Someone Else's Problem (OPEN)

[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

Emmanuelle hadn't anticipated that she would still be living "across the pond" by that point, but she was still residing in London rather than back home in New Orleans. It wasn't against her will, though. She had a job working for Cas Karkaroff at Borgin and Burkes, and she didn't hate it. At the same time, she was determined to make the most of being so far from the world in which she'd grown up. Without Elaine Dupree, that was frankly a lot easier. She could take a vacation day or two from work and not care that she had to be somewhere else in secret.

And so she had booked a package to travel to Wales for Calan Mai. Emmanuelle really didn't know what she was getting herself into, but that was something that could have been said for a lot of what she had already done. It was a way to immerse herself in a different culture, anyway, or so she told herself.

Granted, Emmanuelle wasn't really sure what yurts had to do with anything Welsh. (They weren't Welsh at all, as far as she knew.) She had arranged to stay in one for the long weekend, though, and it was honestly nicer than her own flat. The downside was that she couldn't get too cozy, since she had decided to go for the cheaper option of sharing her yurt with someone else. Maybe that would be the cultural immersion part of the experience, she thought to herself as the flap to the yurt rolled itself up to signal that someone else was entering.

OOC: OPEN!

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

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A small, weekend long break was exactly what Juniper needed prior to the end of the school year. Her second term was set to finish up within a few months. Taking time away from Witch TV and Hogwarts was so beneficial, especially this time of year. Traveling into the Cambrian Mountains to get a bit of fresh air and away from people was definitely what she needed. Juniper was afraid to admit that she had very little knowledge on druidic culture. She knew of May Day, but anything past that and the fact that they lived on an island, was about it. She hoped to get a sliver of cultural experience out of all of this, even if it was a tad watered down for the average person. Staying overnight in a yurt was just an extra step in it all.

Arriving what seemed to be a bit late, having lost track of time earlier in the day because she wanted to grade papers for one of her classes, Juniper hurried from the portkey drop off point to where her yurt supposedly was. The surrounding area was about what she expected from witches and wizards out in the countryside and camping – bonfires, music, and the occasional bright flash of colorful sparks being sent up in the air. It was far tamer than the last time she went camping though.

Staring down at the map she had been given, she had to squint at the lines that had been drawn to her tent. Even with light from her wand, it was difficult to make out. Eventually she found her way there, almost walking into the wrong yurt twice, both times the inhabitants basically welcoming her regardless of the mistake. Once she spotted the correct one (or what she assumed was the right one, again), Juniper pushed the flap open and stepped inside.

There was someone else already in it, a woman that looked to be similar in age, and Juniper gave her an awkward smile as she looked around the yurt. ”Suppose we’re roommates for the weekend, yeah?” she assumed, dropping her bag on the floor. ”Juniper,” she introduced herself.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

Being roommates with a total stranger for a weekend was going to be an experience of some sort. Whether it would be a good one or a bad one had yet to be determined, though whoever was about to step through the flap of the yurt would give Emmanuelle her initial perception of that. Fortunately for her, the woman who entered the yurt looked like she was somewhere around her own age, which was significantly better than getting stuck with some old, creepy wizard. Whoever was responsible for assigning which people to which yurts was in Emmanuelle's good graces for the time being, though.

"Suppose we're roommates for the weekend, yeah?" her apparent yurt-mate asked after looking around. "Juniper," she said by way of introduction. It was clear from her accent that she was British, not that it was any surprise.

"Emmanuelle," Emmanuelle replied. "Nice to meet you, Juniper."

juniper minerva mcgonagall

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

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Merlin, it felt good to get her bag off of her shoulders. Even though it wasn’t heavy, as the trip was only for the weekend, the yanking from the portkey and the subsequent hike up to her yurt had done a number on her. Once again, she was dreadfully out of shape and not built for stuff like this. Having very little materials to bring to her classes didn’t help at all either, as she had gotten used to traveling light. Magic bags and tents had made her soft, though they worked perfectly for her because lugging around those with her wiry arms did not work out well.

”Pleasure’s mine,” she returned the greeting to Emmanuelle. An American! How fun! Though not the novelty that she once thought they were, considering how many had come over to attend Hogwarts and then proceeded to stay after the fact. The most exciting part, at least to her, was how different all of their accents were. Because Emmanuelle here did not sound anything like Monday Weekly or Temp Fleming, whom she worked with. But it was an excellent conversation starter, that was for sure.

”So,” she started as she dragged her bag along the ground towards the area that looked to be reserved for her, letting it go once again by her bed. ”Are you here for just this? Or traveling the world?” From the others she had seen on her way to the yurt, there seemed to be a lot of worldly characters, adventurers and travelers that were here for the event. She supposed that she wasn’t that much different, in a way, but the trip was far closer to home than it was for most.

Giving a long look at the interior of the yurt, it was relatively cozy looking. Perfect for a couple days of living outside and simply enjoying a break. Emmanuelle didn’t look all that weird, rather, seemed like she fit fairly well with the place. Funny how that happened. Meanwhile, here she was looking like she had just finished a trek across a mountain. Slightly sweaty and out of breath. The gradual incline up here had really kicked her butt.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

"Pleasure's mine."

Their pleasantries exchanged, Emmanuelle wouldn't have been surprised if that had marked the end of their conversation until one or the other of them needed something. That wasn't the case, though, because Juniper actually seemed inclined to keep talking to her. With how vague Cas could be at times, it was a different feeling to have to readjust to having a conversation that didn't involve something to do with antiques, especially those of the cursed variety.

"So," Juniper continued upon dragging her bag to her bed in the yurt. "Are you here for just this? Or traveling the world?"

She seemed to assume that she was just a tourist who happened to be passing through, but Emmanuelle wasn't offended by her having come to that conclusion in the least. After all, she knew that her accent made it an easy assumption. Even with as many people with American accents as had come "across the pond", as people called the Atlantic Ocean on that side of it, it was more likely than not that she was simply visiting.

"Oh, I'm in Wales for this," Emmanuelle clarified, referring to the celebrations for Calan Mai that had her staying in a yurt, "but I moved to London a few years ago." She was still obviously a foreigner in what was technically still a foreign land, though it was different than if she had just come by Portkey from the United States. Although she was pretty sure she knew the answer already, she turned the question on Juniper. "You?" she asked, plopping her own bag down at the foot of what would be her bed for the weekend.

juniper minerva mcgonagall

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

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”Same then,” Juniper answered, more about being in Wales for this than the other part. Technically it was true though. She was from Hogsmeade, so moving to London was the natural progression when it came to the magical community in the UK. Granted, she had done so almost immediately after graduating, after spending most of her life within a mile between her parents’ home and Hogwarts. Being able to travel like this felt freeing. ”But I’ve lived there since graduating, so maybe not exactly the same,” she clarified. Still, it was pretty neat how many Americans had decided that they liked the fucked up magical politics of London. Why more didn’t immediately move back to the States after the Hogwarts burning was something she was still trying to understand. Maybe they felt safe now?

”So…do you like it? London, I mean.” Diagon, Horizont, the rest of it. Juniper could see how those from cities with larger magical communities, like New York, would find the old, Victorian style shopping district as a bit of a turn off. In recent years it was livelier, no thanks to a certain matchmaker spreading the goodwill, but she had heard stories from her parents about how Diagon was essentially dead most of the year, save for the holiday break and right before Hogwarts started right up. Not that they ever had to worry, living in Hogsmeade.

”I know I wasn’t expecting it to be so loud all the time…I’m from Hogsmeade originally, so the quiet countryside is a lot more my speed.” Except she couldn’t bring herself to move to one of the smaller communities and buy a house. Not yet. Nothing was really stopping her, aside from the fact that she didn’t want to have to buy everything necessary to furnish a house. To her, it felt like it would be lonely. At least with a flat she had a small amount of space all of her own. Too many empty rooms started to freak her out a bit. ”Being able to see the stars is nice…” And she was positive that was going to happen this weekend at some point.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

Given that the people around whom she had spent most of her time in recent years had their reasons to remain secretive, Emmanuelle wasn't exactly accustomed to hearing someone she didn't know open up immediately about where she lived and where she was from. In a matter of minutes, she knew more about Juniper than she knew about most of her fellow Purifiers: She was originally from Hogsmeade but had lived in London since she had graduated, and she enjoyed being able to see the stars, which suggested that she didn't spend much time in the countryside anymore. It wasn't hard for Emmanuelle to read between the lines when so much of her daily life involved doing the same thing. She didn't need to be told everything explicitly, even at work. It was implied that most of what Cas sold was in some way dangerous or questionable; he didn't need to tell her that.

For most people, it was normal to freely speak about personal information. Conversations continued to revolve around wherever someone had attended school well after they had left it, what House they had been in at said school, and so on. Emmanuelle, having never graduated from anywhere except for what she had heard people call "the school of hard knocks", didn't have that as a milestone of her own.

Juniper had asked her if she liked London, though, and that much she could answer without hesitation. "Yeah," Emmanuelle had replied. "I like it." She liked it enough that she had kept living there despite knowing that she would be better off being back home in New Orleans. There were a lot of cultural differences that she'd had to navigate, and apart from her work with the Purifiers, Emmanuelle hadn't had anyone to guide her through life in another country. She had managed it herself, and she was proud of that.

After Juniper made her comment about the stars, Emmanuelle spoke again. "This place is pretty rural, huh?" she observed. With everything set up for Calan Mai, it didn't seem as empty as it would have been otherwise. "There's lots of space for a festival like this, though." Even with all sorts of enchantments, pulling that off in Hogsmeade or London would be impossible.

juniper minerva mcgonagall

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

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Rural was one way to put it. Juniper couldn’t remember the last time she had been in such a remote location before. Maybe when she and Rhys had gone camping all those years ago? Or when she had undergone her animagus training? Both had been out in the middle of nowhere. But nothing quite like this. Escaping all light pollution was a feat on its own, and she imagined that if she ever made it to the druid island of Hy-Brasil, it would be similar to this. Funny how this was sort of like their dumbed down version of the real thing. How very ‘mainlander’ of them, as she had heard druids call them before.

”It does remind a little bit of home. But only in the sense that when its night, its actually dark out.” When she had first moved in with Rhys, blackout curtains had to be installed because she couldn’t stand any light leaking into the bedroom. Her apartment after had to be the same way. After living the first eighteen years of her life in the same locale, it was a struggle. This yurt, and the surrounding countryside, was so much more comfortable for her.

”What do you do for work? I imagine if you moved all the way over here than it must be relatively impressive.” Juniper had run into a number of foreign government workers as well as a slew of aurors and the likes that had appeared these last few, long years. She even had colleagues that were from abroad now. It was amazing.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

There was only so much that they could say about the setting in which they found themselves without talking in circles about how different it was to be staying in a yurt, et cetera. Juniper asked her what it was that she did for work, expressing that it had to be "relatively impressive".

Juniper was about to be disappointed. If she had a really impressive job, reasoned Emmanuelle, she probably would have been staying someplace nicer than a shared yurt. Then again, maybe she could have been one of those eccentric rich people who enjoyed pretending to be less well-off, just to get the experience of what it must have been like. Staying in a shared yurt really was a vacation for her, though. She missed the compensation that she had received for her work for the Purifiers, but she could live without it.

"Not really." Emmanuelle shrugged her shoulders, sitting down on the end of her bed and kicking off her shoes. "I came over here for… research, I guess?" Hearing herself say that aloud made her feel uncomfortable. She had no qualms about sharing that she practiced voodoo, but she didn't want to misrepresent herself as some sort of academician. "I practice voodoo, so I was curious to see what things were like here," she clarified. "I've been working retail jobs, though." There wasn't as much voodoo being practiced there as in some other places in the world. A handful of different peoples did make use of it, but it wasn't widespread enough for others to seek out voodoo rituals.

juniper minerva mcgonagall

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

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Voodoo? Juniper felt her eyes widen at that. She knew next to nothing on the subject, though felt like she probably should, considering the level of classes she was teaching now. Even if her transfiguration subjects had nothing to do with it, one never knew when a student could ask a question on it. She liked knowing a bit just that way she could point people in the right direction of books or experts. And with the influx of international students these last few years at Hogwarts it felt like it would be more important now than ever to know different kinds of magic from around the world. It was all fascinating.

”That’s amazing,” Juniper stopped unloading her pack to put all of her attention on Emmanuelle. She had a million questions now. ”I know absolutely nothing about voodoo,” she admitted. ”But I assume it’s closer to the more natural magics that groups like druids have here?” She could be completely wrong on that, of course, but the smaller ‘sects’ of magic tended to be like that.

”Is your research about connections that voodoo may have to Europe?” she asked as she resumed unpacking her bag. There really wasn’t much needed for a trip like this, and not bringing a bottomless bag definitely made her pick and choose what she wanted more carefully. While she probably shouldn’t have brought them, she pulled out a folder full of essays that her students in Advanced Transfiguration class had turned in this past week. If she managed to get a few hours of downtime where nothing was going on here, she was going to start on it. They would want to know their grades soon, prior to the final exam.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

To Emmanuelle's surprise, Juniper was impressed by what she had just told her. Admitting that she knew nothing about voodoo, however, Juniper guessed aloud that it was closer to Druidic magic. It was similar in some ways, and it wasn't in other ways. For Emmanuelle in particular, being Native American and Black, the comparison was a little bit closer. Getting into the intricacies of her family background with someone she had just met was a great way to invite unwanted questions, though, so she went with the Druid angle, thinking that it would make the most sense to someone from that part of the world.

"Yeah, sorta," Emmanuelle answered in such a way as to let her know that she was on the right track. Just as Juniper wasn't as familiar with voodoo, Emmanuelle wasn't as familiar with the Druids, but she understood the basics. "We have certain religious beliefs and everything," she said, not that hers were the same as the Druids' beliefs, "but it's a whole mix of different things." From what she knew of the Druid community on Hy-Brasil, at least, they didn't tend to have as much to do with outsiders, except as visitors.

As Juniper continued to unpack her belongings, she asked, "Is your research about connections that voodoo may have to Europe?"

"It's not really formal research," Emmanuelle laughed. She would have been giving herself too much credit. "More just… personal curiosity when the Ilvermorny kids had to come here." If she had the means, she probably would have done some sort of research on voodoo already. Probably not in Europe; Haiti or some parts of Africa—or both—would have been more likely. That was never going to happen in reality, not least because Emmanuelle didn't know how she would go about that.

juniper minerva mcgonagall

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

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”Fascinating…” Juniper breathed as she continued her unpacking. There really were a lot of strands of magic out there that she had yet to learn of. Heck, even old classmates of hers worked in arts that she never could. Nell Ollivander had seemingly perfected the craft of wandmaking by their third year, and despite being a nervous wreck that was terrified of Juniper throughout all of school (and who could really blame her?), she was successful and in a field that very few traversed these days. It seemed like Emmanuelle was sort of in a similar situation, to a degree.

It was no surprise though when her yurt-mate mentioned coming over relatively around when the Ilvermorny kids had. That tended to be when most international witches and wizards had. The whole timeline from the Triwizard Tournament until now had been a wild one, and more had seemingly happened over the last four years than previously. Or maybe that was because she was old enough and actually paying attention.

”I have a few of them as students still,” Juniper mentioned offhandedly. She figured if she was prying as much as she was, she may as well talk about herself too. It would eventually come up anyways. ”I teach part-time at Hogwarts. Advanced Transfiguration and the likes.” That was the easier course to talk about, as her other one was…complicated. Even she wasn’t all that sure if she wanted to teach it after this year. It mostly depended on how the students in that class did on their final, and what the school thought about it after. Personally, she was fine without it and putting all of her effort into the other one. The real hope was that the Transfiguration position for MAGIC would open up, or the school would give her two classes of her Advanced one. Either worked.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

Voodoo clearly held Juniper's interest, so Emmanuelle was glad that she could go back to that if they ran out of other topics of discussion. That wasn't necessary right away, though, because Juniper said that she still had some of the Ilvermorny students as her students. From the context of where they were, that meant that she almost certainly taught at Hogwarts. Since what Elaine had done, the school had grown from teaching just adolescents to being something of a one-stop shop for magical education.

Sure enough, Juniper went on to say that she taught part-time at Hogwarts. More specifically, she taught Advanced Transfiguration—"and the likes", which probably meant that there was some other stuff in there, too.

"Cool," Emmanuelle replied, matching Juniper's relaxed tone, and moving so that she was sitting cross-legged. Transfiguration wasn't the first branch of magic that came to most people's minds, but it was helpful to know how to do it well when it was needed. She preferred charmwork, personally, finding it much easier to change the properties of an object than to change an object or a living being from one thing into another. If she had to teach a subject, thought Emmanuelle, she wasn't sure what that would be other than voodoo, even if it was what the people at Hogwarts would have called "interdisciplinary".

"Do you like it?" It must have been enjoyable enough to do it part-time, at least. The closest Emmanuelle had come to Hogwarts was the Purifiers' base in what had turned out to have been the Chamber of Secrets within the old castle. There had been members of the Purifiers who worked at Hogwarts, too, but Emmanuelle wasn't just sitting around and chatting with them about their day jobs.

juniper minerva mcgonagall

[juniper minerva mcgonagall]

▲

Calling her part-time teaching job cool was quite the understatement. There were times where it was beyond hard work, far harder than anything at Witch TV or her first job at the Ministry had ever been. The latter was mindless work, and she thanked herself constantly for escaping it. She saw how her sister suffered there (though whether that was her own doing or not, Juniper wasn’t quite sure still). She’d heard enough from Holly and others since leaving that unless the Ministry was willing to pay her quite a bit of money, she was never going back. She would get a job in the muggle world over returning to the Ministry again. There were better opportunities out there in both worlds.

”I do. Quite a bit, actually,” she answered. Juniper wasn’t going to completely talk Emmanuelle’s ear off about how she was secretly hoping the MAGIC position would free up so she could take it. That was a long shot, really. And she also didn’t want to completely abandon her position within the tv station. She had worked too hard to get where she was, and now she had syndicated shows. That didn’t just happen to every writer that Witch TV hired. ”I know its been a rough couple of years for the students at most of the schools, so its nice to see them excited about learning.” She could go on and on about it if she really wanted to. The passion her students in the Advanced Transfiguration class had for each lesson felt almost unreal at times. Her other class, not as much. But they tried their hardest. ”At the same time, they were probably happy I cancelled yesterday’s class because I had to travel here. So, it is what it is I suppose,” Juniper laughed.

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[emmanuelle antoinette picquery]

April 29, 2028

Though Emmanuelle had no desire to become a teacher unless it was to pass along her voodoo practices to her own children or grandchildren at some point in the far-off future, she guessed that she was glad to hear Juniper reply that she liked her job. It was more the principle of liking one's job than anything. For instance, she enjoyed working for Cas more than she had working at the Gaelic Knot, but she also wasn't going to gush about working in Knockturn Alley. Luckily, she didn't have to worry about that, because Juniper talked about how difficult it had been for a few years at most of the magical schools. Emmanuelle was, of course, familiar with that—more familiar than she really wanted to be—and relieved that she could mask her discomfort with the excuse of never having attended a formal school to begin with.

"At the same time," Juniper added after discussing her students' love of learning, "they were probably happy I cancelled yesterday’s class because I had to travel here." It was what it was, Juniper laughed.

Emmanuelle laughed slightly, too. There were times growing up when she hadn't really wanted to do whatever her grandmother had wanted her to do. Being homeschooled meant that household chores occasionally got rolled into schoolwork just to ensure that they got done efficiently, and she vividly remembered dragging her feet when her grandmother insisted that she would need to learn how to clean up after herself when she was a grown-up.

"Any excuse for a day off, right?" Emmanuelle asked rhetorically in agreement. "What are you most looking forward to doing out here? I haven't been to Hy-Brasil, so I think the cultural stuff might be kinda nice, even if it is a little touristy."

juniper minerva mcgonagall