"I need your help." I never thought I would be the one to make contact.

I had left Sirius once we boarded the train. I suppose it would have made more sense to lose him somewhere between Platforms 9 and 10, but I figured this way sent a message. There was no excuse, therefore no reason to ever talk to me again.

"I knew you'd take me up on my kissing demonstration offer. Took you a little longer than I would have liked." A little longer? We hadn't talked in almost a month. And I wanted to keep that going, but he had to go and surgically attach his eyes to me whenever we had lunch or during the few classes we shared (I always sat in the front and him in the back). This was astronomically frustrating because he was distracting me from my schoolwork and still managing to make grades that rivaled my own – a Ravenclaw!

At first, it didn't bother me. I figured once he had seen enough he would stop. He must have seen the way I isolated myself, how I had no friends, and drowned myself with my studies, but now had to avoid using the library so I wouldn't risk social interaction.

I just wished he would stop looking at me. I was tired. This game he was playing – and winning – was exhausting.

I had avoided him at dinner, curled up in my bed, partly just so I could make it up later. I usually left it messy, but I had been spending more time than usual in my dorm and needed to create trivial tasks.

It had been long since I settled into my dorm. Some of the girls were still milling about, several weeks into the school year, trying to find the perfect place for their collages of friends and family or scavenging for more room to store their endless supply of clothes. I didn't understand why they packed so many – we wore uniforms for five out of the seven days. Unlike most girls, my trunk did not require a bottomless spell, despite the room my typewriter took up. I packed very minimally, not much beyond the required uniform. I only had one dress; grey, a pair of jeans; grey, and a handful of "fancier" shirts in shades of ivory or black that intentionally washed out my already pallid complexion. The only spot of color I had was a pea-green cardigan that I only wore around Christmas, so it wouldn't be mistaken for Slytherin pride.

"I missed you at dinner." He continued. 'Missed' as in he wanted to see me or he had casually glanced over at the Ravenclaw table and couldn't find me? Merlin, I'm such a girl. "Where were you?"

"I grabbed a roll and went to my room. Homework and all."

"Are you hungry? I could take you to the kitchens and –" Aw – Logan, stop it!

"No! Uh, thanks."

"Are you sure? I could get you some coffee –"

"Actually I was hoping you'd take me somewhere else."

"Somewhere private?" He said. I would have slapped him if that didn't mean touching him.

"Kind of. I mean – do you know where the thestrals are kept?"

"It would help if I knew what a thestral was."

"It's the name for the creatures that pull the carriages."

His eyes widened. I suppose he wasn't used to girls asking to be taken somewhere private that wasn't a bedroom. "You can see them too?" He asked.

"Uh, no. That's why I need you." I said that wrong.

"If you can't see them, how do you know they exist?"

"I read about them." I said.

"Ravenclaw?"

"Yeah." It wasn't like he didn't already know.

"Aren't you going to guess what I am?" I noticed he was wearing his pajamas, and Merlin, it wasn't fair. The boy could make flannel look sexy.

"I don't need to. You like to act chivalrous, but you really just do it for the attention. You love to break the rules. A trouble-maker, but a brave one. Smart too. I have a feeling you wouldn't get caught for half the things you do if you didn't enjoy the glory so much. Gryffindor."

"You're that observant?"

"You're that notorious." I corrected.

"So you're asking me to sneak you outside the school after hours to a forbidden place just so you can see some dangerous animals? Got to tell you Logan, I never figured you to be one to break the rules."

"And I never figured you to be one to think about me. Look, I'm not asking you to protect against the big bad 'monsters' if you're scared. Just take me to them."

"Why do you care anyway?"

I know what it's like to be alone. "They just fascinate me, that's all."

He held out his hand. I didn't take it. "Come on." I looked around, where could he possibly be talking about?

"What – in there? The forest? The forbidden forest?" I said.

"Yeah. You're not scared are you?"

"Yes! Very much so!"

"Don't worry, I'll protect you." That's comforting.

"And I suppose you know your way around the forest so well." I said. What is with him and tugging me by the shoulders? Control freak, much?

"You should be nicer to me. I mean, I'm practically risking my life so you can chat with some animals."

"Risking your life? I thought you knew you're way around the forest?" I said.

"Look, if I'm going to do this for you – put my life in danger – I will expect something in return."

"Uh, okay. What?"

"I want you to be nice to me. And I want you to talk to me. If you see me in the hallways, say hello. No more avoiding me. I'm not stupid, Logan. I know you've been avoiding me." Yeah, well, you've been stalking me!

"That would implicate I care." I said coolly.

"We're here." He said. I shifted my gaze from him for the first time and found myself surrounded by trees. When had we entered the forest? When had gone off the path? How could I have missed all the trees?

"What do they look like?" I asked.

"You don't know?"

"How could I?" How could he? Who had he seen that died?

"I don't think you want to know." Maybe I don't.

"Tell me." I said stubbornly.

"They look sad." It was all he needed. It suddenly didn't matter what color they were or how big they were. All I could see was the emotion in their eyes and the way they hunched their shoulders and hung their body.

He should be a writer.

"Will you take me to one?" I asked.

"No." So he took me all the way out here for the scenery? Oh my God – what if he deserted me in the forest? "You have to wait for them to come up to you. And unless you have an extra roll with you –"

"We wait." I finished for him. Great. More time with Sirius.

"Not necessarily." He said, taking out a knife and pricking his finger with it.

"Oh my God! What did you do that for?" And what else did he intend on doing with that knife?

"Thestrals are attracted to the smell of blood."

"Well, you should have let me do it. I'm the one who wanted to see them! Wait, how did you know –"

"See? You care."

"You are unbelievable!"

"In every sense of the word. And it's about time you realized it." He smirked and put his hand over mine. I didn't realize how cold I had been until he did that.

"I'm not sure if this is –" I started to protest.

"I thought this is what you wanted." I do want this, so much. "Do you not want to see the thestrals anymore?"

"What? Oh, uh, yeah. Uh, I do."

"Do you trust me?"

"Yes."

The forest didn't scare me. The thestrals didn't scare me. What scared me? I didn't hesitate to answer.

"How did you know I would show you?" He asked me.

"I didn't." He looked rather disappointed. Gryffindors.

"Why didn't you just ask me to take you to them after the train ride? You knew they pulled the carriages." I was avoiding you.

"Did I?"

"You must have. You haven't been down to the library once this year and you said you read about them." Did he really listen to every word I said?

"I didn't think you'd want your friends to know that you had seen – that you could see them."

"How did you know I could?"

"You look at them the same way you look at me. And nobody else can see me." For a moment, all I could see was his eyes. Everything faded to black. I knew it was well past midnight, and maybe in my head that was the reason. But nothing else seemed to matter when I was with him, everything else disappeared. I stood there; my head drooping slightly on his shoulder, but my eyes were raised to meet his. I could stay here, just a little longer. Hogwarts could wait. "I could use that coffee now."