Let's just talk all through the night
There's no need to rush
We can dance, until we die
You and I, will be young forever
- Boyce Avenue, Teenage Dream
"They are getting really annoying." Caroline hissed at Cedric as she glared at his cluster of giggling fan girls all of whom were watching them from behind bookshelves like the mindless trollops that they were.
Cedric was keeping his head down, his nose inches away from the book and looked like he wanted nothing better to disappear inside it. "Just ignore them, Caroline."
Caroline couldn't blame him. Cedric had gone from Hogwarts' Golden Boy to Triwizard Champion in a matter of weeks. If he was popular before then he was ridiculously even more now. He couldn't even study in the library with his best friend anymore without his fan club around. For that alone, Caroline would never forgive Tyler Lockwood for daring Cedric into putting his name in the cup and ruining their lives forever.
"Can't you just tell them to go away or something?"
Caroline had never liked Cedric's fan girls. She and the trollops had never gotten along because she had something they couldn't get – Cedric. And no matter how many times she told them that she and Cedric were strictly platonic, they wouldn't believe her and despised her with a passion that was just downright silly. As if Cedric didn't think of her as anything else but the little sister he never had.
"I tried that," He mumbled in reply. "They chased me into the third floor boys' bathroom."
Caroline sighed. "I can't study with them staring."
"Me neither." He suddenly stood up and started collecting his things. "Come on, let's go."
She blinked up at him in surprise before following suit and quickly shoveled all her belongings in her knapsack.
"Now are you ready to run?" He asked her, an almost cheeky smile on his face, his gray eyes bright.
She didn't hesitate to put her hand in his and they were out of there faster than you could say "After them!"
"A dragon?" Caroline exclaimed in alarm as Cedric told her what the tournament's first task would be. "Are they insane?"
Cedric shrugged, looking less frazzled than he ought to be. "Probably,"
"What is wrong with you Brits? Your idea of a challenge is dancing with death. The farthest we Americans get is TheBiggest Loser and what do you guys do? Dragons!" She said this all out with various hand movements as she paced back in forth, her blonde hair bouncing with each hyper step.
Cedric tried not to stare at the way the sun shone on her hair and made her almost glow like she had a halo. "You're really not doing anything to make me feel better."
She stopped her pacing to stare at him in disbelief. "Cedric, I don't think you understand the situation." She proceeded to say in small words and high emphasis on them. "You. Dragons. Toast."
"Could you calm down, Caroline? I do have a plan."
She crossed her arms over her chest and rolled her blue eyes. He hated it when she did that.
"What are you gonna do? Distract it with something shiny?"
He inclined his head and smiled. "Something like that."
She just stared at him oddly and asked him to continue his explanation.
Caroline squeezed her eyes shot as the dragon kept coughing out fire like mad. Even from the stands they could feel the heat of it and she wondered how Cedric wasn't panicking right then. She certainly was.
"Caroline." Bonnie called her as she pried her fingers off her sleeve.
Caroline could only give a half-hearted apology as she watched her best friend almost get killed by dragon. She didn't think Cedric would look good with burns so he better dodge those flames.
And whoa, Sparky, enough with the fire-breathing!
"You look ugly." Caroline told Cedric as he lay shirtless on a hospital bed in the tent. While he'd been lucky enough not to get eaten or barbequed by the dragon, there were still some singing on his neck and chest and Caroline winced at the red raw flesh.
Madam Pomfrey spotted her and handed her a tube of what she guessed was ointment. "Miss Forbes, why don't you make yourself useful and apply this on Mister Diggory," And then she was off to assist the other champions.
Caroline stared down at the tube in her hands apprehensively for a moment, wondering to herself what to do. She looked up to see Cedric's reaction and glared at him when she saw him smirking at her in amusement, looking all too comfortable there on that bed for a burn victim.
"You heard her, Caroline." He said. "Get to it."
She rolled her eyes and read the instructions on the back of the tube before taking a seat beside Cedric, him moving to accommodate her, and uncapping the tube. The ointment was a light green color and she gingerly applied some of it on the skin of his neck. Cedric shivered at the contact and she retracted her hand.
"Sorry."
He shook his head. "It's all right. It's just cold."
She nodded and fought of the sudden blush in her cheeks before proceeding to care to the burns and applying the ointment, it turned out to be some fast acting stuff because the skin already started to pink in a bit. All the while as she worked, she tried to not pay attention to the fact she was rubbing Cedric's chest, Cedric's naked chest and that his gray eyes were observing her with an intensity she couldn't understand.
"You scared me today, you know." She said quietly as she finished, taking the time to fix the cap on the tube before looking him in the eye. His gray eyes were so intense. She almost forgot her train of thought. "Please don't do that again."
He shook his head. "I can't promise that."
She wanted to scream. He almost got killed today and he still won't back out the stupid tournament?
"You're an idiot." She hissed out before she stood up and ran out the tent.
Caroline and Cedric weren't talking. Well, more of, she didn't want to talk to him and had been avoiding him with a stealth she didn't know she had.
But Cedric had a persistence only known to those close to him and when he wanted something, he got it done so before long he tracked her down when she was freezing her ass off by herself by the lake and being all depressed and emo.
"Caroline." He said her name almost exasperated but she forced herself not to turn and look at him. "Oh come on, Caro!" He threw his hands up, fed up over all this melodrama. "Can you look at me, please?"
No, she would not. He could shout all he wanted but she would not acknowledge him. Not even if they both die of frostbite at this rate (because December was coming near and her limbs really were getting numb).
"I'm sorry okay!" He exclaimed, fully tired of trying to keep his cool because really Caroline could drive him insane with little to no effort at all. "Caroline, please look at me."
Okay, fine, she could spare a glance. He might throw something at her head at this point or transfigure her into a porcupine. She didn't think she'd like either situation.
"What?" She pouted stubbornly and she could see the relief in his eyes, ever so bright.
"I'm not dropping out of the tournament." He told her resolutely, that iron still underneath all his niceness shining through.
She thought as much. She'd only really kept up all the drama cause it'd been amusing for a while.
"Then you better win."
Her relationship with Cedric had always been platonic. He'd practically adopted her as his younger sister the moment he found her wondering on the train lost for a place to go and he invited her to stay in his compartment with his other second year friends. When she got sorted into his house, he helped her throughout her first year and through the years became her best friend and she, his. Even when she became friends with Elena and Bonnie, two Ravenclaws in her year, he was still her confidant and no matter how popular he got, he still never left her.
And okay, she may have had a crush on him every once in a while in the past few years of their friendship. But come on, he was Cedric Diggory. He was nice, smart and good-looking. He had good grades, good friends and a good family. The boy was practically perfect, who wouldn't like him?
Still she knew how things were. He thought of her like a little sister, like she was still the same eleven year old with eyes too big for her face and annoyed the upper class men by talking too much.
So, she didn't expect him to ask her out to the Yule ball. She had no plans on asking him out because that would be weird and he'd go through all the trouble of rejecting her nicely. Instead, she waited for him to tell her who he was going with and thought she could go with Tyler Lockwood (who she heard from the grapevine had plans of asking her) even thought she'd always thought Gryffindors to be too obnoxious for their own good.
Cedric couldn't dance very well and Caroline took it upon herself to teach him so that by the time the Yule Ball came, he wouldn't look like a total fool. Caroline's grandmother from her father's side still held on to some of her pureblood customs (much to Sheriff Forbes' chagrin) and had her trained at a young age in all sorts of areas to made her better-rounded. Dancing had just been one of them. And Caroline was accomplished enough at it to make sure Cedric would remember left foot from right.
She winced as he stepped on her foot again. He immediately stepped back from her and apologized profusely, blushing red down to his neck.
"It's okay." She told him before pulling him back to the proper stance. "We're going to get this right, okay? Wouldn't want Cho to end up injured or worse yet, think you're some kind of caveman?" She had to keep her tone light and teasing but inside, her insides felt like they were grated into cottage cheese.
He looked at her oddly for a moment, looking like he was going to say something but shook it off and replied with a week "Yeah".
Caroline decided to go stag. It wasn't that she hadn't had any offers. Tyler had asked her out the other week. But she didn't want to go with some boy and end up being jealous over Cedric and Cho the entire night. It wouldn't have been fair to her date and she wasn't the heartless type to do a thing like that.
But she'd like to think it all worked out well enough. Tyler had asked out Vicki Donovan instead who was in the same year as Cedric and a Gryffindor. Bonnie went as friends with Matt Donovan, Vicki's younger brother and another Hufflepuff. And Elena went with her boyfriend, Stefan Salvatore, who was the nicest Slytherin she ever met.
And so maybe, Caroline was all by herself and she had to watch Cedric dance with Cho as people watched them and cooed "Aren't they perfect for each other?" and "They look so good with each other!" It was fine, just fine and fucking dandy. She wasn't even feeling that jealous.
She was going to enjoy her night anyway. There was no reason for her not to after all and she'd stolen Tyler's flask filled with firewhiskey from him earlier without his knowledge.
After watching Cedric dance with Cho for the nth time that night, she sneaked out of the Great Hall to find some place to wallow in self pity and drink her sorrows away. Luckily, everyone was busy partying or finding places to enjoy each other and nobody was around to bother her and she took a seat on the castle floors of an empty hallway, the portraits were already asleep.
Opening the flask, she took a long sip and winced at the burning sensation that followed.
Here was to buying a ridiculously expensive dress for no reason at all but to look pretty for nobody. Here was to Cedric and Cho who would probably bang each other before the night was up. Here was to Cedric who didn't ask her out to the ball. Here was to Cedric, fuck that bastard, for not seeing that she was madly in love with him. Here was to–
"Caroline?"
She turned and saw the boy of her thoughts staring at her in concern, looking handsome in his robes and very much Cho-less. Ha, Cho-less, she liked that word. Wait, was it even a word?
"Cedric," She said his name and hiccupped. Whoops, had she had that much?
She saw his eyebrows furrowed in more concern before crouching down beside her where she was seated on the floor. "Are you okay?"
"No." She shook her head and instantly felt dizzy at the motion. "Wow, everything's spinning."
"I think you've had enough." He gently pried the flash from her hands and she let him. Stupid Cedric, always so responsible nice. Why couldn't he be a big jerk like Draco Malfoy? It would've given her some excuse to hate him. But no, he had to be all perfect and lovable.
Cedric took the seat beside her, placing the flash away from them and turned her to look at him. "What's wrong, Caroline?"
Oh hell, she was drunk. So she told him.
"I love you."
She had the pleasure of seeing those gray eyes widen in disbelief before she fainted.
Caroline had a hung over from hell the next day. All she wanted was to stay in bed all day and wallow under the sheets in her misery but Cedric had sent Elena and Bonnie up to get her up and dressed before dragging her down the stairs for him to whisk her away to some secluded place. Well, not so secluded because it was just their spot near the lake, anyone could walk by at any moment.
But they wouldn't. Because it was in the middle of freaking December and everyone else was being sane by staying indoors instead of outside and enjoying the temptation of frostbite and catching pneumonia.
Merlin, whatever Cedric had to tell her, please make him just spit it out.
"Did you mean what you said last night?" He asked her, his eyes desperate for an answer.
She took that back. Merlin, do you do re-dos?
She opted to play ignorant.
"What did I say?"
He raised an eyebrow at her, obviously not believing her. "Caroline."
She sighed. "Okay, fine. Yes! I meant what I said." She shook her head in exasperation. "Even under heavily influence, all of what I said was true."
"Great."
She looked up at him in surprise and stared into those clear grey eyes, the most brilliant on his face. She opened her to mouth to ask what he meant but then he kissed her.
Wait a second.
He was kissing her, passionately and she suddenly couldn't breathe.
Okay, okay, time to freak out?
He pulled her closer and his hands cupped her face, one of them tangling in her blonde curls and the other tenderly caressing the apple of her cheek. She moaned in delight and kissed him back, enjoying the sweetness of the kiss.
Nope, she was good.
Caroline kept still and forced herself not to panic as Cedric threaded them through the cold, dark waters and to the stands where loads of people reached for them, helped them up and covered them with numerous layers of towels and blankets. She let out a relieved sigh when Elena and Bonnie bought enveloped her in a hug, happy that she was okay. Stupid tournament was going to be the death of them all.
She looked up to look at Cedric who was being congratulated by his friends, clapping him on the back and cheering. She rolled her eyes at the display and when Cedric turned to look at her, eyes bright and smile nothing short of adoring, she smiled back just the same.
"Most valuable treasure, huh?" She mouthed at him and delighted as his face reddened instantly.
The third task was coming closer and closer and Caroline knew the pressure was getting to Cedric. She found him at their spot near the lake, one night, looking like he just might chance it by jumping into the still cold waters and killing himself. Like her, when Cedric was feeling low, he liked to hide himself from the world, preferring to lick his wounds in private.
"Cedric?" She quietly called and he turned to her, eyes distant. "Are you okay?"
"What would you say if I told you 'no'?"
She hesitated for a moment before answering, trying to find the right words. "I'd say that it's okay to be scared."
He shook his head, turning back to the lake. "I'm not scared."
"Of course you are."
He kept quiet and they both wallowed in it and stared into the dark waters of the lake.
Before they knew it, the day of the last challenge came and Cedric stood outside the maze with the other contestants, students cheering for their favored champions. Caroline sat in the stands, her heart racing and she couldn't explain why. Maybe it was just adrenalin, she was just anxious about what was going to happen in the maze. But why did she feel such a sense of foreboding?
"Why don't you give Ced a kiss for good luck?" Bonnie shouted above the sound of the trumpets and cheering, grinning widely.
Caroline rolled her eyes.
"Come on, Caro!"
Elena and Bonnie were pulling her down the stands before she knew it and she blushed profusely at Cedric who was grinning widely at them.
"Caroline's here to say goodbye," Elena said.
Caroline tried to ignore the way her gut clenched at the sentence. Nothing was going to go wrong, she was just being paranoid.
"Well, thank you, Elena, Bonnie." He smiled at them before turning to her, eyes expectant. "Clock's ticking."
She rolled her eyes at his arrogance before stepping forward and pulling him down for a kiss.
He better win. He had to.