Team: Wigtown Wanderers
Position: Beater 2
Prompt: "I don't cross the line. I stand on it." - Kate Beckett, Castle
Additional Prompts: 1. (word) despondent, 2. (feeling) disillusionment, 3. (dialogue) "Please leave me alone."
Words: 1186
Thanks to Bailey and Ash for betaing!
There's something in his throat, something hard and uncomfortable and impossible to get rid of—it feels too much like tears for Percy's comfort. Not that's he's unused to the shame and anxiety that's threatening to pour out—right now, in front of the whole school, Merlin—but he's never felt it because he'd done wrong.
Not in the conventional sense, at least.
He's not like his siblings—Bill, smart and charming; Charlie, kind and adventurous; Fred and George, absolute menaces but also gold-hearted geniuses; Ron, who makes up for his shortcomings with common sense and people skills; and Ginny, who has grown up in all their shadows and outshines them all even at twelve years old. Percy can never measure up to them, no matter how he tries, so what does it matter that he feels like a failure? That's all in his head!
It's this reality, this disillusionment pressing down on him: the fact that Percy has spent his last seventeen years living a lie.
It's a bit dramatic, maybe. Lots of people get detentions. But not him. Not once in the past seven years has Percy even gotten told off. He can't afford to get in trouble, not when he needs a perfect record to get into the Ministry. Detention?—it just isn't who he is!
He hasn't told anyone about it.
It's been over an hour since Professor McGonagall came up to him in the corridor and given him a note from Professor Snape. He walked in late to his next class and everyone looked at him, and he wanted the floor to swallow him whole. It was Hogwarts, so it was fully possible! But it didn't, and Percy sat through the lesson, not hearing a single word of it; and now he sits through dinner, mechanically eating the food in front of him, vaguely nodding along to Oliver's chatter, his mind far, far from the matter at hand.
"I think the team wants to talk to you," he tells Oliver when they get into the Common Room. "Go ahead, I think I'm going to head up to bed."
Is the team really waiting? Percy doesn't know, but they usually are, and what's a small lie after he's already gotten in trouble? He can't possibly apply to the Ministry now, not with his perfect record ruined—that is, unless he lies on the job application, and what's one more lie?
Now that he's lied to Oliver…
Percy sighs and trudges up the stairs, not even trying to stop himself from spiraling. He knows he's being stupid. One detention hasn't hurt anyone before. He's not special. And yet. Already, he's lied to Oliver—it's not like they're dating or anything, he thinks immediately, but he's wrong: they are. Oliver's the best boyfriend he could have asked for. He's pissed off a teacher, messed up his record, and now he's ruining the best thing that's ever happened to him.
"Fuck," Percy whispers as he walks into his dormitory.
He's never done that, either, and it's safer to start swearing in a whisper. Maybe he'll keep spiraling. Sneak a dragon onto the Hogwarts grounds, maybe. Charlie's always wanted to do that.
Percy shudders at the thought of his family and hopes that they never find out about his transgression. Does the school owl parents about detention? He laughs bitterly—he's never wondered that before. He's never had to, but now… he's got a whole new life. His old life, the one where he had a good record, where he understood who he was—that's gone now.
He throws off his robe and lies down, shutting the curtains of his four-poster. He tugs the pillow over his head and waits to disappear. Maybe he'll be asleep by the time Oliver gets back.
But the door opens immediately after, and Percy curses his terrible luck. He quiets his breathing, hoping that Oliver will just let it go.
There's a rattle as the curtains are pushed aside, the mattress creaks as Oliver sits down, and Percy tenses as Oliver rests his hand on his shoulder.
"You know," Oliver says quietly, "the team wasn't actually waiting for me."
Percy bites his lip. Of course they weren't.
"You want to tell me what's going on?"
Oliver doesn't sound mad, he doesn't even sound disappointed, and that's exactly why Percy loves him. He wants to crawl out from under the pillow and into Oliver's arms—the rest of the world has changed, but Oliver hasn't—but he stays where he is, because what if he's wrong? What if Oliver's angry?
"Please leave me alone," he whispers instead, waiting for Oliver to go.
"Nope."
Oliver grins; Percy can hear it in his voice. That's what happens after living together for seven years. It's wonderful, knowing Oliver so well—it's so wonderful, Percy almost feels like he's ready to talk.
If not for the fact that he's vaguely shaking now that he's not trying to pretend he's not in the room, Percy would pretend that the world's back to normal. But it's not: he has to report on Saturday to Professor Snape's office with a formal apology and a free evening to perform the punishment he's been given.
"You don't have to tell me."
Percy groans lightly. "That's not fair to you."
"It's fine."
Percy scrunches up his face under the pillow—why does Oliver have to be so understanding?—and shakes his head.
"You don't agree? Alright, tell me what's bothering you, then."
He's not making Percy talk; the offer's there, clear as day, but Percy knows that if he stays silent, Oliver's not going to go anywhere. Still, he inches out from under the pillow and lies on his side, but he's still frowning, even as Oliver takes his hand.
He sighs. "I'm just feeling a bit despondent, I suppose."
"'Despondent'? Mind telling me what it means?"
"The short definition? In low spirits from loss of hope or courage." Percy feels his frown twitch into a smile when Oliver smiles. "The long definition?"—he's frowning again, now that the world's caught up to him—"Snape gave me detention. And I suppose I'm having a crisis of confidence."
It sounds stupid now that he says it out loud, and he's about to apologize when Oliver shakes his head. "I know what you're thinking, and it's not stupid."
"I'm sorry for lying," he says instead of arguing. It's no good to argue with Oliver—they know each other too well for that.
"Don't worry about it, you just needed space." Oliver squeezes his hand. "D'you still want it? I can go if you want to be alone.
No, please don't! Percy thinks. His crisis of confidence might have been averted—or maybe not, he's not sure, and he knows himself well enough to know that things won't feel normal for a while yet—but the last thing he needs is isolation and the time to keep spinning horrible hypotheticals.
He must have made some sort of sound, because Oliver leans down and kisses him, before smiling warmly. "Alright, then I'm not going anywhere."