(A/N): We're back with Elaine, Lily, and now the boys. Basically, Lily tries to make Elaine feel better by taking her to the boys' dorm/the boys, and conversation happens. This chapter reads kind of choppily (especially the first two paragraphs), but I can't seem to fix it, no matter how hard I try.

Trigger Warnings: Brief references to child abuse and depression/self-harm (Elaine briefly mentions the nightmares she has about her father, not the reason behind them, but still, I thought I'd tag it, and she mentions being worried about Leo lately, and him being 'miserable', which again, nothing direct, but I thought it was safer to tag it.) References to the nightmare that Elaine doesn't realise was shared, just yet. Elaine also briefly references her theory that Jerremyah is doing something to make Leo like him ('if it's real-'), which isn't true, but still, it's mentioned.

Elaine

Before Lily and I left the girls' dorm, I tucked the letter into my bag, wanting to keep it close at hand in case I had the opportunity to show it off to the boys. The second Lily's feet hit the bottom of one set of stairs, she immediately pivoted and started heading up the other one- the one leading to the boys' dorm- and despite my surprise, I followed her without even really thinking about it. "Lily-" I tried to get her to stop- to ask her what she was doing and why- but she was far too determined to be distracted by something like my confusion, and by the time I caught up to her, she was waiting for a response to her knock.

When she saw the bewildered look I was shooting her, she merely shrugged and said, "What? It's important." That was news to me- if I'd known she had something she needed to talk to them about, I would've rushed through my shower a little more. There was a call to come in that I'm pretty sure came from Peter, and when Lily pushed the door open, I followed her in; I tried to keep my eyes as far away from Leo's bed as possible, but as soon as we entered the room and I took stock of where the boys were, I knew for absolute certain he wasn't here. That he hadn't been anywhere near here for quite a while, either.

"Lillian," James acknowledged her brightly, and I filed her faint blush away in order to be able to return her inevitable teasing, later. "What brings you here so early, this fine morning?" I'd quite like to know that, as well.

Lily turned to me, and I thought she was going to let me in on some secret, but after a second, she simply sighed heavily and brought a hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose. "Elaine!" She whined, which didn't make sense in the slightest. Had I missed something obvious with Mary, Alice, and Marlene? "If you don't want to talk about it, I understand, but I thought- even if you don't want to address it, maybe being here would let you see that-" She cut herself off, her eyes flicking to Leo's bed pointedly, and I blinked.

"This- this is about my nightmare?" Her eyes crinkled like she wanted to roll them at me but couldn't because she'd feel awful about it, and I heard a thump from behind me as Sirius dropped the shoe he'd been about to put on.

"You had a nightmare?!" He practically yelped, instantly jumping to his feet and taking a single step toward me, before seeming to reconsider- probably realising that his proximity might not be all that welcome, at the moment.

Their blatant concern was touching, even if it also happened to be absolutely mortifying, but that wasn't their fault, so I did my best to push past it- and Sirius wasn't the only one edging closer to me. "Is that why you smell... like that?" Remus asked surprisingly timidly, and I felt my eyebrows furrow.

"I- I don't think so? I mean, I showered, so maybe it's my shampoo?" By the look on his face, it obviously wasn't my shampoo- or any other hygiene product. "Why? What do I smell like?" His nose scrunched up, and suddenly, I wasn't so sure I wanted to know the answer.

"You... smell like a lot of things," He said cryptically, but when I gave him my best pointed glare, he sighed, and added, "You simultaneously smell like terror, and joy. It-" He faltered slightly, then flushed and sent me an apologetic look, which I was only confused about until he continued. "It's the smell you have whenever you and Leo are... getting along particularly well." He was purposefully vague, but even if he hadn't said it in front of everyone else, knowing that he could sniff that sort of thing out was still incredibly embarrassing. "The joy, not the... not the fear." I was pretty sure that much was obvious at this point, but I appreciated the clarification anyway, if only for the benefit of the others.

I sighed heavily, and chose not to address anything he'd just said- at least not directly. Leo had mentioned something in his letter about the other vampires being able to smell his emotions- I couldn't exactly interrogate Remus about that in front of Lily, but I could possibly get some of the information I needed by dancing around the subject. "Can you always smell emotions? Or is it just that it's getting close to the full moon again?" We'd always known that the next full moon would come before the end of Christmas Holidays, but the closer it got, the more worried I felt. Not only would we have to operate without Leo, but it would be my first full moon after freezing, and Sirius and Remus were still... not on the best terms. How that would affect things, I guess only time would tell.

"I mean..." His face screwed up momentarily. "Really, really strong emotions, yeah, I can get at least a hint of them at all times- but by that point, it's usually visible on your- the person's- face. Closer to the full moon, it's easier, and in that sweet spot- three days out, I can smell most emotions pretty readily. Nothing extreme, though." Nothing compared to Leo, he meant- which just ensured I'd have to talk to Leo himself about it, when he got back.

"I did have a nightmare," I confirmed, changing the subject, and Remus's brows sunk under the weight of his concern. "A really bad one." It was an understatement, but they all still looked surprised by it- except Lily, that is.

"'Really bad'? Elaine, you were crying, and screaming Leo's name- that's more than just 'really bad'!" I didn't necessarily disagree, but in the grand scheme of things, among the other dreams I'd had in my life, it wasn't leagues ahead of them in terms of awfulness. If I'd had a worse dream, I couldn't name it off the top of my head, but there were definitely several in close competition with each other- namely the one I'd had about Remus's wolf form attacking my mother and me, the one I'd had about Leo 'draining me dry' after the spharmus incident, and the countless number involving my father.

I crossed my arms over my chest in an attempt to rid myself of that vulnerable feeling I was experiencing, and shrugged tersely. "Yes, well... I have a very vivid subconscious, and it tends to like to hit me when I'm down. I guess I've just been so worried about Leo recently that it bled into my dreams." They didn't even try to hide the concerned look they all shared. "Look, it... it was a very weird dream, and I don't particularly want to talk about it. What I do want to talk about, however, is the letter that cheered me up, right after that." They all perked up at that- and even more so, when I pulled said letter out of my bag.

"Oh, she came prepared!" Sirius crowed in delight, and I couldn't help but flush slightly.

"I think she just likes to keep it with her at all times," Lily said, and I would've thought it was a joke if she didn't say it with such fondness. "Like a good luck charm- or better yet, a good love charm." That was a joke, but I let it slide anyway- which surely had nothing to do with the way my eyes snagged on the little love hearts Leo had drawn.

I handed the letter off to James, and I was briefly surprised by the extreme care with which he handled it- until I remembered what I'd said about it having cheered me up after my nightmare, and realised that he was probably being so gentle with it because he knew it was exceptionally precious to me. Sirius and Peter were both crowded around him before he could even fully unfold the parchment, Sirius over one shoulder and Peter peeking around his other arm, but Remus seemed content to wait his turn- or to be the designated Elaine-watcher, for the time being. "He's been quite..." There weren't words for what Leo had been, recently. "Well, I think you can see, by the letter. I don't know how he's doing- not really- but he seems... he seems like he's doing well. Like he's happy." I hesitated, and Remus, of course, saw it.

"Then why is your face like that?" Lily was already watching me, but James, Sirius, and Peter looked up from the letter at that, and I winced.

"It's not- I just- I don't want to be suspicious, because I want Leo to be happy, I do, but... if it's real- if he's really so much happier now, at home, then..." I was reluctant to say it out loud, but by now, I knew I couldn't back out of voicing what was probably only a product of my anxiety-fueled thought process; they were waiting for me to continue, so I put my reluctance aside, and asked the question I knew they had no hope of answering. "Is it us? This place? Is being here, around us-" Around humans. "-what's making him so miserable?"

(A/N): Elaine: 'Why is Leo so sad? Is it us? Is it humans in general? Are we making him worse, just by existing in the same space as him?'

Leo 'my dad's dead, and I refuse to deal with it' Ellwood: 'I have no idea why I'm sad... maybe it's something fundamentally wrong with me? Maybe I'm broken, and always have been?'

Lisbet: 'I hate puzzles, but I swear to God, I will put you back together piece by piece if I have to.'

Jerremyah: '...I'll get the glue ready.'