The Years of Blue [2]

Chapter 29: My Summer in Shatters

The prime minister kept his word on our invitation. Two days before the Quidditch world cup, my parents started ordering us to pack our bags and prepare for our trip to Dartmoor later the next day. House elves were prepping rooms for closure, and staff from The Palace Hotel kept coming up with thank you baskets filled with day old pastries.

"Why are they thanking us again?" Theo asked ruefully, his mouth filled with a croissant. It was the day of our departure and so the Palace Hotel was being extremely generous with breakfast pastries as a final parting.

"Take a wild guess, genius," Damion commented as he flicked Theo in the head while passing the table, newspaper in one hand, a half-eaten chocolate croissant balanced in the other.

I was picking ruefully at my pastry, unmoved to eat. My eyes were on the clock that read 10 minutes to 11am. We were to leave soon and Xander had yet to show up. Since July, Xander and I had gone on many adventures to past the time in New York. From sneaking off from the group at parties to hang out, to being near each other in public around our parents. I wasn't a fool about it either. I knew my mother was suspicious of how much time I spent with him. But there wasn't much she could do to pull me away when most of my activities spent in the city were with the socialites of my age bracket and Xander just happened to be part of that bracket.

And since my mother wasn't making any move against Xander and I, slowly I started to relax, thinking that maybe if she saw that I was happy with other guys in similar society as our family, she would lay off that stupid trade plan cooking in her head.

For it was true, I was happy with Xander. He kept my mind off of my parents, and knew how to have a good time, even in the most boring lectures and charity events sponsored by MACUSA.

We never went on dates. That felt too formal for us, and not really Xander's style. Rather, I would walk with my hand in his a lot, and when groups of us would run off away from our parents, I'd let him kiss me, just as on the Fourth of July.

It felt almost too good to be true when he told me in early August that his parents had received tickets to the Quidditch World cup through a family friend.

"That's means we can meet up at the game," I exclaimed hopefully, only to cause Xander to laugh, his wavy dark hair shielding his eyes subtly.

"Ava, you know my parent's friends will be nowhere near the British prime minister's box."

"So? I could always leave in the middle to come find you."

"You are unbelievable," He would joke as we would walk down central park in the August heat. "Only you would throw away the best seats in the house to come see me."

"Does that mean anything to you?" I would coo back nonchalantly only to get him pushing me off the path while I would giggle.

That conversation was two weeks ago. It was now August 24th, the day before the World Cup, and he and I haven't talked logistics since. He had promised to see me before I left, but things got tricky when my mother started keeping us indoors to pack.