Trickery [open]

[kevin]

Kevin lifted his head from his hands slowly, avoided making eye contact with Chris. He swallowed the rising apprehension in his chest, cleared his throat. Chris spoke and Kevin smiled tiredly, appreciating his offer of assistance. "Thank you," he said quietly, hugging the pillow closer to his thin chest with one arm, the other clutching his now throbbing head. "But I'm alright. There's nothing they could do for me in the hospital wing anyway." Trying to make light of suddenly awkward and rather intense situation, Kevin laughed "At least I skipped dinner. Otherwise you'd probably be standing in a puddle of sick." Ew, Kevin, don't make gross jokes.

Kevin rubbed his eyes with a fist, willing the pain in his head and shoulders to go away. "I should just..." he trailed off, looking vaguely in the direction of the dormitories. I should just think about this, he scolded himself, but I... I've never not been able to decipher a vision before. He winced, afraid suddenly that maybe he was losing his touch. Could Seeing just come and go? Would he still get the visions but none of the meaning? No, he had to think about this, he couldn't just forget about it and go to bed. But Chris...

"Thank you for staying up with me, Chris." Kevin said, genuinely appreciating the company before he was sure he freaked the hell out of the poor seventh year. "It's late. I don't want to keep you up. I'm sorry if I... scared you." Kevin rose from the couch, swaying slightly. He steadied himself, fingers splayed in balance. A nervous smile twitched his lips, his eyes again lighting up as they had when they were talking. "I'm going to go to bed, I think. Don't forget about that Wizard of Oz idea, though, Chris," He smiled wider now, tossing the pillow back on the sofa. "And if you find yourself laying awake tonight, try to think of some famous Asian wizards I could go as, yeah?"

"Good night." Kevin waved and unceremoniously made for his dormitory. He needed to think; who was that boy? The stars... what were they trying to tell him? Kevin felt terrible that he had such an averse reaction to this vision in front of Chris, only to leave him in the dark without so much of a hint as to what he had Seen. Kevin paused for a moment. Should he tell him? Maybe Chris might know something.

But Kevin only pressed his eyes close for a moment, kept walking. No, the only people he ever told his vision to were Professor Firenze, and his best friend in Gryffindor House, Jared. That was what he'd do, he promised himself, first thing tomorrow morning at breakfast. He hoped Jared would be willing to listen to another crazy dream.

[chris]

It went against all of Chris's better judgement to not force Kevin up to the hospital wing to get his head checked out. The kid could have gotten a concussion from that, for Merlin's sake. But he just stood back and half smiled at him when he laughed and made a...some-what gross joke. Oh well, at least he was okay enough to make jokes at all. He kept watching him carefully as he rubbed at his eyes and then apologized to the older boy. Waving one hand, Chris shook his head firmly. He hadn't been scared exactly just...well, confused and a little surprised.

"Don't worry about me, go to bed," he said firmly, still half smiling. As he stood and swayed a bit, Chris put his left hand on his shoulder and steadied him, before sticking both hands in his pockets. He nodded, his smile widening a bit at the boy's mention of the Wizard of Oz, and thinking about wizards that Kevin could go as. "I'll think on it and see if I can't think of somebody. Maybe I'll tell some muggleborns about your Wizard of Oz idea too."

Watching intently as he moved across the common room, he saw him hesitate, almost as if he was going to turn back and say something to Chris. But after a second, he continued on, and as he reached the stairs Chris said quietly, "Night Kevin." Waiting til the boy was out of sight he rubbed the palms of his hands over his eyes, practically groaning in frustration and confusion. That had been so...weird. What had Kevin seen, anyways?

"No, that's none of my business," he said quietly and firmly to himself as he dropped his hands. He stood, staring at the fire for a while before he slowly moved his way back over to the table where he had left all of his stuff. He screwed the lid back onto his ink well, wiped the tip of the quill on a scrap piece of paper, and then collected it all up into his arms. Still, he couldn't help but wonder if every vision that Kevin had left him screaming and in pain or...had it only been that one?

"No reason to read into it," he said softly as he made his way towards the boy's door, opening it and working his way down the hall. When he came to the end of it he assended a few steps that led to the seventh year boys dorms. Getting inside, he dropped all of his stuff into his bag and then flopped onto his bed, stomach down, his head turned to stare at an enchanted window that showed what the sky looked like. He fell asleep after a while of staring at the stars, wondering what Kevin could see in them that was lost to the older Hufflepuff boy.