Fall Apart- R.J.L

flight risk

The House Heads were split in their opinions. McGonagall and Sprout both sides with Teddy, insisting that she was of no harm to anyone, explaining the trauma she has endured her entire life and how this incident was an expression of that. All she needs is someone to talk to about these things rather than bottling them up.
Slughorn and Flitwick however weren't so accepting. They agreed that the incident was a sign that Theodora Malfoy is 'unstable and out of control' that if not expelled now she would be a danger to herself and her classmates. They used mine and my friends' pain against us saying that it was 'interrupting our studies' and how we were too young to be dealing with such things.

The vote was split and Dumbledore was ultimately the deciding vote. Some of our words must have swayed him because somehow, by some miracle, he's letting her stay. On the condition that she meets with Madam Pomfrey once a week for a physical and mental check up.

So, finally, today on Tuesday April 4th 1977, Theodora Malfoy is returning to Gryffindor tower.

"How're you feeling?" I ask her as she sits up in bed sipping the coffee I had sat on her side-table not minutes earlier.
"Glad to be getting out of this place."
"Yeah, I bet. Are you nervous at all? Going back?"
"A little bit...but I know it'll be okay, I've got you."
"That's cute." I peck her forehead and then continue packing her things into the case on the end of her bed.
"How did you manage to accumulate so much stuff when you've only been here for 3 weeks? And only conscious for 1 of them?!"
"I just attract stuff, I'm a stuff magnet."
"Well turn off your stuff magnetism please, any more stuff here and I'm going to need to get another case."
"Oh shut up whiney boots, pass me my wand." She rolls her eyes and puts her hand out palm up.
I hand over her wand and she swiftly casts an invisible extension charm.
"How can you be in the hospital for almost a month and still be ahead of me?"
"I taught myself that a few years ago to hide food in my pockets without anyone being able to tell. It comes in handy."
"You're a genius, I hate you."
"I love you too Rem." She laughs.

"Alright, ready to go?"
She smiles at me and nods. She grasps my hand and wraps herself around my arm to keep herself steady, I carry her case and we leave the hospital wing.
As we walk through the halls I feel Teddy growing more and more anxious. Our usual flow of conversation is stunted by Teddy's near-silence.
"Are you sure you're ready for this?" I ask. She stays silent, staring blankly at her shoes.
"Teds? Teddy?!"
"Oh! What? Sorry, I zoned out for a second. What was it?"
"Are you alright?"
"I'm fine, I'm good yeah."
I look at her concernedly, she's clearly not fine. I've made the mistake of ignoring this once before and I will never make that mistake ever again.

We walk for another few seconds while I gather my thoughts. Mid-stride I hold a hand out Infront of her and stop us in the middle of a corridor.
"Talk to me. What's going on in your mind?"
"Remus I'm-"
"You're clearly not fine so stop that bullshit."
"I don't...I can't-"
"Theodora Malfoy, you can be so stupid sometimes. I thought a near death experience might have wizened you up a bit but clearly it needs to be spelled out for you. You have to talk to people. To me! We all care for you so much, we love you. I love you. There is nothing that you could say that would ever scare me off."
I notice the tears that glisten on her cheeks as she looks at me with pained eyes. She just stares for a minute and I don't break our gaze. I'm here to stay and she needs to know that.
Finally she breaks what had practically become a staring contest, she lurches forward and buries herself in my arms.

I hold her impossibly tight and feel my own tears start to fall as she unravels in my grasp. We grip eachother for comfort as the weight of fear, loss and pain, which had been building for weeks, finally washes over us.
"I'm scared Remus." Teddy whispers, so quietly I wouldn't have heard it if she wasn't pressed so closely to me.
"That's okay, it's okay. We're gonna get through this together. If I could take all the monsters out of your brain I would, I would fight off the shadows and the darkness and the monsters that make you feel scared and like you're not enough. But until I can figure out how to shrink down enough to crawl inside your mind, I'll hold your hand -if that's alright- and I'll be here, to hug you, to kiss you, to listen. I'm here. I'm always here."
"Always?"
"Always."
"Okay..." She steps out of my arms and takes a hold of my hand again. "Let's go."

Getting through Gryffindor tower was rather difficult. Everyone was either staring at Teddy and making her uncomfortable and self conscious or they were trying to come up and hug her. People were crying saying they loved her, people she had never spoken to before. I could tell Teddy wasn't enjoying being the centre of this spectacle, I gripped her hand tightly and headed through the crowd determinedly. I was almost at the doorway up to the girls dorms when I felt her hand slip from mine. She had stopped dead in her tracks infront of another door.
It took me a second to register what it was she was staring at.
The bathroom.
The place where she..

Suddenly she had burst out of her trance and was speeding up the stairs of the dorm with energy I didn't think she possessed.
I called after her desperately.
"Teddy wait! Ted! Theodora! What's wrong? Come back!"
Nothing worked, she wouldn't even turn around to glance at me.
She raced up the stairs at such a ferocious pace, my chest ached and lungs burned- I need to quit smoking.
When we reached the sixth floor dorms she swung the door to her dorm open and lurched forward. She collapsed for a moment but quickly regained her strength and rushed to the bathroom.

No.
No no no no no no.
This can't be happening.
Not again.
Please.
Please no.
Why would she do this.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck.

"TEDDY!" I shout, I pound on the door of the bathroom, there's an ancient charm on it which protects against alohamora.
I can't break it down.
I can't get to her.
"TEDDY, TEDDY PLEASE, LET ME IN, WE'LL FIGURE IT OUT, PLEASE!" I beg and I plead with her but the door doesn't budge. I can't hear anything. It's so silent it's scary.

Please please please.

"Teddy...Ted's?." My voice croaks from my screaming. I keep pounding on the door, tears and sobs being ripped from my body.

"Remus?" The voice jolts me out of my pleading trance. I turn around to see the red headed girl behind me.
"What's going on? What's wrong?"
"Its- it's Teddy. She's-"
"Oh fuck no." Lily's eyes widen at the realisation of what's happening.
"No no no, this is not happening, not again." She rushes through the dorm towards her bed where she hurriedly rifles through her bed-side table.
"Got it, I've got it." She runs back to the bathroom door where she unlocks it and I fall inside, not realising how my entire body weight had been resting upon it.

I lift myself from where I had fallen on the cold tiles and look up, expecting another pool of blood, expecting a cold dead Teddy. Instead I find her leant over the toilet with tears streaming down her face, her skin tinged slightly green.
She looks at me with sad, bleary eyes and my heart breaks.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." She croaks and sobs wrack her small frame.
"Shhh it's okay, it's okay." I rub her back reassuringly and look up at Lily with a tight lipped smile which she returns and closes the bathroom door as she exits.
"Are you ill? Do you need to go back to the hospital wi-"
"NO!- sorry, no. I don't ever want to go back there. Please, please don't make me go back there."
"Okay, okay no hospital but I'm worried Teddy. You've barely been back for five minutes and you're sitting on the floor vomiting."
"I know, I know it looks bad. I'm sorry."
"You terrified me Teds."
"I'm so sorry."
"I thought that you had-" the words catch in my throat as tears start to fall again.
"Oh my love, come here." She holds me close as I cry and I cling to her for dear life.

Once I've gotten Teddy into bed with a cup of tea, a book and a basin in case she needs to be sick again I leave her to rest.
The minute I close the door on her dorm I can finally breathe a sigh of relief.
She's okay...ish.