20 January 2012
Friday at 11am sharp
The hallways between the Defense and History classrooms


"Scuse me! Move please, scuse - sorry!"

Fourteen-year-old Frank Sellaphix, Ravenclaw third year was moving as fast as he could without technically running. A copy of the latest Hogwarts Howler flapped in his clenched hand, his bookbag bounced on his back. The halls had just filled with students moving between classes, which made things difficult because he felt like he had to make apologies every time he bumped into someone.

"Going to make out with your girlfriend, Smellaphix?" called Kari Strong, colliding with Frank's shoulde on purpose. She had a copy of the Howler tucked in with her books.

Frank stopped short and stared at her. The news traveled faster than a snitch! The Howler had only just turned up!

"No! She's not my girlfriend."

"Oh, that's right. You prefer snogging Quidditch magazines!" Kari and her friends, arm-in-arm, just laughed and walked on.

Frank's mouth set into a firm straight line. Great. Just great. All he needed right now.

With a quick breath, he hurried back on his way. If he remembered correctly, the fourth years would just be getting out of History. There! He spotted the girl with shiny black hair in the crowd ready to take the stairs. Making himself as small as he could, Frank slipped like a slippery jarvey through a final knot of students and appeared at her elbow.

"Eirene, hey. Pst, just need you to know  - sorry, just a moment please - " Frank interrupted himself to apologize to Eirene's companion. Without thinking, Frank reached for Eirene's hand to take her aside. Soon as he realized he was doing it, he grasped the crumpled Howler with two hands. Bloody hell! Get it together, Frank!

"Hey! Hello. Did you see - Can I talk to you? Just for a minute." He flashed what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

Eirene left the History classroom with her head bent over her parchment, quill still in hand, wholly engrossed in debating the length of the assignment they'd just received in class. Had the professor's wink meant she should try for extra credit? Or would he sadly note in the margins of her report that he hadn't asked for fifty inches of parchment, and in the future, to please summarize for the benefit of his aging eyes? A professor had said that to her once. Not Greyfriar, never Greyfriar, but she'd never forget it.

Students passed her and giggled, not-parchment in their hands. Eirene studiously ignored them, putting her quill away and hurrying for the stairs with her classmate.

Class! There was a step. She had to get to class!

Frank popped up and Eirene stopped short. He didn't take History with her, what was he doing by the History classroom?

"Now?" Eirene looked alarmed and glanced at her friend.

His fingers grazed her hand for a moment. Eirene gave him a narrow-eyed look - not that again. But Frank wisely pulled away and crumpled up a wad of not-parchment.

She glanced up the stairs at her departing classmate, watching her take the steps to reach higher levels of knowledge.

Eirene sighed, hefting her books, her back-up planner, and her extra parchment in her arms. She shifted the very full and very charmed bag of books on her shoulder. If not for Charms, she'd be a hunchback.

She went to a little window alcove near the stairway.

"I've got to get to Transfiguration, and don't you have Arithmancy?" Eirene was still in mourning over the loss of her planner, but she'd still memorized the schedules of her friends.

"What is it? You know I can't be late."

Not late for studying! Not late for class! Not late for lunch! Oh no, not that.

"You know I'm as enthusiastic about pristine attendance as you are," Frank chided while he smoothed the Hogwarts Howler out on the deep stone window sill.

"Which should tell you, actually, that this is serious. Well, no not serious, I guess. Not serious at all. Childish, actually. But I would say it's time sensitive. Urgent but not emergent." He ought to get on with it. The castle was vast and the passing periods were brief. He flipped through the paper and opened it to the rumors page.

"I just didn't want you to get caught off guard. The Howler's published something untrue and I know that's the  main purpose of the Howler..." Franks' voice rose to a high pitch as he shrugged. "But I'm already 'Smellaphix' and I don't know what they'd do with Antonopoulos, but it probably won't be good. Actually, to get to the point."

Frank turned to look at Eirene in the face. "I don't actually like you."

Wait. Is that really what he wanted to have said?

Ugh, The Howler! Eirene tsked and rolled her eyes as Frank unfurled the paper onto the windowsill.

She'd supported Cosima in the infirmary, allowing her to interview students who should be resting, and even giving her ten pros and ten cons about the magical measles, but that was in the infirmary, the terrible bedlam that shall not be mentioned again. Eirene had no time for The Howler. She wouldn't waste a second of her school day on The Howler. She typically let Noriko give her the highlights once they were done studying in the library in the evening.

Eirene peered over his shoulder to look at the Rumors page. Rigel Acrux... special brownies... Noriko! His arm was covering half of it. Come on, Frank, out with it. She checked her watch as he rambled. The unwashed, uneducated masses always pointed the finger at the clean Sellaphixes and the brilliant Antonopouloses of the world.

He didn't like her.

Eirene looked at her watch. Her gaze snapped to meet his eyes. What?

Her mouth pursed, waiting for the punchline, the joke, his laughter. He always laughed at his own jokes.

Eirene started for him, a prim little smile inching up her face. Come on, Frank, what was the joke?

He didn't like her?

Her smile slowly faded. She drew back a bit, her schoolbag knocking against the stone wall.

"What do you mean?"

She only had so many friends!

"Okay, right, I see what happened there," Frank said and bit his nail. Context, Sellaphix! He'd skipped over it in the urgency to get the information out while still making it to class on time.

"Sorry, I like you a lot," he reassured her.

"Good for you, Frankie boyo!" An older boy gave Frank a drive-by cuff on the shoulder before disappearing. Frank winced not from the blow but from the further evidence that the Howler was very effective.

"Someone at the Howler printed that I'm in love with you," he said feeling a little put upon. He pointed out on the page where it said. 

Completely Uncorroborated
Nothing fit to print.

1. Rigel Acrux got bit by a vampire at Christmas
2. Ayla Collins makes "special" brownies
3. Noriko Wakahisa beat Professor Storm in a duel
4. Frank Sellaphix is sweet on Eirene Antonopoulos
5. Magical Measles is really a Muggle Studies experiment orchestrated by Professor Honeysuckle
6. Akira Hericho has never eaten a vegetable

Frank and Eirene and become friends last year; her abrasive personality didn't bother him and she tolerated his blabbling know-it-all-ness. But lately he'd started to feel confused about how he felt about her. She was nice to him, and she was a girl, and she wasn't bad-looking he supposed. And it pained him to think of how many ruddy times he'd tried to hold her hand lately, augh. This rumor felt wierd! It weedled at his insecurity about Eirene, and now he worried it was going to change things between them.

"I don't like you like you. I just like you, actually. As friends. I didn't tell anyone this," he gestured at the paper.

What had the awful, horrible Howler said about her to make Frank dislike her?! Her mind raced as she hugged her parchment and books to her. What about the train ride in September, their Care of Magical Creatures class, the bees, the detention, the floo adventure, the flu adventure, the infirmary, and all the times they'd studied next to one another in the common room and in the library and in the Great Hall? Did those things not matter?

She stared at him, mouth agape in protest. When he pointed at the article, she snatched the page from the windowsill and put it up to her face to read carefully.

Rigel, Ayla, Noriko. Frank!

Frank Sellaphix is sweet on...

Frank Sellaphix is sweet on...

Eirene Antonopoulos. Her name. In ink.

Oh Merlin no!

She made a strangled sound in her throat, gripping the page at the corners.

"What! People!" She snapped the offending article back on the windowsill. "The Howler," she hissed, scathingly. The Howler. A silly nuisance before. Now her enemy. How dare it! Who had dared!

She sucked in a breath, hearing Frank rambling again. Well of course he liked her! Of course they were friends! Why had she doubted? She hadn't known he'd existed until this year, not really, but they were friends, even though she was a whole year older and he made a lot of puns and she'd lost her sense of humor to the sea long ago.

Of course he wasn't in love with her! That was ridiculous!

Eirene let out a huff and shook her head in solidarity at him, the corners of her mouth relaxing. Of course he wouldn't have started this rumor. He was Frank Sellaphix, the nicest Ravenclaw.

"Of course I know we're friends," she lifted her nose in the air, fighting back a strange mixture of feelings.

The Howler! She tried to feel angry at it. Her forehead creased in confusion. Someone had spread a rumor about her in The Howler! Someone had spelled her name right in The Howler! Someone thought someone liked her in The Howler!

Someone thought she was likable. Romantically likable.

Eirene let out another huff and glanced out the window, her shoulders sagging. What about all those times he'd tried to hold her hand?

Eirene's flustering had caught them a couple of curious observers. Frank crossed his arm and put a hand to the side of his face. Eirene was, erm, very upset. She seemed to go through a few phases of existence in sequence and Frank didn't know what any of them were. At some point he opened his mouth to say something comforting but closed it again.

When she lifted her chin and restated that they were, of course, friends, Frank mirrored her posture. He lifted his chin and furrowed his brow. Even as he shifted awkwardly, he nodded in agreement.

"Of course."

Then she was gazing out of the window, forlorn. A fourth phase. The cool blue light filtering in through cloud cover made her pale skin look icy cold. She sighed. Frank sighed. He should say something.

"I'm sorry. Are you alright? The Howler's just adolescent hormonal propaganda. I can be your boyfriend if you want."

Frank regretted it as soon as he said it. He just didn't want Eirene to be upset and this is what friends were for, right. Being your boyfriend...

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Frank looking pensively out the window. Her eyes flashed to him, startled. Was he - no, he wouldn't mock her!

Eirene shook her head at him in total confusion. "Boyfriend?"

Did he want to be her boyfriend? When had she ever given him any indication that she liked him that way, for one...

The thing was, she had thought Frank liked her, just a little. He was so nice to her. He held doors open for her and offered her a hand, which was what nice boys did for girls they liked. She didn't want to hold hands. He understood that. Whenever she frowned at him, he pulled away, which was also nice. He could like her and she could frown at him and she could be liked and she liked to be liked.

Why wouldn't he like her? She wasn't terrible, was she?

"I want a boyfriend who likes me!" Eirene protested too loudly, crossing her arms over her stack of books.

"You just said that you don't like me! So which is it? Also, what about all the times you tried to hold my hand?"

A passing student tittered at them. Eirene drew herself up to her full fifteen-year-old height and glared over Frank's shoulder at the girly hurrying up the stairs. Hurry along! Hurry along to - oh Merlin, they had class!

Oh Francis dear, you are so confused. You see, Francis, relationships are about honoring yourself and being honest with another. You can't change your heart to please another. Choose honesty, dear boy.

That's all well and good, inner wisdom, but Frank didn't know how he felt!  How could he be honest other than a sort of rambling analysis?

"There aren't good words in English for this," Frank said, frustrated. He didn't want to lose his friendship with Eirene over a rumor, but it was already toiling at its dirty work.

"I actually do like you a lot but 'like' is a very simple word that means too many things, so much that it's like it doesn't mean anything. And I actually do want to hold hands with you but not because I want to be your boyfriend, I just like you. I only offered because I thought that I'd hurt your feelings, but I didn't think you liked me so that's why I didn't think you'd say yes. You're probably my best friend right now, but you don't want to say that unless you know the other person is your best friend. Otherwise it feels crummy."

He bit his nail, but he had to switch to another finger because he'd run out. This was a bad day.

"I've made you late. And now people are definitely going to think we're going out because we're in the Doomed Lovers' Nook which I didn't realize until just now."

"Nooooo," Eirene whined, pressing her hand to her mouth, anxiously looking around the corridor. Not the lover's nook! Who came up with these things! Everyone should be focused on their studies! She wasn't even supposed to date until she was older! Silly parents!

She struggled to process his rambling. He didn't like her like that, but he wanted to hold hands because he liked her? He didn't want to be her boyfriend, but he did consider her to be his best friend - oh Frank! That was so sweet and kind and - oh no! Her best friend was most definitely Noriko!

"I don't know!" She shook her head, stunned by her own not-knowing. She knew all the things!

"I don't know what I feel right now! It's very confusing and it's not like Arithmancy! You've got to get to Arithmancy; you're late!"

Eirene didn't think she liked him, but she felt all the feelings and affection over the best friend comment. She couldn't have two best friends though, could she? Could she hold hands with a boy who was just her friend? It wasn't done. There were only two permissible roles woven into the fabric of student society, and that was A) best friend and B) boyfriend.

"I have to go!" She huffed, hefting her schoolbag and moving around him to escape the dreaded lover's nook.

'I don't know?' 'I don't know!? When did Eirene ever say that? She was supposed to know! He pressed his fingers into his temples and then let his hands drop. This is very unpleasant. Things had been going so well with Eirene.

He frowned and narrowed his eyes. Stupid. Hogwarts. Howler! With a few words, they'd messed up something good. They needed to be set straight - where had they even come up with it? Did they know something he didn't? Was he 'sweet' on Eirene...?

Before he could think of what to say Eirene was making her escape from the fated nook, but she was right. They had to go. They were already late and Frank didn't want to tarnish his reputation with Professor Duerr.

"Right," he said sullenly, then snatched the offending newspaper from the window sill.

"Me too. I'll see you in the commonroom."

Frank let her go and parted in the other direction.

Fin