Looking Forward (Adara/Quinn)

[Adara Snow]

Adara had been spending far less time at Hogwarts than she likely should have. She wasn't neglecting her duties as prefect or Head Girl, but had hardly begun her studies for her NEWTs. She was determined to get O's in everything, to live up to everything she had been raised for. So she had pulled herself away from Emilian for an afternoon cloistered in the library, studying without distraction.

At the moment, she was seated at one of the long tables, one nearest a window, with a generous stack of books to one side. She had one open, and was taking notes with a snow-white quill. She was hoping to accomplish as much as possible in the next week before classes began, and she would never do it with Emilian near.

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn hadn't had a whole lot to do in the previous weeks since she'd come to Hogwarts, and she was hoping, that maybe the library would offer her an escape. When she'd been growing up, mother had secreted books away for them, when their other duties were done they'd been allowed to read them. Quinn stared around the room looking at the aisles and aisles of books, and almost crying inside at the shear joy of the amount of literature.

Quinn looked around the room noticing that no one was here, not abnormal, since in the past weeks she'd only every seen a few people wandering the halls. Quinn's eyes snagged on the lone person in the library aside from herself, and the woman standing guard at the counter. Quinn, who had always had a twin sister to talk to and conspire with, was dying on the inside without anyone to talk to. Without looking about to much, she grabbed one of the first books that she could find, and wandered over to the table the girl was sitting at.

As she sat down, her book opening in front of her so anyone could read the title, she cleared her throat softly, "It's nice to see someone else in the library," she whispered. Quinn still hadn't realized that she'd picked up Watching Gillyweed Grow: The How Tos.

[Adara Snow]

Adara only finished the word she'd begun before mentally marking her spot and raising her head. It was a girl she didn't recognize, and so Adara could only think that she must be a new student. Yes, she herself had been at Hogwarts a mere year and a half, but her duties had assured that she was at least passingly familiar with most everyone.

She met the girl's eyes, and her lips curved gently. "I had begun to wonder if perhaps the other students were purchasing all of their books," she said, her naturally soft voice even lower for the silence of the library. "What is it that you are studying, if I may ask?" The girl didn't look quite old enough to be pursuing her NEWTs, but one never knew. It was then that her eyes caught on the title of the book. Any questions she may have had were pushed back for now, for propriety.

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn's eyes widened a moment when the girl at the table asked her what she was studying for, before looking quickly at the book in her hands. Her eyes closed briefly, the least the cosmic universe could have done for her was let her save face by picking a reasonable book, but then again, recently it seemed the universe was calling in her numbers.

"I'm not studying...I mean I am...I'm not actually reading this...I just, well I wanted." She wanted to find a way to hide inside of herself right now. "I thought maybe if I had this book...but I thought it would be a different book." Quinn set the book down, one of the fingers of her hand threading into her hair at what she'd just said.

"I haven't seen a whole lot of people since I've been here...and when I have...I scare them away." Like she was probably scaring this nice looking girl away. Normally she'd feel safe with another girl, and this girl looked doubly safe to her, but she was so horrified that she was messing things up again already, and all she'd meant to say was hello.

[Adara Snow]

Adara's head inclined slightly as she tried to keep up with what the girl was saying, tried to fill in the blanks to make sense of it. The subject of the book seemed separated from that of apparently scaring people, and though she was quite curious as to the mystery of the former, the latter seemed the larger topic, and so Adara addressed it first. "Why would you scare people?" she asked. The girl seemed quite unsure of herself, but not at all scary.

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn shrugged, "I don't know. I just...I want people..to be my friends...but I don't know what to say...I can't stop." Quinn closed her eyes a moment, "I scared Lyric away, I told him about my sister..and he looked at me like I was crazy. But he asked...he asked and I couldn't stop." Like she couldn't stop now, as long as no one asked direct questions she didn't scare them away. Maybe made them uncomfortable, like Dare and Michael, but she could change the topic before they left.

[Adara Snow]

"People often become uncomfortable if one becomes intimate too quickly, even in conversation," Adara advised. She had been tutored in the art of conversation, but had learned much in her time at school. She and Emilian had had a delicate balance of all types of intimacy, and even now it had its boundaries, for both of them. There was much more that Adara wanted to say, but she would not rush. Her homework was relegated to a future activity for now, in her interests in helping however she could.

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn stared at the girl, "am I being to forward now?" Quinn wrapped a piece of hair around her finger for a moment before she let it go. "My name is Quinn, Quinn Ashwinder." Quinn's lips twisted a moment, "I don't mean to be to forward...I just...never had to worry about it before." Father had never let her talk to any of the guests, only Kiley had been brave enough to sneak conversations. She'd just lived on the joy of her sister, now she had to live vicariously herself...and she didn't know how.

[Adara Snow]

Adara's soft smile returned. "Not for me," she assured Quinn. "My name is Adara Snow," she said, and extended one pale, delicate hand across the table. "Have you been homeschooled?" she asked. It was what made the most sense to her, having come from homeschooling herself. She recalled the strange looks she had gotten from so many people, and though she was still uncertain what had prompted those looks, she saw them far less often now.

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn bit her lip a moment, recalling ever harsh word and enforced fist that mandated she not betray her step-father. But he'd betrayed her, in the worst way possible, worse than had ever happened in the many beating, enforced horrors, he'd killed her sister. "Yes. My...stepfather didn't think it would be a good idea for my sister or I to go to public school." He hadn't believed in the nonsense they taught, like women's rights among other things. To this day, she still asked herself occasionally why her mother thought she deserved the life she had.

[Adara Snow]

"My father was the same in that regard," Adara said, unable to even begin to guess at the thoughts in Quinn's mind. She took so many things at face value that sometimes she missed them entirely. "My stepmother convinced him that I would be more marriageable if I were more worldly, and I must suppose that it was true." She was engaged to be married, as the delicate ring glinting on her finger proclaimed. "May I ask why you have transferred?" she asked, "Or would that be too personal?"

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn looked at the girl who was taking everything in stride, wondering if it was to personal, but altogether to willing to tell someone, anyone that wouldn't judge. And Adara kind of reminded her in some ways of her sister. "It is personal. My step-father, didn't want to marry myself of Kiley off, he didn't really want to have anything to do with us. But my mother's money was enough to take us, even though we weren't his." Quinn wasn't going to tell her everything, she couldn't. "I transferred, because my mother was afraid I was going to ruin the family, and she wanted me out of the house." Before she could smear her stepfather's name with a murder no one believed was him, before she could be killed herself. "And my twin sister...was killed."

[Adara Snow]

Adara's slender brows drew together in empathy. "How terrible," she said softly. "Life is filled with such tragedies that it can be difficult to go on, can it not?" she asked, then caught herself and straightened slightly, trying to keep emotion from clouding her thoughts. "But life goes on as well, and we are lucky that it is so for us." Adara had never had a sister, nor a brother, and would not profess to know Quinn's feelings, though she recalled her own all those months ago when she'd thought Emilian dead.

[Quinn Ashwinder]

Quinn nodded, "Kiley would say something like that as well." Kiley would say alot of things, like how wallowing and not making friends was for people that liked to live in the despair others created for them. "I keep trying, but when I talk to people, I talk to fast. And I never get around to talking about things that would make them friends with me. I don't even know what to talk about to make friends." Admitting that seemed like a failure of it's own nature.

[Adara Snow]

"Well, it does depend on with whom you are speaking," Adara said. "Without knowing the person it can be difficult to tell, but I find that most prefer to speak of themselves and their favorite pastimes, especially males. And you should wait to be offered truly personal thoughts." Adara herself preferred to listen to others speak and add what she could now and then. "A simple way to begin is to not ask about anything which would occur in more private surrounds than those you are speaking in, unless you have been invited."