the first sorta coherent thing to pop into his head.

16 Dathan Fischer Great question! I...am as unsure as you. 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

March 18, 2022 8:42 PM

I am the captain of uncertainty by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

He was waving! And smiling! And coming over! What should she do? Hug him? They’d more or less been on hugging terms, a bit, right? Or kiss him on the cheek? That was waaay too bold, even though she spent a lot of time imagining this cool, confident version of herself that just did things like that and got away with it. She opted for waving again. Just… at really short range. And then instantly regretting that.

“Yes!” she smiled, when he offered to go on a walk with her. That was exactly what she had wanted, and she tried not to grin in that awkward way that made her nose scrunch up and look all ugly, or bounce on the spot like a weirdo even though she really wanted to. She wanted to slip her arm into his too, though she was pretty sure she should wait for it to be offered.

She tugged the edges of her sundress, on the non-Dathan side, trying to subtly twitch it back into position, even though it hadn’t moved out of it. She had read a lot of online articles. What to wear on a second date (did that apply?) and what clothes guys liked on girls. A lot of those had had her rushing to close the tab as fast as possible when they mentioned words like ‘sexy’ five times in the first paragraph. She always felt like she was grown up enough for a relationship until she read the ways adults described them and wanted to bury her face in her pillow. She did want him to think she was… something though. Pretty? Cute? Hot? She didn’t want to look like just a cutesy little girl, but she wasn’t sure she was ready to ‘drive a man wild with desire with these simple wardrobe tricks!’ She had opted for a little white sundress, because apparently the colour white sent subliminal messages that you were marriage material (but subliminal enough that Dathan wouldn’t know she was trying to say that - because whilst it absolutely totally mattered what you wore, there was also a convenient level of double think that said boys weren’t going to notice most things). She’d gone for one that stopped a little way above the knee. It was a length she wore quite a lot. She’d definitely seen girls in shorter things. Should she have gone shorter to make him like her more? How was it possible to think that and be self conscious about how short it was at the exact same time?

“How was your summer?” she asked. Wow. Original.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers I am the captain of uncertainty 1480 0 5

Dathan Fischer

March 23, 2022 3:56 PM

I guess that makes me assistant captain? by Dathan Fischer

If the color white sent subliminal messages about being marriage material, those messages were certainly given good cover for brain infiltration by the parts of the teenaged, heterosexual, male brain which registered 'sundress' on a decidedly superliminal level. Exactly how weird, Dathan wondered, was it to think that someone had really nice collarbones, along with really nice...all the appealing features showcased by sundresses? And exactly how bad was it that he - whose main thoughts about traveling clothes had been about mitigating the discomforts of the wagon ride - had shown up in jean shorts and a t-shirt?

Again, he had the distinct thought that he was an idiot to go for it with a girl like her. That he was going to make a complete fool of himself. But...she had seemed really happy to see him. And if she hadn't seemed at least kinda into him last year at the Ball last year, then wow, was he ever doomed when it came to picking up cues with any girls ever....

"It was okay," he said when asked about his summer. "The usual - hanging out some with my cousins, avoiding my old elementary school bullies...thinking about - " he could tell his ears were doing that thing where they tried their best to match the color of his hair - "y'know...you, and ideas for those...more dates we talked about last year, if you're still on board with that? You? I mean, how was your summer?"

16 Dathan Fischer I guess that makes me assistant captain? 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

March 24, 2022 4:40 AM

You might be able to earn that by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

Dathan looked super casual (and cute) in his shorts and tee. Sadie hoped he didn’t think she was overdressed—at least, in the sense of having made too much, off putting effort—whilst also continuing to worry that she might be underdressed in other ways… But he’d like that, right? No one wanted a girl who looked all slobby. He was allowed to dress down, but she was supposed to be pretty…

She listened to his summer tales, very glad the hanging out he’d been doing had been with cousins. She almost interjected at the ‘bullies’ part, rather shocked by that new piece of information, but then he said something else which drove it out of her head completely, at least for a moment.

“You were thinking about me?” she asked, a smile on lips which made it clear that was a good thing. She desperately scrambled to push the ways she’d been thinking about him to the back of her brain, trying not to wonder if he meant something similar, because she’d almost definitely turn bright red if she let herself think that. “I definitely still want to. If you still want to?” she checked, even though if he’d been coming up with date ideas, it sounded almost definite that he did. “My summer was fine. Just family stuff. And missing you and Jack-Jack,” she said, trying to copy without copying, and hoping that didn’t sound totally weird. It probably did. Best to move on quickly. “What date ideas did you come up with?” she asked hopefully.

“And um…” He’d said it super casually, like it didn’t even matter. But it had to matter. She knew how much that sort of thing could hurt, and whilst she didn’t think that Dathan worried nearly as much as she did about what he revealed about himself, it was a kind of personal thing, and it felt rude to ignore it. “You were bullied at your old school?” she asked, her brown eyes looking him over with concern.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers You might be able to earn that 1480 0 5

Dathan Fischer

April 07, 2022 10:22 PM

I will try my best. by Dathan Fischer

OOC: BIC:

Oh, thank goodness. Sadie was smiling a little - lit was little, but it definitely a smile! - as she repeated what he had said about thinking of her over the summer. He wasn't a weirdo creep! Or if he was, by some objective standard (did something like that even exist? Did that even make sense as, like, a...concept or whatever?) , then...well, Sadie didn't seem to agree with that standard, and that was all that mattered here, right?

"Yeah," he said with a sheepish smile. "And yeah, definitely still want to do that."

He turned even redder, somehow, when she said she'd missed him; she'd said it in the same sentence as talking about her pet, but...she really liked Jack-Jack a lot, right? "I...totally tell me if stuff sounds too lame," he said quickly. "I, uh, Googled ideas for dates when you're in boarding school - some of them still don't work here," he admitted. "But we could probably pull off ice skating, and picnics, and going to a school sports even together. Or hiking...kinda? I'm pretty sure everything here is pretty flat, but hey, if that's what you like to do." He chuckled and then admitted, "I looked up what people did in, like, the eighties - I'm pretty sure I can't pull off a mix tape - not least because I don't know the details of what that is - but what are your thoughts on rollerskates?" he half-joked.

He was a little surprised when she went back to the stuff about his elementary school experiences, looking concerned. "I mean, it was nothing too bad," he said. "I learned to run fast pretty quick - I figured I'd be the shortest guy on the track team in high school, before I knew about the whole wizard thing. More people would say stupid stuff about me being short and, you know, the hair. I just grinned and dealt with that stuff." He glanced at her. "What was school like for you, before?" he asked.

16 Dathan Fischer I will try my best. 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

April 11, 2022 5:29 AM

I don't know, you seem to have pretty solid ideas by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

“I think they’re like… Spotify playlists for old people,” Sadie said, when Dathan expressed wonderings over the ancient artifact know as a mixtape. It was a grand romantic gesture she could probably live without, seeing as she was pretty sure you needed a vintage music device to play them on or something. Like, even older than ipods. “Those all sound wonderful,” she smiled, regarding his date ideas. She’d not really been sure of anything they’d be able to do, and he’d come up with a whole list. Even if they’d been terrible date ideas, she would have been impressed by him going into research mode for her, but they all actually sounded really fun. She wasn’t usually the biggest fan of Quidditch, but weirdly that one appealed a lot. Maybe because it kind of fitted onto her mental template of what a date would be like. “A lot of them even sound like things we might have done at home. I like that.”

Except for maybe roller skating, though it could be kinda fun or funny.

“How come ice skating sounds like a totally normal date idea, but roller skating seems like a total weird throw back? Like, they’re the same thing, just one of them’s freezing cold. How come that got to be the popular one?” she laughed.

They returned to the subject of Muggle school, and although Dathan was joking, Sadie wasn’t laughing. If he’d had to learn to run fast, that sounded like people had been really awful.

“I like your hair!” She said, her tone bordering on argumentative, as if she was fully prepared to go and face off with any school bullies who dared disagree with her. She flushed a little, both at the strength of her own tone, and as Dathan turned the question back on her. Whilst it would never have occurred to her to see Dathan’s hair as anything bad, it was at least something that was on the outside. The things that had made school awful for her weren’t… But one thing movies and teen dramas had taught her was that you were supposed to be able to be honest and open up to someone you truly liked. Little as she wanted to go over that stuff, the only other option right now was lying to Dathan, and she didn’t want to do that either.

“It wasn’t a lot of fun,” she said quietly. “I… I don’t know if you noticed the headmaster using my full name when he gave me my prefect badge last year? I hate it, and it’s stupid—please, don’t try to tell me that it isn’t,” she begged. She hoped that had been a kindness with his hair, she had really meant it. But she didn’t want to hear him defend the name that she hated. “Anyway, kids would make fun of it a lot. And of some of the stuff my mom did with us. But mostly the name thing,” she added, not quite sure she wanted to get deep into all her childhood humiliations.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers I don't know, you seem to have pretty solid ideas 1480 0 5

Dathan Fischer

April 14, 2022 8:53 PM

Oh - uh, thanks! I appreciate that. by Dathan Fischer

Dathan grinned, feeling irrationally delighted about how Sadie's thoughts about skating sort of dovetailed with his. "I know, right?" he said. "It's totally backward. Unless you, I don't know, really like the cold, I guess," he conceded. "Me, I'm...usually okay without it, you know?"

He flushed again (again! Eugh!) when Sadie jumped to the defense of his hair color. That was pretty much the first time he could ever remember anyone doing that; his mom saying that people picked on stupid stuff like that because they were jealous they couldn't find anything more substantial to complain about didn't count, especially since it implicitly acknowledged that it was a somewhat less than ideal feature anyway. "Aw, thanks, Sadie," he said, running a self-conscious hand around the back of his neck. "I like your hair, too," he added, immediately registering that this was an incredibly stupid thing to have said.

Dathan winced a little in sympathy as Sadie described her elementary school experiences. Now that he thought about it, he did remember the headmaster calling her something longer than usual; he thought that he had thought at the time that it was a hyphenated surname or something. It had had a pretty sound, but also been a little weird...like it was a landmark or something. Not that people could help whatever kinds of names their parents stuck them with.

"That sucks," he said, with real sympathy. "If it helps, I always thought 'Dathan' sounded kinda stupid, too. Everyone always figures I'm Nathan and I just can't say my own name right. Still, though - nobody should have made fun of you for it. It's not your fault what kind of mood your parents were in when they named you - or anybody. But just 'Sadie Chalmers' is a nice name," he added firmly.

16 Dathan Fischer Oh - uh, thanks! I appreciate that. 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

April 28, 2022 4:55 AM

So, any more of them? by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

“Warmer is definitely better. I am not looking forward to another Irish winter,” Sadie agreed. “Like, hot chocolate and a cosy aesthetic is all well and good, but you can just turn the AC on to enjoy it.

“Thank you,” Sadie smiled, when Dathan complimented her hair in return. Occasionally, she resented her hair, sure that the sleek blonde locks were a hallmark of the image her mother wanted to present of her, but she could never quite get angry enough at it to want to lop it all off. She’d spent so long reading magazines, sitting in Jessica’s room, learning how to do all kinds of fancy braids and rolls. She had reclaimed her hair, and she could rebel through it, because it was something malleable to do with as she wanted.

“People can be so stupid,” she said, rolling her eyes. She didn’t try to tell him his name was nice, even though she thought it was. Given what she’d just said, she knew that wasn’t always the comfort it was meant as. And it was sort of cool, having the burden of being oddly named as something in common. She guessed they’d be giving their children the most plain and ordinary names they could think of. “Yeah, like you said… It’s not like any of us choose our names.” Well, technically Ellie had, but even if Sadie had thought of that, she wouldn’t have been very likely to bring her up. “Thank you,” she smiled, clearly delighted when he complimented the chosen version of her name. It sounded plainer, but if she was just going to be ‘plain old Sadie,’ that seemed to so far be working out for her rather nicely. Moreso than any of the Sadie-Lake stuff she’d done. Plain old Sadie had a boyfriend, after all. Well… probably.

“Uh… so…” she began, figuring she ought to address that, and then falling very short on the courage front. “... a date will be nice,” she finished, a little awkwardly.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers So, any more of them? 1480 0 5

Dathan Fischer

May 17, 2022 1:10 PM

Maybe...a couple? by Dathan Fischer

Dathan nodded, as there really was no way to argue against the idea that people - some of them, anyway - could be really stupid, and he didn't mean in the sense of doing badly on the SATS or CATS or whatever test a person's school chose to torture them with. "Mom used to say they were just mad that they couldn't come up with anything better than that to be jerks about. She might have just been trying to make me feel better, but you know, it does kind of make sense." Even though he knew he had a whole lot more points that he would have thought would make more sense to poke fun at than his hair, but what did he know? One of the things he would give himself credit for was not being a total jerk, or really understanding why he'd...want to be a total jerk, exactly? Maybe someone could explain to him what was supposed to be fun to be rude to people, but he was kind of skeptical about the odds of that.

"I think so, too," he said, flushing a little yet again but smiling, when Sadie said a date would be nice. "If we count the Ball, will that make two dates? And if it does - does that make us...dating? Like, officially?"

Which felt weird to ask, but what was he supposed to do, exactly? He kind of thought it would be better for everyone involved if they were just clear up front about what...whatever this was...was, so nobody got confused. He thought Professors Skies and Wright would be really annoyed about it if he started letting other people infringe on their confusing-him-to-death privileges; they had been working at it for six years, after all, so a new thing being the one that did him in would be just about as unfair to them as it would be to him if the deck was stacked even further in their favor by the addition of a new player.

16 Dathan Fischer Maybe...a couple? 1457 0 5

Sadie-Lake Chalmers

June 08, 2022 12:28 AM

Like us? by Sadie-Lake Chalmers

Sadie nodded in agreement with Dathan's mom's assessment of bullies. She personally couldn't see any reason to make fun of even his hair, and certainly nothing beyond that.

"I think so," she smiled, when he asked if the ball was date one, and whether date two would mean they were dating. Though did that mean they weren't dating until they went on it? Or did the asking count? "I'd like that," she clarified so there could be no ambiguity.

She wondered what that meant in terms of kissing. She had heard things about waiting a certain number of dates but she wasn't sure if that applied to kissing or Other Stuff that she definitely wasn't about to do. Maybe they should say this was a date, so then they'd definitely be dating, and it would speed up the timeline on when she could kiss him? Except, this was more just a walk and figuring out what to do, and dates had to be something special.

"Shall we sit?" she asked, indicating a bench. They'd got to a more quiet area of the gardens, and she remembered the ball, and how when they'd sat next to each other it felt like they could lean into each other's space, and how aware she'd been of his presence beside her. She took a seat on the bench, finding that she wasn't really leaving a space between them at all.

13 Sadie-Lake Chalmers Like us? 1480 0 5