Truth or bright floral shorts? on Aladren Commons

Louis Valois and Emilia-Louise Scott

April 29, 2016 11:28 AM

Truth or bright floral shorts? by Louis Valois and Emilia-Louise Scott

Emmy-Lou sat in the common room at the end of the school day. Tomorrow was the weekend so she had no intentions of going to bed anytime soon. As usual she could be found curled up on the end of one sofa with her nose in a book, contentedly blocking out the noise of her housemates. That was until a boy clad in floral pyjama shorts of pink and turquoise plonked himself down beside her in a dramatic manner.

“So,” he tore the book from her hands and flung it across to the other end of the sofa out of her reach. “Tell me all your secrets.”

“Louis!” Emmy exclaimed, taken by surprise and then allowing herself a moment to observe the unexpected brightness of the shorts. She wasn't overly impressed by the discarding of the book but her friend’s fashion sense mostly made up for it.

“Look, I've gone without my best friend and confidente the entire summer. I demand lots of juicy gossip and some sympathy regarding mes parents,” he continued. He may or may not have been pouting.

Emmy-Lou heaved a sigh in pretence that she was making great efforts for him to give up her quiet reading time for a gossip session with Louis but in reality there was little she would rather do. “OK,” she readjusted her position, turning around to face him properly and crossing her legs as she did so with a slight lean forward that reflected her keenness to get down to business. “Truth or dare?”

“Dare.” Louis sat there expectantly. This was exactly what he needed after a summer full of stress and confrontations with his parents. The often serious-seeming boy needed a close friend who could make him relax and be silly, and he’d found Emmy to be perfectly suited to the role.

“Ooh,” Emmy raised her eyebrows at his choice. “I’m usually good at coming up with dares,” she said boastfully, “but seeing as you've been strutting around the Aladren corridor in those shorts out of pure choice, I’d say I need to step it up a bit.”

Louis frowned at her. “I don’t strut,” he objected. Looking down at his shorts, he shrugged. “I thought they’re pretty cool? I nicked them at a fashion shoot in Milan last month.”

“Of course you strut. You’re Louis Valois, you were born to strut,” Emmy told him. “And as for the shorts - they’re totally gorgeous.”

Louis pretended to blush in embarrassment at the compliment. “And the dare?” he prompted.

“Hmm...” said Emmy slowly, although she actually already had a fully formulated dare in mind. “OK, this you kinda have to do later when you go up to your dorm so I’m trusting you to actually do it… Basically every time you make eye contact with Dustin, you have to wink at him.” She was quite pleased with the dare, which she thought would work all the better seeing as Louis was wearing those floral shorts.

Louis considered. No doubt this dare would end with Dustin questioning either his sanity or his sexuality, but he could take it. He’d never backed down from a dare yet. “You can trust me,” he replied. “Is an unbreakable vow required or do you have faith in my word of honour?”

Emmy laughed. “No, I trust you. Knowing you you’ll probably enjoy it more than I do when you inform me of his reaction.” Dustin seemed like the perfect victim for the dare, although technically Louis was meant to be the victim.

Louis grinned. It would be amusing to see how his roommate reacted to the winks. “So, Emilia-Louise Scott. Truth or dare?”

“Truth,” said Emmy. “Just to mix it up a bit.” She knew she might live to regret making such a choice but what did she really have to hide from Louis?

Louis’ eyes gleamed in a slightly evil form of anticipation. “Emmy. Emmy, Emmy, Emmy. The most obvious question that springs to mind is this: why the fixation on Dustin Newell?”

Emmy went pink. In reality she had probably actually wanted Louis to ask this kind of question so she could blurt everything out but this was kind of her first Sonora crush (discounting Professor Pye of course) and she was totally prepared to milk it. “How did you guess?” she exclaimed after a brief pause, her hands flying up to her hot cheeks, although Louis hadn't officially guessed anything.

Louis raised his eyebrows, having unexpectedly struck gold. He always liked to hear the juicy details of Emmy’s crushes (learning about Professor Pye had been hilarious - he hadn't let it go for weeks). Dustin, however, was not a crush he would have guessed. “But why?” Louis asked. “Is it his superior intellect? His devastatingly handsome looks? Or his generally grumpy demeanour?”

“Don’t tease me, Louis,” Emmy pursed her lips but she couldn't bring herself to be overly serious, no matter how good an actress she thought she was. “And Dustin isn't grumpy! He’s just… mysterious…”

He couldn't quite conceal his confusion, but Louis nodded and filed the information away for later use. “So, you like them mysterious and pureblooded?”

Emmy frowned, not liking to be reminded that her crush was a society pureblood. She’d always made an extra effort to like the muggles but here she was, her best friend and her crush both purebloods and her latest sworn enemy a muggleborn. Perhaps it was time for the conversation to take a turn and for her own questions to be answered. “So what about you? Who do you fancy? Anyone you might want to take to the ball?”

Louis opened his mouth to deny any form of attraction and then paused. This was only Emmy, and besides he had enough blackmail information on her to protect himself if necessary. Ducking his head briefly, he looked back up at Emmy. “Ingrid’s not bad,” he admitted, the sentence quite a contrast to his usual over-exaggerated declarations.

Emmy’s jaw dropped. Why had she never thought of this match? “Oh my gosh I love it! You’re a genius!”

Louis shrugged. To be honest he hadn't had that much interaction with Ingrid in the two years he’d been at Sonora so far. However, there was no denying that she was pretty, and besides she seemed to be more fun and carefree than most pureblood girls he’d met. He wouldn’t say he had an absolute crush on her; however he’d definitely like to get to know her better.

“What do you mean, genius?” he asked, suddenly becoming quite concerned by Emmy’s enthusiasm. “You don’t need to interfere - I’m quite capable of talking to girls on my own!”

“Oh yes I do!” Emmy exclaimed. The idea of Louis ever having a girlfriend seemed weird because she was his best girl friend and they’d almost be a replacement (not that Emmy would ever want to date Louis herself - the idea seemed close to incest!). But on the other hand Ingrid was awesome and she could totally see them making the cutest couple ever. “What’s the point of having friends if you can’t interfere with their love lives?”

Louis grimaced, and briefly rethought his friendship with Emmy. However, despite her annoying tendencies, she knew exactly how to make him forget his problems and was always a great source of fun. In a complete turnabout from his stance of a second ago, he suddenly gave her a spontaneous hug.

“You’re my best friend, you know?” he muttered into the shoulder of her top.

Emmy wasn't sure what she’d done to provoke this sudden reaction from Louis but she appreciated the sentiment anyway, even if the unexpectedness of it led to her awkwardly trying to free her arms so she could return the affection or at the very least give him an appreciative pat on the back.

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