Who: Eliza Alderton and Emmeline Vance
What: Confrontations?
Where: Outside of Ravenclaw tower
Eliza really hated her roommates.
This happened at least once a year, the other girls would do something stupid and she should be used to it, but she really hated them right now. So much that she probably wouldn't make much of an effort to talk to them this summer, so much that---she couldn't even stay in the same room as them. They were really dumb, they were really dumb, and even though she hadn't been apart of the stupid gossip paper, she was getting punished for it.
"Would you please open?" she snapped at the Ravenclaw door, crossing her arms. She was sure she answered the riddle correctly, she was positive, but the knocker kept telling her that he (it?) simply could not open. "Is it wrong?"
"No, it's just jinxed against Gryffindors."
Eliza shut her eyes and dropped her head to the side at the voice, and barely looked over as Emmeline Vance took a few steps to stand a bit in front of her in front of the door. See--this was another reason she hadn't been involved; why would you want girls like Emmeline and Juliet and Anneliese and Ellie and---and it was just dumb. Plus, they were all friends with Dedalus, so now he was annoyed and--
She hated her roommates.
"So I can't get in at all?"
"Are you a Gryffindor?" Emmeline responded stiffly, arms crossed as her head tilted away from Eliza, expertly avoiding her eyes. Eliza held her breath and shifted on her feet; she needed to see Dedalus and it looked like Emmeline wasn't going to open the door until she was gone. Fine.
"Would you please get Dedalus for me, then?" Eliza asked, even though she knew it was fruitless, "I left my journal in potions and Slughorn isn't in his office."
She felt Emmeline whip toward her before she actually saw her, which was a feat.
"Why did you do it? What the hell made you lot do it?" the other girl said fiercely, eyes blazing. Eliza faltered; no one had actually confronted any of the Gryffindors, and seeing as she hadn't been apart of the bloody thing, she didn't know how to react.
"I didn't, I didn't do it."
"Oh, bullshit," Emmeline spat, looking her up and down. Eliza was taller than the other girl, but with just one glare she felt extremely small, "You Gryffindors are all alike, fucking over other people because of what you think is right."
"I didn't do it," Eliza tried to interject, but the other girl wasn't hearing it.
"We were fucking pissed off at Cooper too, everyone was giving her the cold shoulder, do you think we give a shit about what she says or does? No," Emmeline tossed her hair over her shoulder, crossing her arms again, "If Catchlove's bloody up the duff, we'd have found out anyway when she's the size of a whale, so what the fuck does it matter?"
Eliza's lips pursed. That argument did make sense, even though she did understand why Ingrid (and Gillian, oy) would want to keep their pregnancies quiet. Just look what had happened at the rumor that there might be a pregnant girl wandering the halls. Eliza looked down at her shoes, feeling a heavy silence fall upon them as Emmeline waited for what she assumed to be an answer, or a fight.
"Well?"
"I haven't talked to any of them since Ingrid basically accused me of spreading the rumors," Eliza said flatly, looking up. She watched the other girl's eyes narrow, and took a breath, "Ingrid thought I might've said--something--because of the rumors from the honey pot nonsense, but I didn't."
Maybe that's why she hated her roommates the most. Why would she, the one who had suffered the pregnancy rumors in the first place, want to put that onto her friends? Did they really think she would put their reputations over hers? She was the weirdo who didn't talk and got stuck on stairs, did any of them actually think she would bother trying to fix the school's perception of her now?
But, apparently, that was the consensus. Miranda hadn't even bothered to talk to her, and Eliza hadn't given the others a chance to. She hated her roommates.
Emmeline eyed her somewhat carefully, shifting her weight from leg to leg. Eliza didn't know what else to do; she couldn't say anything else in her defense because that was all she had. She let out a breath, pushing her hair back. It had been a long few bloody months, she really had no fight left in her.
"It just bloody sucks," Emmeline finally muttered, shaking her head. Eliza wasn't sure why she felt a bit lighter at this, because the other girl was obviously upset, but--Emmeline believed her. "I didn't do a bloody thing--this time," a short, fleeting grin crossed her face before disappearing, "and now everyone thinks it's all right to tear the mickey out of me."
Eliza had no idea who would be brave enough to tease Emmeline to her face (and she couldn't imagine what the other girls would be like, or how they were going to retaliate...oy.), but it had seemed to upset her even more than the actual rumors. That was interesting.
Emmeline looked up at Eliza, "I didn't mess around with Bagman."
"I know."
"Or--any of that, other--stuff. None of it's true," Her eyes rolled up to the ceiling, a gentle smile crossing her features, "Juliet may be in love with me, however, wouldn't mind that too much..."
"Yes, the Dearborns are a rather pretty family," Eliza said with a light laugh, eyes widening in interest as Emmeline's ears reddened. The other girl looked at the knocker, her involuntary smile drooping.
"I can't let you in, I'm afraid. We hexed it quite well, it would take a year for me to do it by myself." She looked back with a frown, "But I'll tell Dedalus you're out here."
"Thank you," Eliza said, shoulders dropping as she relaxed a bit. Emmeline's eyebrows went up in what Eliza believed was amusement, and she gave the knocker the answer to its new riddle ("Time").
"We'll try to go easy on you lot," Emmeline said with a wink, and now Eliza's eyebrows quirked up in more confusion than amusement, but she let out a breathy laugh and leaned against the wall beside the door to wait for Dedalus.