Title: Novels
Word Count: About 1, 200
Summary: He gives her a sad smile. "We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we?" LilyTeddy.
A/N: This is really bad, and really brief. I had so little time to write it and was very briefly inspired by a quote, as mentioned below. Ergh. This feels sucky. Don't hold back on your reviews, I want to know.
"We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we?"
The Age of Innocent by Edith Wharton
They light lanterns in a foggy clearing outside Lily's house. Teddy is fourteen, she is three, and this is stupid - so stupid - but he's on break, and the night looks as open and trusting as Lily's face, the stars twinkling above them like a gift from the Heavens. So he sits with her and they believe in things together.
"Do magic," she demands, shooting him a toothy grin.
"But I'm not allowed to!"
"For me," Lily pleads.
"I'll get arrested! I'll get sent to wizard prison! They'll eat my soul!"
"How can you eat a soul?"
"I don't know, but they can. And if I do magic, they will. And if they do, I'm dead."
Lily lets out a dramatic little gasp before squeezing one of Teddy's hands tightly between both of her tiny ones. "But you can't go, Teddy, you can't die! You just can't!"
Teddy expected a reaction very similar to this one, but hides his smile anyway and asks, "Why not?"
"Because I'll be all alone."
Teddy frowns at her and pulls her into a hug. "Lily, you'll never be alone."
Lily snorts in the un-ladylike manner she happens to do things and pulls away from him, her sloppy bow spilling over her face as she crosses her arms. "That's something you hear in a story, Teddy. Don't be stupid."
Lily staggers away to chase a firefly, leaving Teddy frowning at her retreating figure. This is possibly the wisest, most truthful thing Lily would say for a few years, especially in regards to them.
Teddy gets the letter sometime during her fifth year at Hogwarts. Her handwriting is messy, the page stained with tears and owl treat crumbs.
Teddy,
Most horrible thing happened today. Eamon Nott broke up with me, the unfathomable twat, and now I am crying pathetically. I didn't know who else to turn to as Imogen is practically dry-humping her new Hufflepuff toy boy and Celeste isn't speaking to me because I pissed her off for some reason – well, actually, I called her stuff and she called me stuff and then we duelled. I walked away fine, but she had a disgusting rash for just under a week. Hardy ha, Teddy, hardy ha.
Anyway, this fucking twit is after someone who will 'offer him things' and by that he means sex and by that I mean he is a total horn dog that I should have seen straight through the first day I met him. But I didn't, because he's absolutely handsome and charming. Not to put you down, you're good looking too; I'm sure all the girls are just fawning over you, blah, blah, blah. When did this become about your problems, Teddy, anyway?
Write back. I'm distressed and heartbroken, sob.
Lily.
He chuckles hear and there, sighs in the gaps in between. She hasn't changed much – still outrageous, still untameable, still vulnerable, still witty, still funny, still Lily. Teddy picks up a quill and starts writing a response, but decides it's too long for her liking and much too brotherly. He goes for the wise elder approach, instead.
Lils,
I promise you that someday you'll find someone who isn't a horn dog or an unfathomable twat. My promise, to you, for as long as it takes.
Watch your language and stop hexing your friends, fool,
Teddy.
Lily's reply comes a day later, her owl Indigo squawking impatiently and hopping around. Lily still believed the bird had ADHD, but Teddy thought it was a bit rich for such a hyperactive girl to go around diagnosing people.
Teddy,
You're the fool. We aren't fairytales or novels – we aren't even documentaries or sloppy I-did-this-at-one-in-the-morning-because-I-totally-forgot-about-it school essays. It's all just real life, old buddy old chum.
Lily.
He doesn't reply. Mostly because he doesn't know what to say to that, but also because the words old buddy old chum make him miss her like crazy, and he can't stand thinking about a fifteen-year-old like this any more.
Lily is nineteen and she's wearing her favourite, forest-green dress, which flutters out around her knees like a blanket of moss or an abandoned creek. Her fingers are hooked through her high heels and she's stumbling as she trips over uneven ground. The clearing hasn't changed a single bit since she was ten and she last came here.
"Why, I didn't think you'd remember this place," Lily says flatly. His fingers are trailing invisible paths in the air, and a floating lantern is following his lead. "Now that you're a big twenty-eight-year-old and you have your girlfriend, I didn't think you'd have time for such childish nonsense."
"Are you calling yourself childish nonsense?" Teddy asks her, turning around. His white button-up is rolled up at the sleeves and half-tucked into his black trousers, and his gold hair sticks up in all sorts of directions.
"Is that what I am to you?" Her voice breaks on the last syllable.
"No," Teddy murmurs, shaking his head. "That's what you should be to me."
"Then what am I, really?"
"You're a novel," he tells her. "You're a fairytale and a story. You're so lovely and valuable but I can't- It could never- Never ever . . ."
"Did you know that most novels end in a happy ending? All of the ones that I've read do. They end with all the characters smiling and falling in love – except for the snarky, evil ones. But the good characters – they're happy."
He gives her a sad smile. "We can't behave like people in novels, though, can we?"
"Nine years is nothing compared to a happy ending," Lily trembles, dropping her shoes and marching over to him. She takes his face in her hands and forces him to look at her. "Nine years means nothing to me at all."
"Then you're stupid!" Teddy cries. "You're foolish! Soon I'll be an old man, Lily. I'll have wrinkles, and I'll want kids, and I won't be able to hold onto stories."
She presses her lips to his, and he can't resist. He couldn't turn away from her hands on his back or her frail body this close to him or her breath on his cheek. He couldn't possibly deny the faint laugh that echoes around the clearing or the way she stands on her tiptoes to reach him better. He couldn't refuse her, not ever.
And he thinks they might be a twisted, terrible novel, and the epilogue might mean screaming and yelling on her family and his girlfriend, Victoire's behalf, and the characters are not entirely good or wholesome. But he has never been one to quit halfway through a novel, and this is one of his favourites.