tulips
Title: tulips
Pairing(s): Luna/Zacharias
Rating: G
Word Count: 512
Summary: Luna isn’t so strange that she can’t understand why Zacharias Smith and his father (no mother or wife) are moving into the big house across the way from her own. No, she understands it perfectly.
Notes: Written for the 100quills challenge, pairing picked: Luna/Zacharias. Prompt: start over. Also, this is a little prologue to the time-frame (summer in Ottery St. Catchpole) that most of the pieces in this series take place in.
Luna isn’t so strange that she can’t understand why Zacharias Smith and his father (no mother or wife) are moving into the big house across the way from her own. She’s not so odd that she doesn’t fathom to the facts of wanting to begin anew, and she’s not so vague that she can’t tell Ginny Weasley exactly who is moving into town and why.
“You remember Zacharias Smith, don’t you,” Luna says serenely, pouring another cup of tea for Ginny, whose face has suddenly contorted into a look of profound disgust.
“You’re not serious! That old prat? What is he doing here?” Ginny pours half the sugar bowl into her tea and noisily gulps it, as if trying to block out the noise of the movers and the sound of her mother baking a cake for the newly arrived.
“I’m sure he used to have a mother,” is all Luna says wistfully, looking out of the window into the meadow that separates the two houses, and Ginny doesn’t know what she’s talking about but that’s alright, really: not everyone needs to know.
When Luna arrives home she makes a pitcher of lemonade and sets it on the counter for her father to see and the cat to miss (it’s too high up). She takes a glass of what she’s made, shoos the cat upstairs, and goes outside onto her rickety front porch.
The movers, it seems, have already left the house to Mr. Smith and his son, who are trying to plant tulips in the front garden (and Luna knows who for). Zacharias has earth on his nose and on his jeans and Mr. Smith is quite red and shiny, and the tulips are not even fully in the soil. But of course-they’re both men, both rough and hasty, and obviously gardening is something they left up to Mrs. Smith, who is no longer there to do it.
And so Luna catches up to both of them, running barefoot across the spiky grass.
“Do you need some help?” she offers when she meets their apprehensive faces, gesturing to the tulips. “I’m not quite expert in planting myself, but my mother was wonderful at it.”
She hopes the past tense suggests something, and by the way Zacharias’ mouth has just fallen open, he has most certainly gotten the hint.
“That’s a fine idea, young miss, thank you,” says Mr. Smith instead, filling in for his son’s unexplainable silence. “Zach? Why don’t you help her?”
“I don’t-“ Zacharias starts, coloring quickly.
“You can hand me bulbs,” says Luna. “I’ll do everything with the soil.”
Zacharias scowls.
When they’re both finished the thick darkness has crept out, but the eccentric colors of the tulips make themselves known anyway, like little mock imitations of swirling gas in the starless night sky.
“How do you like it?” asks Luna, looking straight at the display in front of them.
There’s a definite pause, and the air looms heavy on them both.
“It’s alright,” mumbles Zacharias, and Luna knows-she knows-that he isn’t talking about the tulips.
Pairing(s): Luna/Zacharias
Rating: G
Word Count: 512
Summary: Luna isn’t so strange that she can’t understand why Zacharias Smith and his father (no mother or wife) are moving into the big house across the way from her own. No, she understands it perfectly.
Notes: Written for the 100quills challenge, pairing picked: Luna/Zacharias. Prompt: start over. Also, this is a little prologue to the time-frame (summer in Ottery St. Catchpole) that most of the pieces in this series take place in.
Luna isn’t so strange that she can’t understand why Zacharias Smith and his father (no mother or wife) are moving into the big house across the way from her own. She’s not so odd that she doesn’t fathom to the facts of wanting to begin anew, and she’s not so vague that she can’t tell Ginny Weasley exactly who is moving into town and why.
“You remember Zacharias Smith, don’t you,” Luna says serenely, pouring another cup of tea for Ginny, whose face has suddenly contorted into a look of profound disgust.
“You’re not serious! That old prat? What is he doing here?” Ginny pours half the sugar bowl into her tea and noisily gulps it, as if trying to block out the noise of the movers and the sound of her mother baking a cake for the newly arrived.
“I’m sure he used to have a mother,” is all Luna says wistfully, looking out of the window into the meadow that separates the two houses, and Ginny doesn’t know what she’s talking about but that’s alright, really: not everyone needs to know.
When Luna arrives home she makes a pitcher of lemonade and sets it on the counter for her father to see and the cat to miss (it’s too high up). She takes a glass of what she’s made, shoos the cat upstairs, and goes outside onto her rickety front porch.
The movers, it seems, have already left the house to Mr. Smith and his son, who are trying to plant tulips in the front garden (and Luna knows who for). Zacharias has earth on his nose and on his jeans and Mr. Smith is quite red and shiny, and the tulips are not even fully in the soil. But of course-they’re both men, both rough and hasty, and obviously gardening is something they left up to Mrs. Smith, who is no longer there to do it.
And so Luna catches up to both of them, running barefoot across the spiky grass.
“Do you need some help?” she offers when she meets their apprehensive faces, gesturing to the tulips. “I’m not quite expert in planting myself, but my mother was wonderful at it.”
She hopes the past tense suggests something, and by the way Zacharias’ mouth has just fallen open, he has most certainly gotten the hint.
“That’s a fine idea, young miss, thank you,” says Mr. Smith instead, filling in for his son’s unexplainable silence. “Zach? Why don’t you help her?”
“I don’t-“ Zacharias starts, coloring quickly.
“You can hand me bulbs,” says Luna. “I’ll do everything with the soil.”
Zacharias scowls.
When they’re both finished the thick darkness has crept out, but the eccentric colors of the tulips make themselves known anyway, like little mock imitations of swirling gas in the starless night sky.
“How do you like it?” asks Luna, looking straight at the display in front of them.
There’s a definite pause, and the air looms heavy on them both.
“It’s alright,” mumbles Zacharias, and Luna knows-she knows-that he isn’t talking about the tulips.