Friends by Chance Lovers by Choice

I Promise

Just as I assumed, the next morning I woke up with a splitting headache and it felt like I had the entire Sahara Desert coating my throat. Narcissa was still sprawled out beside me dead asleep, hair covering her face and soft snores emitting from her still frame.

I got up out of bed and my head spun a bit but otherwise I was alright. The headache and desperate need for water were seemingly the only side effects from last night's events. Also the obvious struggle to walk normally. My legs were still weak and felt like I had run a 20 mile marathon.

I waddled my way into the kitchen and grabbed a glass, filling it with water and allowing the cold liquid to soothe my aching throat. I downed two full glasses before sighing contentedly and grabbing two hangover potions and returning to the bedroom where Narcissa still lay in the same position I had left her.

I chuckled as I looked at her usually always graceful and elegant form lay sprawled out on her stomach, hands buried underneath the pillow, messy hair completely obscuring her face from view; I could feel one leg underneath the blankets on my side of the bed meaning she was starfishing, and with every exhale a few strands of hair would puff up before returning to their place in front of her open mouth.

As much as I loved her typical rich pureblood look, it was adorable to see her relax fully and just allow herself some slack around me. She wasn't trying to maintain appearances for the sake of status and was completely comfortable being herself. I smiled to myself as I chugged the hangover potion, headache immediately relieved.

I strolled my way into the bathroom to take a long and much needed shower. I could still smell the alcohol and lake water emanating from my skin and hair. I would deal with my head of house later to explain why I wasn't in class today, however, that meant coming up with some sort of explanation that didn't involve fucking my best friend's mother all night. 

I adored hot showers, it was such a simple luxury but one I never quite got used to. I was standing with my head lolled back under the warm spray, just enjoying myself, when suddenly there were a pair of small hands on my upper arms.

I looked up at my lover and smiled sleepily, the warm water soothing me until I was ready to pass out once more.

"Good morning my love. Thank you for the hangover potion. I desperately needed that this morning." She chuckled as we switched spots and began running her fingers through her hair, allowing it to get saturated in the clean water.

"So did I. Do you remember how much we drank last night? My memory is pretty fuzzy after around 2am." I kept trying to recall more about the previous night's endeavors but I must have been drunker than I thought.

"I remember the start of the third bottle around 1:30ish, so who knows. We'll have to go back and clean up as I told the elves I'd handle that part. I wasn't sure what exactly we would do and didn't want them having to touch any "toys" or wet items we might have used." I snorted at her using arrow quotes around the word "toys". Did we use toys? Merlin.. I really was drunk last night.

After a quick breakfast of toast and tea, we headed out towards the forbidden forest once more. The trees were much less scary in the daytime without the sounds of nocturnal predators filling the air.

The lake wasn't quite as magical in the sunlight, the water dark and a bit murky from all the algae floating in it. Nevertheless, we knew what happened when the sun went down and the magic that filled the small clearing.

Cleanup was fairly easy, however we did have to sift through the forest for everything we abandoned after each round the night before. It took well into the afternoon and around 2:00pm we summoned an elf to bring us lunch which we shared at a picnic table Narcissa conjured beside the lake.