Late night Coffee (Open)

It was pretty normal for Flora, not sleeping and spending the night reading. But tonight was different. Tonight she was in front of the portrait of the fruit basket. She tickled the pear and the portrait swung open to reveal the famous kitchen of Hogwarts.
A swarm of house-elf looked up at her entrance. 'Ms Flora Evans mam, what can we do for you?' they chorused.
'Thank you. A strong coffee would be nice, add some cream, will you?' she sat gratefully on one of the tools beside the counter.

Aquila stood outside the kitchen with a wide smile on his face. He was thrilled by the fact that he shouldn't be there - he should be in bed.

But this was much more fun.

He tickled the pair, and slipped in just in time to hear another Ravenclaw girl order a coffe.

"You know," he said rather cheekily, "If you wish to sleep that isn't going to help you much."

'And who says I wish to sleep?' Flora raised an eyebrow as she turned to meet the newcomer. 'Flora Evans, Ravenclaw, first year. A pleasure to meet you.'

Aquila leaned against one of the counters in the kitchen, and gave the girl an easy smile, "But don't all girls need their beauty sleep?"

"Aquila Turrow, also a first year Ravenclaw," he held out his hand for a formal introduction, "It's very nice to meet you Flora."

'Apparently I don't need my beauty sleep.' the corner of her mouth twitched up. 'So what are you taking? The elves here are pretty indulgent, I've heard.' Her coffee arived, along with assortment of cookies. 'Cookies?' She offered Aquila

"Well now, I can't turn down a cookie," Aquila smiled taking the cookie before turning to the returning elf, "Just a pumpkin juice please," he turned to Flora with a mischievous grin, " I need all the beauty from sleep I can get."

"So Flora, what brings you here at this hour of the night?"

Flo nibbled on a hazelnut cookie, 'Well I don't sleep much' she shrugged, ' and this night I fancied a cup of coffee. So, here I am. What about you?'

Aquila's almost perpetual mischievous grin widened.

"I like... let's say 'bending' the rules a bit," he said cheerfully, "The kitchen after curfew seemed like as good a place as any to start."

He took his pumpkin juice from an elf with a nod of thanks, "Besides I can't turn down an opportunity at food. I've been told I have a hollow leg."

Flora felt the urge to laugh, such foreign impulses. So she decided on a smirk instead. 'So enjoying rule-bending on your first week, huh? I never had much rules in my life really. Back in the orphanage, they punish you whenever they feel like it. So following rules doesn't matter.'

"Of course I do it on my first week - why wait for my second week," he smirked, "I never procrastinate."

"That's too bad..." Aquila paused for a moment thinking of his own home, "I have a few... my parents can be kind of particular on certain things..." he paused once more letting the sobering thoughts of his parents crazy demands flood him for a moment before he gave Flora a rueful grin, "Those are the only rules I don't break... or at least make good sure I don't get caught."

"You really should try 'bending' a few rules while you're here - I find it quite freeing," he paused a moment thinking of the endings of half his explotes - the ones that end up giving his brother a heart attack - and then smiled, "Though you may want to start out slow if you're a beginner. You never can be too sure what will happen when you throw the rule book out the window."

"So," he said slowly sipping on his pumpkin juice, "You grew up in an orphanage... does that mean that you're parents..." he trialed off not wanting to offend or bring up bad memories.

'Oh, don't get all awkward on me now' Flo smiled easily, she was getting habituated, she noted. 'I never knew them, so it doesn't bother me.' she took another sip of her coffee.
'I pretty much did what I wished, so following the rules will take some get used to, not breaking, er- 'bending' them.' at this point her mischeivous grin matched the one Aquila seemed to carry around with him.
'You're right though' she added as an afterthought, 'I don't really have much idea about magical punishments.'

"Well then I guess that's good - or well as good as the situation could get," he allowed his smile to fall down to kind.

Aquila's grin widened when it seemed she was finally coming around to his way of seeing thing and was matching his own grin, "Well... I don't have many tips for following the rules... seeing as how I rarely do it - except when I know I can't get away with it otherwise," he laughed softly, "But as for punishments, here isn't so bad - techniquely all the Professors are allowed to do is take points, give suspentions, and if you really cross the line - expell you... but that doesn't happen often." He wasn't entirely sure that Defence Professor would follow that rule... but he decided to keep that thought to himself.

"If you run into other Wizards... just know who you're crossing," he paused a moment looking rueful for once, "Spells can be a wee bit nasty."

"So, other than midnight coffee runs, what do you do for fun, Flora?" Aquila raised an eyebrow at the other girl, his smile still playing across his face.

Flora smiled, 'I like you Aquila, It seems I gained a friend at Hogwarts.' Friends over coffee, huh?
'I like reading books, and listening to music. But here I have to wait to go to Hogsmeade for that. My walkman goes all awry in here. And what do you for fun, apart from bending rules, I mean?'

"Good, I like you too," Aquila nodded with concisiveness, as if he was coming to the conclution of a business deal.

"I should read books," he admitted with an impish grin, "but they take too much time to finish. I tend to just skip to the end."

"I don't have fun if I'm following a rule," he laughed, and then shook his head, "No... Ironically - since they are nothing but ruels - I like games. I play a mean game of wizards chess."

'It won't ne a hobby if you do it because you should.' Flora shrugged. She sat up in interest, 'Wizards' chess? Is it different form the muggle one? Will you show me, how to play?'

"Sure I'll show you," Aquila shrugged with an easy smile, "I don't think it's that much different from the Muggle one... just a little more... you'll see."

"Do you want to do it now? I think I have a set in my bag somewhere."

'Yeah sure, why not?' her eyes danced in curiosity. She munched on a chocolate chip cookie.

Aquila clapped his hands together and smiled, "Great."

He bent down fumbling with his bag mummbling as he went, "I know its in here somewhere... no... no... what the bloody hell is that?... Ha- forgot about that..." finally his hand met with what he wanted, "here it is!"

He pulled out a board and a small chest holding the peices. He set it up quickly and with easy.

"Now like I said, Wizard's chess is mostly like the muggle one - so all the pieces move in the same way, the fundemental rules are the same. You want to take out players and checkmate the king," he twirled the king as he set it on the board, "The biggest and first difference you need to know is you don't move your players. It's Wizard's chess after all. Just tell them where you want to go! Like so..."

Aquila grabbed another cookie and munched it slowly as he appraised the board, deciding what move he wished to make.

"Pawn to C3."

He smiled as the apporpriate pawn slide forward.

"See magic!" he smiled some more glancing down at his board before thinking of something else and looking up, "Oh, and for the direction the squares facing you are the ones with the letters they go a to h starting on the left, so obviously if those ones are the letters the other are the numbers."

He paused for a moment, before nodding.

"Do you think you got it so far?"

"I think I get it." Flora murmured. "How about we play and you teach me along the way?" She studied the chessboard carefully, it felt more like a battlefield than the muggle one.

"Sounds like a plan," Aquila lauged at the way she looked at the board; she looked like a general studing her men for a battle, and he told her so.

"That would make it you're move, General Evans."

Flora smirked at that, 'Alright General Turrow, here we go. Knight to F3.' And so it began.

Aquila smiled, "Interesting play." he assessed his board. "Lets go... pawn to E5." He allowed his pawn to edge closer to the night.

"So, Flora..." he pause a moment thinking of something to ask the girl. His grin grew as a thought struck him, "What's your most embarrassing moment? And don't you dare back out of it! I'll tell you mine if you tell me yours." He leaned over the board to whisper, "And you should know that mine is pretty darn good. For you anyways." He laughed merrily.

Flora frowned, what'd be considered embarrasing? Throwing her food away, when she's going to eat? Tripping her into a shallow pit and laugh at her, when she wasn't tall enough to climb up? Her eyes was turning hard and cold.
She shook her head, then she remembered something which made her smile, it was before she did magic, 'Well, there was this one time, I was, two or three maybe. A couple came to adopt a child. They were talking with all of us. They asked me to sing a song for them, and when I opened my mouth, a large barp came out. Everyone in the hall laughed, and I went red with embarrasment. Now, your turn.'

For a moment it looked like Flora was getting upset - at a memory he assumed - but then she shook her head and smiled, and Aquila let the other emotion leave his mind.

"Public bleching," he nodded, smiling, "Not bad... of course as a boy I would have been trying to do that in the first place, however I respect the blow it is to a delicate girl's self image." He laughed kindly.

"My turn?" He pretended to look frightened, "Maybe I shouldn't have enacted this little game."

He pause for a moment shifting through some of the better... shinnanagins... trying to find one that fit this discription perfectly. After a moment of searching, rejecting all the ones that may just horrify people with a normal sense of... pain? Danger? Safety? he came up with his best story.

"I got it," he took a sip of his butterbeer and settled into his seat, getting ready to tell his tale, "You know those things that Muggles watch on a box... they have a funny name - I know I know it... I think they call them shows... these ones are usually... supposed to be funny..." he paused to think, "I think they are called sit something - anyways I know that some of them like to show a plot of the kid who sticks something - usually their head, through a set of bars, and then they find they can't get it back out?" He paused raising his eyebrows and smiling.

"I was at this place with my brother - Muggle's galore - and there was this metal railing with bars between it. While standing by those gates I had one of my boughts of accidently magic, and I found much to my amusement that I could bend the bars." He paused to laugh softly at his own memory, "So like any good six or so year old boy I thought what better idea was there then to stick my head through the bars and then bend them back in place around it."

He took another sip of his drink enjoying the act of telling this story, "Of course, as soon as I did that I found that I could no longer bend the bars and was, in fact, stuck with my head between the bars. Thankfully this was long before Muggles had ever heard of magic or they would have been pretty suspicious as to how I got my head through such a small gap. I had was the center of attention for hours as they tried to get me out, but of course they couldn't get me out without magic. I had to wait for enough muggles to get bored and leave the spectical I had become before whatever Wizards in charge of fixing these sort of things would come and get me out."

He sighed as he came to the conclution of his tale, "All in all I think that I spent almost half a day stuck there; they had to chage or wipe more then a dozen muggle's memories, and I became front page news for a local Muggle news paper."