Date (I'm terrible)
Regardless of the outcome, Emma decides, this will be a learning experience.
For example, she’s learned from this experience that she has an extreme tendency to micromanage.
She asks his friends what his favorite foods are, then has to bribe them not to spoil the secret. Convinces the house elves to help, because Merlin knows she’s awful at cooking, then has to figure out how to transport it from the kitchens in the basement to the highest bloody tower. She even wards the stairwell to the Astronomy Tower after classes end, to prevent detection ( really, if they don’t want students to be out of bounds, they ought to do a better job of keeping them out ) and spends far too long setting it up, making sure everything is perfect.
When he gets there, she’s so worried it’s over-the-top ( she has no idea what a date is supposed to be like, alright? ) that she spends the entire walk up the tower explaining—yes, we’re having a picnic at the top of the Astronomy Tower, because we can’t exactly go traipsing into the bloody Forest, can we? No, no one’s going to bust us for breaking rules, I’m not an idiot, I know how to do basic repelling charms, and the rest of the school will be in the Hall for dinner anyway. Yes, we’ve got butter beer. All answers to questions he doesn’t ask. He wouldn’t—he’s polite, unassuming, wouldn’t interrogate her over something as simple as a date—but she’s nervous, anxious, needs everything to be perfect.
Over the course of dinner, all her rigidity disappears, her fears dissolving. Conversation is difficult at first, but once she realizes he’s not judging her, he’s not either approving or disapproving, they can both allow all the pretense to drop, and from then the only time they’re not talking is when they’re chewing. ( Because they’re polite fuckers, who don’t speak with their mouths full. )
Even after the food is long gone, they’ve Vanished the plates and empty butterbeer bottles and the sun has set, they stay there, just talking.