hands (professor lupin)✔️

Chapter Eleven || Impropriety

Snow had fallen, snow so deep I had to wear my old ugly boots I used to wear in the Alps. However, that didn't bother me much. In fact, it didn't bother me at all.

Rubeus had become more happy and the days preceding the ball he would constantly be at my side, however, not in an annoying way. We sat in the library together and walked the grounds. The first time we stepped into the outside world, I looked to my side and instead of finding Lupin with his pale, gaunt complexion and the old black cloak wrapped clumsily around his shoulders, his grey sweater showing underneath, I saw Ruby, red-haired and pink-faced, his eyes joyful and his mouth wide open in a smile that no one could ever classify as not a cute one.

- Boy, what a day!

As we walked, I found myself getting more and more anxious. Lupin and I hadn't spoken for several days - first, they wouldn't let me see him at the hospital and now they said he spent all the time in his study, recovering. Yet the thought that he could find me with Ruby somehow made me paranoid.

- You all right, Lennie?

- Yes. Yes, I'm all right.

I skipped over the thick snow and jumped over an icy puddle, trying to brush my thoughts away.

Then, an uncontrollable, childish urge came over me.

- Catch me! - I cried and sprinted out across the  snow, too out of breath to laugh, a sudden desperate attempt, feeling of panic mixed with the idea of happiness as I ran over the white field, Ruby following close behind me as I suddenly realised I wasn't running away from him, but, in a strange way, I was trying to run away from the things Lupin had made me feel and yet, no matter how hard I ran, I knew I would never run away. The lighter my feet felt, the more memories of Lupin's smile, hands, scars and laugh seemed to burn through my mind.

***

The day of the ball turned out sunny and cold. I'd gone to the store with some of the girls from Gryffindor, and, after a long and tedious walk through the thousands of dresses, I finally found a black strapless gown, so long it trailed after me as I walked.

Despite how I never thought I'd like myself, that day, as I saw myself in the mirror, I felt I looked good. I twirled around and made a curtsy, trying to remember my old dance lessons. Sadly, I didn't remember a thing. 

Would Lupin even be there?

The ball began at seven. I walked down the marble staircase, feeling like a real-life princess. Even though I knew nothing would ever happen, a sort of voice inside me kept whispering nice things and all of them were connected to Lupin. This was going to be the best night of my life. He would see me and he would... No, not that. I couldn't be thinking that.

At the end of the staircase I saw someone waiting and heard a cough. My heart jumped and I suddenly felt like I couldn't breathe. Yet I went on, my fists clenched.

It wasn't Lupin, it was Ruby. And as I saw him my heart sank and yet I felt a huge relief.

Ruby, on the other hand, stared at me, in much the same way he'd stared at me when he first asked me out.

- Hellouh, - I joked, then remembered where I got the word from and fell silent. I walked over to Ruby and looked at him.

- You're looking great, Rubeus.

Ruby still didn't reply, his blue eyes fixed on me.

- Hello? - I teased him.

- Lennie, - his voice came out in a whisper.

- What? - I whispered back, more out of trying to distract myself from thinking of whatever I had been thinking about before.

- You look gorgeous.