xX... this is slashy, so back off if you don't dig. also- i own nothing. so pshaw. please review! it takes two seconds and I'd just totally adore you! ...xX
Finally.
He shut the door quietly behind him.
He looks around. It's cold. The windows are frosted over. A fire dwindles in the fireplace.
He buttons his coat and squats down besides the hefty four poster. There he sees-
-an empty cup which once contained milk
-3 socks (the fourth was, at this time, MIA)
-some coins
-his Christmas gifts for his friends
-a large trunk
-some books he'd never read
...A trunk...
He heaves the trunk out from under his bed with much difficulty. Panting, tired, and still very cold he opens it open. He can just see it, well hidden among his long underwear, sleeping shirts, scarfs, dress robes, and an old cigar box containing some pot.
But there it is.
He lifts it out. It's very heavy. Old. Rusted. But beautiful. It has a charm to it, something that no goblin could ever recreate.
The base's glaze has long since worn off. The crank's fine leather handle is peeling. The horn is scratched and peeling with use. But still it is. and that is all that matters. The horn needs to be attached, yes, but it is a glorious two pieces. Glorious indeed.
He sets the base and horn onto his bed and stops- a creak. a floorboard. could be nothing. But still. Could be footsteps. Someone. Anyone. Harry. Neville. Seamus, even. Coming to get him. To bust him. He goes to the door and looks out. No one. A trick of the ear. He takes out his wand and whispers "muffliato". He breathes. He relaxes.
But only for a moment.
He returns to his bed. To his moment.
He's managed to steal away half an hour or so from his friends. From the world. He has no qualms with the wizarding world, no, it's been good to him. But he misses one thing about the muggle world. Music. What an experience. At its best, it was glorious, full bodied, rich, a sound that filled the ears with such pleasure that it would seem to explode. Back when he was a muggle, he would hear his brother explain to his friends that "the Blur cd gave me Eargasms". Everyone would buy that cd. From a young age, Dean wanted to have an Eargasm. Even though he didn't know what it meant, or what it actually was a play off. He wanted one. Sure, a lot of the muggle music was crap- but when you discovered what was magical (if you will): Duke Ellington, Janis Joplin, The Beatles, Joni Mitchell...
Listening to an album was like nothing else.
He finally knew what an Eargasm was.
He had them,
day after day after day after day.
It was good.
He gladly went home for holidays and would stock up on the latest cds and spend his time, locked in his room, listening and listening and staring at the ceiling and breathing, feeling, BEING the music.
His friends didn't understand,
"Don't you like The Weird Sisters?" Seamus had asked him one day when Dean had tried to explain to him what it was like to listen to hear Bob Dylan wail about "wanting you". The Weird Sisters.
Wizard music was drivel. It was like listening to Panic! At The Disco and believing you were listening to something that made you PART of something. It was like listening to The Fray and thinking you were Indie. It was like knowing "Stairway to Heaven" and calling yourself a Zeppelin fan.
The Weird Sisters?
PAH!
He wished he could take his music, his passion to Hogwarts but there were spells in place. To block all electronic waves. All muggle things.
That's how he was reduced to this.
Sneaking listens in.
Vinyl.
A record player.
An old as hell record player.
One that didn't require being plugged in. Because, obviously, Hogwarts did not have plugs.
One with a crank.
It was old.
It was out of date.
But it was all Dean had.
He assembles it. He goes back into his drunk and pulls out one of the many albums he was.
Joni Mitchell.
Blue.
He's in that mood.
Melancholy.
Very 50s.
Sort of like A Charlie Brown Christmas, he thinks.
Strange.
He cranks the record player.
He puts the record on.
The sound is crackled. It is pure.
He skips the needle to his favorite song. He's adept at the art of this.
He lays on his bed and listens to her. Her voice is full bodied. Rich. Everything music should be. A piano is all she needs. She croons...
It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on...
She's beautiful.
He never thinks about it, really.
She has the look of a smoker.
He examines the album sleeve.
It's blue.
Surprise.
He never thinks about it, really.
For some reason, it's never occurred to him.
She's female, yes.
She's beautiful, yes.
But not in any way of attraction, she's just beautiful.
For a long time,
Dean thought of this as a mortal failing on his behalf.
His inability to see women as attractive creatures.
Something to be drawn to.
To think about while on the bathroom floor,
discovering himself.
He cried.
Why didn't he work?
His parents talk in hush voices about the fact that he'd never had a girlfriend.
Sometimes,
he thinks they wish they could return him and exchange him for another.
Why didn't he work?
But it don't snow here
It stays pretty green
I'm going to make a lot of money
Then I'm going to quit this crazy scene
I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
He listened to Bjork screech and wondered.
He listened to The Clash bang and wondered.
He listened to Joni Mitchell and wondered.
He got eargasms.
But he still felt hollow.
He felt wrong.
He felt...
He felt worried at the fact that he loved to go to the department store and get lost in the underwear department. Looking at the different men in various states of undress as they modeled Calvin Klein or something like it.
He felt worried because he would watch Harry Potter get dressed every morning, his eyes barely slits. He watched Harry Potter come back from the shower and he felt worried because he liked to look at his ass.
He felt worried because he didn't think Joni Mitchell was beautiful enough to love, in any way other then "worship worship worship".
After a while he conceded and accepted.
One time he heard Draco Malfoy call Neville Longbottom a "fag".
He finally had a word for his feelings.
Fag.
F
A
G
Those three letters. Perfect. Hurtful.
He wouldn't realize until later that there were other words to describe his sexual longings. That Fag was actually not on the "nice" part of the spectrum.
He didn't tell anyone.
Not even his best friend, Seamus.
No one would understand.
Just like they don't understand Joni.
Just like they don't understand music.
Just like they were content to listen to The Weird Sisters.
Closed Minded.
He thinks as he stares at the red velvet canopy he's stared up a so many times before.
I made my baby cry.
He tried hard to help me
You know, he put me at ease
And he loved me so naughty
Made me weak in the knees
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
He thinks of Seamus. Of how Seamus loves to have sex. Of how he and Seamus have spent many a night in the owlery, smoking pot and dreaming of marmalade rivers.
He thinks of his Mum. Who cries when she thinks of Aunt Nellie's son, Richard. Who brought home his boyfriend for August Bank Holiday.
He thinks of Harry Potter, and how he doesn't know that they've shared some intensely personal and close moments together.
Dean takes off his scarf.
Suddenly he's not feeling terribly cold.
The music has enveloped him. It washes over him. It drenches him.
He lives for these moments, he realizes. These moments where he can steal away and do the only thing he loves. Listen to music. He only manages to do so once or twice a month, and it's hardly enough, but it has to suffice.
He wonders where his friends are right now.
Probably at Hogsmeade. Or having a snowball fight. Or having a wonderful lunch.
Christmas. Almost Christmas.
In fact, tomorrow he'll be on the Hogwarts Express. Heading home. In 24 hours he'll see his mother on the platform, he'll run into her arms. She'll hug him and kiss him and say she missed him. She'll continue to tell herself it isn't so. She'll tell herself it's a phase.
She'll bring out the magazine she found.
A phase. A phase. A phase. A phase. A phase.
Dean will cry. She'll cry. He'll ask her not to tell Dad.
She'll ask him why he did this to her?
He'll cry.
She'll cry.
He'll wonder if she can ever forgive him.
She'll say she "still loves him"
He'll want to ask "why would you love me less?"
But he doesn't.
He'll go into his room.
Lock the door.
And play his albums.
He won't have to hide it. He won't have to listen to vinyl. He'll just listen and listen and listen and cry and cry and cry and he'll hear his mother downstairs, cooking, crying.
He'll think of Harry Potter's dick.
He'll hate himself.
He'll hate himself.
He hates himself.
"Dean?"
Dean freezes.
He runs and lifts up the needle.
"Fuck"
"Can I come in?"
Seamus doesn't wait for an answer. He just comes in.
"I didn't say you could"
"It's my fucking dorm too"
Dean takes the record off and carefully puts it in his sleeve.
"You ok?"
Dean, horribly, realizes he's been crying. He hastily wipes his sleeve with his sweater.
"Yeah. Fine."
No one says anything as Dean puts the record player back into his trunk and puts the trunk back under his bed.
"I won't tell anyone."
They sit on their separate beds and stare at each other. Dean's eyes obviously puffy and red.
"You missed a good lunch."
Dean plays with his curtain.
"I'm going to miss you over the holiday."
Dean stops playing with his curtain.
"Me too"
Seamus stops picking at his fingernails.
No one says anything about what was going on.
There is a silence.
"You'll never guess who JUST gave me head"
Seamus grins.
Dean does not.
"Who?"
"Guess!"
"But you said I'll never be able to, so save me some time and tell me"
"Lavendar Brown"
"Cool"
It is not.
"Hey Seamus?"
It pains him. He can't. It hurts. Why must he?
"Yeah?"
"I... I... "
God it's awful. God it's cliched. God it hurts.
"I'm gay."
awful. cliched. painful. silence.
"Oh?"
"Yeah."
"Oh."
Dean twiddles his thumbs.
"I'll see you after break, mate."
He gets up and leaves.
Dean stares at the doorway.
Dean stares at the ceiling.
Dean starts to cry.
Dean doesn't know why.
He does. He tells himself he doesn't.
He hates Seamus.
He hates himself.
He takes his record player.
He throws it at the wall.
It makes a loud sound as it cracks and breaks and screeches and all the music it has ever played escapes it at this one moment where it makes contact with the old walls of Hogwarts.
All the music. All the Joni, the Duke, the Janis, the Bob, the Led, the Rufus, the Ramones, the Jimi everything...
It's a storm. An assault. Of sounds. Of words. Of images. Of feelings.
Dean closes his eyes.
I wish I was dead. I wish I was dead. I wish i was dead.
The music stops. He is breathing heavily.
He whispers...
It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
Singing songs of joy and peace
I wish I had a river
I could skate away on.
xX... Well you finished! won't you review? It makes my day, it really does! ...xX