Proud puffy

Ernie had been his usual cheerful, friendly self earlier in the day, but during Potions he seemed distracted, nodding disjointedly when you spoke to him and scribbling in the margins of his parchment instead of actually taking notes. You didn’t think anything of it, figuring he was just tired. He was a school Prefect in the running for Head Boy next year, and involved with just about every club from Dueling to Choir to Charms. Certainly, it wasn’t the first time he’d grown worn out by the end of the day.

Once Potions ended, though, he’d acted stranger still. Instead of walking you back to Ravenclaw tower like he usually did, he’d disappeared the moment you turned your back to pack your school bag. After a moment of searching for him in the herd of students wandering out of the classroom, you’d shrugged it off. Perhaps he’d suddenly remembered some responsibility he needed to complete or a club meeting for which he was running late.

However, as the main corridor in the dungeons cleared, with students hurrying back to their common rooms, you heard something strange – a voice echoing through the hall, hushed but amplified by the hollow, stone-carved space.

“Han!” There was a chuckle, low and distinctly male, emanating from behind one of the pillars at the end of the corridor. “Han, my love, we really shouldn’t.” It was bright and amused despite its protests. “Come, now, what if someone sees?”

The voice was so familiar, your feet froze to the spot immediately. It was Ernie’s voice.

Almost involuntarily, you turned in the direction of the thick stone pillar, whispering a spell to suppress the noise of your heels clicking against the floor of the corridor. In the silence you could hear the continued whispers echoing through the hall.

“Everyone’s already left.” You’d heard Hannah Abbot’s voice many times before, but never like this – she sounded like a vixen caricature and you wanted to hex her immediately. “It’s alright, Ern, no one will see.”

“Han, you know –” 

The boy you’d known that morning as your loving, sweethearted, devoted boyfriend suddenly froze as you stood in front of him, his Prefect partner’s arms twined around his shoulders like a second skin.

“Am I interrupting something?”

You felt a strange spark of pride at the way your voice failed to waver even as your heart sunk into your boots and your stomach roiled at the sight before you. In your wildest nightmares, you couldn’t have created this – your boyfriend who you’d spent over two years devoted to, with his hands all over a girl who you’d thought of as a friend.

Ernie saw you first, his eyes widening in horror as he took in the way your arms crossed in front of your chest and your jaw tensed, clearly understanding exactly what you were interrupting. Hannah, whose back was towards you, whipped around the moment she heard your voice, her jaw dropping when she saw you. Finally, her stance wavered, her arms slowly retreating from your boyfriend’s shoulders and her feet stepping back.

“Baby, I –” 

You cut off Ernie’s wavery protest with a watery, tense laugh. “Oh, please, carry on,” you snapped. “Don’t let me interfere.” The tears were already gathering in your waterline, but you refused to let them escape, firmly blinking them away. 

“Please, baby, you don’t understand.” He finally stepped away from Hannah, causing her to stumble to the side as he came towards you. She looked astounded at his sudden disregard for her, and in another situation, you would have felt bad for her. “It was a mistake! It only happened a couple of times, I swear. It was so stupid, please, you have to believe me.”

He tried to reach for your hands to hold them in his, as he’d done a thousand times before. This time, though, you pulled away, a sudden wave of disgust crashing through you. Who was this bloke standing in front of you? In the two years of your relationship, you’d never seen anything close to this side of him. The Ernie you knew was intelligent, responsible, sweet, caring…nothing like the person you were witnessing now, begging you to just forget about the way you’d caught him with another girl.

Your eyebrows lifted, your lips pressing together as you continued to fight back tears. “Is this what you’ve been doing while you were ‘patrolling’ on your rounds? Taking advantage of the fact that I’m not there to see you with her?” Memories flashed in your mind of the way he used to complain that he missed you while he was patrolling the corridors at night. You wondered if he’d meant it at some point or if it was a lie from the beginning.

“I –” Ernie sputtered, but from the look in his eyes, you knew you’d hit the nail on the head. Nausea overtook you, sickness in your stomach and your throat as you wondered how long, exactly, this had been going on. He’d been a Prefect for almost the entire duration of your relationship – had he been fooling you this whole time?

The rest of the argument was a blur, fading into unreality as your mind struggled to process the fact that your whole world had just turned on its head. Finally, you turned on your heel, exhausted and convinced that there was no point in continuing this fight. 

“Baby, please.” Ernie’s eyes were full of tears, an expression of despair carved so deeply on his face that in any other situation you would’ve run to him, wrapping him tightly in your arms and holding him closely until everything was better. But nothing could make this better, he’d brought this on himself. “We can work this out, there must be something I can do –”

You shook your head firmly, tears once again pricking at the corners of your own eyes, your vision blurring. Even this morning, you couldn’t have imagined a scenario where you would’ve ever ended things with Ernie. The two of you had talked about getting married after Hogwarts, moving into a flat together, how many children you would have… Just the previous week, he’d told you that he wanted to buy you a promise ring. Your lungs seized at the thought that you’d excitedly described your ideal ring while he was snogging Hannah Abbot on the side.

“No.” Finally, your voice trembled as you brought your gaze up to meet his eyes. “There’s nothing you can do, not anymore. We’re done, if that wasn’t clear.” Then, you glanced back at Hannah, who was still standing behind the two of you, chewing on her glossy lip. “You can have him.” With that, you stormed away.

When Ernie and Hannah finally disappeared behind you, the tears began to fall. Sobs seized your throat as your feet carried you further and further into the dungeons, getting you lost in the dark corridors beneath the school. You couldn’t believe this was happening. Thoughts raced faster than Firebolts in your head, time and space falling to the wayside as you wondered with horror how many of these hallways your newly ex-boyfriend had snogged Hannah in while the two of you were dating. You’d molded your entire life around him. His friends were your friends, his enemies were your enemies. Meanwhile, you weren’t even his only girlfriend.

You stumbled through the dungeons with shaking shoulders and weak knees until you finally found the door to an empty classroom. Stumbling through, you claimed your refuge amongst the silhouettes of abandoned chairs, some stacked atop dust-ridden desks. Rays of sunset streamed through the window, displaying the writings of some former professor on the blackboard, untouched through years of disuse. You stared blankly at the words, eyes unseeing as you slid down the stone wall, sinking to the floor and pulling your knees to your chest.

Time slipped by as you sobbed on the dusty floor, your forehead resting on your knees, the wool of your tights pricking your skin. It felt impossible to wrap your mind around the sudden implosion of your relationship that had felt so perfect in the morning. Why weren’t there any signs? How had you not noticed? He’d lied to you so smoothly, so successfully – if you hadn’t caught him and Hannah together, how much longer would you have stayed with him without realizing? A million questions tormented you in the midst of your seemingly unending flow of tears. 

The sun had slipped behind the mountains and the sky turned from pink to navy by the time your breath steadied, but you still couldn’t fathom the thought of getting up and facing the world. Your hands were still shaking and you were certain your eyes were horrendously red and swollen. Just the thought of anyone seeing you in this state filled you with dread.

And then, as if your life were some cruel joke, the door to the empty classroom slowly began to swing open.

Your breath seized in your chest. “Occupied!” you called, but your voice was so weak and shaky you were certain that no one could hear you. Inhaling and exhaling, you tried to summon the strength for another protest.

It was too late. Inside the doorway stood a silhouette, some fellow student with a schoolbag in hand. He stepped into the empty classroom, flinging his bag down atop a desk without a chair resting on it.

“Please go away.”

The words spilled out of your mouth involuntarily, and the bloke jumped, searching for the source of the noise. Quickly, you swiped at your cheeks, trying to erase the remaining evidence of your tears as his eyes fell on you.

“What’re you doing in here?”

Every muscle in your body tensed at once. You hadn’t recognized the figure in the darkness, your vision blurred from crying, but you knew that voice.

“Zabini?”

Of course, as if your day couldn’t get any worse, it had to be Blaise Zabini who found you crying and covered in dust on the floor of an empty classroom.

Ernie hated Slytherins, and Zabini most of all. The feeling was most certainly mutual. Although it was typically Draco Malfoy who ran about the corridors sneering at students from other houses and throwing wayward jinxes at anyone who looked at him the wrong way, whenever you and Ernie were in sight, Zabini took on the role. He and Ernie were constantly exchanging insults and hexes. The other Slytherins would join in to fling ink in Ernie’s direction in class or make over-the-top gagging sounds whenever the two of you held hands. The obnoxious behavior had lessened once Ernie became a Prefect, as Zabini quickly learned how easy it was for him to take points from Slytherin, but his lip still curled at the sight of you. You were sure he’d get a great laugh out of seeing you like this. 

Abandoning his school bag, he stepped closer, and your heart jumped into your throat. But his lips didn’t quirk upward into his usual smirk. Instead, a little furrow appeared between his eyebrows as he frowned, looking you up and down.

“You alright?”

“I’m fine,” you snapped. “Just…had a bit of a stomachache. I was hoping for a little privacy.”

Brows raising, he eyed you suspiciously. “The Hospital Wing is that way, you know.” He gestured out the door of the empty classroom. 

“Well, it’s passed anyhow.” Standing, you dusted off your skirt, praying that your hands weren’t still shaking. “I’ll be going.”

“Right.” His skeptical voice flowed through the room as you turned away, stepping towards the door. “You sure you’re okay?”

Something about his insistence annoyed you, and you turned back around to face him. “What’s it to you?” you snapped. Immediately, you regretted opening your mouth, your shaky voice betraying you. “You hate me.”

Zabini let out a little scoff. “No, I don’t.” His eyes shifted for a moment as he paused. “MacMillan, maybe. But not you.”

Just the thought of Ernie made your face fall, and to your embarrassment, tears began to gather in your eyes again. Face hot with humiliation, you turned back towards the door, but your feet seemed to be glued to the spot.

“Hey.”

His voice was low and oddly calming, even as you struggled to hide your tears from his sight.

“What’s wrong?”

Finally, you turned back towards him. He was inches from you now, gazing down at you with a mix of confusion and sincerity that you’d never seen on his face before. It was such a far cry from the arrogant, sarcastic version of him that you’d always known, it made you wonder whether this was all a strange dream. First, the person you trusted most in the world betrayed you, and then someone you wouldn’t trust as far as you could throw him was standing in front of you with nothing but care in his eyes.

“I might hate him too.”

Something inside of you broke, as though admitting the truth out loud had eliminated your last hope that maybe none of it was real. Sobs wracked your body and tears flowed down your cheeks, but you were only left to shatter on your own for a moment. A pair of arms wrapped around you, and then Blaise Zabini, of all people, was holding you up as your knees trembled beneath you.

“Hey, hey,” he murmured softly, guiding you back towards the spot where you’d been sitting against the wall. For a moment, he released you, and you wondered if this was all some cruel joke leading up to him hexing you or throwing ink in your face. But then you saw that he was taking off his school robes, revealing the black button-up and trousers that he wore underneath. You opened your mouth to ask what he was doing, but before you could, he laid his robes down on the dusty floor.

“There you go.” He guided you down so you were sitting on his robes, settling himself down beside you.

You frowned, glancing over at him with watery eyes. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

His eyes lowered for a moment before he met your gaze. “Because whatever he did to you, you didn’t deserve it.”

You cried for a long time after that, one of his arms wrapped around your shoulders as you laid your head against him. It felt strange and wrong to be in the arms of someone that wasn’t Ernie, especially considering the bloke currently holding you was his worst enemy. But Blaise was there, and he cared, and strangely enough his touch felt like it was the one thing that could soothe the sickening sensation of loneliness and abandonment that was breaking you down. Though you knew your smeared makeup was probably getting all over his shirt and he was sitting on the dusty floor while you were resting on his discarded robes, he didn’t seem to mind, rubbing your back steadily as you released all of the grief that had accumulated inside you. 

As your tears began to dry up and your trembling finally paused, his low voice finally slipped through the air. “What happened?” His thumb traced your shoulder gently. 

You swallowed hard, forcing your weak voice to speak. “He’s been snogging his Prefect partner for a while.”

Glancing up, you tried to read Blaise’s expression, still not fully trusting him not to laugh. But there was no trace of amusement on his face, only an anger that pooled into disgust. 

“He’s even more of an idiot than I thought he was, then.”

You gave a weak laugh, your fingers fiddling with the edge of your skirt. “Thanks.”

“I’m serious.” He gave your shoulder a light squeeze. “You gave a tosser like that a chance and he wasted it? He’s got to be the dimmest bloke alive.”

Instinctively, a protest rose in your chest. That wasn’t the version of Ernie you’d known for two years. The Ernie that you fell in love with was funny, adorable, kind, intelligent… But it was all a lie, you remembered. It must’ve been. Somehow, you’d missed it.

“He was a good boyfriend,” you managed. “While we were together.” It still felt so strange to say. Imagining your life without Ernie seemed impossible.

Blaise let out a mirthless chuckle. “He’s a cheater and a prat.” His voice lilted with amusement. “You’re allowed to admit it.”

You frowned. “I know you hate him, but I dated him for a reason.” An annoyed little huff escaped your lips. “I’m not a total idiot.”

“I never said you were.” His words were light but insistent. “I always figured he must’ve been doing something to keep you around.”

Satisfied with that, you let silence fall around you. Your thoughts, though, continued to swirl like a tornado in your mind. Were you a total idiot? During your last fight, Ernie had tried to deceive, cheat, and manipulate you, and yet if someone had asked you the day before, you would’ve insisted that such a thing was impossible. How had you managed to ignore every flaw in his character for years?

“How –” You bit your lip, pausing as you wondered how to ask the question that was on your mind.

“Hmm?” Blaise glanced down at you attentively.

“Why don’t you like Ernie?” you finally asked, your voice soft and wavering. “How did you see…whatever it is about him that makes the two of you not get on? How did I miss it?”

A little sigh escaped from Blaise’s lips as your question hung in the air.

“Quit thinking like that,” he finally responded. “This wasn’t your fault.”

He’d read you like a crystal ball – the thoughts of self-doubt and anger at your own naivete had been spiraling in your mind since the moment you’d discovered Ernie’s cheating. But your expression was insistent as you finally lifted your head from his shoulder and held his gaze. “I still want to know.”

Blaise glanced downward, swallowing heavily. For a moment, you wondered whether he would answer. Then, he lifted his eyes back towards you.

“I can’t stand MacMillan because I can’t stand hypocrites,” he finally said. He paused, seemingly considering his words before continuing. “Have you ever noticed how he looks down his nose at everyone when a party gets busted, or when someone gets caught sneaking out, but when he wants to go get food from the kitchens it’s fine? Or how he’s always talking about how you have to earn high marks, how he’s put in the work for his grades, but in the next breath he’s asking you for your notes because he was ‘too tired’ to take them himself?” With a scoff, he shook his head. “He’s a swot who’s not even good at being a swot. That’s why I don’t like him.”

You frowned, glancing down at your lap as you considered Blaise’s words. Ernie had always justified those things to you when you’d first started dating. His dormitory was right next to the kitchens, it wasn’t as if he were sneaking across the castle when he went for a late snack. He was involved in so many activities, he was more tired than the other students and deserved help more than they did. Soon after, he’d stopped having to come up with the excuses. You’d made them for him. 

Of course he was spending a great deal of time with Hannah, she was his fellow Prefect, and they had plenty of projects to work on for the betterment of the school. Of course he was taking longer on patrols than the other Prefects did, he was dedicated to searching every corner of the castle for students out of bed. 

“Thank you,” you whispered, even though tears were beginning to trickle down your cheeks once again.

His fingers that had previously been resting against his thigh lifted, finding purchase beneath your chin and lifting your head so that your eyes connected with his. “Don’t you dare cry over him.” Thumb lightly swiping across your damp cheeks, he cleared the evidence of your sadness away. “No more tears, okay? He’s not worth it.”

Nodding, you gave a loud sniff, trying your best to curb the crying that had been plaguing you for hours. With a heavy inhale, you worked to steady your breathing. As you continued to think on Blaise’s words, another thought struck you.

“He always told me you hated us because we weren’t in Slytherin.”

You weren’t sure why you said it – maybe as a way of trying to explain to Blaise why you’d been so quick to take Ernie’s side in their unending feud. But at your words, his dark eyes narrowed and his jaw tensed before he looked squarely into your eyes.

“I never hated you,” he said firmly. “Never.”

A tension rose in the room, and you could feel your heart pounding in your chest. You were suddenly very aware of the places where Blaise’s fingers were touching your skin, in the little gap between the bottom of your sweater and the top of your skirt. Once again you found yourself wondering whether you should be sitting so close to him, and your lips parted as you fumbled for something to say.

“You did get ink on my favorite shoes, though,” you finally managed. A wry laugh escaped from your lips as you tried to diffuse the tension.

He raised his eyebrows. “Then let me take you to Madame Malkin’s, I’ll buy you a hundred more.” When you gave another soft laugh, he eyed you insistently. “I’m serious. I’m sorry.”

Shrugging, you gave him a little smile. “Don’t be. It was a long time ago.”

“Come here.” He lowered his touch to your knee and brought his palm across your legs, glancing at you for permission. You felt a moment of hesitation, but the comfort that Blaise brought you quickly won out over whatever little hangups you were still facing at the thought that you were in the arms of Ernie’s worst enemy. Caving to his touch, you relaxed into him, letting him bring your legs to rest over his thighs and pulling you in close to his chest. Your arms twined lightly around his torso in return. “I would take you to London and let you spend all my gold, just as long as you don’t cry over that rancid prat again, you hear me?”

“You say that now,” you replied, a lilt of playfulness audible in your still-tired voice, “but I really like bags.”

Blaise threw back his head and laughed at that, in his eyes a mixture of amusement and relief that you were joking instead of crying. “Buy whatever you want, I promise.”

You giggled softly despite yourself. “‘S okay. I’m not really in a spendy mood.” Resting your head against his chest, you closed your eyes and let yourself relax for the first time in hours. Although your heart still ached, the tension in your muscles finally released.

Seeming to sense your tiredness, he let the conversation fall to the wayside as a heavy exhale slipped past your lips. “There you go, angel.” His voice was a low murmur, reverberating against your body and soothing you further. “Did y’ eat dinner yet?”

You shook your head. “I can’t go up there.” Your weary whisper was barely audible. “Everyone’ll ask why we’re not sitting together.” There was a pain in your chest as you wondered whether your ex-boyfriend would be sitting with Hannah instead.

"I’ll go get you some food.” He gave your knee a little squeeze. “You just rest.”

Your heart nearly melted at that, but the thought of leaving the empty classroom still filled you with dread. “The common room will be just as bad.”

“Then we won’t go to your common room. We’ll go to mine.”

The Slytherins stared at you in confusion when you stepped through the door of their common room, but if Blaise’s arm wrapped protectively around you didn’t put a stop to that, the glare he shot at them, daring any of them to object, certainly did. Once his housemates had made the wise decision to turn back around in their seats and mind their own business, he guided you toward a beautiful, high-backed couch in front of the fireplace. After pulling a few throw pillows and a blanket from the neighboring chairs, he let you settle in, wrapping the blanket around your shoulders.

“Still doing alright?” He checked in on you as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and you nodded gratefully. “I’ll be right back,” he assured you, giving your shoulder a squeeze. “If you need anything, just let the girls know.” As he gestured toward a nearby set of armchairs, you saw two girls settled in them, one with a dark, chin-length bob and one with medium-length blonde hair. You knew them to be Pansy Parkinson and Daphne Greengrass, and although you’d never considered them particularly friendly before, they now looked back at you with genuine smiles as Pansy waved. 

“Thanks.” You gave him a soft smile, glad to have a few more allies in unfamiliar territory. Never had you considered that you’d ever step foot in the Slytherin common room, and when Blaise left for the Great Hall, you took to studying your surroundings. You’d always known the room was located below the Black Lake, but truly seeing the bluish-green light seeping in through the windows as fish and mermaids swam by was a different experience entirely. The dark-coloured furniture and moody ambience, with torchlights flickering off the walls, made the place suitable to your current persuasion. 

You were in your sixth year at Hogwarts, and you’d never even considered friendship with any Slytherin, mostly because Ernie had always told you that they hated anyone who wasn’t in their own house. It would have been so easy for you to carry on this way until the end of school. But the Slytherins you’d encountered that day were nothing like Ernie had described. For the first time, you were able to consider that maybe your breakup with him was a good thing. The idea of your future without him still felt hazy and made you a bit ill, but you wondered what else you might find behind the curtain of the lies he’d told you. What else could you experience and enjoy now that you weren’t tied to him? 

Blaise’s return with two large plates of beans, potatoes, and ham pulled you from your thoughts a few minutes later, and you finally remembered how hungry you actually were. You hadn’t eaten since lunch, and the clock on the wall told you it was now nearly eight o’clock at night. 

“You’re amazing.” Gratefully, you took one of the plates into your hands as he settled down on the couch next to you to eat. 

It didn’t take long after you finished your meal and Vanished your dishes for your eyes to start fluttering closed. Your head relaxed against Blaise’s shoulder and you heard him let out a contented little sigh, reclining against the back of the couch so you could lay against his chest instead. 

“All good?” His voice seemed to wrap around you just like the blanket he’d provided, keeping you warm and safe.

You nodded, a little smile on your lips. As you fell to sleep, you felt his fingers gently running through your hair, ensuring it was out of your face.

“Things will be better tomorrow, angel.”