| Details for Snifflepuff to Hottiepuff: Step 2 The Man-tra |
| Summary: | Medusa gives Augustin some tips on how to be more manly, including a mantra. |
| Date: | 17 November 1938 |
| Location: | Empty Classroom |
| Related: | — |
| Characters |
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When he hands her the letter Medusa nods slowly. "Thank you, Gus." She smiles at him and puts the letter in her pocket. "Want to hear my list now?"
Gus looks like his girding his loins for battle, from his expression. His mouth sets into a grim line and he nods once. "Alright, let's have it," he says, clearly expecting something hurtful.
"Good things first," says Medusa as she unfolds the list. "You are a good and loyal friend. You are passionate about your beliefs. You are a faithful boyfriend, even when times can be hard." She looks over at Gus, "Then I just sort of listed single words. "Nice to look at if one fancies blonds. Clean."
"Alright," Gus says, his cheeks a bit pink. "Thanks."
The look she gives him makes it clear he shouldn't thank her just yet. "Now the not so good things," says Medusa. "You cry a lot. Like more than some girls I know. You get too emotional about things, see above. You have low self-esteem." Lifting her gaze from the paper she admits, "Again I just got to listing." She reads more. "Naive. A little bit judgmental. Blows hot and cold. Can be confusing. Sometimes a bit dim."
Gus's face turns positively red, now. He scowls and looks down. He doesn't appear to be able to bring himself to say anything.
"This," she says of the list of negatives, "is stuff we can say about a lot of people. What I'm finding harder to grasp is why the crying." Medusa isn't known for her fuzzy feelings about people or emotional outbursts, not usually. "Have you always cried a lot? Is it something you do when you feel a certain way?"
"Yeah," Gus says. "I guess I tend to cry when girls dump me and I'm very sad about it, and my friends would rather make fun of me than try to cheer me up." Honestly, he doesn't actually cry /that/ much. Lillian and Eibhlin and a broken arm and a dead family pet are the only causes at school anyone will be able to come up with.
Clearly Gus just has the unfortunate luck of having Medusa Malfoy see him cry a disproportionate number of times then. "The more manly thing to do is cry in private. Well the more polite thing period." She turns the paper over so she can see the good things again. "Maybe we should start with the basics. These are good things. Most girls don't care if you can't fly or aren't very good at quidditch. They'd rather a boyfriend was kind to them, loyal. Made them laugh."
Clearly! "Suppose so," Gus says a bit glumly. "I'll keep that in mind the next time I'm crushed by a girl." He says this like it's a certainty. "I don't see the point of having a girlfriend if you're not loyal to her," he admits to Medusa. "So that won't be a problem."
…
"Look," Gus says. "You told me. Now that I know, you can count on me to help. Like with the letter just now. Anything you need, really. Maybe you weren't mopey, but maybe you were a bit too proud. I could've helped sooner if I'd known. Other friends too, maybe."
Medusa shakes her head, "It isn't that I am too proud. It is that I am selective with who I share things with. You are one of three people in the entire school who knows." She pushes a clean bit of parchment at him. "This is going to be our plan of attack. We have already achieved step one. You acknowledged that you are a git. Step two is planning how to improve things." She motions for him to write down what she is dictating. "This is going to become your mantra for the next week. Then we will review it." Medusa closes her eyes as she thinks up a mantra for Augustin. "I will only cry in private. I will smile at girls who smile at me but be mysterious, because I am a puzzle worth solving. I will not mope in public. I will listen when girls speak to me and ask them one question about what they said. I will not give any gifts to any girls until I have had a second date. I will not kiss any girls until I have had a second date. I will do these things because I am a puzzle worth solving and girls should get to know me."
Gus grits his teeth and glares at her. "Are we calling each other names, now? Because it won't take me too long to come up with something for you." Clearly, she's hurt his feelings. Aw. He raises his eyebrows at her. "Medusa…. I'm not a puzzle. I don't have any deep dark secrets or — or unspeakable ambitions. I just want to find a nice, pretty girl to date. Someone I can spoil a bit, but who occasionally spoils me back. Someone I can be close with. Who doesn't mind my parents so much. It'd be nice if her parents weren't terrible, too. Someone I can talk to." Still, despite his misgivings, he writes down what she tells him to. "This is silly," he grouses as he pens the last sentence.
"You are a puzzle. Everyone is. The thing is you want a girl who is interested in you enough to get to know you and who likes you, not despite of your faults but because of them. Because each of them - each little piece makes up who you are." Medusa is running with this whole puzzle metaphor so just deal Gus! "Don't you think you deserve a girl like that?"
"I guess," Gus answers, not sounding particularly convinced. His eyes skip over the mantra she had him write down. "How am I supposed to be mysterious? And how come tea and dancing didn't count as a first date?" He frowns.
"Because both of you have to agree that it is a first date. Just because you think it is, doesn't mean she does." Medusa rubs at her temples. "Be mysterious by not telling a girl everything you are thinking. Just because you fancy her doesn't mean you should draw a picture of her right then and there and be thinking about her having your babies. Which, by the way, if you are thinking that don't tell her. Not for ages. That kind of stuff scares people off."
"Is that why you don't want to tell Douglas about your fantasies of tiny, pitter-pattering feet?" Gus teases her. The other advice gives him pause, though.
"Yes," bites out Medusa, her face flushed.
"Even if you told him, he wouldn't disappear," Gus says. "At least… I don't think so." He gives her a concerned look. "He didn't want to talk about that little scare you two had."
"But I knew he was upset when you broke it off with him," he adds.
She shifts on her chair, clearly a little embarrassed. "I don't know. We…it is a big thing to not be…well that's forever kind of stuff." Medusa tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. "Sometimes that kind of thing is frightening."
"You're willing to be cast out from your family for him," Gus says gently. "Isn't that forever sort of stuff?"
"I know," she says quietly. "But…I don't know if he feels the same." And therein lies the crux of Medusa's problem. "Still, I am willing to risk it."
"I bet he does," Gus says. "If you're willing to risk /that/, and if you're willing to risk making babies with him, why aren't you willing to talk to him about your future together?"
Medusa gently rubs her sore thumb. "I…I can't explain it. I guess I am just not ready." She starts to gather up the things she brought with her. "You should go, it will be dinner soon."
"Alright," Gus says, accepting her answer. He folds up the mantra and sticks it in his sleeve pocket, and will leave, holding the door open for her.
Once Medusa has everything she slips out, holding the parchment against her chest with her good hand.