Chapter 19: Pursuit
19 May, 2018
Diagon Alley
A Study in Emerald
The world first became aware of Hermione Granger when she was photographed exiting a State car while wearing a pair of now-iconic emerald earrings, heirlooms of the royal family that were previously made famous by Princess Narcissa and Queen Adelaide. While Prince Draco chose not to release a public statement on his relationship with Hermione at the time, the candid photographs were then believed (and later confirmed) to reflect a relationship that had been developing over quite some time.
Many believe the gifting of the earrings to Hermione—the first substantial hint at a serious affection between the two, as it appeared to indicate the reclusive Princess Narcissa's blessing—represented a considerable turning point in their relationship. With the exception of a brief period of upheaval, Hermione has worn the earrings for numerous public appearances throughout their relationship, including her official engagement portraits with Prince Draco.
I initially bought this book for everyone as a laugh, suggesting perhaps we were all desperately in need of new paperweights (not entirely thoughtless, as the aristocracy starter pack includes: mahogany desks, reasonably-sized stacks of paper for said mahogany desks—which, naturally, require weighted protection from coastal garden breezes—and, of course, a primer detailing the intricacies of polite but devastating dismissal). This part of the story, I have to admit, brings up something of a new era in difficulty; not solely because of the trials which subsequently befell our good friend New Tracey—which we'd all known was coming, really—but also because of something none of us had foreseen, and which some of us (one in particular) would not grasp in its entirety until years after the impact.
The 'one in particular' I mention is none other than our resident beautiful idiot, as you might have guessed.
(By which, of course, I do mean me.)
3 January, 2013
London, England
"You taste different," remarked Tracey, turning her head from where she'd been eyeing the ceiling to furrow her brow at Blaise, who lay in bed next to her.
"Do I?" Blaise asked. "Perhaps I've evolved in flavor."
She rolled over, pursing her lips. "We've got to stop doing this, you know. I loathe you and your friends," she said, tracing her fingers over his chest. "And aside from that, you're obnoxious and impossible to get close to."
He considered giving her points for noticing, but was keenly aware she didn't care what he thought about her or anything else. It was rewarding, actually, to be with someone who didn't seem to lend any credence to his opinions. It made it that much easier to keep her at the appropriate distance, particularly while he was snaking an arm around her waist and pulling her into him.
"We can stop anytime you like," he reminded her, lightly drawing circles around the shapes of her vertebrae and tracing his hands up her spine. "I'm not counting, obviously—I'm hardly a person given to quantification," he mused falsely, shifting her chin to kiss her neck, "but still, I'm quite sure I've given you a reason to leave."
"Just one reason?" she scoffed, though by the arch of her back, she was already giving in. "You never invite me to anything, Zabini, and we hardly ever leave your bed. I'm just your dirty little secret, aren't I?"
No, actually, she wasn't. He had plenty of secrets, of course, but she wasn't even remotely one.
Coincidentally, it had been only three days since his most recent foray into idiocy, though Tracey wouldn't know anything about that, and certainly couldn't. Blaise hardly knew what to do with it himself. For all that he'd always been upfront about his eccentricities, he kept his truths impossibly close. The only person who had known him even remotely to his core was Pansy, which was why his secret was so impossibly, incomprehensibly filthy.
He hadn't meant for it to happen. In fact, Blaise hardly ever meant for anything to happen, and was generally the product of luck and charm far more than premeditated circumstance. He may have counted among Prince Draco's intimate circle, one of the wealthy and privileged Bad Lads, but in truth, Blaise was the least of them. For as rich as he was, money still couldn't buy titles, couldn't buy approval, couldn't buy acceptance; he certainly couldn't pay any sum of money to excise the little curl of distaste spared to him every time he encountered Pansy's mother. Harry, for all his amiable flaws, was still in line for the throne. Theo, for all his father disapproved of him, was still born with a crest of nobility engraved into his silver spoon. For all that he loved them and they loved him, Blaise had never really been one of them, and would never be.
Which was why, among many reasons, he'd also kept his distance from Neville Longbottom, who had a pedigree to rival all of theirs.
"You don't like me," Neville had noted to Blaise on New Year's Eve, the two of them the only ones remaining around the fire after the others had disappeared.
"I have no opinion on you," Blaise replied, taking a sip of champagne. He was pleasantly tipsy, but drowsily so, which accounted for approximately 40% of his reasoning for not running off with Daphne and Pansy on their miscreant adventures. The remaining majority was that he'd spent plenty of nights curled around Pansy—an incurable snuggler who'd made him promise to take that knowledge to the grave—and now considered it best not to partake in the silent war she was presently waging against her unwitting boyfriend.
Pansy was and had always been entranced by the prospect of her little vengeances, and Blaise felt certain that her falling into bed with him (never unclothed, of course, because that sort of revenge was unsubtle to the point of being loathsome) was precisely what she had in mind for Neville's punishment on that particular night. Forcing the people who loved her to do so from afar was one of her most elegant flaws, and Blaise would know.
"Well, having no opinion is even worse. The opposite of love isn't hate," Neville quoted, "it's indifference."
Blaise glanced at him. "Does it matter whether I like you or not?"
"Of course it matters. You're Pansy's best friend, and aside from that, you're unquestionably beloved." Neville took a sip of his champagne, shaking his head. "I envy you, though," he confessed, "and I suppose that's not liking someone so much as coveting them, so really, I'm no better."
"Coveting their position, you mean," Blaise said, considering subtracting points for inaccuracy, but ultimately opting not to. Neville wanted it too badly, and while Hermione was not dissimilar, she had a passion to her earnestness that Blaise wasn't concerned about breaking. He knew by then that she wasn't fragile, but Neville was as yet unknown.
"Sure, yes," Neville said. He stared into the fire for a moment, leaning back against the cushions of the sofa. "What's it like," he mused, "being adored?"
"You'll have to ask Harry," Blaise replied. "I imagine it does wonderful things for one's complexion, if he's any indication."
Neville dragged himself upright, shaking his head. "You're being difficult."
Ten points to me, Blaise thought. "Yes, I am. It's my way, I'm afraid. A Pavlovian response to pinpricks of decency."
Neville chuckled a little, staring into the fire. "My gran always says my father was that way," he said after a beat of silence. "'Give him an inch, he'd take a mile,' she always said, and I reckon he was charming enough to get away with it." His smile faded slightly, replaced with a wistful lamentation. "I wish I'd learned that from him."
"It's really not as marvelous a quality as it sounds," Blaise said, rising to his feet and reaching for the champagne where it sat nestled in a pool of slowly melting ice. "Charm rarely ages well."
"Ah. I wouldn't know," Neville murmured to himself, and Blaise paused for a moment, the champagne faltering mid-pour. He took a testing sip, biding his time—still champagne, he ruled approvingly—before wandering back over to Neville, holding out the bottle.
Neville looked up, startled slightly out of his reverie by Blaise's presence beside him. After a moment's tick of hesitation he held out his glass, permitting Blaise to top him off. "Sorry," he said, looking sheepish. "I suppose I have a fairly predictable tendency for melancholy when I've been drinking champagne. The more expensive the bottle, the more gloomy the conversation," he joked, shaking his head and taking a sip.
"Well, that's very Gatsby of you," Blaise congratulated him, setting the bottle down on the table and resuming his seat next to Neville. "But I suppose as there's nothing much else to do, you might as well permit me to bask in despondency with you."
"I'd hate to do that to you," Neville said wryly, and Blaise shrugged.
"I'm perfectly comfortable being adjacent to sadness," he said, which was true. He considered it something of an aesthetic draping; however poor empathy may have looked on others, it always seemed to cast him in a favorable light. "It's feeling it myself that I firmly detest."
"Ah," Neville acknowledged, chuckling again. "Well, I suppose it's not a very exciting story." He fiddled with the stem of his glass. "My father is schizophrenic. He was," he began, and faltered before concluding, "committed, I suppose, though my gran likes to simply say he retired to the country. You know, like an old hunting dog," he explained with a bitterly false brightness, and Blaise held his glass to the light, eyeing the golden color in lieu of a response. "You know," Neville added, straightening abruptly, "I rather liked Hermione's speech she wrote for Draco. I wanted to mention to her how much I appreciated it, but Pansy prefers I don't discuss my parents."
That jarred Blaise slightly from his pretense. "Pansy knows?"
"Of course." Neville took a careful sip. "I have no issue with discussing it myself, personally, but I believe my gran specifically asked her not to mention it." He swallowed, adding, "She holds my grandmother in notably high esteem."
"You seem to do the same," Blaise pointed out, and Neville turned his head, glancing at him.
"She raised me," he said simply. "My father was unable and my mother was… unfit, in her words." He paused, and then, "Naturally, I find it somewhat difficult to set aside my grandmother's opinions on things."
Blaise gave a small scoff of doubt. "And yet you do, obviously."
"Well, she arranged for my parents' divorce once he was diagnosed," Neville said. "She also arranged to take custody of me."
The question lingered on Blaise's tongue for only a second before unwisely slipping his defenses. "And your mother?"
"Gone," Neville said flatly. "I used to think she was simply overwhelmed by the prospect of child-rearing when my father's mind went, but lately, I think perhaps someone convinced her to go."
"You think your grandmother paid her to leave?" Blaise asked, frowning.
Neville's silence was answer enough, his eyes fixed on the small pops of carbonation in his glass.
"Does Pansy know?" Blaise asked, torn between curiosity and sympathy, and Neville's gaze cut slowly to his. Neville's eyes were a soft brown, nearly hazel, which typically gave his face a warm, almost doe-eyed look of innocence. Presently, though, he seemed to have fixed Blaise with a look of disbelief so out of place on his features it was like looking at an entirely different man.
"Pansy is extremely clever," Neville said simply. "If there is one thing I believe about her, it is that very little escapes her notice." He grimaced. "She is very like my grandmother that way."
Something tugged its opposition in Blaise's chest at the comparison. "Pansy cares more than you think she does. Certainly more than she lets on."
"Oh, I hope so," Neville agreed, shaking his head. "I know she wants me to propose," he added, "but I'm afraid I'm just not sure what kind of person she is, and I can't make that sort of commitment until she's capable of showing me more glimpses of the woman I love. I see traces every now and then, but at times—"
"Do you think this is a game?" Blaise cut in stiffly. "She's a person, not an experiment. You can't simply set traps to see if she'll fall into them," he said impatiently, "and you certainly can't force her into some sort of mold."
"Really?" Neville said, turning to him and abandoning any trace of the geniality he usually wore. "You're going to sit there—you," he accused, "with your penchant for truth and your complete and total knowledge of her secrets—you'll sit there and tell me Pansy isn't doing precisely that for me?"
Penchant for truth. A laughable misconception.
"Honesty is a luxury," Blaise said. "Truth is positively unaffordable."
"Love isn't a currency," Neville said, and it wasn't until they were facing each other that Blaise realized they were arguing. "Just because her title fits comfortably with mine doesn't make us compatible pieces. It means very little, in fact."
"How marvelously privileged you are to think that means little," Blaise said flatly. Perhaps under other circumstances he'd have laughed it off, but at the moment, for whatever reason—blame the champagne, he thought, or perhaps the combativeness refracting in flickers and sparks from Neville—he found himself quite unable to summon the necessary humor. "You want to envy my charm? How positively tragic for you, the man who has everything else."
"Is that what you think?" Neville asked, looking consummately insulted. "I tell you my father's locked up in a madhouse and my grandmother and my girlfriend both think I'm an idiot, and your takeaway from that is that I have everything—?"
"My father," Blaise informed him, "is a drunken naval officer that I mourned for dead as a child until he showed up on my doorstep asking for money. The only reason I am even here," he spat, waving a hand at his bottle of champagne and his expensive suite and his unlikely circumstances, "is because my fourth stepfather wanted me out of my mother's house and decided to send me to Eton, where the Prince of England happened to step in before I got myself thrashed for the audacity of bearing a nobody's name. Is that enough nothing for you?" he gritted out, one hand balled to a fist at his side. "Am I enough of a novelty for you now, Neville Longbottom, or should I go on?"
Neville stared at him, plainly empty-handed.
"Charm," Blaise said, spitting out the bitter repugnance of it. "That's what you want? Because you aspire to entertain, Neville, is that it? You're right that it's my particular talent," he remarked with a darkened laugh, "because I am either the man making jokes or I am the joke, and if you wish to take that from me, than by all means, take i-"
He broke off as Neville leaned forward, grasping Blaise's lapel and yanking him in for something that could not have possibly been a kiss, because in Blaise's experience, kisses did not feel like that. The touch of his lips to someone else's was always part of a mechanized dance, conjured from strictly rehearsed choreography. It was always some inevitable follow-up to curiosity or interest or want—always the sequence after flirtation and gamified rhythm—and never once had it been a consequence of need. Never once had it been full of anger and pain and spite and then settled so quickly to anguish, to a choked out gasp for air, for the meagerness of survival. His head spun, dizzied by the impact, and the taste of Neville on his lips was as inviting as it was searing-hot and burning through the expanse of his lungs.
"Stop," he muttered, shoving Neville back and stumbling to his feet, catching himself on the arm of the sofa. "Stop, you're—you can't—"
"I wasn't," Neville said, looking stricken and dazed. "I didn't… I hadn't planned to—"
Blaise shook his head, forcing himself backwards. "You shouldn't have done that," he said, one hand rising to the ghostly thrill of it, the heat of Neville's mouth still buzzing on his lips. "You shouldn't have—" Thoughts of Pansy swirled in his head, her dark eyes narrowed with confusion. "It was a mistake," Blaise said flatly, brandishing a finger at Neville. "It was a mistake, wasn't it?"
"Yes," Neville said, face pale. "Yes, it was. It should never have happened. I got carried away, but it wasn't—I didn't mean to—"
"It didn't happen," Blaise said firmly. He was mostly a liar by trade, after all, and this seemed the perfect time to employ his most finely crafted skill set. Hadn't he told Hermione to do the same? Perhaps she'd come to the wrong person for advice, all things considered. "You should go," Blaise added. "Pansy will be expecting you."
Neville's mouth tightened. "Just tell me one truth," he said, and Blaise stepped back, rigid.
"I already told you, this was a mistake—"
"Not about this," Neville said, waving a hand and staring at him. "Just tell me one thing and I swear, I'll forget it ever happened."
Blaise, seeing no reasonable alternative, stood stock-still in concession, not conceding the weakness of a word.
"Does she really love me?" Neville asked him.
I think I'll always love you most out of everyone, Pansy murmured to Blaise in his subconscious, her hair spread out in its usual luxurious raven wing across his pillow during one of her grand escapes from the torment of her mother's constant observation. Everyone else is so thoroughly, reprehensibly breakable—except for you.
And you, he reminded her, and she turned her head to look at him, unsmiling.
Blaise Zabini, I am the most fragile person who's ever lived, she said, and whatever any of the others are stupid enough to think, it's detestable idiocy of you to pretend otherwise.
He'd settled himself beside her on the bed. And what about Neville?
I need him, she said, closing her eyes. He's an exit strategy. He's my way out.
"Yes," Blaise had chosen to say, because Pansy had always mattered most. "She loves you."
If Neville had believed him, he'd done them both the favor of saying nothing else. He'd simply gone to bed, and the next day things had been normal—and now Blaise was here, in bed with Tracey Davis, who cared even less about the things going through his head than he did about whatever existed in hers.
She kissed him in her usual way, all bites and moans that thrilled up his spine in something of a brilliant but foreseeable routine. "Well," she exhaled into his mouth, "I don't know what it is, but something's different."
"I've said hardly anything stupid today," he said, probably only a consequence of having spoken to almost no one but her. "Maybe you're simply benefitting from my mouth's latest vacancy."
"Well, I'll take it," she said, rolling on top of him. "I'm surprised you're even here, actually," she mused, dropping to nip at the lobe of his ear. "I thought for sure you'd be off running to your friends over that new Hermione Granger crisis."
He gripped her waist tightly, frowning up at her. "What Granger crisis?"
"Didn't you hear?" Tracey asked, frowning down at him. In dimly lit rooms, he thought, she and Neville glowed precisely the same shade of honey-blonde. "A bunch of pictures just went viral of her wearing Princess Narcissa's emerald earrings—"
"AND YOU JUST NOW THOUGHT TO MENTION IT?" Blaise demanded, lifting her firmly from where she'd straddled his hips and placing her none-too-gently on the opposite side of the bed, scrambling for the phone in his discarded trousers. As anticipated, his screen was filled margin to margin with texts and calls, including one that said—
"Oh, Christ almighty," Blaise said. "Pansy's coming."
"Wrong," came a voice, just before his door burst open, Tracey leaping under his duvet with an undignified squeak of opposition. "Is this what you've been doing, Blaise? Honestly," Pansy sighed, picking up Tracey's jeans from the floor and tossing them to her. "Come on, we've got to go. Obviously Hermione will have thought of positively nothing," she muttered to herself, "and seeing as Draco's already left for Switzerland—"
"Has he?" Blaise asked, scrolling down through his texts before deciding it would be far simpler to let Pansy fill him in. "Well, this is an entire mess, isn't it? Excellent, ten points to everyone involved," he said, refreshed by the prospect. "It's been so long since I last encountered a crisis."
Only seventy-two hours, give or take, but in his experience, one calamity was easily replaced with another.
"Here," Pansy said, shoving his boxer briefs into his hand. "Put some pants on, would you? Wear the black ones," she suggested, gesturing to his closet, "with that cashmere turtleneck I like."
"Tweed blazer?" he asked, wandering to his closet as Tracey stared at him, shaking her head with something like disbelief, or possibly contempt.
"Yes," Pansy confirmed, "and try to look stern, as we're going to do a lecture. Is this yours?" she asked Tracey, picking up a bra from the floor between two fingers. "You should really get a new one," she advised with a shake of her head, gesturing to a small rip in the fabric and tossing it to her. "Ask for Jane at Myla, she'll get you a better fit."
"You two are insane," Tracey informed them snippily, but Blaise, whose attention had been lost to sock choices, opted not to reply, instead holding up a pair for Pansy's perusal and proceeding wordlessly to shoes.
"Let me make sure I have this straight," Pansy said, arms folded as she addressed Hermione in all her disapproving glory. "You asked us all to join you in France so that you wouldn't get caught," she began grandly, employing her most dramatic duration of pause, "and then, immediately upon arriving back from holiday, you thought to yourself, 'well, surely they won't find me here, where I live'—"
"No, no," Hermione said hurriedly, her hair its most unruly self as she paced the floor of the flat she shared with Daphne. "I was… I checked," she said, flustered, "but I didn't see anything—and anyway, it's not like Draco's even in the picture!"
"Ah, yes," Pansy said drily. "Because it's very difficult to puzzle out who you're consorting with while you're getting out of a Bentley, wearing a pair of royal jewels."
"Well, you never know," Blaise offered cheerfully, noting Hermione's look of frazzled distress. "There's always the possibility she's with Princess Narcissa herself, isn't it? So disappointing that nobody's jumping to that conclusion," he lamented, shaking his head as Pansy rolled her eyes. "This is why Hortense is such a valuable source of commentary."
"Well," Daphne sighed, looking up from her computer, "the entire staff at the Daily Prophet must have been on detective duty all night. They have pictures of you in Princess Narcissa's gown," she said, turning the laptop screen around as Hermione let out a small, stifled wail, "and once the palace confirms it—"
"You say that like it can be safely assumed," Pansy sniffed, and Hermione pivoted sharply, gaping at her. "What? There's no guarantee," she said, rather hurtfully blithe on the subject. "I doubt Lucius or Abraxas wish for you and Draco to go public without ascertaining you have the necessary capacity for comportment—which I can confirm with requisite authority right now: you do not," she concluded flatly.
"What?" Hermione squawked. "But… but it's—" She waved a hand at Daphne's computer screen, flailing slightly. "How could this possibly be any more public than it already is?"
"There's a stark and inconceivable distinction between the public being aware you're dating Draco and the royal family making a public statement confirming it," Pansy informed her. "Typically, you wouldn't be acknowledged in any official capacity until you're engaged, which is a further impossibility. More likely," she concluded, "the press now knows you exist, but that's the extent of it."
"But—" Hermione stopped, her phone ringing impossibly loudly in her hand and prompting her to jump from surprise. "Sorry," she said, hurrying away to reach the privacy of her bedroom. "Draco, did you—? Yes," she sighed, "I know. Did he say anything?"
"Well," Pansy said, turning to Daphne as Hermione's voice faded down the corridor, "I hope you're pleased with yourself."
"Me?" Daphne demanded crossly. "What do I have to do with this?"
"You're supposed to make sure she doesn't do anything stupid," Pansy said, and Daphne sighed loudly, rising to her feet and trying (unsuccessfully) to avoid the continued admonishment as Pansy followed her into the kitchen. "Draco's a lost cause, he's fully invested in the delusion of this abominable romance, but you—"
"First of all, Hermione doesn't listen to anyone," Daphne sniffed, "and secondly, so what? You're overreacting."
"Oh, I'm overreacting?" Pansy scoffed doubtfully, in much the same way a person might overreact, were they to do so. "Blaise," she snapped, rounding on him. "What do you think?"
Blaise, who had witnessed enough media circuses to know all they needed now was an elephant, exchanged a genial glance with Daphne, who clearly understood what was required of his loyalty.
"Well," he attempted, before being interrupted by Hermione's reappearance in the living room, her phone held limply in her hand.
"Hermione?" Daphne said, immediately concerned, and Hermione looked up, slightly dazed.
"He said Prince Lucifer declined to comment," she said dully, falling onto the sofa. "They're just… not going to say anything at all," she said with a softened sense of failure, and Pansy glanced tight-lipped at Blaise, her anger diminishing so rapidly he was certain he'd heard the snap of her jaw clamping shut.
"Well," she said, and stiffened to silence.
Hermione's eyes fell shut, wincing, and after a brief non-verbal exchange of glances with Daphne, Pansy sighed, crossing the room to sit beside Hermione as she tucked one ankle neatly behind the other.
"We're going to have to do everything I told you before," Pansy said, her voice now unnaturally calm. "Do you remember?"
Hermione nodded, one hand held to her mouth, and Pansy sighed again, reaching out to brush some of her hair from her face. "It's early still," Pansy said briskly. "He'll come around."
"Sounds contemptibly optimistic," Hermione said in a near-perfect imitation of Pansy, who exchanged a glance with Blaise, shaking her head.
"Well, we all have our flaws," she said, stiffly permitting Hermione to lean her head against her shoulder.
Pansy left Daphne and Hermione with strict instructions not to leave their flat for at least the remainder of the weekend, which was apparently easy enough. The crowd of photographers outside their building wasn't exactly a compelling reason to go outside.
Pansy and Blaise, who had been photographed from afar while entering the building, surfaced as key pieces of evidence for the veracity behind the picture. Everyone, it seemed, had become a romantic scholar overnight. If Hermione Granger were not dating Prince Draco, the papers and blogs cried in anguish, then why would two of his best known companions visit her in the middle of the night right after their tryst was mistakenly revealed?
"Oops," Blaise said, scrolling down a web page as he sat down to coffee with Pansy.
"Well, it was always going to be positively hopeless," Pansy said, clearly not needing to ask what he'd been looking at. "It was either that or leave Hermione to her own insufficient devices, which is certainly never an option. Leave her alone for five minutes and look what happens, honestly," she sighed.
"Plus five for accuracy," Blaise confirmed in agreement, and Pansy shrugged, unsurprised. "Though there's hardly any reason to pretend you're not loving this. It's not as if anyone's watching," he pointed out with an unapologetic look of smuggery. "Might as well confess, Your Ladyship."
Pansy looked up sharply. "Have you lost your entire mind, Zabini, or has only part of it been hidden away for safekeeping?"
"Mm, you play coy with the others, but you can't hide from me, Lady Parkinson," Blaise reminded her, delighting in her unimpeachable scowl. "You've been restless for weeks. Months, probably," he amended, "had I any proper concept of time. Certainly since we left Hogwarts, if not before that."
"And how should this in any way affect your alleged observations?" Pansy sniffed. "I neither gain nor lose anything from my proximity to two mooning idiots failing to prepare for the inevitable. Just another day among hapless goons," she muttered into her coffee cup, and Blaise gave her arm a nudge.
"Minus five for blatant untruths," he said, her scowl deepening. "You're needed now, which is something you positively adore," he reminded her with a laugh, opting to dismiss her opposition; her blatant relish of being considered necessary was one of the most unequivocal things about her personality. "New Tracey surely needs you," he pointed out. "And don't tell me Draco didn't call you? Perhaps even before he called her."
"That," Pansy said stiffly, "is beside the point."
She sipped patiently at her coffee, playing her usual game of choreographing silence.
"It's the entire point, you lovely minx," Blaise said, playing his usual game of interrupting her right at the moment she opted to disrupt her own dramatic pause. "You're all restless in that house of yours, and you've been needing a project."
"That's what Neville's for," Pansy countered, and Blaise stiffened slightly at the mention of him but forged ahead, giving her a dubious look.
"Neville was a project," he corrected her. "A project which is currently stalled."
"Still keeps my hands busy," Pansy murmured, and again, Blaise's mind went in several impossible directions. One of them fervently shoved away the image of Neville and Pansy with an equal and opposite force to the memory of Neville grabbing hold of him, fitting Blaise's collar into the culpability of his grip.
"Well, you're a cerebral sort of creature," Blaise reminded her, shaking it off and resuming the point. "The penis, as you know, is notoriously uncomplex. Hardly sufficient cause for extended entertainment."
"True," Pansy sighed, "but still, it's not as if I take pleasure in any of this." She sipped her coffee, marinating both of them in an indulgent wave of lies. "I suppose," she said carefully, "if I were to acknowledge your point—"
"Which you are," Blaise said.
"—which I'm not," she informed him, "I might say that yes, it does feel somewhat validating that everyone around me is so hopefully inept. Minus you," she said with another sip, and he shrugged.
"I have my own lack of aptitude," he said, before adding, "Though, as for this business with Neville—"
"It's not as if I care, per se," she said, continuing on with her ardent denial, "because obviously it's their own fault for being so careless, but it occurs to me that Hermione will now be existing in the worst case scenario: Laid bare for public scrutiny, but without the royal family's protection." She grimaced. "Frankly, I shudder to think who would come crawling out of my past, were I to exist in a similar dastardly place between infamy and secrecy."
"You hardly have any skeletons," countered Blaise, who had numerous.
"Still. Some things are meant to stay private," she said, which struck Blaise as rather uncomfortably on the nose.
"Hypothetical thought exercise," he ventured, and Pansy looked up, always game for a philosophical meandering. "Do you think it's ever necessary to know everything about a person?"
"No," she replied without hesitation.
"It's a thought exercise," Blaise told her with a sigh, "not a reflex test."
"Well, I hate to think anyone knows everything about anyone," she said, idly toying with the handle of her cup. "Do you think you know everything about me?"
He'd often wondered what exactly went on inside her head. He imagined it to be a precarious place, full of perilous drops and impossibly labyrinthine pathways. From Blaise's perspective, Pansy's mind was somewhere very easy to get lost in, like an enchanted wood, where some turns led to quicksand and others to fanciful groves of secret aspirations. He doubted she enjoyed exploring it much, foregoing the possibility of splendor in order to circumvent the likelihood of risk. He suspected that she preferred to float somewhere above the shadows of the canopy.
"No," he said, and her mouth twitched up with a smile.
"See? And you love me best of all," she told him, "so there you have it."
He paused, taking a sip of his coffee, and then drummed his fingers on the table. "Neville," he attempted a second time, and Pansy groaned.
"Not you, too," she muttered, displeased. "Hermione won't leave it alone, but of course she doesn't understand." She glanced up at him. "You do, don't you?"
It wasn't very complicated. Pansy had expectations to meet, things to climb to. Neville was the appropriate height for a requisite boost.
"Did you know about his parents?" he asked her, and in response, Pansy's mouth immediately stiffened.
"Augusta's made it quite clear that Neville clings to some delusion about them," she said, "but that's no surprise. All children mythologize their parents. I'm certainly no exception, and neither are you," she added pointedly, and Blaise shrugged.
"Ten for wisdom, Lady Parkinson, but still. I'm afraid you've chosen someone very soft," he pointed out, "which is perhaps an unwise foundation for your particular needs, cerebral or otherwise."
"He just needs proper guidance, that's all." She sipped her coffee again. "A lifetime is very long, Blaise."
"Or very short," he challenged, "and perhaps immensely wasted on invaluable pursuits."
She half-smiled, glancing up. "You loathe him," she said, delighted.
"I don't," Blaise said. "The opposite of love is indifference, or so I'm told, which I've recently been led to believe is worse."
"You loathe him," she chuckled to herself, "and it's adorable. Is it because of me?" she asked, looking smugly pleased by the prospect. "Surely you've always known you couldn't be the primary man in my life forever."
"I never have been," he reminded her. "You have Draco and Henry, and perhaps even Theo, when you're in the mood for a more difficult task."
"Theodore is a lost cause," she said fondly, "and the other two are like brothers to me. Whereas you and I," she countered, "have wandered countless versions of ourselves before, I suspect—and regrettably for both of us," she said with a disingenuous sigh, "always managed to wind up together."
"Plus twenty for such a rare glimpse of whimsy," Blaise said, imagining it drawn from one of the glittering fairy pools inside her head. "Reincarnation, Lady Parkinson? How positively quaint."
She shrugged, feigning indifference as she finished the last of her coffee. "I'm winning the points competition, aren't I?"
"Of course you are," Blaise said. "Who else would possibly win?"
"True," she said, pleased. "Well, are you off to continue your fleeting charade with Tracey Davis?" she asked tangentially. "I'm afraid I can't do you the favor of indifference, Blaise. She falls somewhere south of repugnant but north of odious."
"I like her," Blaise offered noncommittally.
"I'm aware," Pansy acknowledged, "but stop."
"Not quite yet," he said, and she made a face, "but soon, I'm sure. You do realize they're usually the ones who tire of me, don't you?" he posed neutrally. "I can't even remember the last time I've had to formally put an end to any type of charade, farce, or spectacle."
"That's because people are idiots," Pansy said, affectionately giving his hand a tap across the knuckles. "Come on," she sighed, effortlessly resuming her demeanor of disinterest, "I need a better mask than this pratfall sham of Umbrian clay. My pores are positively gaping."
Monday morning brought a slew of articles posturing about Hermione's relationship with Draco. There were countless versions of the same pictures of her as she struggled to make her way to her office from her flat, the majority of her face covered by a thick, knitted scarf as she walked with her gaze resolutely fixed on the ground.
"Greengrass tells me California's asked her parents to hold off on a visit," Theo remarked to Blaise, stirring a bit of lemon into his tea. "I'd advise her on the subject, but of course I have no helpful advice. Probably better left in Fleur's hands."
Privately, Blaise was unsure Fleur Delacour was any good source of advice. Experience she may have possessed in spades, but even Fleur's candids looked like Anna Wintour had personally posed them and then sent them off to be blessed by the pope. Fleur was perhaps the least relatable person Blaise had ever met, and considering he was very close friends with Prince Draco, that was a monumentally telling statement.
"You've spoken to Daphne?" Blaise asked, not looking up from where he was pretending to choose between two paisley pocket squares.
"Of course," Theo said innocently. "Haven't you?"
"Minus ten for uncreative denial," Blaise said, and Theo groaned.
"I thought I was finally winning," he muttered, and Blaise shrugged.
"Of course you were," he said, "but still, the point stands."
"She just seems," Theo began, and paused. "Better now. Happy." He stirred mindlessly at his tea. "It's just much easier to be friends with her now, I suppose. Less weight to carry around."
"Theodore, you're practically a sentient weed," Blaise informed him. "You hardly know a thing about weightiness."
Theo rolled his eyes. "Baggage, then," he said to himself, and glanced at Blaise. "Speaking of which, you've been odd lately. Keeping secrets, Zabini?"
"I like to have two or three within reach at any given time," Blaise said. "You know, for company. I tend to them like little pets."
"Well, it's important to have passion projects," Theo said approvingly. "Anything you'd like me to know about?"
Blaise considered it.
Among his talents had always been compartmentalization. If the inside of Pansy's head was an enchanted forest, the inside of Theo's head was a palace of rooms, most of them locked. Blaise's head, on the other hand, was a very neatly organized filing system. He considered pulling out the file marked Neville Longbottom, New Year's Eve, but decided that if he opened it now, it would likely fill with more materials, and then he would struggle to replace it in its appropriate box.
"Nothing," he ruled, and Theo shrugged, taking a sip of his tea.
"Sounds right," he mused, wandering elsewhere as Blaise proceeded to choose houndstooth over paisley.
By midweek, Hermione's press coverage had worsened considerably. The comment threads beneath articles posted on the website for the Daily Prophet were now filled with speculation about what lurid things she might have done to capture Prince Draco's attention, and every day seemed to bring a new insider source with intimate knowledge on the subject ("Hermione Granger's first kiss speaks out about saucy Yank's playground romance," for example, or "Former roommate reveals shady side of Prince Draco's American girlfriend").
"It's all so frightfully dull," remarked Hortense, who had spontaneously appeared while Blaise was choosing a selection of whisky to replenish what had been lost to Pansy's continuing malcontent, Harry's occasional imbibements, and Tracey's evening visits. He suspected Hortense and Thibaut had somehow begun tracking him, but was considerably loath to wonder how they might have done it, shuddering helplessly at the possibilities.
"Really," Hortense sighed, "you'd think Rita Skeeter would come up with something better than Draco's relationship rumors. Have there been no recent severed heads?"
"None worth remarking, it appears," Blaise replied, glancing over a selection of Odgen's finest. "Though, I should mention I had no idea you concerned yourself with the news."
"She doesn't," Thibaut contributed listlessly, appearing on Blaise's other side, "but there's just so little arson to celebrate in the early months of the year. Flammability is at such a despicable low during times of excessive snowfall."
"Yes," Hortense agreed, turning back to Blaise, "and besides, Basile is insistent on staying informed. He won't leave the stables without some sort of morning announcement. He requires Rita Skeeter and a salt lick," she said, shaking her head. "One of which is for boredom, and the other for iron deficiency."
"Well, horses can be very particular," Blaise said. "Though I don't see how Rita Skeeter could possibly provide any important minerals."
"Who said anything about a horse?" demanded Thibaut, who was languidly eating from a jar of Maraschino cherries. "You seem odd, by the way," he added to Blaise, narrowing his eyes at him. "You have a distinct sense of disturbance about you."
"Is it, perhaps, because you've accosted me while going about my personal business?" Blaise asked, not looking up from the bottle in his hand.
"Nonsense," Hortense said, fanning herself. "We've only been here a matter of minutes. You've looked waist-deep in malaise for nearly a week."
"I haven't seen you for at least three weeks," Blaise pointed out.
"Of course you haven't seen us," Hortense said. "We're very good at what we do."
"Besides, I really don't see how that's relevant," Thibaut sniffed, before turning to give Hortense a nudge. "Come on, let's go. I need a nice scented candle."
"That's a good idea," Hortense said, brightening. "I'm sure the sturdy American will enjoy that."
"That's nice of you," Blaise said, pleasantly surprised. "I'm sure New Tracey would appreciate being gifted a candle of any sort."
"Well, we certainly wouldn't use it simply to influence her mood via any sort of voodoo doll," Thibaut assured him. "There are rules, you know."
"I don't think I asked," replied Blaise, who certainly knew better than to do so, but Hortense and Thibaut only waved carelessly over their shoulders, proceeding to exit through a door marked Employees.
"I'm worried about Hermione," Harry said later that evening, falling back against the sofa cushions and opening Blaise's new bottle of Ogden's.
Blaise, saving them both the tiresome process of questioning, opted to simply arch a brow in response.
"Not because of that," Harry assured him, hastily shaking his head. "Not, you know, feelings or anything, it's just…" He grimaced. "Well, you remember how bad it was for her the first time things got out at Hogwarts, and now—"
"She has practice now," Blaise pointed out. "And she's obviously going to have to get used to it, Henry, as the country is unlikely to lose interest in her so long as she remains Draco's girlfriend."
Harry sighed. "Yes, I know, but—"
"She seems relatively fine," Blaise said. "Besides, even if she weren't," he added knowingly, "what exactly would you do about it?"
"I—" Harry withered, relenting. "Yes, fine." He tightened his hand around his glass, frowning. "You're being especially logical," he noted with suspicion. "What's gotten into you?"
Unfortunately, one to two more things had been deposited into the New Year's file. Guilt, mostly, though there was a bit of yearning smeared across it. A little marmalade of longing, spread thinly over a slice of regret.
"Nothing," said Blaise, who was firmly not in the mood for any Neville Longbottom-shaped toast. "What about you? You have a girlfriend this week, don't you?"
"Not this week," Harry said with a shake of his head. "Probably next."
"I think they call this sort of relationship 'dysfunctional,' but points for self-awareness," Blaise said, considering it. "Five?"
"Ten," Harry suggested, and added, "By the way, I'm winning, right?"
"Of course," Blaise said. "Who else?"
"I figured," Harry said, kicking his feet out aimlessly and pondering something in silence before turning his attention back to Blaise. "I suppose I haven't actually asked—do you like Ginny?"
"Doesn't matter what I like," Blaise said. "Do you?"
"I like parts of her," Harry said with his usual Prince Harry grin, and then, in a defensive reflex that was clearly the result of some prior disapproval by Pansy, "By which I mean her personality, of course. She's fun, adventurous. Cool, for the most part, unless she's angry, in which case I'm fairly confident she's concentrating on trying to shoot bats out of my nose."
"Lady Parkinson is absent," Blaise pointed out. "You may confess your baser urges if you wish, Henry."
"Fine," he muttered, still taking a moment to glance around for certainty. "Then yes, there are other parts of her I enjoy," Harry confessed in a considerably less virtuous tone, "but still." He took a sip of his whisky. "Is it just me," he added tangentially, "or does Ginny look a bit like my mum?"
Blaise made a face. "You know, put together you and Nott become the perfect Oedipal complex," he noted. "It's equal parts disturbing and remarkable."
"Points?" Harry said hopefully.
"For that bit of Freudian drivel? Dream on, Your Highness," Blaise said, and Harry chuckled, the sound of it disappearing once more into his glass.
By Friday, the question of whether or not Draco would appear in Hermione's presence upon his return from Geneva was floating across every conceivable corner of the internet. Daphne, probably sensing Hermione would require something to take her mind off of things, had planned an evening at Blaise and Theo's flat for purposes of pre-emptive strike. To Blaise's surprise, though, he received a phone call earlier in the day that disrupted his preparatory plans.
"Blaise," Draco said, sounding agitated. "Can you get me out of here?"
Draco's mind was a series of hurdles, some of which were on fire, but his primary skill was befriending people who had no trouble venturing the necessary leaps. No further questioning was required for Blaise to know that 1) Draco had arrived back in London, 2) Prince Lucifer was being difficult, 3) the ever-dutiful son of Wales now needed to exit the walls of his father's home to avoid smashing them in, and 4) Blaise was going to need to locate his helmet.
"Ten minutes," Blaise said, promptly hanging up the phone and turning to Tracey. "I have to go," he said, taking in the sight of her draped across his duvet and filing it away for later. "Sorry, something's come up."
She glanced at his trousers. "It certainly has."
"Don't listen to him," Blaise said impatiently. "He's ill-informed."
"Fine," Tracey said, rising to her feet and glaring at him. "I was going to break things off with you, anyway. This is becoming vastly unhealthy."
"I agree," Blaise said. "You should probably find someone you feel slightly less contempt for."
She scowled at him, folding her arms over her chest. "You do realize I mean it this time, don't you?"
"So do I," he said, tossing her shirt back to her. "So, goodbye forever?"
Her scowl deepened as she hesitated, twisting her fingers in the fabric of her shirt. "How late will your idiot friends be here?"
"Until midnight," he estimated, "though either way, you know where to find me."
She gave him a scathing look, as if she were hoping he'd find a way to drown on his way home.
"Fine," she said eventually, shoving her shirt over her head and glaring at him. "If I'm available, I'll stop by."
"Wonderful," he said, tossing her a salute and grabbing his keys. "See you tonight," he called over his shoulder, and headed out for Clarence House, already late for his appointment with the Prince.
"Thanks for this," Draco said, removing his helmet once they were safely away from photographers. "It's been ages."
"Only one or two," Blaise agreed, swiping at his forehead as he set the helmet against the handlebars of his Ducati. "I take it the Prince of Darkness is being his most charming self?"
Draco grimaced, running a hand through the sweat-soaked strands of his hair. "I just needed some air." He kicked one leg over the bike, rising to both feet and throwing his arms overhead, stretching. "He insists on making me jump through hoops and frankly, it's exhausting."
"Abraxas deferring to Lucifer's judgment, then?" Blaise guessed, and Draco nodded moodily.
"I don't know what I'm going to tell Hermione," he admitted, and pressed his hand to his forehead. "I haven't told her I'm back yet," he added, and glanced imploringly at Blaise. "You won't say anything, will you?"
"About your affinity for motorbikes? Of course not," Blaise said, and Draco cracked a smile. "And we both know Theo won't say anything, given how much loud engines frighten him."
"I just needed to gather my thoughts first. I don't know," Draco began, and withered again. "I don't know how I'm going to explain this to her. Or, alternatively, to my father. It seems impossible to make this make sense to anyone, and now—"
"She's not exactly fragile," Blaise said, which seemed to be something he was repeatedly pointing out. He was beginning to worry he was becoming the sensible one in the group, which was much too troubling to fathom. "I'm not always a proponent of truth," he added, "but in this case, I'm not sure you have another option."
Draco smiled grimly at him. "I'm simply procrastinating, aren't I?"
"Well, even princes are permitted their moments of imperfection," Blaise said with a shrug, "or so I'm told, anyway."
"Ah." Draco rolled out his neck, shaking his head before turning back to Blaise. "Well, what's new with you?" he asked. "Surely something. You seem contemplative enough."
The ride, intended for Draco's thoughts, hadn't exactly been devoid of similar effects for Blaise. Some of the files had sprung loose, one or two things slipping out and floating unclaimed through his head.
"It's nothing," Blaise said, and Draco's mouth quirked.
"Ah," he said, delighted to have made an observation. "So it's an it, is it?"
"Poetic, Your Highness," Blaise said, approving. "Tattoo that on my heart. Engrave it on my tomb."
"Come on," Draco groaned imploringly, leaning against his bike. "I know I'm not Theo or Harry, but I'm good for some things, aren't I?"
"You're compromised," Blaise said. "You'll tell your girlfriend. Or your father."
"I—" Draco looked distressed. "Well, certainly not my father," he scoffed, "and possibly not Hermione, either. Not if you expressly forbade me," he insisted, "and you and I both know you love a good forbidding from time to time."
"It does aid my digestion," Blaise conceded thoughtfully. Worse, he was beginning to think if he didn't tell someone, it might simply fall out of his ears, seeing that all the files were presently unsecured and in danger of traumatic collapse.
"Look, I get that I'm not the person of choice," Draco said, "but we've been through things, haven't we?" He gestured to the road behind them, which was both a poignant metaphor and a very literal reference. "And besides, it would really make me feel better to think of something that isn't my father's inability to accept my girlfriend. So really," he determined, brightening, "it would be a service to the crown."
Blaise considered it. "Would I be knighted?"
"Definitely," Draco said. "Would you like some jewels? I'm sure I could dig up one or two."
"I'd like a dukedom," Blaise said.
"Consider the paperwork filed," Draco declared, and Blaise leaned back on his bike, testing the words out before they left his tongue.
Neville kissed me. Not a great start.
I kissed him back. Rapidly worsening.
I don't know who I hate more for it, him or me. True, and hugely problematic.
"You can't tell anyone," Blaise said after a moment, clearing his throat. "Especially not Pansy."
Draco blinked with surprise, then nodded, waiting. It was an oddly symmetrical image to when they'd met a decade earlier, Draco waiting in patient silence as Blaise held ice to the swelling bruise over his eye and tried not to say things like find someone better, Your Highness; surely someone else is more worthy of your time.
"Something happened," Blaise said slowly. "On New Year's Eve, in Courchevel. I did something."
"Blaise, I know it can't be this bad," Draco said, shaking his head. "Out with it."
"I got into a bit of a row with Neville," Blaise said, and added, with as much brightness as he could muster, "and then he kissed me."
Draco, a consummate politician, careened through a spectrum of surprise for only a moment before steadying his constitution. "Did you want him to?"
"No, of course not," Blaise said quickly. "And I told him we couldn't tell Pansy about it, either. You know how she is," he added, and Draco nodded with a slow, resigned suspicion. "She'd prefer to ignore the things that don't fit perfectly with the way she wants them to be."
"But did you," Draco began, and frowned. "I mean, are you—"
"There have been… others," Blaise admitted, and Draco nodded. "A few, here and there over the years. My concern, initially, was Pansy," he said firmly. "For her sake, I told him to forget it ever happened."
"But you haven't forgotten," Draco noted, and Blaise shook his head, the contents of the file dumping out at his feet and flying out on a gust of resignation.
Helpfully, Draco didn't ask him to explain. Instead he merely sorted through his thoughts in silence, looking somewhere between apprehensive and unsettled.
"Do you want it to happen again?" Draco asked, and Blaise hurried to shake his head.
"No," he said, inescapably firm on that. "I had no feelings on Neville whatsoever before, and now I'm certainly going to have to keep my distance. Best case, Pansy finds some other aristocrat and ends things shortly," he said, implausibly optimistic for something that seemed increasingly unlikely, "and then none of us ever have to see him again."
Draco winced. "I don't mind him," he said, ever the diplomat. "He's… unobtrusive."
"About the same compliment I'd give a sponge," Blaise noted, and Draco sighed loudly.
"Frankly, I'm astonished he managed something like this," Draco said, abruptly impressed, as if the concept astounded him more the longer he thought about it. "Kissing his girlfriend's best friend, that's… that sounds like the plot of Thibaut and Hortense's next musical." He swiveled his gaze to Blaise. "But if I'm going to keep this secret for you, you'll have to promise never to let it happen again. Once, fine, I understand your logic," Draco exhaled uneasily, "but if there's a second time—"
"There won't be," Blaise assured him. "But Pansy needs him—" or thinks she does, he thought, "and I don't want to get in the way of that."
"But is that fair to her?" Draco asked neutrally. "If Neville tells her and you don't—"
"He won't." Blaise was certain of that much. "He definitely keeps more from her than he lets on, and believe me—"
He broke off, thinking of the look on Neville's face, which had been replaying in his mind on repeat for the entirety of the last week. In all likelihood, Neville's upbringing was not much different from Pansy's, and if Blaise was unfit for Lady Parkinson's consideration, then surely he didn't even register on the spectrum of appropriate for Lady Augusta Longbottom.
"Trust me," Blaise concluded with a shake of his head, "he's not going to say a word."
That seemed to trouble Draco more than anything. "This is Pansy we're talking about," he said worriedly. "She's more vulnerable than she thinks."
"Yes, but she's worked too hard for this to let it slip through her fingers," Blaise pointed out, and Draco grimaced his grudging agreement. "She certainly won't break it off with him over something this inconsequential—so isn't it better she doesn't have to know?" he ventured, posing the same question he'd been asking himself for days. "Ignorance is bliss, or at least marginally less paralyzing. She's said as much herself."
"Well," Draco said, conceding unhappily, "that's certainly true." He shook his head, dismayed with himself. "I really didn't think that was what you were going to say."
"Well, I have to permit some reprieves from worrying about global climate change," Blaise said. "From time to time I like to let a few other cataclysms pass through to diversify the contents of my inner monologue."
"Certainly relatable. I'm pretty sure that's the longest I've gone without thinking about my own problems recently," Draco said, straightening with a look of repulsion with himself, "so thank you for your service to your kingdom." He eyed his watch, shaking his head. "And now, I suppose, I'll have to return for a lecture about risking my safety and the entire future of the free world. A familiar song and dance," he lamented, "for which I desperately hope my father has developed a few new verses—"
"You're already out," Blaise cut in, gesturing around. "Will it really be that much worse if you simply come over to ours tonight? Better to tell New Tracey what your father said in person," he pointed out, and Draco cocked his head, contemplating it. "I can't imagine she'd take the news well over a phone call."
"No, probably not," Draco sighed, reaching for his mobile and glancing at the screen. "Well," he murmured, typing something in quickly that was met with an instant response, and then another. And then another. And then three more, before he finally shut his phone off and put it back in his pocket, glancing up at Blaise. "Yours, you said?"
"Oh, yes," Blaise informed him. "We're having a party to celebrate New Tracey being made a public spectacle."
"Sounds like something worth toasting," Draco agreed, throwing a leg over his bike and picking up his helmet. "By the way," he added, "I'm still winning the points game, aren't I?"
"Oh, of course," Blaise assured him, securing his helmet and starting the ignition of his bike. "Who else would it be?"
"Oh good," Draco said, royally pleased. "Just checking."
Much to Blaise's discomfort, Neville joined them that evening at Pansy's behest. It was the first time Blaise had seen him since New Year's Eve—aside from an exchange of nods, maybe, as they departed France—and he was extremely displeased to note that opening the Neville Longbottom file to reveal its contents to Draco had accomplished very little towards re-securing it among his other thoughts.
Unfortunately, it wasn't simply guilt eating away at him. Memories of firelight and the taste of expensive champagne had mixed together to flash bubbly and golden at the back of his mind, hovering unhelpfully beneath his senses' duller observations.
Pansy, of course, was the first to comment. "You're being unreasonably quiet, Blaise. It's leaving Theodore to provide all the evening's absurdity, and he has positively no finesse."
From Theo, lamentingly: "It's true, I don't. Not even one single finesse."
From Daphne: "Besides, Nott's absurdity has more of a gloomy fog to it. A tasteful heaping of self-loathing, one might say, versus Blaise, who's really more of a charming observer."
From Draco, who had his arm around Hermione: "An important distinction, I agree."
From Harry, indignant: "Hold on—what about me?"
From Pansy, with an airy scoff: "You're not absurd, Henry, you're roguish. Puckish on an off day, and knavish when you're up to it."
Theo, aghast: "What? His sounds better."
Harry, smirking: "Because it is, Nott."
From Hermione, twisting to look at Draco: "What are you, then, if your crew of Bad Lads are such wonderful renditions of bad?"
Draco, with a sigh: "Average, I expect."
Daphne, chiming in with a laugh: "Isn't it obvious? Draco's the nerd."
Draco, airily: "I prefer the term scholarly. Unrelated, I hear the Tower's plenty warm this time of year, Daph."
Blaise, shaking his head with a laugh, rose to his feet to refill his drink, wandering into the kitchen. He caught the telling motions of Hermione rising from Draco's lap to follow after him as he pretended at ignorance, occupying himself with a fruitless search for a liqueur he knew perfectly well he did not have.
"Blaise," Hermione said. "Pansy's right, you know. You're being very quiet."
"Am I?" Blaise said, feigning surprise. "Only because I've been meditating on something I read this week. Did you know," he mused, "that Prince Draco is dating some sort of colonial floozy who once kissed a boy on the swingset when she was six entire years of age?"
"God, I'm going to murder Anthony Goldstein," Hermione muttered, rolling her eyes before admonishing him, "Don't change the subject, Blaise. I want to hear about you," she insisted. "You're being very un-Blaise, and frankly, I do not care for it."
"Well, what you want is all well and good, New Tracey, but minus five for selfishness, because I'd like to hear about you," he replied, as she let out a low huff in protest. "How go your blogging endeavors?" he asked, dropping his voice and successfully distracting her as she glanced over her shoulder, ascertaining the others remained at a distance.
"Good, actually," she said, and in truth, he agreed. He liked to enjoy the latest posts over his morning libation, and learned a great deal that day about female expectations in the workplace. "It's been a useful distraction this week in particular," Hermione admitted, and then grimaced, adding, "Thanks for hosting this, by the way. I haven't been anywhere but my flat and my office all week. It's," she began, and hesitated. "Hard to get around these days."
"I suspect this isn't the sort of pursuit you imagined as a young, feverishly ambitious commoner," Blaise said, and she smiled thinly.
"I guess I shouldn't be surprised, given how many times I've been warned." She glanced over her shoulder at Draco, then looked back at Blaise. "What about you?"
"Oh, Rita Skeeter loves me," Blaise assured her, and she groaned.
"Of course she does. Everyone does." She gave him a wistful smile. "Rightfully, I suspect."
"Well, plus ten for flattery, minus five for inaccuracy," Blaise said, and Hermione made a squeak of opposition.
"Blaise, am I losing this game?" she demanded.
"Of course you are," he offered comfortingly. "You're terrible at it. But don't take it personally," he added. "It speaks very little to your qualities as a human being, and far more to your relationship with a capricious yet infallible referee."
"Isn't the game entirely about who we are as people?" she asked, sighing.
"Only if you're playing it wrong," he assured her spiritedly, giving her a wink and a smacking kiss to her forehead before reentering the living room, faltering the moment Neville looked up to catch his eye.
Nobody had noticed Neville's unusual silence, which was probably best. Still, Blaise found the palpable awkwardness momentarily unbearable, opting to disappear into the corridor and making his way to his room for a moment to steady himself.
He heard footsteps following and glimpsed a pair of loafers before internally withering, watching them come into view. Blaise, who possessed no furniture aside from his bed and nightstand, watched Neville lean against the bare wall, sipping idly at his drink.
"I guess we should talk," Neville said.
"Nothing to talk about," Blaise reminded him in a low voice, glancing at the open door. The others were a fair distance away, but still.
Neville cleared his throat, tapping his fingers on his glass.
"If you need me to keep my distance—"
"Yes," Blaise said, glancing up at him, "I fucking do."
"I suppose it's not worth it to apologize, then," Neville said, and Blaise curled a fist, suddenly flaring with opposition.
No, that would make it worse. If Neville was sorry, then Blaise had been building the whole thing up in his head for an entire week, and who knew what two weeks would do? Or three? Or three months, or three years? Would he have a lifetime of existing parallel to Neville?
Could sorry fix that?
"You old money purebloods," Blaise muttered under his breath, shaking his head. "You're all just a bunch of garden-variety tragedies, aren't you?"
Neville stared at him for a moment, silent, and then turned slowly, walking to the door.
Blaise exhaled as he went, feeling his entire frame go limp, but Neville only took hold of the knob. Shut the door quietly. Walked back, and then stood still, facing Blaise.
"You sad little rich boy," Neville said, his voice low and shockingly venomous. "Self-pity may not look flattering on me, but it looks absolutely ridiculous on you."
Blaise looked up sharply, taken aback. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me." Neville reached forward, setting his drink on Blaise's nightstand. "Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?" he asked, a hint of mockery coloring his tone. "Because you're insecure, is that it?"
Motherfucker. Blaise's knuckles tightened at his sides. "What are you trying to do? Impress me?"
"Not anymore, no. Turns out I misjudged you," Neville said, folding his arms over his chest. "The others just stumble over themselves for your approval, and I thought it was because you were the one they loved the most—but they don't really love you, do they?" he accused. "You certainly don't think they do. You couldn't live up to what they were, so you made yourself judge and jury over all of them."
Very little was keeping Blaise from losing his temper. There was close to nothing, in fact, aside from knowing that he would most likely be attending Neville and Pansy's wedding, and that Pansy, foolishly thinking Blaise to be reasonable and non-violent, would eventually want him to make a speech. Which would be full of lies, of course, and which would burn his throat to say aloud, and which would haunt him for days, months, years, lifetimes. Probably until he ran into her again in his next life.
"Is it a reaction you want?" Blaise asked, looking up. "Is that it? You want me to lose my temper, want me to snap? What is it?"
"I want to see what you really are," Neville said flatly, in something that felt like a taunt. "None of you are real, do you realize that?" he demanded, suddenly flaring with temper. "Pansy certainly isn't, not with me—and you, you're the worst out of all of them. They never really get close to you because you wouldn't dare let them," he said with a shake of his head. "You're just a snake, aren't you? All you are is secrets and lies—"
"Oh, is that what I am?" Blaise hissed, launching to his feet and shoving Neville backwards. "Well then congratulations, you've sorted me, Longbottom, good job—"
"Tell me I'm wrong," Neville beckoned, his tongue slipping out between his lips. "Go on, tell me."
"What for?" Blaise snapped. "One sob story over too much champagne and you think that changes something between us? You're expendable," he gritted out, "and you're forgettable, and—"
Neville grabbed his face with both hands, pulling him closer, and to Blaise's despondent dismay, he felt himself give in even before their lips touched. It seemed inevitable, pointless to refuse and wastefully undeniable, and instead of champagne and a flickering hearth this time it was gin and hushed gasps and malice, and it was Blaise's hand rising to make its way between the blades of Neville's scapulae, digging with contempt into the gaps of his spine. He closed his eyes and shuddered, limbs flooded with heat. He would regret this later, he knew, and when he did he would burn in it, singed by all the edges of his memory.
"Forgettable," Neville said to Blaise's mouth. "Did you forget me?"
No.
Not for a moment.
Blaise shoved him away, dragging a hand to his lips as Neville stumbled backwards, steadying himself with a hand on Blaise's headboard.
"Stop it," Blaise said. "Stop."
He intended for more words, but for once, nothing came to mind. He reached for the door and flung it open, feeling Neville's gaze following him as he made his way into the corridor and stopped, barreling into Tracey.
"Hey," she said, sounding bored. "Your friends are doing their unbearable little banter thing in the living room."
"Oh," Blaise said, blinking, and she frowned.
"You okay?" Tracey asked. "You seem weird."
He heard Neville walk out of his bedroom behind him, catching the furrow of Tracey's brow as she noticed him materializing in the corridor.
"Oh, hi," Neville said genially, holding up a phone charger. "Was just getting this for Pansy."
Motherfucker, Blaise thought again, sliding him a corrosive glance.
If anyone was pretending, it was clearly Neville Longbottom.
"Cool," Tracey said disinterestedly, taking Blaise's hand and tugging him back to his bedroom. "You won't be interrupted this time, will you?" she asked, shutting the door behind her and whipping her shirt over her head, reaching behind her to unclasp her bra.
Blaise numbly shook his head, unzipping his trousers. He knew he'd be replaying Neville's kiss over and over until the files in his brain were lit aflame and scattered over every layer of his cognizance, dusting his subconscious in ash and settling like rubble into his thoughts.
"No," he said, and let her shove him onto his back, Neville's hair flashing gold behind his eyelids as Pansy's voice echoed down the corridor, flooding him anew.
If Draco and Hermione taught the rest of us anything, it was that some things can't be denied, which is why it became very obvious to me very quickly that I'd have to take drastic measures about keeping my distance from Neville.
The only problem is… I didn't. Or, at least, they didn't work.
But seeing as today's not about me, I suppose it's not really worth getting into that right now.
a/n: Okay, so sometimes it comes out a romantic dramedy... I'm really not in control here. I'm just glad you've decided to come along.