Lavinia barely slept that night, instead lying in bed feeling rather guilty. She'd been awful to Lupin, she was certain of it. He'd trusted her with something private and had probably been terrified she would hate him for his condition. Which she hadn't done, so at least she had one thing going for her. But she'd been selfish. Her first reaction hadn't been to comfort him or assure him that she didn't judge his whole character based on something he couldn't control. No, her response had been anger and entitlement. He first thought had been that he didn't know the first thing about self hatred.
Which was ridiculous of course. It didn't matter that his reason was, in her opinion, utterly ridiculous. Didn't matter how his reasons held up to hers. What mattered was that he felt it. And she of all people should have understood the soul crushing weight of self loathing. Should have understood that from his side, his justification no doubt seemed sound, even if it wasn't.
She rolled out of bed with the sunrise, the clock reading just before 8 am. She was exhausted and had hardly slept a wink, but the ceiling was getting boring and she knew she needed to swallow her pride and apologise to Lupin and if she was going to do that, it needed to be with a clear head. Which was why the first thing she did when she entered the kitchen was start making coffee. Even the smell of it seemed to wake her up slightly.
Nearly two hours and as many cups of coffee later, Lavinia heard the sound of footsteps coming down the stairs. She stayed where she was, sitting in an armchair in the living room, nursing her third cup of caffeine and waiting for the fog of sleep deprivation to leave her more completely. Her head still felt slightly muddy, her thoughts all slow and jumbled and senseless. The coffee was at least helping, though it was also making her hands shake rather badly. Of course that could also have been nerves, she supposed.
"Oh hell yes," she heard someone - Potter, she thought - say from the kitchen. "Someone made coffee."
"Who the hell was up that early?" someone else - Black maybe? - returned, sounding bleary and tired.
"No clue, but don't tell me you're complaining," Potter replied, rather chipper. Their voices were now coming closer and she suspected they were coming to the living room to sit down. She pulled herself up from the slumped position she'd ended up in, trying to seem more awake than she was so as not to arouse suspicions.
"Not at all. Should we wake Lavinia up?" Black asked, his voice close enough now that he had to be in the dining room.
"Let her sleep," said a third voice that must be Lupin. He too sounded tired, and there was a resigned edge to his voice that made guilt curl in her stomach. Still, she couldn't help but give a little snort of almost laughter at the suggestion that she be allowed to keep resting. She would love to be resting right now.
There was a general murmur of agreement among the boys and a short while later they entered the room. Black and Lupin both stopped in the doorway upon seeing her, but Potter just raised his mug to her in salute, yawning as he walked over to the couch. "You made coffee," he said, plopping down and putting his feet up on the coffee table. "Bless you."
Lavnia gave a little smile and inclined her head mockingly to him, returning his raised mug, albeit a little halfheartedly. Merlin she was exhausted. But judging by the concerned look on Black's face, she didn't want to show it any more than she could help. He worried enough for her as it was. That too made her feel rather guilty. The last thing she wanted to do was hurt him.
"How long have you been up?" Black asked, recovering from the surprise of seeing her awake and going to join Potter on the couch.
Lavinia shrugged, looking down at her cup and swirling the black liquid inside a bit. "Just a little while," she lied.
"Mmhmm," Black hummed skeptically, settling himself down on the cushion, mimicking his best friend as he propped his feet on the table. "Why do I feel like that's not true?"
"Because you don't trust me to take care of myself," Lavinia deadpanned, the words slipping out before she could sensor them. She sighed and attempted to cover the slip by taking a sip from her mug and watching him blandly, half hoping he would think she was joking.
He blinked at her for a moment. "Touche," he conceded with a nod of his head. "But not without reason, I think we can agree."
The night on top of the tower flashed briefly and painfully into Lavinia's mind. "Fair point," she muttered, the words all but disappearing into her cup as she went for another sip of coffee.
"Well at least you admit it," Black sighed resignedly, then glanced at Lupin, who was still standing in the door. "Come sit down, Rem."
Lavinia looked over at the boy, an apology halfway to her lips before she pivoted last minute. "I don't bite," she assured him, covering her nerves with humor as best she could.
"Not what I'm concerned about," Lupin replied, finally settling into the other armchair, though he angled himself in it so he was still watching her.
"Then what are you concerned about?" asked James, frowning between Lavinia and his friend.
Lupin looked at Lavinia, an odd expression on his face that she could read, though whether that was because he was being particularly inscrutable or because she was too exhausted to understand emotions right now, she didn't know. Frankly, they seemed like equally viable explanations. "You were up past 3 am last night," he said eventually, shrugging slightly. "I assumed you would be sleeping in."
Lavinia saw Black's eyes snap to her in the corner of her vision, but she ignored him and the accompanying twist of guilt and simply shrugged. "I'll take a nap later if I need it," she replied blithely, stifling a yawn.
"So you two talked last night?" Potter asked carefully. Lavinia glanced his way for a brief moment. His face was carefully blank, though his eyes betrayed an apprehension she understood too well. He didn't want this to turn ugly, but his first loyalty was to Lupin, who he would defend against her if he had to. Lavinia knew that feeling. She'd dealt with it far too often this past year as Potter and Black threatened Severus.
Lupin, either not noticing or not sensing the same urgency from Potter's question as Lavinia did, simply nodded and glanced at her.
Realizing she was going to have to be the one to make it clear she didn't need to be brought to task for more than being sharp with him, Lavinia sighed and spoke. "Yes," she said, sipping her coffee to distract herself from what was now several sources of guilt. "And for the record, Lupin," she added, hating that she was unable to bring herself to look at him, "I'm sorry. I was a proper arse and I know it. Though I stand by what I said."
Again, Black's gaze locked on to Lavinia and again she ignored him. Potter too looked tense and she saw him set down his mug as though preparing to have to intervene. It was only seeing his response that her slow and tired mind realized she hadn't actually said she didn't care about the whole thing.
Lupin was just staring at her, looking utterly puzzled. "Why are you sorry?" he asked, frowning.
Lavinia blinked in mild surprise. "Because I snapped at you," she explained, incredulous. "I should have been nicer. And a whole lot gentler. And instead I was rude and selfish and then just... left." She bit her lip slightly, hating that she was nervous about his response and that she had again not made it clear. Potter was practically on the edge of his seat and part of Lavinia wanted to snap at him that she hadn't said anything particularly awful. Just thought it. The rest of her was waiting for Lupin's assurance that she hadn't been further out of line than he could forgive. She suspected that would persuade Potter far more than her words could.
"You accepted me for something most people would have hated me for and you think you have to apologise?" Lupin asked, evidently shocked. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Potter settle back slightly, a frown on his face. Black was still watching her and she couldn't decide what the look on his face said. She wished she was less tired. She wished she'd slept more last night and that the coffee would do more to wake her up.
"Not for saying those things," Lavinia defended herself, slightly annoyed, both at Lupin's inability to see what she was apologizing for and at her own head for being so obnoxiously foggy. "But I could have been a whole lot nicer about it," she clarified, hoping he could at least understand that.
Lupin rolled his eyes and gave an almost nervous laugh. "You have nothing to apologise for, Lavinia," he insisted.
Lavinia frowned, wondering why this was so hard for him to understand. "No I really do," she muttered, then shook her head, a possibility finally dawning on her. He didn't think he needed an apology because he had learned to expect worse when people found out he was a werewolf. The thought of it broke her heart slightly. "We need to work on your expectations," she sighed, shaking her head.
Black snorted. "Hark who's talking," he muttered, still watching her with that unreadable expression.
Lavinia shot him a look that was mixed annoyance, confusion and the kind of gratitude that came from knowing that even when it wasn't necessary, he was willing to take a moment to remind her she was worth more than she thought. But she wasn't about to say that, not in broad daylight when all of them could desperately use a bit of mirth. So she joked instead: "I resent that," she deadpanned, the edges of her lips turning up in the beginnings of a smile.
He replied with an innocent shrug and Lavinia frowned at him, then glanced sideways at Potter, who was still staring at her.
"What?" she asked, trying, and failing, to read the look on his face.
He just shook his head and turned to Black. "You owe me a galleon," he informed his best friend, a smirk on his face.
Black scowled and Lavinia frowned. "You bet over my prejudices?" she asked, feeling rather put out. Black's eyes immediately leapt from Potter to Lavinia, his mouth already opening in protest. But Potter beat him to it.
"Nah," he said, waving his hand at her as though to brush the comment away. "We bet on whether or not Rem would actually have the balls to tell you."
Lavinia suppressed a surprised laugh and glanced over at Lupin who was smiling and shaking his head at his friends. "I'm disappointed in you, Sirius," he intoned with mock gravity.
Sirius shrugged. "Sorry, mate," he replied, glancing momentarily at Lavinia before seeming to accept the lighter turn to the conversation. "You have a history."
Lupin gestured as if to say fair enough, and returned to his coffee. They were all peaceably silent for a while and Lavinia couldn't help but marvel, not for the first time, at the easy camaraderie between these boys. It reminded her rather shockingly of her own friends and the way they never hesitated to tease each other, each of them comfortable enough with the others not to worry about someone taking offense. It made her almost sad, to think how well all of them might have gotten along if things were different and they were all a little less prejudiced.
After a little while, during which everyone just sipped their coffees, Potter sighed and set his mug down. "I reckon it's time to make breakfast," he announced.
"Don't tell me we're having eggs again?" Black groaned. They'd had the exact same breakfast every day that week, owing largely to Potter's rather limited culinary skills. Lavinia privately admitted that she too was rather sick of it, but being a guest and knowing she she should be grateful for anything she was given here, she hadn't said anything. That and she didn't know how to politely offer to make something without it coming off as an insult to Potter. Of course now she wondered why she was so concerned about that. This was Potter. It wasn't like his abilities in the kitchen were his pride and joy, or like he took offense at every little thing. Not seriously anyway.
Potter frowned at his best friend. "I'm sorry," he said, sounding rather put out for all that there was a teasing air to his tone. "Can you cook anything else?"
Black sighed and pulled a face, admitted defeat.
"Then no complaining," Potter retorted, putting his nose in the air.
"I can cook," Lavinia offered quietly, half because she'd suddenly realized this wasn't home and and offer to cook wouldn't be seen as low class or insulting, and half because her exhaustion prevented her from thinking about what she was saying beyond a brief consideration before it was out of her mouth. She really needed more coffee. Or sleep. Sleep would probably be better, she knew, but she would likely have to settle for the coffee unless she was willing to spark more worry from Black, who worried about her far too much as it was.
She rose from her thoughts to find three pairs of mildly confused eyes fixed on her. She blinked at them, wondering if she'd really misjudged that badly and it was a terribly rude suggestion.
"You can cook?" asked Potter, shocked and Lavinia recoiled slightly. "Isn't that one of those things you posh families have house elves for?"
Realizing his surprise had nothing to do with her voicing the fact and everything to do with the reality that it was indeed something she could do, Lavinia shrugged. "My mother..." She tripped slightly over the words, but forced herself to continue, pressing the mix of feelings at the word down, "My mother thought it would make me a more appealing bride," she explained, keeping her tone controlled. "Our house elf taught me the basics."
"Your family never ceases to amaze," Potter muttered, pulling a face somewhere between awe and disgust.
"So you meant to tell me that all this time, you've been able to cook and you've been letting us eat the same three meals every day?" Black asked, with mock offense.
Lavinia gave an apologetic smile that was almost a wince. "I didn't think of it?" she offered feebly.
Black put a hand to his heart dramatically. "I can't believe you would do this to us," he gasped.
Snorting and shaking her head, Lavinia stood up, downing the rest of her coffee as she did so. "Come on, Potter," she said, rolling her eyes at Black. "Let's go make these ingrates breakfast."
"Hang on, why am I coming?" Potter whined, even as he followed behind her into the dining room.
"Because I enjoy your company."
"Really?"
"No, I just don't know where anything is."
"Ouch."
Sirius listened to their receding conversation with a slight smile on his face. It was good to see Lavinia settling in a bit. Even if he suspected she'd been lying this morning about just how little sleep she'd gotten. Still, progress was progress and he supposed he should probably just be thankful she was opening up as much as she was. Indeed, this past week Lavinia had interacted with all of them much as though the situation was almost normal. She'd laughed with them, teased them and generally seemed close to happy sometimes.
Of course, there were still tells. There were times when her face fell or when she thought no one was watching. There were also the moments when she was soft and tentative and seemed almost painfully unsure of her actions. Perhaps the worst times to see were those when she flinched at harmless movements like someone raising a hand to scratch their nose when they stood just a little too close to her. But she did at least seem to be doing better. Which was all he could ask for.
Of course, despite that, his heart twisted slightly every time she refused his offer to stay up with her. He desperately wanted to believe it was because she was doing well enough that she could get a full night's sleep, but if he was honest with himself, that seemed rather painfully unlikely. The alternative was that she was pushing him away, a thought he also hated for all that he was willing to give her as much space as she needed to work through the chaos that had been this break.
Sighing and pulling himself from his thoughts, Sirius glanced over at Remus, who was watching the corner around which James and Lavinia had disappeared. "How was she last night?" he asked.
Remus started slightly, evidently jerked from his thoughts by the question. "She was..." He trailed off and shrugged slightly, looking rather nonplussed. "She was weirdly okay with it, I guess," he said.
Sirius shook his head and rolled his eyes at his friend's predictable underestimation of his friends' tolerance of his furry little problem, as they called it. "I told you she would be," he chastised his friend, mildly exasperated.
"Mm," Remus hummed. "Yes. Well." He shrugged. "I figured she'd just shrug it off at best," he explained.
"And she didn't?" Sirius asked, confused. He'd been under the impression that that was just what she'd done, though perhaps a bit more gruffly than she'd intended to and, she being the kind of person she was who seemed to think it was her job to comfort and protect each and every person she cared about, had thought she needed apologize for not being more sensitive.
"No," Remus muttered. Then, apparently catching sight of the concern on his friend's face, he hurried to continue. "She wasn't rude about it, don't worry," he clarified. "Well, okay, she was a little." Sirius's frown of confusion deepened. "She gave me a telling off, actually," Remus admitted, sighing. "For thinking I was a monster."
Sirius gave a little sniff of laughter, rather pleasantly surprised by that. How like Lavinia it was, though, he realized. Her protective instincts and wish to comfort a friend in need had no doubt clashed and her defensive nature had won out in the moment, only for her more sensitive side to catch up late and make her feel guilty about it.
"She's something else," he observed, smiling and shaking his head slightly, hoping Remus didn't catch the undercurrent in his tone that, he suspected, said a bit more than he'd been intending.
Whether he did or didn't, however, Sirius would never know, for his friend's reply was simple and uninformative. "That she is," Remus agreed, nodding. "That she is."
Sirius glanced back towards the kitchen. With both he and Remus staying silent, he could hear her voice from the kitchen and his best friend's occasional response. Though he couldn't make out their words, it sounded rather like she was bossing James around. He smiled, part of him wishing James's parents weren't coming back today. And of course, another part of him was stuck on dreading their return to Hogwarts the following week.
He didn't know what would happen when they all went back to school, or when Lavinia was faced with adults in the house, even if they were far gentler and more supportive than the parents she was used to. He just hoped she didn't forget that they were still there. And selfishly, he didn't want to lose this fragile thing they seemed to have built. Because he liked hearing her laugh, liked seeing her teasing smile and the glint in her eyes that meant someone was about to get a piece of her mind - or a taste of her magic. He didn't want to ever see those go away and he feared that at least at the moment, they were just breakable enough to be threatened by something as simple as having someone else's parents around to remind her of all the ways in which her own had failed her.
A/N: I really hope this chapter makes sense. About half way through editing I realized I'd been mis-typing Lavinia's name for the last 3 sentences I'd been working on. Which is great. I really need to stop editing these so late lol. Of course I keep saying that and then nothing changes so...
Also, if anyone was curious, I just passed 150,000 words on the doc where I'm writing this. Cause, ya know, having a social life is really overrated these days and who wants to talk to people when you could sit in your basement and write fanfiction? Not me, apparently. Then again, I say that like it surprises me, but it really shouldn't. (Shout out to my fellow introverts whose daily routine hasn't actually been all that changed by quarantine).
Anyway, as usual, I hope you enjoyed and please forgive the ramblings of a sleep deprived woman who now has to go let the dog out at 1:30 in the morning because she won't stop whining at the door. I hope it's not a raccoon, man. I don't have the energy for that. And I'm gonna shut up now. See you all for another update tomorrow!