hiddenseer:
@blythexxlestrange
To say Percy was stressed out was an understatement. The beginning of the year at Hogwarts was always a tad overwhelming with first years having no idea what they were doing, older students walking around like they owned the place, and just generally trying to get back into the swing of things. It didn’t help that his visions were always getting stronger which meant he felt like he had just encountered twelve Dementors at almost all times. But it was nice to be able to sit in the greenhouse at the end of the day to get some peace and quiet. Though he acted like he was upset with the first years for making such a mess, he was glad it gave him something to do alone. At least it usually did.
Today, the professor had to regretfully give one of his students detention. He truly hated having to punish them, but in this particular case, he had no other choice. Percy cared about all of his students, but the encounter he had with Blythe stood out. It greatly saddened him to see that she was turning to harmful substances in order to deal with whatever must have been going on with her. She was too smart for such things. Though she had made it clear that she didn’t want to talk about it, Percy didn’t want to let it go. Perhaps he just had a knack for fixing broken things.
He was leaned over one of the desks in the greenhouse, cleaning up a Fire-Making spell on a Devil’s Snare that had gone completely wrong, when he heard the door behind him open. Standing up, he turned around to see the student who had been on his mind. “Come on in, Blythe,” he said, beckoning her over. “One of my first years managed to set nearly the whole desk on fire this morning,” he chuckled. “Grab a bucket and a sponge and help me clear away the ash.” He turned to look at her. “How are you doing?” he asked sincerely. “Hopefully not high this time.”
Blythe usually didn’t talk about the underlying motivations behind her wild behavior, perhaps because she’d been that way so long it was easy to forget the why in the first place. Though the few things she did end up saying to Professor Trelawney kept bugging her all day. October was a hard month, every year when it came around she was just a little more unhinged than normal, her ploys and schemes a little more reckless, not huge changes usually nothing anyone could notice. Though she did, she knew she was more on edge and she knew why.
As Blythe entered the greenhouse she wasn’t her normally bubbly self, the grin that nearly always stayed plastered on her face just not there that night. Mostly because she couldn’t help but get the feeling that the Professor was not going to just let their earlier odd conversation go. Professor Percival just didn’t seem like the kind to forget thinking it was the mindless rambling of a pothead.
As she closed the door behind her she stood with her hands in the back pockets of her jeans, leaning back and forth on the soles of her feet as she watched him at his desk until he looked up at her. “At least it was just your desk, this whole place looks highly inflammable.” She said with a weak grin as she made a grab for the cleaning tools as instructed. Blythe usually found ways to make detentions more fun for herself though today she simply wanted to the minutes to fall away as quickly as possible. “No, unfortunately not.” She answered very honestly. She’d burned through what she had fairly quickly that week and knew she needed to ration for the coming days.