ALOHOMORA | CEDRIC DIGGORY

57〝fifty-seven〞

IN RECENT TIMES, CEDRIC FELT that the day when he would have to talk to someone about girls was imminent. Despite his initial beliefs, he now knew this wasn't something he could—or should—navigate alone, lest disaster strike. It was, however, Jaime who often appeared in these imaginations. It never occurred to Cedric that he'd be having this particular heart-to-heart without his best friend, nor with an actual girl, and least of all Margaery, who he was sometimes guilty of forgetting was even a girl at all.

Although, now that he came to think about it, it made all the sense in the world. She was the only one in the clique who had also turned fifteen; the others were all summer babies. And if it was to be believed that girls matured earlier than boys emotionally, she was no doubt the prime non-adult candidate from whom he could seek advice.

"How do you do it?" Cedric asked her in a rather defeated voice.

Margaery looked at him, perplexed.

"What d'you mean?"

"Aren't you currently dating a certain Head Boy?" said Cedric, smiling significantly.

"Oh, yeah," said Margaery with a vague expression. "But I still don't understand. How do I do what?"

"Don't you...I don't know...miss him?" said Cedric awkwardly. "I mean, with the curfew and everything, you guys basically don't get any time together anymore. How do you cope with that?"

Margaery did not answer right away, but stared in Cedric's direction with a faraway look in her eyes.

"Honestly, it's not that hard. No, listen," she added imploringly, for Cedric was glaring at her, jaw dropped, and scandalized by her throwaway tone prior, "Marvin's a real gentlemen; he's so sweet—and everything Stinson's not, mind—but...well, I like him—I do—but he doesn't really...make my heart skip...you know?"

Frankly, Cedric couldn't say that he did, because Ellis did make his heart skip—though nowadays she mostly just made it sink. Still, he nodded slowly.

"Why are you going out with him, then?"

"It's complicated."

Maddened and thinking this line ought to be outlawed, Cedric gave her an excuse-me-but-I-take-more-subjects-than-any-of-you-and-I-kind-of-have-the-best-grades-too face. Margaery simply reciprocated a sad smile.

"It's just...if you have to ask, you'll never know," she said.

"Try me, won't you?"

Irresolute, Margaery considered him for a moment, then sighed.

"Only because you made them stop going on about Stinson," she said, "and this stays between us, got it?"

Cedric mimed zipping up his lips, and, re-assuming that dreamy manner she had, Margaery began:

"There's something to being liked—to being with someone you know likes you more than you like them, and who can never break your heart because you never really hand it over. Think of it like, there're two types of people in this world: there are those who you'd die for, then there are those who'd die for you. There's a beauty in being with the second type of people, because by definition you're protected, you're in this sphere where you can't get hurt—not really. It's like, a safe way to be with someone.

"I knew you wouldn't understand," said Margaery, chuckling briefly, for Cedric looked as though she might have been rationalizing that one plus one, under some circumstances, could equal three instead of two. "You'll never resort to such a thing—you're just not kind of person."

"What kind of person am I, then?" said Cedric, dazed and wondering if it was typical for one-on-one conversations with girls to be the case of one step forwards and two steps back.