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Tomorrow you’d apologize, in the meantime you sit and stared at the night sky. Allowing the cold breeze to freeze your thoughts for a while. Anyone in the common room wouldn’t mind one open window, since it was hot and crowded inside anyways. Full of emotions too, something you got enough of over the summer. Being the first day of the last year. The beginning of the end.
The burning scent of smoke leaving the cigarette between your lips put you at ease. You focused on the moon, the stars and the glimmer of a comet. Right in the perfect time, you thought. Your eyes closed as a wish tried to come to mind... Just one time, could it be someone else and not you who felt everything, just once.
Selfish, the voice of a ghost poisoned your thoughts. Taking the cig out of your lips and staring at the stars, you bit your cheeks as your throat began to burn, it wasn’t the cigarette, you knew, for your eyes were also giving you a warmth sensation and breathing became increasingly harsher.
Losing control of yourself, again, you stared at the stars comforted by the sole presence of the moon, playing a game with the stars which consisted in guessing when they’d blink. You sighed.
The common room was getting louder as more and more students were chatting and reuniting again. You felt sick, selfish and dirty, for acting like a bitch on this special day. Voices inside you battled for finding comfort in the idea of your feelings being valid, but they were losing as the only thought that seemed most logical was your overreacting, craving for attention, self-centered mind.
Blaming yourself was exhausting, but what else could you do? When you knew nothing but find peace in the explanation that there was none else to blame. Easier that way.
The sight of the moon was enough to gift you with a smile. Maybe if you have kept quiet a little longer, things wouldn’t be so hard. Maybe you had to come in terms with your own boundaries... No. Living with yourself as to be someone else was a burden you would not bear to carry tonight.
Something about being alone was good, almost too good. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, and you wouldn’t be surprised if nobody noticed the difference if you weren’t there. It wasn’t a surprise, however, seeing Mary and Marlene laughing near the fireplace.
The comet was long gone now, so wishing to have someone now could’ve been a waste.
Frowned eyebrows, you threw the cigarette out the window, staring at your shoes instead. They were all so full of themselves, big enough to not care, you couldn’t blame her, after all, Marlene was your best friend too. She laughed at something Mary had said.
You swallowed hard. Mary chose Marlene, normally. Lily refused to choose at all, but by doing so she hurt you. Still, you understood. Yet you haven’t expected the boys to know about your conflict. You tried to push away the idea that they, too, would chose her before you.
James was making Sirius and lily laugh, lost in themselves for any worries. Peter was trying to convince Remus to play chess, since no one could beat him and so, no one wanted to play. You didn’t dare to get close.
Remus looking at you caught you cold. Before shifting your sight at the night sky again, eyebrows frowning. He wouldn’t tell, but he heard your heart skipping a beat, as clear as a bird in the calm of the morning or the first thunder before a storm.
He smiled faintly.
Peter would think of it as him having thought five moves ahead and so in silence he panicked, but Remus mind could only be bothered with you.
It was only then when you’ve realized how often he found you glancing over him whenever you were in the window, as if he already was looking after you. The thought of it heated your cheeks. Bones, muscles and heart pounding as strong as the music, hard to pretend it wasn’t there.
Only to glance at him again, this time being him the one taken by surprise. That made you smile. His eyes were calm and the brown color in them were softened by the warm firelight. You noticed a sharp movement near his neck, and his hands, clenching. You raised your eyebrows, daring him to break from the stare. But you both knew, he was too far gone to be saved.
He wasn’t caught by your eyes but by the moon stroking your skin from his spot, accentuating the heavy darkness your eyes carried. When you blinked his mind was free from the spell, he didn’t want it over. There was nothing else to look at, falling in the discovery of a different kind of magic caught between your lips, a magic powerful enough to blurry the line between safe and dangerous. He wanted it until it made him dizzy and drunk on you.
Remus’ mind couldn’t be anywhere else but that window since the first time your eyes intertwined. And he could sense, smell if he was being honest, your hot, sweet, violent, raging pain.
Your attention shifted. The wind raised your cheeks and nose with heat. No star shone as bright as the moon, even if they blinked a thousand times they couldn’t compete. You looked at your hands, then glanced at the party, at your friends.
Cruelty came easy for you, fitted you, consumed you with teeth and gruesome blood, ripping your stomach, making you thirsty, equally dangerous as your desire for flesh, for pain. But hating the monster inside you meant hating yourself with it.
You didn’t want to go, you realized as the crowd began to ceased, not yet.
Taking your time to look at the moon, a warm ache burning inside your heart. You pressed your lips together. You couldn’t help but compare the twinkle of the stars with the memory of his eyes on you seconds ago.
“care for a cig?”
With your legs against your chest he took the invitation to seat. “no,” you’ve said more severely than you’ve wanted, “thank you”.
He shrugged, smiling so politely that if Remus was aware of how awkward he looked he would punch himself. Someone else might’ve missed it, but you laughed.
“you’ve heard?” Your voice was slightly shaken; he could’ve missed the nervous undertone.
He didn’t.
“no... Maybe,” your eyes met again, “yes. Marlene’s side” he rushed to explain himself, you’ve rather he didn’t, “she only told Mary, Lily and me”
Your lips pressed together, and your breathing shifted, he noticed, harsher, heated. He waited, he had all the time in the world. Your defeated sigh relaxed his shoulders and he had his guards down, safe enough for you to speak.
“I don’t want to be mean so easy,” he nodded.
You glanced over his eyes cautiously, repeatedly, hesitant. Selfish, selfish those wants of you, ashamed of even think that you deserved understanding.
“I’m sorry, I really am. I’m sorry I’m constantly exploding on her,” you looked at your hands again, unknowing yourself, “it’s easy to fight with her,” he nodded not daring to separate from your sight “in some way I like it, I can’t avoid the screaming and fighting because it makes me know I’m seen. I’m real... But this” you took a pause, licking your lips and tasting a bitter shame in your tongue “I’m sorry I’m tired of being sorry”
There was silence, only thing you’ve known since this morning. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t have to. For his palm stroked your arm, sharing understanding. He was listening and as ashamed as you were of it, you love talking.
“everyone is afraid of you getting angry,” you heard the girls and marauders laughing somewhere far “I s’pose because they don’t want to lose you... But what do you do with all this rage inside you when nobody wants you?”
He opened his mouth as if a sudden breeze slapped his face, he closed it again after biting his lower lip. His fingers tapping against the pillow underneath you brought all your senses active. You have trapped him.
Looking at your socks and the small length yours and his feet rested. Your eyes started to heat, your inside cheek was bitten lightly, and anyone else near wouldn’t have noticed it, but every breath was heavier to let go than the last one. On the edge, you didn’t cry.
He panicked, knowing he wasn’t the one you needed. Unaware he was exactly the one you wanted. Your hand placement was enough to convince him.
Later he would blame it on the cold wind of the night or the unexpected freezing fingers, the rush of heat that lightened his cheeks and nose.
His hand felt warmer than you’ve imagined. Yet neither of you were talking and you were scared he didn’t find silence as comfortable as you did. With his concentrate frown gone replaced by sparkling eyes and a smile barely noticeable, he softly traced circles in your freezing hand.
“i don’t want this to last, but i don’t want to pretend nothing happened either,” you fidget, trying to convince you of your words “i know they love me as much as i love them,” your voice cracked he wondered if something else might’ve cracked with it “why is it always me who says sorry?”
“what happened?” He just wanted to hear it from your mouth, he wanted to understand as much as you understood yourself.
“i don’t know.” You confessed terrified with the way the words didn’t carry any weight anymore.
He titled his head and for a moment you believed in beauty, and all the poets who claimed to see an angel. So cheesy you chuckled, nose wrinkling. “alright, alright... Please don’t judge?”
“won’t do. Promise” he assured.
“you know how close we are, everyone does.” You nodded to yourself, “sometimes i doubt it. I’m just being silly,” as he didn’t laugh at all, you continued. There was no joke to laugh at as much as you would’ve liked. “it’s easy to drive her up the wall. She gets defensive and i’m scared, most of the times. She gets angry and comes for blood and i give in, all the time. She loves that I’m the one to give up”
You’ve noticed his freckles, they were delicately and one might miss them at first glance but they were there, ethereal, real enough to compare them with magic, as bright as stars in the sky. And his scars, his bloody scars, the wounds that reminded you there was beauty in torment. Face covered in blush as the wind rose increasingly. He was there, in front of you, listening and you might’ve cried.
“you shouldn’t apologize just because you don’t want a problem to last”
“i know!” You didn’t felt guilty this time, “but what else can i do? She won’t, i know it, you know it. I’m just gonna feel bad until I don’t and then everything will be back to normal”
“it’s not normal to live in such pain,”
You cut him off, bitting his words close enough to bleed. “you do it all the time don’t you?”
But he was as much of a threat as you were, and more experienced in hunting. “i do. But i don’t let the bad stuff outlive the good ones”
You pressed your lips, trapped. He smiled, satisfied but you weren’t.
“it’s not her fault, mary’s,” cautiously glancing at the moon, “i would chose anyone over me too,”
“don’t be like that” he had enough pity for himself to give any to you.
“this is why i never talk,”
“i can see that” you glanced at each other and you wondered if there was still a child inside you, strong enough to admit being in the wrong, a child worth saving; as your and his laughter was louder than you’ve wanted.
“i understand. We’re all leaving school behind. We’re all fighting something bigger than us. I just thought it would be different.”
Remus asked what do you mean by that but you didn’t have the answer. You looked at your hands again but there was nothing written in them for you to remember.
“i thought this time, maybe i wouldn’t be the one to feel it all” he nodded, circling the palm of your hands with his thumb. “i thought we would talk, as she said, we’re best friends. But you don’t talk to your best friend for homework only, you don’t respond cold and dry to your best friend’s attempt to a conversation, even if they don’t know how to start one, you don’t” you caught your breath in a bigger, maybe even more dramatic, sigh.
“i do respect her personal space, but we haven’t almost talked at all during summer. And i understand! I just... Don’t i deserve someone too? She has Mary, and Lily, and even James who’s crazy over quidditch, and Sirius and peter and,”
“you have me” you glanced at him, noticing that you have been staring at your fingers intertwined. Maybe it was enough, maybe it wasn’t.
“i know” you shared the guilt of making each other uncomfortable. “but where were you over the summer?” He blinked but sorry wasn’t something someone said to you often. “that’s right. You had your own things. Everyone has. And i don’t blame you for it. I understand, i do, alright? I’m just closest with Marlene and sometimes that’s kind of cathartic”
“well i’m here now”
“yes” you assured, he cradled your hand in his as if it would tell him more than yourself. “but we enjoy silence. It’s our thing you know... I don’t wanna ruin it with emotions and all”
“because i can’t feel any?” You both laughed.
“don’t be dramatic,” you rolled your eyes trying to deny your own smile, “you have a lot on your shoulders already, i didn’t want to be a burden to anyone else”
“you’re not a burden to... Any of us,” you snorted and his jaw clenched, and for a moment you could have kissed him, and then punch him, and then kiss him again after he said “not to me”
“stop,” your shoulders relaxed. You looked at you hand underneath his. “our lives are about to change and i miss us. I miss how close we were. I don’t want a life without all of you, i don’t want a simpler life,” your brows frowned and he could’ve cut you off with a kiss but he didn’t, the thought of it brought a redder shade up to his cheeks “that would if not worse as not living at all”.
You blinked trying to bring yourself to the present, but the future and the past were over your shoulders making your eyes heavier, unbearable. “don’t say stuff like ‘I’m here’, because you are. I can see you. But you weren’t here when i cried yesterday, you probably won’t be here when i need to talk to someone. I’m not saying it’s because you don’t want to, it’s because we can’t be everywhere we’re wanted”
He murmured a reassuring wordless affirmation. “your hands are cold,” placing both hands on yours now, “easy to hold”
Bravery came easy on you; he’d always admired that. As many nervous thought you had you would always end up doing the things you thought were right. Wouldn’t that make you tired?
He put your hands over his shoulders, placing his on your cheeks. Maybe it was enough. Maybe he felt everything, too. “you’re not hard to love, as much of a tragedy that sounds to you”
“stop being sweet” you patted his head harsher than you thought, he just laughed “it’s scaring me”
“can’t i be sweet?” He sounded surprised, specifically to make you laugh. He would never be drained of the addictive sound of it.
“no” you responded, finally allowing you to rest over his weight. He responded with “too bad” seconds later, but that was it.
Your fingers reached his neck trancing lines in his soft hair. Tenderly safe in the selfish, selfish idea of this being enough, of him, of you being enough. But after everything you’ve been through you deserved it.
The wind was calm now. You both enjoyed the cold feeling of your burning cheeks and nose, maybe you liked the idea of using it as an excuse to hug a lot. You smiled through the heat of your bodies. Breathing too drunk in his scent, his touch on your hair, his soft drawings on your waist.
Tomorrow could wait. For now, you felt so close to the stars, like you could reach them. But the moon already caressed your face in between his hands and whispered to you in dreams for years to come to remember you’re not hard to love.