It was a bit of a chilly night, and so the fire roared in the Gryffindor hearth against a backdrop of laughter and the strains of conversation. Hannah sat in a squishy armchair around the fireplace, her blonde hair glinting in the light. She looked bored to tears by her Potions book, which in a fit of self-preservation she'd slung over the armrest of her chair and was devoutly trying not to look at. So currently, she was watching either her housemates or the fire, lulled by the warmth and the desperate urge to procrastinate that drove many, many students.

It was, indeed, a chilly night and the fire might have been warm and comforting.  But, sitting in front of it was, also, boring.  The room was filled with people who, despite their intentions to look that way, were very clearly not studying.  Which begged the question why they bothered pretending.  That just seemed a waste of time, if you asked Mairead.  Of course, she was doing the same - it was, apparently, part of the routine.  It seemed to be what 'students' did and Mairead was a student, now. 

She'd been at school a little over a month now and most of her fellow Gryffindors had gotten used to seeing her stretched out on the floor in various places.  Sometimes sitting was comfortable - sometimes lying down was comfortable.  Mairead had, again, snuck the grey, wire-haired lurcher into the common room.  The dog was stretched out on the floor in the light of the fire and Mairead was flopped out right next to her.  She lay on her back, her head resting on the dog's chest.  It just so happened that they were flopped out along the chair that was, currently, inhabited by one of Mairead's dormmates. 

It was Defense Against the Dark Arts, rather than Potions, that had been cast, carelessly, aside.  It lay, so Mairead assumed, somewhere off to her left.  She had her wand out.  Since her session with Professor Mainwaring, Mairead had grown more at ease with using her McDonough wand.  She could still tell it wasn't quite as smooth as some of her classmates wands - it was still prone to its temperamental hiccups, but she was starting to grow quite fond of it.  It was a nice collar - hopefully, her wand would cooperate and it would still be decent looking after growing four times bigger. 

"Engorgio," Mairead said, quietly, pointing the wand at the collar where it hung off a small jagged piece of wood on the chair's foot.  Not surprisingly, nothing changed.