The world's a stage, and this grass is the grass in the painted background.

Cass sat down, doodling those immortal half moon spectacles of the best hogwarts headmaster there ever was on the people in her mothers publication, The Wrackspurt Chronicles- a deviation of the Quibbler.

Cass did a double take when one of the people she had been doodling on looked like Dumbledore with the glasses on him.
Then she realised.
It was Albus Dumbledore.

She sighed. Hopefully some one would come by and swat at her boredom. In the meantime, she'd play some guitar. Muggle music, perhaps.

Vanessa was feeling like she needed a walk, so she wandered the grounds aimlessly. That is, she was until she came across Cass playing with one of the beautiful guitars Vanessa had ever seen.
When she was close enough to call out to her, Vanessa said, "Cass! Hey, I didn't know you played the guitar. You're really good!"

Vanessa? Wow, this had been too long! Earlier, she'd been desperate to find her resident Gryffindor healer.
"Vanessa!" she said with widened eyes, as she dropped her guitar with a satisfying Twannng! and headed for a hug. "Missed you, you know."
She felt her cheeks redden when Vanessa complimented her. "Thank you..." she laughed heartily. "Sorry, I'm not one for compliments. I never know how to react!"
She looked back at her guitar. It was a beauty.

Vanessa smiled at her friend's reaction. She had not expected such an enthusiastic one.
"Did you really? I was only sick with a cold, so..."

She looked between Cass and the guitar, and breifly wondered how long she had been playing. Often times its the musician that determines the quiality of the music. Sure, the instrument does a lot, too, but its the player that makes good music.
"If you're going to be playing like that around here, you better get used to compliments," she said with a smile.

"Yeah, well with Hogwarts, it's hard to find everyone, ain't it?"
She tapped her knee absently, itching to get the guitar back into her hands again. "It's been with me for ages, that guitar. Since I was small. I was too small and I had to twang then move myself around it to change a chord!" she grinned fondly.

"Shup' you! I'll take compliments how I want them- well, how I try to," she faltered. It was nice to see Vanessa again. So chilled, but smiling and bouncy.

"Yeah, Hogwarts is pretty huge. Its a wonder I haven't been quite as lost as I thought I would be...Well, I made-up of that lack of being lost with my tripping over everything....I'm awfully clumsy!"she smiled. Vanessa continued looking at the guitar with an unfathomable expresson and said in responce to Cass's explanation, "That's always nice. I always wanted to play guitar, but my fingers are too short. The same reason I never tried piano, either."

She giggled at Cass, she really liked this girl. Her friends had been MIA and she really missed having friendly company. "How has Hogwarts been treating you? Hey, did you ever get that leg healed?"

"I'm feeling the whole klutz thing, if that's the right word," said Cass.
Cass' ears pricked up when she heard Vanessa explain why she didn't play musical instruments, "That's never stopped me!" she showed Vanessa her fingers. Short, stubby. Another bane of her existance. "You should try, you know, Vanessa. Here, keep this. Have a go- It's a copy from the Room of Requirement, after all."
Vanessa rocked. Simple.
Inquisitive, interesting, cool. She'd definately be one to add to the good friends list. "Hogwarts is Hogwarts, I guess," she said casually, patting her leg. "Oh, my leg! Oh yeah! Nope, after you bound it together, and I went back to my dorm- it was so weird... I woke up and the binding was gone, and my leg was fine. So someone must have healed it while I was asleep. It wasn't you was it...?" she said, gasping at the idea that someone would go so far as to heal her, out of the Hospital Wing because of her fear of them.

Vanessa smiled, "Yeah, I think klutz is the word..."
She smiled again when she saw Cass's short fingers.
"Haha. I'm impressed, but trust me, mine are barely long enough to manuever my 16" viola. I doubt I could handle a guitar, which fingerboard is easily more than half my finger's length."
Then, when she listened to Cass's explanation on the mysterious healing of her leg, she frowned in thought.
"That's really weird...Could it have been some weird house-elf magic? I've heard that Hogwarts has some, and that they have a different kind of magic. Wizard magic just doesn't seem to apply to them, sometimes."

"Ahh," Cass looked defeated. "At least you have an instrument. Say, you should check out the room of requirement- there's quite a lot of musicians there, string instruments especially."
Cass sat and thought of Vanessa's reasoning. She couldn't place it, but it was almost like Vanessa actually didn't heal her- she looked as shocked as Cass had been in the morning.
"House elf," she stammered, "yeah, that must have been it..."
That was a worrying thought, along with the note next to it that read in elegant script 'Hope you're okay...'

Vanessa smiled and patted Cass on the back. "Yeah, I love my viola.- Oh, I've already been there. I had a violin/viola duet with Will, once. I think he's in your house, so you probably know him."
She smied again-she was smiley person- and shrugged.
"Also, about the whole getting healed, but not knowing who did it thin....Don't worry about it...Your leg got healed, whoever did it obviously isn't a bad person..."

"Yeah, I know him a little. Ah- so it was you who he did the duet with then. Ahhh. It's all making sense," she said with a wink.
Vanessa's logic was good- why worry over a good samaritan, when it could easily have been someone with not so good intentions. "You're right, Vanessa, I shouldn't worry."
A grin crept back on her face again. "Stop making me grin!"

Vanessa frowned in confusion. She didn't like not knowing about things.
'Tis a wonder how she ended up a Gryffin and not a Raven...
"What?...Why'd you wink at me? That was a tad bit weird,"she said not in the least bit serious.
Vanessa smiled even wider at Cass's grin, "Haha I'm sorry! I'm a smile-happy person. I can't help but smile at everyone. Its natural! Don't grin if you don't want to!"

"No, no, I like to grin. And I throw in winks all the time," Cass braced herself. "I don't really know how to use them."
She added a wink and a grin after, for good measure.
Hopefully that hadn't put Vanessa off too much.

Vanessa choked back a laugh at Cass's wrong use of the wink.
"If you like to grin then why say, 'Don't make me grin!' if you did like it?"
It was frustrating to the max for Vanessa to not know what Cass was so obviously hiding. Despite having a certain type of genius-she was a Raven- she wasn't too great with subtleties.

"I'm in a grinning mood," shrugged Cass. "and I have an ulterior motive- see, I'm an undercover Wizarding FBI agent, and laughing would blow my cover." Cass half winked, but stopped after thinking all these things would confuse Vanessa. Not that she could blame her- if she was on the receiving end of them, she'd probably tell the other person to go to St. Mungos.
"I'm messing with you, 'nessa. It's an expression. Like when people say 'Stop making me laugh' because you want them to- it's hard to translate sometimes, I guess."
Cass fancied some Califlower Pureé, she realised as her belly rumbled. Maybe Vanessa wanted to go get something to eat to.
"You hungry?"

Vanessa stared at Cass with a half-confused, half-wondering look.
"No, no I understand perfectly,"she said.
Then, she added with a laugh, "-I understand that you're barking mad!"
She was kidding, of course.
At the mention of food, Vanessa's stomach grumbled embarassingly loud.
She felt a blush creep up her face.
"Haha. I guess so..."

Cass stared back at Vanessa. She could see the cogs working in her head- wondering whether to make a run for it, or just plain laugh.
But what shocked Cass was when Vanessa said she understood.
But no, wait for it.
Understood she was barking mad. Lovely.
Cass' stomach rumbled, and a blushing Vanessa made Cass worry (and blush) that Vanessa heard hers.
"Come on, then... I'm sure our bottom marks in the grass will keep people away."

Vanessa stood up and waited for Cass. "We should probably go before our stomachs find it fit to eat our intestines..."
With that said, she tried no to run. She was really starving, and it was taking all her self control to not sprint to the Great Hall that instant.

Cass nodded seriously to the little tid bit of science Vanessa said. She lumbered up, shaking away the pins and needles in her legs. All she needed was vertigo, a perm and an anorak and she'd be her muggle great-grandma.
"Vanessa," she said whilst jogging, "just so you know, if you don't try Califlower Pureé, I may curse you."
She ended her dramatic mock threat with a grin.

Vanessa, temporarily ignoring the pain in her stomach, turned to Cass and said, "I'll try it. I have no plans on being cursed right now"
She suddenly stops in her tracks and grins almost evilly, "Want to race? Whoever is last has to try eating the one food they would normally never eat!"

"Good," she said, glad that Vanessa had dismissed it being a joke, although it was- this way, she could convert another person to the beautiful thing.
"Honey, I'm a mile ahead of you!" said Cass as she stopped jogging and sprinted to the doors.
"I'm not the one eating duck!" she said, before facepalming herself. Great. Now she knows I hate duck.

Vanessa sprinted after Cass, "Haha duck? We'll see about that!"
It had been awhile since Vanessa had last had a run, but she loved this. She really had missed the nice ache in her legs when she ran full-speed like she was at the moment. She let her legs carry her faster, and faster until she had caught up to Cass again.
"I don't care if you know I hate eating overly sweet food, because I know I'm not gonna lose!"

Cass almost kicked herself. But that would've been stupid- and she would've lost her sprint midstep. The vibrations in the ground told her Vanessa was catching up with her.
She would really start sobbing if she had to eat duck- she had ducks at home and her own rubber duck collection. Eating duck would be like eating family.
"You're getting it, Vanessa, you really are!"

Vanessa continued running, surprising herself with the fact that her endurance had not changed.
She jumped over a particularly large tree root, and wondered if Cass would be able to as well.
"Sorry? I have no intentions of eating sweet and spicy chicken dumplings! You won't make me do it! Never!"
She wondered if Cass was also a runner, because Cass was not even out of breath, yet.

Cass knew she liked the odd muggle county races, but Vanessa was in a league of her own. She jumped over a big tree root that Vanessa had already lithely jumped over.
She sniggered when Vanessa told her what she hated to eat.
And that was what was on the menu, sadly. Sad crying face.
But Cass was liking the dramatic talk, "there's no way you can evade me forever, Lopez! The sweet and sour balls are calling to you..."