Attendance:

Demetri was in high spirits today. Nothing happened, really, besides the fact that he was working and making more money than that foolish girl, Neely. He was happy to be working to the seventh year, especially because he'd remember them more than the fifth years. Then the following day he'd be teaching the first years! How adorable! Demetri gleefully danced around his room with a pillow, pretending it was his best friend. It was good to be happy.

He finally put the pillow down and walked over to the board and began to write what he wanted the seventh years to do. Demetri hoped they remembered him. It wasn't THAT long ago. Back then, Bombay was even teaching Demetri. Though he still had no idea what Graham thought about him, Demetri didn't care! La, la, la. Happy days. He set the chalk down and skipped over to his pillow.

Sit down, wear a jacket, get comfy...
Tell me your Zodiac! Do it!

Demetri quickly settled down and laid down on the pillow, humming song about making all the witches say "OH!" and squirmed a bit. "What's taking these children so long? I want to teach now." As if Demetri even taught his students, anyhow. It was mainly just hanging out and talking. But Demetri was able to learn that way with the scholars he apprenticed for. Why couldn't other witches and wizards?

He flipped onto his stomach and watched the door. These were adults, anyways. They could learn whatever their hearts desired. And if they really cared about Astronomy, then they would be able to learn. If they didn't, why were they even in his class?

Beth liked astronomy, truly, but it would be hard to come to that conclusion on one’s own. It was a good class. It was different, and fun – but also in the middle of the bloody night. When Beth was younger, she looked forward to astronomy class simply because it meant an excuse to stay up late and not get into trouble. Walking to the Astronomy Tower in the evening, after curfew, always made her feel as though she was getting away with doing something wicked, and many a night she would practically skip there, cackling with delight and flashing toothy smiles at prefects as she made her way to class. As she grew, the thrill of having to get out of her comfy things and trudge all the way to class in the middle of the night after winding down for the day didn’t quite look thrilling. Usually she only made it to class after whining for a solid hour – if she made it to class. She was always fine once she got there, but getting there was the pits. She couldn’t help but drag her feet as she trudged upward, complaining the whole way.   

She was in the dormitory the evening of astronomy class, lying on her stomach on her bed. She’d already taken her hair down for the day, and it hung rather limply around her face, as tired as she was. She hadn’t bothered to change completely out of her uniform yet, just out of sheer laziness, but she looked nowhere near ready for class. She had taken her tie off earlier and had hung it from the bed post ages ago, and she had swapped her skirt for comfier blue jeans the moment she was done with classes for the day. Her bare feet swung idly in the air, her school robes thrown somewhere behind them, obscuring her pillow. She was still in her sweater, however, which was better than nothing – it was actually an improvement, considering she’d come to class in her pajamas on more than one occasion in the past. “I have to go, don’t I?” she asked her dormmate, a look of pure disgust on her face. Producing a rather irritating whining sound she rolled herself right off the bed and onto the floor. She wasn’t that exhausted, really – she was mostly looking for a reaction.

“Gracie?” she whined from her spot on the floor, using the name for her roommate that she only used when she was upset or wanted something – which one might assume would have been more often. “Have you seen my school shoes? They aren’t under my bed. If they were under my bed I’d be able to see them from here, and I don’t,” she grumbled, pushing herself up and rising to her feet. She ambled over and sat on her roommate’s bed, her hair just as mussed and her feet just as bare. “Will you walk me, at least? If you really loved me, you’d walk me. The castle’s scary at night and there are ghosts,” she pouted. She leaned over and picked up one of her trainers, which had somehow made its way to the other side of the room. “And I’ve decided not to wear school shoes, so forget that I asked you.” She slipped one of the shoes on before getting up and ambling toward the other one, which was laying upside down closer to her bed. She crawled toward her trunk on her hands and knees, pulled out her telescope, and then rose to her feet once more. Pulling a sweatshirt off the ground, she threw it over her shoulder. “I’m ready – c’mon!” she urged

Miraculously, they made it – though Beth’s uniform wasn’t quite as uniform as one would have hoped. When they arrived, the professor, who looked both familiar and unfamiliar at once, appeared to be laying on the floor. She stepped into the space and stood, hovering above him, seemingly unconcerned that her position may have appeared somewhat disrespectful, considering she could see up his nose. “Hi. All right, sir? I just want to let you know something really quick. I decided it might be a good idea to protest the whole uniform thing, because it’s basically the middle of the night right now, right, and I think that wearing my uniform in the middle of the night might mess up my ability to learn, since it requires more effort to find my school shoes than I budgeted to use this late at night and, you know, my success is important to me, like. So I’m wearing this.” And with that little diatribe, she walked over to a pillow and plopped down, a proud grin on her face.

Delighted to have his first seventh year student, Demetri sat up and smiled, brightly, at the girl. "Hello, hello!" He shouted before she even had time to say greetings herself. But, when she did finally greet him she was explaining something to him about her uniform. His eyes flickered around her apparel (Trying to figure out what was wrong with it) before he laughed, sincerely. "No worries, m'lady! Why on Earth would I care for your uniform? Why on Mercury would I care for it, either?" Ho, ho. Astronomy jokes. He knew how late it was at night, and he didn't care what his students wore since he wanted them to be comfortable.

Demetri was even more thrilled when the nice girl sat down with him. Of course, she would have even if she wasn't nice, but Demetri was just excited to be with children that would possibly recognize him. "Do you remember me at all?" Demetri finally piped up. He really doubted someone would, since they HAD to have been in their early years of school when he graduated. "I was in Gryffindor... I graduated about five years ago..." That just made him sound even more young.

Demetri scratched the back of his head and continued to watch the door. "I wonder when everyone else will be getting here..." He murmured to himself, rhetorically, before turning to the girl and smiling again.

Grace had read the same paragraph of the door stop of a book she had been reading for her History of Magic class for roughly an hour and nothing was registering in her brain. She was beginning to think that she was never going to get through the assignment. And *gasp* for once, Grace Eddy might not be prepared for class. A tragedy!

"Hardly," Grace murmured under her breath. Hearing some activity on Beth's side of the room, Grace closed her book and glanced over. A chuckle escaped her lips when Beth spoke of goign to her class and the look on her face that went with it. If only she had a camera, she would take a picture and show her friend what she looked like in times like these.

Grace resisted laughing outright when Beth resorted to using Gracie. It wasn't something she allowed many people to call her. In fact, aside from her family, the only people at school she was okay with using it as a nickname were Beth and George. But clearly she preferred plain old Grace.

"You're lucky I like you," she said with a sardonic look cast in Beth's direction. She balled up a piece of parchment that she had been writing on to no avail and launched it at her friend. "You know I hate that name." After a pause, she then said, "And you're also lucky that I have yet to change out of my uniform for the day. So yeah, I'll walk with you."

Grace knew that if she walked Beth to her class, there was a good chance that she would end up staying for the whole thing. Astronomy was another class that she had taken to OWLS but eventually stopped taking once she had decided on healing. But a good many classes on the 7th year schedule she still attended, mainly because of Beth. She actually never minded as long as she had a free period. Not being required to do work often allowed her to enjoy a class that in previous years had been overwraught with stress to do well.

Arriving to the tower, Grace greeted Professor Woolfolk with a more tepid "Hello" and then asked, "I hope you don't mind if I sit in on class." For some reason, Grace didn't think he would. What professor refused a prefect wanting to sit in on a class they when they were not required to be there?

She smiled bemusingly at him and the exchange he had with Beth. Then, when he mentioned that he graduated five years ago, she wracked her brain for recollections of him as their elder. "I vaguely do," Grace said and then her expression turned a bit sheepish. "I mean, Beth and I did get into some trouble back then....so I imagine you were probably reprimanding us."