Kurumi had no idea how long she had been there lying alone in the pathways, her body shaking from the pain and tears. What was an even greater mystery was how she had managed to carry her broken body from there to here. It was as if she had just apparated into her bed, because she had no recollection of how she got here.

Curled up in fetal position and almost entirely hidden from view under the covers. Her one hand was still clutching the heart shape pendant around her neck, clutching it like a life line. It was her last connection to him, to what they had been, and while she knew she had made the right decision, letting him go so he could find real happiness with a girl he could trust, it didn't make the heart break any less.

Whimpering and scrunching up into an even tighter fetal position, Kurumi lay there in her bed wishing that somehow she could just disappear. Wishing that somehow all this pain would just go away.

Why was it that every single first year wanted to suddenly be a Quidditch prodigy? She had never seen such an anxious group of young people flock to the sign ups in the great girds that the first years did. Hoards and hoards of first years wanted to be on the Quidditch team and as much as she admired their enthusiasm she was tired of answering the same seven questions all day long. Dinner had been a nightmare because they all seemed to flock to her like she had a sign. And with Gideon up in the astronomy tower doing homework she was relying on Kurumi to save her from the children, but the girl was no where to be found. Usually Kurumi told Selina when she was going to be absent from dinner to go and study, but she had received no such message. The redhead had also seen Jonathan down at dinner so she wasn't with her boyfriend. Her whereabouts were a mystery.

As she pulled herself into the dorms she heard whimpering over in the corner by Kurumi's bed. It was late, but not late enough to be in bed. The whimpering was odd... But she was too distracted to notice.

...Until she heard a district cry. The redheaded girl turned her head to look at the lump that was Kurumi's body. Softly she questioned, "Kurumi?". As slowly and softly as she could, Selina walked over to Kurumi. She made her way around the bed to get a better look at what was going on. What she discovered was something that made her heart drop in her shoes. Kurumi was furled up in a ball on her bed clutching desperately to her necklace like a lifeline. And Selina knew just whose necklace it was and who had given it to her.

Selina tried to think back to the way Jonathan looked at the feast that night and she remembered being curious as to why he was red and blotchy, but the first years had distracted her train of thought. It did not take long to put together the events that had occurred.

Poor Kurumi.

Without another word, Selina crawled on Kurumi's bed and lay down beside her on top of the blankets. She rested her head on her arm so she could look at Kurumi and asked as delicately as possible, "You wanna talk about it?"

It hurt. It hurt as much as when her mother had passed. Only with her mother's passing she knew that she would never see her again. Not physically at least. With this...she was going to see him almost every day. In lessons, in the corridors, in the Great Hall...she was going to see him, but he wasn't going to see her.

And it destroyed her.

Hearing Selina, Kurumi's body stopped shaking for a moment, just a moment, long enough for her to whisper Jonathan's name and clutch the necklace tighter in her hands. "I've lost him...Selina...he says he never wants to speak to me again...or even see me..." But Kurumi knew she shouldn't expect any less than this. She didn't expect him to simply shrug his shoulders and say 'oh well, now we can go back to being friends.' That wasn't Jonathan.

Still...a part of her wished that he would have fought. Given her a reason to doubt her decision. Showed her that he didn't want this to end. But he hadn't. He had just let her break his heart like that and left, leaving the sixth year wondering which response would have been better.

One of the worst things about all this was that her eyes and hair weren't changing colors. Everything was still turned off. Everything was numb...and getting number by the second...and now she was supposed to go and meet Lewis tomorrow to talk. She just couldn't...she couldn't move. Could hardly breathe....

"I...I can't do this..."

There was a shell of a person laying beside Selina on Kurumi's bed. She looked like Kurumi, she talked like Kurumi, but it was as if she was just an empty doll who went through the motions of breathing. The girl who once filled that body had been broken a million times over. And who could blame her for cracking? She had grown up in a world that was out to get her, who had hated who she was born to be; she had traveled to a place far away from home and tried to find her niche in a world that she did not know; she was unloved by a mother who wanted her to be everything but who she was born as; she was pushed around by a boyfriend who was too busy looking ahead to appreciate who was standing right there with him; she was left without a mother when she finally had the love she so craved right at her finger tips; and, now, she was abandoned by the first boy she had ever truly loved. It was no surprise to Selina that this last straw had broken the camels back, and yet, she had wished that Kurumi would have held out just a tad longer. Because now that she was broken Selina was at a loss for what to say, what to do.

There was nothing that Selina could do that would make anything that had happened to Kurumi better. She could not take a bandage and cover up her wounds because eventually, when the bandages were gone, she would have a nasty scar to remind her of all of the pain. To lie would be the worst thing in the world to do at the moment. In no world could Selina tell Kurumi that everything was going to be alright, because it was not going to be alright. Something was fractured, something had ruptured and although things would heal there would always be the small scar as a reminder of what the world had put Kurumi through. And Selina was left to pick up the pieces. But she did not know how to start. There was no way she could fix this and merlin knew if she could take on all of Kurumi's pain to just take away her best friend's hurt she would, but that was not reality.

Selina wiggled herself over to Kurumi and wrapped her arms around her best friend so the girl would rest her head on Selina's shoulder. Perhaps she could not physical shield her from all of her pain, but she was going to damn well try. She was going to be there for Kurumi until all of her crying subsided and if it never did than she supposed she should get comfortable because she was not leaving her. So many people had already left Kurumi, left her broken and scarred and forever altered, but Selina was not going to do that. She was going to show Kurumi that some people stayed. That not everyone was going to leave her and hurt her beyond repair. Because that was what best friends... sisters did for one another. They took on some of the burden to lighten the load, they loved their sister more than anything else in the world, and they made sure that while the wounds healed they were there to protect the wounds from re-opening.

Then, as if a whisper, Selina said, "Kurumi Hollingberry, you listen to me right now. You are the strongest person I have ever met in my entire life. You are brilliant, passionate, and have the biggest heart on a person that I have ever seen. Sometimes you may think that when you do something wrong that you can never recover, but it is in THOSE moments that you become human. People make mistakes. And does right now hurt? Yes, it does. Will it ever really stop hurting? I won't lie to you, it won't. But you have to know that things will get better and you are the strongest person I know. If anyone can get through this it is you. I believe in you. And until you believe in yourself I am going to lay here with you and let you cry and scream and kick and do nothing. Because sometimes its okay to not be perfect." And Selina meant every word.

Kurumi didn't say anything, but her body went back to shaking like she was in the middle of winter instead of in the warmth of her bed. What Selina said to her was beautiful and put her heart at ease, but that feeling was buried under all the pain and guilt she felt right now.

Jonathan had cried. Something he never did. But he had cried. And it was all because of her. What she had done. What she was still doing. What she had been unable to stop.

She could still feel the warmth of his hand on her finger tips and it caused her body to shake even more. Had she done the right thing? She wanted to believe that she had, but seeing just how hurt he was. How much she had meant to him...it made her doubt herself for a moment. Until she remembered the reason behind it all. She hadn't trusted in him enough to not go to Lewis and she had shattered his trust in her. She couldn't live with herself knowing that he would constantly be on high alert every time he wasn't with her. He didn't deserve that. He deserved so much better than she could give him...and she wanted him to have that. Still....a part of her wished that she was that girl...because she had loved him. Still did. Probably always would.

You never forgot your first love...and Kurumi never wanted to forget Jonathan. Never.

Gripping on the necklace some more, Kurumi opened her mouth, whimpering once, and finally found her voice. "S-S-Selina....can you...can you talk to Lewis for me? Please?" she asked, no, begged. "I-I-I can't face him right now..."

Not even she was sure what that meant, but all she knew was her heart was broken in bits and was not ready to have the conversation with Lewis that needed to happen. She wasn't running away from him. She could never run away from Lewis. But she needed to run away from this pain, even if for a little while. Needed to let time work its magic and heal her...even if only a little.

Kurumi was quiet for quite some time after Selina had finished speaking. At the length of the pause, Selina was beginning to question if she had said the wrong thing. The wound was so fresh and new, earlier in the afternoon to be exact, that maybe she should not have said anything at all. Maybe she should have let Kurumi cry and she should have lay there silently holding her best friend until the crying subsided. Yet, she did not do that, she had spoken her mind and told her friend, honestly, her assessment of the situation. Now that she was thinking about it in the drawn out pause, though, she was starting to think she had said too much too soon. And yet, she did not regret what she had said and done moments earlier. Kurumi needed to know that people who cared about her were going to stand by her and help her on the road to recovery.

Selina could see over the summer when Kurumi's mother had passed away that she had suppressed a lot of her feelings about the passing. Kurumi had bounced back too quickly for her to be actually alright. Loosing someone who you love is an experience that changes you and besides small outbursts of sadness, Kurumi was virtually unchanged by the whole traumatic experience. But this break up with Jonathan had unhinged Kurumi and now all of her feelings were piling on top of her at one moment, suffocating her... or at least that was what Selina was assuming. So in her time of need, Selina was going to prove to her friend that she was there for her no matter what happened... and so everything she said was not laced with regret. She was glad she had said it all, she was just sad that Kurumi had gone through the experiences that made it necessary for Selina to say it.

While Selina became lost in her thoughts, Kurumi spoke up. The soft demeanor of her voice almost made Selina overlook it until she was snapped from her thoughts. She quickly perked up to listen to Kurumi's request and was a little taken aback by the nature of the request. She wanted Selina to talk to Lewis? The two had only spoken briefly a very few times in the past few months and Kurumi was electing Selina to talk to Lewis?

She did not even have to ask Kurumi what she wanted her to talk to him about, it was something that Selina already knew. But why did Kurumi need Selina to tell the boy that she needed time to recover? She knew right now was hard, but the conversation coming from Selina would not be as genuine as if it were coming from Kurumi. As she was about to protest she saw how distraught Kurumi looked clutching desperately to her necklace. The sight made Selina stop a moment.

Kurumi was her best friend- that was a fact. Best friends did whatever they could to help their best friend and if talking to Lewis in replacement of Kurumi helped Kurumi start to heal, then Selina would do it. She would not like it, but she would do it. Besides, Kurumi would bring emotions into the conversation and things could get ugly. Being the third party Selina could explain the way Kurumi was feeling to Lewis without getting too involved. But whatever way she looked at the situation, it seemed that every party was going to get hurt. Jonathan and Kurumi were already hurt.... now it was Selina's turn to be the bearer of heart break to a poor boy who, from what Kurumi had told Selina, cared so deeply for this girl it most likely hurt him to breath.

... how could she ruin a person by telling them what she knew she had to divulge? It didn't matter now... it was her task.

So she nodded at Kurumi and said, "What do you need me to tell him exactly?" Selina would try to explain as best as she could muster to Lewis, but this would not be easy. In fact, this was going to be one of the hardest things she had ever done.

Kurumi had been so selfish through this entire thing. Selfish for giving in to her feelings for Lewis knowing that Jonathan was still out there. Selfish for telling Jonathan that she loved him. Selfish for letting him say it back to her. Selfish for kissing him. Selfish for waiting to tell him. Selfish for everything...

And here she was again, being selfish and asking Selina to go to Lewis when she had promised him that she would meet him. She just...she couldn't do it. She couldn't do it right now when all she could think about was Jonathan. How much he had meant to her. Still meant to her. How much she had hurt him. How much she was hurt. Nothing good would come from it. So maybe it was a little selfish, asking Selina to partly fight a battle for her right now.

"T-T-Tell him....that I'm....I'm sorry..." she whimpered again, curling up into a tighter ball as she did. "...f-f-f-for not meeting him." Because there were so many reasons that a sorry from her could mean and she wanted to make sure that he knew which one it was. "I just... I can't right now Selina... I want to... but I can't.... not after.... after this.... not this soon..." Her body was back to shaking again, all sorts of pain washing over her. There was something else Lewis needed to know. Something that she had promised him she would let him know as soon as she did.

She just wished that it would come from her and not Selina, but Lewis needed to know.

"Tell him....that....that... that I broke up with...." but her voice caught on his name. She couldn't say it now, no matter how much she wanted to. Even just thinking his name caused her heart to ache. Throb. Break.

Kurumi continued to clutch the necklace, not knowing if she would ever be able to. Was that wrong? It had taken her a year to finally stop wearing the necklace that that other boy, who Kurumi refused to ever name again, had given her. So was it alright that she kept wearing this one? The one that came from the first boy that called her beautiful? The one from the first boy that said I love you to her and her to him? Most importantly...the one from the first boy that had meant something to her?

"Selina...I want to see him... I do...I just... I can't...." Hopefully her voice and the way her voice quivered was enough to convey the hidden meaning behind them. The weirdest part of all this was...Kurumi had yet to actually look at Selina. Even if she had....her eyes wouldn't have been focusing on anything. They would have looked empty.

For a moment, Selina forgot where she was and what was transpiring. As Kurumi started to outline for Selina the things that were imperative that she told Lewis, she almost cracked a joke about getting a pen to write down the particulars. Then , before she could verbalize her thoughts, she remembered where she was and what it was that she was doing there. This was not a joking moment. Her fear was that if she dare try to lighten the mood, Kurumi might shatter more. Her best friend was in a very sensitive place right now, which called Selina to be equally as sensitive at the current moment. And for Kurumi she would restrain herself from letting her usual quirky, funny personality seep through in the personal and breakable moment.

So as Kurumi spoke, Selina listened intently. She did not want to miss anything that Kurumi had said because she could tell just by the way she was speaking that every word was important and meant something between the pair of them. The more she spoke the more personal the subtext became and Selina started to feel uncomfortable. How could she deliver, in a sincere fashion, a message that was so personal to someone she did not really know? It was not her place to even be giving him the message, but she would do it for Kurumi. Did that make her a bad person? She was not sure, but she was going to do it regardless. A promise was a promise.

Then Kurumi paused once more. During this pause Selina was afraid that Kurumi had just shut down and turned off. That her feelings had over whelmed her and she would no longer respond to what Selina said. To check if Kurumi was okay, Selina's hand reached out to touch Kurumi's hand that was on her necklace. That would be the one place that Selina knew Kurumi would react, but she drew it away just as quickly when Kurumi responded that she could not see Lewis, not now.

The redhead sat up from the position where she was lying their entire conversation and sat up so she could pet Kurumi's hair. She shushed her friend softly and said, "It's okay... I understand. I'll speak to him. I'll let him know how much he means to you and how much you don't want to hurt him. I'll do what I can." For that was all she could do. There was no way that she could word what she needed to say in a clean fashion. No matter how she worded the news to Lewis, he was going to end up hurt. She did not need to see the future to see that.

The hardest thing in the world was to do was to find out that someone you cared about did not share your feelings. And Selina had to be the petty person who gave the news. She was going to need some strong pumpkin juice to get through that day.

"I'll tell him, Kurumi," she whispered, "I'll tell him."

Jezzabelle wasn't entirely certain how she had managed to make it into the girls dormitories but she knew that the safety she needed was behind those silly curtains that hung around her bed. She was so tuned out to the world she didn't even realize Boots following her right to the bed. She pulled the curtains down and the kitty close.

She didn't want to feel like this anymore. She had thought she was well past feeling anything like this but she did it to herself. She went to send the letters to her mother and father. She put herself in that situation and she caused her self to shake and felt herself drain of any energy she had. Boots started to purr and rubbed herself up against her face licking the tears that had fallen the whole way to this destination.

All the young lion could think was that she wanted it all to be taken back. Every last of it to go. She didn't want to be magical anymore. The realization she had made back in the owlery sunk in even more. The day she found out she was a witch was the day things started to go wrong. She wanted it all to go away, every last drop of her magic to just run out. And with that last thought she curled up in a tight ball next to her cat and tried to remain silent. Last thing she needed was to bother someone with her pity party.

Selina was not crying. Only weak girls and the occasional best friend cried, but that was not the way that Selina was hard wired. Ever since Selina was little she was raised along side of her ten older male cousins and her father, since her mother had chosen to hide away in her grief after Danny had died. Growing up in the midst of all boys the typical feminine airs that most girls adopted were not present in Selina's life; she was conditioned to Quidditch and food instead of dresses and tea. Along with all of her other lessons, the most important one that Selina had ever adopted was that crying was weak. It was easier to suck something up than to reveal a chink in the armor. So Selina was going to hide away up in the dorms while she did not cry. Because she did not want to let anyone see her not cry.

It was too embarrassing and painful to let anyone know that she was genuinely hurt by the way things had played out with her boyfriend. Or perhaps he was not her boyfriend anymore. She had not seen him in a few days, so she was not sure exactly what the state of their relationship was at the current moment. Besides, when it came to her romantic life or really any of Selina's personal life, Selina was very private. She did not air her dirty laundry so no doubt, if she left the dorms where she had retreated to earlier in the day after feeling particularly upset after her lunch she did not eat, people would ask why she was so down. She would rather keep the rejection to herself. It was painful enough that Selina knew it happened. To involve anyone else would be... well it would be bad.

So she would wait upstairs alone until she collected herself from not crying and then she would head down to Herbology.

Kurumi hadn't been nearly as much of a shell of herself as she had been the first two months of the term. Yes, there was still damage done and scars over heart that hadn't healed - and some that never would - but Kurumi was finally starting to move on and had even come to accept a tiny bit that Jonathan would just never look her way again so she should stop hoping that he would. Of course, Lewis had played a big part in this healing and had even been the one to help her abilities come back. But there was another person who could not be ignore, and that person had been a shell of herself the past few days which did not sit well with the sixth year at all.

Kurumi knew that when Selina's aura was all dark and gloomy that it would be hard for her to open it. It was hard when Selina was perfectly fine for her to open up and talk about her feelings, so Kurumi had been trying to figure out how best to approach her best friend and ask what was wrong. Selina wasn't Kurumi and Kurumi couldn't approach Selina in the exact same manner that the red head had approached her that day when she had wanted nothing more than to disappear under the sheets of her bed.

When Kurumi had seen Selina drag herself through the common room, Kurumi had closed her book and made her way up to their room where she found Selina...crying. Part of Kurumi wanted to say finally because she hated seeing the way her best friend always seemed to punish herself by holding her feelings up inside, but Kurumi knew better and instead simply walked over to her best friend, sat down next to her, and folded her hands on her lap. "You wanna talk about it?"

No mention of the tears, but gentle eye contact from the Gryffindor with violet eyes towards her best friend. Kurumi didn't even know what IT was, but it didn't matter. Her best friend was suffering and she couldn't just sit by and watch her suffer.

The redhead was sitting up straight on her bed with her feet hanging over the side as she cried did not cry. Every so often, when she felt it was time to try to pull herself together for the rest of the day, Selina would blow her nose inside her hankerchief and prepare to head back downstairs. But then she would remember was she wasn't crying and her emotions would stir themselves up again. Honestly, she was starting to get really sick of all of these emotions that kept hitting her like a wave every day since she had spoken to Gideon. She did not know why she was so affected by what he had said, what had transpired, and why she could not just move on like it was not a big deal. The problem was she kept harping on the issue because their conversation played on repeat in her mind every second of everyday. She had been through a million and seven different variations of the conversation. Each outcome in her head was much better than what had actually occurred. In her head, she saw a plethora of ways she could have avoided what had transpired, the problem was that she had not acted logically in that moment. Her emotions had taken control of her and she had ruined something that she held very dear to her heart.

So now she was dealing with the repercussions of her actions and she was holding onto a hankerchief and a pillow trying to get herself back in order. This was not like Selina, she did not like the girl who was sitting on the bed at that very moment. That girl was weak and could not handle what had happened to her in a way that involved any other solution than crying. Not that Selina was crying because she was not crying. Crying would mean that she was really, really hurt by what had happened and she was fine... she was fine.

The more she told herself that the more she hoped it would come true.

Then she heard the dorm door swing open and Selina sat up in a start trying to collect her person so whoever was in the room would not see her in disrepair. With the length of her arm she wiped away her tears, which were not even existent, and blew her nose quickly. Her lips hardened into a straight line and although her face was red from not crying she was certain if she kept a brave face the intruder would not notice her current state. That was until the bed squeaked and the person who entered the room spoke.

Kurumi. Selina evened out her voice and replied, "I'm fine, Kurumi. I'm just a little tired 'is all." She wiped her nose once more making sure that she did not look like a complete and utter mess. But when she finally found it in herself to look up at Kurumi the redhead's blue eyes crumpled a little.

Tayla entered the dormitory in a not-so-perfect mood. She hadn't been feeling so good since the term started and she didn't know why. Just being at Hogwarts and practicing spells and even doing homework usually made her happy. She hadn't even bothered to sign up for the Quidditch team this year.

Not aware whether there was anyone in the room or not, Tayla went straight to her bed. She took out her journal and began to write, hoping that would help her figure out whatever it was that made her feel so down lately.

Kurumi's expression, while still soft, hardened considerably when Selina spoke. Selina could say pretty much anything she wanted to to Kurumi, and she usually did. Even if the words hurt and Selina was a blunt as an ox, Kurumi never held it against her because she knew that what Selina was telling her was the truth - or at least what the redhead perceived to be the truth. Kurumi still felt that Selina was wrong about a few things she had said to her over the summer, things that Kurumi knew even more to be true now that she had felt pain, but that wasn't the point now. The POINT now was that Selina had no right in saying what she was right now.

Because she was lying.

That was the one thing Kurumi would not accept her best friend to tell her. Lies. Which is exactly what she was doing right now.

Furrowing her brow for a moment, Kurumi eyed Selina's cheeks and noticed the OBVIOUS stains that were there. THAT was not the face of someone that was fine, no matter how many times Selina denied it or tried to convince Kurumi otherwise. "Selina....I would be a terrible best friend if I didn't know when something was wrong...." she said softly, biting her lip. So, no, Selina. You were not fine and Kurumi could tell. "And I can't be your best friend if you don't let me." Kurumi wasn't saying that she wasn't or that she was going to stop, but friendship was a two way street and Selina knew that. Selina could comfort and be there for Kurumi all she wanted, but if Selina wouldn't let Kurumi return the affection, then there was something wrong. "You know....you can trust me, right?"

Because right now, Kurumi felt like Selina wasn't trusting Kurumi with her situation. Not trusting her to understand whatever she was going through. Not trusting her to do her duty as a best friend and a sister.

Ronnie walked into the dorm, feeling like a weight had been lifted off of her shoulders. There wasn't much work today, which must of been why she had that feeling. She smiled, feeling like jumping up and down and fist pumping the air. But of course, she didn't. She kept the exciment inside, she didn't want to disturb the other girls.

She flopped onto her bed, smiling to herself when she saw someone come in, not looking too happy. She frowned at sat up, watching as the girl sat on her bed and took out a journal. She hesitated before walking over and sitting next to the girl, making sure her steps on the way over were a bit loud so the girl knew she was coming.

"Hey, I couldn't help but notice...you look a little sad. Is everything okay?" she asked.

Why did Kurumi have to be a good best friend? At that moment, she did not want anyone to see her is disarray and so when Kurumi said that she would be a terrible best friend if she let Selina lie, the redhead almost told her to be a bad friend and let her lie. To tell Kurumi the truth about why she was hurting would be humiliating and would also really hurt Selina. Thinking about it was really painful, she could not even imagine what talking about it would feel like. Usually, verbalizing something solidified it. Honestly, part of Selina did not really want to except a hundred percent of what happened to be true. She was so ashamed in her and Gideon's conversation. She wished she had never said what she had said that day. All she did was cripple their relationship and made them take seven steps back when they had just recently taken four steps forward.

However, how could she deny Kurumi now? The Gryffindor Prefect was right about one thing- Selina could trust her. There were very few people that Selina genuinely trusted in her life. She was friends with a lot of people, got on well with hoards of people, but truly trusted people? That was hard to come by with Selina. And yet, Kurumi was one of those people, if not one of the ONLY people Selina really trusted.

She had to tell her. Not because she wanted to tell her, but because she owed it to Kurumi to be honest. There friendship was built on brutal honesty. The two had never hidden anything from each other and sometimes that caused some tension, but she could never say that they were not honest with one another. Kurumi and Selina were not best friends, they were sisters. It was not like Kurumi was going to judge Selina, well she might, all Kurumi was going to do was be there for Selina. Maybe offer her some consolation and some advice. Although, the redhead was partial to just some simple not crying. When she was not crying it numbed everything else in her system so she could not concentrate on what she had messed up.

Then she looked at Kurumi and let out a sigh, "I know I can trust you... its just," she sniffled trying to hold back not tears, "I really screwed up Kurumi. I messed up something really terribly." That was the understatement of the year, but that was where she could begin. Baby steps. Selina was really, really upset.

Tayla stared at her open journal and read the few lines she had written over and over.

Dear Diary,

I feel... I don't know...

She didn't know what else to write. So much for writing helping her figure things out...

Tayla sighed. She heard someone approach but didn't react to it much, still quite lost in her thoughts. It took a few moments before she realized someone was talking to her.

"Hmm?" she said a little absentmindedly as she looked up. "Oh...hello." Tayla gave the girl a small smile and closed her journal. She didn't know what to say, especially since Tayla didn't know the answer to the question either. "I...er...I'm fine. Just one of those stupid mood swings I guess..." Tayla gave a weak laugh and suddenly felt on the verge of crying. Yikes! She stopped herself as best as she could. The girl might think her crazy if she just burst into tears.

"I'm Tayla," she said finally then looked out the window. It was still bright and sunny. "I didn't think anyone would be inside this time of day..."

Kurumi sat very still on the bed almost afraid to move. It was as if Selina were niffler slowly emerging from its humble cave towards something shiny and one sudden movement would cause it to disappear back into the darkness. Kurumi didn't have anything shiny on her, minus the necklace that she still refused to take off, but she had something better and no it wasn't red velvet cookies. Kurumi was offering friendship and that was the most shiny thing Kurumi could give. Metaphorically speaking that is.

Kurumi sighed, almost out of frustration, when Selina sniffled but wouldn't let the tears fall. At least it was progress of some sort. Kurumi would take a sniffle over a forced poker face any day. Kurumi simply nodded when Selina said that she did trust her. At least the redhead had confirmed that to herself, that she trusted Kurumi which meant that if Kurumi was gentle enough Selina would tell her...eventually.

Kurumi scooted a little closer to her best friend and inhaled sharply when Selina said she had messed things up. Obviously, this resonated very strongly in the sixth year because no one could have messed something up as terribly as she had with Jonathan. Kurumi eyed Selina out of the corner of her eye for a moment and was hit with the realization that what she was feeling right now, shock and confusion, must have been what Selina had felt when Kurumi had told her about...well, about all that. Kurumi bit down hard on her bottom lip and folded her hands together a little tighter on her lap.

"What is it that you think you screwed up?" Kurumi asked. Selina had yet to prove to Kurumi that she had screwed anything up, so as far as this lioness was concerned, it was all in Selina's head.

The redhead watched Kurumi very carefully as her best friend tried to approach the conversation with caution. Selina appreciated that Kurumi was being mindful of her feelings and that she wanted Selina to open up to her in her own time, but the sterile and almost trepidatuous manner in which Kurumi was handling Selina made the Quidditch Captain feel like a mental patient. She was upset, yes, but she needed Kurumi right now, not some weird doctor who was going to treat her like she was a broken doll. She needed someone real or she did not want anyone at all. Kurumi was the best person to talk to obviously, but she needed Kurumi to not treat her like some frightened little animal. It made Selina feel like she was out of control of her emotions and the situation at present, which, although she was, she wanted to still feel somewhat in control.

However, when Kurumi inhaled deeply Selina did not leave that unnoticed. For a moment she almost wiped away her worries and needs to jump to Kurumi's aid. It was almost a reflect for her to ask if her best friend was alright. Ever since the Jonathan situation her best friend had been in a funk, but she had improved drastically since Selina had forced her to live again and Lewis had forced her to want to participate in life again. It was a tag team effort, yet every once in a while Kurumi still felt awful about what had happened and Selina was always there with a tissue and a hug. Maybe that was what the two of them should be dong right now. Selina could push away her problems for a moment to deal with Kurumi. Besides, it would give Selina an opening to avoid the conversation, to avoid the hurt from seeping into every fiber of her being until her entire body was doubled over and her body was racking with not tears.

But when Kurumi asked Selina what she thought she messed up all of the sudden Selina's thoughts flew right to what had transpired between herself and Gideon a few days earlier in the corridor. The more she thought about it the more she wanted to cry. Yes, she, Selina Arden Skylar, wanted to cry. She wanted to cry because when she had asked him that question in the corridor that day, even though she had not intended to let it slip out, she had meant every word of what she asked. A part of her needed to know what he would do if she told him she loved him, but another part of her wanted to see how he would react if she implied that she did love him. Love was tricky, love was terrible, and she wished it would go away. It only made everything hurt ten times worse. She now understood why Kurumi was so conflicted over the summer. It complicated everything.

"I-I" Selina began, "I asked Gideon what he would do if I told him I loved him and he basically rejected me." That was when the tears started to formulate in her eyes. The very tears that were running down her face minutes before Kurumi had showed up. When she blinked the first tear trickled down her face and it was hot and bothered. Her throat burned and she felt her chest struggle to fill with air. She was not crying, but she was on the way to crying. Right now she was just trying hard to not let her bottom lip quiver, but she was failing. Not only was it quivering but she had to bite down on it and cast her eyes to her lap to keep from a lot of tears escaping their rightful place....

Kurumi tucked her legs underneath her, sitting Indian style on the bed while she waited for Selina to answer her question. Whatever it was Selina had thought she had done couldn't possibly be as bad as the Quidditch Captain was making it seem like. When Selina did eventually speak Kurumi's eyes widened and she simply looked at her best friend with a look of shock plastered on her face. Kurumi was probably the last person Selina should come to about this sort of topic. Love. Kurumi was afraid of the word now. The concept. Falling into it.

Kurumi chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, lost in her own thoughts, when she saw the tears FINALLY start to form in her best friend's eyes and then Kurumi was able to set her own agenda aside completely and throw her arms around her best friend to just hug her tight. Kurumi threw her previous notions of how to act out the window and went with what SHE would want in this situation. What Selina had done for her when she had been at her worst. And that was simply hugging her best friend tightly to let her know that she was here and she wasn't going anywhere. "Selina...sometimes the brave this IS to cry..." she whispered. Sometimes the foolish and cowardly thing was to keep them all in, but Kurumi didn't vocalize that.

Hugging her friend just a little tighter, but not tight enough to be constricting, Kurumi thought over what Selina had just said and, as painful as the memories were, Kurumi had no choice but to reflect on her own experience when it came to this. When she had told Jonathan that she...loved him...she had gone the round about way of doing it. Bringing French bread into the picture and making a right mess out of it. Yet, despite that, once Jonathan had known what she had been wanting to say, what she WAS saying, he hadn't hesitated. Not for a second. He had come right out with those three words, I love you, and said them right back to her. He had known. Put thought into the concept. Had an answer ready.

For Selina, who ironically seemed to be the same as herself when it came to expressing these sort of emotions, it hadn't been that way. Gideon had...rejected her feelings. He had rejected her best friend and that thought made Kurumi's eyes narrow.

But now was not that time to be rash or to tell Selina that she could do better and find someone who would return those feelings. Not when her best friend was crying over the guy. "Selina....maybe he...maybe he just isn't ready for that sort of relationship..." Kurumi needed more details, but she didn't want to push Selina to give them to her. Selina hadn't pushed Kurumi back then, so she wasn't going to do that now.

Her eyes remained downcast so she would not have to face Kurumi's purple eyes.* The last thing that Selina wanted was a pity party for the mess that she had created in her relationship, but she was hurt at the moment.* All she wanted to do was curl up in a ball somewhere and hide herself from everyone who could see her in pain.* It was pain like she had never experienced before and it was a weakness that she could not afford to allow people to see in her.* What would people say and think if they say Selina crying?* She had spent so much time and effort pretending that she was stronger than she really was deep down.* Underneath her tough exterior and witty attitude she was insecure and easily broken and yet, to reveal that would mean that some fascade and impression she had spent so much time perfecting would be shattered.* And Selina did not want it to crumple and break down.* But she did not know if she did not want her fascade to shatter because she was afraid of what people would think or if she did not want it to shatter because it was ten times harder to pull ones self together than to it was to fall apart.* She did not want to fall apart.

She could feel her resolve crumple when Kurumi spoke. The brave thing could not logically be to cry. Crying meant falling apart, it meant accepting that things had transpired the way that they had, it meant that she had to deal with her problems. In private when she was crying it was more bearable because it was private. Doing such in front of Kurumi meant that she was solidifying her fate. It meant that she was not strong enough to deal with rejection. It meant that she was breakable and the pain was real.

Yet, she could not help but look up at Kurumi when the girl spoke to her. She saw Kurumi looking at her softly and speaking to her gently like a mother would a child. The very hard exterior of Selina cracked slowly as she felt her breath uneven as she tried to suppress her tears from escaping the flood gates. One single tear had slipped through her protection, but then, in a moment of vulnerability, Selina cried. Her chest convulsed as the tears fell and her face grew warm with hot tears.

As she began to cry she felt Kurumi wrap her arms around Selina in a tight hug. The redhead rested her head on Kurumi's chest. She wanted to bury away, push all of her feelings back inside, but it was pouring out of her like a slashed tire. Her emotions flew out a they pleased and she could not repress them anymore.

Then she heard Kurumi try to make a rational assessment of what Selina had relayed to her. It was warm words that were said in a sweet nature and undoubtably in good mind, but Selina could not take them in as she wanted to. What had happened between her and her boyfriend was her fault. She had asked the question and she had caused the problem.

"Maybe he just doesn't want that kind I relationship with me," she said with pauses in her speech with her heavy crying induced breathing, "I ruined everything and I should have just kept it to myself."

She wished she had.

When Selina didn't just open the flood gates right away, Kurumi was both frustrated and disappointed. She knew how Selina felt about crying, about herself crying that is. That it was a sign of weakness and whatnot, but wasn't Selina being a bit of a hypocrite for thinking that after what she had said to Kurumi back in September? They both knew that Kurumi cried enough tears for the two of them seeing as she was an emotional person who literally wore her feelings in her hair, but Selina had also called Kurumi brave. So, yes, brave people DID cry Selina Skylar and running from the tears was the cowardly thing to do.

At least, that is something her father had told her after her mother had died and her and her brothers had tried to shut those feeling away somewhere. It was one of the first times she had seen her father cry come to think of it.

When Selina DID let go and cry, Kurumi patted her best friend's back encouragingly to just let it all out. Kurumi wouldn't say anything, no hushing, no anything. She was just going to let her best friend cry because that is what she had wanted when she was in a dark place. She just wanted someone to be there to take her tears while they cascaded down her face like waterfalls. Kurumi rubbed Selina's back making random patterns with her palm as she did to just let her know that the sixth year was here and she wasn't going anywhere.

Selina's next words made Kurumi inhale sharply, but she bit her lip to prevent herself from making a noise. Kurumi was not the person to come to about relationship advice when she had managed to ruin the first one where the word love had been used. "First of all, Selina," she said softly as she began to speak from her own personal experience. "You should never, EVER, feel regret for something you feel. Understand?" Kurumi may have been a bit firm with this, but she was being serious. Kurumi had told Jonathan that she loved him, and now he believed that to be a lie because of everything that had happened. "Never be sorry for your feelings. Never. They are real to you and that is what matters." Not that some guy decided that your feelings were not worth their time or that he wasn't ready for them.

Kurumi rested her head on Selina's for a moment, taking in the other things Selina had said to her and she sighed. "Selina...did he outright say that?" she asked. Kurumi needed more details, but again, she wasn't going to force her best friend to dive further down the rabbit hole unless she was ready.

And if he did....Kurumi knew where Selina kept her Beater's bat.

Through the midst of her tears, Selina had to admit that Kurumi's comfort did feel really nice. It did not stop her out pour of emotions, but it did give her something attainable to hold onto at that moment. Kurumi was there and she was real and she was trying to help her. Although, Selina did not really want to be helped at the moment it was a comfort to know that someone was there for her giving her comfort regardless. And she did not feel like Kurumi was forcing herself onto Selina with overbearing condolence. It was nice for Selina that she could just cry and not feel like she needed to be an active participant in Kurumi's helpful hug. Kurumi was not demanding anything of her. That was why she was her best friend.

Sometimes life went by really fast, in the blink of an eye, and Selina was busy doing so much. Classes took up so much of her time, Quidditch dominated her weekends, and food was a full time job. It was easy to loose track of all of the things in her life that meant something more than just her daily check in and check out jobs. But Kurumi was always there... always being a silent supporter and it was times like this, the times when Kurumi was helping Selina, that she realized how much Selina needed her best friend. Without Kurumi in her life Selina would have turned out a very differently. The Asian prefect sitting next to her was a beam of support in Selina's life that she usually never noticed with life rushing by so fast. In that moment, though, Selina was so glad that Kurumi was there for her and was the only person who could help her through all of her emotions.

Just as she was starting to get accustomed to the random patterns of comfort that Kurumi was tracing into her back, she heard her best friend speak. The tone did not match at all the way that Kurumi was acting toward Selina. It was harsh and fierce, but did not lack compassion. She was so taken aback by the tone that she sat up to look at Kurumi. Her best friend was being very serious and Selina rarely saw her take on this role, so it was a little jarring for her. Like a child being scolded by her mother, Selina tucked a loose strand of red hair behind her ear and looked down at her lap. As Kurumi spoke, Selina tried to digest what her best friend was saying. It was not a complete and coherent thought in her head when Kurumi asked if she understood, but she felt as if she should nod anyway to appease her best friend. What she said did not completely sink in, but she was starting to understand what her best friend was getting at. However, in the recesses of pain it was hard to figure what was really true and what Selina wanted to believe. And it was easier for her to believe that she had done something wrong than to accept that her feelings were warranted. If she believed that it was okay to feel what she felt than it meant that she had NO chance of ever shaking her feelings. And if she could not shake these feelings than it meant that she could never mend her broken relationship. That was all she really wanted to do.

But than she said something that really resonated with Selina. It hit her like a shooting arrow and shook her entire core- did he outright say that? That question bounced around her brain for a while as she shifted through their conversation in her memory. She could not remember exactly if he had or had not said that outright to her. Then she remembered that he had told her that he wasn't sure how he felt, but it didn't mean that he wouldn't feel that way in the future.

That was saying it outright. It beat around the bush a little bit, but it was a clear and definite answer to her question. He did not have an answer for her except that maybe he could feel that way.

The sting of the memory was stronger than it had ever been before because Kurumi had made her evaluate his words instead of her own. Selina had been searching these past few days for what SHE had done wrong, which was a lot. Now that she was looking at his words she saw that it wasn't that she had done something wrong it was just that he did not recooperate her feelings. All along she had known he had felt that way somewhere in her subconscious, but she had been rationalizing it like he had just rejected her question, dismissed her for the time being. Under closer examination she saw that he really did not feel that way about her at ALL. A part of her wanted to hope that he was just at a loss of what to say or that she had surprised him. Now she saw none of the above was true. He just didn't love her.

And that really hurt. More than she thought it would have...

"Yeah," she said nodding her head with her eyes closed as hot tears streamed down her face, "Yes, he did." He didn't want to love her like she had grown to love him. He did not think of their relationship in the same way that she did. She had become the fool by asking... she was foolish to even say it in the first place.

Without even asking Kurumi for permission, Selina slunk away from her best friend and lay down in a ball on her bed. When Kurumi had done this every time that she was upset it seemed to make things better for her best friend. Selina thought she'd test out the theory to see if it helped numb the pain. It didn't... it just made her more acutely aware of the fact that she was hurt. But in her small little ball she could wallow in her pain without exposing others to it.

Kurumi shifted her position on Selina's bed slightly when her best friend had suddenly lifted her head - no doubt in response to something Kurumi had said. Her eyes stayed on Selina, not wavering or even blinking for several moments as Selina seemed to be trying to compute in her mind what advice if you could really call it that Kurumi had just given. Kurumi was not entirely convinced that Selina understood what she had just said, so just to be sure Kurumi took one last deep breath before speaking again. "Feeling regret, in a situation like this, means that you regret being real." So, Selina shouldn't be regretting anything. Disappointment, that was allowed. That was normal. That was expected. Regret. That was Selina running away from herself and Kurumi would not have any of that. "I know you, Selina. I know you are real."

For what it was worth.

Selina's next words, while she was sure also was another deep stab into the redhead's heart, also stabbed Kurumi and she felt her own chest become constricted. Selina had been in Kurumi's heart longer than anyone else at Hogwarts, so when her best friend felt pain it was almost as though she could feel it as well. If what she felt right now was any indication of what Selina felt, then Kurumi knew a few things. Kurumi couldn't speak for him. She didn't know Gideon like she knew Selina and the two never really hung out just the two of them. Selina had always been present and had been sort of the link between the two. But she could for Selina, a little. One, she knew that Selina was heartbroken. Two, that the feelings she had confessed were real. Three, that her best friend deserved someone who would return those. Four, Selina was still holding out that it was Gideon. Five, that Kurumi wanted to hex Gideon's face off for rejecting her best friend.

Biting her own lip now, Kurumi removed her arms from around Selina to give her some more breathing room and folded her hands in her lap. "So...what do you want to do about it, Selina?" Selina had a few options here, but Kurumi was not going to suggest anything. This was for Selina to decide, not her, even if Kurumi had her own opinion on the matter.