Disclaimer: Sorry, forgot for the last chapter - this one's for both. I own none of JK Rowling's characters, or her world.
A/N: Please note: Rating has changed! There's nothing very explicit, but I thought I'd be safe. And I only got one review for the last chapter, I'd quite like a few more please!
Three years later…
He clenched his fists so hard he could feel his nails digging into his palms, and those small shoots of pain gave his anger a channel and stopped him from doing all the things he wanted to do. Slap her, shake her, throw her across the room. Rip that stupid little dress off and fuck her until the only thing she could remember was his name.
No. Not the last one. Control, Teddy.
She was standing in front of him, cheeks flushed, eyes angry, breathing heavy. Waiting for him to answer. Waiting for him to start shouting again, so that she could shout back. Waiting for the outpouring of cruel words; the vitriol that came spilling out and left him with a foul taste in his mouth. The words that slashed and hurt and burned.
"Why?" she had demanded, "Why can't you ever just be happy for me? Why does this always have to be about you? This is nothing to do with you, Teddy. You have nothing to do with the decisions I make in my life.
"What is it, are you jealous? That's it, isn't it? You're jealous, because I'm getting on and living my life, and because my life is a success, and I am happy! Whereas yours is going nowhere; you're just stuck, like some pathetic loser, just like you'll always be…"
And the words had been so unfair that they'd taken his breath away, and he had snarled back, even though he hadn't meant to. Hadn't meant to get into this terrible, agonising cycle again.
"Oh, yeah, success. Success, Victoire Weasley style. Getting ahead and making money; never mind your family. Never mind your friends. You're okay, so what do the rest of us poor pathetic losers matter? How many people did you have to suck off to wangle this one, Victoire…?"
That was as far as he had got.
He could still feel the sting of the blow she had – yet again – landed on his face. He had lost track of the number of times she had hit him, over the years. She had a strong right arm, and she didn't hold back. His face hurt.
But he couldn't hit her back. Because she was Victoire. She was still the little girl who had tagged along after him, with those reproachful blue eyes. She was still the teenage girl who had always been the strongest, most stubborn person he had ever known, but who had suddenly become something vulnerable when he had found her sitting on a staircase, sobbing her heart out.
Sobbing her heart out for him.
It had been a week before the Easter holidays. A week after the day he had kissed her outside the Portrait Hole.
The second kiss had been a mistake. Well, the first one hadn't been the cleverest idea either, but the second one… all he could think of was that he had gone temporarily insane. What sort of person kisses somebody, and then, when they hit him for it, grabs them and physically forces them to do it again?
He had tried not to answer that question for himself.
The second kiss had lasted only a few shocked seconds before she had realised what was happening, wrenched herself away, and hit him again, a resounding slap in the silence. And that had been the moment when they had discovered that Kathy Dimont had followed him out of the Common Room and had seen the last few seconds of the incident.
She hadn't been impressed. Teddy had found himself without a girlfriend after that and, unfairly, part of his mind blamed Victoire.
Who had gone on as normal. As if nothing had happened. Because, after all, she was Victoire Weasley. The girl who had been out with two successive Quidditch Captains. The beautiful, hot-tempered, determined, clever, stubborn, strong Victoire Weasley.
The only thing that was not normal was that she had seemed to have stopped following Teddy around for good.
All those years, while she had been the Gryffindor Ice Queen to everybody else, to Teddy Lupin she had been little Victoire; the toddler who had broken his toys; the child who had spoiled his games; the first year Shadow who had embarrassed him in front of his friends. She had had a special smile for Teddy.
But now she had looked at him with the same distant expression she kept for… well, for people she didn't like very much. And Teddy had thought he'd lost his Shadow for good, and the knowledge had hurt far more than he had wanted to admit.
Until the day he had found her crying on the stairs, and the weeks of coldness had faded away, and she was just little Vic again, and, without thinking, only knowing that something bad must have happened, he had sat down on the step beside her.
"Vic?" he had said, in concern, completely forgetting that they were not speaking, "Are you okay?"
She had looked up at him, and the raw emotion in her eyes had made him flinch back.
"Oh, yes," she had snarled, "Yes, I'm just fine, Teddy. Ab…ab…solutely… fucking fine…"
"Merlin, Vic, what's happened?" there had been a note of panic in his voice. He knew how to deal with Stubborn Shadow Victoire, and with Angry Victoire (at least, he pretended to himself that he did) but Crying Victoire seemed out of his league. But something stopped him being able to simply walk away.
He had never been able to walk away from Victoire; she had a tendency to follow him.
"Why the fuck should I tell you, Lupin?" her voice had come out sounding cold and harsh, and he had flinched at the use of his surname.
"Why are you being like this with me, Vic?" he had asked quietly.
"Why?" she had looked incredulously at him through her tears, "Why am I being like this? Well, let's just recap, shall we? Remember last week, when you assaulted me outside the Portrait Hole…?"
"You weren't speaking to me for weeks before that!" he had burst out, choosing to ignore the words she had used (had he really assaulted her?), "What's going on, Victoire? Why can't you just tell me? And why are you crying? Is it something to do with Venables?"
"Oh, God," she buried her face in her knees, "Oh, God, Teddy, don't you get it?" she looked up, and the tears were streaming down her face again, "It's not Venables. It's never been fucking Venables. It's you, Teddy. You. I know it's stupid and twisted and hopeless. But you're the only one…You can't say you never knew! I'm pathetic. Tell me I'm pathetic. Tell me I'm a stupid, obsessed little girl. I know it's what you'll be thinking. But I can't help it.
"It's you, Teddy. And it always has been."
"I…" he had stared at her, open-mouthed, "I… you… this is about me?"
"Got it, have you? I can't believe you never knew. Merlin, boys are so fucking blind! Oh, just go away, Teddy. You messed with my head enough with what you did last week. I don't need more of your mind games. You can't help me, so just go away."
He could have done as she said. He could have got up and walked away. Because that would have been the easy thing to do. Ignore it. Forget it. Don't even go there.
But you're a Gryffindor, his treacherous mind told him. What happened to Gryffindor courage? So he stayed where he was and screwed that courage up.
"No."
"No… what?"
"No, I'm not going to go away. This isn't going to go away, is it? And whatever crazy thing made me kiss you last week… that isn't going to go away either, Victoire."
And with that, he was in over his head.
But he couldn't hit her. He had never been able to hit her, no matter how many times she hurt him. And he didn't want to start shouting again; his voice hurt, and his head hurt and his cheek hurt, and he couldn't stand it any more. So he did the next best thing and kissed her.
She kissed him back, her muscles tense, her body hard and her lips harsh and demanding. She hadn't forgiven him, but as long as they were doing this, they couldn't be talking. Or shouting. And he wanted her. He always wanted her.
He was vaguely aware that his hair had changed colour, the way it always did when he was turned on. It had been very embarrassing as a teenager (although very few people had worked out what it meant), but he had it under control these days.
Except when it came to Victoire. Then there was no control. And her nails digging into the back of his neck and her teeth biting his lips hard enough to draw blood only scattered that last bit of control he had. So they poured all their frustration and fury into a kiss, just as they always did. A blazing, urgent, ugly, hurtful kiss; the kind they were best at.
Then he ripped the stupid dress off and proceeded to fulfil the last and most stupid of his desires.
And the words finally came flooding out; the angry, hurtful words; only they had both lost the ability to think of proper arguments (had they ever had that ability?) and all that came out were viciously gasped insults and declarations of hate. And then, finally, there was not even that, only each other's names spat out until they came together in an everlasting moment of white hot fire.
Her fingers were in his hair; not fierce and painful any more, but languid and… possessive.
"I always know when you're about to finish," she said lazily, as though she reveled in the slight power this gave her, "Your hair changes colour."
He lifted his head and looked at her incredulously. Then he laughed, long and hard. Because it was at moments like this, when she said this like that, that he remembered why he was with Victoire Weasley.
"How come you never told me that before?" he asked eventually, when he had stopped laughing.
"You didn't know?" she smiled delightedly.
He shook his head.
"I'm not usually looking in a mirror. What colour do I go?"
He lifted a chunk away from his head and squinted at it, but it seemed to be its default dark turquoise.
She shook her head, smirking at him.
"It's changed back now. But it varies. Today it was orange. And then there's your eyes. They're not always such a give away, because they're quite often closed, but today they went a sort of electric blue. That seems to be your 'angry' colour."
There was silence for a moment, then:
"Are we still angry?" he mumbled.
He realised as he said it that it was a bad time to remind her, what with the position they were in. She frowned, and her fingers tightened in his hair. He winced.
"Well, that depends," she replied coldly, "D'you fancy apologising for suggesting that I need to give away sexual favours in order to get promoted?"
He wanted to ask her whether she intended to apologise for calling him a pathetic loser, but decided that he was in the weaker position at the moment. Also, if he was honest with himself, he knew that what he had said was worse than what she had.
So he apologised. He did it quite nicely, he thought, considering that her fingers were still twisted painfully around his hair. But that wasn't really the point.
They always apologised. Well, they usually did, in the end. But it didn't take away the words that had been spoken. It didn't wipe away the memories. And it didn't stop it happening all over again next time. So apologies meant nothing, really, and they both knew it.
But she released his hair, and rolled away from him with a sigh.
"I'm going out tonight."
"Oh," he tried to sound nonchalant, "Who with?"
"Merlin, Teddy, why do you have to know every minute detail of my life?" she snapped, standing up, and grabbing a towel, "I'm going for a shower."
"What? Oh, for goodness' sake, Vic, I didn't mean… Victoire, I was just… taking an interest," he finished quietly to the closed door, "Fuck."
He was such a bastard, she thought, her hands shaking slightly as she re-stoked the anger that had begun to die. Nobody but Teddy could say disgusting, cruel things like that to her.
And nobody but Teddy could possibly get to her like that, whatever they said.
If only he wasn't so bloody attractive, she thought sourly, as she stepped into the shower. If only he wasn't so tall, with sturdy shoulders and muscles toned by the physical work he loved. If only he didn't have that quirky smile and the eyes that were so deep you could get lost in them, whatever colour they happened to be. If only he didn't have that stupidly sexy ability to change his hair colour and style (and that even sexier tendency to change it by accident on occasions). If only he wasn't always able to make her laugh, and cry, and lose it, like nobody else could.
If only he wasn't Teddy Lupin.
She had vivid red finger-marks and the beginnings of bruises on her upper arms and hips, she realised with a sigh. She would have to wear something with sleeves tonight. But then, she thought with a slow smile, he had eight long, deep scratches down his back, and a rather obvious bite mark on his collar bone, which should be interesting next time he wanted to strip off his shirt at work.
Work. Her lip curled slightly. For Teddy, there was 'work' and 'work.' There were the jobs he loved, when he was out there somewhere getting filthy and sweaty out of doors. Then there was the sort of job he actually got paid for, which he didn't seem particularly interested in. He could have done anything, with the NEWTs he had, but he didn't. Instead, he got stupid temporary jobs in bars so that he could carry on going and 'helping out' with the things he enjoyed, and he never held down the same one for more than six months.
No wonder he was resentful that she was getting ahead. They more or less lived on what she was bringing in.
He talked about teaching; it was the only sensible career he seemed remotely interested in. But he insisted that he would never teach at Hogwarts until all the kids he saw as small siblings and cousins had left. Victoire could understand that, to be honest. At least, she could understand why he would want to wait until Jamie, Louis and Rose had left. They would make his life hell. But that wouldn't be for a few years yet. And even longer if he really planned on waiting until all her cousins had finished. Lily and Hugo had only started this year, and Lucy was two years behind them.
Sometimes, on the rare occasions when he was being kind and patient, she thought he would make quite a good teacher. But then she imagined the Teddy she had seen - messed up, angry and not even remotely in control of himself - in charge of a class of teenagers, and she wanted to laugh hysterically.
There had been a time when it had almost been perfect. That first summer, at the end of her fifth year, when Teddy had come to Shell Cottage with the Potters. The stolen moments, always bathed in sunlight in her memories. The illicit thrill of hiding it from everyone had only added to the pleasure. The slight touch of his hand under the table. The quick, secret kisses when nobody was looking. The times they escaped for a while and went for long wanders along the cliff tops, wind in their hair, and gulls wheeling overhead.
The tense days at school, when neither of them had quite known what to say to the other for fear of sparking another explosion, and Kathy Dimont and Matt Venables had always been in the background, had been behind them. What people were saying about them no longer mattered. And Victoire had looked at Teddy and felt the old swelling in her heart that she had felt before he started going out with Kathy, only instead of being accompanied by an ache of disappointment, it was a bubble of pure happiness. And she had honestly thought that this was the beginning of something beautiful; all her dreams and fairytale endings coming true.
At one point, she had said to him: "You're not going to be at Hogwarts next year,"
"No," he had agreed, smiling that crooked smile that made her insides melt, "I think that's probably a good thing, don't you?"
She had drawn a breath, the hurt evident in her eyes.
"After all," he had continued, "James and Louis are starting next year. You know what those two are like. Fred might not have noticed, but I would give Jamie and Louis about a week before they figured it out."
And Victoire, thinking about Louis, who was her little brother, and Jamie, who was both her cousin and practically Teddy's little brother, had had to agree. They had not needed to discuss the option of telling the family. They knew, without talking about it, that they were not ready for that yet.
She should have known. That should have told her something; that they had to keep it a secret, as though it was something dirty and shameful. The fact that they were 'together,' for the whole of her sixth year, and the summer at the end of it, without ever making it official enough to tell anyone except Dominique.
And then, of course, had come the ridiculous incident at the beginning of her Seventh Year, which had made all their secrecy rather redundant.
"I'm coming to see you off," he had said cheerfully.
"Don't be stupid," she had replied, wide-eyed, "Half the family'll be there."
"I don't care," he had said, "We'll be discreet. I'll hide from them. Your parents'll just drop you and go; none of you are first years. And they'll all be too busy talking to each other anyway. You can easily sneak away. They'll never notice me in the crowd, and if they do, I'll pretend I came to see Al and Rosie off, for their first time. Al's practically my little brother anyway; he'd be dead excited if I came to see him."
At first, she had thought it might actually be as simple and easy as that, and a small part of her had been almost disappointed, she realised now. Had she really been hoping that somebody would see them? Had there been some part of her that wanted an end to the deception; that wanted a real relationship; official and above board? Yes, there had. In those days, she was still an innocent girl with romantic dreams of a perfect life.
As Teddy had said, her parents had simply dropped them at the station and left. Bill and Fleur Weasley had always encouraged independence in their children, and anyway, Victoire and Dominique were now in their seventh and fifth years respectively, and did not need to be 'seen off.' Louis might be only a second year, but he certainly did not appreciate cosseting; he had always been able to look after himself. And the other two had disappeared as soon as they got onto the platform, in search of their own friends. Victoire had located Teddy, who had been hovering casually at the back of the crowd, well away from the place where the rest of the Potter/Weasley clan were congregating, his hair for once toned down from its bright colours in an attempt to blend in. And her heart had thudded in her chest, and she had wondered if she might call Teddy her proper boyfriend now.
"I'm going to miss you," he had murmured, leaning his forehead against hers, and she had smiled slightly; they had hardly spent much time together, even over the summer, but it was a nice thing to say.
"Me too," she had whispered.
"I might come and visit you. Let me know when the first Hogsmeade Weekend is."
"Teddy! You can't! What if someone saw you?"
"I am allowed to be in Hogsmeade, you know," he had sounded amused.
"I know. But…"
He had cut off her words with his mouth, pressing his lips to hers. She had responded eagerly, drinking him in, wishing that this could last forever…
"OI!" A small and all-too-familiar voice had broken in on them. Teddy had groaned against her mouth, and pulled away.
Victoire had turned round, a feeling of panic creeping in on her, to face the small brown-haired boy, who had been staring at them with a mixture of astonishment, incredulity and indignation. Victoire had felt her lips twitch in amusement, despite everything, at his expression.
"Do me a favour, yeah, Jamie?" Teddy had said with resignation, "Piss off."
"But… but what are you doing?" the small boy had demanded, confusion in his voice.
Victoire had rolled her eyes.
"What does it look like we're doing, Jamie? Even you aren't that thick."
"But I didn't even know Teddy was here. How come you're here, Ted? And how come you never came to say hello?" his voice had risen in indignation.
"I just… came to see Victoire off," Teddy had said calmly, "I'm going to come and see you lot in a minute. But James…" he had glanced at Victoire, then back at the Second Year, "Er… could you maybe keep this to yourself? No need to mention it to anyone, right?"
James Potter had given them one last, incredulous stare, and disappeared into the crowd. Teddy had looked down at their entwined fingers, running his thumb over the back of her hand.
"I'd better go and see them."
"What are you going to tell them?" she had said worriedly.
"That I came to see Al and Rosie off. No need to mention you. And I'll grab Jamie and offer him some sort of bribe to keep his mouth shut."
She had giggled slightly, swallowing that tiny sliver of disappointment that he was still going to lie.
"Trust Jamie to catch us. You know how you said you'd have given it a week if we'd both still been at school…"
"Maybe twenty four hours," he had said with a chuckle, and kissed her again, "Now I really should go, before I'm too late to catch James."
Only he had been too late, because James couldn't keep his mouth shut to save his life, and he had gone straight back and blurted it out to his whole family. The adults had all been wearing knowing grins when Teddy had turned up and innocently fed them the story he had prepared, and Lily had demanded to know whether he and Victoire were getting married.
After that, the cat had been well and truly out of the bag. James and Louis had not passed up a chance to tease her all year, despite the fact that she was Head Girl, and the story had spread round the whole family. Everybody had seemed to assume that they were properly going out, instead of that they had just shared a few kisses. They had never even been on a date. At Christmas, she had found herself being interrogated by both of her parents, and Dominique, obviously feeling that discretion was now redundant, had exclaimed:
"But it's not like he's her first boyfriend!"
That hadn't exactly helped matters.
She suspected that Teddy might have undergone a similar interrogation from Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny (who doubtless then shared notes with her parents), and he had reacted badly to the pressure. He had backed off from the relationship (not that it had ever been particularly full-on) and Victoire had found herself desperately trying to hold on to him and not to let him drift away. He hadn't liked that either, and that was when the arguments had started.
But although there had been arguments, there had been good times too, and although the arguments had been vicious and left a bitter taste in her mouth, they hadn't been the agonising, hate-filled things they were now; they had just been the outpourings of two frustrated teenagers.
And the good times had made up for them. Teddy had kept his promise and come to meet her on the first Hogsmeade Weekend, and things had been better than they ever had been. For the first time, she had felt like his equal, not like some little girl. They had laughed and talked and lost themselves in each other's company.
Later, talking to Tamsyn, she had worried that it had been too good to be true; that she was reading too much into it. Tamsyn had laughed.
"Reading too much into it? You've got him whipped, Vic."
"You think so?" Victoire had asked anxiously.
Tamsyn had raised her eyebrows.
"Erm… yeah… you didn't even notice?"
"Notice what?" Victoire's voice had held a note of panic.
Tamsyn had grinned broadly.
"I can't believe you Vic. I know you say you're so used to his hair being different colours that you don't even notice what colour it is any more… but still…"
"What? What are you talking about? His hair was just turquoise this afternoon, wasn't it?"
"It might have been at the beginning And maybe by the time you said goodbye, it was back to normal. But when I saw you in the Hog's Head…" she leaned in, smirking, as though about to tell Victoire a fascinating secret, "it was… sort of red. And I don't mean that Gryffindor red he used to use in his fifth year. I mean Weasley red. It was exactly the same colour as yours…"
That had been a beautiful moment.
His letters had taken on a new tone. Before, during her sixth year, they had been flippant and chatty and funny; the sort of letters you'd write to any close friend. But that autumn term, they had become deeper. They were – and who'd have thought it of down-to-earth Teddy Lupin? – love letters. And sometimes, there was the odd sentence in them that made her face catch fire and her breath catch, and she had wondered what it would be like to do the things he… hinted that he'd like to do with her.
She had kept them all, tucked at the back of her drawer.
She still had them, actually. Stupid and sentimental of her. Perhaps there was still something of the old Victoire in her after all. Some little remainder of the teenage girl who had dared to dream of perfect romance.
She would get rid of them some time.
She turned the shower off and emerged into the steam-filled bathroom, wrapping herself in the towel. She wiped the mirror clear, and stared at the familiar face in it. It still looked like the old Victoire, except that the hair was much shorter and the eyes older. She had cut her hair a few weeks ago because Teddy had said he liked it long, and then they had an argument, and it had seemed like a good way to hurt him.
She had overreacted. She had overreacted then, and she had overreacted now. It hadn't been unreasonable for him to ask who she was going out with. And really… she quite liked the idea that he might be a little jealous of whoever she was spending the evening with. It was quite sweet really. She was still angry with him, but perhaps he deserved a little forgiveness. Just a little. She opened the bathroom door, intending, not to make up with him exactly, but to tell him that she was only meeting Tamsyn for a few drinks.
He had gone.