Closed RP: Stephen and Sarah - The Surprise

[nopower-overme.livejournal.com]

((This starts Friday morning. Good clean fun with appliances abounds!))


With minimal fuss, Sarah and Stephen had left the school by Floo to seek out a waiting cab in a nearby 'Muggle' village. Their destination, as far as Sarah knew, was Macduff Aquarium in Aberdeenshire, but this whole day just existing was already so incredible to her. They were leaving the castle - and with it she hoped the stress that had plagued them recently - and venturing out into the non-magic world which she had not been in since her arrival. To be fair, she had not gone beyond the castle and grounds except once to Hogsmeade with Stephen, so she was quite excited.

Settled against Stephen's side in the backseat of the cab, she was content to point out things that caught her attention on the drive - and even explain things that might have been interesting to a man from the 19th century - or simply just sit in companionable silence. The familiarity of being in a car after two months was refreshing because it was something distinctly non-magical and not connected to what they had left behind, and it was all that much better for having Stephen, who was already her new 'familiar', right next to her. They both needed this, in her opinion, so she had been ridiculously pleased when Stephen had mentioned the plans. Without knowing it (or so she assumed, as she had never mentioned her birthday), he had given her an early birthday present in this day trip out with him. There was no more she could ask for, and yet...

"Stephen, I think the cabbie's taken us to the wrong place," she said once she had gotten close to his ear to whisper without being overheard. Outside the window of the now stopped cab was a cottage, very lovely but not the aquarium she had been expecting to see. Too preoccupied with the view or with Stephen, she had not even noticed telling road signs that might have led to confusion much sooner.


((R-ish for quite a lot of smut in various places. xD))

Comments

[nopower-overme.livejournal.com]

"Well I'm glad you didn't, she probably would have sold you the most ridiculously expensive one, but it does matter, I can't believe she got you to buy three cameras," Sarah said, mildly incensed as she picked one of the two and got out the manual. Despite her upset over the horrid saleswoman - as she had yet to realize it was Stephen who had decided three would be a lovely number - she was completely impressed at this camera. Luckily many functions were, for the most part exactly, the same and those she did not quite grasp she decided to leave for later study.

"Could you hold this open for me, please?" she asked, handing him the open manual so she could work various settings and load the film as she referenced the book. "Thankfully, this one seems like it can be somewhat easy to handle with everything set correctly." Though irked still by the saleswoman, she did smile at him as she continued to ready the camera. "The pictures from this one are going to be amazing. Do you want to try using it? She sold you enough film that you can use the whole roll trying it out."

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

The ride to the aquarium was very short, however, and before much progress could be made at all -- before Stephen could express much more than an affirmation that it was his idea to leave with three cameras, and a certainty that they could very well leave the ones they did not like in the cab -- they had arrived.

[nopower-overme.livejournal.com]

Completely gobsmacked, Sarah made a sound of absolute disbelief and just stared at him.

[estebanmd.livejournal.com]

"Well?" The auto had stopped and Stephen had paid the driver. Sarah apparently had not come to a decision on which camera she liked, so Stephen gathered them all -- open box, manual and all -- into the bag and opened the door. This time the cab driver had opened Sarah's door before Stephen could get out and do so himself. There was no chance for her to demur further.

The building that housed the aquarium did not resemble any Stephen could remember having seen. The structure most like it was a round hut he had seen in Moahu. Holding out to Sarah the hand that was not holding the bag of cameras, he thought that this should be interesting. Perhaps there would be scholars there similar to the ones he had been accustomed to meet at Black's, or at the Royal Society's evenings.

(( Moahu is a fictional island created by Patrick O'Brian. Apparently he thought that it would be too limiting to site his tropical intrigues on the actual Maui or Oahu. Or something. ))