apple a day. [keira]

[celeste trista aurelia]

[classy=celtext2][classy=celicon2][/classy]"Excuse me, miss!" the woman called. "I do believe I ordered un tarte aux pommes, not un tarte au citron." She gestured at the dessert she had just been served; Celeste wanted an apple tart, not a lemon one. The professor shot a withering glare at the waitress, who hastily apologized. Celeste held the girl's gaze, making sure her disapproval was known -- she would not let anything get between her and her dessert -- before waving the girl away to get the proper sweet. The young waitress turned to walk away, feeling the woman's glare on her back. Today had been a bad day; Merlin, the week had been a bad week. It was just one thing after another.

First off was most of her class of first-years apparently were inane enough to be able to unable to even use a telescope properly -- or put it back without destroying things, for that matter. They had knocked over her entire shelf of old muggle vinyl records, which then crashed into a stack of ungraded papers. She had to spend the next while sorting out the pages and repairing the records, while being pestered by a few of the know-it-all overacheivers about a spelling error she had made during the lesson. The next time they're stargazing, the woman decided, I'm handing them the punching telescopes.

And then, after the whole telescopes-records-papers fiasco, she found out that someone had stolen her favorite toy mouse, leaving her enchanted rubber duckie very lonely indeed. (She still hadn't found the toy sailboat; it had to be in her tower somewhere.) The heartbroken squeaky toy quacked at the woman all night before Celeste finally convinced the duck that yes, she was going to get the mouse back -- which she did. One of the stupider first years had decided to take advantage of the chaos the lesson before to pocket the toy, but Celeste soon taught him a lesson in stealing. (When your toy mouse suddenly turns into a real mouse and starts to enlarge to be as long as an arm, that's when you know you've been found out. When said giant mouse then wants to start gnawing on your shoulder, that's when you know to never do it again.)

Not to mention her disaster with her quills and a student's eye, or the fishbowl that thought it was a bubble-head charm. Someone had definitely been messing with her tower while she was gone. So Celeste had devised a solution -- leave traps to catch whoever was screwing around in the Astronomy Tower, and simply leave and take that relaxing day off she deserved. The waitress returned with her apple tart, and Celeste smiled in anticipation --

-- then the waitress crashed into a passing customer and spilled the tart all over. "... You're kidding," the woman sighed. What had she done to deserve all of this horrible luck? She was like an angel, for Merlin's sake. Celeste pitied whoever was found in her tower when she came back. An angry Professor Aurelia was a dangerous Professor Aurelia.

ooc: for keira! you can be the person the tart is spilled on or a random passerby or something. the setting is just a small cafe. you can feel free to already know cel, or this can be their first meeting. it doesn't matter to me.[/classy][newclass=celtext2]font-size: 10px; width: 350px; text-align: justify[/newclass][newclass=celtext2 b]font-weight: bold; color: #336699[/newclass][newclass=celicon2]float: left; margin: 5 8 1 0; border: 3px solid #336699;[/newclass]

[Keira Robinson]

Keira was happy that day. It was hard not to be when she had no Death Eater meetings to attend, no Joseph Tanner or Voldemort to see, and no innocent people to kill. Those had to be good reasons for her to venture off to a cafe to enjoy her free time. To treat herself and congratulate herself on having not killed anyone that day. Keira had to control herself from letting out a bitter laughter at that thought. How pathetic her life has turned in just a few years, really.

She stood in the middle of the two rows of various shops and cafes, wondering which one to go to. She never really went out much, preferring to stay at home and just read books when she had nothing to do. Not really a life that one would expect a Death Eater to lead, but then again, Keira was as reluctant a Death Eater as any other normal wizard or witch would be. She never failed to curse the day she had decided to join the Dark Lord out of her own accord just so that she could show her family members only she could control her life. And control her life she did, leading it right into the pitfall named Voldemort.

Sighing and forcing those disturbing memories out of her head, she walked on, and her eyes fell on a small, quaint-looking cafe. It looked neat enough, so Keira stepped into the cafe, and a small bell rang to let the waiters know that there was a new customer. Spotting a table at the far end of the cafe, in a corner that was almost invisible to the rest of the world, she started to make her way towards it, weaving through the tables. It was annoying how small the spaces were between these tables and chairs...

And the annoyance turned to anger when a waitress conveniently crashed into her. And toppled on her a plate of what seemed – or at least used – to be an apple tart. Right then, it was just sticky, gooey substance that was dripping off Keira’s robes, some of it even dripping into her clothes. Looking up, Keira gave the waitress the most coldest stare possible. “What are you, blind?” she hissed dangerously.

The poor waitress shrivelled under Keira’s stare, gathering what pieces of apple tart she could from the floor, drew out her wand, and with a flick of it, cleared the mess up. Which included the mess on Keira’s robes, which was a good thing for the waitress, else the whole cafe just might’ve witness Keira’s uncontrollable temper. She then realised that the waitress was off apologising at someone, and turned to see whose apple tart had ended up on her precious robes.

And she saw Celeste Aurelia. A small smile spread across her face. She knew her, and she was one of the handful of people Keira liked and respected. Keira had met Celeste a few months ago, while she was aimlessly roaming around the wizarding pubs, in search of someone fun to keep her company. Though Celeste wasn’t a young man who she was looking for, their small chat had turned into fun conversations, and Keira realised just how much of a free-spirited and funny woman Celeste was. Granted, Keira never knew a Hogwarts Professor could be this fun to be with.

Over the months, they had rarely kept in contact through owls, mainly because Keira was afraid to keep into contact with anyone. But right then, feeling as alone as she did, Keira was more than happy that she had seen Celeste. Through the conversations they had had, Keira realised that Celeste was pretty non-judgemental, was funny, and enjoyed living life without any restrictions or being chained down. And Keira admired her for that. “Celeste,” she greeted the dark-haired beauty with a smile and sauntered over to her table once the waitress had disappeared with a promise of apple tart for Celeste and a free glass of Firewhiskey for Keira. “How have you been?” she asked her. “Uh...are you expecting someone?” she questioned again, looking at the empty seat opposite Celeste.

[celeste trista aurelia]

[classy=celtext2][classy=celicon2][/classy]The woman turned to look around when she heard her name, an dangerous eyebrow raised -- if this person was here to bother her -- "Oh!" The dark expression was wiped off of the woman's face, to be replaced by a grin. "Miss Keira." Celeste shook her head at the question, gesturing to the seat in front of her. "No, no, I'm quite alone today. Sit down, darling," she encouraged. "I apologize for that fiasco; I didn't think it possible to be that clumsy." A shadow flickered across her expression for a brief moment as she recalled the disastrous events of the past week, but she quickly erased it once more.

"This is a pleasant surprise," she commented airily. And it really was -- Celeste didn't know much about Keira, but the woman honestly didn't mind. It only mattered that Keira was an engaging conversationalist and quite fun to be around. The blonde was someone Celeste never was tired of seeing, even if they didn't often exchange any owls. It piqued Celeste's interest -- Keira never seemed to really speak about herself -- but the woman didn't feel as if knowing that particular truth was important enough to ask about.

Keira was just someone she drank and had great chats with, after all. It wasn't her business to be sticking her nose in every little thing the blonde did; everyone had their secrets, didn't they? Whether or not Keira told her was entirely the blonde's business.

Then Celeste leaned back in her chair, smiling. "In any case, I am doing quite well." (Kind of. She was still a bit miffed, but oh well.) She laughed. "My classes, on the other hand, are most likely under the assumption that I shall eat them sometime soon." Ever since she transfigured that mouse, even some of her older students treated her like a pack of exploding cards. (Which Celeste actually didn't mind; it just made it all the more amusing to startle them when they least expected it.) "Obviously those assumptions are untrue, but I can't help but to tease them a bit." (Or a lot. She had soon figured out that making any sort of ridiculous 'roaring' noise during class made most of them scream shrilly.) The woman shrugged nonchalantly, as if terrorizing her students was a perfectly reasonable occurrence, when the waitress caught her eye.

She could see her tarte aux pommes -- finally, after her long wait, she could eat her dessert. The brunette stared impassively, hiding her excitement as the girl nervously put down the tart and firewhiskey, irritation tugging at the corners of her mouth. (At least the stupid girl didn't spill anything this time.) She took a small bite of her tart, sighing in contentment, then turned back to Keira. "My wonderful life aside, how have you been?" Celeste grinned. "Has anything particularly interesting happened to you recently?"

ooc: for keira! I'm so sorry it's short. ;;[/classy]

[Keira Robinson]

ooc: oh no, it's not short at all! :)

Keira smiled as she took a seat when Celeste mentioned that she was alone, and shook her head. “Please, just Keira,” she offered. She didn’t think there was much of an age difference between the two of them, and even if there was, she didn’t like being addressed as Miss Keira. It brought back too many memories from her Hogwarts years, and those weren’t the most treasured memories of hers.

"I apologize for that fiasco; I didn't think it possible to be that clumsy." Keira chuckled. “Oh please, if anyone should be apologising, it’s the waitress. I would think she’d be a master at weaving in between the tables and chairs by now, but I guess not,” she shrugged, throwing another look at the kitchen where the waitress had disappeared off to. She absolutely hated clumsiness. How could anyone not find proper balance on a planet that has such a strong gravity, it was beyond her. Hadn’t those people learned how to walk? Especially a waitress who has to juggle a number of plates at any given time. It was pathetic.

But then again, she shouldn’t be the one judging. Her own life was spiralling downhill.

She intently listened to what Celeste had to say about her life, her classes, and her students. It was a wonder how Keira managed to pay attention to her, since she never did that. She never bothered listening to anyone, and preferred minding her own business and not care about anyone else. But Celeste was someone who was interesting. She had a way of making a good conversation.

"My classes, on the other hand, are most likely under the assumption that I shall eat them sometime soon. Obviously those assumptions are untrue, but I can't help but to tease them a bit." At that, Keira started laughing. One of the few times she’d ever be seen laughing, actually. “Merlin,” she gasped when she was done, “how I wish I had a Professor like you when I was studying at Hogwarts! You really have a way of keeping the students on their toes, don’t you?”

Her Hogwarts days had been pretty boring and dry. Except for Charms and Transfiguration, she pretty much hated every subject and person. And then there were her brothers, who were SO protective of her, that the boys in the school pretty much feared to date her. She sighed. What was the point of thinking of the past now? Especially when her present was not faring any better?

Keira shrugged when Celeste asked her if there was anything interesting happening in her life. “Nah, I’m just....you know...wandering around, trying to find things that interest me...nothing interesting happens then. Except for good-looking men” she said, smirking. She desperately wanted to share with someone that she was in deep trouble. That she was a Death Eater who didn’t want to be one. That she was attracted to a bar owner who was probably hating her by now for who she was. Instead of sharing all that, she merely stared at the glass of firewhiskey, before taking a sip of it. The fiery liquid soothed her senses a little, and she sighed in satisfaction.

[celeste trista aurelia]

[classy=celtext2][classy=celicon2][/classy]"Keira it is, then," she agreed. Celeste didn't think names were too important -- if Keira had asked to be called 'snufflegoober,' who was she to refuse? Celeste nodded in agreement when Keira spoke about the waitress. Even if accidents happened, two mix-ups in a row by the same girl was just horrible service. That girl could clearly use magic, too. A few precautionary charms and the second scene could have been entirely avoided. (Then again, it had brought Keira to her table, so Celeste had to admit that not everything had gone wrong.)

The professor grinned at the laughing blonde. "It's nice to know I amuse you," she chuckled. "It wouldn't do to have my students thinking that they are able to get away with things, would it?" Celeste thought about her own life at Beauxbatons. Her professors weren't anything out-of-the ordinary, but she had added a bit of spice to her life (at the expense of the other students). Even since she was young, tricks had always been the woman's forte; she supposed it was just one of the many things that had carried on into her adult life.

Not that she was complaining.

Keira's tone caught the woman's attention, and Celeste glanced curiously at the woman opposite her. Why the pauses? Something felt off about the woman's words, but she ignored it when Keira spoke about good-looking men. The woman wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. "Oh?" she said, a mischievous smile creeping across her face. "I'm sure you have someone in mind, don't you?" Oh, how the woman loved her gossip. Now that the blonde had brought up the subject of men -- one that they both could agree was quite the wonderful subject -- Celeste would refuse to let it drop.

Celeste whispered conspiratorially. "My dear Keira, you must tell me all about this man of yours." The woman took another bite of her tart, then rubbed her hands together. "You cannot simply mention something like this and not tell me," she insisted. As nosy as she seemed, the brunette was sincerely interested. Sure, Celeste knew that some people had their secrets, but ... well, Keira brought it up first. To be honest, Keira had the rare skill of being able to keep Celeste's attention. (And Celeste still wanted to know about the aforementioned 'good-looking man.')

ooc: for keira! girl talk, go (?)![/classy]

[Keira Robinson]

ooc: oh no, it's not short at all! :)

Keira saw the tiny change in expression in Celeste's features when she had seemed hesitant to talk more about her life. But she was more than relieved when she realised that her friend (she now considered Celeste her friend - not many people were as fun and non-judgemental as her) did not press her for more details. In some odd sense, she reminded Keira of Charlie.

She took a deep breath. No, she can't think of him now. No point in that, especially since she was just going to hurt both herself and him in the process.

And she especially can't talk about him to Celeste, who seemed to have long forgotten about her vague life story, and was now all focused on the 'good-looking men' she had mentioned. Which made Keira laugh. "Oh Celeste, why would I want to tie myself down with one man? There is no one in particular," she lied through her teeth effortessly, since Keira was used to speaking such lies.

"A few good-looking ones have, of course, left an impression. But really, men are bothersome. One man, even more so," she shared her opinion with a nonchalant shrug. She had never really bothered with getting together with a 'special one' and committing herself to him. Not that she never wanted to...but nobody interested her that way. Maybe Charlie Anderson did. Besides, being a Death Eater was enough to occupy both her mind and life.

"Life should be a little more commitment-free, no? Though if I ever do plan on settling down with The One, I'll be sure to inform you," she grinned. "And while we're at this, how about you tell me if there are any handsome chaps in Hogwarts? There was never an exciting or good-looking Professor when I was studying, of course. But I'm hoping there has been serious changes in the castle?"