Chloe Shepherd (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cmdrchloe) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
gooseberryhigh2016-09-01 09:46 am
cmdrchloe) wrote in gooseberryhigh2016-09-01 09:46 am
Entry tags:
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WHO: Riley Stamper and Chloe Shepherd
WHEN: Sept 1; On the bus ride to school, when the juniors are delayed by weather
WHERE: The bus, somewhere in Oregon
WHAT: Chloe makes a new… friend?
RATING: G
WARNINGS/DISCLAIMERS: Teenagery meanness.
WHEN: Sept 1; On the bus ride to school, when the juniors are delayed by weather
WHERE: The bus, somewhere in Oregon
WHAT: Chloe makes a new… friend?
RATING: G
WARNINGS/DISCLAIMERS: Teenagery meanness.
Chloe sat, oblivious to the world - to the students, to the foul weather outside the bus, to everything - watching her phone’s battery die. It was her lifeline to the outside world and she needed it. Would there even be electricity in this outdoorsy hellhole her parents were sending her to? Or would she have to try to hike through mud and bugs and god knows what to get to a muggle town with power and 4G?
Riley chewed on her lip and jiggled her foot as she watched the rain lash by outside. Ugh. Oregon. You were almost as bad as Washington. She snapped her gum loudly and peered around the bus. Like, she was happy to not be at Hogwarts this year, but it's not like being around the same old same old was going to be much fun.
“Hey, you,” she said, nodding to the girl across the aisle with her green hair and one of those Muggle cell phones that Riley had still never been able to completely figure out. Like, she had a cell phone, but it was mostly a camera and a mirror. “Did you mean to go for that color or was that an accident? That's totally happened to me.”
There was an awkward pause as Chloe 1) realized someone spoke and 2) was speaking to her. “Um. I meant to go for it. Kind of,” she replied, and then, clarifying, “It was blue, and that was fading, and I didn’t want to bleach it again, so I went for green.” She shifted, uncomfortable. Was she insulting her hair? Usually, asking if something was accidental wasn’t a compliment…
“Oh, yeah, it's always blue first, then it goes off the rails.” Riley reached across the aisle and grabbed a piece of the girl's dark green hair between her fingers. “Mine happened because I put the blue in, like, two hours after bleaching it, which, ugh, no. You can't get that shit out without a blowtorch.”
Anyone else might have recoiled, or smacked her hand away, or at least, in some fashion, indicated that it wasn’t okay for a stranger to grab their hair. Chloe just widened her eyes, looking like a deer in its last seconds before impact.
She dropped her hair, shrugged as if she'd been asked a question or an opinion, and said, “Don't worry honey, we can fix it.”
Chloe liked the green. Not many people had green hair, after all - it was unique, without being a highlighter bright color. Still, green was far from the only color she had ever dyed her hair - she could learn to love another color. “Sure,” she agreed, “Sounds fun.” Because, this might be a wilderness nightmare, but it wouldn’t be so bad if she could make friends, right?
There was never any question in Riley’s mind if Chloe was going to accept or not. She had made a decision regarding this girl, and this girl was going to go along with it, right? Right. Riley did seem to have a better idea of what was going on anyways. “Are you new, or just newer?” she asked out of vague curiosity as a blast of wind shook the bus, then immediately turned the topic back around to herself. “I don’t know everyone, you see, I was in England last year.”
“Brand new,” Chloe replied, with a forlorn tone. Being new was terrible, but at least this girl seemed to know the ropes? “Ooh, England? That’s cool,” Chloe said, sounding suitably impressed.
“Uh, yeah it's cool,” Riley said with a scoffing eye roll. Of course she was suitably impressed, Riley was impressive, and she knew how to handle American girls. “But, you know, more strict over there. They could not get away with the crap we do at Goose. Oh, man, my freshman year the older kids got ALL the newbies together and--well, you'll see.”
Chloe shifted uncomfortably, pocketing her phone now that this other girl truly had her full attention
She cocked her head, looked the girl (whose name she didn't know and wasn't too concerned with learning right now) up and down with a bright little smile on her face. “You'll do fine, though. If you survive the Sorting.”
“It’s… not that bad, is it?” Chloe asked. The one at Ilvermorny hadn’t been too bad, and she’d heard that the Hogwarts sorting wasn’t that terrible either - the worst part of either of those was that you had to stand up in front of everyone. She really wanted to know what she was in for with this one, but it wasn’t the sort of thing you could Google.
“I'll just say, I was screaming at the end of mine.” To be fair, Riley was screaming because she was yelling at the bluejay and the fox for deciding her fate for her when she had been told she ultimately got to choose and that was a crock of shit. But. Like. She wasn't technically lying was she? “But we all survived, didn't we?” Riley smiled and swept her hand around to the other juniors, all definitely 100% alive.
Chloe looked legitimately horrified. Surely it wasn’t that bad? Kurt would have warned her! Unless it was that bad and he just didn’t want to dishearten her… “I guess if no one ever died…”
“Oh I didn't say that,” Riley continued, popping her gum, and she giggled in a way that was playful and yet not comforting. “But, you know, this school’s only been around for ten years. It's only a matter of time.”
“They wouldn’t do anything that could get us seriously hurt,” Chloe replied, sounding somewhat certain. Then again, wizards played quidditch and quodpot for fun, so their idea of dangerous wasn’t exactly the same as the muggle idea.
“If you insist!” Riley said with a little wiggle of her shoulders and a bob of her head, like she really was not that concerned with the health and safety of this poor new girl. “I'm sure you'll be fine, though. Not everybody has a hard time. Maybe you'll get one of the easy Sortings!”
“Maybe…” Chloe mumbled, now not at all certain that that would be the case. She really just wanted to take out her phone and finish reading a fanfic with the last drops of power she could squeeze out of her phone. This year was going to be terrible.
“Aw, chin up, cutie,” Riley chirped. “Like I said, you'll probably be fine!” Well, not if she thought she was going to be using that phone. Riley only ever made sure her phone was charged up if they were sneaking off to Logan; it was even mostly useless at home where they had, like, no signal. “If you survive your Sorting, come find me with the rest of the blue jays and I'll help you sort out your hair.”
Riley chewed on her lip and jiggled her foot as she watched the rain lash by outside. Ugh. Oregon. You were almost as bad as Washington. She snapped her gum loudly and peered around the bus. Like, she was happy to not be at Hogwarts this year, but it's not like being around the same old same old was going to be much fun.
“Hey, you,” she said, nodding to the girl across the aisle with her green hair and one of those Muggle cell phones that Riley had still never been able to completely figure out. Like, she had a cell phone, but it was mostly a camera and a mirror. “Did you mean to go for that color or was that an accident? That's totally happened to me.”
There was an awkward pause as Chloe 1) realized someone spoke and 2) was speaking to her. “Um. I meant to go for it. Kind of,” she replied, and then, clarifying, “It was blue, and that was fading, and I didn’t want to bleach it again, so I went for green.” She shifted, uncomfortable. Was she insulting her hair? Usually, asking if something was accidental wasn’t a compliment…
“Oh, yeah, it's always blue first, then it goes off the rails.” Riley reached across the aisle and grabbed a piece of the girl's dark green hair between her fingers. “Mine happened because I put the blue in, like, two hours after bleaching it, which, ugh, no. You can't get that shit out without a blowtorch.”
Anyone else might have recoiled, or smacked her hand away, or at least, in some fashion, indicated that it wasn’t okay for a stranger to grab their hair. Chloe just widened her eyes, looking like a deer in its last seconds before impact.
She dropped her hair, shrugged as if she'd been asked a question or an opinion, and said, “Don't worry honey, we can fix it.”
Chloe liked the green. Not many people had green hair, after all - it was unique, without being a highlighter bright color. Still, green was far from the only color she had ever dyed her hair - she could learn to love another color. “Sure,” she agreed, “Sounds fun.” Because, this might be a wilderness nightmare, but it wouldn’t be so bad if she could make friends, right?
There was never any question in Riley’s mind if Chloe was going to accept or not. She had made a decision regarding this girl, and this girl was going to go along with it, right? Right. Riley did seem to have a better idea of what was going on anyways. “Are you new, or just newer?” she asked out of vague curiosity as a blast of wind shook the bus, then immediately turned the topic back around to herself. “I don’t know everyone, you see, I was in England last year.”
“Brand new,” Chloe replied, with a forlorn tone. Being new was terrible, but at least this girl seemed to know the ropes? “Ooh, England? That’s cool,” Chloe said, sounding suitably impressed.
“Uh, yeah it's cool,” Riley said with a scoffing eye roll. Of course she was suitably impressed, Riley was impressive, and she knew how to handle American girls. “But, you know, more strict over there. They could not get away with the crap we do at Goose. Oh, man, my freshman year the older kids got ALL the newbies together and--well, you'll see.”
Chloe shifted uncomfortably, pocketing her phone now that this other girl truly had her full attention
She cocked her head, looked the girl (whose name she didn't know and wasn't too concerned with learning right now) up and down with a bright little smile on her face. “You'll do fine, though. If you survive the Sorting.”
“It’s… not that bad, is it?” Chloe asked. The one at Ilvermorny hadn’t been too bad, and she’d heard that the Hogwarts sorting wasn’t that terrible either - the worst part of either of those was that you had to stand up in front of everyone. She really wanted to know what she was in for with this one, but it wasn’t the sort of thing you could Google.
“I'll just say, I was screaming at the end of mine.” To be fair, Riley was screaming because she was yelling at the bluejay and the fox for deciding her fate for her when she had been told she ultimately got to choose and that was a crock of shit. But. Like. She wasn't technically lying was she? “But we all survived, didn't we?” Riley smiled and swept her hand around to the other juniors, all definitely 100% alive.
Chloe looked legitimately horrified. Surely it wasn’t that bad? Kurt would have warned her! Unless it was that bad and he just didn’t want to dishearten her… “I guess if no one ever died…”
“Oh I didn't say that,” Riley continued, popping her gum, and she giggled in a way that was playful and yet not comforting. “But, you know, this school’s only been around for ten years. It's only a matter of time.”
“They wouldn’t do anything that could get us seriously hurt,” Chloe replied, sounding somewhat certain. Then again, wizards played quidditch and quodpot for fun, so their idea of dangerous wasn’t exactly the same as the muggle idea.
“If you insist!” Riley said with a little wiggle of her shoulders and a bob of her head, like she really was not that concerned with the health and safety of this poor new girl. “I'm sure you'll be fine, though. Not everybody has a hard time. Maybe you'll get one of the easy Sortings!”
“Maybe…” Chloe mumbled, now not at all certain that that would be the case. She really just wanted to take out her phone and finish reading a fanfic with the last drops of power she could squeeze out of her phone. This year was going to be terrible.
“Aw, chin up, cutie,” Riley chirped. “Like I said, you'll probably be fine!” Well, not if she thought she was going to be using that phone. Riley only ever made sure her phone was charged up if they were sneaking off to Logan; it was even mostly useless at home where they had, like, no signal. “If you survive your Sorting, come find me with the rest of the blue jays and I'll help you sort out your hair.”