4.1
Meeting of Friends-
It's the following day, and even only in the common room can I hear whispers about me and Ewing. Walking down the staircase, the moment I reach the floor, they stop, being replaced with stares. It's before breakfast, and I decide to lounge in the same chair in the corner I used the other morning. I sit there in mostly silence with a book in my hands before I am approached.
"So, you're dating that girl, right?" Burke stands in front of me, looking at me dead on. I nod before placing the book into my bag once again.
"What's your question, kid?" He shuffles on his feet before responding.
"So you really don't care about houses?" This again. I stand up, grabbing his shoulders and guiding him towards the door with a destination already in mind. We walk in silence to the fourth floor and enter the library. With my arm around his shoulder, I bring Burke to the Muggle fiction section. I search for a name before bringing us to a stop. Releasing the boy, I grabbed the first book in the series. The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan. I shove it into the first year's hands, and he looks at it.
"This book was written by a Muggle, and I read it in my first year. You will read it and unlearn everything you think about Muggles." He looks at me with wide eyes. He looks like he will burst into flames for merely holding the book. I cross my arms and ready myself for all the questions on the tip of his tongue. But none come. The young boy simply turns the book around to read the back before leaving the bookcases. I follow him to see him sit at one of the tables and open the chapter book. After telling him to return once he was finished, I left him there and told him to tell me what he thought. I leave him be and go to breakfast, where I will face the wrath of my girls as I didn't respond to any of their texts this morning.
"You're a dick, you know." The first thing that is spoken to me when I sit down in my spot. I place my bag beside me before looking at the two very different but similar girls. I see that neither girl has their usual makeup on while looking at me blankly.
I go to respond, but I am cut off by a girl sitting next to me and slinging her arm around my shoulders. I recognize it as Adelaide because of the lilac perfume that immediately hits me. She kisses my cheek before turning to the girls in front of us, who are now in even worse moods. I smile apologetically at my girls before introducing Adelaide to them.
"You two must be the girls I heard all about the other night." She sends one of her most polite and pretty smiles toward the sour girls. Elle looks down at the coffee in her hands, and Jo simply stares at the two of us. "I'm excited to get to know you two over the year." She looks at me for reassurance before deciding to dip from the situation. She kisses my cheek again before rising and taking her place with her Ravenclaw friends.
"Sorry." I grimace. "We will definitely have a talk about how to approach the two of you." Jo finally slides me my coffee with an eye roll.
"You're still going to walk me to our classes, right?" Elle's voice is timid, and I barely hear its shaky-ness. I reach across the table and grab her hands in mine. I smile softly, telling her I will always pay attention to my girls.
"Nothing is going to take away my love for you two," I say this to where only the two of them can hear me. No one else needs to know how soft I am for these two girls.
—
I am lying on a plush blanket on the classroom floor, the only light source being the candles floating in the air. I wait patiently, scrolling through social media while waiting for Adelaide to appear. We agreed to do this this morning after breakfast—play twenty questions, that is. It was her idea for us to learn more about each other. I had no other ideas, so that's what we will do.
The door opens, and in comes a frazzled Ewing. Her hair is messy, her casual clothes are wrinkled, and she is half-hardly holding a few books and her phone. She stops to observe what I have laid out. She stalks closer and sits across from me while laying her things beside her. She cautiously looks around.
"This is kinda romantic, isn't it?" I tilt my head to the side.
"I suppose, but that certainly wasn't the intention, I can assure you." I lean back on the leg of a desk. "What happened to you?" I motion towards her hair and her clothes. She looks away.
"Was almost caught by a teacher on my way here." Figured as much. "So, how will we start?" That is a valid question, as I have no idea either.
"You go first. You were the one who suggested this, after all." I stretch my legs out and cross my ankles while watching the girl across from me look down at the phone in her hand. "You do know how to play, don't you?" It is a Muggle game, after all. I have no idea how she even knew of it; it must've been her half-blood friends, just like I learned of it years ago in The Room with my girls. Adelaide nods before placing her phone on her lap.
And so the game began. I learned all about her childhood, and she learned of mine. We discovered that we had similar experiences growing up, which caused us to become more comfortable with each other. We each had some questions that we passed so as not to ruin the light mood of the classroom. She asked me about my reputation amongst the students.
"Well, it's a complicated subject."
"And how is that?" She crossed her arms as she tilted her head to the left. I let out a breath before going on to explain myself.
"Most students know me as either a closed-off pure-blood or a man-whore. I have spent my years either snogging or ignoring others, after all." I shrugged and took another drink of my tea.
We are in the classroom until dawn, when we return to our common rooms to prepare for the school day. I walk her to the Ravenclaw Tower before using the passageway to enter the Slytherin commons without using the main door. I freshen up before organizing my notes from the day before at my desk. Arthur is soundlessly asleep on the other side of the room. I get distracted by my phone and spend the rest of my morning on social media, texting back my girls' texts before breakfast.
-1,173 words-