Luhan is so excited he’s going to pass out and have to be dragged back to his dorm room by Lay and Suho. If they would actually show up to the party and take a break from sticking their tongues down each other’s throats. 

But anyways, getting back to the point of Luhan being excited... The birthday party is bloody brilliant.

Bloody. Brilliant.

Everything is ten times better than Luhan had imagined in the short time before the party, daydreaming in class and once getting called out by Professor Snape, who suggested that Luhan, “Get his incredibly small head out of the clouds,” and join the rest of the students, “in that process called learning,” unless Luhan was too high and mighty for, “us mere humans.”

Needless to say, Luhan had banned all party-related thoughts from his mind for the rest of Potions class, slapping Lay who hadn’t been able to stop giggling behind his fist the rest of the period.

But back to the present.

The balloons not only explode and rain glitter. They also produce chocolate frogs. And Luhan has had too many to count, although the tightening of his pants in the waist might be a sign that he needs to stop shoving them down his throat like they’re actually going to hop away.

And the band that’s playing is a werewolf band, and the music is pounding through the walls, and Luhan doesn’t want to dance by himself, but maybe if he pretends that he’s still eating while simultaneously moving his hips, no one will notice, because the music is freaking brilliant.

And the cake.

Oh, the cake.

Luhan’s not sure how much longer he can wait to get a slice of the three-tiered, red and gold gorgeous dessert.

He keeps giving it bedroom eyes  glances because it’s absolutely, mouth-watering, stomach-rumbling gorgeous.

The only thing that’s not awesome right now is that Luhan is alone. 

Xiumin had been dragged away by Chen the moment Luhan had looked away, so now Luhan is occupying himself by eating. And dancing when he thinks no one is looking.

Luhan has just contemplated leaving to find Lay and Suho and force them to come, even if it means having to tear them apart with his own hands, and has just reached for his eleventh hundredth chocolate frog when he catches sight of a familiar face.

Luhan freezes, a foggy memory suddenly appearing in his mind.

He’s not sure what happened that night he passed out in Hogsmeade, but Luhan can remember something vaguely about a very scary tickle monster, a non-speech spell that may or may not have come from his wand, and something that resembled a clown. Luhan shudders, remembering attacking said clown, and then feeling proud of himself.

But there’s something else there, something that makes Luhan cringe.

The person that just walked into the party is Sehun, and Luhan can almost remember how he had tried to kiss him.

Luhan facepalms before he freezes again. 

Because he needs to hide. Now.

So Luhan scurries behind the nearest object, which happens to be an ice sculpture of a lion with punch pouring from its roaring mouth.

But not before shoving the chocolate frog into his mouth. Because Luhan would face any kind of danger for chocolate. And Fizzing Whizbees. Gosh, Luhan really wants a Fizzing Whizbee right now- No, stop it, focus.

Now there’s two things that aren’t awesome.

Luhan pouts.

Before searching the floor around him for any more chocolate frogs.

Sehun isn’t sure what’s up with Kai, but it’s beginning to drive him crazy.

The whole time they were getting ready to come to the birthday party, Kai had been mumbling things like, “I don’t want to go to a stupid birthday party. I want to find Cupcake,” and “I want to know who Cupcake is,” and “I want Cupcake”, until Sehun had felt like he was going to destroy Cupcake just so that Kai would stop being such a dense dimwit.

Sehun had literally had to threaten Kai with a jelly legs jinx that wouldn’t wear off for a few days before Kai had agreed to hurry up and get ready.

Because there was no way Sehun was going to go to the party by himself. And he couldn’t go with anyone else because Kris and Tao had been avoiding Sehun and Kai recently, for obvious unknown reasons that may or may not have had to do with Sehun sticking his hands down Kai’s pants.

So now here they are, the music a deafening roar and the decorations almost managing to make the dungeons look less cold, even though Sehun is already shivering.

Kai glances around dejectedly, looking like a kicked puppy, and Sehun almost, almost, feels bad for his best friend.

“Hey,” Sehun says, hitting Kai’s shoulder. “Lighten up. You’re lack of obnoxious chatter is starting to freak me out.”

“Shut up,” Kai says, rubbing the back of his neck. And then, “I want Cupcake.”

“One more time,” Sehun thinks, breathing in heavily.

“I know you want Crumpet,” Sehun says, ignoring Kai’s glare. “But seriously, can’t you look for whoever it is tomorrow?”

Kai looks at Sehun like he’s just offered to throw Kai off of the astronomy tower.

“Tomorrow?” Kai asks, stepping towards Sehun, who steps back, alarmed. “You want me to look for my soulmate tomorrow?”

“Wait, what?” Sehun asks, moving back again as Kai advances. “Your soulmate? What the hell Kai-”

But Sehun doesn’t finish because Kai is still moving towards him.

“I can’t afford to wait for tomorrow,” he says dramatically, sweeping out his arm. “Every second without Cupcake is like a day without pudding.”

“Ummm,” Sehun begins, pretty sure that that’s not how that saying goes.

But Kai isn’t finished, and Sehun regrets reminding Kai about his “obnoxious chatter”.

By now, Kai has started reciting lines from “Romeo and Juliet” inserting the word “Cupcake” where it’s necessary, and the people around them are starting to give them weird looks. Not that Sehun blames them.

So Sehun does the next best thing.

He does what Oh Sehun does best.

And that is giving advice.

Seriously.

Sehun is the best at giving advice.

Like when he told Tao that he should get Kris that scarf for Christmas a couple years ago because the color would go well with Kris’s eyes.

Or when he told Kris to stop following Pansy Parkinson around, because, “She’s never going to look at you like she looks at Draco. Face it man. You don’t have the hair to compete.”

Come to think of it, that might have been when Kris had started buying all of those hair products from that shop in Diagon Alley, and started spreading rumors that it was really from a wizard in the Netherlands. 

But moving on... 

Or how Sehun told Kai that if he wanted to impress his professors, he should give them all gifts the first day of class.

Oh, wait.

That had been a prank.

One that had included a naive Kai, a mischievous Sehun, a lot of dungbombs and nose-biting teacups, and a few months worth of detention for both of them.

So maybe Sehun didn’t always give good advice.

But he goes for it anyways.

“Seriously, if you want to find Muffin so badly, why don’t you just go ask around? It looks like half the school is here, so I’m sure there’s someone who can help,” he says, resisting the urge to punch Kai in the face out of frustration, fingers flexing at his sides.

Kai immediately brightens up, his shoulders straightening as he thinks about Sehun’s advice.

And then he turns to the crowd, arms outstretched as if he’s addressing all of them, and Sehun thinks, “In three, two, one...”

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Kai says, his voice not even managing to rise above the noise, “today is a monumental occasion. Today, Oh

Sehun said something intelligent. As in something that actually made sense. It is a vast change from the usual stupidity that often comes out of the idiot’s mouth. Unfortunately I left his medal up in my room, so we will have to meet again for the award ceremony.”

Then he turns to Sehun, trademark smirk back in place.

“And it’s Cupcake, moron,” he says, reaching out and giving Sehun a hard  friendly shove before he turns around and disappears into the crowd.

Sehun sighs, shaking his head in exasperation, before something catches his eye. 

Sehun squints as a familiar mop of blonde hair ducks back behind that ice sculpture of the lion, large eyes widening in surprise before they disappear as well.

Sehun frowns, determination settling into his limbs, before he starts forward.

It looks like he’s not the only one who needs to find someone.

And it looks like he just found the person he needs to talk to.

“Oh Merlin,” Luhan thinks frantically, ducking back behind the ice sculpture. “He saw me.”

Luhan had just seen that chocolate frog box poised dangerously on the very tip of one of the ice lion’s paws, and he had thought, “If you really want something, you have to take risks. Especially when that thing is chocolate.”

And so he had taken a deep breath, popped his head over the top of the ice sculpture to take a glance of his surroundings, made sure Sehun hadn’t been looking his way (he had luckily been staring at Kai with his eyebrows furrowed and his mouth open in exasperation and disbelief), and had reached for the chocolate frog.

But it had been so high.

And Luhan was so very small.

And he couldn’t reach it unless he climbed up the ice sculpture a little, the toe of his shoe clinging to the side of the ice sculpture’s base, which he did.

“Mission successful,” Luhan had breathed to himself when his fingers had finally wrapped around the chocolate frog box.

And then, “Uh-oh.”

Because he had just had time to catch a glimpse of a familiar pair of eyes locking with his from across the room before he had dropped to the floor, heart beating quickly, chocolate frog clutched to his chest.

So now Luhan is on his hands and knees on the dungeon floor, crawling away from the direction he saw Sehun, and trying to get to safety under the nearest food table.

“Come on baby,” Luhan coaxes himself silently, crawling as fast as he can past startled party-goers, chocolate frog stuck in his mouth for safe-keeping. “You can get there. Just a few more fe-”

“Aghhh!” Luhan screams as a hand clamps around his ankle and drags him backwards.

But since the chocolate frog is still stuck in his mouth, it comes out a bit more muffled.

And then Luhan is being gripped by the shoulders and lifted off of the floor and then spun around.

A very familiar scowl greets him.

Luhan tries to smile, teeth biting into the cardboard box still clenched ferociously between his teeth, but he’s too intimidated to keep the facade up.

“What are you doing?” Sehun asks, hands still wrapped around Luhan’s small shoulders, and Luhan can feel his knees starting to weaken, partly from fear and partly from being in such close proximity to the Slytherin.

“Ummm,” Luhan mumbles around the candy box, and Sehun reaches out suddenly, grabbing it and pulling it away from Luhan, which takes quite a bit of strength on Sehun’s part because Luhan is not. Letting. Go.

“Give it to me,” Sehun grits out, still pulling.

Luhan’s eyes narrow, and he pulls his head back. “No,” he half-mumbles, refusing to give up his prize.

“Ugh, fine,” Sehun says, letting go finally. “Just eat it already.”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Luhan says, finally removing the chocolate frog from his mouth and shoving it into his back pocket.

The two glare at each other for a few seconds, Luhan’s heart thumping rapidly out of nervousness. 

But he’s not going to let Sehun see that.

“You have some explaining to do,” Sehun says finally, and Luhan hopes the blush he can feel spreading up his neck isn’t visible in the party lights.

“Who are you?” Luhan demands cockily, trying to seem brave. “My mum?”

Sehun frowns, confused.

“What?”

“I said-,” Luhan begins again.

“Never mind,” Sehun says quickly, done with arguing with people for the night. “Just come with me.”