Flying higher than the sky...

She listened quite cloesly, blinking softly as she studied her friend with a quite puzzled look. "A car... Nevermind, I'm not going to ask," she said and broke into a soft chuckle. She'd seen a car once, when her father went off to his job and had to take a ride with a couple of buddies. They all prefered floo powder. Heading to Hogwarts they'd taken the Knight bus, of course. She created a picture of them like she'd seen them earlier, and nodded firmly.

Watching him demonstrate the wonderful arts of flying, she felt inspired and nodded firmly, trying to do everything he'd tried to teach her. She made a soft turn, in a quite slow pace, but she still moved somewhere, so it was one step in the right direction. She made a quicker turn, then tried catching some speed. She was hardly half the speed of Sam, although it was a good thing she didn't go faster. As she tried braking, it turned out the speed had made her quite unbalanced and she slid halfly off her broom, holding on with her bare fingers. It was quite scary really, as she was barely managing to cling on before she finally got back on and breathe out with relief.

Deciding against another attempt at braking, she went back to practicing turns, until they gradually went better and she could fly in smooth circles and with neat turns. Braking still made her stagger though, and she frowned slightly, although she seemed to get the hang of making the turns.

Sam noticed her sliding off the broom when she tried to brake, and he frowned in concentration, trying to figure out a way to help her on this. Then he came up with an idea.

"Mary!" He got her attention back, "To stay balanced when braking, all you have to do is... cross your legs under the broom to maintain stability. It's supposed to look like... this," he showed her, looking like her was sitting Indian-style in the air, with a broom going through each side of his legs.

Turning rapidly to look at Sam, and made a quick turn towards him before scooting over the air and hanging in the air, watching just another demenstration. She blinked softly, trying to make out where she made her wrongs and tried desperatly to spot out how to make it correct. She made an attempt while he was still demonstrating, and found it slightly easier.

Speeding downwards, she caught some speed before she made the attempt of making a full stop. She took quite a risk, and went slightly faster than she had actually done before. She crossed her legs as Sam had told her to, and pulled back when they reached the heights of the trees of the Forbidden Forest, and found herself sliding slightly forwards. However, it worked and she stayed at the middle of the broom before she zoomed back to the Quidditch pitch, feeling ready for a challange.

"Hey Sam! Care to race me? First around the house and through the largest hoop wins!" she yelled over the Quidditch field, wanting to test how quickly she could go in comparison to to Sam, now that she had the basic knowledge.

"Hey Sam! Care to race me? First around the house and through the largest hoop wins!" Mary yelled to him.

Sam grinned and yelled back, "Yeah sure! But don't expect to win on your first try!"

He flew next to her and counted down, "three, two, one, GO!”

He felt the cold air go through his hair and mess it up, and his robes were flying back while his tie flowed with the wind. He went at top speed to the house and made a sharp turn that almost made him wobble, but he held himself right before he did. He flew through the middle - biggest - hoop and then flew to the other side of the pitch and flew through the opposite hoop too. He came to a halt and landed gracefully.

He glanced upwards and was not surprised to see her not far behind, and almost through from one side of the pitch to the other, going through the other hoop just like he did.

Honestly enough, Mary hardly expected beating Sam on the race. Although she decided that she'd do her best and bent forwards, gathering speed. For a short distance, she kept the same pace as Sam, although began falling behind when it came to the turns. Especially the one around the house. She fell a bit behind, and struggled with finding the right speed and presicion to fly through the hoop without knocking herself off the broom completely.

She made one attempt though, and found it pleasing that she got through it. Seeing that Sam managed to do the second hoop too, she made an attempt on the second, finally getting through and landing beside Sam, her hair poofed up due to the wind that had flown through her air at such a rapid speed. She chuckled slightly and put the broom on the ground, before she began attempting to groom her hair again, to reinstate it's previously wavy state.

"I guess I shouldn't be too unhappy with it, but... I'm hoping I'll do better," she said, and picked up the broom again. "I don't think these are the best brooms though, am I right?" she asked, eyeing him slightly while she held up the broom, which seemed to have been used for several years.

Sam snorted, "these brooms are actually about 134 years old," he told her, "being able to fly with these brooms needs real talent! But you caught up to me for the first half of the race, so that's really good," he pointed out, "but when you were flying, I noticed that when you turn, your hands wobble slightly, and that effects how well you turn. So, be careful of that next time."

"D'you wanna learn some speed techniques now?" He asked, looking at her.

"Woah, that old?! That's incredible! I'm amazed they're still able to fly," she muttered and looked over the old broom, and could hardly believe it was as old as her grandma would have been. She shrugged and could feel her cheeks blushing up in a scarlet colour once again. "Alright, I'll make sure I take note of that," she promised, her eyes twinkling with awe at how much he knew about these wonderful arts.

At his suggestion, she looked very relieved that she still had more to learn, and blinked at him. If he couldn't teach me anything more, what would I do then? she asked herself softly and smiled softly. "Okay! Though it's getting slightly darker, isn't it? I don't want to be caught out of bed late," she muttered, knowing that they'd have detention if they got back later than the set time for sleeping. I've made it this far without having one detention, so I'm not planning to get one now,she told herself and clutched the broom a little tightlier.

((This is set before the Lake, right? I'm just assuming))

Sam glanced at the sky and saw the light dimming, and the moon revealing itself. He gulped. It was full moon that day.

"You're right, I'm suddenly not feeling so well, maybe tomorrow after class I could show you some more techniques, but I really have to go now, I think I'm gonna puke soon," he lied to her hurriedly, taking the brooms and trunk to the broomshed and running up to the Hospital wing, leaving Mary behind to do who-knows-what.

((Yup! We started it before the lake, aso it's only suiting the lake happening happens afterwards.))

Mary blinked at his reaction to her comment, and could see all colour drain from his face and she could tell almost too clearly something was wrong. "R-Really? You're that ill?" she asked, although could hardly say a lot more before he vanished, heading back towards the castle and possibly the Hospital Wing. She was left behind in the cold darkness and wrapped her cloak tightlier around her, and muttered "Lumos".

She was left quite upset about being left behind just like that, although could tell he had a good reason for it. She glanced at the hoops once more before she too headed back towards the castle, trying to wrap her scarf tighter around her neck. Somehow, everything turned so cold and dark when she stood there alone, and she rushed to get back to the castle.

((I assume we're done with the thread?))

((Yes, we're done!))