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▬▬"If you don't expect to like someone and then you do, that's an incredibly exciting moment."▬▬

Chadwick had spent most of the train ride salty. All of his friends and almost friends were prefect, and he had to spend a portion of the train ride alone - he didn't even have any siblings to talk to. At one point though they had made an effort to come say hi to Chadwick at least. And - Eden had said he had a crush on Calliope. Chadwick thought about it, thinking of the girl with her oddities. Sure, Chadwick hadn't spent much time with her but... yes, it would be a great thing. Chadwick was going to ask the girl out on a date, get to know her. He asked Eden what was something that Callie liked, and Eden didn't hesitate when he answered astronomy, before leaving Chadwick alone again.

Still on the train, Chadwick had opened a small container of fruit his mom had packed, this would haave to do in the pinch he was in. He roughly cut stars out of the pieces, before eating the scraps and arranging the stars in a pattern in the container. Some watermelon, some pineapple slices (he had a ring; cut a star hole in the middle), and some apples. It wasn't much, but it was a slight offering? Would offering fruit before the sorting feast even be reasonable? But what else was Chadwick to do with such short notice? Maybe... Callie could snack on it while the sorting was going on?

As the train approached the station, Chadwick stood with his robes on and began walking toward the door, he wanted to be out the doors before there was a whole crowd of people. He looked out the door window and saw her - the blond girl with the round glasses, she really was adorable. Once the train stopped and the doors opened, he pushed through the crowd of people and stopped just in front of Callie, "Hey Callie, have a nice summer?" He waited for her answer before holding out the container of star fruit, "I uh. Made this for you. And, I was kind of wondering if you'd like to go on a date with me when Hogsmeade weekend comes up? I mean, you don't have to of course. I just thought it would be nice to get to know you a little more, and maybe go on a few dates? You're just, really cute and I just want to know if this would work. You don't even have to give an answer right now if you don't want, I can be rejected by owl if that would make you more comfortable." No. Chadwick was rambling, he stopped talking and waited for her response, was he nervous? Why was he nervous? Was it because this wasn't thought through very well? Was it because he was worried that Eden was going to come and knock the daylights out of Chadwick for asking his crush? Well, too late now the deed had been done.

▬▬"If you don't expect to like someone and then you do, that's an incredibly exciting moment."▬▬

Chadwick smiled with a second wave of relief when Callie suggested to meet during lunch to discuss plans in I detail, that was a genius idea. ”That’s a great plan, lunch that is. How about... Thursday? Give us both time to get settled into classes?” Chadwick sighed, how were they staying up late for the sorting feast on a Sunday, and having to go to classes the next day, Monday, and go through an entire week of school? It was going to be exhausting, but at least he had a lunch date of sorts to look forward to.

Callie had plenty of thoughts on the village, places Chadwick had been before during Hogsmeade weekends, but he didn’t really know who the owners were, so he didn’t know where she was talking about. Except, fr the park and the Archer’s shop. Upon her mention of Chadwick liking Finley, Chadwick felt his face turn red, ”Uh, I actually know Finley. He’s probably my best friend actually, pretty cool guy. Good trumpeter for sure.” Why was his face so hot? He was embarrassed by Finley’s friendship? By his knowledge of Finley’s trumpet playing? He didn’t need to be embarrassed and Chadwick was then a little ashamed that such an emotion had come over him. He made a note, he needed to talk about Finley more often to make their friendship not as awkward. ”I think all of those places sound lovely, maybe we can just have a walking date and you can show me which places are your favorite? But we will certainly have to spend time at the park, I’m sure it’ll be lovely.”

He looked at the carriages filling up and raised an eyebrow looking at Callie, ”Would you like to ride a carriage together? Or I mean, obviously feel free to go jump in with your other friends! I don’t mean to take up all of your time before the sorting.”

Getting his prefect letter had been one of the few highlights of Eden’s summer. After a summer of being harangued about how unacceptable his grades were and studying his brains off, having a letter recommending him to prefect had bought him about a week’s worth of confidence...during which his girlfriend broke up with him and his best friend admitted to having a crush on her. Eden had spent half the ride glaring at Skipper Hawkins-- having to work with the Slytherin be a prefect was just adding insult to injury. Between him and Celeste Shoichet...well he didn’t want to bother yet another person related to Professor Shoichet, but he’d rather try to figure her out than do patrols with Skip. At least Weslyn hadn’t been made prefect...Willow seemed like a perfectly sweet lass even if her father was intimidating as hell.

The prefect meeting hadn’t been terrible: Head Girl Nasim was very clear and aside from a few puns that he thought were...questionable at best, Eden took the meeting very seriously. He was a little nervous when he realized he would be working with Angus McLellan--Eden was still sorry he’d flipped out at Rian last year, even if it had led to a most interesting project of looking more into the history of wizarding wars.

In any case, Eden was looking forward to being back at school, if only because it ironically felt like a break from the deluge of studying. He knew he’d have to hit the books and practice grind even harder, but being back at school also meant a return to dueling and Quidditch. Maybe he’d find someone to play chess with. He was sure Mattie was looking forward to being more free to practice her music--and probably looking forward to having the opinion of someone more musically inclined than he was. He searched for Mattie in the crowd to wave, but was otherwise busy hurrying fresh-faced first years towards the Groundskeeper. He glared at Ashton Bardsley and Sparrow Winchester, the new prefects for Mattie’s house, neither of whom seemed to be doing their jobs. He didn’t know Ashton very well before this, but right now Eden had the worst impression. Plus he couldn’t help resenting Sparrow for breaking up with Chadwick, even if he knew it was illogical.

He didn’t know many of the other houses’ older prefects that well, but he was as pleased to be in the same group as Hailey as he was disgusted to be in the same group as Wren. He respected Laurel from her skill as a beater and Maya as a seeker, and was hoping to pick their brains on Quidditch strategy before the season started. He vaguely recognized a few others: Yukon was Wes’s brother, which would be awkward. Eion was that kid Yukon and Wren hung out with, which meant Eden didn’t like him to begin with. Finley seemed pretty cool from Dueling last year. He didn’t know much by way of specifics for anyone else. Maybe he’d get to know some of these other prefects better over the year. Maybe these were his people.

As he looked over the sea of faces, Eden had a feeling--a small hunch, he refused to call it a crush--that finding “his people” involved asking one Calliope Whitethorne out to...well he certainly wasn’t sure but he looked forward to hanging out with her. In his efforts to prove he had friends besides Skipper and Weslyn, he’d greeted Chadwick and Cenek with more enthusiasm than usual and even told them about said plan to hang out with Callie. At least, he tried to be friendly, before he was swept into prefect duties. Eden though Cenek Knapp was pretty okay if unremarkable next to his more outstanding twin. What he really couldn’t understand was why the professors would pick Marcella Ashbourne when Aria Siddall was right--actually he hadn’t seen Aria anywhere that day. Huh. Maybe just missed her on the train patrol.

After a check to make sure no one was sneaking off, he caught Chadwick talking to Callie--Eden brightened for a moment and went to catch up with them, only to realize they were...making plans for lunch? She said it was charming to ride with him? Why hadn’t Chadwick told him they were an item earlier? Eden let out a long, partially upset, partially frustrated sigh and went to find another carriage. This was stupid. Why did he bother? Mattie really was his only friend.