come with me on my carousel ride.
Pairing: MollyLysander
Prompt: Sapphires.
A/N: This is part of the 30 Drabbles for 30 days Challenge over at the HPFC
Her head is on the desk, and her hair is splayed out like a flaming halo and she's just so damn distracting, and he just can't get this spell right and he wants to tear his hair out because a huge part of his grade is hanging on this and he can't afford anything less than perfection.
"Five minutes class," comes the drifting voice of Professor Flightweed across the noise of the class, and all Lysander can do is attempt to avert his gaze from the pile of coal in front of him and try not to sigh too loudly.
He doesn't notice (which is shocking really) when she comes up behind him, but the whisper of her voice in his ear and her breath on his neck tickling his hair, sort of knocks the air right out of him (but it's not because he loves her, honest).
"Breathe Ly, seriously, you can do this, we both know it."
He knows that she's right, because he's been practising on everything he can lay his hands on, but it's like he just can't get the cogs to turn in his brain to get the magic flowing properly.
"I can't Moll," he tells her lowly and there must be something like heartbreak in his voice, because he sees this steely glint in her cobalt eyes and then she's telling him to close his own until she says that he can look.
He doesn't really want to because he doesn't have the time, but her voice is like ecstasy to him and he follows her directions like the addict that he is, until he hears a small cough about two feet higher than Molly's head should be.
"Congratulations Lysander," is all he hears before his eyes shoot open and he's looking up at the teacher who is in turn looking down at the desk in front of him where all of the coal he's been trying to spell for the past hour has been transfigured into gemstones.
"I must say, these are quite marvellous, they're the most remarkable shade of blue I think I've ever seen. Looks like all of that practice you've been doing has paid off."
He sits and takes the compliments in silence, because he's too shocked to say a word, and when Professor Flightweed leaves his table to dismiss the class, he finally notices Molly across the room and the half-pleased, half-guilty look lighting up her face as she collects her books and heads out of the door.
It's the wake-up that he needs and he and his books and the gems are out of the door within five seconds and he's running down the corridor after her, ignoring a gaggle of fourth year Hufflepuff girls as he goes.
"Molly, Molly!" he calls as he catches a glimpse of her long red hair and then it's just a case of trying to catch his breath and straighten his mind as he reaches her side.
"Molls, why'd you do it?" he asks her and he knows it's a stupid question because he's pretty sure she's going to say 'just helping a friend', and when he actually thinks about it's even more stupid because he's just asking for pain.
But he just can' help himself.
She thinks about his question for a moment, like actually thinks, and his heart kinda slightly soars as she does.
"Well," she starts finally and he's waiting with bated breath, "I couldn't just let you failback there could I? I mean, you deserve that grade more than anyone Ly."
Her words aren't exactly what he was hoping for, but the word 'friends' isn't anywhere in sight, so he smiles brightly back at her, "Thank you so much Molly, you have no idea how much this means to me."
"It's fine don't worry about," she laughs back at him, "just remember, it's our little secret, yeah?"
Lysander likes that idea more than he'd care to admit, and she's just started walking to her next class when something else crosses his mind.
"Why sapphires?" he calls after her, and she stops for a moment and turns back to him, with her mouth twisted to the left and her noise slightly scrunched up in the way that it does when she thinks.
"Well see, I just concentrated on my favourite colour and then the coal just happened to turn into sapphires," she answers him eventually, "there wasn't really much else to it."
"I didn't know that you liked blue," Lysander says suddenly, and his eyes are so confused that Molly can't help but smile.
"How could I not Ly," she says as if it's the most obvious thing in the whole world and he's an idiot because he can't see it, "it's the colour of your eyes."
She leaves him in the middle of the corridor with a rosy glow on her cheeks and a sparkle in her eyes and he just stands there with a sapphire clutched tightly in his fist and a fool's grin on his face, and he thinks to himself that maybe, just maybe, she's in love with him too.