Good Times Bad Times [Jimmie]

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

It was November. His sixth year. Not that any of that really mattered at all to Grey. What did matter, though, was that he was now the editor-in-chief of the school paper. Usually that position was given during the spring term, so that the new person in charge had an entire two terms to do what they wanted with the paper before training the next editor. That didn’t happen for Grey though. His predecessor had failed to appoint anyone new by the time she graduated last spring. The current group of seventh years that had been a part of the club for their entire schooling decided it wasn’t the best idea for them to try and run the club and do final exams, and thus appointed him as the new head. Grey still didn’t understand why it had to be him. That was a lot of responsibility to suddenly drop on a person, and he wasn’t exactly the best when it came to being enthusiastic about extra work. That was why they had given him the Quidditch column for the last few years. Going from that to this was…well, it was a shock to his system. But he couldn’t let the club fail either. That was another possibility. Shove it into the hands of a boring Gryffindor, whose better judgement would get the best of him. That was exactly what happened.

The first few months of this school year had been tumultuous; new members joining and trying to get into the thick of it, others deciding classes were more important than following leads for stories. All of it came back to him too, since he had the final say in almost everything. All the articles that were published in the paper had to go through him, and he spent a good amount of time reviewing and editing them as well. It was way more work than he had expected to be given, and it was no wonder that new editors were given an entire term under the tutelage of the former ones.

In order to manage all of the aforementioned work, Grey had taken over two tables in the common room, papers he had finished editing stacked neatly on one of them, and the stack he still had to get through laid out on the one he was sitting at. He had found that the only time he could get this done was late at night, long after the younger students had dragged themselves to bed and the remainder of the ones playing hooky strolled back into the common room, smug expressions on their faces. Every time he looked up at those ones, he was sure they could see the life that was slowly draining from inside him. Considering the amount of papers on the table, this was going to be a few more hours still. And there was still more back in the club room for him to work on tomorrow. Beginning to yawn, Grey leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms up into the air. He could sleep once these were finished.

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

HOGWARTS' SCHOOL NEWSPAPER HAD ALWAYS seemed like a boring club to Jimmie. And, trust Jimmie, she was only in her fourth year but she had joined almost every club offered at the school. From potions to duelling, even that one time she tried reading tea leaves with the Divination crew. But, all of that changed when she read a rather inflammatory piece about a few girls labelled 'bullying in the wizarding community'. It had been taken down almost as soon as it was published, but Jimmie had read it and when she had...

But, while Jimmie was miraculously still a member of the paper, she wasn't exactly a 'dedicated' member. Her love of writing and publishing was still a newfound thing. As infantile as any of her new hobbies. It just so happened that few lived to become anything of value. She had forgotten entirely to show up that day. Having bypassed the room to work on her knitting in the library. There was a spot she could sit at quite comfortably, where oftentimes people came to chat. Or, 'gossip' really. 

Creeping in to the common room well after curfew, Jimmie clutched her books to her chest, all tangled in discarded yarn and the remnants of what was supposed to be a scarf. She had gotten distracted, chatting with a few friends on her way back to her room. So, when she headed through the common room towards the dormitory entrance, it was not to see the school papers editor sprawled across two tables. His head barely visible over a mountain of paper work.

"Oh..." Jimmie said, clutching her books tighter to her chest. She felt suddenly exposed. Having entered too sloppily to slip away, and too obvious to try and casually walk it off. There was the leader of her club, of which she hadn't even turned up to, clearly weary and overworked. "Do you... need a hand there, Grey?" She asked, regretting it almost as soon as she offered, but knowing that she must. "Lookin' a little green around the gills."

grey xavier slater

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[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

The portrait of the Fat Lady could be heard opening, faintly of course, as most Gryffindors attempted at this hour of the night, but the trained ears of the Slater boy could hear it nonetheless. Too many nights had been spent on both sides of that door and tonight be happened to be one of the ones not breaking the rules. In his opinion, the curfew rules for the older students were a tad ridiculous. Those in clubs and the library should be exempt, the very nature of them being there was to either complete their studies or to take part in school activities. Having the club room to himself and the ability to spread his papers out would have been a million times better than what he was currently doing. The number of times he was asked to give up the extra table or forced to carry piles of articles and news clippings up to the common room from the club room was too high to count. And school had just begun too. Putting up a petition to have those rules changed would never go anywhere unfortunately. Grey knew he wasn’t the first nor the last that had thought of attempting it too. So breaking the rules it was.

As he contemplated all of this, the bleach-blonde head of a girl bobbed into the common room, Grey assuming that was the person who had tried to creep through the entranceway. He didn’t really care much about her arrival and had returned back to the article in front of him, only to be pulled away from it when he heard his name. Blinking a few times to adjust his depth of field to a distance more than six inches from his face, he realized that he recognized the girl. Jimmie or something he was pretty sure. She asked if he needed any help, adding that he looked rough. Did he really look that out of it right now? No wonder everyone that had come into the common room in the last hour or so had run by him at lightning speed. Probably thought he was a Prefect or about to bite their heads off for making noise. “I uhh…” he started as he looked at the pile of papers looming in front of him, voice raspy from his lack of talking over the last few hours. Turning down help would be silly when he still had a ton to go. Even a few edits or look-overs would help him out immensely. “Yeah, if you’re offering and can find the space somewhere around here.”

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

JIMMIE HAD ONLY OFFERED TO HELP IN SOME misguided, knee-jerk reaction to Grey's awful, tired face. She hadn't actually expected him to accept. She was, after all, a rather terrible member of the school newspaper. She barely turned up, and when she did she always felt like she was getting under everyone's feet.

"Uh, yeah- okay." Jimmie said with a sigh, walking across the room and setting her things on a chair as she looked down at the piles and piles of papers scattered haphazardly across the desk. "How... on earth do keep track of this mess?" Jimmie asked, squinted down at the various marked papers, picking up a few in an attempt to figure out any kind of rhyme or reason. It was too late to back out now, but she truly wished she could as she slowly dragged a chair across to the table and plonked herself opposite of Grey.

"No wonder this is taking so long..." Jimmie muttered thoughtlessly, her brows in her hairline as she began to make short piles from the papers in front of her, skimming her eyes over the writing as she did in an attempt to look like she knew what she was doing. Some of the papers were marked, highlighted and scrubbed out all together. "You need a better filing system." She commented, kissing her teeth as she looked up at Grey's dull, exhausted face. 

grey xavier slater

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!+

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

Grey didn’t think she was actually going to sit down and assist him. He had said if she could find the space, which he didn’t think was possible among the piles of papers that were strewn all over his tables. This was a problem he had expected to fix and finish on his own, so the sudden possibility of help coupled with his exhaustion had him confused and babbling like he was in way over his head. If he had wanted to be overwhelmed, he would have brought the work for the rest of the week with him as well. There was no way Jimmie would have offered her help at that point and Grey wouldn’t blame her for that either. “It’s all in my head,” he chuckled, which quickly turned into a dry cough. “It’s why they named a sixth year as Editor-In-Chief instead of a seventh year.” He didn’t mind being slightly arrogant about the power that had been bestowed upon him recently. It was a title to be proud of, though his parents would probably laugh it off, all the while calling it a waste of time for getting in the way of his studies. Working on the newspaper was a practical, hands-on club that developed real life experience in journalism and print media. Being taught how to arrest a criminal or kill someone was not on any of the Hogwarts syllabi and probably not on any of the Auror training pamphlets either. His parents would see the error in their ways by the time graduation rolled around in two years. Getting to write for a newspaper or magazine would be a synch by then.

“Are you suggesting I replace my brain then?” he said, a hint of playful sarcasm at the end of it. Trying to be witty at this hour was almost impossible. “If I had more hands in the club, I wouldn’t have to deal with most of this. But as of right now, I don’t have too many.” Jimmie had written something for the paper at one point or another, hadn’t she? It wasn’t in the last month or so (or at least he thought it wasn’t, and seeing as he was so out of it with the current material for the newspaper it was entirely possible that she had), but he definitely remembered something at some point. Forgetting the members and what they wrote about was hard to do since it was one of the only things he cared about at school. “Don’t happen to know anyone interested in joining, do you?” he asked, indirectly trying to inquire whether or not she was still thinking about hopping on the wild train known as the school newspaper.

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

SOMEHOW JIMMIE WAS NOT SURPRISED WHEN Grey declared that his great system was inside of his head. She scoffed, laying down an ink splattered leaf of paper to give him a rather shrewd stare, her lips smirking just a little bit. "And how is that working out for you?" She said, in a deceptively conversational tone. In reality, she was deeply judging him. Wasn't he supposed to run the god awful paper? It didn't look very good for him from her point of view. But he had a point, they had chosen him above anyone else.

"Oh not possible, huh?" Jimmie retorted, one of her brows hiking up just a little higher than the other. "That's a shame." She rubbed at a smudge of ink on her finger, her nose wrinkling at the stain before she turned it on the corner of a piece of paper and let it transfer in a imitating whorl of her fingerprint. "Not really..." She muttered, shrugging her shoulders helplessly, her smile turning a little awkward. "I mean... nobody really cares about the paper anymore." At least, that was the general observation. People only wanted to read good, exciting stories. Not many cared about creating them.

Jimmie had even considered quitting recently, but one look at Grey's hopeless face, the pile of papers burying him. She sort of, kind of, definitely wanted to fix it. "What can I do?" She said, smiling with barely contained enthusiasm as she sat up straighter in her chair. "The paper can't be like- a one man show." She shook her head obviously, picking up and tossing a handful of gibberish papers. "It'll be awful." Which was a rather blunt way of putting it, but that was Jimmie's leading trait. "Do you want the paper to suck?" 

grey xavier slater

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!+

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

“Extremely well,” he grinned in return. She probably thought that he was suffering from this amount of paperwork. Yes, it was a lot to do. And yes, there was still a lot more back in the club room. “You should have seen it a few hours ago,” Grey placed his hand a sizeable distance above his current stack to indicate where it had previously been. “Maybe my bravery and courage that us Gryffindors have is the ability to get through this without fearing papercuts.” The days of nasty bites and stings wrought on his hands by the blade-like paper were long gone. Callouses had formed over the years of abuse he put them through. That didn’t mean that his fingers weren’t immune to a slice every so often.

There were times where it was welcome, reminding him that his work was paying off to some degree. Jimmie seemed to think otherwise of his newspaper, deliberately pointing out that nobody cared about it anymore. She wasn’t wrong. Refuting a fact like that would get him into trouble, maybe even get the club shut down if the professor that advised it thought it was unnecessary. Everyone had their noses stuffed into the pages of the Daily Prophet, or whatever their poison was, and refused to even look at what he had. They were interested in the dead kid on the train from September. Grey had wanted to write about it, but the article never made it past the advisor. It was funny because he was the editor-in-chief, and final say was supposed to be with him. Not with serious things, it seemed.

He blew out air through his nostrils as she asked what she could do. That was a tough question. If he had the papers organized, he could have pointed her in the direction of grammar checks or sorting letters from readers (assuming there were any in the first place). “It already does suck,” he said after giving the stacks another hard look. “You don’t need to tell me that.” Trying to rebuild something that was held hostage by complacent members was a daunting task. Grey knew it was going to be difficult. There was the possibility that he wouldn’t even see it reach its glory or receive any recognition for it. If he was in it for that, he would have sought out the gossip paper that had popped up and sold his soul to that. “Go through this pile and find any articles that might even be remotely interesting,” he said as he took half of his stack and pushed it towards Jimmie. “No need to be easy on them. I know most are trash.”

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

DESPITE THE FACT THAT GREY HAD PERFECTED HIS appearance of contentment, Jimmie didn't believe him. She found it hard to believe anybody who looked at such a mountain of work and grinned about it. Her head tilted, unimpressed with him as her lips pulled down at the corners. "Sure," She said, quirking her brows as she looked down at the piles of paperwork and shook her head with a scoff. "That's definitely what old Godric meant when he penned his first draft."

However, as she flicked her gaze from the unruly mess on the table, and back up to Grey's ruffled demeanour, her disdain softened slightly. He genuinely believed what he was saying to her. That making a small dent in the mess before her was worth all of the effort. She didn't understand why, but maybe she respected it.

"I was just saying..." Jimmie said defensively, shrugging her shoulders with a scowl. She'd only tried to help, in her own way, however blunt it may have been. "In case it slipped your mind..." She made it up to him by making a very neat stack of parchment, crisping the corners and avoiding eye contact for a moment. Though, Jimmie's spirits lifted slightly when he appointed her a task. At least he wasn't making it any more difficult for himself. She pushed aside her straightened stack and reached for the mess he pointed at.

Soon enough, Jimmie realised that he was indeed correct. For every half decent article Jimmie found, she had to push aside three or four abominable ones. "I'm surprised you haven't ended up in the infirmary," Jimmie piped up after a good twenty minutes of silent reading. "This could turn even the sanest of us to madness." She smacked a fresh stack of rubbish articles on to the floor at her feet and picked up the one she was currently skimming over. "'Because, like, it's a part of the new curricular... or something...'" Jimmie read aloud, her eyes widening as she cast Grey a scathing look over the top. "I don't even know what this is supposed to be." She shook it at him before dropping it dramatically towards the ground. "Even I could do better than that." 

grey xavier slater

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!+

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

A raised eyebrow and a shrug was all Grey afforded the girl when she scoffed at his comment about bravery. According to ‘old Godric’ and his ideas on bravery, they hadn’t shown up in Grey’s life yet. Maybe it was exactly how he had put it, by not fearing papercuts or to write about whatever he wanted without any concern about what others thought. A sort of personal courage and strength that, no matter how much others tried, they wouldn’t be able to make him bend or waver. It’s other definition: stubbornness. Regardless, Grey was editor-in-chief of his paper (yes, his paper) and those under him in the club had a different view on what the school newspaper was and was not supposed to be. An informative set of well written and crafted articles was where he and the rest of the club seemed to be at odds. Hearing that his project sucked from a person who had very little stake in it was exactly what he needed. The time to get defensive and fight back against that sentiment was long past, and he knew exactly where he had to go with the club if it was ever going to survive his tenure with it. Removing the pieces that could barely be considered one was the first step, and then came the hard truth: getting rid of some of the members. He wanted to run a tight ship, one where people who were actually interested in journalism would flock to, in an attempt to kick start their career post-graduation. A better paper would draw in better writers. At least that was the plan. Acting on it was harder to do.

“You’re assuming I was sane to begin with,” he said flatly, not looking up from the paper he was reading. “Obviously it was easier for my predecessor to appoint someone that wasn’t all there than to force a normal person into the position.” Grey pushed his paper into the pile he had designated as garbage, finally looking in Jimmie’s direction as he did so. “But I also knew what I was getting into, so there is that.” Slipping a new article off of the top of his stack, he listened as Jimmie started to read one of the pieces out loud. It sounded like she finally figured out what he was subjected to almost daily. “Can you?” he asked as he looked up at her again. “I’ve heard that same line before. Maybe even from the author of that one you just dropped.” Grey knew he was being a tad dramatic about it, but it was a reoccurring theme in the club. Some new member joins thinking their articles are going to be on the front page, and then he would turn around and rip them to shreds. Sometimes literally. There needed to be an understanding that the newspaper was either being printed with quality articles or it wasn’t being printed at all. If that meant making the members write ten stories a week until their hands fell off or they quit, then that was what it would take. “Sorry if I’m a skeptic, but you’re seeing the results of me not being one.”

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

SCOFFING WITHOUT EVEN LOOKING UP, JIMMIE thought Grey was joking at first. Though his silence made her lift her head, her teasing grin turning in to a frown as she checked to make sure he was actually alright. She'd only been making fun of him, but maybe he was mad. But, her frown quickly relaxed and she rolled her eyes instead. "Gosh," She sighed, lifting her brows slightly. "I didn't know you were messy and dramatic." She sniffed daintily and didn't correct herself, focusing instead on the unruly pile before her, almost dismissing him and his confession.

"You don't sound convinced," Jimmie said, her brows pulling together as she felt a stab of insult, dropping the parchment she held. "I could do it with my eyes closed." She said with a faux confidence, cocking one brow as she crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair cockily. "Better than that garbage, anyways." She wasn't really a reporter yet. More interested in telling tall tales, but she'd thought that was a hobby she'd grown out of. Apparently all it took was a shred of doubt from somebody she didn't even know.

"You've just been looking in the wrong place." Jimmie told him matter-of-factly. Pursing her lips as she thought for a second. Jimmie had always been nosy, with what little time she spent at the paper, she spent nosing in to the other members business. "Most of the people who joined," She looked down at her paper, feeling a little bad revealing such a thing. "Far as I've heard, they don't even care about being good." Which might have been a blow, but Jimmie figured he already knew. "It just looks good on their transcripts." That had been why Jimmie hadn't dropped it yet herself, she thought guiltily. 

grey xavier slater

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!+

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

Dramatic was an adjective that he had never had said about him before. Lazy, boring, lacking ambition; those were the sorts of words the Gryffindor heard the most. Watching him plug away at his work for the newspaper would have the people that voiced all of those seriously scratching their heads. The trick was that they didn’t take the time to know him, and he didn’t want to do it for them. Raising his arms up in a dramatic shrug, Grey returned to his work without missing a beat.

Jimmie seemed to get ruffled by his comment. Speaking honestly, he had no idea if she would be able to produce a better article. He had barely had reign as the editor and he already knew which ‘journalists’ to completely avoid going forward. Allowing anyone and everyone to write in the paper was the fastest way to have the whole club shelved by the headmaster. Then the articles he was currently working on really would be worthless. He only nodded his head at her, still skeptical on whether or not she could write a real piece. It had to be consistent and ground-breaking. Repeating Quidditch matches was something anyone could do, and going over how great the entrance ceremony was only had its place in the first publication of the year. And yet he was still receiving shoddy attempts at both.

“You know I’d need proof if you want me to believe you, right?” he said as she finished. She was all talk so far, and while he remembered she had done at least a piece or two from some point time, they didn’t have any flashing lights attached to them. “It looks even better to have content to show too. Articles or research, it doesn’t matter which,” he explained. “I know not everyone wants to go into journalism or writing for magazines, but I can’t be the only one in the club serious about it.” Hell, some of the previous seventh years already had internships at the Prophet and they had done a terrible job on the paper. Graduating as the Editor-in-Chief was only going to make him look that much better, especially if he had solid writers beneath him.

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

IF THERE WAS ONE THING THAT COULD HELP motivate a girl like Jimmie, it was a challenge. She wasn't naturally competitive, but she did enjoy being right. This made her a fierce opponent in debates, especially when it came to her own integrity. Not that Grey was biting particularly hard. Jimmie could find something out of nothing and though Grey was just stating facts, she felt her eyes narrow, as if provoked. She wanted him to enthuse, to encourage her just as her father did on her many eclectic adventures. But, Grey wasn't her father and he wasn't going to do that.

"Fine," Jimmie said succinctly, barely taking her eyes off of him, she snatched a piece of parchment from a disorderly pile and grabbed her quill. Looking down at the article in front of her she skimmed it quickly before setting it aside and pulling the parchment in front of her. "I can do better than that," She stabbed the sharp end of her quill at the piece of ink splotched paper, "In less than ten minutes." It wasn't something of her own, but she was simply trying to prove a point. So, she took the subject and decided to rewrite it.

"It's about the decor in the Ravenclaw girls bathroom," She cast the parchment another look of disgust, quill pressed in to her fresh paper as she added, "I think..." The feather of her quill brushed under her chin as she thought for a second. "I can take that, switch it up and make it better." With a slight smirk, Jimmie bent her head down and began scribbling furiously. No matter that Grey was clearly busy editing, Jimmie felt dared and it spurred her on without rest. She wrote a pithy little piece on the unsanitary conditions of the house bathrooms. Adding in an anecdote about grindylows lurking in the pipes, biting bottoms and ended with an outcry for cleaner conditions throughout.

It was the most silent she'd been since she'd arrived at the table. Lifting her head and dropping her quill when she was finished, she flexed her cramping hand and pursed her lips seriously. Before she settled, Jimmie appraised the content before her, picking her quill up once or twice to correct a few mistakes hurriedly before setting it down and pushing it across the table towards Grey. It wasn't perfect by any means but she felt sure it was a shining comparison to the dull, error ridden mess she'd based it upon. "Do your worst, Boss man." 

grey xavier slater

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!+

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

The Gryffindor girl took up his challenge, and she sounded determined to prove him wrong, which was even better. Grey didn’t want to force or sequester anyone into joining the paper but if he could make them understand that they were good at it then maybe they would. Jimmie was pressed to come out on the winning side and Grey wasn’t going to be the one to try and stop her. This was only going to benefit the newspaper in the end. “Less than ten? I was going to give you at least a day or two. But if you say so…” All of his normal writers always needed approximately that much time to be able to make their necessary corrections and adjustments based on his edits and notes. A fresh pair of eyes and an actual functioning brain was going to be a relief on his own if she ended up sticking through with it.

The real trick to the article that Jimmie was correcting was that Grey had never considered using it in the paper to begin with. As his housemate had said on a minute earlier, it was garbage. There was nothing interesting about the Ravenclaw girls’ bathroom or the décor in it (not to mention that there was apparently décor in the girls bathrooms, while the boys bathrooms were all marble and cold). She was already scribbling away though, and apparently had something more interesting to put down that the original content had.

A few silent minutes later, the sound of her quill being set down on the table made him look up from the piece he was editing. Jimmie shot the paper what he assumed was one last scrutinizing glance before pushing it over to him. Carefully pulling on his end of the paper, Grey read through it, eyes widening at the part about grindylows coming up through the pipes. It was creative and definitely better written than the original, but…“Unless these things are actually happening, something like this would turn out better in the Quibbler or another nonsense magazine,” he explained, not breaking his eye contact from the sheet of paper. Picking up his own quill, he made a few more marks on it, and then passed it back across the table. “But you have the right hand for this. Change up the part about the unsanitary conditions maybe leading grindylows up the pipes and into the toilets, and I’ll put it in this week’s edition. We’ll see what happens then.”

[Jameson Hera Blishwick]

no care in the world.

THERE WAS A SLIGHT THRILL TO BE HAD AS Jimmie waited for Grey's opinion. She hadn't cared about it before, but she realised with a startling honesty that she wanted to do well. Jimmie had never truly been interested in the newspaper before that moment. Putting herself in a position to be torn down clearly inspired something in her. She felt her legs begin to jiggle restlessly and clenched her thighs to stop it.

"There have been complaints in the past." Jimmie interjected, her nose scrunching as she scratched the back of her ear. She had every belief that such complaints were complete fabrications, but she felt a need to defend herself. Her eyes followed him as he scribbled down the sides of her hastily written article, her body reflexively leaning forward over the table to try and peek. She jerked back in to her seat with a thud, clearing her throat as she accepted the piece of parchment back with a sober expression. The paper stilled in her hands as Grey spoke again, a seriousness in his tone that she hadn't expected.

"What-" She laughed nervously, the sound verging on a giggle. "Are you serious?" She asked, blinking rapidly as she dipped her head to read his notes. His handwriting looping and expert compared to her messy scrawl. She envied him all at once. Pulling the paper close to herself so frowned and nodded rapidly, chewing on the inside of her cheek to stop herself from smiling.

"I mean, I guess I can do that." She sniffed and averted her gaze. "I have dance and knitting club, but I can try and squeeze it in." Pulling her shoulders back she began skidding out her chair slowly, eager to begin making changes and perfecting the piece, but afraid of appearing to eager - which would be just embarrassingly uncool. "I'll just- I'll see what I can do..." She was half standing. "Gotta go!" She squeaked, before making a break for it, a red blush high in her cheeks. The parchment clutched in a death grip in her hands.

[END JIMMIE?]

grey xavier slater

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!+

[grey xavier slater]

Jameson Hera Blishwick

11.19.2022 - 6th Year - Gryffindor Common Room

Grey pointed the capped end of his pen at Jimmie as she added that there had been complaints in the past about the bathrooms. That was perfect for the piece then! Actual, definitive proof about the sketchiness of the bathrooms and the poor conditions they were actually in was the sort of puff piece that could easily get the professors talking about making improvements. He had heard that things used to be much worse when it came to Hogwarts sanitation, so this was still better than that. And now technically the article wouldn’t be a lie. Just a half truth and how it was possible that grindylows and other nasty little beasties would thrive under those conditions. If he hadn’t placed it upon Jimmie, he would have written it himself.

“Perfect. I like when things line up like that. If you’re feeling adventurous, get some anonymous sources or something to add. I’ll need to know who they are of course, but the school doesn’t,” he added as he finished with the last of his scribbled notes. There was a portion in one of her brief body paragraphs that he felt fit better near the beginning of the paper, now circled with one of his signature red pens with an accompanying sharp arrow pointing to where it belonged. “I’m not joking. This is ten times better than anything the normal members write for me.” He didn’t know how many more times he was going to have to sing her praise until she ran with it. Apparently it was that much of a shock for her, because the ‘complaint’ of having to squeeze it somewhere in between her other duties didn’t really match the reaction she was giving off. “Two days!” he half called after her as she suddenly hopped out of her chair and ran off with the edited article. The school paper needed enthusiasm like that, because he was definitely lacking in that department. Correcting garbage articles and half-ideas wasn’t exactly the most thrilling of tasks. Having Jimmie’s pieces would at least make that a little easier on him.

[The End]