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#i started school back in mid September! its hell

thelovelylolly · 2 years

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Take My Jacket

Summary : It's cold outside and you forgot your jacket, and Eddie notices. Warnings : The reader is described as smaller than Eddie and fem Notes : first stranger things fic! i have fallen down this rabbit hole and i shall not be leaving it for a while. also this is me begging for fall weather to come bc it's still hot af outside. its september. i need fall

You didn't realize how cold it was going to be. You had on a long sleeve shirt and you didn't walk to school, your friend had driven you. You didn't think you would need a jacket.

But when you were waiting outside, you wish you had one.

You were waiting for your ride outside and she was taking a while. You were fine at first, but then a cool breeze came by and made you shiver. Sure enough, you started to rub your arms to warm yourself up and hoped your ride would hurry up.

You heard footsteps approach and you turned to see Eddie 'The Freak' Munson, your best friend. You smiled at him then continued to try to warm yourself up.

"Waiting for a ride?" He asked as he stopped next to you.

"Yeah, and I'm tempted to just walk home at this point. She's taking so long," you answered, a shiver running down your body.

Eddie looked you up and down, then sighed and started to take his leather jacket off. You looked over at him, confused. "What are you doing, Eds?"

He didn't answer, just holding his jacket out for you to take. You looked down at the jacket then back at him.

"What? You looked cold," he said when he saw the confused look on your face.

"I'm good, thanks, Eddie."

"Stop being stubborn and just take my jacket, alright?"

You rolled your eyes with a smile and took your backpack off, setting it by your feet as you reached for his jacket. You grabbed it and put it on. The sleeves went past your hands and the jacket ended at your mid-thigh. His jacket smelled of weed and smoke, something that you were used to since you hung out with him a lot.

You blushed and picked your bag back up, swinging it on your shoulders. Your friend's car drove into the parking lot and you quickly turned back to Eddie.

"Hey, um, I can just come over later and-"

"Keep it."

"I- okay then," you replied with a smile. Eddie smiled back then your friend honked her horn. You looked back to see your friend sitting impatiently in her seat.

You quickly looked back at Eddie and kissed his cheek before running to your friend's car.

Eddie stood there, blush creeping onto his face. He watched you drive away and smiled, reaching his hand up to touch the spot where your lips were. He laughed and started towards his van, giddy as hell.

#eddie munson x reader #stranger things x reader #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie munson fluff

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fandom-boss-of-avocados · 1 year

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A Walk in the Park Pt. 2 (Gojo x Reader)

Gojo clasped the locket around your neck and whispered in your ear “I’ll love you until eternity ends.”

The two of you smiled happily in adolescent bliss. After all, what seventeen year olds would doubt the security of their position in life?

TRIGGER WARNING: BLOOD, GORE, DEATH

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It was 6:30 PM on a Thursday Night in August, Gojo and you had finished sparring no more than 30 minutes ago. Gojo had told you that he was going to take a cursed spirit case right outside of Kyoto. This S-rated cursed spirit had claimed 5 civilian lives in less than a month. So, they decided to dispatch their very best, Gojo Satoru. You’d always known Gojo was one in a million, but it never occurred to you just how special his power as a Jujutsu Sorcerer was.

When he arrived back, no words were spoken. He had saw you waiting by the cherry blossom where he promised to meet you previously and the only exchange was a loving embrace. He looked as though he’d died. The bags underneath is turquoise eyes were a horrid shade of post-mortem grey and his gorgeous white hair was layered with soot and sediment. His appearance said everything.

“I love you until eternity ends.” You whispered into his ear.

He turned the loving embrace into a struggle to hold onto you forever, he clenched his arms around your shoulder and back tighter.

Why would he let go when he could see all the cursed spirits waiting to tear into you? They wanted to make his life a living hell, he doubted you could see these spirits looking with malice at you. He knew he could never be normal but, he thought maybe he would have more than a year with you or he could let you go. Truthfully, Gojo was selfish and wanted you all for himself even if it meant that he knew spirits could easily see you as a meal.

A week later, Gojo decided that if his time with you was limited, he would at least try and be the best boyfriend ever. He took you to Natsu Matsuri and got you dango, takoyaki, okonomiyaki, and purin. He bought you flowers and took you to a shrine in Tokyo.

“I know it’s a lot to ask but, would you make me the happiest man alive and stay in my arms forever?”

“I’d love to, can we get married eventually?”

“Anything for my princess.”

He’d promised to marry you eventually but he would never be able to.

It was a rainy day in mid-September. You were walking the streets of Tokyo near Gojo’s Sorcerer School and he’d seemed stressed the last few weeks. So, it was only reasonable to go get Gojo his favorite dessert, kikufuku!

Unbeknownst to you, a Special Grade cursed spirit had been spying on Gojo since his case in Kyoto a month ago. What better way to let Gojo know he was being watched than by killing someone he cares deeply about.

TW Begins!

You were walking back with the kikufuku and about a block away from the school an old lady asks you for help.

“Dearie would you do this little old lady a favor and help me get my trash to the dumpster in that alleyway?” She pointed right across the street and being the good person you are, you grab the bag and begin to walk.

The spirit starts to shift forms and release the old lady as it follows closely behind you. “HUhuHUhuHUhuHU”

You turn around to see a 180cm creature in black mist and covered in stitches and blood. It reaches its grotesque arms out at you and grabs your arms and begins to rip and contort your limbs into horrid positions. You scream for Gojo.

From a block away, Gojo begins to hear these screams from the open window in the classroom. He races from the classroom and heads toward the piercing screams and shrieks.

Within 5 minutes, your arms were the equivalent of flesh pretzels and the left arm had essentially been detached minus a 2cm of flesh hanging on. Your legs were in no better of a position, the knees had been twisted backward, and the from the ankle down on the right, there was nothing but a bone hanging out. Your ribcage was almost completely shattered and there was blood gushing out of the wound.

Gojo had arrived to see the horrid sight with the kikufuku bag 30 cm from your right arm and your shallow breaths.

“I’m sorry Y/N, this is all my fault!” Gojo cried and shrieked as he ran to hold you in time you had left.

TW END

The idea of death didn’t seem to bad considering the predicament you were already in, you were okay with dying. There was so many things like getting married on your bucket list. You’d never be able to do them but it was fine because Gojo was here.”

“Will you really love me until eternity ends? Please I don’t want to die without knowing someone loves me.” You cried with the breaths you had left.

“I will love you until eternity ends and I could never find someone else. Everyone pales in comparison to you. You’ll always be my sun and moon.”

You closed your eyes for the last time with tears rolling down your face and a smile.

------------

“I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you and that you died for me.” Gojo whispers touching the gravestone and placing down a bag of fresh dango and some forget-me-nots.

Author’s Note: Thank you for reading, sorry if you wanted a happy ending! Anyway I hope you all reach out to me with requests for more fanfics.

#jjk #jjk gojo #gojo x you #gojo x reader #death #anime

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young--cheeseburger · 11 months

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Mid-Year Self Reflection

I turn 24 next month and I've been depressed since I was 11-12 years old.

These past few months have been really eye opening and I've been learning more and more about myself and how I coped with the world for so long isnt healthy. Nor how I saw myself.

I knew I'm depressed but seeing the tangible depths of my depression come to bite me in the ass has really been eye opening.

Ever since I broke down in September-October of 2022, I've been in a state of mourning. As well as the most "unstable" I've been. Looking back at it, it was probably a long time coming.

Feeling like I failed college not only becauae its not easy to get into but also because I didnt put my 100% and then realizing that I can't do art as a full time job anyway really left me in a bad state because I covinced myself it was all I had. And it really felt like it was. Most likely being its something I genuniely enjoyed throughout everything, even me being depressed. Drawing was fun, being able to physically see myself improve was fun and wanting to get better at this skill that I had actually felt good. It felt really good. But I am also my own worst critic so that probably didnt help things either. And since its a medium that does require my emotions to put into it (even if its silly little drawings) I've cut myself off from those. Maybe not completely but I've been in this very stagnant state for a really long time.

Hell me saying that sentence says a lot to me. "Stagnant" is like a mental checkpoint for me since thats how I described my life in High School of all things.

There's a quote from Night In The Woods where Bea tells Mae "I stayed here and got older, and you went away and stayed the same." and it really hit me since Mae also had the opportunity to go to college and didnt change. Mae is a lot more "aimless" and wants to chill and hang around though. Meanwhile I give myself way too harsh standards and constantly fail to live up to them. (geez I wonder who I got that from) Both seem like ways to cope with becoming an adult the more I think about it.

Anyways.

I'm at least glad I have some awareness towards my problems and will always try to take responsibility for my actions when I can. Its because of these issues and a few other things that I lost a few friends along the way. Although its for the better really. I was taking a lot more than I can really give and I wasn't appreciative of friendships, nor the time given by them. And as we get older in life, the less time we're able to give. I don't wanna be someome whos holding anyone back or anything. And no friend should feel like they arent cared about.

I use apathy to cope with not feeling depressed but instead it turned off any other kind of emotion and it grew into me not feeling much of anything at all. No emotions to help guide choices, no emotions to share, no emotions to feel towards anything really. In my mind, if I stopped caring, things wouldnt hurt as much.

I usually didnt talk about emotions because I didnt want to dump on people but also because I kept invalidating my own feelings. A lot of people I know have been through so much worse and here I am. Still with a family, even though they throughly hate who I am as a trans man. I got hit a few times as a kid for making mistakes/disiplinary reasons but I had friends who's parents did so much worse. So who was I to complain in the face of all of that? I should be helping them get through it then worry about what I felt because my problems seemed minor in comparison.

Comparison, the same thing my parents did constantly when I was younger until I started being the one getting compared to. Because "I can do everything right" right? A perfect little mold even if I was a dying dog. Loyal, but at what cost?

"I'm sure theres people who care about me but I don't really care too much anymore. I That just means I am really weak. Useless even until the end. I want to die. The pain would only hurt for a little while before everything is over."

That was a consistent thought in my head for so long. And I've wanted to die for so long. But up to a few weeks ago, I had actual plans for doing it too. Several ways even.

It wasnt till an old friend told me that my ways of thinking were only making me feel worse. And when I told myself I'd listen for once, I did. Before walking out again because once again, I had taken someone's emotional labor for granted.

I realized now that, yeah people will always have it worse. And yeah I can totally do my part to make sure that the people I know, friends or strangers can at least feel better. But I have to realize that what happened to me hurt me too so I can finally let it go.

I want to move on with my life, I really do. It sucks not having a bunch of the adult skills I need (driving especially) but its never too late to learn. I have time and I need to start giving myself the time like I would for others. To stop being at odds with myself and try to be neutral with my existance, instead of not caring. To want to live, to hope, even if nothing is concrete. To be like water, instead of a brick.

Trying to say that last part with this capitalist hellscape in mind is hard but people like me have survived.

Maybe I can too.

#mopey dearest desmond #2023

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agracefulfall · 1 year

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Station Wagons and Tin Roofs

The navy blue station wagon was a humble abode with laughter bouncing off the doors and escaping through the cracked windows. Childish games of truth-or-dare, mid-day escapades to the local convenient store, joyful sing-a-longs down the long highways. I had grown fond of that vehicle and the friendships developed within its interior. Little did I know I would soon grow to detest that navy blue station wagon. Little did I know my school-girl crush, which was childish in and of itself for a then 23 year old, would soon transform to utter hatred.

At first, I enjoyed it. The love of my life was off galavanting across Europe without me, causing a break in our relationship. It was oddly warm for a September day. Our group of bandits, musicians, poets, and artists were gathered, cigarettes between fingers as the as the usual laughter was carried along with the light breeze. I couldn’t help but notice the stolen glances from him, which conjured a warmth upon already rosy cheeks.

"Wanna walk to my car with me?"

His voice hit the air like honey, spreading the warmth from my cheeks to areas of my skin I never knew existed before. He was gentle the first time. Playful, even. He awoke something within me which I had been yearning to set free. Little by little, his gentle touch mirrored that of the changing of the seasons, the crisp fall breeze morphing into the bitter cold of winter. It was Valentine’s Day. The one who held my heart showed no interest in showering me with affection and love, so I turned to the only other place I knew held affirmation, that navy blue station wagon.

Except this time, the affirmation and warmth I was so desperately seeking was nowhere to be found. It wasn’t the first time he ignored my disinterest to pursue activities I had once found so pleasing. Yet this time was different. I watched myself from outside that once beloved vehicle. I watched as he placed his hand upon my head, forcing it towards his desired position, despite my protests. Those blue eyes which once sparkled like the Mediterranean were now masked by the color I imagine Hell must be.

"Give it a kiss."

That sweet voice which once was a ray of sunshine kissed upon the shell of my ear was now the cackle of a hyena after capturing its prey.

It started to rain as he drove me back to my car, which took no more than a minute tops. Longest minute I've endured. Longest 60 seconds to pass. The moment went by in silence before I instinctively reached for the handle, wanting not a second more to be in his presence, let alone that car.

"Drive safe."

The sound of his voice clashed with the soothing rhythm of the rain against the pavement. I don't remember if I said anything or if I mumbled a half-assed response before fleeing from his vehicle into mine. And he drove off. I forget if I had a class left to attend that day as I turned the key, the engine roaring.

I traveled the 20 minute or so ride home in silence. Nothing but the rain pelting against the roof of the car to fill the void. Because it wasn't just the car that was silent, but my entire being. Had there been a switch to turn off everything, I would have given anything. My mind didn't even replay the images of what had just occurred. There wasn't even a static. There was nothing. Nothing but the road and the rain.

I don't remember how I got home. But I parked and took shelter from the rain as I twisted the knob and pushed my way into the house. Kicking off my shoes, dropping my bag, my body led me up the steps and I didn't even make it to my bedroom before my body went loose. I had greeted the carpeted hallway floor with palms and knees, somehow knowing neither parent was home. It was in knowing this that I let out a throaty sob.

I wasn't aware of what had happened in that car. It would take years for me to acknowledge it. What I did know, is that I didn't want it.

That night, I took a shower. A stream of hot water, willing it to burn the layer of skin that he touched off. Every print, every particle. The dirt his hands left in my hair as he pushed my head down. The sweat from his palm upon my ass that soaked through my leggings. Standing beneath the steam, I placed both hands over my ears and let the water beat directly upon my head, an illusion of rain pelting a tin roof. With my eyes shut, I could see it, a tin-roofed shack tucked away in the valley of a mountain, getting paled by buckets of water. A storm within my own head to rid me of that day. To rid me of whatever it was that I was feeling. Shame. Guilt. Embarrassment. Blame. And for what? All because I got in the car.

#original rp #orginal character #a room of one's own #sophie bardot #triggering content

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for-fucks-sake-h · 3 years

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At My Weakest - one

rated: m, mature | word count: 3.2k | story page

...tangled up in heartbeats and bite marks and body heat.

- butterflies rising

When Gianna was young, she used to have elaborate daydreams of what her life would look like in the future. Where would she live? What would she be doing? She thought about it in the way that a lot of kids wish away their youth, wanting to be independent and take care of herself, not have her parents constantly on her case telling her what to do. She worked hard through school, was a straight A student, followed the rules, graduated at the top of her class, had a good job, had her shit together.

Seemingly, her life looked pretty good from the outside. But that was the thing about looking from the outside in. You never truly know what goes on behind closed doors.

She slammed the door so hard the walls shuddered, the trim cracking the tiniest bit around the framing. Fuck, she wished she could slam it harder. Take out all her aggressions and just slam it, over and over and over again.

She didn’t though. She took off towards her car instead, the sound of her name being called a distant echo as her heart hammered in her chest. Her blood was boiling, her hand shaking as she reached for the chrome door handle so that she could lock herself inside. Her breathing was erratic, her chest rising and falling harshly as she pressed her head back against the leather headrest. Her throat burned with emotion as her pulse beat wildly, the threat of tears ready and waiting at her lash line. Deep breaths; one, two, three. Not without slamming her palm down on the top steering wheel in frustration; one, two, three.

She released one more deep exhale, her body practically sinking into the seat with it. She couldn’t help but glance at herself in the rearview mirror, her eyes noticeably dark and soulless.

How did she get here?

That was the question running through her mind as she reversed out of the parking spot, as she drove down the highway, as she circled around her town in an attempt to clear her head. She wasn’t even sure how she ended up at Gemma’s, but all of a sudden she was parked outside her building.

It only took one buzz and a soft “it’s me” into the intercom for the latch to open.

“Hiya babe, you okay?” The concern was written all over her friend's face, a telltale sign that Gianna looked even worse for wear than she thought.

“Is it okay if I stay here for a bit?”

It wasn’t even a question, Gianna knew that. She’d known Gemma nearly her whole life. They grew up across the street from each other, Gemma’s family moving for her mum’s job. One bike accident and two scraped knees when they were six made them inseparable. Their families became so close that they even started vacationing together. They all got older, but it never changed.

Gemma nodded, not pressing the issue. “Come on, I’ll make you coffee.”

That was all Gianna needed, just the comfort from someone who truly knew her. She thought Steve knew her. Shit, she thought she knew him too. They had plans - nothing concrete, but talked about enough that Gianna felt like the rug had been pulled out from under her. She could feel the ache of it in her chest with every breath, and it was excruciating.

“What am I gonna do?” Gianna asked after a while, two coffees and a half a box of pound cake later.

“I don’t think you need to figure that out just yet, babe.” Gemma’s tone was soft, gentle - comfort was something that came naturally to her.

“All my stuff is there. I don’t even want to look at him,” Gianna shook her head with a frown, eyes cast down to her half empty mug.

“I’ll have Harry call him,” Gemma devised. “We’ll figure out a time for you to go over when he isn’t there for you to collect your shit.”

A frustrated growl came from the back of Gianna’s throat as she looked up to the ceiling. “What about tomorrow? How am I supposed to tell my parents?”

Gianna desperately didn’t want to go through this. They were not engaged, but they might have well been. Five years was a long time to be with someone just to have things not work out. Their lives were so intertwined, her parents loved him, Gianna knew her mum was counting down until she could start wedding planning. Fuck, Gianna was ready to start wedding planning. She was ready for the next step in her life, a family of her own. She wanted it with Steve. And poof, all that was gone in the blink of an eye.

“G,” Gemma sighed, a sympathetic look on her face. “Tell them when you’re ready. You don’t owe anything to anyone except yourself.”

Gianna didn’t say anything else. What more could she say? She didn’t even want to acknowledge that this was her new reality. Years of being in a perfectly content bubble popped so quickly it made her head spin. So she nodded as she toyed with the handle of her mug.

“Come on,” Gemma nodded towards the hallway. “You wanna change into some sweats?”

It didn’t even register that she was still dressed in her work attire, which was a feat in and of itself since she usually changed as soon as she got home. Her “home” closing in on her seemed to be enough of a distraction to the now overly prominent tightness of her skirt cinching into her waist.

So Gianna followed Gemma into her room at the end of the hall, and exhaled a sigh of relief as she unzipped the mid length silk skirt that made her feel pretty and complimented her skin tone. The sheer, black dress shirt that she had tucked into it fell away from her skin once the skirt loosened, and she was quick to tug on the joggers and exceptionally soft lavender sweater that Gemma left on her bed for her. It smelled like vanilla and detergent, and somehow that gave Gianna just enough comfort to not stay in Gemma’s bed for the foreseeable future.

It wasn’t until later that evening, with a pitch black sky above her and the cool September air biting at her cheeks as she sat on the rooftop that it really started to feel like everything around her was crumbling. She didn’t let herself cry until then - until she knew she was alone and could let it out without an audience. She hated crying in front of people, and as much as she loved Gemma, she just didn’t have the energy to let herself go there. But now? Now, it was coming full force whether she wanted it or not.

The sound of the metal storm door opening startled Gianna enough to make her jump, her sweater paw immediately going to her face to cover the tear that had just fallen.

She peaked over her shoulder after a moment only to find Harry pouting in the doorway, seemingly deciding if he should trudge forward or not. Gianna turned away from him, back toward the city lights as she pulled the bottom of her sweater down over her knees. She wrapped her hands in the sleeves even more as the wind blew a strip of hair across her face, and let her head fall to peer down at her knees when she heard the door slam closed.

The silence was deafening as he appeared at her side, moving to sit next to her on the picnic table situated at the corner of the roof. His ripped jean clad knee knocked against hers once he was seated on the table top, the side of his boot pressing against her socked foot where it rested on the bench seat, his palm finding its way to her shoulder blade.

Gianna leaned into him as her chin wobbled. Soothing circles were rubbed into her back, but the gesture only expedited the tear from slipping down her cheek.

“Gems told me. ‘M sorry, love.” His voice was gentle despite the deep timbre of it vibrating near her ear as he pressed his jaw against the top of her head.

It felt like too much time had passed before Gianna spoke up, her voice low and broken. “How do you just… fall out of love with someone?”

Harry shook his head against her temple, his arm wrapping around her to pull her closer into his side - an attempt to shield her from the onslaught of disappointment coursing through her veins.

“I don’t know, G.”

She sighed heavily. “I was supposed to marry him, and he just... broke up with me. Like it was nothing.”

“Did he say anything?”

Gianna pulled away from Harry’s side, wiping the sleeves of her sweater under her eyes in an attempt to collect herself. “Said he ‘couldn’t do this anymore’, whatever the fuck that means.”

Harry released a deep breath as he shook his head in disgust. For as long as Gianna and Gemma had been friends, Gianna and Harry were friends too. They weren’t super close, not the way the girls were, but they were friends nonetheless, and he hated seeing her hurt like that.

“Makes me think he didn’t love me at all,” Gianna continued. “How did I not see that?”

“If that’s true, he fooled all of us, love.”

Gianna didn’t say anything for a bit, just looked up to the dark sky as tears burned at her lower lash line. Harry stayed quiet as he watched her with a deep crease etched between his brows.

“I feel so fucking worthless,” she whispered eventually, her voice so solemn it ripped right through him.

“Hey,” he practically called, but she didn’t look at him. “You are not worthless.” Gianna shook her head, disagreeing. “Gianna. Stop it.” Harry wrapped his arm around her shoulder. “His fucking loss. If he doesn’t know a good thing when he has it, fuck him.”

“It’s not that simple.” Gianna leaned into his side once more, finding comfort in the way his fingers gripped her shoulder.

He hummed as he squeezed her shoulder once more. “It is. You’re too good for him anyway.”

Gianna snorted a soft laugh as she shook her head with a gentle jab of her elbow into his side. “Easy for you to say.”

“‘M serious. Way out of his league. In every sense.”

Harry gave the compliment with as much ease as he would with a stranger at a bar in the hopes of taking them home at the end of the night. He was charming that way, a smug sort of confidence wafting around him without any actual effort on his part.

Gianna wasn’t sure why, or how, but the compliment gave her just enough of a boost of confidence to make her feel a bit better.

Maybe Harry was right. Hell, maybe he was right about everything he’s been saying over the years. She couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in a serious relationship. He avoided the mess. He avoided the drama. For as long as Gianna had busted his chops for it, maybe he knew something she didn’t all along.

“You look like you’re thinking too much,” Harry commented when Gianna went quiet in her thoughts.

“No, I don’t know. Maybe you’re right.”

“Course I am,” he nodded surely. “Have I ever steered you wrong?”

She gave him a pointed look, which simply received a chuckle in response and nothing else. They both went quiet as they looked out over the city. Despite it being the middle of the night, it still seemed alive with the buildings roof top lights spreading out in the distance.

If there was one thing Gianna knew after the day she had, it was that she hated feeling the way she did. It had been a while since she felt so down on herself, let alone being let down by someone who she thought she could count on… forever. It put a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, and she hated it.

Harry spoke up after a while, the tone of his voice just enough of a tease to make Gianna’s skin prickle. “You know what they say, G.”

“What’s that?” she turned to him, watching as he kept his eyes focused on the city ahead of him.

“The best way to get over someone is to get under someone else.”

She held her breath without even realizing she was doing it, before slowly exhaling as she watched Harry turn ever so slowly to catch her eyes. She literally couldn’t help it, her reaction was immediate, the most subtle tingle crawling across her skin.

They teased and joked with each other plenty over the years. But somehow, in some way, Harry’s words felt different. The way he was looking at her felt different. Like he was dying to see her reaction but refusing to give in. His eyes were dark on the dimly lit roof, but completely focused on her.

Harry didn’t dare move, just stared back into her curious brown eyes, his mouth forming around the words faster than his brain could catch us. “Sounds to me like you just need a distraction.”

“Are you offering?” Gianna’s response was so quick it made a shudder fall down Harry’s back. And although Harry’s face was completely at ease, his eyes were fixated on the curve of her Cupid’s bow.

Harry’s eyes flicked up to meet hers. “Do you want me to be?”

That was enough to have Gianna’s body lean in on its own accord, her mouth catching his in a slow lingering kiss.

He tasted like the faintest bit of tequila and whatever his choice of spearmint gum was that evening, and it was intoxicating. His lips were soft but reacted immediately, suctioning to her bottom lip in an attempt to keep her there.

Just as quickly as it happened, Gianna was pulling away, the sound of their lips parting reverberating off of thin air.

She closed her eyes and turned back towards the city. “I’m sorry I don’t know what—”

But just as quickly, Harry’s hand reached for her jaw to pull her back to him, immediately interrupting her apology in favor of slanting their lips together once more.

This time, his fingers gently cupped her jaw as his mouth reeled her in further. It was like a knee jerk reaction, or when you haven’t had your favorite chocolate for a while and then can’t get enough of it.

He couldn’t get enough of her.

Gianna’s hand gripped his wrist, her mouth melting into his, head fuzzy and buzzing. And when Harry’s tongue teased, she found her own mouth opening more to let him in.

God, she welcomed him in, her tongue smoothing over his in a way that pulled the most toe curling chill up her spine. The kind that makes your skin erupt in goosebumps and your belly twist with something; need, desire, lust. Whatever it was, it had Gianna’s cheeks warming and her back arching closer to Harry.

And Harry, he was so far gone he felt like his head might explode. She was so warm, and she curved into him perfectly when he wrapped an arm around her waist to pull her closer, fingers still clenched softly at her neck to keep her still. The softness of her breasts against his chest was enough to light a fire in his stomach, desperate to be as close to her as physically possible. The flesh of her hip was pliant under his palm, fingers digging into her skin, subconsciously not wanting her to slip away. But maybe not so subconsciously after all.

His lips smoothed down her chin and across her jaw, nipping softly as a breathy moan slipped past Gianna’s lips. The sound had Harry sucking eagerly into the warm skin of her neck, kiss after sucking kiss being planted upon her soft skin. He could feel her pulse thrumming against his mouth, his own heart beat matching methodically.

“God, what are we doing?” Gianna whispered up into the open sky as her hands squeezed his shoulders.

Harry pulled away from her neck just then to check her face. “Do you wanna stop?”

“No,” she breathed, her mouth finding his waiting lips with a hum.

He kissed her hard, his mouth so insistent on sucking and pulling on her lips that Gianna felt like he was taking her breath with him. His mouth was soft exactly the way it should be, but strong all in the same. Demanding, urgent, salacious. Kissing him was almost too enjoyable.

Gianna’s hand smoothed down the strong expanse of Harry’s shoulder, nails scratching against the hard muscle beneath the soft skin of his bicep. The goosebumps there could have been attributed to the cool evening air, but Gianna knew better.

Especially when her fingers trailed the rest of the way down his side and across the top of his thigh, her palm resting on the center seam of his jeans.

Her eyes were closed despite her head tilting down, pulling her lips from his as their foreheads met softly.

“You’re hard.” Her words were just above a whisper. It was obvious, but she couldn’t help commenting on it. She could feel the firmness of his cock beneath his jeans, hot and full against her palm.

“You made me hard,” he leaned in to kiss her cheek gently. “You’re so fucking sexy. And beautiful. Y’smell like heaven. Fuck.” His words traveled down her neck, his mouth finding the edge of her sweater to suck a new kiss on a new piece of skin. He wanted to uncover every piece of skin to leave traces of his mouth on.

“It’s my perfume.” Gianna’s rebuttal was soft as she tilted her head back to grant him more space; more skin for him to suck tiny kisses into.

She palmed him over his jeans, the twitch of his hard length making her swallow thickly with desire.

“Think it’s just you,” Harry commented wistfully.

Gianna’s fingers toyed with the button of his jeans, his zipper lowering ever so slowly as Harry’s tongue smoothed over her skin before sucking gently.

“Is this okay?” she asked softly as her hand smoothed into his snug jeans, feeling the hardness of his length over his briefs.

His head tilted back with a soft moan while his fingers squeezed her waist tighter, as if her gentle touch was too much for him.

“You tell me,” he breathed as his cock twitched against her palm, his body begging for more from her. “Are you okay?”

That was the age old question, wasn’t it? Was she okay?

Gianna wasn’t sure. She knew she would be, eventually at least. But in that moment, all she knew was that Harry made her... feel. For as long as she’d been numb, he was making her feel alive in that moment. And he made her forget, and that was what she wanted.

“We don’t have to—” Harry began, but was quickly cut off by Gianna pushing forward to press her lips to his jaw, her tongue smooth out over the sharp indent before her lips sucked softly.

His moan was addictive. The firmness of his length was impressive to say the least. His hands felt like molten lava where he gripped her waist. And Gianna’s skin burned with intrigue.

“Let’s go to your room.”

A/N: Ha! Can you believe we’re doing this again??? After I said no more series for a while?? Well, here we are... I really hope you liked it! Lots of people to thank for helping me get my ass in gear - so huge thank you to @oh-honey-styles @andwhenshesays @real-work-of-art @harrytheehottie @all-things-fic @haute-romance-quotidienne for all the hand holding and support and hyping and encouragement and just being overall wonderful humans... you guys have my heart, seriously. And if you’ve read this far - thank you! I would love to hear your thoughts! Lots more to come xx

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#harry styles fanfic #harry styles writing #harry styles smut #harry styles x ofc #amw

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damonsvftie · 4 years

Text

𝐌𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐨𝐞 𝐌𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐜✨

HARRY POTTER MASTERLIST

MEGA MASTERLIST

Summary: it’s that time of the year where everyone has been pulled under the mistletoe but what happens when your the only one who hasn’t?

Note: h2gkmo I love this Sm also it’s 3.8K WORDS

Warnings: none I believe apart from kissing

September, October and November, has already flew by so quickly as if it were a blur and I can’t seem to comprehend that its currently December.

Not that I dislike this certain month but it’s just the whole ‘mistletoe’ thing that I’m not quite fond of. Last week, some boy from Slytherin managed to get a girl he liked from Hufflepuff under the mistletoe, and let’s just say, the tension was absolutely incredulous.

Being a Hufflepuff, she kindly made up an excuse and hurried out of the the great hall. If that were me, I would probably shove my plate full of food down their pants. I mean the audacity though?

It’s that time of year again where Hogwarts is practically covered in a blanket of snow and every single student walks down the corridor with a soft knitted sweater hugging their bodies tightly to stop them from catching a cold. Well mostly everyone, since Malfoy wears very extra stuff during this season.

The last day, I saw Harry snogging Cho Chang under the plant. Okay maybe it wasn’t snogging, but they still kissed! And Hermione had told me all about some oaf from RavenClaw who tried to do the same to her but it didn’t really work out since she smacked him across the face with a heavy book.

—

“I’m so glad no ones tried that on me yet,” I mumbled le as I tucked into a plate full of food.”it’s absolutely ridiculous! I mean the audacity they have to think I’d want to kiss them. I have to puke,” complained Hermione, her facing saying it all. From the corner of my eye, I saw Ron Weasley gulping hard as he tugged at his collar. “You know.. sometimes both of you are very scary,” making me roll my eyes at him.

“It’s not even that bad, it’s just a kiss,”. The way Harry blatantly blurted that out as if it’s the tiniest thing in the world while he drummed his fingers on the table. “You can’t chat! I saw you snogging Cho Chang a day ago,” I argued. Harry’s cheeks were beginning to flush a shade of crimson as he swiftly diverted the attention onto me again.

“And? At least it was Cho and not someone like Pansy Parkinson, besides even Lavenders after Ron,” he mumbled looking annoyed. “Bloody hell I almost forgot! She can’t seem to stay away from me. She’s like a leech,” he complained, his lips curving into a frown.

Hermione shut her book and put it down. “Y/n, hasn’t anyone tried to get you under the mistletoe yet?” Her lips curving into a small smile, preventing me from shoving a forkful of food down my throat, my hand in mid air. “Uh- no,” my cheeks slightly blushed in embarrassment . For some reason my response made Ron giggle to himself.

Irritated, I smacked him behind his head causing him to yelp. “Ow! What was that for?” His brows furrowing as he rubbed the spot I had hit him in. “You dare laugh at me Ronald Weasley and I won’t hesitate to curse you!”

“Both of you please! I’m trying to finish this book off,” Hermione’s facial expressions exasperate as her eyes bore deep into our souls, intimidating us until we both shut up. Huffing under my breathe I continued to pick at my food until someone spoke once again.

“Hey! Give me my book back!”. To my surprise, Draco Malfoy stood towering over Hermione, his book in her hands as he held it high. Her attempts to try and grab it back were failing as she jumped high on the spot. “Malfoy give her book back,” spoke Harry through gritted teeth. “How about no? Besides Potter, this is between me and her so stay out of it,” he sneered.

“Come on Malfoy, stop being such a git,” defended Ron. Whatever the boys had said didn’t really matter to him because of course it went through one ear and out the other. “Oi! Give. Her. Book. Back,” my nostrils flaring as I folded my arms against my chest.

Unexpectedly, he started making owl noises just like the day he was attacked by Buckbeak, slowly striding towards me as his eyes darted up and down at my figure, supposedly ‘checking me out’. “why... what are you going to do y/l/n?” His face inches away from mine. I felt his cool,minty breathe fanning against my face causing my eyes to flutter rapidly in intimidation. Everyone in the great hall had fixed their attention onto the commotion we were causing, making owl noises every time one of us firedback. “Gone silent now have you?” The tone in his voice mocking as he took a step back and swiftly turned on his heels.

I don’t know what I was thinking, but I pulled him back towards me, one of my hands cupping his face as my lips pressed against his instantly. My other hand, smoothly grabbed the book out of his palms, shoving him back once I got what I wanted. “You were saying?” My voice sarcastic as he stared at me, mouth hung slightly open In awe.

Tossing the book back to Hermione, we all sat back down, the golden trio gasping under their breaths. “Did you just KISS Malfoy?” Rons voice exaggerated as his eyes shot wide open. “Yes- Yes I did,”

—

As we walked the hogwarts grounds, Harry and Ron didn’t stop annoying me about Draco. “So let me get this right, you kissed Malfoy to get mione’s book back? Blimey you have some guts don’t you?” A giggle trailed behind his irrelevant question.

I was down right agitated. I paused in the middle of no where, my lips pursing into a line. “I don’t know why both of you think it’s so funny and or hard to believe I kissed him? It’s not like I like him or something!” My voice slightly laced with anger as I strided off into the other direction, ditching the trio.

I could heard Hermione calling after me but it was too late. I was gone. If I were being realistic, I didn’t know where I was headed to as I entered hogwarts, twisting and turning through the dingy,dark corridors until I bumped into something rock hard, resulting in me too lose my balance and collapse.

“Look where your going,” I groaned as I sat up on the cold floor. “You bumped into me, not the other way round,”. It couldn’t be. I recognised that same bitter and unpleasant voice. My eyes trailed up to the figure that looked upon me from down below as I whimpered underneath him in pain.

It was Malfoy.

He stuck his hand out in offer for me too take it but of course I didn’t. Pushing his hand out of the way, I scrambled to my feet my teeth gritting. “Why are you ALWAYS in my way?!” I yelled, although I was lucky enough that the corridors were deserted.

“Me in your way? YOUR the one who keeps getting in MY way! Don’t get too ahead of your self y/l/n!” He firedback immediately, his face scrunched up.

My hands found their way to his collar, fisting at the material, pulling him close until our noses were almost touching. “Listen here Malfoy, stay. Out. Of. My. Way,” I protested my breathing heavy.

His serious face turned looser as a small smirk spread across his face. His hands travelled up my visage, his thumb lightly grazing my lip, tugging it down, the flesh of my lips revealing.

What was he doing?

My breathing hitched, while my heart did a flip in my chest. My grip on his collar slackened as my hands fell by my side before I walked right past him.

—

I should have known better. The more I added fuel to his fire, the more frustrating he was going to become. It was slowly starting to become a very common thing for the two of us to have an argument with each other, while everyone just rolled their eyes at us, since it was starting to get out of hand and become a regular thing.

Something inside me told me that he thoroughly enjoyed bickering with me even when I had at least tried to be civil with him.

“I just wanted say.. maybe we should be civil,” my words sincere as a half grin crept up across his face. “You want US to be civil? Why.. you think I’m going to stop?” He taunted as his smile dropped, his face serious than ever. “Yes- you know why? Because I’m mature unlike you. If I’m honest I don’t understand what pleasure you find in fighting me all the time,” my eyes turning a darker shade as I clenched my fists by my side.

His facial features turned soft almost as if it were putty as I finished my sentence with a sigh. His body instantly loosened up as he took a few steps away from me. “Your right. I’ll leave you alone-“ he muttered before disappearing in the dark.

Was I seeing things or did Draco actually agree with me for once? Was he actually going to put an end to his daily dose of torture?

—

“Did he actually offer to stop and leave you alone?” The confused looks on their faces. “Yep... but it’s quite unbelievable,” the look on my face twisting the more I thought about it. “Wait Wait Wait! Let me get this right... Malfoy’s going to leave you alone for the rest of your life? Bloody hell thats fabulous!” Ron’s lips transitioning into a wide grin as he took a sip out of his cup.

“Why are you so happy? He said he’d leave ME alone not YOU,” I answered back , trying to put Ron off, making his face droop. Within seconds I decided to change the topic so I didn’t have to fight Weasley.

“Anyways- So- hows your defence against the dark arts thing going?” I questioned Harry as he swallowed his food. “Well- we haven’t come up with a proper name for it but we think it should be named ‘Dumbledores army’ and I guess it’s going alright,” he sighed right after causing me to raise a brow. “Somethings off- what’s wrong Harry?” My voice gentle as I glanced at the other two.

“Harry’s worried someone’s going to bail out on us to Umbridge,” the fearful expression on hermiones face explaining it all. Did I mention that Dolores Umbridge was claimed to be the headmistress of the school? We were all lucky enough that she hadn’t created any sort of ridiculous rule in which we were no longer able to talk to our friends.

Everyone apart from a bunch of slytherins, who were named the ‘inquisitorial squad’, including that evil little cockroach Malfoy, loathed her. The trio had managed to gain access to the room of requirements in which they all hosted sessions where they practised spells such as how to unleash a patronus charm.

“Y/n why don’t you join? The more the merrier besides we need to prepare incase anything happens,” the tone in hermiones voice soft. “Guys.. I don’t know.. what if you know.. Umbridge finds out?” I asked wearily, fingers drumming the table.

Disappointment smeared across their faces. I couldn’t disappointment my friends like that. “You know what? Fine, I’m in!” I blurted as their mundane facial expressions changed into goofy smiles and wrinkled eyes.

—

“Expecto Patronum!” The tip of my wand unleashed a faint sort of white vapour which slowly transitioned into a p/n. “Blood hell y/n! You got that right on the first try,” remarked Ron as he stared up at my patronus in awe.

Suddenly, the chandelier started to swing and the floor beneath us was shaking under our feet. Everyone huddled together as it stopped. Then another loud bang came from the door as it crumbled, leaving a tiny cracked hole in which we heard Umbridges voice.

With one last swish and flick of her wand, she blasted down the door completely, walking in infuriated with the inquisitorial squad following behind her. Draco Malfoy stood on the side, his hand gripping Cho Chang’s arm tightly as she hung her head in shame. She had betrayed us.

My eyes met Malfoy’s as I lowered my wand. Each member of the squad practically forced us all the way into umbridges office however Malfoy shoved Cho to the side and came headed in my direction. “Do as I say,” he muttered under his breathe, his hand gripping my wrist causing me too flinch.

“What- What are you doing?” I whispered frantically. “Don’t question me y/l/n,” he replied, his lips barley moving as Umbridge yelled at us all.

One by one, each army member was escorted by a slytherin however Malfoy waited for everyone to leave. “Come on, let’s get out of here,” he mumbled, peering out the door making sure the coast was clear. His hand slowly slid down my wrist, intertwining his fingers with mine.

I didn’t dare speak of it, besides I felt safe with him for some reason as if I were able to trust him. Quickly, we ran down the corridors hand in hand making sure no one spot us. “Wait stop,” I panted as i breathed heavily, leaning against the wall. He stopped for a moment, his hand on his hip as he patiently waited for me too regain enough energy to walk back to my dorm. “Let me walk you back to your dorm,” he insisted.

—

“Goodnight,” he mumbled before turning to walk away. “Draco Wait-,” I called for him reluctantly as i leaned against the door of my dorm room. He turned to face me once again, one of his brows raised in confusion. “Why did you help me? I mean you could have just turned me in like the others,” I questioned hesitantly. He seemed to have straightened his posture as he looked down at the floor before glancing at my visage. “Don’t question it y/l/n,”

—

“What? That’s not possible.. how did Malfoy not turn you in?” Harry exclaimed, his face distorted as he gave the type of look when something was brutally unfair. “I bet he likes you, I remember when he came back and made up an excuse about his whereabouts,” chimed Hermione plainly as she stuck her nose into her book, causing me too flush red.

Running towards us was Fred and George Weasley as they explained what Umbridge was currently doing. “You lot might want to check this out,” their voices weary as they glanced one another. Within seconds we all made our way outside the great hall where the rock solid walls were covered with every stupid law she’d had every created. A new one of her ridiculous educational Decrees was being hung by Filch as he tried balancing on the highest step of the ladder.

My eyes trailed from above all the way down, now examining Draco’s face as he looked up, a smirk painted across his face, after all he was part of Umbridge’s clan. I don’t know why but he looked immensely alluring and it really bothered me. Why did he look so perfect? I didn’t like him did I? No of course I didn’t What type of dumb question was that?

—

Tonight me and the army decided to sneak out after curfew and meet up in the Gryffindor common room. I slipped on my robe as I softly shut the door behind me, trying to make sure it didn’t creak. I tiptoed down the corridors because we were all aware that the inquisitorial squad members were lurking around, keeping an eye on us. I couldn’t risk using a lumos spell because I knew that if I did someone might see the light at the tip of my wand easily so I attempted to guide myself in the dark, sticking my hand out incase I bumped into anything.

Unexpectedly, I tripped over my own feet causing me to fall frontwards, straight into somebody’s arms, my hands flung around their neck, clinging onto them for dear life. We stayed like that for a good few seconds, my breathing hitching as my chin laid propped up on the mystery persons shoulder.

Pulling away from me the person chanted a ‘lumos’ spell, holding their wand between our faces. “Draco?” I shrieked, my face distorted since I knew I had been caught. “What are you doing after curfew?” He interrogated. “Nothing I Uh- I was trying to sneak out to get some fresh air,” I lied, the tone in my voice making me sound sheepish. “Don’t lie to me y/l/n you were going to another one of those meetings, weren’t you?” He snarled, his grip on his wand becoming tighter. “Uh.. okay fine! I am, but please don’t tell on me I beg you,” I pleaded my lips curving into a frown.

His facial expressions changed and became softer than ever, his irresistible,grey eyes glimmering from the tiny source of light as he parted his plump lips to say something. “Go,” he whispered lowly. “Thanks Draco,” I muttered. For some reason my feet were glued too the floor as if they weren’t willing to move. I had the sudden urge to kiss him but I held back until he himself leaned a little closer, his lip ghosting mine before I took steps backwards and disappeared into the darkness.

Was I developing some sort of feelings for him? All he did was save me from landing into trouble twice and actually leave me alone for once. Did he feel the same way?

I had to at least thank him for how humble he was being over the past month so that same week I went to Hogsmeade and bought him a ring with a snake wrapped around it. After all his help, this was the least I could do to repay him.

It was Christmas Eve today and I told one of the sweet slytherins (who I knew was trustworthy) to go and put this perfectly tiny box wrapped up in black paper under the tree in the Slytherin common room.

—

Today was Christmas Day and I ran down the stairs to my common room early in the morning to open up my gifts. Harry hurled me a handful of presents as I struggled to carry them all. “Merry Christmas y/n!” They sung in unison as I started to unwrap them all. Ron had given me a perfectly knitted sweater with the first letter of my name on it. Hermione had bought me a stack of muggle books that had very interesting covers and Harry had bought me a box of assorted sweets from honey dukes because he knew I had a sweet tooth.

“Thanks guys I really appreciate it,” I gave them a warm smile. “Y/n I uh- there’s another gift addressed to you,” Ron fiddled with the present in his hand, taking a close look at it. “It’s not addressed from anyone though,”. He tossed me the dark green wrapped gift as I glanced at them unsure. My hands began unraveling the box taking a peek on the inside. To my surprise, there was a immaculately beautiful necklace with a dark green gem in a pendant. Holding the necklace between my fingers I gave a glance at it before putting it around my neck, trying not to overthink it.

—

“I wonder who gave you that?” Questioned Ginny as she squinted her eyes. Walking into the great hall was a certain blonde haired boy with his annoying group of posse following behind him like a bunch of lost puppies. He looked incredibly charming as he wore a dark green sweater with a black scarf wrapped around his neck as he tugged at it too loosen it a bit. I could just about see the ring that he wore around his finger.

Something about the way he accepted my gift made me smile to myself. “Bloody hell y/n are you blushing?” Joked Ron as I pursed my lips. “Totally not,” i responded as I bit the inside flesh of my cheek too stop myself from grinning.

From across the hall my eyes met his and I felt a unknown spark run through my body. A toothy smile crawled across his face causing me too smile back at him. Oh god I thought to myself, I couldn’t do this. I hid my face in my hands embarrassed as my friends laughed at me. “Y/n are you sure you don’t like Malfoy?” Teased Fred Weasley. “Yep it’s confirmed she does,” added George. “No I don’t,” I mumbled as my voice was muffled by my hands.

“If you’ll excuse me I have somewhere to go,” I muttered before leaving the table in embarrassment. I could see Blaise Zabini and Goyle patting Draco on the back in what seemed like encouragement as he got up. Was he going to follow me?

I strided down the corridors when I saw him calling after me. I swung my head around as I continued walking and he disappeared. Walking backwards, I tried looking for him when something bumped into me from the front. “Where do you think your going?”. I recognised that same tune that use to annoy the hell out of me.

“Draco? Where did you come from? You were right behind me,” I asked curious, trying to change the subject. “Took a shorter route,” he explained. The gap between the two of us was at the point of closing.

“You uh- wore the necklace I gave you,” his cheeks flushing slightly as his rough demeanour vanished. “You were the one who gave this? Why?” My voice cracking at the end. “And you gave me this ring- why?”. He was trying to use my own words against me as I giggled to myself. “It’s more of a thank you gift than you know-,” I elaborated as I crossed my arms.

“So why did you gift me this necklace?” The curiosity in my voice making him pause for a good second. “Let me guess.. don’t question it? That’s what your going to say right?” I giggled to myself. His face slowly dropped his lips parting as he looked above the two of us. “The mistletoe,” he choked. Above our heads, was a magically growing mistletoe that rained glitter.

He scratched the back of his head as i hung my head. “You don’t have too if you don’t want-,” I quickly cut him off by placing my lips against his, savouring the sweet flavour. Initially he was shocked, his eyes wide open until his lips moved in sync with mine, his eyes fluttering closed as he cupped my visage, my body flushed against his.

Pulling away, his eyes fluttered back open, his thumb drawing circles on my cheek as he pulled me back in one last time,his plump lips on mine before pulling back making me admire his enticing face. “Merry Christmas,” he whispered as my hands wrapped around his neck pulling him in for the tightest hug ever.

—

Taglist: @summer-writes @gryffindors-prefect @harry-pottery-barn @adderallanimal @voldygonemoldy @reemusluupin @chaotic-fae-queen if you want to be added or removed lemme know

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athingthatwantsvirginia · 4 years

Text

Wait to Find the Silver Lining

PART TWELVE OF THE DO YOU SEE HER FACE? SERIES

Pairing: Jess Mariano x Original Character (Ella Stevens)

Warnings: mentions of blood and injuries, plentiful pop culture references

Word Count: 3.8K

Summary: On the night of their first date, Ella and Jess end up in the emergency room.

For the first time in quite a while, Ella had the morning off, sitting with Rory and Lorelai at the diner’s counter for breakfast instead of standing on the opposite side to serve them. Mid-September, and the sun shone down on Stars Hollow warmly, but the breeze had already turned chilly. Autumn was falling on Connecticut fast. Due to shifts at the diner and the start of school, neither Jess nor Ella had been able to free up enough time for a real date. Of course, each lunch at school Jess bothered to show up to, and every shift at the diner brought them together. But Jess was anxious to truly take her out. He was partially convinced Luke had booked both of them up so much to prevent a date from ever happening, but Jess had argued with him enough to earn them both an early closing on Friday night. They were only scheduled until eight, instead of nine or ten.

Ella had begun feeling excitement and nerves well up inside her, and they only grew as the day approached. She’d assured him she would be paying for half of whatever they were doing, after the first date. She hadn’t gotten him to budge on the first date, though not for lack of trying. He wanted to show her all the upsides of dating, he’d said, like getting to go out for free. Sipping from her giant mug of tea, she felt her eyes flicking over to the checkered curtain from which Jess would appear at any moment. It was odd; she’d never had a real relationship, had never had such pleasant tension build within her.

“Hey, Stevens!” Lorelai exclaimed, breaking Ella’s reverie.

Ella blinked in surprise, exiting the cloud of her thoughts back to reality. “Sorry, sorry. What’s up?”

Lorelai snorted and rolled her eyes. “My god, you two are like puppies. Waiting to see lover boy this morning?”

Blushing, Ella let out an unconvincing scoff. “Lover boy wishes. Just got a lot on my mind, that’s all.”

“Like what your kids will look like?” Rory chimed in teasingly.

Ella groaned. “You guys keep this up, you’ll never be graced with my presence for breakfast again. And I’ll wait extra long to serve you your coffee tomorrow.”

Both Gilmore women narrowed their eyes at her.

“You wouldn’t dare,” Lorelai wagered.

“Try me,” Ella said, winking and taking another sip.

Luke ambled back over, having just delivered an order to a table by the front window. He’d caught the last bit of their conversation, stance grumpy and curmudgeonly as always when he stood in front of the three of them again. “You should see those two during shifts together. It’s like I’m not even here.”

“A hostile work environment, huh?” Lorelai asked, feigning sympathy.

Again, Ella rolled her eyes. She knew neither Luke nor Lorelai had yet warmed up to the idea of the two of them being together. She knew they feared her being corrupted, but she was confident enough in the head atop her own shoulders. Matters of the heart could always be handled.

“Yeah, whatever. You’ll be spared the agony for a couple hours tonight, though. I’ve got some stuff to pick up from my aunt in New Britain. I’ll be here around six.”

Luke nodded. “At least some semblance of peace will be restored.”

Ella gave a doubtful look. “I wouldn’t speak too soon. Jess’ll still be here, after all.”

Right on cue, Jess trudged down the stairs and emerged from the curtain, rubbing a tired eye with the palm of his hand. A smirk crossed his features at the sight of Ella, though he was acutely aware of all the others witnessing the interaction.

“Hi,” he said, nodding a little at her.

“Hi,” Ella answered, smiling shyly.

“Ah, speak of the Satan,” Lorelai said.

Jess didn’t give more than a momentary glance Lorelai’s way before going to grab a coffee to-go and a donut from under one of the glass domes.

“That’s not the saying, mom,” Rory piped up, raising an eyebrow at Lorelai.

Lorelai nodded over her coffee. “I know. But I think it fits him better. A little more umph, y’know?”

. . .

A rag thrown over her shoulder, Ella hummed under her breath and tried to fight the smile threatening to brighten her face. It was only seven-thirty, after all. She could wait another half hour to truly feel the excitement. Luke would surely scold her if she was too giddy as they closed up, and she wanted to get through the night without being yelled at for a lack of professionalism. The boss had been in a worse mood than usual lately, and Ella sensed it was not entirely due to her and Jess’s new relationship. Blondie lyrics flew from her mouth in a happy whisper as she stacked the chairs on the cleaned tabletops. She could hear the sloshing of water and clinking of plates from the back, Jess on dish duty. Luke was restocking some items in the back. She bounced a little on her heels as she walked, weaving through the tables. Before work, she’d been able to see her aunt, going to fetch the items she’d left over the summer but kept forgetting to pick up. It brightened her mood even more. She pushed up the sleeves of her black shirt as she kept working, smoothing her denim mini-skirt with anxious hands.

“I gotta go to Doose’s for a few things,” Luke announced as he exited the stock room. “Be back in about thirty minutes, alright?”

“Sure. I’ll manage,” Ella nodded, throwing him a good-natured smile.

Luke snorted a chuckle. “Just don’t let Jess burn the place down.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

Not more than five minutes later, Ella was almost finished with the front of house work. Supplies were placed in proper cubbies behind the counter, menus were wiped off, leftover pastries put away. Tucking her hair behind her ears, she put her hands on her hips and racked her brain to make sure there was no task she had forgotten.

“Ow! Dammit!” she heard Jess exclaim from the back, hissing in pain.

Ella furrowed her brows and rushed to the back. “What’s wrong?”

He stood before the steaming vat of dishes, water tinged pink, gripping his left hand firmly in his right. Blood was leaking through his fingers and down his arms, leaving thin, reddish streaks.

“I was reaching in the dish pit and I guess I hit a rogue knife and now here we are!” Jess recounted angrily, through gritted teeth.

As Ella stepped forward, she reached for his injury and he flinched out of instinct.

“Just let me see,” she said softly, and he slowly took his right hand away.

With a gentle touch, she grabbed his left wrist and assessed the cut. There was a deep slice from the base of his pinky down halfway to his wrist. Ella knew the knife which had cut him was almost positively from the kitchen, not one of the dull patron’s utensils. Clicking her tongue in exasperation, she reached above the dish pit to grab a clean towel and pressed it to the wound. He held it there when she took her hands away.

Sighing through her nose, she took him by the shoulder and began guiding him to the front. “That’s gonna need stitches. C’mon, I came from New Britain so I’ve got my car. We’re going to the emergency room.”

Jess’s eyes widened and his pale forehead shone with a light sheen of sweat. “What? No! Let’s just wait until Luke gets back. He can use superglue or something.”

Scribbling a note on the pad from the apron she still wore, she snorted doubtfully. “Wait for Luke while you bleed out? Yeah, right. That’s a deep fucking cut, Jess. Let’s go now. He’ll see the note when he gets back and he’ll meet us there.”

“It’s not even that bad,” he argued, pressing harder on his left hand in hopes of making the bleeding stop.

She scoffed. “Okay, tough guy. Let’s just go for my own peace of mind then, alright?”

While speaking, she’d slammed the frantic note down on the counter and gone to the hanger near the door to grab her bag and keys. Inside, her heart was pounding in her chest and thumping in her ears, but she tried to exhibit outward calm. Color had drained from Jess’s face, and the redness seeped through the white towel he held to the cut.

“But what about tonight?” Jess asked after a moment, disappointment in his voice.

Ella offered a small smile, bringing a hand to his back and leading him out the door. She made sure to lock it as they rushed out. “We’ll do it next weekend, okay? I’ll enjoy dating a lot more if my date is alive.”

“I’m sorry,” he grumbled, slightly dazed as he followed her onto the sidewalk and to her car, parked right behind Luke’s truck outside the front door of the diner.

“Don’t apologize, Jess,” she said, going around to the driver’s side and unlocking it.

Before Jess could attempt to open his door, Ella ran back around and opened it for him. He nodded at her gratefully, though a blush heated up his cheeks as he sat down. As she shut her creaky driver’s side door with a slam! and started up the sputtering engine, Jess managed to click his seatbelt into its place on his own, despite Ella’s attempts to help him.

“For the record, I didn’t mean I was sorry about this,” he said, gesturing to his bloody hand. “I meant I was sorry about how much I’m gonna make fun of this car. What the hell are you doing driving a station wagon, Stevens?”

She laughed as she pulled away from Luke’s, doing her best to remain under the speed limit and not run the stop signs.

. . .

Ammonia and disinfectant burned her nostrils, and she had to blink back the wateriness in her eyes. The walls of the small hospital room were a blinding white, and the flickering of the fluorescent lights was almost nauseating. But Ella kept a calm tone as she ran her hand up and down over Jess’s back, sitting next to him on the exam table, which was covered with crinkling white paper.

The nurse cleaned out Jess’s cut with freezing cold water, and Jess tried his best to not let the pain cross his features. Instead, he listened to Ella, distracting him with random rankings of songs. He disagreed with her judgement frequently, starting weak but playful arguments. When the cut was cleaned, the nurse, a man with a tired face and kind blue eyes, set Jess’s hand palm-up on a small silver table before them, sterile tools set around it. The nurse interrupted their conversation when he brought out a syringe, and explained he would have to give Jess shots inside the cut in order to numb it before sewing it up. Jess nodded, gulping as he straightened up slightly and prepared himself. He blew out a long breath and his face paled even more.

Ella, sitting to his right, grabbed his uninjured hand and squeezed. “You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he assured her, trying to hide his grimace at the thought of what was about to happen. “I just...I don’t like needles.”

“Oh. Well, don’t look at it,” Ella said, trying to calm him as she glanced down at his hand, into which the nurse was about to stick the syringe filled with a numbing agent. “I guess that means matching tattoos are out of the question, huh?”

“I’d say so,” he replied, chuckling.

“Damn,” she shook her head, teasing. “I guess I won’t end up with Jack Nicholson’s face on my ass after all.”

Jess grunted a little and squeezed her hand tighter as the nurse gave him the first shot. Using her free hand to rub circles over his back again, she gave him a quick peck on the cheek to reassure him. In spite of himself, Jess couldn’t help but lean into her touch.

. . .

The process was painful but quick, and Ella managed to keep Jess’s muted laughter going through the whole thing. Jess didn’t think it was possible to smile with a curved needle stitching up his flesh. And while the numbing had been upsetting in its own way, he could barely feel the actual sewing. Ella’s thin hand drew rhythmic circles on his back, and the nurse was just snipping up the thread by the time Luke ran into the room. Other than his baseball cap sitting slightly askew and the frantic look in his eyes, he’d maintained his gruff, stoic mask.

“Nice of you to show, Uncle Luke,” Jess drawled flatly, the nurse winding white gauze around his hand.

Luke frowned at him, and was about to retort, but the nurse piped in to instruct Jess not to get the wound wet and to come back in a few days to get the stitches pulled out. Nodding in thanks and understanding, Jess told the man he was good to go. Then, there were three. And Luke stood with his hands on his hips and stared the two of them down. Even after a few weeks, it was still unnerving to see their hands clasped together.

Sighing through his nose, Luke cleared his throat and tried to keep calm. “Why didn’t you come over and get me before driving all the way out here?”

“I didn’t want Jess to die inside the diner. I hear it brings down retail costs,” she said defensively.

Jess snorted.

Luke rolled his eyes but nodded, could see the panic still painted on her face. He crossed his arms over his chest and stepped towards them. There was a long, awkward silence before he finally spoke. “Alright. I’m sorry. Thanks for...driving.”

Ella nodded in earnest. “You’re welcome.”

“But you can go home, alright? I still have some paperwork and stuff to fill out,” Luke said tiredly.

Nodding again, Ella cast a glance at Jess. He flexed his injured hand once or twice, testing it out.

“Don’t worry, Stevens. I’m good,” he said, catching the worry in her face. “At least I’ll get off dish pit for a little while.”

“That’s true,” she said. “Wait to find the silver lining, Mr. Sunshine.”

Jess scoffed. “Whatever, Daria.”

“Ugh, it’s sickening,” Luke groaned, rolling his eyes at the interaction.

Ella snickered, shaking her head slightly as she stood up. “I’ll see you later, Mariano.”

“Seems that way. Just drive a little slower on the way home, huh?” he scolded, looking over to speak to Luke. “Speed Racer over here couldn’t stay less than twenty over the limit.”

“Traitor,” she shot back, smirking. “You should get them to give you a sticker, kid. You were very brave.”

Jess feigned a glare and was about to retort, but she pecked his lips instead and gave his shoulder a final squeeze. Ella grabbed her bag and made for the hallway.

As she passed Luke, she gave a joking salute. “Happy to be of service, boss.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he grumbled. “Tomorrow morning, okay?”

“I’ll be there.”

. . .

Her shift, a double, passed little by little. The hands of her watch seemed to slow down each time she took a peek, torturous, glacial ticking. Luke had his hands full with Caesar at a doctor’s appointment in the morning and Jess with the day off. The extra work helped the day go by, if nothing else. She’d asked after Jess, and Luke said only that he was out. It made Ella all but laugh, biting back a smirk as she thought of Jess rushing out in the morning with a Walmart vest hidden somewhere on his person. Shangri-la, indeed. She knew he had to be back at some point, though, and had asked to help close, get a little overtime. Luke never refused her for overtime. Especially not after the period following her mother’s death when the diner’s leftovers had been pretty much the only thing keeping her household afloat.

On her lunch break, she’d skipped the meal and instead made trips to both the video store and the makeshift movie house. Kirk somehow was in charge of both places for the day, and it had taken almost all of her patience to negotiate favors with him. She’d promised to make three of her rhubarb pies for the diner the next weekend. Everyone in town hated rhubarb except Kirk.

The evening brought rain, and it made Ella feel cozy as she closed up the diner. Luke was back dealing with the dishes, what with Jess down for the count. Caesar hummed some eighties song while he cleaned the kitchen, but somehow managed to leave early despite the time and energy his closing dance moves took up. Ella was almost finished with everything, nothing left but to sweep up, by nine. She was almost worried Jess wouldn’t return and her plan would fall through, but he ran over from the bus stop at five past nine. His leather jacket was slick with rainwater and his hair was dripping, but his stitched hand was dry in his pocket and he still cracked a smile when he saw Ella.

“You should buy an umbrella,” she said, scrunching up her nose as she ran a hand through his wet locks.

Jess only shrugged. “I like to live dangerously.”

“I’ve noticed. How’s your hand?” she asked, resuming her work on the floor while Jess took a seat at a stool by the counter.

Again, the nonchalant shrug. “Won’t be modelling bracelets any time soon, but I’ll live.”

“Glad to hear it,” she said, then went over and placed the broom in the corner near the stockroom where it belonged. She couldn’t hide her smile; she loved both giving and receiving surprises. “So. Got any plans tonight?”

“Thought I’d crack the books,” he said, shrugging off his jacket. “Geometry, American History, really work on that ol’ GPA.”

Ella rolled her eyes, then came over in front of him. He laced his arms around her waist. With the customers all gone, Ella felt more comfortable with PDA. “Be careful, one of these days someone’s gonna take you seriously and you’ll have to make good on your word.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

“Anytime,” she quipped. “Anyway, I thought we should do our ‘official date’ tonight, instead of next weekend.”

Jess rolled his eyes at her air-quotes, and sighed through his nose. “It’s past nine in Stars Hollow. Nothing’s open.”

She feigned deep thought. “I think ‘nothing’ is far too absolute a term. You’d be surprised.”

“Oh, would I?” he teased, eyebrows raised.

“Yeah, Mariano, I think you would.”

. . .

Hands entwined, Jess and Ella ran down Main Street towards the movie house, only partially shielded by store awnings. She had refused to tell him exactly what was going on, only that he better be hungry for popcorn. By the time they made it in through the front door, Ella’s long hair, tied half-up, half-down, was frizzy and damp. But her cheeks were rosy and her smile was wide. The night had cooled down, and the heat in the movie house was welcome. Immediately, she shed her coat and hung it on the hook by the door. Jess followed, then trailed behind her as she made her way over to the ancient popcorn machine. There was one solitary bucket, kept warm in the center. Kirk stood beside it, looking stoic with his work vest, hands clasped in front of each other.

“Evening, patrons,” he said in a clipped tone, handing her the bucket.

Ella nodded, smirking. “Evening, Kirk. You can call us by our names.”

Kirk shook his head slightly, refusing to make direct eye contact. “Professionalism is always a top priority at the Stars Hollow Movie House, ma’am.”

“This isn’t even a real movie house and I bribed you with pie to do this showing,” Ella retorted.

Jess scoffed, smirking widely.

Sighing, Kirk finally met her eyes and his shoulders dropped in disappointment. “Ella, I’m an employee. I take all my jobs very seriously. I’m asking you to respect that.”

She bit back her smile and raised a hand in surrender. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Thank you for doing this. You’ll have your pie by next weekend.”

Kirk swallowed dryly, then returned to his solemn stance, offering nothing more. Jess cast Ella a suspicious glance, but she only took his uninjured hand again and led him to the red couch at the front of the room, nearest the projector screen. As soon as they sat down, the lights dimmed and they could hear Kirk booting up the projector.

“You paid him in pie?” he asked.

“It’s the universal currency.”

“I was gonna pay for our first date,” he argued, pouting slightly.

She shrugged. “Well, you can’t always get what you want, as the Stones would say.”

“Next time?” he asked, eyebrows raised.

“Yes, Jess, if it’ll make you happy. Next time.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, jackass,” she replied, rolling her eyes at his stubbornness.

He let his eyes roam over the movie house, a place he didn’t remember ever stepping foot in. Dusty bookshelves flanked either side of the large screen. The air smelled like old, weathered pages and the buttery popcorn in the bucket at Ella’s side. Jess wasn’t sure, but he thought he could hear the heavy rain on the tin roof above. He wondered what the building had originally functioned as, considering it looked just like a suburban cottage. Ella’s hand in his, he felt almost comfortable enough to fall asleep on the huge red couch, despite his excited nerves and wet hair and bandaged hand.

“Okay, Stevens, the suspense is killing me,” Jess said after a pause, gesturing to the screen.

A mischievous grin crossed her face and she planted a kiss on his cold cheek.

“Since last night you had a fight with a knife, not to be confused with a knife fight,” she teased, ignoring the playful nudge Jess gave her with his elbow, “I figured having a private screening of one of Cameron Crowe’s masterpieces might make you feel better.”

Almost rendered speechless for a moment, Jess felt his heart flutter in his chest. A small, sincere smile crossed his face. “Well, Almost Famous is the best medicine for pretty much every ailment.”

She nodded, conspiratorial. “I whole-heartedly agree. It’s second only to Stephen King.”

Jess sighed through his nose, shaking his head. “You were so close to sounding refined.”

She snorted. “Hypocrite.”

As the bluish light of the projection came on the screen, the familiar music started and warmed Jess’s heart more than he would ever outwardly admit. They faced the movie, and spoke in hushed tones. He hoped the darkness would conceal his blush.

“Thank you, Eleanor, you didn’t have to do this,” he said, almost shyly.

“I wanted to.”

He looked over at her, and could see the image reflected in her hazel eyes. Bringing a hand to her cheek, gently turning her head, he pressed his lips to hers and smiled into the kiss.

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kilmokea · 3 years

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Self Funded Private Gardens of County Wexford on the Wexford Garden Trail

Out of the earth, these garden owners

are creating living miracles.

These Gardens of Wexford have a few things in common which inspire them to keep going, be creative and open their gates to the public. They are all in County Wexford, privately owned and managed and are self-funded. Together with Garden Centres and Government funded Gardens they are members of The Wexford Garden Trail. This trail welcomes visitors and their members are more than happy to assist with any information visitors require to enjoy their visits to the Gardens and Garden centres of County Wexford.

There really is something special and treasured about Irish Gardens. They represent a natural environment of plants and trees taking in carbon and releasing oxygen into the air while their roots stabilize the soil and filter water. As trees reduce air pollution they help us to breathe better. Spending time within a natural setting often reduces our stress & improves our sleep. Just being among trees is good for our wellbeing and they make a lovely setting for walking, an activity shown to reduce stress and illness. With roots reaching deep into the earth, trees have excellent grounding energy. Indeed the healing powers of a garden have been portrayed in art and literature since our earliest beginnings. Out of the earth these garden owners are creating living miracles.

Nature has long been known for its relaxing qualities. Visiting gardens is so good for our health having vital positive effects on mental health as they boost our mood and generally make us feel more cheery. The Holistic benefits are huge. Relaxation, stress reduction and the value of improved quality of life to name but a few.

So much inspiration can be received through visiting gardens to assist the creation of our own garden too. Meeting the gardeners and owners adds enormously to the visit.

The sharing of valuable knowledge and stories while appreciating someone else’s hard work and creation adds to our lives. So often we are creating and planting for the future generation to enjoy so sharing knowledge cements the continuity of gardening systems. Stories of pioneering gardeners over the years who created and contributed to gardens over time add a depth to our visit helping us appreciate the garden while gaining inspiration for our own gardens. Great inspiration too for poets, artists and writers alike.

The visit provides us with the benefit of expanding our knowledge of horticulture, new technologies and making connections with like-minded people. They are a great way to introduce gardening as a hobby to children teaching them to nurture living things.

Some of the deepest preoccupations of thoughtful gardeners are the weather and the seasons. It is from Spring to Autumn, that magical time of year when many of Wexford’s self- funded private gardens open their gates to the public for you to explore.

Forward by Emma Hewlett

Coolaught Gardens was created and is owned by Harry & Caroline Deacon

“We were both probably always really into gardening but for me it started as an interest in growing to eat vegetables and fruit from a young age, but not into the floral side, I left that to my mother. She loved keeping the garden going and I was often called to help out, not really willingly I may add. When I married Caroline she was really interested as well, so much so that when they teamed up, I needed to find somewhere to escape to when they were both after me to do something or other!

The years that followed saw us become more interested and the garden grew in size and to be fair it was Caroline was now the driving force but we visited more gardens in our time off and I suppose the gardening bug had bitten.

The start of Coolaught Gardens really happened as a result of us deciding for the hell of it to enter what was then the National Garden competition, we came second in the Wexford section but we never realized how much it would impact us and by the end of the following week we had about 4 garden clubs asking us would we open the garden for viewing for their clubs! It seems that up to that point no private garden had come as high up the competition and a lot of people wanted to see this unknown garden. We started playing with the idea of opening the garden for a limited time Sundays 2 to 6 for the Summer months, but we underestimated the response, and we were run off our feet on those Sundays and the tours that came on weekdays again made us realize that we were going to have to open more days to spread the load. We opened from Wednesday through to Sunday next and after that we opened the full seven days and of course by then we had added the garden centre and the garden during this time had also more than doubled in size and now stands at more than 2.5 acres. So even though now when the garden is closed we have the sales area to take care of.

We have loved the time we have spent in making the garden but we have also loved meeting all the like-minded people we have met through the past 20 years because of what we started here. True gardening folk are the best people you can be around, they are generally very positive people who work their way through every adversary, none have been tested as much as by what has happened in the last year. Things and situations have changed utterly for a lot of people, life as we know it has been turned on it's head, these lockdowns have had a devastating impact on families, business, economies across the world are suffering but nothing compared to the families of the people that have died. There has on the other hand been more time for parents to spend with their children, that has to be a bonus. The realization that most people won't be able to travel away for holidays and breaks has seen the nation change by being much more conscious of their homes and their gardens. After the first lockdown we started a call and collect service which I found very difficult. It is not the same as meeting with your customers face to face and making sure what they are buying will suit them, but as the Summer wore on and the economy opened we found that a lot of people had also found the joy of having the space around their homes and now wanted to make that area more beautiful and a place to relax and unwind in i.e. make a garden out of it! Last Summer all the tours both National and International were cancelled as were all the new Brides and Grooms that come for to take their photos in the garden. We were reluctant at first to open the garden as we weren't sure of the protocols to put in place to keep people safe but as we finally became more confident, we did open it and our new customers and old seemed to get new enjoyment from the garden and that also lifted our spirits.

We have passed the first day of Spring St. Bridget's day and even though the weather is still dismal, that too will change the days are getting longer and warmer and Summer will come again and eventually Covid will be consigned to the history books and life will return to the new normal. We will look forward to meeting both our regular customers and those that have been bitten with the gardening bug recently back to Coolaught Gardens again.”

Clonroche, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford

Telephone:

053 9244137

Mobile:

087 6446882

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.facebook.com/coolaughtgardens

Contact:

Caroline & Harry Deacon

Opening Hours:

Garden is open Mid May to Mid September, or by appointment to individuals and groups Garden Centre open all year round.

Glenavon Japanese Garden was created by and is owned by Iris Checkett.

“During the winter of 1999 I attended gardening classes run by Frances McDonald in Gorey Community School. As part of the course we were asked to design our dream gardens. I decided to create a Japanese themed garden. The garden developed over the next few years ,constructed by Drinagh Garden Centre. Originally based on the four seasons of the year over the years it has matured and changed.

Some years ago I joined The Wexford Garden Trail and opened my garden to the public for a few months in the summer. All proceeds are given to charity. The Garden Trail has helped enormously with the marketing of my garden through the Web site, Social Media and The Brochure. It is enormously beneficial too for our garden visitors as we introduce them to the trail and suggest other gardens for them to visit and Garden centres for them to purchase plants and garden related tools, compost, pots and ornaments.

Unfortunately, because of the pandemic last year there were very few visitors and this year I hope Government restrictions allow more people to avail of the wonderful spaces we have all created in the Wexford Garden Trail for visitors to enjoy safely.

Working in the garden keeps me fit and gives me the opportunity to meet like-minded people. Hopefully these visitors get as much pleasure from the beauty of the garden as I do, and the peaceful place helps them to reduce the stresses of life.

Each season brings its own particular pleasures. In Spring we have the beauty of the Cherry Blossom. Summer features Hydrangeas, Autumn, the Liquid Amber walk and in Winter all the grasses.

Of course, there are problems associated with any garden. The area is all macamore soil so it requires quite a lot of chicken manure and hard work. I have to contend with the Macamore soil and Mr Heron repeatedly comes for my fish! On the upside I buy all my replacement plants and receive help and advice from my good friends in Springmount Garden Centre. Nothing takes away from the pleasure and enjoyment of being surrounded by the beauty of a garden. I love Glenavon Japanese Garden and enjoy every moment I have in this gorgeous space.

Glen Richards, Courtown Harbour, Gorey, Co. Wexford

Telephone:

053 9425331

Mobile:

085 2048737

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.facebook.com/glenavonjapanesegarden

Contact:

Iris Checkett

Opening Hours:

Sunday and Friday May to August 2pm – 5pm, or by appointment to individuals and groups.

Kilmurray Gardens was created and is owned by Paul & Orla Woods

Opening your garden to the public is a work of passion it requires complete dedication and a little bit of lunacy which we have in spathes. It is a moving feast which is never complete but which hopefully inspires people to try and achieve parts of it in their own garden space. Opening your garden requires courage as you are opening yourself up to other people opinions and criticism but it also can give you huge rewards for all the hours you are on your hands and knees weeding. Our greatest concern is when people return from a walk in the garden with armfuls of flowers they have picked to see if we have it for sale in the nursery a tight lipped smile usually is the response with a gentle reminder not to pick the flowers. The responses can be quite amusing.

The development of our garden started in conjunction with the development of the nursery as we found people enjoyed seeing the plants they were interested in buying growing in a garden. It is planted in an informal style with the inclusion of pond areas over the past few years. We completed our long border in a formal setting six years ago and they give a formal entrance into the garden joined to the more informal areas. My favourite spot is sitting in the long borders surrounded by hornbeam hedging completely surrounded by foliage and flowers. It is the most perfect tranquil spot. My favourite plants are definitely the ones that continue flowering for a long time like Alstroemeria and are wonderful cut flowers for the house and also the scented ones like phlox and paeonias which are brief but in the few weeks they flower give so much joy. Our gardening opening is self- funded as we have a donation box for the RNLi in Courtown which we are past crew of and which our daughter has now joined. Our greatest pleasure is seeing people enjoying the space we have created and sitting and relaxing which in these times is so important .Our opening last year was hampered with Covid regulations but hopefully when summer arrives we will be able to reopen and allow people to enjoy our space

Kilmurry Nursery, Gorey, Co. Wexford

Telephone:

053 9480223

Mobile:

086 8113171 / 086 8180623

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.kilmurrynursery.com

Contact:

Paul & Orla Woods

Opening Hours:

Nursery Open Jan-March Mon-Friday 10-5 March 30th -Sept 27th open Monday-Saturday-10-5pm 30th Sept-13th December -Monday -Friday-10am-5pm

Entrance Fee:

Donation to Courtown RNLI

Kilmokea Gardens is owned by Mark & Emma Hewlett

“Ancient garden heritage goes back to earliest settlers. In the seventh Century the patron Saint of gardening, Saint Fiachra was adopted. He holds a special place in our hearts as the Kilmokea Monastic site dates back to this time. It is situated next to the walled garden.

When the Church of Ireland purchased the Monastic lands to build the rectory for the Rector of White Church, the fruit and vegetables for the house were grown in the walled Garden. Today it is home to a series of interchanging garden rooms with herbaceous planting, rose gardens and sheltered garden seats positioned to reflect on the beauty of the place. My favourite place is our Italian Loggia and pool which I have adopted as my summer office. As the business has grown, I become more office bound so I may as well be close to the garden on my laptop! Without doubt Roses are my favourite summer flowers and Hellebores in the spring. Many of the healing properties of the flowers and plants in the garden are now bottled as last lockdown I completed a flower essence course and these will be available to purchase in the Conservatory. To further assist the health and wellbeing of our guests we are introducing the concept of ‘Forest Bathing’ in the woodland garden. This Japanese practise known as ‘Shinrin Yoku is a simple method of being calm and quite amongst trees, observing nature around you while breathing deeply. A wonderful way to de-stress and boost the immune system at the same time.

We have been maintaining the seven acres of gardens for 24 years now and have weathered many storms! One of the first things we did was to build a large wooden Conservatory which is our Café where we offer guests lunch and afternoon tea. We then created a new food garden where fruit and vegetables are grown using organic methods for the kitchen which feeds guests staying in the house, self catering cottages and are essential ingredients for our lunch menu the conservatory café. This is really important to us as our philosophy of “ground to fork” is ingrained in our objectives.

Since the food travels only a few feet to reach the plate in the Conservatory Café, it is more sustainable. We strive to offer local & sustainable food and food grown with Organic methods to our guests and our family.

Our parents were all keen gardeners and fostered an interest in Gardens and nature and the outdoors. When we first started caring for the gardens my father would drive down from Dublin arriving at 8am, peel himself out of his low Honda and put on his overalls to mow the lawns and tend to the Roses. He was great inspiration and got involved in many of our early projects, giving advise, even when it wasn’t needed! Over the years we have created a large new food garden, which is very close to our hearts. We have built board walks and wooden structures in the woodland garden, designed fairy houses & viking boats and planted many hundreds of plants not to mention spending many hundreds of hours weeding! We now employ a full time gardener who gardens five days a week. We are very involved with decision making, planning new plantings, building structures, graveling pathways and discussing all the planting of seeds for the Vegetables and Flowers. We are totally indebted to Marty Reville our gardener who tends to the gardens with the love and passion which we hold for the gardens. With him we have created no-dig vegetable beds and he is extending biodiversity throughout the gardens. Large bug hotels are the latest structures! We really hope Government restrictions allow us to open Kilmokea Gardens to visitors this season, and we look forward to welcoming you”.

Great Island, Campile, Co Wexford

Telephone:

051 388109

Mobile:

086 6641946

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.kilmokea.com

Contact:

Mark & Emma Hewlett

Opening Hours:

Opening hours. 10am to 5pm

March 17th to end of May. September & October. Wednesday to Sunday

June, July, August. Every Day.

Entrance Fee:

Adults €7; OAP €6; Children under 16 €4; Children under 2 Free; Groups welcome. Up to 12.5% discount for groups of over 20

Marlfield House Gardens

Marlfield House is owned by The Bowe Family and managed by Margaret and Laura Bowe

When our parents Mary and Ray Bowe bought Marlfield House just outside Gorey in 1977 it was with the intention of opening the house and gardens to guests as a country house hotel. The Dower house of the Courtown Estate, the Earls of Courtown had entertained lavishly in both Marlfield and the nearby Courtown House. With Marlfield’s opening as a hotel in 1978 it began again to welcome guests from all over the world.

The garden was smaller then and has been developed and extended extensively by Mary and Ray in the early days. On 36 acres in total there are 12 acres in woodland walks and garden today. While the gardens have always been enjoyed by hotel guests, since opening ‘The Duck Restaurant’ in 2015 the number of people coming to enjoy a coffee, lunch or dinner and a wander in the gardens has multiplied tenfold. The restaurant is located in a long stone building with French doors opening onto a sandstone terrace overlooking the kitchen garden filled with vegetables, soft fruits, a plethora of herbs and beds of blooming roses! Our guests enjoy seeing chefs picking herbs, vegetables and salad as they dine al fresco on the south facing Terrace. The ‘garden to plate’ ethos could not be more evident!

It brings us great pleasure to see our garden enjoyed by so many.

Woodlands form the back drop of the garden, with meandering paths through a kitchen garden of herbs, vegetables and fruits. Long borders of shrubs and herbaceous perennials flank a yew hedge and lead to the lawns and formal gardens.

The duck pond forms a completely separate garden to the front of the hotel and the island, reached by a wooden bridge, has beautiful specimen shrubs and trees. It has only recently become the location of five private stand alone pond suites where guests can sleep, each in its own grounds amid oak and chestnut trees, surrounded by nature. The many paddling ducks, waterhen, squirrels, rabbits and George our peacock are happy to share this piece of the garden with those sleeping in the pond suites!

Spring is our favourite season and our gardener Sean Kehoe plants thousands of daffodils and tulips annually. Unfortunately in 2020 the pleasure of seeing the carpets of daffodils and rainbows of tulips and Camellias was confined to those on social media , and it seems that history might repeat itself this Spring! But our herb and rose gardens will be filled with a plethora of colour of blooms and fragrances and enjoyed by many this Summer when we are very hopeful that Covid restrictions will lift.

We are Looking forward to welcoming lots of people back to Marlfield and our gardens this year. Now more than ever we all need to Enjoy nature and spending time with each other, enjoy the outdoors, the beauty of our county and its gardens and produce and be grateful for the beautiful gardens in the Wexford Garden Trail.

Courtown Road R742, Gorey, Co Wexford

Telephone:

053 9421124

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.marlfieldhouse.com

Contact:

Margaret & Laura Bowe

Opening Hours:

Garden visit and Lunch/Afternoon Tea by appointment (March to December)

Entrance Fee:

€12.00 which includes morning coffee or afternoon tea with dressed scones in Marlfield House Hotel

Wexford Lavender Farm

My name is Moira Hart, I am the Owner and Manager of Wexford Lavender Farm, a privately run garden and tourism business located 10 km north of Gorey in North Co. Wexford.

We opened to the public in April 2014 with 2 acres of lavender plants in a field located close to old disused stables, which we had converted into our Café/Giftshop prior to opening.

We are currently Irelands’ only dedicated commercial lavender farm and added a second 2 acre field in 2018 with 5,000 more lavender plants. We planted rows of English Lavender Hidcote, English Lavender Rosea, Dutch lavender Grosso and some English Lavender Munstead. My late mum (Betty) was a keen organic gardener, animal lover and bee keeper, my love of gardening, lavender and animals comes from her and after visiting many lavender farms in England (I grew up in rural Dorset) decided to set up my own business here in Ireland. We’re (mostly) fortunate with the weather here in Co. Wexford and grow the English Lavender varieties which are hardy.

Farming anything involves lots of hard work, a passion for what you love and lots of energy, especially in the busy Summer months when the lavender is in bloom and visitor numbers are high. We keep ducks, chickens, goats, ponies and horses too, which all need looking after 365 days a year, whatever the weather. Being self-employed it’s important to be self-motivated and drive yourself forward.

When we first opened the business our daughters (Clara & Martha) were 6 and 9, I didn’t have any experience running a business, managing staff or working in a café so to say it was a steep learning curve would be a big understatement! Seven years later our daughters are now involved working in the business in the summer months when school is closed. We have a fantastic, hardworking team working alongside us, being a seasonal business can be difficult with staffing as its ‘all hands-on-deck’ during the summer then nothing during the winter.

We were at the beginning of planning and building a wooden Maze as an extension to the Lavender Farm in January 2020 when COVID-19 arrived unwelcomed into our lives, with this unknown threat and all the uncertainty it brought, I decided reluctantly to halt plans for 2020. We eventually re-opened on 30th June 2020 and had a strong but short domestic season in between Lockdown one and two, with so many people not being able to travel abroad. The Maze plans are back on track and will be built before June 2021. This will be a welcome addition to the business, as well as being the only wooden Maze in Ireland, it will not be dependent on the lavender flowering season (mid June through early September).

The first Covid lockdown was a welcome break, with fantastic weather and time-off that I hadn’t had through the spring/early summer since opening but this latest Lockdown has been tough on everyone and the very wet winter has made getting outdoor maintenance jobs impossible for the time-being.

We are SO looking forward to Summer, lavender, visitors, long days and being outside with nature and the things we love!

Coolnagloose, Inch, Gorey, Wexford, Y25 NW42

Telephone:

087 068 6774

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.wexfordlavenderfarm.com

Contact:

Moira Hart

Opening Hours:

Closed January, February & March.

Opening 1st May (if restrictions allow) to Mid September: Tuesday - Sunday: 10.30am - 5pm (plus Bank Holiday's)

Mid September to December: Saturday & Sunday: 10.30am - 5pm

Entrance Fee:

€5 per car in June, July & August

Woodville Gardens

Gerald Roche is a farmer and gardener at Woodville, New Ross where his family have lived since 1876.

As a farmer I know that I am simply a custodian of the farm for subsequent generations. A garden is just the same. A garden is shaped by the tastes and fashions of each generation that works in it but it goes on from one generation to the next. So it is with the gardens at Woodville, the apple and pear trees were planted by my grandmother, I think in the 1930s, so they are well past their prime though still productive and a strong structural element in the garden as many of them are espaliered. My interest in gardening came later in life with the realisation that gardening is an all absorbing occupation, once bitten by the gardening bug, there is no escape. The garden is not a chore, as a gardener, one wants to be in the garden planning, planting, shaping, altering, propagating.

At Woodville the walled garden was laid out when the house was built in the early 1800s. It was extended and remodelled in the 1830s and further developed in the 1880s when it was acquired by PJ Roche. He extended the house and built a conservatory. He also extended the existing glasshouse by building a vinery. These houses came from the Messenger Company in England and having restored the conservatory a few years ago and more recently, the peach house, the Messenger greenhouse, home to the vines, is my next project. I have sourced the timber and the help, we will probably lose this year’s crop of grapes unless we have a very warm summer.

In the last decade of the 19th century, plentiful labour and cheap coal meant these glasshouses were both productive and ornamental, these days they are a labour of love. The boilers are gone and they rely on solar gain to heat them, an uneven source of energy even with climate change. I try to garden in as sustainable and environmentally friendly way as I can, using manure and compost produced on site and to choose plants that will flourish in this microclimate.

These days, I look after the garden with the help of the family, a Teagasc student if one is available and the (very) occasional contractor. Help comes in the form of S.482 tax relief in return for which the gardens are opened to the public for two months each year. Covid 19 put a big dent in the visitor numbers in 2020 and I expect the same for 2021 as we rely on garden tours from abroad for much of our income.

Wet weather such as we have endured in January/February 2021 causes anxiety and impatience, even in a garden with free draining soil such as ours and spring sunshine and March breezes are eagerly anticipated. Small highs come from spotting the first bud or flower or fruit, comparing notes from other years. Pleasure comes from the harvest of fruit and vegetables, sweet new carrots, pencil thin, big bowls of autumn raspberries, sculptural romanasco, artichokes, validating puddles of melted butter on the plate. Satisfaction is a freezer filled with vegetables after summer evenings podding and chopping, blanching and bagging. Sweetcorn, broccoli and beans both broad and French, raspberries and blackcurrants all are saved and whatever else is surplus to the day’s requirements. Not for the gardener long days on the beach, those sunny days are spent mowing and edging lawns, harvesting and weeding and at the end of the day, a dash to the sea to cool down and wash off the dust. Just as paper never refuses ink, gardens soak up labour. There is never enough time, power tools have speeded up tasks but there is always more to be done.

In another era, an army of gardeners assisted by carpenters and painters maintained these gardens. Today we do what we can as best we can and relish producing food for the table – nil food miles, kind to the environment. It is an ongoing challenge but one we cherish.

New Ross, Co Wexford

Telephone:

051 422957

Mobile:

087 9709828

Email:

[email protected]

Website:

www.woodvillegardens.ie

Contact:

Gerald Roche

Opening Hours:

May – June: 10am – 2pm, or by appointment

Entrance Fee:

€5.00

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carlycchapman24 · 3 years

Text

The Adventures of Celine Markus-Chapter 1

It was a cool September day and Celine was out running errands. She had just left the grocery store when she saw a figure in a black cloak, with its hood up, motioning her to come over to him. She looked around, and no one seemed to notice the figure, which freaked her out, so she began walking away. The next thing Celine knew, the figure made a gesture with its hands and for a moment she felt compelled to walk over to it. She shook it off, was confused for a moment, and then started heading home. However, when she turned around to walk up the street, the figure seemed to appear right in front of her, startling her. The figure then took its hood down to reveal an older man, perhaps in his mid to late 70s, laughing cheerfully. “You’re a stubborn one, aren’t ya? Good, you’ll need to be. The name is Maverick. I’m the Royal Wizard of Crisherton, which I’m sure you’ve never heard of, so that’s not important. Anywho, you look like someone in need of work, or an adventure, or both even. What’s your name, young lady?” Celine shook her head in disbelief, wizards? Royalty? Crisherton? This guy was a nutcase! “Sir, pardon my rudeness, but you’re delusional. Have you hit your head? Do you have a concussion? Follow me, I’ll take you to the police department.” She grabs his arm and tries to walk away, but she runs into some sort of force field, which seems odd. Then, she looked around and noticed people weren’t paying attention, didn’t seem to notice her, and didn’t seem to hear this man speaking to her, or see him either. “What in the world?” She whispered to herself. “That settles it,” the old man said, tearing his arm from her grasp, “you need an adventure, and I need amusement. If you want some work and are tired of your normal day-to-day life, come to this location tomorrow at 9:00 am sharp. Dress nicely.” Then he hands her a business card with an address on it and smiles, “Don’t be late, Celine.” Then he disappears and she’s back in the middle of the street, looking dumbfounded at what just happened. Then she said aloud, “Wait, how did he know my name?!” earning looks from passersby. Embarrassed, she began heading home so she could process everything that just happened.

Celine put her groceries away, changed into her pajamas, and flopped into bed, staring at the card she was given. It didn’t look like a typical business card, it seemed to be made of some shiny paper and it didn’t even have the man’s name, just the address he wanted her to go to. “Weird,” Celine mumbled and tossed the card onto her bedside table, plugging her phone in and lying back down. Suddenly she woke up and noticed her phone said 8:35 am, she quickly jumped out of bed, haphazardly fixed her bright red pixie cut, and put on a floral print dress and black flats. She threw her phone in her purse, grabbed the card, and ran out of the apartment as quickly as possible. She just barely managed to make it to the building and what she saw caught her off guard. It was a five-story building that looked dilapidated and abandoned. Vines were crawling up the walls, the windows were broken, and it seemed that the trees around it had been dead for many, many years. She froze in fear, staring at the building for what seemed like ages. She eventually shakes it off and glances at her phone, the time reads 8:55 am and she immediately runs inside the building, not wanting to be late for whatever this Wizard guy had planned. When she walked through the door, however, she didn’t see a lobby of any sort, oh no, she somehow ended up in a field in the middle of nowhere. “What the hell?!” Celine exclaimed. The next thing she knew, she heard a familiar laugh, Maverick’s laugh. “What is going on? Explain yourself to me! Where am I?!” Celine demanded, turning towards the old wizard. “You’re in the Kingdom of Calgora on the continent of Adamantia. Anything else you wish to know, you’ll learn as you go along. I have a gift for you, though, here.” The old man handed her a massive leather-bound tome and smiled, “Oh, and that little purse of yours? It’s become this thing called a Bag of Holding, you can hold many things large and small, but it cannot exceed 500 lbs. Enjoy your time, but I must be off. As the Royal Wizard, I have duties to King Auditorius, but I’ll keep an eye on you and check in from time to time. Before I leave, however, I’d like you to give that spellbook a try, you might be surprised,” and he winked. Not believing a thing he said, Celine rolled her eyes, opened the spellbook, and tried a spell called ‘Create Bonfire,’ aiming it at his feet. Suddenly a fire sprung up where she was pointing and it burned Maverick’s feet, who quickly jumped up at the pain and then laughed as he stepped on the fire to put it out. “I’m sorry, but what the hell just happened?!” Celine exclaimed, pulling her hand back, and suddenly she feared herself for the first time in her life. “Why, you just cast a spell. I knew you had potential the moment I saw you walking out of that grocery store in your world! Glad to see my instincts were correct. Be careful though, don’t accidentally harm yourself. Toodles,” and in an instant, Maverick disappeared. “Maverick, Maverick!” Celine called to no avail, “Stupid old Wizard,” she grumbled. Celine looked down and noticed she was still in her dress, and suddenly she felt very exposed, which was embarrassing. She pulled her phone out of her, now, Bag of Holding, and read the time, 10:45 am. Sighing, she looked around for some sort of path so she could get out of the middle of the field, as she began feeling bugs crawling up her leg and making her itchy. She looked around and saw one a few feet away, so she made her way over and began following it.

After what seemed like hours, Celine saw, at a distance, a giant stone wall with an open gate, which she recognized as a portcullis from her World History classes from when she was in school. She took a deep breath and went towards it. When she got within thirty feet, she heard a gruff, male voice say, “Oi, who goes there? State your name and business, stranger.” She didn’t feel comfortable stating her real name in this strange land, so she said, “My name is Annabeth Reed, I’m but a simple traveler just wishing to find a place to stay.” The man glared at her, “Do not lie to me, stranger. Give me the truth now or be arrested by me and questioned by the King himself.” Celine swallowed hard and said, “Alright, fine,” she mumbled to herself, “At least I tried,” and then spoke to the man again, “My name is Celine Markus, I’m a twenty-two year old from Los Angeles, California, on the continent North America.” The man didn’t believe her and was getting ready to arrest her when a woman behind her spoke up, “Arnold, don’t treat new arrivals like that! You may be part of the City Watch, but you are not the Captain of the Guard, I am.” The man now known as Arnold froze in fear and responded, “My apologies Captain Iseut, I meant the girl no harm, I’m simply trying to do my job!” “I understand, but the girl isn’t from here and she seems nervous and scared. Now go, it’s time for a shift switch,” the woman now known as Captain Iseut said. “Yes ma’am!” Guard Arnold said, rushing back into the city. Captain Iseut looked at Celine, “Now, Celine, how did you get here? You’re not from around here, it’s quite obvious by your attire.” “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you, ma’am,” Celine answered nervously. “We’ll see about that, come to my quarters, I’ll get you some new clothes and maybe some tea.” Captain Iseut responded. “Not to push my luck ma’am, but I haven’t eaten today, so maybe some food as well, if it’s available,” Celine said, hoping she didn’t come off as ungrateful. “That can be arranged, oh and don’t worry about Arnold, he’s a good person and guard, but quite hot-headed.”

The two women walked into what Celine assumed was Captain Iseut’s room or quarters as the Captain put it. It was nicely decorated, the walls were made of stone, but there were tapestries with designs that Celine had never seen in her life, they consisted of golds, browns, reds, and slight hints of greens. One had what looked to be some sort of family crest on it with how it was designed, it was a green and white shield with the silhouette of an eagle flying in front of a large tree with no leaves, just bare branches. Celine tilted her head upon seeing the design and Captain Iseut noticed immediately, “Ah yes, that’s the Iseut Family Crest, beautiful, isn’t it? According to my father, my five times great grandfather, on his side, designed it himself. If I ever marry, I plan to keep my family name, my spouse will have to change their name,” the woman laughed, “it’s not exactly common for an instance such as that to happen, but then again, I’m not exactly a traditional sort of person.” “What do you mean by that?” Celine asked, turning to the Captain. “Well, women rarely join the City Guard, let alone become Captain. It’s often considered a man’s job, to be a soldier and a guard, at least here. I’m sure some other countries and Kingdoms have more of a combination of men and women in their military, but this one is more ‘traditional,’ if you can call it that. I wanted to be a knight or join the City Guard as a child, my parents didn’t like that, thought it was just the fantasy of a young child, a phase if you will. When I stayed true to my choice, they hesitantly let me train and join. Enough about me though,” the Captain says and begins boiling water in a kettle, “tell me who you are, how you got here, and if Celine is your true name.” Celine wasn’t sure if the Captain was telling the truth or not, but she also didn’t see a reason for her to lie, so she explained her situation to her. “Of course it was Maverick,” the woman said, rubbing her temples, “he always tries to find some new person to mess with. He always has high hopes for the people he chooses, but half of them die and the other half become stories for a short time and then no one remembers who they are after three months. Although, you’re the first from a completely different world. I’ve never heard of Earth or any of the places you mentioned. If you plan to stay for a while, maybe you can tell me more about these places you speak of.” The woman gets up and grabs the kettle off of the fire and pours them both some Jasmine Tea, then she fishes out some dry meats and cheeses, along with some bread, from her personal stores and splits it between the two of them. “Uh, sure, I guess. So you’re telling me this, ‘bringing new people here’ nonsense is a habit of Maverick’s?” “Unfortunately, yes.” Captain Iseut answers the younger woman. “Why me though? I’m not an interesting or important person, so I don’t understand.” Celine says, she begins to reach for the food when she stops and says, “You eat first,” to the Captain. “Suspicious are we? Smart, that will help you go far here,” Captain Iseut takes a bite of the food when Celine realizes it’s not poisoned, she begins eating as well, “As for why he chose you,” the Captain starts, “clearly he sees some potential in you that you don’t see in yourself.” “I guess,” Celine answers.

After a long conversation over lunch, the two women say goodbye to one another and Celine begins walking out of the Captain’s Quarters, then she stops midway to the door and asks, “Captain Iseut, ma’am,” “You can call me Renee, but yes?” the Captain responded. “Is there someplace I could stay for a few days? Like, a hotel or something?” “I’m not sure what a ‘hotel’ is, but there are a few Inns in town you could stay at. I’d suggest The Clydesdale Inn, it’s a bit on the expensive side, but it’s worth it. Their food is certainly better than what I had, their beds are comfortable, and there are different types of entertainment, if you know what I mean,” the Captain said with a wink. It took Celine a moment, but when she realized what the slightly older woman meant, she flushed a bright red, “Uh, maybe not for me, but I wouldn’t mind a comfortable bed.” “Very well,” she said kindly, “here’s twenty-five gold and a change of clothes. Some trousers, a bodice, some boots, and a cloak. All a brownish-green color to blend into the surroundings when you leave town.” “Thank you for your kindness and standing up for me Ca-,” she corrected herself, “Renee.” “You’re quite welcome, but be careful next time. Not every Captain of the Guard will do what I did, so if you leave Crisherton and go to another city, be warned.” The Captain said, a grave tone in her voice. “I’ll keep that in mind, have a good rest of your day,” Celine said with a soft smile and walked off.

She looked around for a few minutes and finally found The Clydesdale Inn, when she noticed it was near the docks a smile crept across her face, as she loved the water and the ocean, “Maybe this won’t be too bad,” she said to herself and walked in. As she approached the bar, a human-like figure with auburn hair, tanned skin, and seemed to be in his forties, greeted her, but he was very short and had to use a stool to see over the counter, “Lovely to meet you, miss! A traveler huh? I can tell you’re not from around here! Welcome to The Clydesdale Inn, the name is Fredrick Longfoot, and my wife and I own this little establishment. What can I get you?” Celine felt embarrassed again, she knew she stuck out like a sore thumb, but she didn’t realize it was that bad. She cleared her throat, “I’d like one room for a week please, if there’s one available.” “That’ll be fourteen gold,” the man said, “I hope you enjoy your stay. We’ve got a great performance tonight from a traveling musician. He’s been here for about a day and a half now. Now, what’s the name, dear?” “Celine Markus,” she answered, not trying to lie about her name for a second time today after almost being arrested. “Celine, what a lovely name,” a voice she doesn’t recognize says and she quickly turns her head towards the voice, only to see a creature with black Aurochs horns, blood-red skin, Merlot colored hair, and golden eyes with no visible pupil or sclera. Startled, Celine pulled out her pocket knife from her Bag of Holding, which had turned into a dagger, and pointed it at the creature, nearly falling off of her seat. Mr. Longfoot shook his head, “Now, now Arlech, I appreciate your performances, but don’t go scaring guests please.” ‘Arlech’ strummed his lute tunelessly and said, “Sorry Mr. Longfoot, I didn’t mean to. I certainly didn’t expect her to pull a dagger on me either. Although I think mine’s bigger,” he says with a wink. Celine flushes and almost smacks the creature across the face when he does, in fact, pull out a much larger and prettier dagger than her’s, “It’d be more like a short sword for old Fredrick though,” the creature says with a laugh, and Celine notices his sharp canines, much like a Devil’s or a Demon’s based on stories she’d heard from her world. “Pardon my language, but what the fuck are you two? I can guess Mr. Longfoot simply by his name and height, he’s a Hobbit, but you, Demon, Devil, looking thing, I don’t know about you. I’ve had enough scares and surprises for the day and I just got to this place like three or four hours ago.” “I’m not sure what a ‘Hobbit’ is, but I’m a Halfling, so if they’re similar I’ll give it to you,” Mr. Longfoot answered. Shit, that’s right, Celine thought, this isn’t my world, it’s far from it, I don’t belong here. “Let’s put our daggers away and properly introduce ourselves, shall we?” The horned creature asked and slipped his dagger back in his pants pocket. Celine looks towards Mr. Longfoot for reassurance, who says, “It’s alright, Arlech might talk you to death, but he’d never hurt someone unless he had to.” Celine sighed in relief and stuck the dagger back into her Bag of Holding. “You really should keep that on your person somewhere instead of in your bag, if those bags get destroyed, everything you have in there? Gone, and you likely won’t get them back. Anywho, let me formally introduce myself. My name is Arlech, a traveling musician and storyteller and I’m a Tiefling, hence the horns and red skin,” he said with a smile, purposely showing off his sharp teeth. “I’m Celine Markus and, obviously, I’m not from around here. I guess I have some sort of magic because I was given this book with spells in it by the Royal Wizard, Maverick, ever heard of him?” She replied. “Yes, I’ve heard of him, where are you from anyway? Women here certainly don’t wear such, ah, revealing clothing, in this Kingdom at least,” the Tiefling responded, looking her up and down. Celine looked down, confused, because she didn’t have any cleavage hanging out or anything, but then she remembered that the dress stopped above her

knees,

which looked shorter when she was sitting down, which she didn’t find to be too bad, but this wasn’t her world, so the ‘shortness’ of her dress might be ‘distracting.’ “I’m not from this world, I can tell you that much,” she answered. He laughed, thinking she was joking, “Are you serious? Come on, there’s no way.” “Want some proof?” Celine asked. “I don’t know what you think will convince me, but go ahead, show me this ‘proof’ of yours.” He replied.

Celine pulled her phone out of her bag, unlocked it, and showed it to him. Both Arlech and Mr. Longfoot looked at the phone in awe, “What IS this contraption?” the two men ask in unison. “It’s called a cell phone, they’re pretty common where I come from, a place called Earth,” she answered. Arlech reaches for the phone and Celine snatches it away, “Hey, ask first!” Celine says sharply. “May I look at this thing you call a phone?” Asked Arlech, slightly annoyed. “Say please,” she said back. “Please?” He asked, rolling his eyes. “Yes you may,” she says and hands it to him. Celine moves closer to keep an eye on him so he doesn’t try to steal her phone. “So, how does one use this?” He asks, staring at her phone in confusion. The screen times out, becoming black, “Oh no, is it broken, did I break it?!” the Tiefling exclaims. “No, it shut itself off because no one was using it, here, let me turn it back on for you,” Celine says, taking the phone from him and unlocking it with her thumbprint, revealing her phone’s background, which was her old family dog. “Wow, magical!” The horned man said in excitement. “It’s not magic, it’s technology. Though I guess to you all it would be considered magic,” she answered him. He tapped on the camera icon, not knowing what it was, and when it popped up, it was the front camera, which startled him, “What in the Nine Hells?!” he says, nearly dropping Celine’s phone on the hardwood floors. Celine just barely catches it in time and thanks whatever deity or deities this world may have that her phone didn’t shatter. “Please be careful, it can break if you drop it,” Celine said with a frustrated sigh. “Would it explode if it broke?” Arlech asked worriedly. “No, but the screen could shatter and I’m almost positive there are no screen repair shops in this world,” the young woman answered. “What did I do anyway? Why could I see myself? Is there an artist living in your contraption that makes lifelike art?” The man, Celine guessed, said. She laughed, “No, it’s called a camera, here, let me show you.” She unlocked her phone again, opened the camera app like Arlech had previously, and said, “Get a little closer,” he did and she took a picture of the two of them. Then she went into her gallery and tapped on the picture, showing it to both Mr. Longfoot and the Tiefling. “Astounding, I must go get my wife and show her this! Oh, and dinner is on the House for you tonight Miss Markus, simply for showing me such an interesting contraption. Edrich, give Miss Markus the House Special and our best ale.” Before she could say anything, Mr. Longfoot had run off and sighed, “I was gonna say that I prefer water or wine, but okay.” “I’ll take the House Special too, Edrich, if you don’t mind, and some whiskey,” Arlech said. “Be lucky you’re performing tonight or I’d charge you double,” a human, or, he looked like a human, but he had pointy ears, that was standing behind the counter said, which Celine assumed was Edrich. About half an hour later, Mr. Longfoot walked out with a normal human, probably about thirty-seven, from the back of the Inn, she had wavy, light brown hair and a smile across her lips, “Miss Markus, this is my wife, Helena,” he said. “Oh, you must be the newcomer with strange objects, welcome to our Inn! My husband seemed impressed with this object you had, and nowadays it’s quite hard to impress him,” she said with a laugh. Soon after, Edrich brought out Celine and Arlech’s food and drinks.

After an hour of conversation, and a few drinks on Arlech’s part, Celine began getting tired. She’d already had a long day of being transported to a new world and finding out she could use magic. She glanced at her phone, the time read 7:45 pm. She sighed and stuffed her phone back in her Bag of Holding and laid her head on the bar. She took a sip of water that had been placed in front of her an hour ago and out of nowhere, she heard Arlech say, “You know, you’re pretty cute,” and she choked on her water, “Excuse me?!” she exclaimed. “What, you’ve never been told that before?” He asked and Celine noticed he was slurring his words, clearly drunk. “Not by a drunk Demon thing,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Tieflings aren’t Demons, they’re Half-Devils,” explained a drunk Arlech. “What’s the difference?” Celine asked, now amused. “Devils,” he slurred out, “tend to make deals with mortals and they honor those deals, alright? They’re not super violent, unlike Demons. A Tiefling, or Half-Devil, like myself, tends to have one Devil parent and one mortal parent. Usually, the mortal parent isn’t exactly willing to join an arrangement or deal with a Devil, but they do so out of desperation. Some Devils want a soul, others just want the mortal’s body, if you understand my meaning,” he says and gives a very drunk wink that was almost a blink, but Celine understood what he meant and rubbed her temples before he could explain any further. “Alright, time for you to sober up, Mr. Longfoot, do I have permission to knock some sense into him since he’s supposed to perform here soon?” She asks. “Go on ahead, just don’t kill him, if you knock him out, I have spare healing potions.” He answers, wiping down a plate. “Thank you,” says Celine and she pulls out her spell book and finds a spell called ‘Witch Bolt,’ “Oooh, sounds cool,” she says and casts it, but unable to control it, it hits a bar stool instead. Arlech laughs and she says, “Dammit” to herself and tries again, but misses a second time, hitting the same bar stool. “Oh for fuck’s sake!” and she gets up and pulls her dagger out of her bag, flipping it to the blunt side so she doesn’t hurt him too badly, she hopes, and tries to hit Arlech with the hilt, thankfully she’s not nearly as uncoordinated with the dagger and she actually manages it. “Jesus fuck,” she puts her dagger away, “why was that so difficult to do?!” she said, rubbing her eyes. Arlech snaps out of his drunken stupor, “Huh, what? What just happened? Did you just hit me?” “Yes, you have a performance, stupid, and you were drunk, so I needed to snap you out of it.” Celine answered. “Oh, thank you.” He answered, rubbing the back of his head. Then he noticed the burn marks on the barstool behind him, “How did that happen?” he asked. Celine gritted her teeth while Mr. Longfoot chuckled, “I don’t want to talk about it.” “Oh, alright then, let me go get changed into a new outfit for my performance and the music can begin!” Arlech exclaimed and ran up the stairs. A few minutes later, Arlech comes back down the stairs in an all silk, purple outfit, from a button up to a pair of pants, and a beret with a feather attached to it and began to strum his lute and sing, a beautiful baritone voice comes out of this strange Half-Devil thing. Celine was genuinely impressed, she didn’t know what she had expected, but it wasn’t that and her jaw was on the floor. Mr. Longfoot chuckled, and murmured to her, not to interrupt Arlech’s performance, “If he doesn’t win ya over with his sarcasm and wit, his singing will.” Celine scoffed and murmured back, “He didn’t ‘win me over,’ I was just surprised is all. I didn’t expect him to actually be GOOD at singing, ya know?” An hour passed and Arlech’s concert ended with a bang, as he changed the color of the flames from the chandeliers into a purple color, much like his outfit, and everyone that had come to see his show applauded. He took his beret off and people gave him tips of up to five gold, which Celine assumed was a big deal with how he reacted. “Thank you, thank you all so very much! I appreciate

all of your generous tips and I’ll be here all week if you’d like to see me perform again! Goodnight everyone!” Cheers erupted again and Mr. Longfoot stepped up to the platform that Arlech had been on. “Thank you all for being here for tonight’s performance! I hope you enjoyed yourselves because I certainly did. Now, I do have to apologize, however, I’m closing up for the night, so those who only came to see the performance and have homes to return to, you need to leave soon, unfortunately. For the patrons that DO have rooms and are staying, I’d like you to clear out the dining hall here pretty quickly and make your way to your rooms. Thank you again, have a wonderful night, and may the Gods bless you to have a good day tomorrow.”

As the patrons clear out and make their way to their rooms, Arlech plops next to Celine, still in his concert outfit, and asks, “So, did you enjoy that?” “I mean, yeah, you have a good voice. I didn’t expect that at all.” Celine responds. “You underestimate my musical ability? Why, I’m offended.” He says sarcastically. Celine laughs, “I just didn’t know what to expect. Remember, I’m not from around here?” “Well, you’ve got a lot to learn here Miss Markus. Clearly, the world you’re from is vastly different from this one, so you’ll need to adapt to everything. I’ve traveled to quite a few different cities here in Calgora, but outside of this Kingdom, I don’t know much of what’s out there. Maybe we can learn together.” He says with a grin. “Are you trying to flirt with me?” Celine asks, raising an eyebrow. “Is it working?” Arlech asks. “Nope.” She responds. “Then no, but if you’d like someone to travel with anyway, I’ll gladly join,” he answers. Celine sighs, “Fine, but only if you promise to stop trying to flirt with me.” “I don’t know if that’s a promise I can keep. It’s quite fun, and useful if you use it in the right circumstance.” “I hate you,” Celine says half-heartedly. “No, no you don’t, and I think you and I are gonna be good friends.” The Tiefling says with a tired grin. “We’ll see about that, anyway,” she looks at her phone and the time reads 10:35 pm, “I should get some rest. I think I’ll chill here in the city for a couple of days to get used to my surroundings and then try and find some jobs to make some sort of money. You need money to live and to get money you need some sort of income.” “Sounds like a plan,” Arlech responds, “there are usually requests for help on the board near the post office to get some money, there’s also the Solarstriders and you could apply there if you wanted.” “What’s the Solarstriders?” Celine questions, tilting her head. “Oh, they’re an organized group of mercenaries who take requests from private investors, whether it be someone from high society that doesn’t want to do the dirty work themselves, to kill someone from a competing House, or to kill some ridiculous monster for parts to sell, or smugglers and crime families and such that usually want some monster’s part for profit or magic. I'm not part of the group, or Guild, if you will, but if a group asks, I’ll occasionally help out if something sounds interesting, and if the money is good.” He explains. “That could help out a lot actually. I’ll think about it. Anyway, goodnight, don’t get as drunk tomorrow night, I might have to actually kill you next time.” Celine answers, smiling, and heads upstairs to her room for what she hopes is a nice, long, rest.

#OCs #Story #Celine Markus #DnD #Dungeons and Dragons #5e #The Adventures of Celine Markus #Original Story

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theericardo · 3 years

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*Part 2: “Do You Even Remember Yourself?” *WRITTEN BY: PAUL (ME). *DIRECTED BY: HOLLY MARIE COMBS RYAN *SEASON 1, EPISODE 02

Staring

· Alyssa Milano as Phoebe Halliwell

· Rose McGowan as Paige Matthews Mitchell

· with Holly Marie Combs Ryan as Piper Halliwell

· and Shannen Doherty as Prue Halliwell

Co – Staring

· Brian Krause as Leo Wyatt

· Jacob Tremblay as Wyatt Halliwell

· Sunny Suljic as Chris Halliwell

Recurring

· Brooklynn Prince as Melinda Halliwell

· Dafne Keen as Coop Halliwell

· Ivan Sergei as Henry Michell

· Iain Armitage as Henry Michell, Jr.

· Dafne Keen as Hayley Michell

· Dorian Gregory as Darryl Morris

· Victor Webster as Coop Halliwell

Guest – Starting

· LeToya Luckett as Eloise Gannibal

· Lovie Simone as Eloise Gannibal’s sister

· Paul Giamatti as William Alford

· Reese Witherspoon as Miss. Alford

· Keith David as Slave #1

· Uncredited Baby as Letitia Gannibal

· Tyrel Jackson Williams as Zygon

· Sandra Prosper as Sheila Morris

· Ken Page as Adair

· Ian Abercrombie as Aramis

· Christopher Cazenove as Thrask

· Jon Stewart as Crill

· Oded Fehr as Zankou

· Charisma Carpenter as Kyra

START

[Scene: flashback to February 27th, 1670 – Salem Village, Massachusetts Alford’s plantation – Eloise Gannibal and William Alford.]

(Elosie was a “House N***er” at that time to slaver owner to William Alford and his missis.)

(With Eloise being a “House Nigger,” she did not have to work outside like the rest of the slaves did.)

(That night, William came home, drunk.)

(Him and the misses got into an argument.)

Miss. Alford: “WILLIAM, I HAVE TOLD YOU ABOUT COMING HOME DRUNK FURTHERMORE!”

William: “YOU, DON’T RUN ME WOMEN!”

(The two argued back and forwards with each other.)

(Miss. Alford stormed off, leaving the dazed but drunk William there with Elosie, who happens to have overheard the whole argument.)

(William bolted towards and manhandled Elosie.)

Elosie: *screaming* “Let me go Missa!”

William: “Quiet N***er!”

(William dragged Elosie outside to the side of the house where he raped her tell she stared to bleed.)

(Slave #1 and Elosie’s sister found Elosie laying there.)

Elosie’s sister: *crying* “Elosie.” “Elosie, sweetie wake up.”

(Little did they know, Miss. Alford was watching from the widows’ view.)

[Scene: still in flashback but to February 28th, 1670

– Salem Village, Massachusetts – Eloise Gannibal and William Alford on the Alford’s plantation.]

(Miss. Alford demand for Elosie to not step foot back into their house.)

(Since then, Elosie has been working inside.)

[Scene: still in flashback but to October 31st, 1670 – Birth of Letitia Gannibal on the plantation.]

(It was raining hail with high gusty winds at the midnight of 31st of October,1670.)

(Eloise along with every other slave was wearing “N**ro Clothing.”)

Eloise’s sister: “Keep pushing Eloise, she’s almost here!

Eloise: *grunts*

Eloise’s sister: “She’s here Eloise!” “She’s here!”

*baby starts crying*

Eloise: *crying, tears of joy * “She’s adorable.”

Slave #1: “What are you going to name her, Elosie?”

Eloise: “Letitia…” “Letitia Gannibal”

CHARMED THEME SONG MUSIC

[Scene: September 22nd, 2017 – 11:00 pm. Living Quarters at Magic School with Chris, Melinda, Henry Jr., and Hayley.]

(Chris, Henry Jr., and Hayley are chatting among each other)

Henry Jr.: “So you’re telling me, Wyatt tried to kill you?”

Hayley: “Like, kill – kill you?”

Chris: “Yea, he actually did.” *looks over to Wyatt* “I can’t stand him sometimes, but he’s my brother, and I still love him.”

Melinda: *reads Wyatt’s mind* “He’s thinking the same thing Chris.”

Chris: “Didn’t mom tell you stop reading people mind?”

Henry Jr.: “Yo, you can read minds Mel?” “That’s sick!”

Hayley: “Neither me nor Henry didn’t come into our powers till we were 10-years-old!”

Henry Jr.: “You’re like 2, right?”

Melinda: *gives Henry Jr. a dirty look. * “Just because my birthday is on a Leap Day, doesn’t mean I’m 2-years-old stupid!”

(Chris and Hayley laughs at Melinda’s clapback at Henry Jr.)

[Scene: Still in Magic school, but with Piper, Phoebe, Paige, Wyatt, and Leo.]

(Wyatt sitting alone from the rest of the kids.)

(Paige orbs in with Piper and Phoebe)

Piper: “Wyatt Matthews Halliwell, get your butt over here now, mister!”

(Wyatt walks over slowly.)

(Wyatt approaches Piper with his head slumped down.)

Piper: “You sir, have gotten out of hand!” “You used magic in public, that one!” “You used magic on your father, that two!” “You used magic-”

(Leo steps in and cuts Piper off.)

Leo: “Piper, let him catch a break”

Piper: *exhale* “You’re grounded, for 2 weeks!” “No magic, no video games, no hanging out afterschool for anything!”

Wyatt: “But Chris u-”

Piper: “Don’t you BUT me mister!” “I mean it!”

(Piper starts chanting)

Piper: “I don’t think he comprehend.”

“He uses magic to depend”

“Child lock them for two weeks, till then”

(White orbs form centers around Wyatt.)

(The orbs shift into a form of a lock and magically goes into Wyatt.)

Piper: “When I meant no magic, I meant it.”

(Wyatt walks away.)

Phoebe: “Piper sweetie, I don’t think that was a smart idea.”

Piper: “Whenever that” *points to Phoebe’s pregnant stomach* “comes into his powers, then you can do whatever you want to do with him and his powers.”

Paige: “Uhm, I have kids.” “Matter-of-fact, they developed powers similar to yours Piper.” “Honey, I feel like you did the wrong thing.”

(Piper sits down in a chair.)

(She fixes her long-layered bangs and crosses her legs.)

Piper: “What's done is done.” “I didn’t strip him of his powers, I just put a child lock on them so he can’t use them freely.”

[Scene: Still in Magic school, cuts back to Chris, Henry Jr, Hayley, and Melinda.]

(Chris, Henry Jr, Hayley, and Melinda are still chatting among each other.)

(Wyatt walks over.)

Wyatt: “Chris, can I talk to you?”

Chris: “Yes.”

(Chris and Wyatt walk over to the side from everyone else.)

Wyatt: “You know, I never had the attendance to harm you.” “I never should have used magic on you in the first place.”

Chris: “I never should have cut you off or be an asshole to you, or even st-.”

Wyatt: “Stop it Chris.” “I was in the wrong also.” “For god shakes, I almost killed you!”

Chris: “Can we agree, not to kill each other?”

Wyatt: “I can’t make any promises.” *laughs*

(Wyatt and Chris hug.)

Henry: “Ok kids, it’s time to go to school go to bed.”

(Every child heads to a room to sleep.)

(Henry Jr puts up a biker with Henry.)

Henry Jr.: “But dad, its Friday?”

Henry: “Bed, now Jr.”

Henry Jr.: “Fine!”

(Henry Jr. walks to bed.)

[Scene: September23rd, 2017 – 8:25 am In the Underworld with Prue.]

(Prue is now out of her outfit that was covered in dust “death outfit”.)

(She is now wearing a sheer-black tank top, black high waisted pants, and Yuko-40 platform heels.)

(Prue is sitting at The Source’s throne.)

(Demon shimmers into the underworld.)

Demon with shimmering power: “Prue Halliwell.” “What the hell are you doing here?”

Prue: “Haven’t you heard,” (hopes down from the throne.) “I’m here to run this place.” *flips hair* “And you are?”

Zygon: “Zygon.” “I’ve heard about you.”

Prue: “Ahh, do tell.”

(Zygon walks up to Prue.)

Zygon: *walking circles around Prue* “The Charmed One.” “The Power of Three.” “A trio, well quartet, of sister witches.” “Destined to serve the good and good only.”

Prue: *nods her head* “Stop.” “For starts,” *flips hair* “I’m not a good witch.” “I don’t do good.”

Zygon: “Oh, Honey, do you even remember yourself?” “You’re one of them.” “But something is different about you.”

(Zygon stare into Prue’s eyes.)

Zygon: “You’re newly empowered.”

Prue: “What does that even means?”

Zygon: *still circling walking around Prue* “The Window of Opportunity, my dear.”

“Prue: “What does that mean?”

Zyon: “You, can easily be persuaded to be either good or evil.” “By the looks of it, you’re already chosen that path.”

(Prue folds her arms.)

Prue: “I got to get my hands on that book.”

Zygon: “What book.” “Are you referring to The Grimoire?”

Prue: *little smirk*“No, stupid” “It’s this book, that I keep having flashes about.” “Ritch-violet, red cover, with the named engraved into it, kind of on the smaller side.”

Zygon: “Never heard of it.”

Prue: “Maybe those women who called me their ‘sisters’ have it.”

Zygon: “Might I say, I could be some help.”

(Prue uses telekinesis tosses Zygon into a wall.)

(Prue then uses telekinesis to pin him down on the floor.)

Prue: “Thanks for the offer, but I got this.” “I’m going to look for that book.” “Regardless of what I have to do.”

(Prue gives Zygon a wink as she astral teleports out from the underworld.)

[Scene: 9:00 am – Split screen phone conversation between Darry, who is at the San Francisco Police Department. Paige, who is at Magic School.]

*cellphone rings* Darryl: “Go for Morris.” *clutches his mobile with phone with shoulder* *Paige explaining to Darryl about Prue* “Say what now!?”

Paige: *abbreviating herself* “Prue, is alive.”

Darryl: “But ho- how?”

(Paige explains to Darryl how Prue came back in further details.)

Paige: “Can you put an IP out for her?” “Just in case she shows up?”

Darryl: “Sure, Paige.”

Paige: “Thank you.”

(Paige hangs up the phone with Darryl.)

(Darryl walks out his office.)

Darryl *in a loud voice*: “Alright, we are putting IP out for a ‘Jane Doe’.” “Caucasian, black hair, green eyes, mid-to late 40’s.”

Female Detective: “Does she have any medical conditions?”

Darryl: “She, doesn’t remember herself.”

[Scene: 9:20 am- Living Quarters at Magic School with Paige, Phoebe, and Coop.]

(Paige hangs up the phone with Darryl.)

Phoebe: “So, what did he say?”

Paige: “Well, he placed an IP out for her, just in case she decides to resurface back on the Earth place.”

Phoebe: “Maybe I could sense her to see if she did.”

Coop: “Phoebe, I don’t think it would be good to use your powers to the distinctive level.” “It might induce your labor.”

Phoebe: This is my sister for god shakes, I at least have to try.”

(Paige pulls Coop to the side.)

Paige: “Piper, Leo and I are going to speak The Tribunal.”

Coop: “The Tribunal?” “Why?”

Paige *bobbing her head*: “For starters, we don’t know, hell, nobody from ‘Up there,’ knows about the book.” “Maybe The Tribunal could help.”

Coop: “Last time you all went there for help, they stripped Phoebe of her powers.” “We don’t know what they might do to Piper for finding the book, let alone for Wyatt for casting a spell.”

(Piper walks in.)

Piper: “That’s a risk I’m willing to take.” “We are all willing to take.” *walks closer to Paige and Coop* “We need answers, and we need them now.” “Even if that requires a consequence of having are powers striped, goddamnit, I’m willing to do so.”

(Leo walks in.)

Paige: “Are you ready?”

Piper and Leo: “Yes.”

(Piper and Leo hold on to Paige and orbs out, leaving Coop with Phoebe.)

[Scene: 9:48 am- Still in Living Quarters at Magic School with Phoebe, and Coop.]

(Phoebe gets into a mediation position.)

Phoebe: “I need complete quietness, please.”

(Phoebe closes her eyes and starts of sensing for Prue)

Phoebe: “I can’t sense her.”

Coop: “Phoebe, I think you should stop.”

Phoebe: “Instead of me sensing her like any other normal person, I’m going to try sensing her through are blood relationship.”

(Phoebe was able to sense her.)

(Phoebe starts to levitate)

Coop *with panic in his voice*: “Phoebe, stop.” “You’re scarring me.”

Phoebe: “I can sense her.” “She’s not in The Underworld, but where?”

(Phoebe’s eyes turn pure white as her premonition power kicks to get a glace of the area.)

(*flashes* The San Francisco Police Department.)

(*flashes* Prue walking into the station.)

(*astral premonition in an invisible form*)

Darryl: “Prue, you don’t have to do this.”

Prue: “Oh, but I do.” “If you’re going to put an IP on me,” *punches Darryl* “leave a women age out of it!” “Oh look, I got blood on your white shirt.” “To bad.”

(Darryl passes out.)

(Prue hears astral Phoebe’s thoughts.)

(Prue starts to chant.)

Prue: “What is not seen”

“Make seen”

(astral Phoebe visibly fades into a corporal form.)

(Prue gives an evil smirk.)

astral Phoebe: “How can yo-”

Prue: “- You read thoughts?” “I guess my powers are growing also.” “I don’t know where you and your *air quotes* sisters hiding, I will get you.” “I will get that book.” “And I will be the new Queen of the Underworld.” “LEAVE!”

(Premonition ends.)

(Phoebe flops back down to the grown from levitating.)

(Phoebe’s water’s breaks.)

Coop: “I told you that you should have stop, Phoebe!”

Phoebe: “Would you shut up for one second and get me to the infirmary!”

[Scene: 10:00 am- At The Tribunal’s meeting area with Leo, Piper, and Paige.]

(Paige orbs in with Piper and Leo.)

(Piper and Paige starts chanting.)

Piper and Paige: Di! Ecce hora! Uxor mea me necabit!

(The Tribunal appears)

Tribunal all together: “How may we help you this time, The Halliwells?”

Piper: “Well, I found this book while having work done at the manor and I came across this book with the title Book of Damned.’”

(All the Tribunal have a puzzled look on their face.)

(Start to whisper among each other.)

Piper: “Helllo people, we still need answer?”

Crill: “Book of Damned goes back to Salm Witch times.”

Paige: “That is why we seen Melinda Warren in Phoebe’s vision.”

Thrask: “As long as nobody cast a spell from that book, we should be fine.”

(Piper, Paige, Leo give each other a startled look.)

Leo: “Why not?”

Adair: “That book is magically linked to Letitia Gannibal.”

Piper: “I’m sorry who again?”

Crill: “Letitia Gannibal” “Just like how the Warren- Halliwell bloodline stared, the Gannibal-Bennett line started.” “She’s was the first of her bloodline to earn magic also.”

Thrask: “Instead of using her magic for good, she used it for evil.” “Starting the mythological of The Window of Opportunity.”

Paige: “What would happen if such casts a spell from the Book of Damned?

Adair: “If anyone casts a spell out of that book, will awaken Letitia herself!”

Leo: “Well we have a problem.”

Piper: “Wyatt cased a resurrecting spell, which brought back Prue from the dead.” “She doesn’t remember her and she’s using magic for evil acts.”

Adair: “Prue is going through the Window of Opportunity, meaning that she has 48 hours to choose a side to align with.”

Piper: “What the hell you mean the Window of Opportunity, she was already a good witch!”

Thrask: “By the looks of it, she self-choice evil.” “She has time to algin with good if she pleases.”

(The Tribunal looks among each other.)

Crill: “As for Wyatt, he will be held accountable for his acts for using forbidden magic.”

(The Tribunal summons Wyatt present.)

Wyatt: “Why am I here?”

Thrask: “Wyatt Halliwell, you are charged with using forbidden magic, by awaking a force of evil.”

Wyatt *with range in his voice*: “How the hell I suppose to know it was an evil book.” “Bullshit!”

Piper: “Language, mister!”

Wyatt: “I want a trial!” “I demand a trail now!”

Thrask: “Piper, Paige, I’ve just been informed that Phoebe just had her baby.”

Piper: “Paige you go back and check up on Phoebe, I’m staying her.” “There is no way in hell they are going to strip Wyatt of his powers.”

Adair: Actually Ms. Halliwell, we prefer Leo to stay while you and Paige go back to aid your sister.

(Piper rolls her eyes.)

Paige: Piper sweetie, just come on.

Piper: “Fine!” “Leo, let me know what happens.” Don’t leave any details ou—”

(Paige orbs her and Piper out before Piper gets to finish her word.)

Crill: “Let the trail begin.”

Adair: “For the plaintiff side, we have Zankou”

Leo: “Zankou!?”

(Zankou is summoned in flames)

Zankou: “Miss me?”

Thrask: For the dependent side we have Kyra.”

(Kyra is summoned in white orbs.)

Kyra*with a big smile on her face*: “I guy!”

Leo: “Kyra, I haven’t seen you since- ”

Kyra: “Since I was vanquished.” “I know.”

The Tribunal: “Let us begin!”

[Scene: 1:20 pm- Magic School’s infirmary with Phoebe, Coop, Piper, and Paige.]

(Paige orbs in with Piper.)

(Phoebe is swaddling her newborn.)

Piper: “Phoebe.” “Phoebe, are you ok.”

Phoebe: “I’m fine Piper.” “Everything is fine.”

Coop: “I want everyone to meet Ryan Victor Halliwell.”

Piper *with a smile in her face and tears forming in her eyes *: “Victor.”

Phoebe *smiling, crying*: “Dedicated after are father Victor.”

Coop: “He weighted a whooping 9 pounds.”

Paige: “Well, we know he was going to be healthy because Phoebe kept her mouth stuffed with food.”

Phoebe: “Hello, right here!”

(Everyone busted into laughter.)

Phoebe: “We got to get Prue, because she has Darryl in the Underworld.”

Piper: “That’s it.”

Paige: “What Piper.”

Piper: “She has to go.” “Paige orb me to the manor to get the book to from the attic.” “

Paige: “Piper, she’s are sister.” “You just can’t vanquish her like any other demon.”

Piper: “Are Prue died in 2001.” *in tears* “Are Prue would never attack a friend, yet alone an innocent.” *wipes tears* “She needs to be vanquished.”

Phoebe: “Hey, we are not vanquishing our sister Piper.”

(Phoebe climbs out the bed.)

Phoebe: “I got an idea.” *wipes the tears off of Piper’s face* “It requires the Book of Shadows and Sheila.”

[Scene: 2:50 pm- In the Underworld with Prue, Darryl, and Zygon.]

(Prue has Darryl pinned down in a chair.)

Zygon: “Why do you have this mortal in The Underworld.”

(Prue is sitting in The Source’s throne)

Prue: “Have you heard of touch your goddamnit nose.” *crosses her legs* “He’s leverage.”

Zygon: “Ahh, for what?”

Prue: “the Book of Damned, dip-shit.” *sighs* “I read your mind when I first meet you and know you was slow.” “But good god, I didn’t know you was this god damn slow.”

(Darryl wakes up dazed)

Darryl: “Pru- Prue?”

Prue *mimicking Darryl*: “Pru- Prue?” “Stop calling my name like that!” You wouldn’t like for me to call your name like that.” “Da- Darryl.”

Darryl: “Why can’t I move?”

Prue: “Because, I’m using my powers to tame you.”

Darryl: “What do you want from me?”

Prue: “It’s not what I want from you” “It’s what I want to trade you for.”

(Darryl brakes loose from Prue’s telepathic withholding.)

(Zygon used his powers to melt Darryl’s shoes in spot.)

Prue*walks up to Darryl*: “Poor Darryl.” now you don’t have any shoes.” “Now, shut up and SITT!”

(Darryl flops to the ground.)

[Scene: 2:45 pm Magic School’s with Phoebe, Piper, Paige, and Sheila.]

(Paige orbs back into Magic school with Piper and Sheila)

Sheila: “So let me get this straight.” *tilts her head at Paige* “You want me to roam free in The Underworld, just to use me as bait?”

Paige: “Yep, that’s the plan.” “But, trust us, we will be right there behind you.”

Piper: “Phoebe what did you want with the book?”

Phoebe: “I’m looking at the binding potion in the book.” “Something had me thinking, what if we tinker with the potion.

Piper: “Go on.”

Phoebe: “Instead of binding with Prue’s powers, we remove them, hoping it would break her from The Window of Opportunity.”

Paige: “That might actually work.”

(Ryan, who is in his bassinet, starting crying.)

Phoebe: “Oh is little Ryan hungry?” “Oh yes he is, Oh yes he is.”

(Sheila walks over to the bassinet.)

Shelia: “He looks just like Coop.”

Phoebe *bottle feeding*: “He really does.”

(Phoebe stops bottle feeding Ryan.)

(She takes him out the bassinet, burps him a couple of times, and places him back in.)

Phoebe *walks over to Coop in the other room*: “Ryan has been feed and sleep.” “I’ve pumped milk just incase he wakes back up.”

Coop: “Phoebe-”

Phoebe: “Be safe, I know.”

(Coop kisses Phoebe on her forehead.)

(Paige, who has already made the revamped binding potion, approaches Phoebe and Coop.)

Paige: “Ready, Phoebe?”

Phoebe *nods*: “Ready”

(Phoebe, Piper, and Shelia holds on to Paige as she orbs them into The Underworld.)

[Scene: 3:00 pm- The Underworld with Phoebe, Piper, and Paige, and Sheila where Prue was with Darryl.]

(Phoebe, Piper, Shelia, and Paige orbed into The Underworld.)

Shelia *running over to Darryl*: “Darryl, oh honey, are you ok?”

(Darryl mouth was shut and he was still.)

Shelia: “Honey what’s wrong?’

Prue *struts out the shadows* *mimicking Shelia*: ““Darryl, oh honey, are you ok?” “No, he’s not.” “He’s under my control.”

(Prue uses advanced telekinesis to throw Shelia.)

(Paige catches Shelia using telekinetic orbing, placing her back on the ground.)

Paige: “I don’t think that’s nice, Prue.”

Prue: “You’re right dear, let me pick on someone my own size.”

(Prue uses advanced telekinesis to create a telekinetic energy ball, and chucks it at Piper, Phoebe, and Paige.)

(Piper explodes it, midway.)

Piper: “Nice try.”

Prue: “I’m going to ask one more time, where is the book!?”

Phoebe*pulls out the Book of Damned*: “This book?”

Prue: “Yep, now be a gem and hand it over, or Darryl here will be a vegetable for the rest of his living, breathing live.”

Piper: “Now!”

(Paige throws the potion as Phoebe opens up the corked glass bottle so that she would be able to capture Prue’s powers.”

Prue: “No!”

(Prue uses advanced telekinesis to have the bottle bust before traveling her way.)

(This causes the bottle to burst in front of Piper instead.)

(The potion working biding every sister power, but Phoebe, that makes them Charmed - Piper’s Molecular Immobilization, Prue’s Telekinesis, and Paige’s Telekinetic Orbing.)

(The bottle then magically teleports back to magic school.)

Prue: “I’ve had it with the games!” *tries to use telekinesis but does not works*

Phoebe: “You know what Prue, me to.”

(Phoebe’s lounges herself using levitation at Prue.)

Phoebe: “Feel this, bitch!”

(Phoebe uses her Empath and Premonition power to make Prue see her childhood and make her experience the emotions that occurred during that time period.)

(It was enough to knock Prue out, releasing Darryl her Telepathic hold.)

(Shelia and Phoebe walks over to help Darryl)

Paige: “Ok, Let’s go now!”

(Paige orbs all of them out of there back to Magic School.)

THE END

#charmed #Prue halliwell #piper halliwell #phoebe halliwell #paige matthews #wicca

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greenninjagal-blog · 4 years

Text

It’s Always Been This Way (Hasn’t It?)pt2

Hello! Did someone order 52 pages of Virgil angst, gayness, and magical shenanigans? If you missed the prologue you can find it right [here]!

Summary: After deciding not to go back to Hogwarts for their final year of school, Virgil, Roman, Patton, and Logan all enjoy living together in their quiet muggle neighborhood and doing small tasks for the Order. It would be nice, Virgil thinks, if he wasn’t actively lying to their faces every day.

Also if the Neo Death Eaters weren’t trying to kill his friends.

Words: 21,080 (and no thats not some joke)

Read on AO3 || My General Writing Masterlist

Chapter One: Liar, Liar (House On Fire)

“This is absolute bullshit and they know it!” Virgil yells to no one, as he slams the morning paper on the table.

From somewhere not far away, Patton’s voice calls out “language”, but Virgil doesn’t really register it at all. He’s too busy reading over the front page article again as if he missed something the previous four times he had read it. He flicks his wand (Cypress, 9 inches, semi flexible) across the kitchen with barely a thought which makes the coffee pot start up and his favored mug place itself under it.

It’s somewhere past eight in the morning, and Virgil still feels drowsy which probably isn’t helping his mood at all. He hasn’t gotten a full night's rest in at least three years, and he doesn’t expect to get it for another ten years. And that’s only if his half muggle born ass survives that long.

He snarls at the paper again, slamming a fist on the table hard enough that the stinging goes all the way up his arm to the back of his eyes, and that in turn ruffles the owl on the perch in the corner out of its trance.

“Sorry Logan.” Virgil breathes in deep and snarls it back out.

The horned owl titters on the perch turning towards him, blinks twice in a sophisticated way that’s made doubly effective by the strange rectangular pattern around its eyes, and then reaches out its wings. With powerful gust and a blur of brown, white, and black feathers, the animal leaps into the air. It morphs with precision, a complex series of motions that elongates its body, shrinks the eyes, and changes the number of bones under its feathers all together. Its fascinating to watch: in less than a second the air is filled by a stern looking seventeen year old with square glasses, a sharp nose, and matted dark hair that rarely appears to have a strand out of place.

But then again, Virgil thinks its fascinating every time Logan breaks the law at all. There’s something about seeing a man so rule orientated like Logan breaking those very same rules that makes Virgil’s heart flutter in that entirely unhelpful way.

“Salutations, Virgil,” Logan says, sounding exactly like he had just swallowed a muggle computer. “May I inquire what has your frustrations today?”

Virgil huffs, sliding the paper across the table for his friend. “See for yourself.”

Logan picks it up at the same time as Virgil flicks his wand at his mug and exchanges it for the one Logan favored. Logan’s still frowning at the article when both the cups come levitating through the air and set themselves on the table between them.

The Daily Prophet had never been Virgil’s favorite source of information. It didn’t take a genius to know when a reporter was being paid to report--or not report-- something. Not to mention it was practically controlled by the Ministry and that it was more concerned with sales than with accuracy.

Still, Virgil is too much of a sucker for routine to cancel his subscription to the utter nonsense. Which leads him to mornings such as this: grumbling into his coffee mug, with his illegal animagus of a friend across from him equally displeased and showing it in the way his eyebrows furrow and his thin lips squeeze together, with Patton in the other room somewhere, probably stress cleaning again (which is marginally better than when he’s stress eating), and Roman out on his morning jog through the quiet muggle neighborhood they called their own.

It’s strange, Virgil thinks, knowing that none of their neighbors are aware of the nuclear bombs that rest in each of their pockets disguised as sticks that they might have picked up in the park last Saturday.

It’s strange, Virgil thinks, that its September fourth and none of them are at Hogwarts, or even intending on going to the esteemed magic school that had been their homes for six years prior.

It’s strange, Virgil thinks, knowing that Dee’s family had helped finance the Dark Lady's rise to political power and then had started murdering muggles in distant countries and the Daily Prophet was refusing to acknowledge any of it at all.

They’d all be seventh years this year, completing the second half of their courses and preparing for the NEWTS and practicing their nonverbal spells. And maybe Virgil’s spent too much time in his own head this summer because he misses going the kitchens and tapping out the rhythmic pattern of “Helga Hufflepuff” on the barrel that would open up to the soft, cozy, and quiet common room. From the very first moment he had done it himself, Virgil had always felt a bit like he was walking home when he entered the Hufflepuff dorms, as ridiculous a notion as it was. (And he’d die before he’d admit that to anyone else.)

But even here, in Roman’s semi-modest muggle neighborhood, it feels a bit like that. He can’t pretend that he doesn’t like waking up and seeing those three again and again and again. He doesn’t want to either.

He feels guilty about it. A whole lot of guilty. For the first month of them living together, Virgil hadn’t been able to sleep at all, because he’d been so afraid of waking up, and finding the spell over them had broken.

Virgil can survive losing a lot-- he’s done it before with his mother, his home, his holidays, his sanity (on Thursdays, specifically),-- he doesn’t think he can survive losing them too. And that’s partially his fault, he supposes: his defining character trait has always been that fierce loyalty, with a more than a dash of selfishness that his mother hadn’t managed to iron out of him.

He loves the spell that was over them. He also hates that he loves the spell that was over them.

The second they found out it would be over and they’d never forgive him for using them like stepping stones.

His fingers tighten around the mug at the spiral of his own thoughts. Logan’s eyes flick up from his reading to look at him, and Virgil wished he knew what that sort of look meant. If they had actually been friends for five years, he probably would have known.

Its a little late to ask.

It doesn’t matter much because the next moment the front door opens with a loud boom and a louder voice sings the ending line of some Disney song that Virgil recognizes only because it had been in the back of his head for three days straight. (That song from that night when the four of them had curled up in the living room and Roman had tugged him into a cuddle and then forgotten to let go of him before he fell asleep with his head on Virgil’s shoulder and-- and he was blushing just thinking about it.)

Virgil makes a mistake of swallowing his coffee at the same time as Roman Prince comes tromping into the kitchen after his morning run. And hell, if it didn’t take every single muscle in his body to keep from spitting his drink back up.

Virgil has seen Roman come back from runs before: it was part of his routine that he rarely switched up and he had admitted to Virgil once that it was when he did his best thinking. Alone with his music in his ear, his wand in his pocket, and the rhythmic pounding of his sneakers on the pavement-- Virgil could see how it was appealing. If it didn’t require getting up so early, or going outside, or like...exercising, Virgil would have totally been down to run with him.

But the way that Roman comes into the room-- his shirt in his hands, instead of on his body like a normal person, glistening with sweat that seemed to drip off every single muscle which was only emphasized by the smug look on his face, his eyes sparking with his endorphins running rampid and his face still flushed from his workout--like he knew, the little shit, knew that he was making Virgil short circuit by looking like that.

Virgil swallows his coffee, with his hands around his mug so tightly he thinks it might take a crowbar or diffindo to get them apart.

Logan turns into an owl again.

(Animals don’t feel emotions quite like humans, Logan had said once and Virgil has never been able to get over that particular jealousy.)

“What's the matter, Morgan le Fretful?” Roman asks with that shit eating grin of his that, by itself, can turn Virgil’s thought process into a first graders string art project. That smile coupled with his gleaming abs and Virgil’s complete and utter gayness? Oh he’s down for the count and out of the game all together.

“Boo,” Virgil manages, “Weak.”

“I think it was a good one!” Roman responds so blithe and warm that Virgil wonders if the sun came to earth for the day. Logan flutters his feathers, which only makes Roman laugh more.

“Put on a shirt, Princey,” Virgil says, deliberately not looking at him as he says it. He steals the paper back from Logan’s place, and pretends to find the articles in it interesting and not at all offensive.

"And if I don't?" Roman's wiggling his eyebrows and Virgil can tell because the picture of Celestina Warbeck (the famed Singing Sorceress, whom Roman had once said should be the next Disney Princess) was blushing furiously and waving her face in her article.

Virgil glares at the singer and she gives him a wink like she knows exactly what his heart is doing in his chest. He changes pages as fast as he can, grabs his mug and his wand in one hand, and does not look up at Roman.

"If you don't, Patton's gonna have a hard time putting out the Bluebell flames I'm gonna--"

Virgil stops mid sentence as his eyes catch on a familiar face on the page. A face he hadn't seen in a year, but saw each and every time he had a nightmare. The paper crinkled in his hand.

"Virgil?" Roman says playfulness gone. "If it's really that much of a bother I'll put it on--"

Virgil blinks once, twice, and he swallows hard. "What? No its-- Its fine. I don't care." He folds the paper and sticks it under his arm as he convinces himself to keep breathing.

Roman stares at him (shirt around his neck like hawaiian lei). Logan gives a ruffle of feathers and touches down at the edge of the table next to Virgil's elbow. Despite being a bird, and despite the fact the markings around his eyes only look like glasses, the gaze he holds is sophisticated and knowing. Virgil refuses to look at him, at either of them. He finds a spot just over Roman’s shoulder to stare at in conviction.

"I'm fine," Virgil says again, as if that will convince them.

"You're clearly not." Logan's voice says and Virgil just barely restrains himself from batting the glasses off his face. (When the first animagus was done, why didn't they included a sound with their morphing? A bell ringing? A tumblr notification noise? Something???)

"Yeah, last time you acted like this after reading the paper, you disappeared for a day, without explanation." Roman says (and Virgil doesn't flinch, does not, does not), "So to prevent Patton from worrying all day, I'm gonna wait for an answer that's the truth."

"It is the truth!" Virgil responds. And its not a lie. Not a whole lie. Barely a partial lie. Its nothing compared to the other lies he's been telling.

And when neither of them fall for it, he lets out a defeated breath. "You guys remember Professor Remus Dukeson?"

Roman snorts, "Crazy Divination teacher? The one who ate a physical teacup in third year?”

Logan picks up a feather from the table, one of his own feathers, and twists it in his fingers, “What about him, Virgil?”

“Do you know what Alstroemeria flowers represent?”

Virgil unfolds the paper from under his arm, “He’s dead.”

Virgil doesn’t expect them to understand. He can’t expect them to. Logan thought Divination was a waste of school funds. It was the only class he didn’t even attempt to master. And Roman and Professor Remus never once got along. After the disaster of third year Roman had dropped Divination like it had been going out of style, and maybe it had. By fourth year only half the class had stuck around.

And Virgil had been one of them.

He hadn’t been particularly good at it: he didn’t like his tea without sugar, the crystal balls never once filled with smoke for him, and he mixed up the head and life lines on his during the Palmistry portion of his OWLs despite having had the class for three whole years by then. Professor Remus had mentioned he had a latent talent once upon a time, but the man had also said that Roman was going to cast a forbidden curse at Virgil and Logan was going to win a duel with Professor Sanders, so Virgil hadn’t put much merit in his words.

But seeing the teachers face, his smirking mouth, his mustache that always had something in it, and even seeing his picture shuffling side to side as he was trying to stripe which unfortunately was not a new phenomenon to anyone who took his class...seeing Professor Remus in the Obituaries with the cause of death being labeled as an unsolvable murder? Oh, there was something cold about that, something that makes Virgil’s empty stomach churn and his head feel warm, and his fingers itch for the coin in the secret pocket over his heart.

Theres a flash of red in the corner of his eye and Virgil freezes, but in the end its just Roman tugging his shirt over his head, and pushing back his sweat drenched bangs. He’s frowning, as people do when they hear someone died.

“Oh man,” Roman says, “That’s pretty awful. I mean he was a terrible teacher, but I never wanted to see him dead.”

“Agreed,” Logan says. He flips the paper to read the small written eulogy himself. “I wonder who the new teacher in his place is?”

“Maybe they brought back Trelawney?” Roman suggests.

And just like that the topic is gone and Remus Dukeson is forgotten. Virgil wishes that his right hand would stop feeling like someone had stabbed him with a thousand needles in the meantime, please and thanks.

Listening to them feels a lot like they’re standing on opposite sides of a one-way glass wall. They keep talking, the topic gone, and in a few minutes Virgil’s little freak out will have been forgotten to them. Virgil thinks he should be thankful for that: with his life on the line he really doesn’t need them to be prodding into why exactly crazy Remus Dukeson’s death matters all that much.

Crazy Remus Dukeson who would have been the only one who could have helped him out of the hole he’d been digging for himself for the past two years. But if he was dead, then there was no one left who could vouch for him when all of this was over, no one who would be able to stand in a court room and say without a doubt that Virgil had done the only thing he could have done, no one who would want to believe Virgil was a good guy.

And, of course, Logan was not stupid in any manner. If past memories hadn’t secured such a reaction as his as one of normality, then surely he would have put two and two together. Surely if he hadn’t had five years of false memories under his belt he would have realized that Virgil was hiding something behind that glass mirror of his, and that it was bad and evil and going to get them killed.

Virgil slips out of the room about the same time as Roman and Logan start arguing over whether Divination should even be a course offered at school (a debate of which has been ongoing for three years now). Part of him wants to be sad that it's so easy to just fade away from and exit the room without making them even turn from each other.

But Virgil knows how Roman and Logan stare at each other when they get into a debate, how everyone stares at Logan when he gets filled with that prim-and-proper, fuck-you fire. Outside of seeing him break the laws with ease, watching Logan get passionate is one of Virgil’s favorite sights. (Even if the first memory of it that Virgil has also includes Logan giving him a bloody nose and Patton crying--)

Roman isn’t any different. That’s why he purposely eggs the ravenclaw on, and then stares stupidly at Logan’s flushed cheeks with a cocky smirk that is absolutely impossible for Virgil to witness when the other still hasn’t showered from his run.

So really its for his own sanity that he manages to escape the room when he does.

***

Virgil is coming down from his room at a quarter after four when Patton assaults him with the brightest wand-lighting charm Virgil has ever seen performed.

“Pat! Fuck!” Virgil stumbles back on the stairs covering his eyes against the white light. “Warn a dude!”

“Virgil!” Patton yelps, “Language!” But he giggling far too much for it to come out stern. Virgil feels the other boy batting his hands away from his face, “Stop, stop that, Virgil!”

Virgil squints past the glare, “What are you--”

“Smile!”

Then there's a flash of light even brighter than Patton’s wand followed by a puff of purple smoke that practically spelled out what was going on.

Virgil coughs, waving off the smoke while Patton removes the wizard polaroid photo from his camera. His brain is working overtime trying to remember what holiday it is because Patton never breaks the camera out unless its an important date. But Virgil had his calendar in the room marked with all their birthdays, and the major and minor national holidays--magic and muggle alike because Patton had started crying the last time they forgot to tell him about Arbor Day and Virgil wasn’t ready for that to happen again in this lifetime or the next or the one after that. He’s even marked the full moon, because he was pretty sure the girl from the public library was a werewolf and didn’t want to accidentally wander outside if she missed a potion on one of those nights.

“Pat,” Virgil says in a sort of defeated, anxiety ridden tone. “What’s going on? Who’s birthday--”

Patton just laughs at him, and Virgil has to shut up at that. Patton’s laugh was like a waterfall, like bells chiming, like angels signing. Virgil would rather pitch himself from the Astronomy Tower than miss any second of his glorious happiness.

Its unhealthy. Its gonna be the end of him.

Virgil can’t help but smile at the other’s toothy grin. And if he gets a hug out of it? Well, someone once mentioned that that Virgil was touch starved, so that’s the reason he melts at Patton’s touch.

Patton shows him the picture without relinquishing any hold on him. Somehow that leads to them stumbling around on the stairs until Virgil’s sitting and Patton’s basically in his lap, fuck. But Patton doesn’t even seem to notice at all.

“It’s no one’s birthday!” Patton says, “I just was cleaning up earlier and I came across a bunch of photos from school!”

And just like that Virgil’s short lived happiness evaporates. Dread settles on his shoulders like a cloak, and anxiety wriggles straight down his throat to grip his pulsating heart. “Oh?”

It comes out too innocent. Patton doesn’t notice.

“Yeah! I got so many pictures of Logan and Roman and Me! I used to carry this camera around everywhere! Don’t you remember?”

Virgil remembers. He remembers it very well. Especially when he can see the crack on the side where the flash bulb hooked on before he had accio-ed it right out of Patton’s hands in second year and tossed it back and forth with Dee until even Logan had come to Patton’s defense. Especially when Logan had called all three of them childish and then Dee had laughed some sort of nasty laugh and tossed the camera right over the edge of the moving staircase, before linking hands with Virgil and dragging him out to the quidditch pitch for the rest of the time before dinner.

Virgil mentions none of this. “Yeah? What about it?”

Patton waves the photo in his face and, really, it's a pretty terrible photo of him. He didn't even know skin could be that pale and his hair is sticking up from where he had been running a hand through it all evening, and his irises were red from staring directly into the flash.

“I saw that we don’t have any pictures with you in them!” Patton sighed, “It’s terrible! You’ve been our friend for so many years! I can’t believe that you aren’t in any of our pictures!”

Virgil forces himself to keep smiling. It hurts his cheeks. “Well you know me…”

“So we have to take a bunch of pictures right now!”

Patton sets those blue eyes of his on him, and Virgil cannot believe that he’s 100% wizard. Somewhere someone in his family line had to be part selkie because those are definitely baby seal eyes, and who the fuck is gonna say no to them? Not Virgil!

“Okay,” Virgil says. “Alright sure, whatever you want.”

And he means it. He’d give Patton all the stars in the universe if he didn’t think removing them would make Logan lose his shit about order and necessity.

Besides Virgil has just as few photos of them as Patton has of him. So when the photo session is over and Patton’s hair was dusted purple and Virgil’s eyes hurt from the brightness and they were both crying from laughter, Virgil makes sure to snag one of the better photos for his own room.

(It was always so easy to laugh with Patton, so easy, nearly too easy. But that was okay for now.)

“Oh! I almost forgot!” Patton says, looking up from his glistening stack of pictures suddenly, “The Order is having a meeting next week.”

“Oh?” Virgil swallows nervously, “you mean like, having a meeting, here?” He folds the picture of him and Patton in his pocket, running the edge of the photo between his nail and the skin under it. (He’s pretty sure the photo version of Patton is talking the photo version of himself out of a panic attack, but he disregards it.) His other hand comes to his mouth, and he nips away at the black chipped nail polish.

Patton shakes his head, and Virgil can’t but help a sigh of relief. “Nope! No worries, kiddo! Thomas-- wow, it sure is silly to call him by his first name!-- Professor Sanders and I talked about how uncomfortable you are with anyone new in the house, so instead we agreed that it was easier for us to go to him to give our reports!”

Patton hums looking at another picture, where he had magicked up some cat ears for the two of them. “Plus it would be a pain to have to undo all those charms you set up for one measely meeting!”

“Cool,” Virgil says.

It's not really, because Virgil hates leaving the house, hates stepping into an area that could so easily be compromised, hates when he can’t be sure if he’s leading his friends into a trap or if he’s just being paranoid again. But that’s definitely better than inviting people, even the Order, into the house that Virgil had made sure was their safe haven.

But Patton takes his quietness with grace. He gives up one of his blinding smiles and Virgil is vividly reminded of how pretty he looks like this. Virgil knows that the secrets he’s keeping from them are unforgivable, knows what they did to the trio of boys is terrible and deplorable and shameful. Despite that, Virgil can’t help but feel...relief that Patton is smiling like this.

Patton doesn’t remember why he should never smile at Virgil, doesn’t remember the year after year of Virgil tearing him down, doesn’t remember what Virgil and Dee did to him. And Virgil is selfish enough to be grateful for that.

“Oh would you look at the time!” Patton says brightly, “I better go start dinner before Roman gets into the pantry again! Are you going to be joining us, Vee?”

Virgil nods, even though he doesn’t really catch whats being said to him.

“Yay!” Patton holds his new pictures to his chest, “I’ll call you when its ready then! Love you, VeeVee!”

He says it so effortlessly.

Virgil wishes it didn’t feel like a snake wrapping around his chest and squeezing the breath right out of him. Patton pops back down the stairs, leaving a cold empty space in Virgil’s lap where he used to be. He jumps the last step and gives one last wave to Virgil as he turns the corner--

“Hey, uh, Pat?” Virgil says at the last second.

Patton hums to show he’s listening, even though he’s still flipping through their pictures. “Yeah, kiddo?”

“Will Remy be there?”

Patton blinks and looks up the stairs at him. Virgil’s nails dig into the banister. Something flickers in the Ravenclaws eyes, confusion or pity. Virgil’s not sure there’s a difference at this point.

“Remy? Oh! You mean the Ravenclaw that joined the Order the year before us!” Patton shuffles the photos with a smile, “And you mean at the Order meeting, right?” He tilts his head to the side as he thinks, before shrugging and offering, “I’m not sure!”

Virgil breathes like he’s a drowned man finally come up from the water. “Uh, cool! That’s cool.”

The itch to recheck his charms hits him then. Like being trampled by a Mountain Troll.

Remy’s not a threat, Virgil tells himself.

Except that he is. Virgil had met the Ravenclaw twice before, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t acutely aware that Remy was a very skilled Legilimens.

And the last thing Virgil needs right now is someone poking around in his head. Virgil’s seen first hand what a Legilimens can do to someone: Patton looks at him with a smile instead of with tears, Roman challenges him to duels over the spot on the couch rather than to the death, Logan has no clue how attractive he looks angry out of his mind and giving people nosebleeds with his barefists.

“I do.”

No, Virgil doesn’t need someone looking in his memories, even at a glance. Not now, not when they’ve come so far and the Order is so, so very close to being able to combat the Dark Lady before she takes over the Ministry of Magic.

At best, he’ll be labeled a Neo-Death Eater. At worst, no one will ask any questions and they’ll just kill him without hesitation.

He needs to check the charms on the house, because that’s something other that just sitting on a staircase in the center of the house and having a break down where one of the others will see him.

Virgil launches himself to his feet and takes the six stairs upwards two at a time. He runs his fingers over the wall as he goes, picking at the peeling wallpaper that none of them have taken the time to fix yet. There are pictures of baby Roman and his muggle family at the beach on the walls and classical music coming from beyond the closed door of Logan’s room. Virgil moves beyond it all to his room at the end of the hall.

Well he calls it his room, and so do the others. Virgil thinks they might be a little upset if they ventured into the room that Roman had given him and found it was nearly the same as it had been at the beginning of summer break two years ago.

The window facing the street had the blinds drawn and a thick layer of dust over the windowsill because Virgil was not in the process of airing his dirty laundry or his room. The bed was neatly tucked in from his routine habit, the floor was clean and clear, his extra shoes lined up at the foot of the bed so he couldn't trip over them in the night--those were things he did to remember his mother; she always did like it when he kept his room neat. He had a total of eight outfits in the closet, which he was sure if Roman knew about he'd have a heart attack. So far Virgil had avoiding the issue by magically changing the shade of black in his shirts every other day.

The only things that Virgil had brought into the room that weren't absolutely necessary for him to have was that calendar on his wall, a collection of seventh year textbooks he had bought himself even though he wasn't going to school, his school trunk that he hadn't touched since getting off the train last year, and now, a picture of him and Patton making silly faces and laughing (very happy to be unfolded).

He slips out his wand and wanders towards the window.

The spells are all over the house, on every window, over every wall, under every carpet. Roman had put the first layer on himself when he was sixteen, and later when he, Patton, Logan, and Virgil had been inducted into the Order of the Phoenix, Thomas Sanders had come over and reapplied more of them. Once the Transfiguration Teacher had finished, Virgil had then moved in and quietly applied his own.

They were subtle differences in magic, in skill, in finesse. Virgil had smoothed over the rough edges and connected the corners that no one else might have noticed if they hadn’t gone looking for them. Every full moon Virgil had snuck around quietly checking the magic cloaking spell and then muggle deterrent spell and the silencing spells---

Needless to say the one time the girl scouts had rang the doorbell, Virgil had nearly had a heart attack. Patton had bought ten boxes of cookies with Roman’s money before Logan had managed to get Virgil to put his wand away.

Virgil had obsessively checked the spells after the girls had left until he found the loophole that had allowed the girls to get all the way to their front door. By the time he found it dinner had gone cold and only Logan was left awake to witness Virgil trip down the stairs in his haste to fix it.

Roman hadn’t even known he had been adding spells at all until Logan had tried to floo Remy Dormire into the house.

So Virgil’s first time meeting the legilimens is really not a good one. There had been something about the way that Remy had looked at him while Roman gave him the “dude what in Merlin’s name??” speech that made Virgil uneasy. Something about the way that a smile had flickered across Remy’s face and he sipped on his homemade tea that only Patton had touched, something about the way that Virgil felt like Remy had gotten inside his head without him drawing his wand, something about the way that Remy had said “It’s all cool hun! Paranoia is all part of the game!”, which made it sound like Virgil was overreacting yet again.

Something about the guy feels wrong to Virgil.

So he adds more charms to the house, ones he’s sure no one but himself and the trio of boys he lives with can get through.

It doesn’t feel like enough.

And in the end, he's right about that.

***

Their role in the Order is small really. They’re all too young to be doing anything important like infiltrating the Ministry-- except Logan, who despite choosing not to graduate from the esteemed magic school had been offered several internships over the summer which he had denied. Patton’s Uncle Kiddel had been very adamant that Patton be as far removed from danger as he could get, and while Roman had been a bit bummed at the lack of action he had jumped at a chance to offer his family’s house for their activities while his parents took an extended vacation to some place that Virgil doesn’t remember.

The combination of parents between the four of them is depressing: Roman’s muggle parents are unreachable, Patton’s are dead, Logan’s Dad took his mom to a safe place in another country, and Virgil’s mom… well, there’s an understanding between the four of them not to bring up parents unless they were trying to bring the mood down to rock bottom.

So really they are just four seventeen year olds living in the house together. Roman monitors the muggles near them, Logan handles correspondence between certain branches of the Order (although Virgil suspects that Thomas Sanders fields some of the letters before they get to them). Patton monitors the wizarding world. Virgil exists to be anxious on the edge of their consciousnesses.

He doesn’t have a job title really, but Virgil is the one who does his best to keep the rest of them alive and safe and not killing each other (which, surprisingly, happens at least once a week, when Roman gets tired of having no logical reason to practice magic and then starts charming things in the house that shouldn’t be charmed, when Logan runs out of work to do and restlessly snaps at them until a fight starts, when Patton gets too far in his head about what would happen if the Dark Lady manages to win against them and refuses to let any of them leave the room lest they disappear on him--)

So their part of the Order’s functions are minuscule.

Virgil doesn’t see why they have to go at all, but he goes with Patton, Logan, and Roman to the Order meeting all the same. The location they pick is a townhouse that magically doesn’t exist until they need it to. When it does exist, its across the country so they take the brooms there, which makes Roman so happy he cries five minutes into flying, and almost makes Virgil not hate the heights so much.

(Roman, of course, used to be a Quidditch player, a Chaser, up until he decided not to go back to school that year. Virgil used to split his attention between watching Roman’s windswept hair and Dee’s cheeky smile when the latter managed to beat a bludger just right to knock the Quaffle right out of Roman’s hands.)

Virgil sidelines those memories and grips the handle of his broom until his knuckles are white and the cold air of the upper atmosphere begs him to stop holding so tight. Patton flies beside him, naturally swerving like a lackadaisical snake with the ease that only comes with having ridden brooms since he was in diapers. Ahead of them Roman does a loopdeloop and tries to goad Logan into racing him, who in turns calls him every childish name in the book.

It takes them forty minutes to get there. Roman wins the race, and because Logan is petty, he changes the color of Roman’s firetruck red robes to a dull beige.

“Hello Professor!” Patton waves to Thomas Sanders as the older man appears on the street across from them, and because Virgil’s luck is terrible, Remy Dormire appears next to him.

“Patton,” Thomas greets them all warmly. “I’ve told you guys to call me Thomas before.”

Said Ravenclaw ducks his head sheepishly, “Its just feels so strange! You’re always going to be my Transfiguration teacher to me!”

Remy cooes at him and pats Patton on the head, “You are so adorable, hun.” He says, “Come on Bitches! Its cold as balls out here and I’m ready to hear all the juicy gossip you babes have been collecting!”

Virgil is more worried about a muggle peeking out their windows and seeing four teenagers with brooms and long cloaks so for once he agrees with the magic mind reader. The glasses on the older boy's head are mirrored, which makes it hard to tell who he’s looking at, who’s mind he’s reading. Virgil reaffirms his mental walls as he follows the others inside.

The inside of the townhouse looks pretty much like it hasn’t been used in years. There’s layers of dust on everything. Which Virgil guesses is why Remy’s face screws up when Thomas’s hand lands on his shoulder and guides the older boy towards one of the rooms. Remy shrugs his hand off as soon as he physically can, and then brushes the area on his leather jacket that Thomas had touched, like he could wipe the phantom traces of the man off it.

“Vintage Leather, Babe!” Remy doesn’t quite hiss, but it’s a close thing. “No touching!”

Thomas laughs good naturedly and Remy’s snarl fades a bit back to that condescending look that Virgil always associated with him. Roman sneezes three times in succession, and his eyes start watering and he croaks something about dust being the bane of his existence.

“Pardon me,” Logan says to Thomas, “He will be completely unhelpful until this is cleared up. Scourgify!”

It was frankly impressive. At least, to Virgil it was. Patton always got that excited look on his face when someone did magic, and Roman was too busy sniffling and rubbing his red eyes to really watch. Remy rolled his eyes and Thomas smiled at Logan when he performed the charm that left the previously untouchable room into a cozy living room with plenty of space for the six of them.

“Excellent job, Logan!” Thomas said.

(For a moment Virgil feels like he’s back in class and Logan just won another ten points to his house for being naturally gifted at forcing things to shapeshift.)

Logan blushes at the compliment, so Virgil thinks he’s not alone in the flashback.

“Yeah, yeah, he’s great,” Remy bulldozes the compliment and tosses himself on a length of sofa meant for two people. “Its time for the good gossip, girls!”

“None of us are female presenting--” Logan starts, but Remy rolls his eyes and waves him off.

“What-everrr! Pat come sit with me, babes!”

Virgil wants to drag Patton far away from Remy, but the older Ravenclaw raises an eyebrow at him like a dare. Virgil counts to four and reminds himself that Remy is part of the Order and Thomas is there and even if he is a legilimens that doesn’t mean that he’s going to read any of their minds. In fact, he’s likely there just because he got bored doing whatever the fuck Thomas has him doing.

Patton jumps on the cushion next to Remy and bounces on the seat like an excited child. Logan opts for a spot on the adjacent couch with Thomas, Roman on the floor like a drama queen who needs to be the center of attention, and Virgil ends up perched on the armrest next to Logan’s elbow where he can easily see both the fireplace and the door to the dusty parlor.

Thomas is a comforting presence, Virgil thinks as the discussion starts. He had been their professor and he had taught all of them and had been right beside them when they were sworn into the Order. He had never been cagey about this past, being a half blood from Hufflepuff who had been there that day that Harry Potter had defeated Voldemort and witnessed all the fighting first hand. He had joined the Order not long after that final battle by tracking down Headmistress McGonagall and subtly asking if there were any alternative plans for if another dark wizard started raising.

According to Thomas he had gotten the job as a Transfiguration teacher less than a year after that and Virgil really never had the guts to exist in the same room as Headmistress McGonagall long enough to ask her if that was true.

“Remy?” Logan says, after a lull in the conversation, which Virgil, himself, only realizes because Logan’s elbow slides onto the armrest and its dangerously close to touching Virgil’s thigh.

The other member of the Order takes another moment to respond which makes the hairs on Virgil’s neck raise. Remy’s hand is twisting through Patton’s hair so casually and somehow they ended up with Patton leaning heavily on Remy’s shoulder. Virgil thinks it would be weird for anyone else, but Patton likes to touch and its most likely that Logan and Virgil haven’t been providing enough of those touches recently. Remy’s still wearing those stupid sunglasses even though they are inside and its dark in here, but Virgil knows instinctively that he was reading thoughts.

Probably.

“Hmm, doll?” Remy says, “Sorry I zoned out when y’all started getting boring. You know me; I just can’t keep my focus on things when theres a cute boy around!”

Virgil wants to point out that they don’t know him, but Patton meets his gaze and Virgil loses the courage to say anything.

Right, they should be avoiding instigating a fight here.

Regardless Roman spread himself out on the ground and sighs dramatically, “I know what you mean, Rem! All these glor--”

“Remy,” Remy says, peering down his nose at Roman, “Its Remy. Or just don’t address me at all, hun.”

Virgil thinks the whole room is thrown for a moment. Remy’s tone isn’t necessarily icy or cold, and he’s still grinning when he talks, as if they’re sharing a private joke. He twists one of Patton’s curls so gently, it almost looks intimate. Virgil can see Logan’s jaw shift at the motion, and how Patton seems to be unsure if he should be moving away or staying still.

“S-sorry?” Roman says, unsuredly.

Remy smiles at him, with something that’s borderline unfriendly, “Sure, hun. Now are we done here, or are y’all still doing that small talk thing?”

Thomas shifts in his seat, “Actually there is one more thing I want to let you four know about.”

At once he has all of their attentions. Logan who had been talking the most moves to straighten his tie again, and Roman sits back up so he can see the Professor clearly. The room gets a sort of eerie feeling to it, and Virgil swears for a moment that he can see his breath in the air.

“We’ve gotten some suspicious reports about the Dark Lady and her followers.” Thomas says, “I’ve had some suspicions for a while, but we recently got proof-- thanks to Remy-- that the Dark Lady has a time turner on her.”

“A Time Turner?” Logan says, “I thought all of them had been rendered useless after the Battle of the Department of Mysteries when they were all caught in a time loop?”

“Wait wait wait, we’re saying the lady who wants to legalize casual genocide now has the ability to go back in time?” Roman yelped. “Doesn’t this mean all of our possible plans are useless then?”

"I told you, babe!" Remy sings, boredly, "All it would do is worry the poor things!" He rests his chin on Patton's shoulder, which startles a ticklish giggle from the younger Ravenclaw.

Thomas ignores him, "We're not sure what the implications are if it yet." He admits, "Headmistress Mcgonagall, Hermione Granger, Harry Potter, and Ron Weasley are all discussing the possibilities of it now. I was told to advise you guys of the situation." Thomas gives them each a look, and then he smiles, "Don't worry too much about it, boys. We'll take it slow and smart and we'll figure this out."

Its a pep talk, Virgil realizes. And in a weird way, Virgil guesses he does feel a little reassured.

In another way Virgil's mind tunnels downward towards the forbidden memories of a Slytherin boy who told him two years ago that the Dark Lady possessed a means to turn back time and what both of them had done about that.

Thomas is looking at him, he notes, suddenly.

"What?" Virgil asks right as his palms begin to sweat, and his mouth tastes like his black nail polish as he forces his hand away from his mouth.

Thomas frowns, "I...well, I assumed that you would find this information a bit more surprising."

Virgil squeezes the sleeves of his jacket. His jaw creaks open, reminding him pathetically of how tense he was. "Well its like you said," he defends lamely. "We shouldn't worry too much. If the Lady already has a Time Turner, we can't do anything about it now."

Remy is grinning at him. Like the cat that caught the canary and Virgil is the very dead canary in this scenario.

“I’m sure I’ll have a break down later and, you know, over analyze absolutely everything.” Virgil hurriedly says. Which maybe isn’t the best thing to say because now Patton’s staring at him with those wide doe eyes that he makes when he wants to wrap Virgil in a hug. Roman and Logan share a look that shows that maybe they aren’t as convinced, but Thomas nods understandingly and doesn’t push it.

He stands up from the couch and addresses Roman, Logan, and Patton, “I trust you three to keep an eye on him, please? Despite the new news, the Order’s decision so far is to continue work as usual. I’ll be in touch if that changes.”

Logan stands to mirror Thomas and offers his hand. “We’ll do our best.”

Which sounds a little strange to Virgil, because really they weren’t doing much of anything. Thomas had tried talking the four of them into going back to school this year but Roman had gotten antsy about the muggle murders and had dropped out to take care of his parents. Logan and Patton would die before being separated from the Gryffindor, and of course Virgil had followed along with them.

Thomas had set them up with easy jobs and then sent them magical homework via Owl so they were still learning things although Logan seemed to be the only one who was truly excited about more homework. Its enough for now.

Virgil gathers their brooms while Roman breaks into one of his glorious tales of living life in a Muggle neighborhood, followed by Patton make a pun that makes Thomas laugh and Logan groan. When they finally stumbled outside, it’s nearing ten at night and the stars are out.

“Interesting,” Logan states with his eyes to the stars that were just barely seeable behind the halo of the streetlamps. But before Virgil can ask what exactly Logan is seeing in the stars (he had always been the best as Astronomy), Remy vaults down the steps of the house.

“Hey, Badger-boy!” The older Ravenclaw says. He’s grinning again, in a way that makes Virgil’s skin feel too loose, and his palms too slick from sweat, and his mind sing out every protection spell he knows. In the darkness his sunglasses seem even more impractical, and Virgil is left staring at his own reflection rather the other’s eyes.

“What?” Virgil answers, despite the fact he’s not wearing any of his house’s bright yellow and no one had dared call him a badger since he and Dee had put Alfred Hitchcockopolous in the Hospital wing for a day in First Year for it.

Remy laughs. Its the type of laugh that someone gives when their particularly stupid animal does something stupid and has to face the stupid conseqeunces for it.

“Nothing, babe.” He says. “Just wanted to see your face one last time.” He turns to Patton, and flicks his glasses down just enough that he shows off those golden eyes. “Stay adorable, Freckles.”

Then he flashes a peace sign at them and apperates away.

Thomas sends them on their way, with waving hands and farewells and a promise to see them soon. Roman does helix roll once he’s in the air to show off, and Logan berates him for risking the Muggles seeing them, while Patton laughs like an angel beside them.

Virgil glances back at the ground, ignoring the swoop of his stomach at the height difference, to see Thomas staring at the spot Remy had been last with a frown. As if sensing him, Thomas looks up, gives Virgil an unreadable smile, a wave, and then he too apperates away and the street is empty of all the signs they were ever there.

***

“Well that was fun,” Roman hums landing his broom with utmost ease. With a hand through his windswept hair, he turns that charming smile on the rest of them, which somehow still sparkles despite the lack of actual light. He’s a silhouette, a shadow, a half visible fraction, and yet Virgil has absolutely no trouble seeing the full on Roman-ness of the action.

“We have very different definitions of fun,” Logan notes, and turns Roman’s red robes back to a less offensive beige. Virgil bites back a smile when Roman complains about him being petty and uncreative for someone in Ravenclaw.

And if it starts a lighthearted magic battle in the enclosed backyard, well, there are no muggles out at near eleven in their quiet suburban dream neighborhood. In the flashes of red and purple and blue he can see Logan and Roman grinning like fools and he can feel Patton’s laughter reverberating through him when the other boy leans on his shoulder and watches the two quibble.

Its….happy. Virgil is happy.

Watching them like this, watching them laugh and have fun and enjoy themselves, even after they were just told that the evil force they were combating had the ability to change timestreams. They’re so resilient, so optimistic, and Virgil wishes that he could place some complicated spell on the house right here so that they’d never be disturbed and they could just exist like this happy forever.

But Virgil knows that Roman would detest being stuck to one place for forever and Logan would run out of things to do and turn bitter and Patton would wonder why they weren’t happy anymore and then come to the conclusion it was somehow his fault.

There’s no way to preserve the happiness forever. Virgil spent all of fourth year combing through the books in the restricted section for a spell that he could cast and he had come up blank.

“The best type of prison,” Dee had said, once upon a time, “is one that the prisoners do not know they’re in.”

“You really think Prince needs to be aware of a prison to want break out of it?” Virgil had shot back.

And Dee had just laughed and flipped the page of his book.

That had been before he had become a Neo-Death Eater, Virgil thinks. Because he hadn’t been wearing the skull clasp on his robes yet, hadn’t started avoiding Virgil like he had contracted Dragon Pox, hadn’t started actually using the mind magic excessively ….

Virgil’s smile slips, and Patton notices almost immediately. “Kiddo?”

Virgil nudges him with his shoulder, “‘M just tired, you know? Talking to people and all that.”

He feels the Ravenclaw laugh softly. Theres a flash of red where the grass by Logan’s feet catches fire, and the other wastes his turn of their duel using aguamenti to put it out before one of the neighbors look out their windows or it spreads to the deck where Patton and Virgil are and then consumes the entire house.

Roman laughs at him. “My house? Are you sure? Virgil’s put so many charms on that thing nothing short of an atomic bomb is going to bring it down!”

Not true, but Virgil feels himself preen at the compliment anyway. He rubs the back of his neck and knows his face is a flushed pink, but its too dark for anyone to make it out.

“Yeah, sure,” He calls to them, “Now, if you excuse me, I’m going to go overthink everything Professor Sanders just told us.”

“Professore Sanders told us--” Logan starts, but Virgil knows that tone all too well and he manages to wave it away.

“I know, I know. Nothing to worry about.” Virgil waves his wand blindly towards the door handle and unlocks it with Alohomora (a spell which only works for one of their four wands). “I’ll see you guys in the morning!”

“Goodnight, Virge!” Patton calls after him, and because he’s a good person he adds, “I’m making french toast tomorrow for breakfast if you want to help!”

“Happy Nightmares, Jack Smellington!” Roman throws in because he’s much less of a good person.

Virgil closes the door behind him. His body leans against it for a second, hearing the sounds of his friends getting back to their shenanigans. He gives it maybe ten minutes before Roman and Patton start up the cheery Hogwarts chants and an impromptu dance routine in which Logan is dragged around the backyard, trying to pretend like he still has dignity.

Its nice. Virgil fumbles through the kitchen, using the light from the magic hall sconces to guide himself down the hall and then up the stairs. The pictures on the walls of the other three laugh and rough house around. Virgil runs his fingers over the picture frames as he walks.

“Get some sleep, kiddo!” One of Patton at a Dragon Petting Zoo from second year tells him.

And Virgil has every intention of it.

He does.

But he gets to the front of his room and there’s a warmth against his chest that makes his blood freeze. His hand frantically pats his chest, pressing into the warmth, trying to determine if its real or just something in his head, please let it be something in his head, please, please--

Its not in his head. He throws himself into his room and locks it behind him. The lights stay off and he drags the curtains closer together just to make sure that absolutely no one can see inside. Then he crawls into the closet, with his breath coming out in shaky breathes too rapidly to count.

His hands shake too hard to unzip his sweatshirt all the way. It gets jammed by his belly button. The burning against his chest feels like an open flame right to his right pectoral, hissing with heat, demanding to be appeased. Virgil couldn’t have ignored it if he had wanted to.

He doesn’t want to look.

He looks anyway.

His hand opens the invisible seams of the hidden pocket right over his chest. There are only two items in it, but Virgil drops them both into his lap anyway. He kneads his palms into his eyes and forces himself to take a breath and hold it-- one second, two, three-- which is about as long as it takes for him to remember every lie he’s ever told to the trio outside.

As long as it takes for him to remember whose lives are on the line if he messes up.

As long as it takes for his hands to steady enough to pick up the coin from his lap and for the sudden heat to fade. The closet is doors are firmly pulled closed and Virgil twists his Cypress wand in his hand.

“Lumos,” Virgil whispers scarcely more than a thought. He’s sure that the sound of the dishwasher in the kitchen is louder than his own voice. He’s afraid any louder will make Roman or Logan burst into the room and demand to know what he’s doing and he doesn’t have an explanation, doesn’t have an excuse, doesn’t have an escape.

They’d hate him if they knew.

Virgil hates himself for them.

The coin is a Galleon, but despite the shiny color and the heavy weight, Virgil knows its fake. He made it after all, pouring over the details for most of two days. But it would never stand up to a Goblin; Virgil doubts it would stand up to a normal wizard if they looked for more than a couple seconds at it.

The Protean Charm on it is too strong for it to go unnoticed to a trained eye.

He told the others he collects Galleons with specific dates on them. “A half muggle thing,” He had told Patton who had taken him very seriously and started checking the dates on every coin he came across. Even now, Galleons show up on the kitchen counter with dates of their birthdays and the first day of Hogwarts and the day they would have graduated.

The serial number on the rim of the coin in his hand had changed.

It was a series of four numbers and then various letters that Virgil decoded with a slight glance at-- he had memorized the code and then burned the last key in existence after all, too paranoid to risk someone ever finding it.

It takes Virgil a second, a moment, a year to understand what date it was. For him to get his brain to work past the dread that bubbling up his throat like a bottle rocket.

And his breath gets caught in his chest when he does.

It’s tomorrows date.

Its tomorrows date and there’s no time to warn anyone without revealing his source.

Its tomorrows date and someone in the Order is going to die.

Virgil does not have a good night, or happy nightmares, and he most definitely does not sleep at all.

***

“You look like death,” Roman says the next morning when Virgil slumps on the stool at the kitchen counter. Virgil can smell his cinnamon body wash from clear across the kitchen which is entirely unhelpful in the light of things because now he’s thinking about Roman in the shower after his morning run and when there are other things to be thinking about.

“Gee, thanks Princey,” Virgil says very tiredly.

Patton is cooking bacon to go with the French toast. It’s sizzling. Does all bacon sizzle so loud? It smells so good Virgil might throw up. His stomach feels empty, but the thought of actually chewing and swallowing food makes head dizzy.

“-rgil, Virgil!”

Virgil blinks for a second, glancing up from the bacon to see that Logan had somehow appeared next to him.

“You do not appear to have slept at all, Virgil,” Logan says thoughtfully. “If it is about the Dark Lady, I can assure you--”

“It’s not,” Virgil says, which sounds like a lie even to him.

Patton, Logan, and Roman all share a look. A silent conversation that Virgil feels unnecessarily annoyed to be excluded from.

“What?” He snaps.

“No offense, Helga Hufflegruff,” Roman says, “But its not like you to be this out of it.”

Virgil flicks his wand at the coffee mugs across the kitchen, “I’m perfectly fine.”

“Kiddo,” Patton says.

“The eggs are burning,” Virgil waves him off. And for a moment it works on taking the attention of him. He takes all of one breath, while Patton squeaks over the breakfast and Roman and Logan watch on ready to jump in and help before the fire alarms go off. But the moment passes and he feels the suffocating gaze of his housemates on him again.

Granted he did look awful. The picture of both him and Patton which had taken residency on his desk had winced when Virgil had stumbled from the closet. There’s a crick in his neck that he can’t get rid off no matter how much he rotates his head and his eyes feel heavier than they have any right to be. Screw his eyeshadow, he hadn’t even put any on today.

He was still in his clothes from yesterday, and he was careful to keep his left hand in his pocket or his sleeve, because he had bitten his nails until they bled last night, though if anyone asks he’ll tell them the morning paper Owl had bitten him when he had forgotten to pay it.

“We should do something today,” Virgil says suddenly.

Which is not the right thing to say. At all.

Roman chokes on his orange juice, and ends up spilling more on the floor than he gets in his throat. Patton nearly drops his hot pan in the sink with how quickly he whips around to stare at Virgil.

Logan adjusts his glasses, “Pardon?”

“Are you sick?” Roman blurts out, rasping as he tries to dislodge the last of the juice, “Is it Dragon Pox? Scrofungus? Heartbreak?”

“Heartbreak isn’t a sickness,” Virgil squints at him.

“Additionally how would one’s heart break?” Logan asks, “Unless it was frozen with Glacius by some means--”

“People can die from Heartbreak!” Roman interjects, despite the fact no one suggested anything about dying. Virgil’s stomach churns around and the coffee on his tongue tastes stale at the thought.

“I’m not dying!” He says quickly, hotly. His fingers squeeze his mug tightly, drawing the warmth from the liquid inside it and hoping it covers the coldness that came over him.

“Yes, it seems much more likely that he was affected by the imperious curse,” Logan suggests.

“I’m not under any curse either!” Virgil hisses, “I just… I thought--” He grits his teeth, “I thought it might be nice to get out of the house.”

Entirely. And never come back.

“You never want to get out of the house,” Roman points out.

“Well I do now!”

Logan does that thing he does when he doesn’t believe something-- a mix of tilting his head and tapping his fingers on the nearest surface while his eyes rotate around the surroundings. Virgil likes to think it was a subconscious reaction: he’s actually observing the room for threats so that he could produce a working solution.

Roman summons more orange juice from the fridge and makes it pour him another glass.

Virgil twists his mug in his fingers and chances a look towards Patton. He spent most of the night trying to figure out what to do, trying to figure out what to say, what he could say. He thinks that he turned over every scenario ten times and fought off the nauseous urge to vomit all through the fourth hour that morning.

He thinks that if he can just get Patton to say yes.

He thinks if he can just get Patton to leave the house that he'll be able to keep all of them safe if the attack is at their location.

(Because that's in question too. Its possible that by some blessed fate that the dread and certainty in his stomach does not mean its going to be here thats attacked. Its possible that he's just paranoid. Its possible that when Professor Remus Duke told him he had a natural latent ability for Divination that the teacher was just spouting nonsense like usual. Its possible.)

((Virgil doesn't take chances like that. He won't. Cant.))

"Virge…" Patton says.

Logan adjusts his glasses, "Thomas told us that work should continue as normal. As such, I have several letters I must attend to-- a group in Romania is requesting the Orders help in tracking several suspicious individuals, a wizard in America got apprehended by MACUSA without proper papers, and Thomas asked me to make a list of where a certain wizarding plant can be found and I've received a pile of responses just this morning I have to comb through-- I can't just drop these tasks. Patton has already agreed to help me."

"What?" Roman says, "Why didn't you ask me?"

"I'm afraid that the thought didn't cross my mind," the Ravenclaw admitted somewhat guiltily. "But Patton has a superior knowledge of the wizarding world that I believe would be most beneficial, and-- I mean this with the least amount of offense-- I feel that if you or Virgil were to join us, we'd be more hindered than helped."

"Ouch," Roman says with wounded pride, and jabs Logan in the shoulder. "I cannot believe you think I'd be bad at answering letters! My handwriting is amazing."

"The chicken scratch you call handwriting is atrocious." Logan bats his hand away easily, "but that's not why I think you helping would be counterproductive."

“Its not?” Roman asks.

“Its not?” Virgil echoes with just enough of a teasing tone that Roman turns his coffee mug into a chicken like the disrupting asshole he is. The bird squawks the second its lungs are formed and Virgil drops it the moment the warmth turns from “warm liquid in a mug” to “living thing with a heartbeat he can feel”.

“Roman!” Logan yells, stumbling back to avoid it and crashing into Patton. They both land on the floor in a heap of limbs and cooking utensils. The chicken flaps over them, screeching something awful. Patton’s glasses somehow end up hooked with Logan’s and their faces mere inches apart and brown chicken under feathers in both their hair.

Roman’s laughter almost makes it worth it: breathless and gasping for air, doubled over and wheezing like an idiot.

It only takes a moment before Patton’s laughter joins in with Roman’s, very much sounding like the usual angels on high. Virgil watches the glorious sight of Logan’s entire face turning redder than an Hippocampus skin and immediately transforming himself into in an owl.

Virgil can’t really blame him. If he were hit at point blank by both Roman and Patton’s carefree laughs like that, he’d turn into an Owl too, regardless of if an Owl was his animagus form or not.

It takes Patton three times to turn the chicken back to a mug-- missing twice because he’s laughing too hard to keep his wand from shaking, and once because the chicken is fast-- and by that time Roman’s on the floor with a hand gripping his chest, grin wider than the fucking sun itself, feathers on clinging to his clothes and his shirt riding up his stomach just enough to be a tease. Logan transforms back long enough to move the cup from the floor to the sink, but when he turns around to see the Gryffindor, his cheeks flare back up and Virgil can feel the heat from where he is.

The bacon definitely burns.

Virgil doesn’t really think any of them notice.

He doesn’t even notice until the fire alarm goes off.

Roman groans from the floor and Virgil coughs into his sweatshirt sleeve to hide his face. A sound like that? Even with the background of a shrill alarm and the smell of smoke, it makes the room itself feel hundreds of degrees warmer, makes the whole world seem to fade away, makes Virgil want to plunge his face into a bucket of ice water.

Logan hits the smoke detector with his beak. Patton throws open the kitchen windows, giggling foolishly.

“You’re cute when you blush, Vee,” Roman says from his spot on the floor.

“Fuck off and die,” Virgil tells him.

“Aw, but your little ears!” Roman cooes, dragging himself from the floor like it was some tremendous task. He pinches the air with both his hands like he was supposed to be pinching Virgil’s ears.

Virgil’s hands immediately switch position, covering the tattletale tips of his ears. “Shut up!” He grumbles.

“Not exactly my forte, Virge!” Roman sings, “Just ask anyone!”

Logan does that thing where he lands on a surface and turns back to human, and Virgil gets a front row seat of seeing Owl talons elongate into slender legs that cross ever so confidently as he settles on the barstool next to Virgil. And the way that Logan ever so casually reaches up to loosen his tie just a millimeter?

If Virgil wasn’t blushing before, is now.

(He thinks he likes this version of Logan Ackroyd more: the effortlessly oblivious tease, compared to the bloody knuckled version that so angrily put Virgil in his place in the middle fourth year)

“I can attest to that,” Logan says, with the crease in the corners of his lips that implies a smile being hidden just below the surface, “He really does never shut up.”

“Wh--hey!” Roman gasps,”Patton! Logan’s bullying me!” He drapes himself over the smaller Ravenclaw with a dramatic flare that causes Patton’s whole face to light up. Sunlight bounces off his glasses but his eyes sparkle like the ocean on a sunny day.

“Sorry kiddo!” He says, “That’s just how he is!”

“Falsehood!” Logan calls.

“Losing battle,” Virgil nudges him. Oh god, what just came over him? His elbow feels tingly, like some sort of numbing jinx, but warm and welcome. Logan actually laughs as he straightens himself back on the chair.

(Logan laughs like he’s in a library about to be scolded for being too loud. Virgil isn’t sure what it would take for him to laugh louder. He wishes he had time to figure it out.)

Breakfast comes after that. With Patton severing french toast and Roman spilling orange juice on Logan's plate because the Ravenclaw told him he was putting far too much syrup on his and Virgil convincing Roman to shove an entire piece in his mouth just to prove that he could.

"Really attractive, Princey," Virgil says when the Gryffindor chokes and has to spit out soggy mush.

"You love me," Roman coughs.

"Yeah," Virgil says. It's a mostly meaningless statement. Because Roman thinks everything loves him, because Roman is very loveable, because it's light and witty banter and that's what they do.

Because Virgil’s thinking about the coin in the pocket on his chest, because Virgil is thinking how likely it was for him to be able to pry both Logan and Patton out of the house without a real reason, because Virgil is weighing his friends lives in his head like its just another sucky Arithmancy problem on the homework he put off until an hour before it was due.

And because Virgil is not really thinking about what comes out of his mouth, it comes out honest and true and it takes him three more blinks to realize that Roman is staring at him, with something like akin to...to...surprise?

“What?” Virgil asks, his breath hitching all of a sudden. He was tired but he wasn’t so tired that he could have started just talking out loud-- and even if he had surprise was not the thing that Roman would have on his face. Disgust, maybe. Anger, definitely. What kind of person can look at the people sitting next to him and think about how likely it was for someone on the street to kill them? How could he think about blood purity at a time like this?

But then again how could he not?

“You agreed,” Roman says, a tinge of awe.

“What?” Virgil tries again, because he really doesn’t know what is going on. Logan and Patton are staring at him too, but Patton’s smiling and Logan’s rolling his eyes and they’re tugging Logan’s plate between them in a silent argument of who gets to do the dishes.

“You agreed! About liking me!” Roman says down right giddy.

Virgil’s brow furrows, “Princey, we literally live together. Of course I like you.”

“But you said Love!”

Virgil glances at Patton for help. Patton is enchanting a sponge to wash the cups and is therefore, no help. His stomach does a flop. A flip flop. A flip flop right off a fucking cliff top.

Roman’s face appears right next to his, earnest and full and bright. Virgil thinks its like standing at ground zero of an atomic bomb.

“You never say Love. And I think if I remember correctly the last time you implied you even liked me, it was when Logan tried to cook and you got food poisoning and I gave you a bucket to throw up in.” Roman says. “So this is a big thing!”

Virgil should tell him its nothing, because even with his heart threatening to jump straight out of his chest, and his hands aching to curl in the fluff of his russet hair, and his eyes darting to Roman’s lips which for some reason are still right there next to Virgil’s own-- because even with Virgil thinking of that night years ago when Logan had given him a righteous nosebleed and he had run off and hid behind the One-Eyed Witch Statue on the third floor and had the biggest gay breakdown of his entire life--

Virgil should tell him its nothing because he’s been lying to Roman and Patton and Logan for two years, nearly three.

Virgil should give Roman’s face a shove away and make some insulting comment that will draw out those offended dramatic noises he likes so much.

Virgil should.

“I guess,” Virgil tongue warps around the words without an ounce of his permission. “Don’t go--”

“YES!” Roman hollers over him, throwing his hands in the air so suddenly that Virgil legitimately forgets what he was saying. “This is perfect! Amazing! Splendid!”

Virgil should tell him to calm down, that it means less than nothing. But Virgil threw away his entire life for them: for Roman’s celebratory fist pumping and sparkling eyes, for the quirk of Logan’s lips and the late night sleepy talks about the stars, for the taste of Patton’s baking and the feel of those tight, warm, safe hugs. He wants to dance around the word “Love” and its billions of meanings in billions of languages, because he knows that if he thinks about it for too long, he’ll realize that he loves the three of them in every sense of it.

Which, decidedly, means much more than nothing.

But there’s also that thing.

That thing where Virgil is lying, has been lying, will continue to lie, right to their faces. Which stands to be the absolute worst thing he’s ever done and if he stops it he’ll die a horrible painful wizard death and then they’ll be doubly angry with him for it.

But isn’t angry with him-- isn’t never wanting to see his face ever again-- better than them being dead? Which is likely what they’re all going to be if Virgil doesn’t do something to convince them to leave the house for the day.

Them, he thinks and then hesitates because its not really “Them”. Patton’s got magical blood: blood so pure it practically glows under his skin and his wandwork is practically flawless. Logan’s got half magic blood, too, which is half more magic blood than sad little muggleborn Roman has.

The anxious feeling of dread creeps up Virgil’s back, like a dementors fingers ghosting along his spine before it spins him around and gives a soul sucking kiss. Once the thought comes he can’t get it out of his head: the idea that if the Neo-Death Eaters show up here, and they breech the defenses that Virgil’s put up, and they catch them by surprise, the idea that they’d hesitate to hurt Patton or Logan or Virgil, but they’d execute Roman without a thought.

Virgil is staring at Roman.

Virgil is listening to Roman talk about something.

Virgil is thinking about Roman’s corpse lying on the ground in the kitchen, as a green light steals away his life in an echo of two forbidden words.

“Hey Princey,” Virgil says, trying to hide the way his entire body is shaking. “Let’s go on a date.”

Because Roman being angry at him, being unable to ever forgive him, being so enraged he can’t think about Virgil without wanting to put him in St. Mungos, will always be better than Roman being dead and Virgil having not done anything about it.

Roman looks at him and he smiles so prettily Virgil almost thinks he’d be able to forgive himself one day.

***

Virgil has never been on a date before.

It’s tragic. Embarrassingly so.

If Virgil were watching this broomwreck from the outside, he’d been on the floor in tears from laughter.

Roman bumps his shoulder casually, “Relax, Felbert the Fearful! There are no roofs around to cave in on us.”

The joke doesn’t quite land for Virgil, but he laughs anyway. Roman deserves it, at least.

For putting up with Virgil not knowing the first thing about that how one proceeds on a “date”. He thinks he watched a Hallmark movie on this shit once or twice back before...everything. He thinks that it should have given him some clue how to act, what to say, where to go. But all they do it remind him how completely and utterly bootless he is in the grand scheme of things.

Disney, of course, never really taught the whole “take it slow” sort of thing. And with magic? Forget it. He wonders how Patton’s parents did it, how the famous Weasley’s did it, how any wizard ever did it.

(He supposes that it helped that in most cases that neither partner was hiding a double life behind a cloak of fake memories implanted in the other, but really what did he know.)

They had gone shopping. Kinda.

Roman had gone shopping. Virgil had watched him try on muggle clothes again and again, listened to him complain about prices, and testily remark about color coordinating. He tried paying the girl at the cash register in sickles and Virgil got a good laugh at his face when he realized his mistake. He tried on two T shirts just it looked like he was participating his fair share even bought one, but once it was in the bag he forgot what the design had been.

(He did not forget the way that Roman’s eyes had roamed over him and the way that he had mentioned how nice it would be to see that shirt on his floor.)

Virgil wished his heart was in it, wished that he could get his shoulders to unwind, wished that he could stare at Roman for a few minutes without thinking about what an awful person he was.

They have Ice cream for lunch specifically because Logan is not there to tell them not to.

It devolves to Virgil splattering Roman’s nose with Chocolate ice cream and only getting half an apology out before Roman shovels a spoonful of strawberry into his mouth. Like a kiss. Indirectly.

Virgil wonders for all of three seconds if Roman’s tongue also tastes like strawberry.

“There’s a music store,” Roman says. “It just opened around the block. I’m sure it has some PG music for you to listen to, Edgelord.”

They hold hands. Virgil can’t tell if Roman can feel him shaking, or if he notices how distracted Virgil in worrying about something he won’t share. The music store is so muggle-like its distressing.

Virgil loves it. The musty smell of the building despite it being brand new, the feel of actual records in his hands, the beats in the background that his head bops unconsciously. Roman makes comments about the artwork on every cover that Virgil flits through, which is impressive because Virgil isn’t even looking as much as pretending to.

Its hard for him to be excited about an album of music when his friends could be in danger.

Its hard to remind himself why he needs to draw out this date as long as he possibly can to make sure that Roman doesn’t go back to the house.

They catch a movie at the local theater. Virgil doesn’t remember the plot at all because Roman throws an arm over his shoulder halfway through it. Its dark, mostly silent, and Roman smells like cinnamon and ash that somehow is very attractive on him. Virgil leans in, selfishly enjoying the warmth that comes with it.

Virgil’s eyes...close just for a second.

Only a second.

“Hey, Vee,” Roman says, “Maybe we should head home?”

“No!” Virgil snaps awake so suddenly their heads collide. “Ow! Fuck!”

Roman’s pained laughter joins him. The lights are on, now so Virgil must have slept straight through the credits. He wants to curse himself for that one. What if something had happened? What if a Neo Death Eater had tracked them all the way to the theater and crept in during the show?

The ache in his head subsides to a mild annoyance that makes his eyes water.

“Okay, wow, ow,” Roman says, “If I knew you were gonna wake like that, Stormcloud, I would have done something else!”

Virgil freezes. “What did you just call me?”

Roman blinks a couple times, “Stormcloud? Is that alright? I figured it might be nice to, uh, have a nickname that’s not an insult.” He sounds strangely hesitant, strangely unconfident, strangely not-Roman like.

“Its...fine,” Virgil says and pretends like the name doesn’t strike half a million chords in him. “Totally fine.”

Roman hums like he isn’t convinced. “Yeah well, we should get back to the house. I’m sure, Pat is making dinner.”

“Uhh!” Virgil says, “Or we could not!”

The Gryffindor raises an eyebrow at him.

“I just, I mean--” Virgil’s not good at excuses.

“Vee, you literally just fell asleep on my arm in the middle of an action movie. You’ve been unable to focus all day. I have half a mind to think that you only wanted to do this because you’re so sleep deprived that you can’t think straight.”

Virgil doesn’t have anything to say to that. There’s a stain on Roman’s shoulder from where he had been drooling. Roman presses their foreheads together and they both wince where the lumps collide.

“Listen,” Roman says, “I love spending time with you. How about we go back to the house, and throw on a movie and just...cuddle or something?”

Its not fair.

Virgil wants it so badly as whimper builds in his throat. But he doesn’t want to chance it, doesn’t want to risk it, doesn’t, doesn’t, doesn’t.

Roman leads him out the door.

Its dark outside. Its still not dark enough. The town isn’t far enough from their house, and the longer Virgil is silent the closer they get back to the house. His hands twist in his pockets, his nail rubs over the engravings in his wand.

He needs something, anything, to catch Roman’s attention. Keep him away from the house until the days over and he’s sure there’s no chance that the Neo-Wizard Nazis are going to show up and kill Roman.

“We should stop at the bookstore and pick up Logan’s order for him,” Virgil suggests.

“Logan just picked up his newest shipment two days ago, remember?” Roman says. “I dropped them and he yelled at me for a full hour.”

“Do we have milk at the house? Maybe we should get some groceries while we’re out.”

“Patton wants to go tomorrow instead. And only he knows the list. But he’ll love if we come with him.”

“A play!” Virgil says weakly.

“Hm?” Roman blinks lazily from beside him. The street lamps give him halo.

“I heard there’s a play going on!”

“There are no plays this week, Virgil.”

“I swear there was one.” Virgil says, “You know we should check just in case--”

Virgil has seen the news on the TV before: he’s seen coverage of car crashes that had lit on fire, of the forests burning in California and the Amazon, of muggle apartment buildings being swallowed entirely from faulty wiring. He’s kept a lighter in his back pocket for the longest time, for emergencies, for those moments when his wand is out his hand and needs to resort to a more unexpected muggle way of defending himself. He’s started tiny fires made of leaves in his backyard, of candles in his moms house when the summer rain storms knocked out the electricity again, of a pile of photos at his feet wiping away any evidence that would allude to what they had done.

Still watching Roman’s house explode is so much more terrifying. The blast of heat burns his body even from down the street. The noise is deafening, but the sight is ghastly: the roof of the building shoots straight into the air and then dissolves apart until its swallowed by the resulting black cloud, the windows break outward sending millions of shards into the surrounding houses, half of that ugly sofa that Virgil had fallen asleep so many times on shattered on the asphalt road barely four feet from the two of them.

Oh, its something straight from a nightmare and it makes Virgil’s stomach violently turnover and his eyes water and his heart jump straight up his throat to the back of his mouth. His limbs freeze at the sight, as if keeping from moving would keep the destruction from following. Flames lick the the inside windows, a thousand twisted toxic tongues that burned brighter than the sun in the night sky.

In seconds the building is unsalvageable and Virgil’s throat closes up like someone magicked away the very oxygen in the air.

“Virgil!” Roman yells some a million miles away from him, from right behind him, from beside him with a hand on his upper arm, tight and squeezing and real. “Protego!”

A white shield forms in front of him seconds before a chunk of the TV in the downstairs living room crushes him completely. An arm, Roman’s arm, wraps around him and drags him back from the flaming wreckage.

“Logan!” Roman screams, “Pat!”

And suddenly Virgil snaps back to the present, to the way the noise is louder than life, to the way that they stick out like sore thumbs in the middle of the road.

“Aguamenti!” Virgil shouts pointing his wand at the the neighbors hedges. He doesn’t remember drawing it or thinking about the spell, but he knows that the family of four that live there just hit a rough patch financially and don’t need to pay for a house on top of that.

By the time he looks back up, Roman is down the street and Virgil doesn’t think there’s a single thing on this planet, magic or muggle that could stop him. So Virgil, the reigning king of making poor decisions in the moment, charges after him.

(Because he knows what this is, know that houses don’t just explode, knows that Roman is about to charge head into battle. He knows that Virgil would never forgive himself from turning tail and running when any of those three are in danger.)

So Virgil-- also reigning king of mistakes and regrets--charges after him with is wand drawn and prays to deities he does not believe in that he won’t see Dee tonight.

There are three Neo-Death Eaters on what used to be Roman’s front lawn. Virgil stumbles at the sight of them, at the sight of their long black cloaks and white theater masks and the skull pendants they wore so proudly. He doesn’t think they can be more than a few years older than him or Roman, but they find another section of the house to use Bombarda on and shriek joyfully when it sends part of dresser into the next door neighbors roof.

Roman makes use of Flipendo Tria on the first one, and clocks the next with his bare fist. Virgil uses Oppugno on several flaming objects (shirts maybe? Logan’s sweater vests?) and sends them wrapping around the face of the last one before she can make any move against Roman.

“How dare you touch me, Filthy Mudblood!”

Roman punched him again. And then a third time for good measure.

“I may be muggle born, but I’ve never needed magic to fix my problems.”

It would be a good dramatic line if he wasn’t trembling as he delivered it, if Virgil didn’t need to throw protego between him and the guy he had punched because the Neo-Death Eater had managed to get his wand again, if they were acting in a movie this wasn’t real.

Roman snaps the guy’s wand in half and throws it into the fire before sprinting towards the front door.

“Patton!” He yells, “Logan!”

“Roman!” Virgil yells and lunges for him. They go tumbling to the ground, knees scraping on concrete pathway up to the house but Virgil doesn’t notice. He can’t notice, not really.

He’s too busy imagining Roman as a flambeed corpse, as a crispy unrecognizable mass, as ashes fluttering in the wind.

Roman shoves against him, frantically calling for their friends.

And the smoke robs his throat of any moisture, clogs his lungs with lead laden gases and deteriorates his vision. There’s another explosion (Virgil thinks its the fire reaching the chemical closet in the downstairs powder room) and the force of it knocks Virgil across the lawn. His shoulder slams into the grass with a popping noise Virgil is pretty sure it isn’t supposed to make and his vision goes white for all of a second as his chest flops over and his other shoulder follows in a tumble of limbs.

When he can see again Roman is right over him. He’s glowing-- kinda. The fire behind him creates a halo effect all over his body. Whatever words he’s saying, they’re lost in the buzz of Virgil’s brain as it reconnects and reboots and the panic comes back.

In the grass by his hand is a burned photo: the one of him and Patton that they took on the staircase, the one he put in his room, the one he kept.

And the fire burned him right out of the picture.

“--irgil!” Roman says, “We have to get up!”

Virgil nods dumbly at him. He tears his eyes away from the picture and grabs Roman’s forearm so he can help him get up. He smells like smoke and ashes and that Cinnamon body wash he liked so much. Virgil breathes it in and chokes on the air.

“We need to get out of here!” He says, “To the Rendezvous point! They’ll find us!”

Virgil isn’t sure Roman hears him at all, isn’t sure that Roman even remembers that they had a rendezvous point for if the base was attacked. But he doesn’t try to go running into the unsalvageable house again, so Virgil thinks that its enough.

(He doesn’t think about Patton on the kitchen floor desperately gasping for raspy breaths pinned under a flaming beam of the house and unable to move. He doesn’t think about Logan screaming as the flames swallow up his pant legs, and his sweater vest and his hair. He doesn’t think about them yelling for them and Virgil dragging Roman away from the fire and leaving them to die. He doesn’t, he doesn’t, he doesn’t--)

Away. They need to get away. Before a Neo-Death Eater shows up that they can’t beat.

Down the street. Virgil’s eyes are watering, his heart is thumping, his thoughts are screaming.

Somehow he still manages to see the enemy before they see him.

Its just that Virgil has absolutely terrible luck. It’s just that the shock makes him forget Its just that Virgil freezes with half of a hex on his tongue, when his eyes catch on the other figure. Or more specifically, his wand.

Virgil doesnt know a lot about wands, but he thinks he knows more than average. Patton always did have a habit of rambling about his hobbies and wand making happened to be on that list. But even before that, Virgil would know that wand blindfolded: Elm, nine inches, with a rougarou hair core.

And he'd know it by the way it never quite looked like it fit in the hands of its owner.

Said owner, who was staring at him like he was the biggest idiot to ever grace the earth, someone who had been hit with confundgus until he couldnt remember his own name, someone who for some absolutely idiotic reason, decided not to curse a Death Eater the moment he saw one holding a wand at him.

"Virgil!"

Virgil feels the spell blast by him, missing his ear by mere inches. The Death Eater is almost as lucky: the spell hits the black Honda Civic behind him and explodes outward. The Death Eater is launched back towards them rolling across the asphalt, but his cloak took most of the damage.

“Confringo!” Roman shouts again, and another blast of a spell goes out.

"Protego!" The Neo-Death Eater counters and for a moment Virgil doesn't see the shield go up, doesn't see a way for him to escape the spell.

Virgil grabs at Roman's arm, because it's the only thing he can think to do, and the last half of the flame veer to the side just enough that the enemy can scramble to his feet behind his shield.

"What are you--" Roman snaps, fiery and hot, and demanding of Virgil.

"Adorable!" The Neo-Death Eater cooes at them, "You actually thought those flames could hurt me?"

Virgil feels feverish just hearing that voice. Its a slippery eel of a tone, something sinister and mocking and Virgil knows it too well. So does Roman. So does everyone.

Its the voice he uses when he's scheming, when he's hiding something and wants you to know it, when he's got the upper hand in a conversation.

Its the voice that is undeniably Dee’s, and no one else's.

“Ekans,” Roman growled.

“Guilty as Charged, Prince,” Dee Ekans smiles like snake oil and mistrust, “I take it you saw the Fireworks? They were a bit disappointing for my taste, but then again all things muggle usually are.”

“Sectumsempra!”

Virgil mouth tastes like ash. Roman’s wand slices the air like a sword, like a knife, like death, and the green spell flies towards Dee faster than Virgil can react. (He knows what that spell does: they’ve all heard the rumors around Hogwarts of the Potions teacher that created a curse that killed from bloodloss, they’ve all heard how it can’t be cured and how Severus Snape took the countercurse with him to the grave--)

Dee throws himself to the side. He’s not smiling anymore, not when the spell shreds the flaming car behind them. His hand moves to the side of his face, the left side of his face, where some part of the magic had skimmed him and left a precise line that welded with cherry red.

Roman raises his wand again, and this time Virgil leaps in front of him.

“Virgil!”

“Patton, Logan,” Virgil gasps out but he cant remember when he stopped being able to breathe. The world threatens to start swimming so he grabs Roman by the forearms to steady himself. “Patton and Logan.”

Dee hisses violently, “Don’t worry about your blood traitor, Little Raccoon. My father invited him for a stay and when he leaves I’m sure he’ll want nothing to do with you.”

Virgil squeezes Roman’s wrists, but Dee’s face is too proud to be lying about this one.

“Be more worried about the owl.” Dee’s grin came back, a blinding white in the fire of around them. “Last I checked only one wing had been broken, but Mother does move very fast.”

Roman roars and lunges forward, but Dee presses his bloodied fingers to his lips and blows them both a kiss. By the time Roman gets around Virgil, gets close enough to grab the Neo-Death Eater that is Dee Ekans, the Slytherin had twisted up in his cloak and disapparated into a black cloud of smoke.

Virgil wants to throw up. Distantly he’s aware that there are sirens ringing, and he knows that means that Muggles are on the way.

He should be terrified, but all he can feel is relief. Patton is alive, Dee had said so. He was full wizard, a pureblood, from a pureblood family. He was alive for now.

Virgil grabs Roman by the back of his shirt, “We have to go.”

Roman slaps his hand away, “Why did you do that?!” The flames dance behind him, giving him wings of fire. Somehow his breath his hotter than them. “Why did you stop me from killing him?!”

“We have to go, Roman.” Virgil ignores him, “Logan needs us.”

“Ekans deserves to die!”

“Roman!” Virgil yells, “It’s time to go,” He tugs him towards the end of the road, “I’ll explain later.”

“No!” Roman slaps him away again, “You’ll explain right now! I’m so sick and tired of not knowing what the hell is going on in your brain! Why did you stop me from hitting him? He’s the bad guy, Virgil!”

“We don’t have time for this!” Virgil says he grabs on to Roman again, yanks him towards the end of the street. Roman fights him every step of the way, smelling like ashes and cinders and charcoal.

“Answer me!”

“You are no good to anyone in wizard jail, Prince!” Virgil snarls back.

“Bullshit!”

Virgil wants to take a swing at him, wants to yank his wand out and litter him so full of spells that he can’t move a muscle until Virgil finds Logan and gets all three of them somewhere safe, wants to cup Roman’s jaw and tell him everything between rough lip-biting kisses.

“You’re always doing shit like this!”

Virgil doesn’t do any of those things. He drags both of them into the community park and the wooden area beyond that. The heat between them blisters his fingers, stinging and burning and telling Virgil that its not worth it. But Virgil is a Hufflepuff, and Hufflepuffs are a loyal sort of people. And really that is Virgil’s biggest flaw.

“Running off, being secretive, pretending to be happy when you obviously aren’t--”

Roman gets a hand under Virgil jaw and shoves him up, up, and away. Virgil hits the ground with this tongue between his teeth and tears threatening in his eyes.

“Roman!” He snaps, spitting blood from his mouth.

“Whose side are you on?”

Virgil’s body freezes.

Roman stands over him, moonlight shadows painting his face. His wand twists in his hand. He’s always been dangerous, Virgil remembers suddenly, with the effortless magic in his veins and the endless spell knowledge in his head and the whimsical creativity in his words.

“Virgil,” Roman says breathless, and he looks angry. Rightfully so. “The only one of us who would have both the information and the opportunity to give our location to the Death Eaters, is you.”

“What? Why would I--”

“You wanted me out of the house.” Roman says in an accusatory tone that makes Virgil’s blood slow in his veins. “You wanted me--the most powerful of us-- out of the head quarters, for a day of activities you weren’t even enjoying, and on that same day my house is blown up.”

Virgil scrambles to his feet, but he still feels off balanced, “It’s not like that--”

“Isn’t it?” he hisses, “You pestered us all last week about what charms were set up around the house! You said you were adding more! How do we know you didn’t take some off?”

“Because I didn’t!”

“You’re a master at Charms.” Roman snarls, “It would have been a sinch!”

And Virgil doesn’t know what to say to that. His hand slips into his jacket pockets, just barely resisting the urge to go for the hidden pouch over his chest that’s numbly cold--

Roman shoves his wand at him. “No! Hands out of your pockets, Storm.”

“What?”

“You heard me!” Roman said, stepping around him, like he’s some dangerous wild animal and Roman is the hunter come to put him down before he hurts another innocent person. “Did you or did you not give information to the Death Eaters? Did you tell them our location so they could kill us?”

“Roman!” Virgil takes a step back, his hands come out of his pocket and he starts wondering if maybe he should have been reaching for his own wand, after all.

Roman looks angry; he looks like the fire that had eaten up his house. His hold on his wand is so tight, Virgil can see the red oak wood threatening to split. Small sparks dance at the edge reacting to Roman’s anger. No muggles would be out here in the woods, and the neo Death Eaters should still be dancing around the bonfire of the house. The only person who would come was possibly Logan, and they didn’t-- Logan wasn’t--

There was no one to stand between them, or direct attention away. For all intents and purposes they were alone in the world.

“That date was just a ploy,” Roman growls, “A ploy that I fell for!”

“No!” Virgil wants to list all the reasons why it wasn’t just a ploy.

But that of course isn’t the problem here. The problem is that it was a ploy in the first place. It was a ploy that Virgil made and took advantage of Roman to get him to follow in it.

Virgil tongue feels swollen, and he isn’t thinking. He knows he isn’t thinking. Because the next thing out of his mouth is the biggest mistake he’s ever made: “When have I ever done something to purposely harm you guys?”

“I don’t know, maybe every single school year up until fourth year--”

Roman stops.

Blinks.

“Every single school year up until…” He repeats, and Virgil feels the cannonball of dread in his stomach swell until shoves its way up through his lungs and up his throat.

He’s imagined the way it happens a million times. Each one worse than the last, each one dangerous and bad and terrifying. Still the sight of Roman’s copper eyes turning purple and the light that drifts off him like an angelic aura is worse than all of them. Its his nightmares, come to life, and it’s staring at him with a murderous expression.

“Roman?” Virgil whispers, and maybe there’s a faint hope there that he’s wrong and the spell over him hasn’t broken and Virgil hasn’t lost the only thing he’s had for the past two years.

“These are false memories,” Roman says. It feels like a slap in the face. “Why are there false memories in my head?”

Virgil’s mind tells him to run, and to run fast, but his body doesn’t move an inch. Not even to breathe. Roman had effortlessly used Sectumsempra against Dee, and Virgil is weaponless against him. He needs to get out of there, before either of them do something they’re going to regret.

But at that moment there a sound of something tumbling through the branches above them, and Virgil looks up out of instinct.

Its an owl, and it looks like it hell. Virgil lunges to catch it before it hits the ground, because even in the moonlight he’d know that white and brown and black pattern anywhere.

“Logan!” Virgil calls, slightly more than horrified because he’s no owl expert but he’s pretty sure owls wings aren’t supposed to do that. There’s blood too. Virgil doesn’t know what to do with blood like this. “Roman! Roman I need--”

He stops when he sees the the other hasn’t lowered his wand. “Roman?”

“Avada--”

Virgil doesn’t hear the end of it. All he sees is the green light and then…

And then there’s just darkness.

***

Dee had told him on the first Train Ride to Hogwarts about the Sorting Hat.

“It uses Leg-ili-men-cy,” Dee had said holding up identical Chocolate Frog Cards with Salazar Slytherin on it “Thats a type of magic. It reads your thoughts and figures out where you’d best fit.”

Virgil had been so happy to be a Hufflepuff. He had never thought it was going to end up being a death sentence.

***

“-nnervate.”

Virgil blinks his eyes open groggily. His whole head feels a bit like it was stuffed with tissues, like that Christmas that he spent sick out of his mind and Dee had shown up in the fireplace with more pumpkin pasties than he could carry and sugared butterfly wings for his mom, like that time they had hung out over the summer when Dee had wanted to practice for his position as Beater on the Slytherin Quidditch team and Virgil had dragged out his old baseball supplies only have Dee accidently beam him in the head on the first throw, like that time when Roman had cast a killing curse at him and Virgil hadn’t even tried to move out of the way.

And suddenly the fogginess of his head gives away to absolutely panic and its the cold type that surges through his veins freezing over his muscles and making his lungs work over time for air that only comes in every third heave. Its the panic he remembers and hates because its only happened once before and that was the worst day of his life.

He needs his wand.

His hand doesn’t even reach to his chest, not to mention across his body to the inside of his left boot where he normal keeps it. It takes him a moment to realize its not his lack of coordination, not his lack of focus nor disconnected thought process struggling to comprehend what was going on: his arm was being prohibited from coming forward by a rope.

Whats more is that when Virgil looks up too slowly putting together the pieces, Roman is standing over him with Virgil’s wand in his hand and an angry look on his face.

It feels like a nightmare; one of his worst ones yet. Its the version where he can’t wake up. The one where Roman has his wand and he’s been dragged somewhere he doesn’t recognize (the woods? Some woods somewhere?) and he’s been tied up because they can’t trust him and--

And Virgil can’t figure out why he’s alive at all.

He knows what curse Roman sent at him. The bad taste in his mouth and the tingling pain in all of his limbs shows he knows it. The object anger in Roman’s expression is just further confirmation.

And yet, Virgil’s still alive, his pulse fluttering like a pixie’s wings as he desperately tried to come up with an excuse, an explanation, something that he can say that wouldn’t get him killed.

“Hey, Storm,” Roman says with a mockery of a smile that makes Virgil flinch. When was the last time he called Virgil by his last name? Fourth year? “I’m glad to see you alive.”

“Ro- roman,” Virgil gasps. He presses his back against the tree as if he can melt into it. The rope scratches at his wrists. Roman leans closer, and he’s always been taller but its never been threatening until now.

“Wanna tell me why there’s a bunch of fake memories in our heads?” Roman suggests with the end of the wand.

Virgil can’t tear his eyes from the tip, the glowing red that lies there ready to spark whenever Roman wants it to. Virgil’s watched Roman do spells for years; he knows how easily magic comes and flows through him and a wand. Even if it wasn’t through his own wand, he rarely ever messed up.

Is that what happened? Roman made a fluke with the killing curse and now Virgil was still alive when he should be dead?

Virgil’s tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth. Pulling it off will probably make his mouth bleed.

“That was not a rhetorical question, Virgil,” Logan’s voice says icily from beyond the wand.

Virgil pries his eyes away from the wand, to where Logan is standing half turned away, with his arm in a makeshift sweatshirt sling and his clothes rumpled and blood crested. There’s a table in front of him where he’s looking at several things with his good hand and his wand is sticking out of his deep pocket like it was just another day out of class. A breeze blows through the trees.

It looks like it should be a happy place.

Virgil doesn’t think he’s ever been so terrified in his life.

“I-”

Roman looks at him impatiently. “You-?”

He wants to say he doesn’t know, but thats a lie. He knows why there are fake memories in their heads, has known for nearly three years. He’s known and lied and he’s so sick of lying.

But if he doesn’t lie, he has to tell the truth.

And the truth will kill him. Literally. Virgil can feel the stinging pain of his forearm, the burning warmth that he isn’t sure his brain is just making up.

He squeezes his eyes shut pressing his back against the bark of the tree he’s tied to. His voice is quieter than the breeze through the leaves. “I can’t.”

“You can’t?” Roman scoffs, “Did you hear that, Logan? He says he can’t tell us.”

Logan doesn’t answer so Roman lunges forward to grab Virgil by the front of his jacket and hauls him to his feet. Virgil’s knees threaten to give out but he forces himself back against the tree again, getting as far away from the Gryffindor as he can.

(He still smells like ashes, like smoke, like death and danger, and an enemy--)

“I can’t believe you, Storm,” Roman snarls at him, “All this time you were pretending to be our friend, pretending to be more than a friend, and then you turned right back around and fed information to the neo wizard nazis? Who does that?! Other than you, apparently?”

“It’s not like that!” Virgil wishes he kept silent. His eyes are burning with the desperate need to stop the tears from falling, but he doesn’t think he’s been doing a good enough job.

“Tell me what its like then,” Roman challenges.

And Virgil’s mouth snaps shut. His tongue tastes like blood again. His whole mouth tastes like blood.

“His jacket,” Logan says distantly. “He never goes anywhere without that jacket.”

Virgil’s chest constricts, “No.”

Logan glances back at him, then at Roman and without even saying a word they both nod.

“No!” Virgil squirms back into his hoodie, as if he can make himself smaller or make the jacket stick to his back. “Please! Roman!”

Virgil had been smart when he made his jacket. He had been smart when he shielded it with charms to ward off rain and mud and soda. He had protection against cuts and scrapes and fire. Honestly Virgil could charge into battle with nothing but his jacket and most likely come back unscathed from the amount of spells he put on it.

But he's not stupid enough to think that between Logan’s endless knowledge of spells, Roman’s creativity in making new ones, and their combined level of determined spite, that his charms would do anything more than delay the inevitable.

It takes them twenty minutes.

Virgil’s wand flicks in Roman’s hand and then Virgil is left shivering, tied to a fucking tree, begging uselessly for them to stop. His jacket phases right off him, like it was made of some ghost material that existed in a secondary dimension where they can see it but not touch it. Virgil doesn’t understand beyond the fact that its wrong.

“Accio,” Logan says.

His jacket-- the one his mother had bought him, the one that he had painstakingly stitched back together after every adventure with Dee, the one that he had enlarged every time he had outgrown it because that jacket was his safety blanket-- his jacket sails right towards Logan and lands over Logan’s broken arm’s shoulder.

Virgil’s voice is raw. “Guys, please. Stop--”

They don't stop.

Virgil almost wonders what his life would be like if they did.

“Logan,” Virgil repeats, “Logan, please, don’t--”

“Specialis Revelio,” Logan says ignoring Virgil entirely. His wand waves over Virgil’s jacket. And Virgil can’t tear his eyes off the interior pocket he had charmed away from normal eyes, that glows red in response to Logan’s spell.

Logan doesn’t even look at him as he flips the jacket over and tears the patch open. Maybe if he had he would have hesitated, even just a little. Roman crosses his arms, squeezing Virgil’s wand in his hand. Virgil shakes his head, blinking back those unhelpful tears, and the whimper thats climbing up his throat.

“What is he going to find?” Roman demands.

Virgil wishes the rope was just a bit longer, just enough that he could bring his hands up to his ears and block out the accusatory tone.

Logan pulls out the Galleon, and rubs it between his fingers for a moment. Virgil’s breath catches at the sight of it, his dark bangs tumbling into his eye sight and his gaze losing hope when Logan says quietly, “Coin Collecting.”

He doesn’t sound surprised. He doesn’t sound like anything.

“There’s a Protean Charm on this.” Logan says in that same cold tone. “And the date on the border...this is yesterday’s date.”

Roman snarls, oh god, he snarls. Virgil’s chest seizes at the sound. He’s been crying for the past several minutes but that's nothing compared to the absolute dread that floods over him.

“It’s not like that!” Virgil says, “Guys, please!”

“Isn’t it?” Roman growls, “Who were you talking to?”

“I wasn’t--”

“Roman.” Logan interrupts, and Virgil’s stomach drops out.

Because he knows what's in Logan’s hand now, what can make him take on that face, so pale, so horrified.

He knows deep in his heart that the past two years were never going to end quietly but this is something worse. This is his nightmare, this is the scene that keeps him up at night, keeps him terrified of falling asleep and risking seeing that sort of expression on their faces, except this time there is no gasping awake, no pinching himself until his vision blurs and he’s staring up at the ceiling of the guest bedroom in Roman’s house.

Roman’s hands shake as he takes it from the Ravenclaw, that single little paper, worn with age and love and desperation folded into eighths and hidden in his pocket a million times over.

“You--” Roman says, and, oh god, those brown eyes rage with a fury so much like the fire, full of so much hatred, that Virgil feels it from where he is tied up. Roman can’t finish the sentence, and that’s as scary as what else he could have said.

Its a picture. The picture.

Its thirteen year old Virgil and thirteen year old Dee and its Virgil biggest mistake.

“You’re still friends?” Roman’s voice shakes just like his hands.

“Its not what you think!” Virgil repeats like a broken record, his eyes burning, his voice begging, “Please it’s not--”

Roman rearranges the two wands in his hand and flips the picture around and pinches the top on either side of the fold and gives just a quick jerk of his wrists--

“ROMAN!” Virgil screams. “NO! Please! No, please don’t!”

And the picture--

He thrashes against the bindings, and the sound he makes is not human. Its a scream, its desperation, its absolute terror and panic. His eyes blur with tears, and his lungs beg to be allowed to inhale again, and his arms are sticky with blood and burning around the wrists where his movements caused the rope to slice his skin and, and, and.

And all Virgil can see is that picture in halves on the ground between them. One half him, one half Dee, and their winter scarves twisted together so that the yellow and green are on both sides and their arms linked just enough to show off those handmade sweaters.

His knees go weak and Virgil ends up on the ground, without being able to drag his eyes from the way Dee had smiled four years ago and never again.

“Repario,” Virgil whispers desperately, despite the fact he doesn’t have a wand and he’s never had enough skill to perform wandless magic. “Repario, please, Repario.”

His chest heaves, shuddering his entire frame with the pleading gasps and wish, wish, wishing the halves back together because despite the fact that he knows the picture like his own face in the mirror, he needs it to not be torn apart, not be ruined, not to be unrecognizable.

“Please, please, pleasepleaseplease,” Virgil sobs, “Please don’t... take it from me...please Repario, Logan, please!”

He tugs on the bindings again, and his head drops to his chest, vaguely aware that he’s soaked and shivering and this is the longest he’s gone without his jacket since he was ten, and that he hasn’t cried this much since he had last hugged his mom and she had said that she was proud of the man he had grown into and the friend he would die for.

“Why should we do anything for you?” Roman demands, “You got Patton-- he’s-- and Logan’s arm--” Roman blows his breathe out of his nose like a Chinese Fireball, “You’re a Death Eater!”

“I’m not,” Virgil hiccups, “Please, I swear!”

Roman’s foot slams down on the pieces of the photo and grounds them into the forest floor.

Virgil blubbers his way through another series of pleading that falls on deaf ears. His fingernails dig into his palms, sticky with blood from his wrists. He tugs uselessly at the rope again, as if it had somehow become loose in the past three seconds. Snot runs down his chin, and salty tears burn his eyes and irritate his neck where he can’t wipe them off. His shoulder blades ache, but its really nothing compared to how the cavity in his chest seems to gnaw at him from inside.

Then Roman is right in front of him, dragging him off the ground by his shirt collar and forcing Virgil to meet his gaze and the tip of a wand, Virgil’s own wand, digging into the soft flesh under his jaw.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please, stop, I’m sorry--”

“Shut Up!” Roman snaps.

And Virgil’s mouth closes, but the whimper escapes just enough that Roman gives him a violent shake. The back of his head hits the bark of the tree, and Virgil remembers those hands that had held him as they fell asleep on the couch with movies playing, those hands that had caught him when he fell off his broom in sixth year, those hands that had pulled him out of the way of the Whomping Willow-- those same hands were very capable of of crushing his trachea without magic at all.

Roman backs him up until he’s pressed against the tree and Roman is the only thing holding him up.

“How long have you been feeding information about the Order to Dante Ekans?”

Virgil whimpers.

“Tell me!”

“It’s not like that,” Virgil hiccups, “I swear Roman--”

“Don’t swear to me!” Roman’s fist tightens, “You and that snake put false memories into our heads! You made us believe that we were friends for who knows how long! I can’t believe we trusted you! I can’t believe I really thought--”

He lets out a breathy laugh, that’s void of the warmth he’s known for, “So tell me how long you’ve been a traitor, Storm, or I’ll leave you here for the wolves to enjoy, bite by bite.”

“I--” Virgil squeezes his eyes closed but it does nothing to relieve the feeling of being burned alive by the other’s eyes. “I’m sorry I can’t...Roman...p-please you...have to believe me.”

“Give me something to believe!” Roman hisses between his gritted teeth, the wand jabs him in the jaw, but the whatever magic Roman’s trying to produce won’t come out because its still Virgil’s wand and unicorn hair cores are as faithful as they come.

Roman throws the wand to the side and instead hooks his other hand on Virgil’s collar. “I haven’t heard a single reason why I shouldn’t believe you aren’t a Death Eater or why we shouldn’t leave you tied up right here.”

God, if Virgil wasn’t terrified before, he is now. Because he’s lost a lot, and he was prepared to lose some of it, but he’s never been alone. He’s never not had someone to have his back, never not had someone to remind him what he was fighting for. The idea of Roman and Logan simply apperating away and abandoning him in the middle of this forest by himself causes his lungs to stutter in complete horror.

He doesn’t care if they hate him. He doesn’t care if they keep him tied up, or frozen over with petrificus totalus, just as long as they take him with them.

“Virgil!” Roman yells, and Virgil flinches, at the loudness of his tone, at the closeness of their bodies, at the sharpness of his canines. He’s got to be delirious from terror, because he’s pretty sure Roman’s eyes are rimmed red and there’s lift in his voice that sounds like he’s pleading for the truth.

Virgil doesn’t know how else to apologize to him, so he says the same words again and again and again.

Then all at once he feels it.

The feeling of someone shoving their hand directly into his brain, ripping apart the muscle at each wrinkle. There’s no precision to the attack; its bloody, and violent, and unpracticed. Claws that thrash and slash and its not like Dee’s soft touch. And that alone triggers Virgil’s urge to vomit.

The walls come on instinct: practiced instinct, muscle memory. They’re strong and thunderous and built out of critical necessity to protect and defend. The claws scratch at the barricade dragging along the stone like it can out run Virgil’s ability to set it them up.

“Virgil,” Logan’s voice comes from somewhere far away, strained, tired. He doesn’t say to let him inside, but Virgil can hear the unspoken words.

Of the two of them Dee had always been better at Legilimency and Occlumency. He had to be. Virgil wasn’t great at either, but they had practiced every night for a year, and then Virgil had done it by himself in the following years, and that had to count for something, didn’t it?

“S-stop!” Virgil sobbed, “Logan!” His hands yank the rope again pulling as far as they can but he can’t get anywhere near his own body, much less where Roman is holding him up.

“Let him in.” Roman commands, “Virgil, let him in!”

Logan isn’t a practiced Legilimens. In fact Virgil bets he’s barely done this more than twice, and even then he needs to use a wand for it. He’d get tired long before Virgil’s walls would come down.

Virgil blames his own unstability. He blames it on the rising feelings he’s harbored for Patton and Logan and Roman and he blames it on Dee leaving him with them. He blames it on the feeling of Roman’s skin so warm on his own freezing, on the touch of Logan in his mind which disregarding the raw, rough edges of the claws, still feels like the raven haired ravenclaw and Virgil still wants to hoard those touches and keep them for himself. He blames it on the fact that he’s wanted to tell them for years now, and that he doesn’t want them to hate him, and, and, and.

And Logan’s claws leap upward and Virgil’s walls are a second slower then they should have been.

Virgil feels his throat burn with his own stomach acids and memories flash by his mind’s eye, tearing them apart as it goes, searching ever so violently for the memory that explains why Virgil is the way he is, as if his whole life hasn’t been building to this outcome.

Virgil snatches them away from Logan, snatches and stashes and saves those tiny bits behind secondary and tertiary walls before Logan can get to them. Again and again and again until Logan is bruised and battered and Virgil can’t breathe and they’re standing in--

The living room he grew up in. His pictures on the mantle with both him and his mom and three of them emptied where the pictures stolen away. The coffee table has three mugs of tea on it and magazines about the city and the remote that was missing a battery because Virgil had stolen it to put in his secondary Xbox control earlier.

His mom is there, hugging him tightly, “I’m so proud of you, my little storm cloud. I’m always going to be proud of you.”

Virgil tackles Logan out of that memory.

Grocery store. Virgil’s been staring at the cereal for five minutes. His wand is in his boot, and his hands are in his jacket. Clenched into fists.

“Pardon me, young man? Would you mind helping me reach the great value box up there?”

Mom. She smiles at him. She doesn’t know him.

“Yeah, sure. This one, right, Ma’am?”

Another person, a shadow from the end of the aisle, No, no, no, not here--

Virgil locks the rest in a black box. Logan doesn’t fight it.

“Don’t you dare try to take this from me, Ekans!”

Anger. Angry. A challenge. Mistake. Mistake. Mista---

“Lo--Logan!” Virgil gasps.

“Nasty little fates,” The professor mutters, “Nasty indeed. Do you know what Alstroemeria flowers represent?”

“Logan!”

“Face each other! Grip your right hands!”

“Please!”

Fourteen year old Dee is staring at him. Their hands are clasped tightly, and thin stream of red wrapping around their fingers weaving them together. Professor Remus’s wand doesn’t shake. Virgil doesn’t hesitate.

“I do.”

Virgil goes limp in Roman’s arms. Seven feet away, Logan stumbles back further, tripping over a tree root and hitting the ground almost as hard as Virgil does. Maybe harder with that broken arm of his. Virgil’s not sure from how intensely his own body shakes trying to get rid of the vile feeling of someone else being in his head.

He lets out another sob, yanking on the rope and falling as far forward as he can. Roman’s embrace isn’t comforting, but its something. His throat feels dry and eyes burn and he wants to get his hands on that pesky time turner that caused them to do all this just so he can stop himself from ever being born in the first place.

“You--” Logan says. He’s pale, paler than before, paler than paper, paler than the ghosts at that stupid castle. “You made an Unbreakable Vow.”

And whatever slim reserve, whatever dignity, Virgil had left, breaks and he’s gone.

(Next Chapter)

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alternativewinxcontinuity · 4 years

Note

What's your headcanon for how dates/time in the MU compare to Earth time? In season 1 the middle of summer for Bloom was almost back-to-school time for Magix, and Magix's semester break (S1E13) was in the middle of December (maybe? California has a pretty mild climate). And in S1E18 (4Kids version) Mitzi makes a comment that school isn't out 'this time of year' (Which could mean before/after Christmas, Spring break, summer, etc). But Bloom does go home for the summer, so there has to be...(cont)

(cont from 'Bloom does come home for the summer, so...') There has to be some point where the breaks line up in order for Bloom to go home to Earth from Magix and not be in trouble with the law. (There's also the age difference problem—Bloom's an Earth 16 (her birthday is December/January depending on the dub). If meeting Stella happened in the summer (July), she'd be 16 and 6-7 months old. Does that collerate with Magix/MU 16 when considering the time difference?)

*Throws the concept of time into a dumpster and sets it on fire before screaming into the endless void* Ahahaha, oh my gosh, The Winx Club operates outside of normal space time.

So we have two very set points of time that are pretty definitive within the first three seasons:

Season 1 episode 1: Bloom is in the early part of her summer vacation (based on the way she talks about the vacation period it hasn't been going on long). Bloom is from California (allegedly) and Summer Vacation/end of the school year starts around mid-June

Season 2 Episode 16: Hallowinx, this episode happens on or very close to Halloween, which is October 31st

I went through (using the Wiki to double check myself) and counted the “observable days” in each season and... well:

Based on the days we 'see' or at the very least can infer each season has to cover at the very least:

Season 1 (bare minimum) 7 weeksSeason 2 (bare minimum) 9 weeksSeason 3 (bare minimum) 5 ½ weeks

Now, reasonably we can assume that for every day we do 'see', there's going to be at least 1-2 days per season that we don't see.

Given the way the story paces itself, it's unlikely that the events take the full school year to complete, which is where we start to see a breakdown in chronological sense.

Realistically, even at the full 2 days to every 1, season 1 would still only take about 21 weeks to complete, putting the season final (episodes 18-26) in late November, right between the Thanksgiving and Christmas Holidays on Earth. (And therefore 113 likely around September which is early Autumn. No matter how you look at it episodes 117-126 (or at least 118-126) all happen in a very short amount of time, a few conjoined days at most.)

That makes sense, that's fine, until you look at season 2.

Season 2 starts with the new buildings being unveiled, the repaired Alfea. Repaired from the season 1 final battle.

Except that doesn't make a damn lick of sense, and here's why:

Episode 216 happens around October 31st, no getting around it, the observable days from 201-215 are about six weeks worth, or more realistically 12-15 actual weeks. Even if the school year at Alfea starts at the same time by Earth standards every year, (which is to say roughly mid-June) that's still only a 19 week window, so not that much of a stretch-

But here's a problem: that means that it took an advanced techno-magical civilisation 6-7 months to repair their school.

And then there's a few extra weeks in season 2 after Halloween for episodes 217-226 which, with 2ish weeks of observable days stretched to 4 or 5 puts the season end in late November early December. Again.

But moving on to Season 3 and it's week long summer vacation which is inexplicably “much shorter this year”. (That is what Flora actually says in at least 2 out of 4 translations (Cinelume and Rai I believe), the third is 'it will be over before you know it.'”

301-304 cover at least three days, but realistically given the mood, events and apparent pacing - no more than a week.

In 318, the phrase “the past few weeks” is used to refer to the events of the season thus far, and at that point we're at about three weeks worth of observable days, which in unseen days would put them more likely at four to six weeks. (I'd say just shy of two months at the most or they would refer to the time by months not weeks.)

There's no way I can turn the events that make them make sense unless we aren't seeing three years over three seasons of the show.

See, November is roughly mid year for Alfea – if their planetary/school year is comparable to Earth's – which puts the ends of seasons 1 & 2 around the semester break.

We don't really see any signs of extreme weather on Magix during the first three seasons, none that's natural anyway. Which means for all we know their winters are the long school breaks because:That schedule is just how it works out best across the many planets the students come fromorThe winters aren't conducive to learning because the days are so short so they do Winter Vacation instead of Summer Vacation, and place their midyear break of 2-3 weeks at the height of the Summer heat when no one wants to be in classrooms.

If that was true, then it means we could feasibly claim that at the very least seasons 2 & 3 take place in the same school year, that the shortened Summer Holiday is in fact the midyear break which is shorter than normal because they had to compensate for time lost to the Darkar crises.

(There is evidence to counter this I believe, references to coming back from the summer vacation at the start of season 2, but only in the 4kids version if I remember correctly? Which has the most deviation in its script because of the localisation and shuffling of footage, so... *shrugs*)

Hell, if we really go for it we could fit all three seasons into the same year like I did with the Alt Con timeline (although it does still works if there's a gap between the 1st & 2nd season and Hallowinx goes in its normal place in the lineup as opposed to the rearrange I did with the schedule.)

I'm sorry, I know you probably wanted something far more coherent (and prompt) but I just... can't make heads or tails of what the heck is supposed to be going on with the canon timeline.

At the very least I believe that when it comes to ages, we are getting the Earth equivalent, Bloom is an Earth girl and our (the audience) vehicle to seeing the Magical Dimension, even if nothing else, things would likely be translated into terms Bloom is familiar with.

I'm not sure how Bloom doesn't get in trouble with the cops, but there was that one scene in 213 when Aisha has to talk her way out of trouble with an officer. Mike being a fireman, he'd likely have connections with someone on the force who could help clear up the misunderstanding re: 'Bloom's truancy' since she's effectively going to a foreign boarding school.

#winx #winx club #there is no canon timeline #Asking Alternix #timeline what timeline #I am so sorry I really did try my best but it just makes no sense!#I feel like even the og creators couldn't explain this tbh

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mysweetestcreature · 5 years

Text

Tomorrow Never Knows (President!Harry) Chapter 1: Had Me from Hello

(Banner by the wonderful noblewomankat <3)

***

Masterlist

***

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

The car parks right at the entrance of the school, where some students are gathered around making conversation and trying to out-do the other in who’s had the most exotic vacation, while others swarm through the doors on a mission to get back into the flow of the semester. Harry eyes the building up and down from the window cautiously. Don’t get him wrong, he’s ecstatic to be attending Ashwood Prep this year, especially considering the fact he received a hefty amount of scholarship money when he had gotten accepted. It’s just that being the new kid at a K12 school might as well be like getting thrown into open water when all one knows is how to backstroke.

“I could drive around the block again, if you’d like?” Harry snorts at the suggestion as he turns back to his mum. “I can just feel anxiety coming off your aura,” she adds, circling her hand just around the side of his head. Over the last few months, she’s been very interested in trying to read his aura, whatever that means (he isn’t sure how this obsession started, but he’ll admit that she’s getting quite good).

“Mum...” he whines, shrinking further into the leather of his seat as he covers his face from any overly curious eyes that may find him and his mother a little too interesting.

Anne feigns offense and lets out a dramatic huff. “Not even a day in high school, and he’s already ashamed to be seen with me.”

Both remain silent for the time being, and only the chatter from outside fills the void of unsaid between them. It’s when Harry takes the chance and subtly tries to take a peek at her from the corner of his eye, does he find her doing the exact same. They burst into giggles, and Harry shakes his head as he sits up. Once he’s recovered, his gaze falls back towards the window, where the number of students has decreased in just a matter of minutes.

“’m nervous,” he admits despondently a few seconds later.

A hand falls over his, squeezing it tight as its thumb pads over his skin to calm him. “And that’s completely normal, but, darling –– it’s going to be alright. I know this because I know you, and you’re never one to back down. Besides, I think you look quite handsome in your uniform.” He’s dressed in black dress pants topped off with a white polo, a cool-toned dark blue cardigan and a black tie with school’s emblem printed in the middle.

As Harry lets the rest of Anne’s words sink in, he thinks about how he’d been in this position not even two years ago. A year and eight months ago, to be exact, he’d moved from his childhood home in Holmes Chapel in England to New Jersey. Anne had received a stellar job opportunity as marketing head at a consumer goods company, and Harry and his sister, Gemma, felt like that had to support her in this new chapter of her life. Unfortunately, that included leaving behind their friends, family, and all that they’ve ever known. So, in mid-January, he’d been the new kid to insert himself into the seventh-grade at JW Middle School. For the most part, everyone in his year had been kind enough, sans those few jerks who made fun of the way he talked and yelled ‘bloody hell’ whenever they’d see him in the halls or at lunch, but even that only lasted for a month. Other than that, he felt as though he’d really tried to make the best out of their situation.

Now here he is again, in nearly an identical position as the last. It’s a lot better now, he supposes. For starters, he’s starting school on the first day, so he’s sure there are going to be at least a dozen new students like him. By now, he’s also used to living in Jersey (loves it, his mum would say), even knows all the best diners within a thirty-mile radius of his house and where to get the freshest bagels on a Saturday morning.

The eighth grade had even been immensely enjoyable for him, he had made a lot of friends, had his first kiss, and he even graduated salutatorian of the class, only falling a thousandth of a decimal behind Andrea Chung.

“You know what? You’re right, mum. I can so do this,” he affirms himself.

“Hey, I didn’t say to be cocky,” Anne teases, pinching his cheeks before she unlocks the doors. “Now, get out of my car. I have a meeting in less than an hour, and I still need to stop for coffee. Love you!”

Harry lets his feet fall onto the sidewalk toes first, and pulls the straps of his backpack over his shoulders. Ashwood Prep looks even bigger now that he’s stood on the ground. Everyone is dressed in their uniforms, but of course there are those who obviously chose to customize theirs. He looks to his left, and swallows hard as Anne’s Mercedes merges onto the main road. “This is it,” he tells himself. This is where he’ll be spending the next four years of his life.

Suddenly, he feels something knock into his back, causing him to stumble a few steps forward.

“Oof!”

Before he can catch a glimpse and ask if whoever it was is okay, a figure manages to dodge his eyes as she speeds off up the stairs.

“I’m so sorry!” the girl yells back at him, but all he can really make out is the side of her face and a silver and pink checkered scrunchie that holds her hair back in a half do style. “But I have to get these ready before Pattern A or else Mr. N is totally gonna be on my back about it!” Her echo sounds panicked as she disappears into the building, and even the students still remaining towards the entrance part a path for her to pass.

“You’re fine!” he shouts after her.

***

“You’ll find that your locker assignments and schedules are laid out for you in alphabetical order,” the homeroom teacher, Mr. Bartolome says in his most unenthusiastic tone. “If you have any questions...ask each other.” Harry heads towards the back in search of his last name, until he finds it at a desk right by the window, its position is in perfect view of the entire room. There are some small things he notices, like how the walls have barely a scratch on them and how the floors are so we'll polished that even the slightest of movements elicits a squeak.

Just as he takes his seat, a voice booms from beside him. “Excuse me!” His head leads the rest of his body as he pivots on his heel. A girl with magnificent auburn hair tied back in a high ponytail and freckles that dance across her face almost perfectly stares inquisitively at him. “You’re new, right? I’m Zoey”

“Oh, uh...yeah. I’m Harry,” he replies with a polite nod. As he sits down, he can feel Zoey’s eyes scan him up and down.

“Wait!” she gasps, her mouth falling open. “Are you...are you from England?” She looks at him expectantly, as though waiting for him to say that he’s related to the Queen or Churchill or something just as outrageous as that.

He nods before speaking. “Cheshire,” he replies, but she stares at him blankly. “It’s North from London.”

“Oh,” she tries to hide her disappointment. “Well, if you need help with anything, you can always ask me.”

“Thanks,” he offers her a tight-lipped grin. She sends him a wink in return before turning to her friend seated to her other side.

Harry takes the opportunity to look down at the gridded schedule laid out before him. Thank god he’d looked over his schedule ahead a time when it was posted online because it had taken him about an hour to fully comprehend, and if he’s being honest, Mr. Bartolome kind of scares him. The school works on a 6-day cycle, and each class is referred to as a ‘pattern’ rather than a ‘period’. Each day, one subject drops, and the one that had dropped the day before is added in at the beginning. He looks up at the board, where Mr. Bartolome has written an outline of how today is going to work out. Day 1, it says in green marker, followed by the order of classes. Harry looks back down at his schedule, and his eyes linger on his Pattern A.

***

His first class of the day just happens to be his favorite subject. Harry isn’t sure what it is, but he loves reading and learning about the past and drawing maps of how the past has contributed and affected the present. It might be because his grandad had been a university history professor at Oxford and would tell Harry tales from World War 2 in place of the usual bedtime stores (that’s not to say that Harry isn’t well versed in fairytales, of course).

Luckily there hadn’t been assigned seating, so Harry was able to snag a table in the third row when he had first come in. The seats are now slowly filling up as the rest of the class staggers in a few tired looking students at a time, and the teacher makes it a point to note that it’s the first day...the first class of the day nonetheless! Harry recognizes a few from homeroom, like the boy who had dared asked Mr. Bartolome a question, and Zoey, who flirtatiously waves at him with before being forced into the back by a few of her friends.

Their teacher pushes out of his chair and heads to the whiteboard. He takes a dry erase marker in his hand, and in big letters writes what looks to be his name, but Harry can barely make it out without squinting his eyes.

“Welcome to US History Honors!” he exclaims. “As I’ve just written in my embarrisingly horrendous handwriting...which is why we’re definitely using PowerPoint, so I don’t get a billion emails about what’s written, don’t worry...I’m Mr. Noone!”

Mr. Noone walks over to the door, but just as he’s about to shut it to start the lesson, someone calls out to him from the hall. “Wait! I’m here, I’m here!” Everyone watches as the elderly man lets out a knowing sigh, shoulders falling in defeat, but it’s followed by a genuine chuckle as the final student speeds into the room.

“Sorry, Mr. N!” she says, still trying to catch her breath. Harry immediately eyes the same pink and grey scrunchie that had knocked into him earlier. “But I had to wait for these to cool before packing them up or else all the sugar would fall off!” In her hands is a medium-sized Tupperware, and he recognizes the faint yet alluring scent of freshly baked treats.

“Earl grey short bread?” Mr. Noone cocks a brow at her as he finally shuts the door. “I don’t accept tardiness for just any average cookie.”

The girl shakes her head animatedly. “I’m insulted that you even have to ask that question!” Mr. Noone strolls towards his desk with his hands behind his back, then peaks over the top of the container. A pleased expression dances across his face as his fingers fish for a scrumptious cookie to bite in to, and he’s even more ecstatic as the shortbread touches his palate.

“You did good, kid. Now find a seat before I write you up for loitering,” he threatens lightly, and the girl lets out a little huff as she turns around.

And that’s when Harry finally sees her face.

His stomach flips over, and he’s left in that awkward position of will he or won’t he see this morning’s breakfast again (and he’d eaten a hefty meal). Her eyes have a glimmer to them, like a star on top of a Christmas tree or better yet, the real ones he watches from his bedroom window when he can’t fall asleep. He’s so in awe that he stops breathing when those sparkling eyes land on the empty seat right beside him. Whatever amusement he’d been feeling when he’d first sat down is now replaced with something else. It’s like heat that creeps up to his neck originating from the base of his spine.

The closer she gets, the sweatier his palms become, so bad that he has trouble keeping his pen firm in his grasp. “Hi, I’m Y/n!” she says as she stops in front of him, a warm smile embedded on her lips and a warmth that seems to radiate off her so naturally. “I hope you don’t mind if I sit here?”

“Y-yeah, I mean, no! I mean, of course. It’s...it’s all yours.” What was that?! Jesus Christ, Harry. It’s like you’ve never talked to a girl before! She giggles as he trips over his words, but thanks him graciously before sliding into the seat and getting herself comfortable. He tenses at her presence being so close to him and he couldn’t tell you why. “Harry,” he blurts out like vomit.

“What?” She looks up from digging through her bag.

He bites on the inside of his cheek, suddenly feeling conscious under this self-imposed pressure. “My name’s Harry,” and he shyly repeats before turning back to the board.

Y/n tilts her head at him, and the soft smile returns to her face. “Nice to meet you, Harry.”

At that, he’s finally able to breathe normally. He steals a couple glances at her as she sets everything down on their table, and he notices how her lips quirk to the side as she sets everything down with such precision. A printed Beatles-themed pencil case catches his eye, and he smiles to himself as he thinks fondly to all the times his grandad had played their records over and over.

“I love the Beatles,” he says almost as a whisper, but she picks up on it and perks up immediately.

“They’re my favorite band and all I listen to most days.” She picks up the pouch and twirls it in her hands. “My dad brought this back when he visited London a few years ago. I’ve never been, but hopefully one day!” There’s hope in her voice as she stares sheepishly at the print.

“Alright!” Their conversation is cut short as Mr. Noone chews up his last bit of cookie. “Now that that’s taken care of, let’s start class!” A projection screen starts to pull down over the whiteboard, followed by a slowly brightening white light. “While we’re waiting for this to load, I want you to take a good look at who you’re sitting next to because you’ll be partnering up for various projects and presentations over the course of the year.”

***

After class, Harry sits back as he watches a bulk of his classmates file out of the room en route to their next destination. As their voices carry out into the halls, it’s just him and a few others left, including Y/n, who appears to be taking her sweet time packing everything up in her bag.

“So,” the “o” carries out longer than he’d anticipated. He scratches the back of his neck as he searches for something, anything, he can say to her, so she doesn’t think he’s a complete and utter fool for not being able to speak without fumbling over his own tongue. “I’m not really sure where my next class is.”

“Oh!” Her eyes grow wide as she zips up her backpack. “I could help you, if you’d like?” And gosh, does his chest pound when she leans in close and takes a peek at his schedule in front of him on the table. “You’re actually just on the second floor!” she exclaims, pointing up towards the ceiling. “I’m like ninety-seven percent sure it’s the third door on the right if you take the stairs right outside this room.”

Harry takes a quick mental note of her instructions before pushing out of his chair. “Thank you,” he starts, and both of them head towards the door, with her leading the way.

Just as she takes one step outside, she suddenly turns around, and Harry nearly crashes into her. “I’ll be back for my Tupperware, Mr. N! There’s no way I’m letting you swipe another one from under my nose!” The old man waves her off and mutters something under his breath that Harry thinks might have been a “whatever you say”. Y/n looks up at him, and signals for them to continue into the hall.

“He’s a real sweetheart,” she says as they climb up the stairs.

“Who?”

“Mr. Noone,” she explains. “I think you’ll really like him! His classes are pretty chill for the most part and he’s super understanding, too. Like last year I had the flu for about a week and a half since my brother had gotten me sick because his whole kindergarten class had come down with for some strange reason, and Mr. N was the only teacher who didn’t have me make up any work.”

“Yeah?” he smiles at her.

She promptly shakes her head in confirmation. “Yeah! He just gave me this mini test with all the material I’d missed, and he even gave me a study guide to study off to help me with it!” Her face falls into a small frown when they stop in front Harry’s next class. “Oh, well I guess this is you.” She digs her foot into the marbled floor as she peeks into the room. “It was nice talking to you, Harry! I’ll see you around!” she says with a more upbeat tone.

“Bye, and thanks again for helping me get to class. It probably cut down the anxiety time by at least two minutes,” he confesses, a slight blush spreading around the area of his nose. She smiles before heading her own way, and he doesn’t know why he feels this sudden decline in his mood as she grows further and further. He just stands there, watching her walk down the corridor while the rest of the students laze into the classroom. Just as he’s about to head in, he chances one last look in her direction, and it’s just in time see her looking over her shoulder.

***

Harry’s managed to make himself a new friend in Debate class. His name is Max, and he’d been a transfer student from JW the year before Harry had started attending. They bonded over that, as well as a mutual love for movies made during the Classical Hollywood period (they’ve even made plans to watch a Hitchcock film this weekend), and even how they live in the same neighborhood –– a few streets apart, to be more specific!

“I think it’s cool that you have an accent,” Max says to him as they stop at Harry’s locker before heading to lunch. Harry empties out his books from his first three classes. It’s no wonder his back had been aching, he’d forgotten to take out his US Politics textbook, and he doesn’t even have that class today. He’d had a free (also with Max) before this, and he’d managed to finish up all the readings and homework for history and biology that are all due tomorrow. He likes to be efficient with his time, especially when the teachers start putting on a heftier workload. “Did you see how all those girls freaked when you introduced yourself? I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it!”

“Everyone has an accent, mate. It’s just mine sounds a lot different from yours.” Everyone in Debate had freaked over the way he spoke, and as Max had pointed out, it had garnered a lot of attention from some of the girls in class.

“No need to get all technical with me. You have a gift, my friend. Use it wisely.” Harry shuts his locker, and the two continue towards the cafeteria. This morning, Anne had packed him his favorite roast beef and swiss on rye, a tradition on the first day of school that they’ve kept since he was small. Although, Max had been going on about how amazing the food here was, which is hard to believe that any school lunch can be anything but subpar, so he may have to test that out, as well. On the way there, they turn into a hallway, and are immediately hit with a sweet-smelling aroma of cinnamon and brown sugar.

Harry stops just outside the door, humming happily to himself as he pictures whatever magic is happening on the other side. “Kitchen?” He points in its direction with his thumb.

“Home economics room,” his friend smirks. “A friend spends a hell of a lot of time in there. She’s a really good baker, I can’t even count how many of her lemon bars I’ve had since I started going here.”

***

Y/n is late for lunch, but it’s really not her fault! She got caught up in decorating a cake with fondant roses and fancy piping that she been working on all period long because she wanted to impress Miss Genevra with a new technique that she had learned at a baking seminar she’d taken over the summer. And it turned out nearly perfect (there was one flower that looked a tad lopsided, but only Y/n fussed over it), and the flavor was just as impressive.

All that aside, she now only has about ten minutes left to buy lunch and scarf it all down before her Pattern J starts, and she still has to stop by her locker to get her art kit and sketchbook, not to mention she has to make time to hound Mr. N for her Tupperware back, or else her dad will throw another fit.

So, she quickly grabs a Snapple and a basket of chicken tenders from the hot rack, then brings it all to the cashier. A woman, about forty years old sits on her stool, and smiles at Y/n as she approaches. “Hi, Layla!” Y/n greets her, handing her over a crisp ten-dollar bill. “How was your trip to Ecuador? I’m sure Benny and Sammy loved it!” Benny and Sammy are Layla’s twin boys that Y/n babysits from time to time when Layla and her partner go out for a date night. They’re about her brother’s age, so Mason is always so happy when she brings him along to their house for an impromptu playdate.

Layla smiles, handing back her change of four dollars and fifty cents. “They did! Thanks for asking, sweetheart.” She stares down at her watch, then gives the young girl a knowing look. “Now you better finish that up before your next class. I think I saw Maxxie sitting somewhere in the back.”

“Oh, thanks for the heads up! And by the way...” Y/n looks into her bag and pulls out a stack of fudge bars neatly wrapped in tin foil. “The boys’ favorite! Made fresh today.”

“Ah! You’re just an angel, aren’t you?” Layla gushes before sending her on her way.

Y/n searches for Maxxie’s mop of dirty blonde hair as she maneuvers around all the busy tables. They’d met a few years ago, and she considers him to be one of her best friends. He’d texted her earlier saying he’d be bringing a friend to sit with them at lunch, and that he was totally cute and had a smile that would surely make her weak at the knees. Think Zach Anderson, but 100x better, his message had read. She smiles widely when she sees him.

“So, last night I saw this movie made in like the 40s and I totally got this ince-” She cover his eyes with her hands and does her best to bite back the erupting giggles.

“Guess who?”

“Well, you smell strongly of vanilla and...” He takes a long whiff through his nose. “...and...is that orange zest?”

“Lemon, but close enough, I guess.” Y/n takes the empty seat on his right. Maxxie leans in for a hug, and only then does she notice the familiar company.

“Hey, you! I was beginning to think you’d drowned in a tub of frosting or something,” he jokes, picking something out of her hair before settling back. He turns to his left. “This is-”

“Harry,” she says it like it’s a dream. Gosh! When she’d met him earlier, she did everything she could to stay with it, when all she really wanted to do was scream into a pillow about how unrealistically green his eyes are. Instead, she thinks she might have overshared some details with a complete stranger because regardless of how cute she thinks he is –– and that’s very much –– she doesn’t know one thing about him besides his name.

“Y/n, hi,” Harry replies just as whimsically. They hold eye contact for a while, but as Y/n feels the heat begin to rise from her neck to her cheeks, she soon turns away and begins to pick at her chicken, while Harry bites his lips inward and looks down into his lap to check his phone.

The boy in between them looks back and forth between the two. His eyebrows rise to his forehead and his mouth parts slightly in confusion.

“So... I’m guessing you’ve met?”

***

#president!harry #harry styles #harry styles imagine #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles smut #harry styles drabble #harry styles fluff #harry styles au

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blackkudos · 4 years

Text

Betty Carter

Betty Carter (born Lillie Mae Jones; May 19, 1929 – September 26, 1998) was an American jazz singer known for her improvisational technique, scatting and other complex musical abilities that demonstrated her vocal talent and imaginative interpretation of lyrics and melodies. Vocalist Carmen McRae once remarked: "There's really only one jazz singer—only one: Betty Carter."

Early life

Carter was born in Flint, Michigan, and grew up in Detroit, where her father, James Jones, was the musical director of a Detroit church and her mother, Bessie, was a housewife. As a child, Carter was raised to be extremely independent and to not expect nurturing from her family. Even 30 years after leaving home, Carter was still very aware of and affected by the home life she was raised in, and was quoted saying:

I have been far removed from my immediate family. There's been no real contact or phone calls home every week to find out how everybody is…As far as family is concerned, it's been a lonesome trek…It's probably just as much my fault as it is theirs, and I can't blame anybody for it. But there was…no real closeness, where the family urged me on, or said…'We're proud'…and all that. No, no…none of that happened.

While the lack of support from Carter's family caused her to feel isolated, it may also have instilled self-reliance and determination to succeed. She studied piano at the Detroit Conservatory at the age of 15, but only attained a modest level of expertise.

At the age of 16, Carter began singing. As her parents were not big proponents of her pursuing a singing career, she would sneak out at night to audition for amateur shows. After winning first place at her first amateur competition, Carter felt as though she were being accepted into the music world and decided that she must pursue it tirelessly. When she began performing live, she was too young to be admitted into bars, so she obtained a forged birth certificate to gain entry in order to perform.

Career

Even at a young age, Carter was able to bring a new vocal style to jazz. The breathiness of her voice was a characteristic seldom heard before her appearance on the music scene. She also was well known for her passion for scat singing and her strong belief that the throwaway attitude that most jazz musicians approached it with was inappropriate and wasteful due to its spontaneity and basic inventiveness, seldom seen elsewhere.

Detroit, where Carter grew up, was a hotbed of jazz growth. After signing with a talent agent after her win at amateur night, Carter had opportunities to perform with famous jazz artists such as Dizzy Gillespie, who visited Detroit for an extensive amount of time. Gillespie is often considered responsible for her strong passion for scatting. In earlier recordings, it is apparent that her scatting had similarities to the qualities of Gillespie's.

At the time of Gillespie's visit, Charlie Parker was receiving treatment in a psychiatric hospital, delaying her encounter with him. However, Carter eventually performed with Parker, as well as with his band consisting of Tommy Potter, Max Roach, and Miles Davis. After receiving praise from both Gillespie and Parker for her vocal prowess, Carter felt an upsurge in confidence and knew that she could make it in the business with perseverance.

Carter's confidence was well founded. In 1948, she was asked by Lionel Hampton to join his band. She finally had her big break. Working with Hampton's group gave her the chance to be bandmates with artists such as Charles Mingus and Wes Montgomery, as well as with Ernest Harold "Benny" Bailey, who had recently vacated Gillespie's band and Albert Thornton "Al" Grey who would later go on to join Gillespie's band. Hampton obviously had an ear for talent and a love for bebop. Carter too had a deep love for bebop as well as a talent for it. Hampton's wife Gladys gave her the nickname "Betty Bebop", a nickname she reportedly detested. Despite her good ear and charming personality, Carter was fiercely independent and had a tendency to attempt to resist Hampton's direction, while Hampton had a temper and was quick to anger. Hampton expected a lot from his players and did not want them to forget that he was the band's leader. She openly hated his swing style, refused to sing in a swinging way, and she was far too outspoken for his tastes. Carter honed her scat singing ability while on tour, which was not well received by Hampton as he did not enjoy her penchant for improvisation. Over the course of two and a half years, Hampton fired Carter a total of seven times.

Carter was part of the Lionel Hampton Orchestra that played at the famed Cavalcade of Jazz in Los Angeles at Wrigley Field which was produced by Leon Hefflin, Sr. on July 10, 1949. They did a second concert at Lane Field in San Diego on September 3, 1949. They also performed at the sixth famed Cavalcade of Jazz concert on June 25, 1950. Also featured on the same day were Roy Milton & His Solid Senders, Pee Wee Crayton's Orchestra, Dinah Washington, Tiny Davis & Her Hell Divers, and other artists. 16,000 people were reported to be in attendance and the concert ended early because of a fracas while Hampton's band played "Flying High".

Being a part of Hampton's band provided a few things for "The Kid" (a nickname bestowed upon Carter that stuck for the rest of her life): connections, and a new approach to music, making it so that all future musical attitudes that came from Carter bore the mark of Hampton's guidance. Because of Hampton's hiring of Carter, she also goes down in history as one of the last big band era jazz singers in history. However, by 1951, Carter left the band. After a short recuperation back home, Carter was in New York, working all over the city for the better part of the early 1950s, as well as participating in an extensive tour of the south, playing for "camp shows". This work made little to no money, but Carter believed it was necessary in order to develop as an artist, and was a way to "pay her dues".

Very soon after Carter's arrival in New York City, she was given the opportunity to record with King Pleasure and the Ray Bryant Trio, becoming more recognizable and well-known and subsequently being granted the chance to sing at the Apollo Theatre. This theatre was known for giving up-and-coming artists the final shove into becoming household names. Carter was propelled into prominence, recording with Epic label by 1955 and was a well-known artist by the late 1950s. Her first solo LP, Out There, was released on the Peacock label in 1958.

Miles Davis can be credited for Carter's bump in popularity, as he was the person who recommended to Ray Charles that he take Carter under his wing. Carter began touring with Charles in 1960, then making a recording of duets with him in 1961 (Ray Charles and Betty Carter), including the R&B-chart-topping "Baby, It's Cold Outside", which brought her a measure of popular recognition. In 1963 she toured in Japan with Sonny Rollins. She recorded for various labels during this period, including ABC-Paramount, Atco and United Artists, but was rarely satisfied with the resulting product. After three years of touring with Charles and a total of two recordings together, Carter took a hiatus from recording to marry. She and her husband had two children. However, she continued performing, not wanting to be dependent upon her husband for financial support.

The 1960s became an increasingly difficult time for Carter as she began to slip in fame, refusing to sing contemporary pop music, and her youth fading. Carter was nearly forty years old, which at the time was not conducive to a career in the public eye. Rock and roll, like pop, was steadily becoming more popular and provided cash flow for labels and recording companies. Carter had to work extremely hard to continue to book gigs because of the jazz decline. Her marriage also was beginning to crumble. By 1971, Carter was single and mainly performing live with a small group consisting of merely a piano, drums, and a bass. The Betty Carter trio was one of very few jazz groups to continue to book gigs in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Carter created her own record label, Bet-Car Records, in 1969, the sole recording source of Carter's music for the next eighteen years:

....in fact, I think I was probably the first independent label out there in '69. People thought I was crazy when I did it. 'How are you gonna get any distribution?' I mean, 'How are you gonna take care of business and do that yourself?' 'Don't you need somebody else?' I said, 'Listen. Nobody was comin' this way and I wanted the records out there, so I found out that I could do it myself.' So, that's what I did. It's the best thing that ever happened to me. You know. We're talking about '69!

Some of her most famous recordings were originally issued on Bet-Car, including the double album The Audience with Betty Carter (1980). In 1980 she was the subject of a documentary film by Michelle Parkerson, But Then, She's Betty Carter. Carter's approach to music did not concern solely her method of recording and distribution, but also her choice in venues. Carter began performing at colleges and universities, starting in 1972 at Goddard College in Vermont. Carter was excited at this opportunity, as it was since the mid-1960s that Carter had been wanting to visit schools and provide some sort of education for students. She began lecturing along with her musical performances, informing students of the history of jazz and its roots.

By 1975, Carter's life and work prospects began to improve, and Carter was beginning to be able to pick her own jobs once again, touring in Europe, South America, and the United States. In 1976, Carter was a guest live performer on Saturday Night Live′s first season on the air, and was also a performer at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1977 and 1978, carving out a permanent place for herself in the music business as well as in the world of jazz.

In 1977, Carter enjoyed a new peak in critical and popular estimation, and taught a master class with her past mentor, Dizzy Gillespie, at Harvard. In the last decade of her life, Carter began to receive even wider acclaim and recognition. In 1987 she signed with Verve Records, who reissued most of her Bet-Car albums on CD for the first time and made them available to wider audiences. In 1988 she won a Grammy for her album Look What I Got! and sang in a guest appearance on The Cosby Show (episode "How Do You Get to Carnegie Hall?"). In 1994 she performed at the White House and was a headliner at Verve's 50th anniversary celebration in Carnegie Hall. She was the subject of a 1994 short film by Dick Fontaine, Betty Carter: New All the Time.

In 1997 she was awarded a National Medal of Arts by President Bill Clinton. This award was one of thousands, but Carter considered this medal to be her most important that she received in her lifetime.

Death

Carter continued to perform, tour, and record, as well as search for new talent until she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the summer of 1998. She died on September 26, 1998, at the age of 69, and was later cremated. She was survived by her two sons.

Legacy

Carter often recruited young accompanists for performances and recordings, insisting that she "learned a lot from these young players, because they're raw and they come up with things that I would never think about doing."

1993 was Carter's biggest year of innovation, creating a program called Jazz Ahead, which took 20 students who were given the opportunity to spend an entire week training and composing with Carter, a program that still exists to this day and is hosted in The Kennedy Center.

Betty Carter is considered responsible for discovering great jazz talent, her discoveries including John Hicks, Curtis Lundy, Mulgrew Miller, Cyrus Chestnut, Dave Holland, Stephen Scott, Kenny Washington, Benny Green and more.

On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed Betty Carter among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire.

Discography

CD compilations

1990: Compact Jazz – (Polygram) – Bet-Car and Verve recordings from 1976 to 1987

1992: I Can't Help It – (Impulse!/GRP) – the Out There and The Modern Sound albums on one compact disc

1999: Priceless Jazz – (GRP) – Peacock and ABC-Paramount recordings from 1958 and 1960

2003: Betty Carter's Finest Hour – (Verve) – recordings from 1958 to 1992

On multi-artist compilations

1988: "I'm Wishing" on Stay Awake: Various Interpretations of Music from Vintage Disney Films

1997: "Lonely House" on September Songs – The Music of Kurt Weill

#05/19 #09/26

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heartfeltheart · 4 years

Text

Alchemy: Magic Vs. Science

Chapters: 4/25 Fandom: Fullmetal Alchemist/Harry Potter Rating: T Relationships: Edward/Winry, Lan Fan/Ling, and May/Alphonse. Primary Characters: Edward Elric, Severus Snape Additional Tags: Crossover, Teacher!Edward, BrOtp Edward/Severus. Sassy beyond measure. Series: Part 1 of 9. Summary: Magic and Science, are they the same or are they completely different? It just takes one person to point out all up and downs. Along with breaking the stereotypes that come up with being a wizard, alchemist and most of all being human. Thank you, @amynchan! D/C: I do not own Harry Potter or Fullmetal Alchemist. Discord: La Red(Mesh Mash of… stuff.): https://discord.gg/KYjmVAb Alchemy Series: https://discord.gg/DejEYNJ

“English and Edward’s accented voice.” “Amestrian or another foreign language.” “Written notes.” ‘Thoughts.’ First Name: Informal Last Name: Formal (Or used to annoy others)

"Just how much did you actually make in three months?" Snape could not help but ask in total awe, all disregard of appearances at this point. He stood next to Elric and Kavex inside Elric's new personal vault within Gringotts. Right in front of him are multiple mountainous piles of Galleons, Sickles and Knut's. He had previously visited faults of families with money, and none of them could even match Elric's riches. "What did you do exactly in the military?"

"Hm?" Elric looked over his shoulder to see Snape's gob smack expression puzzled. Why do people keep making that face whenever he mentions something about his money? He hardly uses it as it is, making good financial decisions (Aka: his brother Alphonse), and 'borrowing money' from that bastard Mustang. "I haffe changed it from months to a zingle year. I do not vant to end up broke and not be able to exchange it later on."

Elric eyes seemed to dull when he though over Snape's second question. He wondered how he should answer that one, after all even though he told Snape a lot of things from his past. Said past should remain under lock and key. "Rezearch and field vork. A lot of the field vork required me to traffel effervere and fix many problems...Dat and I got a bromozioin."

"You are not going to give me a straight answer aren't you?" Snape deadpanned.

"Nobe." Elric grinned at him, albeit his grin did not quite reach his eyes.

-.-

"All the other supplies you require are not going to be sold here," Snape muttered under his breath as he and Elric left the Magical Goblin run bank.

"The nodepooks, bens, and bencils?" Elric asked he kept his gaze down as he walked down the stone steps. "I vould haffe thought as much conzitering hov the contract vas vritten. The ink, paper, and hov it vas vritden."

"That is highly perceptive of you, Elric." Snape mused following after Elric.

"It is bart of the job descripzion." Elric muttered bitterly, taking the last step of the steps of the bank. He stood there waiting for Snape. "It zure as hell help me stay aliffe out dere...sort of...Is dere anything elze I should go zee?"

Snape thought for a moment and wondered what else Elric would need or show him about the Magical Wizarding World. Robes? No, Elric will probably scrunch his nose at it. Wand... no. Quidditch...no. Snape went the mental checklist on what exactly they should do next. Nothing came up to mind per say. Fortunately for him, Elric's stomach answered for them.

Elric flushed in embarrassment, he covered his stomach. "Zorry, I did not haffe a full breakfast."

"Leaky Cauldron it is then." Snape said curtly, he signaled for Elric to follow him through the busy area.

"Hov does your community communicate?" Elric asked as he walked along side of Snape while avoiding running into anyone or accidentally hitting them with his suitcase. Even though some of them look like they deserve it. "I not once zaw a telephone, mail post or anything of dat manner."

"We use owls." Snape pointed at a shop that was just ahead of them.

"Ovls?" Edward asked, his eyebrow arched upward at the thought of using an owl as a mode of communication. Wouldn't there be a worry of someone taking the owl and get the information that said the animal was carrying. "Is dat effen zecure? Hov long does it take for dem to deliffer mezages? Hov much could dey carry?"

Elric blasted question after question about the mode of communication that wizards have. Fortunately for him, Snape answered him fully without much of a hassle as Elric took in his own words...the majority of his previous and, unfortunately, future students.

"...Hov much do dey uzually cost?"

Snape stopped mid-stride nearly causing Elric to tumble over him.

"Vy did you stop?" Elric complained trying to regain his balance again.

"Do you want an owl?" Snape acquired, looking over at Elric who looked rather embarrassed about it.

"Vell...I vant to get in condact vith my friends and family." Elric explained, he had his head turned towards the direction of the shop that sold owls. He unconsciously gripped the handle of his suitcase harder. "But...I do not knov hov I vould once I get to dat school."

"There are a going to be a few restrictions on what you could and could not write..."

-.-

Edward stared into a cage, his eyebrows slanted downward, and lips pursed in concentration. The owl in question seemed to be copying his expression. One would tilt their head to the side and the other would copy. This seemed to continue on for what seemed like forever.

Edward stared at the owl now with a scowl, to his amusement, the owl attempted to replicate it. With a grin, Edward leaned away from the cage and called out to the owner of the shop. "Vat kind of ovl is he?"

The owl ruffled its feathers at Edward.

"She?" Edward asked he grinned when the owl seemed to understand his words. "Vat kind of ovl is she?"

"That is a Boreal Owl..."

The Boreal Owl that Edward had asked about is about 9 inches long, has brown feathers with white and copper feathers flickered around it. It has a disk-like face with yellow eyes that gave the owl a surprised look. She is a tiny owl compared to a lot of the owls in the shop and the only one that caught Edward's attention.

-.-

In the back corner of the Leaky Cauldron Elric and Snape, along with Elric's owl sat around a table waiting for their late lunch to arrive.

"Your name is nov...Xerxes." Elric cooed into the newly named owl cage that was placed in the seat next to him. His suitcase along with a bag filled with items and a book to take care of Xerxes, along with information he would need to take care of her. Severus sat across of him with a half amused expression. It was rather amusing to see Elric get his fingers get pecked out and not learn his lesson just a moment later.

"Since you are officially going to be teaching Alchemy at Hogwarts." Snape started off to say, as Elric place his travel coat over Xerxes cage. "You are provided with your own private quarters which is already available for once the school year begins. Or would you prefer to move in immediately?"

"Er...ven is dat again?" Elric asked flexing his fingers in an attempt to regain some feeling of them.

"September 1st," Snape replied.

"Hm...hov do the students go to dis school?"

"They go by train."

"Ah...trains..." Elric mused remembering all the times he had to use a train to transverse during his journey to regain his brother's body. A lot of those times made him grumble in dismay at how 'eventful' they were. "If ve vere to go dere nov, hov vould ve get dere?"

"Two ways, floo powder or apparition."

"Vell it be alright if I go py train..." Edward asked, he suddenly felt sick to his stomach for some strange reason at the mention of the mode of transportation. He didn't even know what they are or how they get a person from point a to point b. All he needs is some normalcy at this point. "I do not dink my stomach could handle anything elze at dis point."

"Hey, it's him!"

"You're right, George!"

"Boys come back, don't run!"

Elric and Snape's heads turned to see the Weasley Twins running towards their table. Their sights focused on Elric. "Mr. Elric!"

"Fred, George, are you poth finished vith your shopping?" Elric asked as both boys stood in front of him. They were holding onto the same books he bought for them earlier.

"We are taking a break." Fred started off saying.

"Getting a quick lunch before we continue." George continued on saying.

"How much longer are."

"You going to stay here?"

"I am chust going to eat my lunch and leaffe," Elric said as a waiter came and gave him and Snape's food.

"Excuse me?"

Looking over the top of the twins, Elric saw a woman that looked similar to the twins. Their mother perhaps...

Fred and George turned around to see their mother standing behind them. They could see Charlie standing along side of their mother, and the rest of their siblings were are the other side of the pub.

"Ja?"

"Are you the one that bought the twins their books?" Mrs. Weasley asked she stared at the young man. He seemed far different than what the twins had told her. She would have assumed by their talk, which mostly compromised of a Mr. Elric being a huge bookworm, intelligent beyond comprehension, vastly knowledgeable in Alchemy and not even from the area by the sounds of it. An old age magic that the only person she knew that branch of magic is Dumbledore.

"Mrs. Weasley..." Snape stated, catching the older woman out of her thoughts.

Mrs. Weasley broke out of her thoughts and saw who was sitting with Elric. Her eyes widened at the sight of Snape. "Oh, Professor Snape, I didn't see you there."

Elric shot Snape a look which made the Potion's Master bite back a snarky remark. "This Edward Elric, he will be teaching Alchemy the upcoming year. He was the one that bought your...boys...their books."

"We told you." The twins said to their mother, then they turned their attention back to Elric. "Mr. Elric, this is our mum and that is our brother Charlie."

Elric gave him a short wave. "Hello. You must pe Fred and George's mother, and you are...Charlie right?"

"Ah yes er...Professor Elric." Charlie replied unnerved by Elric's golden colored eyes. He has seen different colored eyes but that is because a good friend of his could turn her eyes into whatever color she wanted them to be. Elric eyes seemed...different. Not in a sense of color but the emotions that range within them. Or lack of for that matter. His accent didn't help for that matter.

Elric waved him off about the title. "I do not like dat term...makes me feel like...."

Elric shook his head as his mind shifted towards memories that made him feel pissed off or a huge sense of dread. "Mr. Elric vill do for nov...Is dere zomething you need?"

"We wanted to say." Fred began.

"Thanks for buying us." George continued.

"Our books." Fred and George finished together. "We promise to study the books you got us to get into your class."

"Heh, dat inclutes all of your clazes, especially...Brofesor Snape class." Elric pointed at Snape, his nose scrunched up when he said Snape's title. "Dat zounted zo veird...pozions vill help you further on your studies in alchemy."

"Really?" Charlie, Fred, and George asked at the same time.

"Really."

-.-

"I'll come by within the week to give you your tickets to the train," Severus said as he and Edward left the Leaky Cauldron. He is helping Edward carrying Xerxes cage as Edward held onto his suitcase, Xerxes items and a paper bag that contained the blonde's dinner for that night. "If you have any more questions, write a letter and have your owl mail it to me."

"Hov vill Xerxes knov where to go precisely?" Edward asked as they crossed the street.

"It is one of the many secrets that this world holds, Mr. Elric." Snape droned.

Edward eyed him from the corner of his eye, scrutinizing him. Several moments later, Edward snorted and looked away from him. "I vill figure it out one vay or another."

Severus' lips curled back in hidden mirth. "Of course, Mr. Elric."

"Could you stop calling me dat!" Edward huffed out while he rolled his eyes. "I do not like it ven my friends calling me dat."

Severus stared at Edward momentarily before he looked away and changed the subject. "Do you have anything you need to ask before we part ways?"

"Vill my letters be monidored?" Edward asked in a low mummer that his lips barely moved as he spoke.

"As long as you do no make it obvious and to not inform anyone that could use it towards their advantage," Severus responded just as quietly. "Am I to assume you are going to tell your brother?"

"Hm..." Edward grinned weakly. "Vat vill be the rebercuzions if ve get caught?"

"Considering that he is your brother, an alchemist and part of a world where no magic exists, just like you." Severus thought over the situation in his mind. What would usually happen involves going to court, or having your mind obliterated. The current case is...different. This time, it is dealing with people that are from a country that has no trace of magic but they deal with something far different. This country, Amestris, have alchemists and it is public knowledge. From what Edward had told him, everyone knows about alchemy and it is not exactly a secret. Unlike the Magical World where everything about magic is hidden away from anyone that does not have a magical background. "Ensure he does not speak it to anyone else about this...However there is the possibility that the government will attempt to read your letters..."

"Do not vorry about dat last part." Edward grinned, a glint of mischief sparkled in his eyes.

Severus stared at Edward wondering if he should be worried for a second. "You already thought of something didn't you?"

"It is zomething dat alchemist knov and share," Edward explained to Severus. "Ve all vrite in a ferze dat ve only understand."

"What?"

Edward only laughed as he quickly picked up his pace when he saw his hotel in the distance. "Dink of alchemy as a...riddle."

Severus only shook his head as he also quickens his pace. "Are all alchemist like you?"

"Combared to all the other alchemist I knov...I am rather normal...zort of..." Edward laughed.

"I am going to regret this aren't I...how normal are they?" Severus asked, deeply regretted when he saw Edward stop walking and shiver excessively.

"You do not vant to knov." Edward shivered in total fear. "Zo much sparkle..."

"Sparkle?"

"You do not vant to knov..."

-.-

Al...

Winry...

Granny...

Hawkeye and Mustang...

Edward sat at the desk that was in his hotel room writing letter after letter, to his loved ones and close friends. The letters covered about his travels so far and only sharing the bare minimum depending on who he was writing to. Some of the letters seemed straightforward or seemed like total gibberish. The only thing was, to someone with an alchemy background will know that the letter that seemed straightforward is total gibberish and the one that is gibberish is straightforward.

Edward looked over his shoulder to see the open window and the curtains are softly billowing by the wind. He had let Xerxes out for the night to allow the owl to stretch his wings and look for a quick midnight snack. Resting his chin on the palm of his left hand, Edward allowed his mind to wonder. Just how is he going to go about teaching a bunch of kids alchemy when they come from a total and different background than him. They all grew up in an environment filled with magic or not knowing about magic and alchemy. At least back in Amestris, everyone had some knowledge of what alchemy is. Here... Nope. Zip. Nada. Zilch.

Picking up the letter that is to be sent to his brother, Edward quickly wrote for some advice about said situation. On how he should go about it. If he does not find a way soon, those kids are going to end up the middle of nowhere. Only given a knife and a riddle to solve... That would only lead to problems on both sides.

'I knew I should not have agreed to this.' Edward thought dropping the pen he was using against the desk.

Plop. Plop.

Something hit the back of Edward's head and it quickly landed on the floor. Edward blinked trying to comprehend what just happened. He turned around to see Xerxes sitting on the bed staring at him and down at the floor repeatedly. Looking down, Edward saw something soft and... oh, Truth...

"GUAH!" Edward screamed and jumped on top of his chair in fright. "Stupid bird, what the hell!"

On the floor is a small mouse staring up at Edward with wide eyes.

-.-

Several countries away...

Alphonse Elric sat crossed legged in the middle of a forest, his eyes closed, shoulders loose and a look of total concentration. Like a switch, one of his eyes cracked open looking out in a seemingly random direction. "Hm...seems like Brother is having a good time."

"What was that Alphonse-sama?"

"Nothing Mei."

-.-

"I wonder what that idiot is doing now?" Winry said to herself as she works on her latest blueprints of an automail someone had ordered for her to make. Her mind did not seem to be fully into it as she kept thinking about her...fiancé. She only shook her head at the thought, Edward asking her to marry him and she agreeing to it. "About time Edward...about time."

"He better come back home in the same shape he left or I'm calling it off." Winry seethed under her breath, tightly holding up her trusty wrench menacingly.

-.-

"Where is it...?" Granny Pinako looked through box after box inside her home. Looking for something she had packed away for safe keeping and perhaps for a future use. Said use is coming up the next spring or summer, and her only hope is that what is in the box managed to survive after so many years being away from the sunlight. "Here it is."

Pinako pulled out a box that was well over her height and brought it out towards the light. With a cutter, she opened the box and attentively took out the contents of the box. A photo album, a small decorative pillow, a velvet box and finally...a white wedding dress. "Good as new."

-.-

"Sir..."

"No."

"Sir."

"You can't make me."

Click.

"Do I have to?"

"Yes. Yes, you do."

Roy Mustang picked up a pen and continued off with his paperwork that was way overdue. His second in command inwardly smiled as she put away her gun and went back to doing her own paperwork. In one or more occasion, Riza would catch Roy staring at her and to ensure he would go back to his work she would pull out her gun. Needless to say, Roy still hasn't gotten the message.

Tag List Below:

Permanent Tag List: @runestarchild @princesskitomi @fanfictionpromptsblog @souleateralicestein @vixen-uchiha @okami-knight @legendaryneckjudgestudent @weird-homosapien @justafanwarrior @vivilakitty @ravennightingaleandavatempus @if-you-give-a-chat-a-cookie @moonwatcher04 @darkshadowguardian @two-faced-biatch @kris-pines04 @mewwitch @edwardhatori @kuroko26 @tall-and-angry @bloody-no-kissu @crazylittlemunchkin @tbehartoo @worlds-tiniest-spook-pastry @melicmusicmagic

#Alchemy Series #FMA #HP #HP/FMA #Chapter 4 #Crossover #Au #Magic vs Science #fanfic

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