#surffari

However, when she arrived at the Quidditch pitch, the pair’s smiles promptly dropped when they saw her broom.

“What is it?” she asked as she walked closer.

“You can’t possibly be thinking of riding that,” Rolland said, staring at the uncarved handle and ratty bristles.

“Does it even get off the ground?” Sen asked, turning her head sideways as if there were some secret angle of the thing she was missing.

There were about twenty come backs floating through Ellyse’s mind, but all she could come out with was, “Sorry?”

Rolland shook his head. “Don’t worry about it, you can ride with me,” he offered.

Sen put her hand on Ellyse’s arm. “No, it’s okay, ride with me.”

“I already offered,” Rolland said, shooting Sen a look.

Sen turned to Rolland in a dramatic movement, hands hard on her hips. “What, so I’m not allowed to offer too?”

“I’m just saying, you don’t have to.”

“What if I want to? Ellyse is my friend, is it so weird that I want her to ride on my broom with me?”

“She’s my friend too,” Rolland growled. “And I offered first.”

“This isn’t dibs, Rolland, first doesn’t count.”

Ellyse began to tune them out. This was ridiculous, and at this point they were paying absolutely no attention to her, even though she was the object of their argument. She was leaving. She turned around, got on her own broom, and began to fly away.

“Hey!” Sen called. “Ellyse, don’t leave!”

So now they pay attention to her, huh?

Ellyse was beyond caring. If she went back, they’d go right back to arguing.

However, what she didn’t anticipate is that they would get on their own brooms and chase after her. The two beaters caught up with her effortlessly, trapping her from the front and sides.

Ellyse huffed. “Fine,” she said, lowering her broom in defeat.

“Good,” said Sen, as the two lowered themselves down as well. “Now hop on with me, you’ll distract Rolland too much if you ride with him.”

Rolland glared at Sen, teeth mildly barred, but said nothing. Ellyse took her chance now that they weren’t fighting and walked over to Sen’s broom, still hovering above the ground. Sen scooted back, and then pat the broom handle in front of her, grinning.

“Why am I doing this again?” Ellyse asked.

“Because we want to show you our moooves,” Sen answered, moving her eyebrows up and down suggestively.

Rolland buried his head in his hands.

Ellyse pulled her lips in a tight line. “I’ll get on if you stop being creepy.”

Sen raised both of her hands in surrender, a laughing smile on her face. “Deal.”

Ellyse sighed and swung her leg over the broom. Sen wrapped her arms on either side of Ellyse, hands gripping the handle.

“Hold on tight, little lady,” she advised, just before taking off. Straight up, with near-dangerous speed. It was all Ellyse could do to cling to the broom.

It didn’t take long to notice Rolland had joined them, the two beaters weaving in and out from each other, rising and rising until Sen broke off suddenly. With a twist and a turn they were upside down, and in a flip they were back up and racing head-on towards Rolland.

As they got closer, he winked to Ellyse. She squeezed her eyes shut, but in the last second, Sen had swerved just slightly, taking one hand off the broom and slapping it with Rolland’s in a hi-five. The two began to laugh, but Ellyse couldn’t dare bring herself to turn back and look.

“Up, up, up,” Sen whispered into her ear. “Time to lose Frenchie.”

In a smooth glide, they headed above the pitch and into the clouds. “Deep breaths,” Sen warned. Rolland had popped up beside them in a second, but Sen already had them turned and dancing on the edge of another cloud. It became a game of hide and seek, cat and mouse, and while Rolland was fast, Sen had the maneuvering capability. It didn’t take long for the two beaters to lose each other.

“Still holding on there, Ellyse?” Sen asked.

Ellyse nodded in a jerky motion.

Sen snerked. “Want to get down?”

Ellyse nodded again, much more fervently.

“Okay. Down we go.”

Sen lowered the broom smoothly, slowly, back below the clouds, down the pitch. Rolland soon fell out from the clouds as well, racing to the bottom to meet them. The ground grew gradually closer, until Ellyse felt Sen shift and place both feet on the grass.

Sen’s arms found Ellyse’s waist and helped to lift her from her stiff position on the broom. “Come on,” she cooed, trying to keep from laughing.

Rolland rushed over on foot, sweeping hair back from his eyes with a grin on his face. “So?” he asked.

“Rolland, help me out. Angel over here’s all shook up,” Sen called.

He immediately skipped over, slinging an arm around Ellyse to help steady her. “You okay, Ellyse?” he asked.

She simply stared at the grass, gripping both of the beaters’ shirts. After a moment and some deep breaths she managed to find her voice. “I’m… I’m just… going to sit here… for a minute.”

“That guy,” she repeated, “that guy is a lame, antisocial… jerkwad! Y’know, I try to help him out, y’know. I’m like, hey, Charlie, here, make friends.” She made a motion with her hands like she was handing something to someone. “And he’s just like, grumble grumble grr.”

Melanie cross her arms over her puffed out chest, making an awkward, scrunched up face. Charlie raised his eyebrow, watching her conversation.

By now, she had broken into a full-on—very bad—impression of him. “I’d rather sit here draw pictures of everything rather than actually participate in conversations. Don’t mind me, I’m just going to hog your video games and play with your brothers and eat all your food!”

Charlie wanted to laugh at her impression, but felt a little bad due to the fact that most of what she was saying was true.

“And then there’s Enri!” Mel flopped back on the couch with an exhausted expression. “I’m like, here, Charlie, help me teach this girl how to live in normal society and be our friend, and he just—”she shot forward,“—doesn’t know what to do with her!”

Charlie nearly went over to defend himself.

“Half the time I’m… ugh,” she stopped, flipping herself upside down on the couch, feet resting over the back of it while her head and arms hung over the edge. “I wish they’d just,” she held her hands out and smooshed them together, “make out already!”

But before Henry could react, Roshii’s lips were gone. He’d pulled away. And now he was looking at Henry, expectantly and a little scared. Blushing like hell.

Henry didn’t know what he was supposed to do. He was still confused. “Roshii?” he asked, voice unintentionally quiet.

“Henryilikeyou,” the boy spit out.

Now, for a lot of people, this might be a difficult situation. It was true Henry had received his fair share of confessions. It was also true he’d had to decline his fair share of confessions. And it was also true that he had accepted a few, even when he wasn’t sure of his own feelings.

But all of those confessions had been from girls.

And up to that point, everyone, including Henry himself, would have considered him straight.

So, if Henry had been anyone else, this could have been a very bad, very difficult situation, which could have resulted in the loss of their friendship and very awkward rest of the year.

But for Henry, because he was Henry, it was simple.

He leaned in, kissed Roshii chastely on the lips, and pulled away with one of his classic, charming grins.

Which caught Roshii completely off guard and sent his blush through the roof. “I thought you were straight?” he asked.

Henry shrugged, and took a hold of Roshii’s hand with one of his. “I am,” he said, looking down. “But I’m also a firm believer in exceptions.” He rubbed his thumb over the back of Roshii’s knuckles and looked him straight in the eyes. “Do you want to do this?”

Roshii had to take a deep breath to keep his voice from wavering. “Yes.”

And that’s where it was now. Rolland, in one corner, focused entirely on Annika and hitting on her rather heavily. Sen and Ellyse, in the other corner, leaning against the wall with equal looks of annoyed disappointment and nearly empty cups.

“This sucks,” Sen said, breaking their mutual silence.

“Agreed,” said Ellyse. She lifted her cup to her lips once again, to discover hardly a drop left of her drink. “I’m out.”

“Fuck!” shouted Sen. “This is ridiculous, why are we waiting on some guy?!”

“Yeah,” Ellyse agreed.

“He’s just another jerk who’s thinking with his dick anyway,” Sen continued.

“Yeah,” Ellyse agreed, getting more spirited.

“Who does he think he is, the king of the fucking world?”

“Yeah!”

“Well,” Sen paused for just a moment, trying to remember what she was saying. “He’s not!”

“Yeah!” By now, Ellyse was even beginning to take an angry tone herself.

“And we’re not going to fucking wait for him, isn’t that right?”

“Yeah!”

Sen downed the very last of her drink and chucked the cup across the room. “We are strong, independent, sexy women and we don’t need no man!”

“Yeah!”

“Emphasis on the sexy. We don’t have to take this, we don’t have to wait for him.”

“Yeah!” Ellyse cheered. “You’re looking really good tonight, by the way. I love your dress.”

“Thanks, thrift shop. You know for all he cares, we could be making out right now.”

“Yeah!” Ellyse shouted, before realizing what was being said and covering her mouth with her hand.

“Like, you and me. Lip-locking. Right now,” Sen repeated, turning to Ellyse.

“Yeah,” Ellyse agreed, a little more quietly, staring at Sen’s lips.

“With tongue and everything,” Sen continued, quieter, leaning closer to the other girl.

“Yeah,” Ellyse whispered, leaning in further.

“Just like this,” Sen whispered back, finally closing the distance between them.