Don't Know Why
Benjamin Beshemin closed his eyes. The Saturday afternoon sun felt good on his face, and for once, there wasn't anyone out here to bother him. The Black Lake was silent, and only the feintest of echos could be heard of the game of catch that was taking place ajacent to his spot. He leaned against the tree, his Firebolt next to him in the grass. The broom had only recently been released, and was something the seventh year had been looking forward to for quite some time. Brooms of this calibre didn't come out too often, and he'd needed something faster than his old Silver Arrow to weave in and out of the trees with. With his new broom, that crack-of-dawn fly always went so much faster, but it gave him so much more energy.
The sounds from across the water drifted slowly together, forming a muddled lullaby. A light breeze brushed against the dark curld that fell across his eyes. With four o'clock approaching, the Ravenclaw boy drifted to sleep, under the tree he'd perched so neatly beneath.
He was in his room, the same room he'd stayed in for almost seven complete years now. Gently, he tossed a muggle soccer ball back and forth. Back and forth. He was smiling. Laughing even. Something that anyone who knew him could say that they rarely saw. It wasn't because Ben had a poor attitude. It was because they barely ever saw his face. He was always hiding behind something, too shy to make a comment.
His friend, Jaidyn, a Gryffindor, was the person he was playing catch with. Jay was a nice guy. How he'd gotten in the Ravenclaw common room, let alone the dormitory wasn't of Ben's dreaming conscience's concern. However the boy got there, didn't matter. All that mattered was that Ben actually felt happy. The two chatted about nonsense. In fact, there probably weren't real words at all. Just tossing the ball back and forth, and mumbles in the background. A happy place.
The ball slipped from Ben's unfamilliar fingers. He wasn't accustomed to the weight of the muggle football like Jay was. In the attempt to prevent the ball from falling on the floor, Ben reached out toward it. At the same time, Jay did the exact same thing. The two boys' hands joined for a moment, and in the moment, Ben could see the look on the other's face. It wasn't a mean look. It was a longing look. A look which Ben returned.
This only lasted a few seconds, because the ball rolled out of their clumsy hands and bounced, silently, on the dream floor. Blushing, much more slightly than he might have in consciousness, Ben moved his hand and retrieved the ball. "You don't have to be afraid." Though he wasn't looking at Jay, he could feel the other's words all around him, wrapping him up and melting into him like butter melting into warm bread.
Ben looked up, questioning whether what he'd heard was real or not. He smiled again, standing upright, the football in his hands once again. How he wanted to run his fingers through the other boy's dark hair, and just sit, for hours, looking through his chocolatey eyes and right into his soul. The smile was returned, and Jay nodded, as though answering Ben's question directly.
He took one step in the direction of the other, the ball dropping from his fingers, and bouncing silently on the floor, away from the two. Another step. Jay was standing now, his hands held out expectantly. One more step. He could feel his heart beating inside his chest, faster and faster. Just another step.
"Oi! Ben!"
He sat upright with a start, looking around. The blush spread across his face like wildfire on a bone dry field. The voice was his friend and roommate, Hunter. Hunter's big grin was stretched across his face, making him look slightly crazy, much like his crazy dyed blonde hair did the same. "Oh, Hunter," he said," panicking slightly.
There was no way that his friend knew what he'd been dremaing of. Ben knew for a fact that Hunter was not a ligilimens, something that he was very thankful for at the moment.
Scrambling up from the ground, Ben grabbed his broom. "Sorry, fell asleep," he confessed, rubbing his eye with his knuckle. "What time is it?" he asked.
"Nearly quarter to five," Hunter replied, adjusting his prefects badge. "You'd better get in there. Don't want to keep Charlotte waiting."
Charlotte? Oh, right. Charlotte DuClaire was Ben's girlfriend. They'd officially met at the Quidditch World Cup only this past summer. Ireland against Bulgaria. The two seventeen year olds had met beforehand, while Ben was people watching. He'd spotted her, smiled a bit, and she'd come over to say hello. She wasn't a Ravenclaw, of that he was certain. He'd never seen her before. She hadn't seen him before either, and both reasons were the same. Ben had a tendency to not be noticed. As it turned out, she was a Slytherin. He didn't mind the difference in houses, because it wasn't much of a big deal to him. She had made sure to find out his blood liniage, and when she found out that he was in fact a pureblooded wizard, she was happy to continue chatting.
They'd spent the day together, and watched the match together. The night was spent in celebration, a bit with her family, before they had to leave, and then Ben went back to his own family's tent, where the continued to celebrate Ireland's victory until the Death Eaters marched through. Ben and his family had made quick work of getting out of there that night.
Once school had started, the blonde girl with the pale green eyes had found him in the library after class one day. They'd shared a kiss, and never turned back. The only thing that Ben wasn't crazy about was the way she spoke of people with 'unpure' blood. And how she was always telling him that he was so much better than the few friends he did have. Except the one girl, Delilah, in their year, and Charlotte's house.
"Right. See you at dinner," Ben replied to his friend, hopping his broom and zipping off toward the castle, forgetting about his dream. Lucky thing it was, having a broom to get you to and from the other side of the lake. It made quick work of the normal twenty minute walk. That was one of the reasons Ben loved to fly. The main reason was how he felt free in the air, like no one was judging him, no one was ready to criticize him for everything and anything. He felt that people always did that, that all the glances and looks were because he was awkward or doing something wrong. Yet, somehow, Charlotte seemed alright with walking hand-in-hand with him around the school.
Once back to the castle, he headed right for the Ravenclaw common room, answering the riddle and ducking inside. He bounded up the stairs to his dormitory room, and stowed his broom in the trunk by the foot of his bed. Charlotte and he had made plans for tonight. They were going to meet in the Astronomy Tower to look for shooting stars together. He didn't really need to look nice, but he thought a shower might be good, so he made off for the bathroom.
After his shower, he dressed, simply, in a pair of khaki pants and a dark blue polo shirt. Dinner was in a half hour. He let his curls air dry a bit before casting a staying-spell on them so that he didn't end up with what Hunter liked to call an afro. Twenty minutes. If he headed down now, he could spend a little time with Charlotte before they were allowed to eat. Something about the room was jogging his memory. He sat down on the edge of the bed.
Jaidyn. His dream came back to him, hitting him in the face. Had he really been dreaming about a boy? And wanting to run his fingers through a boy's hair? No. That was silly. Ben had a girlfriend. He wasn't gay. Maybe everyone had dreams about their friends like that. Maybe it was just something that was unspoken.
His breathing had quickened, and if he didn't calm down soon, that shower would be in vein. He took a few deep breaths, and began to pick apart the facts. Charlotte was not his first girlfriend, though he hadn't had many. Suddenly, though he did like Charlotte, he found himself thinking of Jay, and wishing it was his Gryffindor friend that he was meeting at the Astronomy Tower tonight.
He let his mind wander into what that might be like. He imagined the two boys chatting, up there in the dark, sitting cross legged next to one another with their back against the wall. Their idle conversation would lead to a still silence, a hand drifting over to another hand, eyes chocolate eyes meeting charcoal ones, and pairs of lips drifiting together, a first for both parties.
Time passed, and suddenly Hunter was standing in front of him, the door to the room, standing wide open, slowly making its way to hit the wall behind it. Ben looked up, again startled by his best friend, this time a guilty look on his face.
Hunter seemed to know that something was bother his roommate, and left him alone, climbing into his own bed without asking why Ben hadn't been at dinner, or in the common room after. Glancing at the clock, he noted that it was only ten minutes to midnight, the time that he had said he'd meet Charlotte in the tower. He needed to get a move on if he was going to make it. Only, he couldn't make himself move. Frozen wasn't quite the word for it. No, he could move his arms and freely stand if he wanted to. Instead, he stayed sitting on the edge of his bed.
He stared at the clock. The minuted ticked by. Five minutes till. If he didn't leave, he was going to be late. Charlotte was already up there, surely, waiting for him. Waiting to scold him for not being early. Four minutes. She was always yelling at him for something. For being friends with Hunter, or other non-pureblood students. That really bothered Ben. Three minutes. How was it that she could boss him around, and get the better of him at everything? That wasn't how relationships were supposed to work. Two people were supposed to work together and accept their differences and the things that the other person liked. Two minutes. It wasn't fair of her to do that to him. It also wasn't fair for him to be thinking about other people the way he was while he was dating her. Especially boys. Boys that were his friends. One minute. Ben's eyes watched the second hand tick its way around the dial, sixty times.
Midnight. It was midnight. He was officially late. Charlotte was most definitely fuming by now, having been stood up. Ben wasn't leaving his room anymore tonight. He sat there for hours, staring at the floor and the clock. When he could see light coming over the horizon, he finally stood, and looked at his exhausted face in the shared mirror.
He needed to fly.
Flying really was the only that that took his stress away. In the air he was able to let go. Be normal. Be himself. Grabbing his broom from his trunk, he slipped out of the dorm room, and down the stairs. No one was awake this early on a Sunday morning. He made it out of the common room, and out to the grounds, no problem. Taking to the air was successful as well. No one was outside, not even the other kids that he sometimes saw and never spoke with in the mornings.
Weaving in and out of the treeline, he pushed the Firebolt as fast as it could go. Ben was an expert flier, though he'd never let anyone know that. He knew just about everything there was to know about the enchanted brooms, due to his liniage. Coming from a long line of broom designers had its advantages. Even his older sister was in on the action, working in the Broom Regulatory Control department of the Ministry. It was almost a family enterprise.
After a good forty five minutes of zooming in and out of the trees and dipping low enough that his toes almost touched the water of the lake, Ben came in for a landing near the courtyard nearest the staircases that would take him back to the Ravenclaw common room.
He threw the broom up on his shoulder, carrying it with the twigs in the air. A small smile actually had situated itself on his lips. That was, until he spotted Charlotte standing there, arms folded, blocking his entrance to the castle.