Call It Home - Prinxiety [COMPLETED]

Chapter Seven: Headaches & Awkward Introductions

It wasn't uncommon for Virgil to get headaches while in school. Though he'd never been to an actual education institute in his life, whenever his mother assigned him a lot of work or lectured for long amounts of time his head would begin to throb. He'd never outright complained about it, but one afternoon, she noticed him wincing over his work for the day.

"What's wrong, love? Is this giving you a hard time or is it something else?" she'd asked him gently, putting a hand on his shoulder. 

He'd looked up at her and then quickly back down. He'd felt ashamed for letting her see that he wasn't feeling his best; prioritizing work over his health was a nasty habit of his that he was still working on to this day. At the time, he'd just brushed her concerns off and mumbled that his head hurt, hoping she would leave it be.

However, his mother was a unconditionally loving and caring woman. She had insisted he take a break and gotten him some painkillers. Virgil felt guilty for not being stronger and not persevering through his pain, but she'd comforted him and let him know that there was nothing weak about needing a break now and again. His health was far more important than whether or not he memorized the exact dates that were important to wizarding world history. 

The house-less student tried to keep this in mind as he studied for his first exam. It had only been about a month since the start of the school year and he was already feeling overwhelmed. 

His History of Magic class was easy enough to follow, as well as his Divination class. However, he was finding himself struggling a bit with Transfiguration, Care of Magical Creatures, and Astronomy. Patton had been kind enough to help him the earlier two but he'd yet to find someone to help him with the latter. Well, this was a slight fib. The Hufflepuff had said that his boyfriend, Logan Sharp, would be more than happy to tutor him on the subject of Astronomy should he need help, and the Ravenclaw was even in his class; he just couldn't get up the confidence to go speak to him yet.

He partially blamed the cocky Gryffindor he'd run into at the library for his lack of self-confidence. The interaction had made him feel more out of place than ever and the feeling that he would never fit in was hovering over him constantly already. Said Gryffindor was in his DADA class and his Potions class, making his attempts to keep to himself much more difficult. Virgil had caught him glaring at him from across the classroom on more than one occasion.

As the weekend approached, he hoped he wouldn't have to deal with him for a couple days. He was sorely mistaken. 

After spending many class periods trying to convince him, Patton Valentine had managed to get him to agree to spending a day with him and his friends down at Hogsmeade Village. At some point today, the Hufflepuff was gonna come get him to head down there. He'd been almost in a panic over it since he woke up that morning, but he'd feel like a jerk if he canceled on him when he was being so kind. 

But what if his friends don't like me? Or they think I'm weird because I don't have a house? he thought to himself as he thoughts drifted away from the essay he was supposed to be writing for DADA. Virgil shook his head, his breathing accelerating. No, no, no, don't work yourself up. That'll make it worse.

He took deep breaths, successfully steadying himself. There was nothing he could do to get the anxiety he felt about meeting new people to go away completely but he'd gotten adept at breathing exercises that prevented him from working himself up into a panic attack over smaller things. There were some things he couldn't stop himself from getting upset about. For example, he still hated crowds, new environments, and sudden changes in plans.

About an hour later, Virgil had finished his essay and was scribbling some lyrics into a notebook when there was a knock at his door. He flinched but quickly jumped up to open it.

"Hey Virge!" Patton greeted as he stepped out of his dorm. He was standing in the corridor with his group of friends, which was slightly larger than he was expecting. His eyes flew over the different robes and colors, feeling a little relieved that they weren't all from Hufflepuff; it would've been more awkward if he was hanging out with people from only one house. Patton gestured to them happily. "These are my friends! I'll introduce you!"

He guided the darkly dressed boy by the arm to each of them. "This is Logan, he's my boyfriend," he said, grinning affectionately at him. 

Virgil looked down shyly. He was never good at finding a way to introduce himself. Thankfully, the Ravenclaw was good at making things less awkward for everyone else by being overly formal in the way he handles himself. He extended his hand. "A pleasure to meet you. I've heard you've had some trouble with Astronomy," he said as they shook hands. "I'll be happy to assist you if you'd like."

"Uh, thanks, yeah..." he managed to reply. 

The Hufflepuff beamed and pulled along to introduce him to the other people in their friend group. Excluding Logan and Patton, there was a total of eight people in the group. Luis Requiem, another Hufflepuff, who was incredibly good at specifically water magic. Emile Picani, a lovable Ravenclaw who was fantastic with spells involving the mind and emotions. The only Slytherin of the group was named Remy Kettles, who looked like he was a muggle among the others, with his leather jacket and water bottle filled with a brown liquid that resembled coffee. Melissa Scamander, a relatively well-known Hufflepuff with extraordinary talent in Care of Magical Creatures. A Gryffindor girl by the name of Rachel Raywood who was sticking a pencil into her curly hair to keep it up; she was clearly someone who liked to write. Val Medlar, a female-to-male trans beater for the Gryffindor Quidditch team who looked like he could beat him to a pulp without breaking a sweat. A nonbinary Ravenclaw student by the name of Bay Rubis who had a talent for Charms. 

Virgil's head was swimming a little with the amount of names he needed to learn by the time they reached the last person to be introduced. His stomach twisted uncomfortably. "And this is Roman, who I've heard you've already met," Patton said, oblivious to the ominous air that had formed around the two of them as they locked eyes. 

The Hufflepuff wasn't misinformed. The darkly dressed boy recognized Roman and knew that the Gryffindor recognized him too. He bit back a sigh of resignation. This wasn't going to go as well as he'd hoped.