VIOLET (A Harry Potter Universe Fanfiction)

21.

"Thank god," said Caiti when Evelyn arrived. She still had her backpack with her from whatever uni class she'd had that day. "I'm freaking out."

She and Marlowe were leaving in just a few hours for Cornwall and Caiti still hadn't packed.

Evelyn smiled a little. She dropped her backpack down on Caiti's bedroom floor.

"How do you do this? How do you live together? How do you not just combust? I'm so nervous and it's only three nights."

"Well, it's different when it's just three nights I think," said Evelyn. "I don't really get nervous because it's normal, you know?"

"But still. What about in the beginning? How did you not panic right before you moved in together?"

"I did, a little," Evelyn said. "What are you nervous about specifically? Not having privacy or?"

Caiti shook her head.

"Being together that long without a break?"

Again Caiti shook her head.

Evelyn just waited.

Caiti glanced at her door, which was part way open, and got up to shut it. She still whispered when she spoke again.

"I'm afraid he might want to— you know." She sat back down on the floor amidst the pile of clothes she had been trying to piece together appropriate outfits from.

"I don't think Marlowe will push you into anything you don't want to do," Evelyn said with a frown. "He really loves you. He's not just in it for that stuff."

"I know." Caiti melted backwards onto the floor. "I've just never over thought anything with him like this."

"So what's making this different?" Evelyn asked, which was such a good question that Caiti had to think about it for a solid two minutes.

She grabbed a shirt from the floor next to her and covered her face with it before she answered. "I think I might want it to happen," she whispered.

Evelyn didn't answer right away. From the gap under the shirt, Caiti watched her pick a few things up from the floor and refold them.

"You're allowed to want that, Caiti," said Evelyn finally.

Caiti just rolled onto her side and curled up in a little ball to hide.

—-

Caiti's nerves didn't disappear until she and Marlowe had arrived in Cornwall. She'd lived all week long with butterflies in her stomach making it nearly impossible to eat. She hadn't slept well, hadn't been able to focus, and except for that one stroke of inspiration the previous morning, hadn't been able to think about anything else at all.

But once they were there, it was like she'd never been nervous at all.

Being with Marlowe was easy. That first night, he took her out to dinner for a belated birthday celebration even though he had been over to her house for her actual birthday dinner with her parents just the night before.

Then they'd gone back to their hotel room and played Uno Enchanted — the card game they'd bought in Hogsmeade when Marlowe had visited her the previous year — until they got too tired to continue. She beat him three times and Marlowe said it was rigged, but as the cards changed face at random, there really wasn't that much strategy involved. Caiti maintained that it was birthday girl luck.

The following morning, they bought hot teas and croissants at a small cafe for breakfast and then spent the day exploring a local pumpkin patch. Halloween was the following day. It was all decked out for the holiday and the muggle depictions of witches had Caiti in fits.