ALASTOR MOODY was the last person in the entire world that Elaine Gallagher had ever expected to chase her down. Sure, she hadn't been doing that great in lessons ( her essays were quite poor, and her spell execution left a lot to be desired ), but to be fair, Defense Against the Dark Arts had never been her cup of tea. She'd only passed her OWL because of Professor Lupin's ( an absolute angel of a man ) extra help, and a lot of tutoring. Sure, she avoided Professor Moody as often as she could and tripped terribly over her words when he called on her and cringed every time he mentioned Ben or her dad — but Elaine hadn't thought she was so awful a student that Mad-Eye Moody would be chasing her down for an intervention on a Friday afternoon!
Truthfully, the very last thing she wanted to deal with was Professor Moody. She had quite a lot on her plate already, thank you very much! With February flying by, with the Golden Egg still completely un-cracked and the Second Task only a week away, and with Blake and Milo still not on speaking terms ( that was just... a whole thing on its own ) — there were several more important things on Elaine's mind than how completely incompetent she was at defending herself against the dark arts. ( Like she would ever face off against a dark wizard anyway! )
But she couldn't seem to evade her grizzled professor for long, especially as the corridors suddenly became packed with other students all conveniently going the opposite direction — causing her to get completely stuck. ( Because she was much too polite to shove anyone out of her way! ) It was almost like the entire school wanted her to suffer.
"Gallagher!" Moody's gruff bark echoed throughout the noisy corridors, and everyone abruptly stopped gossiping about their weekend plans in order to hear Elaine get her arse busted for being a complete moron.
With her best attempt at a pleasant smile, Elaine spun around and squeaked, "Lovely afternoon, Pro-Professor!"
His scarred hand clapped around her shoulder in an instant, squeezing slightly. "Come with me, girl."
Her throat closed up slightly. "Is this about my grades, s-sir? I-I swear I'm doing — I'm doing my best!"
At that, he merely glanced at her sidelong, with his electric blue eye rolling about in its socket, as he led her back to his office. Not to be dramatic, but she would much rather enjoy the frigid company of Blake and Milo than spend a single second alone with Mad-Eye Moody. Things had gotten so bad between her two friends after the Yule Ball that they hadn't spoken a single word to each other since, and the year had since slipped into a snow-covered, blustery February and the Sexy Sixth Years still couldn't sit together at dinner. She and Cedric had been sitting separately in lessons for the first time since their first year.
They'd even rung in the new year separately. ( Not like she had been hoping for a midnight kiss or anything. ) Blake had dragged Cedric to a New Year's party, and both of them staggered back in at three in the morning, giggling and absolutely plastered with faces covered in red lipsticked kisses ( which she really tried not to be upset about, because they already had enough to deal with without her being a jealous kumquat ). Milo and Elaine had spent the night staked out in front of the fireplace in their coziest pajamas, scrapbooking, painting each other's nails, and gossiping with Helga Hufflepuff. They'd rung in 1995 with a smuggled bottle of champagne and kisses on their cheeks.
Almost two months had gone by though, and things still hadn't improved. And trying to be there for both Blake and Milo, and trying to help Cedric with the Second Task had been causing her enough stress that she'd noticed her vitiligo had been spreading again, minutely pushing a hair's breadth further down her temple and across the peak of her forehead. She'd cried to Lucien about everything ( because he was extremely comforting, he had nice shoulders. To cry on. ) and she'd only felt slightly better, and a good cry usually fixed everything!
How had things gotten so messy? That was what Elaine chose to think about rather than her impending academic doom as Mad-Eye Moody towed her back to his office, clunking along and snarling at every student in his path. She would much rather fix her friendships than attempt to make something of her poor Defense marks.
What had happened was this: Blake and Milo had been in a fight even before the ball. They'd talked extensively about the dance, and Milo had been under the impression that he and Blake were going to go together. Come to find out, Blake had led him on, so obviously, Milo had been upset when he'd found out Blake had actually invited a French girl instead. Blake had claimed he'd invited the girl because he hadn't wanted to hurt Milo — which was what they had argued about at the actual ball. Their argument at the ball had bubbled into them leaving amidst a shouting match ( which neither she nor Cedric had noticed, actually ) — and their argument ended with them snogging in one of the empty corridors. ( How juicy! ) After that, things had turned glacially cold between them and not another word had been spoken.
So, basically, Elaine felt like her life was sort of falling apart. She was hopelessly, hopelessly in love with her best friend, her two other best friends hadn't spoken in over a month and a half and the four of them hadn't all been together since Christmas, she was failing Defense and Potions lessons, the Golden Egg still screamed bloody murder, and her skin was slowly turning bone white with all the crushing emotional stress and anxiety. She'd really thought her sixth year would go better than this.
All she wanted was to crawl beneath her patchwork quilt and sleep the weekend away. She also wanted her brother to tell her everything was going to be okay, and to just fix everything — because Ben Gallagher had the power to fix anything. Even broken friendships and her dreadful grades.
But what she got was Professor Moody ushering her into his creepy office, with all his auror instruments lining the walls and jars of eyeballs that followed her every movement. He gestured to a rickety chair in front of his desk, and Elaine hesitantly sat down as Moody clunked around moving books and papers that were stacked so high as to block the paned windows. Not that you would've been able to see much, because it was snowing quite fiercely outside and the world had become a wintry, white wonderland ( that Elaine longed to make snow angels in ), but he tried to allow as much weak sunlight in as he could — which was really a somewhat sweet gesture.
"Gallagher, I need you to be completely honest with me," Moody said gruffly as he finally sat down across from her.
She was silent for a long moment as she tried to tame her tongue and keep it from stumbling. The wind howled like a pack of wolves as she swallowed and slowly said, "Of course, sir."
"How is Diggory getting on with the Egg?"
"I-I'm sorry?" she spluttered, choosing to look over his hunched shoulder at the fat dancing flakes, rather than directly at his haggard face.
"Has he cracked the clue for the Second Task?"
"Oh! No," she swallowed hard. "We ha-haven't figured it out yet."
Moody drummed his fingers on the table and shifted his attention to leafing through the various sheets of parchment on his desk. Without looking up at her, he said, "Have you tried water?"
Elaine twisted her fingers into her thighs. "Water?"
He nodded. "Try listening to it again, near water. It might help make things a little clearer for your friend."
When Moody glanced up at her again, Elaine had the distinct feeling of being dismissed. And an even more obvious feeling of relief — he wasn't going to bring up her grades. He just wanted to help Cedric.
But even as she thought that, a dark seed of doubt pinched in her gut. But why was he helping Cedric? What did he really want? And why was he telling her?
Elaine shook off the bad feeling as she shot to her feet. "Thank you, sir," she said slowly, calmly; her smile then was more genuine. "Have a — a good weekend." Then, she spun on her heel and hurried for the door, eager to escape the office ( and its occupant ) and the chills down her spine.
As her hand hovered over the frigid iron door handle, however, the massive chest beside her suddenly began to shake viciously, and it sounded as though there were muffled, angry screams coming from within it. With a yelp, Elaine leaped back from the door and the pounding chest, falling backwards into something solid. A scarred hand then closed around her forearm, and her veins turned to ice. When had he gotten behind her? She hadn't even heard him move. The kernel of dread in her stomach pinched tighter, and deep in her skull, it seemed as though a hot knife had speared through her brain.
Elaine winced, from both fear and the pain, and she lurched away from Moody as soon as his iron fingers released her arm. There was something in that chest — and a part of her knew that whatever it was, wasn't good.
"Don't pay it any mind," he said gruffly. "It's just a boggart for the third years."
"O-Oh," she laughed nervously, aware of how painfully high-pitched and panicky she sounded. Her own boggart flashed through her mind like lightning. Ben, lying crumpled upon the floor; dark blood trickling down his lip and his laughing eyes impossibly cold, unbearably empty. "I hate those — those th-things."
The sharp pain in her skull compounded as the box rammed against the ancient floorboards and the creature within screamed again, and she flinched even further back as Moody kicked the chest roughly. As it fell silent once more, he quickly grabbed the door handle and wrenched it open. Elaine ducked past him, feeling his searing eyes upon her, and she fought to suppress the shudder that ached in her spine. She was several steps down the corridor, with her vision edged black from the searing pain in her head, when she heard him clear his throat, and she glanced back over her shoulder to find him still standing in the doorway, watching her.
"Try and do some revision this weekend, Gallagher," Moody said, voice stern. "I'd recommend a tutor, so you don't fall even more behind. I'm sure Diggory would be more than happy to help you."
Elaine nodded hastily, even as her temples threatened to explode. "Y-Yes, sir," she gasped, and then bolted down the corridor like her life depended on it. Yet even when she had turned the corner and sprinted down a flight of stairs, that frosty prickle of his eyes on her remained, as did the goosebumps and the ghost of dread that gnawed at her insides.
She shuddered slightly as she paused to catch her breath. She leaned her pounding head against the frozen glass, only to end up shivering a second later as ice crept toward her skin and the howling wind rattled the windows like a beast roaring to be let in, like the creature in Moody's chest roaring to be let out. The dagger behind her eyes, mercifully, was gone as quick as it had come, but the fear lingered. She needed to tell Ben; he'd want to know. But first, she needed to find Cedric, because while Moody gave her the creeps, he was their only potential break in the endless weeks spent agonizing over the bloodcurdling Egg.
Elaine pulled her robes tighter around her and with shaking fingers rifled through her bag in search of her gray gloves. Hopefully, Moody just meant near any water. Like, from a sink or something, or the bath. Hopefully, he hadn't meant the lake, because there was absolutely no way Elaine was setting foot anywhere near that black pit of terror ( sorry, Melvin! ), least of all in the dead of winter. She slipped the gloves onto her hands and then pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes, hauling a few deep breaths into her aching lungs.
After a moment, she exhaled heavily, rubbed her gloved fingers together to force some warmth into them, and set off to find Cedric. Typically, he'd be staked out in the common room in front of the fire, with Milo bent over a book in the overstuffed chair across from him and Blake sprawled across the entire sofa, his dirty trainers propped up on the arm, as he rolled a joint — but with Blake and Milo, you know, it was a bit of a toss-up as to where Cedric would be. The library, the Great Hall, maybe the common room.
So she pushed Moody out of her mind as best as she could and set off to find him, humming a bit of Fly Me To The Moon to set herself further at ease. Baking and Frank Sinatra were her two guilty pleasures, and her favorite avenues of stress relief. Frank Sinatra took her back to her first memory: young Ben standing toddler Elaine up on his socked feet and taking the pair of them in a funny, slow dance around the living room, as an old Sinatra record wrapped them in a velvety embrace. Their father had sung along, pulled their mother out onto the carpeted dance floor, and when Elaine's tiny legs had grown tired of standing, her father had swept her up into his great bear arms and her mother had grabbed Ben's hands and begun to dance with him instead.
At the golden memory, her first instance of true happiness, Elaine blinked away the dewy tears that threatened to fall. She missed her parents terribly. She missed Ben terribly. ( This always happened when she was emotionally stressed. She had a tendency to become very melancholic, and then get even more upset. )
Luckily though, she couldn't dwell for long, as the hurrying sound of footsteps reached her ears. A decadent, musical laugh sang through the empty corridor like golden honey, and Elaine forced herself not to turn around as she slowly came to a halt, and whoever it was came running up behind her.
A giddy smile pulled at her lips as a pair of warm hands came down over her eyes, and she couldn't help her little giggle as a laughing breath tickled her ear. "Guess who?" her assailant whispered.
"Hm," Elaine hummed, as though deep in thought. "It can't be — Moaning Myrtle? Is that you, darling?"
"Oh, no fun! How did you guess so easily!" he whined, adopting a high-pitched, girly tone of voice.
The hands slipped from her eyes to rest upon her shoulders, and Elaine tilted her head back against Cedric's chest. He was grinning adorably, with the corners of his eyes happily crinkled and the tip of his nose kissed red from the cold.
"I have good news for you!" she sang as she slipped around to face him.
"Oh, really?" he said teasingly, a mischievous sparkle in his gray eyes. "You just realized you're madly in love with me?"
At that, everything inside Elaine's mind abruptly died! Just completely stopped working! No thoughts whatsoever, no grinding gears, nothing at all except a slightly panicking siren and her heartbeat pounding into overdrive because she suddenly had absolutely no bloody idea how to respond, or what words even were. ( Seriously, what are words? She totally forgot. ) How does one even respond to that? ( Like, yes? I am very much in love with you? ) ( SOS. Please send help. )
And so Elaine stood there ( come on, she thought, just say something! Anything! ), gaping like a completely lovestruck fish out of water — seriously, she thought her jaw had dropped to the floor — for approximately an embarrassing eternity, before Cedric laughed and ran his hands through his hair, which wasn't that much better because then her brain was still completely fixated on how beautiful he was, and she was quite unable to form a coherent sentence when he looked at her like that — with that teasing twinkle in his eye and his soft curls falling over his forehead.
Plus, had he been... flirting? No, no, of course not. But, maybe?
"I'm just messing with you," he laughed, and playfully squeezed her chin. "What's up?"
Elaine blinked several times to bring her soul back into her body, and she took a deep breath that she turned into an easy laugh before she felt like enough English had returned to her that she could safely respond in something other than a scream. "It's time to crack open the Egg! Moody's told me you ought to listen to it near water!"
"You're yolking, right?" Cedric teased, and then his smile grew even wider. "We ought to listen to it near water! The Prefect's Bath! Come on!" He grabbed her hand, their fingers intertwining like it was second nature.
"Wait," she paused. "Right now?"
"Yes, now!" Cedric said excitedly, squeezing her hand. "There's no time to waste!"
"But!"
"But what!"
Elaine felt heat crawl up her neck and spill across her cheeks in a sea of tomato red. She had never been more thankful to find herself in an empty corridor, besides the paintings that really didn't do a good job hiding their attempts at eavesdropping. "I don't have any clothes!" she hissed.
Cedric belted out a laugh and began to tug on her arm anew. There was something different about his smile then, she thought. Something she couldn't quite put her finger on, something new that she hadn't seen before when he'd smiled at her. She'd been noticing it more and more the past few weeks, that twinkle of different, as though something within him had changed, ever so slightly. Again, there was that funny glimmer in his eyes, like she'd noticed at the Yule Ball, but his charming smile — it was almost devilish.
"I'll turn on the bubbles," Cedric said solemnly. "And I won't look. You have my word, my lady."
He sketched a theatrical bow, and Elaine poked his side, laughing as she nodded, relented. "I better not catch you trying to sneak a peek, peasant."
Almost immediately, Cedric began to hurry down the corridor as fast as his long legs could carry him, and Elaine tried as best as she could to match his quick stride, though she was much less athletic and her legs were not nearly as long as his. Normally, he would've slowed down and matched her pace, but he was much too excited to finally figure out the clue and instead merely swept her up like she weighed less than a feather, and then picked up his pace even further. Purposefully, she knew, he jostled her in his arms to make her laugh, and his light fingers were ticklish against her waist.
In no time, they'd reached the prefect's bathroom and Cedric covertly whispered the password for entry ( "Pine fresh." ), though there was definitely no one else hanging around the fourth floor on a Friday afternoon, and Elaine thought he looked quite silly. Which, of course, made her love him even more.
Elaine had been in the prefect's bathroom before, one day last year when she'd been sick and wanted a private bath, but it still took her breath away with how beautiful it was. Everything was divinely crafted of beautiful white marble, and with the snowstorm raging outside, it was as though they had stepped into a soft, candlelit heaven. The only sources of color were the intricate stained glass windows, and the mermaid in front of the large pool sized tub waved politely to them before she went back to ringing out her long hair. Gold accented nearly everything, from the great chandelier to the bath taps to the unique bubble machine, filled with soaps scented nearly anything imaginable.
"Which bubbles would you like, Ellie?"
She glanced over at Cedric, who had already cast down his backpack and shimmied out of his robes, and ( pardon her French ), but fuck, he was only wearing his pants! Elaine's eyes shot open and she gulped, feeling herself blush again. She forced herself to look at anything but his abs. Merlin, his chiseled abs. ( She's going to curse again, sorry, but he's just fit as fuck! )
Elaine ended up spinning completely around before she answered, trying to keep her head on straight — which was something she definitely couldn't do with Cedric standing there in his boxers. "How about the purple one?"
The tap squeaked loudly as steamy water began to flood the large pool, followed by a torrent of thick lavender bubbles that smelled exactly like Cedric's mum's flower garden. Elaine began to pull off all of her sweaters, but glanced back over her shoulder just before she finished unbuttoning her shirt. Cedric was determinedly not looking her direction and was whistling softly, though he looked over at her as soon as he felt her gaze.
"Close your eyes," she ordered.
"Yes, darling," Cedric sang, and then clapped his hands over his eyes.
Elaine slipped out of the rest of her uniform, and, left only in her undergarments, hurried across the floor towards the bath with the Egg heavy in her arms. The tiles were decadently warm beneath her toes, and she decided then that heated flooring was the only thing really worthwhile about being a prefect. Like, she could seriously get used to this bathroom!
Elaine paused at the edge of the bath to set down the Egg and bit her lip, looking up at Cedric, who was smiling with his eyes still closed. Before she could decide against it, she gave Cedric a sharp push from behind, sending him tumbling headfirst, very gracefully, into the bubbly pool.
He made quite a splash, and as he resurfaced, he shot a fountain of water from his mouth a bit like a whale. Cedric shook his drenched hair out of his eyes and glared playfully up at her. Water slipped from the sharp planes of his golden face and clung to his thick lashes, and Elaine completely forgot she stood there only in her underwear as he swam back towards where she still stood at the side.
"I suppose you think that was terribly funny," he asked, a barely concealed smile on his face as he propped himself up on the edge of the marble pool with his strong forearms.
"Yes, actually!" Elaine replied haughtily, squatting down towards him and poking his forehead.
"Well," he gasped dramatically. "I think this is funnier!" He promptly seized both her forearms and dragged her into the pool with him. Warm water enveloped her like a cozy blanket, and the lavender bubbles sang against her skin as they burst in stars of faint fairy glitter that smelled like a florist's heaven.
"Cedric Diggory!" Elaine came up spluttering, her blonde hair plastered to her head and soapy water in her mouth, which she then spit at him. Cedric, however, ducked beneath the surface once more, and was hidden completely beneath the thick cloud of bubbles. After a second, his arms closed around her waist and he pulled her back under.
Beneath the surface, Elaine opened her eyes to find Cedric already looking at her, his arms still capturing her waist. Again, that funny look, that funny little smile. She twisted out of his grip and kicked off back towards the side of the pool, with her golden hair a halo about her head. Cedric grabbed at her toes as he followed, and both of them came up gasping for air and laughing.
Surrounded by mountains of lavender bubbles, all Elaine could see of Cedric was a disembodied head, which made her laugh even more. He said nothing as she giggled and began to pile bubbles on his head. "Hold still," she said quietly, seriously, as she grabbed another handful of foam. "Just a little more, right here!" She smushed the bubbles against his mouth, and they tumbled down his chin like a purple beard.
"Come here, you!" Cedric cried. In retaliation, he reached for her waist with tickling fingers, and as she grew weak with the giggles, he pulled her flush against his chest and smeared a handful of lavender bubbles beneath her nose like an old man's mustache, making her sneeze and then giggle even more.
Slowly, gradually, their laughter and giggles began to fade, and the sound of fizzling bubbles and rising steam filled the bathroom. Neither of them, however, made any move; it was as though they were frozen, enraptured in each other's embrace. Elaine, perched on Cedric's lap with his thighs soft as butter beneath her own, felt like she couldn't have pulled away even if she had wanted to, though it was the very last thing on her mind. Cedric's arms curled tighter around her, his fingers light as a dream as they brushed her hips.
Elaine's teeth sank into her lip. Her breath hitched in her lungs as she slowly, slowly moved her bubble-covered hands up his smooth torso. Her fingers danced across his bare chest, leaving faint traces of glittery lavender fizzle as they slipped onto his shoulders. His own breathing grew rapid, and she felt his grip tighten around her waist as her right hand strayed to his sharp jaw.
Her gaze flickered from Cedric's lips, where his breath shuttered in and out, up to his eyes, which had grown dark. He was staring at her lips too, and as her fingers curled against his jaw, he finally looked into her eyes. There was an impossible tenderness in those stormy depths, a longing, a yearning akin to the call of her own heart.
"Cedric," Elaine murmured, her thumb lightly caressing the base of his cheek. His damp skin was soft as velvet beneath her touch.
One of his large hands ran the length of her body, tracing her curves from hip to shoulder, to the elegant slope of her neck, where he cradled her head from behind. "Elaine," Cedric breathed, his dark eyes falling back down to her lips.
Slowly, slowly, she leaned towards him, pressed her forehead to his, with the tips of their noses gently touching. They had eyes only for each other, a clash of deep blue and dove gray, and the entire world disappeared — until there was only Cedric and Elaine, Elaine and Cedric. She smiled slightly, her teeth still teasing her bottom lip and Cedric groaned softly, as his hand tightened at the back of her neck as he leaned to close the final distance.
Their lips met, and Elaine thought it was the most natural thing in the entire world — kissing Cedric Diggory. His soft lips were gentle as he captured her clumsy mouth with his, claimed it for his own. Though he had already owned it, and her heart, since the day they first met. The way he kissed her, so tenderly, was as though he was trying to savor the taste of his most favorite sweet, and the thought made her toes curl.
Elaine's head guttered of all thoughts except him, except for how silken his lips were and how smooth his golden skin was beneath her roving fingers and how taut and strong his muscles were, how his hands cradled her head and how decadent heat blossomed in her bones like flame everywhere their bodies touched, how her heart beat its love song for Cedric, and Cedric alone.
She melted further into his embrace as his other hand swept up to caress her jaw, their lips moving perfectly in sync, and she gasped softly into his mouth as his tongue swept across her bottom lip, hesitantly, sweetly. He tasted like peppermint and hot chocolate, and he felt like home, and Elaine was sure nothing else mattered, or would ever matter, more than the depth of her love for him — Cedric Diggory, the keeper of her heart, the other half of her soul.
Surely cloud nine wasn't all there was; there must be something higher, something more — maybe a cloud eleven or fourteen or twenty-three — because Elaine was sure her complete and utter happiness radiated higher than the heavens, and cloud nine wasn't high enough to cover it all.
The gentle kiss grew more urgent as she tangled her fingers in his curls, as he tilted her chin upward to open her mouth further to him. His lips were like fine silk as they moved against hers, and she couldn't help the little sigh of utter bliss that escaped her. Cedric smiled against her mouth, laughed into the kiss, and then his strong hands were again on her waist as he flipped them around. Her back collided with the wall of the pool, and she threw out an arm to steady herself as she pulled him ever closer with the other, lost in this heaven on earth.
Elaine's hand collided with something heavy and metal, and she gasped again as she knocked whatever it was into the water. The splash of it finally pulled them apart, gasping, though they remained wrapped in each other's embrace. Cedric leaned his forehead against hers, laughing as she began to giggle and her fingers again slipped down his jaw.
"You are ethereal," Cedric murmured, hungry eyes memorizing the flushed planes of her face and how beautiful she was in that moment as he tucked her wet hair back behind her ears.
"Ceddie," she sighed, stroking his cheekbones. She pressed a silken kiss to her favorite freckle, the heart shaped one, just beside his nose, and traced her thumb over his swollen bottom lip. "You are everything, my love. Everything and more."
"You've been writing me, haven't you, Ellie?" he laughed softly. His fingers traced circles on her hip, and one calloused hand slipped flat around her waist to press against the small of her back.
Elaine's eyes welled with silver tears of happiness. "Yes," she giggled, tilting her face ever closer to his. She wondered if she might die of joy, there in Cedric's arms, aching again to feel his lips upon hers.
Her heart swelled with even more adoration than she thought possible as loving warmth filled his eyes, and Cedric opened his mouth to say more, but then they both noticed the faint, golden glow emanating from the bottom of the pool. "The Egg," he gasped instead, and then promptly ducked beneath the surface.
Elaine quickly followed, feeling the blazing heat in her cheeks as her skin pimpled with cold, now that she was no longer wrapped in Cedric's arms. Lying open at the bottom of the pool was the Golden Egg. She had accidentally knocked it into the water when Cedric had flipped her over; it had come open, and it had begun to sing.
"Come and seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground,
And while you're searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss,
An hour long you'll have to look,
And to recover what we took,
But past an hour — the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back."
They resurfaced together, holding hands and gasping and grinning, in shock and surprise. The Egg had been cracked — the clue had been heard. ( And all it had taken was a steamy snogging session in the bath! )
"Elaine, you're brilliant!" Cedric beamed, planting a kiss to her temple before diving back down for the Egg. When he came up, he swam directly for the side and pulled himself out, hurrying to grab towels for them both. "The Second Task is underwater! I'd bet it's in the Black Lake — that's the closest big body of water."
Elaine shuddered at the thought and eagerly grabbed his offered hand. Cedric pulled her out of the tub with ease, then quickly wrapped one of the fluffy towels around her shoulders as he continued to let his thoughts spill. "What's in the lake? Who am I seeking down there? And what have I lost? What will they have taken from me?"
Elaine rubbed furiously at her arms to keep some warmth in them as the water on her skin began to turn cold. "Maybe grindylows? Melvin?" she thought aloud, trembling slightly and clutching the towel close. "Or... are there mermaids down there?"
"Mermaids?" Cedric stopped pacing and turned to face her. "Merpeople! Yes, that could be it! But what would they take from me? What would I sorely miss?"
As he began to pace once more, Elaine grabbed another thick towel for her hair and began to pull on all her sweaters. "Maybe your pink hat?" she suggested teasingly.
At that, Cedric sidled over to her and slowly wrapped her into his arms, resting his chin atop her head. "If anyone even thinks about taking that incredible hat, they'll have a serious problem to deal with. An angry Cedric is not to be messed with."
She giggled, and leaned back against his warm chest, allowing his heat to seep into her. "Maybe you'll win by default because the merpeople will be too scared to take anything from a big, tough guy like yourself." At that, Cedric puffed out his chest, and Elaine shook her head slightly as she poked him in the stomach, deflating him. "Come on, champion. It's time for dinner, and I'm starving."
"You're starving? When you just ate my —"
"Cedric Amos! Do not finish that sentence."
With a laugh, Cedric hurriedly dressed and roughly toweled off his hair, then waited patiently as Elaine combed through his curls with her fingers to make them look somewhat presentable. "There!" she smiled. "At least now it doesn't look like you've just been snogging someone in the bath."
"But what if I want everyone to know I've just been snogging someone in the bath?" he asked innocently, squeezing her chin. "And not just someone."
He knew that'd make her blush, and Elaine ducked her head and preoccupied herself with making sure her shoes were tied rather than responding, though she didn't try to hide her wide, blissful smile. The pair slipped out of the bathroom a few moments later, with their fingers entwined and their smiling lips swollen and a new warmth in their smiles, and in their hearts.
Elaine had to say that this was the greatest day of her entire life — that he was the greatest joy she'd ever known, and the one person she'd love, more than anything, to call her home.
And as he squeezed her hand and matched her angelic smile with one of his own, Cedric found himself thinking the same.
author's note. ELAIDRIC KISSSSSSSSS AAAAAAAAAAAAAA PLS I LOVE MY BABIES SO MUCH THEYRE SO SOFT
ok ok but SERIOUSLY. this scene is literally the entire reason I wrote this fic!!!! I thought like "how funny would it be if they were making out and that's how they cracked the egg" and thus! honeysuckle was born! SO I HOPE THIS SCENE WAS GOOD BC LITERALLY THIS CHAP IS EVERYTHING TO ME
also writing kiss scenes???? stressful????? like omg. I hope that was a good kiss. elaidric deserves only the best first kiss. also y'all get ready for blake's reaction SHDHSJDHD
also thank u so much for 4k reads!!!! u all are amazing u bring me joy I LOVE U ALL HEHE