𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐚¹- hp.

𝐯𝐢𝐢𝐢. cherry red cheeks and vanilla stained fingers.

"If you break the promise I'm allowed to cut your pinky off. That's how it was done in former times." Lavinia teased, waving a finger from her free hand at him.

Harry rolled his eyes, catching her free hand with his own and lacing their fingers. "If that's the case I'm free to cut yours too. It's only fair, you know."

"I don't break my promises, Mr Potter." She states in a mock serious tone, pursing her lips with a slight nod. "I hold only myself accountable for my actions."

"Well that's good to know." Harry laughs. "That doesn't exactly answer how you got into my home though."

Lavinia drops his hands to dismissively wave, picking the picture of his parents up off the floor and placing it on the end table. "It's not exactly a hard task to accomplish. I just picked the lock on the patio door and snuck my way up here."

"That's good to know for the future." Harry murmured, flushing once he realizes that was in fact not his inside voice.

"Pardon? I didn't quite catch that." She turns around to face him, quirking a brow at his blush.

"Oh, erm, just wondering what the plan for today was." He replied, awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck.

"Oh yes — shoot sorry, did not mean to clap that loud. We should probably leave before your whale of an uncle gets up to see what the racket is, but I was thinking we could do some baking today? I have a few recipes I need to test out and you, mooie jongen, are my guinea pig." She explains, moving towards his wardrobe.

She pulls the door open and pushes aside various hangers, examining each article of clothing. After a few minutes she settles on a plain blue shirt and trousers, nose scrunched in distaste. It's as if he has no sense of clothing taste and makes a vow to take him shopping. No friend of hers is allowed to walk around in such horrendous clothing, it's a crime in her eyes. Turning around she holds the clothes towards him, softly closing the wardrobe door once he takes them.

"We need to get going unless you want to get caught so just change at my house. I've got a pair of soft trousers I stole from my brother you can borrow, these ones won't be very comfortable for baking." Lavinia said, opening his bedroom door.

He grabs her hand as he follows her throughout the house, nudging her foot whenever she's about to step on a spot he knows will creak, skipping the stairs two at a time. Quiet giggles are shared between the doorframe of the patio, branded into the crevices of scratches to serve as a reminder of their stealth in the future, an untold secret they'll call their own. When they enter her house the laughter becomes louder, ricocheting off the walls like bullets, further piercing their hearts. Neither can remember a time they've felt so happy, knowing wholeheartedly they'd trade the world to feel this way forever.

"Here are the trousers. I'll be in the kitchen, come find me when you've changed." Lavinia tells him once they've made it to her room and she's found the pair of trousers, memories burning at the front of her skull.

Without waiting for a response she hastily leaves the room, biting her quivering lip and blinking back the tears that start to sting in her eyes. In the empty hallway she can hear the faint sound of her mothers voice reprimanding her for her tears, thickly swallowing as she harshly rubs at her eyes. Tears are a weakness, she reminds herself, feeling the overwhelming need to look over her shoulder starting to build. No matter where her mother is in the world, Alida has found a way to perpetually torment her, a personally crafted token of her hatred.

She rolls her shoulders to distract herself from her thoughts, moving towards the shelves of vinyls, trailing her fingers over the covers until she taps on a Def Leppard album, nodding in approval as she removes it from the shelf. They haven't listened to Hysteria yet, and she'll be damned if Harry goes another day without hearing it. If there's one thing she misses about her father it's his love for music; the intense need he had to collect a wide variety of genres to assure his children had an exceptional music taste ( on a good day she'll begrudgingly admit that this is something her father has passed down to her), filling their home with colourful tunes and poorly performed concerts.