So, after he was just bored with ducks--they weren't quite magical, after all), Forrest continued on his way until...

...

... ...he fell in love.

Mouth as open as it would go, he just STARED at the treehouse that looked much, much beautiful than their own home from about twenty metres. It was even better than Hogwarts itself! It was just like in his dreams, and just like the very house his father had always put off building. He could LIVE here, y'know? After taking in every detail and making sure there was NO ONE arond, he broke into a gallop towards it and in a few seconds he was already at the rope ladder to climb.

THIS was magic!

The grounds had never been more desirable to Theodore. A place that had an unlimited supply of fresh air, ugggh, he had taken air for granted his entire life until right now. The boy was tired, but feeling a little better than he had done yesterday. Nights were still very tough, though. Sleeping on a trunk in the common room. He was not stepping a foot in those dorms until it was fumigated.

The tree house seemed like a good place to go. Maybe he could sleep there tonight? It would sure save him a flipping knut to get back into his common room. The bugs would also be welcomed compared to rats and stuff.

He pulled himself up, and led face down on the wooden floor.

And he cried.

Because he was on his own and it was allowed. He just wanted his own bed and a cuddle.

Lex was full. The kinda full you get after finishing two bowls of ice-cream. What else was there to eat? Surely not the food they were offering. Definitely not. She tried swallowing that stuff and on an odd occasion or two she actually managed to get through at least half her meals but today just wasn't one of those days and she was 'rationing' with her candy now, as Aidan said, so the next best thing was that one thing that seemed to be abundantly at the school.

She got herself nice and cozy, leaning against a wall of the treehouse and got set to read until her eyes closed (make no mistake, it was a book on hexing, otherwise this wouldn't be happening) but then she heard footsteps.

Hmmm?

Quite lazily she heaved herself up and walked to the exterior or the massive treehouse. This was her fort for the day, she was prepared to hex the magic out of anyone who wanted to interrupt--OOOHHHHH!!!

"Forrest!" She beamed down at the First Year who seemed to have just gotten there. Lex shoved her wand back into its holster. "You're coming up right??"

Christmas was mad she had wasted her only knut to enter the common room and she had got her stuff and was not to enter the common room again she refused

Dora was tired.

She still hadn't taken a step into her common room since she had to PAY, and the fourth year was just refusing to do that. Combine that with having to cook her own meals, lessons, worrying about letters, and just not being at all happy about the situation at all... she was tired.

But not too tired for a walk out to the tree house. She wanted fresh air, and also to get away from all of everything that was wrong with the castle. She started the climb with no intentions of stopping until she heard crying. Normally that was cue for her to keep going, but this crying... sounded familiar. Like she knew that voice.

Dora really hoped she didn't know that voice, but she stopped anyway and searched until.... yep. She did. Her expression immediately became one of both worry and anxiousness. Why was HER boyfriend crying on the treehouse floor? Didn't he know this was not okay?

"Um..... Theo?" She slowly came to his side, took a seat, and stared at him for a looooong uncomfortable moment before finally taking his hand, and giving it a squeeze. She was trying to comfort him or something.

Really she just wanted him to stop crying.

Good thing Forrest hadn't started climbing yet, because he was startled again when she called out. He had to fix this 'scare' problem soon, or he'd hurt himself.

Luckily, it was his hero Alexa though, so he beamed back and calmed down. In fact, he felt much better for seeing her. He had to ask stuff, and she was the only person he could approach he knew.

"Yes," he called out as he started to climb up, and he was beside her a few seconds later.

Could she see the happiness on his face for seeing her? It'd been THREE days since the train ride, and those three days had been miserable not how he'd imagined, and a familiar face usually made him feel better.

"How are you?"

This crying helped. It was a very small inner release, though, because Theo usually threw all the tours of the pram during his emotional breakdowns. This was just a mere sob against the wooden ground. He heard a few footsteps, so he GROANED. Like, he groaned SO LOUDLY as a warning to whoever was coming. Basically, back off.

But that didn't work, and they were still coming.

Theo stopped crying obviously, and raised his head a little to rub the tears from his eyes. He sat up after doing that, and sighed a sigh of relief when he saw his girlfriend. He squeezed her hand back and smiled.

Crying in front of his GIRLFRIEND? How embarrassing and totally not manly. "Hi.. I think... some of these dirty...." SNIFF. "... fumes got in my eyes." Perfectly legit reasoning for the red eyes. Yep. Back to the whole creepy smiling thing. "How's your common room?"

Oh, good, he was coming up! Meant she didn't have to keep looking down, even better because she wanted to go back to sitting, which she did shortly after he got to her side. Oooo, and just look how happy he was! Guess Hogwarts was treating him better than even she would have expected! This got her grinning as she plopped to the floor again.

"I'm actually very good. Got through two bowls of ice-cream just now and thought I'd come by the treehouse for a bit. It's not as nice as last year but I guess...nothing is as nice as last year." Lex gave a simple shrug then patted the floor next to her.

"And what about you? How are you doing? Have you made many friends yet? Getting on well with your housemates?"

She had to be sure he was being well taken care of. Forrest being picked on in any way wouldn't have gone over well with her at all. He was good people, good people got taken care of.

Forrest sat down next to her and turned towards her completely. He was, of course, oblivious to the book she was holding, because he directly started talking excitedly.

"I met only a girl, Kahlan, on the boats," he said a little bit rejectedly. "And she visited me at the feast and that's it. Everyone's too busy, I guess..." That was how he tried to comfort himself, actually. The thought that he didn't quite fit in there was much scarier, and he wasn't at that point yet.

He was silent for a moment, being sad all over again. He missed his friends, actually, his real friends back in Riyadh. Then he looked up, because he didn't want to spend another day thinking and missing his family, friends and CLEAN school.

"What's the problem with school?" Referring to her previous statement about 'nice'ness of the school.

It was cool that he met someone on the boats but with his expression she was beginning to not see it as a good thing so she listened on hoping there'd be some kind of explanation. As a Firstie she would practically burst with some kind of unbelievable happiness when she met someone....okay, when she met someone who wasn't an idiot (same thing, really) so she couldn't help but think that he should have been a little happier.

That explained it...

"I guess the castle has been a little busy this term. Not much time to settle in with all this cleaning some of us have to be doing," Paying just to have to clean your own Common Room. Madness really. "Doesn't matter though. Everyone's forced into the same place for classes, you can make more friends there--so long as you don't talk too much and have the Professor get upset." Yeah...experience told her that that wasn't such a grand idea.

Lex thought over his question, the answer needed to be a complete one but at the same time she didn't want him getting any more discouraged.

"Well, it's just, everything was super clean and pretty last year. The food was good and I never had to spread my own bed. This year's real different. I wish you had come here a year sooner so you could see. Basically now that the school's broke, everything is automatically worse." Surely he'd tasted the food!!!

Forrest nodded, though he didn't look much happier. He had never been the most social type, but his last three days had really been boring with Kahlan in Slytherin. "I mean... I've met quite a lot of older students, and I see a few first years around too but--" I don't have the courage to talk to them. He sighed, avoiding admitting his incapacity. "I'll just wait for the classes yet." And this time, he didn't even giggle at the little tip there because he was preoccupied with fitting in and whatnot. This proved to be much harder than fitting in Saudi Arabia.

"I don't mind paying," he went on, not realising that this may sound rude and snobbish. That wasn't his intention at all, though. He was just used to attending private schools. "But they surely could have seen it was going to be like this, no? I mean--" he looked around desperately, "--Kahlan told me house elves did whatever their wizards ordered them to do. Why didn't Headmistress tell them to stay?" Assuming Headmistress didn't, and also assuming Alexa knew everything about it, because she was his heroine.

The groaning was better than crying in her opinion. Anything was better than crying. She smiled back comfortingly and gave his hand another squeeze. "Everything about this place is dirty now. At least dirt belongs out here." She was playing along in hopes that it would help and she wouldn't have to deal with tears.

Conjuring up a handkerchief, she offered it up to him and gave his hand a gentle tug up. Him sitting up would be better for talking. "I haven't been in it yet, but from what I've heard it's just really dusty. How's yours?"

Lex nodded at him. "I think I understand." Though she could have been wrong but something told her she wasn't. When she ran into him on the train she could tell that he wasn't really one for conversations with a perfect stranger. She wanted to change that about him but she figured it would take some time for him to grow a stronger backbone. Not to worry, by the time she was done with him he'd be walking up to dragons with a feather. GRIN. "All the coolest things happen in class anyway and you'll have more to talk about...just...do me a favour...if the class gets to a point where magic is required...uh...don't let an idiot cast on you, you could lose on arm or something."

And she could do without him losing one, THANKS!

Ah, and there it was, that whole I don't mind paying thing. "That's really good on you. I have too many plans for my galleons to want any of them broken down just so I can enter somewhere that was typically free." She LIKED her candy and she wasn't going to let this affect her usual intake while she was here. Withdrawal was real, she'd been through it before and didn't plan to go there again.

"And that girl's right, they do. I'm not sure why they left really, I just know they left Toddles behind." Which had to be the meanest thing ever. He was barely not a baby anymore!! "Kinda makes you wonder, doesn't it?" She gave it a moment's thought. "Creatures that obedient don't just up and quit..." She didn't even know things worked like that!

Ronnie skipped along the grounds, feeling awfully happy. Nothing could bring her down! It was just such a beautiful day! The grounds was beautiful! The school was beautiful! Even those paper plates she had eaten off of this morning were b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l! Everything was!

She skipped and skipped until she found herself at the tree house. "Oh tree house! I love youuuu!" she said giggling. She then wrapped her arms around the tree holding the tree house and...hugged it. Tightly.

Once she pulled away, she made her way up the rope ladder, humming to herself as she did. When she got to the top she went inside. Ah! It was still as awesome as last year. She barley even noticed the missing boards.

She suddenly began to spin in the center of the tree house, not caring what the few students inside thought. She was too happy and full of joy to care. She threw her arms out and spinned some more, going faster and faster.

Elise made her way up to the tree house for the first time that term, grateful for the fact that she didn't need to pay to access it. She just needed some space to think and the lake wasn't an option anymore, since it had become too crowded with people for her to even hear herself think. No, the tree house was the best, she decided as she climbed all the way to the top of the three floors.

The further away she was from the rest of the world, the better. Why, you might ask? It was simply because as soon as she reached the top floor, she dropped the book bag she was carrying and leaned against the wall of the treehouse, sinking slowly to the ground. Then, head meeting her knees, she started to sob.

It was probably a good thing that nobody could hear her, anyway. What would her team think of her? Weak, no doubt.

Forrest grinned for the first time in their conversation. The idea of losing an arm amused him, clearly, because he thought she exaggerated it to deliver her point.

"I'll be extra careful, okay."

She clearly forgot he could be an idiot too, and he didn't remember that possibility for a change. It felt weird to think he could ever be successful at magic, and he enjoyed the feeling for a while.

His smile was gone in less than a second when she snapped at him. It just never occured to him that she might be financially tight. He blinked, trying to close his open mouth. He felt HORRIBLE now, and all the happiness inside him had flown like a helium balloon.

"I--I didn't mean--that." He looked down, utterly uncomfortable in her presence now. He doubted she could even hear his voice in the little breeze.

And thus, as he racked his brains to come up with something to make up his foolishness, he missed half of her explanation. He found the courage to meet her gaze only when she said that obedient creatures shouldn't quit that way. Well, he didn't know anything so... and his mind was still back on the money issue... he looked away from her into the horizon.

She didn't hate him, did she?

She returned his grin. "Good! I'd hate to think of the hex I'd have to use if something were to happen to you."........Okay so maybe she was looking forward to said hex but she wasn't looking forward to him getting hurt so she'd have to forget about that. There would be plenty of other reasons to hex people!!!

It probably didn't need saying anything about though. She was sure he'd do fine. Better than her in her first year. Back then she could count on one hand the spells she actually got right without nearly causing harm to herself or anyone else.

Her grin slowly faded when his did. For a moment she tried thinking of something she might have said to upset him and it hit her when he apologized...but...for what...? This meant more thinking back. The only thing she could think of was her issue of paying instead of buying candy...

"Er...you don't have to apologize." She tried smiling hoping he would too. It was all really silly and went back to the conversation she'd had with a few others recently. It wasn't until she upset Forrest that she realized how true it was. She was spoiled...don't get her wrong she was fine with being spoiled but she wasn't fine with him being upset and not talking anymore. "You should have meant it. I prioritize in a funny way is all. Like, candy's my top priority, everything else comes second." That wasn't changing any time soon. Noooooope.

And this silence wasn't working for her either. She gave him a playful nudge and a grin for good measure. "Have you learned any neat spells as yet?"

Although he was still whistling the tune to "Row Your Boat," Christopher had changed his mind from going to the lake to making his way up the treehouse. He realized that he hadn't spent much to any time up there last term and decided now was a good way to fix that.

Once he was halfway up the steps, he stopped whistling when he thought he heard someone, a girl, crying. And she was crying quite a bit. He continued climbing up, hoping whoever was up there was just laughing so much that she began crying. That happened quite often, right?

Finally reaching the top, he saw someone with long blonde hair that seemed an awful lot like a certain someone he was extremely familiar with but was hoping it was any other blonde girl. Without even saying a single word, he made his way over to her as quietly as possible and, once he was close enough, was positive the girl was Elise. Of all people, he hated seeing her crying. Especially since he had no idea why it was even happening.

"Elise..." he whispered and took another step towards her. He wanted to pull her into a hug and tell her it would all be okay but...he didn't even know what was wrong. What if he had someone managed to upset her and this was all his fault? It wasn't like he hadn't been the cause of her tears before. So instead of going up to console her, he stood there and watched, hoping she'd give him some sign that she wasn't upset with him.

Forrest was FLATTERED to know she would hex someone for him. He blushed and got shy all of a sudden. He didn't actually know the rules here, but he figured that she would probably be in trouble for hexing someone, so he felt SPECIAL.

"I'll--I'll behave," he promised, because he'd hate to see her hexing someone. Or maybe, he'd not hate it but feel utterly guilty, because he wondered what the hex was, and whether it was something grand... he'd seen very little magic, come to think about it, and now he wondered hexes too.

Anyways.

He should mean it?.. He met her gaze again and he was relieved to see her grinning. And a weight was visibly off his shoulders too when she said it was a joke. "Oh." He smiled a little, gaining his happiness back. "I--yeah--okay." GOOD to know. Might be useful in the future.

HEHE.

So, he was still preoccupied, but it was a relieved preoccupation.

"No." Flatly. He hurried to change the subject, because this spell talk made him nervous.

"What's Quidditch?"

Hahahahaha! He'd behave?? HAHAHAHAHA!!! [i]"It's not you behaving that I'm worried about."[/b] Heh. Something told her he was the type that could hardly stand the thought of getting caught up in any kind of trouble. She was sure he'd behave. Forrest was funny; Fact.

Oh and lookit! He was getting back to normal! Good. She preferred him smiling, it suited him moooore.

The flat tone around the spell business didn't go unnoticed. Obviously it was something he didn't like talking about. That was fine she supposed. It wasn't all that big a deal. He'd probably be bouncing around about them once he got some good ones under his belt. For now it might have been good to drop it, in case it got him upset or something.

His next question told her that he was more than ready to move on. Needless to say the question had her grinning.

"It's possibly the most epic sport any witch or wizard could play. I take it you haven't played it then, seeing as you're asking." Probably never went to a match then either. "You play it while flying on your broom and you got four positions. I play Chaser, well...when I was on the team last year, beaters have an epic job though, they get to knock people off their brooms. Really what you do is have the Chasers scoring quaffles until a seeker catches something called a snitch then the game ends. The one with the most points by the end of the game wins. Why? You interested in playing???"

"Yeah." He said thoughtfully, "I was thinking of staying here tonight." Maybe she could stay with him, because it could get a little spooky up here. You know, if unicorns and werewolves started to run about and stuff.

Normally Theo would ask how in Merlin's beard she conjured that handkerchief up, but that could wait till later. He took it with a thankful smile and rubbed it against his eyes. Blowing his nose could wait until he wasn't in girl company, obviously. He made a noise as she pulled him up, but he did so anyway, because it would be rude not to. "Ours is really bad. It smells and there's rats in the dorms... and the sheets haven't even been washed and.... there was a spider on my pillow." It could really go on forever.

Before any more tears could come, Theo covered his eyes with the handkerchief again and mopped them up.

Ooooh the grounds, so beautiful.

Walking. Walking. Walking

OH MY GOODNESS A TREE HOUSE! No freaking way. That's so amazing and beautiful.

He had one Knut left, well it was really the only one he had, who really carries them all around all of the time? There was no need. He had pies, pillows and a tent. That's all he needed. Stupid school had to take all of his money as it was to get here and study.

GIRLFRIEND!

"'Ello."

Christmas smiled and said "Hey Nash, what do you get about paying to enter the common room"

Nashville stopped right in front of her, he gave her a soft smile. What did he think about this whole money issue?Nashville's family barely had enough money to sent him to Hogwarts, it took them sixteen years to save up the money for him to go here for this term and next term and they were still saving just in case his little sister wanted to go to Hogwarts, it was horrible and his parents wouldn't even let his grandparents pay, they had all of the money in the world and he wasn't even allowed to touch it unless needed something for school and he was really fine with that. He only had one knut and he was going to save it until he really needed it.

"I'm protesting, it's so stupid and childish that we have to pay to go into the common rooms, there is no point of even having the common rooms if we have to pay to get in." Being sorted into a house was one thing and paying for access to the house's common room was another. He was thinking about going to the headmistress to ask her what was going on."I'm a tent set up and everything, it's great."