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SIMON
Sorry for the late reply- service out here isn’t great. But of course- you’re welcome to visit the goats. They’d be happy to see you, I’m sure.
My toothbrush is in my mouth, and I’m staring at the text message blinking back at me, my phone balanced on the edge of the sink (Baz would have a fit if he knew).
It’s been days since I sent Agatha a text asking to visit her and the goats at Watford, and I’d honestly forgotten about it. It’s not that I don’t want to go- I do- I just haven’t mentally prepared myself for actually having to take the trip up there.
I’m not great at actually planning further into the future than a few days. That’s better than the seconds I was managing before, though.
That, and I never told Baz I even sent that text. I did it on a whim- a stupid thing while he was at a class and I was at home, staring at a faded picture of Ebb and the goats and longing for a piece of that back.
I hadn’t actually expected her to reply.
Partly because I’m never sure if Agatha actually likes our company, most of the time. (To be fair, in recent years, for most of the time we’ve spent together our lives have been in some kind of grave danger.) I’m even less sure that Niamh does- especially after I denied her the opportunity to dissect real (are they real?) (Margaret seemed to think they were real) dragon wings.
But despite that, despite all of the baggage that comes crashing down from the top shelf every time we take a trip up to Watford, I want to go.
I turn the light off and go back into the bedroom, scrambling under the covers as Baz wordlessly holds them open for me.
His face glows yellow in the soft light from the lamp, and neither of us say a word as I wrap my wings around him, sharing the same breath, frozen in a single moment.
This has become routine, on our good days.
Today though, the silence is itching to be broken. By me. (It’s usually by me.) (He’s better at holding delicate things.)
“Baz,” I whisper, even though he’s right in front of me, between my arms. I don’t know why we whisper. I think we’re still afraid of shattering something. But I don’t think we’re that breakable (were we ever breakable? Ever?) anymore. We’ve built up some reinforcements over the last few months. Several layers, at least.
“Snow.” I roll my eyes at the nickname, but mostly out of duty.
Baz is the only one who calls me that.
“Can we go to Watford?” I blurt out. I blurt a lot of things out. It’s easier that way, rather than building up slowly to them. It gives me less time to reconsider, to talk myself out of saying something I really do want to say.
He looks taken aback, but no more than he usually does. “Now?”
I think he really would go now, if I asked him to. I think if I told him I needed to, that I had to, that he’d get up and get dressed in seconds, fumbling for his keys to Fiona’s car as he smooths back his hair.
“Merlin, no. Next week, maybe. When the holidays start.”
We’re not going up to Oxford for Christmas until the 23rd. And we’re not seeing Ruth until the 27th. It should work out.
Baz’s brows are still scrunched up slightly, trying to decipher my hidden meanings. I think I spent too long burying my meanings behind meaninglessness. I think sometimes he forgets that most of the time with him, I have no hidden meanings. “To visit the catacombs?”
We’ve been twice now, to see her. Last time, Headmistress Bunce had put in a memorial to her, after asking mine and Lady Ruth’s permission first. (I’m still touched she even bothered to ask me.) It’s nice.
It’s still a lot though. Too much right now. Too much maybe forever.
But that’s okay, I think.
“No. I mean, unless you want to go. I wanted to see the goats.” I break eye contact with him for a moment. “Especially around Christmas time.”
One of Baz’s arms snakes up to cradle my chin, forcing me to resume our eye contact. “Of course. Of course, we can go.”
“I can’t believe you’re not letting me drive.”
I’m sitting in the passenger seat of Baz’s aunt’s MG, my arms crossed as I stare stubbornly out of the window.
“You used to be afraid of driving Fiona’s car.”
“It’s been ages since I drove,” I mutter, risking a glance at him. Looking at Baz while he’s driving is dangerous for me. Even in his aunt’s shabby car, he still looks like he’s straight out of a 1950s black and white film.
“We really should get you a license,” he replies, ignoring my tone.
I roll my eyes. “Pfft. I don’t need a licence. You can just spell me one.” I don’t want to take the written test. I left that behind at Watford. And then again at university. For now. I think.
Baz throws me a slightly alarmed look. “Bunce is a bad influence on you.”
“And to think, Penny’s mum was so sure it was the other way around.”
“Speaking of Mitali,” (How is Baz on a first name basis with Penny’s mum? I don’t think I’ll ever be on a first name basis with Penny’s mum), “Does she know we’re coming?”
I shake my head. “No. I didn’t think she needed to. I think she’s at home for the holidays now, anyway.”
“I can’t imagine Penelope’s in her good books right now, spending Christmas in America.”
“I’m glad I wasn’t there for that conversation.”
We spend the latter part of the drive in relative silence, my hand tangled with his as he brushes with the speed limit. It still makes me think of America, these long car journeys. I’d quite like to go back, one day. To make better memories there. Ones more like this- peaceful car rides and soft breaths, the ability to bring Baz’s hand to my lips whenever I want to.
I’d never have dared to in all of America.
The grounds at Watford are mostly deserted, most students and staff having retreated for the holidays. I think about that last Christmas I almost spent here, before running after Baz. I’ll spend my life running after Baz, if I have to. I don’t anymore though, not with his chilly fingers laced surely with mine.
It’s not cold enough for snow yet, but there’s a thin layer of ice covering the grass, that crunches under our feet.
We make the slow walk up to the barn, a couple of the goats grazing lazily outside. Agatha’s sitting in the open door, a cup of tea nursed in her hands and her walking stick leaning against the barn. A small part of me wonders how she gets her hair to still look so perfect when she’s sleeping in a barn. (Only Agatha would be able to pull of the whole living in a barn look.)
As I approach, one of the bigger goats nudges up against my legs, in almost a cat-like gesture, and I lean down to pat its head.
“They remember you- from Ebb,” Agatha, says instead of a greeting.
I look up at her. “You really think? They haven’t seemed to for the last two years.” A couple of other goats have wandered over to see what all the fuss is about.
Agatha takes a sip of her tea. “They’re calmer now.”
I don’t mention how much calmer she seems; how different she is since she gave up her wand and moved in with the goats. And since Niamh.
It’s a nice sort of different.
Baz is standing a few awkward feet away, his hands now shoved into his pockets- he doesn’t want to freak the goats out too thoroughly. “Afternoon, Wellbelove.” He nods in her direction. Despite everything, Baz and Agatha still haven’t exactly warmed to each other.
She nods vaguely back, before returning her attention mostly to me (I think a bit of her attention will always be on the goats now. Like Ebb.)
“You both better come in. I have something you might want to see.”
She leads me through the entrance, Baz following reluctantly a few steps behind. I glance back at him, and catch a glimpse of him sneering at the goats as they scatter around him, like he’s some kind of anti-goat forcefield.
My breath catches in my throat as we enter what was once Ebb’s living area- so little has changed, and the loss of her still stings like a flesh wound. She’d want me to cry, if I felt like it, so I don’t bother to stop the few tears that do escape down my face, just at the rawness of it.
Baz’s hand slips into mine, as he finally levels his steps with me.
“Just give me a moment,” Agatha murmurs, before slipping up into the loft. Baz squeezes my hand gently, and I squeeze right back.
Niamh’s pottering about with a couple of the goats in the back of the barn, but I don’t think she’s noticed us. Or maybe she has, and she’s pretending she hasn’t. Either way, she hasn’t acknowledged us.
Before long, Agatha’s climbing nimbly down the thin set of wooden stairs, cradling a small bundle in her arms, like she’s afraid of breaking it.
She brings us over to the small coffee table and sofa, and unwraps the bundle.
Inside, are each of the goats and figurines I bought Ebb every Christmas.
All in perfect condition, ceramic bodies shining in the dim light of the fire.
I reach out a finger and smooth it over one of them, the one I first remember buying her. A small brown and white goat standing with its tail in the air.
Baz’s hand tightens round mine, though he can’t possibly understand the significance of these.
“Niamh found them wrapped up in a box upstairs when I was first moving in. And I remembered you bringing them back, refusing to leave for the holidays until you’d delivered it to her. And I thought- I thought maybe you’d like to take one with you? I mean you can take them all, if you want, but I’d love to display them somewhere. It would be a great way for her to live on, I think.”
I nod, my fingers tightening around the one I’d been holding. “She’d love that.” My throat’s thick with emotion, and I don’t bother trying to push it back.
Agatha offers me a small smile. She never understood my relationship with Ebb, never really tried to. But she’s trying now. And I look around, at everything she’s doing here, and I think it’s the most alive Ebb’s felt since her death. It’s the closest to her I’ve been.
It’s lovely.
BAZ
We don’t stay for very long after Wellbelove brings out the little figurines. There are tear tracks down Simon’s cheeks, but I don’t think he’s upset. Just emotional, and missing Ebb.
It’s an emotion I’m familiar with.
We walk slowly back across the grounds, Snow’s hand in mine, whilst his other is shoved in his coat pocket, clasped around that little porcelain goat.
We’ll have to find somewhere nice to put it, back at the flat.
We’re about halfway to the car, when Simon pulls on my arm. I stop automatically, turning to him and shivering in the slight breeze.
“Alright Snow?”
He looks nervously around him. “There’s somewhere else I want to go.”
I’m surprised, but Simon’s constantly knocking me off my feet (figuratively and literally). “The catacombs?”
He shakes his head. “God, no. Not- not at the moment.” He’s been a few times, but it’s a lot. It’s a lot all at once, and he’s doing so well. “There’s something I want to show you.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Lead the way, Snow.”
It doesn’t take me very long to work out that he’s taking me to Mummer’s House. “As romantic as this is Snow, it’s still someone else’s room,” I say, as we approach the entrance.
He shakes his head at me again. “Just come with me.”
I don’t question him, as he pulls me past the other rooms- we pass Dev and Niall’s old room, and the ghost of a smile plays on my lips as I think of the shit we used to get up to in there, while I was avoiding my own roommate (it never worked- I couldn’t avoid my own thoughts).
Eventually we reach the staircase I pushed him down, and he pulls me up it behind him.
We get to our door at the top of Mummer’s Tower, and I run my hand slowly across the wood panelling, closing my eyes and breathing it in.
“What did you want to show me?” I whisper, though my eyes are still closed. If I focus, it’s almost like being back in sixth year. Except now Simon’s hand is wound with mine, and if I wanted to, I could lean over and kiss him.
I do. Just for the sake of seventeen-year-old Basilton. This one’s for you, I think, as my tongue brushes with his.
He pulls away after only a moment, though. “Look at this,” he murmurs, matching my tone. His hand reaches across to the handle and opens it with ease. I stare at him in shock as he walks into the room. The room that shouldn’t be ours anymore.
And yet. As he pulls me in, it seems to look exactly the same as when I last left it (should it look different? Would the new occupants have changed it?).
And yet. It still- smells the same? Like my overly fancy soap and the faded hint of burnt wood.
And yet.
And yet.
And yet.
“We’re not even students anymore. It shouldn’t have opened for us at all. I mean- it’s the holidays,” I murmur to him, still trying to take it all in.
He turns to me, taking my other hand as well, and my mind can’t quite comprehend the image. Simon Snow. Holding my hands. In our room.
In the place where it all began. Simon will tell you it began in a burning forest and my ancestral home in Hampshire, but this will always be it for me. The place I learned to love again. The place I learned I was still capable of love, that my heart wasn’t completely undead yet.
“Penny spoke to her mum a couple of weeks ago,” Simon starts, dragging my attention back to the present, “You were wrong. The room rejected any other occupants after you left. It sealed itself off from the school. No one else has even been able to enter it.”
I think I’m going to cry. “But you could.”
“We can, Baz. This part of Watford will always be ours.”
Even if the gates don’t open for him. Even if he doesn’t see himself as magic (he’s more magic than anything else I’ve ever experienced). Even if he gave everything up, time and time again to save this safe haven of a school where all our worst memories lie.
I don’t have enough words. Simon’s eyes are shining as they stare into mine, and I know mine mirror his (I always mirror him).
I push him up against the wall, the wall I used to dream of kissing him against. And I kiss him.
And kiss him.
And kiss him.
And it’s like being home.
We wind up on Simon’s bed, wings wrapped around me protectively as I lean against his chest.
“Imagine how much better it would’ve been,” Simon laments, as I play absentmindedly with his tail.
“You know, when I returned to Watford without you, I slept in this bed every night,” I say quietly, trying to gauge his reaction.
His arms tighten impossibly round my waist. “I wish we had done this at Watford,” he mumbles, and I don’t need to see him to know the familiar regret in his eyes.
“There’s a lot of things I wish we had done at Watford.”
“I mean, technically, we’re still at Watford now.”
I twist in his arms, so I’m facing him. “Well, when in Rome, Snow.”
He leans in slightly, but before our lips meet, I grab a pillow from behind him and whack him with it, putting all my energy in.
“Oi, what the actual fuck?”
I’m cackling (I’m a menace; he’s a menace; we’re a menace), as he rubs the side of his head. “I always wanted to do that,” I manage, between breaths.
“I miss the Anathema,” he mutters, dodging my arm when I reach for him. He gives in after only a moment though, and finally, finally, our lips meet.
When he pulls away entirely too soon, he pushes his forehead into mine, breathing heavily as he whispers, “I like this better than fighting.”
I laugh against him, all breath and no control, but he’s not done. “Is this doing it for you? More than the Mage’s bed?”
I flick him on his head, but he just laughs harder. “So much more,” I breathe into his ear, and he shivers.
I pull the faded Watford-issue sheet around us- the one that still smells slightly of the old versions of ourselves, the paper cut-outs we left behind, all fire and cedar- and attack his neck with a fervour that would put even the Las Vegas vampires to shame.
Before we leave, we both stand by the door for an excessive amount of time, the air growing oppressive around us.
“Baz?” Simon’s the one to finally break the silence, which is becoming an increasingly common- and welcome- occurrence.
“Snow?”
“I know-” he hesitates, fumbling for the right words as they scatter around him, “I know what we should probably do here. I know we should probably try to get the room to stay open again. Do the noble thing and cast some spell on it to make us forget us.” He looks up at me, emotion swirling recklessly in his eyes. “Baz, I’m so fucking sick of doing the noble thing.”
I cradle his face in my hands, the way I was never able to do before in this room, when he was facing so much of this alone. “I know, Simon. Me too.”
And, hand in hand, we walk out of our room at the top of the tower, not for the last time.
The room that will remain ours, and only ours, a shrine to our past selves, the people who led us to who we are now.
We grew up at the top of a tower.
But we’ll grow old somewhere else.
(Preferably not Hackney Wick forever.)
(But I’d do it. I’d stay in Hackney Wick for eternity, if that eternity was with him.)