tw: marlotte divorced era ???
he didn't know why he was the way he was. he couldn't let her go, but he couldn't quite hold her, either. he wondered if he had an imbalance, if there was something physically wrong with him. he knew the truth, that he was just scared, that he didn't know where to go from here, he just couldn't accept that. for what felt like the hundred time that day, mattheo let his mind drift to charlotte. she occupied most of his waking thoughts, and definitely all of his unconscious ones.
she seemed to haunt him. summer had started, she was too far to plague his thoughts like this, yet she did. maybe it was his love for her that kept her so keenly on his mind, maybe it was his desire to once again be understood the way he was with her. he didn't know, couldn't explain it, but he missed her all the same. he couldn't help but long for the time he spent with her, the
memories he made along side her. she was his bestfriend, he didn't know anyone like her.
the first letter came just days after school let out. it detailed the ocean in wales, the distance from her friends, her boredom. it implored a reply back, something he didn't provide. how could he, he wondered, when his heart ached for her so strongly? how could he bear to have her, just not in the way he wanted? he had never felt for anyone as strongly as he felt for her. she was special to him, in a way no one else has been before.
it was plane in the open, he had thought. he had reckoned it was as clear as the eye could see. he figured everyone, students and teachers and friends and enemies could all see it. that he needed charlotte as potently as he needed air. he wished she was here so strongly that it was lethal. he longed for her company, her talks, her laugh, and yet, he couldn't write her back.
the second letter came just days after the first. she asked how he was, if he had been keeping busy. he didn't reply to that, either. he was keeping busy though, or at least something like that. he devoted hours of his time to trying to recall the sound of her voice, talking to him, yelling at him, whispering to him. he had to strain his ears to make out even a smidgen of how she sounded. there was nothing quite like her voice, soft and sweet, but also loud and aggressive. she was his balance. whatever he needed in life, he was sure she had it, sure that if her ever found himself in need of something, that she would be the one to help him find it. he had an itching suspicion that he loved her beyond the bounds of mortality. that even in death, he would love her so viciously. it was unnerving.
she wrote him a third letter, a week later. she asked if he was okay, if something had happened. something had happened. he had realized her loved her so uncontrollably that he couldn't even bear to think about her smiling at the paper fondly, waiting excitedly for his reply. he was letting her down, he knew, but he figured it was better than the alternative. come hell or high waters, he would love her just as fanatically as he had from the start. he had started to think that nothing could change his love for her, nothing could shrink, effect, or belittle his feelings about her. it was dangerous and calming, an oxymoron if he'd ever seen one, but he payed little mind to it.
his days were long and boring. he went outside, sat by his pool, thought of charlotte. he ignored his friends, his housekeeper, anyone who took the time to owl him. he ate gourmet meals and lounged outside in designed bathing suits, but no amount of expensive things could cure the ache in his heart forming missing charlotte so dearly.
on the third week of summer, he decided to go out. it had been weeks since she wrote him last, and he was both thrilled and disappointed that she had given up. he got ready, wore his crisply ironed button down and slacks. he wondered if charlotte thought about him the way he did her. he got ready, his heart ached. it didn't make any sense, how this all happened. how he grew to love her. he knew the answer, of course. how could he have been her friend, learned so much about her, and not loved her. it was unavoidable, to him. he left his house, and apparated to his best friend, Blaise Zabini's house.
the three broomsticks was packed. mattheo couldn't decided if he preferred this or his too quiet house. everywhere he went, he was bumping into someone, he was glad for the crowds, and he was also not. he lazed around the bar while Blaise went to find a new girl or two to get accompanied with. he was bored, but he was also not, and he wondered if he would ever stop feeling so indecisive about everything. as he sat at the bar, a cold hand landed on his shoulder gently, he looked back and there she was.
summer had done charlotte well. she was tan, beautifully so, and her nose was littered with freckles. it would have quite possibly been the most beautiful he'd ever seen her, if it wasn't for the pissed off look on her face.
"can we talk outside?" she asked, and burst out laughing. he had a strong suspicion she was drunk, but he wouldn't ask, he didn't want to embarrass her.
"sure char, what about?" he asked as she lead him to the door of the packed bar.
"guess," she said with a laugh, like he had said something absolutely ridiculous. he pushed the door open for her, and hot, humid air flooded the atmosphere around him. he longed for the crowdedness of the bar. he looked over at charlotte, who was wearing a light purple dress, and waited for her to say something.
"you never wrote me back," she accused, glaring at him lightly.
"i know," he said.
"why not?" she looked away from him, and he wondered distantly if she was going to cry. she certainly looked like it, upset and weepy, a look he wished he never saw on her.
"i'm not sure," he said, because he can't tell her he loves her, not here, not now. not when she's upset at him and drunk and crying.
"oh," she says, and mattheo still doesn't know what to say.
"are you okay, charlotte?" he ends up asking, because she doesn't look okay, and he'd be surprised if she felt okay.
"no," she said, tears starting to slip down her cheeks, "no, i wanna go home, i wanna see my parents."
"charlotte," he says slowly, "your dads in azkaban, you can't see him."
"my mums dead," she says quietly, looking at something over his shoulder.
"mine too," he says, but when he looks down at her watery eyes and sad face, he's sure it was the wrong thing to say.
"come with me char." he says, it's not a question, he doesn't quite far if she wants to or not, he needs to know that she's safe, just for tonight.
"no," she says, sounding confused and sad and a little bit..angry?
"come on charlotte," he said exasperatedly.
"no," she says again, shaking her head.
"please charlotte, just for tonight," he asks again, reaching out to grab her hand. this time, she lets him, and he grasps her cold fingers tightly. he sighs in relief. he had missed her, he realizes. all this time he had been ignoring her and thinking about her, he was really just missing her. looking back, he couldn't think of a time that he didn't miss her. he missed her when they fought, and when they didn't talk, he missed her when she was in her dorm and he was in his, he missed her all the time. he didn't know what to do with that, what to make of it, but it didn't bother him. he loved her. loves, not loved.
"fine," she said, filling the silence around them, "but you owe me a drink first."
"i don't think that's a very good idea," he said, and watched as annoyance filled her face.
"i'm not an alcoholic, matty." she stated coyly, watching him with her eyebrows raised.
"okay," he said quietly, "one drink."
she smiled brightly and pulled him back into the cramped bar. she ordered a firewhiskey, which mattheo thought was odd since she hated wizard alcohol, but he didn't say a word as he payed for the drink and sat beside her.
when she finished it, she was drunker than before. he held tight to her hand a led her outside, where she sank down to the ground, looking up at him and patting the spot beside her until he too sat.
"why are you doing this?" she asked, "what do you want?"
he had no idea what he wanted, not a single clue, but he was certain it had something to do with her, always.
"you," he says, and hears a dull laugh from where she's sitting next to him. she laughs loudly, spookily so.
"shut up," she says, and then stands back up, "i wanna go home."
"i know," mattheo says, looking up at her, "i'll take you home."
her grabbed her hand and apparated back to the gloomy estate of Riddle Manor. she looked around for a moment before turning back to him.
"mattheo," she said slowly, "this isn't my home."
he laughed, "no, it's mine."
she followed him as he led her inside and up a set of winding white stairs. he stopped at a pair of french doors and opened them up. inside was a beautiful room, with crisp white walls and light blue bedding. it looked like a room she would've had if her parents were alive. he laughed quietly at her amazement and lead her inside. they sat on the unwrinkled linen sheets, and through her drunken haze, she worried about messing them up. she looks back over to mattheo, watching him as he digs through the linen closet for an extra blanket.
i love you, she thinks, before ridding her mind of the words. she didn't know where they came from, or why she thought them, but she knew she shouldn't have. they were dangerous words, the kind you spared for family and life long friends, not ones you think about boys who always leave you hanging, waiting for more only to get nothing. he brings her the spare blanket and she lays back against the headboard.
"why'd you bring me here?" she asked, desperate to know what he was thinking. what he was feeling.
"i wanted to know if you were okay." he explained, like it was the simplest thing in the world.
"so you kidnapped me to your manor to make sure i was okay?" charlotte clarified.
"pretty much," he shrugged, enticing her to be mad at him. she could feel anger towards him build in her chest, but she didn't know what to do. she reclined her body and rolled over, lying down so he wouldn't notice how bothered she was.
"are you tired?" he asked curiously.
"no."
"then what are you doing?" he asked with an entertained laugh.
"ignoring you." she stated coldly.
he laughed and walked to the side of the bed she was facing, kneeling down so they were eye level.
"i missed you, char." he said seriously, all humor gone from his eyes.
"i didn't miss you," she argued, not daring to let herself hope his words were true.
"i know you did," he whispered with a smug grin, "you wrote to me."
"yeah and you didn't write back," she said, rolling her eyes. she couldn't deal with him sometimes. he was so much, and being around someone like him was thrilling, yes, but it also was hard to know when he was being serious.
"that doesn't change the fact that you love me," he said with a wink, emphasizing the word love.
"get the fuck away from me," she said angrily. she wondered if she was growing to hate him. she wondered if it was possible for her to hate him. she wasn't sure. he only laughed, which only made her more upset. she felt tears of anger and frustration build in her eyes, but she was determined to not cry in front of him again tonight.
as if he could sense the change in her mood, mattheo moved to sit on the bed next to where she lay.
"i'm sorry," he said quietly, and then, after a moment, "are you mad at me?"
she sniffled sharply, before replying, "yes."
"okay," he said.
charlotte felt the bed shift as mattheo got off. she didn't understand why he was leaving, she didn't tell him to, and she certainly didn't want him to, but he was all the same. she heard his steps as he crept to the side of the bed she was on. his lips pressed a warm kiss to her forehead before he turned and left her. anger kept a keen hold on her heart, even when her eyelids drooped and sleep eased her conscious.
in her dreams, she was dying. she laid on the grassy ground of the hogwarts courtyard, but she was heaving for breath, trying to lift herself back up to get to... she didn't know. something maybe? someone? as she tried to decipher what was going on, she realized what she was trying to reach. in front of her, probably suffering the same deadly, painful fate as her, was mattheo. he lay bleeding in the grass, a pool of blood surrounding his unusually cold body. mattheo had always run warm, it used to offer her great comfort, to feel his warmth, but now it only brought her despair knowing that she would never feel it again. she grasped her cold, limp ish hand tightly, and felt tears slid down her cheeks as his eyes drifted closed and he fingers went lax as she held them.
charlotte shot up, enveloped by the darkness of mattheos guest room. she quickly got up and grabbed her wand from where it sat on the bedside table. she cast a quick lumos so she could see where she was going, and she left the room. the hall was much darker than her room had been, and she was scared that his room wouldn't even be on this floor, but in the back of her mind charlotte knew that mattheo wouldn't have put her so far from him. she looked into five dark, empty rooms before opening his door. his walls were dark green, with quidditch posters and trophies on them. he was laying in his bed,
sleeping peacefully. it gave her some comfort knowing that he was here, alive and well.
she tiptoed over to the edge of his bed and tapped his shoulder.
"mattheo," she whispered into the dark room, hoping it would wake him up.
"mattheo," she whispered again, louder this
time.
"what?" he said angrily, slapping at her hand that was consistently tapping his shoulder.
"can i sleep in here?" she asked quietly, worried he would say no.
"yeah," he said after looking at her for a moment, he scooted over a bit and patted the bed beside him, "yeah char, come on over."
she slid into the spot he patted, delight when she felt the warm sheets and pillows from where he lay seconds ago. his arm stretched to rest across her, pulling her close to him, and regardless of how mad she was, charlotte let him. she turned and hurried her face in his chest, and let sleep come over her once again.