"Fabulous," Lily mutters through her crying when she spots Daphne. "Now you've come out here to laugh at me."
"I promise I haven't."
When Lily goes to snap back at her, a sob escapes from between her lips instead.
"Oh, Gods. What's wrong, sweetheart?"
It's a silly question since the answer is so obvious, and the term is too sweet, too familiar. But when Daphne tenses slightly in embarrassment it seems that Lily's too weepy to notice.
"It's stupid," she insists.
"I mean, clearly it isn't if it's got you like this."
She pauses. "This has just all gone too far," Lily wails, sobbing into the fabric covering her knees.
Daphne inches closer. "Talk to me."
She sniffles, hesitating before she answers. "I don't understand why he just can't leave me alone. In First Year, I supposed that I could just ignore it because I reckoned that he never really fancied me, that he was just taking the piss because— you know..." Lily gestures vaguely to herself, unable to make eye contact.
Finally, Daphne sits down in front of her with a graceless thud, concern etched into the furrow of her brow as she takes her quivering hands in her own. "No, Lily. I don't know. You're the most gorgeous girl I've ever laid eyes on and if you can't see that, then you're completely daft."
Lily looks up at that with pink cheeks, giggling through her maelstrom of teardrops. "You're just saying that so I stop crying."
"Why would I do that?" Daphne asks very seriously, squeezing her hand gently. "Why would I say something that I don't mean, yeux d'ange?"
That catches her off guard.
"Because you don't like me," Lily mutters eventually. She jumps at the opportunity to change the subject. "What does that mean?"
"Angel eyes," Daphne whispers, grinning. "Now, go on and finish your story. I've got all night."
Her eyes avoid Daphne's. "Boys have always gone out of their way to ask me out for a laugh. That's why I never took James too seriously, but whenever I tell him to leave me be, he just keeps trying harder. I don't understand why he can't go after all of the other girls that are falling at his feet, and he has to harass me instead. Honestly, I've never fancied him and I'm starting to think that I don't even like boys—"
They freeze.
Daphne hesitates. "You don't like boys?"
"Forget I said that," Lily says, her voice one tremor away from being a blubbery sob.
"No, no!" Daphne says hurriedly, nearly falling off the ledge. "I mean— um, me neither."
"Really?"
"Really."
She narrows her eyes. "Are you taking the piss?"
"You're a very mistrustful person."
"I try," Lily shrugs, her sniffles dying down.
Something outside draws away her attention. Daphne takes a minute to admire her side profile — memorising the slope of her nose and her sweeping eyelashes in the fear that she'll never get the opportunity again. Moonlight casts a silvery beam over her fair complexion, highlighting the little details and flaws that weren't really flaws at all, because Daphne finds herself believing that there could never be anything wrong with the girl in front of her.
"You look really nice," Daphne whispers, so quietly that it could've been lost in the whistling wind forever. She pauses, her cheeks heating up. "I mean, I like your costume."
Lily smiles gently and melts her with a pair of rosy dimples. "Have you read Carrie? Nobody else knew who I was."
"I love Carrie! It's one of my favourite books."
"What about your other favourites?" she asks, tilting her head to the side in wonder.
Daphne beams. "Definitely anything Jane Austen. Oh, and The Wind in the Willows."
"Is that not a children's book?" Lily laughs. Daphne immediately decides that she likes making her laugh.
"Yeah, but that doesn't matter!" she says as brightly as the sun. "It's always been my favourite book, ever since I was little. Never gets old."
"I don't think I've ever read it," Lily admits.
Daphne practically explodes. "No way! I have to lend it to you, it's such a good book."
"If you say so."
"Don't give me that look!"
They laugh together, the musical sound melting into the nocturnal choir rustling outside.
"Can you walk me back to my common room?" Lily asks tentatively.
"Of course," Daphne answers warmly.
They stand, their close shadows painted as an amalgamation of each other. The tears on Lily's face have long since dried, her smile diminishing the flickering sadness in her eyes. Portraits jostle angrily in their sleep when they saunter past, but Daphne pays them no mind because she's so captivated by whatever Lily has to say. She feels less lost in the winding corridors — the labyrinth seems less threatening with Ariadne at Theseus' side.
Much to Daphne's chagrin, they reach the Gryffindor common room all too soon. Lily utters the password and slips away from her side, the silence broken by her kitten heels palpable.
Before she steps into the portrait hole and disappears up into her dorm, she spins around to look over her shoulder. Daphne can't tell if her heart beats faster or stops altogether.
Instead, Daphne feels her heart sink.
"Can we..." she pauses to think of the right words. "Forget all about this?"
"Yeah," she murmurs after a beat. "Consider it forgotten."
"Great. Er, well, goodnight."
She hums noncommittally, turning back to the stairs. "Night."
A war wages in her head as she starts to trudge down the stairs, frays in her plaits and her eyebrows knitted together in thought. Habitually, she falls into that state of worrying that seizes her whenever something's over, nitpicking everything that was said and wondering if she'd managed to ruin anything yet. Where did she go wrong? Was it something she said? She walks until she stumbles over a gap in the moving staircase, cursing herself for her clumsiness — hating herself for this entire night.
But if anything, Daphne just loathes how dejected she feels when Lily Evans slips away from her.
author's note
projecting all of my troubles onto lily and daphne core
this book is not as slow burn as i was intending for it to be but tbh i've given up on that xox
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