WHO: Anthony Goldstein & Tracey Davis. WHEN: Tuesday, May 2nd later in the day. Or something. Time is an illusion. WHERE: St. Mungo's. SUMMARY: Tracey fills her boyfriend in on what happened. WARNINGS: Battle spoilers and sads.
His fingers brushed along the course fabric of the hospital linen as his eyelashes began to flutter. From all around him, the sound of voices flowed past his ears, the intensity growing louder with each passing second. Slowly, Anthony’s eyes finally cracked open, though he immediately shut them thanks to the seemingly harsh lights that were illuminating the area above him. It was then his fingers swept across soft familiar hair and the corner of his mouth managed a twinge of a smile.
“Hey. Did we win?” he managed to ask in a strained voice as his fingers tried twirl the ends of Tracey’s hair.
“Hey.” She cracked her eyes open, eased herself into a sitting position from where she had fallen asleep, slumped against Anthony’s mattress with her head resting on her arms. This and other instances had been all she had snatched of sleep in the last 48 hours—hadn’t, couldn’t have gone home—not with him and Ritchie both here. Shadows like bruising beneath her puffy eyes. “Yeah. Yeah, we did.”
He let out a sigh of relief that was instantly followed by a hiss as pain shot out from his right ride. Turning his head to one side, Anthony grimaced before the pain started to subside. “That’s good news,” he said after a moment as his finger finally managed to begin twirling some of Tracey’s hair, who had given up on sitting upright and was now pillowing her head on his mattress again, facing towards him.
“Harry, he killed You-Know-How, and then it all just fell apart for them from there,” she began softly. “I know that Harry was dead, or at least appeared to be—I don’t really know how that works but he, you know, capital letter He, is gone, entirely gone, and He’s not coming back.” She didn’t have much beyond that, her world being restricted to the bland corners of both this hospital room and Ritchies and cups of weak coffee thrust into her hands and the cuffs of this borrowed jumper that she had gradually been picking holes in.
“Good fucking riddance.” His voice was weak and lack the jovial tone that he managed to produce even in the worst times. Though he did manage a brief small smile for Tracey and her oversized jumper. “I didn’t slip and fall or anything to end up here did I? That would be embarrassing.”
Tracey raised her head, regarding him consideringly. “What was the last thing you remember?” she asked carefully.
Squinting, Anthony’s fingers stopped their rhythmic twirling of her hair. “I remember talking to you in the Great Hall,” he offered after a moment. “Nothing after that is really coherent or clear.”
“They told me that’s common, after trauma.” She reached over, gave his hand a squeeze. “We were dueling a Death Eater. At one point he fired a spell at you, which collided with one of yours. There was some sort of explosion. Then I—I got you away and now you’re here.”
Trauma. He knew what the word meant, but his mind was still having difficulty connecting the dots on how exactly it related to him. “With one of mine?” Anthony let out a small laugh, but quickly stopped when the pain returned. “Fuck. How’s that for amazing accuracy, huh?”
“Pretty impressive.” She smiled weakly. “They said that it might come back to you. Eventually. And take it easy. Do you need me to call the mediwizard for more pain potions?”
Anthony shook his head. “No. That would just knock me out again.” While it probably would be the best thing to do for himself at the moment, he didn’t to let more time pass him by. “But you’re okay, right? You weren’t hurt too badly?”
She shook her head. “Some slashing curses to my back and left arm, but Mum patched me up. I was lucky.” Lucky. Yes. She supposed that she was. She didn’t feel that way.
“Anthony.” Tracey shifted gingerly onto the edge of the mattress, tightening her grip on his hand. “There’s no nice way or right time to tell you this. And I thought that maybe I should wait, but I’d want to know right away if it were me, and I don’t have the right to keep this information from you.” She found it hard to maintain eye contact with him, but forced herself. He deserved that much. “Seamus is dead.”
As he stared at Tracey, his eyes blinked a few times as they tried to focus on her face. He knew the meaning behind her words, but much like the words concerning his own condition, none of them made sense. The idea of one of his friends, someone his own age, didn’t register with him. Along with other members of Dumbledore’s Army, they had been to Hell and back, so Seamus being —
“That fucker,” Anthony said before he began to chew on his lower lip. Tracey nodded. There was nothing else that could be said. Careful of his ribs, she manoevered herself onto the bed next to him and draped an arm across his middle.
The question of who else had died was on the tip of his tongue, but Anthony couldn’t bring himself to ask it. Instead, he rested his head down upon hers and shut his eyes tightly in an attempt to prevent what he knew was coming next. He held off for as long as he could, but eventually his shoulders began to shake and Tracey’s hair became damp as the wall that had been holding him up for so long began to crumble. And all she could do was hold him back and run her fingers through his own hair. There was nothing else that could be said.