Amortentia

Part 26

                After he said goodbye to Mary with a quick kiss in the corridors, which his friends always made sure to miss, he went into Charms with his friends, sitting at his normal desk with Greg. Flitwick went on and on about summoning charms for about the third day in a row, John could almost quote the whole speech.
“When are you going to ask her to the ball?” Greg whispered.
“Mary?” John asked, momentarily confused.
“No, your other girlfriend.”
“I don’t know, when should I?”
“You better hurry up mate, it’s in a week.” Greg insisted.
“I just want the timing to be perfect.”
“Then make it perfect, get her roses or something stupid like that.” Greg shrugged. John thought of the roses on his windowsill, he still hadn’t taken them away, knowing they were from someone that he loved. They had died long ago, but the petals were still there, brown and wrinkled. It kind of reminded him of beauty and the beast. He nodded at Greg as Flitwick told them to summon pillows from across the room. Even though they had worked on these for a while, John hadn’t perfected them, the cushions flew up to him, but either dropped or flew to right or left. Thankfully he wasn’t the only one with this problem though; a lot of the students had trouble too, like Greg, whose cushions kept flying to John instead of him. When Charms was over they headed to Defense against the Dark Arts, where they had left boggarts behind for grindylows, creatures in the lake which were deadly to swim with, they’d pull you to the bottom of the lake and drown you. Tonks had managed to catch one, and kept it in a tank in the corner of the classroom for the class to look at. It looked like an evil octopus; it had tentacles, but also had a head with red eyes and sharp teeth, swimming around the glass cage, looking for a way out. Tonks thought they were cute, but she was a bit odd. The boys in the class thought it was funny to throw paper balls at the tank when Tonks wasn’t looking, making the grindylow race around the cage desperately. Tonks usually caught the person that did it though, and they’d get detention or something like that. John had managed to resist throwing things at the cage, but Greg had gotten a detention for it. When that was over they went down to lunch, John meeting up with Mary in the doorway and exchanging stories of the day with her, then they kissed quickly and went to their separate tables. John smiled at her, but it was rather forced, and sat at his table, head resting on his hands.
“What’s wrong John?” Sara asked, taking a sandwich from the platter.
“I don’t know.” John admitted.
“Are you going to ask her soon?” Mike asked.
“I don’t know.” He repeated. They paused what they were doing to look at him with surprise.
“You don’t know if you’re going to ask her?” Greg asked with amazement.
“What, no, I’ll ask her! I just don’t know if it will be soon.” John shrugged.
“You said you wanted it to be perfect, we can probably help with that.” Greg offered. John’s mood lifted a little bit.
“How?” John asked hopefully.
“Well, we can arrange a moonlit stroll; we can brew some Amortentia…” Sara paused, the enthusiasm in her eyes fading.
“What’s that?” John asked.
“It’s a potion, if you drink it, you smell like the person’s favorite sent.” Mike said.
“Look at you, ate a textbook?” John asked with a smile.
“You can give her roses and then ask her, all romantic and stuff.” Greg said.
“Perfect! How are we going to make the potion though?” John asked.
“Well, for starters you can ask Professor Holmes.” Sara suggested quickly. John thought about that for a moment, but he didn’t see any drawbacks.
“I’ll ask him after dinner then.” John planned. Not again, stuck in a room with Holmes, but he just had to ask, make the potion maybe, and get out of there quickly. John nodded as if it was settled then, and bit into a sandwich. Astronomy and Herbology seemed to take years, both boring classes out of a textbook for the day, which John couldn’t stand. Overall it was an extremely boring day, but thankfully it was over, and he ate a fairly big dinner, nervous for his surprise meeting with Professor Holmes. He didn’t see him in the staff table, which might be a good sign, he wasn’t sure. John just hoped Snape wouldn’t leave dinner and go straight to the classroom, Holmes may be bad, but he’d much rather him than Snape. At least Professor Holmes didn’t take points from Gryffindor whenever John messed the smallest thing up.
“Are you going down then?” Greg asked as they were finishing their last bites of food.
“Ya I guess, can you maybe come with me?” John asked nervously. Greg shook his head.
“Sorry mate, I’ve got to do, homework.” He said quickly.
“We don’t have homework today.” John pointed out.
“We do though.” Sara agreed. John rolled his eyes, he could tell when they wanted to stay out of things, and this was one of those times.
“Okay then, I’ll see you in the common room later.” John decided. He got up from the table, grabbed his bag, and headed down to the dungeons. It was weird, seeing them without people lined up at the door, waiting for Snape to let them in. John was debating in his mind whether or not to turn back, Mary liked him the way he was, of course she’d say yes, but on the other hand he wanted it to be perfect, and this sounded like the best way to make it perfect. He knocked on the wooden door, hoping someone was in the classroom.
“Come in.” Someone called, thankfully not sounding like Snape. John cracked the door open and peeked his head inside. Professor Holmes was sitting at his desk, writing with an eagle feather quill.
“John!” He exclaimed, putting the quill back and folding the paper up, tucking it in his desk quickly. John looked at him with confusion, but stepped fully in the classroom.
“Hi, um, I was wondering if you could help me make a potion.” John asked. Holmes looked down at him with momentary forgetfulness, but then blinked and breathed sharply.
“Yes I could, what kind of potion?” He said quickly.
“Well, I don’t quite know the name, it’s a love potion, it smells good or something?” John said a bit awkwardly.
“Amortentia?” Holmes asked.
“That’s the one.” John agreed.
“That’s a quick potion to whip up, yes.” Holmes said confidently.
“You’ve used it before?” John asked, hoping to find out if it worked. Unfortunately he realized that was kind of a personal question, so he wasn’t surprised when Holmes didn’t answer. Holmes got up from his desk, thought for a second, and went to the supply cabinet, grabbing jars and herbs from the numerous shelves as if he memorized the potion.
“Need a hand?” John asked as he walked to the desk with his hands full of jars. He dumped them on the table, standing up the ones that fell quickly, as if it had to be perfect. He went back over and grabbed two knives from the drawer, coming back over and lighting a fire under the caldron. John watched awkwardly, wondering if there was anything he could do to help him, but he seemed to have it under control. Holmes finally stood still behind the table, looking at John as if seeing what he’d do next.
“Instructions?” John asked after a while.
“Do you have your potions book?” Holmes asked. John checked his bag, digging around through the contents.
“No, I don’t…” He said, looking back up to see Holmes flipping through a potions book.
“Good thing I’ve got one then.” He said with a smile. John laughed a bit; this man was really on top of things apparently.
“Lacewing fly.” Holmes said, holding out his hand, still reading the book. John looked at him with confusion, but then searched the containers, handing Holmes the one labeled Lacewing Fly. He unscrewed the container and put a pinch into the now bubbling water.
“Baneberry.” He held out his hand again, forcing John to find the jar and hand it to him, careful this time not to brush hands. It seemed that Professor Holmes was doing all of the work now, John simply handed him the containers and he added the ingredients, his hands moving gracefully as if he had done this many times. When the last ingredient was added, the potion was golden, looking like sunlight floating in a pot. It smelled to John like his mother’s kitchen, which was just like Professor Holmes had smelled like during extra potions… John looked up at the Professor, who was looking back at him with a strange look in his eyes. John started to get nervous now, realizing that he had been using Amortentia this whole time for some reason. He felt his face flush, and wanted very much to leave. But to his horror, Holmes started making his way around the desk that was separating them, moving closer to John with every step. They still had personal space, but he was slowly closing that space.
“It probably smells familiar.” Holmes said, still coming closer. John took a small step back, his mid running at what was going on and what he should do. “Do you know what it smells like for me?” Holmes asked with another step. Now he was about a foot away. John looked up at his face, extremely uncomfortable. “It smells like the lake, where I had my first kiss.” He said, making John back up a step again. John opened his mouth to say something, but a small croak came out, he couldn’t believe what was happening right now. Holmes took one final step closer, closing what little space they had between each other. To John’s horror, he took him by the shoulders and went to kiss him, their lips almost touching when John pulled back violently, shaking Holmes off of him and retreating to the far wall.
“Whoa, no!” John exclaimed. His heart was pounding, he was blushing like crazy, and he wanted so badly to run away from the class, from the school, never see Professor Holmes again. But when he looked back up at the Professor, he only saw a broken man, looking at John with tears running down his face, his eyes seemingly shattered, and every purpose of life gone.
“I’m sorry, I really am sorry.” John said. “I have a girlfriend, who is a girl…” He said, as far away from Holmes as possible.
“I know.  I’ve seen you John, the way you look at her… it hurts.” Holmes said his voice small. As horrified as John was, he did feel bad for him, he had no idea what was wrong, but he looked like a dead man walking. “You used to look at me like that!” His voice raised, he sounded as if he was about to scream, the tears flowing from his eyes increasing. “John, please, tell me you remember at least some of that!” He begged. John looked at him with absolute amazement, the one person that his friends had tried to keep for him, the one who gave him the roses, the missing person in his life, was Professor Holmes.
“I’m sorry, I don’t remember that.” John said, and he was sorry, but it was different now, he had Mary now, and right now Holmes didn’t look like the type of person he would fall in love with.
“John, I loved you! I loved you so much, and you woke up in the hospital wing, asked me who I was, and you threw me out! You never visited, I only saw you from a distance, with your new girlfriend, I can’t take it anymore, John, you loved me too!” Holmes said, now he was full out crying.
“I don’t remember that!” John debated, trying his best to stay calm. Holmes walked swiftly up to his desk and pulled open one of the drawers, pulling out a sealed envelope.
“Everything I couldn’t say to you I wrote down, as if you would respond, as if you still cared!” Holmes threw the letter at John, but it just floated down and slid onto the floor. Professor Holmes pulled out another one and threw it to join the first, and then another, and another. “Every day I wrote to you, I just put them in the drawer because I knew I couldn’t send it to you, I knew you’d just throw it out!” He kept throwing envelopes on the ground, one after another, and with every envelope John felt like an absolutely horrible person.
“Professor, I am so sorry, whatever I did to upset you, I didn’t do it on purpose!” John begged. Holmes had stopped throwing the envelopes; the floor was littered with them.
“Take them, just take them, you can use them to keep the fire burning or something, goodbye John.” Holmes said, sinking into his desk chair and looking at John with anger and sadness. John looked at him, so confused, he didn’t feel any love for this man, but apparently he had. He just stood there, so conflicted at the moment.
“Goodbye John.” Holmes repeated, his voice harsh. John was worried that he’d get jinxed, or worse, so he grabbed his bag, picked up the first letter he could find, and ran out of the door, not stopping until he was at the portrait hole, his heart racing.
“UMQRA!” He said between breaths. The portrait opened and his friends looked at him expectantly, as if expecting to hear good news. They were in front of the fire, and thankfully there weren’t many people there, it had gotten late apparently. “You three knew about this, and you didn’t bother telling me!” John demanded, throwing his bag violently on a chair.
“What do you mean, what happened?” Greg asked.
“He tried to bloody kiss me.” John hissed. Their faces fell.
“Tried?” Sara asked quietly.
“If it surprises you, I am not gay. I may have been once, but I’ve moved on, I lost those memories, I have Mary now.”  He said, furious with his friends for not warning him he was walking into some psycho love man’s office.
“What happened?” Mike asked.
“Well, we made the potion, and it smelled exactly like he had the days before, so I realized he had been using the potion on me, and then he walked over and tried to kiss me! So of course I backed up and  told him no, and then he broke down, telling me how much he had loved me and how mean I was being and then he threw a billion letters on the ground, apparently he wrote everything down in them that he wanted to say to me!” John hissed.
“But don’t you like him?” Sara asked hopefully.
“No I don’t like him!” John protested.
“He finally cracked then? I was wondering how long it would take.” Greg sighed.
“Why didn’t you just tell me about this, it would’ve saved me so much time?” John demanded.
“We wanted to, trust me, we told you not to go out with Mary, we thought you’d fall for him again, obviously we were wrong.” Mike said.
“Who else knows about this?” John demanded.
“McGonagall.” Greg muttered. John stared at him in disbelief.
“You told McGonagall?” he hissed.
“No, you got in a fight in the common room with a bunch of girls about him, they wanted to ask him out and they really didn’t like you, and when you got sent to McGonagall’s Sherlock was called to, where you told her everything. She was about to make you two split up, but then Sherlock said something about being so hopelessly in love with you or something and she let you guys go free.” Greg explained.
“That’s why she was crying then, well that’s great, now we’ve got her crying over my love life.” John complained.
“Just give him a chance, please?” Sara asked, trying to make puppy eyes. John grabbed his bag from the chair and went up to the dorm, where Sam and Rory were already asleep. He didn’t even bother changing into his pajamas, he flopped into his bed and pulled the curtains around it, lighting his wand so that blue light flooded the small space. John sat up on the headboard, holding the wand on his shoulder and holding the note with two hands, looking at the neat cursive writing on the envelope. It just said one word, John, but he knew it was written with meaning. John debated whether or not to open it, to read what Holmes had to say about him, but he was worried about his relationship with Mary. He loved her, and he didn’t want anything to get in the way of that, but he also wanted to help Holmes, he was worried someone would find him hanging from his ceiling the next morning. He carefully opened the envelope, trying his best not to rip or wrinkle it for some reason. There was piece of parchment tucked neatly inside, John took it out and unfolded it to see more of the neat writing all down the page.
John,
Once again I see you with that Mary girl, and I can’t help the jealously that flows through my tortured veins. She is a very lucky girl, and I am speaking from experience. I know you’ll never read this, so far the only time I even get to see you is in class or from across the Great Hall. You for one, have friends, people to support you, to love you, when I sit here alone, cursed to watch you love someone else. I hadn’t been able to tell you how much you had meant to me, how much I loved you, and how much I miss you now that you’re gone. I was so alone, and I owe you so much, you brightened up my world, for once I had a purpose in living, I could talk to someone, care about someone. Now you’re gone and I know that almost my entire heart had been ripped from my body when you looked at me with a blank expression. I am hurt, rejected, but I know it’s not your fault, I know that it’s whoever’s fault that was in the Chamber, and if I find them  I promise you I will give you justice, even though you’ll never know. If anything that would land me in Azkaban, without any purpose, left to rot in vain for my lost love. The next word was blurred with a small drop of water, undoubtedly a tear. I sincerely hope that you’re enjoying your life, loving Mary, doing well in your classes. God knows I’ll never enjoy my life again, nothing can and nothing will replace you, eventually it just won’t be worth it anymore, but that’s not yet, I still have hope that you might realize what there was between us. I love you John, I can never say it again, but I truly love you with all of my missing heart.
Love,
Sherlock Holmes
John put down the letter, feeling tears running down his face. He didn’t try to wipe them away, he didn’t try to hold them back, he had just read the most depressing piece of writing he had ever read, and it was about losing him. Sherlock Holmes had truly loved him, and John felt like he was the most horrible man to walk the face of the earth. He had pushed him away, openly rejected him, and it said here, in this note, that his life wasn’t worth it when John said no. John hoped that didn’t mean he would kill himself, but he had looked like it when he was in the classroom. The writing was poetic, so saddening, John felt like he wanted to run to the classroom and give him a hug, assuring him that everything was okay, that he loved him too, but he didn’t know if he did. He didn’t know him well enough, but judging on this note, John was willing to give him a chance, because apparently he had been the whole of Holmes’s heart, and had been ripped away from him. John could almost feel Holmes’s tears at the moment, because he had no doubt he was crying. He felt so guilty; he was responsible for all of this man’s tears. John fell asleep late, holding the letter to his chest, his pillow wet with tears, the light from his wand still shining.