Wasteland
where fewer posh boys
can't believe we treasure our beer cans
it's not a miracle
we're just so strangely atypical
- Wasteland, The View
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Maybe he doesn't like hanging around with a lot of people because it hurts his head and the noise is too loud and he really just wants to go to bed. So what if he and his brother have the most fucked up idea of love? Maybe it was because they counted on each other more than they counted on anyone else in their lives including their parents or maybe it was being identical twins with a strange sort of bond that gave them the edge of downright twisted love. He doesn't know but he doesn't try to understand because he really doesn't care why it is there, it just is.
He worries about his brother because he's violent and moody and he fights far too often. He sometimes just doesn't want to think about it because it's all a bit crazy and he knows that his brother is so desperate to protect him. He doesn't need it. He really doesn't need to be protected from what other people say or do. So what if he gets obsessive and he listens to that one song on repeat for weeks. Surely that is his business and nobody else. So what if he wants to twirl around in the rain or search for things that other people don't believe exist? What does it matter if people pity him because his parents are slightly crazy and his brother is slowly becoming an alcoholic? He finds it plain strange how it has never bothered him about what people say about him but now they have started saying things about his brother it makes him feel so furious. Maybe that is how his brother has felt for so many years?
He really just wants to find a quiet place, a safe haven, to rest his weary head and not think about any of it anymore. Surely it isn't important but it is because he relies on his brother so much and he never wants to see him get hurt. If he runs away from all of this then surely his brother would be lost. He doesn't want that but he really just wants to find somewhere he can sleep and not dream.
He is not his brother so he doesn't look to mask his pain with a bottle of liquor and instead he just wanders around aimlessly as though just plain desperate to find somewhere decent to rest. He wanders through muggle London and Diagon Alley and he regularly closets himself away at the back of Flourish and Blotts whilst his brother sits in the Leaky Cauldron drowning his sorrows. He throws himself into any book he can find because it doesn't really matter what the storyline is as long as he can dive into some other person's problems instead of his own. It always helps for that short while that the book lasts and then it's a mad rush to find something else to get rid of the worry and the pain.
He doesn't really know how to help his brother. He really wants to find a way but everything he tries just seems to fail and his brother is slowly spiralling out of control and there seems to be nothing he can do to stop it. So he plays music and loses himself in fictional characters and tries not to focus on the lyrics of that particularly sad song.
Somewhere in his head he wants to just scream STOP! He knows that won't do anything though. Nothing is going to stop and go back to the way things were when they were young and carefree and they were still at school. He just really needs everything to be all right.
So he goes to the only person he can think of that will help him pull his brother from his destructive circle. She is so pleased to see him and he can see the way her eyes light up when she speaks his brother's name and he is filled with hope for a few moments as she agrees to help him. There is nothing he wants more than to pull his brother back from the brink and she is definitely the answer to that. He wishes stupidly to catch a glimpse of her younger sister and is nothing if not heartbroken not to see her. He knows that it's silly to be thinking like that as he is watching the love of his brother's life pull on her shoes and hurry out of her front door with him.
He takes her to where his brother will be propping up the bar as per usual and they go in out of the rain. The ohsofamiliar woman behind the bar greets her loudly and he sees his brother tucked away in the shadow corner of the bar and he turns around with shock upon his face. He watches as his brother calls out her name and she spots him and goes running across the room to him. There he sees his brother engulf her in his arms and squeeze her tight to his chest as if he is afraid that she will suddenly disappear. He knows that it'll be okay now as he sees the way he looks at her and the way that she returns his adoration. So he pushes through the bar and makes his way into Diagon Alley.
He should be happy. He knows that he should because all he ever wanted was to save his brother and now he has done that. He doesn't really know why he doesn't particularly feel any better. Maybe it's because everything is still going on his head and he knows it's going to take a while before its all okay again. He knows that won't quite stop the whispers and the gossip but he hopes that soon it'll fade, to be forgotten about. Right now though there is still so much to face and he knows his brother will have her to support him but he won't have anyone and the thought depresses him just slightly. He doesn't like these uncharitable thoughts because they are so not him and he really doesn't want to think them. His brother deserves all the happiness he can get. Then again, didn't he deserve the same?
So he holes up once again in Flourish and Blotts because he finds it so much easier to deal with the noise in his head. It's quieter in the back cupboard and as long as he doesn't get in the way the proprietor isn't all that bothered about him being there. He buries himself in books and regularly gets updates on how his brother is doing. He is glad when she tells him that he's okay but refuses to come over for any of her family barbeques or parties because right now he still needs to find a safe haven, somewhere he can sleep and not dream.
It is several months before he finally hears his brother's voice out front, but he doesn't move from his spot in the back cupboard. He doesn't think he can face a talking to right now because he knows that's what his brother will do. He doesn't want his brother to know that occasionally he feels alone because he wants his brother to be happy. That's all he has ever wanted and if he needed to stay out of the way for that to happen then so be it.
The door to his cupboard opens and he looks up but it is not his brother that enters the room and he feels as though he has been robbed of his breath because the creature before him is so heart-breakingly beautiful.
He knows her though and he has seen her face in his dreams for years now but she is even more beautiful in reality and his dreams had never done her justice at all. She smiles at him and he beams back like an idiot. She finds an empty bin and turns it upside down so she can sit on it and then she begins to speak. He can't believe how much he has missed her voice and the words she is saying are like music to his ears because he knows that next to wanting his brother to be okay the only other thing he truly needed was her. He knew that he had hurt her badly when she had first told him that she loved him because all he was worried about back then was fixing his brother. He hadn't even bothered to explain to her properly so that she understood.
She stops speaking and he has to start by telling her how sorry he is and that he had never wanted to cause her so much pain. He tells her that he should have explained properly but that he could never explain the fucked up idea of love that he shares with his brother. He tells her that he walked away because he really didn't want to mess up her life as well. There was no need for her to become so twisted.
She tells him that she understands and he doesn't think that she quite realises how much that word means to him. He has always wanted to explain this downright weird bond between him and his brother and how nobody could ever come across it. So he tells her that is what it will always be and she accepts it with grace and then tells him that it was his brother that brought her here to him. He feels as though he could howl at her words but instead he leans forward and so does she. Their lips meet and turn to liquid like lightening striking the sand and suddenly everything is quiet.
She drags him out of the back room into the hub of Flourish and Blotts and he delights in the way her strawberry-blonde curls bounce and the way her blue eyes seem to sparkle. There in the middle of the store stands his brother with his arm wrapped round a similar if older strawberry-blonde. He stops for a moment and looks at his brother who looks like his old self with his wayward dark blond hair and big blue eyes no longer glazed with drink.
He can feel tears pricking in the corners of his eyes as his brother removes his arm from around her shoulders and take a step towards him. All of a sudden it seems like it just the two of them and he steps forward to stand directly in front of his brother. The old smirk is on his brother's face and he returns it for a moment before they grasp each other in a hug that almost breaks their ribs. He can feel a tear on his cheek and he clutches his brother tightly afraid that he'll just disappear.
'I love you, Lor,' his brother whispers in his ear.
'I love you too, Ly,' he whispers back and he is so glad that the noise has finally gone.