Let Me In, I've Been Knocking for Ten Minutes
A magneo fanfiction – Modern AU
Note: I do not own the characters and any other things you may recognize. Falling Kingdoms series solely belongs to Morgan Rhodes.
Prompt (AU): "your apartment is next to/above mine and I can hear you and your partner dancing. singing/the bed moving/you two laughing and talking and I can't sleep so I bitch about it to you 24/7 and one day it stops and one day turns to months and I haven't seen you smile in forever please let me in, I've been knocking for ten minutes" au.
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Magnus Lukas Damora was skimming through his thick leather bound sketchbook when the music started. The electronic song blasted from the unit next to him through his own walls.
He rolled his eyes and muttered, "Oh for fuck's sake, princess."
The apartment he was renting has all the necessities he needs. Aside from those, there was also a pool for adults and children, a clubhouse for booze and table games, a gym and a study hall. The place is mostly exclusive for students like him—those who were raised with money, but it didn't mean a family couldn't rent one unit, as well.
When Magnus finished high school, he didn't waste time moving out of his parents' place. Gaius Damora, his father, expects him to take over their company when he finishes his business program. He wanted Magnus to handle everything with perspicacity—gradually pushing him to his limits, even when he was still young.
Growing up, Magnus was a troublesome kid, though he couldn't say he's any different now. Once when he was seven, during a house party of his father's business partner, Magnus slipped an ancient knife off the walls and pocketed it as his own.
The knife wasn't even too shiny, but it had intricate carvings down to its tip that fascinated Magnus.
He was young and often a pain in the neck but he still had guilt, and soon confessed to his parents what he did.
Magnus sought them and went clean, after finding a place to talk to them without anyone hearing the affair.
Gaius Damora, ignoring his wife's pleas, threw his glass of wine down the cobbled floor and shattered it into pieces.
The party continued on. No one heard the glass break, as the classical music continued to play on the surround sound system.
With his hands, fighting the tremble threatening to run through his body, he handed his father the knife. With it, Gaius carved a wound from the top of his left cheek down to the corner of his mouth. The pain slithered onto his face but he didn't cry. Magnus kept a straight face. His father had always told him to be strong, and he will comply. Anger coddled in him, and the wound was excused as an accident—he tripped and cut his cheek on a piece of glass.
He hated to leave Lucia, his sister, behind but she insisted he should. She's one of the few people who understands him and knows the thoughts that'd run in his head.
A lilting voice snapped him back and Magnus cussed again.
Cleiona Aurora Bellos's singing and her companion's laugh made Magnus want to shoot a hole in their walls or barricade himself more—he wasn't too sure but both ideas were tempting.
His first year was peaceful enough but when the "golden princess," or so he likes to call her more often as an insult, moved in, that peace was shot into pieces.
Magnus wasn't foreign to Cleiona Aurora Bellos.
The golden girl just so happens to be the daughter of his father's business partner. The same business partner whose knife he nicked before.
They've met each other a few times, mostly during parties and groundbreaking ceremonies.
He wasn't also sure why he had told her the story about the scar across his left cheek. He was convinced it was her eyes. There's something about those cerulean orbs that made him spill that specific hurt that's still bottled inside him.
She looked at him, then, concerned—warm and light that seemed to tug him from his own darkness—and defiant too.
And now, whenever they'd find each other arguing over silly things of which are mostly how she and Theon, her boyfriend, cause so much racket, Cleiona would always vindicate him in the end. She'd look at him and would speak, "But I understand why you're an ass." Magnus hated himself for sharing that piece with her. He hated the scrutiny that came with her gaze and he hated how much she'd make him believe he was more than his misdeeds.
From their side, the couple laughed again. The song changed but it was still as rock and roll and electronic as the last one.
Magnus was thinking of pounding on their door and requesting for peace and quiet but he knows so well, it wouldn't last. They would heed his request but they'd be on it again, after a few minutes
"Would you please stop with all that laughter, princess? I have an oral exam next week and I need a head start," he seethed at the golden girl when she opened the door to her unit.
"By the goddess, Magnus. Is it wrong to be happy?" Smiling, she had asked him. There was a hint of teasing in her voice coaxing another roll of his eyes. Cleiona can be irritating, most of the time.
He grinned at her, cat-like—not amused, "Unless you don't want a ticket to the nearest mental asylum, I suggest you turn it down."
She frowned at him and bit her lips as though fighting back a retort.
Finally, Magnus said in his head. There was oddly a sufficiently rewarding feeling for making her frown. Cleiona Bellos had always been a sunny person. Her laugh and smile annoyed him. Why does she always had to be happy?
"You're so bitter," She snarled at him, sounding both annoyed and pleased. Magnus found himself frowning, now. "We will turn it down. Now go do your business study thing."
Cleiona grabbed his shoulders and forced him away from the threshold of her door. "Study hard," she said, rather bubbly, at him before closing her door.
Magnus was thankful, after that. They gave him quiet—yes. They gave him peace—yes, but only for a while. Checking his wristwatch, Magnus rattled out a series of curses under his breath.
They were only quiet for 45 minutes until a pop song started pumping from her room—laughter and footsteps harmonized with the music. He huffed, are they dancing now, too?
Magnus thought of them lucky, this time. The term is almost to end and Magnus had nothing else to do but pass a few requirements for one or two minor subjects—nothing that needs staying up for—and he'd be ready to go for summer break. But if the term still isn't, then Magnus wouldn't waste time and complain to the management, probably for the umpteenth time. He wasn't sure. He stopped counting.
Cleiona Bellos was tolerated and barely hated. If she can't get away with something or have what she wants with her long golden curls, cerulean eyes and sweet smile, her amiable characteristic and demeanor would always swoop in and save her. Even Lucia liked her. So, it was always and only Magnus who complains.
The golden girl's laugh rang from her room. Magnus perked at the sound of his name.
How thin is this wall? Magnus had thought. The wall partition was either thin enough or Cleiona's voice was just really loud. Magnus had a feeling it was both.
"Theon, you have to stop making me laugh," she pleaded, between her laughs, "We might disturb the neighbors and you know, Magnus, he won't be pleased."
Another voice answered. Magnus knew it was Theon.
"How do you even know he's in his room?" Theon asked her. There was mirth in his voice.
Theon Ranus—Magnus rocked the name in his head. He knows well enough, Theon didn't grow up with money. Cleiona had shared that his father, a soldier, died overseas during fieldwork. He's a fresh criminology graduate and ahead of him by a year and of Cleiona by three years.
He didn't pay much attention to Theon, as he didn't care. To him, Theon was simply Cleiona's boyfriend.
"I know it," Cleiona insisted, "I can feel him breathing."
Magnus made a sound of something between a huff and a laugh, pausing his flipping and staring at his rendered image of an island he visited last year.
Her boyfriend only laughed and cajoled her to dance with him. The music turned louder.
Sighing again, Magnus shook his head, at least, this is better than the sexual noises.
Love making is a natural human interaction and Magnus couldn't complain about it, as he has a habit of bringing girls to his bed more often than Cleiona and Theon sharing theirs.
A smile tugged at one corner of his lips when he remembered a specific memory of him and a certain "princess" with hair of pale gold.
It was in one of those groundbreaking ceremonies.
Magnus was swirling a glass of wine while watching notable-or so they think, people socialize, clink glasses together and laugh. He was close to frowning but glad that he's got a good grip of his composure.
"Oh, when will this sorrow end?"
He didn't look at the speaker. Cleiona Bellos was standing beside him, arms folded across her chest, with a plastered practiced smile on her face.
She was wearing a knee-length dress in her favorite color—blue. It was in a shade you'd notice the sky would take right before dawn. It complimented her sun-kissed skin, and the ray of sun hitting her face only made her gold hair as pale as ever—like the light.
"What's wrong, princess?" He asked, still using the title—still teasing, "Not feeling sociable today?"
She grunted at him, cocking an eyebrow, "Why, Magnus, feeling broodier today?"
Magnus let out a bitter laugh. Cleiona Bellos may be a sweet girl but underneath her exterior of collected calmness and affability, she was capable of striking with her words like a poisonous snake.
"You stung me," He mocked. Then added, after sipping his wine, "Lighten up, princess. You need to keep smiling for both of us."
But Magnus understands. He understands how tiring all these groundbreaking, social and business ceremonies are. Magnus is good at social gatherings but too much can be tiring and vexing too.
"Did you have fun last night?" She asked him.
Magnus regarded her and asked, "Whatever do you mean?"
"With Amara," She supplied, too sweetly, sounding like a cat waiting to pounce on her prey. She pulled him away from the crowd and waited for his answer.
He didn't have to think deep and long. Magnus remembered Amara and their night—or nights, to put it correctly—together.
Amara was simply amazing—seizing and controlling, crushing and lusting. Still, he wasn't attracted to her like a moth to a flame. She doesn't have that power on him.
"Did you enjoy listening to us?" He poked the flame.
Cleiona rolled her eyes, almost sneering, "No."
"Oh, Magnus! Where did you learn that?" She mimicked and then laughed, "Please, it's annoying. It seems she can't say anything other than that."
This time Magnus let out a laugh too, looking at Cleiona's purple-blue eyes.
"I don't think so," He said and placed a hand on his chin, looking thoughtful, "I recall hearing her moan "more, Magnus" and "harder, Magnus," too. But who knows?"
The golden girl murmured in disgust, rolled her eyes and padded away.
Magnus watched her, laughing to himself.
Another laugh from Cleiona's room—Cleiona's voice made Magnus snap his ledger close and sigh a too heavy one.
He left his sketchbook on his desk, grabbed his keys on the table and trudged outside.
There was no particular destination in his mind. He'd probably drive around, or maybe hit the gym for an excuse to beat people up or maybe see Amara—not unless she sees him first—or anything else that will pull him away from his room and from Cleiona's annoying laughs—or so he convinces himself.
Summer break painfully paced into closure.
Magnus spent his "break"—even if he refuses to call it one—oversees, studying under the supervision of his father to handle and supervise the ramifications and corners of their company, especially now that he was in his last year in attending the university.
Requirements, mandatory events and on the job training, oral and written exams started threatening his resiliency weeks within his fourth year, making Magnus unable to notice the lack of usual noise he'd often hear from the unit to his right.
He dropped the pencil he was holding and closed the book in front of him.
Cleiona would be in her room, right now, he knew. He had seen her a few times in the building and even on campus but never bothered to talk for longer than five minutes.
Her lover died during summer. Magnus didn't hear anything from Cleiona; it was his sister, Lucia, who told him the news. Theon and his field partner were in pursuit of a wanted victim. They apprehended him and everything was going great, Lucia had told him. Until the criminal pulled a fight, taking advantage on the humming activity in the precinct and threatened to kill civilians. There was yet another fight. A civilian would've died if Theon Ranus didn't go in the way and took the bullet.
Magnus scoffed then and Magnus scoffed now. Sure it was a heroic thing to do, but he wasn't too pleased with the idea that the man didn't consider the feelings of the people he'd be leaving behind.
Cleiona Bellos rarely smiled anymore and her laughs no longer intrude through his walls. It should've pleased Magnus but somehow, he grew somber. The golden girl wasn't golden, anymore, and it had started to make an impression on him. He realized he'd come to miss the music, the sound of feet brewing up dance steps on the floor and her laugh. Magnus missed the happiness from her—he missed the light.
Weeks turned to a month, and the silence was slowly killing him.
Some nights, he swore, he'd hear her muffled cries and feel his chest heavy.
It was during one of those nights, when Magnus kicked off his blanket down the floor, put on a jacket and approached the golden girl's door.
"Princess, are you in there?" He asked, knocking on the door. He hissed at the dumb question that came from his mouth. He knew pretty well, she was inside.
No one answered and Magnus knocked again, "Cleiona, it's Magnus."
He almost rolled his eyes. What am I doing? He asked himself and pressed an ear to her door.
Still, there was no answer and not even a sound of someone moving inside.
A rock seemed to lodge in his throat. The worry that was slowly creeping on him for the past weeks now hung around his neck like an albatross.
Magnus knocked again, and when he heard someone move inside, he knocked—more incessantly.
"Cleiona, I know you're in there," he said, putting his hands in his pockets and sighed.
"What do you want?" He heard her answer. She sounded small and far away.
Her voice wasn't as confident as she normally sounded. He felt broken ceramic from her tone—pieces you'd want to pick carefully as to avoid getting hurt, but you'd still want to put together because you've seen it whole before and it was beautiful.
"You're awfully quiet," he replied before thinking it through. Magnus caught himself biting his lip and mentally berating himself for another stupid answer.
"Well isn't it a delight for you," she snapped—not as strong as she usually does it, but it still gave Magnus hope.
"Open the door," he told her, knocking again.
"Go away, Magnus," she sounded tired, "Stop annoying me with your voice."
Magnus knocked again and heard her huff. He continued rapping his knuckles on her door. He'd see her. He wasn't sure how he's going to comfort her, and he knows that he can't simply tell her to stop crying. He knows it doesn't work that way. He doesn't know what he's going to do, but he's got to make her open the door. He has to see her and then, he'd do whatever it takes, to take those tears away.
From opposite the door, something hit it and made a loud thud. Magnus quickly pulled his hand away and heard Cleo shout, "Go away!"
He huffed and rocked on his feet with his hands shoved in his pants' pockets.
For a while, Magnus stared at her door while still rocking on his feet.
Magnus wasn't Nicolo or Mira Cassian – the golden girl's childhood friends. He wasn't his sister, too. He wondered if maybe he was any of them, Cleiona would've already opened the door for him and let him in.
Though, he didn't blame her. He was rarely concerned with people and if he was, he's often too cold to even show it.
"I can hear you breathing, Magnus," Cleiona sullenly said from inside, "Just go away."
Refusing to leave without staring daggers at her door, Magnus finally turned and walked away.
Good riddance, Cleiona Bellos thought to herself as she heard Magnus's footsteps receding from her door.
She wiped the tears that still fell from her eyes down her cheeks.
Theon Ranus was dead for almost three months.
If she'd be honest, the first month was a hurricane. She didn't know what was going on. All she knew was that she was sad and sad was only an understatement.
Corvin Bellos, her father, had given all measures to keep her happy. He cajoled her into traveling, bought her gifts—new dresses, pieces of jewelry and paint kit, and even allow her a night of nothing but getting wasted.
All of it—Cleo rejected.
Her friends had been too good. Nic and Mira were her shoulders to lean on and Lucia Damora, too.
And although far away, Jonas Agallon, an old suitor, and his sweetheart, Lysandra Barbas took the time to visit her and send their condolences.
Everyone showed they care, except Magnus Damora.
Cleo knew it would be asking too much, but she expected he would at least show he cared—that he was human. Cleo believed he was—he is.
The dark-haired man, with his scar running from the top of his left cheek to the corner of his lips, always insisted there's no goodness in him, but Cleo believed he has. He has to. She believes.
Her place felt emptier without Theon.
She was convinced she was getting better. Not in a way that she's forgotten him, no, she'll never forget him; but she felt, slowly, she was going back on her feet again and that the hurricane wasn't sweeping her anymore.
And then she had to be back and study; the walls of her room felt choking. She misses the songs she and Theon would put on and play. She misses their feet moving together. She misses their laughs, his hands around her waist, his voice, his kisses, and him, and him, and him.
Her eyes started to sting again and tears came rushing down. Cleo bit her lower lip and let her tears come silently. She wouldn't want to disturb Magnus—and all her other neighbors, too—anymore.
She turned, still curled on the sofa, and scowled at her closed door.
How dare he, Cleo thought, poison coating her thoughts. Did Magnus really leave? She wanted to scoff or laugh at herself, or maybe both.
As if he heard her, the knocks kept coming again.
Cleo looked at her door but didn't get up. She stared dully at it, listened to the knocks that seemed less threatening than the heaviness she was feeling from inside.
"I won't stop, you know," Magnus Damora knocked. He sounded bored with a slight hint of authority but Cleo was used to the boredom and authority oozing from his voice—even if they were a little or too much.
His knocking didn't cease and he said, "Have you been missing classes?"
She has and she hasn't. She was mostly late, but she was still going to her classes or at least some of them.
Finding herself unable to get up, Cleo remained silent, listening to Magnus's knockings that are slowly gaining pace.
"Cleiona, I can hear you breathing," Magnus sounded smug.
A small smile crawled on her lips as she recognized her own words from his voice, yet she still didn't answer.
True to his words, Magnus didn't stop. It was also questionable how no one was telling him to stop. She heard at least, two or three neighbors greet him, but no one said anything. She was convinced they were more afraid of him than friendly.
Why can't he just leave me alone? Cleo asked to herself, feeling the drag of the tears that dried down her cheek. She was half-agreeing with her own question.
Blinking, she frowned at the green post-it note on the floor in front of her door.
There was something written on it but it was too far away to tell.
Tiredly, she sat up on the sofa, combed back her hair with her fingers and padded straight to her door.
Cleo crouched down, grabbed the note and read, Open the door. I miss you.
She smiled to herself. Magnus was still knocking. She didn't open the door but instead, sat on the floor and rested her back on the door.
"You have horrible penmanship," she said, not too loud and stared at the post-it note still in her hands, "Is this supposed to be a "t" and not "f," Magnus?"
The knocks stopped and Magnus didn't immediately reply. Cleo was afraid she didn't say those words loud enough for him to hear.
"I am a business student, princess, not a calligrapher," he replied, then. He sounded low and close.
She had a feeling Magnus was also sitting on his side of her door, his back against it too.
"You render quite well. I was hoping you'd have better handwriting," she responded.
Magnus laughed but cut short, "You flatter me."
Out of habit, she rolled her eyes, smiling a little now, too.
"I'm sorry about Theon," he was bearing the grim, Cleo had been waiting for so long to hear from him, "I was away. I'm sorry I couldn't be there."
Cleo knew that, of course. She only refused to let her mind wrap around it. Magnus had been away to see through their company overseas. He had big responsibilities being handed by his father. Inside, she understood.
"You don't know how to stop, do you?" Cleo asked him instead, a bit wistful, and dodging discussing Theon further with an abrupt, "I know."
"Shouldn't you be pleased?" He asked. "Some would want to be you right now."
She shook her head, out of delight, as though the gesture could revoke what he said.
Magnus Damora is an attractive specimen—that, she won't deny, but the man knows it and sometimes, he'd even flaunt it to an extent that'd always annoy Cleo.
"Ass," she murmured.
"Heard that," he retorted.
"What do you want, Magnus?" she bit back.
"For you to open the door," he answered, reciting, "I miss you."
Something seemed stuck in her throat, Cleo found herself swallowing hard.
People fascinated Cleiona Bellos. Nic and Mira often tease her and gesture as though granting her the Miss Congeniality Award. Cleo has a knack for reading people—learning how to make them tickle and more often than not, give her what she wants.
She allowed herself to smile and appreciate the humanity that Magnus let her see.
"Cleiona," he called—voice low, deep and something more, "Can you let me in? I've been knocking for ten minutes."
Cleo was no genius in numbers but she was sure Magnus had been knocking for more than ten minutes but didn't complain. Magnus knows his numbers. He was doing it again—acting like he wasn't doing something heartwarming.
"That depends," she teased, a little lightly. She still felt heavy, but she wasn't as worse as she was.
"Did you bring me something?" She inquired.
"All the snacks in my storage," he replied, rather proud.
A short laugh escaped her. She said, "You drive such hard bargain, Magnus Damora."
She stood up, pocketed his note to keep and opened her door even before he replied.
"I told you," he smirked, still smug, "I'm a business student, princess."
He was holding one brown tote bag filled with snacks in his left hand, while his right hand was pocketed.
Magnus Damora was still smirking. If she was someone else, she would've probably felt offended by how he sounded, but Cleo and Magnus knew each other more than they're sharing. She could see the humanity in his dark eyes—its warmth and the comfort it was bringing as he took in her appearance.
"Come on in," she smiled at him, and finally, Magnus did.
The next day, Magnus came back and Cleiona, smiling, opened the door for him.
He came back the day after that, and the next and even the next.
It went on, until Cleiona no longer cries herself to sleep and she was laughing without reserve again; until Magnus started dreaming of a girl with pale golden hair and eyes that remind him of a clear purplish blue October sky; until he was the one popping the music; until they were each other's reason for smiling and laughing and doing silly dance on each other's floor.
And when Magnus would knock, he didn't need to hear "go away" or wait for ten minutes, Cleo would, now, always, always, always open the door.
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