Story Title - Sensing Senses

Words - 1894

Rating - G. K.. It's fine for everyone, okay?

Summary - No matter how hard we try to figure ourselves out, the simple fact is that we are too close to even try. So how do others see us?

AN - I got this idea shortly before I had to go on a five hour car ride, so the story was moving around in my head for a while.. Hope it turned out as cool as I was hoping it would, because the idea just seemed to interesting to pass up. Oh yes, and reviews would be much appreciated. Thanks!

Everyone seems to have a specific group of things that fits them, that can help to sort them into a bunch of different groups. People know some of these on their own, usually by way of likes and dislikes, favourites and hated things. However, those that truly help to classify us can only be seen by those close enough to know us, but not enough to be influenced by their own feelings about the person they are classifying. It's a delicate balance, which may explain why so many people wander around, hoping to figure out for themselves who they really are. It's either finding a person with this balance of familiarity, or getting to know someone else, and they you, so intrinsically that it's nigh impossible for either of you to not know the other completely. This last sort of relationship is rather hard to find outside of family though, and those in your family can frequently have too many shades of love or memories of how you used to be to accurately asses anyway.

Now, I may simply be a portrait, and a rather new one compared to most of the others around here, but as such I get to do quite a bit of observing, something I can tell my actual portrait-subject enjoyed to do in life. I have found many ways to classify people; through colours, houses, though that's not much fun nor does it require any creativity, and other sorts of things. Recently, I've taken to using the five common senses. No, no! It's really not quite as silly as it sounds. If you take the time to think about it for a moment, it really makes quite a lot of sense, if you don't mind the weak pun. If someone will just pass through the corridor, I can show you what I mean..

Anytime now..

People really do come through here, you know.. I can get a fair amount of traffic at certain times of day, though I fear you may have come at one of the slower hours...

You see, I'm rather hesitant to move as it is a rather late hour, and I do not wish to disturb any of the other portrait-dwelling citizens by just popping into their frames or backdrops..

Oh look, here's one now! And I'd recognise the face anywhere, as well as, I'm sure, most of the school. If not all of the school.. That one there, is predominately a Touch sort of chap. I've seen him through here many times, and either with people or not, he's always touching something. When he walks with his mates, he's got an arm slung over someone's shoulder, or a hand reaching out to hit whomever he feels has made a comment deserving of a smack upside the back of the head. While he's with a girl, and much of the time he is, it's an arm around her, or a head resting next to hers, or something or other. Even by himself, it's a hand through that black, shiny hair, or fingertips running over the stones in the walls. See? How he's constantly moving his hands over things, as if everything can be discovered through simple contact. His name? I can't seem to recall it at the moment... Maybe in a bit..

But you see now, what I'm speaking of?

Perhaps another demonstration.

Ah yes, this one I know as well. Half the time he is the one receiving the previously said smack up the back of his head the first one likes to hand out so much. This one took a bit longer to place. Hm.. I'm sure you'd like the name for this one as well, ay? I believe it was Peter, though the surname I'm unsure of. This one though, I had to follow a bit longer to be sure. I finally determined him to be Taste. He ironically just happens to be a bit large around the middle, but I assure you, that wasn't how I sorted him. Well, it wasn't the only reason I sorted him.. No, I've watched the eyes of this one, even as he watches others. He seems to want to try to do what they do, to feel a bit of their expertise, to taste their relative glory. Young Peter here also has a sweet tooth for a spot of power, hence some of the people he tags along with. Listen, he's saying something..

Serious about what?

Oh! Sirius Black! That was the first lad! Of course! You must forgive me though, I see a great many people everyday, and with the small group of other portraits who have been so kind as to allow me to visit their frames in order to continue my observing grows, I lose track of more and more of these specific details. You see, despite my own findings that a person is far too close to themselves to classify.. Er.. Themselves, I've found it to be quite obvious that I am ruled by sight.

But never mind me, I can tell you want me to continue by the way you turned to look as this person came around the corner.

Excuse me, these two came around the corner.

Now these two, one doesn't normally see together. At least, one didn't normally see them together so harmoniously until just a couple months ago. That one there, with the red hair, the girl, is a Smell. She was difficult to place too, which only causes me to remember more about her. For instance, her name is Lily Evans. Ha! See, I'm not entirely hopeless.. But I am straying from my commentary. You see, these other three lads that have passed so far, where is the other one, seem to enjoy their fair share of.. Mischief, shall we say. And not only their fair shares, but the fair shares of others too studious or well-behaved to partake of their shares for themselves. This girl is exceptional at sniffing out when they are about to commit or unleash a prank upon an otherwise unsuspecting student body.

Or possibly teachers, so I've heard..

She also does smaller, but less figurative things with the sense of smell, such as pausing a moment to inhale the aroma of her dinner before she eats, smelling any flower someone hands her, save for those she received in the last six years from that boy she's with.

And speaking of him before he too, disappears around that other corner they all seem to be heading towards..

He, James Potter I heard from one of the paintings outside the Gryffindor Quidditch room, is a Sound.

Now, before you say anything, I can tell by that look on your face that you may disagree, just.. Hear me out.

I'm sorry, I'm terrible for puns.. Although I am serious.

That wasn't a pun, don't look at me like that..

I figured him to be a Sound because of the way he loves to stir up a room, because of the way that the first lad gets exponentially louder as James enters the room, and because of the way his face can just light up or darken to the colour of a raven in a pitch black night at the simple sound of a few words, or even at the mere absence of words at all. I've also found it on rather good authority, that Shock-Head here frequently hears things during a quidditch match and responds to those sounds faster than he does to sight.

Sight is obviously though, a very close second.

And look! There he is, the Sight of the bunch in the flesh. I wondered where he'd gotten off to..

Ah ha! See now I can also tell by the look on your face that you are becoming more and more interested! I found this one particularly interesting myself, as it took ages for me to classify him. In the end though, once I had done it, the answer seemed so simple that I felt silly for not noticing it before. This one is rather different from most of the others. In fact, he is most similar to the girl who just passed by. What do you think of him at a first glance?

Quiet?

Calm?

Like he doesn't exactly mesh with these others so much, maybe?

Ha!

Well, perhaps not so much 'Ha!' as 'You're a mite off..' He is quiet and calm compared to the others, and indeed most of the others in the school, and is usually well-behaved, which only further adds to the non-meshing.. However, this one was pulling pranks of his own long before the others could even get theirs to work properly. He's got a sense of humour too, that's as sharp as can be. I even once saw him say something offhandedly to one of the others, an insult, where the other didn't realize the comment for what it was until the next day.

You can tell I spent a while trying to figure this one out, can't you?

Sight's name is Remus.

Ha! You can even tell he's a sight from this very spot; he's looking all over the place as if to unlock or uncover anything that may be hiding here. He even noticed me while I was trailing him those many times ago. That was a nice little conversation we had.

Even he agreed with me about the classifications of people. Many people too, not simply these he is usually with.

And again, it's painfully obvious how long I spent watching this one. Not only by my depth of memory and knowledge, but by how long I've spent speaking of him compared to the other four..

It's easier to speak about a grouping one is more familiar with though.. I'm a Sight, so I figure I know just that much more about them.

I see that yawn. I daresay I've kept you here long enough simply listening to my own blathering about classifying people. It's simply a hobby, and a slightly dangerous one at that. Classifications can lead to rocky paths. The categories have to the broad enough to not pigeon-hole, not narrow enough to be worth the effort. There have to be a bunch of classifications too, not just the one sort. As I said before, I've used colours, and likes or dislikes, as well as school subjects, numbers, seasons, sorts of books, and now senses, among many other sorts of things that have enough facets to be able to apply to people.

You'd best be off though, as it's late, and I doubt if you want to be caught up in whatever they're doing.. Best to not be near the scene of the crime either.. Maybe a couple floors away, perhaps?

Of course you're welcome to come back! Anytime you'd like to have another chat about people, or really just anything. While I do love being able to watch people without getting in trouble for stalking, it can get a tad lonely for a young picture.

Hm.. Well, I'll probably be here, but there is a portrait of an old Frenchman, Athos, in the third floor of the East Tower that I visit from time to time. I've discovered that most Sounds and Sights together can figure out almost anything, or at least get a firm understanding.

Thank you! I hope you have a g'day as well!

Consummatio.

Again, any reviews would just be all up and down with the coolness. Those little notes can just make a day, can't they? Hehe.. Anyway, as I said at the top, hope you enjoyed, and thanks for reading!