The next words out of Elsie's cousin's mouth dashed all the remaining hope he had that they might be able to worm their way out of this. The consequences... He swallowed. They were going to be more dire than he'd expected, worse than he had even imagined they could be.
She was threatening to destroy his quidditch chances, on top of putting a stop to this. His career, his life. Tyb had considered what he would do without quidditch enough (fruitlessly, every time, he still didn't know what he would do) but he'd always thought he had time to figure it out. Barring injury, the only reason he could have envisioned giving it up for was - well, for Elsie's sake, somehow. Never had he considered losing both in one go.
And now Elsie was leaving the room, and everything was falling apart. Tybalt waited until the library door had fallen shut again, trying to disentangle his vocal chords enough to try and speak. "You don't need to tell her mother," he entreated, wide-eyed; he didn't much think the plea would work - Mrs. Cavanaugh would do as she bloody well pleased, that was obvious - but surely she would realise that they'd learned their lesson from this, that Elsie would suffer enough from the fallout here without having to endure it all again from another direction.
All Elsie's defence hadn't done her any good, though, so Tybalt presumed they were past protesting. So he stood there to attention, not quite meeting Mrs. Cavanaugh's gaze as he waited for the part of the lecture that would be, no doubt, tailored to him. "What do you want me to do?" He asked tonelessly, though it wasn't as though he didn't have his suspicions. Mostly, he'd been in trouble enough in his life to recognise sometimes there was nothing for it but to cooperate.
She was threatening to destroy his quidditch chances, on top of putting a stop to this. His career, his life. Tyb had considered what he would do without quidditch enough (fruitlessly, every time, he still didn't know what he would do) but he'd always thought he had time to figure it out. Barring injury, the only reason he could have envisioned giving it up for was - well, for Elsie's sake, somehow. Never had he considered losing both in one go.
And now Elsie was leaving the room, and everything was falling apart. Tybalt waited until the library door had fallen shut again, trying to disentangle his vocal chords enough to try and speak. "You don't need to tell her mother," he entreated, wide-eyed; he didn't much think the plea would work - Mrs. Cavanaugh would do as she bloody well pleased, that was obvious - but surely she would realise that they'd learned their lesson from this, that Elsie would suffer enough from the fallout here without having to endure it all again from another direction.
All Elsie's defence hadn't done her any good, though, so Tybalt presumed they were past protesting. So he stood there to attention, not quite meeting Mrs. Cavanaugh's gaze as he waited for the part of the lecture that would be, no doubt, tailored to him. "What do you want me to do?" He asked tonelessly, though it wasn't as though he didn't have his suspicions. Mostly, he'd been in trouble enough in his life to recognise sometimes there was nothing for it but to cooperate.
