Klouny [Sluggy!]

[Dimitri Mikhail Zolnerowich]

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Weekend.
Dimitri had to admit, after a few weeks off for Christmas (and a brief visit home just to thank the neighbour for looking after his garden), the first week after always took some time getting used to. Not that he disliked teaching - perish the thought - but compared to, say, Slughorn he was but a rookie teacher of course: he had only been teaching for a few years. He loved it, though. Dimitri couldn't imagine himself doing anything else. When he had first come to England he had thought of maybe applying at Gringotts as a magical engineer for the carts and things, because it had sounded pretty interesting, but he had no education and his technical insight wasn't as good as it probably should be for the job. Plus - he imagined it was a bit of a lonely job, flying around dark caves inspecting rails..
No, Dimitri was not even considering quitting his job - but he was glad it was Friday afternoon and all he had to do was think about the lesson plans for next week (he hadn't given any of his classes essays for this particular reason, he was a little behind, especially as he was thinking about setting up an extracurricular duelling class or something).

But he'd look into that later. For now, he had installed himself in one of the comfortable armchairs (the emerald green one - he had a soft spot for the colour green), a cup of tea steaming next to him on the table (ginger spice), and a book in his lap (Смерть Ивана Ильича (The Death of Ivan Ilyich) by Tolstoy). He should probably be reading up on things for his seventh years, but it was Friday afternoon and he needed a bit of distraction before getting to that. He'd just read until dinner and then get some work done in the evening.
..or tomorrow. Dimitri was feeling lazy.

[sluggy]

As a Head of House, for Slytherin of course, Horace had to stay in the castle over the christmas holiday. He didn't really mind it all that much; students would leave gifts for him, some would purposefully remain behind just for little old him, and then of course there were the Alumni, his old students from the Slug Club. The presents they would give him varied from a simple jar of crystallised pineapple, his favourite, to a forty galleon solid gold cauldron. This year his favourite present came from a young gringotts employee that he'd aided somewhat and had sent him a goblin made dagger with a slytherin serpent curling around the lower half of the blade and arching to the side to provide the perfectly ergonomicallyformed handle to allow fine slicing of roots without straining the wrists or risking one's fingers.

And of course, he loved his Christmas get together.

Now though, Christmas was over. He didn't mind that all that much either; he loved his job. All those bright minds, so much to teach, so much for them to learn. And after a long day's teaching he could return to the staffroom, sit in his chair, emerald green, easily the most comfortable one, and close to the fire's warmth and light, though not too close, have a little glass of port and look through the essays handed in that day.

As it was, upon entering the staff room with a sheaf of parchment under one arm, and his slippers, magically warmed, under the other, his chair, the emerald one, you remember, was occupied. By the new Defence Teacher.

"Ah, Dimitri, how lovely to see you.How are you?" He opted for a slightly less comfortable chair and a tone tinged gently with disappointment in the joviality. Sat down in the chair, minerva's preferred one, in fact, he shifted slightly, oohing and aahing as he attempted to get comfortable.
"Oh my, seems as though my rheumatism playing up again." HE glanced longingly at the chair and then shook himself gently, smiling. "Sorry, always makes me a little senile when I'm out of my chair." Horcae gave a gentle laugh and stretched his legs out too.

[Dimitri Mikhail Zolnerowich]

Dimitri wasn't near as well-connected as Horace was. Not that he minded in particular, because he had been 'well-connected' when he'd still lived with his parents and he hadn't liked it one bit. Not that he minded company, he was an amiable fellow, but it was the pretence, the act of trying to seem important, that he didn't care for at all. Since he'd come to England, he had made a few close friends (of which at least half muggle, actually) and that was good enough for him. He didn't want crowds to entertain and Christmas parties he had to hire cooks for because it was too much to do himself. No, Dimitri had learned to appreciate his privacy, instead.
Not that there was any kind of real privacy at Hogwarts, of course.

What Slughorn and Dimitri did have in common, however, was their love for teaching. Maybe they had different reasons, but the essence was the same. Helping students improve themselves made Dimitri feel better about himself, as though he was doing something good in the world as if doing so made up for the damage he'd caused in the first two decades of his life. It made him feel like he mattered and although he knew that students mostly loved Defense because it was exciting and dynamic, he did feel a little flattered whenever one of the teenagers tried extra hard in class or for an essay.
Also, he liked the contact he had with his colleagues. Not that his colleagues were his best friends (though he did count Dumbledore as one, to be very honest), but he got along well with most of them, Sprout and MacGonagall in particular. Only that new German man, Sascha, he didn't like his ways much.. Nothing he could do about it, though - you can't be friends with everyone.

Emerged in his book, Dimitri didn't look up as the door to the stafroom opened, only when Slughorn spoke to him. “Oh, fine, fine - had a good Christmas?” he asked, watching as the potions master sat down and looked uncomfortable. Even though he had been alone when he had sat down and the chair was, of course, not reserved for anyone in particular, Dimitri felt slightly guilty watching Horace having to settle for something uncomfortable. He didn't even doubt the truth of his colleague's as he spoke - because Dimitri would also have moved if Slughorn had simply asked him to switch seats, so why exaggerate?
“No, no - have mine,” he said, his voice still tinged with a slightly darker accent than usual - something undoubtably due to his reading Russian. Getting up and putting his things out of the way so Horace could sit, he moved to the chair next to where he'd been sitting. A little less comfortable, but still good enough for him.

[sluggy]

Now Horace had it on good authority that the young professor before him had rather a few connections of his own. And he fully intended to strike up a friendship of sorts with the young man.
He doubted the other Professor would be going high places, but a HOgwarts teaching position was fairly prestigious on its own. And it was always nice to have a second opinion identical to yours when the staff had their discussions, such as whether ginger nut biscuits should be regularly supplied to the staff room or not. Horace was firmly in the yes camp. After all, Teaching was stress ful and biscuits were a nice touch, more homely that way. And it wasn't the same with rich teas or digestives. Horace had in fact suggested they have cakes supplied, but no-one had been able to decided which cake to get and while the House-elves had considerable numbers, they too had their limits. As did the side of the coffee counter. Apparently seven different cakes nad their associated plates was a little too much and the counter had rebelled by kncking plates off until only three remianed.

"Oh yes, my favourite holiday, I think. How was yours? Any presents from Saint Nick's house-elves?" HE smiled broadly, not intending to patronise, merely to pass a small amusing comment with a little tongue-in-cheek humour that was his styel.

"Oh no really, it's- are you sure?" Horace didnt' give him time to take back his decision, and once Dimitri was enough out of the way, he settled into the comfortable emerald upholstery, slippers on his feet and the papers on the nearby table. "Ahhh.." The Potions profesor let out a long contented sigh. "It's very kind of you to give up this chair for an old wreck of a wizard like me."

A flick of his wand and the port hidden in a secret cupboard in the wall floated across the room and poured itself into two glasses. One of the glasses, after a prompting jab from the wand mad eits way over to the Defence Professor.

"How have you been finding classes? A little different to your Alma mater?" He sipped the port and tutted at the essay he was perusing, putting the glass down to make a small corrective but not disparaging note in neutral green ink, none of that agressive red for him.

[Dimitri Mikhail Zolnerowich]

To be completely honest, Dimitri did actually like Horace. Granted, the man sometimes used incredibly British phrases he didn't quite understand - but wasn't that part of his own personal learning process? The potions teacher was a jovial, usually good-humoured fellow and who would Dimitri be if he didn't like the man without any good reason?
Now Horace was right about Dimitri not going high places. After all, we all know that if Dimitri had had a desire to go high places, he wouldn't have left Russia years ago. No, Dimitri was pretty happy where he was right now. Sure, the summer holidays were a little quiet, but hadn't he wanted quiet? Also, after a whole year filled with loud and increasingly-louder teenagers, some quiet wasn't all that unwelcome.
However, if Horace wanted an ally when it came to regular biscuits or cake in the staff room, I fear Dim will disappoint him. He has no taste for biscuits. Fun fact: he especially abhors shortbread (but he'd better not let Minerva hear him say that about a Scottish delicacy!). As stressful as teaching was (he did agree with Slughorn on that one), sugar was not a way of unwinding nerves - not for Dimitri, at least.

"My Christmas was fine, thank you." Dimitri smiled a little, marking the page in his book and closing it. It would be wrong to read and have a conversation at the same time, after all - impolite. He didn't really answer Horace's question about presents, because none he had received were particularly memorable. He'd gotten candy floss from Dumbledore (as stated before) and a number of other small things from some of the colleagues he got along with rather well. A few of his muggle neighbours had given him some things, like they did every year, to make the quiet single foreign man feel welcome in their neighbourhood. This year there had been a disturbingly amount of food - cakes and pies and home-baked cookies and things. As though he had mouths to feed! He really didn't quite know what to do with thim, but he'd been too polite to refuse, so he had taken them back with him - they were still in his trunk, untouched. Apart from that food-incident, nothing worthy of remembering had happened.
"It's a pity it's only once a year." Well, not really.. Dimitri was sure that two or more Christmasses a year would take the shine off it, but he was trying to make polite conversation, of course.

Horace needn't worry about Dimitri re-claiming the chair in the last second. Dimitri had felt quite bad for not offering the chair sooner and he was all too relieved to switch. He didn't want to cause his colleague unnecessary trouble and he didn't mind sitting somewhere else, after all. He smiled a little warmer when Slughorn called him kind. Dim knew it was silly of him, but small compliments like those made him feel better. "Don't mention it. It's the least I can do."
He hadn't failed to notice that Horace liked the small (and not so small) luxury pleasures in life and the port only served to illustrate that point. Before Dimitri had the chance to quietly object that he still had tea and that he didn't often drink, the glass was in front of him and it seemed impolite to refuse.
"Classes?" he echoed for a second as Horace had asked him a question. "Oh, fine, fine," Dimitri assured his colleague while trying to remember what 'Alma Mater' actually meant (which he knew, deep down). "Very, ah, very different, indeed," he added with a nod, sipping the port and pulling a slight face - too sweet for him. Good thing that Slughorn seemed occupied marking essays and couldn't have noticed. "A better sort of different, though." Dimitri was all too glad that this school was very different from his own, he would never have gone to work here if it had been even remotely similar.
"I have to admit it takes me a while to get back into gear after the holiday season, though," Dimitri confessed. "In fact, I think I ought to be working on lesson plans for next week." The tone in his voice betrayed that although he didn't particularly feel like making lesson plans at this very moment, he wasn't averse to it in general. He didn't mind teaching, nor all the extra work that was part of teaching - his brain was just still in holiday setting, apparently.