Delia Ainsworth
Do you know what it's like to not be able to see what you're looking for? I mean really to be lost in the sense that your vision is incapable of finding the place that you just came from? And to be stuck with a strange boy, who happens to be cute and kind and caring, but who also could be anyone… murderer, rapist, news reporter on ugly looking teens.
I think I went along with him so willingly because part of me didn't mind if he was a murderer. Part of me wanted to live a little dangerously because I was so overprotected at home.
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I went along with the boy's plan. I followed him to the cottage that he pointed to in the distance that I had no chance of actually seeing from that far away.
I became more and more frustrated with myself as I walked along the shore with Remus Lupin, as he soon introduced himself as. It was my fault for ever leaving the cottage. I was angry and upset, but I should have known that I would get confused. That I wouldn't be able to find my way back because that stupid visual sense that had blocked the cottage from my view. And no matter what way I turned, I just couldn't find it again.
"Delia!" he shouted, interrupting my thoughts. "Did you just hear a word of what I said?"
"No," I answered, soon upset that I had actually told him my real name. I mean, his most definitely had to be made up. Who would actually name their kid after some Roman legend? "Sorry, I was just thinking." But I probably wouldn't have heard him anyways.
"About?" he was nosy, delving more into my life.
I sighed, focusing on his eyes for a moment in time. From what I could tell they were blue, but for some reason I could see something more in them. Like some sort of struggle. "Just about how long it took you to come up with that name," I lied. I guess I was sort of thinking about it, but not really.
"I didn't make it up," he sounded sincere.
"You don't happen to have a brother named Romulus, do you?" I laughed as we walked closer to the crowd of people from the beach. I tensed up, not really wanting to walk near them, but having to do it in order to eventually make it home.
"Very funny," he answered back, as I concentrated intently on what he had to say. I had to in order to hear everything correctly. "But why would I pick my name to be Remus if I made it up? You'd think that I would pick Romulus."
He was right. Romulus killed Remus. Why would he pick the name of the dead brother instead of the one that founded Rome? "You got me there," I answered. "So your mum picked it out so that it could match your last name or something? She must have had fun with that." I thought of the name Lupin, which I knew had something to do with a wolf. And Romulus and Remus were brought up by a she-wolf, according to legend.
"Actually it was my dad. He thought I was a cute kid."
"Cute kid?" I asked. What did that have to do with his name?
"Cute fit," he answered. "The name… he just thought it went well together."
"Oh," I answered, embarrassed. I should have just kept my mouth shut. I didn't need him to figure out that I was on my way to becoming deaf. Not saying anything and acting as normal as possible would make that easier.
At least that's what I learned in school for awhile. The school I went to before the special school for the deaf and dumb and disabled that my parents made me transfer to. As my problems grew worse, I just stayed silent. I lost a bunch of my friends, but they never did find out my biggest secret. Only those in that special school knew and that was only because they had to know. And because they were like that too. We all had similar problems.
We walked silently until we finally reached the cottage. It wasn't actually as far as I suspected… my vision was probably getting worse by the day. The doctor did say that I probably had less than a year left before it was gone completely. Even less than that for my hearing.
"You might want to stay outside first," Remus directed me, as he found his key to open up the cottage. "I'm not quite sure what my friends are doing in there."
"Oh," I answered, realizing that there were other people that I would have to come in contact with. I didn't think that he would be bringing me to a place with other people. I didn't want other people to see me, but that was still my only option. And I didn't really want to stay outside, while he caught up with his friends. "That's okay." It wasn't like I would see anything anyways.
Remus knocked on the door first, giving warning to his friends that we were coming. He then opened the door and shouted, "Lily! James! I have company. We're coming in, in a minute." He then shut the door and waited for a bit.
I focused my eyes around the outside of the cottage, realizing that it seemed rather nice. It was white and somewhat round, but from what I could tell it was a nice place.
Soon, Remus opened the door again. I hesitantly followed behind him, hoping that for some reason Lily and James were not there. Other people just made me nervous especially when I was so openly showing off my scars. I was hideous looking and I knew I shouldn't have ever bought that dress, but it wasn't like I planned on leaving the house in it.
As I walked in, I saw the view. It seemed just as nice in the inside. It was a bit small, but it was cozy. There was a grey couch in the living room and the telly was turned on.
"James? Lily?" Remus was surprised as he approached the two, cuddled up together, watching the screen.
"Hey Loony," a deep voice spoke, which made it difficult to hear.
"Loony?" I questioned, as I laughed. "That's a great nickname."
"Oh, you fought company," the man jumped up out of his seat. Yeah, my hearing was pretty terrible around him. He must have said, 'brought,' not 'fought.' "And I said Loony, not Loony," he corrected me.
Damn, I recalled thinking. I needed to learn to keep my mouth shut. I had no idea what meant. I would just have to ignore it. The situation had to end soon.
"You're not too good with that hearing thing," Remus teased.
I felt my face flush up, as I did not want him to sense that anything was wrong with me. I did not answer, besides a brief chuckle, hoping that someone would save me.
Luckily, the woman came over to greet me at that point and she started to talk. "It's nice to meet you," she stated, in her higher pitched feminine voice. It was much easier to hear what she was saying. "I'm Lily."
"Delia," I placed out my hand to shake hers. As I was doing so, I dimly saw Remus whisper something in James's ear. There was no way that I would be able to interpret the whisper, as I was way too far away.
"Why don't I help you get cleaned up?" Remus soon offered, looking at my wounded legs. He had been kind to offer help walking over, but I refused. In fact, I didn't even feel much of anything from the wounds from earlier. I just wanted to call my father and be on my way home.
"I guess so," I answered. I had to let on that it hurt though. I didn't want too many questions.
"You'll find what you need in mine and James's room upstairs," Lily told Remus.
Remus and I then walked up the stairs, just like Lily instructed. I hesitantly took to the stairs, making sure to watch carefully as I took to each individual stair. With my balance and sight problems, I had a good chance of tumbling to the ground.
Luckily that did not happen. Remus made it to the top of the stairs about a minute ahead of me, but I made it to the top without incident. Remus waited for me like a gentleman, and soon led me to Lily's room.
The room was relatively large as we walked in. It seemed as if it was bigger than what the whole cottage looked like from the outside, but that could have easily been from my distorted vision. "This is nice," I commented.
"Yeah, I haven't even had a chance to look at their room yet," Remus answered. "Here, sit on the bed and I'll be right back."
I obeyed, reaching my hands forward to find the bed. I made sure that Remus was not looking as I did it because he would surely suspect something from it. It just made it easier to find my way.
I did not observe the room too much. All I could look at were the basic necessities. As my vision grew worse and worse I found that staring too intently at details was not worth it. I would become dizzy and disorientated and fight a headache for hours. Even trying to listen too hard to certain sounds made me feel the same way… like listening to deep, monotone voices like James's voice. So instead I kept my eyes focused on the sight of my yellow sandals.
"Alright, I've got antibacterial ointment, Band-Aids, wet towels, and a phone," I suddenly heard as Remus appeared right next to me. I jumped at the sudden voice and close proximity of the man.
Some people say that when you lose a sense, your other senses grow stronger. So for me I should have a stronger sense of smell or something like that. But when Remus came closer all I smelled was sweaty armpits, and that smell wasn't even that strong.
"Is there anything else you need?" Remus then asked.
"I think I'm fine, but one question," I smiled.
"What is it?" he wanted to know.
"How did you pull a phone out of the loo?" I asked. That was obviously where he had been and it just did not make sense. No one kept their phone in the loo.
He laughed at my question. It was not to be taken completely seriously, so I didn't mind. "You're pretty perceptive, aren't you?"
If only he knew.
"I just grabbed it on my way back. You were staring at your toes at that point."
"I see," I answered, giggling slightly.
Remus then pulled closer to me, putting down the ointment, Band-Aids, and towels on the rather large sized bed that I was sitting on. He then handed me the phone and I readily accepted it from his hands. "Why don't you call your parents while I clean you up?"
I wanted to reject. To tell him that I could do it on my own. It was rather odd for a grown man to tend to a relative stranger's wounds. But I couldn't do that. He would watch me. He would see that I had difficulty putting on the ointment and he would grow suspicious. "Okay," I finally answered him.
I took a look at the phone and I waited several seconds until he focused his eyes on cleaning my wounds, before I started to dial the number.
It did not take long for me to connect to my father. And there was evident worry in his tone as soon as I talked to him. "I'm sorry about before," he told me, soon after I told him the directions to Remus's house.
"It was my fault," I honestly told him. "Don't worry about it."
"I'll come over right now," he said before he hung up the phone.
As soon as I put down the phone I felt as Remus applied the cool ointment to my skin, and rubbed it in, trying to make me feel better. I became lost in that feeling for just a moment because touch was something that I could truly feel. But I didn't know much about it… I was relatively inexperienced in the touch of the opposite gender, not related to me. And for some reason my heart started to beat just a little quicker as he touched me.
"Everything okay?" he finally spoke. I jumped up at his words.
"Yeah," I quickly responded, taking my eyes off of him.
"You saw, didn't you?" he then asked. I couldn't tell if I heard him correctly this time. I didn't know what he was talking about.
"I knew this shirt was too easy to see through," he explained, backing away from me. "You saw my scars."
"No," I quickly answered. "I didn't see anything." I really didn't. I probably wouldn't have even seen them if his shirt was off.
"Then why did you jump?" he asked.
"I…," I didn't have a good answer. I jumped because I was startled after realizing what his touch made me feel.
"They're hideous. I know," he said as he took a seat next to me on the bed.
"And what about mine?" I asked. I knew he had to have seen my scars. No one could miss them.
"What are yours from?" he asked, making me feel subconscious. Everything was centered at me for that moment.
"I fought a tiger," I answered quickly. Coming up with answers like those always helped me out. Sarcasm… my fallback.
"Oh really?" he asked as he laughed. "Bengal or Siberian?"
"White," I answered with a smirk. "If you think this was bad, you should have seen him."
"I can only imagine," Remus answered, still smiling. He had a beautiful smile.
"Now what about you? Where are your scars from?" I was curious.
"Wait, I'm not convinced with this tiger thing," he responded. "Now how did it happen? Why did you fight a tiger?"
"I was at the circus," I promptly responded. "They asked for a volunteer. My father raised my hand and they picked me. I went down to the ring and the cart carrying the tiger was passing by. I wasn't even supposed to be involved with the tiger act, but the trainer forgot to lock his door and he got out just as I walked by. It was so quick that I didn't have a chance to react at first, so that's why I got the scars. But as soon as I realized what was going on I gave him a quick punch on the nose. Then I kicked him… you know, right in between his back legs."
"Ouch!" Remus sort of laughed, but squirmed at the same time. I assumed that he had felt that before.
"Now what about you?" I asked.
"I fought a monkey," he quickly stated.
"Oh come on," I laughed. "You can't change just one word of my experience. I went through the humiliation of telling you that and you just mock me?"
"Fine, fine," he said. "A monkey bit me. But I did bite him back."
"Okay, that's a little better," I reasoned. "But let's make it a wolf… like your name."
He seemed to pause for a second as I suggested it, but then he responded, "That works."
"So why did you bite him?" I asked, ready to listen to his story.
"I was outside staring at the full moon one day," he started. "I was in my backyard and I started to walk into the woods. It was a nice night and I just needed to walk, to get my thoughts sorted through. As I was walking, I saw this grayish blur run by. I didn't know what it was, so I kept going. But I soon heard this howling sound and I grew worried. I didn't think there were any wolves in the woods, but I was wrong. Out of no where this creature came by and took a bite of me. My immediate reaction was to bite back, and I did."
"That was your immediate reaction?" I asked. "That seems a little weak."
"It's true," he defended his story. "He bit me, so I bit him. What's wrong with that?"
"I've never heard of someone biting back as an automatic reaction," I told him.
"So you think kicking a tiger in the balls is an automatic thing to do?" he asked. He did have a point.
"I did punch him in the nose first," I recalled. "I had time to think before I kicked."
We both laughed. Our faced were aligned with bright smiles. He was a pretty cool guy. "Can you at least admit that we're both a little bit odd?" he asked.
"You're not odd," I confessed. "You're cute." I quickly covered my mouth with my hand. Did I just say that out loud?
"You are too," he automatically answered. We both looked at each other briefly, trying to interpret the other's thoughts. Did he really think I was cute? Did I like him?
"I…-" I started to mumble, but he didn't let me finish. His lips moved closer to mine and I reluctantly read what he was intending to do. Before I knew it, our lips locked together and his tongue slowly pressed against my lips. I instinctively felt my mouth open, allowing his tongue in. My eyes shut closed and a doorbell suddenly rang, breaking us apart.
"I'm sorry," he immediately said.
"I'm not," I answered, before I even thought about it. My first kiss. If a half kiss counted. I never thought I would get the opportunity, even if it was a little sudden.
"DELIA!" I heard the shouting voice of James interrupting our moment.
"I've got to go," I answered. Way to be obvious, Delia.
"Meet me on the cliff tomorrow," he told me, as I headed for the stairs.
I started to think about his words and I realized that may not be the right thing to do. A relationship was not what I needed. And everything was moving so fast. Did I even really like him? Where did that kiss come from?
But maybe I needed to find out more. "What time?"
"10," he answered.
I walked down the stairs, slow once again, making sure that I did not tumble to the ground. I saw my father in the living room, standing with Lily and James, talking intently with the pair, while I concentrated on one step at a time.
As soon as I reached the bottom step, my father saw me and he ran over to give me a hug. In that hug, I could feel that he was perfectly content with what just happened.