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lavender is sure that living is worse (lavishly) wrote in pandorarpg,
@ 2011-11-16 22:00:00

Entry tags:

!status: complete, ^date: november 03 2003, character: lavender brown, character: neville longbottom

Characters: Lavender Brown & Neville Longbottom
Setting: Marble Staircase, Hogwarts, half twelve or so
Rating: PG
Summary: Because today wasn't enough already, Lavender Brown goes in search of more ghosts (the metaphorical kind).

She shouldn't be here. There was already enough to get through today without having to face this, but she hadn't been back at Hogwarts in years. Keeping in touch with Professor Trelawney never required her to walk these hallowed halls again. It was a lot more than she needed to deal with on such little sleep and her hormones all over the place to the point where she wasn't sure if she wanted to cry or yell at someone. Although maybe that was why she had to come back, why she needed to see this place again, allowing her mind to finally rectify the stories with physical location in hopes that it might settle something in her.

Except she felt anything but settled.

Even if she didn't remember all of it, she still had nightmares that took place right here. Lavender felt like at any moment Fenrir Greyback was going to attack her again - although all she really saw was the stray student on his way to the Great Hall. Looking over the entrance and down the marble staircases it all seemed so innocent - almost like that night hadn't happened, but it had and here she was again. This time a few years older, hopefully a little wiser, and still strangely worried about what was going to happen next.

This time Harry Potter wasn't coming back to save the day. In a little while they were going to be putting him to rest and the world didn't feel like a safe place. She certainly didn't feel safe. And that was when the careful distractions of bread making and outfit picking stopped working. Pressing her eyes closed she tried to keep it bay, but she was too far in it to be able to shake this feeling. Lavender turned her back to balcony, sinking down against the railing and just let go a little, hoping that some unsuspecting Hogwarts student wouldn't happen across her. She just needed a few minutes to let it pass and then maybe she would be ready - whatever that meant.

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whatgenus
2011-11-17 09:56 am UTC (link)

Being at Hogwarts was terribly bittersweet for Neville. On the one hand, he had loved this castle more than just about anything. On the other, it had also seen quite a number of tragedies. The only reason he was able to come back now, like he had been able to return for the repeating of his final year, was to remember that the good time outweighed the bad. Of course now that seemed to have been turned on its head. As he walked down from Professor McGonagall's office, he couldn't help the faint trace of a smile in the corner of his lips as he remembered those good times. He had come to talk to the Headmistress, more for himself than anything, but it was good to see her again. It was on his way out of the castle that he noticed the girl sitting on the floor against the railing. For a brief moment he thought it was a student, until he was a few feet away and realized it was Lavender. He paused for a moment, wondering whether he should sit or stand to talk to her, though his body made the decision for him and sat beside her.

"Knut for your thoughts," he said quietly and nudged her with his shoulder. Neville didn't expect many people to be in good moods. He expected there to be a lot of tears at the funeral, and a number of people who would feel completely lost. It was a feeling that Neville had some experience with. Part of the reason the DA had been revived. People needed hope.

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lavishly
2011-11-18 01:10 am UTC (link)

Lavender Brown definitely needed hope. And in the absence of hope well, she was relegated to this. A small heap of a young woman wearing her second choice dress and emotionally pulling at the seams a little. Maybe she was more exhausted than she realized, but she had felt like she was falling again.

However, before she it was too far there was Neville. And she was glad it was him. He had become something of a beacon while they were at school and she needed that now. Wiping her face she looked over at him, doing her best to give him a small smile. Only it didn't quite reach her eyes.

"This is where..." she shook her head. It was ridiculous. That night was five years ago and it felt much closer than that now. "It's just a lot to be back here, and then with Harry...I just can't help but think about that night."

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whatgenus
2011-11-21 03:23 pm UTC (link)

"You mean the night Lavender Brown became a fearless Amazon," Neville quipped. Certainly no one of his friends saw themselves the way Neville saw them, but to the young man they were all fearless. He had seen so many of his fellow students simply charge in without a second thought. Some of them weren't even fighting for the Order, they were merely fighting to save Hogwarts. He sighed and nodded, making a more serious face as he looked at the floor that he remembered helping with. "It is a lot, but then again... it's Hogwarts."

For a moment he didn't say anything, being uncertain of what to say at all to make Lavender feel better when he himself hadn't had time to decide. He heard movement behind him on the ground floor and sighed. Time was an amazing thing. Once would never have guessed what had happened here just a few short years ago.

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lavishly
2011-11-21 08:48 pm UTC (link)

Lavender brushed her hair back, revealing the scars on the left side of her face. So many of them had scars from the war, but she carried hers like the burden they were. "Yeah, an Amazon," she said her tone a mix between light hearted and genuinely not believing. Although she would have liked to be strong like an Amazon warrior, but she was just Lavender Brown, the girl who might as well died that night. Leaning back against the banister, she took a deep breath in forcing herself to calm down a little.

"Strange how a place can hold both the best and worst of times." Now that thought actually earned a smile, along with the notion that her life might be some Dickens story. Because that was what Hogwarts was, the years spent here had been honestly the best of her life, up until their final year when it all slipped away. That year she had hung onto the hope that it could get better, that it wouldn't always be like this, and while it wasn't as bad as it was then, she was never able to go back to who she had been before. "And sometimes I wish I..." she paused shaking her head, not sure how to really explain what she was feeling, "I just miss the person I could have been."

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whatgenus
2011-11-22 06:07 am UTC (link)

Although he understood where Lavender was coming from, before-the-war-Neville was not someone the young man had liked. And certainly the person he was now was not entirely different from who he was before, but at the same time, he was. Lavender had unfortunately been bitten by a werewolf, but she had survived. And unlike so many, she was still alive. That was reason enough to celebrate in Neville's opinion.

"This is where you fought for what you believed in, where we all did. I thought about Colin when I first came in here earlier. And I'm sure I'll see Dennis at the funeral. The point is, this place is still here because of us. Because of you." He put his arm around his old friend, trying to think of some way to comfort her. "What do you miss about the person you could have been?"

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lavishly
2011-11-22 06:30 am UTC (link)

Lavender leaned into to the touch, grateful for the contact. She didn't let a lot of people in these days, it was easier to keep them at a distance, to not have to worry about how they might react to thought of touching her like she was diseased. And he wasn't wrong, today wasn't going to be easy for anyone, facing the ghosts of their past with the knowledge that this time Harry wasn't coming to save the day. Truly that was what weighed on her the most.

"Lavender Brown at 17 had the world in front of her." She also had boys interested in her and actual interest in pursuing the possibility of second dates or sometimes just being kissed. "And I'm a baker that people don't quite know what to make of because," she paused to swallow, "Greyback attacked me and I survived mostly unchanged. And now Harry is dead, there are nightmares that I don't think are nightmares and this feeling that what I told myself when I was here was a lie - maybe it doesn't get better."

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whatgenus
2011-11-22 08:25 am UTC (link)

"And Lavender Brown at twenty-three doesn't have the world ahead of her," Neville asked with what could have been a naive sense of the world. And maybe it was naive of him to think that things like that didn't matter. They certainly hadn't mattered to Tonks, or to Fleur Weasley. He paused for a moment and looked away from Lavender, as if the stone floor helped him think a lot better. "Sometimes it's us who get in our own way, and until you just move you won't get past something. What happened to you was awful, but you're an incredible person and an amazing baker. And thank you for the box you sent to the Ministry this morning, they were fantastic. The point is, you're selling yourself short."

Not that Neville was anyone to talk about selling themselves short. He himself had still never even dated a girl. Though such things didn't seem as important to him as they were to others. His opinion wouldn't matter either way, Neville had learned that from his years at school and interacting with girls in general, but he still liked this Lavender to the old one a lot better.

"It will get better."

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lavishly
2011-11-22 02:21 pm UTC (link)

For her, the answer was no, plain and simple. All of those things she had dreamed about five years ago where largely an impossibility and she had learned to settle. Even if she was finding happiness in where she did, it was still settling. "What happened to me is still happening," she said softly. And maybe that was in part her fault, but it was also out of her control. Most days she could hide it, pretend that everything was okay, that she was normal, but on some days - days like today - that just became too much and she cracked a little.

Lavender could have let this devolve into some deep discussion that probably wouldn't change a thing, but she didn't want that. What really helped was just having another person nearby. So, she fell quiet for a few seconds, letting it hang between them and the marble staircases. After a moment, she turned her head to look at him, truly considering him for the first time since he sat down next to her and she made a choice then. "And when did you get so smart, anyway?"

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whatgenus
2011-11-22 04:10 pm UTC (link)

A small smile crept along his lips and he looked at his shoes, or anywhere that wasn't at Lavender. He wasn't trying to give her false hope, but he knew what it felt like to not see any light at the end of the tunnel. It had all changed for him, just like it had changed for so many other people.

"It'll get better," he repeated. "Maybe in a month, maybe in a few years. But to answer your question, I think when I had to learn to stand up for myself. That's what Dumbledore and Harry taught me, I think. We don't have to accept things because it's how things are. We can all be heroes, and you are one."

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lavishly
2011-11-22 09:08 pm UTC (link)

She wasn't about to comment on whether or not she was a hero, Lavender doubted she would change his mind and honestly, it felt good to know that someone believed in her. "Those are two great men to have as role models," she said, still watching him carefully. Albus Dumbledore's funeral was the last time she was in this sort of position. Only it was easier then, sandwiched between Ron Weasley and Jamie Campbell. Now, it was just her.

Lavender glanced over her shoulder, to the entrance hall down below that was filling with students leaving the Great Hall. Taking a deep breath in, she let it go slowly. She wasn't ready to do this, but she was already here. "It must be getting close to one now."

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