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chapter thirty-seven,
crush! crush! crush!
As the following weeks passed, and Beatrice got used to the new school year, she quickly learnt that Narcissa was not the only one concerned with romance.
While her Gryffindor friends may not be worried about marriage, they all certainly had their own infatuations, and plans to act upon them. By now Mary Macdonald was entirely open with her crush on Sirius, and was trying her best to get him to like her back too. Sirius didn't seem particularly interested yet, but Beatrice couldn't see why not. Mary was funny, and kind, and had also bought lots of new muggle makeup supplies over the summer, including lipstick, eyeliner, and mascara, and was practicing them on the daily. Beatrice was very impressed with how good she was at it, but still felt a bit too nervous to ask if she could have a go like Lily sometimes did. Beatrice reassured her dorm-mate that, sure, Sirius may not have mentioned any feelings for her yet, but he definitely would any day now.
Beatrice was also fairly certain that Lily had a crush on Remus, the most sensible of the marauders, although she couldn't quite tell if this was the case, or if the young red-head was just being friendly. Of all her dorm-mates, Beatrice still got on the least with Lily and Marlene, who still seemed to hold some resentment for her.
Meanwhile Alice was obviously still interested Dirk Cresswell, and Beatrice was quite sure that he must feel the same way given how many little gifts he would send her. When she wasn't spending time with Beatrice or Frank, Alice would be going on constant walks and study sessions with the Ravenclaw, and Beatrice didn't like to admit it, but the amount of time her friend was spending with Cresswell did make her feel a bit jealous. Not because Beatrice wanted to go out with Cresswell, of course, just because she really did enjoy hanging out with Alice more than anyone else, except for maybe Regulus.
In fact, the only people Beatrice knew who weren't hung up on romance were Marlene and Regulus. Marlene was already quite moody, but nothing seemed to bug her more than when the other girls would gather around the large shaggy rug in the center of the dormitories most Friday nights, to eat sweets as they discussed boys.
"You lot are all being so dramatic. No boy is worth all that faking, Mary."
Mary had looked rather hurt by this, and told Marlene that she liked doing makeup for herself, not Sirius, and that Marlene was just being a sour old cow because she didn't seem to be interested in boys at all.
The blonde witch had gone rather quiet after that.
Personally, Beatrice had to find herself siding with Marlene more than Mary on this one. Maybe it was because an arranged marriage felt so inevitable for her, but she found all this "crush" business to be rather annoying, and was glad to find that Regulus agreed with her.
