Chapter Twenty-Six: The Morning After

Mya lay in her bed the next morning, her head still spinning from the events of last night. Once James and her had broken apart, they had decided to leave the party so they could go be alone and be able to talk. After they kissed the room felt much smaller, especially with everyone's eyes being on them. They had snuck off to the kitchen and stole a tub of ice cream and two bottles of fire-whiskey from the house elves stash, that only Mya knew about. She told him she knew about it from the summers she would spend with her dad at the castle; while he worked she would explore. James joked to her that he never thought about her as much of a rule breaker. She only shrugged, telling him there's more to her than just the perfect Head Girl persona that everyone sees her as.

The pair had chosen to sit outside, so they could look at the stars, but also so they could avoid the leering eyes of their peers or even the portraits. They sat and talked about the most random things for hours; their family, classes, hopes and dreams. James asked how the progress was going on hearing about the internship over Christmas break. She told him the she was told if she does well enough that they want her to take a job in one of their branches. Only when Mya's eyes started to droop towards four in the morning, did James suggest that it was time for them to go back to their dorm rooms and get some sleep. He joked that he would have carried her to her bed, but Slytherins aren't allowed anywhere near the Gryffindor Tower and that the Fat Lady would have a cow if he showed up carrying her.

They had parted after they got back inside of the castle; James headed down to the dungeons and Mya up to the tower. She had to wake up the Fat Lady, who wasn't happy to be woken up at four in the morning, but she let her in after Mya swore she would never try to enter this late again. As Mya climbed through the portrait, the Fat Lady tried asking Mya about the rumor she heard about her and James Potter being together and why she was in a ball gown. The young witch didn't answer either question though and shut the portrait behind her. When she crawled into bed, still in her dress, heels in hand, Harper was the only one whose bed was empty, but she was too tired to bother questioning where her friend was. Now Harper was the only one still in her bed. Mya assumed that her other roommates must have already headed out to breakfast and down to watch the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw match.

Mya sat up in bed and her stirring seemed to wake Harper up, who had managed to get herself out of her dress and into real pajamas. When Harper opened her eyes, Mya starting at her was the first thing she saw.

"Morning." She mumbled to her friend.

"Hey; that was an interesting night." Mya answered biting on her bottom lip.

"I'd say. You and James Potter; that was unexpected." Harper lied. She had guessed for a long time ago that Mya had feelings for either James or Eli, but she would never let Mya know she knew.

"I'm sure that will be all over the Daily Prophet soon enough." Mya scoffed. She then looked at her friend, remembering the last time she saw her, rushing Eli out of the Room of Requirements. "How's Eli?"

Harper eyed her friend suspiciously. "I thought you didn't care about him."

"Just because I'm mad at him doesn't mean I don't care about him."

"I think he cares more about the blow to his ego than the broken nose."

"James broke his nose?!"

Harper waved her hand to brush off Mya's question. "I took him to the Hospital Wing and he got that taken care of. I had the joy of telling Madame Alfred why Eli was in dress robes, drunk with a broken nose and why I was in a gown at one in the morning."

"What did you tell her?" Mya inquired.

Harper only shrugged her shoulders. "The truth; I'm not exactly the best at lying. She isn't going to report us though. I guess Eli being punch and me dragging his ass to the Hospital Wing was enough punishment."

"Well I guess Madame Alfred needed some type of entertainment on a Friday night and you and Eli gave it to her." Mya hopped out of bed and started digging through her trunk as she spoke. "I can't believe we slept this late; there's going to be no food left. What time did you end up going to bed?"

"I couldn't have been much later than you. The Fat Lady gave me a long lecture about how everyone keeps waking her up when all she wants to do is sleep. I told her that makes two of us. I sat in the common room with Eli for a bit and we talked." Mya slammed her trunk shut and gave Harper a look who only sighed in return. "Yes, of course we talked about you. How could we not? He fell apart once he sobered up. He was worried that you would never forgive him. I told him that he needs to back off and that you would most likely forgive him, but you would never love him like he wants you to."

Mya picked up on the bitterness of Harper's tone. "And like you want him to love you?"

"Excuse me?"

"You like Eli. He's the reason you wore red last night isn't it? And why you wanted to know if I liked him, because you didn't want to be rejected before you even got a chance."

Harper gave Mya a looked, but then sighed. "It's not exactly fun to come in second to Mya Longbottom."

"I'm not that great." Mya started, but Harper held up her hand, startling her.

"You're the most popular girl in school and everyone loves you. God your enemy is even in love with you. You're Head Girl and on the Quidditch team; you're pretty much perfect in everyone's eyes."

Mya had no idea how to respond. She stood there gaping trying to find the right words to say. "I didn't realize I was that bad."

"Maybe I was always jealous of you. You know what they say the grass is always greener on the other side. We're two different people." Harper shrugged. "Let's just go see if we can find any food and go to the pitch."

Harper shut the curtain around her bed so she could get dressed, leaving Mya speechless. She had no idea she had made Harper jealous all these years, or how she could have been so clueless about it for this long. She knew she was well liked and was pretty positive her dad was a major reason that she was Head Girl, but she didn't want people to be jealous of her for that. She was the baby of the family and the thing Neville used to hold onto the memories of his wife and she did not wish that upon anyone. Mya worried she was going to go from one of the most popular girls in school to one of the most hated all over a kiss.

OOO

Lily sat at the Gryffindor table, tapping her foot, watching as everyone left the Great Hall to head to the pitch to wait for the Quidditch game. She had Lorcan's family ring on a chain around her neck that she kept twisting around. Dominique sat next to her with a cup of coffee, looking like she was about to pass back out.

The two had gotten separated after Lily went to find Lorcan and Dominique went to find her special someone, that she still refused to tell Lily who that was. When they met up that morning Dominque was in a bad mood and looked like she was nursing a hangover. She said that she didn't want to talk about last night and that was the end of that. All Lily knew was that whoever Dominique wanted to be with either chose someone else or was a no show. As much as Lily wanted to help her cousin, she wanted to find Mya even more and find out what happened between her and James after they left. She was praying that James didn't ruin anything after they left the party. She had wanted to follow them, but Rose had told her that she needed to leave them alone and suggested she go find Lorcan instead.

She had spotted James come into the Great Hall, talking to Scorpius and Holden. He laughed at something one of them said and she cocked her head wondering how long it took before his other friends found out about Mya and made her life miserable. Then her view was blocked making her forget about Mya and James briefly.

"Hey Harmony are you looking for Rose? Because I figured she'd be snogging Scorpius, but he's over that the Slytherin table." Lily addressed the older witch. Harmony Roads, was a muggle born witch and incredibly shy. She was in the same year as Albus and Rose; she mostly kept to herself, but every once in a while Lily would see her handing out with Rose. The older witch shifted uncomfortably and Lily glanced over at her cousin, wanting her input, but Dominique's eyes were still glued to her coffee cup. "Are you okay?"

"I could really use some advice."

"If it's about school. I can go find Rose for you, she can't be too far away; or Professor Longbottom, he's pretty chill."

"Shut up for once Lily, it's about a boy not school." Dominique snapped causing Harmony to turn pink.

"Oh," Lily's mouth dropped to a wide o shape. "Then I should be able to help. Ignore Dom's tone; someone dropped bitch in her coffee this morning instead of sugar."

Harmony glanced at Dominique, but she only rolled her eyes at Lily's comment. "How do I get Albus to notice me?"

Lily's nose crinkled at the sound of her brother's name. She glanced down the table where Albus was sitting. He had refused to sit with any of them, hadn't said a word to either her, Dominique or Rose, so Lily could only assume he was still pissed at her about setting Mya up with James.

"You like Albus?"

"Yes," Harmony blushed. "I find him incredibly cute."

"And you're sure you mean Albus and not James?" Dominique elbowed her cousin. "Ow! What it's not my fault I'm used to most girls wanting to be with James. No one ever asks me about Albus."

"I wore maroon to the ball last night for him." Harmony murmured.

"You were at the ball last night? We didn't see you."

Harmony pushed her hair behind her ear. "I stood in the corner trying to find the courage to talk to Albus and when I finally found it everything happened with James and Eli and Mya. When everything settled down, Albus was gone, so I just ended up leaving; I didn't see the point of being there if Albus wasn't."

Lily glanced down the table at her brother, who looked like a lost puppy. "You really like him?"

"I've had a crush on him since third year." Harmony nodded.

"Okay, I'll help you then." Lily answered. She figured she helped break her older brother's heart, so the best thing to do would be to help him move on and heal.

OOO

Mya went to walk into the Great Hall, praying that there would be food as her stomach rumbled. She groaned when she saw that the doors were closed; of course she had missed breakfast. She turned figuring she might as well head to the Quidditch pitch and just get lunch afterwards with everyone else.

"Longbottom there you are. I've been waiting forever for you to show up. Are you okay? I was worried when you didn't show up to breakfast. I thought maybe I scared you off last night, that we got too close." James spilled out.

"I don't think I've ever heard you speak so fast." Mya teased with a tired smile. "Of course you didn't scare me off. I overslept; I had quite an eventful night."

Mya's stomach rumbled as she let out a groan. James only chuckled in response and pulled out a cinnamon roll. "I managed to snatch this before all of the food disappeared."

A smiled spread across her face as she took the cinnamon roll. "My favorite; now I feel like you're buttering me up." She took a bite and then looked at him skeptically. "What do you want?"

"I only have a harmless proposal for you." James said sweetly.

"Which would be?"

"Next Saturday after the game we're going on our first public date."

"Are we ready for that?" Mya blushed.

"I grabbed you and kissed you in front of a bunch of people. I think I can take my girlfriend out in public." Mya stopped mid-bite and stared at James. "What did I say something wrong?"

"Girlfriend huh? I don't ever recall you asking me."

"I was under the impression after we kissed that we were dating."

"Why? Because girls like me don't kiss around?"

"No, because I thought that's what we both wanted." James scratched him head. Mya wasn't like any other girl he had been with before. Girls typically always went with what he said, but Mya made him work for her, and he loved that about her; not that he would ever let her know that. "I'll do this the proper way then. Mya Longbottom will you officially be my girlfriend?"

Mya paused, pretending to think. "Well I guess since you asked so nice. How could I say no to such an adorable face?"

James kissed her on the cheek. "Glad to know I'm irresistible."

She snorted in response. "I said you were adorable not irresistible; there is a difference, incase no one ever told you." She slipped her hand in James'. "You know next Saturday is Gryffindor verses Slytherin right?"

"Not afraid of a challenge are you Longbottom?" James teased.

"If anyone was going to be scared I would think it would be you. As I recall I beat you the last time we played each other." Mya grinned smugly.

"The sun was in my eyes!" James lied.

"Mhmm." Mya rolled her eyes. She knew how competitive James was, but luckily she was just as competitive as James was. "How about we make things more interesting."

"I'm listening."

"I'll go on your date, but winner gets to pick the date and the loser pays."

"And what if I wanted to take you somewhere nice for our first date?" James protested. "There's no way I would make you pay for something like that."

"You're not courting me, I'm fine with going to the pub. My mother did run a pub before she passed away. I find myself quite comfortable in them."

"Alright you're on." James stuck his hand out for Mya to shake. "And don't think for a second I'm going to go easy on you because you're my girlfriend now."

Mya laughed at that as she shook James' hand. "I wouldn't want to have it any other way."

Here we go another chapter down. I finally finished writing this chapter and started onto the next one. Just as a heads up I think the next chapter is going to be a bit shorter than the others. It's going to focus on Lily, Albus and Harmony with Dominique. Harmony is a character that I created in my other story My Best Friend and I wanted to bring her into this story as a love interest for Albus, because the poor guy needs someone. I haven't decided if the next chapter is going to have Mya and James in it a lot yet or even at all. Their date chapter is going to be the chapter after the next one. The next chapter is called The Rebound right now, but I don't know if I'm going to keep that title. So I've read the spoilers for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and I'm trying to figure out how I feel about it. There are parts I like and parts I find to be incredibly strange. I'm going to wait and read the script when it comes out and make my judgment of it then. Out of respect for those who don't want to read any spoilers I'm not going to post anything. I hope you guys liked this chapter. I really like the blooming relationship between Mya and James. Dominique is going to be explored more in the next chapter and why she's been so upset. Originally I had a different route that I wanted to go with this book that was much darker, but I decided against it and came up with a different ending that I like much better now. I have had a brainstorm for a new story though that is sort of hunger games like. That Voldemort lives and punishes the heroes by having their kids fight against each other and kill one another for sport. I don't know if it's a book I will end up doing or not, but I was wondering if you guys had any input on it. Thank you as always for reading and to my new subscribers. I love hearing the comments that you guys give me. Please SUSCRIBE and COMMENT so I can hear feedback from you guys. Thank you again.

-Chelsea