Nora Cadwallader (safekeep) wrote in disorderic, @ 2017-10-06 10:08:00 |
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Entry tags: | grace jordan, nora cadwallader |
WHO: Grace Jordan & Nora Cadwallader
WHAT: Chatting over apple cider
WHEN: Friday, October 6
WHERE: The Gentle Green
WARNINGS: Nah
It was a gorgeous Autumn day, air chilled but gentle, the calm of it broken up by infrequent bursts of a biting wind (that Grace couldn’t help but measure in her Quidditch obsessed mind). It was good to be outside. Aside from several pointed visits from her brother, Grace had spent several days holed up in her flat, seeing very few people and venturing out only when it was required of her. She decompressed as she always did, quietly by herself. Except for where Nora was concerned. “This is incredible,” Grace hummed in appreciation as she took a long sip of her hot apple cider. “How you two haven’t gone into business marketing your hot beverages, I’ll never know. I mean, you already have a built in brand. Pea & Carrot.” "You just like the cinnamon," Nora said quietly. Her hands were wrapped tightly around the mug as she sipped. It was pretty good, she had to admit, but the Cadwalladers had more than enough new projects on hand without picking up some new kind of sales. Besides, that would make it less special, somehow. "And Carrot would get a very big head over the whole thing. Pea would probably be fine." Grace stifled a laugh at that, grinning at the thought of Carrot the puffskein, hypothetical narcissist. “I think a big head is very deserved, they are heroes.” As soon as she’d said it, Grace tensed, smile fading slightly. "It'll make it difficult for her to roll around properly, though," Nora said, as if she'd given it all a lot of thought. She tried to breeze right past Grace's comment, though she knew, after the events of this week, they would get there sooner or later. They would have to. "Can't have that. No lopsided puffskeins, that would just confuse everyone. Including the puff!" “Does it make me a bad person that that mental image is kind of adorable?” "All mental images of puffskeins should be adorable, honestly," Nora said, though she couldn't quite make her tone sound has happy as her words. She played absently with the cuff of Rhys's jumper (she never wore her own around the house if one of his was available). "Grace, what are we going to do?" The air caught in her chest was exhaled slowly, quietly. The mug in Grace’s hand suddenly seemed too hot to touch. She pushed her thumb against it anyway. “I don’t know,” she said honestly, plainly. Meetings were happening out of the locker room, behind doors that would eventually admit their Captain. But for now, Grace wasn’t sure what direction management wanted to take, what the Team wanted to do. But that wasn’t what Nora had asked. “What do you want to do?” A breeze rustled its way through the trees nearby, and another set of leaves gracefully floated their way down to the ground. Nora shivered. What could they really do? Every action against the Ministry or Death Eaters came back at them ten, fifty, one hundred times harder. This wasn't some philosophical stand anymore -- not that it ever really was. She weighed her words carefully, but in the end, simply came back to something Rhys hexted the night of the attack: "Quidditch was supposed to be safer." Grace felt the truth of that comment like a pit in her stomach, a pinprick of guilt that she had helped Nora make the switch to Quidditch. She’d promised egotistical athletes and bad rotator cuffs, not the dead devouring innocent spectators. “I don’t think anywhere is really safe anymore,” Grace admitted quietly. In fact it seemed like Death Eaters relished making sure people knew ‘safe,’ was dependent on their whims. “Do you think we should retract our statement?” Nora honestly didn't know what she thought. Retracting the statement meant turning their backs, meant giving the Death Eaters what they wanted and buckling under pressure. It might not even mean safety -- Grace was right, nowhere was really safe anymore. But that didn't mean they should go out of their way to make things worse for themselves. Quidditch was way too visible, its crowds far too large. They were lucky more people weren't killed just in the panic trying to get away. "What if Rhys had been there?" she asked. "With all that … chaos, everyone running and throwing spells and --" her voice caught. She took a deep breath. "He can't move very quickly, now. He could've…" She trailed off. There was no need to fill in the rest. She hated thinking of Rhys like this, in terms of his limitations, but there were moments when she couldn't help it. "And I know it's probably selfish, I mean, just to think about us and not the bigger picture, but…" Nora looked over to Grace, pleading her to understand, "I think maybe we get to be selfish now." Grace swallowed hard and immediately reached forward to grasp her best friend’s hand. “Nora you and Rhys deserve to be happy and safe and that should always be the priority. Your family comes first, and if that means stepping away from Quidditch, or saying no to whatever we...that’s ok. You know I will support you, no matter what.” Nora squeezed Grace’s hand. Her best friend may not blame her, but the didn’t mean no one would. It didn’t mean she wouldn’t blame herself. “I don’t want to leave you. Or the team, or Quidditch at all. I just …” She wasn’t sure how to finish that sentence. Everything was such a mess. “What do you want to do?” Grace could understand not being able to find the words, she wasn’t sure how to answer that question herself. “I...want to play Quidditch,” she said and felt idiotic for it. Such a simple, frivolous statement, but an honest one. “It’s all I can do, all I’ve ever been good at. And seeing them take that away from our teammates because they’re Muggleborn? Killing for it?” Grace let go of Nora’s hand and pushed her hair behind her ear in a distracted motion, screams still ringing in her ears. “What's happening in this war...If there’s a way I can help, I want to do that and the only way I know how is through Quidditch. Which,” she gave a thin laugh devoid of humour, “did a hell of a lot more bad than good. So, I don't know.” She shrugged helplessly, throat tight, the gnashing, dead faces of inferi never far from her mind. “Have we done more harm than good?” Yes, Nora wouldn't bring herself to say. Yes, absolutely. None of this has made anything better. "I know it … feels like the right thing to do," she said slowly. "But maybe the right thing right now just needs to be more … subtle. Something that won't attract attention." “Subtle,” Grace repeated. “What do you mean by subtle?” "I don't know," Nora admitted. "Using the team's connections in Europe to help get Muggleborns out of Britain, or …" sheltering them at the stadium. That, of course, hit too close to Nora's own secret, and it wasn't one she would share even with Grace. "Or cancelling matches because there aren't enough players, to prove now important Muggleborns are. Or maybe just playing Quidditch and giving everyone something to look forward to while the people who are trained to deal with Death Eaters figure out what to do." Grace bit into her lip and considered Nora’s suggestions. It was likely that any further large scale condemnation of the Ministry’s policies would put not only them at risk, but the fans. They’d proven they’d kill to make a point. She wouldn’t just play, couldn’t. In a perfect world, the league would boycott, establish a season lockout, protecting both their players and fans. But they wouldn't, some players didn't care, or were understandably afraid what it would mean if they did. Some teams had sponsors who would pull funding and make it so that teams couldn't play at all. They should cancel matches. They should make a statement that the Ministry clearly cared as much about the innocent fans as they did about Muggleborns, to allow the Death Eaters to do as they wished. “Using the team’s connections to get people out is a really good idea Nora.” Nora shrugged. It was a good idea unless the got caught. "It's easier to run when you know you've got someplace to go, I think. It could still be really dangerous, though. Probably more dangerous." Grace frowned, her shoulder lifting in a partial shrug. “But is the alternative to do nothing? I think you’re right that whatever benefit being visible may have had, also put people in danger. Something like this could use whatever benefits come with all of this, to help, without the same risks to those people.” Right? “Not everything that’s meant to help actually helps,” Nora said gently. Grace drew back at that and looked down at the steam still rising from her apple cider. Her brother had some involvement with the Order of the Phoenix, was likely one of them. Grace had never felt that she had anything to offer anyone outside of Quidditch, least of all in something like this. “No,” she agreed and then it was her turn to plead. “I can’t just do nothing Nora.” Nora took a long sip of her apple cider, as if delaying what she was going to say next as long as she could. It wouldn't be what Grace wanted to hear. It wouldn't even really be what she wanted to say -- or at least, not what she wanted to be true. But all week, she'd closed her eyes and seen half-rotted corpses biting into innocent people. She heard the screams and panic of a crowd as she barely managed to suppress her own. She went through triage procedure over and over again in her head, as if she might need it again at any moment. "But what if doing nothing now means you get to stay alive to do something later?" Uneasy with her own uncertainty, Grace sighed. “We can’t know that for sure, can’t know anything for sure.” "I think we know for sure that if we make another statement, they'll respond again. And it'll be worse. I think we can be very sure about that." It was then Nora realized in her gut that they weren't going to get anywhere. They weren't going to convince each other, not today. Maybe not anytime soon. Maybe never. Grace couldn’t deny that, it was all she thought of when she became too tired to force herself to focus on something, anything else. And clearly, Nora thought it best that they step back and stand down for now. After everything, Grace couldn’t blame her for that, felt parts of her own mind drift that way as well. “You’re right,” she said after a moment. “It probably will be.Will be. I don’t know, I just…” she trailed off and pushed her fingertips into the bridge of her nose. She inhaled deeply, feeling despondent and close to tears. “Some assistant captain I turned out to be." "Hey," Nora said, rising from her seat to wrap her arms around her friend's shoulders in a hug. "You're a great assistant captain. It's just shit that assistant captains have to deal with this stuff at all." She gave a reassuring squeeze. "But, I'm out of apple cider. And it's getting kind of chilly out here. Do you want to head in?" Grace leaned into the hug, disentangling her hold on her mug to return it as tightly as possible. “Sure,” she mumbled into Nora’s shoulder, used to the abrupt changes in topic. Right now, she welcomed it. Whatever Nora wanted. She cleared her throat. “I didn’t want to seem greedy and ask for another round, or you know, finish it for you. Apple cider has an unhealthy amount of sugar Nora, I’m only thinking of your health.” "Hmm," Nora said as she collected her empty mug and studied it. "Well, just don't tell the team mediwitch about it. I hear she's really strict." A small laugh escaped, and Nora felt a little better, even if it was only for a fleeting moment. |