welcome to chimera!

[Helena Tofty]

Oh, it was a lovely morning. Despite leaving some work unfinished the night before, Helen had dutifully woken up early to finish it. She had surprised herself by taking only a quarter of an hour to manage. Having woken up an hour early, she was a bit put out by the thought that she could have got more sleep by staying up to finish. Or perhaps not. Helen remembered the fuzzy disorientation that had overtaken her last night. Either way, everything for the day was organized. Her notes and essays were neatly rolled, her bag assembled with everything she would need, her bed made, and her work done. It was a full 45 minutes before breakfast would even be on the table, and the first class period of the day was blissfully empty. Helen contemplated going back to bed for a while, but this thought was quickly dismissed. She'd miss breakfast if she did, and she never functioned well without a bit of food before her classes. Best to find something else to amuse herself. As Helen brought her things back to her dorm, a flutter above her bed caught her eye. Helen smiled. This would be a kite flying morning. The air was never still in Scotland during the winter, so she didn't bother worrying about the weather, past changing her clothing a bit. An extra pair of socks were slipped on, and boots over that, followed by her grey-blue winter cloak, a cream scarf, and the fingerless gloves her mother had knit her specifically for kite flying.

Helen clambered onto the bit of wood at the end of her bed, and peered over the top of the canopy, trying to decide which kite to take out. With a happy smile she settled on the two-line trick kite she had just finished this summer. The kite was shaped like a swallow, and that same bird was painted onto the translucent, magically reinforced tissue. She was terribly proud of it, especially the way she had arranged the spars. It flew beautifully, and managed magnificent tricks for her. Helen emerged from Hufflepuff house and made her way to the open lawns in front of the lake. The wind was light, but from the last few leaves flitting about in the sky, Helen knew it would be fine flying once her kite was aloft. It was cheating, but with no one there to watch her, Helen worked a simple charm that sent a merry gust of wind to get her kite in the sky. After that it was moments until it was flying high, and a minute or two of contentedly watching it flit about before Helen started making it dance with the two lines wrapped around her hands. The breeze whipped off her hood, but she had pinned back the crown of her hair with a pretty clip, thus keeping it out of the way.

For several minutes, she continued in this happy way, finding that hard won balance with the day's wind. It wasn't until a figure emerged from the lake and started to cross her line of sight that Helen lost her concentration. It didn't perturb her at first, past wondering who was insane enough to swim in the highland November. But a second spared glance made that stride very familiar, and the shoulders and height recognizable, and a little gasp escaped Helen's mouth. The swallow kite gave a responsive shudder, and dipped a bit in the sky before the slackness in the lines prompted Helen to back up a few paces and return it to it's rightful height.

Brede Jorgenson was walking up towards the castle (or was it her) half naked and dripping from a presumed swim in the lake. She could absolutely die. Brede was so sweet and such a good friend that a terrible sense of guilt overwhelmed her whenever she started thinking about him in more than friendly terms, but honestly, how was a girl supposed to help it when the object of a crush was walking towards her partially clothed? Hopefully he would just call out a cheerful hello and she could call back to him, and not make a fool of herself. She felt shy at the sight of him, but Brede had long ago earned the trust which banished much of her reserve. Oh, why was he walking towards her? She couldn't pretend not to notice him any longer.

"Oh hello, Brede," she finally sung out. Ugh, was that a hitch in her voice? Why was she so pathetic all the time? Helen steadfastly turned her eyes back up to her kite, trying desperately not to notice the state of his shoulders.

[Brede Jørgensen]

Like any sane person, Brede's response to a bright winter morning was to take his clothes off and go and swim in the lake.

He had woken, as he did most mornings, earlier than most and with the intent to go out and exercise. It wasn't necessarily that he was a fitness freak, for such people didn't really exist, but that he genuinely enjoyed physical exertion. Unlike his best friend and the general population of Hogwarts, however, this appreciation did not spread to the one sport that the school seemed to validate - Quidditch. In Brede's opinion, Quidditch was not only criminally dangerous, but also criminally boring. It was too difficult to keep up with all of the fancy plays of the players, and he exerted more energy in trying to distract Kennilworthy Whisp than he did on actually watching; to conclude, Brede did not like the sport.

So he had to find his own ways of satisfying his innate appreciation of straining himself and, being by nature a bit of a daredevil (not at all helped by his friendship with 'Dangerous' Dai Llewellyn), one of those ways had ended up being taking freezing cold swims in the freezing cold lake in the middle of the freezing Scottish winter. They were very bracing, as he was liable to tell anyone who questioned the sanity of his actions, but, as even he had to grimace and admit as he pulled himself from the water, they ended one way: extremely cold.

Shivering a little as he groped around for his towel and draped it around his shoulders, making a vague effort at scrubbing away both the water and the cold, he pulled his trousers back on after swiping at his legs and began to head back to the castle. Swim done with, there was breakfast to look forward to, and the very thought of toast and bacon was making him want to run rather than walk. Still, the cold stiffness of his limbs argued otherwise, and so he kept to a leisurely pace, only pausing briefly as he noted another, familiar figure standing out on the grass.

Further inspection revealed it to be Helena Tofty, a sixth year fellow Hufflepuff for whom Brede had no small amount of affection. Shy as she was, she hadn't ever balked at his company in the past, and it was nice to see someone else up and about at this time. Changing course, he headed for her instead of the hall, offering a cheery wave and only conceding to the fact that he was half undressed by swinging the towel properly over his shoulder.

"Good morning, Helena!" He answered, brightly, glancing up at the kite and grinning. "That looks fun."

[Helena Tofty]

The towel. There was a towel present. Helen could feel the unfortunate tightness in her chest, and tried to take a breath. It resulted in an even fuller lungful of air. She suddenly wishes she hadn't pulled back the front of her hair so well. If she could hide behind it right now she would. It was all she could do to keep her eyes from straying away from Brede's face. Helen knew she hated it when people stared at parts of her that weren't her face, and she;d try her damndest not to do the same to a friend. Granted, staring at a man's chest and staring at a woman's chest were fundamentally different behaviors, but the thought didn't cross Helen's mind.

"Good morning, Helena!" He answered, brightly, glancing up at the kite and grinning. "That looks fun."

"Oh yes, well. Kites."

Oh, why couldn't she think of something clever and fun, or even flirtatious to say? She knew she was an idiot, but Brede Jorgensen was possibly the last person on the planet she wanted thinking that. He spent time with her, and she should have been able to give him the benefit of the doubt, but with the addition of her strange and uncomfortable feelings for him (oh god, her stomach felt upset) it was impossible to think about him rationally.

"Um. Did you really go for a swim? Aren't you freezing?"

Please just go inside, she begged him silently. Please stop looking at her with that happy grin, and talking in that silly, endearing accent. Stop having half wet hair tussled every which way, and a bare abdomen and trousers that fit remarkably well, if she did say so herself. Helen abruptly stopped gazing at Brede and turned her eyes resolutely back to the sky. She would not stare, she absolutely wouldn't. And then when he put his clothes back on, it wouldn't be nearly as impossible to speak intelligibly.

[Brede Jørgensen]

If Brede noticed that Helena didn't know where to look, he didn't show it. Indeed, his attention seemed more fixed on the floating kite than his companion, and he only glanced back down again after she mentioned the swim; before that, he had been quite content to eye the kite and grin.

"Oh, yeah," he chuckled, in that bizarrely cheerful way that he seemed to carry with him everywhere, and made a vague effort at smoothing his hair back. and adjusting his towel, glancing back towards the black lake before he looked towards her again and gave a sheepish shrug. It was true: he was absolutely freezing, but in this moment it only seemed funny rather than uncomfortable. "It's quite cold out. Not too bad, though. Very bracing." Laughing a little more at his wording, he offered her yet another smile.

"I'm going to have to head back in, though," he finished, looking more apologetic and sheepish than cheerful; gooseflesh was beginning to coat his arms, and shivering was going to set in if he didn't start moving soon. "Are you done? We could walk back together."

[Helena Tofty]

Helena was uncomfortable. There was no avoiding this fact. But there was also no avoiding the fact that Brede was far too capable of making her smile. How could a girl resist when someone like him grinned and laughed and was so pleasant Helena could practically taste the sweetness in her mouth? She was beginning to think that she wasn't imagining it.

"I'm going to have to head back in, though,"

"Oh, of course, you should be in front of a fire."

"Are you done? We could walk back together."

Helena blinked for a moment before she smiled at Brede a bit too enthusiastically. In a comic manner the smile dropped from her face and she began to cough as a sort of half-hearted cover up. Helena was never really ready to stop flying her kites, but a series of rationalizations swept through her head. She'd have to stop flying for breakfast anyway, and in the meantime this wind was sure to have blown her hair into a proper mess, even if she had pinned it back. And if she really thought about it she didn't want the kite to be in the Great Hall during breakfast. All sorts of havoc could happen at meals, and the translucent tissue had been charmed to resist a buffeting wind, not grubby hands and sticky syrup. Slowly the smile crossed Helen's face again, and with that she started rolling the kite's strings back down.

"I am, actually. Give me a moment?"

It wasn't more than half a minute before Helena was holding the kite in one hand, and unwinding her scarf with the other.

"There's no reason you should catch cold," Helen explained as she offered the fuzzy length of cream. It was a silly gesture (she knew that) but there was no reason for Brede to walk about in cold weather with a wet head exposed to the air. It was at least a five minute walk back to the castle, and Helen's mother had imprinted the folly of such an action long ago. Besides, Brede was her friend, despite her pointless crush.

[Brede Jørgensen]

"Certainly," he replied, easily enough as he watched her wind her kite back down and wondering absently at the way her smile had fallen from her face. Brede was not socially incompetent - far from it, he was actually rather good at making friends and making other people feel liked - but he was as clueless as the next teenage boy when it came to the machinations of the opposite sex. Certainly, he'd had dates and girlfriends in the past, but all the experience in the world couldn't help him identify Helena's little crush - which was probably ultimately a good thing for the both of them, as he would have tripped over his words in his attempts to react, and she would probably have been mortified.

Rubbing at his forearms as he waited, patient despite the chill, he couldn't help but chuckle lightly and grin at the offer of the scarf. Not proud or masculine enough to refute that he needed the help, still carrying his shirt until he dried off properly and could put it back on, he took the scarf from her with a slight inclination of his head and a smile. "Thanks very much," he answered, brightly, and wound it around his head in a rather ridiculous fashion - if he was going to accept a gift from a girl, the least he could do was make it funny.

"Do you think it suits me?" He asked, almost going to offer an arm for her to hold before he realised that his top half was still quite naked, and so it might not be appropriate.