Look Away For Now

Lucius stirred, barely. Light was streaming in through the open window and curtains, a chill reaching him through the heavy green covers. He shivered, pulling the sheets up around him and turning away from the light, momentarily unconcerned with anything but the pursuit of yet more beauty sleep.

Something against his side stirred and, yelping, Lucius pulled back. His sleep fogged senses managed to make out a warm entity under the blankets beside him. It had sort of poky edges but seemed curved at the same time. A little braver now that he was more awake, Lucius poked at it. Under the covers, the thing snorted and moved, causing the boy to pull back and collect his nerves.

Slowly, cautiously, Lucius reached for the edge of the bedclothes covering the creature and, with a swift, and, he thought, rather brave, movement, pulled back all the sheets to reveal a decidedly unhappy Severus.

Growling slightly, Severus rolled over, trying to grab at the sheets. Relieved, Lucius let the duvet drop over his boyfriend, sinking down and throwing an arm around the still sleeping sixth year. He was about to drop back into sleep when something occurred to him.

"Hey! What am I doing in your bed?" Severus groaned and ignored the question. Pouting, Lucius shook the older boy firmly. "Severus, wake up!"

"What do you want? Whatever it is, you can have it. Just leave me alone!" The petulant whine brought a slight scowl to Lucius fair face, but overall the boy thought it was sort of cute. If we were married, I'd get to see this everyday, he thought, and momentarily lost track of what it was he was so worried about. Then he remembered and pulled the covers off the taller boy with determination.

"Severus!"

The older boy shot up at the sound of his name, eyes wide and dark, and completely panicked. "What! What! What's going on!?" Lucius giggled, and found himself on the receiving end of a ferocious glare. "Oh, it's you." Severus yawned. "What time is it love?"

Lucius paused to glance at his watch. "Um, it's ten thirty." Severus muttered something and started sliding out of bed. "Hold on a second!" Lucius reached out and stopped the older boy with a hand on his shoulder. "You haven't told me what I'm doing in your bed yet."

Severus blinked at him, still mostly asleep. "Oh that," he finally managed. "Well, after you fell asleep in the common room, I thought about putting you in your dorm room, but all the boys in your year were up there already asleep, and I didn't know if you'd all hexed the door. So I figured I could put you on the couch and leave you there. But, the dungeons can get really cold at night and I didn't want to just leave you down there alone after the explosion. So I brought you up here. I hope you don't mind." Severus looked almost worried.

"Of course not silly." Lucius grinned reassuringly. "You didn't molest me while I was asleep, did you?"

Severus snorted. "You're still wearing that ridiculous t-shirt aren't you? So clearly I didn't strip you down and have my wicked way with your unconscious carcass."

Lucius grinned wider. "Want to molest me now then?"

Severus' eyebrow twitched. "I thought we talked about-"

"Not totally molest," Lucius hurried to reply. "Just, sort of molest. Like, how about a good morning kiss? Since I woke you up so nicely."

Severus smiled shyly, and leaned in to kiss the blond. Lucius felt his heartbeat quicken again. Damn it, why did he always have to be so nervous? It was only a kiss! Still, he couldn't help feeling a little excited, and whimpered lightly against his boyfriend's mouth.

Too soon the kiss was broken. Severus sat back on his heels, licking his lips unconsciously and looking at Lucius. "You have such soft lips," he said, eyes still wide and dark. Lucius blushed.

                                                            *          *          *

            Both Lucius and Severus were dressed too late for breakfast. Instead they snagged a few pieces of toast from the kitchen, refusing the éclairs, muffins, eggs, bacon, sausage, and pumpkin juice that overly zealous house elves tried to thrust upon them. Happy and well fed, the pair made their way back towards Slytherin to find something to do. However, they were accosted along the way.

            "Lucius! Hey, I need to talk to you." Anemone came running up from a side corridor, looking uncommonly concerned. Any concern was uncommon with Anemone, who ordinarily did her homework five minutes before class and managed to look pretty without any real effort. Lucius didn't think he'd ever seen her actually try at anything, and she had certainly never been worried about failing at something. Now she looked positively panicked.

            "What's up Annie?" Lucius shot Severus a brief look before returning his attention to the girl. He had a feeling that Severus was thinking the same thing he was: that this, like everything else lately, had something to do with a certain Ravenclaw head boy.

            "I need to talk with you alone if it's alright," she said, her eyes darting in Severus' direction.

            "Yeah, I was just about to go get some homework done anyway." Severus kissed Lucius quickly on the mouth. "See you later Luc."

            "See you." Lucius watched as Severus, hands in the pockets of his robes, moved fluidly back towards the dungeons. It seemed a very long time before he turned back to his best friend. "What's wrong?"

            "Not here." The girl shook her head, reddish hair falling into her paler than usual face. "Follow me."

            Lucius jogged along after Anemone, up six flights of stairs and down several hallways. By the time she stopped, several meters ahead of him in front of a door, the blond was panting heavily, a stitch in his side threatening to collapse him then and there.

            "Honestly Lucius," she said, head angled to the side reprovingly. "You are in the worst shape."

            "I didn't" pant "even know" huff "the school" wheeze "had six floors." Lucius managed to pull himself into the room after Anemone before slumping exhaustedly into a corner. A few minutes passed in silence as he caught his breath. "Where are we anyway?"

            "This used to be a classroom or something," Anemone enlightened. "No one comes up here now but me. And Sydney, since I showed it to him. You can bring Severus some time, but don't tell other people or everyone will want to hang out here. It's a nice place. Good for getting away from everyone."

            "Sure, if you don't mind the hike," Lucius grimaced. Looking around, it was actually rather nice. A few old couches and chairs sat at one end beside a fireplace, and half the wall was missing, opening out to the chilly October air. Lucius shivered and moved to the fireplace, pointing his wand quickly to light a roaring fire. A thought occurred to him suddenly.

            "Could you floo up here?"

            Anemone thought a moment before answering. "Yeah, I suppose you could. Like I said, it's a nice place." She was silent for a moment. "Can we talk now?"

Lucius nodded. "Sure. What do you want to talk about that was so important I had to run a marathon to hear about it?"

Anemone bit her lower lip. "I'm worried about Sydney." Figures, Lucius thought, but said nothing. "He'd been, strange, lately. I started thinking about it last night. After the explosion he seemed really upset, and I asked if I could go back to his room. He let me, but I could tell he was really pissed off about something and didn't want me around, so I left after a while. That got me thinking though."

"Go on," Lucius intoned softly when his friend paused.

"Sydney doesn't like Dumbledore. I've heard him say so at least a dozen times. And, he's always disappearing. He's usually so careful about things, making sure that he meets me when he says he will. But all last week he'd cancel dates at the last minute with no excuse. Just said 'something's come up' every time. And there's Pettigrew…" 

Lucius' ears perked up at that. "What about him?"

"Well, he's friends with Black and Potter you know. Not so bad as them, but still dangerous. Everyone should know better than to fuck with any of them. But I keep finding Sydney and Pettigrew talking in the hallways. Once I even heard Sydney yelling at him. And what's more, Pettigrew didn't seem to be playing up his best friends card. Ordinarily he'd just use that old 'You can't hurt me or my friends will kick your ass' line. He seemed really scared though. I don't know what's going on!"  

"It's okay Annie." Lucius thought about telling her what Severus had said the night before, and about the badge. But I'm sure it's nothing, he thought, and I don't want to worry her any more…

"It's probably all really stupid, but I can't help worrying," Anemone was saying. "I have no idea what's going on right now, but whatever it is, I'll stick by Sydney to the end. I love him."

Lucius glanced at her warily. "What if he was involved with the tower?"

Anemone didn't flinch. "From what he tells me, Dumbledore had it coming. Maybe that explosion wasn't such a bad thing after all." Lucius shrugged. "I mean it Lucius. Sydney says that Dumbledore is trying to control the wizarding world by influencing us while we're young. You notice how he's always encouraging us to go to him with any problems? There's something funny about him, and I think Sydney might be right."

"Maybe…" Lucius sighed, somewhat distracted. He leaned closer to the fire. "You love him then?"

Anemone nodded fervently. "Yeah. He said that after he graduates he's going to be working for some organisation, a higher up wizarding job I think. Very hush-hush from the way he makes it out. Anyways, he says that he'll have to really work hard for the first year or two, but by the time we graduate he'll have enough money for a wedding and a house." Anemone's eyes shone as she talked, and Lucius couldn't help feeling excited for her.

"You're getting married? Oh my god Annie! That's so great."

"Yeah," she said dreamily. "You can be the maid of honor Lucy." Lucius glared at her. "Or maybe the flower girl…"

He smacked her playfully. "Oi! Shut up."

                                                *          *          *

            "You're doing it wrong."

            "I am not Severus, will you please butt out?"

            "Okay, fine. Just don't say I didn't warn you."

            Lucius sighed and snuggled closer into his boyfriend's embrace. They were the only people sitting on the large common room couch. On the floor in front of them, Anemone was mixing a potion to turn her hair blue. Severus turned to his boyfriend and smiled, mouthing slowly, "She's going to fuck it up."

            "Why are you dyeing your hair anyway, Annie?" Lucius didn't care exactly. He was too comfortable to care about much, but it seemed like the polite thing to ask.

            "It's all the rage in France," was the confusing reply. Lucius must have looked confused, because she hurried to elaborate. "My cousin Narcissa is at Beauxbatons and sent me some photos. She and her friends all did their hair blue. It's the new thing. Pretty soon everyone will be doing it, but I'll be cool because I'll have done it here first." Anemone smiled and returned to the potion.

            It was after lunch, and the excitement of the previous night had died down somewhat. Sydney had been at lunch, his good nature apparently once more intact. He'd thanked Severus graciously for the return of his head boy badge, but offered no explanation as to how he had lost it. Somehow, Lucius knew better than to ask.

            "You're adding too many scarab wings."

            "I know what I'm doing! God Lucius, your boyfriend is truly aggravating."

            Lucius grinned happily. "Yep," he agreed, leaning over to kiss the older boy. But Severus pulled back almost at once, to Lucius utter annoyance.

            "You think I'm aggravating do you?" Severus raised one wicked eyebrow, his mouth a delicious smirk. "Well, let's see how you like this then!" and, without warning, Lucius found himself, back pressed against the cushions and Severus' lithe frame pushing down on him, being tickled mercilessly.

            "Severus…stop…ohmygod…STOP!" Lucius giggled hideously, praying that no one decided to enter the common rooms just then. On the floor Anemone rolled her eyes at them.

            "How aggravating is that, huh?" Severus moved his hands under Lucius defensive ones, seeking sensitive spots on legs, waist, neck, arms, anywhere. He managed to pinch the soft area about his captive's hips and was rewarded with a surprised and protesting yelp. "Come on, take it back!"

            "I take it back! I take it back! You're not aggravating!" Lucius panted, laughing idiotically and clawing at the attacking hands. He managed to catch one wrist and held it, sucking air in desperately at Severus sat back and smiled at him. A sudden series of loud popping noises diverted his attention and he turned his head quickly to see Anemone, looking shocked, and blue as the sky, blinking at her cauldron.

Severus snorted derisively. "I told you so."