CONVOLUTED

CHAPTER 1

A/N: Hello all! Thanks for clicking into this. Convoluted is a fic I'm writing with my cousin FreezingPenguins. She actually puts more effort into this, I think, as it isn't her own work. Much of this would be based on word formatting because we were after something interesting-once again her idea. Sadly, the site won't allow something quite like Patrick Ness' mess, so we'll work with what we have. Thanks for reading!

She hates me. She always has.

And at the start I asked for it.

(-At the start, I hated her too.)

It was a childish sort of hate. The squabblish type. It wasn't like my feelings of irk and distaste for Voldemort-

(Never fear a name)-

But I swore all sorts of stuff I never truly meant. We'd scream our hatred in corridors, we'd insult and try to hurt each other.

But I think we always cared for each other. I'd never let her die. She'd do the same. The moment I started pondering upon the subject I knew it.

It never was meant to be anything romantic. I didn't feel like that for her.

I had thought.

I had a crush on her, sure. But never anything more. Never.

Love was superficial-

Love was too deep. I never wanted to feel that way for anyone. Never, to feel as if I would do anything for someone. To be willing to go to the ends of the earth for another. I wanted to get married and had that sort of light flighty emotion. Loads of people lived like that.

I hate her for making me feel this.

Then, she got hurt. By her own best friend.

I provoked him.

I wanted to hide her behind me and save her from all the horrors of the world. I never wanted her to hurt again.

And I felt guilty. It wasn't explainable.

I was sixteen. I was not meant to feel so strongly for anyone.

Then again, I had risked everything I had for one of my best friends. I took up a forbidden branch or magic with my other friends for him.

I had publicly insulted the parents of the brother I never had. I told them off for being biased, for giving him a tough time, had offered my friend a place at my house permanently without my parents' consent. They tried to hex me. I'd probably been placed higher on a blacklist for that.

It didn't seem like a big deal.

As for the last friend in our little gang, he didn't seem to have so many problems. I just taught him magic, maybe gave him a bit of confidence and saved his ass once is a while.

It was no big deal. No big deal. NO BIG DEAL. Lily hates my ego. My ego. Lily hates. LILY HATES ME. LILY HATES ME. LILY HATES ME.

I wasn't, aren't, all good of course. Sirius always said I looked like a bloody angel and acted nothing like one.

McGonagall phrased is more nicely. She said I had a misleading aura of pure innocence. I knew I didn't have one. I'd seen too much. I learnt, I sinned too much.

But I liked to have fun. I like being young. I loved life. I liked all the energy. I was reckless.

I think I have some sort of split personality, which were somehow joined by experience and thoughts because I was me and put simply, could not be anyone else.

Lily saw the immature me.

The immature side wasn't even a complete part of the split. It was just the show I usually put on. Which was me and my compliance to entertain, amuse, have an outward personality and laugh. It sounds plastic, but really, it wasn't synthetic in any way. It was just how I acted. How I displayed myself as.

As we know, our minds are private. Our private mess. I think Sirius understands me better than anyone else and vice versa, but it still isn't complete. I don't even know myself so well. I surprise myself all the time.

Lily doesn't want to see you.

Mother loved me. Dad loved mother.

(I want her back.)

Thoughts betray you, see? They go out of line. They aren't controllable. It's why I'm never anything but a prat in front of Lily. She made me nervous. I'm not sure, but I think it was an automatic defensive measure.

I doubt I wanted her to see me for me. Because I wanted-

(needed)

-A reason to resent her. Or all my control would go out of hand. And if she loved me too...

She'd do anything.

We are much alike.

(And I love her.)

I love her.

I LOVE LILY EVANS.

Sad but true. It's only in moments of clarity that I see the extent of our feelings. Then I'll ignore them all over again. Because really, they scare me. They would scare anyone.

Or I was a coward.

I was just too young. I wasn't ready. We didn't know each other well enough.

I just had all these dreams. These expectations.

I just wanted something slow, soft and sweet. That sort of relationship that everyone sighed about in the dark times. It required the right times.

I was willing to wait.

I didn't fully understand what I felt about her anyway.

I was probably a better person than she was ready to see, but darker, if it makes any sense.

People have too many dimensions.

But I knew I cared for her. Even when I thought I hated her, I admired her. I would be destroyed if she died, put it that way. Even as kids.

It's an emotion I only feel for two people-her and Sirius. I love my parents and Remus and Peter, but it isn't the same.

I'm sentimental, clingy and dependent I guess.

I hate my mind.

I hate worrying. I hate thinking. I hate knowing a bright future is unlikely.

But I won't run away.

My own mother wouldn't understand you if you told her everything.

She's on the other side now. I think mother would be able to read my mind. But it's such a mess I doubt she'll understand completely.

And she'll be stuck with one hell of a headache. Headache from heaven. What's that like?

I miss her. But I hope I'm not worse than what she thought of me.

I don't know how good or bad I am. I doubt anyone can be judged so easily.

But I'm me. And in a way, I'm dead proud of that.

A/N: Work in progress. Run on sentences intentional. Please review? :)