Over the next few days, Evelyn found that no matter what the four of them were doing, no matter where they were, she could not keep her eyes (or her mind) off how happy Caiti and Marlowe appeared. Marlowe was touching Caiti in some way at all times. He had an easy arm around her shoulders or a hand on her knee or they had their fingers laced together or she was curled up with her head on his shoulder or he was playing with the ends of her hair.

They smiled a lot. They laughed just as often.

Evelyn tried to participate in the conversations, tried to concentrate on the board games they pulled out sitting on the floor around the coffee table in the O'Connell's living room, but she felt so distant from it all.

The more she watched them, the more it didn't make sense.

When people graduated, when one half of a couple was left behind, they said lots of nice things about making it work, but things always fizzled out. That was how it was supposed to be. That was how it was in books and movies and with people she knew. That was how it was with other couples from Hogwarts she had known. But Caiti and Marlowe seemed closer than ever. They seemed to be on exactly the same page.

She and Sean were the ones that should have worked. It should have been so easy to keep their bond as strong as it always had been. They lived together. They saw each other every day, just as they always had. But the more time Evelyn spent with Sean, the more separate she felt from him.

She tried to sit close to Sean like she would have done so naturally just a year ago. She tried to look at him as often as Caiti looked at Marlowe. She tried to mirror the way Caiti and Marlowe behaved around each other so maybe she could cover up the fact that every interaction between her and Sean was stilted and awkward.

But Caiti and Marlowe weren't stupid. They caught on.

On the day before Christmas Eve, they had all been sitting in front of the fireplace on the glassed in porch, just talking and looking out at the snow falling gently in the wooded backyard of the house, but Caiti and Marlowe had gotten up a few minutes before on the pretense of picking out their third Christmas cookie of the day.

With the two of them out of the room, the awkwardness that had swallowed up every conversation she'd had with Sean in the last month stifled her. Evelyn waited as long as she could, but when they still weren't back, bringing with them the noise and smiles and ideas, she said, "I'm going to get a glass of water. Do you want anything?"

Sean shook his head. Evelyn pushed herself off the ground, went in through the sliding door and headed towards the kitchen. She could hear Caiti's voice as she approached, much more serious than anything she'd heard her say in the last three days combined.

"You've noticed it, too, right?" she was asking. "She just seems sad."

"Yeah," Marlowe agreed. "Yeah, I've been thinking that for a while. Something's not good there."

"I'm really worried about her."

Evelyn's eyes started to well up. She could no more walk into that kitchen than she could walk right back out to the porch with no water in her hand.

She took one step further, close enough to see into the kitchen, and saw Marlowe wrap Caiti into a tight hug. They rotated back and forth and he said, "I'm so glad we're okay even though we don't get to see each other much. I need you."

And at that, Evelyn had to get out of there. She backed up, through the living room, past the enormous Christmas tree, down the hall, past Sean's room — she couldn't bring herself to hide out in there again — and into Caiti's room because she didn't know where else to go. She sank down on the floor where she'd be hidden behind the bed if anyone looked in, tucked her knees up, and tried so, so hard not to cry because if she cried, it wouldn't matter how long she waited to go back out. They would all know. She would not be able to cover it up. If she started crying now, it would be a streaming, sniffling, ugly mess kind of crying that went on and on and on because she had been holding it in for so long.

She tried not to think about it. She was going home for the next three days and wouldn't see him at all. She would have a break from the tiptoeing around. Maybe after the holidays, things would look different.

She squeezed her eyes shut, but it didn't help. All she could see behind her eyelids was the way Marlowe had hugged Caiti in the kitchen just now. How it had looked so safe.

There was a knock at the door and Caiti poked her head in. She must have seen Evelyn from the kitchen, watched her walk in here. "Ev?" she asked.

"I'm down here," said Evelyn. She couldn't hide the thickness in her voice. She hadn't started to cry yet, but she was close.

Caiti shut the door quietly and came to sit on the floor across from her. "Hey," she said.

Evelyn couldn't say anything.

"Did you hear Marlowe and I talking?"

Evelyn nodded.

Caiti took a deep breath. "We're worried about you," she said. "Both of us. You don't seem like yourself."

Still, Evelyn couldn't talk. If she talked, she would cry, and if she started to cry, she would never stop. She would never, ever be able to stop.

"Are you okay?" she asked, and Evelyn knew she didn't just mean right now, she meant in general. Evelyn was not okay. She was not okay at all. She felt small and humiliated and so, so sad.

"Is it Sean?" Caiti asked.

Evelyn gave a small nod and a tear slipped out. She squeezed her eyes shut to try to stop the rest that were threatening to spill over. She felt shaky. She hadn't told anyone how she'd been feeling. Not her parents. Not Margaret. Not even Sean.

"Are you fighting?"

Evelyn shook her head. A part of her wished they were fighting. Fighting would've shown that he still cared somehow. Caiti and Marlowe had had a horrible fight the year before that would never have happened if they hadn't both cared so much. Everything with Sean was apathetic.

"Can I ask what's going on? You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to."

Evelyn opened her mouth. She didn't know where to begin. It had been going on so long. Finally, she shook her head and whispered, "We aren't friends anymore. I barely know him."

As soon as the words came out, the tears followed. Evelyn tried to blink them away but they were coming too fast, so fast she couldn't see straight anymore. Caiti was a blur in front of her.

"I could kill him," Caiti said in a low voice, and then she scooted closer and pulled Evelyn into a tight hug.

It was a long time before Evelyn could talk again. "Please don't say anything to him," she said shakily.

Caiti didn't make any promises. Instead, she asked, "What's been going on?"

Evelyn sat back against the wall, head tipped back. "We don't talk," she said. Her voice sounded blank and distant, even to herself. "We don't do anything together. He barely touches me and when he does it's like it's part of a script. He stays at work late every night and works all weekend and every time I ask him to do something he says he has too much work to do. And then he'll have a moment where I think I see him again and I start to get my hopes up that we can fix it, but then he goes right back to ignoring me and getting short when I try to talk to him and honestly I've just stopped trying because it makes me feel so, so stupid to keep having these one-sided conversations. I just don't know what I did. I don't know what happened. He's never been like this before. But he hates me now. He hates me. Every time I say anything to him, you can just see it."

"He doesn't hate you," said Caiti very quietly. "I know that much." She leaned back against the bed and frowned at the baseboards opposite her.

"He's such a fucking idiot," Caiti whispered. "My god. Took him seven years to finally ask you out and now he's screwing it up already."

"Please don't say anything to him," Evelyn said again. "I need to figure out how to fix it on my own."

"Have you told him how you feel?"

"Sort of." This was a lie, but telling Sean she felt hurt and lonely was the obvious thing to do and the fact she hadn't done it made her sound even more stupid than she already felt. She couldn't explain to Caiti that she was terrified to bring it up to Sean. He would just snap at her about how he was busy with work, say she was being needy. Or more likely, he would brush her off altogether. He wouldn't really listen.

"You need to tell him, Ev. Sean's both incredibly smart and incredibly stupid. He might not realize what he's doing to you. He might just be so wrapped up in himself he's not seeing that you're hurt."

Again, Evelyn knew she was partly right, but she also knew that Caiti hadn't seen the whole of it. She was seeing Sean at his current best, Sean when he was acting the part of "boyfriend" for the benefit of people who knew them.

Evelyn was pretty sure that Sean did know what he was doing. She didn't think he had gone as far as to start neglecting her on purpose, but she was pretty sure he had realized that Evelyn was hurt by how he'd been treating her and that he'd kept on doing it anyway.

But she couldn't say this to Caiti. Sean was her brother. Instead, she nodded.

"You need to tell him how you feel. And then you need to make him date you," Caiti said decisively. "You know Sean's thick. He didn't even realize you liked him back for like three years. You've got to make him put his work away and spend time with you. Don't make it an option. Don't ask. Make him realize he's missed you."

Again, Evelyn just nodded.

Maybe she would try it. She didn't think it would work, but maybe she would try it anyway.

—-

Sean turned the lamp on before he turned out the overhead light. Evelyn was already in bed, but she was sitting up, legs crossed under the covers. She looked down at her lap.

"Sean?" she asked when he'd started to crawl under the covers, too. "Can I talk to you about something?"

Her heart was pounding very hard and very fast. She felt like it was the only thing she could hear.

"Yeah," said Sean, but Evelyn heard it muffled under the amplified sound of her own heartbeat shooting up into her ears.

"Do you think we're okay?" she asked.

"What do you mean?"

She shouldn't have started this way. She should have started with what she thought, let him give his perspective later.

This was going all wrong already.

"Like...." Evelyn started to say, but then she didn't know how to finish. "Never mind." She laid down on her side facing away from him. She couldn't do it. She was too afraid.

Sean stayed sitting up at first, but then the lamp flicked out and she felt the mattress move as he settled down. Then, unexpectedly, his hand was in her hair, smoothing it down, and her heart was pounding again, because maybe they could fix it without having this conversation at all. Maybe he would lay down pressed up against her and he would put his arm over and she could hold onto his hand tight and then tomorrow they would wake up still touching and she could leave to go to her parents' house for Christmas with a little bit of hope that Sean didn't completely hate her. She would maybe be able to answer questions about him without breaking down in front of her entire extended family.

And then he took his hand away and went still and quiet. He didn't ask her again what she'd meant.

That little moment of Sean acting like Sean was gone already, and she felt even worse than she had before.

—-

Marlowe was absolutely not supposed to have stayed at the O'Connell's house. He had said a very formal and polite goodbye to her parents at the door, disapparated to go "home" and ended up accidentally in Caiti's bedroom.

Caiti spent about ten minutes in the bathroom across the hall and he could hear the sink turning on and off as she brushed her teeth and took off her makeup.

He heard her saying goodnight to her parents out in the living room and then the doorknob turned and she slipped quietly inside.

Without wasting any time, Marlowe got up from his perch at the end of her bed and kissed her hard. They'd spent so much time together the last few days, but so little of it unsupervised and alone.

"Finally," he whispered. Her eyes were bright and it made him feel all warm inside.

"Let me change quickly," she said. She sounded nervous. She had never done this before and that was not lost on Marlowe. She turned away from him as she pulled off her sweater and traded it for an old t-shirt. She took her bra off through the sleeves, but even that little glimpse of her back made Marlowe's stomach jump.

He stepped out of his jeans and unbuttoned his collared shirt so he could sleep in his boxers and t-shirt and then they stood facing each other again. Both of them hesitated. There was something about tonight that felt different.

They had spent many nights together over the summer, one night while they'd still been at Hogwarts, but it had always been a planned out thing. Caiti came to his house already dressed for bed, crawled in beside him and they curled up and went right to sleep so he could get up for work the following morning.

Tonight though, it was a holiday. There was no practice the next morning, no match. The full moon had been the night before and he should have felt weak and shaky, but for some reason (a reason probably named Caiti), he didn't. He felt like himself. Sore and a little achy, but himself.

When Caiti still hadn't moved, Marlowe took a seat on the bed and whispered, "Come're."

Caiti stepped over to the bed, close to him. He put his hands on her waist and pulled her in, but it was Caiti who leaned in first to kiss him. Her right hand wrapped around the side of his neck, thumb reaching up to his cheek, and then she climbed up, wrapped both legs around him, and her other hand found its way to his hair. Shivers ran up his spine from her touch.

He kissed her and kissed her until Caiti pulled back and whispered, "Oh my god. I need to breathe."

Marlowe couldn't take his eyes off her. Even in the almost total darkness, he could see her brown eyes sparkling. Marlowe loved that she wasn't a blue-eyed blonde. She was different. Her hair was down, loopy curls spilling around her shoulders, and she looked older suddenly, more grown-up than she had this time last year.

"You," he said, "are exquisite, Caitlyn O'Connell."

She let out a little nervous laugh and then she tightened both her arms and her legs around him, tucking her face down into the crook of his neck.

"I really, really love you," she said.

Her breath tickled his skin when she spoke. Marlowe kissed her hair and shut his eyes. He wanted to memorize this feeling, every bit of her curved around him, holding on tight. "I love you, too," he said.

Then, ignoring the dull ache of his joints and muscles, he lifted Caiti off his lap and laid her down on the bed. He kissed the crook of her neck and shoulder first, then her throat, her jaw, and finally back to her mouth. Her arms were around him again, pulling him close to her.

Her hand was under his shirt, running up his side. Then it was twisting through his hair, her fingernails grazing the back of his neck on their way into his curls. Her mouth was on his and her back was arching up into him and he could feel her heart beating fast.

Marlowe's head was like a blank. For the first time in so many months, there were no thoughts running through his brain other than Caiti, Caiti, Caiti.

By the time they finally relaxed, Marlowe's entire body was buzzing with her. He rolled onto his back, pulling her with him. She laid her head on his chest, twisted her legs up with his, and put her hand on his chest.

They were quiet while they caught their breath. Marlowe worked her t-shirt up to her shoulder blades and drew patterns on her back. Her breaths came in and out steady and deliberate.

"You talked to Evelyn earlier, right?" Marlowe asked after they had been silent a long while.

"Yeah," Caiti said softly. "She's really not okay."

"Sean's been weird lately," said Marlowe, shifting to readjust his arm underneath her. His fingers went back to tracing up her spine. "I've barely seen him since the summer. Honestly, I've seen you more than I've seen him and I only see you for an hour a month. But I guess I didn't realize he was weird with her, too. They've always been so solid."

"She said they don't talk," Caiti said. "Or really do anything together. She said he just works all the time."

Marlowe was quiet while he thought about this.

"You know, he hasn't talked about work once since you've been home," said Marlowe. "Never even mentions it."

"Yeah," said Caiti. Her hand was pressed flat up against his chest, but she moved it now, trailing her fingers along his collarbone.

"Evelyn said they aren't friends anymore." Caiti took a deep breath and added, "I hope that never happens to us."

"Not possible," said Marlowe. "You're my best friend. That doesn't just stop. That's a lifetime commitment. You're stuck with me."

"Thank god," said Caiti. She lifted herself up and kissed him again, deep and slow.

Marlowe smiled when they broke apart.

They looked at each other for a long time. It was crazy how not awkward it felt. There was no one else he could maintain eye contact with like this.

"I know it's Christmas Eve tomorrow, but will you come over whenever your family stuff is done?" he asked. "Just to sleep."

Caiti pressed her lips together to keep her smile under control. "Yeah," she said, and she laid back down on his chest again.