Toujours Pur (dot) Net

Wes merely looked at Abbey with an innocent smile, not confirming or denying. It was no secret Wes complimented himself frequently; besides, most of the time people just had to take one look at him to know he wasn't serious. And anyway, when was he ever? He looked down at the bowl. Abbey was right; they had been firing back and forth so much that the ice cream had been long forgotten, now reduced to a murky multicolored puddle in the bowl. "Yeah," he said, a little disappointedly himself. He looked back up and caught Abbey's eye, and he smiled. "Well it's a good thing it was on the house then, innit? You talk too much, Abs."

"Me?" Abbey scoffed, shaking her head. She knew the defiant response was probably just the one Wes was looking for, but couldn't help herself. More often than not they both said things just to provoke each other, all goodheartedly of course, and Abbey still hadn't quite learned how to rise above it. "As I remember it, you were the one that was all 'I'm the master of words' and 'I can teach you a thing or two'," Abbey said, waving both hands as she spoke as if that made her imitation of Wes seem more pompous. She grinned teasingly at him and shrugged. "Guess it is lucky, then." Abbey took another fleeting glance back to the register and the person working who'd supposedly given them the free ice cream. "Actually, I feel right guilty now. We get this for free and half of it is just all--" she lifted a spoon from the bowl, where a gloppy mess spilled off of it and then set the utensil back again. "I guess you'll just need to make sure your new flat has plenty of Neopolitan for when I'm over," Abbey suggested with a smirk.

Wes made a show of looking around them and then back at Abbey as if to say well who else? when she expressed playful surprise that he could possibly be referring to her. He laughed at her impression of him, shaking his head. "Okay come on, was that really supposed to be me?" he demanded. "My impression of you was way more accurate. And you say you know me well. Pffft." He looked down at the ice cream again when Abbey said she felt guilty about the fact that most of it wasn't eaten. In fact, he didn't feel bad at all about this despite having paid for it; he didn't mind losing a few Galleons over melted ice cream when the conversation had been so enjoyable. "You feel guilty for some random ice cream guy," he said slowly and dramatically. "And not for me, the poor bloke you've bullied for seven years?" He shook his head in disbelief before scoffing at her last words, nodding and widening his eyes. "Oh believe you me, I'll have nothing but Neopolitan if that's what pleases you," he said. "I don't want to get murdered in my sleep." He had to grin a little sheepishly after saying this, realizing his words indicated he didn't actually want to get rid of her at all like he had implied earlier.

"I think someone is just being a little picky," Abbey sniffed, even if she did really agree with Wes. It wasn't like she'd ever admit it though, because she knew she wouldn't hear the end of it. When Wes began to mention, in that over-dramatized way of his, how she'd bullied him for seven years, Abbey burst out laughing. "What happened to it's hardly abuse anymore?" she asked with a grin. "And might I remind you that you are hardly innocent here. I remember when we both got detention in our second year because you were getting all mouthy with me in Branstone's class." Abbey chuckled as she recalled the memory from her earlier days at Hogwarts, when she and Wes were constantly at odds with each other despite their mutual friends of Roxanne and Chase. "Thank you," Abbey replied to his final statement, flashing a winning smile at him. "That's what I like to hear."

Wes threw his head back in laughter at the memory from so long ago. He sat up straight and held up his finger, needing to defend himself. "Okay, okay no, Abbey," he said, using her full first name for once, for emphasis, still laughing. "We both got detention because I was being provoked. How d'you expect me to not respond to you blathering on in Spanish when it was so obvious you were talking shit about me?! S'not my fault I had the guts to talk back in English. It's just too bad Branstone heard me. Not that it stopped you from doing the same thing throughout detention too." He shook his head, still chuckling, recalling how infuriating he used to think Abbey was and how amusing it was to think back on now. He rolled his eyes at her last words. "Whoa relax," he said, holding up his hand. "Don't get a big head or anything. This place isn't big enough for both our egos. And mine's got a right to be so inflated, let's be honest here."

Abbey rolled her eyes, grinning at both the memory from so many years ago and how typical it was that Wes would have his take on the situation too. As he continued, she laughed out loud, recalling the time more vividly now that Wes had elaborated. Abbey could remember pulling that same trick more than once with Wes back in those first years of school; after she'd realized how much it bothered him, she used it to her advantage to annoy him quite often. Even now, she had her occasional outbursts of Spanish where he was completely clueless as to what she was saying.

"All right, yeah, but it's not my fault that you didn't think to start shit talking me in Hindi. You could've, you know, and then Branstone never would've known. And --" she pointed her index finger at him, pretending to get serious for a moment, "for the record, how do you know what I was saying about you?" Abbey smirked mischievously, raising an eyebrow in question. "It could've been anything. I could've been, I don't know," she waved a hand, grasping for any random thing that would've been outrageous for the twelve year-old her to say, "professing my love and claiming everything I did to you had all been act, but you would never have known." After the words were out, Abbey had one of those sinking moments where she realized what she said could be taken entirely out of place. Shit, like why would you bring that up? Not skipping a beat, Abbey was grinning at Wes's next words, as if that could play off the slip up she'd just made. "I really don't think we need to start discussing who's ego is bigger. That is a losing battle, for us both."

Wes scoffed at Abbey retaliating by saying he didn't think to respond in Hindi. He was on the point of telling her there was no fun for him in doing that because he had wanted Abbey to be perfectly aware how annoying he thought she was and that speaking in a different language only defeated the purpose -- when she continued onto say what it was that she might have been saying in Spanish. Though it, once again, brought back memories of their past (after all, it was because Abbey didn't love Wes that she had broken things off) but simultaneously, it made him feel a bit better considering he had made a similar blunder earlier -- and moreover, the fact that she didn't call attention to what she said once again confirmed for Wes that what was in the past really was in the past.

"Yeah right," he said, not showing that he had noticed anything in her comment. "Your black little heart? You're forgetting I was a torture victim of yours for years. You were probably calling me a squat git. You were weren't you? You so were!" He narrowed his eyes at her accusingly before laughing at her quip about egos. "Uh, I don't think so, Abs," he said. "Mine beats yours. And rightfully so." He held his arms open boastfully, though really, his lanky frame wasn't very impressive -- however, he knew that, and therein lay the joke.

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Although she was still smiling, Abbey was waiting to see if any sort of look would cross Wes's face that show that he'd caught the other meaning her words could have. She figured it wasn't hard to, particularly since she knew she'd picked up on the mistake he'd made earlier, but in typical fashion he didn't let it show. As he moved on with the conversation, Abbey allowed herself to as well; after all, having been in such an intense relationship with one another, they were allowed a few slip ups like this every once in a while, right?

Quickly, the issue had passed out of mind when she was scoffing at his words. "Like you didn't dish everything right back at me," she protested, although it was true that she'd given Wes an especially hard time in the first years they knew each other. "And I guess you'll never know what I said." Abbey shrugged noncommittally, leaving it hanging. "Which means I could call you anything I want -- kinda nice, eh? It's a good thing I stopped trying to teach you Spanish, or that would take away all the fun," she noted a bit smugly, and debated following that up with a comment in Spanish to prove her point, but she was cut off in that thought when Wes mentioned his ego was bigger.

"Oh, please," she said, leaning across the table to playfully smack one of the arms he was holding out. "We both know that's a lie." Abbey smirked despite her words. It was another one of those losing battles between the two, where Abbey knew neither would give in to the other and grinning a little at how ridiculous they were being, like always, she stood up. "C'mon, we might as well leave now before we really get into it, or they might have to close up shop with us still debating this one." After a few more sassy replies, Wes stood up along with Abbey and the two made their way out of the ice cream parlour and down Diagon Alley.