Evening, kitchens. M for possibly harsh language.


Virgil wiped the sweat off his brow as he stepped away from the large potbelly stove that squatted next to the great fireplace of their school Kitchen. He had long tugged off his sweater by now, looking a bit skinnier than normal in a white tee and dark jeans - both smeared in various cocoa batters.

That was the... fourth tray of brownies in, and the dough for the butter cookies was cold enough to work with now.

A scattering of house elves remained watching, most of them having dispersed hours ago when Virgil came by to commandeer the kitchen with such silent determination that they didn't put up much of a protest. Those who stayed behind handed him things when he asked in a soft voice, or helped levitate the hot trays out of the oven.

"Piping bag?" he enquired in that curious, gentle way that sounded clear even over the roar of the fire. Several piping bags appeared all at once on the great tables and he picked a pastel pink one with a moderate nozzle. "Thank you."

They - people - would tell him that he was trying not to think about it, about the damp black room on level nine. Virgil used a spatula to calmly spoon the plain dough into the bag before delicately sealing it. They were wrong, of course. He'd thought about it plenty. Dreamt about it.

Dreams were easiest - with some effort, one could always... step away from nightmares.

The Slytherin reached for his wand to roll out a sheet of baking parchment. It wasn't the thinking he was avoiding, it was the talking and the quiet of the castle; the alternations. Everything here was as far from that as he wanted: solitary without being alone, busy without too much work.

He began to pipe thumb-sized spiral flowers on to the parchment, using both hands to squeeze as he hunched over the work surface. The kitchen smelled like dark chocolate and caramelised butter and ever-so-slightly cinnamon. Too focused, Virgil didn't notice anyone come in until they were close at hand.

She had been working long hours as of late, spending more nights in her room at Hogwarts rather than in her own bed. Mai spent as much of her time meeting with parents and sending them reassuring letters as she did counseling students. What they had gone through was... Horrible. Unspeakable. She'd been around their age during the war, and everything that had happened then left their mark. The kidnapping had likewise left permanent marks on the students. Everybody handled it differently.

Mai had just washed her face clean of makeup and changed into more comfortable loungewear when she heard a quiet tap tap tap at her door. The house elves were agitated-- Virgil Carstairs had taken up residence in the kitchen and would not leave. He'd been baking. For hours. They were worried as much as they also wanted their kitchen back.

She made her way down the staircase, walking with purpose and care as her body protested the long hours. A portrait pear-tickle later, she was there. Virgil was so engrossed in his project that he hadn't noticed her entrance. Her slippered feet didn't alert him to her presence the way heeled shoes would. Her face, clean of makeup, showed fine lines, old acne scars, and a flush over her cheeks and nose. It also betrayed weeks of exhaustion.

 Silently, Mai made her way to the kitchen sink and poured him a glass of water. Virgil looked warm, overheated, emaciated. When was the last time he'd eaten anything substantial? When was the last time he'd had anything to drink?

He was absorbed in busywork as an escape.

"Do you need a hand?" Mai asked, setting the glass of water gingerly in front of him.

He flinched, even as he noted that their counsellor had spoken in a most reasonable tone and volume.

Virgil released the piping bag - it continued to pipe away even so, floating over the baking parchment and leaving behind miniature dots of cookie dough. What time was it? They'd gone and fetch Miss Biladeau-Yukawa, so no doubt a substantial amount of time. He looked at the water for a moment as if though he didn't know what to do with it.

"Thank you," the real world clicked into place and he drank; at first a sip but then more hungrily, realising his thirst. It went down cool and reassuring. The glass was empty when he finally set it down.

His legs felt odd, so he sat on the bench before they gave him away. "A hand at baking?" Virgil smiled weakly up at Maiko. "Or do you mean more your profession?"

She wasn't wearing her perfume at present but he remembered, vaguely, its scent in the black dungeon. Almost like she had been there with them. Maiko looked almost as tired as he felt. The Slytherin crossed one leg over the other effeminately and leaned against the table as he indicated three full trays of frosted brownies before them.

"You might taste test. I promise," he raised a limp and listless hand to rest on his heart, "... nothing in them." In fact, he'd not had any gillyweed since returning. Or alcohol. Or sex. Puritan sainthood had somehow been thrust upon Virgil.

She pulled out her wand and tapped the now-empty glass, refilling it. "Drink this one a bit slower." Mai said gently, not wanting him to get sick on too much water after being dehydrated. That kind of sickness, she suspected, would be more welcome than the dark tint to his memories, of the thoughts that stayed when he wanted them gone.

"A hand at baking, is what I meant." Mai clarified, glancing at the brownies. As soon as Virgil said there was nothing in them, she immediately suspected that there was something in them. The counselor gave them a wary look, before deciding they were worth the risk. If she felt the effects of gillyweed, so be it. As she served herself a brownie, she realized that perhaps she should care a bit more about her state of consciousness in front of students.

It was too late now. She'd already helped herself. It would be rude if she put it back! Mai took a bite. It didn't taste like it was laced with anything.

"They're good." Mai approved, setting her brownie down and getting a serving out for Virgil as well. "I'm not going to eat alone in the kitchens like a spinster with twenty dogs." She took a seat next to him, "You look like shit."

Virgil sipped at the water this time, heeding the counsellor's advice mostly because draining the glass again would have been too much effort.

He accepted a brownie piece and gave Maiko a skeptical look - as if though trying and failing to picture her as a spinster with twenty dogs. She was evidently a dog person, though. Virgil could always tell. He preferred cats but they had three canines at home and his parents owned a menagerie.

"I'm almost done baking," he shrugged before biting into the brownie. The Slytherin paused to chew, waxen eyelids fluttering hesitantly as the sugar hit him right away. They were good but they were also very rich. Hm. He'd used an awful lot of butter.

Virgil was nearly too absorbed in his mouth to catch what Maiko had said. "You look like shit."

Was she allowed to say that? He cleared his throat, drinking again. He supposed she could say whatever she wanted, especially if it was the truth.

"Do I?" his lips thinned into one of those smiles that isn't really a smile. "I feel like shit. Like when you're trying to sleep but can't get into a comfortable position." He'd felt like that for days and had come to accept it as normal for now. Virgil took another bite and then, speaking through the chocolate fudge, added as an afterthought: "I felt you. In the... on level nine. Were you Looking?"

Ever a pupil of Divination, he asked the question with its full implication.

Not many students would have taken her comment so gracefully. She had reached a level of... Not apathy, but exhaustion that wore away at her filters. And she hadn't been great at keeping those in the first place.

Mai could relate to that feeling. She was about to comment on that, to ask him to elaborate a bit more when he asked her a direct question. A more pressing question.

"I was." She confirmed, "I scryed for you. In my office." Mai closed her eyes, as if it would help her recall. It wasn't necessary. She remembered it clearly. Not only had it tied in too well with visions she'd had, but she had replayed it in her head every day until the students were found. "I sensed you." The smell of blood, so strong it left a metallic taste in her mouth. A wave of dizziness. Exhaustion. A fog, a clouded consciousness. She didn't want to elaborate in case he didn't want to go there.

"This scrying that I did, is very nearly impossible for non-seers." She explained. "I knew you were strong in divination, so I had to try." No matter how unlikely it was that she would have gotten results. The fact that she had made contact with him the way she did was telling.

 "I'm certain now, that you're a seer." As Mai said the words, something in her confirmed them.  "You felt me looking. What did you sense?"

Virgil blinked very slowly as a cat might, not quite looking at Maiko as he stared into space - he did not want the brownie any longer. Something savoury. Cheese puff pastries. Surely the kitchen stocked quality cheese for it, bit of camembert or brie left to age. He was deflecting thoughts again.

"I thought I might be," the focus returned to his gaze and he rose to go to one of the large pantry cupboards. The Kitchens afforded one of those pantries that presented what you were looking for, provided it was available, and so the doors swung open before he'd even reached it.

A sudden, surprised shiver at the scents wafting out. Too high a quality of cheese.

"Your perfume," Virgil answered finally before breathing in through his mouth and plucking out three small wheels of camembert. He returned to the table - a pair of elves were levitating the cookie tray away to a vacant oven - and began to work on the cheese sauce whilst speaking.

Steel bowl, white flour, milk... butter. The Slytherin rolled his shoulders in preparation.

"It was a reverberation in the, ah-" he gestured lazily at the space around his head before reaching for a whisk. "- mindscape. An echo of you calling my name." It was a strain on his already sore arm muscles to beat the mixture, so he handed the bowl to Maiko. "If you'd please."

He accio'd a sheet of puff pastry he'd left out with the intention to make something else earlier, and laid the dough flat on the floured surface. Virgil shook the flour off his wand, then used it to gracefully make square incisions. "I felt like you had just left the room."

He glanced up from the pastry distractedly, shadows beneath his eyes as he looked at Maiko. It had been a wretched feeling because it had briefly given him hope at the time.

She watched as he began to make a cheese sauce. Camembert? That wouldn't exactly be her choice for cheese puffs-- it was soft with a thick rind. Brie would've been better, though that was probably because she preferred it. Neither one of those cheeses would have been perfect; gruyere was ideal. Mai knew for a fact that the cupboard had gruyere in it. Virgil was simply a cheese heathen. Silently, she hoped he'd redeem himself by adding pepper.

However, this was not the time to be thinking about such things. She was not here to judge, she was here to listen.

Mai accepted the whisk and the bowl, deftly beating the cheese mixture together.

He'd smelled her perfume. The hollow look in Virgil's eyes stung. Making that connection with her had given him hope-- given them both hope. As much as Mai tried, she couldn't completely erase the bitter feelings she held towards Minerva and Ignan for not taking her seriously when they could've. The trauma they'd been through had been completely avoidable.

She let his words hang in the air. Her eyes met his and she gave him a brief nod in silent acknowledgement. Yes, Mai was sorry. In this situation, an apology wouldn't suffice. It wouldn't help anybody if she vocalized it. She found that these kinds of apologies were more often therapeutic for the person doing the apologizing rather than the recipient.

His eyes narrowed marginally at the look their counsellor had given the three small wheels of camembert and, yes, Virgil never actively intruded on another waking mind if he could help it - but he allowed himself to glean her surface thoughts as he went on to separate the square slices of puff pastry.

Gruyere! He reached for one of the wheels, exhaling a puff of air incredulously. She didn't even know what he was going to do with th--

Oh hell, he was deflecting again.

Virgil reached for a fine knife and sliced the wheel in half, sensing an ambiance of modest apology from Maiko. For her scrying, not the cheese obviously. He used the knife to hollow out the rind, chunks of milky camembert dropping to the table.

"People are like this too, aren't we...?" he moved on to the next wheel, breaking the silence with a sullen push of his lower lip. "Soft on the inside. Some of us are soft on the outside."

This was said in a quieter tone, and Virgil reached for the bowl Maiko held. He cradled it in one arm, dug into his right pocket for a grab of pepper (his left pocket contained salt) before stirring it into the white sauce. His gaze flicked from black flecks swirling in the cream to the witch's patient face.

"What do you call that?" he found the words he had been looking for, "Being born soft. Luck? Providence?" Virgil lowered the bowl and leaned against the table on both hands, the slight scratches from the dungeon visible on his inner fore arm.

He had wanted them to heal naturally "I can't... I can't be anything else."

She was comfortable with silence; teenagers usually weren't, even if they weren't the talkative type. Giving him space to think and speak worked. Few things prompted words more than a prolonged silence between two people with heavy thoughts weighing them down, refusing to be ignored.

"I wouldn't say it's luck," Mai replied, voice soft but steady. "Or providence." She was silent for a bit longer as she thought about what it meant to be soft. Sympathetic. Empathetic. Tender. Vulnerable.

Resilient.

That word rang against her senses as right. It took resilience to retain a soft nature after going through the unthinkable. For a moment she recalled the scent of wet dirt, the snap of a splintered wand, the taste of copper. Time. Time is what it took for the reflex to jump or fight to go away. Time without being hurt or the threat of pain. However many days, weeks, or years they were given, it still wouldn't erase the memories, or distance them from the feelings.

Instead, it gave them time to be accustomed to them. Like grief.

Mai supposed that in a way, trauma made people grieve who they had been before. Who they could've become.

Virgil couldn't be anything else other than soft, and neither could she-- as much as she had tried. It struck her then, as bravery. Mai's eyes met Virgil's. She had been silent for too long, thinking and feeling. The two were never separated, were they?

"I call it vulnerable and exposed." Mai finally said, "But brave. Being soft means you're open to others, and that they can be open to you." The words didn't come out as smoothly as she had hoped. They were raw, jagged around the edges. "You can't be this way without being resilient, too." She gave him a grim smile, "It comes with the territory."

In the lengthy pause between them, Virgil sighed softly and resumed his work with the pastry squares. He put aside the emptied rind and then began to separate the soft camembert, stickily placing a small wedge of the creamy cheese on to each square. His long, thin fingers were nimble and fussy in their work.

Vulnerable and exposed. Brave. Resilient.

The Slytherin rubbed his aching temples with the heel of his palm, inadvertently dusting flour all over his face and hair. Words. They felt like nothing but words - he absorbed what she was saying, the way he absorbed everything around him, and concentrated on making those words real.

He didn't need Maiko to help him bake. A pair of charms and everything he needed whipped, sliced and folded could have been happening at the same time - utensils whizzing about the Kitchens. But sometimes when Virgil wanted life to make sense he had to slow down: he had to break down what he was doing into single steps, one by one, instead of a whirlwind of simultaneous thoughts.

"Alright," he breathed out slowly. Vulnerable and exposed, brave and resilient. Open to harm. Voluntarily open to harm. Stupid or courageous? It didn't matter, it could be both. Both were survivable. "I'll take that."

Virgil opened his eyes - they were focused - and neatly reclaimed the bowl of white sauce he had placed down, using a spatula to drop a dollop of the sauce on to each bit of camembert. "I didn't mean to make you come down here," he looked at Maiko in her leisurewear, lips pressed into a grim pink smile against the flour.

"It's a temporary thing, the... grief." A word that had leapt from the surface of her thoughts to his. "You're tired also. Enough nights of good sleep and we can both reach equilibrium."

Sleep, Virgil always maintained, had the power to heal.

"I'll take that."

Mai nodded in acknowledgement. It was certainly better than the alternative-- whatever it would be.

The house elves were not-so-subtly giving them stares. A few of the older ones that Mai remembered from when she had been a student seemed more resigned than the new hires. Oh, they would learn that some students found a sense of comfort in being able to cook late at night. She had been a Hufflepuff, and its' proximity to the kitchens was a boon to those who had discovered how to enter it. You'd think that Hogwarts would change it up, but the fact that you still had to tickle a pear after all these years indicated that it was an open space to those who needed it.

"You didn't make me do anything." She insisted.  She had wanted to come, Virgil didn't exactly force her hand. He was right about her being tired--  Mai shook her head at the thought, she was usually some level of tired. This level of exhaustion though, was stress-induced and had lasted for far too long.

However, Mai disagreed about the grief being temporary. No. It was permanent. Once something was gone, you never stopped missing it. It was just pushed back and buried. Then, at the most unexpected times when you already believe to be accustomed to it,  it would open up again to remind you of its' vitality. Grief was a persistent thing, its source was not finite.

"There is absolutely no way I am going to bed until after the cheese puffs are done." Mai managed a small smile, bittersweet. "Though I have to admit that sleep can help heal most things." It certainly didn't make it worse-- not usually.

One by one, he began to fold the pastry squares over each dollop of camembert and white sauce. Virgil wished he was less tired and more able to throw up the barriers of his mind - it gleamed to odd thought from Maiko's consciousness and they were not thoughts he wanted to hear.

He didn't want to linger on this grief or the possibility of it ever being opened again.

The Slytherin was still too raw to the experience; he dusted the flour off his hands and dragged his feet to the table bench, quietly folding himself down to a seating position. "Do you lucid dream at all?" he looked up from his jeans, which were now nearly white, a pensive glimmer in otherwise tired eyes.

Virgil went walking in his dreams but the closest thing to his Leglimency was being able to exert control on one's own dreamscape. It was a curious sensation, one that seem fantastical in theory but abided by its own rules once in practice. He watched as a pair of house elves - resigned - levitated the tray of puffs into an oven. They first had to remove his last tray of brownies.

Watching them work was calming.

"I do. Every time I have dreamt about Mortimer Gamp in the dungeon, I lower the walls and walk away." Virgil imagined this in his mind's eye momentarily, the glossy dark walls of level nine unfolding like a cheap box into the soft-focus scenery of some other, less imposing dream. "I don't know if it's the right thing to do, or if I must confront him in my dream."

Or in real life, if they were allowed to attend the wizard's trial. He leaned back against the table and rubbed his eyes sleepily with both hands. "What would you do?"

She sat down next to him, her aching joints protesting before rejoicing at the chance to rest. The bench was horribly uncomfortable; Mai had half a mind to tell Minerva that the house elves deserved comfortable seating in the kitchens. As they put the tray of cheese puffs in the oven, she gave them a soft 'thank you.' One of them curtseyed back in acknowledgement.

Mai couldn't lucid dream. She never had. She'd tried, of course-- everybody who studied Carl Jung would have actively tried. And she did. The moment she realized it was a dream, she'd wake up. Or, worse-- she'd know it was a dream, but couldn't escape. She froze and still didn't have control. Mai didn't want to contemplate what that meant about her own general state of mind. Didn't looking at clocks consistently help with it?

She glanced up at the clock. 3:02. Sleep would be sparse if there was any tonight. If classes were happening that morning, she would have written an excuse for Virgil.

"What would I do?" Mai echoed his words. The answer came to her easier than expected.  "If I could lucid dream, I'd probably walk away." Cut the ties-- but not before acknowledging they were there. She found as much power in walking away as she did in summoning the energy for a confrontation. "But is it the right thing to do? I don't know. That's the thing about the 'right' thing. It's different for everybody, and elusive when you need it the most."

Her green gaze turned to Virgil, steady, exhausted, serious. "What's right for you tonight could be different than what's right tomorrow. You need to test the waters, take a risk. Sometimes the only way to know what is right is to figure out first what isn't. You'll feel it. You'll know. Some part of you probably already does."

Nothing was black and white - he knew that - but faced with such a subjective response, Virgil wished that for once someone could tell him what to do. The independence of his thoughts wavered marginally; they did not vanish all at once, however, if only because he did not naturally relent to taking the easiest path. Not where his mind was concerned.

"I have a suspicion, about what to do." Virgil nodded to himself with a serious expression, vaguely determined. "Some things you can only face on your own."

Or perhaps that wasn't the literal case. He wondered, though not for the first time, if he could bring other people into his dreamscape. If he could welcome his closest friends into a nightmare and by doing so, reshape the entire texture of the manifestation.

He stopped himself from getting carried away by the thought and instead slowly twisted at the waist to reach for a brownie on the table - a corner piece, lots of crispy edges. Virgil loved those the best. They were quiet for a spell - he chewed, looked away towards the great fireplace at a cauldron that was brewing a berry reduction for the morning's pastries. Its scent was nearly palpable now. Sharp sourness, sweet overtones.

Fire crackled. A house elf stirred the cauldron.

"I'm going to work for the Department of Mysteries," he broke the silence after swallowing down an especially ruminative bite of the brownie. "Not only because of what happened. I think I'll like the work there." Virgil continued staring at the fireplace while he spoke and softly licked the chocolate off the tips of his fingers. "Exploring the unknown. Gamp must have liked that too. He must have liked it a great deal."