{Nice to see you again.}

[Briony Cauldwell]

In the dusk and chill of the outdoor courtyard, a fiery headed sat on a bench. There wasn't much going on, so she was twitching erratically to keep herself entertained. Briony sure didn't want to keep herself entertained by watching the few couples that thought they were being smart by sneaking out to the Courtyard to do their snogging. To keep herself from gagging she was swinging her legs and twirling her wand.

Briony had a large cluster of Begonias in her hair and a pile of cookies she had swiped from the kitchen next to her. Of course, swiping from the kitchen couldn't actually be considered stealing. The house elves were more than happy to cater to Briony's need for sweets. They were so easy to please. The simple fact that she knew their names and could tell them apart made them so grateful.

She sighed audibly, she had figured that by now she would have a distraction from just sitting here avoiding her homework. Her professors seem to have decided that they would prepare her for the O.W.Ls whether she liked it or not. Briony peered around her, hoping to find Layla or Jonathon, or even Aisu to give her something else to do. She saw no one in the dusk and went back to concentrating on her swinging feet.

[Layla Turner]

Layla walked through the corridors, bouncing on her feet at the thought of finally getting to talk to her friends. Classes had been quite annoying for her today, the very first class not getting off to a great start, but she had cheered up a bit after it. The young airhead stopped to observe new spider webs here or there, and even talk to some of the portraits.

She reached the courtyard and she noticed a head of red hair adorned with flowers, the owner of it sitting in a bench and pretending to barf at the couples that were also around. This made Layla laugh loudly as she skipped towards her friend, noticing random little nothings as always. "Briony! Hey pretty girl. I love your begonias today! They're looking fresh." she said loudly as she reached her friend and sat down next to her with a plop.

She swung her feet from the bench and swayed a little in her spot, looking happily at her best friend. It had been a long time away, and she was quite happy to be together again. Layla couldn't wait to hear whatever Briony had to tell, nor to tell her the only highlight she had, which was about this morning's breakfast. "I missed you! I hate that we can't talk that much in class!"

[Briony Cauldwell]

Briony looked up with a start and smiled widely. "Hey prettier girl!" She responded in jubilant greeting. "I know! They're lovely, I just made them!" Briony exclaimed with excitement. "Oh! I haven't told you! Over the summer I learned how to conjure up flowers!" She could barely say any of this without visibly bouncing. "It's now officially the only spell I can do without fail!" There was now a grin of self pride plastered across her face.

Briony shoved a cookie into Layla's lap in her haste to say all that she wanted to say. There was too much to say, there was always too much to tell and now that they hadn't spoken over the summer, save the few owls and phone calls. Briony figured that she was probably was the only person in all of Hogwarts who actually took her cell phone to school in the hope that one year it would finally work.

"I know. Professor Longbottom's such a bore," Briony said offhandedly, "But anyway! We can talk now! How are you? How was your day? How was your summer? Did you meet any boys? Hear any juicy rumors? I have a few, by the way. But first, answer all those questions!" She exclaimed, firing the questions all in very rapid succession. She briefly wondered how long the cookies would last them as she took out another one. She knew there was a spell for increasing the quantity of something but she would never be able to remember something like that.

ooc:// So many exclamation marks...

[Layla Turner]

Layla's smile grew brighter at Briony's greeting; being with her always cheered her up, made her feel better about everything... and everything seemed just so bright. "Wow, really? That's so amazing, I wish I could do that! Yum, cookies! You have to teach me some day, yeah?" Briony's excitement was rubbing on her so easily, Layla was already bouncing on her seat. "Thanks for earlier, by the way. I missed you so much, you are so brave."

Layla munched on the cookie as Briony started asking her a lot of questions at once, making the brunette want to answer everything at once too. They'd been in contact so little during the summer, there was too much to tell. Or at least she could see Briony was bursting with news, which was never a surprise.

"Oh, wow. I stayed at home mostly during the summer, but we took a trip to my uncle's house. I'm good, and it was by the sea! The day was pretty much boring without you through out it. Only one class together, how awful was that!" she started answering, the sentences jumbling up in her speech with her excitement, not really thinking it all a lot to manage to clearly separate them, but she knew Briony would understand.

"I didn't hear any rumors, except at breakfast today, they were talking about the party I didn't go to. You did go, right? What happened? I heard Allen got himself in more trouble! And at breakfast, today... Sophocles! I was eating whipped cream and he said hi to me first, like... called me dear and said I looked well." she said, the last part in a kind of very loud whisper. Her eyes were wide and slightly surprised as she explained, but she had a sweet smile on her face. "Now you tell me everything!"

ooc: Oh yes, these two are so full of exclamation marks.

[Briony Cauldwell]

Briony laughed, Layla was entertaining. She was so easy to excite, as was Briony herself. "Sure! It's really easy, you just kind of..." She swished her wand in an overly complicated pattern with a look of severe concentration on her face. A small daisy grew out of the end of her wand, and she let out a cheer. "See!" Briony exclaimed, gesturing at the little flower. "And I missed you too."

Nodding as Layla spoke, Briony picked the daisy off the end of her wand and let it float to the ground where it took root underneath her. Magic was amazing. "By the sea? Did you go swimming? Oh maybe... Scuba diving? That's supposed to be cool. Or was it too cold? That happens." She told Layla, as if she knew what she were talking about. In truth, she had never been to the sea, but she enjoyed the idea. "How awful? It was absolutely dreadful! Like the kind of dreadful that happens when something cute dies." Briony said with a grim smile.

"Course I went! Wouldn't miss a party for anything! And Allen... Allen was naughty." Briony said with a serious nod. "He kissed Aisu without consent and then this morning Aisu was pissed. Like seriously mad. He was yelling and stuff, he woke me up. And then! And then he exploded the good couch!" She exclaimed with the tone that this was a most grievous sin. "And then he stormed out after I came down and I hurt my foot!" She held the mentioned appendage up for inspection, although her shoe was still on so there wasn't much to see. "And then Allen got hexed by Aisu so I had to counter it, and you know how bad I am at magic. But I did it, and his eyebrows turned bright pink! It was the most hilarious thing!" She said with a laugh. "The color did really suit him well, I thought. And Sophocles? That's so exciting! I bet he likes you. Like like likes you. You're so pretty, how could he not?"

[Layla Turner]

Layla watched in awe as her friend did a series of complicated wand motions, quite surprised it was so wandy to make flowers. She giggled at the sight of the pretty flower sprouting from Briony's wand. "Wow, that is really cool. I'll try!" she said loudly, repeating the movements in a rush, but perfectly well, which ended with a small red carnation flying out of the tip of her wand, making her giggle once again. "Whoa, I hope that doesn't poke one of those couple's eyes." she said, with her silly, bright smile, looking once again at her friend. "Yours are a lot better though."

"Oh yes, I did. Swim that is. My mum said scuba diving was dangerous right now. Cute things shouldn't die... The sea was really, really... wavy, and I could still feel the waves when I got home it was weird. I hope we get more classes together through the week!" The brunette girl said all of this in one very long breath, making her gasp a little for air as she finished.

Layla's eyes widened slightly again, though she wasn't that surprised at the news of the party. Things did usually go that way for Allen Blackwell, but kissing his unwilling best friend usually turned out badly. "I would've thought he'd learnt that by now" she said, not completely saying everything she was thinking... but she hoped it made sense. The entire couch blasting thing, though, sounded really dangerous. "Are you okay, I mean... your foot? Did you get it bandaged and healed?" she asked, concerned for her friend. Briony though, didn't seem to mind too much, but the next part of the story made Layla giggle loudly again. "I can imagine! I bet he laughed too? It must've been really funny!"

The topic shifting back to Soph and her made Layla blush a little. She opened her mouth to speak but no words came out for a couple seconds, then she smiled and tried again. "Do you... wow, like... really think so? You know how he's like with a lot of people, but I loved that in the morning, it was so cool. So, any boys with you?" she said very quickly, adding the last part with a couple of seconds of pause.

[Briony Cauldwell]

Briony watched in amusement as Layla replicated the spell perfectly. She couldn't believe that anyone could think the girl stupid, she was a genius. A little mad perhaps, but what genius doesn't come with a touch of madness?

"If it did poke them, they might get mad and leave though," Briony said with a grin, pretending to shoot more flowers their way. "And no they're not, yours are brilliant." She said with a serious nod.

Briony listened to her garbled speech, understanding it like she would a second language. At times she had to think about what Layla had said twice and refer back to what Briony herself had said before she completely understood. Nonetheless, she wouldn't trade Layla's ease of distraction for anything in the world.

"Well Allen does like his parties, I doubt he remembers much of it at all. He was really angry when he told me. I wonder if Aisu's still mad at me... I guess it really doesn't matter. He'll get over it." Briony said with a shrug. "And Allen bandaged it for me, I figured it wasn't that big of a deal. Wonder if that couch had some disease or something... A lot of stuff has happened there, I suppose." She said, not elaborating, "I should probably get it healed up in the hospital wing at some point in the near future, but it's not important right now." Briony said, focusing back on Sophocles.

"You know what Sophocles is like, but that doesn't mean he doesn't like you. Of course he does!" Briony said with a certainty. "Boys with me? Nah. I mean, there's some nice eye candy around, and there's one..." Briony paused. "One different one, but that's not important. I met this guy over the summer too! But he was a muggle... Do you think that matters? I don't know what I think about that. But it doesn't really matter right now, it's not like I can just call him up because no technology works here. I told him that I was going to a boarding school out of range, but he'll probably meet someone else. It was only a summer fling, anyway." She told Layla with a shrug. The guy had been nice, but he was really nothing to write home about.