Thunderstruck

"Can't argue with that." he said laughing as she added a light bounce into her step. Even though it was raining, he couldn't help but feel a little happier then.

James followed Juliet as she led him through the town, and curiousity was coursing through him as he wondered where on earth she was leading him to. He hoped it was somewhere dry, but he had to admit even if it wasn't he was sure he'd still have fun.

The rain had been coming down in such a quantity that there were now puddles in the completely vacant streets. The storm was bending trees and rumbling thunder in its wake. Part of Juliet's mind was actually always on the lightening crossing the sky, however part of her was getting a sort of childish glee with playing in the rain. She couldn't stop herself from jumping in a puddle, and then sticking out her tongue to catch rain drops on them.

Even though she seemed completely at peace with her place in the rain, she was in fact looking for shelter for the two of them. Deep down the tree incident had shaken her up more than she cared for. The original destination she had had in mind had been home, but it was a long way off, and testing Miss Mad's hospitality for strangers -particularly of the male variety - so she had changed her mind for her second favourite holding spot instead.

Before long she had slipped the two underneath the cover of picnic shelter, slightly further up the hill, still within view of the lake.

"I use to be scared of storms you know. Thunder would terrify me to no end," she wrung hair out of her hair as she curled up on the table, the sound of rain ringing heavily on the hard shelter, "but there is a certain... natural beauty to a storm that I can't deny."

Laughing as Juliet seemed to enjoy the rain, he couldn't help but join in and sort of dance in the rain with her. He loved rain, not storms neccessarily, but the rain was always so much fun. The two danced around a little before coming to a picnic area where they sat and began to dry off.

James didn't have to wring out his hair as Juliet did, but he ran his hand through it, trying to get rid of a majority of the water anyways.

"Really? That's awful!" he said eyes widening a little. "Though I guess you're right, there is a fairly...interesting beauty and excitement to them." he agreed, nodding his head.

"So, here comes the silly small talk, how's your summer been so far?" he asked laughing at his cheesy question.

Running a hand through her hair before shaking it out, she just gave a shrug, flashing the boy a small smile, "I don't know if its really all that bad. It was just a fear - really do you know any child that didn't jump at least a little at thunder? It just took me longer than most to out grow that nervousness."

Humming softly under her breath, she listened to the other boy, quietly pausing between the question, taking her time before answering.

"Its been... good. You know. Summerish. My brother got married, went to that. Then you know, some other summer stuff. The beach. Tried not to melt. Yourself?"

"I suppose that's true, but I'm still sorry to hear that." he said with a smile. He had to admit, as a kid he was fairly frightened of thunder storms, but as he grew older, he grew out of it. Now he even liked thunder storms, but if there was lightning, especially after nearly getting hit by it, he found himself still a little afraid.

James placed his chin in his hands as he listened to Juliet's summer events so far. He had to admit, he had always wanted to go to a wedding, but unless his father decided to marry Ellie, there was no chance. "Sound fun actually. I haven't really done all that much. Met some new people while wandering around different parts of the world." he said with a shrug.

He knew he probably sounded boring as all hell but he didn't really want to get into his family issues, he didn't think that Juliet would want to hear about that.

"Well than I'm still thankful for your sympathy. Even if its completely unreasonable and you're wasting your time on it." A laugh escaped her lips, and she leaned back on the table she was sitting upon, her wet shirt sticking further to her skin, but she didn't care. She was in a good mood, despite the rain.

Or maybe even because of it.

"It was and it wasn't," Juliet responded easily. "I was nervous as hell. My family's muggles you see; when I found magic... well long story short we haven't had a great relationship since then. It had been a while since I've seen them." Even her admittance of her troubles wasn't going to be putting her mood down any time soon. Juliet was simply put just... happy, at the moment. "But, I think we all got on a better place at the wedding. And I had... I had Zander so, it was good. It was good." She sort of sounded like she was trying to convince herself of that fact. But it was the truth, she only sounded that way because until this moment, until she actually reflected upon it, she didn't realize how good it was.

"Meeting new people is always good, and making friends. You never know which people you meet at say, when you're getting your new robes, might become one of the most important people you know only a few months later," Juliet's face coloured ever so slightly as she realized what her words had done - how she had turned in her impersonal antidote into something completely personal without even meaning to. To move passed it, she quickly changed topics, "I love wandering. I want to see the whole world one day."

James frowned a little at hearing Juliet's story. Growing up with a pure-blood family, he had almost always known he had magic, whether it was by accident, or when his father told him. He had heard some of his muggle born friends talk about how their parents were shocked to find out their children had magic, but he had never heard of the person being, almost hated in a way.

He reached out to Juliet, but then pulled away, wondering if it would be weird. "I'm sorry to hear that. But I am glad to hear that things got better." he said with a smile. He hated the idea of someone being in a bad place, especially with their family.

"I agree with that. Meeting new people, and then realizing they're going to be with you forever." he said thoughtfully. "We were-" but then he stopped himself when he realized he was about to mention Casey. They had planned to go around the world, or at least Europe anyways, but then that plan died when they broke up.

"I er, wanted to travel the world too, one day." he said instead.

She raised her eyebrow at the movement of the other boy. "I won't fall apart if you touch me. Nor will I bite you either." She grinned slightly, her gaze slightly distant for a brief moment, before she shook her head, and looked back at him, "And don't be sorry. It wasn't that really that bad. I mean... I guess at some points I was a little - but it was life. I got over it, I moved on and I think we fixed things a lot better."

Tiling her head to the side she looked over at the boy with appraising eyes; Juliet did not wish to pry but there was something about her tone.

"Hey. If you ever want to talk about anything - I hear in the middle of a thunderstorm with a practical stranger is a good place to do it. Sometimes they are even sort of pretty nice about it."

James nodded, and smiled in slight embarassment. He had a habit of being very sympathetic, and he knew some people who found it annoying especially when they didn't need it. Sometimes James wondered if he was really a Slytherin at all with the amount of sympathy he had, and good will he had.

"I'm glad that you're alright now." he said finally with a smile.

Looking up at Juliet at her words, James gave her a small smile as a thank you. It was hard for him to find someone to talk to, aside from Casey anyways. "Thanks." he replied laughing. "I hear the people in the storms aren't so bad after all." he grinned.

Juliet just flashed the obviously embarrassed boy a grin before she laid back on the table she was sitting upon, staring up at the warn ceiling of the picnic shelter they were now using to keep themselves try, and hopefully safe from lightening. Her mind flashed briefly to a worry that the shelter would still conduct electricity should it get hit - she couldn't tell what kind of material it was made out of at the moment - but after a pause she pushed it aside and moved on with her life, her thoughts.

"You know, I am too."

Her grin turned mischievous although it was still focused on the ceiling rather than the boy, "I hear they are the best." Letting out a laugh that was so soft it might as well have been nothing more then a breath, her smile softened thoughtfully. Although she had no idea what the boy was thinking of, whatever piece of news he was trying to tell, Juliet thought it only fair that if she was encouraging him to talk to her,s he might as well share with him. "I had this... boy once you know. Back in second year. He was younger but... didn't act it; I always knew somehow I was still the younger of the two." Mainly because Dimitri was a vampire but that was neither her nor there for the sake of her story. "I think I thought I loved him, but I was twelve, what does a twelve year old really know of love?"

That was a question she asked herself many times over the past few years, and even now - she seemed to be asking it even more now. Maybe she was scared to make the same mistake again - to let herself think she loved someone only to have them suddenly not there, and she would be left to figure out what was true and false all over again. Still... when she thought of love, of what it might feel like to be in love, she always seemed to come back to one thing, one feeling... one person.

"Anyway, even if I didn't love him, I cared about him a lot. I possibly could have grown to love him with time. Who knows. I thought I would have that time, he promised to stay around; he promised to give me that time. He even gave me this to show that he'd keep that promise," fishing the chain out from under her shirt, she picked the ring out of the two items that hung there and held it up to the light, "But here I am, three years later and I still have the ring, but I have no idea where Dimitri went. He didn't even have the decency to dump me. He just... took off." Although she was talking casual enough, even punctuated her statement with a little shoulder shrug, there was still that undercurrent of anger that her tone always held when she thought or spoke of Dimitri. In the end it might be possible that that anger would never quite go away. First cuts the deepest and all of that.

"Anyway. That's my tale of woe. What's yours?"

James listened carefully and respectfully to her story. He wondered what it would be like to have someone just disappear. He couldn't imagine what he would do if Casey did that to him. He might break down and wonder what he did wrong, and what he would do with his life.

He gave her a weak yet truthfully sympathetic smile, before beginning his story. "Well, I have a girlfriend, Casey Donohoe, if you know her. We're alright, there isn't much to tell about our relationship." he replied with shrug. "I mean aside from her, I guess you could say my tale of woe, is the one involving my mom and dad."

He fidgeted with his soaked shirt for a moment before saying, "My mom died when I was born, and only recently my dad started dating this girl that makes him happy, but I don't like her...I don't like the idea of having someone else replace my mom. Besides, all they seem to do is shag and nothing else. It's not even love." he said throwing his hands in the air.

"Things are bad between my dad and I. We get into fights a lot, it's not so bad now, but before when they first started dating, it was pretty bad. We used to be like best friends, especially after my incident in the tree house." Then he stopped, wondering whether to continue with his story of how he became afraid of fire.

Juliet told him, more or less of her fear of thunder and lightning, maybe he should tell her his story.

Taking a deep breath and deciding it might do him good to talk about it, he said, "Only two years ago, I was over at his friend's home, hanging out in a treehouse, when the tree house suddenly got struck by lightning and burned to the ground. All of my friends managed to escape and even when they had the opportunity to help me, they left me there all alone.

As the house crumbled and burned around me, I grew afraid of being trapped in a dark space, and burning to death, which sort of began my fear of darkness and fire. If it hadn't been for my father, who rushed over when he heard the news, I most likely wouldn't be here."

With that, he turned to Juliet and smiled weakly, as though trying to show that it was nothing and that he was over it, when in fact it still haunted him. He didn't want her to feel bad, that wasn't why he told her, he just thought maybe letting it out would help, and she asked about his tale of woe, and that was it.

She nodded her head slightly in response to his frown, but only to be polite. She hadn't been looking for sympathy for what Dimitri did to her, she had merely been trying to show him that it was alright to share - that she understood some things or another.

"That's too bad," Juliet said softly, rolling on to her side to look at him, she kept her expression solemn as she looked over at the boy. "For both your father and the accident. I couldn't imagine being trapped by fire. That must have been awful."

Humming very lowly, she thought about what he said, tracing the pattern of the wood on the table as she did so, "You know. I was never all that close to my father - and like I said about my magic, I think he was the first to pull away. Though you know, I think even me and him have made some ground this summer. If me and my father can work through things - I'm sure that you and yours can as well. I'm not going to say it will be easy, but if you care about him and he you then something should be able to be worked out eventually."

Maybe Juliet was too much of an optimist, but that was what she believed.

James smiled at Juliet, grateful for what she said, even though, he didn't want her to feel she had to say what she did. Shrugging, he said, "Thanks. And yeah, it was pretty awful and I don't wish for anyone to have to go through it." He wanted to sound as though it was no big deal, it was, no doubt, but he wanted to show that he was strong.

"I'm glad to hear that." he said his smile becoming genuine. "It's great that you guys are trying. My father and I...well it's not so bad now, as I said, but we'll see." He said with a nod. He was sure at some point he and his father would work something out.

James looked around for a moment, wondering when the rain would stop. It wasn't like he hated rain, it was just...too much at this point. "Is it me or is this rain getting...annoying?" he asked, humour in his voice as he looked back at Juliet.

Pulling her hand away from the table with a small gasp, she stared at her finger, eyes narrowing at the offending sliver of wood that had decided to wedge itself into the soft smooth skin that she had formally been moving along the table. Cursing herself in her head - she knew better than to run her fingers along a rough surface like that - she stuck the offending wound in her mouth.

Shrugging her shoulders in a non-committal act, she moved her gaze towards the falling rain, as she tried to remove the wood out of her skin. Though after a moment she seemed to realize that picking at it was only making it worse.

"I don't know. It seems to be removing some of the heat. That has to be a plus right?" she squinted out at the drops, a frown on her face, "And hey - it might even be letting up, at least a little bit."

Frowning as he watched Juliet stick her finger in her mouth, James said, "Splinters are the worst, aren't they?" Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a small bandage and offered it to the girl across from him. "It's probably soaked by now, but here." he said with a smile.

James looked up at the sky and nodded. "True, true. That is a bonus." he said glancing around. He did notice how the rain was letting up a tad, but it was still close to a downpour. "Ah, well. Just have to deal with it, right?" he asked with as much of a happy tone as he could.

He knew he might be stuck outside for a long while yet, so he decided to make the best of it. Standing up, without waiting to see if Juliet would follow, he walked out from under his shelter and began splashing around in the puddles and allowed himself to get drenched all over again. It was just water after all, and as a kid he always did like to dance around in the rain.

Laughing as he did so, he glanced back at Juliet with questioning, wondering if she would join him. "Might as well make the best of it, right?" he called. He knew people were staring at him, but he couldn't care less.

Taking the bandage she began to slowly wrap the thing around her finger, only the sodden thing wouldn't actually stick to her still damp skin. Grumbling to herself she threw it to the side and resorted to slowly picking at the splinter again, trying to pull it back out. So it was with slight surprise that she looked up again to find the boy that had formally been sitting beside her was now out in the rain instead.

Raising an eyebrow she let out an amused grin, and then an outright laugh as she watched him move about the water.

"Is that what you're doing?" She called back her grin still on. Pausing for a moment, she pushed off the table and danced out into the rain with the boy. Pausing for a moment right where she was, she glanced at the boy before bending down, grabbing a handful of the mud forming on the ground and then flung it in his direction. The grin on her face was completely innocent, "Is that still making the most of it?"

James couldn't help but laugh as Juliet joined in for a moment, however his smile faded and he stopped laughing as a whole handful of mud landed on the side of his neck. Shaking his head, he playfully squinted at the girl and reached down, grabbing a handful of his own mud.

Raising his arm, he smirked at Juliet and said, "Oh yes, this counts." And he threw it. He aimed the pile of mud for somewhere on her shirt, so that he could get even with her for getting it on his.

Laughing, he ran around trying to get away if he could before she chucked another mud ball at him. He knew she would catch up, but in truth, it didn't bother him. For the first time in a while he was having some kind of fun.

It seemed like a waste of her energy to attempt to dive on the slick ground. Juliet knew with her luck and grace she would just fall flat on her face anyway. She did manage to duck slightly causing most of the mud to hit her arm rather than the shirt that it was intended to.

"Oh, it's on now mister." With a laugh that she used as a war call she scooped up another ball of dirt.

Their mud fight of sorts went on for what felt like some time before sudden Juliet, coated in mud, noticed that the rain had finally stopped.

"Hey look," she laughed pointing to the sky, "Sun."

The appearance of sun actually made her wonder how long she had been out there. A frown crossed her face and she rubbed at a spot of mud, "I think I should probably get going. There are people who apparently care when I come home or not."

She gave a half grin and a "It was nice to meet you" before she waved and was gone.