WHO: Juliet Dearborn & Rhys Nott
WHAT: He has to bring her back to school. Because life is mean.
WHERE: Train to Hogwarts
WHEN: November '78
It was bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit.
Some cruel trick by a higher power, some sick joke by her ex-boyfriend himself, or karma setting itself up to screw her over; call it what you will, but above all, it was bullshit.
There was no way in hell that she was going to last a train ride to Hogwarts being escorted (augh, she wanted to scream) by Rhys Nott. No way--she was just--she'd simply explode. Explode of anger and awkwardness and frustration and the overwhelming urge to bash his skull into the ground, and not just for what he had done over the journals, but for the fact that she was certain that he had to be behind this whole arrangement. Why he would be, well, that she hadn't figured out yet. But she was a Ravenclaw, she was smart--Juliet was sure that she'd find some plausible reason for him to want to be an ass.
Oh wait--aha! That was it. He wanted to be an ass. Well, that wasn't a stretch of the imagination, to be sure.
Fabulous. The blame could begin. At least... when she decided he was worth speaking to--as it was, it didn't seem like that point was going to come any time soon, so they had a while to wait.
Treading back through the aisle of the train, Juliet found a compartment near the middle and stepped inside, shutting the door behind her before her companion could join her. He could find his own fucking place to sit, somewhere far away from her.
Rhys retracted his hand from the doorway just in time to watch it slam shut. If she had pulled it shut just that much harder, he was fairly confident something would have broken off or shattered. How dramatic. Granted, he wasn’t exactly thrilled with these forced conditions (well, she was obviously more angry about it than he was), but was that really necessary? He was her escort-attendant-thing, after all. Whatever that was; his boss hadn’t exactly been specific in that matter. All he had told Rhys was to bring the ‘girl’ back to the ‘school’ right away because the ‘headmaster’ wanted her ‘now.’ Right. And the Ministry was…virtually powerless when it came to the law? Oh yes, that’s right.
Trying to hide the rolling his eyes to the best of his ability, Rhys waited a few moments before inching the door open again and slipping through into the compartment. Well, this was going to be mighty awkward, he could tell by the glare she surely meant to kill with spread across her face. What did she want from him? Well, ha-- a lot of things, but this was his job, wasn’t it? A job. She was just going to have to suck it up, because she was not going to stop him from sitting wherever he pleased. With her. Ugh, this was going to be the longest ride to Hogwarts he wished he never had to take.
“Stop glaring at me,” he stated simply, opting for the seat across and away from her. Just because Rhys knew he could handle her didn’t mean she couldn’t be incredibly fierce when she wanted to. He would rather not have his face clawed out, thank you very much. Someone else had tried to do that earlier in the week, and honestly, Juliet had caused more than enough problems for him already.
“Stop sitting in my compartment. Find your own damn seat,” Juliet bit back.
So much for finding him completely unworthy of speaking to, but at least she was doing it for something important, such as, oh, keeping her sanity.... not being charged with murder... so on and so forth.
Crossing her arms over her chest, the Ravenclaw averted her gaze to the window, determined to not look at him. See, that's how much she hated him right now, she couldn't even stand to glance in his general direction. Juliet figured that she didn't have to watch him kindly remove himself from her personal space either; despite how she felt he acted sometimes, Rhys was a big enough boy to go find another compartment without her holding his hand on the way.
He felt his eyes droop slightly at her words, but then proceeded to sink deeper into his seat. Because yes, it was his seat now because he was bloody sitting in it, wasn’t he? That constituted enough, stated by the unwritten code of placement concerning seats. Just because Juliet just so happen to be sitting in the same vicinity didn’t mean she owned the whole bloody train. Because, yes, he was fairly certain that was what she was aiming at.
“I don’t see your name anywhere,” Rhys replied in the best innocent tone he was capable of. Though, hiding the smugness hadn’t been as easy. It was hard to when he knew she was hating this much more than he was. It was almost as if, for one of those rare times, he had the upper hand in their relationship. And it actually felt good. Why in the world would he want that to go away? Copying Juliet, Rhys folded his arms over his chest, but in a lazy manner.
Juliet was determined not to show how much he was getting to her, but it was difficult when she knew he knew what he was doing, and he knew she knew he knew what he was doing and--wasn't he supposed to have a black eye or something? She was going to have to have a serious conversation with Caradoc about this problem, and how when she said 'Beat up Rhys Nott', she actually meant it.
"Fine," she said, her 'nonchalant' shrug a bit tenser than it should have been. Juliet rose up out of her seat, grabbed her belongings and went to the door. Just before she stepped out, she turned over her shoulder and addressed him as neutrally as possible. “I'll find another compartment, if you want to be an arse about it.”
Was it really that hard for her to just sit in one spot? She knew just as well as he did that she would have to technically stay in his sight for whole ride back. So basically, Juliet was making this obnoxiously difficult for him. Though, it wasn’t as if he was making it any easier for her, but--- that was beside the point. He was allowed to push her, while she was most certainly not.
As she rose to her feet, Rhys did as well, though a bit more jerkily. His knees were a bit--- no, that was an absolute lie; they were completely swollen and bruised over because--- Dearborn, it had to have been Dearborn, had decided to just kick the shit out of his knees after a late night meeting. Maybe not so randomly but, holy he hated that man. Twitching slightly, Rhys struck his hand to the opposite side of the door way in time, leaving Juliet no room to leave, seeing as his arm provided a nice obstacle. He clicked his elbow straight.
“Nope,” Rhys answered simply, leaning slightly into the doorframe for balance. He sent her a sweet smile and leaned in slightly to further it.
Oh, so he had been serious about following out his orders to keep her within sight? Well, that was just fucking great--although now that she thought about it, in correlation to the way he was acting now, it wasn't at all surprising that he would, just to piss her off some more. Juliet gave Rhys' arm a long stare, debating for a moment whether or not she wanted to duck underneath it and risk him grabbing her and thus having to fight him to leave... no, she thought reluctantly, she didn't want to bother with that. But she would, she decided, bother with glaring at him some more to show her complete and utter displeasure.
Of course, nothing could ever go quite to plan for her, at least where Rhys Nott was involved. As Juliet turned sideways to meet him with a fierce look, she was confronted with a face much closer than she had anticipated, looking a lot more smug and pleased than she had anticipated.
Okay, fuck that, he was getting it.
Without a second thought, Juliet's palm contacted with his face, creating a loud smack noise that seemed to resound inside the small compartment. “Fuck. Off.”
Argh. Rhys instantly withdrew his hand and pushed it onto his cheek, desperately trying to ease the pain pounding from it. What the--- such a--- argh! The smirk previously planted on his face vanished, but it took a few seconds for him to look at her again. Moving his jaw in a chewing motion, he glared. Before, that fierce look on her face would have at least made him coil back, but now, not so much. That had fucking hurt.
What did she want from him, exactly? Did she think that after she broke up with him (which really, was unacceptable in itself) that he would be alright with it? That everything would be normal and he would be nicer to her than before? Surely, Juliet of all people would have realized that he wasn’t going to be nice to her. They had hardly been nice when they were dating, why should he be nice now?
“What is your problem, exactly?” Rhys drawled out, shifting to move in front of the door because no, she was definitely not leaving now. “Are you stressed out, is that why you’ve been acting so mad?”
Juliet looked pleased for a moment as she watched him clap a hand to his face for the pain she had caused, the emotion only going away when he moved himself in front of the door entirely. Well, at least if she had to stay in here with him, she had shown him that she wasn't going to be easy about it.
"I have no problem, Rhys," she drawled in imitation of him. "Not now that that shit-eating grin is off your face."
Her arms crossed slowly one over another, and she didn't back down despite the fact that she knew she wasn't leaving and that he was giving her that angry glare. Fuck, he had never intimidated her before, she didn't see why he should start now. "Nor am I acting mad--I'm actually quite legitimately angry, in case you haven't noticed. And why? Well, to get to the bottom of that, why don't you give me an answer as to why you're such a prick. I think then we can start talking."
His fucking fault, it was always his fucking fault, wasn't it? No, no, of course it could never be hers, Juliet was fucking perfect and did everything every way it was supposed to be done and blah blah blah Rhys was so over that. His face twitched in aggravation, wanting nothing more than to just slap her back but-- oh, she would kill him. Actually, truly kill him. This annoyed Rhys even further, which caused him to tense up even more, if that was possible.
"I'm the prick? Oh, yeah--- that's it." His eyes rolled to the ceiling as he let out a short, forced laugh. Yes, he was the prick in this whole situation. And-- alright, maybe sometimes he was a bit of and arse, but did she honestly expect him to be pleasurable to her every waking moment? Certainly not.
"You're mad because you broke up with me, and now you don't know how to deal with me."
Rhys had better get out his calendar to mark the date, because this was probably the only time in the history of the world that Juliet was ever going to look physically so taken aback by someone's words. Her shoulders tensed up and her hands formed fists at her side as she stared speechlessly up into his face. Fuck him, fuck him--nevermind that she didn't know why she hated him so much right now. Of course, there was always the reasons she had been mad at him before, but this was something different, this was something that struck much deeper. So fuck him for knowing so well how to get to her.
Fuck him for getting straight to the root of the problem, looking straight through her and finding the precise reasoning behind it all. Fuck him for being able to do that, to a girl so private, who so hated to show people her emotions and had thought, until meeting him, that she could hide them from anyone.
Juliet's mouth opened and closed a couple of times, but no sound come out. She thought, for a brief moment, that maybe she should just smack him again, but she couldn't do anything; it was like she was paralyzed out of shock.
She hated him so much.
For a split second, Rhys thought Juliet was going to hurt him again. Definitely something more than a slap, because she looked so worked up how could she not? Her hands had formed into tight little balls and her shoulders were so tense most of her neck had disappeared. The thought of moving out of the direct line of fire crossed through his mind but--- no. No, he was not going to because it was only Juliet. And as scary as she could be sometimes, that didn't mean she was actually harmful. Physically.
He watched her for those few moments, just waiting for the bite back. But, the silence ensued and--- nothing? She was going to say nothing? Never, for all the time that he had known her, did she never just stay silent. Especially after hitting him. His mouth dropped slightly, parting just enough so that he could stop breathing through his nose.
Well, at least he had been right.
Hm. Yes alright, maybe since she seemed to be speechless, her reaction time would be slower. And, since they had already broken that comfortable two feet barrier at least fifteen minutes ago, Rhys felt no problem tentatively leaning into her face to give a kiss and slowly begin to move his arm around her waist.
Okay, so she had definitely not been expecting that. Anything but that, actually, even given how violently hot-and-cold their relationship (she didn't even correct herself that time) seemed to be 99% of the time. Even given how this was the way that she had gone about solving their last huge argument, it was--that was her, but apparently Rhys could play that game just as well, because there was something about the way his kiss was draining the fight out of her.
Not the anger, oh no. She was, if possible, even angrier with him than before, because now not only had he laid out in front of her problems that he shouldn't know, but he was kissing her and making her not want to push him away and making her not want to argue with him about any of it any more. Auuuugh--
...
Fine. It'd been too bloody long anyway, and he tasted good. Better than she remembered. Juliet fought over everything inside of her that was saying that she was probably going to regret this later, and reached up behind his neck, deepening the annoyingly light kiss and pushing up against him, reveling in how relieving it felt to do this again.
The thought crossed her mind for a split second that maybe it really had been too long, and she should stop this whole--no. Forget it. She still wasn't dating him.
