1Chapter Seven: Friendship's Comfort

It was still early afternoon when we went back to out hotel room, but I was exhausted and fell to the bed instantly asleep. I knew Oliver watched me the entire time. We'd been over so much in such a short period of time; I could hardly understand how we were going to get past this. There was so much.

The bed sheets were soft and inviting and the pillow sucked me into a dreamland that I welcomed with all my heart. It was a sweet getaway. I didn't want to be anywhere but where I dreamed, with Oliver. Just he and I would live like that for the rest of our lives. I could see it, boy could I see it, but I knew that I could only dream it. It would never become a reality. And did I really want it to be?

I couldn't answer my own questions fast enough because I heard a gentle knocking on the door. Padded footsteps told me that Oliver had taken off his shoes and was going to get the door. I didn't want to wake up in case it was Hermione. As much as I wanted her to come and say she was sorry, I also didn't want to see her because it would mean talking to her. I rolled over restlessly and shoved the pillow over my head to drown out the voices at the door.

"Oh my gosh, you're here."

"Yeah, I came as soon as my shift ended this morning. How is she?"

"Not good. She's confused."

"Yeah, I'll bet. You know I should be angry at you Wood?"

"You should?"

"Yes, I should. Although her sister should have told her long ago about all this, you did keep this secret from her just as long as her sister did. I should totally be pissed at you. She's my best friend you know?"

"Yeah, I know. You can be if you'd like. I know you're right. You're always right."

"I'm not always right, but thanks for the compliment. If I were always right I'd be Minister of Magic."

"Oh I am so glad you're here. This will cheer her up so much. Thank you Liah."

"LIAH!" I yelled out loud as soon as I heard the name and jumped out of bed in the blink of an eye.

My hair must have been in a mess, my make-up smudged, and I would look a dreadful sight, but I leapt into Liah's outstretched arms nonetheless. "Hey girl," she said, wrapping her arms around me.

"Liah, what are you doing here?" I asked, refusing to let go of her.

"You sounded like you needed a backup girl this morning," she joked, chuckling to herself.

I pulled back and looked at my best friend. Her blond hair was wrapped up at the back of her head in a very professional looking manner and her face was glowing. Her soft brown eyes smiled at me, as did her mouth with perfect teeth. "Oh I do. I'm so glad you're here!" I hugged her again.

"Let her breath hun," Oliver suggested. I looked over Liah's shoulder to where he stood smiling. I smiled back before releasing Liah from my grip.

"How…Why…?" I began.

"Girl, you sounded like something else on the phone when we talked this morning. Damn I was afraid you'd do something to hurt yourself. I know you're not that kinda girl, but I dunno, you sounded rough. So I talked with my boss and he said it would be cool if I left for a few days. They're overstaffed as it is right now. It'll start getting busier later in the month. And voila, I apparated home to get some clothes and then apparated here." She pulled her grey chemise sweater over her head and draped it over one of the hotel chairs revealing a slim figure in a purple-fringed tank top.

"Oh, you look fabulous," I said.

"Are you kidding me?" she said exasperated, sitting down on the chair. "I do look worse than ever. I've just come off a ten hour shift and I haven't had a manicure for days." She held up her nails to show off her perfectly trimmed and polished nails.

I laughed, shaking my head. Liah had always had more brains than I had and that is why she'd graduated a year before me, but she had some great style. We were both the same age, we both had the same ideals all around, but she was so much smarter than I was. The difference was that I worked for the fashion side of our passion and Liah was working her way up the St. Mungos hierarchy towards the position of Top Healer. Our fashion outweighed our brains sometimes, but when we put on our reading glasses, we looked way brainier. We'd both gotten reading glasses in our fifth year because we'd noticed that seeing the black board for written instructions was getting difficult. We were seeing a bunch of squiggly white lines rather than words. God I loved Liah, she was such a sweetheart and I adored her.

"You came all this way for me?" I asked, feeling guilty that I'd pulled her out of her job.

"Don't flatter yourself," Liah laughed, "I came for your sexy boyfriend too. I had to kick his ass after hearing what he did to you." Her eyes sparkled when she joked.

I laughed. Looking over at Oliver I found him sitting by the window just watching the two of us talk. He was so out of place when we were together. We usually preferred to leave the house when he was around so he wouldn't feel that way. I gently smiled at him. With my eyes I asked him if he was all right and he nodded his answer.

"Well if you'll excuse me ladies," Oliver said, "I believe I'll step outside for a little while. I hear they serve excellent firewhiskey in a pub just around the corner. If you don't mind I believe I'll go get sloshed while you work up an appetite with your girl talk."

Laughed I nodded my agreement. "Thank you Oliver," I said, "for your consideration. But if you get sloshed tonight you are not getting' any." I stood up and walked towards him. He kissed me on the forehead and the twinkle in his eye proved he was just joking. He wouldn't get sloshed. He just wanted to give us some time alone.

"Bye babe," he whispered. He nodded at Liah and she waved lightly.

He shut the door behind him and I dropped into the chair beside Liah.

"I am so jealous of you," Liah said, almost as though she was whining.

"Why?"

"Because darlin', you get to have that," she pointed at the door, "any time you want."

I burst out laughing and twisted in my chair to look out the window, just in time to see Oliver walk down around the corner of the street. "He's a sweetheart. Besides, you've already heard all the details about that story. Been there, done that, several times."

She sighed, smiling, "Yes indeed we have. But he's still as gorgeous now as he was then. And he'll continue on being gorgeous until the day he dies. And you know what," she asked, her voice becoming more serious, "He loves you more than everyone in this whole wide world."

I raised my eyebrows, "Everyone else in this whole wide world? He hasn't met everyone in the world."

She nodded, "My point exactly. He's willing to stop looking for that special someone out of the 6 billion people on this planet because he believes he's already found her. You." She reached over and grabbed my hand, "You aren't mad at him are you?"

I lowered my gaze and shook my head. "No I'm not mad at him. I already told him he wasn't at fault for any of this. It was Hermione."

"I understand why you would want to feel that way hun, but you know deep down, I mean deep, deep, deep down, that it's not true."

"Yeah, I know," I admitted, "It's not true. But you know she still did hurt me. She stabbed me in the back all those years ago, only I couldn't feel it. She betrayed my trust and only now am I finding out about the wound." I twisted my hands in my lap. I didn't want to admit defeat. I'd just yelled at Hermione this morning and it would be over so soon?

"I know what you're thinking Gwyn," Liah said, looking at me perceptively. "After all these years and you still haven't figured out that I am aware of everything that goes on in that little head of yours. Give it up. Defeat to your sister isn't going to kill you. It will release you. You've always had a cause to hate her. She's smarter, shows you up every time you're together. She's getting married before you, and though you've never truly been an older sister, you always did have that trait: motherly and protective. Can you not allow yourself to understand that she wanted to protect you this time? You're the same age as she is, you are at different levels of maturity, but Hermione made the right choice. You weren't mature at twelve when Wood wanted to go out with you. You weren't ready for that kind of commitment. Acknowledge your fault Gwyn. Forgive your sister."

I hadn't noticed the tear that slid down my left cheek. Slowly and surely it fell off the tip of my chin at hit my hands that were still folded in my lap. I took a deep, shaky breath and let it out bit by bit. "You're right Liah. I know you are."

She reached over to grasp my hand once more, giving me a quick squeeze. She winked at me as if to say "there you go." I had all I needed to forgive my sister now. I'd yelled at her, felt my anger, cried my tears, and let go of all the emotion I'd built up inside my chest. It was still a long way from being over, but I felt better now that Liah had put it all into perspective.

I looked up into her eyes, tears now streaming down my cheeks. "Thank you," I mouthed to her before standing up and going to hug her. She stood up also and I cried into her shoulder, her motherly patting on my back and soothing voice told me that it was okay to cry. So I cried. When I had finished crying I pulled back, wiped my eyes and smiled warmly at her.

She did likewise and said, "Now come on, your moping has come to an end. Time to get dressed into something spectacular and meet your man at that pub 'round the corner."

I laughed and walked over to my suitcase with her. She flipped it open and then continued to rummage through it. "Is there not any one thing in here that will look devastating on you?" she asked, holding up my high priced fashion t-shirts and blue jeans. "I mean hun, I know it's not exactly required, but shouldn't you at least…" She had spun in a circle and caught a glimpse of my maid of honour dress that was hanging up in the bathroom. "Oohh!" she exclaimed, running over to the dress.

"Oh no," I cried. I didn't want anyone to see the dress until the wedding day. I had even made Hermione promise not to tell anyone about the dress I'd made for her. Making the dress for her was what she wanted, knowing I worked in fashion, and at the time I didn't see a reason to say no. I had wanted to talk to her seriously anyways, and making the dress for her gave me some reason to do so.

"My dress!" I said, rushing in front of Liah and blocking her way into the bathroom. "My dress. My secret, so back off."

She jumped back, alarmed, "Holy, protective of our clothes are we?" she laughed.

"Damn right I am," I told her. "This dress was made for Saturday therefore it won't be revealed until that day and not a moment sooner. And as for your comments on my other clothes, you know very well that those are classical witch couture fashion items. Don't give me the devastating speech."

She raised her hands in defeat and said, "Fine, fine. What are you going to wear then?"

"Clothes," I said nonchalantly, tossing the remark over my shoulder as I went through my suitcase once more. Liah was right however, there were no clothes in there that would make me look utterly devastating. They were all business and all casual except for my maid of honour dress. "Ugh, I have no idea!"

"Have no fear," Liah replied, moving away from me and over to where Oliver had put her suitcase down. "I have, again," she added, "Come to save the day."

From out of her bag she pulled a gorgeous fire-colour frilled skirt with matching red halter-top that had flowered embroidery and white sequins. "That's an Apple Cameron outfit. Where did you get that?" I exclaimed, moving over to take the clothes from Liah.

"I have my connections," Liah said smugly.

I narrowed my gaze towards her. "I've been trying to get clothes from Cameron for the past seven months and no one seems to know how to get in touch with him. How did you get it?" Few people knew that Apple Cameron was a guy. He was such a mysterious man and his designs were fantastic.

Liah directed her eyes heavenward and shrugged innocently.

My jaw dropped, "No…you didn't!"

Liah nodded, "I so did!"

"Whoa, how…when?" I was in total shock. My best friend was sleeping with a famous fashion designer.

"Um…well about a month ago. Goodness Gwyn, he's so good looking. Anyways, he's offered me a modelling job, only Cameron clothes of course, but oh gosh, he's handsome." She looked absolutely exhilarated when she talked about this guy. I hadn't seen her this excited about a man since our sixth year when she fell in love with Kennedy Dillon, a boy from Hufflepuff a year older than us.

"Sounds like a great guy," I said, feeling as excited as my friend did. "But, the clothes?" I held up the skirt and top.

"Oh well they were meant for me, but I figured you'd need a pick me up and I wasn't going to bring it and steal your thunder. So because we're the same size and I'm feeling particularly generous today, you may have that." She pointed at the clothes in my hand.

"Really?" I held them to my chest. Because I'd been searching for Cameron's creations for over half a year I was devilishly selfish about these particular clothes.

Liah laughed jovially, "Yeah, of course. Duh!"

"Awesome!"

I'm doing your make-up!" Liah yelled as I went into the bathroom to change.

"Fine," I yelled back. The skirt was made of a material that felt like satin and silk but was much sturdier. It flowed over my legs like butter. The top fit perfectly and as I looked into the mirror I had all but forgotten about Hermione. She was far beyond me now. I was having too much fun with Liah to worry about what I was going to say to my sister. I knew it would come to me though. I couldn't be this happy forever, which was against the laws of sisterhood. I had to right what I had wronged, and I supposed that if it was going down like that, I had best go down in flames, in this fabulously perfect outfit that Liah had brought for me. Oliver would say I was beautiful and I would steal the spotlight from Hermione for sure, but only long enough for me to build up my courage to say I was sorry to her. It was the right thing to do. That was what I had decided.