She stepped further into the room and saw him, but he didn't return the gaze just yet. Her eyes traveled to the low-sitting table and the things on it. What.....was he doing? There was food, utensils......Lux was even there. Was this a peace offering? Well, it took a lot of effort to stop herself from smiling.

The Slytherin then looked up and she met his eyes but didn't quite return his smile. Not yet. She came, yeah. She couldn't bear not to. It was Dylan...she would always be there when it concerned him. "What.....what is this?"

No, she wasn't stupid not to know. But she wanted to hear it from him.

The Slytherin's face fell just a little at her question. Beezus didn't look incredibly impressed like he'd hoped she would...but then again, with her, he was known to pull out all the stops. This wasn't the first time Dylan had needed to make up for some blunder or another...

His cheeks reddened slightly.

".....Well, I owl'd for reinforcements." He looked down at all the food containers, not meeting her eyes. It was stupid how she could always make him feel like an idiot. He both loved and hated that about her..."...My mother cooked French things for you..."...because if there was one thing Beezus loved more than him...it was French anything...and his mother was from France. So, like a good little Slytherin, Dylan was using his natural advantages. "Everything is labeled with what it is..."

Then there was some more blushing on his part...as he indicted things and their names...

'Quiche'...because that was one of his mom's favorite things to make, those weird rolls that had 'croissants' printed on it's container side, a large bowl of French onion soup...that was labeled 'Soupe à l’oignon', another weird soup that smelled fantastic, labeled 'Baeckeoffe'...Then were was steak and black peppers (his favorite)...labeled 'Steak au poivre'...She'd even included 'Bouillabaisse', something she knew he hated...

There was an over-abundance of sweets...Apparently she thought Bee wasn't eating or something...Some flaky, sweet bread that had 'Kouign amann' written on it...and then those awesome 'Madeleine' cakes that she KNEW he couldn't have right now. Silly troll....and the last two things...the Slytherin knew were special items just for her...if the note 'DO NOT TOUCH, DYLAN' was anything to go by.

Seriously, like he didn't have self control when it came to food. No doubt Francis would owl Bee and check, too...

One of the 'special' tupperwear containers was chilled, the contents clearly meant to be in a freezer...'Profiteroles' written on it's label....and a whole BIG bag of different colored 'Macaroons'...

There was loads more blushing...This had been too much. Dylan felt kinda embarrassed.

"You always seem happier when you eat...." STARE......and that totally could've been said more eloquently...

Okay....first, there were lots....lots of food containers on that table. She even idly wondered how it all managed to fit there. Second, Dylan was blushing. Darn it. She liked looking at his face when he was all flustered like that. And third....his mother cooked FRENCH food for her.......for her? "W-What?" Did he ask his mother to? When she had twins to take care of? She slumped down on the cushion, was about to scold him for the so-called reinforcements and the hassle he might've caused his mother because of this but......cat got her tongue when she saw ALL THE FOOD.

Holy snitch.

She might've spent quite a few minutes eyeballing all the fare before her because Dylan was already starting to point out the dishes with their corresponding the labels. SWEET MERLIN....each even had labels. All she could do was stare....mouth parted in astonishment.

MORE STARING.

There were stuff she could recall from their time in Paris, others, she haven't come across yet but nonetheless, looked inviting. Soup, bread, steak, cake, seafood.... She was immensely surprised by all of these. Her eyes just went to and fro, admiring each individual dish. And there were even those that were apparently off limits to Dylan. Profiteroles....she couldn't remember having those before but they certainly looked divine. Macaroons! Her favorite....and in so many colors.

She bit her bottom lip, unable to find the words to say - can someone provide her with some blooming words of some sort, please? This was all too much. She couldn't say anything.... Well, she tried to...opening her mouth but she had to close it again because there was just none. Is this how the Slytherin Captain made up for his shortcomings, particularly not showing up for their breakfast date? Heh. He's done a damn good job. She was melting. He's really outdone himself this time and she was feeling as though she was the luckiest girl in the entire universe. Heck, actually.....with him....she was.....so very lucky.

Then he was speaking up and she slowly looked up at him, eyebrows pushed together. He was almost scarlet......and he looked utterly unparalleled....handsome even. What has she done to deserve him again? .....He always makes her feel special.....and she was feeling very special right now.

Blushing too, Beezus shook her head....."No..." She wasn't happier whenever she ate, "....I'm happier when I'm eating with you.......or just being with you.." Now, he earned her smile - a sweet, affectionate one.

.....But yeah, she was still going to scold him.

The Slytherin Captain's ego...was diminishing by the second as Beezus eyeballed everything he'd set out for her. In fact, she looked a tad stunned...Had he done good? Was she happy? Was she more upset than before?

Hell, he didn't know.

...and if he could stop blushing as some point during this exchange, Dylan would've been so very grateful.

Feeling some more embarrassment, he rubbed at his face...In fact, he was about to open his mouth and say stuff...Stuff like..."I knew this was too much"...and "I know you can't be bought with food"...but Beezus has started talking...and she was saying stuff about being happy with him. The amount of relief the Slytherin felt at hearing those words could not have been properly described.

Cue a genuinely brilliant smile...

"So....does this mean you'll still travel with me for Christmas?" Yep, that was hope in his tone. He wasn't even trying to mask it.

Upset state has officially been lifted. She was trying not to smile too much but was failing drastically so she threw all caution to the wind and just allowed herself to grin brightly at him as she tucked a few strands of hair behind her ear. It was Dylan she was with anyway, she had the right to be vulnerable.

".....Yes." She nodded in response to his question. No matter how upset she was though, she'd still want to spend the holidays with him as they have originally planned. "Mother and Grandmother wants to see you..." Oh, yeah. She wrote to them, asked permission and whatnot and they returned a reply letter rather quickly. ...."I also wouldn't want to miss the opportunity of seeing the place where you grew up." There was still so much more she didn't know about him, she knew that.

Oh, and....she didn't forgot the scolding part.

Still smiling, she narrowed her eyes at her boyfriend. "And next time, babe....please don't....trouble your mother with," She gestured with her head the table filled with food. "...this. I appreciate it.....very much." She really did. LOADS, in fact. "But I don't want her to think that......." Beezus trailed off, not really knowing what words were appropriate enough to finish that sentence. "....you know." She liked his mother....she can say that they have quite a pleasant relationship to be honest and she didn't want that ruined just because it was coming off that she was being an excessively difficult girlfriend to her son.

Next stop on the list of five places he would be checking for dead people's outline is the Room of Requirement. Jory had done his research and already knew who died there but he just wanted confirmation for himself that someone had died there. Even though it was confirmed before.

"Spiritum Revelio!" The badger made the familiar counter clockwise circle then pointed his wand through it. Nothing. He had expected that after searching at the Astronomy Tower and the Great Hall. The hard part was actually finding where precisely the person died. He continued his search until...

"Spiritum Revelio!" And that wand movement again. There on the ground, was the green outline of a biggish figure lying on the ground. Confirmation someone had indeed died there.

Nessie was still with her, yeah? Ella glanced at the red head quickly before turning in a slow circle. She'd asked the room to take her to where the student had died and sure enough, she was in a room filled with lots of different things. Now to find exactly where in the room this kid died was a whole other story. Hmmm...

"I think I'll start over here." Yup, seemed like a legit place to start. The blonde did the familiar circular motion, pointing through the middle of it with her wand. "Spiritum Revelio!" Blink. Blink. ...Nothing.

She did this several times, walking around the room. She kept glancing over at the older badger with hopeful looks but she hadn't heard anything from her yet. That meant she hadn't found anything, yeah?

Finally, after about a half hour of serious looking, Ella came to a spot and stopped. Hm. Maybe this was a good place to try?

Doing the familiar wand movement, the blonde said clearly, "Spiritum Revelio!"

GRIN! ...Frown. She probably shouldn't be feeling happy about this.

"Nessie, over here! I found one." A green, glowly, human form.

This was how you strategized and worked out a plan, you picked the rooms that were closest together to minimize much of the walking. You know, saving the energy to walk down to the kitchen for ice-cream after this was all done! The Room of Requirement was a good choice, she was convinced.

"This is a great place, you know why?" She asked, stepping inside and having a brief looking around before turning her attention back to the parchment. "It says that two people died in here so I'm thinking we spread out and we each find one?" A good idea, yes it was.

Lex gave the room another look over. Where would she start looking exactly?

"I'll just...yeah...over here looks nice." She whipped out her wand. The best place for casting. "Spiritum Revelio!" It took only a few seconds for her to realize there would be no green, either that or she was just extremely impatient so she moved on. "Spiritum Revelio!"

Here we go! "Any luck with you?" And who would she say this was...?

Room of Requirement. That was their next stop and this was one of her favorite rooms in the whole of Hogwarts. This was where she danced, had her alone time and did just anything she couldn't in any of the other rooms at Hogwarts...but now the idea of someone dying here. That sort of creeped her out. Why did people have to ruin her special room? Frown. At least it was ages ago and not recent.

The room where the kid died, was almost like a storage room. Weird place to die, but if she remembered correctly Crabbe..or was it Goyle..eh one of those people died in this room through a fire of some sort. Which made sense, because most of these things could probably catch alight quite easily. Still freaky though.

Nods to Ella once more. "Okay, I'll be the other side."

The Seventh year went in the opposite direction and just like her kiddo began examining the room with the spell. "Spiritum Revelio!" Counter-clockwise turn, and jab right through. She repeated the process again and again walking around the room, wondering where this kid could of died.

This room was HUGE. Were they expected to search through the whole thing? Good thing Ella was here to help. Thinking of Ella was that her shouting. Blink. The red head turned around and walked into the direction of where the voice came.

Ahhh. Ella had found it. "Well done, kiddo! " She was proud.

After walking with Jory down the hall to the Room of Requirement, she stood in front of the wall. She hadn't been here in a long while, now that she thought of it. "Think of a place we can just relax in." she said to him, and began to think deeply. Soon enough, the large doors began to appear and she smiled as they opened. She made her way inside to find a large room with a large fireplace taking up a bit of the far wall with couches and a coffee table in front of it. There were a few bookshelves with many books upon them lining more walls, and a little table with plenty of food on it. She turned her head to the left now, seeing a table with Wizard's Chess set up on it. Beaming, she turned to Jory. "Isn't this perfect?!" she exclaimed, squeezing his hand.

Ronnie seemed to have everything under control so Jory just watched her as she thought about that place where they could relax . When the door appeared, he followed her eagerly inside, wanting to know what had appeared for them. "Oh, this is so cool!'' he told her. Lookie at all the books! Then he spotted the Chess set. "I'm not good at chess,'' the puffer explained. "I just don't understand it.'' Not that he had not tried. Wizarding Chess or normal chess, he always lost. Maybe they could think of another game?

She nodded in agreement. "It is very cool...I'm glad we came." she told him as she examined the room some more. It was such a cozy little spot... which was perfect. Just what Ronnie needed at the moment. To be in a cozy little room with her Jory. She was already starting to feel a tad bit better.

Ronnie raised an eyebrow when Jory mentioned not being good at Wizard's Chess. Or any chess. "Oh, really?" she asked, frowning a bit in disappointment. "I loveee Wizard's Chess.." she said as she walked with him, taking a seat upon one of the red couches. "What games do you like to play, then?" she asked, looking at him with interest.

So... two people had died here.

Alec ruffled his hair as he finally came to a stop outside of the room of requirement. It had taken him slightly longer than he hoped to get up here because, as time ticked on, he was starting to grow more and more uncomfortable with this assignment. Homework wasn't exactly fun to do but some pieces of homework were bearable while others... well...

And this was one of those in the latter categories.

The boy shook his head and started pacing three times in front of the blank stretch of wall. This had to be the easiest part of this and surely enough, when he opened his eyes, a door had materialised in front of him. Okay... Now he just had to go and find that outline in here. He moved forwards, pushed the door open and stepped into the room...

BLINK.

Everything looked... weird. Usually when he came into this room, the room always managed to look quite... elegant? Or classy? Were those good enough words to use? ... But not here! This place looked cluttered, like the spare room in people's houses where everything useless and broken was shoved into haphazardly. And he just... blinked.

... Wait... he had things to find! ... Namely, the place where someone had died!

The Hufflepuff shook his head again and moved forwards, taking in the room in greater detail as he went. The room? It also looked burnt. And messy. And... and... he didn't like the feeling of being in here. "Spiritum Revelio!" he said, moving his wand in the familiar counter-clockwise motion and then pointing his wand through the circle. ... Nothing. Great. That meant more time in this room.

He shuffled forwards some more and continued casting the spell, trying to concentrate on the spell and finding the outline. The only time he looked away was when a charred item fell down to the ground and shattered. GULP. A sense of urgency filled the boy who continued casting the spell and moving around in what seemed like a labyrinth rather than the Room of Requirement.

"Spiritum Revelio!"

... HEY! Green outline!

The sixteen year old studied the outline for a couple of seconds before letting out a sigh of relief. Yeah, it was definitely an outline of someone who had died here. Which meant that he only had two more outlines to find.

Could he go now?

"Me too,'' Jory said. It was a nice place to get away from all the hustle and bustle of school life. He set the bag they had brought which contained food on a table. And of course, Ice cream. One does not simply forget about ice cream, after all.

The Puffer followed Ronnie and sat next to heron one of the couches. "Well, it's too bad I'm no good at it. If I had played more I bet I could beat you.'' Grin. "The game of Life,'' he added. Yup. He loved that game too much as he played that frequently when he was a kid. "Ever played that?''

Ronnie grabbed her ice cream and began to eat it. Ah, ice cream. It surely was helping a bit with her feeling better. So was Jory. Everything was...he was brilliant to help her out as soon as he saw her crying. What a perfect boyfriend! She didn't know what she'd do without him. Looking over at him, she smiled, watching him. He sure was cute, too. He had brilliant eyes, amazing hair...and those arms were quite muscular too...

She hadn't realized how long she'd been staring at him until he spoke, and she quickly snapped back into reality. Ahaha...erm...*blush* Anywho. Yes, chess. "Perhaps I could teach ya sometime and help you get better?" she suggested, smiling. She then nodded. "Oh! I seee." She'd never played that game before.

"No, why?" Oh. Oh, TWO dead guys. Alice perked up immediately, "Um. Crabbe somewhere, right? And Weasley. Okay." She headed over to the side where Lex wasn't, performing the counterclockwise circle and pointing through it as quickly as she could without messing up. "Spiritum Revelio!" Glancing around a little before she found an outline, she waited for Lex to document where her dead guy had been found before beckoning her over. "Did you write that down? I think mine looks porkier. Crabbe."

Also, she was getting hungry again. Which was weird because they'd literally JUST come up from munching on rolls and finding Bellatrix's outline in the Great Hall, but now Alice was craving something sweet. "I kind of want ice cream. Do you want ice cream? I kind of want ice cream. Bet it tastes GREAT after rolls." She beamed at Lex as they made for the courtyard. "Faster we cast spells, the more of it we get to eat, okay?" Made sense in her head.

How many flavors of it did that machine in the Kitchen have? Hmm, she'd have to check.

Jory grabbed his container of ice cream, too. Chocolate! The best flavour ever. He was enjoying his ice cream so much, that he failed to notice Ronnie staring at him. That is, until he looked up back at her. "What?'' he asked with a grin and reached over to wipe a bit of ice cream from the side of Ronnie's mouth.

"Sure,'' Jory replied. Ronnie would teach him, he would become a chess master and beat her. Noo problemo. "So, you heard from your family? I forgot to ask, did they like the plants?''

Moseying back inside and down the corridor a bit, Dylan found himself in front of a very special stretch of stone wall....Pacing in front of it three times exactly, a door appeared. The Room of Requirement. Stop TWO on his list...

It was said a Slytherin died in here...which was interesting to him, considering Slytherins. They must not have made them like that anymore...because Dylan was almost positive none of his housemates were that stupid....Almost. He himself wasn't in any event.

Naturally, the Captain had paced the wall with Vincent Crabbe's name in mind...Perhaps that was why a room with so much junk had appeared. Dylan eyed everything distastefully before setting off to deeper and darker parts of the room. With history books, it was hard to know exactly where to perform the spell...considering no one knew EXACTLY what spot he'd died in...So, Dylan imagined he wouldn't be having much success in here...

Deciding on a random area, he lifted his wand and concentrated...Cleared his mind...Thought about a spirit making itself known to him....All that.

Breeeeeeeeeeeath...again....

"Spiritum Revelio!" He maneuvered his wand in the same counterclockwise circle as before, pointing rather forcibly through it. He was tense for some reason. On edge...It was hard to know why....but something had the hairs on the back of his neck standing up...

......and then.....there was a green, glowing...something.....

BLINK.

"Vincent Crabbe......" The Slytherins eyes grew wide...as he marveled at the green outline..........

/mellow

Without saying or doing anything further, Dylan slowly backed himself OUT of the room. He was thoroughly creeped...and he didn't want to be so totally ALONE with a.....whatever it was.....He didn't know the specifics of these things.

She blushed slightly when Jory noticed her staring at him. "I was just looking at you. You're really cute, y'know." she said, smiling shyly when he wiped a bit of ice cream from her mouth. She then nodded when he asked about her family. "Yeah, they loved the plants! Especially my mum." she told him, chuckling. Her mother was always fond of plants, she had a whole beautiful garden in the front of the house.

Pace... pace... shuffle... pace...

He would be lying if he said that he wasn’t scared about this. Because he was! He’d spent most of the coming week fretting and planning and hoping against hope that this wasn’t going to be taken the wrong way. And that this wasn’t going to end up turning out to be horrible. His grip on the basket tightened a little. This... wasn't going to be horrible, right?

Hair!ruffle.

Alec glanced down at the watch on his wrist, the very same watch that Ells had given him not too long ago for their one year anniversary. It was fine, there was still time. He looked back up at the door that had materialised not too long ago from his pacing. A quick glance up and down the corridor had told him that no one was coming so far. That meant that he could... just... check on things, right? He moved forwards, open the door and took a quick peek at the room inside.

...

GRIN. Awesome.

The Hufflepuff wandered back outside and glanced up and down the corridor again, keeping a hand on the doorknob. Now... he just had to wait. Stand and wait. And pretend that he wasn't nervous at all. Which he wasn't! Nope.

Hair!ruffle.

After checking that her hair looked nice for the millionth time, Ella finally made her way towards the room of requirement. She was excited, y'know. Mostly because she got to spend time with Alec away from the stress of classes and quidditch and studying for OWLs. Meep. Ella was so done with studying.

Turning the corner, the blonde slowed her pace and took a moment to just watch Alec. He looked adorable, by the way. Nervous too. The blonde couldn't help but wonder about that part. Did he need some ice cream? She could go get some and then come back. She didn't mind at all. ...Best to ask him first though, right? Right.

Smoothing her dress, the sixteen year old BEAMED at the boyfriend and headed towards him. "Hey handsome! Someone waiting for a valentine?" GRIN. Ohhhh! And what was in the basket? Curious Ella was curious!

Alec stood there, readjusting his grip on the basket and occasionally switching the hand that held it. Yeah... he should... stop doing that. And something else he should stop doing is ruffling his hair as if there's no tomorrow. He could be messing it up and the last thing he wanted to do was greet a certain blonde haired girl with really messy hair. It just... wasn't allowed, yeah?

And speaking of the blonde haired girl, SHE WAS COMING SHE WAS COMING!

... Ahem.

Alec GRINNED WIDELY as she approached him, his hand fighting the urge to ruffle his hair again. "Hey you!" he said, holding onto the basket with both of his hands, "Yeah! My Valentine should know that she looks beautiful in her dress." ... He... wasn't romantic. At all. That was another thing that could make this date go horribly wrong. Although, it wasn't his fault; someone needed to tell the girl to stop looking so pretty and making his mind go to mush. Problem solved. ... Sort of.

"So, erm, are you ready to go inside?" he asked, tilting his head towards the direction of the door.

It was Jory's turn to go red. of course, not a deep red a Ronnie but still, he went red. "Thank you, Angel,'' he said. "And you're always beautiful.'' Grin. She always looked beautiful and to him she was the prettiest girl around.

"I'm glad they did,'' Jory added. And speaking of gifts. "I've got something for you.'' He reached into his bag and pulled out a neatly- well okay, not so neatly wrapped gift. He was not good at wrapping stuff. "Er...sorry about the wrapping. I'm bad at this stuff.'' But he was confident she would love his present. It was pretty easy finding something Ronnie would like. Since she was just like him, all he did was to think what he would love to have as a present. An assortment of comic books. Marvel comics to be exact. The Puffer spooned more ice cream into his mouth, and watched as Ronnie unwrapped her present.

There was that word again. Beautiful. Ella looked down and blushed, smiling to herself. "Thanks. I...you look really nice too, y'know." He always did, though. There was just something about his face and his hair that complimented any outfit, y'know? Ella approved, obviously.

The sixteen year old took another step closer and adjusted his tie before smoothing it down again. She then smiled up at him and placed a kiss on his cheek. She really liked that she could do that whenever she wanted. The kissing thing. It was really nice.

"I'm ready if you are." Grin. Oh and there was just one more thing she wanted to do before they did go in. Her hand found his and she laced their fingers, smiling a bit as she did. There. Now she was ready.

Alec tilted his head and grinned, taking note of the rise in colour on the girl's cheeks. It was nice, actually, the way she tended to blush like that. It always made him want to reach over and stroke her cheeks gently. "Anytime!" he said, "I do? Thanks, Ells!" And did she mind that he wasn't wearing anything red? ... Because it was hard to pick out a nice enough looking red shirt.

Before he knew what was going on, the girl was adjusting his tie and planting a kiss on his cheek. The boy blinked a couple of times before grinning sheepishly at her. Yeah... he wasn't going to be able to think properly now. ... "Thanks!" he finally managed to blurt out, gripping onto the basket out of fear that it would slip from his fingers because of, well, his girlfriend. It was probably the only thing stopping him from leaning closer and kissing her back.

And she was ready to go inside? "Awesome!" When her hand found his, he looked down and gave her hand a small squeeze before looking back up at her again. ... Inside... remember the plan, Summers? "So, erm... before we go in... do you mind closing your eyes? Please?" Surprise and all.