Going Somewhere? |ERIN|

Erin laughed as they walked back through the passageway from Hogsmeade. It had been an eventful night, and although her laughter was still somewhat nervous, it was also genuine. They had made it out of the castle and most of the way back without being caught, and it gave her a keen sense of exhilaration to have done so. Erin and Jane had spent the past couple of hours with a couple of the boys from Slytherin, and Erin had enjoyed herself. She had never really noticed boys, always thinking them annoying and immature, but the older she got, she found she had a newfound interest in them.

She knew she was probably something of a late bloomer, being sixteen, and having absolutely zero experience with anyone male, with the exception of her dad and her brother, neither of which really counted. Erin was getting bored of her girlfriends and their stories about what had happened with whatever boy, and she wanted in.

She let Jane go out first, waiting a second to make sure the coast was clear before she pulled the tapestry to one side and walked out into the hallway. It was then that she heard an all too familiar voice saying her friends name and she swore internally, her head turning to locate somewhere to hide, before realising it was likely already too late and Willow had probably already seen her. Erin folded her arms across her chest and took a few steps forward to join her friend.

Willow sent Jane to bed and took points, and Erin thought that it wasn't too bad, considering they'd been gone for most of the night. Jane gave her a consoling look and she shrugged a little, hanging back to find out what her punishment would be. As long as she didn't decide that it was down to her dad to punish her, then it would be okay. If she did, then she had no hope in hell of keeping what they had been doing from either of them, and that was among her top priorities just then.

When Willow turned to her, after Jane had disappeared around the corner, Erin cringed a little at the way the older woman spoke to her. If there was one thing Erin hated, it was being patronised, and if that wasn't what Willow had just done, then she didn't know what was. Erin tightened her arms, in the vain hope that it might protect her secret. She shrugged again.

"Dad probably wouldn't say anything. I'm sure he did worse when he was in school," Erin replied, hoping that she would get away with avoiding the other questions. She knew it probably seemed odd, as she wasn't normally the type to go against the rules, but she couldn't just be an angel for the rest of her life. It wouldn't be any kind of life if she did.

Erin noticed Willow's sigh, and was hard pushed not to roll her eyes. The older woman liked to act like she had authority over Erin, but Erin knew better than to let her. She also knew that calling her older was only true to some extent, as she was nowhere near old enough to be her actual mother. Although it didn't really bother her that her dad had chosen Willow to spend the rest of his life with, after all, he was happy with her; it didn't mean that she had to be best friends with her. One of the perks of her dad's relationship ought to be that she got away with things like this.

She knew that it was pushing it a little when she said that her dad wouldn't say anything, they both knew that he would, but he wouldn't go crazy at her, it wasn't really her dad's style. Erin remained where she was with her arms folded across her chest and an expression on her face that she hoped told Willow that she wasn't getting anything out of her, no matter how hard she tried. She felt like laughing at Willow's next words, though. The woman obviously wasn't well versed in the art of blackmail, and her threat of getting her dad involved was too thinly veiled for her to ignore.

Erin raised an eyebrow at the other woman when she spoke again. It was as though she was trying to sweet talk her into giving something away, and it wasn't going to work. She shrugged and feigned disinterest. "If you want," she said shortly, thinking that maybe she could wrangle a night out of the dormitory and convince the girls that she had met one of the guys on her way back.

Erin followed Willow down the corridor, arms still crossed over her chest. As far as she was concerned, her lips were sealed and she wasn't saying anything. If the older woman, let alone her Dad, found out that they had left school when they weren't supposed to to go to the opening of a new bar in Hogsmeade when they weren't technically old enough to do so, then she didn't know what the consequences would be, but she knew they wouldn't be pretty. Willow led her to the empty transfiguration classroom, and it looked kind of creepy with the moonlight against the harsh stone walls.

Her step mother let her go in first and she walked in, not unfamiliar with her surroundings, but not as comfortable in them as she was at her Dad's. Willow went to make tea and Erin settled herself in her favourite armchair by the fire, bringing her legs up in front of her as kind of a barrier between them. It was an unconscious move, but Erin knew that she wasn't any good at lying, and so avoidance seemed to be the best option.

Willow brought her tea and she took it, with a small muttered 'thanks', although she didn't say much else, waiting for the other woman to settle herself and no doubt start asking questions that were none of her business. And then there it was, and it was such an easy question to avoid.

"We went to Hogsmeade. Jane was having some boy drama and wanted to talk about it somewhere we wouldn't be overheard so we went and sat in the shrieking shack for a couple of hours."