Hearts break and hands wave, nico / jenn dear <3

[CALANDRA ROSALINE VERONESI]

Callie did not dare to go near the brawl going down at the Ministry. For one, she was absolutely terrified of what would happen. She knew that Deen and Elliot were going, and that scared her more than anything. If something happened to them, who was she going to make pastries for? No one! She would have no one to bake for if something happened to them and she knew she wouldn't be able to handle it. So she was spending most of her time in the hospital wing, anticipating for their return. For two, she had gotten very specific directions from her father not to go to the riot. It wasn't as if she had been planning on it, either way, but she wasn't the kind of person that went against her father. Call her a wimp but - well, there were no 'but's, Callie was a wimp.

At the very least, she'd gotten a heap of schoolwork done and had crafted up enough sweets to fill up the Hufflepuff common room. Well, they didn't do much good sitting around in her almost empty dormitory (or mysteriously disappearing - no thank you, Dianne Midgen), so once she'd placed them ever so neatly into boxes, she decided to bring them down to the hospital wing. Surely there were people there who needed it more than her, as she had eaten enough pastries for her dress to feel a little more tightly fitted than before. Anyway, she thought that the people in the hospital wing could use some cheering up and that sugar would be helpful. A good pastry could fix anything, really. Well, it wasn't Skele-Gro, but it was a start. The biggest problem was maneuvering the pastries down the moving staircases by herself. At some point, she should have figured out the more intricate bits of the school, but sometimes it surprised her where she ended up, like the fates or whatever controlled her clumsiness and her cluttered brain smiled upon her and gave her a little nudge in the right direction.

So she considered it a miracle when she found herself just down the hallway from the hospital wing, taking small, careful steps so as not to disturb the pastries. She had just taken a step into a corridor when a movement out of the corner of her eye made her jump back, the boxes shuffling forwards, nearly out of her hands. "Oh, bother - I'm so sorry to startle you," she apologized immediately, straightening the boxes as the crimson swam up her cheeks. "Mum always said sugar was the best medicine besides laughter so... um... sorry, again."

[NICHOLAI DIMITRI IVASHKOV]

He had been working with the Order for quite some time now. He knew he was on the right and good side, he was sure of it in fact, but when things went far off track, like things had at the protest today, Nicholai didn’t just worry about the laws of the wizarding world. He was worried about people and their morale, mostly the men who thought it was okay to hit a girl. Which was something he had seen up close, when he’d met Nadine. The image of her was still ingrained in his brain; broken nose, bloody hands. In fact, he hadn’t had time to change his shirt yet and it had totally slipped his mind until that minute that his shirt was still smeared with blood.

Making sure Nadine was okay had somehow become first priority when he had kicked that Death Eater over the knee, hopefully breaking it and incapacitating him for long enough for someone else to get to him and – deal with him. Nicholai had made sure Nadine got back to Hogwarts, and had waited while she was getting sorted. She had looked so small in that crowd, people pressing against her and pushing her around. He was pretty sure there would be no sleeping tonight; he still had the look on her face as he turned to her ingrained on the back of his eyelids. After making sure, again, that she was okay and after promising he would be back to check on her, he decided it was probably time to leave. Saying goodbye was a little harder than he would have thought.

He closed the door behind him and started down the hall, just as a girl came around a corner and he took a half step back, feeling his heart-rate go up. Today really had him more spooked than he would have liked to admit! He gave a nervous laugh when he saw she was carrying boxes. ”No, don’t be sorry,” he said, a half smile on his face, as he took a few steps towards her. ”Let me help you with those, because I think that’s a brilliant idea, and I know at least one girl in there that could use some sugar,” he said, holding his hands out to take some of her burden.

[CALANDRA ROSALINE VERONESI]

She honestly wished that she were not so clumsy, or forgetful. Truly, had the boxes not been in her arms, she might have forgotten her mission to help her best friend with whatever injuries she might have sustained at the riot. Her own lack of inclination to partake in the riot made her irrationally proud of Nadine for being able to stand up against men who were twice her size and more menacing than any Slytherin (or staircase, for that matter) Callie had ever encountered. She was still, of course, overbearingly anxious about her wellbeing, even though she knew that Nadine could fend for herself a thousand times better than Callie could if ever they were in the same predicament. Then again, Callie was also positive that she would never put herself in that kind of predicament. Her father might go into a coma if she came anywhere near danger.

Her pulse still pounding from the unexpected surprise, she sighed to regain her breath. "Oh, I mean—I can handle it—I've just—um," she paused to collect her thoughts. Forgive her, she was a teenage girl and he was a good-looking boy (man, she guessed, judging by the absence of childlike roundness in his face) offering her help. "Thank you," she amended, shifting the top two boxes gently forward into his more capable (and presumably more graceful) care.

"Who are you going to see?" she asked innocently, genuinely curious. She wasn't necessarily jealous of whoever he was going to see, but she was sure that any girl would have been lucky to have a gentleman like him. Oh, Merlin, she hadn't even learned his name. "Wait!" she exclaimed before he could answer. "Let's pretend I asked your name before I started prying. I'm Callie, and if I didn't think that sticking my hand out would throw off my balance, I'd shake your hand." Glancing at his now occupied arms, she giggled. "Not that you really can, either," she grinned cheekily, "But we can pretend I was more cordial."