Cameron watched in awe as her hair began to shift from its greyish-blue state to its natural brown with the pink ends she'd started adding. He smiled and ran his hand down her braid, his fingers pulling out a few wispy strands. Sloane looked almost as suspect with not a hair out of place as she did with no hair in place. "Now it's perfect," he said, giving it a little tug before he dropped his hand altogether.

Despite her more neutral appearance, he knew that she had to be feeling plain awful still. She could chuckle and smile, but that didn't change the fact that her friendship with Sisse had been drastically altered (and likely because of him). He couldn't help the feeling of guilt that overwhelmed him as he smiled down at her, but he knew better than to say anything. He just had to let her be and trust that she'd let him in when she needed him.

(Everything really was different. Entirely different.)

"Or we could write notes in disappearing ink and then write really generic notes between the lines," he suggested, already mentally running through a list of topics he could write to Sloane about as a cover. Quidditch practice, classwork, friendships, study sessions, more classwork, overdue homework, professional quidditch—the list went on and on.

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Despite his best efforts (they were valiant and working, just not as well as he probably would have liked) Sloane was still feeling pretty low. "Yeah, I'm sure we can figure something out." She smiled, but it didn't quite go all the way to her eyes. It would be pretty funny to use Splash, who already had free reign of the Gryffindor tower and probably the Hufflepuff dorm as well, as a go-between to send notes. Barnabas would be the less-obvious choice, but Sloane knew Cam was not a huge fan of her rat.

Of course now she didn't plan on spending too much time in her room, so that might present a problem, but she could figure it out. She might have to resort to the library. Oh the humanity. She was exhausted now from the emotional upheaval of the evening, but knew the last place she could go was back to the common room or up to bed.

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That was a cue and he knew it. He smiled sadly at her, wanting to reach out and squeeze her hand once more, or even pull her into a hug before they parted ways, but he knew it was risky. They'd already gotten into enough trouble that day to last them an entire school year.

"We will," he reassured, mindlessly brushing a few leaves from the bottom of his robes and then from her own. If Splash and secret notes didn't work, they'd find something else. He was determined to spend as much time with her as possible, and if that meant going out of his way he would do it. (Struggling to be sneaky was still easier than pretending not to fancy her every hour, day and night. He didn't think he'd be able to contain his emotions for the months in-between Hogsmeade visits, anyways.)

"You know where to find me if you need me. I can always, I don't know, mess up the quidditch practice schedule again. Or chase you down for transfiguration help—for real, though." Whatever it took, he told himself.

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