I'm BAAAAAaaaack...

Hah. Miss me?

So so so so so so so so SOOOOO sorry about the massive gap between the last chappy and this one. I just needed time to make this one perfect. And it's really long, so you get alot for your patience.

Okay, this is the penultimate chappy, so the next one will be the Reviewer Awards. I will try my best to thank each and everyone of you, but if--in my infinite absent-mindedness--I forget you, just know that each review is more special to me that I can even say.

Anyway, enjoy!

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Chapter 25:

Where The Real Line Lay

Six weeks.

Six weeks, a month and a half, forty-two days, any way you spun it, Teddy hadn't seen Cass for the longest stretch since he was eleven years old.

It did get slightly easier with time, as it turned out. But only just slightly. The truth was, the pain never really got any better; you only got better at dealing with it.

Elle and Teddy had been getting by together, both trying desperately to get over their respective exes—if you could really call Cass Teddy's ex. Elle seemed to be doing better—compared to Teddy at least. Perhaps it was because more time had past for her, perhaps it was because she was incredibly yet understandably incensed with Johnny and therefore it was easier to forget how much she had loved him (and might still possibly love him), but either way, Teddy was still far worse off than Elle.

Teddy had just gotten home from an early shift when he found Elle on her hands and knees, waging war on an individual square on Teddy's ridiculously old linoleum floor in the kitchen armed with nothing but a toothbrush and some baking soda.

"Elle…?" he asked cautiously, setting down his bag on the sofa. "Whacha doin…?"

"Cleaning," she said offhandedly, sounding as though having a sudden urge to scrub your friend's linoleum was as normal as could be. Teddy glanced at the floor to the left of Elle. It appeared to be considerably brighter and whiter than the ones to the right, giving Teddy the impression that she had individually scrubbed each square panel of linoleum in rows, working her way deeper into the kitchen.

"Okay, Elle?" he said gently, pulling her off the floor and taking the toothbrush from her hands. His tone was quite clearly reminiscent of the tone one might use when addressing a mental hospital patient. "Why are you scrubbing my floor?"

"Because it was dirty."

"Elle."

She sighed, pushing the stray strands that had not found their way into her ponytail out of her face.

"I, erm…" she attempted to explain, but failed, getting a bit frustrated with her sudden inability to articulate. "Merlin, I hate this…"

"Elle, just sit for a second," he said, ushering her into one of the stools at the island. "Now, what happened?"

"I…" she started, looking perplexed on multiple levels. "I got asked out…"

"You did?" Teddy asked, immediately concerned. "Was it someone at the research institute?"

"No," she said uncertainly, wringing her hands and eyeing the fruit bowl.

"Was it a patron at the restaurant?"

"No…"

"Who was it then?"

She sighed again, tilting her head as her finger traced the lines of grout in the countertop tiles.

"Joaquin…" she elaborated, still not making eye contact.

Joaquin Vega was a dead man.

"Whoa, there!" Elle said, diving in front of the door before Teddy could storm out of it. Her arms were spread over the door. "Where do you think you're going?"

"To personally kick Joaquin's pretty boy ass," Teddy said firmly, trying to get past Elle.

"No you're not!" she insisted, her hands on her hips. "I said yes!"

"You WHAT?!" Teddy asked incredulously. "Why'd you do that?!"

Elle raised her pointer finger to him and opened her mouth to respond with what Teddy was sure would be a very witty, biting comeback. But apparently he was wrong, because after a moment she simply closed her mouth and lowered her hand.

"I don't know," she said weakly, sighing and going to the couch, where she promptly plopped down as though she had just run a mile.

"Elle," he said, following her to the couch. Women and their confusing-ness… "What's the matter?"

"Oh, who bloody knows?" she said frustratedly, looking up at the ceiling.

"Okay," Teddy said, trying to remain patient. "Do you want to go on a date with Joaquin?"

"Well…" she said, looking extremely sheepish. "Yeah…"

"Then what's the problem?" he asked, feeling like he was missing something.

"I…" she started, thinking intently. "I don't… trust him. How many women have we watched traipse out of here after a night with him?"

Teddy looked at Elle, a look of dawning comprehension on his face.

"What?" she asked, noticing the look on his face.

"You really like him, huh?" he said.

"No!" she snapped at Teddy, crossing her arms over her chest. Teddy rolled his eyes at her knowingly. She sighed. "Yeah…" she said defeatedly. "I dunno. It's too soon, right?"

"Elle, Johnny didn't die," he assured her. "He was a lying scumbag who thought it would be better to impregnate the village broom rather than stay with an amazingly beautiful, smart woman." Elle smiled gratefully. "You don't have to worry about other people's judgment calls about whether or not it's too soon. What do you think?"

"I'm not over John," she sighed. "Not completely anyway."

"That's okay," Teddy said reassuringly. "It doesn't mean you can't get out there."

"Really?" she asked, smiling hesitantly. "Okay." She leaned over and hugged Teddy. "Thanks."

---

"You're a dead man."

Teddy pinned Joaquin against the hospital wall, his wand at his throat.

"What're you doing, mate!" Joaquin responded indignantly, eyeing Teddy's wand cautiously.

"I told you to leave her alone!" Teddy said menacingly. "Did you need me to act it out for you?"

"I didn't break them up, that bastard of an ex-boyfriend did!" Joaquin shot back. "And all I did was ask her to coffee, that's it!"

"She's bloody fragile, you great insensitive prat!" Teddy shouted. "When I got back to the flat, she was cleaning the kitchen floor with a damned toothbrush! She's a nervous wreck right now! Don't you think that maybe—just maybe—it would've been better to just wait a bit?!"

"I tried!" Joaquin yelled at him, getting more and more angry with him. "I know it doesn't sound like much, but I bloody well tried to stay away!"

"Then why didn't you!" Teddy growled, pressing his wand into his neck harder.

"Because I bloody love her!"

Teddy released him from shock, looking at him incredulously.

"What the hell are you talking about!" Teddy shouted at him. "You don't love her! You barely know her!"

"Oh, yeah?" Joaquin asked spitefully. "I know that she has six brothers and sisters—aside from Cy—named Mira, Corinna, Jack, Finn, Natasha and Thomas. I know she can kick anyone's ass at one-on-one Quidditch. I know that she likes to act tough, but she's actually a huge softie. I know that whenever she comes to see you at the hospital, she always visits the nursery and watches the newborns for hours, if she has the time. I know that her sole weakness is designer pumps, and her favorite food is apple pie with vanilla-caramel swirl ice cream. I know she thinks she's fat, even though that's probably the farthest thing from the truth." Joaquin sighed, shaking his head. "I also know that she's probably the most real person I've ever met. I know that I can't go more than a few minutes without thinking about what she's doing. I know that when she laughs or smiles—especially when I make her laugh or smile—I feel like I'm doing something right. I know she is beautiful and amazing and fucking stubborn and frustrating a lot of the time, and I lay awake at night picturing the white picket fence and the little dog and a mess of kids and all that."

Joaquin looked down at his shoes, appearing extremely unsettled and unsure and just plain frustrated.

"I don't know how and I don't know why, but I am madly in love with that woman," he said desperately. Teddy looked at him, trying to sense whether or not he was sincere.

Teddy sighed.

"Okay," he said, resigned. "Okay, but lay a hand on her—anyway you can construe that—and I'll send Cyrus after you."

"I won't," he said.

"Good," Teddy said, falling into his thoughts. He eyes, previously on the floor, looked up to Joaquin's. "I have to get back before Elle starts scrubbing our shower."

"Okay," Joaquin said cautiously, as though at any moment, Teddy would change his mind and suddenly become enraged all over again. "I'll see you later, mate."

Teddy only nodded.

There was a distant part of his mind that told him he should be happy; he should be happy that his friends were—for the most part—happy and were growing and moving on.

But he could not.

He couldn't help but wish there was someone still here with him, someone who not only recognized his pain but understood it because they carried it with them as well. He had believed Elle was still there with him, in this abyss where you felt everything and nothing simultaneously, but she had passed through, to the other side. She had found the way out, and he was still groping about in pitch black darkness, trying to feel for the doorknob. And she could no longer whisper him instructions to find it, to follow her out. He was desperately and completely alone, and he would have to find his way out on his own.

He had to move on. Even if it killed him, he had to move on.

---

"How do I look?"

Teddy sighed, looking up from the Daily Prophet for the umpteenth time to—once again—help Joaquin, whom Teddy had now donned with the nickname "Señor Metrosexual", decide if his hair was laying properly.

"Lovely," Teddy said in a monotone, immediately glancing back down at the Prophet to continue reading the article he had been reading. "Glowing, even."

"What would I do if you weren't here, spreading your sarcasm about?" Joaquin said, grabbing his tie off the .

"Fine, how's this?" Teddy said, setting down the paper for good, seeing as he wouldn't be able to properly read it until Joaquin had left. "You look absolutely terrible. Your eyes are too damned close together and your hair is too long and I can't for the life of me imagine why on earth Elena Parker would ever in her right want to go out with someone who was so aesthetically deficient."

"Thanks, mate," Joaquin said, chuckling a bit as he fastened his tie.

"Aren't you a bit dressed up just for coffee?" Teddy noted, cocking his head to the side thoughtfully.

"You think?" he said, suddenly looking very nervous as he glanced over his outfit. "Maybe I should change…"

"No, Joaquin—" Teddy began to backtrack just before the doorbell rang. "Listen, I'm getting the door," Teddy explained, removing Joaquin's hands from the tie as he began to undo it in an attempt to make himself less dressed-up. "Leave your clothes alone—I was only joking—and come out when you're ready."

Teddy exited Joaquin's room and hurried down the stairs as the doorbell rang again, quickly making his way across the room and opening the door.

"Hey Teddy," Elle said, entering into the apartment.

"Hey Elle," he said, closing the door behind her.

The first thing that struck Teddy was how blatantly nervous Elle was. Elle had many strange sides: anxious wreck who cleaned when she was unsettled Elle; 'Teddy-I'm-so-mad-at-you-I'm-going-to-rip-your-nuts-off' Elle; heartbroken dumpee with an insatiable appetite for anything that contained chocolate, caramel, or copious amounts of sugar Elle; and even passive-aggressive brooding Elle who gets easily offended because you previously fucked up big with her. However, nervous, jittery, butterflies-in-her-stomach Elle was a new one.

The second thing that struck Teddy was that Elle was at an almost identical level of dressiness that Joaquin was, wearing a white, collared, button-down shirt, a pencil skirt and a pair of pumps that were distinctly un-corporate, giving Teddy the impression she had brought them to change into before her date. The formal nature of her outfit made Teddy understand why Joaquin had gotten so dressy. He was beginning to have faith in that man after all.

"A bit dressed up, aren't we?" Teddy said, hoping to get a bit of entertainment at Elle's expense. It worked like a charm: an instant later, her eyes shot down to her outfit frantically.

"Oh my gosh," she exclaimed in the tone that Teddy instantly associated with Elle, even when it was used by others. Her eyes were wide with horror. "Oh crap! I thought this would be fine, I mean, I just got of work at the institute, I didn't have time to go back home and get dressed—"

She had finally noticed that Teddy was collapsing into silent but hysterical laughter.

"I HATE you!" she shouted at him, fighting and failing to keep the smile off her face. When he continued laughing, she silenced him by resoundly whacking his head with one of the couch pillows.

"You are so easy to get," Teddy sighed, removing the pillow from his facial region.

"I still hate you," she said rather maturely, crossing her arms over her chest.

Just then Joaquin came down the stairs.

"Hey," he said to Elle with a surprisingly sincere-looking smile. Usually, when accompanied by one of his 'women', he wore a smile that was highly reminiscent of a used broom salesman; so suffice it to say that Teddy was pleased when there was a noticeable difference in the way Joaquin had treated his 'women' and how he was treating Elle. In true magician form, he pulled a bouquet of Casablanca lilies—which Teddy knew to be Elle's favorite. "These are for you."

"Oooo, my panties are already flying off," Elle said in completely uninterested monotone as she took the flowers with disdain. Teddy rolled his eyes. To the untrained eye, this would appear to be Elle showing a complete and utter lack of interest in Joaquin. To Teddy, having known Elle as long as he had, this was the ultimate proof of Elle's feelings for Joaquin. She was only a bitch to the blokes she was crazy about. And guessing from the pleased smile on Joaquin's face, he was fully aware of this fact. "So where are we going, again?"

"You'll see," he said confidently. "Shall we go?"

"Sure," she sighed, feigning a lack of enthusiasm as she went for the door.

"Oh and Teddy," Joaquin said just before he left. He pointed his wand up the stairs and muttered, "Accio Prophet." After a few seconds, the paper flew down the stairs in a flutter. Joaquin caught it and handed it to Teddy. "Sorry for interrupting you."

"No problem," he said. "Keep your hands to yourself and little Joaquin in your pants."

"Hey!" Joaquin said, mock-indignantly as he was just about to step out of the door. "There's nothing little about him."

"Thanks for sharing," Teddy said, trying not to laugh.

Once the door shut behind the two of them, Teddy shook his head and chuckled as he went into the kitchen. Pouring himself a cup of black coffee, he proceeded to finish reading the article.

No word yet on whether the Minister will hold a press conference to discuss the suspected interdepartmental abuse, but a source close to the Minister insists that he has the utmost confidence in Mr. Collins.

Meanwhile, Ms. Lewis insists that despite the lack of support from the Minister, she is still innocent.

"The truth will come out in time," she maintains. "When all is said and done, the truth will come out."

-Cassandra Devereaux

Teddy sighed as he let his eyes drift over her byline over and over again. Unwillingly, he thought back to when they were only a couple of kids…

"You're such an old lady," Teddy joked as he pushed Cass's legs out of his sitting space on her swing. "Reading the newspaper. You're only fifteen. Shouldn't you be chasing boys and fixing your make up?"

"Love the stereotypes, Ted," Cass responded, blowing her bangs out of her eyes as she released a breath. Her eyes never left that day's edition of the Daily Prophet. "On that note, shouldn't you be off smuggling dirty magazines and bragging to your mates about what you've done sexually?"

"Touché," he said, sitting down beside her. "So. What's going on in the wizarding world today?"

"Shacklebolt pardoned some ex-Death Eater," she said, turning the page. "Foolish, if you ask me. I'd've thrown his arse in Azkaban for the rest of his days."

"Oh merciful one," Teddy laughed, sipping iced tea. The summer day was hot, very hot. Balmy too. He pushed his sweaty blue hair off of his forehead. "Anything else?"

"Apparently," Cass said as she took Teddy's iced tea and took a hearty sip before claiming it as her own, "we're in the midst of a heat wave."

"You're kidding," Teddy said, feigning shock. "I had no clue."

"Me neither," Cass joined, laughing. Her smile faded very slowly, never completely disappearing as she closed the paper, staring intensely at the front-page story.

"My story's gonna be right here one day," she said, looking very sure as the smile faded back onto her face.

She looked up at him with a smile so hopeful, the kind of look Teddy had never seen her wear. He smiled.

"Of course you will."

Teddy clenched his jaw and sniffed.

She had always been so sure about things like that. Most attributed it to her Inner Eye, but Teddy had always known that it was something much more rare than that. It wasn't even faith. It a confidence. She simply knew she could—and would—do it. He had always been proud of her for it—even jealous.

But now he realized that she hadn't just had confidence in her future achievements. Cass, with her nearly infallible intuition and her natural talent for Seeing, must have seen this—all of this—coming. The future to Teddy had always been some hazy illusion, as far off and unreal as the stars. Not so for Cass. The future was Cass's domain, where she always dwelled. It was as much a part of her as the present; as much a part of her as the past was of Teddy.

She had known this was coming. She hadn't wanted to believe it—just as he hadn't once he realized—but she had known all the same, and a lot farther ahead of time, he was convinced.

That's why she wanted it to be friends with benefits. That's why she had been so damn planned and methodical and calculated about the whole thing. She had known that they couldn't survive just going back and pretending it hadn't happened, not after the kiss. She had simply concocted this whole plan to keep them together for while they could.

Becuase it was only a matter of time.

He was tired of being miserable all the time. He wished he could at least enjoy the happy times he remembered with her without fighting off the urge to cry.

He set down the paper and went upstairs. Arriving at his room, he was immediately irked by the messy state of his bedroom. Determined to get his mind off of Cass, he started to make his bed.

"Sonaofabitch!" Teddy yelped, accidentally kneeling on something small and hard and pointy, like some sort of sharp rock. In the pain, he fell onto his back and groaned.

Regrouping, he set himself upright and searched for the cause of the very localized, now-throbbing pain in his knee. He glanced around, his eyes catching something yellow and shiny… it was a cocktail ring in an oversized, emerald-cut yellow gem set in white gold…

Cass's mother's ring…

Teddy sighed.

He picked up the ring and held it between his forefinger and thumb, twisting it and examining it from every angle, every light. It was beautiful.

Without any warning, Cass's image—the most beautiful one he could remember, from that amazing night—forced its way into his head. The image was as clear as if she were right before him, her skin on his skin, her fingers entangled in his hair, her eyes so very beautiful and special and wonderful. He could almost smell her hair.

Shouting in indignation, Teddy hurled the ring across the room like a speeding bullet, and it hit the wall, dropping to the ground like a wounded bird. It seemed to lay so pitifully on the floor.

Teddy felt a lot of things. But the one thing he could not seem to escape was the feeling of desperation.

There was nothing. No chance. And she was bloody everywhere. Everywhere he looked, everywhere he went, any time, day or night, she was there. But she didn't love him. And she never would. And they would never be together, in any sense of the word.

The ring glistened on the floor, and Teddy could not suppress the urge to cry when he looked at it and thought about its beautiful, amazing owner who would never be his.

Teddy grabbed a small box out of the junk drawer in his nightstand. Going over and kneeling down to scoop up the ring, he placed it inside the box.

Just like its owner, this ring did not belong to him.

Teddy knocked on the door.

Then he simply stood there on the front step, realizing with a jolt that he had never believed he would ever be here again.

With another, more uncomfortable jolt, he wondered how many more times he would keep coming back.

"Teddy?"

"Josie, hi," Teddy said quickly. He was suddenly extremely nervous and he didn't know why. She eyed him cautiously. "I, erm… I… Cass left this at my apartment a while ago, and I only just realized it was there."

He pulled the box out of his coat pocket, and handing the box to Josie. She crinkled her eyebrow a bit in confusion, shooting him a puzzled look before glancing back down at the box. Slowly, she set her hand on the lid, and gently revealed its contents by pulling off the lid.

As soon as she saw the ring the puzzlement slid from her face, replaced by realization. She nodded her head, her eyes still locked on the ring, as if she understood.

"I'll be sure to give it to her," she said quietly, looking back up at Teddy. The empathy was blaringly apparent in this look. She knew that this truly would be the last time he would be coming around. She extended her arms out to him in a hug. "Goodbye, Teddy."

"Bye, Josie," he said, returning the hug. He pulled away slowly, and took a couple steps back. He savored the moment. It would be his last here.

He turned around and walked away.

"Teddy?" Josie called. He sighed, turning around slowly. "What really happened? With you and Cass?"

Teddy sighed, feeling the weight of the pain settle uncomfortably in his chest.

"You tell me," he shrugged sadly. "You're related to her, you could probably guess better than I could."

"Related?" she repeated. He look struck by the word. "What are you on about?"

Teddy's suspicions immediately shot up.

"Aren't you Cass's aunt?"

"Aunt?" Josie asked, perplexed. "I'm not their aunt, I'm their nanny."

"Nanny?" Teddy repeated, equally confused. "Cass told me that you were her aunt."

A sweeping look of dawning comprehension came over Josie's face.

"Oh," she said on the exhale. She looked at him for a few moments, trying to decide whether or not to say what she wanted to say, then shut the door behind her. "Sit. We should talk."

"Uh. Alright…" Teddy said uneasily, sitting down on the stoop beside Josie.

"Cass…" she started off, only halfway through her thought process. She had a pensive look on her face as she caught up. "Well, I'm sure you've noticed Cass has a tendency to be guarded."

"Guarded?" he said incredulously. "The woman keeps a proverbial mile between herself and the rest of the world."

"Point taken," Josie said, shooting him a look that clearly said, 'Let me finish my story, dammit.' "Like I was saying, she's distant. Sometimes to the point where she doesn't trust other people with the truth."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"For starters, Cass has no aunts or uncles," she explained. "No grandparents either. I am a hired nanny, and I used to take care of the kids after Cass left for Hogwarts. She paid me with the inheritance that her parents left her. Now I'm just a family friend and I occasionally help out with Ava and Lulu."

"So her parents really are dead, right?" he inquired. "They're not actually lurking around in there?"

"Her father is." Josie nodded. "Her mother… god, she could be anywhere now. She left when Cass was about ten, and her poor old Dad couldn't take it. The healers said it was heart failure."

"But there's a potion for that—"

"It didn't work," Josie explained quietly, shaking her head. "It happens. It turns out it wasn't degenerate heart failure, it was an ultra rare case called 'Broken Heart Syndrome'."

"You're kidding right?" Teddy said incredulously.

"It's a real condition, Ted," she insisted. "The impact of some sort of emotional trauma actually can weaken the heart. Either way, he died."

"Why did her mom leave?" he asked. A whole other world of truth was opening up to him and he felt himself falling into it, without much—if any—of his own consent.

"Said she wasn't happy," she said simply, shrugging. "That she was done with the marriage and done with the children, and so she up and left. That's how Cass remembers it, at least."

Neither spoke for a minute or two.

"Cass doesn't really feel like everyone else does," Josie started off, looking at him. "It's not really even voluntary anymore, her heart has simply learned to shut things out."

"Why though?" he asked desperately. He just didn't understand… "I was always there with her, she didn't have to be so alone…"

"Teddy, when disappointment is all you know, you learn never to be disappointed," she said slowly and emphatically. Her gaze met his with intensity. "And that is all she's ever known."

Teddy said nothing for a moment, letting all of this sink in.

"If you've ever heard Cass talk about a line," she began again, Teddy perking up immediately, "the truth that the line isn't conceptual, drawn in the vastness of space to separate the right and wrong, good and bad." She paused for a moment. "It's to separate her from the rest of the world. The line that you thought she drew for propriety was drawn to protect her from what you could make her feel."

And it all made sense.

"And Teddy," she added, drawing his attention back to her. "There's something I need to tell you. Cass told me not to, but she doesn't know what's good for her right now."

"Why, what is it?" he asked. Whatever it was, he knew it must be what she wanted to talk to him about when he'd come over that day to clear things up. Why hadn't he simply listened, why hadn't he just shut the bloody hell up…

"Before I tell you," she started off furtively, leaning in a bit closer, "I don't know if Cass really is in love with you. I can't guarantee you anything. But right now, she's up in her flat taking a test, and I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that she'd probably like you to be with her right now."

"What do you mean, taking a test?" Teddy asked, frustrated by her secretive demeanor. Josie eyed him with a knowing sort of look, as if to say, "C'mon, it doesn't take that much brain power."

"Think about it, Teddy."

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