Festival of St. Patrick's Day

[marloww]

Tucked back behind Diagon Alley, in a cleared out space near Knockturn, an odd assortment of carnival workers set to putting together the annual St. Patrick's Day Festival. Due to open at 11 o'clock Monday morning, the crew was cutting it close, barely putting on the finishing touches before the gates opened (to which very eager young children-

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[marloww]

It had been a quiet week.

Since everything that had happened at the beer garden and the still insanely painful argument and subsequent, what? break-up? with Seamus, Marlow had all but retreated completely into herself. She'd taken refuge at Zacharias' flat for as long as she could before she had to return to real life, pretending that she wasn't completely at a loss while putting on a show that she was a proper adult, somehow responsible for the young minds at Hogwarts.

If only they knew what a bloody basket case she'd become.

A part of her hadn't expected the note from Dean, somehow convincing herself that he'd just chosen Seamus' side- whatever side there might have been, she didn't really want to think about it that way.

She didn't want to think about it at all.

But, she was here, bundled up in a heavy sweater and a pair of skinny jeans, her favorite Doc Martens laced up as she caught sight of Dean waiting for her. She felt more nervous than she'd like to admit, this feeling something she didn't think she'd ever get used to.

"Hey-" was all she said, her face as pleasant as she could manage given the nerves wracking through her.

[deantom]

Even in this thick of a crowd, it was easy enough to spot Marlow's familiar small stature heading his way - though the nervous hitch to her shoulders and the lack of real enthusiasm on her face as she approached him were decidedly unfamiliar, and he felt another wave of guilt twist up his insides at that hesitant greeting.

Nope. He was definitely not having any of this.

He firmly set down his half-empty glass on the table he had gravitated towards, a firm crease pulling together his eyebrows as he wordlessly raised a hand to motion for her to come forward. He didn't quite give her the chance to react, however, before crossing the remaining distance between them and pulling her into a solid hug.

"Hey yourself-" he quietly spoke against the top of her head, his grip on her not loosening just yet.

[marloww]

Just the warmth and strength of his hold was enough to push a sigh of relief from Marlow's lips. She had lost Seamus (seemingly out of nowhere and the pain inflicted from that conversation was still adding to weight bearing down on her shoulders), she couldn't imagine what it would be like without Dean around. She slowly, timidly, wrapped her arms around his waist, burying her head against his chest as she clung to him. For a moment she let them stay like that, relishing in the idea that maybe not everyone was just bailing before she pulled back.

"I figured you'd want to spent tonight with Sabrina-" she said with an odd shrug of her shoulders.

Maybe if she moved the conversation toward something else, she wouldn't have to explain what had happened after the fight that day or confess to Dean that Seamus had completely given up on her. It still felt too embarrassing and too hurtful to really think about.

Not to mention the way she'd somehow ruined the dynamic between the three of them.

[deantom]

Dean still kept a hand on Marlow's shoulder as she pulled back, watching her with a slight crease settled between his eyebrows.

He felt badly enough about having failed to intervene when it had become clear that whatever turn the conversation between Seamus and Riah was taking was not one whose outcome they wanted to see. Worse still for having left her there all teary-eyed with a bruised up boyfriend and no further explanation.

Never mind the radio silence that had been left hanging in the air since, both Seamus and Marlow awkwardly silent in their own corners. He had strangely started to feel like the torn-up child in the middle of a divorcing couple, both confused and eagerly desperate to assure both parties that he still loved them both equally, as uneasy as this whole mess was making him-

He similarly shrugged a shoulder, offering Marlow a crooked sort of tentative smile.

"I'll catch up with her later. I just- well, I wanted to make sure you were okay?"

He shook his head a bit, his hand sliding down to her elbow and giving it a quick squeeze before pulling away and reaching up to scratch at the back of his neck. There were a lot more apologies lining up for her than he was actually able or willing to account for - checking in to assure her that at the very least he wasn't planning on helping to further damage her new boyfriend's precious commodity of a face or to take the (all things considered, rather understandable, as much as he hated to think of it) step back from her that Seamus, in the midst of his long-time-coming mess of less-than-platonic feelings made messier by this entirely new problem that he would have to avoid bringing up for the sake of it not being his business to share, apparently had.

While he hadn't been the one to get riled up to the point of knocking the words out of his mouth, he couldn't deny that Zacharias's words had decidedly stung and had been lingering in the back of his mind among the rest of the chaos since.

"If there's anything- you know I'm here if you need me, right?"

[marloww]

There had been such a major shift in her demeanor and her emotions in the last few months, her body slowly and surely hinting that it could give up on her at any time. She hadn't always been like this, she knew. And to think about what sparked it precisely only made her head hurt. She hardly wanted to blame the break-up with Riley- that would have made it worse, to think that a man could have such an effect on her.

But the break-up had been more than that and she had to give it the credit it deserved in all of this. Her whole life went upside down and she hadn't had a chance to really catch up to it.

And when she didn't understand what was really going on, it felt impossible to try and relay any of what she was feeling to those around her.

Especially someone like Dean or Seamus or Lavender, the people that knew her the best, the longest. She felt a pressure to always be the same, to let them rely on her instead of the other way around. But she'd failed on that end, too. Obviously something was going on with Seamus and she was clueless, desperate to know what could have made him act the way he did- or why he so abruptly pushed her away. She saw truth in everything he said but she could see a distraction when it was hanging in front of her face. She'd done it herself plenty of times lately.

"I just don't want to be a burden-"

The words came out lamely, remembering the way Seamus had so callously turn her he wanted to get on with his life. She hadn't ever expected he could be so mean.

"Besides there's nothing anyone can do anyway-" she said, fingers wringing at each other. "It's just a dumb thing-"

She glanced up at him, chewing on the inside of her cheek.

"Is he okay?"

[deantom]

"Oy-" he said sharply, his frown deepening a bit more as he watched her wringing hands, took in that noticeable slump in her shoulders and the weary look in her eye that he knew he should have caught so much earlier than he did, should have realized that it was more than a busy schedule that had kept her locked in the castle for weeks at a time since the new year, and it suddenly struck him just how spot on Zacharias's accusations had actually been.

He stepped up to her again, loosely gripping her shoulders and firmly glaring down at her. "You are not, have never been, and could never possibly a burden, okay?" he told her, feeling guiltier than ever at the thought that she would for even one second think that she was anything less than family, someone whose problems he would always gladly take on as his own were he able to.

"Seamus is fine. He's just- working through a few things, I guess." That was vague enough, but not necessarily a lie, right? "Did um- did you talk to him since that whole...thing?"

[marloww]

"Yeah-"

She couldn't look back up at him, her eyes darting toward the dirt beneath their feet. They had all been best friends since they were eleven years old. Since the Sorting Hat pushed them together. And now, for the first time since then, there was a rift and a pretty major one at that. The small group they'd formed had somehow fallen apart. And she felt responsible for it.

"We're um-" she sucked in a slight breath, her chest tightening. "We're not speaking right now-"

That was a nice enough way to put it, right?

"Look- I am so sorry for what Riah said- he's sorry too, he's going to apologize the next time he sees you, though at this point I don't know when that should be-"

She lifted her gaze to meet his meekly.

"I know you don't like him, and I'm sure you agree with everything Seamus said to me the other night but I just- you know, don't tell me, alright? Seamus made it clear enough how he feels and I'd just rather not do that again-"

[deantom]

He wasn't sure what he had been expecting to happen, how he had thought Seamus's decision to put some space between in and Marlow for the sake of his own sanity in the face of already complicated feelings being further complicated by new boyfriends and new, well, circumstances would be put across or received.

He certainly hadn't been prepared for this level of devastation on Marlow's face or the meekness with which she had approached him in the first place.

However Seamus had gone about pushing (or violently shoving, it seemed) her away, he had apparently done it with all the subtlety and grace of an Irish farm boy.

Figures.

"Look, whatever Seamus said- I mean, sure, the guy's not my favorite. But if he makes you happy and treats you properly, then, well, what the hell does it matter what I think?" he shrugged. "You don't have anything to be sorry for. He may've had a point-"

[marloww]

"Dean-"

The last thing she wanted was for anyone to feel responsible in any way for the how she had been feeling. It wasn't even in her own control, it certainly didn't lie with him or Seamus or anyone else.

"I hid out for a reason-" she told him as her brow furrowed, realizing that maybe this was the first time she'd ever really talked about it in this way. "I didn't want to see anyone-"

She paused.

"I didn't want anyone to see me-"

She raked her fingers through her hair, the anxiety bubbling beneath the surface of her skin stinging. It was an exhausting feeling, carrying this weight around, wondering when it was going to find its end. Talking about it couldn't make it any worse, right?

"I haven't been...well-" she admitted, finally, her skin growing warm as she spoke. "And it's like everything- every bloody thing-is a massive chore- and I've been the one keeping my distance because I haven't been able to stomach anyone seeing me like this-"

She held her arms out in a sort of surrender.

"That's not on you or Seamus or Riah- that's on me-"

[deantom]

He could only imagine that it wasn't exactly helping, the way his face fell into a more pronounced frown, worry and guilt and an uncertain sort of understanding mixing into a single concerned expression and creeping all too obviously into his features as he watched her stumble over her words, try to explain something that was all but inexplicable.

As senseless as that reasoning was, it did, in that most heartwrenching sort of way, make perfect sense.

There had been a lingering period of time, after the battle at Hogwarts when things were falling back into place and everything was expected to go back to normal, that he had essentially felt much the same way. The majority of his classmates, his friends, had graduated, the younger generations had resumed classes, people had gone back to work, back to their families, back to their lives - and he had been left in a sort of limbo with little more than a jumble of memories, each more nagging and painful than the next, hardly anyone left alive who could reminisce with any kind of understanding. He had made it a point of avoiding crowds and parties and reunions for a while, the lingering effects of being made to believe that his kind, Muggle-born and Muggle-raised, had no place in the wizarding world trailing after him for over a year before he had finally been smack-talked (by his mother, mostly) into getting his act together.

So while he wouldn't dare to claim he understood, there was a familiarity about the struggle she was describing that struck him that much deeper.

"'Low- fucking hell-" he sighed, throwing another flickering, hesitant glance at her before giving it up and stepping in to pull her into another hug. Partly due to a lack of anything helpful to say, and partly because he couldn't stand to see that look on her face knowing that he had no power to make it go away.

[marloww]

"No- it's alright-" she said, though she hardly fought against his embrace. It felt good for Marlow to express, no matter how poorly or haphazardly, what she had been feeling, why everything seemed to be weighing her down. There was a slight weight easing off her shoulders, though, perhaps it helped that Dean was holding her so tightly. "I've sort of just let it consume me and it's affected so much-"

She sucked in a breath, shaking her head against his chest.

"It's fucked a lot of things up-" she told him, embarrassment over her failures tinging the back of her neck. "I'm not okay but I'm not dead- I can't just-"

She hesitated.

"I'm gonna figure it out-"

She had to. In what way, she wasn't sure, but there was a list of therapists sitting on her desk, scribbles surrounding the names as she contemplated reaching out to them. It might have been weeks since her mother's suggestion but she'd get around to it, maybe. It all seemed so overwhelming.

[deantom]

Dean pulled back just long enough to be able to catch her eye, a hint of a smile pulling at his lips in as comforting a way as he could manage.

"Yeah, you will," he nodded, giving her shoulder a quick squeeze. "You always do, right?"

As much as they had gone through in their short eventful lives, the circumstances had always been beyond their control. Outer forces acting upon them in ways so irrepressible that at least they had had no semblance of impression that there was anything to be done about it. When your own mind became the enemy, it came with a whole different kind of helplessness that only managed to feed the problem.

"Have you thought about- y'know, talking to someone?"

[marloww]

"Kind of the thing I'd been trying to avoid-"

Marlow wasn't typically one to talk about her feelings in a way beyond strange humor or passing sarcasm. It was easy to push beyond the bad when a particularly good pun was dangling right in front of her. It was a good distraction (though whether it was to keep herself preoccupied or those around her, she wasn't sure).

"But I think it's the only thing left," she admitted. "I'm working on it, anyway, there's a list and everything-"

She laughed, then, feeling a little silly about the whole thing.

"I'm sorry I didn't say anything-"