Who: Simon. What: ???? Where: Starting in the Great Hall and then going wherever. When: After Dinner. Status: Open. Rating: Pretty low.
So far today, Simon's schoolwork was oh-fer. He'd read the first three chapters of 1984, which was chilling but a really good, gripping read. He couldn't help but draw parallels between the oligarchy of Airstrip One, and the kind of world that Voldemort would try to impose on the rest of the wizarding world. Even that fell short of Voldemort's goals. If 1984 and Hitler had a baby, maybe.
He'd read through most of dinner, engrossed enough to have neglected the pork roast on his plate almost entirely. He picked at the vegetables sparingly, for maybe the most inane subconscious reason he'd never realize: Because Sirius Black had mentioned the taste of semen in a journal entry that day. That journal entry led to some idle, curious research. Research had led to some evaluation of his eating habits, and the result?
Not much, really. He'd lost himself in the pages of 1984 later on, and so his mind was subconsciously stepping around sulfur-rich vegetables and the garlic-encrusted pork tonight. On the virtually nil chance that someone would be sampling... well... "him", they might have been pleasantly surprised. But he wouldn't be doing anything to make that possibility happen. Simon almost never did.
He had crushes. He carried an infatuation around with him most of the time. Lately, it was Chase Harper. Simon hadn't pegged down any official reasons for liking the younger student. Chase didn't really go out of his way to be unusually kind to him or notice him, well, except today for the cookies. That had been nice though, and led to a couple of hours of nice, floaty feelings of being noticed. Chase was nothing like him though. He was wild and funny and untamed. Simon... didn't seem to care that they were different. Maybe Simon was interested in Chase's 'badness.' He wanted to understand what made that brain tick, even though he would almost certainly never, ever be able to tell Chase anything.
He'd tried to fit in after the cookies, riding the wave of confidence, but Chase... he didn't get his sense of humor, or so it seemed. What was new there? Simon was only funny when he was comfortable, how dumb was he to try? And around Chase, Simon could barely put together a coherent sentence. Simon wouldn't have been surprised if Chase thought he belonged on the short bus. With a sigh, Simon had closed his journal on that one, and brooded over his book for awhile.
Simon never said anything to any of his crushes. First off, he had the world's most untrusted gaydar, he figured. So telling them without some kind of confirmation was just asking to get his arse kicked in. And what would he do if a boy genuinely showed interest in him anyway? Possibly explode, Simon hypothesized.
Simon's internal stream of consciousness, which followed from 1984, to cookies, to drawings as a thank you, to the journal, to his bad attempt at journal-based humor, to wanting to fit in about the semen jokes, took him to now. He was wedged up in a windowsill, using his coat as a poor substitute for padding against the cold stone of the roughly hewn wall. His hair was a little damp, because he'd stuck his head outside in a vain attempt to see some stars through the clouds. He wanted to see stars tonight. They were a great focus for escape. He could close his eyes and yeah... he'd be lost in alien worlds and fantastic adventures were he was eloquent and cool, not bookish, shy and a little eccentric. And on the short bus going nowhere.
He flipped slowly through his drawing pad- a Muggle drawing pad. It wasn't scrolls of drawing parchments. He used Muggle pencils, pastels and charcoals too. He drew everything that fancied him. He flipped past a picture of the Owlery that he imagined overgrown with ivy a hundred years in the future. Next was a conceptual drawing for a new astronomy pavilion with a huge Lunar calendar and clock at the center. He'd seen a sun clock from some clock tower in Czechoslovakia and used it as inspiration.
Next he flipped to a drawing of Chase. He cringed at it, and felt kind of like an idiot for even bothering to nurse this. He really needed to develop a new infatuation soon. He flipped past it, and ignored the really annoying boner in his trousers. It was like a big flagpole of fail. Now, he was to blank paper and he pulled out a couple of charcoals.
His blond head tilted back and he swallowed. His throat bobbed. His eyes closed and he started to let his imagination stir. He should have been studying. He probably should have told Gawain Robards that he was free tonight a little bit more vehemently. But instead, he started to draw. He got into it, so into it that he became transfixed. He scarcely realized that he wasn't alone. His fingers moved faster. He smudged with a fingertip and bit his tongue, his eyebrows flexing in concentration at the paper.