Quill Work (Evan and Aoife)

Willow was sitting at one of the many tables in the library with a stack of parchment, her quill and a bottle of ink. She grumbled frustratedly crumpling up another piece of parchment and tossing it into a small pile that was beginning to form on the table. Her quill work didn't compare to her penmanship one bit! She always got too much ink on the page, it was still legible but it was obvious she'd never used a quill before in her life.

She sighed, putting the stopper back into her ink well. Was she ever going to fit in here and be a true witch? All the other first years seemed so far ahead of her and she was finding herself having to do extra research in her spare time to just be able to make conversation with some of the other students and to keep up in the classes. She sighed as she looked at the last piece of parchment she'd been working on, her quill work was terrible. Legible yes, but still terrible.

Aoife had decided to come to the library to do a bit of homework so she wasn't leaving everything until the last minute, like she always had at her old muggle school. She'd been doing pretty well so far, mainly due to all the reading she'd done over the holidays learning about Hogwarts and the stuff she needed to know to be at the same stage as the rest of her class.

When she came into the room, the Irish girl spotted a girl, probably a first year by how young she looked, sitting by herself. So Aoife obviously needed to bounce over and join her on the chair next to her. "Hi!" she whispered (because you were supposed to be quiet in a library). "I'm Aoife! Can I sit here?" She didn't want to sit alone and this was an opportunity to make another new friend.

After taking a seat and getting out her stuff, she started writing, only to get irritated when she still couldn't get the hang of this quill thing. "It's so stupid, these quills, don't you think?" Aoife said to the girl. "Pens are much easier."

Willow smiled at the girl. "Hi, sure you can! I'm Willow." She nodded to Aoife motioning to her stack of crumpled parchment. "Yeah, pens are way easier." She smiled to the girl. "I like your accent, where are you from?" Willow sounded different than everyone else in the school. That was because on top of being Muggle-born Willow was also Canadian, her family moved to London only a year before she got her Hogwarts letter.

She sighed looking at another piece of parchment and her quill and shook her head. "Quills are so frustrating, I've been working on my quill work all afternoon and it's not really getting any better."

Evan went to the library to get the newest "Martin Miggs" comics, when his eye suddenly caught a pile of crumpled parchment on a table. Heh. Trial and error. Only once in my life I got a pile this large. He smiled and noticed that this table was occupied by two young girls, probably first years. He was a first year too when he made his super-pile. Can it be the same problem? Evan decided to come closer to look at the parchments. That was it. The "Quill Problem". The one and only thing that prevented him from being the best student during the first year. Or at least he thought so.

"Um, hi?" he greeted the girls. "Sorry to interrupt, but.. Are you practicing in quill-writing?"

Willow started as an older boy approached, a Ravenclaw by his uniform colour. She smiled warmly. "How did you know?" She asked surprised. "Umm... hi, I'm Willow by the way, I'm a first year in Hufflepuff." She looked at her ever growing pile of parchment. "S-sorry for the mess... I'm trying to get better at using quills... I'm a muggle-born so using quills is entirely new to me and I always seem to use either too much ink or not enough ink and it just ends up looking sloppy... only thing I miss about being a muggle these days is pens!" She blinked in surprise. "I'm rambling now aren't I? I'm sorry."

"Well, I'm Evan Williams, third year," he replied. "And in case you heard about me, don't believe it. It all lies. I'm not that bad." This introduction was obviously lame. But if some rumors had reached Willow, it was probably the best way to start a conversation. "I used to make piles just like this one in my first year too, that's how." He gestured towards the pile of crumpled parchment. "Although I did it at night in the common room, so no one could see. Hmm, I still prefer pens to quills, by the way. Can I sit here?" Not waiting for an answer, he took a seat and opened his bag. "It's bigger on the inside, just like TARDIS."

As Evan opened his bag, a gray tabby can emerged from it. She leaped on the table, sniffed the air, and looked around. When she noticed the pile of crumpled parchment sheets, she chose one that resembled ball the most, threw it on the ground, and started playing with it.

Willow smiled to Evan. "You're a muggle-born too?" She asked happily. So she wasn't the only one, perhaps Evan and Aoife would understand her then! She started as a cat jumped out of Evan's bag. "ooh, kitty!" She called the cat over excitedly, "come here cutie!" She looked to Evan with a smile, "is she yours? I love cats, Smudge lives in my room."

Sparkle heard the girl calling her and looked up at Evan, waiting for his reaction. When Evan nodded slightly, she leaped back on the table and came closer to Willow.

Sparkle generally liked people, especially who acted like they were fond of cats.

Willow smiled as the cat approached, she held out her hand softly and continued calling her. "Come on," she said softly, "I just want to pet you, I won't hurt you." She smiled as the cat inched closer. "What a sweet little kitty you are."

"Ireland," Aoife beamed at Willow. Someone had complimented her accent! First time ever! Most people found it really annoying. "What about you? Yours sounds different too."

Then that boy came over. THAT HEARTLESS DINOSAUR WHO WASN'T ACTUALLY THAT HEARTLESS BECAUSE THE FLOWERS WERE FAKE BUT STILL. When Willow talked to him about quills, Aoife crossed her arms and didn't try to get involved in the conversation. But he did have a REALLY cute cat, she had to admit.

But then he mentioned a TARDIS. She couldn't ignore a reference to a TARDIS. Forgetting the principles she'd just established, Aoife grinned at him. "I LOVE Doctor Who! And yes, I do hate quills!" A bit late but the answer was still there.

"Yep, luckily, I'm a muggle-born," Evan replied to Willow. Then he turned to the girl who knew what TARDIS meant and said, "Heh, Doctor Who is surely one of the things that make being a muggle-born so awesome. Well, quills, on the other hand, were ruining my Hogwarts life too." Evan made a short dramatic pause and continued, "But not for long! I asked my sister to send me some gel pens that look like quills. I actually like ballpoint pens better, but their writing is too different from real quills'. Oh, what's your name, by the way?"

Willow smiled to Aoife, "I'm from Canada, my family moved to London last year and then I got my Hogwarts letter this year." Willow looked between the two confused. "What's a TARDIS? Who's Doctor Who?" She titled her head a little confused while she stroked the cute cat.

Willow smiled at the older Ravenclaw boy. "I'm also muggle-born, my name's Willow and I'm a Hufflepuff and in my first year here." Her eyes widened in excitement, "gel pens that look like quills?! Then I could get used to the amount of ink and pressure to use while still feeling rather comfortable writing, once I get used to that the transition to quills will be much easier! That's a great idea Evan, I should write home and see if my mom can get me some!" Willow perked up happily, removed her wand from her cloak and gave it a swish and a flick. "Wingardium Leviosa!" She announced happily. The crumpled pile of parchment levitated into the air and then, with Willow directing them with her wand, landed elegantly in a nearby wastebin. She nodded to herself satisfied. "Finite Incantatem!" She said happily, ending the spell. She was getting quite good with her wand-work all ready.

Aoife gasped dramatically. This girl was DEPRIVED. And she was a muggle-born too, so you'd think she'd know what THE BEST TV SHOW OF ALL TIME was, even if she'd been stupid enough not to watch it. "OH, it must be cause you're from CANADA." That made sense. But you'd think Canada would be a little more intelligent. "HE'S A TIME LORD. FROM THE BEST SHOW EVER," Aoife beamed. "And a tardis is his cool machine WHICH IS BIGGER ON THE INSIDE LIKE EVAN'S BAG! Oh, and my name's O'Donnell. Aoife O'Donnell. Sheep and time lord." That sounded quite cool. Maybe her new introduction thingy?

"That's a good idea," the Irish girl nodded. "I don't want to trouble my family or anything, though..." Mainly because they were pretty broke at the minute and even a pen would seem mean to Aoife. When they could only just afford food for the family and the animals.

"Sheep and time lord. Sounds cool," Evan replied and smiled. That was a really cool introduction. "Oh, I have one spare pen, by the way. I don't use mine as much as I used to. My sister sent me three of them, but I somehow broke one. I don't think I actually need more than one right now, as I've learned how to write with a quill."

It felt so good being nice to nice people. Evan looked inside his bag and was searching something for a while, then he turned to Aoife again said, "Sorry, seems like a don't have a quill-pen with me at the moment. But don't worry, you'll get one." He smiled to the sheep time lord.

Willow nodded a little as Aoife explained, rather loudly, about this Doctor Who business. She giggled a little to the girl's introduction of herself and then quickly motioned for her to keep her voice down. They were in the library after all.

The Hufflepuff smiled at Evan, that was very nice of him. Slowly, she picked her quill back up and began to write a letter home asking for some gel pens that looked like quills. Hopefully her parents would be able to find some, she explained the need for them clearly, though it was probably apparent from the appearance of her letter. Several spots of parchment had a bit of ink leaking through it where she'd let the quill linger too long.

"Thanks so much for the idea Evan." She said softly as she folded up her letter and placed it in an envelope that she'd carefully addressed to avoid the ink from that leaking through to her letter. "I should go give this to Luna, my owl, so that she can take it off to my parents." The young girl smiled warmly.

"W-wait, what?" she stammered. He was giving this awesome quill pen to her for FREE? Turned out he wasn't so heartless after all. Aoife beamed. "You're GIVING it to me?" Nobody ever GAVE her anything. For FREE. Other than food, but that was different. It was all her siblings fault. It was every kid for their own at home. They never GAVE each other anything, unless they got something back. "THANK YOU!" She wrapped her arms around him suddenly. FREE HUG FOR EVAN.

It was sort of bad that the other girl wasn't getting one, but she was going to write to her parents and get one, so it was fair enough, Aoife supposed.

"Owl, cool. I have one too, but I left mine at my family house, so they can contact me anytime. Because I can always send them a letter with one of the school owls anyway. Oh, and my sister likes birds," Evan told Willow. The other reason of leaving the owl behind was the "one pet" rule. He couldn't bring both Sparkle and Arrow to Hogwarts. But he would never buy an owl in the first place if he didn't want to let his family write him when they wish to.

"Of course, Aoife! If you don't want to trou-," Evan hadn't finished his talking yet when Aoife suddenly hugged him. Oh, God! How cute one can be! For a couple of seconds Evan was probably the happiest person. Hug from a time lord, not many people had it. He carefully hugged Aoife back, like she was as fragile as a lily. Or even more fragile. Anyway, this quill talk totally worth it.

Willow blushed a little. "Luna takes turns staying here and at my parents' place. Granted, my parents live in London so they can't have an owl around all the time. We take turns writing to each other." She smiled as Aoife hugged Evan, how sweet!

She cleared her throat after a moment. "Well I should be going and giving this to Luna, thank you for the idea Evan, bye Aoife!" She slipped out with her things quickly giving them some time alone in case they needed it.

"Bye Willow! Say hi to...your owl for me!" Aoife grinned, still hugging Evan as the Hufflepuff left the library.

Why was he hugging her so stupidly. You were supposed to SQUEEZE the person, not pretend they were a feather who would break any minute. Pffhh. Stupid boy. "Evan! You're such a good person, even though you don't know how to HUG someone!" She reluctantly let go of him.

"Bye!" Evan said to the leaving Hufflepuff.

Aoife hugged Evan a little more and complained how bad he was at it. "Oh.. I-I'm sorry," Evan mumbled, when Aoife let go of him. "I'll be better next time. I mean, if there is one. I promise, okay?" At least she called me a good person. This happens not so often. Hmm.. I think it has *never* happened at Hogwarts. Even if one called Evan good during the last three years, he didn't remember it. Memory wasn't one of the things Evan could be proud of, despite Evan tried to be proud of everything.

Suddenly Evan got an idea. "Aoife, are you going to the Dark Arts special dinner? Hm.. I mean, are you invited? Well, now you can go there anyway. If you want, of course.. Because I can bring a guest, you know." That was probably the most illiterate way to ask someone to come to the group A dinner.

"There will be one!" Aoife assured him. Hopefully. Because he was an adorable little dinosaur who had a heart. Definitely. And wasn't that little. Well, maybe he was but so was she. See, Claire was right. She did babble on, even in her HEAD.

Then he asked about the DADA dinner party. "Yeah, I'm going. It's going to be fun even though Profe-" WHY WAS SHE SO THICK ON PICKING THESE THINGS UP? "Well, I-I'm really sorry. I-I'm taking Hunter already." Now Aoife was the heartless one. She felt so bad but she couldn't owl her best friend and say "sorry I take back my invitation because I want to go with someone else". And she'd been invited anyway.

What if he was sad? Maybe there wouldn't be a next time after all.

"Oh, so you will be there. Cool. Then I can meet you at the party and I still can invite someone!" Evan was really glad to know he was going to meet Aoife again soon. "You're pretty talented at magic if you was invited despite you're just a first year!" he added. "True daughter of Gallifrey!"

Evan stood up and asked, "So, let's get going then? I'm going to carry my gel quill with me, in case we meet somewhere." He opened his bag widely, inviting Sparkle to leap in.

Sparkle was a bit upset because of Willow's leaving. The girl was really nice to her and even stroke her a little. Nevertheless, the second girl was still here, and Sparkle couldn't miss an opportunity to get some more petting. So she came close to Aoife and purred, expecting some nice treatment.

Oh, that was cool then. Maybe there would be a next time after all. "Not really, I just used my textbook. I don't like that professor. He gave me detention and cares about blood purity." Yes, Aoife had read up on this and knew all about purebloods and stuff now. "He doesn't like me either put he put me in Group A. And thanks!" True daughter of Gallifrey. Best compliment EVER.

The Irish girl was about to stand up and leave when Evan's cat came up to her and she beamed. Animals were awesome. "Hello," Aoife murmured happily, stroking Sparkle gently. She was quite good with animals because she'd grown up on a farm, whether they be sheep or cats or horses.