Chapter 30: Unexpected Guests

"You're looking exceptionally pretty this morning," Marlene muses as she lounges on her bed. Cressida dances past her in a dramatic flair. "I'm guessing there's a particular reason."

"Oo la la," Mary giggles from her own bed where she and Lily are perched. "Someone has a date."

Cressida leans close to the mirror, checking that there are no odd spots on her face. "I do," she agrees easily. "And I'm running late so I'll give you the details when I return."

"We want to know every detail," states Lily with a broad side-smirk. "Elias Griffiths is a hunk."

The other two girls lapse into laughter and even Cressida shakes her head with a silent and breathy laugh. This is the one thing she does miss in her daily life. The girl chatter. Borrowing makeup and clothes. She rarely spends enough time in her own dorm to ever really be a part of their world but for now, Cressida is content with slithers of it.

Swinging down to grab her purse, Cressida humours them with a cheeky grin. "I'll remember every single word."

As she practically jumps down the steps, not having lied when she said she was running late, Cressida glances up towards the boy's dormitory. She has no idea if they are actually heading to Hogsmeade this weekend and they hadn't bothered to tell her. Though she has been in her room all morning.

Never-minding them, Cressida prances out of the Gryffindor tower with a beat in her step the continues all the way down the seven flights of stairs. This day has been running over her mind for the entire week, but her eagerness lies in the unknown of it all. The thrill of doing something new with someone new.

"There you are." Cressida smiles up at Elias as he waits in the courtyard.

"I'm just being fashionably late," she is already defending, the prance in her step finally settling. "You know, the whole ruse to have the attention of everybody else when you enter."

"Well it worked perfectly." They begin walking towards the carriages that would be going back and forth all day at intervals. "The entire audience had their eyes on you. A single-man audience, but still an audience."

Cressida grins with a small blush as the climb into one of the carriages. It is drawn by magic alone. Pulling up her pants' leg, she displays her socks. "I do have a good reason for being late though. I couldn't find any of my socks besides a heap that I got for Christmas and they all have funky patterns on them."

Elias leans down closer, eyeing off the red and grey socks. "Triceratops," he observes. "I love them. You said they were a Christmas present? Whoever they are, have good taste."

"I'll tell Sirius you said so. Though I fear his head my explode with how big it is getting."

"I would've thought Potter was closest to that happening."

"Oh, you'd be surprised," she grins with a hearty laugh. "James can be arrogant, no doubt, but it's more…showy than anything else."

Elias nods slowly, pondering her observations. "I feel like there's a lot people don't know about you."

"We have a lot of secrets," Cressida responds quickly. "And a lot of people make assumptions, and they can't really be bothered to prove them wrong." Shrugging slightly, her eyes turn out the window. "And neither can I. If you spend your time trying to change those assumptions, then that's all you'll ever spend your life doing."

"Wise words."

Cressida shifts her poise back to Elias. "We've been talking about me already for ages. What do you plan on doing once you leave school?"

A fond smile broadens his mouth as he leans back further against the carriage seat. "I want to be an Auror," he says. "Seems like the perfect time for it to be action-packed as well, doesn't it?"

Cressida nods. "It does. An admirable career choice."

His smile dampens slightly into something more remorseful. "That's what my father tells me. My brother, Garret, went to America to open a muggle pub over there and my father refuses to support him."

"I remember Garret," Cressida murmurs, a bit lost in her own memory. "He was in Hufflepuff – one of the prefects. I liked him. Probably because he let Sirius and I get away with turning the steps into slides, but still, cool guy."

Elias laughs with a broad smile once more, nodding his head vigorously. "He actually told me about that. Said you and Black were the most adorable first years he's ever seen."

"Adorable?!" Cressida cries in faux outrage but then settles quickly. "Actually, I can live with adorable. Maybe if I try and look like I did all those years ago I'll get away with more."

"I'm guessing Evans doesn't let you get away with much then. She's in your year, right?"

Cressida sighs longingly. "Nope," she answers to the first part. "Just last night she was telling Peter and Sirius off for playing checkers past eleven."

His face morphs into something similar to her own when Sirius and Peter had come back to their dorm sulking. "First of all, what a party-pooper she is, and second-" he leans forward but turns his body to the side, "-why on earth are they playing checkers when Wizard's chess exists?"

Cressida holds her hands up in surrender. "Don't ask me. Peter wants to play it. I prefer chess any day of the week. I actually brought James a really nice set for Christmas mostly so I could play it as well and not feel guilty about spending so much money on it."

His mouth slowly parts in a sudden realisation. "Is that…. Was that the one that used to be in the window at Relly's Relics?" he demands. "With the gold trimmings?"

Cressida lets out a stunned, "Yes."

Elias's lips press tightly together, his hands forming fists in front of him. "You're the one who got to it a day before I did," he hisses. "I was going to buy it for one of my uncles. Then I got to Hogsmeade and it's gone!"

"Stop," Cressida gasps, hands planting on her cheeks. "You're making me feel so guilty right now. Mr Relly even said I was lucky since someone else had been looking at it."

He laughs loudly, his palm resting on his chest while his head drops back onto the top of the seat. "I can't believe it was you," he chuckles. "Just know that I've thought deeply about stunning you."

Cressida laughs behind her covered mouth, hilarity and guilt battling for dominance. "I don't blame you, it was really nice," she adds, breaking out in uncontrollable laughter at the end. Elias groans theatrically but the carriage ride is tear and laughter filled. A good start to the day.

Xx

If Cressida has made one good decision this year, it would be asking out Elias Griffiths. The day has flowed so easily that it feels no different from coming out with her friends. At some points, she even forgets it's considered a date and that's the best part.

"I can't believe you played through that entire game with a fractured hand," says Elias, shaking his head as he raises a butterbeer to his mouth. "I was there, and I couldn't tell a damn thing."

Cressida smiles softly, cupping her own tankard of the sweet drink. "I'm glad nobody could see me. And James was pissed at me after that, but I still think it was worth the win."

His glass raises higher in a small toast. "Anything to get the Quidditch Cup, right?"

Her brows raise in an exhausted but agreement manner, clinking her drink against his. "Go, Go, Gryffindor," she replies. "We really aren't creative when it comes to school chants, are we?"

Elias hums, nodding. "We should have a cheerleading squad like they do at American muggle schools in the movies. I am fully prepared to lead that squad." With a grin that spreads from ear to ear, he pushes his chair back slightly from their table at the Three Broomsticks. "Cress! Cress! I'm her fan, if she can't do it, nobody can!" Cressida's head flings backwards, sinking slowly off the seat of her chair as her chest racks with laughter. "You like it? I thought about it for a whole ten seconds."

An older man from a nearby table growls over the top of his tankard. "Oi! Keep it down."

Cressida and Elias settle, their laughter lapsing into a fit of childish giggles instead. "That was amazing. Maybe I can convince James to let you form a team to perform at try-outs to get the morale up."

Elias laughs softly, contrasting her loud one. "You talk about James a lot," he observes.

Shrugging, she replies, "I talk about all of them a lot. They're my entire life."

"That must be nice." He smiles gently, eyes staring at his own drink which he fiddles with on the table. "To have people that you're so close with. Not worrying about having to expand on it because it is already perfect."

"Sometimes," she agrees, matching the soft tone. "But other times I wonder if being so closed up in a small group is a bad thing. I don't talk to a lot of other people. Really they're my only friends."

"I wish I had that. I don't have a group that I'm that close with."

"What about the twins?"

"Don't get me wrong, they're my best mates but somehow it's still not the same. I know they'll be there for me if I need it, but it feels like I would have to ask for it. But you could be in any matter of trouble and your friends would be there before it even starts."

Cressida visualises those contexts in her mind, both from imagination and her own memory. She wouldn't have to seek their help – they would already be there. The cup of jealously she felt for Elias and his wide group diminishes, replaced by an overwhelming fondness. "I suppose a balance is good," she says to settle the conversation.

Her eyes flicker to the pub's door which creaks slightly whenever it opens. The corners of her lips falter slightly as four figures walk in, heads turning around as they each look for something. Sirius is the first to spot Cressida, a dog-like grin displaying as he whacks James' shoulder and points in their direction.

Shifting in her seat, Cressida looks back to Elias but he's none-the-wisest with his back to the door, already speaking about a story with him and the twins. Glancing back over his shoulder, she spies James waving wildly at her, but she does nothing to signal seeing him. Remus pushes his arm down, sending her an apologetic wince as they take a booth table with a direct line of sight.

Cressida blinks rapidly, forcing her attention to stay back on Elias. She knows that they mean well – to be annoying and spy on her, but in the way that she would if one of them were to go on a date as well. And if was only Sirius, Peter or Remus she would laugh the matter off and probably even joke about it with the man in front of her. But as James sits there, her heart is reminded that it is him she'd rather be sitting across from out of the two. How can she focus and enjoy the date when he's so close?

Elias picks up both their glasses, peering in. "I'm going to go get us some more," he declares. He gets up and leaves before she even has a chance to protest, leaving an even clearer view of the booth. James is hunched over slightly, a pencil in hand as he writes down something. Once he finishes, he looks back up to her, revealing that it is their diary that he's written in. Cressida huffily holds up her small purse which is only large enough to hold a few essentials. James exasperatedly closes the book. It's not like she carries the book around all day. They start talking amongst themselves again, not even a whisper of their voices travelling far enough to be heard by her own ears.

"I thought you said they didn't want to come to the Three Broomsticks."

Cressida forces another smile as Elias sits back down with two glass tankards in hand. He doesn't seem all that upset, nor surprised about the pub's new arrivals. "They said they weren't," she murmurs, trying and failing not to look back at them. "I'm sorry."

He shrugs light-heartedly. "We can always turn the tables." A slow smirk appears – a unique one that she cannot compare to James and Sirius' notorious ones. "Let them think we're gossiping about them."

Cressida lifts her head slightly, teeth revealing in an open smile. "I like the way you think."