Oddeties and Archways {Jari}

Fighting a crowd of adolescents who were trying to include you in their activities was difficult as h3ll Fredrik had learned. First off they did it usually out of goodness which was hard to resist anyway and he always did pick up some odd quirk of Jari's that he could use, but it was tricky as heck managing to not raise suspicions! As it was he spent a lot of time studying his notes on, not classes and homework so much, but on people's faces and names and backgrounds. He, of course, knew most of the details learned in class to begin with even down to notes, though the Durmstrang approach had been much different.

Having managed more then half a year he felt infinitely relieved.

Now he had a few weeks of break and he was looking forward to a little less cramming for even a short time by being home, though there would be new pitfalls to deal with there for certain! So when a group of his year begged him to come along (mostly because he was in the Library and they wanted him to go outside with them for a game; how you captured a non-moving flag he had no idea) he felt trapped into tagging along. Hopefully during the game they would get so tied up in it he could escape. As they stepped into the courtyard however a distraction happened that revealed a chance at escape in the form of his name being called. He motioned at the others to go on saying "I'll catch up, just go and start," as he diverted his steps over to a girl from his year and house.

The girl he recognized immediately, though they had not spoken many times. Meggera, with the unfortunate name of Tepes (he hadn't asked if there was a connection), was in several of his classes, but he had managed to stay fairly quiet and more isolated then most of his house. Plus, when you were studying in the dorm it was easy as most Ravenclaws would not interrupt anyone studying! "Hi Meggera. What are you working on?" he asked, hoping to take control of the subject right off. Stepping to her side and looking directly at the picture he could see that though he was no art critic (heck, he never even had any on the walls much at home), she seemed to have a good capture of the archway itself. "That's nice! You have a good eye..."

The tactic helped as always when he tried it, making it at least delayed before the tricky questions came out. A few times he had been able to control the entire conversation and get away before the real reason people wanted to talk to him came out. He couldn't keep it up forever, but Fredrik didn't hope to. If he could fake it long enough memories would fade and more of his current actions would stand out in people's minds, the remaking of the boy named Jari. Thank goodness no one at this school was called Fredrik! She seemed pleased enough by his words, but hesitant at admitting her own skills. Maybe she was hesitant, that could help him in information.

"Ha, well isn't drawing something imitating it in the first place?" Realism? Did that mean she was trying to make it look as real as possible? Why would you do that when the mind takes much better pictures of places? A little puzzled, he said "Looks fine to me. You certainly draw a lot better then I can." Jari, he was fairly sure, had not been much of a drawer as there was nothing on the woman's walls of the home of his artwork and didn't parents display everything? She patted the stone bench and he tensed up, hoping this wasn't a clue that she wanted to talk something personal.

Still Jari had been an open kid. Damn it all.

He sat, but on the edge not right up against her, turning so his bent leg was between them like a small barrier, his ankle up on his knee so it didn't seem a barrier so much. "Them? No, I was studying and they insisted I come outside. They went to play the game with a flag they have to capture." He had no idea how they had said it, he Fredrik didn't know it at all, but they had acted as if Jari knew it and would join them. That was another landmine narrowly avoided thanks to Meg. Fredrik didn't understand why the games were so important to kids; studying right now and scoring top NEWTS would set him up for life! "Sorry about that, it's been a rough year..."

She said something about her grandfather needing to be told and he chuckled with her and tried to select a good general statement; he had no idea if she had ever spoken to him about her grandfather before! "Eh, adults always have their minds made up in a different way from us. It's hard to convince them of much. My mom is that way." That was loose enough to be taken more then one way. As she continued speaking he let her, watching for any clues he might need. "Oh no, not me! I suck at drawing," he laughed as if it was a known thing, "my skills are elsewhere I'm sure, not so much in art. Who knows, maybe some year I'll buy art from you!"

Ah he had been afraid of that. The game was a much more physical game then he wanted to begin with. Too bad they were already out of sight so he could gain more knowledge about how it was played. Mind you, he would be avoiding it in the future anyway now that he knew it was a tackle type game. "I guess some like it better then others. Besides, it lets them work off their energy so I guess it does serve a purpose in a way. Otherwise they would be up her looking for something to do and I doubt you would get much art done after that!" Girls rarely (he had noticed) liked having hyper boys around them all the time, which he didn't actually blame them for.

He had never been an active energy type anyway. The Ravenclaw house was well suited for his mind.

Now, Fredrik had been speaking about the fact it was a hard year for him due to the 'fake memory' issues he had used as his excuse for remembering things from past years. While not totally believable, the word he had passed around to a few in his house (surely not everyone as they didn't need to be in his business now did they?) was that it was mostly temporary and should come back. Hearing her mention his uncle as the cause made him suddenly a bit more wary, careful. It wouldn't take a genius to piece together the two events happening near each other and that was not something he wanted happening.

"My uncle? Yeah, that was bad and I miss him, but that's not what I was talking about." He couldn't say he was over it (heck, how were you suppose to get over your own death? Insane this situation was!) but he couldn't make the connection any stronger either! "I got really sick a the end of the summer and the Healer's said it will be some time before my memories come back more. I've forgotten a lot of stuff so it's a tougher year then it might be normally...." From under his lashes as he looked down he kept her in his sights, waiting to see how she reacted.

Her thoughts about her future did not seem encouraged and he frowned slightly, wondering why. It didn't occur to him that her background might be so restrictive, but that was common in the parts of the world her family came from. The Finns were far more open about young people's futures then some countries, after all. "I don't understand, Meg. Only you can choose what you want to do, right?" To Fredrik whose parents had never once restricted his options, this was a very foreign concept. Her comments about potions though did make him chuckle slightly.

"Closer to science I would say. You can't go off in new and random directions with potions without something explosive or corrosive happen whereas like cooking, a similar type of science-art, you can try new things all the time to learn what works." There was no doubt in Fredrik's mind there was an art to how it was applied, but there were very specific recipes to follow for the most part that variations of did not do well with. Melting flagstone was the least of his problems! She agreed with him about how it could worse and her words had him nodding, but he said nothing else about that.

What he wanted to say was something about how energetic and troublesome young boys could be, but he could not really, being as he was supposed to be one of them! As to the memory problems, he knew how to angle that one from experience over the last year. "Oh it's been daily stuff. Like, I can read back on the class stuff and that come back, but how do you remember a name or a story someone told from years ago? That's what makes it hard, not the school work so much."

She seemed pleasant enough and certainly she showed no signs of trying to bed him or date him so he felt safe enough just talking to her, but he watched for signs that was coming so he could get up or put distance between them. As she spoke about her family he had to nod; he had heard of some families who used to act like that much farther back. He had thought many of those had passed on, but apparently not. Fredrik had always considered anyone not following up on their loves was squandering a gift of potential passed on by whatever ran the universe, no matter your religion. "Shame. And I assume you stay with them because they are your family I take it? Leaving would make things much worse?"

Nasty situation! "I've never thought anyone should be forced to go against their nature, but so many don't even know what they want to do that people just go along with what they are told usually." Musing on this, he realized he sounded more adult then he should; Jari was not such a great philosophizer really! He hastily added "That was what my father was saying this summer when we heard about a neighbor forcing their kids to go to a boarding school." He grinned at her and her potion comment, knowing from the way she had answered in class she was not nearly his equal in the subject! Then he inwardly frowned as he realized Jari had been the one who had smiled, not Fredrik. Damn body reactions! "Understood. I do seem to have a talent with them. I assume you won't accept me as the expert in this?"

Unfortunately, the medical stuff was both nebulous enough she wouldn't get the details and muddled enough to show there were too many variations; healer's didn't know it all yet at least! The thought cheered Fredrik almost immediately; he had finally found a way to mess with the buggers confidence! "Nope. They said I was in a coma for about two weeks before I came out of it. None of them could explain the exact reason it happened and they don't treat stuff that's not life threatening without more information then that..." In a way he felt a nudge of guilt that he would be causing the Healer's a lot of work trying to figure out what had happened without knowing the actual reasoning. That merely guaranteed their failure actually...

He frowned, listening to her description of her relatives and found himself remembering some in his own year way back when who would have fit the role well enough. The old days were far gone, but not for his original generation! "So, it has to be one he chooses? Or one he approves of? If you found someone who matched whatever he wants, would he let you marry them? If so, you have a small chance of controlling your own future I guess." Not that he was offering! The last thing he needed was being set up for marriage when he already had so many things to balance!

Fredrik chuckled, knowing he was more expert then she was by far regardless of what he own skill level was; he did have a century on her near-abouts. "Ha, I didn't mean it quite that way so much as between the two of us with my potion skills I might pass for the expert on the subject so far as we have learned." Sure it sounded egotistical, but he had that kind of confidence in his potion skills if anything. "Besides," he said crossing his mental fingers Jari had not been superstitious, "I try not to rely to heavy on things like jinxes and luck. You have to make your own luck I think..."

Being the only person who knew it was, without a shadow of a doubt, no reoccurring illness, Fredrik felt confident there would be no relapses, unfortunately. He'd almost feel better to go to sleep and never wake again if his cousin survived again. Saddened by the thought, he felt pensive suddenly. "No, I don't think so. They were still running some tests and all that, but the Healer said it didn't sound like anything that they knew of. Probably unique." Not something he wanted to be.

"So let me ask you something, if I can, how long has your family had that name? And are there many branches in your family?"

Even as an old man, Fredrik had always preferred young people as company; oldsters had their place and all that but it was the young who had the most innovative ideas he thought, the best freedom to think outside what was already known. So the idea of someone trying to marry their granddaughter off since she was fourteen was disturbing enough as he could imagine that lively curiosity about the world being destroyed quick, but the age she said blew his mind. "Wait! Did you just say forty?!?" His mouth dropped open.

The idea of her being married off to a man twice her age-- heck, half Fredrik's age was horrible. "Okay, you must really love your brother to stick it out with that held over your head. I'd say it's time for you and your brother to both escape and take the lump. You'll out live him anyway. Merlin's bloody Beard, who would he stick your brother with I wonder?" Why did families do that to themselves and why hadn't the rest stood up to the old goat? Fredrik forgot that his family was far more sensible as most of the Finnish people were known for being; the phrase 'mad Englshman' and 'snobby Frenchman' popped into his head unbidden.

Shaking his head at her situation, he liked the fact she cheerfully went along with his suggestion he was the expert between them, grinning back unexpectedly. Damn those Jari genes! "That's okay, I bet you have me in another half-dozen subjects at least. We are Ravies, after all, we just each concentrate in our own ways." Ravenclaws, Fredrik had decided, was fairly close to one of the groups he had known at Durmstrang, serious book education minded students. The mention of her name and the resulting answer did give him a bit of insight into the grandfather's mindset however.

"Oh. Oh yeah, the Tepes were known for being more then a bit harsh in politics. All right, I can see more of why your grandfather is the way he thinks..." Not completely mind, but he could remember that that particular country had been a harsh land and faced such overwhelming number her ancestor Vlad had had to make some severe moves. "Still, how does the rest of the family react to that? You would think there would be enough breakaway branches after someone took control like that."