Seamus M. Finnigan (ndr_seamus) wrote in newdarkrising, @ 2008-05-05 10:45:00 |
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Entry tags: | char: seamus finnigan, char: tracey davis |
RP Log: Seamus and Tracey, Saturday afternoon/evening
Characters: Seamus Finnigan and Tracey Davis
Setting: Seamus's flat; Galway, Ireland; Saturday, May 3; beginning around noon.
Summary: Tracey finally gets out of the DE's castle and goes to see Seamus; she has some handy information that he passes along to Theodore; they talk about rescues, options, and fathers.
Rating: R
Warnings: Language, sexual references, references to previous domestic violence, references to previous parent death. And as usual with Kate and Aurora, it's long.
For the past six years, Tracey had spent every May 3rd wallowing in self-pity for the majority of the day, and then going out to do something spectacularly self-destructive. Once, she'd ended up naked on a freight train to Siberia with no idea how she got there or how she'd managed to get herself handcuffed to the Spanish ambassador's son.
This year, she had no chance to do any of that. After she'd run out of Lilith's cell, she'd spent the rest of the night in the castle that the Death Eaters had taken over, acting as errand girl for whomever needed her to fetch something or someone. By the time day broke, she was completely exhausted and limping from running around the castle. Her gorgeous gold heels, which she'd bought in Milan, weren't exactly meant for walking in the first place, and their delicate straps cut into her feet. She tried not to think about the fact that they were now permanently ruined, stained with Lilith Moon's blood.
All the while, she anxiously listened for any clue as to what might have happened to Seamus. He'd gone to Hogwarts, and she wasn't sure if he'd been there when the attack happened. Likely -- he'd told her not to worry, and why would he be concerned that she'd worry about a trip to Hogwarts, unless he knew that something was going to happen? There was nothing said about a fallen Irishman, though, and Tracey let herself hope that he hadn't been killed. But until she confirmed that for herself, she knew she wasn't going to be able to breathe properly.
Finally, Alecto told her to go home, and Tracey immediately did. She apparated straight back to her flat, but she didn't stay there. Instead, she did a series of quick apparations around the country to make sure that no one was following her, and took herself to Seamus's flat.
"Finnigan!" she shouted, as soon as she arrived. She kicked off her ruined shoes so she could look for him. The flat was small, but she couldn't search it fast enough. If he weren't there, she'd check St. Mungo's. And if he weren't at St. Mungo's...she didn't know what she was going to do. "Finnigan! Where are you?"
Seamus heard her from the bedroom, where he wasn't long out of the shower. The night had gone rough for Seamus, too. He'd taken a few bad hits in the fight, enough that Cho had to patch him up before he could get to work helping to clean up after it all. After that had been the meeting of the Order, discussing the battle and determining what to do about Lilith. Theodore seemed confident that he could run that rescue mission best on his own, so Seamus was left to simply worry about Lilith. He worried for Tracey, too - got only knew what sort of position she was in until he could manage to get her out of there. By the time he'd finally reached home Seamus was simply too exhausted to do anything but fall into bed; in spite of his worry, he slept like the dead. He was too thoroughly worn out to do otherwise.
"Back here!" he called, but he was already coming out to meet her. Without his shirt, the scythe-shaped scar left from the magical wound Cho had healed was easily visible. It was accompanied by an assortment of other scrapes and bruises. When one charged in like a berserker, one tended to acquire a lot of injuries. Luckily, this time none of his were especially bad. Eventually he'd get around to healing up the more minor ones, but for now he was only concerned with seeing that Tracey had come out okay. She'd made it here and he could hear her, and that was something. "'re ye all right?" he asked quickly, his concern for her evident.
Tracey had always thought that Seamus's flat was tiny, but at the moment it felt much too large as she ran-limped across the living room toward him. She registered the wounds on his body, but she was so relieved that he was alive and standing that she didn't stop to fuss over them: she threw herself into his arms and frantically sought his lips with hers. "Fine," she gasped, in between kisses. "I heard...Hogwarts...attack...didn't know if you were...got back soon as I could..."
He cut off the rest of her words in a long, thorough kiss, then pulled her into a tight hug. "I'm okay," he whispered. "Li'l bruised up, but 'm fine." Seamus kissed her neck, her shoulder, and then spent a moment just holding her, comforted by her solid presence in his arms. He didn't know what to say next; there were too many questions. What had happened? Had she heard anything about Lilith? What was happening next? He'd have to breathe for a moment before he came up with the next step.
Now that Tracey was sure that she hadn't lost another man that she...well, thought about, she felt herself relax. She kept her arms tightly around him, content to simply stand there and feel the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed. Then she started to notice the bruises on his chest, and the ugly scar there. She recognised it; she knew exactly which curse had made it, and she wondered which of the Death Eaters she'd talked to last night had put it there. Whoever had worked on it had done a good job of healing it up, but the scar would likely never fade. She traced it now with her fingertip, once more struck by how different their worlds were. "You knew, didn't you, when you left? You knew there was going to be an attack."
"I knew," he quietly admitted. "Lilith saw it 'fore it happened, called on everybody for help. We had to keep 'em out o' the school." Because war shouldn't be for kids. They'd had to fight it, and neither Seamus nor any of the others wanted to see the same happen to this generation of Hogwarts students.
Lilith... Seamus pulled back just a little and looked down at her. "D'ye know where Lilith is?"
And so he'd rushed to save the school and its students, probably just as he had seven years ago, whereas Tracey had done her best to keep herself out of it, just as she had seven years ago. One of them was more successful than the other. At his question, she pulled back as well, and was reminded that the bottom of her robes was caked with Moon's blood. "Yeah," she said, after a moment. "She wants me to tell you and Theodore where she is."
Seamus breathed a sigh of relief that Lilith was alive. They'd all been worried like mad. "Where?" he asked. "Ye tell Theodore yet? How is she?" Whatever needed to be done, they needed to do it as soon as possible. The Death Eaters had not only his friend, but also a true Seer under their power now. That was doubly bad. Lilith was likely being tortured and could very well end up dead if they didn't act quickly. Time wasn't a luxury they had here.
Tracey shook her head. "I came straight here. I didn't know if you were-- well. She..." Tracey hesitated, not wanting to remember the cuts and wounds that Alecto had inflicted on Lilith. "She swore at me quite a bit." Which should assure Seamus that Lilith was still holding up. "I've still got to tell Theodore. I'm not sure, exactly, where the castle was. I Apparated straight into it. It's a castle in northern England. It hasn't been redecorated since the 1800s, but it's at least 400 years old. I can tell by the drapery."
"That should at least narrow it down," Seamus replied with a nod. "I dunno, but maybe somebody who's more up on northern England will." He placed another light kiss on her temple, and his hand came to rest at the side of her face. "Lemme place an owl real quickly, eh?"
Tracey turned her head to place a kiss on his palm. "Yeah," she said, although her arms remained wrapped around him. She wasn't ready to release him just yet. "I should write to Theodore."
"I can take care o' that too, if ye want," he offered. "Less chance of anything comin' back to ye that way." The last thing they needed was for someone to find her handwriting somewhere it ought not to be. Seamus felt responsible for her safety; Merlin knew nobody else was taking care of her, and she had trusted him. He had to make sure she made it though this.
She looked up at him, somewhat surprised by the offer. She shouldn't have been, perhaps. A man who'd go charging into battle against Death Eaters to protect students that he didn't even know wouldn't hesitate to take an extra precaution for someone else's safety, but Tracey appreciated it nonetheless. There weren't a lot of other people who'd do that for her. "If you could," she said quietly. "He...doesn't know about us."
Seamus nodded. "It's no trouble," he told her. One last kiss for good measure, just lightly, and he slowly let her go to find parchment and a quill. His fingers lingered on hers, taking a little longer than he needed to step away from her. After all they'd been through in the past few weeks, there seemed to be a perpetual urge to hold on to anything that was important. And as he penned his brief owl to Theodore Nott, Seamus was thinking that Tracey was without a doubt important to him. People, he thought more and more, were always the most important things. Even music would come in second when it came to his friends and family, and that was saying something for Seamus Finnigan. Strange how times like these would put the world into very clear perspective.
With the letter finished and handed off to his owl, Seamus turned back to Tracey. "Hopefully he'll have some idea where the place is," he said. "An' they can come up with some way to get 'er out." He didn't include himself in the planning simply because Seamus knew that planning ahead was not his forte. He would just wait for Hestia or Kingsley to send him a message and then he'd go fuck some people up. It was what he was good at.
Tracey had taken a seat on the sofa, where she'd slid down its length just far enough to rest her arms and head on its arm. While Tracey was used to staying up until the wee small hours of the night, she'd never stayed up this late -- or this early, as the case may be -- tonight, and she was exhausted. "They'll need to know which room she's in," she said quietly. She didn't want to think too much about the fact that her information was likely going to lead to another battle, one that was going to injure a lot of people that she'd grown up with. "Tell them to leave the guard alone. He's rather thick, but he's not like the rest of them. He just does what they tell him to do."
"All right," he agreed, and picked up his quill again. Apparently he needed to dash off one more note. This could probably be trusted to a journal message - divorced from the rest of the information, it wasn't very compromising. "I'll tell 'em. D'ye know what room?"
The more information that Tracey provided, the more she was aware that she was selling out her family and friends. There were all sorts of justification for it, of course, but it still left an unpleasant taste in her mouth. "Yeah," she said, after a long silence, and proceeded to give him instructions on reaching the room that would minimise the number of Death Eaters they were likely to run into. "If they break her, they'll probably move her, and I don't know where that'll be."
Seamus wrote it all down carefully, and then sent that along as well. With it done, he went over to where Tracey sat, putting himself on the floor in front of her. He sat parallel to the sofa, with one knee up and his arm draped next to Tracey on the cushions. "Thanks," he said quietly. He knew that she was putting herself in a lot of danger by pretending to stick with the Death Eaters while giving them information. Frankly, he didn't like it; from a completely selfish perspective, there were any number of people he would rather be in that position than her.
Tracey left her head pillowed on one of her arms and reached out her other hand to slide her fingers through his hair. It was soothing, in a way, but it still didn't make her feel any less like she'd just committed a grave act of betrayal -- not just of the people she thought she knew, but of her very upbringing and values. She knew that the Death Eaters would certainly see it that way if they ever found out about it. "Just make sure it never gets traced back to me."
"It won't," Seamus said, and that was true. Should it come back to him (unlikely, with the information in Theodore's hands), he'd let them kill him before he gave them Tracey. It was the advantage of getting involved with a low class stubborn Irish Gryffindor; he might not know a shrimp fork from an olive fork, but he'd never betray someone he cared for.
His head tipped back, bringing him closer to her fingers. They felt good in his hair, nice enough that he let his eyes drift closed. He hadn't been up all that long, but he still felt so tired.
Tracey had been up for almost a full 24 hours now, and although she was exhausted, she didn't feel anywhere ready to sleep just yet. Too much had happened, and too much was going to happen. She needed a drink to fortify herself against it, but at the moment it felt so nice to stay where she was, running her fingers over Seamus's drying hair and the bare skin of his neck and shoulders. It wasn't nice enough for her to forget all the other things that were happening, though.
"Do you think they can help her?" Tracey asked softly. It wasn't so much for Lilith's safety that she was asking, but for her own. Seamus had indicated that he could go to them to help Tracey get out of her untenable situation. She didn't know if he'd had a chance to do so before the attack happened, but if they couldn't manage to help their own, Tracey wouldn't have a chance.
Seamus replied with quiet confidence. "We'll get 'er out," he said. "Theodore had some kind of idea last night - with a li'l more information, they'll be able to figure out somethin' a li'l more concrete." And if he could help, he would. And then they could figure out what to do about Tracey. At that thought his eyes opened, and Seamus sat up a little more so he could turn to look at her without breaking his neck. "What kind o' solution d'ye want for yerself?" he asked. "Stay where ye are an' keep givin' us information? Or d'ye just plain want out?"
Tracey shook her head sharply and retracted her hand to rest it at the edge of the sofa. "I want to go back to the way it was before. I don't want people telling me what to do, and I don't want to tell anyone what I'm being told to do. Can your friends give me that?"
"Merlin himself couldn' put everything back like it was," Seamus said sadly. He turned his body more and put his hand on her hip, his thumb brushing lightly back and forth. "We can find ye someplace safe to go, or at least someplace safer. It'd prob'ly mean gettin' out o' the country - just to make it more trouble for them to find ye than they've got time for."
Forced to leave the country again, and this time she wouldn't even be able to go wild to distract herself. No more starting bar fights in trendy clubs for the sake of excitement. No more skinny-dipping in the Loire with the French Minister's daughter. She wouldn't see Pansy or Daphne or Finnigan until it was over, and who knew how long it would last this time? It was imprisonment of a different sort. Tracey stared out at the window, seeing the empty weeks and months stretch out ahead of her.
"I need a drink," she said. She touched his hand lightly, then pulled away.
A drink was something he could give her. Seamus stretched slowly, wincing at a pain in his shoulder, then slowly got to his feet. "The other option's stayin' with me or Theodore or somebody," he said on his way to the kitchen. "It's more likely to have people comin' after ye, but on the other hand it means ye've always got somebody with ye if they do come after ye." He opened the cabinet that held all the liquor and looked at the stock. "Rum, vodka, or whiskey?"
Tracey liked that option better. She could stay with Seamus, though perhaps not in this tiny place, until they were tired of each other, and then maybe Theodore would help her out. There was a lot of uncertainty around that, and she didn't like to think about not being with Seamus anymore, but it still sounded better than going off into exile on her own. "That'd be better, I think." She rose and followed him to the kitchen. "Whiskey."
There were plenty of things Seamus didn't know about Tracey, but he certainly knew how she took her whiskey. He fetched a short tumbler from the upper cabinet and put it to half-full, then waved his wand for a cooling charm - no ice that might water down the liquor for Tracey. "This place'd be tough to ward up well enough to make it safe, but...Mam an' Patrick have a house on Inis Meáin, where Patrick lived 'fore they got married. 's well out o' the way, an' nicer than here. Easier to keep people out of a house than a flat."
The place he referred to was his stepfather's cottage on the middle one of the Aran Islands. His family resided on the largest, Inis Mór, outside the village of Kilronan. The islands were so isolated that they made a good place for wizards to stay hidden. Patrick's house was a two-bedroom place by the seaside, too small for their whole family but certainly more spacious than Seamus's flat. They rented the place, usually to young people just starting out, but it currently stood empty. Aine O'Connor would be beyond pleased for her son to finally take them up on their offer to let him stay there. He wouldn't have to explain the complicated (or complicatedly uncomplicated) nature of his relationship with Tracey; simply telling his mother and stepfather that she was a girl in trouble who needed protection would be enough for them. Seamus hadn't thought through how living together would even further complicate said relationship; all he was considering now was how to best get Tracey away from the Death Eaters and keep them from killing her once she was away.
Tracey couldn't even pronounce the name of that place he mentioned, and right now she couldn't imagine living there either. It was just all too much to think about at once, so she just accepted the whiskey from Seamus and focused on the fact that she was still alive and so was he, and there was something being done about getting her out of her current situation. It wasn't anything like what she'd want, not really, and Tracey was used to getting what she wanted, but what she wanted most was not to die -- not at the hands of the Death Eaters -- so it was going to have to do for now.
"They could still get me when I'm not there," she pointed out. "Unless I never leave, and if that's the case I might as well go somewhere else. I could pretend to spy on you lot, but then they'd eviscerate me if they find out I'm not."
"Unfortunately, there's not a non-dangerous option," Seamus said. "It's gonna be a lesser of multiple evils matter no matter what ye choose. Somebody else may have better ideas'n I do, an' that'd be great if they do. As far as what I've got, though - I can take ye to Briar-rose an' look after ye m'self, or I can get ye to Canada or some other place an' pray they don' find ye there. Wi' the former, ye'd still be able to go places - just not by yerself. Ye'd need to stick wi' me or Theodore or Adrian or somebody else who we could trust to keep ye safe."
Neither option was ideal, but they were all Seamus had at his disposal. He'd feel better about the former than the latter; at least then he'd know exactly where she was. It would eliminate a lot of worry for him. On the other hand, Seamus could recognize that as a slightly selfish take on things.
Tracey didn't like the idea of having to rely on anyone to be around if she wanted to go anywhere, but it probably was the best option at the moment. There might be other ones, but she couldn't think of anything else right now. She let out a small, tired whine. "I hate this date."
"Date?" he asked, giving her a bemused smile. Seamus wasn't exactly sure what she meant. If this was a date, she was right that it definitely left something to be desired. If she meant "date" in the sense of "day of the month", well...the day was pretty miserable, too. Really, there was no reason to have asked, now that he thought about it. The response was the same either way. Seamus took the two steps over to her and put an arm around her shoulders. "Yeah, it's lousy," he admitted, and leaned down to kiss her forehead. "I promise ye a better one sometime."
Tracey didn't think there would ever be a time when May 3rd would not be lousy for her, and this one in particular had exceeded all the ones past. At this point, she'd welcome anything that didn't involve thinking about death or blood or betrayal. With a small sigh, she set down her whiskey and turned towards him. "You can make it better right now," she said, and brought him down for a kiss.
He kissed her back, taking his time as he tasted the whiskey on her lips. Much better than when it came from the glass, he thought. Seamus put both his arms around her, his hands moving slowly up her back, and he thought of that crack in the kitchen wall's plaster. Maybe this time they had better chances of making it around the counter to the bedroom.
And then he heard the owl return to the window. Seamus looked up, and saw that the owl had another message in its beak. With a reluctant sigh, he gave Tracey one more short kiss. "I'll be right back," he said, and detached himself from her to find out what the letter had to say.
As he read it, Seamus's expression darkened. "That's it?" he asked the letter, though it obviously couldn't answer. "Jaysus Christ," he muttered, and picked up his journal from the table beside him, scribbling quickly. The message would be understandable enough to Theodore, but vague enough that it wouldn't be figured out by someone who didn't know what was going on, and this would be quicker than sending another owl.
When he pulled away, Tracey made a frustrated sound. Even trying to distract herself from everything that was going on wasn't going to work, it seemed. She'd kick something if she didn't think she'd stub her toe. "What?" she demanded. It'd better be good, anyway. "What'd he say?"
"Just thanks," Seamus replied, and he rolled his eyes. He handed the note over to Tracey so she could see it if she liked. "So I sent 'im a journal message askin' for some way to make m'self useful."
If there was one thing Seamus hated, it was waiting. Patience was far from his strong suit. If Theodore didn't come up with some way for him to help there was going to be another crack in the plaster, because he'd need some way to distract himself.
Blasted Theodore. His four words had ruined Tracey's attempt to get a bit of distraction. She took a pull from her whiskey and made her way to the kitchen table, where she flopped down gracelessly onto a chair there. "If making yourself useful involves going to the castle at all, you'd better retract that offer."
"I'll do what needs doin', Tracey," he told her, quiet but matter-of-fact. This wasn't a situation in which there were options. He was rather touched that she'd care one way or another, though. "Somebody's gonna have to go into that castle, an' Theodore can't very well be doin' it by 'imself."
"Theodore knows how to handle himself around Death Eaters," Tracey protested. She still wasn't sure what the whole relationship was between Theodore and Seamus and Lilith within their group, and she didn't know who knew what, so she didn't point out that Theodore could just walk into the castle and no one would bat an eye. Seamus, however...
"Maybe he'd want to go in by himself," she continued. "He'd be much less conspicuous."
"An' if that's what 'e tells me, I'll be happy to oblige," Seamus allowed. "Even if I'll likely twitch the whole time I've got to wait. But if he does need me, I'll go. 'Cause I'm actually pretty good at handlin' m'self around Death Eaters. If I weren't, I'd've gotten killed last night."
"There's a whole castle full of Death Eaters there," Tracey snapped. Worry over his safety was putting her on edge. He may have survived last night, but they hadn't been after him, had they? "You could be walking into a slaughter."
Seamus went down on one knee beside her, putting him just below her eye level. "How 'bout we worry about that when we find out if I'm goin' anywhere, eh?" he suggested. The hand he put on her knee was already sliding up her thigh, because distracting her again seemed like a good idea.
It worked. Tracey didn't really want a fight anyway, not after their recent reconciliation and certainly not after the events of last night. She did, however, definitely want a distraction. "You're still not going anywhere," she told him, just before she set down her whiskey glass and slid off her chair onto his bent knee. There had better not be any bloody owls this time.
Seamus didn't answer her, because responding to her orders was just going to get him into a fight he didn't want to have. Kissing her was a much better idea, he thought, as was picking her up and carrying her to his bedroom. So in spite of the fact that he was tired and sore from the previous evening's work, he did exactly that.
---
It was several hours later before Tracey stirred again. For all that Seamus provided a very nice distraction, he'd also worn her clean out, and she'd curled up beside him afterwards and gave in to the sleep that had been trying to claim her ever since she'd left the castle. By the time she woke up, the sun was setting. That was fine with her; she pulled the covers up over her head, intending to fall back asleep again, but was struck with the nagging feeling that there was still something she wanted to do before the end of the day that she hadn't done yet. What was it?
Her father. Tracey had wanted to visit her parents on the anniversary of her father's death. It would be the first time in seven years that she'd have an opportunity to do so. "Oh, shit," she moaned, and fell off the bed.
She was soon met with Seamus peering over the edge of the bed, looking down at her with some concern. "Tracey? Y'okay?" He'd been awake for quite some time, having been awakened by Theodore's return message in the journal. He'd come back to bed afterward, because spending the time curled up next to Tracey was better than anything else he could think of to do. He'd found that he liked watching her sleep; she managed to look almost innocent with her eyes shut and her breathing relaxed.
With a grimace, Tracey pushed herself up among a tangle of sheets. "You need a bigger bed," she told him, but her complaint was tempered by the fact that her voice was still husky from sleep. She didn't seem to have any luck in getting herself up, though, so she held up her hand for him to help her up. "What time is it?"
"'bout eight," Seamus replied, pulling her up. "I reckon ye needed the sleep - ye didn' even twitch when I got up for a bit earlier." She was right about the bigger bed - they'd both nearly gone off it a few times in the course of the afternoon. If they did decide to take up residence at Briar-Rose, he'd have to see about remedying that situation.
"Yeah, think I did." Tracey stepped out of the tangle of sheets, with no concern for her modesty. Her head was beginning to clear up now that she'd had some sleep, and she went over the things she needed to do before she could head over to the graveyard: take a shower; change into clothes that didn't have dried blood all over them; find a flower shop that was open at 8 at night. "Don't look at me," she instructed as she searched for her abandoned clothes. She was going to have to start leaving some of her clothing here so she wouldn't have to purloin his low-grade cotton clothes. "I'm a mess. I'm going to shower, and then I've got to go."
Seamus rolled his eyes at the command to not look at her, sitting down on the edge of the bed. He wasn't going to turn his back to not look at a woman who he'd just been in bed with moments before. "Where're ye off to?" he asked, his question more one of interest than worry.
Tracey, who was by now going through his closet in search of something she could borrow at least until she got home to her own wardrobe, hesitated and then glanced back over her shoulder at him. "I wanted to visit Daddy. He died seven years ago today."
"Ah." The sound was more than anything an acknowledgment of what she'd said. There wasn't really much in the way of a response that would be helpful there. It was an understandable thing to want to do, of course. He also knew that with her father dying so close to the day of Voldemort's defeat, the two were almost undoubtedly related. That of course reminded him that all the people she'd grown up with were people who would likely disown her for being here with him. But nothing worth having came easy, did it?
"Ye gonna be all right by yerself?" he asked.
Tracey turned back to his closet, silent. After a moment, she picked out a random set of robes that didn't look too terribly worn and slid into it. It almost swallowed her up, and she rolled back its sleeves several times before going over to sit on the bed next to Seamus. "No," she admitted. She'd never been good at doing anything alone. "I don't know what I'm going to say, either. He killed himself, you know. I found him."
"I'm sorry," Seamus said quietly. He slipped his arm around her waist, because she seemed to appreciate physical comfort the same way he did. He couldn't imagine how horrible it would be to have a loved parent kill himself to begin with, and for her to have found him...it was unthinkable. No wonder the girl had issues; that happened, and then her brother went to Azkaban right after. "If ye want me to go with ye, I will."
She wrapped her arms around him in turn, feeling somewhat better from the comfort given. It wasn't enough to ease the pain of the memories, of course, but it was also the first time that she hadn't felt the need to get absolutely piss drunk. The offer was appreciated too, and for a moment she considered taking him up on it. She knew that she was going to be a mess when she got to her parents' graves, and having someone with her -- or more specifically having Seamus with her -- would be a great help, but their relationship was still too new and too fragile for her to want to bring her halfblood lover to the grave of someone who might have once killed him if he'd gotten in his way.
"It's all right," she said quietly. "Just be here when I'm done."
Seamus understood; he wasn't precisely what he understood, but he did. He gave her a light kiss on her temple. "I will be," he promised, because he'd called out of work for the night. "Already told work that I'd need a replacement t'night."
Friday had worn him out too much to be much good to anyone that day. He was going to need another twenty-four hours at least before he could show up and smile at people for hours on end. Luckily Gina had been happy to take on a Saturday shift in exchange for his promise to take a shift for her sometime in the future.
"Good," Tracey said absently. "You're in no shape to mix any cocktails." She snuggled up against him, no longer so concerned about looking a mess. If he didn't seem to care, she was willing to stay like this for a few more minutes. "It's funny -- I used to hate you lot, Potter especially. I always thought that if he hadn't defeated the Dark Lord, Daddy wouldn't have been ruined, and he'd still be with us. But in the end, he's the one who decided to turn his wand on himself. He could have taken us all away, somewhere where nobody knew us, and we could have been all together. In the end, he just didn't love us enough to stay. Mummy didn't either; she took potions and drinks, and she went away somewhere in her mind. I suppose I did the same thing; I went to the Continent, and Charlotte went to the other side. The only one who really did remain true was Julian, and he's in Azkaban. Funny how things turn out."
He listened through it all, and when she finished he still wasn't certain how to respond. His family had its own dysfunctions, but he didn't see this as the appropriate time to discuss his own father. It was too different a situation. Seamus understood that feeling of abandonment all too well, though. He wondered if perhaps that had something to do with the possessive streak they both had. This wasn't really the time for psychoanalysis, either.
"Guess so," Seamus softly agreed. Regardless of all that, it was indeed funny how things turned out. After all, who would ever have imagined that someday the two of them would be together? Even Lilith and her paintings couldn't have predicted this one. "Nothing's ever quite what we expect."
"No," she murmured. It was getting later now, and she ought to be going, but to Tracey it seemed that the longer she stayed like this, the stronger she felt about going to see her parents. "What was your father like?" she asked, unaware of Seamus's issues with his father. "You don't really talk about him. I'm assuming you didn't sprout from a potato."
"Wish I had," he replied wryly. "It prob'ly would've been a better parent. I've seen many potatoes, an' not one's ever hit any women or children while I was lookin'. Nor've I ever seen a drunken potato, a potato that couldn' take care of itself, or a potato that consistently fucked up anybody who came within five yards of it."
Referring to his father in joking potato terms was much easier than being too serious about him. It had been almost ten years since Seamus had spoken to the man, but he also had no desire whatsoever to change that. Keiran Cavanaugh was always going to be a sensitive subject.
Tracey pulled back to look at him, shocked. For all that she prided herself on being jaded and experienced in the ways of the world, she'd also been horribly coddled as a child. The bitterness with which he spoke about his father was hard for her to process. "Did he hit you?"
"Couple o' times," Seamus answered with a shrug. "Mam an' I left when I was six. He'd beat me up pretty bad that time, an' Mam decided she'd had enough. She went to stop 'im, he was about to hit 'er, an' that was the first time he ever saw 'er do magic. Bit of a nasty shock for 'im. We were gone an' he was Obliviated by the end o' the day."
He told himself that he didn't care about his father anymore. Things were better for him and for his mother now. Still, talking about it dredged up a lot of the old feelings no matter how detached he tried to be in the telling of it.
It made perfect sense to Tracey now that she knew that his father had been the Muggle one. Such awful, cruel creatures they were. That was what her father and her brother had been fighting against, to prevent them from bringing their twisted values into the wizarding world and messing things up for wizards the way that Tracey had heard they'd messed up things for themselves. "I'm glad she got you out," she said quietly. "No wonder you never talk about him."
"Yeah, that'd be why," he said, giving a tight smile. He could have told her that his father's issues weren't anything to do with him being a Muggle. Dean's family were Muggles, and their house was practically fucking Perfectville. "I haven't seen 'im in years now, nor do I want to. Mam remarried when I was fourteen, an' Patrick actually appreciates 'er. He's a good man, treats her an' Aoife like a pair o' princesses. So...yeah. There's my Dysfunctional Family Story."
Tracey felt sorry for him then, that he hadn't known a loving father. Tracey's father had adored her, and she couldn't imagine growing up without someone to run to when she was scared, or when she wanted a present, or if she just wanted a hug. She missed having someone to take care of her and love her like her father had. And he had loved her. His suicide didn't change that. Tracey felt better about the prospect of visiting him now.
She leaned over to kiss Seamus's jaw. "He's an idiot, and you're better off without him."
The gesture was unexpectedly sweet. But then, the fact that she'd asked at all sort of was, too. If they kept all this up, they'd be in danger of looking like a normal couple. Seamus smiled just a little bit and tightened his arm around her.
"Yeah, I know," he quietly agreed. He shrugged it off, though. "It's okay, really - I got m' lessons in what the world's like early on, so I never expected anything to be easy. 'M glad m' sister doesn' have to grow up that way, but I don' guess I mind too much that I did anymore. An' I always had Mam there for me, an' I wasn' like some kids who live their whole lives that way, so it wasn' really so bad."
"It's still very sad." Tracey stayed where she was for a moment longer, enjoying the feel of his arms around her. As the world outside darkened, casting their reflection back at them from the window, she finally pulled away with some reluctance. "I'll be back later."
He caught her hand with his as she stood, and pressed her fingers once before letting go. "I'll be here."