"What a load of utter rubbish!" Hunter slammed down the paper, glaring at it in anger.
It was her lunch break, and she was sat in her secret room by the kitchen. She'd been given the paper in advance of its publication by Skeeter (a string that her father was able to pull), and had only just found the opportunity to read it.
The paper was due out tomorrow, and a pit formed in the girls stomach. Regulus had been painted as a machiavellian figure, one who lured Hunter out of the safety of the world she resided in.
Well, he was certainly trying to, but not in the way Skeeter had wrote him to be.
Hunter also felt exceedingly uncomfortable with the way that she had been portrayed. Not as bubbly or kind, but fragile, breakable. 'A china doll', trapped in a bullpen. No, that was not her.
The blonde was aware of her situation and she was determined to make it out carefully, not breaking under the force of the Black family.
She couldn't imagine how Regulus would react. Outwardly, when they were together in public, he was calm yet authoritative. If he wasn't talking quietly to Hunter about quidditch or something that was on his mind, he was commanding for his companions to act as he saw fit.
He was the puppeteer, and they were all just felt characters that he'd carefully crafted to fit his story.
So how would he feel now that a side character had cut from their strings and spoken out against him?
The Hufflepuffs eyes floated over to the moving picture of herself and Regulus that graced the front cover of the paper underneath the title. It was taken in the middle of a bustling path of Hogsmeade, Regulus on the left and Hunter-Rose on the right, arms linked tightly.
The picture depicted Hunter looking up at Regulus, before looking into the camera; all the while, she smiled cheerfully. Regulus was shown looking down at his girlfriend, a small smile playing on his lips before gazing at the camera slightly after Hunter. His blue-grey eyes twinkled slightly whereas Hunter's shone brightly.
They were a picture perfect couple, that was certain. One blonde and one brunette, a freckled girl and a porcelain-skinned boy, the bright Moore and the rugged Black. Regulus' admiration of Hunter was evident, both in text and in the photo, although that was something that Hunter now completely doubted.
Whether she liked it or not, Snape's words had a profound effect on her. Was she to keep up her appearance of the perfect student, or let it go and hide herself from everyone she encountered?
Hunter-Rose did doubt Regulus' intentions from the beginning, as they had barely talked this school year, but she never could've dreamed of the plot that had been in the works since she started Hogwarts.
She needed someone to console in.
Hunter needed to talk to James.