#LOL yeah even if these three at first seem like a traditional golden trio

[carewyncromwell]

Back to School Challenge // hosted by @cursebreakerfarrier​​

🦅𝟒𝐭𝐡 𝐒𝐄𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐌𝐁𝐄𝐑: 𝑻𝑯𝑹𝑶𝑼𝑮𝑯 𝑻𝑯𝑰𝑪𝑲 𝑨𝑵𝑫 𝑻𝑯𝑰𝑵🐍

“Here we are -- no one else -- We walked to school all by ourselves. There's dirt on our uniforms From chasing all the ants and worms --  We clean up and now it's time to learn... We clean up and now it's time to learn...”

~“We’re Gonna Be Friends (cover)” by Chad Sugg

x~x~x~x

Jacob Cromwell. Duncan Ashe. Olivia Green. 

Three distinctly different students who seemingly had nothing in common...and yet during their school careers, one almost never saw one without the other two close behind. 

Jacob Cromwell, naturally, was the brains of the trio. The magical prodigy never struggled in an academic setting, running circles around all of his classmates with apparent ease. Jacob didn’t excel in class out of a desire for attention or praise, rather for his passionate love of learning, and his enthusiasm for knowledge was infectious. It made it so even those who found him arrogant couldn’t help but find the boyish giddiness with which he spoke and the brilliant light in his eyes rather endearing. No one would argue, though, that Jacob’s intelligence translated to people-smarts. He never truly realized how much his genius intellect and magical talent alienated his classmates, nor would he likely have empathized much with their position if he had. He didn’t see the need to pull his punches -- if someone wanted to do better than him, then they should just do it, rather than insist he go easy on them. Jacob wasn’t afraid of good, old-fashioned competition: he’d honestly be thrilled to get his arse handed to him by a real opponent, not get all weepy because he lost. This didn’t even touch on Jacob’s temper, which -- when provoked -- could become rather violent. Still, any objective person would notice that Jacob’s rage only ever came out in response to someone he loved being hurt or threatened, never in response to slights against himself. This was part of why so many of his classmates had trouble believing Jacob wasn’t at least somewhat justified in pushing Sharon Edgecombe into the punch bowl during a party in their fourth year.

Duncan Ashe was -- in many ways -- Jacob’s opposite. However good with books Jacob was, Duncan was good with common sense. Jacob was reckless and frequently jumped into dangerous situations without thinking; Duncan always looked before he leapt and frequently had to act as Jacob’s “leash” to rein him in before he did something stupid. Jacob had his head in the clouds almost constantly, while Duncan always kept himself grounded and singularly focused on his goals. And for as sloppily as Jacob dressed and how much he’d grown his hair out, Duncan always kept his hair and uniform clean and neat. It wasn’t uncommon for Duncan to complain about Jacob’s shortcomings within other people’s earshot, to the point that someone might wonder if Duncan really, truly detested Jacob Cromwell...but it wouldn’t take long for the person to realize that whenever Duncan was scolding Jacob for never thinking anything through and for being an idiot, it wasn’t out of hatred. Nobody would spend so much time with someone, keeping them out of trouble and tolerating their bad habits, if they hated them. And there were times -- when Duncan would tease Jacob mercilessly, or when he’d fix Jacob’s tie, or when he’d bite back a smile listening to Jacob go on a diatribe in the middle of Potions class, or when he’d hex someone for messing with Jacob, or even when he’d ward off any less-than-savory “admirers” of his best friend from pursuing him -- when it was clear just how fond Duncan Ashe was of Jacob.

Olivia Green was the mediating force between these two diametrically opposed forces. As the oldest of three kids, she frequently had had to be the “mature one” and settle disputes among her younger siblings, so she had no problem keeping her cool whenever Ashe got fed up with Jacob or Jacob’s violent temper reared its ugly head. Although Jacob and she were both Ravenclaws, Jacob was much more a Ravenclaw in the sense of his love of knowledge and desire to achieve academically, while Olivia was much more one to embrace Ravenclaw’s values of wisdom and creativity. She wrote poetry in the margins of her notes, played guitar, and spoke out on the morality of Transfiguring animals when they couldn’t give consent. She even wore a suede vest she’d embroidered herself over her school uniform, rather than the usual sweater. Ever a contrarian, Olivia found Hogwarts’s curriculum -- like most schools -- faulty in how they measured intelligence with grades and tests, rather than trying to encourage different forms of learning that didn’t involve a lot of memorization and regurgitation. She didn’t do badly in her classes, exactly, but the young Ravenclaw seemed to know early on that she was never going to fit within the confines of what the Wizarding World wanted her to be, and she wasn’t even going to try. This did make Olivia rather non-conformist in her own modest way, which explained why she gravitated toward Jacob, who only ever really lived in the moment and loved “sticking it to the Man,” and Duncan, who had no problem breaking rules to get what he wanted. Despite her slightly critical view of Hogwarts’s classes, though, she still loved the school more than anything, since she -- as a Muggle-born -- had never felt so free to be truly herself until she’d arrived there. 

Together these three ended up dealing with several Cursed Vaults before Olivia mysteriously vanished without a trace. The following year Duncan died in the Prefects’ Bathroom while brewing a particularly potent Erumpent Potion, and Jacob was expelled from school before likewise disappearing seemingly into thin air. It wasn’t until many years later, when Jacob Cromwell’s little sister Carewyn started at school, that the true tragedy of these friends finally came fully to light.