"I can't believe that we get back from our honeymoon to this weather. We would have this luck." I groaned as we landed roughly in the fireplace. A guffaw broke out from James' chest, and I smiled despite my aching muscles.
Leaving the villa, with the waves bidding us "good-bye" and "come back soon", their call so tempting, we had tumbled back through the Floo Network into a late snow storm that had been ravaging London.
Not only outside our window, however.
"What the-"
"How in Merlin's name," James sounded absolutely bewildered, which wasn't too far off from my own emotions.
'Is this some sort of a joke?" I demanded, though it did not come out as threatening as I'd meant as snow flew into my face, causing me to splutter.
James got up from the floor, leaving his suitcases behind, and trudged through the inches of snow covering almost every nook and cranny of our small flat. Our apartment had become our own private snow globe while we'd been away. He had found the source quicker than I did, I realized, as I watched him slam the living room window closed, shoving the lock in place more out of anger than necessity.
Both of us fell into a patch of silence for a moment, surveying the damage on the flat.
"Well was it left open?" I asked as I stood, dusting the wretched powder from my clothes.
"How should I know?" James shrugged, a stray hand running through his snow filled hair as he stepped carefully back to retrieve our bags.
"You should! Didn't you check the windows before we left?"
"I didn't think they needed checking!"
"Well, they do!"
"So why didn't you do it?"
"Because I thought you were aware of the need for the windows to be checked!"
James' eyes grew sharp in seconds as they fell back on me. He roughly hoisted the bags up, his heel almost slipping in the layer of snow.
"Don't try to blame me for this," His voice had grown lower, his brows traveling in the same direction as they shadowed his eyes.
"Well did you leave it open?"
"I don't remember," He was no longer shouting, but his voice had become dangerously quiet.
"Why not? It's not like we left in a hurry, you have no excuses!"
"How do you know that you didn't leave it open?"
"Because I knew I would have closed it!"
"So why didn't you check the windows before we left?"
"Because I thought you had!"
"You thought-ugh!" He gave an exasperated growl, stomping away from me down the hallway to drop our belongings in there. He really did drop them too, for moments later I heard the thumping of heavy suitcases hitting the floor, even over the blood pumping loudly in my ears.
Clenching my eyes shut, I tried breathing deeply to calm myself. It didn't work so well. The minute he entered the room again, with snow still speckling his hair, my anger came flooding back through my veins.
"I can't believe you left it open," I snarled.
"Oh yeah? Well I can't believe you're actually being immature enough to blame me for this."
"I know I didn't do it, so it had to have been you."
"Do we have to lay blame? It was an honest mistake! Whoever left it open," I noticed the emphasis he put on "whoever", but I ignored it.
"Well, someone has got to clean all this up," I called over my shoulder, hurrying down the hallway. He had too much effect on my emotions, and with the anger now bubbling up inside me, it only grew hotter and wilder in his presence.
At least the snow had not reached out bedroom.
"I find it funny that you say 'someone'. Who is this 'someone' you're referring to Evans?" He was leaning in the door frame, a bright flash in his eyes as he stared at me.
And fury boiled over.
"You can't call me 'Evans' anymore, Potter!" I bellowed, storming past him into the main area. "And I only said someone passively! I believe you were the one saying we shouldn't be laying blame, so I didn't say you should clean it up!"
It was like one of the battles we'd read about in History of Magic, snow covering the ground with the opposite forces facing off amidst the calm, shivering in their boots. The air between us buzzed, crackling back and forth.
In the very back of my head something in me realized how ridiculous this was. Here we were, back from our honeymoon, a week of enjoying nice weather, sights, and each other; arguing. Arguing like an old married couple, which we were not. Not yet.
There was a lot more shouting between us, enough that we even earned a knock on the wall form our neighbor, which neither James nor I heeded. In truth, I cannot recall all that was said, and some of the things I do remember I am not proud of. Halfway through, we ran completely off topic from the original point of the fight, shouting about odd things that caused rage to flourish in us in general. The argument technically ended with the snow being whisked away with a wand wave, James storming into the kitchen, and me into the bedroom.
Plopping down on the mattress, with my head in my hands, a bout of breath fell from my lips. It was exhausting, fighting. There was really no physical action in it, yet I was left with drooping limbs and heavy eyelids. With snow swirling all around in the darkening sky outside, I gave in to the fatigue, sinking back into the mattress.
-x-
Many people say it. I've heard it quite often. My own mother, Professor Dumbledore, Alice had said the words many times. Petunia may have even said it, I don't know.
"Never go to sleep angry."
Now I knew why that was so important.
My sleep had been restless, as was evident from the rustled sheets when I woke up, and my skin was glazed in sweat. Before my eyes were opened, I could sense that I had left the lights by the glowing red hue that my eyelids were. With a crinkling forehead, I let a hand search across the sheets for the other body, full of warmth that would wrap long arms around me and press a smile into my hair.
It was only after my eyes flew open in a wild panic, and I shot into an upright position, my hair flying all around my head at finding a lack of a husband on the other side of the bed, that I remembered the argument at all.
"Damn it," my head fell back against the pillows, and I released a groan. We didn't have a clock in the bedroom anymore, because on one of the days of an early Order meeting, it may or may not have been smashed to smithereens with a nasty hex from James, so I had no way of knowing how long I'd been asleep. Whatever time it was, James was not here with me, and I wasn't sure how much anger was still boiling away under his skin. There was one way I could find out, I just wasn't sure I was ready to go and see.
We had gone through plenty of fights before, but this one was much worse one me, and doubtless on James as well. Why did arguments seem so strenuous after marriage than they were before? And James and I still had such a long way to go. The smallest of smiles ghosted over my lips. Yes, we would be an old couple, gray hair beginning to pepper our heads, still arguing over ridiculous little things. But I would much rather fight over silly shenanigans with him than with anyone else.
It was quite hard, even if the anger had simmered out of my blood long ago, to confront him and tell him that. The simple route was one way to go: "Hey, James. I'm not mad anymore, so you shouldn't be mad at me either."
But just because I may hold his heart did not mean I controlled his emotions.
Rousing any Gryffindor courage I could muster, I lifted myself off of the mattress, some muscles in my back screaming about the odd angel I had slept at, and crept to the door that led to the hallway. The ceiling light from the bedroom was the only light on in the flat, as it shown a striking path down the hallway.
Not wanting to break the silence, I slid along the floor in my stockings, muffling the creaks the best I could.
Flicking the light switch on for the living room, I was shocked to be met with a rumpled James, curled up on the couch. He was still in his traveling clothes, his button up shirt very wrinkled now, and his glasses so haphazard on his face, the glass was closer to his mouth than his eyes.
A pang hit the wall of my stomach at his sleeping face. I could have woken him up, and we could have settled things right then, but the amount of sleep I had gotten had not been the best, and my body was demanding more.
Dragging the blanket off the back of the couch, I carefully fit my way beside him, snuggling right into his chest so I wouldn't fall of the edge.
Apparently, what I had taken for sleeping had only been resting his eyes. One of James' arms caught me around the middle and pulled me tighter, leading both of us deeper into the couch cushions. My eyes flashed up to stare at him, but his did not open. There were no more creases in his forehead and his frown vanished from his face.
No words were exchanged, and none truly needed to be. Only a brush of my lips to his chin, and press of his to my temple, before we both drifted off into a much easier sleep than before.
