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Albus Dumbledore (albus_ablaze) wrote in lockewood,

A blend of worry and slugging panic tumbled through Albus for a moment, a sensation that both compounded and diminished as the seconds stretched on, as Elphias's arms tightened. He understood immediately what, and who, Elphias meant; for a moment he thought that Elphias had intent to act at that very moment. The seconds passed, however, and Elphias stayed where he was, instead of bolting out into the night, and Albus's fear diminished.

Navigating the course of what he wanted to say through the boundaries of what he could not was often so difficult with most people. He hadn’t wanted, and couldn’t permit himself, to tell Elphias, but he had wanted Elphias to understand. Certain that he did, regardless of the consequences, Albus’s relief was nothing but selfish. Gellert had pointed out, often, that he was the only one who truly understood Albus. Not his brother, whose resent Albus had taken years to learn to not feel, even if he never could manage stop seeing it. (Though for a few weeks there-- here, it had seemed as though Aberforth had been trying, trying something Albus hadn’t been able to grasp.) Not Harry, who bore fragments of Albus’s own fingerprints, who could see so much of what Albus did but seemed uninterested in the why. Not his mother, who loved him so entirely, except the pieces of him she couldn't bring herself to tolerate.

Relief, again, that there was someone else who could understand him-- who could muddle through what he did say, and could grasp at what he didn't.

"You will not have to," Albus promised, stepping inside. If Elphias ever did, it would have been entirely Albus's fault, now that he knew well enough to explicitly expect it from Gellert. If he failed Elphias like that again, it would be unforgiveable. "I'm sorry for the hour," he thought to say, because it was true and because he pined to say something banal. "But I didn't want to wait. And I just needed," distance from Gellert, to get out of the house, "friendly company."