Third Floor Common Room - Saturday Morning

[wantstocheer.livejournal.com]

Claire was still in an excellent mood after her conversation with Jon last night. She decided to pass on the trip into the city and instead headed for the common room to make breakfast in an effort to meet some new people.

Anyone making their way past the room would be welcome to enjoy some pancakes with blueberry topping, strawberry topping and/or whipped cream. Because, yes, Claire was kind of a dork and went the red, white and blue route.

There was an appropriate holiday movie on the television.


[oooooopen common room!]

Comments

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"Morning," came a near-chirp from one of the couches. He wasn't cheerful in the mornings, or much at all, but the sound was quick and birdlike.

[vanillajello]

Kate was startled by that. And then felt slightly embarrassed, because wtf Kate, people tend to greet people who come in the room.
"Good morning", she managed to reply, with a slight smile.

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

He finally looked up to give her a once over, realizing at once that she was 1. new and 2. ...had obviously had a rough night.

"Hopefully," he replied with a wry smile.

"Mind if I add another welcome to the island to the pile I'm sure you've built up?"

[vanillajello]

"Not at all", she smiled, now with visibly more ease, "that's pretty much the only thing the first few days at a new place are good for. Being welcomed. Over and over and over again." A short pause. "Well, that, and repeating your name, and pretending to learn everyone else's names."

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"Mine's Liir. If you forget it, feel free to call me anything you think I'll reply to. A pleasure to meet you."

[vanillajello]

"Nice to meet you too", she smiled, "I'm Kate. And I'm probably going to end up calling everyone weird nicknames anyway."

Because this was the girl who called her brother Moosh.

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"Someone else already calls me Greeneyes," he pointed out to her with a faint grin, "and 'broomboy' is woefully overused back where I come from. I'll remember Kate, though."

[vanillajello]

"That's too obvious for me... Well okay, 'broomboy' isn't." She raised an eyebrow at that. "I like names that are more subtle. Consider me the nickname ninja."

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"Only because I left my broom in my room. Considering that this is a holiday dedicated to shooting off fireworks, flying is definitely off the menu for the moment."

He rubbed at one eye thoughtfully before smiling a little more.

"Subtlety is something of a lost art here. Good luck with that."

[vanillajello]

Kate was going to ignore the whole 'broom + flying = ...wait, what?' thing for now. She just wasn't at that stage of acceptance yet.

"Subtlety is pretty much a lost cause elsewhere too. You know what my only nickname is?" she asked, helping herself to some more pancakes before answering herself, "Katie. Very original."

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"An entire additional letter. I dare say if someone shouted 'Katie' into a room and you hadn't told me, I very well might not be able to direct them correctly," he said dryly.

[vanillajello]

"I know, right?" She smirked. "Also, in many cases, there's that whole possibility that there are several people called Katie in the room. Or at least people, who think it might mean them, even if no one ever calls them that. Then everyone gets all confused."

"I doubt you have that problem much with a name like Liir?"

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"Not too much," he admitted, "though it does sound a bit like a drunken slur if you tilt your head. And there's the terrible puns, of course."

[vanillajello]

Mostly because she was tired, Kate couldn't come up with any puns based on the boy's name. She resisted asking about them.
Instead, she shrugged and said "I guess every name has its drawbacks."

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"So, now that we've spent a good number of minutes on our names and have explored the subject thoroughly, we come to the next question: from where do you hail?"

[vanillajello]

She laughed, without any sort of nervous tone. She seemed pretty relaxed by now.

"The ever-boring city of Overland Park, Kansas. And you?"

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"...Kansas?"

Of course it had to be Kansas.

"Kiamo Ko in the north of the Vinkus. Which is in Oz, which is not Australia. But, er, I knew someone from Kansas once, back at home."

[vanillajello]

"Oz but not Australia? Okay." She frowned, before smiling again. "You did? And here I was thinking I was the only one to have escaped the state."

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

He shook his head.

"There's a professor from there, and his sons who attend here. And... yes, Dorothy said she was from Kansas. She was very insistent on getting back, but if she did, I suppose I can see why you call it 'escaping.'"

[vanillajello]

"Well to be fair – not that I really want to be fair to Kansas", she made a face and laughed, "I think I was escaping Overland Park and my life there more than I was escaping the actual state. Even though it did get pretty boring after 15 years."

"I just associate the crap stuff with the state, I guess." She shrugged and smiled slightly.

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"I tend to associate it with Dorothy," he admitted, "which gives me something of a prejudice. If I told you how many hours I spent in the tall grasses looking for her dog because she was too cheap to invest in a leash, you'd stare."

He waved it off.

"You've already made a considerably better impression, for whatever that counts for."

[vanillajello]

"That's always nice to hear", she smiled, attempting to appear like she didn't appreciate hearing it as much as she actually did. Because she appreciated hearing it way more than she would have liked to admit, even to herself.

"So I guess it's a good thing I don't have a dog, then."

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

"Nothing against dogs," he said with a laugh.

"But mine is a great deal better behaved. She's just asleep in the room."

[vanillajello]

"Aww, you have a dog here?" Like most people, she liked pets. Especially ones that were furry.

"I was thinking about that on the plane, actually. It was one of my 'in case of homesickness' plans. ...Although now that I'm here, my new roomie sort of reminds me of a puppy, so I guess that will be enough." She laughed a little.

[new-to-liirness.livejournal.com]

He laughed a little.

"Yes, her name is Makejoy. She fell asleep after I took her out this morning. I'm starting to think I should go see if she's awake now, though."

His eyebrows bounced.

"Who's your roommate?"

...he was betting on Zack.