"People don't almost kiss people they have no feelings for."

36

Of Remembering and Forgetting

AS PER REQUEST: MUSICAL MOOD FOR THIS CHAPTER: Kelsey Karter - Liquor Store On Mars;

Thunder rolled in the distance. The rain had picked up, thrashing violently against the high windows of the hospital wing, but I barely noticed. My head was leaning against the doorframe, my fingers clutching the wood so tightly that my knuckles had turned white. I couldn't see much; the curtain next to the bed had been drawn, the white cloth billowing softly whenever one of the healers rushed by. There was only Hector who was sitting on a chair at the foot of the bed, his elbows resting on his knees. His lips were moving, but his voice didn't carry and the words ebbed away in mumbled whispers.

"You really have to go now." Madam Pomfrey's Crocs were slapping against the hardwood floor, her brow furrowed as she advanced on us. Her usually crisp apron was crumpled in odd places and a few wisps of white hair had freed themselves of her tight chignon, fluttering about her face. "Go to bed. All of you."

She had reached for the door and slowly began to close it, forcing me to finally abandon my silent vigil and step back. The door snapped shut in my face, locking out the pungent smell of disinfectant that had been crawling up my nose, and I took a deep breath, welcoming the squeeze that issued from Katie's hand.

"She's right," I sighed and turned around. My best friend looked the worse for wear with her auburn hair disheveled and the mascara around her eyes smudged to accentuate the dark circles underneath her eyes. Honestly, she looked as whacked as I felt. "Get your man and let's go."

Katie turned to look at the bench where Tarquin's tall frame was backed up against the rigid backrest, his head drooping to the side and his long arms wrapped loosely around his torso. As she watched him, the expression on her face grew so tender that it suddenly felt like I was intruding on a very private moment, and I quickly looked away, just to find James leaning against the wall. Our eyes met and my breath caught in my throat.

"You get your man." Katie's voice was barely a whisper in my ear, yet it felt as though she had shouted the words across the hallway for everyone to hear. I would have blushed - violently so - but the exhaustion of today's events was soaking my bones and my body seemed to be functioning only in emergency mode.

Katie and Tarquin were walking ahead of us, their arms entangled and their bodies gravitating together as they moved along the corridor. I had often marveled at it before; their easy comfort with each other that showed most in these small, inconspicuous moments. It was hard to pinpoint when exactly they had changed from nervous smiles and stiff gestures to this warm familiarity, but it was impossible to imagine them any other way now.

I stole a glimpse at James who hadn't spoken for a while; he was watching them too - the way their hands rested naturally on each other's back - and I suddenly felt profoundly awkward just walking next to him. The corridor was narrow and we were close enough that I could feel the warmth radiating from his body. Our hands brushed against each other as we turned the corner, conjuring up the memory of his fingers lacing through mine. It seemed like it had been forever ago that we were holding hands, like something that existed in an entirely different universe.

"EY POTTER!" There was a sudden commotion, the clanking of glass on stone, and a group of guys spilled into the hallway, stumbling over each other in the process. They congregated around James like moths that had found a solitary lightbulb in a castle full of fires and he smiled.

"What's up mate? Where were you?"

James accepted the half-hug from Isaac Kastner, one of the Gryffindor beaters, with generous ease, looking entirely at home. After the last couple of hours it felt strange to see him like this - in his natural element - the centre of attention: the unattainable James Potter, the Gryffindor golden boy, whose careless laugh would ring across the hallway as he passed you by with a beautiful girl dangling from his arm and the ever crooked half-smile playing on his lips.

"I was busy." He shrugged it off as though he was talking about a nasty piece of homework.

Busy.

I had been lingering next to him; the way you did when a friend ran into an old acquaintance from another life and you just stood there, not quite part of the conversation but also somewhat expected to smile along as though you could actually contribute. Before I had the chance to slowly untangle myself from the group, however, I was drawn into the conversation.

"Sure. Busy." Kastner grinned; his gaze had flickered towards me a few times already, but now he seemed to have abandoned all pretence of discretion. I knew what it must have looked like, of course; prowling the castle after curfew with James Potter. Luckily they seemed to be too drunk to form any concrete thoughts.

"Dude, you missed Genie Patil doing a striptease on the bar - it was -" The guy behind Kastner stopped mid-sentence, only shaking his head. Apparently the experience had been too transcendental to put into words.

"We're going back there right now, are you coming?" Kastner had swung his sweaty arm around James's shoulders. It wasn't so much a question as it was an assumption - that James Potter would not want to miss a wild party like that - and it was as though I suddenly snapped out of a very long and very strange dream.

"Um, hey," I said, seizing my opportunity for a smooth-adjacent exit. There was not going to be a non-awkward way to initiate this and now was as good a moment as any. "It's been a long night, so..."

I found James's eyes; the familiar frown - the one he had had when he had been bent over my messy notes in the potions classroom, his fingers raking through his hair, trying to figure out the Hephadore theorem - and, for a brash second, I wished he would offer to take me home.

I also wished he wouldn't.

The sobering cold of the castle was beginning to crawl in, much like it had in the abandoned church last week, and I felt a resurging bout of mortification as James's words echoed in my head. This was all too confusing, too strange, too much to think about right now. I needed a clear head to deal with all of these rogue emotions that made absolutely no sense.

"Woodley-"

I didn't know what he was going to say - if he was going to say anything - but my brain was exhausted and my muscles were aching from sitting on that hard bench all night and I needed to leave. "Have fun."

He didn't reply. All he did was look at me with that strange, unreadable expression, his hands buried in the pockets of his jeans, and then he nodded - like he would when he'd see someone vaguely familiar in the hallway - and I walked over to Katie and Tarquin as Kastner's friend launched into a detailed description of Genie Patil's knickers.

I hadn't realised how tired I was until my head sank into the pillow. Everything felt suddenly heavy, like it was weighed down by an invisible blanket, and my eyelids closed for longer with every time I shut them.

"So, Sam," Katie said slowly, her voice mingling with the rain that floated into the room through the open window. I could feel the weight of her body next to mine and let my head tilt towards hers, catching a whiff of her flowery shampoo.

"Sam," I murmured into the darkness, letting his name hang above us. I could still see him - his body sprawled on the bathroom floor, his face as white as the tiles around him - and, as the memory rushed back, the drowsy stupor was broken like a bad spell. "I wish I hadn't -"

"No!" I could feel Katie's head turn towards me. "Don't you even think of going there, Seth."

I swallowed hard and tried to focus on the gold stitching on the canopy above my bed. I had tried to trace the pattern a thousand times before, but it only seemed to go in circles, like a labyrinth that made you run around for hours, just to spit you back out right where you had started.

"I give up on people, don't I?" I couldn't look at Katie, mostly because I knew that it was true. I had always known. Not consciously, but like you just knew the flaws that lurked in the darkest crevices of your core, containing all the ugliness and the spite and the pride that made you stand in your own way.

"You've never given up on me."

I smiled at the ceiling. "Because you wouldn't let me."

"You and me are different," she said and I could feel her shoulder bump against my arm as she shrugged. "We're for life, baby."

I finally turned my head to look at my best friend, her curly hair tickling my cheek. "I'm scared that I push people away too quickly."

She looked back at me for a long moment, her eyebrows drawn together in contemplation. "Are we still talking about Sam?" There was a long pause before she finally said, "I saw you."

I laughed. "Well, I saw you too."

"No, I mean, you and James." Katie took a deep breath as her eyes locked with mine. "You were holding hands."

I could feel the heat crawl up my face, defying even the cool air that streamed in from outside. "We - um - how could you see that? You were snoring like a lumberjack most of the time."

"Hey! I'd like to think of it more as a gentle purring than snoring."

My friend, the queen of euphemisms.

"It didn't mean anything." I said it like I was reciting a text passage for an exam. Something I had learnt by heart because I hadn't been quite able to grasp the deeper meaning behind the principle.

Katie sighed. "You always say that."

"Because it's true." I rubbed my eyes, trying to counteract the budding images of the forsaken church: the cold air and James practically telling me that everything anyone would ever see in me was a fancy pureblood legacy. In the aftermath of the wedding I had thought about this more than I liked to admit to myself, and the bottom line was never a good one.

"Do you like him?"

"No."

"Seth."

The ends of Katie's locks were now tickling in my nose and I turned back to look at the veiled canopy above my bed again, studying the strange pattern once more. I just couldn't go there. I couldn't think about James; mostly because I knew that, if I did, there would be no way back. But there was also no use in lying to Katie.

"I don't want to."

I thought she would press me for a more concrete answer; that she wouldn't let it go. But she didn't say anything and I closed my eyes, allowing my thoughts to swerve until they melted into a dreamless sleep.

It was all over the castle. How word got around so quickly at Hogwarts would always remain a mystery to me, but the fact was that, by Monday afternoon, it was everywhere. People were whispering about it in the hallways, congregating in large clumps on the stairs to exchange shreds of information in an attempt at shoe-horning them into whatever version of the story they had crafted for themselves.

"Can you believe it? A prefect." The girl in front of me said to her friends as they ambled up the stairs, her voice practically trembling with excitement.

"I heard James Potter found him."

"I heard he saved his life."

I exchanged a look with Katie as we pushed past the huddled group of Gryffindors, taking a right on the fourth floor.

"Have you talked to him at all?"

I shook my head, not looking at her. I could barely think about James without feeling a myriad of muddled emotions that were too complex to detangle and I also wasn't sure if I even wanted to, really. Things were complicated enough as it was without having to deal with Hogwarts' resident heartthrob.

"You go in first." Katie's voice was quiet, but it cut through my revolving thoughts nonetheless. She had stopped in front of a heavy wooden door and I stared at it for a moment, the knot I had been feeling in my stomach all weekend tying itself even tighter.

"I'm scared," I told her as I gripped the handle of my bag, shifting my weight from one foot to the other. It felt selfish to say it out loud, even though the thought had been with me for days, and I immediately wished that I could take it back.

"I know. Me too." Katie gave me a miniscule smile and I felt a bit of the heaviness lift from my shoulders before I steadied my breath and pushed against the door.

The recovery room was bright and airy despite the lousy weather outside. Someone had cracked open a window to let in the rain-sodden air and the sound of birds chirping mingled with the faint clinking of china. Hector was sitting next to one of the beds by the window, but he turned around and got up when he saw me, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jeans. Behind him, Sam was sitting in his bed with his head propped up against four pillows and his blonde hair completely dishevelled.

Hector gave me a small nod before turning back to Sam. "I'll get more tea. Be right back."

I could feel my hands getting clammy as I began to twist the handle of my bag, moving towards the bed. I wasn't sure what I had expected, but the fact that Sam looked so utterly normal - like he had just rolled out of bed and was sitting across from me at breakfast - took me by surprise. When he looked up at me, however, there was nothing but polite puzzlement and I felt my heart sink to my stomach. The easy familiarity we had built over the last months was gone and I had to force myself to smile at him.

"Hi." I lifted my hand in a small wave, the smile still plastered to my face. It felt completely wrong, but there was little else I could do. "I'm Seth."

"I know." Sam's voice sounded exactly the same and, for a moment - as he was smiling back at me - I nursed a glimmer of hope that all was not lost; that my friend was still there.

It must have shown on my face as he quickly added, "Hector briefed me."

"Oh, right." I tried to not let the disappointment show, feeling supremely awkward as I moved to make space for Hector who had come back with tea. I watched him tinker with the porcelain as he placed it on his boyfriend's bedside table for a second before bracing myself and turning back to Sam.

"How - um - how are you?"

It was an exceptionally stupid question, but everything I wanted to tell Sam - that I wished this hadn't happened to him; that I was sorry; that he was brave and a good friend - would have only confused him.

"Good." He frowned and then said, "I think", almost like an afterthought. His eyes followed me as I sat down on the other empty chair next to his bed and I wondered how it must have felt for him; to wake up in a life that wasn't his own anymore.

"So, I hear we're friends?"

I glanced at Hector once more and, this time, he gave me a small smile. It wasn't much, but it somehow helped to brave the strangeness of the situation.

"Yes. We are."

Sam nodded and his gaze shifted towards the steam that was now curling above the cup Hector had poured for him. "I'm sorry that I can't remember you," he said very quietly after a while and I felt a swelling pressure in my chest that made it hard to speak.

"That's alright." I cleared my throat, hoping that he hadn't picked up on the strain in my voice. For a moment, I wanted to reach out and touch his arm, but I suddenly realised that that might freak him out and so I stopped mid-motion and let my hand drop into my lap.

"I brought you something to read," I finally said to give myself something to do other than nervously twisting the rings on my fingers and pulled a stack of books and graphic novels out of my bag, handing them to Sam.

He took them with a sort of puzzled expression on his face and I watched him leaf through the assortment in silence. His eyes flitted over the titles, sometimes lingering on the pictures on the covers like the one of From Hell, and I felt a stab behind my chest as I remembered the night he had first read it, whispering 'Woah' after every page he had turned and annoying Katie to pieces.

"They are - um -were your favourites."

His forehead creased when he had reached a fiercely pink cover flashing a scantily dressed wizard who was cradling his busty love interest under a full moon.

"Well, obviously not that one," I said quickly, "Katie insisted on packing that, which doesn't really seem like a thoughtful gesture, but you know Katie. I mean, you - you don't know Katie, obviously, but um, when you knew her you would have - I mean, it comes from a place of love. Like when she made you wear pom poms for ice skating and - um-" I trailed off before I would crash and burn this conversation into the ground. I was a disaster, truly.

Sam was still frowning when he looked up at me, the books clutched in his hands. "Pom poms?"

"Um, yeah." I tucked my hair behind my ears, feeling like the worst friend in the world. "I - I'm sorry. I'm useless."

"No." He shook his head and then looked down at the Ambrosia Tinkertabber novel in his lap again, his lips curving as he studied the gaudy title. "Actually that sounds really nice. Weird, but nice."

I had let my back sink against the wall, appreciating the stream of cool air that came in through the cracked open window, and I closed my eyes. It felt as though it had been raining forever; the sky over the castle had been nothing but grey for days and while it was supposed to be spring, Scotland was unyielding to the conventions of the season.

My mind was reeling, trying to put the pieces together to help make sense of this mess that had been my sixth year so far, but nothing fit. It was like I was trying to assemble a picture with parts from different puzzles - no matter how I twisted and turned everything, the pieces would not connect.

The sudden sound of footsteps tore me from my thoughts and I opened my eyes again, feeling momentarily discombobulated as I watched Hector cross the corridor.

"Katie is doing a dramatic reading of Spellbound in Stratford."

"A classic."

He laughed and leaned against the wall next to me. "I nicked some of the good tea from Madam Pomfrey's secret stash," he said, passing me one of the hospital wing's pink patterned cups. "Are you OK?"

"Yeah. Sure." I took the cup and wrapped my cold fingers around the porcelain to savor the heat for a moment. "Not really."

Hector nodded, his arms tied in front of him. He was usually so put together that it felt strange to see him like this: in a rumpled jumper and unkempt hair that was in need of a wash.

"They think it's irreversible," he said into the silence that had settled between us and I clenched the cup a little tighter, making the tea inside tremble against the brim. I wanted to scream; I probably would have if I hadn't felt so tired.

"He'll never remember?"

Hector shook his head. "He knows the basics, like his name and that he's a wizard. He remembers spells and skills and all that. He just doesn't remember his life."

I stared into my cup for a moment like Professor Trewlany sometimes did during dinner, wishing that the scattered dregs at the bottom would tell me what to do, but they were predictably useless.

"But - how is that possible?"

Hector shrugged. "No one really tells me anything. I just overheard the healers talking to Sam's parents." He dragged his hands through his hair and then clenched the strands with his fingers like he had to actively keep himself from tearing them out. "He doesn't even know that we're together. Or, were together. Shit."

The word echoed faintly in the dim hallway and I opened and closed my mouth again because there was nothing even remotely comforting that came to my mind. It was implied - the fear that Sam might not want him anymore - and there was nothing I could do to make this any less horrible.

I was stirring a little too idly, which showed in the uncharacteristic number of bubbles that plopped in regular intervals, spraying the inside of the cauldron with golden flecks. Usually, I enjoyed Potions Club and the Draught of Peace wasn't overly complicated to make, but I could feel my focus slipping as I tried to direct my attention back to the task at hand. It felt like the day had already been dragging on forever, especially since I had spent the better part of the afternoon in a useless Prefects meeting, listening to a one-hour lecture by the Slytherin Headgirl on enforcing proper dress code in the corridors.

"Very well, that's it for today!" Slughorn's voice sounded above the clinking and hissing, triggering a wave of chair-scraping that swept the room as people began to pack up. "Nicely done, everybody."

I let the spoon drop to the edge of my cauldron and leaned against the table, rolling my shoulders to counteract the budding tension in my neck. My uniform jumper felt hot and sticky against my skin and I was deeply immersed in thoughts about the nice, hot bath I was going to take, when, suddenly, I realised that James Potter was leaning against the doorway of the potions classroom, arms crossed and the sleeves of his jumper pushed up all the way to his elbows. The handful of people that were still packing up their things shot curious glances at him and I marveled again at his ability to command a room's attention without even having to try.

I watched him for a slow second, taking in his furrowed brows and the fading Gryffindor lettering that sprawled across the grey cloth of his sweatshirt. It wasn't exactly awkward, how we stood there, looking at each other, but there was definitely some sort of odd tension - imagined or not - that suddenly seemed to take up the space between us.

"James!" Helen MacFarley had walked up to him, swiping her shiny hair over one shoulder and giving him a brilliant smile. She had that girly-flirty thing down pat and it looked enviably effortless.

"Hey." James gave her a nod and I turned my attention back to the leftover potions ingredients that were still splayed across my desk. It would be too weird if I was still here when they started their tutoring lesson; mostly because I hadn't spoken to James since Saturday.

And maybe a little bit because of the odd writhing sensation in my stomach that made no sense at all.

I willed myself not to look at them as Glen Kessler passed me the box to collect the dried hemlock, but they were flickering at the edges of my vision, vying for attention. Did Helen just touch his arm?

"What are you doing?" Glen hissed and I snapped my focus back to him, feeling caught.

"Shit," I cursed under my breath as I looked to my feet where I had just spilled the dried herbs I had been supposed to pour into the container. Some of them had crumpled from the impact and I crouched down, trying my best to savor what was left of them.

"James, my boy!" Slughorn called out, and I looked up despite myself as the Potions master walked towards the door, his arms outstretched like he was welcoming guests at a dinner party. "What a pleasant surprise. Can I help you with something?"

"Um, no." From the corner of my eye I saw James untie his arms before shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. There must have been some sort nonverbal communication taking place between them because Slughorn suddenly turned his head and raised his bushy eyebrows at me.

"Oh, I see." He grinned. "Well then, don't mind me."

He gave James an amicable pat on the shoulder and then, to my horror, actually winked at me.

My skin felt hot with mortification and I quickly returned to cleaning up the mess I had created. Clearly I was overreacting, maybe even imagining things, but, suddenly, a pair of worn-out trainers appeared next to the scattered hemlock and James squatted down across from me.

"So, if I touch this, will I break out in hives or something?" When he looked at me, one corner of his mouth tugged upwards, hinting at the dimple I knew to be there when he really smiled, and my stomach did that funky wiggly thing again that did nothing to make this at all better.

"No," I said and I was relieved to find that, despite my dumb, pounding heart, my voice sounded quite normal. "I wouldn't eat it, though."

James laughed. "OK, noted. Thanks for the tip, Woodley."

I didn't want to smile at him - not when we were still technically not on speaking terms, caught in this weird limbo that blurred the edges of our relationship - and so I looked back down to the floor, hoping that he hadn't seen my lips twitch.

He began to pick up some of the herbs and I caught a familiar scent - like the Forbidden Forest on a rainy day - and I glanced up again, just to find him looking at me.

My breath caught and he cleared his throat.

"Um, where do I put this?" He indicated the handful of hemlock he had collected and I wanted to kick myself for acting like a generic Potter-fangirl all of a sudden. What the hell was wrong with me? I couldn't let him get to me like this.

"In here." I indicated the box that stood on my table and got up from the floor, glad to bring some distance between us. "Thanks."

"Yeah, no problem." He wiped his hands on his jeans and stuffed them back into his pockets, watching me stow away the remaining ingredients. Behind him, Slughorn kept shooting very obvious glances at us as he pushed around stacks of papers on the teacher's desk and James seemed to notice too; he looked over his shoulder and then back at me, lips curving into his signature crooked half-smile. It would have been the ideal moment to ask him what he was even doing here, but before I could open my mouth, Slughorn's voice cut through the awkward tension.

"I don't mean to interrupt, but I have to lock up the classroom."

"Oh, sure," I said, just as James said, "Right. Sorry."

I crammed the rest of my things into my bag and then left the classroom with James, falling into step with him as we ambled along the sparsely lit corridor. We walked next to each other in silence for a while and I contemplated saying something - anything - several times, but I didn't know what, and so I discarded the thought again.

"So, how's your friend?"

I looked up at James, my gaze catching on the damp strands of hair that stuck out from under his grey hat.

"Sam's OK." I sighed, because it really was so much more complicated than that. Physically, Sam was fine. Having to come to terms with complete memory loss, however, wasn't. "He's at St. Mungo's at the moment for some check-ups."

"What about his memory?"

I shook my head, unable to say it out loud, but James seemed to understand nonetheless.

"Shit. I'm sorry." He looked so genuine, his dark eyebrows furrowed as he studied my face, and I felt the sudden reckless urge to lean into him and bury my face in his rumpled sweatshirt.

Clearly, that was not an option.

"Yeah. It sucks." I hiked my bag further up on my shoulder, feeling the straps pull at the cloth of my jumper. Somewhere in the distance a bevy of voices swelled and ebbed like waves in the ocean and it somehow highlighted the fact that we were still completely alone.

"Hey, um, can we talk? James's voice was low and scratchy, brushing against my skin like the fabric of my favourite sweater, and I cleared my throat in an attempt to regain some control over my racing pulse.

"We are talking."

I could feel his eyes on my face as I pretended to look where I was going. It made everything a thousand times worse; so much so that I noticed too late that I had walked into the wrong direction, leading us deeper into the dungeons instead of the Entrance Hall.

"I mean about what happened." He paused for a second before adding, "at the wedding."

The castle had never felt so small or stifling as it did at this moment. I tried to mask the warmed up mortification behind a display of nonchalance, but my face felt hot and I knew that there was nothing I could do to play this cool.

So, in proper Woodley manner, I charged.

"Oh, you mean when you acted like a complete prick?" The words were out before I could think this through, but it felt somewhat better to snap at him than to awkwardly avoid looking at him.

"I didn't mean what I said," James said and I finally stopped walking and turned to face him. "Any of it."

This felt exceptionally lame and vague, like he was taking the easy way out, and I snorted. "Sure."

"I was plastered and weird and-" He broke off and raised his hand to his head in that familiar gesture, just to stop mid-motion when he seemed to remember that he was wearing a hat. "I was just... really fucked up."

There were so many things that just lingered between us and I couldn't understand why he insisted on bringing them back up; all of the things I tried to push away so hard, things that still made me want to fall off the face of the earth. I had been in his bed in nothing but my knickers - something that still made me physically cringe whenever I thought about it - and he hadn't wanted me then either.

In the aftermath of everything - all these little moments in which I had stupidly allowed myself to think about James Potter - I just felt so unbelievably dumb; like the delusional fangirl he believed me to be. I needed this conversation to be over - for him to stop looking at me like this - and so I shook my head.

"Potter, let's just -"

"No, Woodley, listen -"

"You know, I really don't want to." I was aiming to sound irritated, but my words came out desperate and weak and I felt like an idiot.

"OK, I deserve this," James said and - to my utter horror - he took a step closer, his gaze resting on my face so intently that my breath hitched in my throat. "I'm a tosser. And I get that you don't want to talk to me - I wouldn't want to talk to me, either - but I need you to forgive me."

He was so disgustingly good at this and I hated that my heart was beating a frantic rhythm against my chest like I had just completed a couple of laps around the Black Lake.

"Why?"

James shook his head, his upper body tensing up as he buried his hands in his pockets before looking down to the floor. What the bloody hell was this boy doing?

"I have to go," I said, probably more to myself than to him, but when I turned to walk away, he came after me.

"No, Woodley, wait." His hand wrapped around my arm and I stumbled backwards, my bag slipping from my shoulder and landing on the floor with an awkward thump. Cedar wood - that was what he smelled like; and I suddenly felt a swooping sensation behind my navel.

"Don't go." James's voice was barely louder than the crackling of the torches on the wall and I desperately tried to remember why I definitely should go. Unfortunately, my thoughts seemed to be slipping through my head like bands of smoke, scattering more with every beat of my heart, and all I could do was stand there and stare at his broad chest. I couldn't look up at him - mostly because I didn't know if I could keep up my fake-cool composure if I did - and so I occupied my rampaging mind by staring at the small hole at his shoulder where the stitching of his sweatshirt was coming undone.

His grip on my arm slackened and I held my breath as his hand slowly slid down my forearm until his fingers brushed against mine, leaving behind a tingling trail of pure electricity. He was frowning at our hands as though he wasn't sure what to make of this either, but then he suddenly looked up, his brown eyes narrowed, and I was standing at the edge of a cliff, feeling the way you did when you went downhill on your bike and you got faster and faster and some part of you was terrified because you knew this would potentially end in disaster, but it was also exhilarating and gut-wrenching and you couldn't have stopped it, even if you wanted to.

I was plummeting, unable to move as James leaned in, unbearably slowly, until our foreheads touched and his nose brushed against mine and his eyes that looked so much darker in this light travelled down to my lips, sending a shiver down my core.

And then, my brain went into overdrive and I panicked.

He was disastrously good at this and I suddenly felt the wild urge to laugh about myself; about falling for one of James Potter's easiest tricks. What the fuck was I doing? I couldn't be that girl.

I wasn't that girl.

"You're forgiven, Potter," I said as coolly as possible and pulled back before he could close the gap between us, hoping that he wouldn't notice the frenzied rhythm my heart was drumming against my ribcage. The distance helped to snap me out of my stupor and my thoughts became solid again.

"Um, what?" James looked mildly confused, watching me as I bent down to pick up my tote bag. A handful of random hairpins had fallen out before and were still scattered across the floor, but collecting them now would have somewhat ruined my momentum.

"Good night, James."

He just looked at me as his hands found their way back into his pockets and I took a few more steps backwards before finally turning around and walking away, my dumb heart refusing to slow down all the way to Ravenclaw tower.

It was only four o' clock, but the sky was blustery and dark, wrapping the castle into a gloomy mood that rivaled the old horror movies Katie and I had spent a summer binge-watching at her house. The flickering lights of the candles were dancing across my parchment, making the runes even harder to discern, and I leaned back for a second to stretch my sore neck. Considering that it was Thursday afternoon, the library was moderately empty except for a few hunched-over people who occupied the long tables that were grouped around the designated study area, poring over books and scratching away on endless rolls of parchment. At this time of the day and with this kind of weather, the cosy nooks and secluded corners had been long occupied and so we had claimed one of the heavy wooden tables close to the Charms section, where we had set up camp until dinner.

Katie cleared her throat and I turned my head to find her frowning at me. Her auburn curls were twisted into two buns atop her head and held together by an assortment of glittery hair clips that sparkled in the quivering candle light which was completely at odds with the brooding look on her face. I could almost feel her internal struggle as she bit her lip, physically trying to keep herself from saying something.

"Stop staring at me, you're freaking me out." My words were barely more than a string of hissing sounds that drowned easily in the soft scraping of quill-tips against parchment surrounding us. I knew what she wanted to talk about, of course, but the library was hardly the ideal place to open that can of worms.

Not that Katie cared about that sort of thing.

"I can't let you run away from your feelings anymore."

"I don't have feelings."

"You almost kiss-"

"Shhh!" I glanced at Hector and Tarquin who were sitting across from us; they looked completely oblivious to our whispered conversation with their heads still bent over their books and I made a point of turning my head back to my own runes translation, feigning deep interest in the philosophical writings of Merlin. Next to me, Katie cleared her throat again but I kept my head down, pretending to look up a translation in my ancient runes dictionary, which I had opened on a random page that had absolutely nothing to do with my homework.

I could feel my best friend's glare boring into me, however, and when I still refused to acknowledge her, she leaned in and scribbled something into the margin of my dictionary.

'You almost KISSED James. Again.'

I bit the inside of my lips, pretending that she had not just defiled the section eah to eahth, but my fake indifference only seemed to encourage her.

'People don't almost kiss people they have no feelings for,' she scrawled underneath the first sentence, making the letters even bigger, but I continued to ignore her and slid the book away, propping my arm up to shield it from being vandalised any further.

Katie threw her arm over mine, her pen-tip pressing into the thin paper with such force that the all-caps letters left an actual imprint: 'YOU'RE BEING UNREASONABLY STUBBORN.'

I snapped my book close, feeling a definite surge of frustration at Katie's persistence; I knew she meant well, but I needed her to understand that, even if I might have been thinking about James Potter more than I liked to admit, I wasn't keen on joining the ranks of his girls of the month.

"So you want me to become another one of Potter's shag-mates? Really?" I whispered, hoping to stump my best friend, but she was not going to give up that easily.

"What if this is different?"

"What is?" Tarquin's voice was startlingly loud compared to the low hissing noises Katie and I had been exchanging, and I snapped my head up to find both him and Hector looking at us.

"The translation for 'eywas'," I said quickly and held up the dictionary to hide my blush. "It's not, in case you were wondering."

Tarquin frowned at me, then at his girlfriend and, finally, exchanged a confused look with Hector, who just shook his head.

"Speaking of the devil," Katie sang under her breath and I felt an uncomfortable tug behind my navel as James, Freddie, and Augustus strolled into the library. Their presence caused a sudden commotion in the study area, making people shift and crane their necks as they walked by, and I quickly turned back to my homework.

Surely they wouldn't come over.

"Ravenclaws! Excellent." Freddie's voice carried over the muttered conversations and I glanced up just as he bumped his arm against James's, nodding in our direction. "That's always a safe bet for dolts like the three of us."

He didn't wait for his friends and simply marched over to our table, the grin on his face growing wider the closer he got. "Hey, look, empty seats! Is it OK if we join you guys?"

"Yes!" Katie practically shouted and, in one swift motion, had swiped her bag off the bench we were sitting on, completely ignoring the panicked looks I was trying to give her. I wasn't the only one who seemed to think this was a subpar idea, either: Behind Freddie, James actually looked like he was eager to punch something.

"Or, you know, we could take one of the thousand other tables that are completely empty," he muttered under his breath, but Freddie ignored him and sat down on the bench, letting his books drop onto the table. Augustus followed suit, throwing a general nod at us before unpacking a pile of arithmancy notes. James, however, didn't move for a while, one hand wrapped around the strap of his backpack as he stood there, frowning at his friends.

"Sit down, you twit!" Freddie said, sounding somewhat exasperated, and, after another moment's hesitation, James finally followed suit and took the empty seat across from me, still diligently avoiding eye contact.

Not that I wanted him to look at me, of course.

I forced my attention back to the half-finished translation work in front of me, trying to pick up the line I had abandoned before, but I was struggling to get back into the flow as my eyes kept drifting upwards and my focus slipped.

Across from me, James seemed to have unpacked his entire backpack, his head bent over a crumpled piece of parchment and his forehead propped up on his hand, which was entangled in his hair so that a few dark strands were poking through the cracks between his fingers. He wasn't actually writing anything, yet his pen was poised over the paper, ink dripping onto the page in a steady rhythm as he was bouncing one of his legs so fiercely that the table quivered.

"OK, what the fuck are you doing, mate?" Augustus looked mildly annoyed as he dabbed at the unsightly smear of glistening ink where his quill had just slipped, making the stain even worse.

"What?" James looked up, unaware of the nervous energy that was practically oozing from him.

"Let him work, will you." Freddie sighed, shooting a pointed look at Augustus. "Merlin knows we're fucked if James can't play the Gryffindor-Slytherin match next weekend."

At that, Hector's head shot up, a deep frown creasing his forehead. "Why wouldn't he?"

"I will," James said firmly, but Freddie ignored his best friend's objection.

"Jamie here trolled his last potions exam."

"You got a T?" I asked without really thinking about it, and James suddenly looked up, the cap of his pen wedged between his lips as he properly looked at me for the first time since he had sat down. I wasn't prepared for this - at all - and my thoughts scattered as something heavy twisted against my chest.

"I mean - you are still being tutored, aren't you?"

James's eyebrows furrowed, his gaze lingering on me a second too long to be entirely casual before he shook his head and turned back to his notes again. "It's no big deal."

"You're joking, right?" Augustus snorted, which earned him a scowl from James.

"Can everybody just relax?" He pushed back his hair with both of his hands, drawing an accidental ink line on his temple with his pen. "I'll be fine, OK?"

Freddie had leaned back so that James wouldn't see him, shaking his head ostentatiously at me as he mouthed the words 'he won't'.

"Well," Katie piped up, "if anyone can salvage a rotten Potions essay, it's Seth."

It took me a second to realise that she had basically just volunteered me to help James with his homework and my first instinct was to protest, but on second thought this seemed unnecessarily petty. I mean, it was just homework; what was the harm in that, right?

"I can read it through, if you want to."

James glanced up at me again, a weird expression on his face. "I'm good," he said defensively, "thanks." But before he could even finish his sentence, Augustus had snatched the parchment from under his nose and passed it to Freddie, who held it out to me.

"Seriously, you should accept the help, mate," I heard him say as I scanned James's homework: it was only half a page - not nearly enough for a seventh year essay on toxin interaction theory - and the first few sentences were already riddled with mistakes.

"OK, why are you shaking your head, Woodley?" James had gotten up from his seat and walked around the table to look over my shoulder as I struggled to read the last paragraph.

"This doesn't make any sense."

"It did in my head, I swear," he said, absently sitting down on the bench next to me where Katie had just moved over to make space for him. "I just don't get this shit."

"It gets easier once you understand the principle. Look, your equation doesn't add up here-" I pointed to the topmost formula before looking up from the parchment and - because I was not expecting it - temporarily lost track of my train of thoughts when I realised how close James had come: his face was only inches from mine as he frowned at me, the flecks in his eyes gleaming in the candlelight. I tried to focus on the ink smudge next to his ear rather than on his perfect jawline, but it was hard to ignore the way my heart had picked up speed, and the look on his face as his eyes flitted across mine didn't make this any better.

And because I was so entirely unprepared to be this close to him and breathing in his woodsy scent was making me woozy, I practically jumped back and forced my attention back to the essay. "Um, you - um - you used the wrong factor, see?"

"Oh - um - yeah. OK." James cleared his throat and put his hand on the back of his head, tousling his hair as he bent back over his paper as well. It felt like the air around us had gotten thicker - more sluggish as it filled the space between us - and I instinctively shot a panicked glance at Katie. She raised her eyebrows at me, which I had no clue how to interpret, and I shook my head in reply, hoping to convey that I really needed her to do something about this.

Anything.

"So, um, are you guys going to the Hey Hey Hippogriff concert this weekend?" She said a little too loudly to be entirely natural, but it did the trick and got everybody to look up at her, including James, which allowed me a moment to get a grip on my dense, racing heart.

This was definitely not good.

I almost stumbled over a group of first years who were scurrying out of the Charms classroom, their ties flapping behind them as they raced each other down the corridor. Technically, they were blatantly violating the code of conduct, but Brogan Roberts, a sixth year Hufflepuff Prefect, caught my eye and we exchanged a small smile before continuing down the hallway. There was a fine line between taking one's Prefect duties seriously and being a pain in everybody's arse.

"Lizziebeth!" Someone shouted behind me and several heads turned my way when Freddie Weasley caught up with me, flashing his signature brilliant smile. "Have you heard the glad tidings of joy?"

"It's Taco Tuesday?"

Freddie laughed, easily falling into step with me as though it was the most natural thing. "That, obviously, and James got an E on his toxin interaction paper. Can you believe it?"

"That's great," I said, ignoring the weird jab in the pit of my stomach.

"Great?" He arched an eyebrow at me, amusement still curling his mouth. "Pyjama girl, I don't think you quite understand the magnitude of the miracle you performed."

I frowned at Freddie, not entirely sure if he was taking the piss or not, which he seemed to notice as his tone suddenly became more serious.

"James is the absolute worst at potions. I'm fairly certain that the only reason he even got to NEWT level was because Slughorn was purposely blind-drunk when he graded his OWL exam."

"OK, you're clearly exaggerating."

"I wish. He needs an Acceptable on the exam next week to stay on the team." Freddie considered me for a long moment, his smile fading as he bit his lip. "Do you think you could maybe find it in your heart to study with him?"

There was that annoying jab again and I took a bit longer to answer than I probably should have. "Isn't Helen McFarley still tutoring him?"

"You saw his essay, didn't you?"

"Yes, but-"

"He is failing potions." Freddie gave me an apprehensive look. "The only pass grades he had this year were the ones you helped him with. He just - you really seem to get through to him."

I instinctively shook my head at that."I honestly doubt that."

"Seriously, Seth. James needs your help." Freddie had stopped walking abruptly and I turned to look at him, the soles of my boots squeaking on the floor. I couldn't tell him - that even the thought of being alone with James sent a mild prickle of panic down my spine. Whichever way I put it, it always sounded weird; that having to spend every second Saturday basically locked in a room with his best friend was already more than I could handle at the moment. What I needed was to spend less time with James, not more.

"I - I can't, Freddie. I'm sorry."

He looked at his shoes, nodding softly.

"I - I get that," he said, which was odd, but before I could overthink his reaction, he looked up again, the expression on his face so unfamiliarly serious that it threw me off for a second. "It's just… It's the last game for us and all the important scouts are going to be there. James has been working towards this for years. He's already missed two games this season. If he can't play…"

Freddie trailed off, letting the unspoken words linger between us, and I felt something heavy coil behind my chest, wrapping around my heart. James had missed two matches because of me - because he had stupidly crashed my hearing with McGonagall and lied about the Graviditas potion - and I had felt so guilty and helpless about costing him so much.

"An Acceptable, huh?" I said after a moment, glancing up at Freddie, whose entire face seemed to light up.

"Honestly, Seth, you're the best." Before I could stop him he had wrapped his arms around my shoulders and properly lifted me off the ground, causing a mild hold-up in the corridor as the people around us craned their necks to observe the scene.

Great.

This was absolutely great.

When I finally got to the Entrance Hall, Katie was already waiting for me next to the staircase, her curly hair piled into a messy topknot and stack of books in her arms.

"Thank the gods, it's Taco Tuesday," she groaned and I let her pull me with her through the throngs of students that congregated in the Entrance hall, waiting for their friends.

"Yeah," I said as I tried to keep up with her. "Listen, Kat-" I was about to tell her about my conversation with Freddie Weasley and that I had foolishly agreed to help James with potions again, when suddenly, she stopped dead in her tracks and I basically ran into her.

"Ouch, what-"

"Sam!"

My heart gave a jolt when I spotted him as well, standing by himself in the middle of the Entrance Hall and kneading his fingers as he continued to frown towards the Great Hall.

"You're back!" Katie said when we had reached him, making him peel his gaze off the arched entryway. He looked so obviously lost and the horrible reality of the situation hit me like a rogue bludger again; it would be a while before this would even begin to feel somewhat close to normal again.

"Yeah." Sam shrugged and put on a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "The Healers figured I might as well go back to school."

"That's good." I tried to sound upbeat, but the awkwardness still clung to my voice. "So, um, should we go in?"

Sam nodded, but he didn't move. "It just - it looks so intimidating. I mean, it feels like everyone is staring at me. I'm a freak."

Katie gave me a long look and I felt my heart sink. He was right, of course; people were staring - blatantly - but, after everything that had happened this year, unwanted attention and sidelong glances failed to rattle me quite as much as they used to.

"Don't worry. Most of those stares are for me," I said, shrugging my shoulders when Sam's frown deepened. "I'm a rumoured potions ringleader and word in the hallways is that I poisoned both Potter brothers."

This wasn't entirely true anymore; the rumour mill had actually grinded to an almost-halt with my recent reinstatement as Prefect and the attack on Sam, which most people seemed to think couldn't have been me since he was one of my best friends. Sure, there was still the odd funny look or a whispered giggle now and then, but since there had been a surprising lack of illegal potion-related activity recently, my fellow classmates seemed to have lost interest in the scandal.

"That's old news, really," Katie sighed and looped her arm through Sam's, who looked back and forth between us like he wasn't quite sure what to make of us yet. "Mostly, people are looking at me. I'm immensely popular, you see."

"We're lucky she's even talking to us," I said and took Sam's other arm. Then, slowly, the corners of his mouth suddenly began to tug upwards and a genuine smile crinkled the skin around his eyes as we walked into the Great Hall together.

A/N: First of all, a massive THANK YOU to all of you who are reading and leaving me those wonderful reviews. It helps to know that people are still interested in reading this story and I just wanted to say that it's because of you amazing people that I am dedicated to finishing Seth's story. I'm working on responding to your comments, but it might take me a while so please be patient with me. Next chapter is already in the making.

I hope you enjoyed this one and I would love to know what you guys think. :-)