Prompts: (#18) Find a nice secluded place to lie and watch the stars.

Stay With Me

"...I still need love cause I'm just a man. These nights never seem to go to plan. I don't want you to leave, will you hold my hand?"

-Sam Smith, Stay With Me

"I still can't believe you haven't outgrown this," he says in the dark, even as he lays on his back, so too staring at the sky... or rather... the frozen and enchanted representation of it... as it's sketched magnificently through magic on the ceiling of the Astronomy classroom.

At twenty-five... Severus certainly feels that he's outgrown, laying on his back on the ground, staring up at the stars. Though the floor beneath him is heavily carpeted... it's still quite uncomfortable for his still, too-bony back.

But... this is Aurora at her most tranquil... her guard for once lowered... and all the bitterness of yesterdays... all the resentments of their shared past... all the pain that he's caused her... it's only in these moments when she can set it aside. And Severus wouldn't be much of a Slytherin, if he didn't take advantage of that... of these few and spare moments where Aurora is almost like the girl he used to know... his only friend, when there was nothing or no one else.

"Can you ever outgrow your first love?" she asks, and though there is a teasing tone to her voice, there is also that soft melancholy that always seems to come over her on these nights, when he joins her in her star-gazing.

Severus isn't sure how to respond to that. Isn't sure what exactly she's trying to say.

Though he knows her first love, perhaps, has always been the stars, he knows there is more to her words than the obvious statement. She wouldn't be much of a Slytherin if there weren't.

But Severus has never really understood, how it would be possible for anyone to love him.

But then... he can't really doubt Aurora, because he knows even if she tries to hide it, how much he's hurt her. And only the people you love, have the power to hurt you.

And it's staggering... that anyone could love him so much, even through the years and everything he's said and done. That she can love him so much... even through the interval of so many years spent apart... even in spite of the distance... that every day, she still feels the pain so acutely.

He's never deserved it. It was something he's always known... since their friendship blossomed in second year. Since she kissed him at the end of fifth year. Even whilst in the midst of being blindly in love with someone else... he's always known he was undeserving of Aurora Sinistra's regard.

Turning his head, he stares at her profile which is upside down, but still so beautiful. So snowy in it's paleness... serene in the starlight which is all the brighter in her magical classroom.

Splayed around her are the long locks of her slightly curly, long hair. The fragrant, silken strands look so much like spilled, black ink. And Severus can't help inhaling sharply the scent which he is sure he would never tire of. Which he can never resist, wishing to bury his nose in.

No, his mind answers, even as he can't bring his lips to form the monosyllabic word to answer her question. First loves are impossible to forget.

But he doesn't think she really wanted an answer. And when she turns her head, and stares into his eyes with a set as dark as his... he feels like the breath has been punched out of him, at the way they seem to sparkle like the stars above.

"It's getting late," she whispers, her tone quiet and Severus feels his heart squeeze and plummet. Because he knows the message she's conveying...

'It's time for you to leave... I can take no more tonight...'

But Severus doesn't want to go. Can't find the strength in him to push off the floor, and leave. Because even when it hurts... even if they are saying nothing, and merely laying next to each other, staring at the unfathomable darkness above... she's still the only light in his life.

And while he enjoys her barbs... and tolerates her Ice Queen attitude during the day... he's come to live for these nights.

It's selfish to ask for more, when she's always given him so much... but Severus has never denied being selfish.

"And I thought you would never tire of the stars," he says... because he can't bring himself to beg her to let him stay, if only a while longer, even though he knows it would not be enough.

Aurora turns away from him and shuts her eyes, exhaling slowly. He thinks for a moment, she might just set him straight... tell him it was never the stars she'd tire of, but his presence. In fact, if it were day, she would say that.

But her patience... her understanding... her kindness towards him, it never ceases to surprise him.

Raising a hand, she lets it fall in the space between their faces.

"Just a little while longer," she exhales.

And that's another thing he's grateful for. That she never does make him beg.

And though it's like tempting fate... thought he's pushing far past her barrier of comfort... he can't help reaching his own hand up, and tentatively sliding his fingers along her own thin fingers.

Aurora releases a shuddering breath, even as she turns her hand to more easily twist her fingers with his own, her face turning towards their twined fingers. And though her eyes remain shut, she leans forward, her lips resting against the skin on the back of his hand and the moisture on her cheeks, salting his skin.

"I always so, loved your hands," she whispers, even as he clenches his fingers tighter against hers, unable to help the way she can still make his heart skip a beat, and clench, and soar and fall... all simultaneously.

~FIN~

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