#8 | Down by the River

"Never a Quidditch fan? Really? I couldn't get enough when I first came to Hogwarts. Would have tried out but I was so overwhelmed when I first got here that I didn't, and I've had just as much fun watching the games as I would playing in them," Harris said with a shrug. He nodded in agreement with Seb pontificating on the difference between collaboration and competition. Harris had often felt a weird kind of disconnect between playing on a team and the team's whole objective being tied to beating their competition. It felt destructive in a way where teamwork should have been constructive.

It was nice to hear the Slytherin boy explain things that Harris himself struggled to put into words. The Hufflepuff's mind was a volatile ocean of disjointed thoughts, and it was frustrating sometimes to struggle to get his point across or portray the nuance in his opinions. Sebastian seemed to have a way with words and an intuitive nature that helped him to fill in the blanks where Harris' own words failed. Harris caught himself smiling again and felt bashful at the realization. Were his cheeks beginning to blush? What was going on here?

Harris tried to force himself back into the conversation as Lucky was brought up. "He is a knob, but he's my buddy," Harris said with a smile. Langford and he were two of Hufflepuff's biggest class clowns, and while they weren't exactly close on a deep and personal level, their personalities and antics meant there was a kind of kindred spirit between them. "I taught him about bowling. It's a Muggle sport where you get to throw a ball at pins, do you know it?" Harris loved bowling. Not as flashy or impressive as Quidditch, but just as fun.

"Sounds good, Seb. Let's go." He smiled at the other boy and followed behind, settling into a leisurely pace and looking forward to chatting with his new friend all the way back to the castle. The sky was beginning to get that slight tint of purple that meant the sun would be going down soon and dinner time was just around the corner. He hadn't realized until now just how starving he was until he considered all the wonderful things he could eat tonight. He felt a sudden pang of sadness at the realization that he and Sebastian would be sitting at different tables.

"I think Amara screams at others for their mistakes because she hates admitting she makes any of her own," Harris opined to keep the conversation moving, and began to expound on his personal philosophy about personality types like Amara's and Mardling's and even Luckett's to an extent. He rambled and rambled, not feeling embarrassed about how much he was talking or if he was or wasn't making sense. He was comfortable and felt free to be himself with his new Slytherin friend and even threw an arm around the other boy at one point, his skin tingling at the contact.

[EXIT]