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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 19:56:49 GMT -5
"This is my phone," Rhys said. "It's probably more expensive than I should have bought but I'm kind of a technophile. Ah...I like tech stuff, like this, my computer, television, whatever." He swiped his finger over the screen and it showed the home screen, with a picture of a smiling Matthew as the background. "I don't go anywhere without this.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 20:03:02 GMT -5
Dare's eyes widened, and he leaned over to better see the thing. "It looks like a computer," he said. A very little one, or at least, the part with the pictures. "How does it work? It's not plugged into anything!" In the four years since he'd moved to Europe, he'd had very little exposure to Muggle things, and had no clue how much they could change over time.
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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 20:17:10 GMT -5
"It's a lot like a computer," Rhys said. "Phones now are pretty advanced. I can do just about anything I want on here. I can get maps, write, research something, play games...really whatever. It has a battery inside of it that I have to charge overnight with a plug so that it will work. How much do you know about this kind of thing?" Dare knew computers, apparently, but Rhys couldn't be certain how far Dare's knowledge extended.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 20:30:08 GMT -5
"My mom was a Muggle—a Squib, but she never knew, she grew up as a Muggle—so we had some stuff that plugged in. No one used it but her, but like, we had a Muggle stove and stuff." And he'd said it. After five months, he'd finally said it out loud. He distracted himself from the fact by biting into the edge of the cone.
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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 20:41:44 GMT -5
"So you don't know a ton, then," Rhys said. He flipped through some of the things on his phone and found a simple connect three game and slid it over to Dare. "Get three of the same color in a row, there's no time limit or anything. Give it a shot, you just have to touch the screen. So how did your mum end up in that situation?" he asked when he looked up away from the phone again.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 21:13:12 GMT -5
Dare poked at the computer-phone, delighted when it responded to his touch, as promised. "Uh, someone told me that some of the Pureblood families, some of the bad ones, if their kid doesn't show magic, they'll just give them up. So that's probably what happened," Dare said distractedly. He poked at the phone again, smiling boyishly, though it had given him the same reaction only a moment before.
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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 21:23:22 GMT -5
Rhys was silent. It hit a little close to home for him, considering the kids he regularly worked with. "So they put them in muggle orphanages or something?" he asked. Where the kids old enough to know what was happening? Did the parents really consider magic more important than their child? Well, he knew parents that hated their children for lesser things, he supposed. That didn't make it sound any more reasonable.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 21:33:58 GMT -5
Rhys's question was enough to bring Dare's attention back up from the fascinating little phone thing. "Yeah, pretty much," he said. "There are really some hardcore Purists, but they're not all like that. Michael's friends, they've been nothing but cool to me, it's just... there are always going to be bigots, and my mom was happy. She never even knew anything was missing."
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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 21:38:06 GMT -5
"Yeah," Rhys said, though he couldn't really believe it. Did magical kids just pop out making things change colors? "When do kids start showing magic? I mean, if she didn't know then it must be early." How did he manage to always end up quizzing Dare about magical society? Well, at least this time he could say it was helping Dare not think about his own problems for a little while.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 21:41:46 GMT -5
"It can start any time," Dare said, shrugging lightly. "I mean, the twins started out... at first it was things changing or moving that you could blow off as just having forgotten you'd put something away. But some kids don't start showing until right before they start school. I didn't even know stuff like that happened, so it's got to be rare to give up a kid, and young enough that she didn't even remember anything different. They had to have been horrible to do something like that, but if someone's going to do it, the kid's probably better off, right?"
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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 21:59:32 GMT -5
"Definitely," Rhys said. "Sometimes I wish that people could know some things about their kids, that way if they knew they couldn't handle it they could give the kid to someone that would love them." It would be a lie to say he had never wondered what his life would have been like if he had had different parents. Yes, he knew he wouldn't be the same person he was today, but that didn't make the thought tantalizing.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 22:06:31 GMT -5
"Some people shouldn't even have kids," Dare said. He didn't regret the lives of the people he knew and had known who'd been raised in unthinkable circumstances, but he could just imagine how many of those horrible parents would have thought I can handle it. I'll beat it out of him, or something just as bad. Would Soren have given up Michael for being bisexual? Probably not, but he'd likely have put in even more of an effort to push him at girls. He distracted himself again from thoughts of Michael by finishing off his ice cream.
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Post by Rhys Moreau on May 12, 2012 22:25:30 GMT -5
"Yeah," Rhys said before falling into silence again. There were horrible people in the world, and once again he considered the possibility of adopting. He would give some child who might never have had the chance a wonderful life. "I'm glad you like the phone, though. I really couldn't go without my tech, it's my connection to everything. I have a lot of international friends that I never would have met without my computer or anything.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on May 12, 2012 22:35:19 GMT -5
Dare was perfectly fine with the conversation change. He and Rhys had talked about heavy stuff before, and they'd be doing so again, so he let himself be distracted with questions about all the interesting and mysterious ways of the computer-phone. He left that afternoon feeling better than he had ever expected.
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