𝐒𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐖𝐇𝐈𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒

「 none of your business 」

   "It has been a while." Delilah sighed, turning back to the girl. "Sorry for being so distant, I was not in a good headspace."

   "No need to apologise. Been there, done that. Well, done worse." The blonde said, flashing her brows at Delilah who giggled knowingly. "Where have you been?"

   "St Mungos. You know how I wasn't eating before I tried to fix that, you know mentally. Madame Pomfrey was a lot of help. That was going well but I started getting sick again." Delilah began to explain, her hands trembling. Picking up on that, Eleanor took hold of her hand as she ran her thumb across the back of her palm comfortingly. "Like I was always tired, throwing up in a morning or feeling nauseous, I was bloated and had bad cramps with no period. It was bizarre. Completely." She explained, struggling to remember the events better. "Then I was with Lily and she offered me some chocolate and I ended up eating them all, they were so good! I remember that. My last appointment was with Madame Pomfrey and I separated from Lily when everything went black."

   "You ate the chocolates, the ones Snape sent!" The girl stated, worrying washing through her. For the past week or so, she believed that they hadn't worked but it was clear that Delilah had been knocked out from them. Strange. Eleanor had believed they were riddled with a potion that controls the mind, like Isadora's had.

"Yes. I woke up in the hospital a week later. I had lost a lot of blood but they hadn't told me what happened. None of them told me what happened, none of them will! Aaron knows but refuses to tell me 'for my own good'. Now I'm scared on top of confused and alone." The curly-haired girl explained desperately, knowing that Eleanor would listen. She always had.

"You're not alone. You have me, Marlene, Thomas, Lily, Isadora, and Remus!" She reminded her, squeezing her hand. There was a pause. A dreadful silence made Eleanor regret those words because Delilah let out a choked sob, tears spilling down my face.

"I woke up to a letter. He broke up with me!" The girl cried, falling onto the blonde's hand. El took that as a que to pull her into another hug, astounded that the boy would do such a thing. "He couldn't even wait to get rid of me. I should have known. I should have known!"

"No, no, no. This isn't your fault. I pushed you to talk to him, we all did. I thought he liked you, that's my fault." Eleanor whispered, stroking the back of her head as she held her tightly to her chest. What the fuck, Remus! She thought. Yes, he couldn't control his feelings but breaking up with her after she disappeared, when he knew that she didn't look well. It was disgusting.

"No, I rushed things and probably scared him away. Too much. I was scared that this was going to happen! That he'd throw me away because he got bored. I threw myself on him. Oh, merlin. I had such a distorted version of him that I forgot he was a teenage boy!" Delilah raged at her own stupidity, the tears not stopping as she realised how crazy that she'd been. "How do you do it? Get everyone to love you?"

"Not everybody does. It just seems that way. Most of them want something from me, they don't actually want to know me, Delilah." The girl lied, thinking of the book. She knew why. But love was different for everybody. Platonic, romantic, lustful. Some were short-lived and some were strong enough to last longer than one lifetime.

"Yeah, right." The curly-haired girl mumbled, a smile on her lips as she pushed away from Eleanor. She wiped her tears. "I just want to know what happened. Can you help me ask them? I don't want you to figure this out - I know you have a lot on your plate. Lily and Marlene have kept me up to date. I need moral support, you know."