Can you play me a memory? I'm not really sure how it goes.

[likeblueblazes]

When Ophelia awakens on the last Sunday before school officially starts, she expects nothing of the day except to laze about in bed and savor her freedom before essays and thoughts of college begin to plague her every waking moment. She has today off from work, for which she is quite grateful. Perhaps she'll go to the local bakery for a sweet breakfast; perhaps she'll even knock on Jehan's door and ask if he will accompany her, if she feels daring enough. She blushes as she giggles, holding her pillow up to her face as though it might lessen said flush.

But first, of course, she has to actually move and get up from her bed, a task that seems especially herculean this morning. She sighs, lets the pillow drop from her face onto the floor before throwing the blankets back. She yawns, stretches for a good moment, before letting her feet onto the carpeted floor. Her typically tidy hair hangs loose around her, stray strands flying everywhere in the wake of sleep. Her nightgown, a simple, elegant cotton dress, clings to her as she makes her way to the door of her bedroom.

She's still considering her options for the day when she steps out into her living room. For a moment, she finds herself blinded by the sunlight streaming through the window; but then she blinks, and what she finds almost causes her heart to stop.

"Oh my God," she gasps, gaping at the sight of the familiar grand piano. Once held in the grand halls of Buckshaw, here it now sits, barely contained by the limitations of Ophelia's living room.

She's so ecstatic, tears tremble down her face as she runs over and traces her fingers along the edge of the keys, as though she had stumbled over a beloved childhood artifact. And really, this piano is her oldest, dearest friend; her equivalent to what Flavia has between Dogger back home.

All her morning possibilities forgotten for the moment, Ophelia hurriedly grabs her cellphone from the counter, texting all of her dearest acquaintances to come over; she, of course, texts Flavia first. Mindless of her own disheveled appearance and overwhelmed by her good fortune, Ophelia sits down at the piano to play, awaiting the arrival of her friends to share with them the wonderful news.

Comments

[du_vallon]

Porthos had been meaning to drop by and bring with him a few treats from the bakery. He knows that he should keep up with his friends, especially when work doesn't hound most of his steps, and so he's pleased to hear beautiful music when he arrives at Ophelia's door, politely knocking and hoping that she hears him over the music -- the likes of which he thinks he hasn't heard since one of the King's events.

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia is pouring herself into one of Beethoven's grander symphonies, allowing the music to seep from her fingers into the piano keys as she basks in the glory of the piano she's grown up with; to have her own instrument in the city with her, well. She could not ask for a better musical companion.

She pauses when she thinks she hears a knock on the door. Hurriedly, she tries to flatten her hair and smooth out her nightgown; she grimaces when she catches sight of herself in the mirror by the front door, but she carries on regardless.

"Oh, Porthos, hello!" She beams at him, too delighted by her piano to really trouble herself over her looks. "Oh, do please come in! How are you?"

[du_vallon]

Porthos smiles warmly as he enters, shifting the box in his hands as he approaches, trying not to make it seem like he's completely interfering. "I brought some pastries and breads, for you and Flavia," he says, peering around to see the piano. He notes how the music has stopped and brightens a bit. "Was that you, then? Playing?"

[likeblueblazes]

"Oh, how lovely, thank you," she says, noticing the box only when he mentions it. She moves back to give him more space, closing the door behind him. "Yes, it was. I awoke this morning to find myself with my piano from home here!"

She walks him over to her living room, where the piano now sits, a bit cramped, but still.

[du_vallon]

"I've only ever heard court composers using one of those things," he admits, gesturing to a chair nearby so he can sit down and listen. "I love music, though. There's this sort of record player thing that they've got here, but I haven't had a chance to really learn how to use it. There's always been more important things."

He offers her a hopeful little smile. "Will you play something for me?"

[spirit_of_vitriol]

Ordinarily, the sort of summons Feely had just sent out would've merited only a saucy rejoinder--if any at all--and a campaign of silence the rest of the day. No matter how much she acted like it, her sister wasn't royalty; especially now that they lived in two separate locations, Flavia had no reason to respond.

That said, given recent events, it could well behoove Flavia to stop by. Maybe some other dreadful monster was wearing Harriet's face this week.

Slipping in the front door behind one of the other residents, Flavia makes her way up to her sister's apartment, surprised to hear what sounds like the tinkle of piano keys from inside. "Feely?" she calls, rapping on the door as loudly as she can, "It's Flavia, let me in."

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia half-expects her sister not to show; no matter how many oddities they've endured in the city together, they both seem content with the new amount of distance between them in their own lives in Darrow. Flavia always did have a way of letting the world know her displeasure through silence as well as poison.

But when she hears the knocking on her door, Ophelia finds herself to excited to care beyond that there is now a piece of Buckshaw in the city with her.

And she's still so excited, she hasn't even gotten dressed yet.

She manages to at least smooth out her hair before opening her door.

"Hello, little beast."

[spirit_of_vitriol]

Flavia's surprised to see her normally put-together sister answering the door--where anyone (or any dashingly handsome men, more like) might see her!--in her nightgown. It's a sight that evokes dim memories of Christmas mornings, or the short, sweet stretches of time when she and her sisters had established a truce, of sorts: curling up in Feely's bed with a book of myths or fairy tales from the library; Mrs. Mullet bringing up a tray of hot cocoa.

Those days were long past, and hardly worth dwelling on now.

"Feely," she says evenly, biting her tongue before any cracks about the failure of Feely's beauty sleep could slip out. Given the new addition to Feely's living room, however, it was doubtful they'd have been given voice as it is.

"Yaroo," she breathes, looking at the piano. "When'd you get that? It looks just like the one back home."

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia is so proud of having the piano in her apartment, she doesn't have time to consider Flavia's potential reaction to herself in her sleeping clothes; indeed, she barely has the time to dwell on changing in the near future, so enthralled she is with her good fortune.

But for a brief moment, Ophelia finds herself recalling the ghosts of memories past; Christmas mornings when they were all overly eager to open presents and late nights spent reading fairy tales over cups of cocoa and slices of chocolate cake.

Ophelia shakes her head to clear them of the thoughts.

"It just arrived," she tells her sister. "This morning, I woke to find it here. I'm pretty sure it is the piano from home."

[spirit_of_vitriol]

"If it isn't, it's a very convincing facsimile," she says. "I've heard of that happening, things from home arriving here." More than heard, she thinks, recalling the surprise she'd found last year in the galleries of the art museum. Who Vanetta Harewood was was still a complete mystery to her; but the woman and children in the painting were unmistakable.

She should tell Feely. She should never tell Feely. Either choice seemed the right one; either choice was completely wrong.

"Did it come with all your sheet music, too?" she asks instead.

[and_proud]

The excitement of Ophelia's message makes Raven glad it's a day she's not working, although with the way the alley is during the day she could probably not even turn up and have nobody notice. In any case, she's free, and any excuse to see Ophelia is a good one. So she heads on over and starts to knock on the door before she hears the tinkling of the piano, and she can't help but stop and smile as she listens for a few moments. "Hey, Mozart," she calls. "It's me."

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia laughs at Raven's words, her voice recognizable even over the loudness of the piano. She stops playing almost instantly, smoothing down her nightgown and moving her hair over her shoulder to better disguise her less than perfect condition.

"You just missed Mozart, actually," she greets, face flushed as she grins. "He left the building, so to speak."

[and_proud]

"Probably intimidated," Raven quips, stepping inside and approaching the piano. It's beautiful. Classic. But what makes it is the way Ophelia sounds as she plays it, as if it's as much a part of her as her own limbs, her own fingers, the music a piece of herself more than notes on a page. "This is new, huh?"

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia rolls her eyes fondly, snorting at the comment; she appreciates the compliment, though. "Yes, intimidated by how unfaithfully I was playing his music, probably," she says. "Well, yes and no. It's the piano from Buckshaw; I've been playing it my whole life. It's only new in the sense that I woke up to find it here this morning."

[and_proud]

"It's beautiful," Raven tells her, although that much is probably obvious. Stepping closer she takes in the details of the instrument. It reminds her a little of the classic furniture back at the mansion, the house that never really felt like her own. "Enormous, though. I can't imagine how it got here without it waking you up..."

[onlyabird]

Though Sansa didn't use her telephone very often, still too unfamiliar with the object to be very comfortable in doing so, she at least knew that she was supposed to keep it on, just in case anyone tried to get in touch with her. Even so, that happened so rarely that she was surprised to get a message on it, and fumbled with it for a moment, trying to figure out how to see what had been sent to her. Seeing that it came from Ophelia, though, she smiled in spite of her confusion. She liked to think of the other girl as a friend, and someone she hoped to get to know even better.

Making her way to Ophelia's building didn't take very long, but she paused for a moment outside her door, the sound of music carrying through it. Like everything else she'd heard here, it wasn't something she'd heard before, but Sansa thought it beautiful all the same. Lifting a hand, she knocked gently, just loud enough to be heard over the noise inside. "Ophelia?"

[likeblueblazes]

The evolution of phones, particularly cellphones, have proven to be the easiest technology for Ophelia to master; she already chats away like a hummingbird at any given opportunity, so to channel that enthusiasm for conversation into text messaging seems like the most natural transition in the world for her. Texting, especially in her current state of excitement, just seemed right for informing her friends of her sudden good fortune.

She's especially relishing said fortune as she plays through one of her new favorites, a song called "All I Ask Of You" from her new favorite musical, the Phantom of the Opera. She ceases playing when she hears the gentle knock; the style of it makes her think of Sansa, and she's delighted when she finds the girl on the other side of the door.

"Hello, Sansa!" She greets with a bright smile. "Do come in, I have the most wonderful news!"

[onlyabird]

Ophelia's smile prompted one from Sansa in turn even before the other girl's announcement, though something had clearly prompted the invitation over. Whatever it was, she was already glad for it. Over a year she'd been here now, but she'd grown so accustomed to good news being few and far between that it came as something of a relief whenever something good happened to someone she cared about. She'd had welcome news of her own recently, too, though she once had been sure that she would never have thought so about Arya's presence.

"Do you?" she asked warmly, beginning to step inside. "What is it?"

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia giggles the way she once did when she was seven, before Harriet's disappearance and the souring of the rest of her life. She eagerly gestures for Sansa to follow her, leading her into the living room and all but bursting with excitement at the piano standing within the room.

"It's my piano from home," she says, unable to stop grinning. "I woke up to find it here this morning."

[onlyabird]

"Oh, it's beautiful," Sansa said, almost a gasp, as she looked at the instrument. She was far from an expert on pianos, Darrow having been the only place she'd encountered them, but with what she had gathered from that, ones she'd seen in stores and elsewhere, it was clear that this one was especially nice. That it came from home, clearly meaning something to Ophelia, was even better. This happened sometimes, she knew, items appearing as if from nowhere, but they weren't always this kind, and she was likewise pleased for Ophelia's sake that she'd been fortunate in that regard. "I thought I heard music when I was at the door."

[petit_poete]

When Jehan received the electronic message from Ophelia, he was eager to respond. She seemed quite excited, and he was intrigued as to what it could be about.

He quickly finished his breakfast and dressed, then hurried down to mademoiselle Ophelia's flat. There he hesitated briefly, for the thought of being alone in her flat was a bit worrisome. He reminded himself that in this place, none of their neighbors would give such impropriety a second thought, steeled his nerves (though his heart refused to stop racing), and rapped on her door.

[likeblueblazes]

Ophelia delights at the knock on her door; though she knows she sent out the text to many of her friends, she hopes one golden haired poet in particular waits behind the door. She doesn't pause to consider the boldness of having him alone in her flat, nor does she realize that she is still in her nightgown and really unfit to be seen. The arrival of her piano is still sending thrills through her, and the possibility of Jehan waiting behind the door only adds to the excitement.

Eagerly, she bounds over to the door, pulling it open to reveal that it is, in fact, Jehan waiting behind it.

"Oh, Jehan, I'm so glad you're here!" She exclaims, her cheeks turning pink and her entire countenance brightening at the sight of him. "Do come in!"

[petit_poete]

Jehan took a step back instinctively when he saw Ophelia standing at the door in nothing but a chemise. "Oh..." he murmured, cheeks reddening as he lowered his eyes. He scuffed his feet, wondering if he should point out her state of undress. In the back of his mind he could hear Courfeyrac laughing at him, chiding him to enjoy such a splendor as the one he'd caught but a glimpse of before looking away. "...Are you certain?" he asked softly, looking up and down the hallway as if expecting her neighbors to burst out and accuse them of some impropriety.

[likeblueblazes]

"Of course I am certain," she tells him, thinking nothing of her state of dress (or lack thereof, rather) until she catches the flush to his cheeks and the way he avoids meeting her gaze. She blushes herself, embarrassed to have allowed herself to be found in such a state but also delighting in the fact of Jehan's shyness. He scuffles his feet, and she feels her heart soften more, even as she steps back and crosses her arms over her chest to more fully cover herself.

"Oh, goodness, I've been so excited, I've forgotten to dress myself properly," she says, her words coming out in a rush. She keeps playing with her hair, and it strikes her suddenly how butterflies seem to frolic in her stomach. "I'll go and throw a robe on. Pardon me, I don't mean to cause you any distress, monsieur."

[petit_poete]

"Merci," Jehan murmurs with a little sigh of relief. He had difficulty knowing quite what to say or do around Ophelia as it was, much less with her in such a state of undress. A robe would at least be a marginal improvement, and he could tell she was quite excited about something and he was eager to find out what that something might be. Eager enough to accept a robe as an acceptable compromise to taking the time and care it would require to properly dress.

He stole another quick glance at her, allowing himself to think, just for one debauched moment, about how positively (if unintentionally) seductive she looked, dressed in nothing but her chemise. Then he looked away again and stepped inside, eyes cast modestly downward.