Chapter Text
Let’s commence to coordinate our sights,
Get them square to rights
‘Oh Ominis. Sebastian sent word by owl, told me everything. I came as soon as I could.’
Ominis does his best to hold back the unimpressed huff that threatens. He’s really far too happy that Anne’s here, in Hogwarts of all places, as if her absence since last year was just a bad dream, to take much offence at his best friend sharing the more private parts of his life he wished would remain so. Far too happy to lecture her about journeying from Feldcroft on her own, in spite of her steadily declining health.
‘Does it still hurt?’ She asks, tentatively, her fingers brushing his cheek. He’d forgotten about it, in all truth, until that moment. Her light fingers spark sleeping nerves back to life, and he’s suddenly aware of the bruised skin in a flush of heat that spreads further than his father hand did.
‘I’m fine,’ He says automatically, taking a minute step back, hoping it’s re-assuring, she has absolutely no business worrying about him, in her condition. He hears her chuckle, but there’s no mirth to it.
‘Sebastian said you’d say that.’
‘Sebastian likes to think everyone else’s business is his business.’ He really can’t help the indignant huff that escapes him that time.
She sighs. There’s a few seconds of silence, disturbed only by the background castle chatter and the far-off notes of Bocherrini’s Minuet filtering through.
‘He was worried, that’s all.’
Ominis sniffs. Resists the urge to argue it wasn’t worry that led Sebastian to ignoring his request and sneaking after him to spy in the first place. She sighs again. A heavy weary thing.
‘I’m going to hug you now.’
Anne doesn’t give him a chance to rebuff, her arms looping round him, clasping together gently at the small of his back. He knows he’s too tense. She hums against him, the sound rumbling.
‘For your information, it’s uncomfortably weird hugging someone who’s just standing there like they’ve been petrificus totalus-ed.’ She leans back slightly. ‘Here.’
She re-positions them, her arms under his, snaking up his back, palms pressing into the point where his shoulder blades meet, it brings their bodies closer, her forehead ever so gently resting on his shoulder. He lets his arms rise, hovering, unsure what to do with them. He settles for patting her back, hopes it conveys the right amount of affection for the current predicament.
She’s always been overly tactile, even from the first day they met. He thinks back, the way she’d always touched his shoulder in greeting, as if to say ‘I’m here’. He’d never quite had the heart to tell her she doesn’t need to. He thinks of the way she liked to fully link their arms, between classes, half dragging him along. The way the side of her hand pressed against his cheek as she leant in during a History of Magic class to whisper a quiet, private joke, minty breath tickling his ear. It’s not, comme il faut, but that must just be the way she is with everyone, he supposes, not having the power of observation on his side. He’s missed her, their easy friendship.
She laughs, sounding almost like her normal self, and it positively vibrates through him. Something long forgotten uncoils in the pit of his stomach, he holds his breath.
The moment passes.
She lets go, her hands slipping away as she takes a step back.
He feels lost as she does so, like his wand snuffed out momentarily, cast into an abyss.
‘C’mon, let’s go find Sebastian.’ She says, sounding resigned, not looping her arm around his.