No one should like reading that much. (Zoe)

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin saw one girl in the library every single day. He would walk by and she would be sitting in there reading or doing homework. He never saw her with anyone and he had started to feel bad for her. He wanted to get her out of the freaking library for at least a little while so he had decided to ask her to the ball. He came into the library and started to look around for her.

[Zoe Stratford]

Although Zoe had pretty much caused the break up of Dean and Jackie, she honestly had no clue. She didn't even think it odd that people in her own house were shunning her more than usual. As her father always said, it's lonely at the top, and loneliness is just the price to be paid for greatness. Zoe was used to being alone with her books. They were the one thing she understood; the only place she felt at home.

After her breakdown, her studying had become a little less frantic, but just as constant. She spent more time in the library now, because the common room was too noisy, with talk of the stupid ball. And she couldn't regret all of her studying, since she had spent the weekend of the attack studying in the library. Studying may have saved her life, she reasoned.

She was currently working on her Arithmancy homework, and was so deep in her studies that she never even noticed someone walking up to her table.

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin sat down right across from the girl he had been looking for. 'There you are' he thought to himself. He sat and put his feet up on the table right on her book because he had the feeling she wasn't going to look up otherwise. He put his hands behind he head and grinned. "So whats your name anyways," he asked because he was sure she knew of his presence by now.

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe couldn't have been more shocked when a pair of feet suddenly intruded on her vision. She jumped back and raised her eyes to see the person to whom the feet belonged.

She stared at him for a long moment, almost not comprehending what was happening. It had been days... maybe even a week since she'd had an actual conversation with someone besides a teacher or a librarian.

"Er... I'm Zoe," she said at last. "And who are you?"

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin saw he shocked look and smiled a little more. He saw her stare at him for a second and he waited. 'Her name is Zoe, remember that' he thought to himself.

"I'm Gryffin," he said with a smile. "Okay next question," he said tilting his head to the side, "why are you always in the library?"

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe looked at him as if he had two heads. Who was this guy and what did he want? Was he teasing her? She didn't really care what other people thought of her, because her father had always told her people would act like that around her, and they were really just jealous. She was doing this for herself and her parents, because they always said she had so much potential. It would be a shame to waste it by being mediocre.

"Uh... because I have to study?" she replied, as if the answer should have been obvious. "My grades have to be perfect."

[Gryffin Edwin]

'Wow, have to have perfect grades okay' he thought to himself. He moved his feet and sat back up leaning in towards her. "Why the need for perfection, no one is perfect" he said raising an eyebrow. "What do you do for fun" he asked picking up one of the books in front of him and reading the title.

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe rolled her eyes at him. "Well, maybe no one's ever been perfect before, but no one else is me," she said in a lofty tone. "I tested at a genius IQ level when I was 5. So there's a lot of expectation on me to succeed. I have to be perfect, because... well, because I do."

As he picked up her book, Arithmancy Decoded: Uncovering the Truth, she frowned and snatched it away from him. "I don't have fun," she said disdainfully. "I don't have time for fun."

The last time she'd tried to have fun had been with Dean. And she'd ended up rejected and brokenhearted, and ore obsessed with her school work than ever. Relationships didn't make sense, but studying did.

[Gryffin Edwin]

'Genius level at five' he thought 'dang she must really be smart.' Gryffin felt bad for her, no one should have such high expectations, they would ether work themselves silly or be disappointed.

When she snapped the book up he just held his hands up in a sorry kind of expression. When she said she didn't have time for fun, Gryffin thought she was getting a little ridiculous. "No time for fun? Seriously, you never have any fun," he asked with a worried expression on his face.

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe faltered. Something about his tone made her feel suddenly foolish. How must she look to others--frantically studying, with her nose forever in a book, never talking to anyone? Normally she didn't care, but she'd never thought of herself as an object of pity, either. The way Gryffin looked at her just then, she felt that he was feeling sorry for her, and it was an odd sensation.

"Not really, no," she said. "I did once. Someone tried to get me to loosen up, and I messed it up. I'm not good at having fun... I don't even read for fun."

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin's worried expression got even worse. 'Don't even read for fun' he thought amazed 'who reads for fun anyways. Wow, she really needs to get out a little,' he thought. "Okay look Zoe I know you don't feel like you know me, but you should. Cause I may be a little crazy but I have a good balance on responsibility and fun," he said with a nod. "You however need to have a little fun, you don't want to look back on your life and regret not taking chances," he said in a more serious tone. "Look take a chance, go to the ball with me," he said plastering the goofy grin back on his face.

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe stared at him blankly for a long minute. Of all the things he could have said, this was just about the last thing she had expected. The bit about taking chances and having fun was certainly something she'd heard before. Dean used to say it to her all the time. But the part that threw her was the part where he actually asked her to the ball. For one thing, she had her head so buried in her books that she hadn't actually realized there was a ball going on. But the fact that this guy, who didn't know her from Rowena Ravenclaw, was actually asking her to go to the ball was even more unbelievable to her.

Zoe was not ignorant of the fact that she was pretty. She often did get compliments on her looks. But her obsession with school work was largely considered to be a turnoff, even in Ravenclaw, where everyone was supposed to like studying. So ulitmately, her looks were not important to her. They meant nothing.

But here was someone asking her to the ball... just because. Zoe didn't understand it.

"You.... you want to go to the ball with me?" she said, disbelieving. "Why?"

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin watched all sorts of emotion run across her face for a few minutes before she finally responded with a really questioning toned why me. He looked at her square in the eyes and grinned. "Why not," he asked grinning even wider.

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe continued to look at him strangely, but her eyes had softened. Slowly but surely, he was starting to break through her defenses. "I... I didn't even know there was a ball," she said, a hysterical bubble of laughter erupting from her mouth. "I really have been buried too deep in my books, haven't I?"

She sighed softly, then bit down on her lower lip. "But... I don't have a dress."

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin waited to see how she would react next and she started to smile. Then she even laughed. Gryffin grinned widely and chuckled a little with her. "How did you not know there was a ball, its all everyone is talking about as far as I know. I would think it would be worse with girls," he said nodding slowly. "I think you have been so far in your books it's scary. That is how I found you actually. I came in here to get a book and tripped over your chair. You didn't even look up, I couldn't decide if you were being rude or just crazy intense. So I looked in the next day and here you were. That happened for a few days and then I decided you needed a break so here I am," he said smiling at her.

Then he laughed a little, "Zoe do you really think I have dress robes? You might have a since of humor after all," he said with a little chuckle and grinned at her.

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe looked down, but she was smiling softly. "I, uh... I don't talk to a lot of people," she confessed. "Or they don't talk to me. I'm not sure which. Maybe it's both."

It was strange, though... she usually wasn't very good at talking to people. But she was doing OK with Gryffin. It was getting surprisingly easy. And she actually didn't even feel compelled to get back to her books right away.

"Maybe I do need a break," she said. "I kind of had a breakdown a few weeks ago, because I was working so hard. I spent a whole weekend on forced bedrest in the Hospital wing. Since then, I've been trying to catch up..."

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin nodded when she said she might need a break. Yet he went to a mixture of sock and concern when she talked about her breakdown. "Look how about this," he said grabbing her books and moving them beside him and leaning in towards her. He grinned. "Okay so background? Siblings, parents, life, favorite color," he said with being a little sarcastic on the last part. "Tell me about you," he said putting his hand in his hands and staring at her with a smile.

[Zoe Stratford]

When he pulled her books away, Zoe reached out for them, almost like a reflex. She felt a little nervous without them; they were like a security blanket to her, that kept her from dealing with the rest of the world. But she let her hand slip back, so that it was in front of her. She still had a quill in one hand and she began fiddling with the feathers out of a subconscious need to keep her hands busy.

"My parents are muggles. My Dad teaches at University, and my Mum is a nurse. I'm an only child and they fuss over me constantly, telling me how brilliant and perfect I am and how I need to work hard to live up to my potential. If i hadn't got my Hogwarts letter, I probably would already be at University right now... maybe even sooner. I was taking the most advance classes... I do calculus problems to help me relax."

[Gryffin Edwin]

Gryffin understood so much more about her just from those few things. He nodded and gave her a sympathetic smile. "Listen I know you might have heard this before or you think I am being foolish, but you can't always try to live up to your parents expectations. You need to live for you...I mean it is your life. Yaknow"he said tilting his head to the side again. He kept looking at her with sympathetic eyes. He understood the pressure to try to own up to someones standards because he use to feel that way with his family being pure blood and all. He soon figured out you just have to live for you or you can't be very happy. "By the way don't be so nervous," he said looking at her hands "it will be okay."

[Zoe Stratford]

Zoe frowned slightly and continued to fidget with her quill. "It's not just my parents," she said. "They encourage me... motivate me... But I want this, too. I do. I just... I want to be special. I need to be special. If I don't have my studies... if I'm not perfect... what else have I got? I've been working like this so long I don't know how to do or be anything else. I tried... it didn't work. I ruined things."