This isn't what it looks like [[Chris]]

Lindsey wasn’t in the best moods. She was feeling guilty, or at least she thought it was guilt, never having experienced this feeling before. It was hard, it made her want to tell the truth and cry all at the same time. She was stronger than this though, she knew it. Her mother was right, feelings were dangerous. They made you do or consider stupid things like she was now. She needed to get away from the castle and talk to someone. Her best friend would have been nice, but Aria was busy. Instead she walked through the forest.

She couldn’t be in the castle anymore. She was getting dangerously close to doing something stupid. She pulled at her hair releasing it from its braid and letting it fall softly around her shoulders. She walked, her feet crunching the leaves beneath her. She wasn’t paying attention to where she was going. She didn’t care about being safe. Her own safety was at the back of her mind. Maybe if something happened to her this feeling would go away. She walked until she found herself in a small clearing.

Pausing, she couldn’t ever remember being here, which was rather odd since she often explored the forest in various different animal forms. She looked around trying to figure out where she was. She didn’t feel lost, oddly enough she felt at home. The feelings that were plaguing her earlier were dulled here. She felt almost normal, whatever that meant for her. She sighed and took a seat on a nearby log wondering what was wrong with her. If she truly was broken like everyone claimed. She didn’t mean to be so cruel. She didn’t even know when it had become habit for her friends to make excuses for her.

She had always been taught to be the best but what was the point of that when you were alone. Even Aria shied away from her sometimes. In her fits of anger she knew that she would hurt whoever it took for those feelings to go away. Something wet hit her palm and she brought her hands up to her face. She was crying, at least that’s what she thought. She had cried before, when her mother cursed her, the pain had brought tears to her eyes. She cried when she was playing the victim as well. Crocodile tears were easy to fake but this was different. These tears stemmed from a deep loneliness, from a place she had pretended never existed.

She crumpled into herself burying her face in her hands, hugging her knees close to her body. She didn’t know where these feelings were coming from. She didn’t know what was happening to her but she was alone and she didn’t like it. Try as she might the tears did not stop and her sobbing was the only thing she could hear. She missed the footsteps, the crunching of leaves as someone approached her.

Christian was feeling restless. He wanted to get out of the Hufflepuff common room, and just walk. He did just that, but felt only marginally better when he stepped out of the oak front doors to the castle.

The truth was, Christian couldn't get a certain girl off his mind. He needed to clear his head so that he could concentrate on his homework, or it would never get done and he'd fail his final year. His professors wouldn't be happy about that. Especially since he'd been doing so well this term. Until he'd noticed Lindsey.

Lindsey Vanderbilt. So many knew her as somewhat of a bitch, but Christian didn't see it. Maybe it was his crush speaking for his mouth, but he was unable to understand why people didn't just try to get to know her better rather than stick a rather mean title on her.

CJ sighed as he headed to the forest. He thought that maybe if he went to the clearing that he'd found the other day, he might be able to just lay back against one of the fallen branches and just stare blankly at the sky. That was what he needed right now.

He lit his wand as he entered the forest and followed along the path that he'd taken, not really paying attention to the crunching that his footsteps made in the fallen leaves. His mind was too occupied with thoughts of what he was going to do if he couldn't get his homework done and get it turned in on time.

He reached the place where he could extinguish the light from his wand and continued on, looking forward to just being able to not think about anything. Not Lindsey or his homework. He'd face all that when he got back to the castle. He'd deal with all of it then. Right now, he just needed peace.

He stopped short when his ears picked up the sound of someone crying. There was someone else in the Forbidden Forest? And near his clearing? He thought he was the only one that knew about it, other than Professor Black. He stepped through the trees slowly, not wanting to scare the person that was so unhappy. CJ might have been prone to pranks now and then, but he did understand that you didn't want to scare someone that was already upset. That was beyond cruel.

He reached his clearing and stopped short for a moment. He'd found the source of the crying. It was Lindsey. He didn't know what to do now. Should he just leave? Try and help her? Run back to the castle and bring back one of the professors? He looked around for a moment and stepped closer to her.

"Lindsey? Are you all right?" he asked with concern.

Lindsey heard the voice and quickly wiped away the tears. Vanderbilts didn’t cry, that’s what her mother had drilled into her head. They don’t show weakness and this display was certainly compromising. She breathed deeply, trying to gather her composure before looking up. She hadn’t recognized the voice as anything other than male. However, looking at the source now she should have recognized it.

It was decidedly male. Christian Hill, one of her friends ex boyfriends, stood before her. She gave him a weak smile and nodded. She could just pretend that she got in a fight with Iris. That would surely make him uncomfortable and he wouldn’t question it further. “I’m fine,” she said giving him another smile.

She didn’t know how persistent he would be, but hopefully it wouldn’t be much. She had never noticed how cute he was. He always seemed out of reach when he was with Iris, and a little off limit. Although, to be fair, if she went with those standards everyone would be off limits. Iris got around quite a bit. Still, she hadn’t noticed him much and now that he was standing in front of her she wondered why that was. He was definitely attractive, and from what she knew he was smart.

Lindsey wiped her blue eyes a little more making sure that all the tears were gone from them. Despite the fact that she knew him, she couldn’t take the risk of word getting out. She would make him promise, or erase his mind. Although the latter seemed easier she couldn’t help but remember the feelings that had driven her here. She moved her hand away from her wand and looked up at him.

“What are you doing here?” she asked him, her voice polite and kind, something that Lindz has never been described as being, something that she could never be if her mother got her way. She would resume her training to become a Death Eater during the summer. If all went well she would be inducted into her mother’s elite circle as soon as she graduated from Hogwarts.

She couldn’t imagine being a Death Eater, although her mother claimed that it was the highest honor she wasn’t so sure. She couldn’t picture the dark mark on her arm, permanently scarring her smooth flesh. She felt fear, this emotion she was familiar with, and shook it away. She didn’t have to be afraid, everything would work out.

“Please don’t tell anyone about this. Don’t need the old rumor mill starting about why Miss Vanderbilt was out in the middle of the forest,” she said, giving him a bright but sarcastic smile. “You know how people love to talk.”

Lindz || 454

Christian looked Lindsey over. He didn't have any intention of telling anyone that he'd found her crying in the forest, or anywhere else for that matter. He could keep a secret. He didn't know who he would tell anyway. Iris? He didn't think so. He thought very highly of her, no matter her sexual history, but he would hold his tongue even if he'd never known Iris. He didn't think that anyone had the right to be going around spreading rumors about anyone.

He moved forward as he inspected Lindz's eyes. It looked as if she'd been crying for a while, and he wondered what had upset her so badly. He wouldn't dare ask, it wasn't his place to do so, if she wanted him to know, she'd tell him. It was completely up to her who she told or didn't tell about what was bothering her.

Christian sat on a fallen tree and looked up at her, patting the spot next to him in invitation to sit down. He'd been in this exact clearing just a few days earlier, and it just now occured to him that he'd been thinking of the girl that was in front of him at that moment. It made him feel a little warm under the collar, and he was sure that he was blushing lightly.

"Don't worry. I won't say a word to anyone about it. I was just going for a walk to get my head to clear up because I was feeling restless. I wasn't intending on running into anyone out here, actually."

He smiled reasuringly up at her as he spoke, not wanting her to be mad at him for intruding on her while she was upset. If she asked, he would leave in an instant, but he wanted the chance to get to know her better if he could.

Christian