The Owlery could be a chilly place, with the open arch windows letting in a draft but Obderedria didn't mind. Although out of the way and smelly there was something cozy in this tower where the owls roosted. Maybe because of all the animals, the birds with their wide eyes and powerful wings. Maybe because of the activity; owls flying in and out, resting, or coughing up pellets...okay, the pellet part wasn't all that intriguing.

The young Hufflepuff had a stack of letters to mail. She always liked coming her to deliver them. Well, it was needed with her letters off to her mother. Patricia Pienas had yet to get used to owls rapping at the windows to deliver post (always addressed to home now, the Incident At The Court Commons was still a fresh memory). Letters like this one:

36E Bardsley Close, East Croydon

Dear Mum,

I am good and well, we're just about to start exams in June. They aren't too bad, when compared with the standard tests the older students have to take like OWLS and NEWTS (I forget what the acronyms stand for) so I think I should do fine. Well, except for Transfiguration, that like-chemistry class. We had an enjoyable lesson recently, changing the flavors of jelly beans but I kept getting stuck with Burnt Toast.

Puddin' is doing well though I worry when he's out of my house for long periods. Did you find his tinkle ball? I think he would enjoy it. If you did, please send it back with this owl. You might want to offer it some meat so you can tie on the package, the school owls shouldn't nip.

I've kept my money well, leaving 10 Sickles and 6 Knuts (bout 3 pounds) and it should last me until term is over. Can't wait to come home.

Luv, your darling daughter Drea

That money was about to lower a bit, with an order to be sent down to the village with a cheerful note:

Honeydukes, Hogsmeade

Dear Mr. Flume,

I have not heard that bit about Acid Pops and Venomous Tentacula sap! I think the Acid Pops are nasty enough, I'm glad the effect doesn't last long. So would an Acid Pop calm a Venomous Tentacula or make things worse? I don't want to try to find out. I don't think we handle that plant until next year in Herbology.

Included is the usual order but with extra Ice Mice. And thank Mrs. Flume for me for the free marshmallows.

Signed, Obderedria Pienas

Even included were letters that never went anywhere, like this one that Drea had picked up accidently with her outgoing post:

Dear Beverly,

Our house team was in another Quidditch match! I don't get what the big deal over the sport is but if we were playing it we should ride vacuum cleaners instead of those narrow broomstick things. And the bludgers should be flying pillows so it doesn't hurt so bad. Better yet, there should be a 10-point quaffle and a 20-point quaffle and when you score a goal the hoop should release giant bubbles because those goal hoops look like the wands you get in bubble juice to blow bubbles with.

The snitch should flash different colors because it was too easily lost in the Hufflepuff section. And unicorns! I'm unimpressed with the wizarding world because I have yet to see a unicorn. They say that unicorns live in the Forbidden Forrest but that can't be right because it's a dark scary place filled with hundreds of monsters (I bet a Sneezelthworpe like the one under my bed back home lives in the forrest too) which doesn't sound like any place for a unicorn to be.

My dormmates are planning a slumber party soon but I don't think it'll be anything like our slumbers parties since it won't be at your pink coral castle with the dolphin jet skis and the heated roof where we can look up at the milky way constellations (which reminds me our Astronomy teacher is really tall and sweet but the only magical parts of the class are when he waves his wand for a visual example and he doesn't think the Mighty Donut is a heavenly body is space!!) or anything like that. But I am bringing marshmallows!

We can have some fun over the summer soon, Beverly, since I know it's so hard for you to get off of your missions to Jupiter and visit the castle. Though you might want to bring your waders. Between this ghost named Moaning Myrtle and my roommate Heliotrope LeJean I'm surprised the whole building isn't flooded!

Love,

Obderedria Pienas

Drea absentmindedly ran her free hand through her green speckled hair. She was looking for a small, inconspicuous owl that wouldn't freak out her mother when it delivered her message.

Pax was rather deep in thought. With the end of the school year approaching, he'd had a lot of things on his mind; primarily studying, but also finding time for SAWS and the other clubs he was involved in, laying the groundwork for starting his own club (with the copious assistance of Professor Trishna, of course), practicing his flying in the hopes of making the Quidditch team next year, and on-and-off trying to talk himself out of having a crush on one of his closest friends. Pax being exceptionally comfortable with his parents, all of these concerns had made their way into the letter for them that he was currently clutching protectively to his chest.

He was just wondering what his mum and dad would make of all his ramblings when he reached the top of the stairs, and was startled out of his reverie by the presence of one of his fellow first-year housemates. 'Oh!' he exclaimed, jumping a little. The jerky movement was just enough to tip the bag of owl treats he had been holding along with his letter, and several of the little pellets scattered to the floor. A number of the more eager owls, noticing the free food, swarmed about his ankles.

'Ah. Oops,' Pax cringed, trying to shuffle his way out of the crowd of owls, but rather ineffectually, since he didn't want to risk stepping on any of them. 'Sorry Drea. Um. Did you, did you want an owl?' With a half-smile, half-grimace, he gestured to the owls fluttering about him. Granted, he had brought the owl treats to make it easier to get an owl to take his post, but this wasn't quite what he had intended.

With a creak of wood and something falling thump on the floor, a flash-flock of owls swooped down from their rafters. "Eek!" Obderedria shrieked, pulling her arms up for protection. Besides the rush of air overhead she felt her fingers loose grip on her letters as her hands switched to guarding her face. Peering out from behind her hands, she found a boy from her house, Pax Wintergreen, mobbed about the ankles with owls.

"Ah. Oops. Sorry Drea. Um. Did you, did you want an owl?"

"Oh, yes, I did," she replied, still thrilled from the sudden owl movement. "Oh no!" The post owls were dropping their duty of mail delivering in favor of mounds of food. She stooped to rescue her letters from being torn and ripped from exited talons and beaks. Oh dear. She should have put them in envelopes at least before coming up here, they were going to be ruined.

Pulling up on message and reading it, she didn't recognize the handwriting. "Is this one of yours?" she asked before peering again for her lost letters.

'Huh wha--? Oh!' Pax recognised the envelope in Drea's hands as his own; he must have dropped it when he spilled the bag of owl treats. 'Yes, that's mine, thanks-- oh, hang on--'

For creatures that didn't seem interested in having much to do with him whenever he came up here, the owls could certainly cause a stir when properly motivated. Realising that Drea was trying to rescue her own post from being mistaken for owl food, he looked about frantically, trying to catch sight of any scrap of parchment. His gaze landed on a sheaf of paper fluttering in the commotion the owls were creating, and he nimbly darted out to snatch it up.

He took in the first line without really meaning to read it, then waved the letter at Drea. 'Addressed to Beverly,' he told her. 'Yours?' Not having noticed how many letters Drea had been holding, Pax continued looking around in case there were any more to be found.

Her letter home was recovered from from under a black and gray feathered owl. Obderedria looked for her other letters but froze, wide eyed, at Pax's discovery. "Addressed to Beverly. Yours?'

"Um, yes," Obderedria said, quickly snatching up the letter. Did he read it? All the nonsense of quidditch and vacuum cleaners and jet skis and doughnut shaped planets? She had been writing another letter to Beverly but must have forgotten to place it in the box. Hopefully he wouldn't ask about it.

"Ack, my note to Mr. Flume!" she cried, happy for another pressing need, rescuing the order form and note from it's duty as table linens as a few owls argued over their rat treat dinner. There, that was all of them.

"Thanks Pax," she said. "Er, I think I'll need two owls, once they're done eating." She shifted the letter to Beverly under her stack of outgoing post.

'Yeah, once they're-- oh hang on, this is getting ridiculous...' Pax could still barely move for fear of stepping on an owl. Giving Drea an apologetic look, he stooped down and reached gingerly through the flurry of feathers and claws for the bag of treats he had dropped. 'Ouch,' he muttered, as one of the beaks mistakenly scratched the back of his hand, but a moment later, he emerged triumphant with the little bag. Of course, there were still some tasty morsels on the owlery floor, so this didn't really dissipate the crowd. With a resigned sigh, Pax, scooped a handful of treats out of the bag and flung them to an empty patch of floor currently not occupied by him or Drea. Noting the replenished food source, the owls soon shifted, and Pax was free to move around again.

'I, um, I guess I'll tidy that up when they're done. Urgh. Next time? I'm keeping these treats in a zip-lock bag.' Pax might have been tempted to laugh a little at the situation, but he was still aware that he rather both disrupted and inconvenienced his housemate with his clumsiness, so it was a grimace he wore rather than a smile. 'Sorry again, Drea. And um, thanks for rescuing mine,' he added, taking his own envelope back now that he could actually walk over to Drea.

'I'll help you get your owls, once the fuss has died down,' he said, eager to make up for the mess. 'And, um, d'you need any envelopes? I think I have some spares-- two letters, right? No, wait, three?' Pax tilted his head inquiringly. He was sure Drea had said she'd need two owls, but wasn't she holding three letters? 'Are two of the letters going to the same place?' he asked, before stopping to think about whether it was polite to ask questions about Drea's post.

"Oh thanks for the help with the owls," Obderedria said truthfully. "And yes, I'll need envelopes, um..." She felt very self conscious at that point. How was she supposed to explain that not everything was to be mailed, that she had this imaginary pen pal since she was six so she wasn't the loneliest girl in school? But somehow explaining that sounded worse then pretending everything needed to be mailed.

"Um, three envelopes and three owls," Obderedria said, adopting a business-like tone her mum used when in unknown situations. "One just needs to get to the village, that's for Mr. Flume. One to home in London, that needs an owl that won't draw attention. And," Beverly lived in a pink coral castle that had no means of address! It was just the spot Drea went to in her daydreams. "Another for long distance."

'Three, okay...' Pax worried for a moment as he rooted in his backpack, trying to remember if the packet of envelopes was actually still there. Thankfully it was, and he handed three over to Drea with a flourish. 'There! Now, owls...'

Fishing out one of the few treats actually left in the bag, Pax carefully approached one of the owls that had actually remained in his perch. 'Hey buddy, got your favourite!' He offered up the food, holding out his arm for the owl to hop on to. After regarding him in a fairly long-suffering fashion, the owl finally deigned to accept the treat and clamber onto Pax's forearm. Pax winced a little at the claws; Hogwarts owls were usually good about not clutching too hard, and he had a habit of wearing thick sweaters under his robes whenever he ventured to the owlery, but having an owl on his arm did still pinch a bit.

'I usually use this guy for sending stuff to my grandad in Hogsmeade,' Pax explained, bringing the owl over to his classmate. 'He's a bit grumpy, but he's very reliable for short distances. He'll take your letter to Mr. Flume no problem-- hey, that's the one who runs Honeydukes, right?' Pax's face lit up a little. Even though he'd only been to Honeydukes a few times, it was by far his favourite sweet shop. 'I didn't know you knew him!'

Obderedria took the envelopes as Pax called down an owl. One had [Beverly] scrawled on it before it was placed under the others. She got to addressing the rest. Pax returned with an owl. ''I usually use this guy for sending stuff to my grandad in Hogsmeade. He's a bit grumpy, but he's very reliable for short distances. He'll take your letter to Mr. Flume no problem-- hey, that's the one who runs Honeydukes, right? I didn't know you knew him!''

"Oh," said Obderedria, blushing as she looked up from her labeling. "Yes, I met him on that supervised trip this spring. I was asking so many questions about his candies and he seemed to like that. His wife too, Mrs. Flume, they're both very nice. Your grandad lives down there?"

Filling out her home address, she set to sending the sweets order off to Honeydukes. "And two owls for long distance. Continental, though."

The Hogsmeade owl handed off to Drea, Pax set about enticing another couple down. She'd mentioned needing one that wouldn't draw much attention, so he chose what he hoped was a fairly unobtrusive barn owl.

'Yeah, Grandad has lived there for as long as I can remember. He runs a little bookshop. It'll be so good in third year, actually getting to visit Hogsmeade, I'll get to see him a lot more that way.' Pax grinned at the thought as he looked around for another long-distance owl that wasn't in the slowly-dissipating flock on the owlery floor. His grandad was a little stern and had little patience for anything he deemed 'nonsense', but he always had good advice to give and interesting stories to tell.

Finding a suitable owl and fishing another treat out of the bag, Pax continued, 'Not to mention getting to visit the shops. I mean, I've been before, but with my family, you know? Never just hanging out with friends. Oh hey, when we do get to go in third year, maybe you could introduce me to the Flumes? Their sweets are pretty much the best things I've ever tasted. Right, here we go.' Finally, Pax had the two arms perched on his arm. He went back over to Drea, moving carefully so as not to jostle them too much.

'So, this one is for London, and-- where's the other one going?' he asked conversationally. 'UK as well?'

Obderedria finished up her labeling. She too couldn't wait until her third year to visit Hogsmeade especially to go to Honeydukes in person. And she'd heard there was a new bakery in the village too.

"I'll be sure to introduce them to you! Um...not sure if I could do this, might have to message Mr. Flume on whether you could mail order from him too. Or if you ever wanted me to order something for you, I could do that." Drea really wanted to thank Pax for helping her out with her post. She'd taken to the whimsy of using owls for mail but the birds screeched and shuffled in such a way that always made her flinch.

"So, this one is for London, and-- where's the other one going? UK as well?"

Obderedria blushed as she accepted the owls and prepped the messages. After a moment she said something that wasn't a full truth, wasn't full fiction but it would free her from worrying about giving a reasonable explanation. "Well, it should be somewhere in the UK. I don't know where, exactly because she travels so much but the owl should find her, right? I'm not worried if it takes a while."

With the messages ready, Obderedria let the owls fly out the window. The one with Beverly's letter staying in the line of sight, shrinking into a speck. She felt odd, unbalanced, almost melancholy. Surely it would be a fruitless mission for the owl, the letter winding up somewhere random, like the forrest floor or lost in a skip. She starred out the window for a time until she remembered Pax was still in the Owlery.

"Thank you for the help, Pax."

'Oh, hey, I mean, no problem, I mean, um.' Pax shrugged bashfully, giving a sidelong glance to the slowly dissipating flurry of owls. He'd need to take a look at that floor soon to see if there were any scraps of food he'd need to pick up. It was at times like this he really wished he was good enough at magic to master scourgify. 'Y'know, least I could do after starting an owl storm. Sorry again about that.'

Tentatively, he stepped over to the window, giving Drea a quietly discerning look. Was it just him, or had she gone a bit subdued? 'And that's, um, really kind of you, offering to ask Mr. Flume, but I think I'll be okay.' He smiled a little. 'My parents send me sweets sometimes.' Distractedly, he rubbed the back of his neck, ostensibly gazing out the window, but really eyeing his housemate out of the corner of his eye.

He dithered a moment about whether to ask what he was thinking of asking, but really, when Pax dithered like that, it wasn't really a matter of if he was going to say what was on his mind, but when. 'Um. Drea? Um, feel free to tell me to get lost or whatever, but... Are you okay?' He looked out of the window again, trying to imagine which way the owls had flown, and wondered briefly if perhaps Drea was homesick. Although, maybe she wasn't sad at all. Maybe she had just gone a little quiet because she was thinking. But Pax had a habit of overthinking and overworrying sometimes.

"Huh?" Obderedria asked, still out of things. "Oh, no you don't need to leave Pax! I'm fine, I was just pondering something."

She had never sent a letter off to Beverly like that before, not an actual one via post. They were placed in a box of other writings and unsendable letters. But of course her imaginary friend knew the contents of each. Pax was eyeing her slightly and she recognized the worry, her and mum were like that too.

"Did you get all your mail off, Pax?"

Pax watched Drea a moment longer, not entirely convinced, but he wasn't going to press the matter. At her inquiry after his own post, he started a little. Of course, sending a letter to his parents had been his entire reason for coming up here, but in all the chaos with the owls it had altogether slipped his mind.

'Oh! Oh, right, thanks for reminding me,' he said sheepishly, and he started rummaging inside his backpack again, vaguely remembering having put it there when he went to look for spare envelopes for Drea. Withdrawing the sealed envelope for his parents, he double-checked the address, then returned to the roosts to entice one more owl into service today.

'Mum and Dad worry a bit when they don't hear from me,' he remarked, absentmindedly filling the silence once he had found an owl willing to let him tie the letter to its leg. 'I mean, I still think Mum would rather use the phone, or the muggle post, but,' he shrugged, hardly needing to state why this wasn't a viable option. 'She seems okay with a monthly owl, anyway.'

Aware he was thinking out loud, and rambling at that, Pax asked, 'Do you owl home a lot, Drea? Or that friend of yours who travels?' By this point he was back at the window, and with one last quick check to make sure the envelope was properly secured, he sent the owl soaring from the window, watching as it went.

Obderedria could understand keeping in touch with family. "I try to write to mum at least once a week. So she knows I'm safe. We've been saving up money for a cell phone but that wouldn't work up here, so owls it is."

"I don't often write to my traveling friend," she ran a hand through her green speckled hair, distracted. "I mean, I do but I don't often send them..."

She twisted her hands together, a jumble of fingers. Obderedria couldn't keep the story going any longer. "Promise not to laugh if I share something?"