hannah & mark (woodenfans) wrote in valesco,
@ 2013-09-23 19:30:00

Entry tags:

delilah spinnet, elliot alderton, ellsinore alderton, elphias doge, galvin gudgeon, glenda prewett, grail yates, group, henry wadcock, iwan quigley, marissa macfusty, mark wood, matthew summerby, max fancourt, melania comstock, phoebe smethwyck, richard house, savannah davies, scarlett rabnott, seth wadcock, therese bonaccord, victoria cadwallader

Posted for this Friday!

It had been a long, long year for St. Mungo's.

Mark stood with a long flute of champagne in one hand, taking slow, deep breaths. The rearing of the ugly virus' head had given the year a bad, bad start, but here they were. Lives had been lost, but so many had been saved. Mark felt bittersweet about celebrating the year, but he knew events like this needed to be held to keep the hospital running. The donations were used to buy new supplies, potion remedies, and to provide for better training for their healers. Everything was being spun into a positive manner, Mark just wished that it didn't have to be such a lavish event to do so.

"Do you think it's too much?" he said to his wife, looking down at Hannah with a worried smirk. If anything, the night provided a reason for his wife to doll herself and look even more fantastic than she normally did. They deserved a night out, especially now that their trio of children was complete.

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brickhouse
2013-09-23 10:45 pm UTC (link)

Rich was at the gathering, but any smile he put on felt utterly fake. The year had been rough on him and bouncing back anew had never been his style. The last time that he'd been through such tragedy, he'd actually had disappeared for a couple years. Honestly, he couldn't understand why he hadn't done that this time. Maybe it was because he was getting a better handle on his own coping with grief or maybe, he just didn't care anymore. The latter possibility worried him more than anything.

Not to mention he still couldn't bear to see or speak about Delilah without becoming upset. A year ago, he'd thought he'd be proposing to her by now, and just look at where he was -- in a stuffy suit at a party that made him uncomfortable sipping on a drink that did nothing but put a burn in his belly that challenged the tightness in his chest for strongest pain.

Merlin, he sounded so morose. Maybe it would be better to just pay his respects to his old colleagues and leave them to the festivities. No one wanted a gloomy glum git at their party.

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beavertails
2013-09-24 01:25 am UTC (link)

Victoria had been fully planning on spending this party trying to get back to her old self. Her brother's death had shaken her up more than she cared to admit -- it had come at a time where she'd been relying on him to jump to and from Canada at her whim and it was something she'd been taking advantage of, so his death brought her not only grief, but an immense sort of guilt that kept her up at night. He'd surely caught his sickness visiting her and her child, and that -- well, it wasn't a good feeling.

She spotted someone who looked like just as miserable as she was. Misery loved company though, right? Wasn't that the saying?

She shuffled over to him, not bothering to flash a smile. That's what the dress was for -- the sparkle was to distract the media from her less-than-cheerful disposition. It was out of character for her, and she didn't want them picking up on it. Her agent -- Henry, poor Henry -- had just as much on his plate as she did, if not more.

"You look worse than me." And that was quite the feat, really. She didn't recognize him from the pitch, so maybe he was someone who wouldn't recognize her either.

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brickhouse
2013-09-24 07:20 pm UTC (link)

Rich honestly didn't notice that someone had approached until she was speaking to him. Tensing momentarily because he wanted to grimace at his selfish wallowing, but knowing it'd likely be taken the wrong way, all he did was briefly clench his teeth as he canted his head, glancing up from staring at his drink. His lips were drawn too tight for a smile and he blinked a few times before he finally bowed his head with a slight flinch. This was such an awful way to behave in a the presence of a beautiful woman.

Softly clearing his throat, Rich forced himself to stand up straighter and loosened his jaw. He had better manners than this, honestly. "Ah, I've only just started," he finally replied and tipped his glass slightly. "Give me a few more of these and then you have a babbling fool to go with the sorry sap disposition."

Oh, that was terrible. Rich hung his head for a moment. "Sorry," he apologized quietly before attempting a kinder expression, even a smile, after a sigh. "It's been a year -- for everyone -- but harder on some than others."

The light shrug he gave her wasn't out of pity. He knew who she was, he'd taken care of her bumps on the pitch more than once and knew about her brother's death from the papers. She didn't need pity, though -- perhaps a little compassion, which was what he felt. He'd lost some family to the virus, too, after all.

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beavertails
2013-09-25 11:18 pm UTC (link)

As soon as Richard stopped slumping at his table, Victoria did figure out who he was. She rarely saw little more than stars when she was getting treated, so maybe that explained it, but -- egad, this was going to be terrible. Her dead brother's ex-girlfriend's -- ex? Was he even her ex, or was she stepping on all of his toes by speaking to him at all? She felt her cheeks heat up and very nearly turned tail and just completely escaped the whole situation. That wouldn't be fair to Richard, though, and he did seem like he was down in the dumps too...maybe they could cheer each other up, at least a little.

"Well, some of us have to explain to our kids why their uncles aren't around any more, so -- yeah. And don't be sorry. People are allowed to take as much time as they want to get over things, despite what the tabloids have to say about it." She didn't mean to sound too bitter, but it had been hard on her too, having to explain things to her daughter. She paused, sliding down into the chair next to him and kicking out one foot.

"You know, you blokes have it better than us at these things. Or at least, your shoes are more comfortable." You'd have thought someone would've come up with a spell to make shoes more comfortable by now, but as far as Victoria knew none of them actually worked.

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brickhouse
2013-09-26 12:28 am UTC (link)

Rich lifted his brow in mild shock at her bluntness. He, personally, had such a way of trying to gently beat around topics, but Victoria was clearly more of a head-on sort, which was somewhat refreshing when all he'd known was his own self-pity for so long.

"I rarely touch the rags -- unless my mum makes a stink about something outrageous that they've printed," he rolled his eyes at the word 'outrageous' and then frowned. "Never really had to worry about them myself until last year, but now..."

The trailing off was due to his sustained inability to say a thing about Delilah. He didn't want to talk about her, at all, especially in the context of the tabloids. Thankfully, Victoria plopped down and changed the subject.

Glancing to her shoe, the slightest, genuine smile finally pulled at Rich's face when he softly snorted. "Hasn't anyone ever told you that most blokes don't care about shoes?" he lightly taunted and sat back in his seat, a little more open, now. "Honestly, I'd prefer you to comfortable from head to toe if I were to ask you to dance."

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beavertails
2013-09-26 12:34 am UTC (link)

"So I guess you figured out that you're not missing much, huh?" At least now that he and Delilah were old news the tabloids had more or less laid off of him though, right? Victoria, as long as she was a Quidditch player, would always be on their radar. The thought made her frown, so she focused on what he had to say about her feet. She wiggled her toes, making the top of her shoe bulge out and then fall flat again.

"Oh, I know men don't care about shoes." The people that she'd dated, they didn't care much about the way she looked and that was the way she liked it. It was really only at these rare events that she made it a habit to do things like put on make-up and jewellery. No point in sweating off all your mascara on the pitch. "Women do, though. And besides, these are really great for 'accidentally' stepping on a snoopy photographer's foot when they get a little too close." She flexed her foot, showing off the heel.

"I've got too many sisters for shoes to not be a big deal, anyway. Scott is -- was -- into them too." Annnd they were back to being depressing. Great.

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brickhouse
2013-09-26 03:53 am UTC (link)

Rich's jaw clenched momentarily. "I found out they like ruffling feathers just because they can," he commented, remembering a few choice instances of awful things that had been said Delilah or her brother. He took a breath to shake that thought off and kept his attention on her shoe, her foot, her leg, and the way they all worked together when they flexed. He knew every muscle and tendon it took do such a thing, and it marveled him if he pondered it for too long -- the human body and how it worked. Likely why he was a healer -- well, sports mediwizard anyway.

"I've always been more fascinated with hands," he offered randomly, hoping to keep this conversation going because well, Victoria was rather nice to talk to and he'd always wondered what it would be like to say more to her than 'where does it hurt?'

Giving a slight shrug, he sat his glass to the table. "I mean, we all have our qualities -- physical and emotional -- that we find attractive, right?" He was being rhetorical as he held at his hand to her, hoping she'd provide hers. "And honestly, I could bore you with all the details by tracing each working millimeter of each finger back to your palm and down to your wrist," he paused to glance up at her with a soft smile, "or we could go dance until you want to carry those shoes."

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beavertails
2013-09-26 10:13 pm UTC (link)

For a moment she was sure that he was going to take her hand and start studying it. That would've been awkward, frankly, for several reasons - mostly because she didn't like to think about just how much smarter than her Rich probably was. Feeling stupid was her least favorite thing in the world, so when he followed up his offer with a request to dance, she couldn't help the slight smile that curved over her lips.

"I think I could manage that. Nothing makes a person sleep better than exhaustion, right?" Because she sure as hell hadn't been sleeping well since her brother's death, not that she was going to share that with poor Rich. He probably knew, since he'd seen her on the field once or twice since then. She took his hand easily enough, using the extra leverage to stand up.

"I'll try to keep from stepping on your feet. The music that they play at these things isn't really my -- style." She was more about line-dancing and two-stepping, truthfully.

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brickhouse
2013-09-27 11:01 pm UTC (link)

Concern momentarily creased Rich's brow at her oddly worded comment. He hadn't meant he wanted to exhaust her or make her want to sleep; he just thought she might like to dance so they didn't have to keep making awkward conversation. The shoes comment -- well, she'd said they hurt and women normally carried their shoes if the shoes hurt but they wanted to dance. Did she not want to dance?

Merlin's great bloody beard, he was over-thinking this. That was more usual for Rich. He couldn't let anything go without chasing down a reason, even if he wasn't meant to know.

Standing to join Victoria, Rich lightened up his expression and proffered an elbow for her to take as they walked. "Ah, I don't have enough drink in me to even pretend that I know what to do with my feet," he confessed with a smile and slight flush. "If you'd like, I could ask that something more your style be played?"

Shrugging, he slowed and looked to her. "Honestly, Victoria, I'm going to apologize before I go ahead and make a great fool of myself." His tone was soft and genuine. "I know I'm a terrible dancer and even worse conversationalist, but having your attention is -- it feels good."

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beavertails
2013-09-28 12:45 pm UTC (link)

She took his arm as soon as he offered it to her, glad to have at least some distraction at this party. Maybe if she could keep her mind off of things for a while, she could actually have a passable time here. She let out a soft laugh as he spoke, but it quickly sobered up when he started apologizing. Victoria squeezed his arm lightly.

"Trust me, you're not the only one who's appreciating the attention." She wasn't sure if it was because her brother's death had made her feel terrible, or if she was actually radiating an aura that offended the senses of most men, but she hadn't exactly had many offers of dates or dinner since his death. Being a single mum didn't help much with that either, she was sure.

"I doubt you can make a fool of yourself around me. I'm pretty hard to impress in that regard," she mused, shifting once they'd gotten onto the dance floor to loop her arms around his neck. "Once you've seen someone fly head-first into a barstool after getting flung off a magically-enhanced mechanical bull, nobody looks that silly. And as for the dancing style -- I don't think anyone here seems much into country music. I wouldn't want everyone else to have to stand around looking like idiots."

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