Chapter Six
The kiss is sweet and simple. My lips tingle from the touch of his, and my thoughts stop. My heart races in my chest. I'm so stunned that I don't think I react for a full three seconds to his lips moving on mine. This is the boy I have pinned after, loved for too long... And now he's kissing me. This boy who has ignored me...Used me...Left me...
Suddenly I push him away. He looks a bit confused. What girl has ever resisted Scorpius Malfoy? Anger coils in my stomach as I think about all of the things he did to me, all the emotional torment he caused me. Angry tears pool in my eyes.
He reaches out to cradle my cheek in his big, warm hand but I jerk away and stand next to the bed. I blush when I realise I'm still only in my underwear. He looks up at me, his eyes puzzled.
"I can't just let you do this to me. I've been in love with you for years Scorpius. And you never even gave me a second glance. And I want this, I want you, but I can't just let you in, because right now, I have no reason to believe that you won't just up and leave me, alone and dying without you. And if that happens I don't know if I'll be able to survive it. So I'm going to fight, I'm not letting this happen unless you show me real reason to trust you-
"Rose-" He said, trying to interject. My anger flared.
"Don't interrupt me" I say, my voice deadly. His eyes widen. "Sorry" I murmur looking down, my momentary burst of confidence gone.
"Rosie don't be sorry. I understand." His arms reach out and I automatically crawl into them. "I can prove to you that I'm here to stay, if I up and leave then someone has kidnapped me and you need to gather a search party." He jokes. I laugh resting my head against his shoulder. I feel his hands gently tracing the cuts on my hips.
"Okay" I murmur. My eyes drooping down, and closing.
We sat there. I'm draped across his chest, my head nested into the crook of his neck. Our legs were intertwined. One of his arms wrapped around my waist the other my upper back firmly holding me to his chest. His head tilted so that its resting on the top of mine. His body is keeping me warm. I drift off into sleep, my mind wandering between reality and dream, until my mind is finally consumed by sleep.
My body is engulfed in warmth. A safe warmth. A friendly warmth. A strong warmth. Strong limbs hold me to a chest. A familiar musky scent fills my nose. I raise my head and look at Scorpius. But in place of his eyes. Is black. Plain black nothingness. Nothing is there. His cheeks are hollow. His lips have been sewn together. He tilts his head toward me and I feel his hellish eyes train on me. When he tries to open his mouth to speak it tears. And starts to bleed. I try and try to scream. I try and try to get out of his arms but they are like iron grips holding me to him, unyielding. He leans down closer and closer to me, his dead black eyes drawing me in, stopping my struggle. He gets so close that I feel the drops of blood from his lips splashing onto mine. I feel black inside...Dead.
Becoming aware of my physical surroundings I feel the same warmth. The same limbs. The same chest. The same smell. Becoming fully conscious I gasp, and struggle to get out of Scorp's arms. He only holds on tighter. I'm panicking and starting to cry. I watch his eyes open and scream, expecting the black demon eyes I saw in my dream. I close my eyes not wanting to face the satanic eyes.
"Rose! Rose what's wrong?" Scorp says to me, sounding quite startled.
"I-I-" I can't finish my sentence as Scorp, in all his academic glory finally figures out that I need him to let go of me, as I'm still fighting the arms clutching at me. I scramble away from him falling backwards off the bed. I land on my pile of clothes from earlier that night. Or maybe it was yesterday, seeing as I haven't got a clue what the time is.
I curl into a ball on the floor, My bare skin touching the cold wood. The tears racing down my cheeks land on the floor, my shoulders shake with silent sobs and I gasp for breath. I can't rid my mind of the awful images, that I produced myself, so I dig my nails into my arms the pain making it a little easier to not focus so much on the horrors. I claw at my skin harder and my crying began to stop and the images started to fade, the pain becoming so overwhelming that I could forget. I felt blood dripping down my arm. Then I felt pressure on my back. I jerked away from Scorps hand, but he was too fast. His arm encircled my waist and pulled me up onto the bed like I didn't weigh a single thing.
Taking care of my delicate condition he set me down near his feet, keeping his distance from me. I looked down at my arms. The half moons twinkled with their red shine and cried their silent scarlet tears. He saw the cuts and I watched his eyes widen a little. There was a lot of blood for simple cuts made by my fingernails. Albeit his surprise he calmly leaned back and pulled his shirt over his head. I was too freaked out to let my eyes ogle at his thick muscular chest. He leaned forwards and wiped the blood off of both of my arms then pressed the shirt to my left side where the cuts were deepest.
"Rosie. . . What the hell was that?" His voice was soft but when his eyes met mine I could see that he was completely freaked out.
"Bad dream," I murmured, "sorry."
"Listen baby, you don't get to get off that easily. No way. You just freaked the fuck out right there and you're going to tell me what happened," His voice was now harsh and I could hear the panic that was prevalent in his eyes/
"You were a monster...and...and...You-I-" the tears that had ebbed were cascading down my cheeks again and his eyes widened at me once more.
"Hey... It's okay. It's okay. You don't have to tell me." His arms reached out and effortlessly pulled me into his chest. "I'm sorry. Everything is okay. I'm not a monster. You're okay. It's all okay," He kept muttering phrases such as these to me as he sat criss-cross-applesauce with me in his lap, so tiny compared to him that I could still tuck my head under his chin. He rocked us back and forth on the bed, his voice still murmuring to me that it was going to be okay. Being in his arms was both comforting and terrifying. The arms that held me were so familiar but so similar to the dream...the eyes...and lips... I started to tense up, becoming rigid where I sat in his lap.
"Don't think about it Rosie. It's okay I'm right here." He pulls me away from his chest, and looks down into my scared eyes. "Don't think about it. It's not real. I'm right here. I'm not a monster. It's okay." He leans his forehead against mine while his hands tangle in my hair, holding my face to his. Our noses were touching, our lips only centimeters apart. His breath tickled my cheeks. His lips brushed mine, not in a kiss, they just simply touched. I let out a sigh, and my body relaxed against him, his hands, his arms, his lips. My hands on his shoulders felt his muscles tense, and then he kissed me again. This time harder. More urgent. But at the same time like we had all the time in the world.
The next morning I woke up I woke up warm and happy. The first time that I had woken up happy for years. Scorp's arms were still around me. In the night he had tucked me under his chin against his chest. I could hear him softly snoring above me. I pulled his arm out from around me and checked the time on his watch. It was only 5:30. I had a solid 2 and a half hours before breakfast even started. And everyone always slept in on sundays. I disentangled myself reluctantly from Scorps arms and got out of bed. Pulling on a pair of yoga pants, a warm shirt, socks and boots, I looked around for my sweatshirt. It must have been somewhere back in my dorm, because I didn't see it anywhere here. Sighing I grabbed an old pull-over sweatshirt of Scorp's. It hung down to the middle of my thighs, and the sleeves were about 5 inches too long for my arms. I looked at myself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door. I looked kinda cute I guess in my huge sweatshirt. I pulled my lightly ringleted red hair out of it's bun, letting it fall down my back. It was so long that it reached my hips and would sway when I walked. My hair was one of my favorite things about me. It was smooth and the curls were nice-not too tight or too loose- and the color was a warm auburn. I always thought that it looked nice with my bright greenish-blue eyes. The downside of being a ginger though was my pale skin. It wasn't gross pale I guess but I didn't ever get very tan. I was almost always pale from blood loss and lack of eating. But my skin was clear, no acne or blemishes, so that was nice. I guess in all senses I was a pretty girl. I was 5'3" and so frail it was a little scary. I could never play any sports because of my stature, any contact sport would break me. I had full rouged lips and high cheek bones. My cheeks were sunken and the circles under my eyes looked like black eyes. I looked down at my hands, pulling back the sweatshirt sleeves. My wrists were like twigs, my hands frail, my skin paper thin. Scars covered my arms. It was such a sad sight, and for a moment I felt pathetic, for doing this to myself. I pulled the sleeves back down and stepped out of the room, opening and closing the door lightly, in hopes of not waking Scorpius.
I walked through the corridors, making my way down the kitchen. I figured I should probably eat a little something since I haven't eaten anything for the past 2 days. I tickled the pear and stepped into the room. The house elves were already busy preparing breakfast, but they all looked at me and said hi cheerfully. I laughed at them. I loved the house elves, they always made my day a little better. I was down here a lot since I only ate one meal in the great hall and that was supper. I sometimes just came to visit my favorite elf, Swinks. She was a young elf who the other elves didn't let cook very often because she was so clumsy. She reminded me of myself a little. She would sit and talk with me while I picked away at whatever fruit or vegetable I was eating.
Today I sat at the little corner table with her and had a peach.
"How have been doing, Swinks?" I asked her taking small bites out of my peach. I had learned that eating quickly after fasting is a horrible idea. The one time that happened I got such bad cramps that I had to go to the hospital wing cause I thought I was bleeding internally.
"I've been real well miss," She says beaming at me with her gap-toothed smile. "Lately I's been doing lots of cleaning in the dorms miss and I like it a lot. The others in here don't let me cook. They says I'm dangerous." She says pouting a little. "How've you been miss?" She asks her mood swinging back up to cheery in a matter of milliseconds.
"I've been fine, thanks." I say, looking up from my peach and smiling softly at her. We talked for a few more minutes but then I got up to leave. I was feeling a desperate need to get out of the castle and just be with my thoughts for a while, away from the clammer of the student body.