Chapter 4.
Life With Lavender.
Could I ever believe such a perfect surprise?
I keep asking myself, wondering how
I keep closing my eyes but I can't block you out
Gregory settled into life with Lavender.
Every night he would lie awake on the sofa, listening to the sounds of the night, which often included the distant wails of those Muggle contraptions he had deduced were called ambo lancers, and at times the late night scratching of Lavender's quill against the scraps of parchment that littered her room. Sometimes when she was out, curiosity would lead him there. She had decorated her room to match her name, accompanied with white wood furnishing giving the room a distinctive girl feel. He did not like it, but it was hers, and somehow he could stand it then.
Besides, the rest of the apartment wasn't too bad.
In those hours, he couldn't believe he had escaped the grips of the Dementors, that he had escaped the life of a tramp and was now living with the one person who had given him hope through all of this. The food in his stomach, the new dress robes on his back, the badge he wore proudly on his chest with his name was all due to her.
Gregory thought only of her, even though he knew that it was pointless, and he would sometimes awaken with a headache. She was an award-winning gossip columnist, and he was the Argus Filch of the Daily Prophet headquarters. Lavender had replaced Rita Skeeter, who was now a renown gossip author, which was worse in his mind; whilst he could read Lavender's columns with some patience because they were only a page at most, he had no patience for whole books of gossip.
He liked that Lavender hated reading books as much as he did. Instead, they read newspapers and magazines. Those he didn't mind because they were short, had pictures and he felt as if he was part of the fold when he strode into work with one tucked under his arm. Once or twice, on the lift up to his work station someone would start a conversation about a headline. It made his day when he could do more than nod and mumble generalisations.
It made his week when he and Lavender had an entire discussion without him getting confused somewhere along the way. She would get this look in her eyes, and he wondered if then she wanted to kiss him as he wanted to kiss her.
Instead they settled back into the sofa and looked for something on that square box with the talking pictures he could never remember the name of.
Though he never said this out loud, Gregory counted himself as one of the lucky survivors. He had a job, he had a home, and he had someone who cared for him, and that was all he needed. All he wanted. He had learnt at a young age that it was better for the heart not to ever expect too much from life. Disappointment hurt. Also, sometimes his work took him to Knockturn Alley, where they still sold what Diagon Alley did not have. Many of the businesses were closed on order of the Ministry of Magic, and the street was lined with beggars instead of the pedlars who had once made a living off the shady. He had seen Marcus Flint amongst them, and probably failed to recognise others who had been in his House.
How the mighty fall.
Wanna fly to a place where it's just you and me
"What do you think about?"
They were sitting at the table in the kitchen eating dinner. It was a Saturday, the one day when they made sure to eat dinner together at a table. She worked from home at the weekends, and he worked shorter hours, but on Sunday they liked to eat in front of the box. Sunday was the one day when Lavender wasn't feeding him grass and pasta that tasted like cardboard because he had agreed to support her on some stupid diet she was on. He never asked about the ice cream in the freezer and the packets of chocolates stashed behind all the sauces in the kitchen cupboard. He reasoned she had her reasons.
"When?" he asked, confused. What a strange question. He thought about many things during the course of the day, not all which he remembered.
"When you get all quiet and stare into space as if you're in another world. When we're watching television and it's like you don't even notice what's going on in front of you."
"I think about..." His eyes were on his salad, the one he had already picked out the tomatoes and cucumbers, his favourite diet food she fed him. "I think about being with you. Like a couple."
"Oh, Greg-"
He stopped her, not needing to hear the inevitable rejection.
"I know, I know we can't. I just wish there was a place in this world where we could."
"How about right here? We can be right here."
She reached across the table, and placed a hand on top of his. The warmth her hands radiated and the smile she gave him sent his heart racing. In that moment, Gregory felt like the luckiest man on Earth.
Harry Potter had nothing on him.
Nobody else so we can be free
And her – well, their apartment became their haven.
At work, if they passed each other, they would nod to each other, and sometimes if he was going out for coffee, he would ask her assistant if she wanted a break and he would get it for all three of them. They had all grown used to his presence, and the wary glances had not stopped, but were less frequent and far between. It was only when he forgot to charm his hair into compliance or did not shave that they increased.
At home, the only glances he got were the loving ones Lavender shot him over her magazine as he fixed the kitchen table they had accidentally broken the night before. Or there was that one special glances that she gave, and he had to brace himself for what would follow. It hadn't taken long to find out that Lavender was a woman with needs, and they were met when she wanted them met.
And Gregory wasn't one to argue.
They worked well, because even though he wasn't the talking type, Lavender could talk more than enough for the both of them, and he enjoyed listening to her voice, twisting her blonde curls around his fingers as she rested her head in his lap. Their life in the apartment rotated mainly around the sofa where they spent most of their time, sometimes going to the kitchen, and when night time fell, they would move into the bedroom. Their bedroom.
Though he hated the colour Lavender, the woman in his arms with the same name was enough to make him forget that he was lying in a room he hated.
As long as she was there, the world was perfect.
Nobody else so we can be free
Or close to being perfect.
Months passed, and as their relationship grew it begun to feel cramped in the one bedroom apartment on the posh side of Muggle London, where everyone wore suits and carried briefcases and the women all looked the same. They were pretty, some even beautiful, but they had nothing on Lavender. He Flooed to work to avoid having to navigate through the confusing wardrobe of Muggle clothing Lavender had bought him one week, but some times he liked to stretch his feet, and to walk among people who had not a clue of who he was. He liked the anonymity of the Muggle crowds. He couldn't understand why the Dark Lord had been so desperate to kill them all. They didn't seem that bad.
On one of his walks, something caught his eye.
It was a shop with pictures of sunny places with beaches and seas, and foreign countries he had heard of written on posters with prices underneath them. The sign told him that this was a travel agents. He wasn't quite sure what they did, but he felt the urge to go inside.
He approached the lady in the nasty coloured shirt sitting behind the desk.
"Hello, how may I help you?"
"What is it that you do here?"
"We are a travel agents. You can come to us and we help you to book the perfect holiday break. We can help with anything from flights to all-inclusive holiday packages. Did you have anything in mind sir?"
"Somewhere far away where I can be with the one I love."
"Well, take a seat sir, and maybe we can talk through some options."
When Gregory left the travel agents a little while later, clutching a selection of brochures, he felt that finally they could get away and be together without being under the constant scrutiny of the wizarding community.
The Muggle world wasn't that different, was it?
A/N: Yay, an update! Hope you enjoy the story, thanks for reading, and do tell me what you think in a review :)