𝗺𝗲𝗿𝗺𝗮𝗶𝗱 𝗹𝗮𝗴𝗼𝗼𝗻, cedric diggory

˗ˋ 52

CHAPTER FIFTY TWO
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-: sixth year :-

── IN WHICH THINGS ARE DISCUSSED

. . .

Students had poured into the Three Broomsticks from the minute it opened. Not just from Hogwarts, but a mixture of the other two school. 

Rosie had been busy all day, and had been rushing around with orders, as well as taking them and tidying up after people who had left. Which was what her job was - but it was so busy that she barely had time to think.

"Rosie." Madam Rosmerta had approached her at one point, as she was returning for placing her upteenth order down on one of the tables. "Take the butterbeer to the Flumes now, and make sure I get those pineapple sweets."

"Are you sure, it's pretty busy here?" Rosie sounded polite enough, but her expression said it all - she though Madam Rosmerta was positively crazy for sending her away at this point in time.

"Yes, yes." Rosmerta said, placing several beakers of butter beer onto a tray, accompanied by a plate of some cheese scones. "Now off you go, chop chop, and mind you don't spill anything."

"I'll try my best." Rosie promised, still visually concerned about the state she was leaving Rosmerta in. Customers continued to pour in, and as Rosie left she passed a group of Durmstrang students, her head ducked in case Theo was somewhere in there.

"You know I'm pretty convinced he won't come near you." A familair voice made Rosie jump out of her skin. Cedric stood by the outside of the pub, and quickly reached out to take the tray as the girl almost dropped it. 

"Awfully confident about that. And you know that how?" She asked, eyebrow cocked as she tried to not look too jumpy, taking a moment to calm her heart before taking the tray back and heading up the cobbled roads to where Honeydukes was.

"Have you looked his way recently?" 

"No, I tend to avoid the Slytherin table at all costs, why, should I have been?" Rosie replied, glancing over at him, but mostly staring down at the tray, making sure nothing was spilling. 

Because you would see that Theo is still sporting a black eye. Meaning I hit him rather hard." Cedric said, a smirk on his face.

"Yes, well the bruises on your knuckles proved that just fine." Rosie replied, and the smirk on Cedric's face turned to a frown for just a moment, before returning to it's previous state. 

"Who pissed in your cereal this morning?" He asked, and his words made the girl physically halt in her path, staring at the Hufflepuff boy. 

"Who spiked yours?" She replied, and Cedric made a face.

"Come on, I'm just trying something new. Trying to get you to be more comfortable around me again - it'll make our practises easier." Cedric's cheeks burned pink.

"By what? Acting like Fred and George?" Rosie sarcastically said, but when she got no reply, she turned towards him. "Ced-"

"Hear me out." He said, before she could go any further. "You quite clearly trust the twins are are extremely comfortable around them. If it was them you were teaching then you would have no problems with feeling awkward around them."

"But I would have the problem of them being unteachable because they wouldn't listen to me at all." Rosie mumbled, eyes trained towards the ground, grumbling as someone bumped into her, the butterbeer close to spilling. 

"Well yes, but you would overall be a lot more comfortable around them, yes?" Cedric said, and Rosie nodded after a moment. "So my thoughts are, if our friendship is a little bit more similar to that of you and the twins', then we could make practises easier and I could learn more in preparation for the next task, which isn't long away now."

"I know it isn't. And I suppose you have a point." The pair stopped outside of Honeydukes, Cedric looking down at the girl, who looked up at him, a prominent frown on her face. "But I don't want to."

"What?" He exclaimed - he had assumed that this would be something that she would have agreed to.

"Ced - this really is nice of you, but I don't want our friendship to be more like mine with the twins. There's years of friendship there, an understanding which couldn't be imitated. And even if you could imitate it, I still wouldn't want to. Ced, you're so different from the twins, and that's a good thing. And I am comfortable with you, I'm just balancing a lot and with everything that happened it might take me just a little bit longer to be as comfortable as I was." She said.

"Yeah, that makes sense." Cedric nodded. 

"Good, now bend down slightly - just a little more - there." Rosie instructed, and Cedric did as she said, confused. The girl pressed a kiss to his cheek, tapping his shoulder to tell him he could stand up again. "If you want to talk more then go down to the Three Broomsticks, but I need to give Eddie and Mr and Mrs Flume this."

And with that, Rosie disappeared into the overflowing sweet shop.

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