salvation - f.weasley

Red alert

rumour has it - adele

• • •

Grace Colten sits on the bench in the Great Hall, her cheeks red as she has just passed the Gryffindor table. She hides her face while taking her bowl of cereal.

Ania frowns. "Who are you hiding from, G? Snape?"

"We are in a state of crisis Ania, red alert," she says between her teeth as quietly as possible.

"What? What are you telling me? And where were you last night? Did you fall asleep in the library again?"

"I can't talk here. Too many ears," Grace adds, picking up a spoon. "Meet me in thirty minutes in the dorm."

Ania rolls her eyes as she sees Grace down her bowl in one gulp. "It better not be a trap where we spend the day studying Grace I swear because it's bloody Sunday!"

"Believe me, I'd prefer that," Grace adds before getting up and walking across the hall again.

On her way, she meets Fred's gaze but she quickly lowers her head. He can't see what state she is in. Impossible.

Once in the dorm, Grace paces around waiting for Ania. She steals glances at the perfectly folded sweater on her bed, like a piece of evidence at a crime scene that shouldn't be touched.

Ania finally walks out the door and sprawls in her bed, her eyes tired.

"You're a minute late," Grace says, hands behind her back.

Ania grunts before grabbing the cushion and throwing it at Grace. "It's Sunday, Colten!"

"But I said red alert!"

Ania suddenly sits up and a smirk appears on her face. "Wait, so this is about a boy?"

Grace nods, biting her nails.

"Tell me everything."

Grace sighs and starts pacing again. "So yesterday, oh yeah I forgot to tell you that too," she laughs nervously, "I took part in an informal quidditch match against Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, and there was Rog', of course, Diggory, the twins, Wood and Spinet, everything was fine we lost but hey who can beat the great Viktor Krum, no one, right?" she pauses, taking a breath, before starting again.

"Anyway, afterward they organised a sort of little party in the locker room and I don't even know why I went there, you know very well that's not my type, but it was that bloody Weasley who convinced me, anyway, so I have a drink and I talk with Krum, well, it was incredible, well not really because he doesn't talk much actually, but he still congratulated me on my technique, but anyway, then I went to put away the equipment and Weasley came to help me, except that we found ourselves stuck somehow in the locker rooms when we were tidying up, so basically I spent the night stuck in the locker rooms with Fred Weasley and when I woke up I had his sweater on my shoulders."

Once finished, Grace stops, out of breath, waiting for her friend's response. The latter looks at her with a mixture of shock, incomprehension and excitement.

"Why didn't you start with the first sentence?"

Grace sighs and shrugs. "I don't know, I'm lost here, I-"

"What the hell actually happened in those fucking locker rooms?"

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. We tried to open the door, smoked a cigarette, talked badly to each other as usual, then I fell asleep."