Cigarettes [Mattheo Riddle]

eight

blaire woke the next morning with a start. she felt exhausted- and drained.

closing her eyes firmly and blindly locating the bathroom, she opened the door and stood above the sink. she looked at herself.

the unfamiliarity of a faint, yet undeniable mark on her neck. "are you serious? he barely even-" blaire sighed. she took out cho's makeup bag and dabbed the mark with concealer frantically.

she looked at the mark however, and felt a rush of reminiscence. he was so caring, recently, but blaire doubted he was being sincere.

after washing her face, she got dressed and left for her first lesson.

"lestrange."

blaire nodded to snape and sat beside mattheo. he studied her carefully, and noticed the concealer.
with his mouth closed, he gave a small laugh. he then raised his thumb to his lips and licked it.
"come here." he said to blaire. she frowned, but moved closer.
he harshly rubbed the concealer with his thumb.
then he could see his lip's marks.

"are you joking? it wasn't even that serious-" blaire got chills from his morning voice. it was so harsh, and rough, but somehow so soft.

"i know." blaire replied, pulling her collar back up.

mattheo turned away and focused on snape. he then started writing in his book aggressively.
"fuck." he whispered.

"what?" blaire asked, turning to him.
"quill snapped." he said, getting up to get a new one.

•

blaire decided half-way through the day that she would go to the astronomy tower at midnight.
but, it was currently lunch.

blaire sat with cho and a frigid-looking cedric, eating tomato soup and bread.

luna, opposite her, was reading the daily prophet. "see? look here, blaire." she held up the newspaper and turned it around so blaire could read the article.
"death eater attack on muggles? tell me why i'm hardly surprised." blaire said, then continued chewing her bread.
"you're hardly one to talk, you're dead obsessed with mattheo riddle." cho snapped.

"it's him who's obsessed," blaire swallowed her food. "and why are you defending death eaters?" blaire accused, before filling her spoon with more soup.

"ugh, ced, don't you agree with me?" cho winced.
"no, they're horrible people." cedric said, shaking off cho.

"see." blaire said, pointing her spoon at cho.

"blaire, would you like to come with me to the library?" luna asked, putting her newspaper in her satchel.

"sure." blaire got up from her seat and followed luna.

the beautiful, antique library. mahogany bookcases, worn, ancient books filled with outstanding knowledge. dusty shelves with hidden secrets nobody else knows. and the cozy ambience of quills scratching hurriedly on paper.

"here, i need to research mandrakes, my father's friend was petrified." luna said, stroking her dainty finger against the spines of the books.

"oh? how did that happen?" blaire asked, leaning against a bookshelf behind them.

"nobody knows. we expect it was nargles." she said mistily.