I have writer's block, exams are kicking my ass all the way to Valhalla. Here's the new chapter. Please enjoy while I go die in the corner.

Sam stood nervously in front of the old pub that was the entrance to Diagon Alley. Her coat was jipped all the way up and she pulled her hijab closer over her head to protect herself from the cold breeze. A thin blanket of snow lay on the sidewalks, dirty from all the people who had stepped on it. The people passing by were bundled up in heavy coats and thick scarves. None for them paid any notice to Sam and Alex, her brother today, who were leaning against the wall in front of the pub.

Sam looked down at her watch for what must have been the twentieth time in the past fifteen minutes. The process had been the same each time: first, Sam glances up and down the street, searching the crowd for a familiar face. Then, once she doesn't see that familiar face, she looks down at her watch only to see that it has barely moved and pulls her hijab closer.

Alex had seen his sister do the same thing over and over so much it was starting to get on his nerves.

"Calm down, Sam," he finally said, pushing his body off the wall and standing straight. "Amir will come any minute now."

Sam had told Alex about her plan before she left Hogwarts. She had been working on it for some time – after all, she couldn't just bring a muggle to Diagon Alley, so she didn't let Alex know until she had everything planned. It had been difficult to convince Professor Sif to let Alex come to London today, but after telling the Transfiguration teacher that Sam's grandparents wanted to meet him and that he couldn't tell them no, she had agreed to take Alex with her when she went to London to meet an old friend.

So today, only an hour ago, Alex and Professor Sif had apparated close to Sam's house. Professor Sif hadn't stayed around long, telling Alex she would come to pick him up from Sam's house at eight.

Alex had made sure to turn his hair brown before he knocked on Sam's door. The whole plan hinged on Sam's grandparents allowing her to leave with Alex, so he had to make a good impression.

The whole meeting-your-sister's-grandparents thing had been awkward, but in the end they let Sam leave with Alex. According to them "Simply looking at you is enough to realize you're his son." Alex didn't know how to take that.

So now Alex and Sam were waiting for Amir to arrive. Sam had tried to find some sort of excuse so Amir would forget about their argument and her reluctance to talk about her school, but it didn't feel right. Amir had been her friend ever since she was little, he was a good boy and he cared for her. Lying to him about such a big part of her life didn't feel right.

Sam sighed heavily. "I know. I'm just… I'm anxious. What if this doesn't work?"

Sam was a wreck, her brother could see this. He knew Sam had trouble sleeping when something was troubling her, so Alex knew she hadn't slept well, if at all. The dark circles under her eyes were proof of this and she kept fiddling with the fabric of her scarf.

Alex rested his hands on Sam's shoulders and looked her in the eyes. "It will work. Don't doubt yourself, okay? Everything will be fine. Just show him your world and explain. I'm sure he'll understand."

"You haven't even met him before."

"Maybe. But he must be a good guy if you like him so much. And hey," Alex continued with a smirk, "if it will help, I can follow you around and sing 'A whole new world'."

Sam actually laughed at that and Alex felt proud for making her forget her nervousness, even for just a moment. "Yeah, that might help," Sam said after she stopped laughing.

"Does that mean I can sing it?"

"No, please don't do it."

"Aw, come on!"

"Um, excuse me," someone said. Sam turned around suddenly to see Amir, a long scarf wrapped around his neck. "Hello, Sam."

"Amir! I didn't notice you had arrived! Hello."

Amir smiled and Alex saw his sister blush – she might say it was because of the cold later, but Alex didn't buy that.

"It's nice to see you again," Amir said. He turned to Alex. "And who is that?"

"That's Alex, he's my half-brother. We go to school together."

"Nice to meet my future brother-in-law," Alex said as he offered his hand to Amir for a handshake. He could see Sam blush even more at that and Alex cackled evilly in his head.

"Nice to meet you too. I didn't know Sam had a brother." Amir spoke those words with a smile, but it still sent a pang of guilt through Sam. Her having a brother was only one of the things Amir didn't know about her.

"Don't worry, she didn't either," Alex joked. "We didn't even know the other existed until we met last year. And even then we didn't learn we were related for a long time."

"Oh." Amir seemed confused and Alex didn't blame him. Just wait until he heard the whole story. "So what are we going to do?"

"I want to show you something. Follow me."

Sam didn't wait for Amir to answer and walked into the Leaky Cauldron. Amir seemed surprised to be taken into some random pub he hadn't even noticed was there but Alex grabbed his sleeve and kept walking.

"Sam, where are we going-" he tried asking, but Alex shushed him quickly.

"Don't talk," the other boy said and Amir immediately shut up.

Sam took them to the back of the pub and stopped in front of a brick wall with a large garbage bin in front of it. Amir looked on perplexed as Sam counted three bricks up from the garbage bin and two across.

"What are you-" he started asking but the words died in his throat as the bricks started moving aside like a curtain to reveal an archway.

"W-what?"

Sam didn't speak and instead walked through the archway, Alex and Amir right behind her. Amir reached out to the walls of the archway experimentally, touching them with gentle fingers as if they would disappear.

When they exited the archway they were in a loud, bustling street. A street. How-? T-they had only just walked in a pub and –how was a street back here? Amir had been around this part of London before and yet he didn't recognize this street at all and – was that a flying broom?

"S-Sam, where are we?" he asked. Sam turned around to face him and rubbed her arm awkwardly.

"Do you remember the argument we had some time ago? About my not telling you anything about my school?" She asked. Amir nodded. What did that have to do with anything? "Well, I was afraid you wouldn't believe me if I told you, so I thought bringing you here would be a good idea."

Sam took a deep breath as she bend down and pulled a long stick out of her boot – it looked like a wand you'd see kids holding on Halloween. "I'm a wizard."

The words were so random Amir didn't register them for a second. "A… wizard?"

Sam nodded. "Yeah. A pointy-hats, flying-broomsticks wizard. But I'm not allowed to do magic during the holidays."

Amir was gaping like a fish, his mouth moving up and down like he wanted to say something but no words came out. "I…I don't understand," he finally said.

So Sam took a deep breath and explained everything to him. About how her mother was a Muggle – what they call non-magic people – and her father a wizard. How she received her Hogwarts letter when she was eleven and how she left every September to go to a remote castle in Scotland to study magic. How she had a wand and a flying broomstick and knew how to make potions and cast spells.

She told him everything that had happened during her five years at Hogwarts up until now and she told him about all her friends and her teachers and her lessons. By the end of it all Amir looked utterly overwhelmed.

"I… I don't know what to say."

Sam frowned. She moved her hand closer to Amir's, close enough that they were almost touching but not quite. "I know this is a lot to take in, but… I didn't want to leave you in the dark anymore. You have a right of knowing and I didn't want us to fight over this again."

Amir smiled at her and Sam finally let herself relax. "I understand. I'm glad you told me, but… I'm still really confused about all this."

"And this is why we're here!" Alex finally spoke. "You two lovebirds just go take a walk and ask Sam about anything that confuses you. I'll come along to make sure you don't end up making out in some dirty alley."

Sam and Amir blushed at Alex's words but they did as he said. They spent the rest of the day walking around Diagon Alley window-shopping and stopping in front of every store so Sam and Alex could explain to Amir what they sold there and how it worked. They lingered in front of some shops longer than others- they spent nearly half an hour in front of the Quidditch shop so Sam could explain to him what the sport was and how it was played and what it was she did during the game.

"I'd love to see you play sometime," he had said when Sam had finally finished explaining. "You always wanted to be able to fly. I bet you're great at it."

Sam had blushed at the compliment and smiled. Telling Amir about the magical part of her life had worked out and she couldn't be happier.

Christmas holidays went by in a flash. Why weekends and holidays went by so fast yet the school year dragged on, Alex didn't know. Still, there was something good about school starting up again, even if lessons sucked your soul out of your body like a Dementor, and that was the energy the castle got back. There simply wasn't as much going on around the school when all of its students weren't there.

And one of those thing was The Date™. Mallory and Halfborn's date was coming up soon, as soon as their first Hogsmeade weekend in the second semester, in fact. Alex didn't know if she should be this exited when it wasn't even her date, but she was. Finally, finally, those two got a hint and would go on a date. Her ship was becoming cannon, as Magnus would put it.

So here they were, standing in their room almost two hours before they were supposed to leave for Hogsmeade. The room was a mess put simply. All three girls' closets were wide open and clothes covered all three of their beds. Mallory was sitting in what little space she had managed to find among all the different articles of clothing and she was looking around the hurricane aftermath that her room had become.

"Why did you empty out all of our closets?" she finally asked.

"You need to get dressed!" Alex said and went back to digging through her closet. It looked two times as bad as the rest of the room and Mallory knew that was nothing new.

"I know, but what does that have to do with you two blowing our room up? And we have two more hours before we have to leave for Hogsmeade. We have plenty of time."

"Come on, this is your first date with Halfborn, aren't you excited?"

Mallory blushed. When Alex said it like that it was like there would be more dates afterwards (which she really hoped for).

"Yes, but I still don't get why you had to make our room look like a complete clusterfuck."

"We need to find you a good outfit! So we need to look everywhere. We wear about the same size so this will be fine. Though my clothes might be a bit large on you, but it's okay…" The whole time Alex was talking she was searching around the piles of clothes in their room.

Mallory gestured at the green haired girl with both arms in a 'are you seeing this shit' kind of way. "Are you honestly letting her do this?" she asked Sam.

The girl shrugged. "She said she'll clean up all the mess on her own afterwards, so I can't complain. And I want to help you out too."

Mallory sighed. Really, Alex and Sam were the best friends a girl could ask for, but still. She already felt jumpy enough as it was- their putting so much emphasis on what she would wear made it even worse.

"Guys, I really appreciate what you're doing, but it's okay. You don't have to make our room into a battlefield so I can find an outfit."

Alex paused her digging. "You sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure." She looked around the room for a moment and then said, "You still have to clean this up, though."

Alex's shoulders slumped. "Fiiiine. At least let me look at what you're going to wear."

In the end, both Mallory and Sam felt bad to watch Alex tidy up that mess on her own so they helped her out. When their room didn't look like something from a sitcom's teen girl's room, they finally started talking about what Mallory should wear.

"What were you thinking about?" Alex asked.

"I don't know. Jeans, a nice shirt and those boots you got?"

"The brown ones with the buckles?"

"Yeah, those."

"That sounds good," Sam said. "Let's find you a nice shirt."

Twenty minutes later, Mallory's outfit was lying on Alex's bed and the girls had Mallory sat between them as they gave her advice. She had to say it was kind of laughable considering Alex had never gone on a date (as far as she knew) and Sam's dating experiences were far from typical (like, how many fifteen year olds did you know with betrotheds?). Their advice was probably pulled from TV dramas and romance movies, but Mallory really appreciated their efforts.

Similar things were happening to the other party of this date as well. Since the three boys weren't in the same house, it was hard to do the same thing the girls had done. Still, Halfborn managed to get them into his room and they tried to find his nicest looking shirt and jeans. It sounded easy, but Halfborn's closet could rival Alex's in messiness and most of his clothes needed ironing.

Once they found clothes that would look decent once they weren't a crumpled mess, Magnus ironed them with a quick spell. Both Halfborn and T.J looked at him amazed- they probably didn't even know this spell existed.

"Professor Hearthstone showed it to us during summer," he explained. "It's much more convenient when you have to iron a lot of clothes."

With Halfborn's outfit figured out, they set out for the bigger, more taunting task: taming Halfborn's wild hair and his beard. Or to-be-beard, anyway. The teachers didn't allow him to have one since he was a student, but he never shaved it until it was long enough that he would get detention if he didn't. Magnus had no doubt that once he graduated next year (Halfborn was a year older than them after all) he would grow a beard worthy of Santa Claus or the Vikings in How to train your Dragon.

T.J decided that if they were going to fight this battle they should go all out. They dragged a chair from the common room in front of the bathroom mirror and sat Halfborn down on it. They tied a towel around his neck like they did at the barber's and brought the tools they would need close by.

"Water," T.J said as if he was playing in some doctor drama. Magnus handed him a sprayer filled with water. T.J proceeded to use it to spray Halfborn's hair with water so it would be easier to deal with.

"Comb."Magnus handed T.J the comb and the boy started pulling it through Halfborn's hair. Or he tried to, at least, because he was obviously having trouble with it. The comb had hardly gone through a third of the hair's length when it got stuck. T.J took it out of the hairy mess and tried again but to no avail. The comb was stuck once more and T.J looked at it troubled.

"When did you last comb your hair?" Magnus asked, glancing cautiously at the comb stuck in Halfborn's hair. Which was stupid because it was just hair and a comb; there was no reason for him to look at it like it was a jumpy cat that could claw his eyes out any minute. Thought if a rat had nested in there he wouldn't be surprised.

"Two days ago?" Halfborn said. "It gets tangled easily so I normally comb it in the shower when it's wet. It's easier that way."

"Yeah, but it looks like something nested in there!" T.J exclaimed. "What did you do to it to make it like this?"

Halfborn shrugged and shook his head like he was finally admitting something was a lost cause. "I don't know man, I don't know."

And so an epic battle began. It would go down in history, the day two brave boys had the courage to face the untamable beast. They fought bravely and many weapons were needed for the exhausting battle. It lasted for hours, but neither boy was ready to give up despite the odds being against them. They attacked, again and again, using every weapon at their disposal. Every time it seemed as though the monster was finally defeated it would spring back up.

Many historians would try to explain what it was that helped them land the final blow and lay waste to the beast. Maybe it was the boys' courage, their teamwork or their determination. Whatever it might have been, bards will sing their praise for centuries to come.

"Okay, we finally finished," Magnus sighed as he plopped down on the floor. He flexed his fingers which were tired from holding the comb so tight for so long. The comb he had used was lying discarded near him, a ball of hair on it that looked like a hamster. T.J's comb was a similar mess, but at least Halfborn's hair was now untangled with no odd kinks in it.

"I feel like I just fought a dragon." T.J was lying on his back on Halfborn's bed, spread out like a starfish. He did look like he had just fought a dragon- minus all the shoot and charred clothes that probably came with fighting a fire-breathing beast.

With Halfborn's hair out of the way, they got to the second formidable task.

"Just do it," Magnus said, pushing the sharp object closer to the Gryffindor's face.

"No."

"It's for your own good, Halfborn," T.J added. "You want to look good for your date with Mallory, right?"

"Mallory likes my beard."

"Maybe she does, but it's good to look sharp for a date. And I assume it's not that comfortable to kiss someone whose face is covered in hair." The thought of kissing his crush seemed to make Halfborn consider it so Magnus kept going. "And you don't even have to be completely clean shaved. You can just shave it into a 5 o'clock shadow, just get rid of all this fluff."

Halfborn looked at his scruffy beard through the mirror and with sad eyes, as if he was ordering the doctor to put down his fatally sick pet, he nodded at his two friends. "Do it."

And so the time came. The group of friends headed to Hogsmeade along with the rest of the students. Yet this time they didn't do it as a group, but rather each Mallory and Halfborn were accompanied by their friends that helped them get ready. It felt weirdly like they were the couple's best men and women.

They met outside Blitzen's Best, Sam and Alex flanking Mallory and Magnus and T.J walking by Halfborn to make sure he wouldn't suddenly chicken out and leave.

"Fuck," Halfborn swore under his breath and Magnus wouldn't have heard him if he wasn't walking so close to him. He glanced up at the taller boy to see his eyes transfixed on his date. Magnus understood why; Mallory looked great.

Then again, Mallory always looked great (all his friends' did. Somehow Magnus had very attractive friends). So maybe it wasn't so much how she looked that had Halfborn unable to utter a word but rather the fact the he was going on a date with her. That he hadn't realized this was all actually happening until he saw the redhead standing opposite him.

Mallory was wearing jeans that showed off how fit her legs were from Quidditch and a pair of brown boots that gave a weird fantasy feeling to Magnus, like these were the boots the heroine wore when she left to kill a dragon. She wore a deep blue knitted shirt and one of those cool loopy scarves that Magnus was pretty sure Alex had made her.

"Get her, tiger," T.J whispered, low enough that only Halfborn and Magnus would hear him. And Halfborn heard him because he gulped as if he was about to play an especially crucial Quidditch match.

"Hey, Mallory," Halfborn said. Magnus was proud that he didn't stutter when he talked. "You look really g-good."

He spoke too soon.

"Thank you." Mallory smiled at him. "You look nice too. I like the pony tail."

Halfborn reached behind his head at the small pony tail at the base of his neck Magnus had made him make. "Trust me, the pony tail always works," the blond had told him as he had shoved the hair tie in the Gryffindor's face.

"How do you know that?" Halfborn had asked.

"It always does in movies," Magnus had explained.

"Do you, um, want to get going?" Halfborn asked. Mallory nodded and the two of them left their friends behind as they went on their date.

Magnus turned to his friends. "So what do you want to do while the love birds are on a date?"

Alex and T.J looked at him as if he was crazy. "We follow them," they said together.

"Are you sure?" Sam asked. "Shouldn't we give them privacy?"

"We won't follow them," Alex said. "We'll just happen to be close to where they are."

"Completely by chance," T.J added.

"Exactly."

Magnus took a moment to stare at his two friends who were beaming innocently, expecting one of them to crack up and say they were just joking and suggest something else they should do. Yet neither of them talked and Magnus realized they were completely serious.

The blonde boy let out a loud sigh. "Alright," he said. "Let's go."

The four teens followed the hopefully-will-be-couple from a safe distance as they entered Madam Puddifoot's Tea Shop. It was the dictionary definition of pink and frilly, with everything inside in shades of pastel and lace absolutely everywhere. Magnus was over-dosing on sugar just looking at it.

"Seriously?" Alex muttered under her breath.

Halfborn and Mallory walked up to the door. It was painted pastel blue, like most things in the shop, and both of them went to reach for the doorknob at the same time. They stopped abruptly when their hands collided above the brass handle and looked at each other nervously.

"Eh, um… Here," Halfborn said quickly as he averted his eyes from Mallory to avoid the awkwardness and opened the door for her.

"Thanks," Mallory said as she walked it and waited at the side for Halfborn to come in too.

Outside, the rest of the table 19 gang was looking in through the window. T.J did a little victory gesture. Magnus knew it was because they had advised Halfborn to be a gentleman and he had remembered.

Inside the Lolita-puke shop, Mallory and Halfborn sat down at a table. The chairs were a light cream color and made from metal that shaped hearts at the back. A bow held the little cushions onto the chairs and the table was covered in a dainty tablecloth with lace at the end. Mallory couldn't help but wonder who had decorated this place and whether they had chosen all these things un-ironically. She would be worried about their mental health if they had.

She reached for the menu that stood in one of those little wooden stands they had at cafes and restaurants and her hand bumped with Halfborn's again. She snapped hers back quickly, cheeks turning pink. What was this, a stupid rom-com?

"You can look first," Halfborn said and pushed the menu towards her. Damn it, why was this so awkward?

Mallory looked through the menu and once again couldn't believe the amount of bows, sparkle and cute things someone could shove into something. Who had made this thing, a five year old? There were little cartoon bunnies, puppies and kittens drawn next to the shop specialties telling the customers they should try it because it tasted "sooo good~!" and lace was drawn at the top and bottom margins. Stars, hearts and flowers littered the page at random and every item was written in fancy cursive.

After five minutes of looking thought the available options and trying to make out what each word was supposed to be, Mallory gave up. They had a picture of a milkshake there, inside an elaborate sketch of a frame, so she could just get one of those.

After Halfborn attempted to make sense of the menu too and failed, they decided to order.

"What would you like?" the waitress said cheerfully. She was probably meant to act that way to match with the shop's theme. Thought just walking around in that outfit was enough for that. It looked like a maid outfit; a chocolate brown dress that reached her knees, with details in pink and pink lace at the trim of the skirt, the sleeves and the neckline. A mint green ribbon held her apron in place and a similar one held her chestnut curls back in a ponytail. Mallory guessed the outfit was cute in theory but it simply looked awkward in practice. The girl should be paid just for putting that thing on.

"I'd like a cookies and cream milkshake," Mallory said.

"Make that two," Halfborn added.

The girl wrote that down on her notepad before she left with a smile. Mallory watched her go before she turned back to her date.

"So, um… how are you doing?" he asked her.

"Good, good. You?"

"Good."

Silence. Mallory's eyes darted across the room. Oh hey, that picture of a puppy on the wall is nice. And I like what they've done with the flowers at the tables. Man, I didn't know my shirt was so interesting. It's nice how the thread loops together to make the fabric and—

Damn it, what was wrong with her? Here she was, on the date she hoped she'd get with Halfborn for so long, even if she didn't let herself admit it sometimes, and she couldn't get a word out!

"So, um, you have your hair in a ponytail," she said, latching onto the first conversation starter she could find. Damn it, his hair? Really?

"Uh, yeah. Magnus insisted on it. He and T.J wanted to help me get ready." He chuckled and Mallory cocked an eyebrow, curious as to what was so funny. "They spent an hour trying to untangle it because it had somehow turned into a mess."

Outside the window, T.J and Alex were face palming. Really, his messy hair? That's the conversation topic he chooses?

Yet, somehow, Mallory laughed at that. "Man, really?" Halfborn nodded. "I feel you," she said. "My hair is a mess too. I can spent an hour trying to untangle it and get all the kinks out and then it'll be a mess again two minutes after I'm finished!"

"I know, right?"

Magnus blinked, surprised. "Well, that worked."

The two kids laughed, finally being able to relax over their stupid banter about their tragic hair. Once they calmed down, Halfborn talked.

"You look really nice today."

"Thank you. You do too," Mallory smiled. "Sam and Alex insisted on helping me too. Well, it was mostly Alex."

Outside the shop, Sam nodded in agreement,

"She turned our room into a battle zone!" Mallory went on. "If I didn't know what had actually happened I would have sworn a bomb went off in there or something."

Halfborn burst out laughing at the mental image. His laughter was contagious and soon Mallory was laughing along with him. Their conversation went on normally after that and any anxiousness they had about their date went away.

Until, that is, the waitress came back with their drinks. Or drink, to be more specific. Singular.

"Here you go," she said cheerfully as she set down their milkshake, two straws swimming inside it. Both Mallory and Halfborn were too shocked to talk and the waitress left as they stared at their drink like it was a human brain someone had just dropped at their table.

Outside the shop, Magnus and Sam were giggling at their friends' distraught faces, T.J was almost squealing with delight and Alex was doing a full on victory dance in the middle of the street.

Conall happened to pass by at that moment and he paused when he saw the object of his affections (read: his crush) doing the most ridiculous dance moves in the middle of the street, hidden behind a tree.

"Um, are you okay, Alex?" he asked hesitantly.

"Yes, I'm great!" She punctuated her sentence with a freaking pirouette. "Mallory and Halfborn are having a date, come spy on them with us!"

She grabbed Conall by the wrist and had him kneel down in their hiding spot. Her hand didn't leave his wrist and Conall didn't feel like letting her know.

Back inside the shop, the happy couple was still looking at their milkshake in horror.

"I-I… why is it only one?" Mallory stammered out. Halfborn shook his head, just as blind as to why they were given a single, larger-than-normal-milkshake instead of two separate ones. He quickly turned around and grabbed a menu from the empty table behind them. He flipped it open on the page with the milkshakes and saw what he hadn't noticed before.

There, right at the bottom of the page, a cartoon teddy bear was informing the customers that in light of Valentine's Day, couples who ordered the same beverage could get a bigger one to share for the price of one.

He sighed in exasperation and gave the menu to Mallory to see for herself. "They have a special offer."

Mallory scrunched her eyebrows as she read what the little bear was saying. Halfborn knew when she finished because she slumped down on her chair and sighed just as heavily as he had.

"They must have assumed we wanted a shared one since we both ordered the same one."

"Should we tell them we don't want it?"

Mallory bit her lip. Should they? They were getting both their drinks for the price of one, it was a pretty good deal. Maybe they shouldn't say anything. It wasn't like she wanted to share a drink with him or anything. They were students, it wasn't like their allowances were that big anyway. She was just doing this because it was logical. (Later, Alex would call her a tsundere for that. Mallory guessed she should be mad, but she didn't even know what that meant.)

"It's okay, I guess," she answered slowly. "I mean, it's two for the price of one a-and we both get our own straw, so it's fine."

"O-okay."

Mallory leaned in tentatively to take a sip of her drink. Halfborn did the same thing and leaning over the table like this put their faces impossibly close. Mallory could make out each individual hair of Halfborn's eyebrows, the different shades of color in his eyes, that faint scar on his forehead from when she threw a ball at him and he fell of his broom during a match.

Maybe being this close to him should have made her a blushing, bumbling mess. A lovestruck schoolgirl (which she was anyway).

But it didn't. Instead it made her want to map out his eyes and the way his skin stretched over his face. She didn't want to look away.

But Halfborn did. He pulled back just enough that he could talk and said, "Staring contest. The first one to look away before we finish this loses."

Mallory, who had stopped sipping so she wouldn't drink all of it and leave nothing for Halfborn, smirked. "You're on."

Their mouths were back on the straws and they sucked away, draining their glass more and more. Yet their eyes never left each other's. The battle was intense, like a final Quidditch match between their houses.

Before long, their glass was empty, ice cream that hadn't had the chance to melt staining its walls. Mallory and Halfborn were still at it, not looking away for a single second.

"I can't believe their having a staring contest on their date," T.J muttered, but he didn't take his eyes of the couple. He wanted to see who would win.

"Ten sickles Mallory wins," Alex says.

"Ten on Halfborn," Magnus adds.

T.J raises his hand. "Fifteen on Halfborn."

With a sigh clearly saying "I can't believe we're betting on this" Sam said, "Ten for Mallory."

Meanwhile, Conall looked at the kids around him confused. Were they actually betting on their friends' starring contest? Should he bet too? Should Alex still be holding his wrist like this?

He didn't get to pour over his worries for long though (at least the first two) because Mallory had decided to put an end to their competition. Never breaking their intense eye contact, she pursed her lips and blew a kiss to Halfborn. The poor boy was so surprised by the sudden gesture that he burst out laughing. One moment they were locking gazes like two warriors before an epic battle and then Mallory completely breaks the mood by doing something so cute like this.

Dear Lord, this girl would be the death of him one of these days.

"I win!" Mallory exclaimed triumphantly, throwing her fists up in the air. Outside, Magnus and T.J paid Alex and Sam.

The rest of their date had been great. After they had broken the ice in the tea shop it was much easier to spend time alone together without freaking out because they were on a date. The wandered around Hogsmeade and did the same stupid, random shit they would have done anyway. They messed around at the joke shop, bought candy and threw a contest to see who could throw peddles further in a small pond.

The only thing that might have let people know that they weren't just friends hanging out together was their linked hands. "So your hands don't get cold," Halfborn had said when he took her hand.

Mallory grinned. "I still have another hand."

"Yeah, well, it would be weird to walk if I held both, so you'll have to make due," Halfborn had said through his blush.

By the end of their date, it was safe to say there would be a second one. And probably many, many more.

But the biggest bombshell of the evening hadn't fell until they were standing at the entrance to Hogwarts, each student ready to leave for their respective dorms so they could change out of their clothes and relax.

"Um, Alex?" Conall had mumbled uncertainly. "Can I ask you something?"

"Mm? Yeah, sure. What is it?"

The freckled boy had fiddled with the hem of his shirt and had stared at his shoes. He had muttered a string of incomprehensive words before Alex told him to speak clearer because she couldn't understand what he was saying.

That's when the bomb fell.

"W-would you like to go on a date with me?"

Alex's eyes had widened in surprise. Maybe it was her good mood after everything that had happened that day, maybe it was the fact she liked spending time with Conall and that he was kind and awfully cute, if awkward. Whatever it was, Alex opened he mouth and her answer was,

"Yes."

(Yes, I'm projecting my hair pain on Mallory and Halfborn. shut up.)
I am glad to announce that we are at the halfway mark! *throws confetti* If everything goes according to plan (it never does) this will be twenty chapters long. We're getting there!
Now, buckle up kiddos cause their sixth year is going to be a wild ride (and by that I mean Magnus will spend the whole year singing 'Treat you better'). The fierrochase I promised starts here! (Took me long enough)