Waldosia/// George Weasley

Chapter 22

"I learn from the best," Harry sent a wink towards Rory just as walked up to Ginny and placed a kiss on her cheek.

"What are you lot doing here?" The ginger girl questioned, leaning her head against Harry's shoulder.

Before Harry had a chance to explain, Rory looked over at Clover knowingly, "Babs' mother surprised him with a visit today."

The smile on Clover's face instantly dropped as all eyes fell on her. That safe feeling created with George earlier came crashing down and she was reminded of reality. Her reality, Babs' reality, their reality. Happiness wasn't suited for them, their atoms plucked from the darkest of holes in space and time. They were never meant to be safe; never had been and never will be.

Her heart leapt to the door before her feet did, an arm holding her wrist and stopping her from doing so.

"What's going on, bean?" Lee asked her with a face ridden of concern and worry.

She gently pulled her arm from out of his grasp and refused to look at him. She couldn't look into the eyes of a boy who clearly cared about her best friend so much and lie to him. Clover couldn't lie to Lee, she wouldn't.

Urgency to get to yer friend rippled through her again, knowing he probably begun his spiral downwards as soon as he saw his mother. He was about to weave himself in a tangled web that both of them knew he couldn't get out of, the one he had been avoiding since the very day he was born. Clover knew that's why they've gotten so close, they were both runners. Running from the things they feared most. Without saying a word, she turned towards the door.

"Clover," Lee called out one last time, an urgency of his own woven in his voice, "Is Babs alright?"

"No," she told him the truth, her head looking back towards him, "But it's not my story to tell."

Lee opened his mouth to speak again, but the next voice that rung out wasn't his own. It was one that sent Clover into a deep spiral of her own, a voice that dipped into her past and pulled her down with it.

"Clover?" It sounded out from behind her.

Her past ripped her heart out of her chest, threw it to the ground, and beat it. Kicking it over and over again until it was back to being the frail organ it was before she had built up all her walls. Before reality gripped her with its talons and forced her out of her childhood.

The blue eyes that shone with dullness and void were now darkened into grey; stormy and quiet, yet as powerful as lightning.

"Theo?" Her voice rung out in child-like innocence before her head even processed what happened, before her anger pulsed through her entire body and reminded her who the boy was standing in front of her. Nothing but a coward.

Her mouth pulled into a stone-cold frown and she glared at him, "What the fuck are you doing here?"

"You know exactly what I'm doing here," he returned her glare and stood challengingly in front of her, but his eyes were swimming in guilt and regret, "I-I sent Draco, I came to see you, I-,"

"What are you talking about?" She angrily roared, not wanting to deal with her own ghosts. Clover wanted to run to Babs, hide in his arms like she often had, and face his ghosts instead. But here hers was, standing in front of her. Mocking her. "I told Draco to get the fuck away from me, and that was it. You never came-,"

"Your friends never told you," he scoffed and rolled his eyes, "And you say I'm the one who made bad choices."

"Don't you dare come in here and say a word about my friends," her voice got lower, more threatening, "You lost the right to have a say in my life a long time ago."