Max felt like a strange molten mix of tired and wired. The journey in, meeting so many kids, and the sorting left him overwhelmed and exhausted at first. A delicious meal soothed him, and made him sluggish. Then the nervousness and thrill of post-dinner broom racing gave him a second wave of energy. Max wanted to get to his room, but he also wanted to jump on his bed to see how good it is. He wanted to fall right asleep, but he also wanted to anxiously pour over his schedule and fuss over the stuff he needed to bring. He’d never had his choice of so many “things” that should be on his person at any given moment and was worried about finding it all in a rush to class in the morning.
The boy followed where the Prefect directed him, and resolved that he should be practical about this. Sort through his things for tomorrow first, jump around or explore the common room next. He went into the room not expecting it to be empty, but he couldn’t school his features fast enough to conceal his profound disappointment once he clocked who was in it.
Oh. It’s you. Max’s thoughts exactly. He responded with narrowed eyes, and a quick assessment that his bed was directly next to this freakishly tall redhead. It’s not as though Cal had said anything that offensive, honestly. But in Max’s mind, he didn’t have to. Everything about him signaled things that Max did not like. Rich and probably a big entitled brat, like his stepbrother Nick. Cal and Nick would probably get along so well if they met. Cal never had to lose his mom like Max did, or meet a strange crazy man that was supposed to be his dad like Max did. Cal even started school with some friends already. Cal would probably make fun of him too, just like that tall bully at the orphanage. Already Max’s blood started to roil, just thinking about
the incident and how Cal's smug face would be there laughing with the rest of them.
The boys just glared at each other. Maybe it was only three seconds, but it felt like a whole minute. When neither of them said anything else, Max finally huffed and broke eye contact. Obviously it’s
me. But he wasn’t about to be made to feel unwelcome in his own dormitory. His trunk was there right next to Cal's, and his owl was here too —
Merda! The owl!
Becks had been explicit with him about the one thing with Mort, and that was that he didn’t like staying caged and Max needed to let him out
right away. Only Max went off after dinner and took an extra long time today to get back to his room. The owl was huffing and as frustrated as Max was, apparently, jumping around in his cage with many an indignant squeak. The brunette’s frown turned into a scowl (he didn’t want this dumb bird anyways!), and he stomped across the room to the cage to unclasp its little cage door. Mort instantly darted out, squawking up a storm as it informed Max of his grave error.
“Statazit,” he grumbled under his breath for the bird to shut up as it pecked incessantly at his curls. Capable of dealing with only one problem at a time, Max waved him off and continued to ignore stupid Callum as he went to the window between their beds. He swung it open to the cool night air outside, and stood aside for Mort to take off uttering something crossed between angry-and-harrumph-thanks hoots.
Max watched him go out for a second, deciding to maintain an unbothered attitude by stupid Cal and his stupid looks. He decided to lean up against the window and stick as much as he could of his head and upper body out. This was easily the tallest building he’d ever been in, nothing in Rome was allowed to be bigger than the Vatican. So he leaned further out to inspect. Brown eyes widened as he could see the picture-perfect night sky with sparkling stars and moon silhouetting impressive mountaintops and a great big lake.
This is pretty. I guess.
Callum wasn’t sure how he was still standing. With all of the excitement and chaos of today, what with saying goodbye to his parents at the station, to meeting all these new people, then being sorted and following the crowd to the common room? It had been one crazy long day and one that Callum needed some time to properly process and digest. He’d been assigned a dorm and as he climbed up into the appropriate space, he noted his trunk and things were already there. Thank goodness; there was only so long Callum could bear to be separated from his notebook and this had already been much too long. 
![[Image: Kc9h1cI.png]](https://i.imgur.com/Kc9h1cI.png)