Ditching the Spectators (Dean)

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

She made a little gasping noise as she looked at him. "No! But that's brilliant, Dean!"

He had just given her a very good idea, and she wondered just how far away she could stash the broom and still have it get to her in time.

"You've been holding out on me, Dean. What else have you got? I like these outrageous ideas of yours."

[Dean Fisher]

"Jackie! I'm not going to let you do that! You're broom might not make it fast enough," he said trying to reason with her. He shook his head. Dean shouldn't have said anything about that, even though he was joking.

"I'm not going to tell you anything else of my 'outrageous' ideas. They give you the wrong ones!"

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

"Aw, no, please tell me," she said, giving him what she called her 'puppy eyes.' He appearantly, had a wild, daredevil streak in him as well, and she liked it.

"I'll test it first... I'll drop something from up top and have you call the broom, and we'll time it out before I actually jump."

[Dean Fisher]

Dean sighed. "You are crazy, you know that," he said. He ran a hand through his hair and messed it up. It would be impossible for talking Jackie out of this. "We'll test it first, but that does not mean that you can jump off the roof." He gave her a stern look. "And I mean it, cause I will stop you if you decide that you're going to jump first instead of whatever we use to test it out on."

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

She waved off his concern. "I don't want to die, you know. I'll test it. But the broom has to be kind of far away... or where's the fun?"

For the moment, she had abandoned the chess game, running a hand through her own, long hair. "We'll put it somewhere on the first floor, though, because really, it would have to get to me near the ground. Second floor at the highest."

[Dean Fisher]

"Good," he replied to her good sense. "I still might not let you do it even after we try it." Dean was protective of her and didn't like the idea of her doing something like jumping off a roof. He didn't really care to much when other guys flirted with her, but then again he wasn't going to say anything. After all, they were just friends.

"When are we going to try this?"

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

Jackie's eyes drifted back to his and she grinned slowly. "How long does it take to play a game of chess?" She asked. He should have known she'd want to do it now. Really, he should have known not to suggest it at all.

[Dean Fisher]

"We can play chess at anytime," he said recongizing the look in his eye. He could go along with her this time. "If you want, we can go ahead and go attempt the idea. I know that you're eager to go for it." Dean gave her a smile. He was going to be more careful with the ideas that he shared with her, especially the one he had been thinking about for a good while.

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

He was right... she was itching to do it. And now would be perfect because there was no one left in the castle, which meant there would be no teachers to yell at her.

"I started the game with you. I would feel bad if I quit it now. But there's no one around right now and we can leave the board set up in here."

[Dean Fisher]

"Don't feel bad," replied Dean. "I'll make sure that you make up for it later." He wiggled his eyebrows and winked teasingly.

He stood up and shook out his leg because it had fell asleep. "Are you ready Ms. Frazier? I know there is no way that I can talk you out of this one, so I might as well go with you on it."

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

"You should jump with me," Jackie said. She highly doubted that he would. Usually, she could convince him to do whatever scheme she had in mind, but this one was... a little dangerous.

"I'll get my broom, and we'll stash it on the second floor, and then you go below the Astronomy tower, and I'll go up."

It was a well known fact that the astronomy tower was the highest point the school had. If she was going to do it, she may as well do it right.

[Dean Fisher]

Dean looked at Jackie like she was crazy. "Jump with you? What happens if we just keep falling and splat on the ground? That wouldn't be a good thing. Remind me next time to think before I speak." He shook his head.

"And you're doing it off the Astronomy Tower?" Dean sighed. There wasn't going to be any stopping her. However, he would be there if she fell. He could do that. Plus, he would make sure he had his broom at his side, just in case.

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

"It would be fun!" She tried to sell it to him, but she didn't think he was buying it. "All right. Fine... but you'll be at the bottom to catch me, right?" She asked, once again giving him the puppy eyes that usually got her *anything* she asked for.

"Come on," she said, standing up and taking his hand.

[Dean Fisher]

"Someone's gotta make sure that you don't go 'splat' on the ground," he said. "And stop looking at me like that." He shook his head. "You know that I'll be there to catch you. I'm always here to catch you." Dean smiled at her.

His cheeks flushed as she took his hand. Dean didn't let go, he simply held on. "Alright, alright. Let's go get this over with..."

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

She grinned and nearly pulled him out of the room.

"Tell you what... the Gryffindor commons are close to here... I'll go get my broom, why don't you go ahead and go downstairs. Oh! And what should we drop to test this?" She'd almost forgotten that part.

[Dean Fisher]

"Tell you what. We won't drop anything. You can just summon your broom and count how long it takes to get there, and then we can replace the broom on the first floor. That would make more sense. I'll wait for you, because it'll be easier if I take your broom and put it on the first floor on my way down." He ran a hand through his hair, causing a little to fall in his face. "That would make more sense, wouldn't it?"

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

"How will we know how long it takes me to drop?" She asked. Did it really do any good to know how long it took the broom if they didn't know how fast she would fall?

"Or am I misunderstanding you?"

[Dean Fisher]

"The way I can see the situation is this. You count for how long it takes your broom to get to you on the roof. Then you take that number, half it, and then that's when you drop. If you half the time, then that will give you a chance to drop from the top of the tower and give you plenty of room before you hit the ground if you are not able to mount the broom quick enough." That seemed to make decent sense. "Also, because of your body mass, and because of gravity, you'll fall pretty fast, however you gave a pretty good distance to fall, there for that gives the broom enough time to get under you so you can get ahold of it."

[Jaquelyn Frazier]

Well, that made sense, and she could follow that logic. "Okay. Thank Merlin one of us ended up in Ravenclaw."

She nodded. There was still a bigger risk involved, the way he laid it out... a slight, what if halving it didn't give it enough time, and she liked that. Loved it, in fact.

"Let's get my broom, then."

[Dean Fisher]

He smiled down at her. "If anything goes wrong, I'll be on the ground waiting to catch you." Dean gave her a wink. "Alright then. Let's go get it." He still held on to her hand and walked over to the Gryffindor portrait. He couldn't believe that he was going ot let Jackie go through with jumping off the Astronomy Tower. However, at least he was going to catch her, just like he always would.