Today was a beautiful day. Light streamed through the fragile, floral-printed curtains and reflected onto the white, plastic hospital bed. On top of the bed, was a woman as fragile as the curtains, if not more. Her skin was covered in wrinkles and a sprinkling of yellow bruises. Her cracked lips were closed shut, as well as her eyes. Her long, dark eyelashes sprinkled over them lightly. She wore a white hospital gown and her hospital bracelet was a few days away from wearing away.
The room was dreary and depressing. The woman often kept her eyes closed in order to imagine a happier, nicer place than the room she currently resided in.
A light knock on the door alerted the frail woman on the bed from her current daydream, and she struggled to sit up in her bed.
"Hey, relax," said a wonderfully, melodic voice from the doorway.
The old woman looked up and smiled. "I thought you were the nurse coming to bother me again," she replied, her voice remarkably strong for a woman so frail.
The girl laughed lightly and skipped over to chair from the corner and dragged it towards the center. Her brown hair was down today and the slight curls bounced lightly again her back. She wore a simple, white dress today but it seemed to be made out of sunshine.
"So how are you?" The girl asked, politely.
"No better, no worse. The usual. How about you? Excited to be heading back to school, eh?" The woman replied, her face still lit up with a smile.
"Of course, you know how much I love school. I'm going to head down to Diagon Alley tomorrow to get some supplies and then the Hogwarts Express leaves the day after that. I'm afraid this will have to be my last visit. I will come and see you whenever possible, though," the girl replied, her blue eyes twinkling brightly even in the dingy lighting.
"Don't worry about visiting me. Your letters are enough. I love hearing what you're up to," the woman replied, sighing to herself.
"I'm sorry that you're stuck here. I'm going to try and talk to the nurses about letting you come home for Christmas," the girl apologized.
"Good luck with that," said the woman, chuckling to herself.
"Hey! You wait! I will get you out of here. I promised, right?" The girl replied, smiling brightly once more. This girl was just full of smiles.
"That you did. I know how you are about your promises," responded the woman, chuckling again to herself at the memory of their pinky promise they had made a year or so ago.
Before any of them could say anything else, a knock sounded on the other side of the door, and it creaked open to reveal two nurses.
"I'm sorry to cut your short visit even shorter, but your grandmother has some tests to get done and you're going to need to leave," said the shorter of the two nurses.
"Okay. If she needs the tests, I will leave. I will write you soon, Grandma. Stay strong for Mum, okay?" The girl asked, moving the chair back to its lonely spot in the corner and preparing to leave.
"Always," the woman replied, lying back and shutting her eyes right as the door shut once more and all the sunshine was sucked back out of the room again as the girl left once more.
**
"Get your fucking ass out of bed, you lazy twat!" Lily Potter screeched, her face becoming as red as her bright red hair, just like her mother. She placed her hands on her hips impatiently and kicked the edge of his bed with her pointed boot.
"What is this disgusting smell?" Rose Weasley questioned, her face crinkling in disgust as she entered the room behind Lily.
"I think it's the moldy sandwich he has stashed under his bed." Albus Potter answered.
"Actually, it's a slice of cake from Charlie's wedding," James Potter answered groggily and with his face buried in his pillow. Rose rolled her eyes and Lily made a disgusted face as she kicked a pair of shorts off the ground to reveal some type of fungus all over the floor.
"Seriously, James. Stop being a lazy arse and get up. You haven't gotten out of bed before noon all summer. You can't possible be tired," Lily said as she walked over to open the shades in a further attempt to awaken James. Light streamed in through the window, but this didn't make him get up. James simply yanked the covers further over his head.
"You're hopeless," Rose said, with her hand covering her nose to block out the stench.
Lily plopped down on the edge of his bed and started bouncing. The bed creaked under her weight a bit, but Lily didn't stop. She just kept bouncing. James groaned and finally emerged from underneath the sheets, his hair sticking up in a million directions.
"Alright, alright. Don't get your panties in a bunch. I'm going to get dressed and then I'll be right down," James said, shuffling towards his dresser half asleep.
"Don't forget to comb your hair," Rose joked.
"You should consider cleaning your room too. It's a mess, mate," Al suggested, right before he, Rose, and Lily walked out of James' room and closed the door with a slight slam.
James rolled his eyes. It wasn't that bad, was it? Yeah, actually, it was. Ginny had completely given up on cleaning his room years ago. The floor was completely covered with dirty clothes, socks, shoes, drinks, letters, quills, Quidditch strategies, whatever else you could possibly think of – it's there. The curtains on the windows were torn down in anger when he trashed his O.W.L.S. There was a hole in one of his closet doors from where Albus tried to punch James for sleeping with his girlfriend. There was a dark stain on the carpet nearest his head from when Rose vomited after a particularly interesting game of spin the bottle. There were lipstick stains all over his dirty mirror, from all the Muggle girls he had brought home over the summers and requested they leave their marks. He had posters of Muggle girls and a few Quidditch posters around the room, with food stains on them somehow. James hated his room, really, but couldn't be arsed cleaning it.
There was one thing he would never ever dare to change, though. The "James and Delaney forever" that was carved into his night table late one night when the two of them were getting pissed and hanging out in his room, which is why James ended up spelling his own name wrong.
They were just friends, though, which stung James to the core. Delaney had her oh-so-perfect boyfriend, Scorpius Malfoy. Fucking twat. Of all the people in the world who could possibly be her boyfriend instead of him, it had to be a Malfoy. Just his luck.
James was instantly in a bad mood after being reminded of this. He was tired of being considered a player – good for one night, maybe a few, but never full-time. What was the use of being a Potter if the girl you loved didn't love you back?
James was alerted back to the reality of his sad life with an annoying tapping on the window. Speak of the devil. This was Delaney's owl, Twizzler. He opened the window and grabbed the letter off his leg and began to read.
James,
Meet me at our spot at Diagon Alley today at noon? I want to talk.
Delaney
James smiled to himself, tucked the letter into his drawer full of her letters, and scribbled a quick response back to attach back to Twizzler.
Laney,
I'll be there. .
James
**
"Cover for me," James said, attempting to persuade Al.
"Yeah, sure, whatever. She's too busy fussing with Lily anyways," Al responded, rolling his eyes.
James nodded in thanks and scurried out of the store.
He rounded the corner excitedly, his eyes lighting up at the mere prospect of getting to stare at Delaney for an hour or so. He had really missed that hobby of his. It even beat out playing Quidditch and wanking. That was saying something.
There she was.
Her long, dark brown hair was pulled into a low ponytail. Her deep blue eyes sparkled in the light, but they appeared sad today. She had her 'I've been thinking' outfit on today. As pathetic as it was, James had memorized almost all of her outfits and gave them all titles. This one consisted of jeans and a beige blouse with her favorite necklace. She had her comfy boots on and everything, and minimal make-up. She looked beautiful, minus the dark bags under her eyes and the tears that seemed to have stained her cheeks. He wanted to hug her really badly but decided against it.
"Hi," James said, quietly, as to not startle her.
"How good do you have to be considered a good person?" Delaney blurted, not even bothering to say hello back. She was definitely in one of her moods. James sat down next to her and placed his hand right next to her so that they brushed past each other the tiniest bit, sending tingles up his arms.
"Fuck," James responded.
"What kind of response is that?" Delaney questioned, narrowing her eyes at me.
"Fuck is a response for everything," James replied, smiling to himself at his cleverness.
"Not this time. I'm just so...I don't know. Grandma's isn't getting any better and she knows it. How do you tell someone they're going to die? How do you talk to them after you're certain that they know?" Delaney questioned.
"I don't know. You just have to have as much fun as you can while she's here, right?" James suggested.
"She's in a hospital. What kind of fun can you have in there? Plus, we're going to back to Hogwarts. I won't even see her," She responded, frowning.
"It'll be okay, Delaney. She knows how much you care about her," He offered, trying to cheer her up even if it was only slightly.
"But maybe that's not enough. Do you think I'm a good person, James?" Delaney asked, lowering her eyes.
"The very goodest," James responded, smiling.
"Goodest isn't a word," Delaney replied, smiling too. He always managed to cheer her up in some way or another.
"I'm fucking rich as hell. Do you think I care about stupid things like grammar?" James said, sending her another smile to let her know he was kidding. Sort of.
"Oh yes, of course. I'm sorry I forgot I was in the presence of a God. Forgive me, oh wise one!" She responded happily, pretending to bow down to James.
James laughed good-naturely and his hand accidently brushed against Delaney's. He jumped slightly as a tingle flew up his arm.
They both pretended not to notice and sat in silence for a bit. James knew he wasn't meant to talk right now. Delaney was thinking and his job, as the best friend, was to let her do that and offer minimal, shitty advice.
"So, how's Scorpius?" James asked, awkwardly.
"He's okay. I'm getting kind of bored of him, to be honest. It's not like we love each other, we just love snogging each other," Delaney responded, shrugging her shoulders.
"Just because he doesn't love you the way you want, doesn't mean he doesn't love you in his own way, you know," James said, moving his hand closer to Delaney's once more, trying to offer up a hint that he secretly loved her more than anything.
"Remind me why you don't have a girlfriend again?" Delaney asked, seriously for once, he thought.
"Because I'm too sexy for them all," James said, completely ruining any chance of a serious mood with that comment.
Delaney laughed and tugged on his arm. "Let's go for a walk."
*
Author's Note: Er okay, no idea what I'm doing with this particular chapter but hopefully it'll be better in the future. I have lots of little plot ideas in store for later, just not so good with actually writing it. Anyways, let me know what you think and I hope you liked it! xoxo
- Kara