He’d fluffed his first move, that was obvious – couldn’t get out the bishop yet like how he’d meant to start the attack – so Theo tried his best to start afresh, and picked out a knight to move instead.
Mm, we're friends. That was... all he was going to say? That ought to be better – it made it easier to brush past the topic – but that could mean anything, and in the absence of more information, his brain began filling in the blanks with possibilities. The kind of society friends all the old pureblood families were? An old schoolfriend? Or a real friend, one close enough to know that Cassius Lestrange wasn’t exactly all right? (Or maybe he was the same kind of ‘friend’ Theo was, and – )
Not that it mattered: this was about chess, he shouldn’t need to be practising a poker face. “Well, hopefully he didn’t say anything too bad about me,” Theo joked, pulling a face briefly (– Christ, he hoped it was a joke –) because griping about their bosses was something people did with their friends, usually. He leant back to seem more at ease, fighting the urge to fidget while he waited for his next turn.
Mm, we're friends. That was... all he was going to say? That ought to be better – it made it easier to brush past the topic – but that could mean anything, and in the absence of more information, his brain began filling in the blanks with possibilities. The kind of society friends all the old pureblood families were? An old schoolfriend? Or a real friend, one close enough to know that Cassius Lestrange wasn’t exactly all right? (Or maybe he was the same kind of ‘friend’ Theo was, and – )
Not that it mattered: this was about chess, he shouldn’t need to be practising a poker face. “Well, hopefully he didn’t say anything too bad about me,” Theo joked, pulling a face briefly (– Christ, he hoped it was a joke –) because griping about their bosses was something people did with their friends, usually. He leant back to seem more at ease, fighting the urge to fidget while he waited for his next turn.
