No Rules, Just Love

or

Harry and Luna Gone Wild

--- Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming, "WOW! What a ride!"  -- Hunter S. Thompson

We were riding on the back of a stolen thestral somewhere near Hogsmeade, making our way along the edge of the Forbidden Forest, when it hit me like a malicious Confundus Charm. But obviously, it was not a Confundus Charm—you never feel one of them hit you. I had been struck by something else, something unrecognizable to me at the time, something even more insidious; I had been struck by love. It was also the moment that  I realized I was done running—from war, from the world, from myself.

I remember looking back over my shoulder and saying something like, "I feel odd—uh—peculiar; why don’t you take the reins—" And suddenly there was a light coming at me from her big, silvery-blue eyes. It was bright and electric, like a flashbulb—only it didn’t go away. I just kept staring at it like a deer in her headlights.

She started laughing, laughing with that strange, sphinxlike laugh of hers that always made me wonder if she knew the answer to a puzzle the rest of us did not—if she was seeing with great clarity things invisible to us unwashed mortals.

All I had on was a tuxedo shirt and jacket, a Union Jack Speedo, and a pair of moccasins. I have no idea where I got them. The party had gotten boring, and we decided to leave. I must have randomly grabbed them from a pile of clothes on the way out. She was wearing nothing save for a kaleidoscopic poncho, a cowboy hat, and boots. Her dirty blonde hair was like a cascade of frothy whitewater tumbling downward from the top of a petite waterfall. 

Luna Lovegood was a walking hallucination, a psychedelic head trip adorned with radish earrings. She had a dreamy gaze and unwavering belief in things no sane person could believe. But that was the thing—she was anything except insane. She was quite likely the sanest person I'd ever met. She didn't give a damn about the rules of the game that held others captive. She made her own rules, and if you could not handle them, well, that was your problem, not hers.

We stopped and dismounted. Luna sighed and unceremoniously pulled up her poncho, exposing to the light the alabaster perfection of her lithe, naked body. “This was an exceptionally poor idea,” she moaned as she looked down at her red, chaffed loins. “Thestrals are particularly unsuited for riding this way.”

She smiled as she conjured a pair of jeans and pulled them on. We remounted the thestral with her at the reins. We rode on with me leaning on her back, my hands under her poncho cupping her soft, modest breasts.

I was an unresolved rebel in a post-war Magical World—traveling, searching in a world that was still crawling out from under the death and destruction, a world where I thought we were supposed to be done with all of the madness. However, it was not—and neither was I.

The truth was, I was anything but done. I was a long way from done. In fact, I was just getting started on my search for meaning, for answers to questions I had yet to ask. The world behind us was supposed to be evolving into Utopia. It was not. It was traveling like a yo-yo returning to the top of its string, like a boomerang coming back to the hand that threw it. We were headed backward into a dystopian jumble—and Luna was the only person who saw that.

Everyone else wanted to talk about peace beyond Voldemort, to rebuilding the remnants of the Magical World, to ‘move on’. But moving on to where, what, and how? Most of them wanted to reinvent the past, to bring forth a bigger, better, new and improved version of the same old, Vogon-style bureaucracy that delivered us here in the first place. Bollocks 2.0. No thanks!

 I wanted—I still needed something real, something raw, something that made my blood pump faster and my mind race. And Luna, bless her crazy heart, she understood that. She lived that. She was that.

Our thestral deserted us at the boundaries of Hogwarts and Hogsmeade. We were on our own. So we had to hit the road in earnest—so to speak. Not the Muggle road, but the magical one. We never apparated. That was too clean, too easy, too boring. We went the hard way, the scenic way—the fun way. 

We survived Floo Powder mishaps and broom flights that left our hearts racing and bodies shaking with excess exhilaration. We zigged and zagged across the wizarding world like a pair of rogue bludgers. We dared to venture through hidden groves, dense and disorienting foliage, ancient magic, and corrupted areas of the secret Elven Forest of Baudoin. 

Luna fit in surprisingly well with the elves. She loved wine and had barely eaten meat of any kind for years. Her unique views of things and penchant for expounding on odd subjects seemed to fascinate them. This probably saved me from becoming a target for archery practice, which was their initial inclination. However, I was craving a rare burger and fries with a bottle of firewhisky. So, we headed ‘on’.

We surfed on the backs of Kelpies off the Isle of Skye in waves that would wreck a freighter, we dueled toreador style with a Jamaican Rolling Calf near Ocho Rios, and we wrestled with an angry Amarok in a forest on the coast of Greenland. No adventure was too bold. No risk was too great.

Late one evening in Norway, we were seeking a place to crash when we happened upon the entrance to a large cave. We had eaten some mushrooms given to us by a gnome gardener earlier in the day and were finally starting to come down. 

“What is this place?” gasped Luna, grabbing her nose as we stepped inside. “It smells rather unpleasant.”

“Rather unpleasant. It's bloody minging,” I gagged, trying to avoid blowing chunks.

“Do you think it is home to a dragon or maybe—a Crumple-Horned Snorkack?” 

“I think—,” I started to say, and that is when I saw it in the light from my wand tip. There were piles of money, weapons, jewelry, and valuables stacked taller than either of us all over the place. “Bloody hell! This place is a troll horde.”

Luna had a pouch similar to Hermione’s infamous beaded bag. We started stuffing it full with a fortune that could sustain us indefinitely. Then, just as we were about to leave, we heard gruff voices. The trolls were returning. 

“Nox,” I said as I pulled out my cloak and covered us just in time. Three of the biggest, ugliest trolls imaginable clambered into the cave carrying torches, bags, and a brace of lambs. 

“Hey,” said one of them as he tossed his bag on a pile. “I smell something.”

“Me, too,” said the one with the lambs. “I smells human.”

“Where are they?” said the third as he pulled out a dagger. “I love eating human.”

“Humans are delicious,” replied the second one.

“This one must be female,” said the third. “I smell oakmoss, honeysuckle, and maybe a subtle hint of wet cedar.”

“You’re an idiot,” snarled the first troll as he punched his partner.

It was time to get out of there. The cloak may have rendered us invisible, but it did not hide our scent.

We edged along the wall as the trolls started to look behind piles and under the tables. Then, just as we were about to make good with our escape, I bumped into a sword leaning against a stack of firewood. It clattered and rattled to the floor, and the chase was on. We ran blindly through the trees, across streams, and around boulders in the pale moonlight. The trolls were tracking us like bloodhounds hot on a scent. Finally, we were winded, fearing this was the end, when we topped a rise at the crack of dawn. Just as the trolls came over after us, the sun poked up over the horizon. You could hear a gritty, grinding sound as they were turned into grotesque, stone statues.

We collapsed on the ground and slept for several hours. When we woke up, we made love in the shadows of the trolls before continuing onward, laughing about the chase and our gathered fortune as tears of joy trickled from those silvery-blues.

Two days later, we tempted our fates a second time. We found ourselves in the darkest recesses of Knockturn Alley, dickering over the sale of our booty with sketchy goblins and wizards that would just as soon slit our throats as pay us.  The remaining smell of the troll cave on the loot and us must have deterred them. Who would be foolish enough to cross a pair of people crazy enough to raid a horde and live to tell the tale? We left London with a fortune large enough to keep us going almost indefinitely.

From there, we were on a constant hunt for something, anything that would rescue us from the ordinary. We were addicts craving our next fix of adrenaline. We did whatever was necessary to make our hearts and minds pound. We were almost captured by cannibals while stalking Nundu in the jungles of Uganda. We almost plummeted over a cliff to our deaths while evading a Zouwu in the foothills of the Himalayas in Bhutan... that one nearly ended us. Nearly, but we lived for nearlys.

Somewhere along the way, I completed my fall for Luna. I was unbreakably, unshakably, undeniably in love with her. Bloody hell, who wouldn't be? Her appeal was irresistible, like trying to defy gravity. She was a wild thing in a world full of tamed, tired souls. We were both misfits, survivors of a war that had tried to grind us down with the whole of the Magical World. However, where others had failed, we came out on the other side sharper, harder, and more determined than ever to live life on our own terms.

I professed my love to Luna in a village named Tabatinga on the banks of the Amazon at the intersection of Brazil, Colombia, and Peru. She said she had known for months. She was just waiting for me to open my eyes and see it. “It has been tattooed on your face for a very long time,” she laughed. “All you needed to do was look in the mirror and read the words.”

We got married in the middle of the night under a full moon on the steps of a run-down chapel somewhere deep in the jungle. The only witnesses to our spontaneous vows were a half-crazed, South American centaur and a couple of wayward house elves who'd lost their way. It was perfect. No pomp, no ceremony—just a reception hosted by the native Matsés people. We were formally united, high on love, and their special cocktail made with the sweat of Monkey Frogs that enhanced her already big, silvery-blue eyes. Our love was like the force holding together the nucleus of a newly formed atom. We were ready to take on the world. And the world did not realize it—it did not stand a chance.

Getting married didn't slow us down. If anything, it sped us up. We were unstoppable, tearing through life like fiendfyre. Luna got pregnant pretty quickly— ’something in the water,’ she claimed, or 'maybe a misfired charm’. Who knows? Who cares? Our kid came out screaming, and we named him Sirius after the only other lunatic I ever respected.

Sirius Betelgeuse Potter-Lovegood was as tough as Graphorn hide from day one. He had the spectral, wise eyes of an Opaleye dragon, his mother's hair, and my determined temperament. He grew up fast, and he grew up right in a world drenched in chaos, of shifting landscapes and shifting minds. We did not baby him or sugarcoat things—we didn't know how. We were too busy living, too busy trying to extract every last drop of craziness out of the world before it squeezed us dry. And he thrived on it. 

A few years later, Luna got pregnant again—this time with twins. She gave birth to a boy and a girl.  They were born in the middle of a November cyclone. The sky cracked open like some cosmic omen. Luna screamed, and they hit the ground running. We named them Cygnus Deneb and Lyra Vega, keeping with our celestial theme. Lyra was pure chaos, a whirlwind of dirty-blonde energy that even Luna had trouble keeping up with. Cygnus was quieter, almost brooding, but there was a darkness in him, a depth that reminded me of the things I tried not to think about.

We did not do the whole parenting thing by the book—I suppose there must be a book, maybe some kind of manual. Our old friend, Hermione Granger, was too busy making and raising babies with our other old friend, Ron Weasley, to chime in regularly and say, ‘I’ve read about that, and…’.  

We did our best, or you might say worst, but we do not give a damn what you think. We taught them the way we lived our lives: fast, loose, and with a healthy dose of skepticism for authority. Hogwarts had no idea what was about to hit them when our kids started rolling up to the gates. They were a new breed, the vanguard of an updated blend of magic and madness. They were a natural evolution. They were destined to be the climactic act of an avant-garde play—and they made sure everyone knew it.

By the time he was eleven, Sirius could outfly me on a broom, outspell me in a duel, and out-think anyone who tried to put him in a box. His mother was exceptionally delighted when he caused a hatstall that finally ended with him joining Ravenclaw. If he had landed anywhere else, he would have probably spent his whole seven years in detention. Instead, he was groomed and revered into a status usually reserved for some sort of messiah. His No Rules, Just Love Society is the rave or bane, depending on who you ask, of the modern wizarding world.

Cygnus and Lyra were equally disruptive to the status quo upon their arrival at the school. During the sorting, Cygnus flowed, almost too easily, into Slytherin ranks. When he was made their prefect in his fifth year over a son of Draco Malfoy and another one of Pansy Parkinson, he turned the house upside down. 

Lyra was a little stick of dynamite tossed in the middle of the Gryffindor tables. She sparked a revival of the old Gryffindor. It was no longer a house that had settled into a comfortable chair and was getting by living on the stories and exploits of previous members, the likes of Godric Gryffindor, Sir Cadogan, Nearly-headless Nick, Dumbledore, the Marauders, Fred and George Weasley, and, of course, her father. 

And so, our lives continued to careen forward, a wild ride with no brakes, no map, and no idea where the hell we were going, or what we were going to do next. That was the beauty of it from the beginning. We were never looking for a destination. There were no ‘To Do’ or ‘Bucket’ lists. A conversation at the next table in a restaurant could send us out the door without dessert. If we had not done it, it was because we had not thought of it. If we had thought of it, we were either doing it or on the way. We were riding the train of life to experience the highs and the lows, the moments of pure, unfiltered reality. Anything less would be a betrayal of everything we had ever done.

With the time finally approaching for me to move onto my next and greatest adventure, I am realizing I have found more than love, I have found happiness, fulfillment, and life—not the kind they try to sell you in books or movies, but the real kind, the kind that comes from knowing you're living on your own terms with someone who really gets you, and who you really get. Luna was my partner in crime, my co-pilot on life’s crazy ride. We built something that couldn't be broken by time, war, or anything. Our love was a fierce, burning thing, a beacon in the dark---two bright, silvery-blue beacons. A fire carrying us through the worst and the best of it all.

So yeah, I have had a happy life—a life most people cannot understand, a life they could not handle if they tried. But it is mine—mine and Luna’s—and I would not trade a single second of it for all the safe, quiet lives in the world.

And that light—the one that hit me like a curse all those years ago, blazing out of her silvery-blue eyes—it never went out. Not once. Not even now.

—So this isn’t the end. Just the part where I go on ahead and wait for her to catch up—