Thorn | Neville Longbottom

Chapter 9: The Awkward Hugger

Only a few weeks after the dance, Pansy came into their dorm room in hysterics. She stumbled in, wiping away the tears that were streaming down her face, and made some truly awful gut-wrenching sounds. Briar had been just sketching in bed, and she sat up abruptly at this. Briar had asked, "Are you okay?"

Pansy didn't reply and just collapsed into bed, so Briar hesitantly got up and padded across the room to reach her. She reached out and gently touched Pansy's shoulder as she wondered, "What happened?"

While laying face down on her mattress, Pansy murmured, "Draco."

Briar's eyes flashed with anger as she questioned, "What did he do?" Briar sat down on the bed beside Pansy and kept her hands awkwardly folded in her lap. Should she be rubbing her back or something? Briar felt lost, so she just stayed very still.

Pansy sat up a few moments later and sighed, "Are you ready for a long story?"

Briar nodded sincerely and waited for Pansy to continue.

Pansy wiped away some of her tears and took a deep breath. She explained, "Draco and I broke up... We were having an argument, and then I told him he was being a terrible soulmate if he was mine, and — do you know what he said to me?"

Briar replied with just a shake of her head and kept watching Pansy carefully.

She exhaled a long breath, "Well. We can't be soulmates anyway, he said. He told me that he lied about his soulmate's blood status. She's a muggle-born."

Briar slapped her hand over her mouth with this news. Malfoy's soulmate was a muggle-born? That's terrible, terrible news. While someone like Briar couldn't care less about all the blood status garbage her father had been spewing at her from a young age, she knew that Malfoy had wholeheartedly followed it, even using the M word at times, which Briar could never bring herself to say.

She stared at Pansy for a few seconds and whispered, "Merlin. That's awful, Pansy. Do you need, uh, a hug or something?"

Pansy and Briar both just stared at each other uncertainly for a moment until Pansy finally nodded. Briar scooted closer and stiffly wrapped her arms around the other girl.

Pansy laughed through her sniffles, "You are such an awkward hugger."

"I can't remember the last time I've hugged someone," Briar admitted as she slowly cracked a smile.

Pansy swiped at her tears and chuckled, "Now, that's sad. I'm definitely going to hug you more now."

"Oh, god, please don't," Briar groaned. She couldn't help but give a small smile, even as she said this.

Pansy and Briar pulled away from each other after that, and Pansy just slowly defeatedly slid under her duvet. She glanced at Briar after a moment and sighed, "Can you tell the others what happened? I don't feel like talking about it anymore today."

Briar nodded her head wordlessly and then shifted off Pansy's bed. She shuffled back to her own bed and picked up the sketch she had been drawing and begin to work on it with more fervor. She was determined to finish it faster now, thinking that it could maybe cheer Pansy up a little.

She tried to quietly shape in Pansy's haircut once she finished Millicent's. She didn't want to disturb Pansy, who had appeared to have fallen asleep already. Briar grinned when Pansy's hair came out just as she had wanted it to. The long, dark hair she had drawn perfectly reminded her of Pansy's current hair style.

Once Briar finished the sketch, she slowly tore it from her sketch pad, wincing at the loud noises. Pansy didn't move at all as she did this, which made Briar feel relieved. She placed it on Pansy's dresser beside her bed and then yanked on her Slytherin robes.

It was time for dinner now, and she figured it best to catch Daphne and Millicent before the girls came back to the room anyway.

She hurried down the corridors since she knew she was already running late to dinner when she came around a corner too fast and crashed right into someone. Briar fell backwards and landed on the ground with a thunk, just as the other person did the same.

Briar glanced up and instantly felt her cheeks flame. She stammered, "Ah! I'm so sorry. I wasn't paying attention to where I was going! I didn't mean to knock you over!"

Neville was staring at her in shock, but he slowly gave her a shy smile and chuckled, "It's okay. You didn't mean to."

Neville pulled himself to his feet and then offered a hand to Briar. She graciously took his hand and wondered why her cheeks were still burning. This was stupid. She didn't need to be embarrassed about this. She had seen dozens of other students have clumsy accidents in the hallway, so she was no different.

Briar smiled at him and shook her head. "Merlin, I'm glad you aren't hurt. I don't know why I came around that corner so quickly without even looking."

"It's okay. Happens to me all the time. Truly... Have a nice day then," He assured her with a shy smile. He stepped around her and continued on back to the Gryffindor dorms.

Neither of them realized that they were both wearing matching smiles after the interaction.

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