Laurie and Jo

((OOC: Took the easy way out and re-copied most of it. Heh. Wouldn't have had the time otherwise ))

Yes, life had been better at a point. Like, two seconds prior. Atleast then, the redhead had still been standing at the doorstep.

He had turned away, naturally. She wasn't going to come in. She wasn't. He knew her that much, at least. For whatever reason she had accompanied Fred, (and his feelings towards that Weasley were still a curious cocktail of guilt, regret and sheer outrage at even having the audacity to pull a stunt like this, because it was his, Albus knew it), that reason had evaporated as soon as they had set eyes on one another. She would turn around, and leave. That was just the way she was, or rather had been, ever since he had stolen that first look of her in the little alley off Diagon, peeking above a trash-can. Her obstinacy, and her fear, would never allow it.

Except there was a little click, which could be nothing but the door shutting behind someone; and two small footsteps. He turned, and she was standing opposite him, not more than five feet away. Five feet. Her fingers, looking pale and starved underneath the bleaching light of the Muggle lights, clenched and unclenched over the collar of her jacket. Her left foot was quivering, twisting about in its place.

He wasn't observing her. Never would, again. Simply taking every reason in sight to refuse looking at her face. Not avoid. Refuse.

And it was a shame, because she kept looking. And with every second that she took, the pain expanded, the throb magnifying and crashing against the walls of his head with a raw ferocity that scoured every inch and left it empty; till the confines of his head were nothing but vast, echoing depths, ringing with pain, ringing with questions.

She had never bothered to look, before. Not carefully, not scoping out every detail with a desperate eye. Why? Why now?

Afloat on an island of consciousness amidst the migraine, the light pricking at the edges of the eyelids was almost unnoticeable. Staring at one point too long had that kind of effect. For Albus, it was the worn out spot on the flooring next to the ragged ends of her shoelaces; pale and discoloured from the rest. It wasn't fair. She was the one who should be avoiding her eyes, not him. He didn't do anything wrong.

“I really f*cking miss seeing your stupid face, Potter.”

The room was a vacuum, the air drawing to a dangerous low; lungs straining to draw it in. In the mindless drive to force it, in and out, in and out; memories could not be denied, especially not those of a voice, in a tone exactly like this, saying not too long ago.....

You're the only friend I have.

His mouth opened, and some part of him wondered what would come out. Which part of him would come out. The study of a human mind- so thrown to the winds, taut control he prided himself on so ruthlessly shattered and trampled upon that it was like playing audience to one's own mind- stripped of the ability to do anything, just watch and be amazed.

"Could've fooled me." He heard, bouncing off the walls of the hallway. He watched, as one foot lifted over another, in tandem and contradiction, walking away from the door. He sensed, as dulled stabs of pain worked over his spine, with each step he took, distant enough to be happening to someone else. What he couldn't dissociate from was the weariness. The bone-deep tiredness that waft over his eyelids, pressed into his limbs and wouldn't let him sleep.

"Lily's resting in the next room, so keep your voice down." He took another step, and raised his hand to his mouth, jaw cracking open in a yawn that sent a flash of such vivid, blinding pain cracking through his skull that it might as well have split open. "Finish whatever you came here for, then carry yourself out of the door and do whatever it is that noble, self-righteous people do on Friday nights." His hands found the dining table and he leaned on it, closing his eyes. It wouldn't work. Nothing would, not until he lost the feeling that something was draining, leeching life out of his bones.

"Please go, Jack." Pride could go to hell. No energy for it, nor for anger. He said it, plain and earnest and weary. "I want to sleep."

But it won't come. It won't come.


And then......the footsteps came again. Softer, this time. Growing distant with every second. Albus lifted his head, face up to the ceiling, pain weighing down his skull and smiled. Bitter victory, perhaps. Hollow triumph.

"Besides....." The words drifted out, half delirious, half reckless, and almost completely to himself. "It isn't like anything you do now will make a difference. Even if there was.....you'd be too afraid." And he laughed then, slowly, ........because who wouldn't? At the idea of Jack Dyllan being a coward. "Too afraid to stop the ones always leaving."

The laughter hitched once. Twice. Died, with the remnants sour in his throat. It left him more drained than before.

Because he really was laughing at himself. "Or maybe you just never cared enough to do it."

Jack had never felt more antsy. If she allowed her body to give itself relief she would jump from foot to foot, shake out her hands, and swing her head around until every ounce of anxiety left her. She wasn't sure what made her feel so nervous about facing Albus. She had not been so nervous facing Vito on his rampages. Maybe because, back then, she had felt righteous in her confrontation. And though she felt what she had to say what she had to say, she was only afraid of causing more pain. More pain than she already had.

Could have fooled him. "Could have fooled everyone," she said, glancing down, a bit of shame in her gaze. "I guess I'm very sneaky. Fooled myself sometimes," she sighed. She had tried to convince herself that she had spoken with reason and logic and truth that night that the party had come to her. And she had been right about reason and logic but what was truth? What was truth until one had a chance to face the facts, face their feelings? Albus had snuck up on her. she had not expected that she would ever have to begin reconsidering her own emotions towards someone. she had bought into the old tale that people had one true love, and her one true love was running around America with no recollection of her.

But what if she had been wrong?


He so obviously wanted her gone. She opened her mouth to argue, but found her jaw shutting itself, telling her she had lost, to give up. If she wanted to prove that she cared, shouldn't she obey? Shouldn't she do what would make him feel best? He had asked and maybe she should do the one not-Jack thing and do as she was asked.

She began to walk away and he called after her, stopping her. He was antagonized. He was deliberately going after her. He had to know that he was going to get a rise out of her, didn’t he? That she simply couldn’t obey if he was going to talk to her like that. Then why would he-

Oh.

Oh, yes. That Albus Potter was a clever boy, even if he didn’t know it.

He knew how she would respond if he talked like this, didn’t he? She would respond like only she would. And wasn’t that exactly what he wanted? Her? Then he would get it.

She whipped around, fire in her eyes. He wanted her? Here she came. Jack approached, grabbing his shoulder and whipping him around to face her. She continued to advance, saying, “Me, the afraid one? I’m the Gryffindor, Potter, I’m always brave. I can prove it too.” She had backed him against a wall and now she leaned her face up to his, getting as close as she could without touching him. The air between them trembled. “I care,” she said, her voice heavy with the meaning. “I dare you to prove to me that you care me. Go ahead. Show me.”

((in love with the title. stop it. You're perfect))

His lids had fallen shut with the last word. Shoulders down, calf muscles weakened by sickness quivering imperceptibly with the strain of supporting his body. Mind drowned in a permanent haze by pain, consciousness roaming in a distant land. He didn't know how long he would have stood, quiet, motionless in his own hallway. Maybe for hours until sleep called for him, and his dead limbs led him back to sink over the covers, fully dressed. Maybe sleep would never call, and exhaustion would come first- and knees would buckle and he would lay down on the very spot he stood, cheek against the bare ground.

He wouldn't ever know. Because Jack came first.

Her eyes were the first. All dark fire and glory, set in a pale, determined face that dominated his swimming vision. Albus blinked. Something was happening. Something was happening, and his mind wasn't in a fit enough state to comprehend, and cope. It struggled- pushing against the overwhelming tide of the ache and the weariness; and his eyes followed in turn, eyelashes falling and rising rapidly in an increasingly desperate attempt to clear his sight. Something was happening. Just when the sun had set and the backs had been turned and the wounded heart had accepted grudgingly.....something.....

One blink- and Jack was striding towards him, sorrow and shame obliterated and buried somewhere in the ground beneath them. Another blink- and her face was all he could see. A third- and cold concrete touched the damp fabric of his shirt and she was talking. Saying. Something....something....

It was working, his mind was coming to, words had stopped being white noise and started making sense......no. No. They weren't making sense at all. This migraine was messing with his senses. They were cheating him. Throwing up hallucinations. Showing him Jack's face inches from his own when she should have been past the doorstep already; morphing words like 'no' and 'friend' and 'can't' into 'show' and 'prove' and 'care'......mistaking the cold draft of loneliness slithering past his spine into the warmth of another's breath washing past his cheek, several inches too far. His eyes.....they were the biggest cheats of all. Masters of deception. When her sealed-off face in Layabout with an unchangable decision gleaming hardly in her features, was supposed to be the last thing burned across his eyelids.....they were throwing up images of a Jack who was breathing and glaring and had something unreadable flickering in her eyes.

Something......which looked a lot like 'yes'.

Because he hadn't been doing this on purpose. His unconscious mind, spewing out half coherent words as a last ditch attempt.....hadn't been expecting this to succeed when so much had failed. As much as it still stung for him to admit it....he had pleaded. That night. Let his pride be trampled before his eyes. And now, when she was just about to leave, when he had finally accepted her leaving....she was....was she....

No. It wasn't a yes. But it was a chance.

His eyelids closed for a fourth time. Then opened, clear and inescapable. The invisible, overpowering force that bound their gazes together, entwined so tight that there seemed no reprieve......felt long awaited, and inevitable.

Inevitable.

"I showed you when I came to your house when I barely knew you, and listened about Nemo." His voice was bare. Bare breath, bare in every way possible. "I showed you when I agreed to defy a government, and start a rebellion. I showed you when I showed something apart from the smile that was the only thing the world was allowed to see." The words escaped in a trickle. So fast, so quiet...for something that was weighing down on a soul for so long. "I showed you in every guitar strum. Every mug of morning coffee. Every stupid bite of the salad that you never tired of eating, and I never tired of making." The air strained, but he inched closer, and his eyes were bared too. Bared to the heart. "Ever since you entered it, my life has been about nothing but showing you, Jack Dyllan."

And he closed the gap.

It wasn't a kiss. It was a dry, chapped pair of lips resting against one another, seeking assurance. Seeking reality. Their lips touched, and he breathed- exhaling pain. Inhaling her.

The eyelids closed, the fifth time. He inched back. Their lips still brushed when he spoke, "Scared, yet?"

He was taking her in. He was taking her in very candidly, without a screen or a veil between them. She had seen that drop once or twice, but never so openly, never so purposefully, and never for so long. Albus Potter was doing something spectacular and just existing before her as honestly as he could. She thought that, even if something went horribly wrong, this would be enough. That seeing him as himself, so true and sincere and real, was all she truly needed from this confrontation. She could take it and be happy with it. She could feel as though good had been done. Even if the worst happened, they would always have this moment.

Moments like these usually did not last. They usually could not survive the cruelty of this world that preferred reality to happiness. But this moment was surviving. And, correct her if she was wrong, Jack was almost positive that this moment was growing, getting stronger by the second, stretching past moments into minutes into an event. There was an event happening between them, too long and true to ever deny or distort. It would always exist as it was existing now, and though that was terrifying, it was also wonderfully exhilarating.

They were close to each other, closer than they had ever been. There was space between them, a sliver, but at points their bodies made contact. Their knees had connected, their toes overlapped, her chest barely grazed his torso. And though their faces had space between them, she felt her eyes pressing into his own more tangibly than ever before. Her breath was no longer air. There was substance to it that she could not define. She was breathing more purposefully than she ever had. She was looking more intimately than ever before. She was standing with more righteous defiance that she ever had… and she was feeling as though she had redefined what it meant to be alive.

This was no longer just a moment.

His eyes closed and for one, frightening second, Jack thought she would see a mask when they opened again. She thought she would see the polite smile, the veil, the mimed life. But instead, she saw clarity. Every last obstacle fell away and for the first time ever, Jack looked at Albus Severus Potter for what he truly was. She felt her heart flutter and continue to pound, she felt her stomach do gymnastics, and she felt her whole face want to smile, though she kept herself waiting, kept herself prepared for the worst, because the worst was always the most predictable.

She knew all of that now, of course. But she was useless. She was always the last to see these signs if they meant believing someone capable of feeling them towards her. And it was not a confidence issue, either. Jack just used her head, and her head told her it was illogical for someone to care that much for it, because it meant being okay with all the shit. She wasn’t even okay with all of it, so she could not expect someone else to be either. And yet, Albus had believed in her. He had supported her. He had cared. And now she heard it. That wasn’t the proof she was waiting for. She had told Nemo she had loved him, and he had said the same, but there had been one missing thing to prove that it was not just the idea, not just the hope, but it was the real, life thing.

And he proved it. His lips drew near hers, not stealing the kiss as Ari had, but promising the care and desire that Nemo had not. She tilted her own head, applying equal pressure. Not a kiss, but not nothing either. And they breathed together, existed together, in a way Jack had always hoped to.

They were still close. Her eyes looked up at him, their lips resting against each other the way a weary child leaned against the legs of his mother.  And a smile cracked her face apart, revealing Jack Dyllan as she had always wanted to be, unchained by anger and doubt. “Hell yes,” she said, triumphant in admitting her fear. And her hands reached up and clung to his neck as she rose again to meet his lips, this time making sure he could not mistake it. This. This was a kiss.

She surged up to meet him, warm lips pressing and coaxing, fingers hooking around his neck, digging, comforting, claiming. And it was gone. The fear. The anger. The insecurities. The shields. The misunderstandings. Discarded to the side like the worthless burdens they were, trampled beneath their feet, incinerated to cinders in the flames that seemed to burn every time they breathed against each others lips. And this was a dream. Because things like this didn’t happen in real life and maybe his mind would finally break and the scream bubbling at the base of his throat would break past his lips, twisting in self-hate at constructing such....delusions......or dance in sheer joy because the breath gasping in his ears were too real, the body heat too real, and her lips tasted of dry chapstick and soured Firewhisky- which his delusional mind had never known, so could not make up, had never known that it would be the best taste the world had ever made- by mere virtue of the fact that it was Jack. Jack.

And sleep deprived, pain ridden, exhausted muscles could take it no longer and his knees buckled, back sliding to the floor- and they fell together, in a tangle of limbs. And this was better, so much better, because his hands could draw her -Jack- closer, wrapping around her back, fingers digging and curling and tightening around the thick, rough material of a jacket with warm skin and bone beneath -Jack-, his lips grazing against a collarbone, “This isn’t real.” And space had to be eliminated immediately, and air choked when arms held on harder, and shoulders and chests were crushed to each other, breath knocking out of their lungs in a simultaneous exhale, and it was so, so little about lust that it wasn’t even funny, and he spoke into her hair next, dry strands tickling his lips, “Isn’t real.” And it was the biggest struggle of his life, whether to draw behind in order to see her face, but that would mean ending this hug, creating space between them, even if his chin was tucked into her shoulder and his vision registered the walls of his hallway, blurry and out of focus through all the moisture. Jack.

One of his hands, he was mindless of which, dragged down slowly to find hers lying on the floor, and twined around the blister-laden fingers, unending. His voice was muffled against her shoulder, creating a small, damp patch on the rough material. “This isn’t real, is it Jack?”

Because.......if it was. If it was.

Then.

Then everything. Then he would feel equal to cook in the kitchen for her, the entire day. (Because she liked it. Didn’t she?) He would strum the guitar till his fingers were torn to shreds, because she liked that too, and repair the old broom he had broken and never flown on after the night at Layabout, and slam the door in du Hunt’s face, and be nice to James again, and go visit his father’s grave, and maybe start writing again. And maybe he was thinking all these stupid, rambling thoughts because he was delirious with pain and fever, and something else -joy, joy, joy....- but if she wanted it, then he would stay away the entire time and never see her face and speak a word, only if she came back at night and threw her arms around him and gave him this. This.

If this was real.

“Because...if it is.....” It took strength beyond imagining, to deprive himself of that self-immolating warmth and press back to see her face, but it was worth it, because her eyes could warm an entire city. Albus took solace in it, inching forward till their foreheads knocked together, voice harsher than it had ever been, “Then you are an utter twit Jack Dyllan.” And his lip twitched ever so slightly, in the reflection of a smile and he wanted to see one on hers too and the sudden realisation shocked him because he could and he moved an inch more and pressed it to the corner of her lips, transferring it on. “Couldn’t have done this on that night, could you? Would’ve saved a lot of heartburn. And shouting.”

Something before her melted away. This was Albus Potter in his full glory, full of self worth and purpose and certainty. There was no confusion, no blurred lines of yes or no, there was only decision and the certainty that came with it. He was not kissing her. He was embracing her, welcoming her into him as their arms tightened around each other, as their bodies pressed against the other, as they explored what it meant to know the care and love was mutual. Somehow, the connection was beyond the physical. She felt as though he was looking into her heart even with eyes closed tightly. She felt as though he was enveloping her though she could clearly feel where his hands were. Somehow, she and Albus Potter had been swallowed up and were now nestled in the belly of a monster who would carry them away from the mess of the world to a place where happiness abounded.

He collapsed, and she collapsed onto him, because that was what people did when they were so intimately clasped together. She did not know what had made him give out, whether it was force, shock, or external reasons. She did not question it. She kept her mouth on his, stealing sweet kisses from him as selfishly and selflessly as she could. Her hands tangled in his dark hair, the hair that he had surely thought too closely resembled that of his father's, the hair she thought was so uniqely Albus. She could not see him, but it was because the best reason. She was too close to see him. His arms travelled to grip her back, pulling her in closer, moving his head to nestle against her shoulder, lips breaking from her to touch the bare skin of her neck and collar. He was clinging to her like he would never leave, never do exactly what Jack suspected everyone would. She reached around his shoulders, clinging to them, her head resting above his in peaceful harmony.

He said it wasn't real. She smiled, moving her head to hold him tight, pressing her lips to his temple as they laid like the heathen youngsters they were on the floor. He repeated it and one of her hands lifted to his hair, where it gently began to stroke away all the silly little worries in his head. "Dreams don't feature cold tile," she whispered, unable to keep in the small laughs that followed.

He seemed unable to process it. She was having less trouble, because she wanted happiness to be reality so badly that she would wait until later to suspect how it could all go wrong. Surely, when she was on her own, she would fear that it had been a dream. Surely then she would tell herself this was doomed to fail, that real happiness did not linger, that good was always marred by grim reality. But for now, she had no suspicion, so cyncism. And hey... maybe she would not be alone later.

He moved away, allowing air to feel the space where before there had been nothing. She immediately found his eyes, finding the light she had suspected to be there, the light that she fought so hard for, the light that had kept her so interested. She gave him a look of mock anger and hit his arm, but found her hand immediately gripping the place it had landed, unwilling to leave so soon. He kissed the side of her mouth and her eyes fluttered closed, pressing back as her hand slipped to his wrist, the other fingers tangled with his own.

She released him and propped herself up, so she was looking down at him, body still close. "Albus Potter, what are you doing with your life? Sprawled across the floor like a hooligan, pledging your love to a lowly muggleborn with a penchant for trouble. You need to reevaluate, I think." A playful smile tugged on her lips.