It was interesting to her that while some aspects of Hogwarts did seem to change, others remained completely the same. Back when she was at school, it had always been Gryffindor or Slytherin making the most trouble—throwing parties, drinking, and general rule-breaking had been between those two houses. They hadn’t gotten along, obviously, as it seemed that the two houses never would; but at the time, they had occasionally been able to mix without catastrophic results. Now, however, it seemed that Gryffindor and Slytherin got along even poorer than they had when she was in school. It did still seem that the two houses were more prone to getting in trouble than the other two. Callie thought she was able to get a pretty good read on that since a lot of the misbehaving ended with them at the hospital wing. Hell, she was pretty sure there had only been two or three Ravenclaws admitted since she’d started working; one had been simply sick whereas the others overtired from too much studying and not enough sleeping. Claws certainly knew how to stick to the stereotypes for the most part. “Oh my head of house walked in on quite the few interesting activities—so I can only imagine what they’re getting into now,” she said, shaking her head. She smiled slightly at his question, lifting her shoulders in a small shrug. How was she supposed to say any of that without sounding conceited, she had no idea. But having a crush on the matron or a professor wasn’t exactly something that was so ridiculous that she couldn’t say it. “Since some of your bolder Gryffindors have unabashedly asked me out, I’d say they had motives that have nothing to do with their health,” she said instead, laughing at the thought. It was just like a Gryffindor bloke to think like that, and she’d had plenty of friends back at Hogwarts that would have done the same thing.

The boathouse really didn’t seem to have much of a purpose, so she found it a rather odd place to study, though she supposed it made sense. It was commonly empty and quiet enough to practice. Callie didn’t find herself studying too much back at school, so thoughts like that simply wouldn’t have crossed her mind at the time. “Interesting place to study,” Callie replied, glancing around again, “Better than the library, certainly,” she added, as she wasn’t sure she’d stepped foot into that place as a student except for detentions and perhaps the day before an exam. Her smile widened at his words, “I do what I can. There’s no need to thank me, really—everything thus far has been incredibly mild.” There hadn’t been a situation where she’d even been remotely challenged, which was a good thing even if she did like the occasional challenge. She’d rather no one be in a situation where that would occur. “It’s true. I always got a bit stir-crazy near the end of the year,” she agreed, knowing that it would explain her increased level of troublemaking. “A lot of sneaking around, drinking and partying, as we were occasionally quite unoriginal. Though,” she paused, recalling the prank war that Gryffindor had found themselves in the midst of at the end of her sixth year, “One time I did orchestrate a prank involving stealing all of the blokes in Gryffindors’ clothes and hanging them about the Quidditch pitch.” Callie stated, her lips quirking up into an amused smirk at the thought. That had been the winning prank of their little war, as she recalled.

Even after all the time he had been here and had become head of Gryffindor, Samuel still got surprised on occasion by the antics he came across in the common room. If he was speaking with his sister he would have surely written to her and shared the hilarious tales with Hannah. But right now he didn’t want to think of that, no since it was late at night and he was alone with a fellow staff member, this was not the place to think about what had happened with his sister all those years ago. Instead he threw the thought from his mind and honed back in on the conversation he was having with the witch opposite him. “Glad to know somethings haven’t changed then” Samuel smirked. He knew full well that some of the shenanigans that he saw his students got into were probably the same sort of things their parents had done if had been in Gryffindor, their children would have just wanted to recreate them. “I’d be lying if I didn’t say that they do amuse me from time to time” he added as his smirk faded. The professor knew full well why his students made such frequent visits to the hospital wing. Probably he was 15 years younger he would do that same. He quirked a brow at her answer. Well he wouldn’t have gone that far. “Have they? I’ll have to have a word them about that” he nodded. After all that was no way to speak to a woman, especially a staff member. He could tell that Callie hadn’t minded the actions of his students but he would still speak to them.

Samuel supposed it was easy enough for someone to assume he had come here to study. After all it was a plausible assumption. He shook his head though he was unsure if she could see that or not. “I didn’t come here to study” he explained not really sure if he should go further into detail or not. Sure yes he had practiced charms in here but it was for an entirely different reason. “Well I don’t know about it being better but it offers a different setting to study in, the library doesn’t work for everyone” he said. The professor had come across students studying in the quad, by the lake or even a corridor in his wanderings around the castle. “Well good thing you started this term, come September I foresee you dealing with more severe cases and probably more students faking stomach issues or colds to get out of classes” he said with a light laugh, speaking from experiences. His classroom always did look fuller after Easter break. “ That’s understandable, after being here for some many months and staring the same walls all this times, students are destined to get restless” . Samuel was the same when he had been a student in that respect. He let out a bark of laughter as she spoke of some major prank she had pulled. “Yeah you look the type to do that” he teased. Then he remembered something “Wait! That was you? My sister was in Gryffindor too, she told me about it. I’m glad I wasn’t here for it” the man shook his head in amusement at Callie.

If anything, it seemed that students had gotten even more creative in ways to get into trouble. Although she never saw much go on personally, she’d seen a hell of a lot of the aftermath, and Callie could use her imagination to figure out just how it had gone down. Most students were willing…ish, to tell her what had happened. After all, she was curious and normally entertained. As she hadn’t seen it happen, it wasn’t like she could get them into trouble for it—unless it was particularly serious, then she obviously would have to. “Oh, a day doesn’t go by that I’m not amused. Of course, I’m not in charge of disciplining anyone, so I suppose it’s easier for me to be entertained.” So far no one had done anything that had seemed particularly bad, which was good, though she had no idea how restless they would get before the year came to a close. “Boys will be boys, and all that,” she stated, shaking her head, as she supposed being the youngest staff member at the school would lead to something like that. It was more amusing than anything, as they were obviously joking about it, to an extent.

Callie raised an eyebrow at his response, slightly curious though deciding not to ask. If he’d come here to practice charms, but hadn’t been studying, then she supposed he just liked to practice additional spells in his spare time as a student. Sometimes she did wish she’d done a bit more of actual… work at school. But she’d had a hell of a time doing just about anything else, and she supposed she wouldn’t take back those experiences if she had an opportunity. Her years at school were certainly memorable, after all. “Didn’t go to the library much either, so apparently no settings were good for me and any concept of studying,” she replied, shrugging. Callie had passed her classes, which was enough, really. She’d never had a problem getting work, at the very least. “Great, something to look forward to, then,” Callie said, as that had been something she hadn’t thought too much of. He was right, of course, when it was still warm enough to remind everyone of summer, no one would want to waste their time in classes. Although this had been a sentiment she’d wholeheartedly shared while back in school, it wasn’t something she could promote while working there. Luckily, she was sure she’d be able to fix students up so quickly that they could go right back to class and consider their mission a fail. Her smile widened at his words, as she had found that prank particularly amusing. “That’d be me, and you certainly should be glad you weren’t there. You wouldn’t have been spared,” she said, solemnly, before pausing. “What’s your sister’s name?” Callie asked, wondering if the girl had been in her year. The last name didn’t sound familiar, but she’d never been that great at names.

Samuel for his own reasoning had chosen to come out tonight. He could have very well retreated immediately to his flat in Hogsmeade, eaten leftovers and played a few songs on his guitar and crashed for the night. But instead he had chosen to stay where he worked and roam around. He was beginning to feel like those employees in the muggle world who stayed at their offices way past the end of a normal working day. However as he stood in the boathouse he felt he had made the right choice as this was proving to be a very interesting encounter. “Believe me, there are times when I struggle to discipline them, especially when they impress me with some of the charm and transfiguration work. If I could award Outstanding marks freely, I would” he told her speaking truthfully. It certainly made his classes more interesting since he became fully aware of his students could achieve when given a bit of free reign and more time to practice what they had learnt in their classes. Of course he had his fair of students who still struggled with some charms like some sixth years who still struggled with Aguamenti. “Yes I know that, some boys never grow up” he said in a lower tone of voice. He hoped she hadn't assumed he was speaking of himself because since he had started working at Hogwarts he felt he had matured a fair bit.


He wasn’t sure he if he should explain why he had been practising charms but hadn’t been studying but he wanted to be honest with her from the get go, especially if they had to work in the same place. Samuel certainly wasn’t out for any sympathy, that tactic never cut it with him, so it wouldn’t be something he would use. “I came out here to forget, practicing charms and transfiguration proved a good distraction….a great one in fact” he explained. Since he his father had left the family, he had found some sort of sanctuary in the one thing the man explained to him before he left. Of course it was only after his third year had he started to purposefully venture down here to forget, his dad and what he had seen during the battle. He chuckled under his breath at her admission. He supposed that method worked for a fair few students. “Well maybe you were destined to come back to find that setting of yours” the man joked. He felt that he had given her some sort of warning of what she could expect come September. At least now he was friendly terms with the new healer so he knew where he could find his students if they were absent from class ‘claiming’ to be sick. “Well I’m not sure if it’s an honour or not to finally meet that great orchestrator of such prank” he smirked. He went silent for a moment before answering her. “Hannah…….Copeland” he told Callie. Of coure he didn’t know if his sister’s surname was still Copeland or not, for all he knew she could be married now. “I don’t know if she would have been in your year or a year or two above” he added since he didn’t know how old the woman was.

She was certain that she could never be a professor or a head of house. The pranks that students pulled off were far too amusing for her to be able to even think up any disciplinary action. As matron, Callie couldn’t even take house points, which was good because she honestly very rarely would find a situation where that was necessary. If anything happened that she came across worthy if a student getting in trouble, she was supposed to take them to their head of house or the headmistress if it was serious enough. Even that hadn’t happened yet, obviously, and she actually quite hoped it wouldn’t. She was much more content in just healing students and being amused by their antics, not worrying about discipline at all. “I can imagine—I would be far too impressed to even think about taking points. Hell, it would be worth trying to give them an Outstanding after walking in on a prank simply to see how they react,” she replied, grinning. If any professor had ever reacted like that to pranks that she’d been involved in, the few times that she actually got caught, Callie probably would have gotten a hell of a laugh out of it. “It’s true, some certainly don’t,” Callie agreed, which she supposed was rather sad to an extent, though at least now blokes at Hogwarts had an excuse to be ridiculous. There was no better time or place for it, after all.

Callie wasn’t one to pry all that much into the lives of others’. She enjoyed having conversations with just about anyone, but they were kept pretty light for the most part. It was because of that she wasn’t going to ask just what he came down here to forget back in Hogwarts, even if he was the one that technically brought it up. If he had wanted to forget it now, there was certainly a chance that he still did and asking and bringing it up would be rather rude. “A good enough distraction as any,” she agreed, knowing that she’d had plenty that she had needed distracting from back in her school days as well, though her avenues mostly had not involved anything so productive. Nothing serious was going on with her, of course, as she knew that her family drama was relatively mild compared to most. Everyone had issues with their parents wanting something else for them than they wanted, after all, though she supposed most parents didn’t disown their children after graduation because of it. Luckily, that was hardly something that she dwelled on. “Perhaps I was,” Callie said, pushing the thoughts from her mind. She rarely found it necessary to think much about her parents, really. “I’m going to have a bit of selective hearing and pretend you just said ‘it’s an honour,’ and call it a day,” she replied, her smile widening.

It wasn’t easy to miss that Samuel had gone momentarily quiet at the mention of his sister, something that Callie made a mental note of. As someone who didn’t talk about her family, she could sometimes detect when others felt similarly and knew that she certainly wouldn’t be speaking too extensively about his sister even if he did know her. Of course, luck of all lucks, she did know his sister relatively well; well enough that she felt like a bit of a prat that she hadn’t made the connection with their surnames. “Oh, of course—Hannah,” she said, nodding. Callie had certainly been friends with her back at Hogwarts, though she lost touch with her after Hogwarts. “She was the year above me,” Callie told him, wondering if she could ask how she was doing or if that would be stepping into something. “How is she doing? We lost touch after she graduated.” Callie finally asked, too curious to hold back the question. If he got silent about it again, she would most certainly drop the topic, not wanting to upset him if there was something there she didn’t know about. Every family had their share of drama.

When he taken the position of heading his former house, Samuel did have some idea what was in store for him. And true to their nature the Gryffindors hadn’t disappointed him. Well they had, but in an entirely different context. He really was amazed when he stumbled across a lion playing a prank in the tower or around the castle somewhere, their creativity really knew no bounds. It made it harder to hand out detentions or deduct house points. Which, he wasn’t short of doing even from his former house. Giving a student a detention was perhaps better because at least if they were to help him or another professor with some task at least they were still learning, even in a small way. “You’ve given me a great idea, next time I come across a second year practising Expelliarmus, I just may award them an outstanding mark just to see their reaction” he laughed picturing their possible facial expression. After all, their reactions when he did show up in the common room now were pretty priceless. When the healer confirmed that yes indeed some blokes don’t grow up, Samuel nodded, not wanting to pry too much into that topic “Believe me, speaking to my female students about boys proves to be interesting experience” he laughed. They normally assumed that being a head of house he wouldn’t venture into that area but if he had to Samuel would go there, though probably not as much as a female head of house would.


Thankfully Callie had pried too much into his reasons for coming down here. If she had, he would have explained to her but the war or rather the battle had been well hashed out topic over the years and it was more worthwhile for them to focus on the current state of affairs. Though wanting to keep this conversation friendly and light hearted he wouldn’t be brining that out either. “Sure was! Did you have a favourite place while you were a student here?” Samuel asked. He figured everyone had a some regular place they hung out, he and his mates certainly had. “Although I’ll warn you, if you find that place for yourself, students will more likely find it soon after you……they tend to be more adventurous these days….” The professor trailed off as he looked up towards the castle before looking back at the witch with a warm smile on his face. “Oh of course, I’m sure many of the guys I knew in the younger years were your victims…..must have been quite the sight” he grinned.


What? Was his first reaction….Callie had known his sister? That he didn’t expect but then again he knew that students in Gryffindor at least knew of the people in the year above and the year below them if they weren't close friends with them. “Funny, she never mentioned you” he said thoughtfully, Hannah would have been in her seventh year and dating Declan? Dylan? Oh whatever the heck his name had been, so Samuel had barely spoken to her but then again that was his fault since he had been travelling at that time. “She’s good I think…..I haven’t spoken to her in about four years” he answered honestly. There was nothing else he could say, all he could do was hope for the best. “Do you have any siblings?”

She was glad that she couldn’t take away house points or give detentions, actually. If she could, Callie would probably feel obligated to actually make use of those powers, and she really did enjoy just watching what ridiculousness the students got up to—to a point. Luckily, she hadn’t witnessed anything of much seriousness occur since she had been there. Next term could be different, she supposed, and she would have to wait and see; hopefully, students continued to only get into some more minor and amusing troublemaking as opposed to the kind that she would feel the need to report. “Well, be sure to send them to the hospital wing if they faint from shock,” she replied, grinning. That would certainly be an amused situation, after all. Callie couldn’t help but laugh at the image of any male head of house trying to talk to his students about boys or anything like that. Her head of house had never tried that, but she was sure it wouldn’t have gone all that well. More than likely, she would have skipped that meeting.

“Not so much a favorite, really, I just wandered around getting into trouble,” she replied, shrugging. Having a favorite location, for anything other than drinking or shagging, would have meant actually staying still for any number of minutes, which was never what she felt like doing. Merlin, it was a wonder she’d even gotten this job with how much trouble she’d gotten into back in school. She supposed they probably didn’t really keep that in mind, but Minerva had been the headmistress, after all. “I’ve noticed that,” she agreed, as students did tend to be getting into a hell of a lot more trouble now than they ever had when she was a student here. “Oh, it was always quite the sight.” Callie said, solemnly, as she always had found her pranks to be rather amusing—particularly the ones that took place during their prank war.

Callie had a pretty damn good group of friends when she was at Hogwarts, and they all stuck pretty close together. For being so close, it was a bit sad that she barely talked to any of them now, and it hadn’t even been a decade since they had graduated, though some of their group had been in the year below and above… so she supposed it had been a bit spread out. That was how she had met Hannah to begin with, when she had begun dating Declan, a seventh year who had been apart of their group. “I’m not all that memorable,” she said, self-deprecatingly, before laughing under her breath. “She dated my friend, Declan,” Callie explained, shrugging. Gryffindors were all at least friendly with each other, so she had known Hannah before then, but didn’t talk much to her until then. “Oh,” she replied, nodding as she determined that was certainly something she didn’t want to step in. her curiosity would not trample over her restraint when it came to not being nosy. Callie certainly knew when something wasn’t her business. “I don’t have any siblings, actually,” Callie answered, which was a lie, of course, but she was glad that he had changed the subject away from his sister before she’d had to come up with a new topic.

The Professor looked around trying to estimate how much time had passed since he had gotten to the boathouse. He lit his wand with a non-verbal spell and used it to read his watch. Samuel took note of the time and used ‘nox’ to darken the wand and stowed it back in the back pocket of his trousers. He was hoping that his students were in the tower, even if not sleep he hoped they were up there, doing whatever they did when he wasn’t around. But he knew there was a high chance that some of them were snooping around where they shouldn’t be or traversing some corridor somewhere in the castle. Gryffindors couldn’t shake their trouble causing ways from their system no matter how old they got, he of course being a prime example. He laughed at her insistence to send any student of his that faints to the hospital wing. Samuel knew that he of course awaken them himself but since she was the healer out of the two of them, he figured he better leave it in her capable hands. “I will levitate them down to the fourth floor myself” he grinned at her. When she laughed at his mention of speaking with the teenage girls in house about boys the Professor smiled, it wasn’t something he necessarily saw himself doing before he started at Hogwarts as a professor.

 
“Well that’s an interesting tactic” Samuel commented. But he supposed it was a clever one too, it was better to cause whatever trouble you wanted to and move on rather than to hang around the scene and wait to be found out. The Gryffindor head knew he would have to come up with more variety in his detentions for next year, and he wasn’t against given them out to his own students. After all he couldn’t be seen as being biased. “But perhaps the safer one” he nodded. He supposed that the students of this generation got into more trouble because simply, they could, they were freer and he supposed that their parents had told them stories of what they had gotten up to in their time here. “At least they are thoughtful and like to keep us on our toes” he said as he shifted position slightly against the wall. He would have to leave soon and he supposed that Callie would have to head home too or back to the hospital wing if she needed to. Samuel didn’t know if she had any patients up there currently or not. “Well at least you and the other girls were amused” the man smirked. He wondered what the younger students would have thought of the older students pulling such a prank.

Hannah had told him very little in her final year of school, he could have seen it as a sign of what was to come. But he Samuel had been too ignorant when he was twenty preferring to believe that everything would work out in due course, how wrong he had been. The wizard laughed. “You’re wrong, Callie you’re pretty memorable” he nodded smirking slightly. No doubt he’d forget this anytime soon. “Declan right, I couldn’t keep track” Samuel replied nonchalantly. He wasn’t at Hogwarts to keep track anyhow. “Nothing I can do right now, unless I run into her in Muggle London” the man shrugged not wanting to dicuss this any further. He was thankful that Callie hadn’t pried into what had gone on between him and his sister. She was lucky she was an only child unless she had to bare the stigma that came with it, then he would feel sorry for her. “Well it appears to be getting late, I should be heading home, will you be heading home now or wander around a bit? If you're going home I can escort you” he asked her since he thought she lived in the same building.

Callie nodded concisely at his response, a smile forming across her face. Obviously he could just wake them up himself, but she always appreciated someone who would just go with the joke as opposed to correcting whatever random statements she made. “Good.” Contemplating her times at Hogwarts was always amusing, simply because she and her friends always found themselves in interesting situations that normally involved a far amount of troublemaking. “I had all the interesting tactics down, clearly,” she replied, solemnly. Being back at the school and recalling all of those memories didn’t make her miss her times at Hogwarts, per say, since being a teenager was always so damn dramatic, but it did make her want to get back in contact with everyone she hadn’t spoken to in a while. It was something she’d definitely have to make an effort to do over the summer since she’d have the free time. “That’s true, it certainly keeps things interesting.” She agreed. Callie wouldn’t have thought it was possible to improve upon the pranks and general troublemaking of their day but it just seemed to get crazier each year. “If I wasn’t amused, then I was doing something wrong.” After all, she made a concerted effort to always take the time to amuse herself with different stunts, and it always had resulted in a good time.

It really was getting quite late, she realized, as she had been there for a bit before Samuel had even shown up. Since she had no patients currently staying overnight in the hospital wing, she’d be heading back to her apartment. There was a cot in her office for times she needed to stay there, but she much preferred her own apartment for obvious reasons. Callie had no idea what had prompted her to wander around the school instead of heading home and passing out, realizing that she was actually pretty damn tired now that she thought about it. “Well, I’ll take that as a compliment,” she replied, smiling brightly. She wasn’t one to assume she was memorable, after all, even if she was confident enough to realize that she wasn’t exactly unmemorable. Nodding vaguely at his response, she further noted that this was a topic best suited for moving quickly past, since there was clearly something going on with him and his sister. Callie made sure to make a mental note that Hannah was apparently in Muggle London, which was interesting, and could perhaps explain why she hadn’t run into the woman since she had graduating. “Sure,” she agreed, nodding. For two people who hadn’t spoken much, she did recall them living in the same apartment building, as most professors seemed to stick to Hogsmeade. “I was just going to walk though, so I understand if you want to Floo.” Callie added, knowing that he’d probably have a fireplace in his office that was open for ease of getting back to his own apartment as well as anywhere else he needed to go. After all, not being able to apparate in Hogwarts was a bit inconvenient, but she deemed it a nice enough night for the brief walk back to Hogsmeade.

-END OF THREAD-