Who: JJ Monroe, Derry Ackerly What: Dobby JJ is a free elf! When: Friday, August 23, 2019 | morning Where: Auror offices in Billings; The Reserve Warnings: Just feelings and some plot resolution
Exonerated.
The word kept running around her head, but the meaning wouldn't stick. It had been thrown around a lot in the last couple of days, mostly by her lawyer, and it should have given her a renewed sense of hope. But she couldn't connect with that feeling anymore. She sat in a small space that wasn't actually an interrogation room, in a chair that was vastly more comfortable than any since she'd been brought in, with a plastic bag of her clothes leaned against her leg and the Bible Will had given her on her lap.
She was only dimly aware of any of this. It felt like a dream. And if it was a dream, she didn't want to wake up from it. Her fingers rubbed at her wrist, bare now and faded pink in a thin circle. Even the full return of her magic felt distant. Everything was muted and surreal. "Miss Monroe?" She hadn't even heard the staff person enter the room, but it sounded like this wasn't the first her name had been said. "Someone's here to take you home."
Derry was allowed into the room where JJ was waiting. He was happy she was getting out of course, but from the look in JJ’s face he didn’t know what she was thinking. Derry was still figuring out what had happened to him. Njall had sent him to a specialist but Derry hadn’t been able to recover much in terms of his memory of that night.
“JJ,” he called her name to let her know he was there. He missed her and he hated that she had to go through this. Derry wanted to be there for her and help in any way he could. “Let’s go.”
At this point, she'd fully expected it to be Felix—because he'd been her most vocal supporter in this, or at least the most visible—or possibly someone from reserve security. But seeing that it was her boyfriend gave the whole situation another level of unreality. JJ started from her seat, but then froze midway, flinching as she waited for that magical shock.
It was all the more surprising when it didn't happen. "Derry?" Her voice was this tiny thing, uncertain and afraid. So many of her dreams had started out like this after she came to here. Waking up had been a cruelty. She clutched the Bible to her chest, shoulders hunching inward. "Are we really gettin' outta here?"
Derry stepped closer to JJ. He didn’t go too fast, but reached his hand out to her instead so JJ could take it herself. “We really are, JJ,” he told her and smiled to reassure her. “You can come with me right now, and I’ll take you out of here.”
Her movements were slow and tentative as she finally willed herself to close that narrow gap between them. Her fingertips bumped against his palm, and she stared at that tiny point of contact, barely breathing. It was just a couple of seconds, and then her hand slid into his. She used it to pull herself into him, and then freed her hand so she could wrap her arms around his shoulders as tears of disbelief flowed down her cheeks. "I'm sorry," she choked out, finally able to say it. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."
Derry wrapped his arms around JJ and he let her cry. His hands rubbed and down her back to soothe her. Derry pressed a kiss to the top of her head and just held her close. "I know," he told her. He knew she didn't need to be but he let her get it out. "I forgive you."
"How?" The word came out brokenly, but JJ regretted it immediately. It sounded so selfish, like she was seeking reassurance, when there was absolutely no need for him to justify his own feelings. "No, sorry. Sorry. You don't have to— Can we go?"
At her question, Derry reached to brush his fingers over her cheeks so she couldn’t look away from him. “I forgive you because it’s not your fault.” It was to reassure her but it was also what Derry believed. He still had to find a way to deal with this on his own. “We can go.”
He took JJ’s bags, and took them to the apparating spot in the AWC building. Derry held JJ’s hand in his as he side along apparated them back to the reserve. He took her right to her room in the bunkhouse, hoping to avoid anyone so JJ could take her time adjusting being back. Realistically, it hadn’t been that long, only a few weeks, but to Derry—and probably JJ—it felt much longer.
She was no more than two footsteps inside her room before JJ went tense and unmoving. Normal should have felt safe and familiar; instead, it was just a harsh reminder of what her life had turned into. JJ started shaking her head slowly, and took a few steps back. The only reason she stopped was because of the door behind her. "I can't— Can we— I don't want to be here."
“Okay, it’s alright,” Derry said putting JJ’s bags down and moving to stand in front of her and taking both of her hands in his. “Where do you want to go?” he asked. “We could go to my room. We could go into town, get you something to eat. We could try going to the lake again,” he said trying to think of some suggestions that would help her calm down.
The air felt thick, and she was having problems getting enough of it. JJ held his hands like they were her only lifeline. Maybe they were. "Room. Your room. Please."
Derry nodded, and moved quickly. Keeping one of JJ’s hands in his, Derry moved them from her room, locking it with his wand as they left. He brought JJ to his room and used his wand to open the window so there was fresh air for her too. He led JJ over to the bed so she could sit down, and Derry sat on the edge of the bed next to her. “Just breathe,” he told her, and gave her hand a squeeze. He was concerned that she was going to have a panic attack.
She sat as directed and watched as he moved around his own space while her thoughts swirled without being able to settle on any one thing at a time. It probably wasn't fair, making him do all the emotional heavy lifting, but everything still felt disjointed. "This is real, right? I'm not just gonna wake up back in that place, am I? I don't...I don't think I can take it if it is."
Once he'd settled next to her, Derry took JJ's hand again. He'd hoped that physical contact would be enough to help her see she wasn't imagining this. "This is real. You're here with me," Derry assured her pressing a kiss to her temple. "You don't have to go back there ever again."
Turning very suddenly toward him, JJ pressed her lips to his. Her time in that cell had been relatively short, but it may as well have been months. And up until a couple of days ago, it would have been years. It was all so impossible. This was impossible. She pressed shaking fingers to the side of Derry's face as she kissed him, like she needed to hold him there, like if she stopped touching him he wouldn't be there anymore.
He hadn’t expected it, JJ leaning over to kiss him. He’d only hesitated in kissing her himself because he was concerned with how she was dealing with everything: from being accused, locked up and now being free again. Derry didn’t push her away but held her hand and wrapped his free arm at her waist. He let her take a hold of his face, he let her set the pace and Derry kissed JJ back.
Too late or too soon, JJ finally pulled back. Her thoughts were a little more ordered now, centered and accepting. Her forehead rested against his as she took a moment to get her breath back, before letting it slide down until her face rested comfortably against the side of his neck. "I know you're gonna get sick of me sayin' it, but I'm so sorry. I still don't rightly understand any of it. They told me a lot—the Aurors and Ms. Davis—but it sounds like something out of a badly written crime novel."
Derry noticed that JJ did seem at least calmer when their kiss broke. He let her lean into him, and his hand rubbed up and down her side in a soothing way. “I won’t get sick of hearing it. I’ll be too busy being relieved that you’re here,” Derry assured her with a soft grin. “Did you want to talk about it?” he asked. Derry didn’t ask for curiosity sake but in case JJ wanted to go through it herself. He would also understand if JJ wanted to forget all of it for now.
The shrugged shoulder she gave at first wasn't one of dismissal, but of helplessness. It was one thing to have the facts of what happened and quite another to actually comprehend what had been done to her, what she'd been made to do. "No, not really. But I think I probably should." JJ sighed, the warm air puffed across his skin and his warmth, and then leaned away. "They said it was like an Imperius curse, with kind of a sleeper element to it. I'd be 'activated' to do somethin', but then it would just go away. And sometimes it wasn't right then. There'd be a delay or whatever. But always the same: little bits of my day stolen. Little bits of my life."
She waited for the sadness again, for that despair to settle like a thick blanket across her mind. What she got instead was the clarity of anger.
“You don’t have to,” Derry said that she didn’t have to tell him anything. It could wait but he knew it would never be easier. He was quiet and listened as JJ tried to explain. Derry didn’t like what he heard and squeezed JJ’s hand when she told him she’d been under some kind of Imperius curse. “I’m so sorry,” he said because someone had to say it to JJ. “Do the Aurors have any idea who did this to you?”
That sudden wellspring of some other emotion than abject misery had her pressing her mouth into trembling, furious line. She bundled her free hand up and pressed it against her thigh. For a moment, she could only shake her head. But the words wanted to bubble out of her, simmered to a roiling boil. "No," she spat with the vehemence of a curse word. "I don't think they have a clue. They're bringin' in a cursebreaker from back East. I've gotta go back a few times this week, just to make sure it's really all gone."
Turning her head, she lifted her hair. Three concentric rings with a slight silver sheen to them twirled lazily just behind her jaw, just below her ear. "They're watchin' every little bit of magic I do. I s'pose it's a small price to pay to be let go, but Ms. Davis says I might have to live with it for the rest of my life."
Derry wrapped his arm around JJ’s shoulders, feeling guilty now about getting her upset. This wasn’t going to be over until the Aurors found out who did this to her. “Is there anything I can do? Now… or if you want me to come with you when you go back to see the Aurors?” he asked. He didn’t want to make this about him, but he wanted to do something to try to help JJ.
He was being so sweet. She'd attacked him, and he was practically tripping over himself to help her. Gratitude was in a fierce battle with shame and remorse in her heart. "I… I wanna be selfish, 'cause I've missed you, but I couldn't ask you to disrupt your day. Not for me, not after I— Are you… okay? It's all right if you're not. I need to know."
He should be mad at her, and for a time Derry was scared of her too. He hadn’t had a reason. He didn’t know what JJ had done or why. Now Derry knew it wasn’t her fault. “It’s not selfish. You need help. I’ve missed you,” he promised her. He paused for a moment before thinking about what to say. “I went to see Njall. He sent me to a specialist,” he explained and gave JJ’s hand a squeeze. “I still don’t remember anything. Just… feelings.”
Her eyes fell to their joined hands, and she wanted to just drop it. But that wasn't fair to either of them. She needed to know. Quietly, she asked, "What kind of feelings?"
That was a more complex question than Derry was sure he could answer. “I was afraid because I didn’t know what was happening to me when I was sleeping. I don’t know if it’s because I’m… different, but there was a part of me that knew something had been done to me,” he tried to explain. He gave JJ’s hand a squeeze. “My adrenaline and blood sugar had been heightened. And a part of me was... afraid when you were around,” he told JJ to be honest.
And just like that, the sadness was back. But JJ limited herself to a trembling lip, and even that was short lived. The answer had been just as hard as she'd believed it would be, but there was one question more she had to get out there. "And now?"
Derry didn’t mean to make JJ sad, but he didn’t want to lie to her either. He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. “I’m not afraid anymore. Now I just want to remember,” he told her and that was true. “That same part that told me something was wrong is telling me the threat is gone now.”
She spent a long moment just searching his face, and reached out to trace the side of it with her fingers before resting her hand against it. Apology and sorrow were a heady mixture with relief, and JJ wanted to cry all over again. She didn't, however. Instead, she leaned in and kissed him. It was supposed to be a quick one, but it turned long and slow and deep. Before she even realized it, she found herself pushed against him, arms around his back and practically sitting in his lap. "Sorry. I'm sorry. I hope you remember. I know what it's like, having your memory stolen. I just hope you can get yours back. I'm not sure I want mine." She sighed. "I owe so many apologies around here."
Derry smiled at JJ to assure her that he was alright and he was telling the truth. He let JJ move in close, and returned her kiss. His arms wrapped around her waist when he felt her lean in closer. When she was practically in his lap, Derry helped her move the rest of the way. Even when their kiss broke he was able to hold her and hug JJ to him. He brushed a hand back through her hair. “You have time,” he tried to assure her. Time to heal, and time to speak to everyone, and figure out what was going wrong. “We’ll figure this out together.”
There was this feeling in her chest, an expansiveness that maybe pushed back all of the negativity, even if it was just for a few precious seconds. "Yeah," she breathed against his lips. "Together."