Open Catch the snitch & hold it tight

[Leda Layton]

Leda hadn’t really been paying much attention to what she’d been doing since Brightstone weekend, Olives funeral still on her mind. How was she just meant to carry on, with the weight of her sisters death in her shoulders? Of course all her duties and activities were keeping her busy, and for the most part they were enough to distract her thoughts to push the guilt away. Leda was spending a lot of her time trying to organise Slytherin with Liam ahead of the games, but she didn’t have the strength to hold team building sessions as she had last year. The Head Girl was out in the equipment shed by herself, checking over the brooms when she moved to the case of different balls that were involved in the game. It had never been a secret why Leda had joined the team in the first place. Popping open the chest, she saw the Quaffle, sandwiches between the two dangerous bludgers that as an eleven year old she’d once considered hiding before a match to stop anyone getting hurt, before her eyes drifted upwards to the secret compartment. Her fingers traced the pattern on the front, before gently popping open the little doors and taking out the golden snitch, laying it in the centre of her flat palm. Leda had managed to close her emotions off completely since finding out the news of her sister, but now that she was by herself, looking at the ball that was not only important to her own role and for how far she’d come, but also as a memory. Olive had been the seeker for Gryffindor while at school, and it was the reason Leda had even joined; to follow in her sisters footsteps. The Slytherin had looked at it a thousand times before, but this was different, and the emotions that suddenly hit the teen were overwhelming. Before she could stop herself, she was overcome with floods of tears, and taking a step back to lean against the wall, unable to hold her own weight she slid to the ground, snitch gripped tightly in her hand as though it was only thing of Olive she had left.​

 

[Zennon Baros]

Zennon wasn't proud of it, but he'd been following Leda. He still couldn't believe everything that had happened regarding her sister. She didn't talk about it, she was clinical and she kept herself busy, Zennon was worried about her. Her behaviour wasn't that different to how she normally was and that was the part that worried him, because she should be grieving and, from what he could see, she wasn't. It was true that people grieved how they did, it was no one's right to say whether someone was grieving wrong, but, Leda was one of his best friends and he was worried about her. This was horrible, losing a sister like that, it was the kind of thing you didn't wish on anyone, certainly not your friends. In the back of his mind Zennon was aware that this could end incredibly badly for him, he remembered what an emotional Leda was like from his first year, but, they'd struck up a friendship since then, surely it would be different now. He'd seen her go into the shed, and he had intended to give her some time to herself, but, he also loved Leda, and he wanted to be there for her if he could be. So he steeled his resolve and headed in after her. What he found was not ideal. He didn't think he'd ever seen Leda cry. He wasn't sure how long she'd been sat against the wall like that before he'd gotten the courage to approach, but, it wasn't good. Zennon didn't get too close, but close enough to reach out to her is he needed to, "Leda?" He asked, hoping she wasn't about to curse him into the nothingness. Could she get into trouble for vanishing him if people didn't know he'd been vanished? "Leda, I'm sorry." Because really, what did you say?​

 

[Leda Layton]

Leda didn’t bother to hide it anymore, not that she thought she could even if she wanted to. She knew she hadn’t been too obvious or making much of a noise, although somehow as if on cue, there was already a voice beside her. She didn’t need to look up to know who it belonged to, having been best friends with the Slytherin for over five years. She’d already mentioned what had happened to Zennon in passing, but it seemed that naturally over time the news was travelling by word of mouth regardless, so it was no longer a secret nor a surprise to hear it mentioned at school. Of course he knew what this was about, even if he didn’t understand quite the extent of it. The Head Girl sat pitifully on the floor, so many memories and moments replaying over and over in her head, her chest tight at the realisation she was never going to be able to add to that with her sister. “I was never there..” She didn’t mean physically though. Leda had ever been there for Olive like she had to her growing up, and by the time Leda was old enough to be a support herself she knew she’d done nothing but challenge her sisters behaviour, making things harder for her than they needed to be. “I was trying to prove myself to her, that I could be more. Be good enough.” Since her second year Leda had had a defensive wall up, a grudge against her sister for leaving her. “She stopped speaking to me, stopped including me. I never knew why and now I never will.” The Slytherin had one arm on her knees, the other still clutching the snitch. In her efforts to show Olive that she was worth being accepted, she’d pushed her sister even further away, to a point now of no return. It had been strange hearing West mention her Head Girl status to her mom over the break, the only time Leda having ever mentioned it to Olive was in anger. She’d wanted to show Olive she was still in the competition, and overtaken anything she’d done while at school, and once again Leda felt the tug from the pain in her chest from that last conversation they’d ever have.​

 

[Zennon Baros]

Zennon didn’t know what to say, why would he? This wasn’t something he’d ever experienced before. He didn’t want to think that he was intruding one her private thoughts, but this was a side of Leda he certainly wasn’t used to. She started speaking and all he could do was sit and listen. She looked... horrible quite frankly. He wanted to be there for her, but he didn’t know how to do that, other than just by giving her whatever she wanted or asked of him. If she wanted him to leave he would, but he hoped she would allow him to be here for her in some capacity like this. He’d had some of an idea of the issues between Leda and Olive, all from Leda’s point of view of course, but he’d known she’d loved her sister, that much had been obvious from day one that he’d met her. She was such a strong person that seeing her this low was shocking and it pained Zennon that he couldn’t help. He wanted to be a healer and yet he couldn’t help heal a broken heart. Nothing could. “Leda, Olive loved you,” he said, though he knew it wouldn’t do much. He didn’t know Olive, so really he was just going from what he knew of his own sisters and how he would feel if it was one of them. He didn’t think he’d survive it. But Leda, she was stronger than him, she could recover, eventually. “She knew exactly who you were, she was proud of you, you know that.” He added, trying to find the right words, though he feared he was failing.​

 

[Leda Layton]

Leda closed her eyes when Zennon tried to reassure her that Olive did love her. She knew that deep down, but that was half the problem. Leda hadn't appreciated it, noticed it or ever told Olive back that she'd been the one who was always looking out for her. Even over the last few years, it wasn't Olive's fault that she'd had to help their mom or her own family. Only, Leda had been too tied up in her own life to realise what Olive was going through too. The blonde shook her head, "I don't think she did. She didn't really know, even I didn't." Leda hadn't expected to need to revisit her own beliefs, she'd always been confident in what she thought, but now that she had a new perspective on it Leda wasn't sure who she was anymore. The Head Girl wiped at her cheeks with her fingers, knowing that the only way now was forward. She'd already surprised herself by offering to look after Wendall where she could, and she barely even knew her own cousin. She'd only done it because she'd known it would have been what Olive would have wanted. Despite being a prefect and Head Girl, it wasn't until Olive had left her completely that she felt the weight of pressure on her shoulders. She no longer had that person to look up to, to ask questions or learn from. How was she meant to know if she was on the right track? She couldn't exactly ask Monty, nor West, both of which had their own families to deal with. Instead she now had both those younger in the school and younger in her personal life looking up to her. What would she tell Ten and Felix about their mom? "How am I meant to do it on my own?" she asked, fresh tears appearing in her eyes. She knew she wasn't really alone, she had a wide net of people around her, but it certainly felt that way at the moment. ​