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The small black owl catches up to Sophia on her way from the hospital.
“Hi Ophy,” Sophia whispers as Ophelia—Aesop’s owl—lands on her outstretched arm.
The streets of London are dark and filled with sounds of hurried footsteps and quiet pops as her colleagues apparate away; their shift has ended and everyone is trying to escape the soft rain that had just started falling. Sophia’s apartment is not far, and she prefers to walk.
Her day had been… not so good, but as she reads the note attached to Ophelia’s leg, a pleasant warmth starts blooming in her heart, spreading through her veins like water through a riverbed after a drought, all the way to her tired fingertips.
I’m back in London.
And I brought you something.
-A
She smiles, droplets of rain falling on her face; he has, apparently, finished his mission a few days early. Today will not be such a bad day after all.
***
His apartment building looms before her, an old, multistoried thing, squeezed between two muggle houses; but space has never been a problem for wizards, and things are not always as they seem from the outside.
The front door is locked, but Sophia has spent more time in this apartment than in her own near St. Mungo’s, and she has the key.
He lives on the highest floor, of course. The staircase is dark but she knows the way by heart by now.
There is no keyhole or doorknob on his front door—an elaborate lock system guards this door, invisible to the eye.
She puts a hand on the wood and the door opens automatically. This she still is not used to—that she is in his life, that he trusts her so much to enchant the door so she can come and go as she pleases.
She swallows the lump in her throat and goes in.
The familiar smell of his apartment loops itself around her like a warm, familiar shawl: oiled wood—from the dark paneling that is everywhere, tasteful and elegant and just so him ; leather and parchment—from the myriad bookshelves lining the living room; and lilies—from the small bouquet on the kitchen table (from her).
As she takes her boots off, her eyes land on a half-full glass of firewhiskey on the low table in the living room and she knows he too had a bad day even before he emerges from the bathroom. The smell of clean soap wafts toward her; he just came out of the shower.
Aesop halts, for a moment, as if surprised she is there. (He is not surprised. It’s only that he sometimes still can’t believe the sight of her in his apartment.)
It has been a few weeks since Hogwarts, but her breath still hitches at the sight of him. He is so tall , and even in his early forties, lean muscles shift beneath his simple white shirt and grey trousers. His soft brown locks are neatly combed back and his beard is slightly longer and slightly better maintained than a few months ago.
He regards her with that hard, commanding stare, and her knees grow weak. His mouth twitches, and he walks, with that slightly uneven but confident gait, toward her.
She takes a deep breath, then takes off her cloak and hangs it over a chair.
By the time she does that, he is already standing before her. His arm circles her waist and the other goes behind her head as he kisses her. He tastes like firewhiskey, hot and searing, but that is not why her head suddenly feels dizzy. His lips glide insistently over hers, and she digs her fingers into his arms.
It is not a gentle kiss. It is hungry, bruising, all tongue and sharp intakes of breaths. He is restless, he is frustrated, and she meets it head-on, throws all her frustration from her day right back at him, and they kiss until they are both panting and breathless and calm.
“Hi,” she says when they finally pull apart.
“Mhm.” He kisses her again, this time gently, below her ear.
“So the mission was a failure?” she asks.
A muscle works in his jaw. “Not entirely. But the target wasn’t there.”
She nods; they’d known from the start the odds were slim. Still, disappointment always tastes bitter.
”We did find some promising clues. I’ll tell you about it later.”
Sophia grins, and his eyes sparkle knowingly; he is aware she loves it when he talks about his investigation, and he always taunts her for it.
She shifts in his arms to free her hand and strokes his jaw, reveling in the feel of his beard and the warmth of his skin. She slides her hand lower and begins to gently knead the stiff muscles of his neck.
He sighs and leans, begrudgingly, into her touch. She increases the pressure, massaging away all that tension and hard knots that never truly go away, no matter how hard she tries.
“You are late,” he says.
“Yes, I…”
His eyes open. He takes in her expression. “Bad day at work?”
She just nods, not meeting his gaze.
“We can talk about it, if you want,” he says. The deep, calm rumble of his voice is like a soothing balm for her nerves.
But she shakes her head. “Not yet.”
It’s late, almost time to sleep. They would usually go to the bedroom now, but he surprises her by saying, “Sometimes, when I want to clear my head, I find that movement helps.”
He says it in a way that makes it apparent he doesn’t mean sex. And—she frowns—his voice is strangely strained.
“Movement?” she prompts.
He regards her for a moment, as if making some difficult decision.
Despite them meeting almost every other day for the past two months, there is still so much she doesn’t know about him. He’d let her in, slowly. He’d allowed her to slowly start peeling back the layers of his life, his old guilt and pain and bitterness, but that iron wall he had built over the years would not come down in one day.
So she waits until he nods, once, making his decision.
“Come,” he says with resolve.
“Where?“
But he had already grabbed her hand and she stumbles as he pulls her after him. He walks them to the middle of the room, into the open space framed by his fireplace and the dining table. She feels the softness of his oriental rug beneath her feet.
“What are we doing, Aesop?”
Her pulse spikes when he waves his hand and all the lights in the apartment die down.
The only sources of light are the dying coals in the hearth and the moonlight filtering through the windows. They provide enough light for her to see his face, though. Enough light for her to catch the slight movement of his arm, toward an old gramophone tucked into the corner of the room that she had never seen him use.
Soft instrumental music fills the space.
Oh.
He places his hands around her waist. All of a sudden, her heart is beating so loudly in her ears that it almost drowns out the music.
“Put your hands around my neck.”
And she wants to say that she knows how to slow dance, but that would’ve been a lie—she doesn’t know how to dance with this man who has this strange, vulnerable look in his eyes.
She swallows, feeling the air between them shift to something tender and fragile and new.
Sophia puts her arms around his neck, tilting her head up so she can see his face. He shifts his weight to the side, and she follows, a bit awkwardly; she has never been a good dancer and her limbs feel even more wooden than usual.
But his hands are large and solid and strong, a reassuring weight that moves her along with him. He shows her what to do with gentle nudges, and she lets herself relax, step by small step. She rests her head against his shoulder and he tightens his arms around her.
They have to be careful of his bad leg, so they barely do anything more than sway side to side, but his body is pressed very close to hers, and she thinks it is the most wonderful dance she has ever had in her life.
“I didn’t know you danced,” she whispers.
He takes a while to answer. “I used to.”
His voice is deep, steady, and full of sorrow that travels straight to her heart. She thinks back on all those times he’d told her and other students to turn down the music in the laboratory, or when he told her the dancing was awful at Headmaster Black’s Christmas ball. All reminders of his loss.
“We know what to do now. We will find him,” she says quietly. “And we will heal your leg.” And we will dance properly, then.
“Yes.” He presses a kiss to her hair.
The first song ends and another one starts.
They sway to the gentle music and he is right—this is helping.
“Today, they brought in a poacher covered with Acromantula bites,” she says.
She wants to continue but her throat is too tight. He hmm-s and puts one arm around her shoulder where he moves his thumb in slow, reassuring circles. She leans into his touch and is able to continue, after a moment.
“It was so bad, Aesop. The worst case I’ve seen. He was so full of poison...” She closes her eyes. “We couldn’t save him.”
“He was a poacher—he knew the risks.” The words are harsh, but his voice is not. “Survival isn’t guaranteed for any of us.”
She nods along as he says it. He says it often. It is also what she says to herself each time he goes on a mission, and her mind is plagued by worry. But that is a conversation they had more than once, and no more words are needed. That is the life they chose, and if that means her heart would one day break, then so be it.
So he only holds her in his arms and she buries her head into his chest.
Eventually, the music stops. He turns on the lights and they go to the kitchen where she rummages in the pantry until she scrambles a makeshift dinner. There isn’t much to choose from. She’d reprimand him for his pathetic state of food supplies if her own pantry was any better.
After she has finished eating, they lean against the kitchen counter next to each other. He sips his whiskey and her gaze tracks over the unbuttoned collar of his shirt, showing a bit of his neck. His sleeves are comfortably rolled up to his elbows, showing strong, scarred forearms, tendons shifting under pale skin as he taps his finger against the glass, lost in thought.
She wonders if it is unhealthy to love someone’s arms so much.
“So what is that thing that you have for me?” she asks instead.
He throws her a sideways glance but keeps quiet.
She narrows his eyes at him. “Is it a quill?”
“It’s not a quill,” he scoffs. “Though that is not the worst idea—at least then you would stop stealing mine.”
“Yours are so much better than mine, though.”
“You have a job now. You can buy your own quills.” He regards her with mirth in his eyes; for him, that is as good as a laugh.
“I would, but I always forget.” She reaches out her hand and starts playing with the open collar of his shirt. “Perhaps it’s the sleep deprivation. Someone keeps calling me into his apartment in the middle of the night.”
His eyes darken and his voice drops dangerously low. “Is that so?”
He puts his glass down and places his hands on the kitchen counter on either side of her, caging her in. The smell of whiskey and clean cotton and him envelops her, headier than any alcohol, as he leans down until their faces are almost touching.
He murmurs, “Indeed, a proper sleep schedule is very important. I suppose I could take care of whoever that is, but…”
“But what?” With his serious face so close, she can feel his warm breath against her mouth. It is very hard to focus on anything else.
He ghosts over her jaw with his lips, making her shiver. “But, why should I do something for nothing, Miss Fay?”
Her heart is positively racing now. “Always looking for something to gain, you Slytherins. But you are all just talk and no—”
He props her up on the kitchen counter and shuts her up with a kiss.