[Part of Gokudera is holding out hope one of them will return. It’s not making dealing with them leaving any easier, certainly, but this is not the first time he’s lost someone he’s loved. He’s… hardening over it, growing a bit more calloused, bitter.

He isn’t trying to avoid how he feels, but he also isn’t eager to talk.]

I’ll try.

[Gokudera opens his journal and starts to write in it, a script made of strange symbols, something he made up to pass his time in classes back home.]

I know the magic has been acting up.

[He doesn’t work magic into his studies unless he’s on the training grounds, where, if something can go wrong, no one else would be around to get hurt.]

Rose left, the veil was opened, then Zuko left. I’m too tired to practice any magic right now, anyways…

[Gokudera turns his head away and coughs gently, smoke rising from his mouth before he’s back to writing in his journal. The words aren’t coming out right, symbols crossed out and rewritten in red pen as if he’s grading his own journal.]

Are you any good at poetry?