Alone in her room, Victoire stretched her legs out on her bed and rested her head lazily on her pillow. With an issue of Young Witches magazine propped up above her, she flipped idly through the pages as she waited for Whit to return from her shower.
She wasn't even sure why she still read this magazine anymore, seeing as she'd clearly outgrown most of the style tips and juvenile ideas for fun. Even the boys whose pictures covered the pages weren't nearly as cute as she remembered them being a few years ago. Then again, that was probably because most of them seemed a lot younger than they used to be—or rather, she was a lot older and they were staying the same age. She had to remind herself that she wasn't exactly a young witch anymore. At eighteen, perhaps she should move onto more adult geared magazines with more mature themes. She'd have to remember that when her subscription to this ran out and the time came to pick something new.
With a bored sigh, she continued flipping through the issue, watching as colorful photo after photo of smiling, happy teenagers passed her by. She glazed over articles entitled, "How to Score that Perfect Smile!" and "Which Boy is your Perfect Match!" only to stop finally on the magazine's featured article—an interview the Nymph Chasers. Casually, she began to read over the article, where pictures of long haired wizards with guitars jumped around on stage for the viewing pleasure of a packed audience filled the pages. There was a small information box off to the side declaring the band's likes and dislikes, their favorite songs, and a list of their musical influences, including the Hob Goblins, the Helgapuffs, and the Weird Sisters.
She scanned the article for its finer points before noticing a small blinking decal claiming a free poster of the band in every issue. Free poster? She hadn't seen a free poster. Her expression grew curious as she flipped to the back of the magazine, only to find nothing there. She turned the magazine upside down and shook it, knowing that if there were a poster somewhere in there, it would find its way out. When nothing fell, she began to feel like she'd gotten a faulty issue.
"What the…?" she said, sitting herself up straight and forcing a random page to fall open across her lap. It was then that a perforated edge—the sort that had clearly had something torn from it—became apparent. Victoire ran her finger along the jagged, torn piece of paper, inspecting it for a quick moment. Someone had taken her poster.
She immediately looked up to her open doorway. "Nicki!"
"What?" called Dominique from somewhere down the hall.
"Come here!"
There was a long pause before the sound of movement and footsteps followed. A moment later, Dominique appeared in the doorway and propped herself against its frame. "What?"
Victoire held up her magazine. "You didn't happen to get to my magazine first, did you?"
Dominique's face immediately looked as if she knew where this was going, though she attempted to play it off as if she didn't have a clue. "Uh, I think I may have looked through it. I don't really remember."
Victoire pulled the pages back to reveal the perforated edge from where the poster had been torn. "Just looked?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Dominique said, turning swiftly on the spot and speeding off back down the hallway.
"You can't just take my stuff and expect me not to notice!" Victoire called after her.
There was no answer, but she hadn't expected one since Dominique was the queen of denial. In truth, Victoire didn't even want the poster, but it was more the principle of the matter. Had she wanted it, her sister would have just pinched it from her and hoped she wouldn't notice. She couldn't have that. She really should do something about it…but she was in no mood to argue at the moment. What was the point really?
She tossed her magazine to the floor and plopped back down onto her pillow with a soft thud. From nearby, she could hear the sound of the shower water being shut off, followed by the sounds of a shower curtain being pulled back. Whit would be out in the minute or two; just in time to help her ring out the last—she checked the clock on her bedside table—twenty-three minutes of her birthday.
By all accounts, her birthday had actually been quite lovely. Once she put breakfast behind her, she had waited for Whit to arrive so that they, along with her mother, could spend the day out and about. They had ventured to Hogsmeade for most of the day, where her mother had let her pick out various small gifts here and there, including stationary, some earrings, candy, and a few books. They had then gone to Diagon Alley so her mother could run some quick errands and pick up all the necessary items that were still needed for that night's dinner. When her mother had set off to do just that, Victoire and Whit had gone off on their own to window shop and enjoy what was left of the afternoon.
All in all, she'd kept herself good and busy most of the day. Upon returning home, she'd enjoyed a lovely dinner and the most wonderful chocolate soufflé in the world. Whit had readily agreed to stay the night, even after only hearing the briefest of descriptions about what had happened the day before with Ted—as much as Victoire was willing to recount—and the girls had since been spending the evening talking and hanging out in her room.
That had been that; her day from start to finish.
Lazily, she reached up and stretched her arms above her head, letting them fall lamely on the pillow and behind her. As she waited for Whit, she glanced out the window that sat beside her bed and watched as the large tree that stood just beyond her house swayed gently in the moonlight; its branches looking as if they were shaking off the cold just as she would had she been stuck outside. Beyond that, she could just make out how the sea's waters were calm and tranquil tonight. Everything seemed almost frozen.
She refocused her attention back on her room, lifting her eyes upwards towards the ceiling. Immediately, she spotted a small black spot that held more memories than she was willing to admit at the moment. That stupid spot…
She closed her eyes, but thoughts of Ted were already materializing before she knew better. She'd be lying if she said that whenever her mind had found an inactive second that day, she didn't think of him. Without fail, all day, the second she let her mind lull, there he was creeping into her thoughts.
Still, she had to admit, even with him finding his way into her head time and time again, she felt as though she'd been very good about keeping those thoughts to herself all day. She hadn't bothered anyone by droning on incessantly about what had happened, and she had in fact only even told Whit a small summary of what had happened yesterday. Even when Whit had pressed for more details, Victoire had more or less shrugged it off and changed the subject. As much as she wanted to talk about things, she didn't want to complain or mope or say things she may regret later on. If she'd learned one thing from her former friendship with Colleen Lynch, it was that once you told people things you may not necessarily mean—having said them only because you were mad—you can't take them back. People don't forget.
It had been one of Colleen's horrible habits—dating boys who would do something to set her off, and her turning around and spilling every horrible detail or secret about that boy to her friends out of anger. She would always go on to forgive the boy the next day, but Victoire had always wondered how she was supposed to suddenly forget all of those embarrassing stories of small penises, funny smells, and worthless lays that Colleen had told them about. Colleen may have forgotten, but Victoire never could; she couldn't even look at some of these people the same way as before, knowing now what she knew. It had been something that had taught her one very valuable lesson: Watch what you say about other people out of anger.
It was for this very reason that she had chosen to barely mention Ted today, but that wasn't to say she wasn't constantly thinking about him. Every time he popped into her head, a different emotion would surface. Sometimes, she'd be angry, though not nearly as much as the day before. Other times, she'd feel pangs of hurt, but again, not as bad as yesterday. It seemed that as time passed, the anger and the hurt were subsiding significantly, only to make room for the unanswered questions that were now looming over her.
What happened next? What happened when she saw him again? What was supposed to happen? What did she expect? Tomorrow was Simon's wedding and, at this point, was she even still going? Technically, she wasn't even invited. She'd been invited through Ted. What was she supposed to do about that?
She opened her eyes for half of a second, only to immediately shut them again. In the end—after she'd analyzed and reanalyzed, and then reanalyzed again how she felt—the only thing she had found herself truly surprised by was Ted having actually listening to her . He had heeded her request and stayed away; he'd taken her seriously. She wasn't necessarily hurt by this since she told him not to come, though she was certainly something. She couldn't pinpoint exactly how she felt about it; confusion seemed to sum things up best, though the word didn't quite grasp the situation like she wanted.
She couldn't lie to herself—a large part of her had wanted Ted to come by today; another part of her didn't know how she would have reacted if he did. She didn't know whether she should still be mad or whether she should just let bygones be bygones for the sake of making things better and moving on. She knew she didn't feel quite so angry anymore, but something inside her was telling her not to drop things so easily; something was telling her she should still be mad. But no matter how much that little voice in her head kept telling her should be mad, it didn't change the fact that she wasn't really mad. It didn't change that the only real emotion she felt at the moment was complete and utter uncertainty.
"Well," said Whit, reentering the room in her robe with a towel wrapped around her head. "It needs to be said that I really like the soap you have in there. It smells fantastic."
Victoire opened her eyes and looked at her. "We aim to please."
"I'm starting to figure out all your secrets," Whit joked, smiling as she pulled the towel off her head. "You'd better watch out."
Victoire mustered a small smile and rolled over onto her stomach, watching as Whit set about using her wand to dry her hair. It took her less than a minute to dry her pin straight hair, though it took her even less time to notice Victoire's vacant stare in her direction.
"What's up?" Whit asked once she lowered her wand.
"What do you mean?"
"You're just staring into space," she said before she sat down on the nearby camp bed that had been set up for her.
Victoire groaned a little before burying her face into her pillow.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
She didn't look up, but shook her head.
"It might help."
"What's there to say?" Victoire asked, picking her head up to look at her. "I have no idea what's going on, I haven't heard from him all day, and I think I might be going a little mad over it all. And by a little, I mean a lot."
"You have to heard from him," Whit said, pointing towards the door. "Those flowers he sent you count as hearing from him."
"Okay, so I've heard from some flowers he's sent," Victoire muttered, "I still haven't heard from him. But why do I even care? He's probably out right now getting piss drunk and doing who knows what, and he probably doesn't have a damn care in the world. Meanwhile, I'm sitting here driving myself mad thinking about…" She trailed off and plopped her face back down into her pillow. She wasn't going to talk about this anymore.
"Vic…" said Whit, her tone somewhat consoling. "I don't know Ted as well as you do, but I really doubt it's that black and white. He doesn't seem like the type to just brush this sort of thing under the rug without a second thought."
Victoire made a noncommittal noise for lack of anything better to say. Sure, Whit was probably right, or rather, she hoped she was right, but she wasn't about to go admitting that at moment.
"What are you going to do about Simon's wedding tomorrow?" Whit asked.
Victoire shrugged and flipped over onto her back. "I don't know. I mean, I want to go, but…I don't know."
Whit nodded and casually reached down to grab at the magazine Victoire had discarded earlier. She opened it to somewhere in the middle and looked as if she was simply flipping through the pages for something to do rather than actually reading any of it.
Victoire groaned. "I hate this feeling."
"I know."
"I want to talk to him, but at the same time, if I see him right now, I think I might curse him."
Whit laughed a little, just as the sound of knocking at the door pulled both of their attentions away from the topic at hand. Without waiting to be invited in, the knob turned and Dominique appeared with a large piece of paper in her hand.
"Here," Dominique said, walking over to where Victoire was to hand her the paper she'd brought in with her. "Happy birthday. Don't say I don't ever get you anything."
Victoire hesitated taking it from her right away, though when she finally did, she didn't quite understanding what her sister was giving her. It only took a quick inspection of the gift to realize that Dominique was merely returning her free magazine poster to her.
"You're giving what was originally mine back to me?" Victoire asked. "As a present…"
Dominique smiled and nodded. "And look, I even drew a moustache on the drummer for you since I know you don't like him."
She looked down at the poster, noticing that the drummer did, in fact, now have a poorly drawn moustache over his face. He didn't look at all happy for it.
"Well, thanks," Victoire said slowly, "but I don't have a problem with the drummer."
Dominique's expression turned curious. "Yes, you do. You're always saying how much he annoys you, and how he'll never be as good as their original drummer."
"No, I've never said that," Victoire said, shaking her head. "I've got no issue with the new guy. But tell you what, you go ahead and keep this." She handed the poster back. "You've gone and made it your own anyway."
"What do you mean you've never said that?" Dominique asked, though she didn't hesitate to take the poster back. "I know you've said that."
"Wasn't me," Victoire said. "You're thinking of someone else."
"Who else would I be thinking of?" Dominique asked, looking as if she was thinking out loud rather than actually addressing anyone specifically. "I could have sworn it was…" She suddenly stopped, as if something dawned on her. "Oh, never mind, I know who said it."
"Not me," Victoire said with a smile.
"No, it wasn't," Dominique said, waving her hand dismissively. "It was something Sarah had mentioned awhile ago. I don't know how I confused you with her."
At the mention of Sarah's name, Victoire took the opportunity to stare down her sister. "Speaking of Sarah, what's going on there? You plan on talking to her anytime soon?"
Dominique frowned. "Maybe. Eventually. I'm in no rush."
"So, you'll forgive Louis and not her?" Victoire asked, her eyes narrowing.
"I have no real choice but to tolerate Louis," she said, her face growing bored. "I'm sort of stuck with him. Sarah…" She shrugged.
Victoire rolled her eyes, making no attempt to hide this from her sister.
"Oh, stop acting like you'd be any better," Dominique countered. "You and Ted had that one fight back in school and you stopped speaking for like a year."
"Longer than that," offered Whit.
"Exactly," Dominique said, gesturing to Whit. "You're going to sit here and give me grief when you're just as stubborn as I am?"
"You can go now," Victoire muttered.
"And I'd also bet," Dominique added, "that whatever the reason Ted sent half the flowers in the country to our house this morning is something that you're still being stubborn about."
"It is my birthday," Victoire said, not looking her sister and wishing she would altogether drop the issue. "People get flowers for their birthdays all the time."
"Yes, but those people don't usually look like they want to chuck them in the rubbish bin," Dominique said pointedly, "especially when they're from their boyfriend. Which, funnily enough, is the very same boyfriend who you usually spend every free second with, but yet, is nowhere to be found on your birthday."
Victoire's exhaled deeply.
"Now, my question is," Dominique continued, "did Ted actually do something wrong, or are you overreacting to something insignificant like you always do?"
"I didn't overreact," Victoire said matter-of-factly.
"I really can't fault her for being upset," said Whit.
"What happened, then?" she asked. "I mean, this is Ted we're talking about. He's only capable of doing so much."
Victoire bit her tongue.
"Let's see," Dominique said, mocking thoughtful introspection. "Did he sleep with someone else?"
"No!" said Whit and Victoire in unison, though Whit quickly added, "no, nothing like that. He just made a mistake and they got into an argument over it."
"Yes, but what kind of mistake?" Dominique asked. "There are different kinds of—"
"He went and planned Simon's stag night for tonight without realizing it and waited until the last possible second to tell me," Victoire said finally. "He planned it for tonight, and when I got upset, he went and called me childish. We ended up getting into a row over it. That's it. That's all there is to it." She looked at Whit. "Now that being said, I don't want to talk about it anymore. Okay?"
"Okay," Whit said, looking as if she was more than willing to change the subject. "Let's talk about something else. Anything else."
Dominique stared at them both for a second, though she looked as if she wanted to laugh. "Fine," she turned to Whit. "So, I forgot to tell you that I ran into Jack earlier today."
"Anything else, but that…" Victoire said, wondering where on earth her sister came from. It was as if she had a sensor to simply address every issue that people were bothered by and then throw it back in their faces.
"What?" Dominique asked. "We can't talk about him, either? We can't talk about Ted, we can't talk about Jack, who can we talk about?"
"Anyone else," said Victoire simply.
Dominique ignored her and turned back to Whit. "I thought you and Jack were still friends?"
"We are…were…sort of. He got mad because of," she made an obvious face, "what you said I'd said about Kenley and him."
"What'd I say about Kenley and him?" Dominique asked, looking confused.
"You don't even remember?" Victoire asked. "In the common room? After the Ravenclaw match? You went and said Whit suspected something was going on between those two, and that's why they broke up. You announced it for the entire castle to hear. "
"Ohhhh," Dominique said, sounding as if she'd remembered. "Right, I did say that." She looked back at Whit. "He got mad at you for that?"
Victoire rolled her eyes.
"He wasn't happy," said Whit.
"Have you talked to him?"
Whit shrugged. "Well, no, but…"
"You both," Dominique pointed between Victoire and Whit, "are so strange. It's as if avoiding these boys and sitting on everything is easier to deal with than actually talking to them."
"You're really one to talk," Victoire muttered.
"I've never said I wasn't strange," Dominique countered. "At least I admit it." She looked at Whit. "For the record, Jack doesn't care and he's not mad. Not even a little bit. Come on, you dated the boy for almost a year. You know he's not even capable of holding a proper grudge. He's the most easy-going person in the universe."
Whit looked down at her hands.
"Oh, and also," she added, "he and Kenley don't have anything going on. But then again, who really even pegged Jack as being the player type?"
"Well, she was obviously always flirting with him," said Victoire. "She gave off the distinct impression that she fancied him."
"She probably does," Dominique said. "But, she also fancies half the Slytherin Quidditch team, she's practically in love with Mike Flack out of Hufflepuff, and Henry's told me she'd come flirting around him and his friends countless time. The girl obviously likes boys. A little too much, if you ask me…"
"It still doesn't make it right—"
A strange clicking noise from somewhere in the room made Victoire stop speaking. For a brief second, she had thought she was imagining things, but both Dominique and Whit's faces looked as if they'd heard it too.
"You heard that?" Victoire asked, sitting up straighter.
Both Dominique and Whit nodded, though Dominique added, "What was it?"
Victoire looked around, but noticed nothing out of place or out of the ordinary. "Perhaps it was just—"
She heard it again, though this time, it came from behind her—from the window. It had sounded like something small and hard had hit it. She immediately pulled herself up onto her knees and turned to look outside.
"It's probably just ice falling from the roof," Whit suggested.
"What ice?" Dominique asked, climbing upon the bed to stare out the window with Victoire. "There is no ice."
With Dominique beside her, Victoire stared out into the darkness, but saw nothing out of the ordinary out there. Only the tree, the sea, and the roof awning that lay right below her window. It all seemed completely normal.
"I don't see anything," Victoire said, giving the layout one last sweep with her eyes before turning back to Whit.
"It's probably nothing," said Whit. "It's windy out tonight, so things are probably being kicked up off the ground."
Victoire shrugged, as if to agree, and turned herself back around to face away from the window. "You know what I'm in the mood for?"
"What?"
She smiled and pulled herself off the bed. "Let's go and see what's left of my chocolate soufflé downstairs."
"I doubt there's anything left," Dominique said, finally turning away from the window herself. "I saw Louis digging into it as I was coming upstairs earlier. You know he will have inhaled the rest of it."
"Ug, if he ate the rest of my—"
The clinking sound repeated itself.
"Something definitely hit the window," Whit said, pointing at the glass. "I saw it."
"I thought I saw something, too," said Dominique, "but just barely." She reached up to open the window.
"What are you doing!?" Victoire asked, taking a step back. "It's freezing outside! Plus, who knows what that is! Maybe Whit's right and it is ice. If you open the window, it could come crashing down on your head."
"It'll just be for a second," Dominique said, unlatching the latch and reaching down to tug at the bottom of the window. "And it's not ice."
Victoire pulled a disgruntled face as she walked over to pull her robe on over her pajamas and shield herself from the cold that was inevitably seconds away from invading her room. Whit followed suit and wrapped her blanket around her shoulders, just as Dominique heaved the window open with a small grunt. Almost instantly, the cold sea air brushed Dominique's hair back as she stuck her head partially out the window.
"Do you see anything?" asked Whit, pulling herself off her own bed and onto Victoire's to take the spot next to Dominique.
"There's this," said Dominique, reaching herself half out the window to lean against the roof awning. When she pulled herself back in, she was holding a small pebble. "It's sitting here on the roof."
"Is that a rock?" Victoire asked.
"Yeah, a very small—" Dominique stopped. Both she and Whit had turned to look out the window at the exact same time.
"A very small what?" Victoire asked. "Do you see something?"
"You didn't hear that?" Whit asked without turning away from the window.
"I heard it," Dominique said as she once against pushed her head through the window. "It was a voice."
"Definitely a voice," Whit agreed.
Instantly, a creepy sense of panic ran through Victoire. Was something out there? Was someone watching them?
"What kind of voice—?"
"Hello!" yelled Dominique. "Who goes there!?"
"Nicki!" Victoire snapped, reaching forward to grab the back of her jumper and reel her back inside. "Stop it! What is wrong with you?!"
Dominique laughed as she poked her head back inside of the room. "Well, it's rude to ignore them."
"It could be some strange nutter!"
"A strange nutter is just a friend you haven't made yet," Dominique joked, looking back out the window.
"I'm going to go and tell Dad," said Victoire, turning immediately towards the door.
"I wouldn't do that," Whit said before she pulled herself onto her knees and squinted into the darkness. She looked as if she was trying to get a better look at something. "Look." She pointed. "Just there."
Dominique followed her finger, but was soon laughing once again. "Well, you were right about one thing, Vic. It is a strange nutter."
"It's Ted," Whit said, turning to look back at Victoire.
Something inside Victoire gave a start. While she was thrilled that it wasn't some strange pervy, creep crawling about in the garden, the fact that it was Ted brought out an entirely different form of anxiety in her.
"Hey, Lupin!" yelled Dominique. "Why are you messing about like a prowler? Have you forgotten we have a front door!?"
Victoire crossed her arms across her chest and hung back by the door. "What's he want?"
"I'm going to go ahead and take a wild guess," Dominique said, turning back to her sister, "and say he probably wants to see you."
"But why is he out there throwing pebbles at my window?"
"Why don't you come and ask him?" Dominique asked, gesturing for her to join them at the window.
Victoire didn't move. In fact, she almost felt rooted to the spot where she was standing, as if some force was holding her there. She bounced nervously on the balls of her feet before averting her eyes to anywhere but the window. What on earth was Ted doing? He'd never once resorted to anything like this before. What possessed him to throw stones at her window in the middle of the night?
"Vic?" asked Whit. "Are you—?" She pointed outside.
"Ask him what he wants," Victoire said, still not budging.
Dominique rolled her eyes, but stuck her head back out the window. "She wants to know what you want!"
Victoire couldn't hear anything but the wind, though both Whit and Dominique looked as if they were listening intently to something that was being said. After a few seconds, Whit rounded back on her.
"He wants to talk to you," she said. "Said he would have rung the bell, but he was afraid of getting yelled at for coming around so late."
"Right, because getting caught at throwing rocks at the window this late is much better," said Dominique, laughing. "You know, I think he might be drunk."
Of course. That's exactly what it was, Victoire realized. He was drunk. He'd probably had too much to drink, got to thinking about things, and decided to come around while he was off-his-head inebriated to tell her something that probably won't make any sense anyway. Bloody fantastic…
Whit stood up from the bed. "Vic, go and talk to him. Go and see what he has to say."
Victoire made a face. "I don't want to talk to him if he's pissed. What is that going to do?"
"You can yell at him and he probably won't remember tomorrow," suggested Dominique.
"Or…" Whit said, butting in immediately. "You can just go and talk to him."
"But—"
"Just go see what he wants," said Whit.
Victoire frowned and looked towards her now open bedroom door. If Ted was drunk enough to stand outside her window throwing pebbles, who knew what he might do if she didn't talk to him. The last thing she needed was him to somehow get her parents' attention and for them to see him like this.
She glanced back at the window. If she was going to do this, she certainly wasn't doing it here. She was going to have to go downstairs.
"Fine, I'm going," Victoire said quietly, turning on the spot, but hesitating briefly. She wheeled back around and gestured to the still open window. "Shut it."
"But then we won't be able to hear you," said Dominique.
"I'll do it," said Whit, walking over to climb back onto Victoire's bed and reach for the window.
Victoire took a deep breath and stepped out into the hallway before slowly making her way down the stairs. Upon reaching the entrance hall, she glanced into the living room, where her mother was sitting on the sofa with a book in one hand and a cup of tea in the other. It wasn't until she reached out to set her teacup down that she noticed Victoire.
"Everyzing all right, sweet'eart?"
Victoire forced a small smile. "Let's hope so." She reached out to pull her cloak off the hook by the door. "I'll be right back."
"Where on earz are you going?" asked her mother, sitting up straighter. "It iz nearly midnight."
"Just outside for a second. I'm not going anywhere."
"It iz freezing outside!"
"It's just for a second," Victoire said, stopping short of actually mentioning that Ted was outside for fear of her mother wondering what his prerogative was. "I, um, dropped something out my window on accident."
"Why do you 'ave your window open?"
Victoire pulled her cloak around her. "It just got a little stuffy, but it's shut now." She reached out to pull the door open. "I'll be right back." She smiled quickly before stepping outside into the frigid night, hoping that her mother had believed her little lie.
Outside on the porch, she immediately felt a chilly wind sweep up the hem of her cloak and send a bone chilling cold through her body. She wrapped her arms around herself in a makeshift attempt to keep warm, but quickly looked for any sight of Ted. He apparently hadn't come around the front.
She took to the porch stairs and set out across the lawn, walking towards the side of the house where she knew her room was stationed. She suddenly wondered why she hadn't bothered to put on something a little warmer. Her cloak couldn't only block out so much of the cold, and her robe, thin cotton clothes, and slippers weren't doing much to help matters. She wished she would have grabbed a scarf or some mittens.
She turned the corner to the left side of the house, where the large tree that sat just outside of her window came into view and blocked out most of the space along the horizon of the sea. Through a crack in the branches, she could just barely make out a crescent moon that hung low in the sky and provided very little light on anything in this darkness.
Victoire pulled out her wand to cast a spell to shed some light on her surroundings, but the sound of a cough over by the house made her instead look straight in that direction. It was there, crouching lazily again the house in a squatted position, she saw Ted.
She exhaled slowly, her cold breath visible against what little light there was before she stepped forward to fill the gap between them. Ted didn't bother to move to meet her halfway, but rather stayed crouched exactly where he was. She wondered if he was so drunk that he could barely stand, and if that was the case, then why on earth was he Apparating here in the middle of the night?
"Hey," Ted said quietly, right as she found herself a few feet away from him. "Happy Birthday."
Was it even her birthday anymore? She didn't even know, but she wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't. As she stood there staring at him, she was suddenly reminded of the year before—her seventeenth birthday—whereupon Ted had also showed up just before midnight to see her before the day was out. It was almost funny how the exact same gesture was now being viewed in a completely different way.
"This was a lot a cuter when you did it last year," she said dryly.
He didn't say anything; instead he stayed put where he was crouching, his eyes focused on the ground. Even in the dark, she could see how heavy his eyes looked and how exhausted he seemed. If it were for any other reason other than him being stupidly drunk, then she may have felt sorry for him.
"What are you doing, Ted?" she asked, shifting her weight on her feet to keep the cold at bay.
"I'm not sure," he said, still not looking at her.
"Oh," she said blankly, her eyebrows flexing skeptically at that.
"I wanted to see you," he said, his voice still very low, though after a beat pause he looked up at her. She then saw first hand how tired his face really looked. Not only were there bags under his eyes, but they looked bloodshot and glassy. His hair was messier than it usually was, and oddly enough, it was brown. She'd never known him to willing wear it brown when he didn't have to, which only told her that he was so drunk that he was incapable of keeping even his simplest habits straight.
"How much have you had to drink tonight?" she asked.
He shrugged and looked away. "Don't know. Can't remember."
"Not surprising," she said, looking off along the sea before turning back to him. "You shouldn't be Apparating if you're this drunk."
"I'm not drunk," he said flatly.
"Right," she said sarcastically. "No, of course not."
"I'm something right now," he said with a little laugh, "but it's not drunk."
"Sure. Fine," she said, deciding to just let him just call it whatever he wanted. "But why are you standing here throwing rocks at my window in the freezing cold—" She stopped and noticed he wasn't wearing a cloak or anything warmer than a standard set of robes. "Where's your cloak?"
"Left it somewhere," he said dully. "Probably lost it."
She rolled her eyes. "You're going to freeze to death."
"Nah, if anything, the broken glass would have done me in. Not the cold."
Victoire wasn't even going to pretend to understand what that meant. As it was, she was beginning to feel her feet go numb, which meant attempting to crack his drunken code wasn't worth the effort. "Ted, you need to go home and get some rest. Sober up a bit and then we can talk. This isn't doing anyone any good."
"I'm not drunk, Vic. I told you that already."
"Whatever you are," she muttered. "If you sit out here in the cold for much long, you're going to get sick."
"Are you still upset with me?" he asked, ignoring what she'd said and instead looking up at her through squinted eyes.
"I will be if I end up losing a foot to frostbite."
He continued to stare at her.
She sighed. "Ted, we can talk later."
"It's a yes or no question," he said simply.
He was acting weird; no doubt because of how drunk he was. The last thing she felt like doing was standing there and explaining to him how she felt at the moment, considering he wouldn't understand. She'd be wasting her time with him like this. If he was sober, then he'd be able to comprehend, but—
"Because I really am sorry," he said, cutting into her thoughts. "I fucked up. I'm sorry. I love you. The last few hours have been hell for me, and going through it all thinking you didn't want anything to do with me was probably one if the shittiest feelings I've ever felt."
She continued to stare at him. She didn't know how serious he was being, or even how much of this he'd remember in the morning, but all of this had to be coming from somewhere. Drunk or not, it seemed mostly sincere. She really did want to believe him and put this entire mess behind them and go back to way things were before, but could it really be that simple?
Ted reached up to rub his eyes. "Just tell me what I have to do to fix things and I'll do it."
"You don't have to…" She sighed and looked at her slippers. "I don't want you to do anything. I just wanted you to understand why I was upset in the first place."
"I knew why you were upset," he said, snapping his head up to look at her. "You were just being…" He trailed off. "It doesn't even matter. I'm sorry."
She grinned a little. "You said that already."
"I'll say it a hundred times if I have to," he said as he finally stood up from his crouched position and used the house as a means of supporting himself. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…"
"Okay, that's enough," she with a quick laugh, reaching out to touch his arm as a means of signaling for him to stop. As she did, she noticed the fabric of his sleeve felt oddly stiff and crusty. She looked down at it.
Ted looked down too, but he immediately reached to pull his sleeve up to his elbow, as if he was purposely hiding something.
"What's happened to your clothes?" she asked after just barely catching a glimpse of something dark running up his sleeve. "What is that?"
"I just had an accident. I cut myself, but—"
Victoire took a step back, the realization hitting her instantly after hearing the words, 'cut myself.' "Wait, is that…?" She hesitated. "Is that blood?"
He coughed. "It looks worse than it is."
"Is that your blood?!"
Ted let his sleeve unravel and fall from his elbow back down his arm, where he lamely held it out for her to see. "Yeah."
She inhaled sharply, now seeing first hand his dried blood that covered his sleeve. Even in the dark, she could easily tell how much of it there had been.
"Don't worry about it," he said.
"Ted, what happened?"
His eyes drooped a little. "It's a really long story…"
"But…are you okay?" she asked, sounding doubtful. "That's a lot of blood."
He nodded and shrugged a little. "I went to the hospital and they put all sorts of potions in me. They fixed this—" he rolled up his sleeve again and held up his hand palm up, where, in a flash, the smooth skin that had been there a moment before morphed to reveal a long, semi-healed gash mark that ran from the center of his palm to his wrist, "and I was supposed to go home, but I wanted to come and see you first."
Victoire gaped at seeing the wound, but it didn't stop her from taking his hand into hers to immediately examine it. That had caused all of this blood? But how? Why? When? Where? She wanted to know what had happened, but Ted barely looked like he could keep his eyes open, let alone tell her.
She knew then that he wasn't drunk at all, but rather, he was doped up. He'd had so many different potions working through him that he clearly couldn't function properly. That's why he was acting so weird.
"You're not drunk…" she said, still looking at his hand.
"I know that," he said obviously.
She dropped his hand and looked up at his face, which she'd just then noticed was especially pale. It was the closest she'd come to him since walking outside in the first place, and it was then that she figured out that him looking like death wasn't because he'd been binge drinking all night, but because he'd been run through the ringer. Not to mention, he wasn't wearing a cloak and it was freezing outside…
"Ted, you need to get inside before you get sick," she said, sounding far more like her mother than she would have liked to admit. "You're really weak right now. You'll barely be able to stave off the cold."
He nodded a little, but made a point of looking her in the eyes with his own droopy, tired eyes. "Are we okay?"
"Ted…"
"Please just answer me."
"If I say yes," she asked, "will you please stop running around like a mad man in the cold and get some rest?"
He smiled a little. "Only if you mean it."
"Then yes, we're okay," she said matter-of-factly. "But let's go inside. You can't be Apparating home like this."
Ted grunted and picked himself off the wall, though he quickly began shaking his head. "I'm not letting your family see me like this." He coughed and blinked several times. "I'm covered in my own blood and out of my head. There's no way…"
"Ted, they'll understand. You can't—"
"I can make it home," he said lamely before he focused his tired gaze on her.
"Ted, please just come inside."
"I'm not letting your parents see me like this," he said more adamantly. "I don't want them to know about this."
She looked him up and down; her doubtful expression already speaking for.
"Honestly, Vic, I'm fine," he said, still bracing himself against the house. "I made it here okay and I'll make it home okay." He paused and looked up at the sky. "I wish you could come."
"Come?" she asked.
"With me," he said. "Home. It's just…going home alone right now sounds," he visibly shivered, "not fun."
"I know," she said, frowning the longer she watched him. "But you know my parents won't…especially if you won't explain to them why..." she shook her head, "it's why you should come inside—"
Ted just shook his head.
Victoire stared at him, not knowing what else to do or say. He wasn't budging on this. She looked down at the ground. "I can come by first thing tomorrow morning," she offered
He nodded a little, before mumbling, "I wish you could be there now."
She forced a sad smile, wishing in part that she could do just that. If she could go, she'd at least be able to keep an eye on him for the next couple of hours. She'd never seen him like this before, and it worried her to know he was going back to his empty flat alone.
But that was something that would never happen. Her parents wouldn't believe her if she told them some crackpot story of Ted showing up bloodied and doped up in the middle of the night, and if she actually brought Ted to them to prove it, they wouldn't let him leave. Not to mention, with Ted refusing to allow himself to be seen by them, it only left the crackpot story option; one that would only make her parents suspicious—if they didn't write her off as mental first.
"I wish I could," she said honestly. "But first thing in the morning, I promise."
He shivered again, but without a word, he reached into his pocket and pulled something out. Whatever it was, he attempted to inspect it for a moment before holding it out to her.
"What's this?" she asked, taking from him what appeared to be a key. Upon examining it further, she saw that it was just that—a small, brass, old looking key.
"It's to my flat," he said, his voice sounding slightly clearer. "Just let yourself in tomorrow morning."
"Oh," she nodded, "okay. But how are you going to get in when you get home?"
"Spell," he mumbled. "Actually," he gestured to the key, "I want you to keep that. You'll need it."
She blinked. "You want me to keep your key?"
He took a step around her, moving further than she'd seen him move all night. "Yeah, it's so you don't ever have to knock again." He shrugged. "You shouldn't have to knock anymore. Happy Birthday."
She looked down at the key in her hand and turned it over twice, noting that the metal was cold. This was a big step. A huge step, really. He'd give her a key to his place. She couldn't help but wonder if Ted was thinking properly or if the potions in him system were making him act a little loopy. The last thing she wanted to do was put him in a position where he might regret his decision in the morning.
"Let's go ahead and talk about this tomorrow when you feeling better," she said before she reached out to grab his good hand. "When you're sure you want to do this."
"I already know I want to do this," he said, looking off in the direction of the front of her house. "I've been planning on doing this for months. Why do you think I'm carrying a key around in my pocket if I can get into my flat with a spell?"
"Victoire?!" shouted her mother's voice from somewhere. "Where are you?"
Victoire hadn't even had time to gauge what he had said before, with a quick pop, Ted was gone. He'd disappeared.
She stared, somewhat startled, at the spot he'd just been standing in, hoping with all hope that he was coherent enough to have made it home instead of off somewhere he wasn't supposed to be. Even though he wasn't drunk, he still wasn't in the proper state of mind to be Apparating. She should have made sure of that.
"Victoire!" called her mother again.
With a lump in her throat and the key clutched her key in her hand, Victoire pulled her cloak around her and took to a jogging pace towards the front of the house. It was there that her mother stood on the porch, watching her as she came into sight.
"It iz far too cold to be outside in what you are wearing," said her mother with disapproving stare. "What was taking you so long?"
"It was dark," she said, pointing back towards where she had come from as she remembered the story she had told her mother about dropping something out the window. "I couldn't see. I, um, had to search."
"Did you find whatever it iz?"
She nodded solemnly as she shuffled past her back into the house.
"Well?" her mother asked, following after her and shutting the door behind them. "What was it?"
"Oh," Victoire said, taken off guard by the request. "It was…" She remembered the key in her hand and held it up. "It was this."
"A key?"
She nodded.
"What iz it to?"
Victoire didn't answer her right away, but instead looked down at the key that she was letting lay flat across her palm. When she finally did, her tone sounded far away. "So many things."
Her mother stared at her curiously, though Victoire didn't bother to stay put to answer anymore questions. Instead, she immediately took to the stairs to escape her mother's gaze and return to her room.
"Tell me everything that happened," said Whit before Victoire could take even one step inside. It seemed that she had been waiting—rather attentively—on the camp bed, as judged by how quickly she sat up at attention once Victoire reappeared. Across the room and on Victoire's own bed, Dominique posed a complete opposite reaction. She was stretched out comfortably with her head resting on a nearby pillow; unlike Whit, she barely even budged.
"I'm surprised you didn't listen out the window," Victoire said, throwing a particular look at Dominique.
"Don't look at me," Dominique said, reaching her arms out in front of her before tucking them behind her head. "You know I would have. Whit wouldn't let me."
"And don't think she didn't try," Whit said frankly, glancing back at Victoire. "So? What happened?"
Victoire crossed the room towards her bed and pushed her sister's legs to the floor with a sweeping motion to make room to sit. Without a word, she immediately plopped down at the foot of her bed and let her back rest against the nearest wall. She absently continued to turn Ted's key over and over again in her hand.
"Was he drunk?" Dominique asked. "Because he seemed pretty pissed from where I was sitting."
Victoire shook her head. "He had some accident tonight. He couldn't even tell me what it was because he was so doped up on potions. He's got this huge gash on his hand and there was blood all over his sleeve. Apparently, he went to the hospital and everything."
Whit gaped.
"And you didn't ask what happened?"
Victoire shrugged. "He couldn't tell me. He just looked so exhausted and dead-on-his-feet that I didn't want to stand there questioning him." She frowned and looked down at the key in her hand. "He looked awful."
"I wonder what happened," mumbled Whit.
"He mentioned something about glass," Victoire said, her tone dropping significantly lower, "but I don't know if that had anything to do with what happened. He could have meant anything."
"So, wait," Dominique said. "Was he just here to show off his injury?"
She shook her head. "No, he said something about how the last few hours had been hell, and thinking I was mad at him just made things worse. That was really it."
"I'm sure that after going through something that put him in the hospital," Whit said, grabbing her pillow and pulling it onto her lap, "he'd probably realized it's stupid to be fighting when who knows when something terrible could happen."
"I guess," Victoire said, still staring down at the key.
"Or maybe you're just the person he wants to see when he's feeling shitty," Dominique said, a strange tenderness in her tone.
Victoire didn't look up, but a small smile played at the corner of her lips at hearing that. She had to admit that it took actually hearing something along those lines for her to register the idea of that being the case. After all, he was the first person she wanted to see when she was feeling low or sick; she could only hope the same from him.
"What's that?" asked Whit, gesturing to the key in her hands.
She stopped turning it and held it up to show her. "When I told him I was going to come by and check on him in the morning he gave it to me." She lowered it. "It's to his flat. He told me to keep it and that I'd be needing it. I guess he's wanted to give it to me for awhile."
"But it took being doped up on pain and strengthening potions for him to actually do it?" Dominique joked, taking the moment to stand from the bed and brush the wrinkles out of her clothes.
"Would you let me have my moment?" Victoire asked.
"By all means, moment away," Dominique said, smiling as she headed towards the door. She hovered just by it before exiting out into hallway. "But anyway, I'm glad you two worked everything out. You're annoying when you're mopey."
"Yeah, well, you're annoying all the time," Victoire countered.
Dominique laughed as she walked out, and it carried even after she had disappeared out into the hallway and out of sight. With Whit and Victoire now alone, a thoughtful silence filled between the two of them once Dominique's laughter finally tapered off. Victoire continued to turn her key over in her hand under Whit's gaze.
"I think the key is a sweet gesture," Whit said. "It's sort of like a metaphor."
Victoire cocked her eyebrow at her. "A metaphor for what?"
"You know," she said as she hugged the pillow in her lap. "He's opening doors for you. For the two of you."
A doubtful smile crept across Victoire's face. "I think you're really reaching." She stared at the key. "Though it is nice to have the freedom to come and go, I suppose. He doesn't seem care that I can just walk in on him whenever. It's like he's encouraging it."
"Well, that's what I meant," Whit said obviously. "All people have their walls, and the more you give someone the opportunity to break through those walls, the more intimate you become. I read it in a book once."
"Oh," Victoire said, laughing loudly. "Well, if you read it in a book…"
"You know what I mean," Whit said, shaking her head. "It's just, it's a big step, is all. He's taking the two of you seriously."
"I guess so," Victoire said, reaching out towards her desk to set the key down on desktop. She stared at it for a second longer before turning back to Whit. "You know what was really weird? When I saw him, I didn't even want to be mad at him anymore. Usually, I feel like I should still be mad or hold the grudge and be stubborn, but this time, I just didn't feel like doing that. I wanted to put everything behind me and move on. The fighting just seemed so stupid and pointless."
"I think some would say that means you're maturing," Whit said. "It's a mature response to forgive and move on when something really isn't the end of the world."
"You read that in a book?" Victoire joked.
"Ha-ha," Whit said, picking up her pillow and tossing it at Victoire's head. "You know I'm right."
Victoire ducked and let the pillow bounce off the wall behind her. "Right," she said. "Because you're always right?"
Whit smiled. "I wouldn't say always."
"Well," said Victoire as she pulled her knees up in front of her and wrapped her arms around her legs. "I think the real answer is that being in love is making me go all soft."
"I don't know if I'd say that," Whit said, plopping herself down into a lying position on her bed. "But I think it might teach you a thing or two about yourself."
"The only thing it's teaching me right now is how to worry about whether or not Ted is all right. When he and I were out there, my mum called my name and his Disapparated before I could stop him. Now I'm wondering if he made it home."
Whit made a pensive face. "I'm sure he's fine. He made it here, didn't he? And getting here would have been harder than getting to a place where he goes everyday."
"Still," Victoire said, checking the clock and seeing it was a quarter after midnight, which meant that it was no longer her birthday. It was now New Year's Eve. Soon enough, yet another year would be out, and a fresh one beginning. After the last year she'd had, she could only wonder what was in store for her now that 2018 was on the horizon.
"I just wish I could be with him right now," Victoire said, thinking out loud. "Just knowing he's at home by himself…" She sighed.
Whit smiled sympathetically. "I'm sure he's fine."
"I hope so," Victoire said before shaking her head. "Sod it. Let's not even talk about it anymore. It'll just drive me mad if keep thinking about it."
"How about we go downstairs and see if there's any soufflé left?" Whit suggested. "It might take your mind off of things for awhile."
Victoire forced a lukewarm smile. "If it doesn't, the shouting match I'm going to have with Louis for eating the rest of it very well might."