Ethereal

Adjective

Heavenly or celestial

Extremely delicate and light in a way that seems too perfect for this world.

Godric snapped the book shut and bemoaned the fact that Rowena was right. Again. Salazar could be described as "ethereal", in no way was he 'heavenly', but 'too perfect for this world' sounded about right. In his head anyway.

Sighing he threw himself backwards onto the grass and whacked his head off of the tree he was sitting under. Terrific.

"Trouble in paradise?" A boy of around 18 slid onto the grass next to him, smirking as he surveyed his friend rubbing the now throbbing back of his head.

"Shut up Sal," Godric groaned, checking his head for blood. His friend's smirk only grew.

"You're fine, there's no blood. Stop overreacting, you're meant to be brave."

"I am brave!" Godric squawked indignantly, running his hand through his wild tawny hair, making it look more like a lion's mane. He was rather proud of his hair; it was a work of art. It reached his shoulders, framing his face, and stuck out like he had been struck by lightning. Far better than his hair anyway. It was flat and shiny and pretty and fell past his shoulders like a magnificent waterfall of black ink… NO! STOP!

He shook his head wildly as if he could rattle the thoughts out of there. Of course he couldn't.

"You realise you look like a mad dog when you do that, right?" There was no malice in his voice though.

Before Godric could think of a clever and witty return, Salazar had risen and walked down to the lakeside, the sun catching the back of his head and making his hair look even more damn shiny.

Damn it, he wasn't sure if Sal's tongue was sharper than Rowena's or if he just got really tongue-tied and stupid in his presence. He preferred to think the former, though the latter was probably the case. He couldn't help it.

They had been friends since they were young, but he hadn't noticed anything until about a year ago when Rowena and Helga had pointed it out. Now he couldn't un-notice it and it drove him insane. His "ethereal" beauty. His pale white, almost translucent skin; his sharp grey eyes; his goddamn pretty hair; his slender physique… the list went on.

Bringing his attention back to the present, he noticed Sal walking back to the tree, smiling one of his amazing smiles. For one insane moment Godric thought it was for him, but of course it wasn't. His friend vanished behind a bush and reappeared a moment later, carrying an adder.

He had never understood the snake thing, but Helga had assured him it was mysterious and alluring. He supposed the hissing noises were quite cool, but the way the snakes obeyed him was a bit creepy. It didn't stop him from admiring his friend's fluid movements as he expertly handled the snake, and marvelled at his look of contentment and warmth for it. If only he could get Sal to look at him like that. That'd be great.

His daydreaming/gawking session was rudely interrupted by the arrival of Rowena, come to yell at him for finishing her ink and not telling her. Frankly Godric could not remember this at all, but it was best not to argue with Rowena. He let her finish her rant and stalk off before loudly exclaiming his innocence.

This earned a laugh from Sal and he knew.

"It was you wasn't it!?"

Sal let the snake slither off before continuing to laugh.

"You're a git, you know that, Salazar?" He said idly with a shove.

This earned him a painful punch in the arm and being pushed off balance so he nearly fell over. He considered himself lucky. Usually the use of Sal's full name ended up with him suffering the effects of his leg-locker curse, which he preferred to perform and undo wordlessly, so Godric couldn't fix himself, and had to hop around until Sal saw fit to release him.

He responded immediately by throwing himself onto his friend and initiating a wrestling match, both of them now laughing.

A short while later Godric had him pinned underneath him, both breathing heavily.

He didn't know why he did it. Maybe it was the way he was laying on top of him, or the way the sun caught his hair again, or the way he was breathing and laughing so arousingly, but he couldn't help himself from leaning down and kissing him hungrily.

Oh god it was amazing, everything he thought it would be. He tasted so good, like a firework in his stomach. Until he was literally hit in the stomach by a firework and blasted onto his back.

He scrambled to his feet and looked at his friend, who looked shocked and angry.

"Let me-" Godric started,

"Back off!" Sal spat, pointing his drawn wand at Godric's face.

He sensibly backed off. Sal lowered his wand slightly, his hand shaking, his face wearing an expression half livid, half of fear. He began to step back himself, before turning on his heel and sprinting away into the trees.

Godric could have punched himself. A whole year he had preserved their friendship, keeping his feelings in check; a whole year, ruined in one moment. They had been unofficially meeting in this lakeside clearing at around noon most days for years. Now he'd be lucky to see him at all.

A week passed and no sign of him, and then another. Godric was getting desperate; he had been coming to their spot every day, sometimes hiding, just to see if he would turn up.

He didn't.

In fact he didn't see him for almost a month, until one day he was walking through the woods with Helga, talking about him.

"A month, Ric, really? That long? How are you holding up? Are you ok?" Helga asked concernedly. "Do you want me to try to talk to him?"

"NO!" Godric yelled in alarm, making her jump. "No, sorry Helga. I-I think I upset him. A lot. It's best I just leave him."

"If you really believe that then why have you been coming back here every day for a month?" She asked shrewdly.

"I-I…" He spluttered.

She giggled, "Come on Godric, just tell him how you feel! At least he'll understand why you did it at least!"

"H-how I f-feel? I don't feel-" He tried to continue.

She laughed again. "Aw, Ric, you're so unsubtle! It's obvious you're crazy about him!"

Godric continued to sputter incoherently.

"How do you expect to continue working with him without talking to him? You're not going to convince anyone of your school plan like that! And besides…"

She stopped speaking as soon as they reached the clearing, for sitting under the large shady tree, was Salazar.

Godric felt as though his stomach was doing backflips as he stared at his friend, who stood up and faced him.

Helga gabbled some excuse to leave, but Godric had stopped paying attention to her. He started towards the black haired boy, and stopped just in front of him.

"Hi." Sal finally said, after what seemed an eternity of silence.

"Er – hi…" Godric replied, before launching high speed into a speech.

"Look, Sal, I'm really really sorry. I don't know what came over me, well, I do, but I don't know why I acted on it. I've liked you for ages but I've not said anything 'cause I didn't know what would happen if I did and I didn't want to ruin things between us as they were. But I have now so I might as well tell you that I'm crazy about you and if you want to hit me that's totally cool, I get it, but I just wanted you to know that it's not going to change how I feel!"

He stopped to gasp for breath.

After another eternity of silence he finally said,

"Please say something, anything…"

Sal had looked fairly taken aback by his rant, but his voice was quiet when he said,

"That's… That's how you feel? For how long?"

"A year." Godric replied, avoiding his eyes.

"Merlin, Ric, a year!?" He said, exhaling sharply. "A year, and you didn't say anything!? Did you think I just didn't notice how weird you were starting to act around me?! Were you ever intending to speak up?!"

"I… I don't know…" Godric replied in a small voice.

"No then." Sal snapped, raking his fingers through his hair. "You had no idea how I would have reacted, how do you know it would have been bad?!"

"It was bad…" Godric mumbled in the same small voice.

"Yes, because you gave me a serious shock and caught me off guard! However, if you had told me how you felt like a normal person, instead of throwing yourself on me like a maniac, I might have reacted differently!"

Godric was confused. So confused. It sounded like Sal… but no, couldn't be. He looked at him, obviously in a confused way, because he rolled his eyes in an exasperated way, crossed the last of the distance between them and pulled him into another kiss.

It was better than before, everything Godric could have dreamed of and more. Fireworks were exploding through his entire body as hot desire ripped through him.

The kiss broke as they stopped to breathe, and Godric felt brave enough to ask,

"So… you're… okay, with this?"

"Idiot…" Sal looked away as a faint blush grew on his pale cheeks, and Godric grinned as he pulled his face back around and kissed him passionately.

This time he didn't stop. He ran his hands through that silky black hair before running them down, down his back, down to…

The ground. Once again he was shoved out of balance and hit the floor and looked up to see Sal's face, as red as the sunset behind him.

"What're you… Don't even think... We only just…"

But Godric laughed, sat upright and pulled him down on top of him, delighted to see his normally calm and collected friend so jumpy and spluttering. He wrapped his arms around his waist and nuzzled his neck, kissing and nipping gently with his teeth, chuckling at how brilliantly embarrassed he was.

He leant his head on his shoulder as they watched the sun set and night fall, marvelling at the way the moonlight could make his skin glow and knowing he would never see anything as ethereally beautiful.