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When Sebastian Sallow was seven years old, his parents died. When Sebastian Sallow was fifteen years old, his twin sister was cursed. When Sebastian Sallow was sixteen years old, he killed his uncle. When Sebastian Sallow was eighteen years old, he was sent to Azkaban.
And there he stayed for 247 days. 247 days spent in hell on earth. 247 days of being forced to listen to the moans and wails of his fellow suffering prisoners. 247 days of suffocating under the dread that coated the place like tar. 247 days of wondering whether his twin was still alive.
It was this last thought that haunted him more than the Dementors ever could. He’d hardly gotten any chance to see her when he had been taken in only two years prior, and he certainly never got the chance to anymore now that he was in Azkaban.
She was getting worse, he was sure of it. There was no other reason she would refuse to visit him. Which meant he had to leave here. Because if she was getting worse, then she was running out of time…
He had to leave. He had to make sure she was still alive keep her alive. Even now, despite everything, he was determined– no, desperate to find a cure.
So he escaped. He wasn’t quite sure himself how he’d managed to do it. All he could say was that he’d been desperate and lucky enough to somehow manage it. Of course, he knew this rare stroke of good luck would most certainly not last, so he’d have to find Anne a cure before he was recaptured.
He’d be damned if he was sent back there without saving her first. Her dying was far worse than a dementor’s kiss or whatever other inhumane punishment they’d have in store for him.
He’s now been on the run for a week. At least, he thinks it’s been a week. He’s stopped being able to properly tell time after spending so long in the darkness of his cell. He’s survived on wild fruits, animals he’s hunted and cooked, and scraps of food he’s found in a few stray homes’ trashcans. And luck. A whole lot of luck.
He didn’t get his hopes up though. He’d lived long enough to know life only pretended to give you lucky breaks so it would hurt that much more when they took it all away.
Well, it won’t take Anne away.
He wasn’t quite sure where he was going most days. He’d escaped from Azkaban mostly on foot, and as he was entirely unfamiliar with the surrounding areas, he was mostly looking for a trace of society. Just something familiar that could lead him to Feldcroft. He’d need to make sure to find a way to get there without being spotted, as he was positive his escape was all over the Daily Prophet by now.
During his week-long wandering, he’d been left to stew in his own thoughts. The isolation didn’t bother him as much as it used to, as he’d grown accustomed to being alone. His thoughts though….those were what bothered him.
Even now, now that he was free and on his way to find Anne, his cursed mind still found ways to plague him. ‘How do you know she won’t turn you in?’ That damned voice whispered to him. It had been keeping him company as long as he could remember, and had only grown louder during his time in Azkaban. ‘She turned you in last time.’
He shook his head. No, she didn’t. Bee and Ominis did that, not her.
‘But she didn’t stop them, did she?’ It whispered back. ‘She wanted you arrested. You know that. You remember the look on her face after what you did. You know she hates you now.’
‘They all do. And you deserve it.’
He swallows the lump in his throat, but makes no reply. It’s always better to just let the voice take its course. He’d tried fighting it before, but the constant drain of energy from the dementors made even that difficult. So he just listened now.
And so the voice continued on. And on. And on. For hours, maybe. It could never seem to run out of things to say. Or run out of reasons for him to hate himself more than he already does.
He’d gotten so lost in his own thoughts, he hadn’t even noticed he’d been approaching a cabin until a door opened in front of him. He immediately stopped in his tracks and ducked behind the wall, heart seizing in his throat. Had they seen him?! He didn’t have his wand…..he’d have to knock them out with his bare hands.
The person- a woman- didn’t seem to have noticed his presence however, as she stepped out with a teapot in hand. She made her way over to the flowers blooming in her garden, and began to pour water from the kettle. She was humming softly to herself, and he couldn’t help but notice that the tune sounded strangely…familiar.
His eyes squinted in confusion as he realized several other things about her seemed familiar as well. Something about her hair, her voice, the way she walked…. It stirred a strange sense of nostalgia in him that he couldn’t quite place……
Only for it all to make sense when she turned around enough for him to catch a glimpse of her face. His breath caught in his throat.
Large, warm eyes that brought chocolate to mind. They looked a bit more tired than he remembered, but still just as gentle and kind as ever. They were unmistakable.
It was Bee.
His heart pounded in his chest as he watched this girl…no, this woman continue on watering her garden as though her very presence hadn’t just tilted his whole world on its axis.
There’s no way…..there’s no way it’s her….it can’t be her…….
But it was her. It was undeniable now. The airy, breezy way she moved; the soft wisps of baby hair framing her youthful face; the quiet, carefree humming. It was her. It was all so her, it hurt.
All at once he could feel a rush of memories flooding back to him. Memories of when they used to meet up in the transfiguration courtyard in the morning, trading candies they’d gotten at Hogsmeade and playing cards. Hours spent in the library, reading in comfortable silence, because they knew each other well enough to not need to talk. Weekends spent at the Three Broomsticks….evenings spent in the Hufflepuff common room…that night they’d spent in the astronomy tower, watching the stars together and falling asleep next to each other.
Bee sighed softly when she finished watering her second row of plants, stretching a bit as a stray strand of brown hair fell across her face. His heart simultaneously warmed and ached at the sight. That strand of hair was still there…..the one that used to always fall over her eyes whenever the slightest breeze went through a room. He remembered how he’d used to teasingly brush it away….how she’d pout and turn pink as she called him ‘annoying’ for the millionth time that day.
It was actually her…. He couldn’t believe it. After all these years…. His dark eyes looked over her, observing the changes in her appearance as she continued her gardening. She still appeared mostly the same. Still beautiful. But she had matured in some ways.
Her hands, once soft and untouched, were now faintly lined in scars. He couldn’t help but wince at the sight of them. He still remembered the particular incident from which those scars appeared in fifth year.
He shook his head, trying to clear his head of those dark thoughts before the unpleasant memories could resurface. She hadn’t grown any taller, still at 5’3– a height she’d always insisted to be ‘average’ whenever he’d called her ‘shorty’, ‘pipsqueak’, ‘bitty-Bee’, or something else along those lines.
Quite possibly the most striking difference was her body. She looked a lot thinner than he’d remembered seeing her last, and the healthy glow that had always seemed to emanate from her was gone, replaced by an almost sickly pallor. Her hair, upon closer inspection, seemed to have lost some of its vibrancy as well, as it didn’t look as distinctly reddish-brown as it used to in the sunlight.
He frowned upon noticing these things. Why did she look so ill? Sure, she may have lost some of her natural vitality due to the stress of fifth year, but seeing her like this….it’s almost as though she were a different person.
It wasn’t right. She shouldn’t look like this. She’s Bee. She’s supposed to be healthy. She’s supposed to have her goofy smile, and pink cheeks, and that bell-like laugh—
He hadn’t even realized he’d stepped closer until a twig snapped beneath his foot.
Shit.
She whipped around with a sharp gasp, wand already out, her sharpened survival instincts evidently having not dimmed with time. When her eyes locked onto him though, the world seemed to freeze.
For several seconds, nothing happened. Two pairs of brown eyes were locked onto each other, both betraying equal measures of shock, and millions of other emotions that couldn’t be expressed even if one tried.
After what felt like an eternity, he finally managed to choke out, “hey, Bee.”
Her wand clattered to the ground, face paling further. “S……Se…..?” She took a hesitant step forward, eyes wide and expression disbelieving as though she were looking at a ghost (which wasn’t entirely untrue).
He gulps, three years of pain, guilt, and longing pushing down with it. He manages a shaky nod. “Yeah. It’s me.”
Her brows furrow in disbelief as she steps even closer, wide, glassy eyes flicking across his face, trying to take in every detail. “Is it…..is it really you….?”
She moves closer still, moving agonizingly slow, and it takes every bit of restraint he has to not pull her against him right now. But god, it is agony, to just stand there when she’s…she’s right there. So close he could touch her.
But she beats him to it. Hesitantly, her hand comes up, and, in the lightest of touches, her hand brushes against his arm. Her eyes widen as the tears finally slip free.
“Sebastian…..!”
She crashes into him, capturing him in an iron-tight hug fueled with desperation and grief. He is frozen at first, breath taken away when he feels her against him.
Bee. Bee is….hugging him. He hasn’t had one of her hugs in…..years. Is this…..is this really….?
He slowly brings his own hands up, fingers grazing her back, which shakes with sobs. When his fingers meet something solid, something real; he has to choke back a sob himself. His arms come up around her in a grip to match her own. She hugs back tighter in response, burrowing her face into his chest.
His fingers dig into the fabric of her clothing, inhaling her scent like a dying man. Honey, vanilla, and baked goods….gods she still smells the same. Still as wonderful as ever……damn it, he’s missed that smell. How’s he’s ached for it, longed for it….longed for her.
And now here she was. In his arms again. He couldn’t believe it.
His arms tightened around her, his own eyes beginning to prick now.
But damn it if he was ever going to let her go.
The hug ended all too soon however. When she finally pulled away, he had to stop himself from pulling her right back to him. “It’s you, I….I can’t believe it’s actually….” Her voice trails off as her hands hesitantly come up to brush against his cheeks. She lets out a choked sob when her fingers touch his skin, a fresh round of tears welling up in her eyes.
She rests her head against his shoulder, pulling him back into another embrace. One of her hands moves to cup the back of his head with a tenderness that nearly burns him in its familiarity. His mind flashes back to the countless other times she’s hugged him like this, back when they were still disillusioned kids.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” she chokes out, her form trembling against his own. His heart squeezes painfully when she cries. It always did hurt seeing her cry, but to watch her do so on his account….it was unbearable.
“Shh……don’t cry, Bumblebee”, he says, gently running a hand through her hair, wispier than he remembers. She lets out a shaky sigh at the old nickname. “I never th-thought I’d hear that nickname again….” She sniffs, “I never thought I’d…h-hear your voice-again.” Her arms tighten around him. “When you were taken away…when you were in there so long…I was so scared that you….that you’d…..”
He shakes his head, voice soft and scratchy from disuse, “they could never break me.” He forces himself to smile, something alien to him now, and tries a weak attempt at a joke, “I mean, come on. I was a beater once, remember? Dementors got nothing against a bludger to the head- which I survived by the way.”
Surprisingly, she lets out a wet laugh at his feeble attempt at humor. It was a terrible joke, he knew that, so it was probably a pity laugh. Still…hearing that sound again….the sound of bells in spring….it made it worth it.
He holds her a little tighter. She responds in kind.
For a few minutes after, they didn’t move from that position. One would think their bodies had fused into one with how tightly they held one another. Perhaps they had. Years of grief and regret seemed to bind them together, communicating sentiments and feelings words never could. The only sound in the clearing was their mingled breath, occasionally interrupted by a sniffle.
He wanted to stay like this forever. With her tucked up right against him, like she should be. Warm and impossibly soft, holding him like this. For just a few precious moments, he could almost pretend this was how his life had always been. That he had always been here, in her arms, warm and safe, not a dementor in sight. No awful memories tormenting his mind, no screams keeping him up every waking second.
It all came back the moment he felt her pull away. The cold, the emptiness, it all returned. He was about to pull her right back when he heard her say: “Wait! You- you need to get inside! Someone could see you!”
…Inside? Inside her house? Before he can even register her words, she’s already taken his hand, and he suddenly finds himself incapable of forming a coherent thought.
She leads the two of them inside her cottage, shutting and locking the door behind them. She sighs and returns her gaze to him, once again taking him in. “…Let’s get you something to eat.”
Even when her hand slips out of his, it’s as though he can still feel it there. His hand twitches involuntarily at the absence of hers, and all he can do is watch her as she glides away toward a pantry and begins looking through it. He watches the movement of her hands, the gentle rustle of her hair, and the same clumsy way she sways a little while standing on her tiptoes, attempting to reach for something on a high shelf.
Before he can realize what he’s doing, he’s walked over and retrieved what she was reaching for, holding it out to her. She blinks. “…..thanks.” She takes the box from his hand, her fingers brushing against his. A jolt of electricity goes through him at the touch, the invisible handprint she’s left burning again at the sensation. She seems to feel it as well, as she falters for a moment before continuing on to the stove.
“Pasta and bread…..how does that sound?” She asks softly. It takes him a moment to realize she was speaking to him, and dumbly says, “uh, yeah. Sure.” She nods, setting the box of noodles down on the counter next to the stove as she fills a pot with a quick aguamenti spell.
She starts the stove to get the water boiling and glances over at him, noticing he’s still awkwardly standing by the pantry. “You can sit down you know,” she says, gesturing to a nearby kitchen table with two chairs. He blinks. “Oh. Right.” Idiot.
He sits down in the cushioned seat, feeling terribly out of place already. The whole cottage is cozy and warm, just like her. He can’t help but feel like an intruder in her home; sitting in her chair. A chair where she’s probably sat dozens of times. His gaze briefly flicks over to the other empty chair at the table, and he briefly wonders if someone else lives with her here. He gets a sour taste in his mouth at the thought, and looks away.
His gaze inevitably returns to her, completely entranced by the simple actions she performs. She’s now taken out a loaf of bread and is gently tearing it into pieces. His eyes lock onto her hands again, thinking about how small they still are compared to his. Despite the scars lining the once untouched skin, they still look as graceful and delicate as ever.
From the violin, he faintly recalls. She has violinist’s hands. He notices the small bump on the ring finger of her right hand, and he can’t help but smile to himself. The writer’s bump….that’s still there too. I wonder if she still writes? Or if she wrote that book she’d always talked about…? And does she still draw? He mentally shakes his head. Oh who am I kidding. Of course she does. She draws like she breathes.
His gaze moves on from her hands, taking her in again despite having done so earlier. She was still concerningly thin, and a bit too pale for his liking. But she was nonetheless still so….beautiful. He watched the subtle movement of her arms as she stirred the pot. The movement was so subtle, and so gentle: just like everything else about her. Her skin…even scarred, it still looked soft. Even the dress she wore, which hung so loose yet hugged her gentle curves so perfectly….
No. He mentally berated himself. Don’t even start on that line of thought. You lost the chance for anything like that a long time ago. You don’t deserve to look at her like that. You don’t even deserve to look at her at all.
But he still couldn’t look away.
She returns to the water, which is now boiling in the pot, and begins to add the noodles, stirring with the ladle to spread them out evenly. Unbidden, he begins to think about how she could’ve been doing this for their children had things gone differently. How he could’ve come home from work every night to see her preparing dinner just like she was now. How they could’ve been….
She comes over to him with a glass of water and hands it to him. “Here. Drink slowly,” she says, watching him closely as though expecting him to shatter if she so much as glanced away. He’s stuck staring at her for a few seconds before gratefully accepting the glass. He forces himself to not chug it all down like she’d advised. It was a good thing he hadn’t, as his throat burned like hot lava the second the water ran down. He began to cough, his throat only further aggravated by the motion.
He doesn’t realize she’s shifted over to him until a gentle hand begins to rub his back as the other rests on his shoulder, holding him steady. “Shh…shh…it’s okay. I’m sorry…” she murmurs, eyes wide with concern as she helplessly watches him practically heave up a lung. She hesitates, unsure of what to do now.
When his coughing fit finally begins to die down, she softly asks, “do you think you could drink a little bit more for me, Seb? A smaller sip….just a tiny one. I don’t want you to be dehydrated.” He’s not too pleased at the idea, but nods anyway. He could never refuse her.
He takes a slower, smaller sip this time, and his throat tingles in discomfort again….but he doesn’t start coughing at least. She smiles, looking a little sad. “Good job…Thanks, Seb.”
She pats his back gently once more before returning to the pot to check on the noodles. “The pasta will be ready soon. I won’t add any sauce, because you need to get used to eating again. Best to start out with plain foods. Would you like your bread now, or would you rather it served with the pasta?”
“Uh…now please,” he says, remembering just how hungry he is. She nods and brings the plate of sliced bread over. “Remember, eat slowly,” she advises in that maternal tone he’s all too familiar with. He huffs a laugh and takes one of the bread pieces, “I know, I know.”
She returns to the pot, humming to herself again and stirring every so often. His gaze naturally returns to her before he catches himself again. He forces himself to turn his attention elsewhere, looking around at her home. It’s small, rustic, simple, and cozy: exactly the kind’ve home he’d expect her to get.
A thought suddenly occurred to him. This was her home. Hadn’t she always said she’d live with her grandparents until they passed? That she’d continue to look after their home even after that, hoping to start a family there?
“Bee?” He says, after a few more slow sips of water so his voice wasn’t quite so scratchy, “Why aren’t you staying with your grandparents?” She froze.
For several seconds, there was an uncomfortable quiet. “…..Bee?” He says, dread beginning to grow at her prolonged silence.
“They………”
Her voice hitches at the end and she takes a shaky breath before finishing, “They passed away already. In seventh year.”
The news hit him like a bludger to the chest. Passed away….? She continued to keep her gaze focused on the pot in front of her, back turned to him and preventing him from seeing her expression.
He could still vividly recall the last time he had seen them. It had been during winter break of fifth year, when he and Uncle Solomon were no longer on speaking terms. His uncle had banished him from their home after the incident at the attack on Feldcroft. With nowhere else to stay over the winter except Hogwarts, Bee had offered for him to stay with her and her grandparents over the break.
He remembers the first time he had met Bee’s grandparents, Nora and Edward Bluelake. They had both been so kind and so welcoming from the moment he had stepped into their home. They had let him in with open arms and open hearts, and for the first time in nearly nine years, he remembered what it was like to live in a loving home with guardians who actually cared for you.
…And now they were…..gone? Just like that? The thought made his stomach roil in anger. Why? Why them? Was the world really so cruel to take away such kind people?
….He already knew the answer to that. Of course it was. Why else would it be trying to take away Anne? Why else had it already taken away his parents?
A soft sniff drew him back into reality, and he mentally berated himself for getting so caught up in his own head he’d forgotten about the girl who was actually mourning. Selfish.
“Bee…..I’m….so sorry,” he says quietly. He hesitated, then stood up from the chair, ready to go over and comfort her if she wanted it. She sniffs again, and though her back is turned, he can see her wipe away a few stray tears before offering a tired smile. “I’m okay…. I’m….I’m doing better now.”
Better, maybe. Okay? What an absolute lie. Everytime she said she was ‘okay’ it was a lie. He was about to point it out, but one more look at the expression on her face silenced any protest he had.
She sniffed once more and glanced back at the pasta. “Ah. The noodles are done. Go ahead and sit back down.” He watches her move the pot off the stove, draining the water from the pot.
He wants to continue the conversation; to not let her sweep it under the rug like she always does. But he already knows that would be pointless. And anyway, what right did he have to push her? He was lucky she didn’t throw him out right now.
She spoons the noodles into a bowl and brings it over to him. “Careful, they’re hot,” she says as she slides the bowl in front of him.
“And remember to-“ “Eat slowly, I know,” he says, stomach already rumbling at the sight of so much food before him.
The first bite was heaven. He had to physically stop himself from just wolfing it all down, knowing that would only result in him throwing it up later. But now that he could eat again– eat edible food that is– he found the rest of the world pretty much disappears.
She can’t help but smile when she sees how he lights up at the first bite. “It’s good?” She says, and he only manages a nod.
She nods in kind. “Alright. Well, enjoy your food. I’m going to start a bath for you, alright?”
As soon as she turned to leave, however, his hand shot out and grabbed hers. “Wait,” he says before he can stop himself, his voice unfamiliar to his own ears, “Don’t go.“
She halts, a look of surprise and something else crossing her face before it melts into sympathetic understanding. “Oh, Seb….it’s okay. I’ll only be a minute. I just need to start the bath.” She moves to leave again, but his grip holds firm. “Please,” he says, a pleading tone in his voice that he doesn’t recognize, “just….just stay.”
She’s quiet for a few seconds, eyes flicking over his face wordlessly.
“……Alright.”
She slips back into the seat next to his, his hold on her hand loosening but not letting go. He couldn’t let go. He just couldn’t. The thought of doing so felt unthinkable. Though he wasn’t quite sure why.
The silence stretches between them. She then reaches down to the center of the table and takes the book that sat there. He caught a brief glimpse of the title, which read, “A Guide to Wizarding Law.”
Wizarding law? She hated that subject: found it dreadfully boring. Why was she reading a book on it?
She froze, then shrugged and said, “Just….wanted to try out a new genre.”
Shit. Had he said that out loud? He’d forgotten he couldn’t speak all his thoughts aloud anymore now that he had company.
He scoffs and says, “You? Trying something new? Highly doubtful.” She frowns and replies, “Hey, I try plenty of new things.”
“Sure,” he says with a knowing smirk, finding himself falling back into the patterns of their old banter, “says the girl who almost never left the Hufflepuff common room when she could help it. Says the girl who refuses to try oatmeal again just because she didn’t like it when she was five. Says the girl who’s read ‘Little Women’ 13 times already.”
“23 times, now, actually”, she mumbles sheepishly and he throws up his arms with a lazy grin. “See? That’s exactly what I mean.” She huffs and shoots him one of her Sebastian-Sallow-reserved-looks and says, “well, so what if I have? I just know what I like.”
“Twenty. Three. Times,” he repeats, smirk only growing. “Oh shut up,” she huffed, shoving him in the shoulder as a laugh bubbles out of him.
It sounds strange coming from his mouth: strange but…. also vaguely familiar. He hasn’t laughed in a long time. Certainly not like this. Even before he had been taken in, he can’t remember the last time he really, truly laughed like this after Anne was cursed.
He’d almost forgotten what it sounded like.
When his laugh dies down, he realizes she’s staring at him with an unreadable expression. “What?” He says. She blinked. “Oh, uh,” she turned her face away, cheeks tinting slightly pink, “nothing. Nothing.”
“No, no, come on,” he presses, leaning forward slightly. “I haven’t seen you in almost a year. Talk to me. What is it?”
She swallows down a lump in her throat, hesitating before quietly replying, “that. That’s it.”
“What?” He prods, confusion only growing.
“Your….” She sighs, brown eyes returning to the ground. “Your voice. I-I haven’t heard it in so long…..and your….your laugh, it…..” She lets out a shaky sigh, hands clenching the fabric of her dress.
“I missed it.”
He’s struck silent for a few moments, not believing what his own ears are hearing. She…..missed it? She missed him? After all the trouble he caused for her….?
He shakes his head, his voice coming out more strained when he says, “no….Bee, no. You’ve got it all wrong. I’m the one who’s missed you. For two whole…damn years, I’ve thought of you. You were….one of the few things that managed to keep me sane in that godawful place.”
She looks up in surprise at that. “Wh-what? Me? But- but I turned you in…! I betrayed you!” His chest tightens at her words, and he moves closer, brows furrowing.
“Is that honestly what you think?” He shakes his head. “No. No, you didn’t betray me. If anything, I betrayed you. All of you. I let you all down…and I paid for it.”
She shakes her head, growing increasingly upset as she insists, “no, no, that doesn’t mean you deserved Azkaban!”
He huffs a humorless laugh. “I killed my uncle, Bee. I used all three unforgivables. I’m pretty sure that guarantees a life sentence in Azkaban.”
“I don’t care what it guarantees!” She snaps, “you don’t deserve to spend the rest of your life in Azkaban!” He sighs, starting to get irritated with her stubborn refusal to acknowledge the facts. Clearly just so she can blame herself some more, like she always does. But he never gets the chance to protest, as she continues:
“No one deserves that place! Especially not you! You- you didn’t mean to!! You said it yourself!” Her voice grows frantic as she goes on, “Y-you just made a mistake! You were a child! And he attacked us, like you said…!”
“Bee.”
“Sure, m-maybe you shouldn’t have- have done what you did, but you’ve learned your lesson, haven’t you?! Azkaban doesn’t even give you the chance to redeem yourself!!”
“Bee.”
“I couldn’t just leave you to rot in there!! I-I had to do something!! I-I swore to myself I’d get you out! But then you had to go and escape and ruin everything and–“
“Bee,” he grabs her shoulders, snapping her out of her frenzied panic. Her eyes, now teary, snap up to his, and his heart clenches in his chest at the sight. “Bee,” he says, trying to keep his voice steady, “listen to me. This. Is not. Your fault.”
“B-but–“
“No.” He says, his grip on her shoulders tightening. “This is not your fault. Don’t try and argue with me, or pin this on yourself like you do with everything.” He looks her dead in the eyes, voice softening slightly as he says, “I made my choice. I can’t take it back now. I paid for it. You tried to stop me. Countless times. But I didn’t listen. You aren’t to blame for any of this.”
He gently brushes away a tear trickling down her cheek and says, “you’re the one good thing that came out of fifth year. So don’t go making excuses for me just so you can blame yourself.“
She can’t seem to muster a response to that, her glassy eyes still holding his steady gaze. God, how he’s missed those eyes. How he’s missed her. So, so, so much.
He doesn’t realize he’s pulled her into a hug until he hears her soft startled gasp. Not a second later, she melts into him, sobbing into his chest.
“It’s….it’s okay….” He murmurs, rubbing soothing circles into her back like she’d done for him countless times before. “I’m here now….”
“Why did you do it…..? H-how did things go so wrong…..?” Her fragile voice cries. His hold on her tightens as his heart squeezes painfully. “I….I don’t know, Bumblebee. I was…..I was being stupid.”
“Stupid?!” She pulls back enough to look him in the eyes, cheeks wet with tears and snot. “Damn right, you were stupid! You massive, humongous idiot!” She smacks his chest in that scolding way she always used to, though it lacks its usual ‘strength’. “And you still are! Why would you escape?! Don’t you know what’s going to happen to you if they catch you?!”
He’s briefly taken aback by her sudden change in tone before his gaze darkens. “Of course I do,” he says solemnly.
“Then why?!” She cries, “why escape?! Why make things worse for yourself than they already are?!”
“Well, would you rather I have just stayed there?!” He snaps back defensively, “I doubt there’s much worse than what I already went through!”
“Well, there is!” She seethes, “there is, and now you’re almost certainly going to experience it! The– th-the…”
The unspoken words hung in the air. The Dementor’s Kiss. The worst fate known to wizardkind. A fate worse than death; worse than anything. The fate that promises only eternal suffering and misery with no reprieve. He can feel a pit forming in his stomach at just the thought of it. The room seems to go cold as though dementors themselves have already arrived.
“I….I know,” he says quietly. “I know, Bee. But I….I couldn’t just stay there. I had to see Anne.”
She shook her head. “You should’ve waited! I was going to get you out!! Instead you had to go and break out!! What were you thinking?!
“And how exactly were you planning to do that?” He retorts, “What were you going to do, fly over and somehow fight off a whole prison of aurors and dementors?”
“No, of course not!! I was going to break you out legally,” she snaps, “by taking it to court!”
“What are you talking about?” He says, growing increasingly frustrated by the second, “how would you do that?! You don’t know law!!”
“I do now!” She says, “after you were taken away, I dedicated my life to law so I could argue you out of Azkaban!”
He falls silent at that.
“….What?”
She too cuts off her next argument, realizing what she’d just let slip out.
He shakes his head in disbelief. “Sorry you….you studied law? To…get me out of Azkaban?”
She gives no response. He continues on, “you said you wanted to be a mind healer. Or a magizoologist. You always said you hated law.”
Another moment of silence.
“Bee. Tell me you didn’t.” He turns to look at her. She’s still avoiding his gaze.
“Beatrice. Look at me,” he commands. She hesitates for several seconds before slowly meeting his gaze, looking guilty.
“Tell me you didn’t give up your dreams just to help me,” he says. She doesn’t reply. She looks away.
No.
“You….stupid girl,” he says, heart sinking. “Why….why would you do that?” He lets out a heavy sigh, his head dropping into his hands. “Why would you……why would you do that for me? I’m not worth that. You should’ve…moved on with your life.”
She shakes her head, eyes beginning to glisten again. “I couldn’t. I couldn’t just– just move on with my life knowing that you were in there.”
She sniffs, her arms coming up to hug herself. “I couldn’t just….live my life, knowing you’d never get the chance to live yours. To- to graduate without you. To start a job…knowing your future was taken away from you. To get married knowing you’d be alone. To start a family knowing…….knowing that you wouldn’t be the one I’d come home to.”
He looks up at that, not quite believing what he’d heard. His mouth opened, meaning to ask what she’d said. To ask her to repeat herself. Because there’s no way it could be true, right?
But no sound came out. Because there was nothing to reply to. Because it wasn’t true. There’s no way it ever could be.
The silence resumes, thick, heavy. and untouchable.
Finally, she gets up. “I’m going to start your bath,” she says. She quietly makes her way to the hall, but stops just short of the doorway. “Sebastian…..”
She hesitates. She isn’t sure what to say. She was going to say something…but did she even know what it was? She wasn’t sure she knew now or then. So she says nothing. She glances back at him one more time.
Still sitting there, rigid as a stone. Pale, thin, and lined with injuries he hadn’t had before.
It was as though a skeleton were sitting at her table.
Her heart ached painfully in her chest like it did every time she’s looked at him since he arrived.
Without another word, she disappeared.