Chapter Twenty: The Riddle-Malfoy Situation
"My father will hear about this!" -Draco Malfoy
The revelation stayed jumbled in Azalea's mind as Professor Dumbledore began his lesson. "What? How can that even be?" She whispered to Ocean. The best friend now looked upon Azalea with eyes of sympathy. "It's not true, is it?" Azalea just stared at her blankly, but Ocean gave her a knowing look and shot a dirty glare towards Riddle's gang.
Classes that day seemed to stretch on for hours. Azalea supposed that it didn't help that she kept glancing at the clock every other second. She had been formulating a plan all day on what she would do about the Riddle situation.
* * *
"I'm going to talk with him at dinner," Azalea concluded to Ocean at the end of their final class. The exhale Azalea heard from her friend told her that she was in disagreement. "Do you really think that's a good idea," Ocean said as if exhausted by the whole situation. "I mean, the entire school already thinks you're romantically involved with him and doing that definitely won't help."
"What else do you want me to do!" Azalea said, exasperatedly. "I need to know what the benefit is for spreading this rumour."
Ocean threw her hands up in defeat and mumbled a, "whatever, it's your funeral," which Azalea completely ignored.
The two walked in an uncomfortable silence with the Riddle-Malloy situation in mind. Both looking as though they wanted to apologize to the other, but neither taking the initiative to do so. The suffocating silence stretched along the whole way to the common room. Both girls adamant not to be the first one to apologize.
As they came across the entrance to the common room, Ocean sharply spoke the password and walked in, leaving Azalea a considerable distance behind her. Azalea didn't bother to catch up, she thought it would be better to give Ocean some space. There was only an hour left until dinner anyways since the two girls spent all their time in the library after class.
Azalea spent the whole hour debating with herself whether or not she should talk to Riddle. The thought of doing either put an icy feeling in the pit of her stomach. Her raging mental debate was cut short though. As student passed her to get to the Great Hall, she noticed Riddle's group eying her as though they had sinister intentions.
She closed her eyes and took a moment to collect herself before following the rest of the students to the Great Hall. As she walked into the Hall, she passed Ocean and went straight for Riddle's group. "Riddle, may I talk to you? Alone?" On the lips of every boy in the group was a tiny half-smirk as they looked to their leader, who, surprisingly, had the same expression. "Of course, Ms. Rosefield." Riddle and Azalea walked out of the room together, but not before she glanced back at Ocean. Ocean didn't look back at her, however. She continued to poke absentmindedly at her food while Coden was excitingly engaging her in conversation.