Closed The Rose and its Thorns

[Hayley Elridge]

It seemed to Hayley that everything was finally going right. She had wanted this for so, so, long, and now, at last, she was dating Harley. And it was everything she'd dreamed it would be, and more. To kiss Harley, and walk with her hand in hand, and know that she felt the same . . . it was idyllic. The restrictions of being in different houses chafed more than ever, of course, while this was still fresh and new and she wanted nothing more than to spend every moment with Harley, but they could overcome that. They could overcome anything, so long as they were together. There was one thing left to do: one vitally important thing that was making Hayley nervous. They had to tell their friends.

The pair had decided to talk to Rose first, as she was the most mature of the girl gang, and was most likely to take it well. Rory, Hayley was sure, would tease them mercilessly, but hopefully Rose could ameliorate that. So it was that the couple (couple! of girlfriends! the thought gave Hayley a thrill whenever she used it) strolled down to the Wild Patch, hand in hand, to find Rose among the flowers. "Hey Rose!" Hayley wouldn't even try to keep the excitement out of her voice. "We have something to tell you."

 

[Rose Holland]

It still startled Rose sometimes, when she remembered she was a sixth year. The thought of her seventh year scared her, and she tried not to think about it too much. Time was running out to figure out what she wanted to do with her life, and she really didn't know yet. She was considering a career as an herbologist like her dad, but worried a bit that she was just picking a safe option she knew a lot about. But she did love Herbology a lot, and her work in the Wild Patch confirmed that for her. She was there now, kneeling in the dirt and tending to flowers happily. It was nice work and distracting, which was good because she kept thinking of her Valentine's dance date with Kauri. She wondered if her friends would find it strange that she was maybe thinking of dating a younger boy, even if it was only a year.

As if thinking of her friends had summoned them, Rose looked up to see Hayley and Harley approach. She wiped some sweat from her brow and grinned at her friends. "Hi guys!" She said, taking off her gloves and getting to her feet. "What's up?" She asked, before her eyes fell on the pair of linked hands. The smile froze on her face as she looked back at the two of them, a feeling of dread rising up inside her quickly. "Guys?" She asked, confusion in her voice now.

 

[Harley Tsuji]

Even with the small pit of uncertainty in her stomach, Harley still felt... pretty good about the decision they had made. It was undeniable how much she liked Hayley, and her heart skipped every time she remembered that the other girl felt the same. Worries crept into her thoughts when they were apart, but the second she she had Hayley by her side, it was easy for Harley to just brush all of that aside, distracted by how comfortable and easy the new relationship felt. As though this was how things had always been.

There was one thing left to handle though, which still made Harley a little nervous. Telling their friends could either go very well, or very badly. As eager as she had been in her last relationship to tell people, part of Harley was worried. They could easily raise the same concerns Harley had had, or... the dynamic of their friend group could wind up changing, or... there seemed to be a million things that could go wrong, but Harley was determined to put them aside and just see how things went. The look that spread across Rose's face as she caught sight of them was exactly what Harley had feared though, and it was difficult not to let her worries rush back in as she smiled nervously, trying to lighten the tone. "Sooooo, we've got some news." Harley said, keeping her voice bright as best she could. "Hayley glued our hands together." She said with a serious nod, holding their hands up. "We discovered we're actually psychic as long as we hold hands. Hayley has a new disease where if I don't kiss her every ten minutes she'll die. There's a new house unity rule where everyone's gotta hold hands with someone from another house at all times. Hayley's hand fell off and I'm holding it in place for her." Once stupid jokes had started escaping her mouth it was difficult to stop them, as Harley quickly fell back into her comfort zone of making fun of things that made her nervous.

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Hayley saw Rose's expression change as she noticed their clasped hands, and the cold knot of anxiety in her stomach contracted painfully. She had thought that Rose would be cool with this, she'd been so sure. Maybe it had been too much to go in holding hands. but if she looked this worried about this alone . . . how would she react to the actual announcement? Hayley hadn't been truly worried before, not about Rose of all people, but now she was.

Hayley spluttered with laughter as Harley started sprouting silly jokes. She wanted to add more, to say something funny, but in the stress of the moment she couldn't think of anything witty to say. Besides, Rose was only looking more and more confused, and as amusing as it was, it really wasn't fair to her to keep dancing around the issue. "What Harley means to say is . . ." Now that she was about to say it, Hayley almost froze up. This was so much scarier than it should be, almost scarier than confessing her love to Harley. She was so worried now about how Rose would react; she and Harley had vowed that it wouldn't ruin their friendship, even if they broke up, but what if it ruined the group's dynamic? In any case, she'd taken this upon herself, there was nothing to do but say it. "We're dating."

 

[Rose Holland]

Rose felt dread rise up as she looked at the two of them, and it only intensified as Harley started to talk. Rose knew her friend, and she knew that she only did this... joking thing when she was nervous. It made her nervous too, but also feel annoyed, especially as it went on for a long time. Rose frowned, trying to look Harley in the eye and see what she really meant. She thought she knew what was happening, but she was hoping to find a sign that she was wrong. But Harley wouldn't actually tell her anything, instead she just kept piling on joke after joke. Rose crossed her arms, then looked at Hayley as she spoke. Rose was now expecting the news, but it was still a blow when Hayley finally said it. Her frown deepened, and she looked between the two of them for moment. Silence fell between them, and Rose actually felt herself grow angry. They were dating, and this is how they brought her the news? By walking in and dropping it on her, but not before joking around about it? It didn't feel like they were taking her seriously, like they assumed she would just... be fine with it. But truthfully, she was not fine. "Are you serious?" She asked them, her anger clear in her voice. "That's a horrible idea, you guys know that, right?" She sounded entirely unlike herself, and she knew it. But she really did think it was a bad idea. Best friends dating was never good, because breaking up would ruin everything. She gestured to Hayley. "You and Lizzie were friends before you dated, and now you can hardly stand each other." Then she looked at Harley. "Not to mention the mess that happened with you and Odette. Don't you guys think this is a dumb risk to take with your friendship?" She paused. "Our friendship? In case you forgot it was not just the two of you." Her words were spoken in anger, but deep down she wasn't mad, she was scared. The two of them standing there together holding hands already felt strange. They had only just announced this, and Rose already felt like an outsider.

 

[Harley Tsuji]

The look on Rose's face absolutely terrified Harley, and she knew before Hayley had even spoken that whatever reaction was coming wasn't going to be good. Any thought that Rose was the friend they could rely on to be cool with this had clearly been misplaced. When she actually spoke though, Rose's anger stung even more than Harley had expected. Every word came like a blow to the gut, and it was hard to gather her thoughts to respond at all, betrayal written all over her face as she finally spoke. "Hey! That's not fair!" She snapped, squeezing Hayley's hand a little too hard to hold herself back from giving in to the instinct to step closer to Rose threateningly. "Of course we bloody thought about it, and it's FINE! It's gonna be fine! You've gotta take a little risk sometimes! But we've always been best friends, we're not gonna just stop wanting that because we're also dating! And it's SAFER to date someone you're already friends with, who wants to just go out with some rando and hope they aren't a huge creep? I thought you'd be happy for us! We're really happy about this!"

 

[Hayley Elridge]

Whatever Hayley might have expected from Rose, it wasn't this. This hurt, deep and harsh. Hayley knew she and Harley - well, the whole gang - could be impulsive sometimes, but did Rose really think they hadn't thought about this? They'd barely even begun and she was brushing off their blooming feelings like they were some shallow, stupid mistake. Hayley felt Harley's hand tighten on hers and knew that she felt the same, even before the pain in her voice became apparent. She squeezed Harley's hand in return, in what she hoped was a reassuring gesture, trying to ground herself, calm herself down before this got out of hand. She didn't want to fight with Rose, and if she could just cool this discussion down . . . "Rose . . . we have thought about this. A lot. And we've thought about how it'll affect the group - although I didn't expect a reaction like this from you of all people." But then Rose kept talking, and all those thoughts flew out of Hayley's head. "Hey! This is nothing like that! Lizzie and I were barely friends before we started dating, we didn't know each other! And Harley and Odette were practically still enemies. None of that compares! We've all been friends since we started Hogwarts, I dunno about you, but I didn't think anything could come between the girl gang. Certainly not two of us dating." Hayley was seething, she couldn't stop herself. The idea that Rose thought their group could be so easily broken up was appalling . . . and scary. Hayley didn't even want to think about what might happen if she was right, so she couldn't be. She just couldn't.

 

[Rose Holland]

Harley was seriously pissing Rose off. First she couldn't even stop making jokes, and now she was immediately yelling and arguing with Rose as if she hadn't made a good point. "I'm glad to hear you two thought about it, together." She snapped back. "I guess that's how it's going to be now, isn't it? You two always together? Have you thought about how that would affect our friendship?" She balled her hands into fists, glaring at both of them. "It's not safer at all, it's a dumb idea! You're going to break up and then things will be horrible forever." She couldn't get past this, and she was angry as well as scared. She felt cornered, like the two of them were a wall she couldn't move past. They already looked like an united front. She groaned as Hayley argued about her and Lizzie not being friends, as if that was the point. "So that's even worse! You weren't great friends, and now you two hate each other. You have so much more to lose now!" Her glare intensified as Hayley tried to turn it around and make it seem like it was Rose's fault for not believing in the girl gang enough. She hated having to argue with both of them at once, it wasn't fair. She was outnumbered, and it would be like this forever now. "I didn't think anything could come between the girl gang either, but you two dating might do it. What if you DO break up? Have you thought and talked about that? Neither of you are very good at letting go of grudges." She threw her hands up in anger. "Don't act like I'm being unreasonable, you KNOW it's a danger of dating a friend." She felt like they were ignoring her very real concerns, just because they didn't want to think about it themselves.

 

[Harley Tsuji]

Any hopes Harley may have held of Rose being the reasonable friend had long since vanished, and every word out of her mouth seemed to sting more than the last. She had tapped directly into Harley's own worries about what they were doing, and it only sparked Harley's anger further, her eyes narrowing as she took a threatening step closer to Rose, restraint abandoned in her fury. "Of course we f*cking thought about it, it'll be FINE! And it's pretty rich to hear you accusing someone else of breaking up the group!" Harley snapped, letting her anger take over as she brought up something that had bothered her more and more recently. "You've been no fun ever since you got that bloody badge, when's the last time we broke any rules together?! You've only gotten worse since you started hanging around that teacher's pet, do you really think hooking up with a human rule book isn't gonna have any effect on our friendship? Rose three years ago never would have given a crap about any of this, you knew how to have fun back then! You've changed!"

 

[Hayley Elridge]

It was all going wrong. This was going so much more badly than Hayley had ever imagined it would. All the little resentments they'd built up were coming spilling out, and they were a good group, they were great friends, it couldn't be like this. Hayley felt tears well up in her eyes as Rose lashed out and Harley responded in time. She let go of Harley's hand to raise both of her own in a calming gesture, though she was feeling far from calm herself. "Guys. GUYS. Don't DO this. Rose, please, can't you give us a chance?" Hayley couldn't help but feel that fighting like this was already ruining their friendship, far more than she and Harley dating would, and she couldn't let that happen, but she didn't know how to stop it. But as Rose went on about Lizzie, she felt herself growing angrier instead. "You know why I broke up with Lizzie, there's no chance of that happening with Harley! Stop saying this as though they're the same!" The H-leys' politics had always aligned, that was part of why they were so perfect for each other - but Rose had disregarded that enough to stay friends with Lizzie despite what she'd said about her own mother, so maybe it was inevitable that she wouldn't understand. Harley's next outburst tapped directly into some of Hayley's own feelings. They were so in sync, how could Rose even think about them breaking up? Hayley had always stayed true to herself despite her prefect's badge, but Rose had let the position change her. "She's right," she blurted out. "It's you who's letting stuff break up our friendship, right now. Maybe we will break up, someday. Maybe that'll mess things up, or maybe it won't. But you won't even give us a chance to try, and meanwhile you keep ditching us!" There was a lump in Hayley's throat and a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach. She was only making things worse, but she couldn't stop herself saying what she felt now that it was there. "I want you back. The old you, who knew how to have fun and didn't care about dumb rules."

 

[Rose Holland]

Rose glared at Harley as she started to shout and curse even more, not enjoying how quickly she had turned on Rose so completely. Rose's eyes widened when Harley turned it around, saying that it was her who was breaking up her group. Rose's mouth dropped open at her next words, and she felt really, deeply hurt. Had they been talking together about how boring she was now? Was that what they thought of her? She flushed as she mentioned Kauri too, shaking with fury as Harley just kept going. Hayley was still trying to create peace between them, but Rose shook her head as her eyes filled with tears. She thought for a moment that Hayley was going to tell Harley she had gone so far, but then the Slytherin said Harley was right. That was even more of a betrayal to Rose, whose heart sank. "I'm not ditching you." She said, her voice shaky and quiet now. "I never said... I never..." She couldn't keep the words from sounding like she was about to cry, and she realized it was because she was. Rose clenched her fists, focusing on her anger rather than her sadness. "You know what? F*ck you both!" She yelled, pointing an accusatory finger at them both in turn. "If you were feeling that way, you could have SAID something to me. But I thought I was more important to you guys as a friend, not just someone you broke rules with. I thought our friendship was about more than pulling dumb childish stunts all the time." She snapped, tears escaping her eyes and sliding down her cheeks. "It's a real class act to confront me about this now, you two in such a nice little team. I guess that's how it's always going to be now, right? You two telling me everything I'm doing wrong, because you two are so perfect and in sync together." She snorted, then stepped forward, pushing them both aside so there was room for her to walk past them. "Have fun together, then. I don't want your friend if you think of me like that. You don't need me, anyway." She said, her voice loud, though shaky. "Grow up!" She added, before a sob escaped her, and Rose ran away, leaving the two of them behind her.

 

[Harley Tsuji]

Harley was so numb with anger that it was impossible to even process the impact of what she was saying. She was just lashing out, angry and hurt that something that had made her so happy could be turned into a bad thing in her best friend's mind so quickly. She didn't try to stop Rose as the girl brushed past them, teeth gritted and fists clenched. This had all gone so unbelievably wrong. "F@CK!" She yelled once Rose was gone, turning and kicking violently at one of the plants nearby, shattering an overripe tomato to pieces with an unpleasant squelch. "F@CK F@CK F@CK!" She put her face in her hands and took a few slow, shaky breaths, trying desperately to calm down. This was a disaster.