Lyla Holland
September 02, 2023 7:56 AM
Having a moment by Lyla Holland
Everything was totally fine. Lyla had had a...Christmas, and now she was back at Sonora, and everything was fine. She put the traditional box of cookies on Samara's bed as she waited for her friend to come up.She had known, to some extent, that her mom had been talking to her side of the family again. What she did not know was that the Hollands were set to host said family over Christmas. Kerri, her cousin, had ended up bunking in Lyla's room, and they'd gotten on well enough, but it had been awkward sharing with a person she'd never met before, and overwhelming to suddenly have a whole other family be part of her family.
Kerri had just turned eleven, which meant that next year, she'd be here at Sonora. Lyla had looked at her and wondered if she'd looked that scrawny when she had been eleven. She was much taller now, and she'd outgrown all her clothes from last year, though there still wasn't much going on chest-wise.
Lyla had been hoping that just she and her mom could go shopping for something for her to wear to the ball, without Lena, but Aunt Astrid had convinced Mom that it should be a girl's trip, and so Lyla had ended up crammed into the backseat of the car with Lena and Kerri. They had, at least, found a very cute dress with sparkling gold accents. It had an off-the-shoulder neckline, which Lyla thought looked very grown-up.
Uncle Ryan was alright, for a total and complete stranger. He'd brought a gift for each Lyla and Lena to put under the tree, and took over cooking breakfast the entire time he was there. Lyla had never eaten so many biscuits with jam in a two-week span.
The grown-ups had stayed up late every night, talking. Lyla halfway wanted to listen in, to find out why in the world Ryan and her mom had gotten separated. The other half had won out, if only out of fear that Kerri would wake up and catch her eavesdropping at the door. She didn't know if her cousin would snitch or not, and she didn't want to embarrass her mom by being caught sneaking, so she remained in the dark. It bothered her, though, wondering what could have caused such a rift between siblings. What would it take to cause a rift with Lena?
Lyla got out her writing supplies. It was weird, to think about writing to Lena, but it was weirder to think about Lena not meeting her kids until they were thirteen-practically a grown-up themselves. Whatever had happened between her mom and Ryan wasn't going to happen between her and Lena.
OOC: Open to having Samara come in for some cookies and conversation, also fine if it's just a reflective/informative post.
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Lyla Holland
Having a moment
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Samara Crosby
September 13, 2023 4:16 PM
Did I interrupt? by Samara Crosby
As usual, Samara’s holiday was chock full of tension and drama. Of course, she didn’t know anything different so to her, this was normal, and she doubted that she would know what to do with a peaceful and wholesome holiday. Besides, according to Mother, wholesomeness was unrealistic and fake and nobody could really pull it off.However, Samara wasn’t entirely sure that was true, because Aunt Pippa honestly came off that way. She was pretty sure that when it was just the four of them, without everyone else and their…rivalries and flaws, it was that sort of wholesome holiday. Which was one of the reasons, from what the Crotalus understood, that Mother had such a problem with her sister and Aunt Melanie. Because they came off as this perfect ideal that Mother could not achieve so she dismissed it instead.
That was not a criticism though, really. Samara very much saw her mother’s side of things-probably because she had heard it her whole life and also was sort of afraid not to. However, she also truly agreed with the underlying message of perfection being unattainable-and the pursuit of it being a frustrating waste of time. Therefore, Samara wouldn’t even try.
Which was liberating, honestly. She did things all the time like wear comfortable casual clothes under her robes because nobody saw them. Sometimes, she even just left her pajamas on. And even though she decidedly needed one and owned them, she sometimes didn’t wear a bra because they were not terribly comfortable either and she was wearing baggy, shapeless robes, so there was not really a point to wearing nice clothes and a bra. However, she did pay a bit more attention to things people could see. By which she meant that she showered, used deodorant and brushed her hair. Samara didn’t want to be totally gross, just as comfortable as possible.
And she had to at least be seen to follow social conventions. Otherwise she would embarrass her family and then they might turn against her. Although, honestly, since Mother resented said conventions, she might very well instead rail against them and be angry that they existed and that people were insulting her daughter and herself. It was the same with things like prefect and Head Student where if Samara did not win-and Martin had not won- such honors, it was the fault of those voting, not her or her brother and Mother would not only take it as a slight against them, but against her personally.
The thing was though, if she did not get prefect, that meant Lyla did and Samara definitely would be super happy for her friend, who was every bit deserving. However, Mother would still have a hippogriff. Plus, Robyn would get it for Teppenpaw since she was the only one and then she would share something with Lyla and Samara would be the odd one out.
Not that she wanted Lyla to be the odd one out either but the thing was that while Samara liked Robyn fine, she was unsure the feeling was mutual, like the Teppenpaw didn’t really want her around. So, if Lyla got prefect, Samara could end up left out but if Samara did, well, then maybe she and Robyn could bond! She really would like that. She wanted the Teppenpaw to like her. Since her parents liked her and they hated everyone else, she had always believed herself to be very likable, and the other third year sort of made her doubt that belief.
Still, hoping for it for herself, meant Lyla wouldn’t get it and she didn’t like the idea of rooting against her friend.
She entered the dorm to see her friend with writing supplies out. “Hey.” Samara greeted her. “Who are you writing to?” She wondered if Lyla’s dad had made it home for the holidays. Maybe he hadn’t and she was writing to him.
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Samara Crosby
Did I interrupt?
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Lyla Holland
October 02, 2023 3:11 AM
It's a welcome interruption by Lyla Holland
“Oh, hey!” Lyla stood up from the desk to hug her roommate, “I missed you! I brought cookies.”She pointed toward the box on Samara’s bed, wrapped prettily with red and gold ribbons. Lyla was quite proud that both her baking skills and her wrapping skills improved with every holiday.
“I was just writing to…um…Lena, actually. I kind of miss her.”
It wasn’t a lie, Lena was pretty much the only normal part of everything that had happened over midterm, and Lyla was strangely appreciative that despite a lot of things changing, her sister was a constant. A constant bother, but constant, nonetheless.
Lyla sat down on the edge of her bed, twirling a curl around her finger. She'd been dying to get back to Sonora, to talk to Samara about everything, and now she found herself struggling to find a starting point.
"So, my mom's family came down for Christmas. It was weird," Lyla blurted out suddenly, pausing before she continued, "Wait, do you want to talk about my holiday or yours first?"
It wasn't like the only thing she had to talk about was Ryan & Co.; Lyla's dress for the ball hung in the wardrobe already, and she was very much looking forward to working out plans for attending with her friends.
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Lyla Holland
It's a welcome interruption
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Samara Crosby
October 03, 2023 1:58 AM
Oh good by Samara Crosby
Samara smiled as she returned Lyla’s hug. What a nice way to be greeted. It felt so good to have someone be happy to see you. Not that she had felt that her family wasn’t but she was just glad that school was a place where she felt safe and comfortable. Well, for the most part, like, she had Lyla, who was a person she felt safe and comfortable around and like she didn’t have to walk on eggshells with. Samara did sort of feel like she had to walk on them with Robyn but that was more because she wanted to make sure that she didn’t do something that would make the Teppenpaw dislike her.-or, possibly, that she would dislike Samara more than she already did, as if Robyn already disliked her, as she so often feared, then it wouldn’t be making the other girl dislike her because that would suggest Robyn had previously liked her and Samara had done something wrong to make the Teppenpaw dislike her as opposed to Robyn already disliking her and Samara making things worse rather than better-than because she really thought the other third year would get angry like Mother would.Because nobody got angry quite like Mother would. Mother took anger and hatred to an art form almost.
However, Samara felt like with Lyla, she could relax. Her room at Sonora was a safe place and the Crotalus appreciated that. Prior to coming to school, she had actually been very worried about having a roommate. She had known that not everyone did, Mother hadn’t, which had been pretty much for the best all around, but the possibility had caused her some anxiety given how she’d been raised to believe that most people were unpleasant and unlikable creatures. It did not help matters that her brother had not really seemed to have had the best relationships with his and that she had been sorted into Crotalus where the meanest pureblood girls supposedly went. Of course, she’d also been told about all the worst possible people she could get stuck with in the other houses too. So all in all, Samara felt pretty lucky to have a roommate who was her best friend and hoped that nothing ever came between them. “I missed you too.”
She smiled even bigger at the mention of cookies. “Ooh thank you so much.” She had to admit that the cookies were a nice added bonus.
Samara blinked. She was sort of surprised to hear that Lyla missed her younger sister since she had always gotten the impression that the other Crotalus found her to be sort of a pain. From what Samara had gathered, that was what siblings were normally like, somewhere between how she and her brother actually adored each other-unusual in itself, as Martin was indifferent to most people-and how Mother loathed Aunt Pippa. “You do?”
Then Lyla blurted out something about her mother’s family visiting. That was news too, Samara didn’t think she’d ever mentioned them before. “You go. You clearly need to talk. Mine wasn’t even anything special, it was just the normal drama. Of course, Mother is thrilled that Martin is engaged before my cousin Hannah is.”
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Samara Crosby
Oh good
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Lyla Holland
October 07, 2023 1:41 AM
Yeah, it's great. Everything's great. by Lyla Holland
Lyla nodded in acknowledgement of the engagement; from what she knew of Samara's mother, it was a good thing when she was pleased with something. Accepting her roommate's relinquishment of the floor, Lyla tried to figure out where to start."So, you remember earlier this year when I was asking you about the Stonehurst family? They're from Monterey, in California, I guess, and as it turns out-" Lyla let out a short, barking laugh, "They're my family. And they stayed. At my house. For Christmas."
She didn't really know what to do with her hands; nothing felt natural. She settled for placing them on her hips. Samara, her sweet friend, had accidentally unlocked every thought that had run through Lyla's mind since she'd arrived home.
"Yep. So my mom and my uncle have...figured out their stuff, I guess, and I have a cousin, which is news. Oh, and more news, she's starting school here next year. She's okay. Her name's Kerri, and I just don't really know how to handle this whole thing."
Lyla realized that her words were coming out squeaky, and gave a small cough to clear her throat. She caught sight of her writing supplies laying out on the desk. It prompted a sigh.
"And I'm writing to Lena because...because my mom didn't talk to her brother for like, a million years, and I know that Lena gets on my nerves, but we're still sisters, you know? And I don't want that to happen to us. Anyway," Lyla thought she had better shut up and let Samara process the word vomit that she'd just dumped on her, "It was sort of happy, sort of sad, and really, really weird."
OOC: Lyla is referencing this post of Wendy's- https://sonora.terragenaonline.net/Boards/Post/66159
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Lyla Holland
Yeah, it's great. Everything's great.
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