Skyler wandered around the third floor leisurely, having just been released from a rather interesting charms class where she had managed to set fire to her desk. It happened every now and again when she tried too hard or let her frustration get the better of her. She would just get so frustrated and poof!! Things would go up in smoke. She thought maybe it had something to do with her inner magic reacting to her mood, but who knew. All she knew was that now she had extra homework and that she smelled like burnt wood. Great.

As she wandered, a small plaque on the wall above a pair of double doors caught her eye. Trophy Room. She cocked her head, and then shrugged, pulling the doors open. What the hell. She strolled into the room filled with trophy's and plaques and awards, occasionally finding one interesting enough to stop and read. Most of these had to do with quidditch. It seemed her house had a good number of Quidditch cups, but it looked like the past few years favored Gryffindor.

Eventually her perusal led her to an award of sort, presented to one Tom Riddle, for services to the school. A sharp intake of breath could be heard as she leaned forward to examine it. There wasn't much to it really. It didn't say what he had done or anything. But just the name somehow made it all the more real. "So he really is out there.."

Running down the corridors at full speed and trying to avoid being pelted by pieces of chalk was not how Avery thought he would be spending his free time after class but it looked like Peeves had other ideas. He wasnt quite sure when he had ended up the poltegiest's target or why but reason illuded him for the time being as he crashed full on into the doors at the end of the corridor he was running down.

He could hear Peeves cackling and kicked the doors closed from his place on the ground realizing a little late that Peeves could go straight through the door. Thankfully the poltergeist gave up or found someone else to use for target practice because he didn't float in and Avery collapsed with his back on the ground. "Stupid poltergeist." He looked around and found himself in the trophy room and not as alone as he thought. "He's hard to outrun that one." He said giving a grin to the smallish brunette.

Skyler was startled from her reverie when someone came crashing though the entrance to the trophy room, her wand immediately in her hand should the need to use it arise. It was like second nature lately to have it within her grasp and she would have felt stupid if she wasn't prepared for another attack like the one on the night she had first arrived. That had been a huge blow to her ego and the brunette was determined not to have another occurrence like it if she could help it.

Skyler narrowed her purple eyes on the someone who had landed quite spectacularly on the stone floor after their abrupt entrance, trying to make out who they were, when a cackling sound could be heard from outside the room and the doors were kicked closed. From the lean body the Slytherin could tell the someone was a guy, and when he turned to look at her his face confirmed it, and by the robes he was quite obviously a Gryffindor. She seemed to have a lot of run ins with students from that house that it was a wonder she hadn't been placed there.

The brunette was thankful that she hadn't been startled enough to do anything as ridiculous as yelp or jump when he came crashing in, and she noted he didn't look familiar to her so he wasn't in her year. It was getting easier for her determine that much atleast. Skyler stood there with her arms crossed over her chest, and hip cocked. She arched one dark, questioning brow, her violet eyes alive with obvious amusement. She was sure he wasn't a threat to her so she allowed her amusement to show through when he spoke. The fifth year rolled her eyes but grinned nonetheless. She herself hadn't had a run in with the poltergeist but she counted her blessings on that one. From word of mouth he sounded like a nightmare.

"So I've heard." She replied after snorting. She couldn't help it. He looked like he would tower over her should he stand so it was funny to imagine him running from a sort of ghost. She wondered absently how Harry was fairing off with his ghost and made a mental note to question her friend on it the next time she saw him. Being her, Skyler stepped forward and held out a helping hand to him. "Need a hand? Or do you prefer the floor?" She asked playfully, her eyes dancing in her amusement as her grin widened.

"I'll take the hand unless you want to join me down here." He said and took the offered hand and got to his feet winking at her. If she was going to be playful he might as well be too. "That's quite the pair of eyes you got there." Avery told her dusting himself off by patting his tall body down. From that alone he knew he had never met this girl before and giving her figure a once over he noticed the Slytherin green trimming of her robes. That might be why because Gryffindors and Slytherins didn't normally mix and when they did all hell tended to break lose. She was easy on the eyes though and even for a Slytherin he could tell she would turn heads. She definitely had his attention.

It wasn't every day that a Slytherin was playing nice though and he knew she had to be observant enough to have noticed his own robes trimmed in scarlet. Avery was a little on edge and didn't know how to proceed so in true Gryffindor form he asked bluntly. "Why help me?"

Skyler rolled her eyes at him but otherwise ignored his comment, choosing to just help him to his feet. When he took her hand it felt awfully large in her small one, and when he was finally up right he did seem to tower over her as she had predicted. But then, most of the guys, and even some girls, did. So she didn't think on it too much.

Instead, Skyler cocked her head to the side, observing him as he did her. The teen rolled her eyes again at him, but she grinned anyways and responded in her American accent. "Thanks. I totally didn't realize that when I looked in the mirror this morning." Skyler replied sarcastically, but her grin never faltered and there was no real bite behind her words.

His question, though, had her brows furrowing together and she looked at him with obvious confusion shinning in her eyes. Why had she helped him? Well hadn't that been obvious? It was simple common courtesy really. Skyler had been brought up with manners and whatnot. For a moment, a look of offense stole across her face and indignation flashed in her eyes at the implications his one question brought. But it was gone as soon as it had appeared, replaced with nothing but curiosity as Skyler shrugged gracefully. "Why not help you?"

She answered his question with one her own, honestly curious. Did the house rivalry really run that deep? It would be a shame if it did. Maybe he was on to something though. It had been her offer of assistance that had led to her attack from Parkinson. But Skyler wasn't about to change who she was or how she reacted just because it pushed on some stupid boundaries that shouldn't exist anyway. If she felt the urge to offer someone help then she would, and if they reacted negatively to it then that was their problem and not hers.

"Why not?" He repeated and looked at her as if she had two heads and as of he didn't know if she were serious or not. "Because you're...you know...you. And I'm...you know...me.." Avery gestured between them as he spoke and his words came out lacking and finally he let his hands fall uselessly to his sides with a confused look.

Now that he thought about it the reasons behind his question sounded dumb and trying to explain them was making him sound even dumber. He tried to make himself string together a coherent sentence. "I was going to say because you're a Slytherin and I'm a Gryffindor and then realized how lame that sounded in my head." It did sounds lame even though it was true and her offer of help had him intrigued. Wary but intrigued and she was cute too and that was a plus.

Skyler couldn't help it, she really couldn't. Her laughter bubbled up out of her so suddenly she didn't have time to try and force it back. It wasn't just what he said or even how he said it, but it was more like the complete seriousness of his words when he said it that brought her to laughter. The brunette struggled to get ahold of herself, her violet eyes bright like jewels from her amusement and her cheeks flushed from laughing so hard. She clutched at the stitch in her side, but finally got her breathing under control enough to flash him an apologetic grin.

"Sorry, that was just too funny, how you said that." She didn't want him to think she were laughing at his expense. His delivery though had just been so hilarious and had caught her off guard. "But I agree. It is rather lame and not just in your head." Skyler said this in a serious tone, nodding her head to reinstate the fact that she believed it was stupid to let a rivalry create such a rift to the point where one person couldn't help another without suspicions and repercussions.

Shaking her head, she turned her gaze back to the award she had been looking at when he had first entered, sighing softly and then returning her attention back to the boy. "So why was Peeves after you anyway?" She questioned with obvious curiosity, arching a brow at him. She really did want to know. He looked like a pretty straight arrow so she couldn't imagine him causing any kind trouble.

Her laughter was kind of contagious and he chuckled a little with her, but he was kind of startled by her laughing and it made him kind of uneasy. Avery had heard Slytherins laugh before but never like that. It was usually more of a cold dead sound when they did and not the genuine warm one she made. He shruged at her apology and shook his head at her to signal she should stop apologizing. "I would have laughed too if I were in your shoes. Or maybe not because you snakes dont usually laugh..like that.." His voice faded away and he smiled with a sheepish look but it was true. They normally laughed in cruel mean ways. "Just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Skyler snorted at the boy's words. Clearly her housemates didn't make great impressions on the rest of the school. It was beginning to annoy her, how little she fit in around the castle. She was like a lepper in her own house, and a stranger to the rest. Most we're nice enough to her though, if a bit wary. Until she admitted her name anyways, or until someone else mentioned it to them. "Yea. Lovely lot we are huh?" The brunette replied rhetorically with a wry grin, giving him a knowing look.

Her grin morphed into a smirk, her purple eyes dancing in amusement. "Fair enough. I just thought there might be a reason why he would turn your hair orange. Or did you have it that way in a show of house pride?" Skyler's tone was innocent and curious enough to be convincing, but her playful eyes would have given her away to anyone who actually knew her. His hair wasn't orange at all, but she thought his reaction to thinking it was might be fun.

Was she playing with him? He got the feeling she was. She looked and sounded like she were playing with him but with a Slytherin he never could be too sure. "Lovely isn't the term I would use for describing you lot.." He trailed off apparently not wanting to say what he would use to describe the Slytherins. Not in front of her because she seemed like a nice enough girl and for the time being he couldn't fit her into the category the other snakes went into.

The sudden appearance of her smirk and the way her eyes danced caught Avery off guard and he blinked dumbly before her words made it to his brain and then it was a moment more before he could actually compute them. "My hair is orange?" His face and tone were ones of disbelief as he hurried forward to look at his reflection in one of the glass cases and it was with relief that he saw his hair was its normal color.

He wondered why she would think it was orange then..Ohhhh. "You tricky little thing." He told her and laughed at his own vanity. Who could blame him? He didn't want horrible orange hair anymore than anyone else did and now since she had started it he would finish it. He had always wondered if snakes could be tickled and this looked like a good time to find out.

Avery rushed her with his large form and a large grin and trapped her against one of the glass displays and his fingers attacked her sides while he laughed. He never gave any thought to that she might think he were really attacking her or what someone might think of they walked in on them. It was just all in good fun to him.

Why, oh why, was everyone suddenly tickling her? Well, that might have been an exaggeration but still. For the second time in a week her sides were under a fierce tickling attack and no matter how she would have liked to glare, Skyler couldn't make it happen when she was laughing like a lunatic thanks to the sensation the boy was inducing. And unfortunately, she was trapped between his rather large form and a trophy case, leaving the brunette with very little maneuvering room. It was definitely not a great place to be.

Her sides were beginning to hurt from the laughing, and her cheeks ached from or as well. She tried to bat away his hands with her own but tickling was merciless and left her with only being able to laugh. Breathing was becoming a problem but Skyler would not admit defeat and an idea popped into her head like a lightbulb being turned on. She raised one foot as high as she could and stomped it down flat on the boy's toes, putting as much strength into as she could muster in her laughing fit, hoping it would be painful enough to break his focus on his tickle attack.