Curfew was really more of a suggestion than a rule at this point in the school year for any student above the age of seventeen.  Honestly, it was kind of silly to assume everyone would be in bed, and with the castle being so big and the routes of professors and prefects being so obvious (particularly when your partner in crime for the evening was also a prefect), so Indi strolled comfortably from the Gryffindor tower and to the Room of Requirement. 

In the oversized pockets of her cardigan, she carried her papers with her and a little bit of what they would need.  She knew Virgil would supply too, but along with her letter about being part of the sexual education panel, her mum had sent some from their garden and it was prime.  (Carol was the best human alive.) 

Honestly, Indi was looking forward to it.  She was educated, clearly, her mother didn’t have boundaries on those sorts of conversations, so she didn’t need to go.  But, seeing her mum and people like her mum talking about important things?  She liked that.  It was also something she wouldn’t mind doing at some point in the future. 

The future, though, was something Indica had hardly considered.  Sure, she wanted to study yoga – her mum had a lot of contacts all over the world for that, but she didn’t know when and why or how she was going to do it.  Even before the kidnapping she had been blasé about the entire thing, but now even more so.  She tried not think beyond tomorrow.  It had a horrible toll on her parchments and their quality, but Indica had never been a truly gifted student anyway (except herbology  and that was raw talent mixed with some dedication). 

When she finally arrived at the room of requirement, she breathed easy.  It was the perfect place.  Plush with lots of large pillows to lounge on and snacks.  Snacks everywhere on a low table – perfect for reaching from a pillow on the floor!  It knew her and Virgil so well.  Not to mention the incense and candlelight.  It was a paradise for her evening plans.  Looking around, she didn’t notice the sleepy slytherin anywhere – he was probably on his way, so she took the opportunity to plop onto a pillow and reach for a brownie. 

The door to the Room of Requirement gave way to his insignificant weight, creaking quietly on its hinges as Virgil slipped in and let it shut behind him. A sweet perfume imbued the air here - lighthearted patchouli, made woodier by its source of incense. He had been in earlier to drop off the brownies he'd made from leftover gillyweed after the bake sale, and gone up to fetch his notebook before returning.

Indi had arrived whilst he was away.

"Papers?" the Slytherin practically collapsed on to the mountainous range of throws and pillows, elbows leaning back against soft cotton. "Forgot mine. Tired."

He had three lessons today, which was one short of the most that Virgil ever had in his schedule, although he worked harder at them in the last month than most people would in more classes - it was the looming pressure of graduation and getting grades good enough for level 9 traineeship.

His slender hand extended feebly for a brownie. "Light me up, Indica Kemp." Virgil bit into the chocolate without tasting it, thinking only of the sugar rush that would give him a strong enough kick to get through a late night - he fully intended on being lazy all through Saturday but only because he needed to marshall energy for Sunday.

"If I have to hear one more person tell me that these exams will decide my future, " he chewed spitefully with a pouting lip. "I'm getting out the Tarot cards and predicting theirs."

When Virgil pushed his way in, an easy smile crossed Indica’s face.  “You’re always tired,” she countered teasingly as he dropped into the pillows, indicating that he’d forgotten his papers.  “But you’re in luck, I brought enough for a joint or two,” she winked at him, pulling out the contraband before sitting up all the way. 

As if on cue, a little lap desk appeared- thank you, room of requirement, and Indi was able to slide it into her lap – opening the bag of ground gilly.  She liked to have some pre-ground for situations like this.  Situations where there were brownies and she knew she’d eat one in five minutes and then be too out of it to grind at all.  Making her fingers work quickly, it was clear she was the roller this evening. 

“Working on it,” she chirped and lifted the paper to start to twist.  There was something satisfying about the whole thing, watching it form and knowing that in about fifteen seconds they’d be enjoying it.  Besides, as frustrated as Virgil seemed to be about exams, Indi couldn’t help but feel apathetic.  It didn’t matter anyway, formal schooling wasn’t the be-all-end-all, but her parents wanted her to finish anyway.  So, she did a half-hearted sort of job at it and she really didn’t want to go work yet… so there was that bit too. 

Indi just wanted to enjoy the time she had, and that was going to start with this joint, she thought with a bright smile – lifting it and then extending it to Virgil with the lighter.  “Sounds like you need the first hit,” she was the spirit of generosity.  There was nothing quite as satisfying as taking the first hit. She was really a kind person to grant it to him, especially after she rolled. 

“I can’t imagine Edgar is riding you that hard about it though,” she commented off-handedly: Virgil’s parents were like her own; there was really no reasonable way to win the title of family shame.  Indi was relived, but sometimes she felt like Virgil resented it.  As if he could TRY to be disappointing.  “Or is it something else?” 

Indi was a godsend, more diligent as she rolled her papers than Virgil was comfortable observing in his languorous state. Exposed gillyweed mingled with the incense and he smiled to himself, head tilted back with closed eyes. There was no necessity to think on lessons for the next two days - homework aside.

He could float away from those thoughts as soon as they lit up. The Gryffindor proffered first draw of her joint on cue and he sat up slightly to take it into his lips. A flame leapt up. Virgil drew deeply drew breath before laying back into the cushions.

“I can’t imagine Edgar is riding you that hard about it though,” Indi continued while he was holding in the gulp of smoke, “Or is it something else?”

The idea of his father being harsh on anything short of a crime was laughable, true. He pursed his lips and sighed a stream of smoke into the air; Virgil felt the walls of his mind waver though he stopped himself from having a wander in nearby heads. Indi was a good friend and conversation was more interesting for not knowing someone else's intention.

"No, it's... I don't know. Mortimer Gamp," the young wizard stared at the arches of the high ceiling and tasted that name in his mouth. "Department of Mysteries. It's difficult to believe I might be there again, but I want to." Badly.

A lightness inhabited him from the inside out, like his bones had turned to clouds and his thoughts to the stratosphere of a purple night sky beyond castle rooftops. Virgil turned his head to the side, catching glimpse of Indi as she took her hit off the joint. It was alright saying it to her.

Indi was not judgemental, relaxed to the extent of even having any outward ambition. An ambivalent state. "We're leaving all of this behind."

Taking the joint from Virgil, Indi put the end to her lips and inhaled.  As the slight burn hit the back of her throat, she could feel her lungs filling and Godric that was an amazing (and immediate) feeling.  She was convinced that there was honestly nothing more pleasing, except perhaps a bong, and the room of requirement wasn’t that progressive.  It certainly didn’t help students technically break the law.  So, papers for the time being.

Holding her breath, she turned her head toward him and exhaled slowly as he talked about Mortimer Gamp and mysteries and the future, which inevitably brought up the lamentable past.  She preferred not to dwell, but some of her classmates were not the same. 

She let the thick smoke out of her lungs and it pooled above their heads in a smoky haze before she extended her hand back to Virgil.  “Carol would say life goes in circle: sometimes you end up where you start.”  It was one of those weird things that Carol would definitely say.  And maybe it was true.  Maybe Virgil had something he had to do there – like unfinished business, even if he wasn’t a ghost. 

Indi didn’t have that same pull, she didn’t want to do anything.  Curling up in the pillow much like a cat might, Indi tucked her hands under her head and sighed, closing her eyes for just the briefest moment.  “I want to travel, I think,” she shrugged, “but who knows?  Definitely not the ministry.”

There was very little about that place that made her want to go there.  It was clinical, dark… foreboding.  Indi liked warmth and happiness and welcoming.  “Spend a year at an ashram or something,” she grinned, “couldn’t you just picture it?”

      "...sometimes you end up where you start."

"Maybe." He tried not to contemplate the idea of his final destination being a former starting point - if Carol Kemp were right, he hoped it was only because people wished to end in the same place but on their own terms. Virgil made a discontent sound as he rolled on to his front with forearms resting on the cushions, reaching to accept the joint from Indi while she told him about her plans.

The prefect paused before taking another puff, fumbling with his free hand for the notebook he'd brought down.

He flipped it open against the soft rug to where he had reached in the halfway point before pulling out a short pencil that had been hiding behind his ear. "I can picture you at an ashram," he held the fag between his lips and smiled wryly.

A serene, spiritual setting suited his friend. His hands played at sketching the outline of a face - slow and dreamy in its movements; more out of habit than intention.

"What would you do there, en précisément?" Virgil glanced up to observe the way Indi hid under her hands, long dark hair falling across her tan face in a messy but pretty way. "Exalt your flexibility of body and soul?" he only half teased - her limberness was a force to reckon with, in truth.

Indi nodded slowly as he gave a non-committal response, which was a very Virgil reaction to the whole thing.  While Virgil was laying on his stomach, Indica flopped onto her back and stared up at the ceiling.  She hadn’t noticed what it looked like before, but now it was swirling with color.  Hot, bright hues swirled in conjunction with softer tones, Indi smiled as she watched the colors crash together like waves.  It wasn’t like she was absolutely high yet… but it was calming and very pretty. 

As she closed her eyes, she turned her head.  She only reopened her eyes when he indicated that he could picture her on an ashram and Indi pouted.  “You don’t want to come with me instead?” she puffed out her bottom lip and batted her eyelashes at him.

Truthfully, she couldn’t see Virgil practicing oneness of mind and body with her in India at all.  He’d burn up like a crisp.  He also wasn’t exactly the same sort of disciplined as Indi was.  “Learn more yoga,” she shrugged, “search for enlightenment maybe?  Nirvana has always appealed to me,” she laughed and threw her arm out, stretching her greedy fingers toward the joint they were sharing. 

“Besides, you know better than most how I can best exalt my flexibility,” she winked at him and took the joint to her lips, inhaling slowly.  It was true though, he and plenty of others were quite aware of Indi’s extreme flexibility.   “Should I pose for you?” Indi grinned and stretched herself out, hands above her head as she groaned.  The feeling of a stretched spine was a beautiful thing. 

The lines he slowly drafted against the notebook paper were in a light hand, partially as part of Virgil's own sketching style but also because he was distracted by the various sensations beginning to course through him. A soft tingling in the extremities and the edges of his vision pleasantly blurred in comparison to its usual sharpness.

"My meditation is in sleep-" he replied to Indi's offer to follow her without looking up, broad strokes of the sketch manifesting a figure laying on its side. "- and my prayers are too selfish anyway." It was a flippant response.

Virgil used his right hand to retrieve the joint from his mouth, glancing at the other student as he returned it to her. You would think she had already discovered Nirvana by the way their ambitions barely concerned her; at least on the outside. He would have found it annoying if she weren't so endearing, or generous.

The Slytherin laughed lightly at the offer to pose and stared longer whilst she stretched. "Does being in a state of Nirvana involve purpose, you think?" he asked, momentarily losing thread of structured conversation."Or is it the purpose in itself?" Attaining spiritual liberation would probably bore him.

He moved on to the slight details of the sketch, working mostly from his mind's eye view of Indi's appearance although he would glance up to confirm the odd aspect. A softness to her lips, a vexingly human curve of her hip.

Every time his pencil touched paper, music hummed inside Virgil's head. "You're already posing," he replied peaceably and ran a free hand through his untidy hair. "Maybe you should become somebody's muse, Indi. Inspire with flexibility."

The concept of nirvana was one that Indi was vastly interested in.  It certainly seemed like the best thing to pursue.  Rather than money or fame or an empty existence that involved going to and from an office every day, Indi was going to chase the ultimate: nothingness. 

“It’s the ultimate purpose,” she yawned.  “The end of rebirth, the loss of attachment, aversion and ignorance…” she lifted her hands up and spread her fingers wide, as if she could see it all in front of her, spreading the words like a deck of cards.  “You just… are.” 

She let out a slow, long breath.  The thought was freeing and oppressive at the same time.  She wondered if it were truly possible, to be enlightened: to let go of everything and just exist.  There was obviously more to it than that, but still.  That was the essence, wasn’t it?  “If I reach that point, I will definitely impart some of my wisdom onto you,” she smiled and closed her eyes again, letting her hands fall haphazardly to her sides. 

“I think I inspire Eli a little more than you,” she wrinkled her nose and laughed softly.  He wanted to be a tattoo artist and Indica personally couldn’t wait until he could do something for her.  Maybe after she travelled.  After she found something meaningful she wanted on her body forever.  “But I can be okay with that,” she shrugged and turned over on her side again.  As comfortable as the pillows were, she just… wasn’t getting into that sweet spot where you didn’t want to move yet. 

Propping her head on her hand, Indi contorted her body so her position now mimicked Virgil’s.  “I didn’t see you all week,” she pointed out, “have you succumbed to studying with everyone else?” 

He admired Indi's embrace of simply being - one that he felt was not only in direct opposition to what history has shown them but to human nature itself.

"I'll take my loss of attachment six feet under, when it happens," his unfocused gaze dropped back to the notebook. What interested Virgil best about people was that they were incomplete without conflict. He suspected that even his friend would become bored if left alone in an Ashram to attain nirvana.

But they already knew that about each other, the innate differences of opinion on which they could agree to disagree. The Slytherin did not want to talk about what he had just implied anyway, considering how close they had both come to Death last month.

He shook his head self-deprecatingly, continuing to sketch while Indi mentioned her acts of inspiration towards Eli. "You do," Virgil agreed in a dreamy voice. "That is because Eli is a true artist. I can only imitate." A pause as he put down the pencil, swivelling the book around to show her the quick outlines of her form laying against the white background. "See?"

She looked like she was made out of cloud and atmosphere. Maybe she was.

Virgil delicately snatched the joint from Indi - she was gesturing wildly, wriggling about across the rugs and cushions to get comfortable. He took a toke and decided to sit up while the gillyweed continued to gently unchurn his knotted thoughts.

        “I didn’t see you all week, have you succumbed to studying with everyone else?”

"Only distracting myself. Baking, knitting, reading..." he replied a beat before realising the double-meaning behind her use of studying, and made a noise that resembled a cat whose tail had been pulled. "Fuck, was trying to forget it as well. Donovan caught Sophie and I in the hut on Monday."

A helpless, effeminate laugh. "Not the nice Donovan either."

Death was always an uncomfortable topic, particularly when people who had nearly experienced it talked about it.  So, Indi elected to ignore it.  She could just lay her head down and watch the colors instead of worry about mortality.  Wasn’t that the whole point of looking for nirvana? Transcending worries about death?  Too bad she hadn’t actually gotten there yet and the fear was very real.

Not that Indica was going to let it get to her.  She just closed her eyes and breathed.  Focusing on the feeling of a slow inhales and an equally as slow exhales. It was effective, because as she calmed herself down, she was able to refocus and open her eyes.  It was just in time to see the image Virgil revealed, which was a rough sketch of her in the pillows.  “I love it!” she grinned, tracing the uneven lines with her eyes. 

It was so fun being friends with artistic people.  Indi was her own kind of artist, but definitely not like them.  She didn’t work with paints or charcoal or even pencil.  She could make a garden look like art though.  That had to count for something.  “Imitation or not, I think you’re supremely talented,” she wiggled her eyebrows and dissolved into giggles as she allowed him to take the joint back.  They were, for lack of a better word, blowing through that one. 

The giggles did not stop immediately though.  The fuzzy cloud of chemical euphoria surrounded her and she was so pleased with herself.  “You should make me a new hat,” Indi commented casually.  She liked Virgil’s knitting. She tried to learn once.  It wasn’t her thing – despite the repetitive, almost meditative quality, she couldn’t get the tension right and it was just a mess. 

Apparently, not as big of a mess as Virgil though.  “Sophie?” she repeated dumbly, “like Flitwick?” she asked, just to clarify.  It was an odd thought, Indi never would have imagined it.  “What was that like?” she lifted her head up with intense interest,  She had so many questions.  “Like noisy or quiet as a mouse?” instantly, Indi went from existential dreaming to curious inquisitor pretty quickly.  “Is she a freak? It’s always the wholesome looking ones, you know.”   

He sat forward, bringing his lanky knees up and resting a hand on it partly to offer the last toke or two for Indi to finish now that a fog was truly starting to unravel the tension in his shoulders. It felt like thoughts were dropping off one by one... each a will-o'-the-wisp that disappeared into distant darkness if he tried to chase them.

Still, Virgil carefully scribbled a note in his messy script at the bottom of his sketch: knit hat for Indi - mauve? indigo? forest green?

The pencil went back behind his ear as his gaze lifted to her curious expression. And while Indi had few questions to ask about life and death and the uncertainty between, she could be counted upon to ask the important ones. Important in the eyes of some anyway.

Virgil smirked, reaching for a brownie and breaking off a quarter of a corner piece; just to nibble on while they spoke. "It was alright," he shrugged: which was to say, it was sex, upon which variations were many but culminations singular. "Neither a mouse nor a lion," the Slytherin affirmed pointedly in reference to Indi and Sophie's shared house. "Nor a chipmunk."

His mouth closed on the brownie, nibbling meekly at a bit of the chocolate and savouring the bitterness masked by herb and sugar. Was it really so surprising that he slept with the other Gryffindor? Virgil had admittedly been looking for a distraction and he'd fulfilled a natural desire. He didn't like to think about it as being... overtly personal. Just a release, a relief.

He didn't want to admit that somebody touching his body could also access other parts of him.

"It was normal." A pronouncement, avoiding that word - freak, and deciding that it would be bad taste to bring up how the hut had been Sophie's first time. Not that Indi could be cruel but because Virgil did not trust himself not to be. "Why?" he asked with a laconic tone between soft bites. "Would you like me to sketch a picture of that too?"

Indi didn’t know where chipmunk came from, but then again she wasn’t entire sure she wanted to.  It was probably some inside joke – maybe a reference to her cheeks.  Chipmunks were able to store a lot in their cheeks… if it was related to that, Indi wrinkled her nose in confusion.  Yes, that was something better to leave unasked. 

There were more details that would be less… gross.  Though, she couldn’t help but look at him with sympathy, “Just alright?” that wasn’t good.  Sex should be fun!  Indi sure as hell enjoyed it, though she was the sort to laugh and joke the entire time.  She and Eli were similar in that respect: the seriousness that some people regarded it with was not suited for her.  It was also where her and Virgil had common ground; sex didn’t have to be about love eternal.

So, she supposed that’s what surprised her.  Sophie had always struck her as a good girl, someone who would think very hard about who she was going to sleep with and not just have a fling.  Maybe something had happened.  The year had been quite stressful and it wasn’t like other classmates hadn’t flown off the deep end.  Zia Piselli came to mind, her habits had changed pretty rapidly after the explosion and then the ministry thing… Maybe Sophie was like that. 

She made a mental note to bring her some green tea and maybe a brownie if she was interested.  “Just curious,” Indi beamed, “no need for pictures.”  She reached for a brownie and bit off a corner with enthusiasm.  The comfortable cloud of gillyweed was settling in around her and adding a brownie would prolong the high for hours to come.  It was the perfect use of an evening, the distraction they both probably needed.  Chewing while she thought, Indi swallowed before she continued, “Do you like her?” she raised her eyebrows. 

Indi made a face and, unable to resist the reason, Virgil let himself glean the thought from her mind that might have caused it - he coughed abruptly, covering up the piece of brownie he'd choked on. Storing things in one's cheeks. The Slytherin cleared his throat, eyes half-closed and reddened by their use of gillyweed.

A deeply amused smile plastered itself across his face and he finished the last of the corner brownie he had taken, shrugging indifferently at Indi's initial sympathy. Fooling around with Flickwik had been alright.

While he and Indi shared a notion that sex could be recreational without necessarily eluding to deeper emotion, his understanding came from a more detached source. Virgil believed sex varied. You did it to fulfil a physical desire; it could be fun but - like having a smoke - it could just as well be average. Or a bad trip.

He leaned against his drawn up legs and pulled his notebook closer to flip over a new page while Indi ate and spoke.

        “Do you like her?”

Virgil picked up his pencil again, glancing up only for a second to catch her raised eyebrows and smirk in response. He was quiet for a second while he drew the outline of a spider across the page.

"No..." his response came in a thoughtful, quiet voice. "Not in a special way." The faint threads of a web around the arachnid now and he frowned to himself with the air of someone who had realised an unlikeable truth about themselves. "I suppose I thought it would be interesting."

The smile from earlier was gone now, lost to the cloud behind his eyes that watched his own thoughts go by like they were foreign subjects. Virgil flicked the pencil at the edges of the web and looked at Indi, mouth sullen but not unpleasant. "Don't you ever do things just because?" here he met her in the eye. "Or just to see what will happen?"

 ”No… not in a special way.”

Indi nodded.  She understood those feelings.  Sometimes it was just good to get into it with someone who was aesthetically pleasing, and she couldn’t say Sophie wasn’t.  She was soft in the right places and she did have nice lips.  Indica could appreciate the other gryffindor’s recommending physical attributes, as it appeared Virgil could (at least once). 

He looked lost in thought though and that was slightly distressing to Indica who felt like she was floating, so comfortably situated in the pillows that she hadn’t a care in the world.  That was how she preferred to experience a high anyway.
 
The only bad trip she’d had recently was directly related to what Virgil asked her about: doing things just to see what would happen.  “Of course,” she answered readily.  Impulse was often the driving factor behind the choices she made.  “I was tending the gardens,” she lowered her voice, a smile creeping over her features because she couldn’t help it – the floating and the high just made her so numb which was almost the same as happiness, “and there was a mushroom… I’d read about it…” she flicked her hand around, dismissing that part as she continued, “the text said fully matured and ingested they were hallucinogenic.” 

Her smile dipped for only a moment before it became impossible to hold a solemn expression.  “Rather than pushing the limits of my consciousness, I sweat all night and felt like there were spiders crawling under my skin,” a pause, “lesson learned: don’t mess with fungus.  I hope that wasn’t the sort of interesting you were looking for – or experienced,” she looked at him seriously now, even though she was still smiling and her eyes were starting to feel heavy with the haze of the drug. 

At this point, Indica realized they were too far apart.  She hit the pillow next to her, “you should come here.”  She giggled and smiled, doing her best to as gracefully as possible scoot over to create more room.  “And sign my picture.  I want to take it back with me – frame it, you know," she laughed breathily as she flopped onto her back and gazed up at the ceiling again.