Cho Chang (ravenbutterfly) wrote in mundus_district, @ 2008-09-14 21:58:00 |
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Entry tags: | cho chang, ritchie coote |
Who: Cho Chang & Ritchie Coote
What: Reunion
When: September 15th, morning
Where: Cafe
Rating: PG
Ritchie had just woken up minutes before. The place was strange and in an odd way familiar. Somewhat like his dorm, but significantly nicer. He had woken up in strange places before, crashing at someone's house he had met at a party, or under significantly odder situations. But this was different. His things were in the drawers. "What the bloody hell is going on?" He muttered to himself slipping on a pair of worn jeans and a white t-shirt. He grabbed for his wallet and found a key on top of it. Without questioning it, he put both in his back pocket. As he walked out of his room - not that he was ready to call it his just yet anyway - and heard someone walking around in a nearby room. Not wanting to stick around to see who it was - or the even bigger dissapointment of who it wasn't - Ritchie slipped on his trainers silently and crept out of the flat. He ran down the four flights of stairs, not even bothering to check if there was an elevator. He continued to run down the unfamiliar street, but when he got to the end of it, finally he looked around. This was not London, well not his London. What had he gotten himself into? He hadn't been drinking in months, and he was pretty sure even if he had drank the night before he wouldn't have decided to move in with someone far away from where he needed to be in the middle of the night and just done it. He was a bit spontaneous, but not daft.
He would figure it out later, he told himself, as he walked further into the city. First thing was first, he needed something to eat. It wasn't good to try and think with an empty stomach. Something he had learned very well in his time at college. Probably the only thing he learned while there, but at least he had learned something. He grabbed a bagel and coffee at a shop and ate it outside, grabbing a newspaper London Daily. Only, it wasn't his London. He was in Canada, apparently, not a destination he ever really wanted to go to, but there were worse possibilities. Suddenly, he felt completely alone again, and cursed himself for not bringing his wand. This could could be very very bad. Though he didn't exactly see why Voldermort would come after him and make him suffer, as he wasn't really an active member of the wizarding world, but the man was insane.
Sighing he threw the newspaper into the trashcan and finished his bagel in silence. He was probably just overreacting, and if his suspicions were correct (unlikely), then a wand wouldn't do him much good anyway. He was as good as dead.
Cho had woken to similar circumstances, but had found her wand on her desk. She had spent more time in her room, exploring and finding that everything she needed (or wanted) was there in the room. Of course, she would need to spend more time decorating it, but...
It seemed strange to wake up in a completely different room, but she didn't feel as freaked out as she should have. Instead, she felt rather calm. But she felt anxious just sitting in an empty room. She stepped outside and looked around her living area. There didn't seem to be anyone else in the other rooms and she noticed that her name was outside her door room, in her own hand writing. She frowned and looked at it, before stepping back. It was hers alright.
Once outside, she began to wander up and down the street, looking for anything that might look familiar. Of course, she was speaking of landmark places, but she noticed a familiar face she had never expected to see, ever again. She hesitated and stood on the sidewalk, staring at the familiar boy sitting outside the cafe. It couldn't be...could it? After all these months, she had found him. Did she come to this place because he was here? Millions of thoughts seemed to flow through her mind, but she found she was still walking towards him, in a daze.
"Ritchie."
Ritchie, at first, was oblivious to Cho. He wasn't exactly looking for a familiar face on a busy street, or really expecting to see her again. It hurt too much to even think of her name most of the time, so hearing her voice, he thought his mind was playing tricks on him. Or Voldermort. But something inside of him told him it was real, that it was her voice, so he put down the remainder of his bagel and wiped his face off before looking up and around. It wasn't hard to spot her, she stood out wherever she went.
It had been a little more than four months since he had seen her last, but when he locked eyes with her, it was like they had never parted. What kind of cruel joke was this? He wasn't a fan for heart ache and anguish, which was why he had left without telling her in the first place. A clean break, even if a little severe, was always best. Or so he had thought. Now seeing her, he wondered if he should have gone about things differenly. "Cho," Ritchie said with an obvious blush on his cheeks. "What are you doing here?"
"I should ask you the same thing," she said, feeling hurt and happiness at the same time. She was sure those emotions were expressed on her face, but she didn't care. She looked around, knowing she didn't want to have this conversation out in public, but the words seemed to spill out of her mouth.
"Is this where you've been? Is this where you've mysteriously disappeared to?" Her arms were folded and she felt like a scolding girlfriend or wife, asking where their spouse has been.
"Where I disappeared to?" He repeated looking around the place. It was like a cozy little novelesque town. He thought she knew him better. "No, I just woke up here. The wrong London." He shook his head. And he thought that Voldermort was doing this. He would have known better than to bring Cho along for this.
He got up from his table. "Come on, let me buy you a bagel. It's early. I'll explain what I know." He said with an arched brow. Like she couldn't resist him. But he knew she could, which was why he had left in the first place. "They even have kiwis." He added knowing she wouldn't be able to resist that. Walking closer to her, he stood too closely to her, like he was going to give her a hug, but didn't. She was probably too angry at him to give him a hug anyway. And he was too weak around her to survive that.
Cho wanted desperately to hug him, but she kept her hands at her sides. She was happy to see him, but upset at him...and hurt. Why would he have done that? He was the closest friend she could possibly have, who had supported her through everything, and then he had just left. She glared up at him, knowing he was using her weakness to stay.
"Plain bagel with cream cheese," she said, walking around and sitting on the other side of the table, her arms still crossed and not looking at him.
"Anything to drink? And no kiwi?" He said crossing his arms, trying not to look disappointed. She was just upset with him, that was why she was being so distant. And it wasn't like he ran up to her and gave her a hug anyway. Things were better this way, he kept trying to tell himself, when you don't touch her or let your mind wander. Like his mind ever actually listened to him anyway.
"Of course Kiwi," she said, trying to keep her voice annoyed, but it came out joking. How could she not be with Ritchie? "And you choose my drink. I'm sure you know what I would like more than myself right now." She still couldn't bring herself to look at him and stared at the table. She had spent a good month trying to find him with no luck. Could it really have been that easy to run into him in this strange circumstance? She doubted it and half of her wanted to reach out and grab him, just to make sure it was real.
Ritchie was about to ask what she meant by this, but decided against it and waved a quick goodbye before popping into the cafe to get what she wanted. Minutes later, he returned, her bagel, two kiwis, and an orange juice in tow. He put them down in front of her before returning to his own seat and looking at his half eaten bagel. "We're in Canada. London, Ontario I think. I don't know how. But my only suspicion is thrown out the window, so that's all I have for you, in terms of telling you where we are or how we got here." He shrugged taking a bite of his now cold bagel. "And, to clear things up from what you just said, I don't think I know you that well. Orange juice is what everyone drinks in the morning." He shrugged, if he just pretended that he didn't know what she really wanted from him, maybe he wouldn't get his heart broken for real this time.
She didn't answer to the drink question, picking up one of the kiwi's and and a spoon. "Canada?" She frowned, thinking about it. Tony hadn't said anything about coming to Canada...so it wasn't for work and she had just forgotten. She scooped out a bit of the fruit and popped it in her mouth, chewing thoughtfully. "Did you just arrive here as well?" She decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Ritchie nodded. "This morning. Or last night? While I was sleeping maybe?" He shrugged, not really wanting to think about it. Hairy details weren't really his thing. "I mean, one it's Canada, two it's Canada, three do you know how cold it gets in Canada, four it's not London or rather the real London, five it's too...normal and boring," he said disregarding his last comment was completely unwarranted because he had been awake and there less than an hour.
"This was not on my plan of events for today, or ever really. I mean, being here." He clarified, because one day he did hope to see Cho again. Just, not so soon, not while his love for her was still so real, strong, and painful.
"It wasn't on mine," she muttered, finishing off one kiwi and moving on to her bagel. She was silent for awhile, letting everything soak in. It seemed they both had just arrived...but wasn't it just a little funny that he was the first person she would run into here? There was too much of a coincidence with that.
"Where did you go?" She asked it quietly and finally looked over at him. "Why did you leave?"
"Where did I go?" Ritchie repeated, sounding a little perplexed. Sure he knew she'd probably want to ask that eventually, but he figured since she didn't get it out right away, he'd at least be safe for the day. "I went to Uni," he said with a shrug. "A muggle one. Not much to tell about that. Finals are to start in a couple of weeks, rotten luck on my part." Like he really cared about homework.
"Why did I leave? School mostly, and the rest, well, you just don't want to know about that."
"I do want to know!" she said, her anger building. She put her bagel down and wiped her hands, as if she were getting ready to talk about something important. "Ritchie, you just left! Got up and left, without even leaving me a message! For a full month, I was devoted to trying to find you! But it was like you had disappeared off the face of the earth! I was a mess! Why...how...why did you do that?" She realized her voice was raising in volume and a couple of people were looking over. She cleared her throat and took a sip of her orange juice, trying to compose herself again.
Ritchie grimaced, but relaxed when she said she had been looking for him for a month. He had been gone just over four, which meant he was right. Time just moved on for her. No big deal after the initial shock. "Well you can't have been that torn up about it, because I've been gone for four months." He started out. Sometimes he could be a real jerk. "I didn't disappear off of the face of the earth. I just started going to Uni. Not too far from where I used to live, actually." He grinned, as if he was getting some sort of self satisfaction out of the heartache this was causing him. Because to him, if she had tried, like she claimed to, she would have found him. If she loved him, which she didn't, she would have. He crossed his arms and shrugged. "I told you before and I'll tell you again, you don't want to know why I left. It doesn't change the fact that I did leave. It's not going to give you four months with that old Ritchie back. I'm not him." His words were flat, like he was running out of steam and energy to keep up his mask.
She tilted her head to the side, frowning. "No, you've been gone for a year," she corrected. She remembered it. He had left right after their graduation, without so much as a goodbye. It had been about a year of his disappearance, but she kept hoping to get an owl from him. "And how can you even dare to tell me how torn up I was or not? You weren't there for the nights I couldn't sleep because I was crying too hard or the days I just sat in one room all day, staring at the same spot on my floor, because you weren't there to snap me out of it!" She stared at him for a moment. "I looked for you," she said. "I did. But I didn't think to look in muggle places for you." She felt completely stupid now, because that should have been the first thing she should have looked into. What was she thinking?
She stared at him again, as his last words sunk into her. "What are you saying?" she said, her anger building up again. "You're not the same Ritchie? You're still a jerk as always! Selfish and only thinking of yourself!" She stood up, the rest of her food in front of her. "I guess it was a mistake then...I don't know why you were the first person I saw here, but now I am definitely regretting it!"