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“You know I hate the damned gossip in this school.” Caradoc grinned at him as he spoke, excitement bubbling in his chest for his friend. “Oh man, I’m so pleased for you. You should totally go and meet them!” Nudging his shoulder, he let out a laugh at his words. “I have been telling you to ask her out for years now, what made you finally heed my wise advice?”

“Wait.” Caradoc paused, sitting up with wide eyes as his words registered. “You told Alice how you felt?” He grinned incredibly widely at the news, gripping hold of Frank’s shoulders with excitement. “Are you kidding me? My dude! Did you kiss her? Was is perfect? When’s the wedding?” 

                   “Sitting.” Alice repeated, almost robotically. “You’re very good at sitting.” She said with a smile manipulating her lips into an asymmetric curve, pearly whites showing as a consequence. “You know, Frank…” Head bowed as the pair made their way down the hall, hands instinctively intertwining with his, “…I can’t help but think, that you might quite possibly by the best person I’ve met.” Though there was a tinge of embarrassment polluting her words, they were spoken with the utmost truth - or at least as much as Alice could possibly give. It scared her. How quickly she was falling for a boy she hardly knew - in the grand scheme of things. She didn’t know his favourite colour, though hers was pastel blue. She didn’t know his deepest fears, though hers was heights. There was a grey area that she wished so very much to conquer— but she knew. She knew that the best things took time. Her naivety would one day be the death of her. “God, you do keep me tame…” Again, that calloused truth that spewed from her lips. Cliche in nature, but encased in fibres of Alice that had never seen the light before. Her head in the clouds, optimism a translucent glaze over her sense of reality— he was what was best for her. One way or another. As the two walked, heels meeting the cold stone floor in unison, blonde curls found his shoulder, resting there tenderly as they walked. Fingertips climbed his arm like ivy, resting in the curve of her elbow. It was serene, really. Like a retreat from reality. But her feet were firmly planted on the floor. 

Caradoc felt himself blush a bright red colour, knowing the exact rumours that Frank was referring to. “I’m always here for you too but I really hoped you wouldn’t ask about that.” He sighed, laying back on the bed and letting Freckles crawl into a ball on his stomach. “Clearly I’m terrible at hiding my gay feelings because Rita keeps going on about it which, okay, is bollocks. I’m not that obvious, am I? I thought I was doing a pretty good job of hiding that I’m into guys, and Remus is just a friend anyway. I swear, he’s probably not even into dudes, probably, I mean, he does blush an awful lot and he was really fun to dance with, but I dunno if I should risk it.”

Rita nodded, though she knew deep down she’d never be able to actually take a break from writing. Perhaps she could try- the upcoming Christmas holiday would be a good time to do so, considering plenty of people would be going home and maybe she could let herself have a little fun to take her mind off of things. “Thank you.. you know, it seems a bit hard to find someone so kind.. I’m sure you’re busy enough as it is…” she told him honestly. She had to wonder, though, if he would still be so nice if she’d happened to write something less than flattering about him - she was always doubting people that way. “This may be the longest school year of my life so far, by the feel of it. but you’ve only got half a term left… what’re you taking NEWTs in anyway?”

Caradoc let out a sigh of relief at his words, practically sinking into his arm. “I’m so glad you said that.” Involuntarily he found himself letting out a small laugh at his own words. His crush had just turned him down and all he could feel was a sense of utter relief and joy. “Oh my Merlin, I’m an idiot.” He laughed again, louder this time, turning to look up at Frank. “I’m not sad at all? I just feel relieved and grateful, fuck why didn’t I do this sooner?” Caradoc smiled warmly, taking hold of his hand and giving it a small squeeze. “You’re the best friend anyone could wish for. I’m so lucky to have you and I’m going to be with you till the end, okay? No more secrets from now on, even embarrassing ones.” 

“Yeah, with my writing, my schoolwork… don’t know what’s the matter with me, to be honest,” she sighed deeply. Honestly she had no business telling Frank about her writers block at all, but it didn’t seem like there was any harm in it. “Thank you, I may take you up on that actually,” she smiled. While she had no interest in attempting to come between him and Alice, she was hardly one to pass up spending an afternoon with a cute boy. “Right, I’d almost forgotten about your arm, seems like it was so long ago..” Returning to a slow walk, she laughed in agreement, “the grass ones can actually taste a bit minty, they’re definitely not the worst..”

                 “We do do an awful lot of walking.” Alice said with a sugary smile. She had never minded. Not one bit. Swinging hands laced together in synchronisation with the pitter patter of shoes on the stone floors had instilled her with a sense of belonging and destiny. Two things she had dismissed as fiction until now. “But I’ll walk with you, Frank.” Nodding now, listening to him detail his parents, albeit briefly, another smile found its way to her lips. “They spoil you an awful lot.” Though Frank scarcely mentioned his parents in the wake of their seemingly hour-long talks, Alice tread carefully. Not all parent-child relationships were as silky smooth and agile as her own. “Are you seeing them at Christmas?” She asked, hoisting herself from the bench only to extend both arms in his direction, hands tensing and relaxing as if to usher his back into them. That closeness. It was there. For both of them. The mutuality for euphoric. “Or maybe I could…” Shoulders swayed side to side, a misshapen look of mischief on her features. “Maybe I could see you over Christmas? Or more importantly…my parents could? They’ve been dying to meet you. My letters they…don’t do you any sort of justice.” Jarring now, lips straightened into a cringing fear. “I was meant to tell them about you…wasn’t I? Oh— do yours know about me? Am I being perhaps…oh…I don’t know? Ambitious?” It was the niggling doubt, product of years of being mishandled, that had Alice second-guessing the only thing in her life that had ever felt true. 

                         “Well…aren’t we a sorry bunch?” Fingertips dancing along his shoulder in their lopsided embrace, Alice reserved a moment to intake the scent of Frank. Something so simple— and she was in heaven. “Gosh, can you imagine us…grey and old…pining for the other across the sorry halls of one of those retirement homes?” It was a sentiment founded on hope. Something that was in short supply these days. It was habit, really, the snaking of her arms to accommodate the rather large and garish frame of Frank, but she did so effortlessly, nuzzling his neck delicately as she did. “If it sorts that ego of yours out….I missed you so terribly, Frank.” As she spoke, hazel hues darted to and fro, yearning to hinge upon his muted tones - even for a second. It was all she needed. 

                   “Don’t hesitate.” She squeezed his hand, though considerably larger than her own, in a rather odd-looking hand sandwich. Her head darted left and right quickly as if to dismiss the prior anxiety. “Please…I’d love to help you.” Being on top of studies was one of the few things Alice prided herself on. A notorious over-achiever, deadlines and due dates swarmed her mind like bees. And she so wished never to get stung. One her secret had slipped…how stupidly devoted to him she had become— she had no reason to mask the beam plastered to her lips. A huff infused with humiliation and her inability to take compliments had her cheeks a vivid cherry, her tongue tracing rows of pearly whites. “Merlin, Franklin…” She mused, gaze falling low to a do-it-yourself sewn patch on her skirt. Anything but him. “You do know how to make a girl feel better.” Her voice too was now a whisper— not that it had to be. They shared the kind of love Alice wished to scream at the top of her lungs from the tallest rooftop. The kind she’d plastered over billboards on the busiest motorway and never look back on. It was pride. It was joy. It was the kind of love she’d only seen in movies. “Rub it in, why don’t you? At this stage I’m so smitten you may as well tattoo F R A N K L I N across my forehead.” There it was again. That same passion-infused tone of voice that seemed to appear flawlessly whenever Frank was around. “Come ‘ere, Cranky.” She added soon after, fingers itching to catch her in an unsteady embrace as they often did. A safety blanket in the wake of all the chaos.