For dimitrisgirl18's Big/Lil' Sis Competition.
Title is taken from Andrea Gibson's poem "Maybe I Need You."
For Laura, because she's absolutely amazing and I've never written her anything, despite her wonderfulness, and I decided that needed to change.
Word count: 1166
The light of the moon reflects off of her hair as she sits, curled on a chair, watching the stars. Lavender sits across the room. She's playing the piano. Her long, graceful fingers slide across the piano keys, never missing a note as she engulfs herself in the music because she's afraid to let go.
She's afraid to let the notes drift away as she's forced to come back to reality, because there's no music in reality, anymore. No more soft lullabies, or jaunty tunes.
Only the crashing aftermath of the battle, which is anything but music to their ears.
"It's cold in here," Luna says absentmindedly, watching Lavender's fingers fly across the piano keys, apparently fascinated. Lavender gives her a sort of half nod and continues playing. For days, they go on like this; Luna is seated on the couch with a book, a dreamy, faraway look in her eyes, while Lavender sits at the piano bench, pouring her heart and soul into every note.
And every day, Luna watches her in awe, as if she's never seen anything quite so beautiful as this girl playing the music that takes her to another world. One day, Luna gently picks up a piece of sheet music and looks at it thoughtfully.
"It's very pretty," she says. "The arrangement of the notes and all the different lines and curves; I don't know what any of them mean, but they sound so lovely." Lavender almost smiles as she answers, "I started lessons when I was six. I hardly played all through Hogwarts... but I love it. Especially now. It's the only thing that can really get me to forget everything that happened with the battle."
But they both know this isn't quite true. There's another way that Lavender can forget about the battle, but neither of them really talk about it. No one quite wants to discuss whatever this is, whatever lying in the same bed and kissing and whispering into the other's skin is. No one really wants to discuss this, because discussing it would inevitably lead to explaining and defining it, which both of them are unable to do.
Luna touches Lavender's arm gently, and leaves her fingers brushing against her skin for a long time, long enough for Lavender to finish another song.
"Thank you," Lavender whispers, her eyes clouded with tears, as she stands up and puts her arms around Luna. Slowly, the girls walk back to the bedroom and lie down, Lavender's arms still around the other girl. Neither one speaks for a long time.
.
Lavender sits up. Her back is straight and her eyes are wide with terror and terrible screams escape her mouth, screams that would have terrified any sane person who heard them. But Luna isn't necessarily sane, so she opens her eyes and quietly puts a hand on Lavender's chest. Almost immediately, the screams cease and Luna cups Lavender's head in her hands and kisses her. Lavender kisses her back, her breathing still quick and shaky, and after a moment, pulls away. Luna's hand is still pressed against her cheek as she whispers "It's awful," whispers, "I hate it I hate it I hate everything I just want to DIE!"
Then she whispers, "Thank you." And a few nights later, when the same thing happens again, Luna's palm is against her cheek as Lavender whispers her first "I love you." Luna's breathing is the only sound heard for a moment until she whispers back, "Loving someone and being grateful to them are very different things." A small smile spreads across Lavender's lips, and she shakes her head.
"I love you," she says again.
The next day, Lavender is about to sit down at the piano bench when Luna gently grabs her wrist.
"No. Try without it, for a day. We can go somewhere, do something. You can choose. But let's do something different." Lavender's eyes widen, and she looks almost scared to be jolted out of the monotony she's been living for weeks.
And finally, "There's a zoo, not too far away..." So they go. For hours, they watch the elephants and giraffes and monkeys, Luna always adding her two cents about what the animals really are ("They look just like monkeys, but they're not! They're actually these magnificent creatures called-"). A bit after noon, it begins to rain, and Lavender starts to pull toward the exit, but Luna simply laughs.
"Come on," she giggles, pulling Lavender's hand in the opposite direction, "Let's eat." So they unwrap their sandwiches and sit down, the rain pouring down on them.
"I guess it is sort of refreshing," Lavender admits, smiling. Luna stares past her at the bird exhibit they're sitting by.
"They're very pretty, wouldn't you say? That's such a lovely shade of blue. There's a creature in the magical world that looks just like them, you know. They're called Moddle Hoppers, and they look exactly like those birds, except they're a beautiful shade of green. A sea green, really, sort of light with a hint of blue... They're beautiful."
Lavender fights back a laugh; Luna can always turn the topic around to her creatures, can't she?
"Thanks for making me come here today, Luna," she says softly. Luna smiles in response.
"I thought it might help. You seemed like you needed some... brightening up, and the zoo is such a wonderful place for that." As they walk out of the zoo together, Lavender leans down so that her lips are almost touching Luna's ear.
"I love you."
"You need me," Luna replies.
Over the next few weeks, Lavender begins to recover more and more from the battle. Less time is spent at the piano, and more is spent with Luna, picking flowers or taking walks. Their kisses are less desperate, less instinctive; more gentle. Softer.
Luna sees all of this, until one day, Lavender finds her packing her clothes into boxes, and preparing to leave.
"Luna! What are you doing?"
"I have to go home, Lavender," she says, confused. "We weren't going to stay like this forever..."
"What do you mean?" she demands, looking shocked. "Did I do something?" Luna shakes her head and brushes her fingers against Lavender's arm.
"Of course you didn't. You just... don't need me, anymore. You're happy again."
"But, I love-" Luna cuts her off shaking her head.
"You never loved me, anyway." And her tone isn't accusing, just factual. She knows that she's right. "You needed me, you appreciated me, but you didn't love me. And now, you don't need me anymore."
Lavender stops for a moment, a dawning look on her face.
"Thank you." And she kisses Luna with all of the desperateness she used to, and Luna responds with the same urgency.
Their last kiss is just like their first. Full of unwanted emotions that they can't quite understand. But as always, it calms them both down. Enough to move on as if nothing had changed.
But they both know, everything has.