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So, some of you guessed this chapter right - congrats! But I think I haven't got anything to say here so...

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Chapter 25: Alfie

Lies are, generally, a bad thing. Big lies can destroy a life. Massive lies can bring down a world. Little lies are maybe okay, though. Max lies to himself all the time, and he's not doing too badly for sixteen-year-old cooped up in a castle all the time. But what about my lies? The constant white lies and lies by omission and lies that shape how my friends see me? Is all of that... bigger than a little lie? Have I handled it all so badly that now, it's a big lie that can destroy my life?

I hope not. I fear yes.

"Oh wait, where's Joshua? And Max?" Albus inquired suddenly, standing on his tiptoes and craning his next around the crowd to hopefully get a peep at them.

Being taller anyway, I looked around easily but couldn't see them. There must've been five hundred people, perhaps six, in the hall, all clustered together making it impossible to find someone once you'd lost them.

"We'll find them later, let's just go look for Rose and Lydia. And Sabrina."

I knew where Sabrina was - under the portrait of Aedelbert the Spotty - but I decided to just follow them instead of saying anything.

I'd been in a weird mood for several weeks now. And it's funny how the swirling of over-information or over-emotion in your brain can completely cloud you from acting as you usually do. It drains you of all capability to fit in like anyone else. Max had been a little bit like this recently, but we all knew why. He was actually attracted to a girl on more than looks alone - which wasn't a first, but him realising it? That was.

"Hey Alfie, can you see anyone yet?" Scorpius asked as he, too, went into his tiptoes to try and look around the Hall and catch a glimpse of anyone. Theoretically, it shouldn't be hard to find Rose. Her hair made her stick out in any situation, after all, clearly marking her out as the daughter of the Minister for Magic in texture alone.

"They're over there - just a bit over this way," I said, pointing just a little to our right and not too far in front. "I can see Rose."

"Yeah, well, that's not hard."

"Hey!"

"I'm just saying!" Albus sighed, rubbing his arm from where Scorpius whacked him.

"Scorpius!"

Rose was the first to see them, and she hurried over to her now... boyfriend, I think? And gave him a peck on the cheek. I felt terrible for not knowing. I should really have been paying more attention to these things than closeted in my own head, recently.

"Come on, everyone's over here. Well, for the most part. Isabelle's still upstairs, Lola went looking for someone, Paige is off somewhere with Rhys—"

"As in Rhys Owens? Really?"

Rose nodded back at Albus, giving him the same look that meant she, too, had no idea how or why that happened. "But otherwise, everyone else is here!"

By 'everyone else', it transpired that she meant 'everyone else in her family in Hogwarts', with a few others joining them.

Lydia and Albus seemed to gravitate towards each other within seconds of seeing each other - those two were lucky. They were the definition of a couple meant to be. If I'm completely honest, I was pretty envious of them. It must've been nice to have that constant, reassuring companionship.

Almost all of the other cousins and siblings were assembled - even Roxanne, who it turned out had managed to come by securing a fourth year as a date. Where that fourth year was, I had no idea, but I still couldn't help but admire her gumption.

There was something about being around such large families in Hogwarts that made me feel slightly uncomfortable. Especially recently. It wasn't the people - it was never the people - but just the concept itself. It was because of my own family. How uncomfortable I felt with them, when we all gathered back at our house during Christmas or birthdays. How utterly out of place I was. And it wasn't that my parents were ever outright abusive or neglectful - indeed, they were quite the opposite. But I do wish that just once, they had written to me whilst I was here, at Hogwarts.

The cousins were discussing a time when Rose and Albus had teamed up to fool his father, when I saw my chance to leave. Not that I wanted to leave them, but I felt I had to. I was lying to them with every action I took, after all. At least, recently I had felt that way more than ever, and the guilt was gnawing away at me from the inside out.

I knew that Sabrina wouldn't be far off. She was an angel; one of the kindest people I knew. And I would never know why she did all this for me, or how I could ever repay her.

Sure enough, there she was: standing right under the portrait we'd agreed, looking wonderful in a deep crimson, floor length dress, and her sweet face looking even prettier than usual in skilfully applied makeup.

"Good evening, Sabrina. You look lovely."

"You too, Alfie."

We embraced in a brief hug, before settling into our quiet, familiar routine of speaking in riddles.

"How is everything?"

I nodded, in the vague kind of way that means 'terrible, or at least very complicated, but I shan't go into it now'. Sabrina knew exactly what I meant.

"Ah. So, still confused about what to do?"

"Wouldn't you be?"

"I am." She pointed out, with eyebrows raised.

I averted my eyes; ashamed that, so caught up in my own issues, I had neglected to consider her. I had been doing that more and more recently, and I despised it. It wasn't me. It wasn't my personality, or a characteristic of mine to forget everyone else. I took pride in caring for everyone around me, trying my hardest to be kind to all. I could even be conversationally cordial to Rhys Owens, which was really something, given his past actions towards my closest friends. But recently, it was like my very spirit had been fractured into a hundred pieces, and whilst I knew I had the capability to embrace them all, I just... couldn't.

"You're even quieter than usual, Alfie. I worry about you." She said, simply, and I looked down at her again, meeting her kind, green eyes.

"I know. But I worry about you, too. It's a mutually concerned relationship." I pointed out, and couldn't help but smile.

It made Sabrina laugh, too. Which was always a positive. She was easy to make laugh, even easier to bring a smile to her face, usually. She was, it would be fair to say, my crutch throughout the years of Hogwarts. As soon as we discovered each other's secrets - which is a story far/ too long to go into, but needless to say involves two ghosts, a photograph, and a hastily written note - we realised that we might as well continue trying to fool the world together.

"We have done a wonderful job, haven't we?"

"And may we continue to do so for a long time to come." I added, with a hidden meaning behind my words.

"So, that is your decision?"

I nodded, wordlessly.

"Are you certain?"

"I have thought long and hard. But it would cause too many problems, shift too many relationships. People would speculate, hold my life under a magnifying glass - any action I took would not be safe from scrutiny."

She looked down at the ground and nodded. "Okay. I'm behind you, as always." She said, and I could almost feel the warmth from her words envelope my body in the cold winter chill.

"Thank you, 'Brina," I said, as the students around us began to move like a herd of sheep. "You know I am always ready to act however you want or need."

She nodded. "Of course."

Professor Henrich stride over to us, dragon skin coat flapping in the breeze he created, as we remained unmoved, almost the last students in the hall.

"Come on, time to go into the Hall."

"Yes, Sir," I said and offered my arm out to Sabrina as we, too, traipsed into the packed Great Hall with all the other students.

"Let's stay near the back. I prefer it back there, anyway." Sabrina muttered into my ear, and I obliged happily. I couldn't even see where Max or Joshua or Scorpius or Albus where anymore, and there was no one else in the vicinity that we knew too well, either. Only friendly faces I passed with a wave as I walked the corridors of Hogwarts, and there were, admittedly, a lot of them.

Sabrina and I hung at the back, near a table presumably left out for the tired dancers later in the night, happy to be anonymous and ignored as the slow, gentle waltz struck up some way before us.

"I wonder who she's with tonight." Sabrina opined, searching the crowd for someone who Alfie would never say.

"I never heard who she went with." It was a lie, a little white lie, but she didn't need to know what he'd heard. Not tonight.

"Sure," She said, with a smile. And then her face shifted into a frown, or perhaps closer to confusion, as she stuck her head out beyond Alfie, "oh—"

"Alfie," came a voice from his left; quite suddenly, but a voice he knew well.

Oliver.

"Shall I leave the two of you to it...?" Sabrina offered, green eyes flicking between the two.

I nodded, "thank you."

She disappeared into the crowd, weaving her way through to search for someone she knew, still a smile on her face.

My stomach clenched. Another person I was letting down for my own selfish gains.

"It's alright, Alfie. She knew what she was signing up to."

"I know, but she deserves to have all the friends in the world around her, not to be left alone."

Oliver smiled with a roll of his eyes. "She's not alone. She has lots of friends, and she will be fine/. Put yourself first for once."

I let out a half-snort, half-sigh. I wasn't sure when the last time I'd done that was. At least, I wasn't sure when the last time I'd enjoyed doing it was.

"You look handsome tonight." He said, and I couldn't help the blush that spread across my cheeks. "Oh— you're so cute!" He said, and laughed.

"Thanks. You look—" I looked him up and down. He did look very nice, actually, "you look splendid, too."

"'Splendid'? Sometimes I wonder where you get these words from," he laughed, and I couldn't help the smile that blossomed from his infectious laughter. "I don't think I've ever been called splendid before, actually. Must be a first. I'll take it, thank you."

And he took my hand gently in his, squeezing it affectionately. I slipped my hand out of his as soon as was feasible, eyes scanning the crowd as my heart beat a million miles an hour.

The crowd was all applauding, eyes firmly ahead of them. No one saw. I let out a deep breath.

I knew Oliver would be frowning next to me, but I didn't care. I was just glad no one saw.

"Hey, why don't we go and dance?" He nodded over to the crowd gathered before us, with his head of light blonde hair. There were couples stranded everywhere, dancing like the pretty figurines in Muggle musical boxes. My mother had one of those in her room, enchanted to dance for ever and ever but never omit a sound.

"No, I'm sorry."

"Wait— so we're going to just sit at the back here, all evening? Doing nothing?"

"Well, I mean... we might do something else."

"Like dance?"

"No."

"But why?"

"Because I— I already told you. I don't want to. I told you this is what it would be like, and you agreed."

"But I doesn't have to be!"

"Yes, it does! This is how it is and always will be for me!"

I was standing before I knew it; panting and out of breath before I knew it. He was standing too, and taking several paces back.

Silence hung between us, thick and heavy. I heard Max shouting some choice swear words behind me but I was too focused on this dark, heavy, unbearable silence to listen to even him.

"Alfie, I— you are... you're unbelievable." He left, turning tail and fleeing the Great Hall. Looking around for any eyes on me, I decided it was safe, and fled, too.

"Oliver, Oliver! Wait!" I could hear his footsteps not too far beyond me, heading down the Transfiguration corridor of all places.

I caught sight of his blonde hair, shining with the light of the full moon outside, and he veered sharply left, pushing a tapestry out of the way.

"What— Oliver!" I jogged to catch up with him, pushing the tapestry aside to see...

A secret corridor?

"Oliver! I'm sorry, I'm just..."

"I know. You've said it a thousand times. But you're not the only one to have ever gone through this!"

I looked down at the ground; dimly lit in the light of the one and only torch that lit this narrow corridor, but I could still see broken and uneven tiles below me.

"Alfie, you're gay." The words were blunt, and true, but uncomfortable enough to make both of them pause and draw in a sharp breath. "You are gay. It's just a fact."

I knew that. I'd known it already for years. But that didn't make it any easier.

"And you should be proud of it."

I looked up to meet his eyes. They shone more amber than usual in this dim torchlight.

"I'm just not ready to tell the world yet."

"Why?"

He came to stand in front of me, oh so close in the narrow space of this corridor. The uneven, jagged plaster felt uncomfortable against my back.

"Because... I..." There was no way I could eloquently say what I hadn't even made up in my own mind yet. "I'm just... not ready. To tell my friends. And my brothers..."

And they weren't the half of it. I knew I could tell Scorpius and Albus, easy. I'd even considered telling Scorpius once, and in a trance-like daydream I'd heard the words come out of my own mouth. But then I'd awoken, and never been able to do it.

I don't know why. Of all my friends, bar Sabrina, they would understand. That, I knew. Albus would continue on life as normal, and I doubted Scorpius would even understand why I felt the need to tell him as though I were confessing my darkest secret. But that was the issue: it was my darkest, deepest secret, and they needed to understand that.

Joshua, I was sure would be fine. Probably. Perhaps he'd crack a few crude jokes, change behind his curtains, but he was my friend, after all. But Max... how did one tell the object of one's affections for years who you really are? How can you say it, without making it apparent that all the things I'd done over the years were more than just signs of friendly affection.

No, Max could wait. That wasn't a bridge I wanted to risk burning.

And my family... that was a nightmare I wasn't really to live yet. I was the one who kept all their secrets, and yet no one had ever asked me of mine. I wasn't sure they'd care if I told them - only if I acted in what they termed, a 'homosexual lifestyle'. I was already the most 'feminine' of my five, macho brothers. The little skinny one, into the arts and old books and fashion and interior design... the cliche wrote itself, and I wasn't ready to live their jokes, not yet.

And my parents... through their inaction, they would be the worst of all. I could tell them, and they would never care. Ignore it, skirt around it, and make it a bigger taboo than I already felt it was. And then force me to marry a nice pureblood girl, despite my protestations. No, with my parents, I had two options: live my entire life as a lie under their eye, or cut myself off from them and be free.

And that was only my close friends and family. These are decisions I cannot make with the flip of a knut; I need more time to decide if I will live a comfortable lie, or try for perilous freedom.

"I just need more time."

Oliver sighed, and came even closer to me. I could feel his body resting over mine; every muscles and curvature of his bones pressing into mine. "Fine. It's fine."

He was no Max. He didn't have that same charisma oozing from his amber eyes. And he had blonde hair, not brown, and his face wasn't sharp and masculine but soft and pixie-ish. And he was no Harvey Payne, with looks straight out of a catalogue or ancient statue of the gods. But he would do.

I leant in, and kissed him.

It was good. Better than when I'd kissed a girl. Much, much better; my stomach clinched and twirled, and I sighed into his mouth, with happiness and release and finally, the feeling of things being right.

And I kissed him again, and again. He wasn't exactly right, but he was still the only man I wanted in that second.

He pulled away, eyes filled with a little more passion, now.

He smirked, and I followed the movement of his lips with careful eyes.

"So. Want to be my secret boyfriend, now?"

I simply nodded. With a smile. It wasn't like Lydia and Albus, this wasn't endgame. But it was a start, and it would do. It would do very well, I thought, as I kissed him again.

He's not Max and Max will never be like Oliver. He's not like Harvey Payne, although there are certain rumours about him. He's just Oliver. He's the only gay student I know who isn't miles out of my league. He's kind, and fun to talk to. He'll do.

So I kissed him again, and again, whilling away the night in his lips. And finally, it felt right.

Okay, so, disclaimer: I'm not gay. Coming out is an experience I have not lived, so if you are gay and have come out and this doesn't feel faithful to your experiences, please let me know! I don't want to be a writer who purports to be a friend to the LGBTQ+ community but then also writes harmful cliches. Y'know, just let me know if there's something that you'd like me to add/take out, please!

On another note, I had a review left that says I write with too much dialogue. I'm perfectly secure in how I write - dialogue heavy is my style - but nonetheless, I'd like your opinions, please. Yay or nay on the dialogue?

Anyway! Serious stuff aside, what did you guys think of Alfie? There's only two left, so who do you think's next - Albus or Scorpius?

Please review if you've got time, and follow for more. Thanks!