Food Gods: That's how we jam

[Neferure Emerson]

Date: A Saturday of Your Choice, End of Semester
Time: 7:08 AM
ISO: Amoretta Leigh.

The quiet Saturday morning breakfast was one of Nef's favorite. The school had wifi and she usually took her laptop with her to download the archaeological teams latest information and talk to Alan a bit. She strode down the empty hallways in her comfy blue jeans and loose, hand spun brown tunic, intent on getting Cinnamon Crunch for breakfast. And maybe a blueberry muffin. With lemon curd. She reached the doors of the cafeteria and pulled them opened. Her silent steps led her to the magical servers and she spoke her order in a mere whisper. The cereal came right out in a plastic blue bowl with milk and a spoon. The blueberry muffin came out too. With raspberry jam. Raspberry. Really. She sighed, clasped her hand to her chest in despair and looked at the ceiling. The damn thing never got the topping right. A thought came to her. Maybe it just didn't do lemon curd. Oooh. She glared at the machines. This warranted having a conversation with...someone about that.

She turned around rather suddenly, aware that someone might have been watching her. To her relief, the cafeteria was oddly empty. She started walking then nearly spilled her cereal as she saw a girl she had somehow missed. She was sitting right in the center, too. And looking directly at Nef. This was so damn awkward. Not to mention embarrassing. Well, she couldn't very well ignore the girl. That would just make the silence worse. Nef started walking towards her and realized it was an older classmate, Amoretta. She was on the soccer team with Nef! They both played forwards, actually. Ok. Nef could deal with this.

“Hey Amo. Mind if I sit with you?” Not that it was really a question, because she was already setting her stuff down by the time she was finished asking. She slipped her leather messenger bag off, up over her head and let it sink to the ground. Flipping a thumb back towards the magical food gods, she explained her strange behavior. “They never give me lemon curd. I have no idea why. I'm starting to think they don't have it. It always picks some random jam. Today is raspberry.” She probably thought she was a total weirdo. If not from her odd leather sandals and unfashionable tunic, then from her behavior. Oh well.

“So, why are you up early?”

[Amoretta Leigh]

"Oh yes, please sit!" The seventeen year old beamed at her teammate, anxious to have some company. Ever the outgoing witch, Amoretta was always happiest being social. She took a drink of her apple juice, then considered her new companion. She had recognized her from the soccer team immediately and it took only a few quick moments for her name to register. Nef, that's what everyone called her, though Amo was quite sure she remembered there being more to her name. Oh well, everyone here semmed to have a nickname anyway.

Amo couldn't help but notice all of the items the other girl had brought along with her. Compared to the fourth year's single notebook and pen and, Nef looked like she planned to camp out in the cafeteria all day. Perhaps she had some last minute work to catch up on. How anyone could concentrate on anything with the din that usually carried on in the cafeteria was beyond Amoretta, but to each their own.

The younger girl had just vented her woes about the food dispenser and Amoretta gave her a sympathetic look. She was almost surprised every time Nef said something. Though they played together, Amo couldn't remember ever having had a conversation with Nef before. She felt a little guilty about this - wasn't it her job as a senior member of the team to get to know her teammates? Beyond that, Amo had always been so good about getting to know everyone she came into contact with. How had this girl gotten through the cracks?

So, why are you up so early?Nef asked her.

Amo shrugged. It was an atypical hour for her. She usually found it easy to get a head start on the day, one of the benefits to being a morning person. Sure, there might be other reasons for her to be up, but that didn't need to be spread around the school.

"Oh no reason really, I'm just an early riser," Amo said, hoping this was a satisfactory answer, "How about you? Got a lot of work to get done today?"

[Neferure Emerson]

After cheerfully letting her know that she could sit at the table, her teammate raised her shoulders in a nonchalant way as Nef asked why she was up so early. At least she didn't seem to think Nef was weird, although anything more than a minute was enough to change that. She hoped momentarily to Thoth that she would not break out with any puns.

“Oh no reason really, I'm just an early riser.”

Nef nodded her head. Not many students rose early, and she wasn't sure she saw Amo here regularly on Saturday mornings, but just because someone wasn't coming to eat every Saturday didn't mean that they weren't getting up early. Nef came here mostly because she could get food and then she usually headed outdoors after about an hour. A trickle of students began coming in at that point anyways and Nef got quite annoyed when a nosy someone wanted to know what she was doing on her laptop. They weren't terribly common, because they really weren't necessary for class and thus made her the target of nosy individuals.

How about you? Got a lot of work to get done today?"

Define work. Nef was going to do some stuff for the archaeological dig. School work, no. Work... well, she didn't quite think of it was work. It was more something she got to participate in that was absolutely amazing and made her wish at times that she wasn't magical, because then she could fully throw herself into it. However, she reminded herself, the reason that she could sense special pockets of magic was because she was, well, magical. So really, it was positive, because she was going into a basically untouched field. Right then.

“It's not school work, but it is work in a manner of speaking. I'm doing some preliminary translations for an archaeological dig in Egypt on the pictures they've sent me. If I can, I plan to finish at least one of the sets.”

They had been written obvious divisions and the team had photographed them and labeled the hieroglyphs appropriately. After noting that it was in middle Egyptian, the recommendation had been to send them to Nef. She was quite literally the fastest at translating and they could always use another team member, particularly one that didn't take up space at the site. Looking at the pictures was definitely not the same thing as being there, but Nef did her best to satisfy her longing for Egypt with the tantalizing bits that were sent to her. She quite wanted to be there in the dust, under the sun, slowly making clear progress and charting everything.

She sighed heavily after a moment and opened her laptop, careful to keep her face tilted towards Amo, so that she could keep the conversation going without looking rude. She pushed the on button and brought up a mouthful of cereal as she waited for the girl to comment. Nothing beat the cinnamon sugary sweetness early in the morning. One of the few things she missed while at digs.

“Are you doing any work as well, or just chilling?” She glanced at the notebook on the table as she asked.

[Amoretta Leigh]

While she waited for the other girl to reply, Amoretta pondered her breakfast mate. She was a quiet girl, that was for sure, though she seemed friendly. Perhaps she simply opened up more once you got to know her.

It was a smart thing to do, Amo thought, not to give everything about yourself away in the first ten seconds. So many of the girls at school were so eager for approval that they laid their entire personality and then some on the table the second anyone approached them. It was even worse when the approacher was a boy! But now Amo was going on a thinking tangent, and her teammate had started to reply.

So Nef was interested in archeology, and pretty gifted in the area by the sound of it. Amoretta didn't know at first what to say in response, she didn't particularly know a lot on the subject. Although not vain, the young witch didn't like being ignorant on any subject. Luckily, for the moment she was spared the problem of coming up with a satisfactory remark.

"Are you doing any work as well, or just chilling?"

Amoretta saw her glance at the notebook and subconsciously inched it closer to herself. A small, shy smile reached the young girl's lips. One wouldn't exactly call it working, though the subject she was pouring into didn't feel exactly like a recreational activity either. But Amo didn't want to reveal her every secret just yet either; like her friend she was not dumb either.

"I guess just chilling for the time being," she replied, a shallow blush rising on her cheeks.

"Your project sounds fascinating," Amo hurried on, quickly regaining her composition, "How did you get interested in archeology?"


(OOC: SO SORRY IT TOOK ME SOOOOOOO LONG - I'LL BE BETTER I PROMISE!!!!)

[Neferure Emerson]

Nef was rather perceptive and so she noticed the shift in her team mates attitude. First, she seemed more protective of the notebook Nef had looked at, and second, a smile appeared on her face. Hmm. Were those class notes? Boring old notes weren't usually guarded. So... perhaps Amo was writing a book or something. That might be embarrassing to share with someone. Because then everyone would want to read it and well, that was just embarrassing. Nef had never written a book. Essays and reports, yes. These were the sorts of things that archaeologists most often had to do with regards to penning something. Her father had written a few books, and her mother had one out. She planned to write one once she had done work in the magical aspect of archaeology for the magical world.

But maybe she wasn't writing a book. Maybe she wrote lyrics or poems. Nef was of course curious, but she knew about a little something called privacy and wasn't about to press someone she wasn't well acquainted with. Amoretta blushed slightly as she replied that she was just chilling for a while and Nef's belief that those were not class notes was supported. Interesting. Nef wasn't a big writer in the recreational sense (her head was too buried in archaeology), so she'd never really contemplated writing for pleasure's sake. She'd probably be good at it, she mused. Her essays had been college level when she was 12 years old. Another bit of cereal and she moved to cut her blueberry muffin, unaware of the fact that good essay skills did not equal other good writing skills.

"Your project sounds fascinating. How did you get interested in archeology?" The other girl asked this quickly, moving away from topics that might concern her notebook, Nef ventured to guess.

This was possibly one of her favorite questions. She had taken a bit of her muffin as Amo spoke and held up her hand to show that she would finishing chewing first. She swallowed hard because she was rather excited and took a quick spoonful of milk to help it go down.

“My parents are actually both archaeologists, so I practically was born doing this. What I'm actually doing right now is some preliminary translations for the archaeological team at a dig my parents are running. I'm a few steps short of fluently speaking and reading it.”

She stopped, not wanting to cram too much information into the initial introduction. Sometimes peoples eyes glazed over if she told them too much and she did not want to miss any opportunities to get others interested in Egypt.

She gestured to the laptop, which was currently asking her for her password. “They send me images and then I translate them so they can get a better idea of what they are dealing with.”

[Amoretta Leigh]

So Nef's parents were archaeologists - that certainly explained her seeming expertise in the area. Amoretta was well aware that if one's parents are experts in an area then one is destined to absorb some of the information, whether one wants to or not. If there was a true interest then the offspring could count him/herself lucky. For Amoretta this was not the case.

"You're parents are archaeologists? Wow, you must have had a fascinating childhood! At any rate, your holidays are bound to be more interesting than mine. My parents don't have very interesting careers, or at least I don't find them interesting. My mom is a magical botanist and my dad is a doctor of magical history and there's not too much I find interesting in either of those areas...."

Amoretta stopped talking to eat some of the bagel sitting in front of her. Nef seemed to be a girl of few words, and the young witch hoped she hadn't alarmed her with the onslaught of information that she had just been given. At the same time, Amo was really interested in hearing about the other girl's work, so she decided to press on.

"So these images, are they involved in a magical area of archeology? I don't think I've heard of much work in the archeology arena as far as in terms of wizarding importance," Amoretta said, then hurriedly added, "I mean, of course there are the old egyptian pyramids and what not, but besides that well worked-over area....."

Hopefully her breakfast partner wouldn't think that she was suggesting that there was no magic involved in her area of interest. But if there wasn't, Amoretta wouldn't be one to turn up her nose at a fascinating Muggle subject. Feeling quite umcomfortable , (Amoretta was not used to being ignorant in any area) she waited almost impatiently for Nef to speak.

[Neferure Emerson]

It had been a fascinating childhood, so Nef nodded her head as Amo spoke. It had been amazing really, unparalleled, perhaps. She wondered for a brief moment again as to what she was doing in this dull school when there were entire civilizations running amok, waiting to be uncovered. Ok. Maybe it was just one civilization she was interested in. And it was entirely possible, in fact, rather likely, that it wasn't going anywhere for a very very long time. Ok ok. And the school wasn't really dull at all. But still, she longed to be on the scene.

Nef's eyes widened a bit as Amo told her that her father was a PhD of magical history. That was really awesome. PhD's in general tended to have interesting and educated things to say, and magical history was something she took very seriously, as that was the department with the most information in regards to the magical counterparts of ancient civilizations. There were, disappointingly, no 'archaeology' classes in the magical world, although Nef hoped to change that one day.

“That actually sounds pretty cool,” Nef slipped in as Amo took a bite of her bagel. The other girl then sort of half shrugged and rotated the conversation back around to Nef. Which was quite fine with Nef. While not vain, she liked talking about her work and was rather proud of it.

Nef raised an eye brow jokingly as Amo seemed to suggest that there might not be much of magical importance other than the tombs which the curse breakers heart wrenchingly mistreated and destroyed. Nef had a few theories as to how the magical world might have lived alongside their muggle counterparts; this was part of what she shared in her correspondence with Gringotts. They were only theories however, and she needed a lot of evidence to back them up – something she could only get with permission to magically excavate with the assistance of curse breakers. It was going to be complicated, but in her nearly as good quality as a professional opinion, it ought to be done. There was simply so much history that was missing. Wizards did not have very good record keeping systems in their early times.

"I mean, of course there are the old Egyptian pyramids and what not, but besides that well worked-over area....."

Laughing a little, Nef shook her head slightly. “The only thing that wizards know how to do is break into tombs and take the treasure. Nothing has really been studied. The muggles have worked out their part of it well enough, but the magical side is practically untouched in terms of studying the civilization. There's actually a lot of places in Egypt that have magical history. But I'm not at the point yet where I can study that.”

She flipped the screen around, to show Amo a set of images she had been downloading as she spoke.

“My friend Alan is a graduate student there and he sends me these.”

She gave the screen a slightly wistful smile as the next picture appeared. It was a picture of Alan standing against the wall she was translating with his thumbs up, smiling. Within a second she had lost her focus and started daydreaming. Her eyes glazed over slightly and her mind drifted completely.

The other girl cleared her throat. Nef jumped just a bit and turned back to her. “These are the photos I'm currently translating.” Her eyes darted to the screen again and then back to Amo and to the screen again, where they settled. She set the photos into slide show mode and hoped that Amo would ignore her obviously mental lapse.