Dani had the greatest difficulty remembering why she hung around Aimee. The small, blonde girl was unbearably upbeat, skipping rather than walking and jumping steps three at a time anywhere they went. She'd known her long enough to know that the odds of a genuine frown were about the same as those of spotting a unicorn, and it was a truth both comforting and at times totally infuriating. They were of opposite temperaments, one born of cheer and the other of a carefully cultivated bitterness, and bickered quite a bit as a result - Dani quick to side with Lynn out of habit more than true disagreement.
The morning after the dance found the unusual occasion of Dani on the same side as her better half.
"Lynn!" Aimee said sharply, her stern face hard to reconcile with her pixie-like features.
It was too early for any such volume, and all three of them winced.
Madame was still at the castle for breakfast, and Fleur as well, so the remaining Beauxbatons students sat lounging in the reprieve of the dark carriage until their return. A few nearby glanced in annoyance at the sound, but in that vague way of those long accustomed to it.
"Yes?" said Lynn, feigning ignorance.
Her hands betrayed her nervousness, motioning in the air between them for Aimee to quiet. Even in Madame's absence, her bulk left an anxiety around the girl that was impossible to break.
Dani exhaled loudly from her makeshift cot, her fists slamming against the sheets impatiently.
"Would you tell us?" She said, eyes wide. "PLEASE?"
Patience was not one of her many gifts, and boredom had rendered it completely mute. She wanted a good story and she wanted it soon.
Lynn shook her head softly, but they saw the red rising behind her ears. She'd been unable to sleep for long the night before, heart pattering in the darkness to keep her awake with hope and consequently with fear. The two girls watched her handwriting continue, with uncharacteristic clumsiness, across the parchment of Charms notes in her lap.
Dani groaned at her silence but smiled a little. She'd never seen Lynn nervous like this.
The silence was interrupted again by Aimee, who had tumbled somehow over air and somersaulted into Lynn's cot.
"Blimey, who needs champions? You could've offed a dragon out by accident," Dani said, grumpy but amused, "I'm surprised you haven't broken half the furniture in the carriage yet. If Lynn would just hurry up and tell us we could get on to the castle for class—"
"Oh, what's that!" Aimee said suddenly to the parchment in Lynn's lap.
"It's rude to point," said Dani.
Aimee shot Dani an impish glare and slammed her arm to her side dramatically. Lynn glanced up for only a second.
"I'm writing out a schedule for this week," she said, as Aimee made faces at Dani's turned head. "Mallory fell down one of the moving staircases and broke her arm, so someone needs to carry her things, and Fleur and Gabrielle have requested breakfast in the carriage for the coming week-"
Both Dani and Aimee rolled their eyes dramatically.
"—so we've got to figure out who's going to be able to do what." Lynn finished, still staring at the parchment with a furrowed brow.
Dani shrugged, unimpressed. She pulled her wand out of her pocket and began systematically examining and trimming her fingernails.
"Ooooh! Put me down for more detention from Monday till Wednesday," Aimee said.
Lynn cast her a scolding look, only half joking.
"What for this time?"
Dani scoffed from the bed, clipping her split ends with dainty spells.
"More Weasley Wheezes Whatnot?" she said.
"Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes!" Aimee corrected, enunciating the title slowly and deliberately.
Dani was indifferent, Lynn confused.
"What's that?"
"Fred and George's business," Aimee said excitedly, "Well…not yet, but it's coming along. I'm helping with the development and testing of new products."
Before Lynn had time to express the worry and panic clearly evident on her face, Aimee turned to Dani.
"How'd you know about that anyway?"
"Common room," Dani answered shortly.
"Why were you in the—" Lynn started.
Dani glanced up with a smirk.
"…nevermind."
Dani continued smirking as Lynn shook her head, uncomfortable for entirely new reasons. It had occurred to her suddenly that she wouldn't mind similar reasons to visit Gryffindor Tower - and the thought burned in her cheeks on its way to rest of her skin. She tried to brush the thought away, heart jumping again.
Aimee, completely oblivious to her friends' rustling hearts and hormones, began pulling on her shoes and overcoat.
"Let's go to class, I'm tired of sitting in this stuffy old thing," she said, handing Lynn her scarf.
The two were ready to agree, and quickly donned their own coats and shoes before heading out the door. The snow was almost melted from the ground, but though the grass was visible once more, it was prickly and frozen from the cold. It was still the season for hats and scarves, and even the wind refused to die down. Students, sick of teary eyes and red noses, were gladly looking forward to the promise of warmer weather.
Dani and Lynn set the pace toward the castle, Aimee almost immediately distracted by the snow. She chopped a frozen block of it off in her hand before running to catch their step. As they walked, she shaped it into a snowball, muttering a spell to preserve it in a sphere and dropping it into her schoolbag.
"Dunno how you find anything in that bag," said Lynn, peeking in at what looked like several (likely stolen) inkblotters and multicoloured feathers.
"You'd lose your mind looking for anything in there," said Dani.
It was one of her favorite Aimee jokes. Aimee fixed them both with a stern look, then continued as though uninterrupted.
"We're working on a trick with glitter at the moment," she said, chirpy in return to her favorite topic, "Well sort of glitter...but not really - more a sort of sparkly light. We just ran into a small problem in the testing and erm…got detention."
Dani raised an eyebrow, snorting once to Lynn as her friend shook her head in return. Aimee noticed neither of them, eyes straight ahead in the heat of her tangent.
"Detention'll be good though, 'cause there'll be loads of time to work on our 'Easter Surprise' project!"
Dani laughed sharply. Aimee only snapped a proud grin in her direction. They were accustomed to more fanciful naming of Aimee's plots, but recent projects with the twins had surpassed even their wildest expectations of amusement.
"What's that?" Lynn said, a cautious smile on her face.
"Oh it's—"
Dani interrupted her in an abrupt return to annoyance.
"Stop!" she yelled, causing Aimee to promptly trip on a rock and faceplant in the snowy grass. Both she and Lynn turned questioningly toward their friend, the former with a face of grass blades.
"We just got completely off track," said Dani.
Two dumbfounded faces stared back at her, until Lynn at last dropped a blushing gaze to the ground and realization dawned on Aimee's face.
"Oops," Aimee said simply, picking herself up off the ground and brushing ice chips from her jacket.
Dani rolled her eyes, but didn't say anything. They both turned to Lynn expectantly, who kept her gaze glued to the ground.
"Lynn!" Dani shrieked, her lip jutting out in such a way that always identified her anger.
Lynn looked sideways to the younger girl next to her.
"What?"
"What happened?" Aimee hissed urgently.
"Nothing!" said Lynn.
She was a terrible liar, a truth her friends knew all too well. Something rang painfully true in her lie...why was it that her heart dropped a little, at how close those lips had been?
"Did he kiss you?" Dani asked.
Lynn's inability at lying had proven itself with such consistency that Dani now instinctively assumed that the opposite of Lynn's lie was true.
"No!" Lynn said immediately, and Dani fixed her with a flat glare until she broke. "Well….almost…"
Aimee was overtaken by a sudden fit of giggling and fell again to the frozen ground in her laughter, schoolbag sending a cloud of fluffy snow up around her. Bits of paper and a feather fell from it as she tumbled, so that ultimately she looked like a bird in a white nest.
"What do you mean almost!?" Dani said, incredulous, "What happened!?"
"Madame," Lynn said, a little shamefully.
Her friends exchanged glances, mood dampened by the disappointment that seemed always to follow them.
"Madame…" they groaned in unison.