Hannah and Quinn - Friday night's all right for fighting
Who: Hannah and Quinn (plus various music-related NPCs) When: Friday night, February 1st Where: Phil's party house in the middle of nowhere What: The fallout from the latest initiation task hits hard in the middle of a party.
It was dark outside when Hannah returned to her house. It had been for hours now. She closed the front door and leaned back against it, letting the latch click shut as she slid to the floor. She'd been exhausted when she'd started the day, tired and worn from her day spent with Marietta and the night that followed. She'd been just as exhausted when it neared its end, just as the reports on the escaped dragon began flying on paper wings throughout the Ministry.
Now, having left the chaotic scene behind in a more orderly state then when they'd arrived in Portree, going out again was about the last thing she wanted to do. She lifted her wand, and summoned up just enough energy to lock the door from where she sat. Hannah could imagine herself drifting off right there, propped up against the door with her half-aching, half-numb feet rotating outward to point her squished toes at opposite walls....
In the last moment before sleep took her, she blinked and made herself sit up. The party was where Quinn was, and with everything that had happened to them this week, she needed to be with him, however much it took out of her.
"Miss Hannah?" a timid voice said. Looking up, Hannah could see one greyish, floppy ear and a large, violet eye peeking around the corner from the kitchen.
"Tilly, you can come out whenever you wish," Hannah said, drawing her knees up to her chest. "You don't need to ask me first."
"As Miss Hannah wishes, Tilly will do," said the house elf, who emerged and moved gingerly across the floor, her short but lithe legs moving more than they needed to with each step, like a cat trying not to get its feet wet. She wore a clean pink silk pillow case (with holes cut into it for her neck and arms), and an old tasseled curtain tieback cinched the waist, giving it the effect of a pleated party dress. She was Hannah's family's youngest house elf, and her skin was still light and smooth. When she reached Hannah, she held out a folded piece of parchment. "Mister Quinn was leaving this for you. Tilly thought it might be important."
"Thank you, Tilly," she said, taking the note from her and unfolding it. It was the Apparition instructions he'd promised to leave her. She folded them back up again.
"You're welcome, Miss Hannah," Tilly said, and then she fell silent but didn't leave, looking as if there was something more she wanted to say.
"Go ahead," Hannah said, mustering up a quick, encouraging smile for her out of the depths of her exhaustion. Her youth meant that she wasn't well-trained yet, which suited Hannah just fine since that left some opportunity to teach her to be less timid and formal about things. However, Tilly also seemed extremely determined to prove herself, which just made it harder for Hannah to get her to be more free in her speech and actions.
"Mister Quinn is looking very sad today when he is coming to take away Crumbelina," Tilly said, her gaze dropping shyly. "And Miss Hannah is also looking very sad today."
"Oh," Hannah said, a line forming between her brows. Her mind conjured up images of Quinn walking through her house, broad shoulders slumped. Upset and confused because of her. "Yes. We both were sad last night." She tried for a smile again, unsuccessfully. "But we're going to a party tonight. It's hard not to be happy at a party."
Tilly's eyes grew even wider. "Miss Hannah should be sleeping tonight, not going to a party! Miss Hannah is being exhausted."
"Yes. She is," Hannah said, and she sighed as she slumped back against the door. "But making Quinn happy is more important."
Tilly was quiet for a moment, and then she nodded. "Can Tilly be doing anything to help Miss Hannah tonight?"
Hannah nodded with a tiny movement of her head. "You could make me coffee. Not too much--just one cup, with cream."
An expression of pure joy flooded Tilly's face. "Miss Hannah is letting Tilly cook?"
Hannah couldn't help but smile a little, although she couldn't keep it up for long. "Yes, she is."
As Tilly rushed off to make the coffee before she changed her mind, Hannah took off her shoes and forced herself back up onto her feet. The climb up the stairs seemed longer than usual, and it took her several tries to get all the buttons on her shirt undone. She left her clothes on the bed, figuring Tilly would be glad of something to do, and took a long, hot shower. Unfortunately, despite staying in twice as long as she normally would, the heat of the scalding water never seemed to penetrate past the first layer of her skin.
But, at least she felt a little more awake when she got out, and the cup of coffee that Tilly had left on her dressing table helped, too. Hannah considered wearing a new short skirt she knew Quinn would like, hoping that tonight he wouldn't turn her away if she tried to snog him since she didn't think she could handle a second time, but ever since Mr. Chambers had caught them in the break room she hadn't much felt like exposing any more skin than necessary. Finally, she decided just to wear her "rock star" jeans--the ones with the Rock Star patch she'd given Quinn for Christmas sewn on them--and an old and soft but tight-fitting Hobgoblins t-shirt with long sleeves. Sacrificing comfort to vanity, she put on a glittery pair of heels, and then sat down to fix her hair and her make-up. She didn't quite recognize the girl in the mirror. The feeling that she was a stranger, a person who was neither anything like Marietta nor anything like Hannah herself, still clung to her. Hopefully the party would be enough to knock her back into being herself.
When she was finally ready, she pulled on a wool coat and Apparated according to the instructions Quinn had left for her. The air outside the house vibrated with muffled baselines coming from inside. Knocking seemed like a futile gesture, so she approached the door and twisted the knob, letting herself in.
When Phil and Yaya started out to build the ultimate party house, they had taken to the task with a harder and more intense work ethic than anyone would ever expect from them - or from anyone building a house with the soul intention of having parties in it. The front seemed normal enough: simple, nondescript, an obvious bachelor pad from the dead flowers in the bed and the 'if you don't water it you don't have to cut it since it won't grow' grass philosophy. But inside the house was a completely different story.
The entrance hall was made to look like a queue, complete with velvet ropes and a surly looking bouncer assigned to prevent intoxicated Apparations and to expel undesirables (like the one time Chance Fass tried to sneak in unnoticed. He was noticed). Once past the bouncer, the living room had been transformed into a miniature concert venu. A stage with dramatic lighting that was currently boasting two of the Hinkypunks who were far too intoxicated to remember they were even at the party much less playing for it. On the floor, partygoers were dancing and jumping and getting lost in music that made no sense and seemed to jump from one song to another. Past the stage and the concert was the kitchen and dining room which was basically a full length bar and several dark booths. Two girls were currently attempting to dance on the bar in an effort to win a shot from the drummer of another band. At the back of the house the sliding doors were open to reveal a spacious enclosed patio where a pool shapped like a pastrami sandwich was being inhabited by people in various states of undress, the water slide currently being used to transport shots of some clear but powerful alcohol to the patrons of the pool.
Back inside the house, to the right of the kitchen, was a dark hallway. The further one walked down the hallway, the more muffled the music became. At the end, the hall forked off into two rooms with closed doors. Behind one, the sounds of a strumming guitar and laughter could be heard among the thick stench of a skunk that seemed to be oozing from under the cracks. Behind the other, men's voices shouted incomprehnsibly. It was behind this second door where Quinn Chambers, two of his bandmates, and a bloke with white hair whose words were so slurred it soundeed as if he'd been raised among a tribe of camels. Each boy held a pool stick and was starring at the pool table between them as if the balls were moving of its own accord.
"I swear on Merlin's saggy left ball, Chambers, there was no way that shot was even possible," Arion was yelling, laying his head against the table at an angle.
"Fuck off Arion, Everyone here saw me make it. My wand is with yours in the cupboard, how the bleeding hell could I have cheated?!" Quinn yelled back, lighting a new cigarette with the butt of his current one and stamping the stump out in an overflowing ashtray. "Now stop stalling! I have a game to win. Phil and I want our hundred galleons, you daft tit." Glaring, he bent down low towards the table, lining up his shot.
Hannah, who had run the entire gauntlet of the party before finding Quinn in this last room (and had somehow acquired two shots in violent shades of pink and green along the way), paused for a moment before coming up beside Quinn. She meant to kiss his cheek and say hello, but he was watching the table with such intensity that she was afraid to--
Afraid to kiss her own boyfriend. Merlin. That wasn't good. But even realizing that couldn't jolt her into doing it, so she stood there awkwardly, both hands occupied holding shots she wasn't sure if she should trust enough to drink, and waited for Quinn to make his shot.
Exhaling the smoke through his nose, Quinn hit the solid white ball and watched it sore across the table, brushing by a yellow ball that landed smoothly in a side pocket before the white ball stopped to rest near a solid red ball. Quinn grinned, and gestured for Phil to take his shot, looking up and spotting Hannah through red tinged eyes. "Pidge!" he shouted, gleeful to see her. Clapping Phil on the shoulder, he hurried over and kissed her with a loud smack. "And you brought refreshments! You're brill!" Taking one of the shots in her hand, he clinked it against the other and tossed it back - chasing it with a drag from his cigarette. "You're here!"
She wrinkled her nose a little at the damp, swampy smell that underlay the cigarette smoke on his clothes, but she was happy for the enthusiastic welcome. Even if it was a little too enthusiastic, it was better than last night. "I'm here," she said, and glanced down at her own shot. Figuring if Quinn thought it was safe it probably was, and really desperately needing something to help her shrug off the whole horrible week and relax, she lifted it to her lips and drank it down, grimacing as she lowered it from her lips. "Ugh--I thought it would taste more like the colour. So you're winning?"
"I'm always winning!" he said gleefully, just as Arion let out a whoop as Phil scratched. Quinn turned to glare at his partner. "It's not that bleeding hard, Phil, you don't get the white ball in a hole!" he shouted, rolling his eyes and turning back to Hannah. "I'm winning. Phil is Arion's handicap so I don't slaughter them."
"Then I'll cheer for you and not Phil," Hannah said, looking from him to the pool table and back, trying to keep up with the stream of disjointed information. "I wouldn't want to waste my time."
"You'd probably play better than Phil, and you've never held a pool cue before," Quinn confessed, taking a long drag from his cigarette and handing it to her when Phil called for him to stop flirting with his girlfriend and come win them their money already. "Come watch how brilliant I am," he beckoned as he sauntered over to the table, pointing at the last of the yellow balls. "Back right corner pocket." Closing one eye, Quinn held his breath, aiming, leveling, bringing back his arm, and sending the cue ball flying. The cue ball hit a red ball which slammed into the black eight ball. The black ball shot across the table, bumping the yellow ball Quinn had pointed out and sending it neatly into the back right pocket. Turning to Hannah, Quinn took a bow. "Just try to get the cue in the center of the table, Phil. Nothing fancy. I'll get the blackball on my next turn," he muttered to Phil, walking back over to Hannah and putting an arm around her neck, bringing her in so he could place a kiss to the side of her head.
"I'm impressed," Hannah said, holding the cigarette out away from them and looking up at him. So, was everything all right between them, just like that? "So, can you teach me to play like you?"
"I'm an excellent teacher, aren't I?" He said as an answer, resting his chin on the crown of her head to watch the game, his arms fitting comfortably around her waist. Perhaps, if his mind hadn't been wobbling in a haze of gillyweed, alcohol and gambling, he might have remembered that he was annoyed with Hannah, and worried sick about her, which only contributed to the annoyance. But it was, and so all he knew was that he'd missed Hannah, and now she was here, and she smelled really good.
"You definitely." So...everything did seem to be all right. Even if she didn't feel like it was. She felt his chest rise and fall against her back as he inhaled, and she relaxed back against him, her eyelids drooped. She wished she could just fall asleep in his arms, even standing up like that. It was easier than trying to follow the game when she didn't know the rules yet.
But all too soon, it was Quinn's turn again and he jumped from where he stood, his arms falling from her waist as he caught the cue stick thrown in his direction. "Pigeon, I'm about to win a hundred galleons," he told her, causing Phil to splutter. "Fifty galleons! We're on a team."
Using the back of his cue stick, Quinn hit his teammate over the head with the back of it. "I'm on a team. You're making sure I don't have a perfect game," he corrected, causing a grudging agreement from Arion and his partner. "He's got a point, Philyra," Arion answered, putting extra emphasis on the other boy's full name. "You probably even owe him a few galleons."
Grumbling, Phil tried to think of a retort before tossing his cue stick to the couch. "Fuck it, I'll hang out with Miss Biscuit," he declared, draping an arm over Hannah's shoulders. "Hello Miss Biscuit," he greeted, every pore reeking of gillyweed and liquor, so much so that it was nearly a miracle the boy could stand.
"Hello Phil," Hannah said, rolling her eyes up toward him without tilting her chin up and not entirely happy about going from leaning on someone to being leaned upon. She wasn't sure if she had the energy to deal with him tonight. "Enjoying your party?"
"Now that you're here! Quincy there can stop bitching like a GIRL," he yelled, emphasizing the last part in an effort to get Quinn to miss his shot. Quinn, luckily, had been about to shoot, but the shout made him look up just a second before. He glared, Phil grinned and then pointed to Hannah, giving a thumbs up before turning back to his arm rest while Quinn turned back to the pool table. "Miss Biscuit. You should quit having a sensible job. And travel the world with us. And bake us biscuits. We'll pay you!"
"That sounds nice, but I'm not sure you could afford my salary," she said, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Yeah... and how am I supposed to sleep with all Quincy's groupies if you're there scaring them away? We'd have no one at our shows! And our stages would be knicker free. It's a very sad thought..." Phil mused sadly. "Biscuits or groupies... tough decision."
Hannah might have been exhausted, but that wasn't enough to slow down the blood that rushed to her cheeks, quickened by the alcohol that was now just starting to hit her. "I might be able to take a sabbatical from the Ministry, if you're really going on a world tour."
Phil grinned, an elfish glint appearing in his bloodshot eyes as he placed a big wet kiss to Hannah's cheek. "I knew you were the jealous type! Can you make my favourites? The little ginger ones?"
She grimaced and wiped her cheek as she answered him. "That depends...I'm not entirely sure how practical baking biscuits will be on tour. Most hotels rooms I've stayed in don't have fully-stocked kitchens."
"Our hotels have whatever we want them to have," Phil assured her, resting his head against hers. "You can stay in my room. And serve me biscuits at three in the morning."
Hannah's cheeks turned even redder. "I don't think Quinn would approve of that plan," she said, elbowing him in the ribs. "So what was Quinn complaining about like a girl?"
"Dragons, the Ministry, nachos, maybe even the theory of advanced arithmatical modification, I can't be sure," Phil mused. "Definitely Obliviation, which is how we'll keep Quincy from knowing about our affair, by the way."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "And if I were to have an affair--which I wouldn't, of course--why do you think I'd choose you?"
"Because, Miss Biscuit, not only would I take the name of Mr. Biscuit with pride," he pointed out, "but unlike any other man at this party: I look forward to making babies. And you're a Hufflepuff. I bet you have little baby infested dreams."
Her eyebrows flew up toward her hairline. "Really. Should I consider that a proposal?"
"Oooh, you don't even require a diamond. I like that in a girl," he said with a wiggle of his eyebrows.
Hannah rolled her eyes. "I figured you were going to take me shopping for the perfect ring tomorrow."
Phil grinned. "Who needs a ring when we have biscuits? And babymaking?"
"You obviously haven't met my grandfather," she said.
"You're marrying a drummer and bearing his crazy drummer babies," Phil pointed out. "I think the ring will be lower on his list of objections."
"Crazy drummer babies..." She grimaced, feeling like she was getting drunker just from smelling him. "You're making this all sound very appealing. I never even said I wanted babies. And I definitely wouldn't want them without the diamond."
Phil thought about this, then pointed to one of his gauged ears and the plug keeping its shape. "I bet I could fit this around your finger. We can just glue a diamond to it."
Her expression reached a new level of disgust and she reached up and removed his arm from her shoulders. "Sorry. As tempting as the offer is, I think I'll pass."
Phil feigned a hurt expression. "I still get my ginger biscuits, right?"
Ignoring him, Hannah walked over to Quinn's side at the pool table and rested her hand on his arm. "If you're busy here, I'm going to go get another drink, and maybe find someone to talk to who isn't trying to propose to me with an earring."
Watching the blackball sail into its designated pocket with ease, Quinn grinned while Arion grabbed his money bag and started counting out galleons. Feeling a hand on his arm, Quinn turned to see Hannah and his happy smile faltered briefly before it returned firmly to his face. "No, no, I thought I was going to teach you how to play!"
"Tonight?" she asked, and then glanced toward the others. "In front of them?"
Forehead furrowing, Quinn looked over at Arion and Phil arguing over biscuits and the white haired bloke who sounded like a camel passed out on the couch. "I don't think they'd care."
"All right, fine," Hannah said, "you have a point. Where do we start?"
The table was charmed to re-rack all the balls once all fourteen coloured balls, the black eight ball, and the cue ball were in the pockets. So Quinn dropped the cue ball into a corner pocket and waited until everything was set into a neat red and yellow triangle, the blackball resting on the footspot in the triangle. Pulling Hannah in front of him, he put her hands in the correct places of the cue stick and rested his over hers. "Alright. First we have to break. We're going to hit that white ball - the cue ball - at that triangle. As hard as you can. Ready?" Pressing against her, hips against hips, he leaned them over the table so she could get a good angle.
More heat rose up her neck to her cheeks, and Hannah was glad that she'd worn the jeans instead of the skirt, considering how that would look should the biscuit argument break up and Arion and Phil look over. She took a deep breath, trying to focus on hitting the cue ball instead of on Quinn, not an easy task for her mind at the moment. "Okay. Ready." She drew her arm back like she'd seen him do, not noticing her elbow swinging wide behind her, and jabbed the cue stick forward. The cue ball jumped and rolled off to one side, bouncing around the table without ever hitting the other balls. She frowned. "I hope you're a really good teacher."
Quinn laughed, backing up from her. "Let me go get my wand, I think we might need it," he told her, heading off to the cupboard after giving her rockstar patch a light tap with his hand. Finding his wand among the other three, he headed back to Hannah and summoned the cure ball back - taking his place behind Hannah once more. "Okay, concentrate this time. May your aim be true."
Hannah leaned forward again, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear before lining up the cue. She slid it back and forth a few times, trying to judge her aim, and then thrust it forward again. This time the cue ball rolled in vaguely the right direction, but too weakly to send the balls far.
"Better..." Quinn drew out, his tone not quite measuring up to the word as he re-racked the balls and brought the cue ball back. "Now, hit it as hard as you did the first time in the direction you hit it the second time," he directed, kissing the spot between her ear and neck as he eased back into their aiming position.
She closed her eyes as the kiss struck a chord along her spine, but then shot a look at him over her shoulder, raising an eyebrow. "You say that as if I wasn't already trying to do that."
"Just try harder," he said simply, as if it was as easy as that. "Hit hard, aim true."
Try harder. Right. She bit her lip, resisting the temptation to roll her eyes, and looked back toward the cue ball. Hitting it hard, it buzzed one side of the triangle, sending a red ball and a yellow ball into a couple of pockets. "I got two of them in!" she said, grinning and surprised.
"Much better," Quinn told her, resisting the urge to bite his cheek. "Unfortunately, that's a fault. You sunk your opponents ball. You either get red or yellow, not both. First one you sink is your colour. You sunk both so you faulted. But!" he amended, holding up a finger, "you still managed to actually sink a ball. Now you just have to learn how to control your shot."
She frowned as he explained what she'd done wrong, and his amendment to it didn't bring the smile back again. "Oh, right. I knew that about the colours." She pressed her lips together, managing to make one corner of her mouth curve upward. "Maybe I should stick to cheering on my brilliant boyfriend from the sidelines."
Deciding he'd had enough with teaching, Quinn put the cue stick aside, leaning back against the table and pulling her towards him and in between his legs. "Well, I did win 150 galleons, and you did sink two balls, so I think we deserve a treat," he reasoned, kissing her hard before she could respond.
She kissed him back for a moment before pulling away. "What kind of treat?" she asked, wrapping her arms around his neck.
Instead of answering, Quinn lifted her up and turned around, setting her down on the edge of the pool table. Wedging himself between her legs, he resumed kissing her with a renewed vigor.
Hannah's arms and legs tightened around him in her need to have him closer, but then almost instantly went slack. They weren't alone in the room, at least not last she'd checked. Besides, she was sitting on a pool table in Phil's sketchy party house. Even if they were alone...she ducked her head, pulling her lips away from his. "Quinn..."
Quinn wasn't daunted by her pulling away, and in his substance addled mind the way she said his name made it sound like an encouragement. So he moved to jawbone, and down her neck, pushing against her in an effort to lean her back against the table.
"Quinn," she said through her teeth, resisting the pressure to lie back, "we're not alone."
"They know we snog," he whispered back, hands finding their way under her shirt to dig his fingers into the skin of her back. "And they really don't care."
"I care." She moved back a little to wedge her knees between his hipbones and the pool table, her hands pressed against his chest. "Just because they know we snog doesn't mean I want them watching. What is wrong with you?" she whispered, not realizing she was echoing what he'd said to her last night until the words were already out of her mouth. But she meant it. It wasn't like she hadn't been around him plenty of times when he was drunk before, and he was never like this.
Stepping back as if he'd been slapped, Quinn blinked, shaking his head and trying to make sense of everything. "What's wrong with me? I don't know. Maybe I want to kiss my girlfriend without her pushing me away? Or maybe I'm trying to be normal and ignore the fact that she's been avoiding me? Or perhaps, I don't know, this is a stretch - but I just might miss you since you're never bleeding around anymore!" He was practically yelling at this point, and Arion and Phil had stopped betting on how long it would take Quinn to get her top off and started on how likely it was that a cue stick was going to get broken.
Hannah blinked and blinked, holding back the tears that were springing to her eyes. She hadn't cried as much as she had this week since...well, since long before the war had ended, and she didn't have a lot of patience for it but that didn't seem to help. "Maybe, just maybe, after getting caught in my knickers by your father--who is completely terrifying, you know--I might be even more sensitive to what I do in front of people," she said, keeping her voice low at first even though that probably wouldn't prevent Arion and Phil from hearing. "I haven't been avoiding you, and I don't want to push you away, but if you make me, I will."
"If I make you?" he asked, shocked that she could even say that. "I... I'm not even sure what to say to that. I'm the one who chased you, Hannah. I've prostrated myself in front of your family and my own - and yes, I know more than anyone how completely terrifying they are - for you. Everything I do is for you! And it isn't ever enough! Sweet Merlin, what am I supposed to do Hannah, huh? What do you want from me? Because apparently nothing I do is ever going to make you happy!" he shouted, a vague part of his brain knowing he was being drunkenly overdramatic and that if Richie were here he'd be called a girl on the spot. But he couldn't help it. He knew she and Andy had both told him to ignore her actions from Thursday, but that on top of an already weird week, combined with that bleeding picture and now this? He wasn't sure he could really take much more.
She slid off the pool table and onto her feet, wrapping her arms around her ribs. "I want you to let me be who I am! I'm not the girl who gets drunk at a party and snogs her boyfriend on the pool table in the middle of it! Or in the break room at work. And I'm not the girl who flaunts the fact that she sleeps at her boyfriend's flat, or moves in with him. I'm supposed to grow up, and get a good job, and....and...oh Merlin." She covered her mouth with her hand.
"Get married. And have babies," he finished, his voice hard as he folded his arms over his chest. "I can't. I wish I could, but I can't. So what's more important to you Hannah? I'm risking being disowned - dis-owned - and cut off without a knut to my name. Because you're worth it. If I'm not you should just go now."
"You're...I want to be with you," she said, staring up into his eyes, her raised eyebrows making deep furrows across her forehead. "That's not what this fight is about, anyway. It's about snogging on a pool table, and you being drunk and me being exhausted."
"Every fight is about this, Hannah. It will always be about this. We're never going to agree and you're never going to change your mind and I can't change mine," he told her, reaching into his pocket and taking out his money bag, withdrawing a picture from it he handed it to her. "Is that going to change?"
She looked at the picture for a long moment, mouth hanging open and nostrils flared. Her and Cho. In the maternity ward. He was never supposed to know about this, much less see it. She wanted to Disapparate, or sinked down into the floor, or just...dissolve. "Where did you get this?" she finally asked, and then glanced down. "No, don't...don't bother, I think I can guess." She lowered the picture, but didn't raise her eyes. "No. It probably won't."
Reaching out, Quinn pulled the picture gently from her hands, glancing at it even though it was burned into his mind. That look of pure, unadulterated happiness on her face that he'd never be able to see. Closing his eyes, he put it back into his money bag and into his pocket once more. "Why do you want to be with someone who is just going to make you miserable in the end?" he asked, forcing the words out, and glad that he'd dulled his senses enough to make it easier to say the things he'd been thinking since that conversation in his father's office.
"Because I love you," she said, her voice shaking. Every ounce of her exhaustion was coming back to her all at once, painful in the weight it set in her chest. She couldn't let this fight continue, not right now, not like this. She couldn't wake up tomorrow without him being hers. "You're right. You're the one who chased me. You're the one who's risking being disowned, who's doing everything he can for me. So if you're trying to convince me to break up with you, you must be too drunk to talk about this." She looked away. "I'm not leaving, or walking out. I'm going to get some air and let you cool down," she said, and turned and headed for the door.
Waiting until she was out the door, Quinn calmly reached for the cue stick. After weighing it in his hand, twirling it around once, and holding it out to view - he methodically split it in two over his knee and tossed the pieces to the side. Turning to Phil and Arion - the later of which was smugly accepting a handful of galleons from the other - he gestured to the door. "You said Jim Boy has the good stuff, yeah?"
Phil nodded. "Best in London. Clean."
Quinn considered this, pulling out his money bag again. "Yeah, alright. Find me Jim Boy."
Coming over and clapping a hand on Quinn's back, Arion led his bandmate to the door. "Quincy, dear Quincy, just let yourself forget tonight. It's easier done than said, I swear it."
After leaving the room, Hannah walked down the hallway, with all the purpose of having no purpose at all except to get away from where she'd been. She wanted to go home, but she'd said she wasn't leaving; she wanted to get some air, but people accepting shots off of a water slide weren't the kind of company she wanted to keep.
"Cat...Cat...Cat."
It wasn't until she felt the hand her elbow that she realized the voice was speaking to her. She turned and looked up, and then looked up a little higher to Cadmar's face.
"You look...c'mon, you should sit down," he said, leading her inside the room that had smelled so strongly of gillyweed earlier. She wasn't sure if the air had cleared in the meantime or if all of her senses were slowly going numb, eclipsed by everything she was feeling inside. Several people were sitting around on couches, beanbag chairs, or the floor, some she knew, some she didn't, some she only recognized from magazines. He sat down on a couch and brought her with him, staying a couple feet off with his hand on her shoulder. "Too much to drink?"
"Not enough, I think," she said, leaning forward and resting her chin in her hands. She wanted to rest her face there, but that was one step away from sobbing uncontrollably. "I can't believe I just said that."
"It was a good, solid response," he said. "You want me to get you one?"
Say no. "Okay." Well, at least here he wouldn't be paying for it.
He squeezed her shoulder and got up, heading out the door, and Hannah sat back against the couch, staring up at the ceiling.
Lirit had noticed immediately when Cadmar walked in the door with the Girlfriend, and her eyes had narrowed at the expression on both of their faces. Not that Cadmar would ever do anything, she knew him well enough by now to know he didn't break up relationships... but if the look on the Girlfriend's face was any indication, then no doubt Cadmar would start counting down the days. And Lirit was not bout to suffer an out of sorts frontman right before the release of their album and tours were in the works. Not on her watch, not on her band. And especially not on someone who made biscuits like Girlfriend did.
Excusing herself from the banal conversation she was in, Lirit crossed to the couch she was sitting on and slid into Cadmar's seat. "You know," she started, leaning her head up to look at the ceiling with the Girlfriend, "for blokes who supposedly claim to have made the ultimate party house, the ceilings are rather boring. Just popcorn. How is that ultimate? I told YaYa this when I first visited and he said I just have an abnormal fixation on finding the flaws in perfect works of art. But if Michaelangelo could create a perfect work of art on a ceiling, then the ceiling is just as important as the rest of the structure. All the parts creating a whole."
Hannah stayed quiet for a moment, her eyes darting from one tiny sparkle among the popcorn to another. "You'd think they could've at least painted lyrics all over. A little literal, but at least it would give you something nice to look at if you fell flat on your back."
Laughing, Lirit grabbed a pillow and held it to her chest as she tried to find patterns in the nonsensical design. "The people falling flat on their backs in this house wouldn't be able to read lyrics. Or understand that they are letters forming a word forming a sentence. They probably couldn't even tell you what a letter is. They'd have been better off painting a giant picture of dried gillyweed. That they understand. A house filled with music aficionados and they'd rather point and laugh at a plant than admire their own art."
"Okay, then pictures," Hannah said, fixing her stare on a single sparkle. "Very simple pictures. Maybe Muggle street signs, but with more helpful messages."
"What would your street signs say?" she asked, playing hopscotch with her eyes.
Hannah glanced at her out of the corner of her eye. "If I knew, I wouldn't be staring at the ceiling."
"What do you wish they said then?" Lirit corrected, moving from one square to the next.
"I don't know that, either," she said, looking back up at the ceiling and trying to picture that page of her Muggle Studies textbook. "U-turn. Maybe somthing about a U-turn."
"That could be dangerous. Imagine if everyone could U-turn every decision they made. Chaos. Utter chaos. It's why you have to learn from mistakes and do it right the second time."
"I suppose you're right," Hannah said. "Anyway, I don't think fixing the mistakes would solve anything. He wants one thing, I want the other. There's no way to resolve that."
"No one ever wants the same thing," Lirit said simply. "Where would the world be if everyone wanted the exact same thing as the other? It would be boring. No songs, or stories, or works of art of any sort. Sure, there'd be no war or divorce... but without all the darkness how can we ever appreciate the morning? People say it's about compromise?" she whispered, finally turning her eyes to Hannah, "it isn't. Compromise makes no one happy. It's about figuring out which path would make you both the most miserable. And then avoiding it."
"He thinks he'll just make me miserable in the end," Hannah said in a low tone. "He might..." Her voice cracked, and she dropped to a whisper. "He might be right."
Sitting up, Lirit looked around. Still Cadmar free. If Hannah was this upset then she could only imagine what Phil and Arion had convinced Quinn to smoke. Which means he probably wouldn't realize she was gone. Standing up, she reached down and grabbed Hannah's hand and pulled her to her feet. "Come on. We're going to my flat. It has no gillyweed or lead singers or alcohol and it has very fascinating ceilings. I'll send an owl to Quinn in the morning letting him know you're safe. If I know the boys - and I do - than he's probably going to be blacking out very soon."
"I..." Hannah said, staring at her, lips parted. "I said I wasn't leaving."
"You aren't. Not by choice. I'm forcing you," Lirit said simply, already expertly weaving through back halls and taking shortcuts through unused rooms decorated in various bizarre themes. Including one with a bed shaped like a giant half of a lemon. "I told YaYa I wouldn't come here ever unless he created a back exit for me," she told Hannah - crossing briefly through the edge of the kitchen bar where Cadmar was leaving, balancing two drinks in his hands. "Luckily he was a smart boy and did so." Pushing open a side door that looked suspiciously like the entrance to a linen closet, Lirit pushed Hannah into a smaller hallway that led out to the side of the house. "Fresh air. You don't ever really appreciate it until you've been inhaling so much secondhand gillyweed that you stopped smelling the stench."
"Oh, is that what happened?" Hannah said, taking a long, deep breath. The cold air did clear her head a little.
"If you stay you'll have to get used to these," Lirit told her, threading an arm through hers. "It kind of becomes fun, like a game almost. Ask anyone here tomorrow and they'll think I was here all night, laughing, singing, drinking and smoking. When, truthfully, I've been starring mindlessly at the ceiling for hours until I saw you come in with Caddy."
Hannah held onto her arm, but glanced over her shoulder at the house. "It wouldn't have been so bad if he hadn't been so...if he had just been...Quinn."
"This is all new to him too," she explained, heading down a path that seemingly led to nowhere. "He has a new career, a new girlfriend, a completely new life. Everything has been turned upside down. I know, I've been in his shoes. To a lesser degree to be sure, but I have. I've ruined relationships for people's 'own good,' gotten completely stoned just because I could, and said things that made me want to drown myself in a shallow puddle the next morning. It's a package deal. The life you always wanted, but it's more screwed up than you'd ever imagined."
"Are you trying to make me feel better or worse?" Hannah said, her eyebrow raised as she finally looked at Lirit.
"Neither. You're a grown woman, Hannah. I don't need to coddle you or guilt trip you. The truth is, that you need to know all the facts of both sides before you make any decisions. Exactly what would a life with Quinn entail and what exactly would a life without him consist of. If you don't know what you're getting into you'll never be able to be at peace."
Hannah nodded. Even at the moment, that made sense. "What else should I know?"
"He'll always be asked to sign the cleavage of a woman with bigger breasts than brains. You will be eviscerated in teen magazines by sixteen year olds who think they are his soul mate. Every detail of your private life will somehow find its way into a song of his and the world will dissect the lyrics and your relationship as if it is nothing more than a newt in a third year potions class," she explained. "But it is the most brilliant existence. If you can get past the battle zone of the beginning of his career, and if you love him, and if it's worth it... then you will never regret it for a moment. I can't explain it, I can't even begin to give a rational explanation to why. But there is nothing like it."
Hannah's brow furrowed. "If you can't explain it, how can I know what a life with him would be like before I make a decision?"
"Well, that's just it. You know exactly what a life without him would be like, don't you? You'll be working at the Ministry. You'll find a nice gentleman eventually, a proper one who your family approves of but finds just as boring as you do. And you'll wear a cardboard smile, and have Aryan children, and you'll have a pleasant life. But you'll always wonder, in some tiny corner of your mind, if it could have been different." Pausing, Lirit took both of Hannah's hands in hers. "And with him? It could be anything. Anything at all. It could be adventure, and passion, and music, and everything you've never let yourself imagine in your wildest dreams because you didn't even know such things existed. But, with adventure there is homesickness. With passion there is pain. With music there is silence. And with your wildest dreams is your worst fears. Like the popcorn ceiling - you will never have perfection. And the more you try to grasp it, the more flaws you'll find."
Their footsteps were the only sound for a moment as Hannah walked in silence next to her. "So...the trick is to try not to grasp it?" Even though she didn't quite understand Lirit's last metaphor, it made her nervous, and Hannah held onto her arm tighter.
Laughing, Lirit pulled the younger girl closer. "Sort of. The trick is deciding what you want most: the ordinary, or the extraordinary? The expected, or the unexpected? As unhappy as you are now... try to imagine when you were the most happy. Alone, or together? And you don't have to answer now. Sleep on it. Cry on it. Meditate on it. We can do Yoga in the morning."
Hannah raised her eyebrows, almost smiling a little. "You sound like a friend of mine," she said. "Only his ceilings aren't painted. You'd better take me to see yours."
"I thought you'd never ask!" With a twirl, the two girls appeared out front of a simple set of flats, the sounds of waves breaking against a cliff echoing in the distance. Taking out a key, Lirit fairly pulled Hannah up nine flights of stairs. "I never take the lift. It's lazy. Besides, you only appreciate the view when you've had to work for it," she explained, pushing open her front door.
The first thing their eyes saw was a wide window, taking up most of the back wall, looking over the starlit ocean throwing itself against jagged cliffs. "It isn't a fancy place where someone would expect a rockstar to live," Lirit started, walking towards the window in the still dark flat, making the ocean outside seem to be part of the room. "But I saw the view and knew it was better than any ultimate party house or luxury flat. I wake up every morning and get to see just how small I actually am. How can any problem seem overly important when there are so much bigger things in the world? Things that can swallow us whole without a sound."
Approaching the window, Hannah got close enough that her vision was filled with crashing waves. "I know about those things," Hannah said, her voice low, eyes wide. "Too much about those things."
"Not bigger problems, little lamb. Bigger things. The ocean, for example. It covers over seventy percent of the world. Seventy percent! Any problem you have, any problem there is... it isn't seventy percent." Sitting on the floor, she tugged Hannah's hand to make her join her as she leaned a cheek against the cold glass. "When YaYa was captured and killed, I spent three days sitting here. I didn't move for anything. I didn't eat, or sleep, or even breathe for fear of breaking. And then, one day, I watched a bird be pulled beneath the waves. Just like that. It was there, and then it was gone. And the ocean moved on like it had never existed at all. Then I knew. We're just a bird in an ocean. And it will continue to swell and break and churn, whether or not we are flying above it or let ourselves be pulled under. The ocean doesn't care. it isn't fair and it isn't biased. It just is. I realized as much as I love YaYa, that life would move forward and would continue without him. And I could either be pulled under with the tide or I could fly above it." Her lips turned into a soft smile as she glanced at Hannah. "I chose to fly."
"Quinn taught me to fly," Hannah said, still staring out at the endless movement of the water. "And I don't mean that in some sort of sappy Venus Aryan way. Literally. I...I had a proper gentleman when I met Quinn. Ernie. He's my best friend, always has been, but when we were children he let me fly on his first broom. I went too far too fast and crashed into a tree. There was a lot of blood, and then I woke up in St. Mungo's and he never let me fly again. After Quinn and I got together, I asked Ernie what our life would have been like, he told me he would've made me quit my job to raise my children. If Quinn and I..." She couldn't say it. "I wouldn't want a proper gentleman ever again. But at the same time, it seems like whichever way I go, I have to bend to what they want. As if the only way to prove I really am in love is to compromise my principles. But then...then I wouldn't be the same person. I'm willing to make sacrifices, but why does it have to be at the expense of who I am?"
"You're what, nineteen?" Lirit asked, brushing a piece of Hannah's hair away from her face. "At nineteen I was on gillyweed every day before noon. I thought I was going to take over the world, marry and divorce Stubby Boardman, live in the Ultimate Party House, and never grow up. I'm twenty-five now. I haven't touched gillyweed in half a decade. I don't drink anything more than a glass of wine or champagne at a celebration. I live in a tiny flat in a tiny village with no record store. And I didn't take over the world. I'm on top of the world."
Hannah's brow furrowed. "But surely there are parts of yourself that have stayed the same, even through all of those changes? I'm not saying that I don't think my mind will change on some things--Merlin knows I've changed a lot in the last three years--but there have to be things deep inside that are just part of who we are, and who we'll always be."
"Everyone has at least one large non-negotiable. That is their main grounding force, and everything else falls secondary to that, and thirdly to those, and so on and so forth. Mine?" Smiling, she turned to place a hand on the window. "Music comes first. Always. It is my one great love, and when everything falls apart it is the one thing I know I'd never be able to live without." Looking back at Hannah, she picked up the other girl's hand and placed her palm against the glass. "What is the one thing you know would destroy you if it was gone? That you know without you are nothing?"
"I...I'm not sure," Hannah said, her eyes focusing in on her hand instead of the ocean. "I guess...I went through something sort of strange recently, and I just really wasn't myself for almost a whole day, but even in the middle of that the thing I stuck to was doing the right thing. My definition of what the right thing is might change, but whatever I believe it to be, I don't feel like myself if I go against it."
"Oh, you're a tulip," Lirit murmured, her eyes brightening. "Of course you are. You're an Abbott. Yes, that's a rather bizarre experience. You don't appreciate the value of it for several years later in most cases. But the women have a purpose for everything they do, and there's a method to the madness. There always is. But let's use that as an example. While you were someone else, what was the one thing you worried the most about the person who was you messing up? Your job, your family, your friendships, your relationship? Anything at all. What is the one thing you might have killed her for if she disregarded?"
Hannah's eyes widened as she looked at Lirit. "You're a...wow. Okay." She blinked, trying to get past her shock. "They arranged it so she wouldn't have to pretend to be an Obliviator--that would've probably been disastrous, at the level I'm cleared for--so that wasn't an issue. But, even before that, I was most worried about...about Quinn. And whether or not I'd have to kiss the other girl's boyfriend. Or if he'd try worse." She flushed. "I didn't, of course, thanks to developing a very convenient one-day bout of the flu. And afterwards, the only thing I regret about the day is...is how much it confused Quinn."
"Let's say that the Tulips are the apex of what is right, and proper, and expected of a young woman. Which, it is, in a way, but that's a much longer explanation I am not allowed to have with you yet," she said, shrugging it off. "If being a Tulip is the right thing to do, and the choice is between being a Tulip or being with Quinn... which choice could you live with? Not survive with," she clarified, holding up a finger, "but live with."
"Quinn," Hannah said without hesitation. "I almost back out on Thursday morning because of him, but I decided to try and trust my partner."
"Alright then," she said patiently, taking both of Hannah's hands in hers. "Now, what could you live with: waking up every morning next to Quinn and falling asleep with him every night, but having to give up propriety and the acceptance of the society you grew up pleasing? Or never seeing him again, but being the proper wife and mother and Obliviator you have been groomed to be?"
"But see, you're phrasing the question so there's only one answer," Hannah said, gripping Lirit's hands. "That doesn't fully represent the choice I'm making. I want to be a wife and a mother, and not just because that's what's expected of me. One of the things he's most upset about is this photo his father gave him of me holding a baby in the maternity ward at St. Mungo's. I'm certain that if I got to the end of my life without ever having a child, I'd feel like I'd missed out on something I needed to experience."
"You aren't looking below the surface," Lirit chastised her, breaking the grip of their hands to summon something from the dark kitchen. With a hard thump, a coconut landed smack into the palm of her hand. Holding it up between them, Lirit turned it around. "Why is he so opposed to you being a mother? What upset him so much about that photo?" she asked, keeping the coconut in Hannah's line of sight. "Remember, below the surface."
Hannah frowned, eyes narrowing at the coconut as if she were trying to see inside. "I don't know. That he doesn't want them, and he can see how much I do?"
Lirit smiled sadly. "No, if that were the only issue than he would fold easily. You are only seeing that the coconut is hard, and hairy, and off putting. It is hard to get into, to see inside. Most creatures are discouraged by there being no apparent means to break into it and simply give up, fearing it a lost cause." Turning the coconut around, Lirit showed her the three dark indentations on the end. "But there is a weak spot. There is always a weak spot if you look hard enough. Now, think back. What is his main argument against children? Something you can be sure he will say every time the issue is broached?"
"That...that he can't even imagine it right now," Hannah said, looking more and more confused. "He told me once that we could think about it someday--which is fine with me, since as you pointed out, I'm only nineteen--but then tonight he said he couldn't do marriage or babies. So...I don't know what his argument is, other than not wanting them and not being able to imagine having them."
"Inconsistency, interesting," Lirit mused. Tapping a finger against the coconut, she summoned a glass from the kitchen as well and set it down on the floor between them, turning the coconut so the weak points faced up. "His weak point is that he doesn't have a clear argument. Which means it could be something big, or it could be an irrational fear, or it could just be he was very drunk. Either way. They are all weak points. Now, you have to drill them," she explained, holding her wand tip to one of the dark indentations. "Drill him about every inconsistency he's presented," she ordered, finishing and moving onto the next. "Every can't, every won't, every shouldn't, every wouldn't." Placing the wand above the last one, she caught Hannah's eyes. "Drill until you get an answer that doesn't lead to more questions. Only then will you begin to get to the fruit of the matter," she finished, turning the coconut upside down over the glass so the milk from inside the fruit poured out.
"But...but then we'll fight that much more," Hannah said, leaning forward and resting her elbows on her knees. "We shouldn't be fighting about this at all. We've only been dating for a few months. I just...there are reasons why it's hard not to think of things in those terms. Like the fact that I desperately want to spend the rest of my life with him, starting months ago. Maybe years."
"Then what does the short time you've been dating matter in the scheme of things?" Lirit laughed, stroking the coconut tenderly. "It doesn't. And if you don't fight about it now, the fight will only be that much worse when you do end up fighting about it. Fights never get easier to have, only harder. Which brings me to my next stage!" Grinning, she summoned a towel and wrapped the coconut in it tightly, making the tip of her wand a hammer head. "The fight. If you want something bad enough, you have to be willing to fight for it."
With a spark to her eyes, Lirit slammed the hammer down upon the towel covered coconut. Again, and again, and again. "Knock out, drag out, no holds barred. If it's worth wanting it's worth fight for." With a flick of her wrist, her wand returned to normal and she opened up the towel to reveal the shattered shards of the coconut, the white meat finally visible. "There's your truth. You earned it, you see it. It's still messy and dirty and clinging to him, but it is there for the taking if you only have the patience to sort through the pieces and finish what you started and clean up the mess you made."
Picking up a large piece of coconut, Lirit used her wand to carve the meat away from the shell. "It's a time consuming process. It isn't quick, or easy, or fun. But it's necessary. The fruit of your labour is so close you can almost taste it." Holding up a piece of coconut meat, free of the shell, she broke it in half and handed part to Hannah, biting a piece off of her own and closing her eyes to enjoy the taste. "When you have your fruit, then you have your choice. Was it worth the pain and the effort put into receiving it? Would you do it again?" Opening her eyes, she grinned. "I love coconuts. And the effort is always worth the payoff it gives me in the end. And if it wasn't? At least then I'd know that I wasn't meant to like coconuts. Besides," she said with a shrug, "if you wait too long to pry open a coconut then it ferments and it's spongy and gross and just makes you wish you'd never heard of coconuts."
"That does sound gross." Hannah chewed on a chunk of her piece of coconut thoughtfully. When she closed her eyes, she could almost imagine the waves outside washing up against some tropical beach. After a moment, she opened her eyes. "Are you busy tomorrow?"
"I don't know," she said with a shrug. "It isn't tomorrow yet."
"Oh," Hannah said, considering this. "Well, if you aren't, would you want to help me with something?"
"If I can help I will do my best to," she told her sincerely.
Hannah smiled. It might have been a tired, exhausted, half-miserable smile, but it was a real smile nonetheless. "How do you feel about baking?"
Lirit's eyes lit up. "Yes, I will taste test everything!"
Hannah laughed. "You might have to do a little work to earn that privilege."
"Coconut macaroons?" she asked with a wink.
"Among other things."
"Then we will bake," Lirit said decisively, pushing herself off the floor and gathering up the remains of the coconut and the glass of coconut milk. "It's quite dark in here," she declared, flicking her wand and causing all the lights in the flat to burst to life, making the ocean outside disappear behind a now black window and illuminating a tiny sitting room with painted ceilings. "I will put this away and set you up on the sofa. You can use the toilet through that door there," she directed, pointing to a closed door to the left.
Hannah thanked her and went in through the door Lirit showed her, closing it behind her. She started running some water, and just bending down to splash it over her face when she caught sight of her face--her face--in the mirror. Not some strange, unfamiliar person that wasn't quite her and wasn't quite a stranger, but her own tired, but determined, face. Maybe everything would be okay, she thought as started scrubbing off her makeup. Not just like that, but in the end. Unless, of course, Quinn turned out to be a strawberry or a peach. Then she'd squish him.
She was pretty sure it was the exhaustion that made her laugh so hard into her hands, but then again, it might have been the image of Quinn in a giant strawberry costume.