oh rabbit. [victoria]

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

The man's stomach twisted into little knots as he stepped up to the door of his somewhat abandoned bakery. He hadn't found the strength to visit it until now, his mind too twisted and disturbed to give his floundering, desicated business any proper attention. The months spent trying to mend things with his wife, with little true progress made, had colored much of his time since Akzaban.

Three-quarters of a year since he was released and he felt like an absolute coward for not having the courage to approach the business he had put years of work into after he graduated from Hogwarts. Pulling the key out of the deep pocket of his jeans, he remained constantly aware of Victoria close by. Alain hadn't expected her to come with but he wasn't going to push her away now.

Alain had spent so much time trying to get her to trust him again and that would just be counterintuitive.

Pressing the key into the lock, Alain glanced at one of the larger windows to his side, noting that it had been broken. Probably someone who had been unable to attack him so they took their rage out on the next best thing. His store. Grimacing, he turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open, ducking under the frame of the door and into the main room.

There had been a time where the building had been absolutely swamped with patrons. Witches and wizards who wanted fresh bread or cakes. Then the cafe goers in the adjoining building seeking coffee, tea, and anything deli related. Now, it was broken and dusty. Alain had been hiding here, terrified fo himself when he had been arrested and the aurors hadn't been kind to his establishment. Chewing on the inside of his cheek, Alain shoved his hands into his pockets to keep the slight trembling of his fingers out of sight.

Then he started to move about the space, trying to assess every little bit of damage that he could find. Making little mental notes about everything that needed repair or updating, the werewolf finally circled back behind the counter, starting to pull out old supplies. Everything would need to be replaced. Stale flour, confectionary sugar, and assorted toppings wouldn't do. 'Besides', he thought as he brushed away a nest of spiders with his bare hands, 'it's all drawn bugs.'

Lifting up a few bags of flour onto the counter, Alain let his gaze lift, observing his wife in complete silence. His expression turned forlorn and he breathed deeply through his nose, keeping his emotions in check. "I've let it go too long," he said quietly as if trying to explain his immediate need to do something. Make some change. Do something to change the state of things in the now. Not the past, but right then and there.

Alain then paused, resting both hands atop the large bag and tipped his head forward, closing his eyes and swallowing. "You don't have to stay," he whispered, glancing away from her to try and busy himself with something, anything, that would make him feel like he was making progress.

525 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

She still didn't fully understand why it was that she had decided to accompany him to the bakery. Vic hadn't set foot in the building since before her attack, and once she had woken to discover the horrible turn of events that took her husband away from her, she hadn't been able to bring herself to return. Not even the madness she felt by being chained to a desk upon her return to work had propelled her to come anywhere near the building. Life over the last several months had been an absolute nightmare. But Alain's sudden return at Christmas had done little to make her feel better.

Victoria didn't want to believe that her husband was capable of such violence. He had been so timid as a boy, and she had never known him to be anything but kind to those around him as he got older. Yet they had found his wand after her attacker had been viciously attacked in kind. His wand had been tested and discovered to be responsible.

He'd been shipped off to Azkaban while she was motionless in a hospital bed.

Waking up to find that he wasn't there had been hard enough. Learning that he was in prison for attacking someone else had sent her into a wave of hysteria that required a Healer to come in and sedate her. For the next several weeks her parents had worried about her health, both physically and mentally. She would never be able to work in the field as an Auror again. Her career was over and her husband was a criminal. She was, for all intents and purposes, completely alone.

Perhaps she ought to have stayed back at the house, she thought to herself as the shop came into view. It had been so long since she had been anywhere near here, and things with Alain were still so strained that she didn't know what to do. It would have been so much easier if her feelings for him had simply disappeared when she had woken up. But they hadn't. And that had only made things infinitely more complicated when he had knocked on the door of her parents' home in the middle of a blizzard, frozen to the bone and near ready to catch his death. That night was the first time that she had dared to set foot in their home since discovering his release from Azkaban on Christmas Eve.

Victoria stood silently behind him as he turned the key in the door, looking at the front windows. Even from here she could already tell that there was damage to the building, damage that would need to be tended to if he truly wished to re-open the shop. How well it would do, she had no idea. Unfortunately, his reputation would likely be the talk of Hogsmeade for a long while.

She carefully folded her arms over her chest, avoiding eye contact as she followed him inside and looked about. Cobwebs everywhere...more damage to the inside from the Aurors...it was going to take a miracle to get this place back up to code again.

"Where else would you like me to go?" she asked her husband quietly, stepping toward the display counter where they used to store all of the cupcakes and other pastries that were available for the cafe patrons. "I don't-...I don't have anywhere else to go..."

WORD COUNT: 572
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

The man was not sure how he really felt about this place. For him, it held some of his best memories. Some of which had been sitting down to a lunch or quick supper with Victoria whenever she had a moment to spare from her training. He had made birthday cakes, numerous, in the back room. He had sang happy birthday at the top of his lungs for his wife for the few years the bakery had been open before he was arrested. Always a new design. Always a new flavor. And her cheeks always seemed to flush, but she never failed to smile.

He had been released on Christmas Eve the year before, but he still didn't know what he was to do with himself. Did he try and open the bakery back up? Did he repair it and then sell it, giving up on one of his biggest dreams since he was a boy? So far, it was seeming like the second option was the best choice. It would bring less attention to himself and his family and he could attempt to move on with his life and from the mistakes that had colored the entire course of his future.

What would Alain even be able to do now? There would be talk and assumptions made on his character before most would even meet him. Because his wand had shown that he had used those spells. The assumption was that he, a werewolf, had lost his temper an attacked the man that had nearly killed his wife.

It was entirely unlike him and he didn't remember a single moment of it. But the evidence clearly didn't lie. And now that Alain was free, there was little he could do but just attempt to move forward and show the world that he was working on bettering himself. That was what he was doing, after all. Hopefully with the help of his family. Maybe he could put his best foot forward and prove that the event had just been a fluke.

Looking up from the bag of flour and toward his beautiful wife. The wife that had shied away from him, terrified of what he had done to another man on her behalf. There was pain there, but Alain wasn't sure how he was supposed to approach it. "You don't have to go anywhere. I'm just telling you that you don't have to stay. This isn't... this isn't your mess," Alain said quietly, pushing away from the counter and stepping slowly along the back of the display cases. His gaze left her and his stomach seemed to twist even further into painful little knots.

Like he had eaten something bad and might be sick. "I'm going to be here a while," he then added, rounding the corner and stepping slowly into the pastry kitchen. With a deep sigh, he noted some of the damage to a few of the machines and bit down on his bottom lip. It would take some time to repair them but they seemed like they were still in good condition. Dragging his gaze away from the mixers, he lingered close to the ovens, checking the brickwork for any damage or neglect.

536 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

How on earth was anyone meant to navigate something like this? Was there another person in the entire world who could say that this had all happened to them? That they had lost their husband to Azkaban and had him return home again...but hadn't been able to throw him out?

There were a few different members of her family who thought that Victoria had lost her mind in letting her husband back into the house after his release. Her mother had been horrified to learn of her current living conditions and practically demanded that she move back into their house. Her father was prepared to hex Alain to get him away from her if that was what was needed. Only her brother seemed incapable of making a definite decision about how he felt on the matter, simply settling to write every day and ensure that his sister was okay.

But she wasn't okay. And she didn't know if she was ever going to be okay again.

Victoria frowned over at her husband. "If I don't have to stay but I don't have to go...what am I meant to do, Alain?"

Their home was already a hell on earth for both of them. Neither one knew how to be around the other anymore, and Victoria was terrified of what would happen if something were to trigger him. She had heard the shouts from the other room in the late hours of the evening, the visions of his time in Azkaban returning to haunt him in his sleep. It woke her every single time, and though instinct drove her to sit up in bed and begin to pull the blankets off of her so that she could go to him, her fear kept her rooted in place. What if she were to find him while he was still confused and afraid? Would he attack her as well because he hadn't yet realized that he was back in his own home?

Pressing her lips tightly together, Victoria turned sharply and moved to the front of the bakery where the cafe had once been. The tables and chairs were discarded all over the place, clearly tossed about when the store had been vandalized. There was debris all over the room, shattered plates and cups littered the floor and made it a hazard for her to travel too far in her sandal clad feet. Yet the blonde ventured forward anyway...

They had once been so proud of this little bakery. They had built it together from the ground up, serving patrons from all walks of life. Adults came on the weekends with their younger children to purchase freshly baked treats. Students ventured down from the castle so that they could press their faces against the front window and inhale the sweet smells that came from the shop. And Alain, as always, would beckon them inside for samples of his latest creations. He used to offer them steaming cups of tea on the house when the cold winter weather rolled in, hoping to warm them just a little bit before they went back up to school once more.

But that felt like a long time ago now. Back when they had been younger and happy together.

WORD COUNT: 542
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

Alain found his vision bluring the longer he stared at the ovens. He had paused for far longer than should have been natural. Far longer than what would have already tipped his wife off to his silent difficulty with making anything make sense. Nothing did. Not anymore. Not with their mutual insecurity in their own relationship. The silent insistance that he was a criminal despite him not remembering anything about doing the crime.

But he remembered every torturous moment of the time he spent paying for such a crime. His hands shook at his side and he momentarily considered throwing his wand across the room just to get it out of sight, out of mind. His wand had been used but he didn't remember ever touching it. His only worry had been getting to Victoria, so why had he come back to his senses here? Nestled among the ovens and struggling to make sense of how he had gotten there?

He barely registered his wife's voice until moments later, when he had turned to reply. And she was gone. Gritting his teeth together in a moment of silent frustration and unease, the man rubbed sharply at his face, having to let out a slow, easing breath. Victoria was not to blame for any of this. Honestly, he couldn't blame her for feeling the way that she did. If he had been in her position, and she had been the one who had been sent to Azkaban, he might have felt the same way? When was he going to snap next? When was he going to lose his temper? Would he hurt her when he did it? Did she really not know him as well as she had her entire life? These were the questions he assumed were constantly running through her mind.

Alain didn't want to leave things like that. So he took a moment to venture further into the kitchens, looking toward the sink and the stovetops that lined one wall. They used to cook small meals there. Deli items and hot drinks from scratch. They were popular and Alain had had to hire a cook just to make the drinks and a cook to make the food. It had been too much for any one person to take on. He could remember the joyful laughter of the two cooks, sisters, who had spent so much time in front of those stoves. He could remember the drink maker, her eyes bright and excited any time she came to him with a new drink idea. They were always a hit and Alain had adored the fact that the two young women had taken such a liking to the place.

The entire staff of this bakery had been like his family. The first Christmas that the place had been open, he had thrown a massive feast for everyone just to show his appreciation, along with sizable bonuses for the season. Now they were just memories marred by his dilapidated bakery.

Yet, the kettle was untouched and he spent a few minutes searching for a few of the unbroken mugs, washing them, washing the kettle, and then boiling water while he set about finding a tin of tea that hadn't gone stale and hadn't been strewn across the place by vagrants. Finding a simple earl grey, their most popular brew, he quietly prepared two mugs of tea, taking them both out into the main cafe area. "Victoria?" he asked quietly, spotting her easily but not wanting to spook her. "Here," he offered as he came to stand beside her, though not close enough to touch.

The offer of the mug of tea was a peace offering he truly hoped that she would take.

621 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

The longer she stood there amongst the dust and debris, the more Victoria felt that she just ought to leave. The bakery had once been a thing of joy for the both of them, and now it lay in shambles at her feet. Just like her marriage. Just like her career. Just like everything else that she had worked so hard for.

Gritting her teeth in frustration, she rubbed firmly at her cheek to erase the foolish evidence of her tears before winding her arms around her body once more. She could remember so vividly the day that Alain had brought her to this place, when it had been empty and completely void of any life. When he had announced that he was going to build a bakery, she had initially been unsure. The building itself didn’t appear to be prepped for such a thing. Bakeries required ovens and shelves and a kitchen in which all of the confectionary could be handled safely and properly. But as time had progressed and he had shown his tenacity, a picture had begun to take form.

Alain had been so proud of this place once. They both had been. One night, about a week before opening, he had brought her in here at midnight to show her the completed picture. Victoria had been giddy with excitement for him...and they had gotten a little carried away in the back.

The memory made her cheeks flush softly. Such intimacy hadn’t existed between them since his return. He continued to sleep in the spare room, plagued by the memories of that horrible prison. Her brother had refused to take her to see him because of how vile it was, afraid that her fragile body wouldn’t be able to handle the stress as she continued to recover. No one wanted her to go there. No one wanted her to see him.

One of her hands slipped, gingerly pressing against the wound at her side. Even with all of the medicinal magic in the world, they had been unable to restore her skin to what it had been. Now it was riddled with angry scars, marking the place where the curse had struck her and nearly taken her life from blood loss. She was still hazy on the details of who had found her and how...all she knew was that she had woken in the hospital some months later, calling for a man who wasn’t there.

She turned when she heard him behind her, startled because she had been so lost in her thoughts. Even now, with two steaming mugs of tea in his hand, he kept his distance from her. She could only touch him if they both reached out, and even then she wasn’t sure if their fingers would make contact at all. ”...thanks.”

Victoria took the mug carefully, aiming for the parts that he wasn’t holding until she had taken it into her hands. She knew from the moment she smelled it that he had made an earl grey...a favourite from her school days. How many nights had she spent on the couch in Ravenclaw House, curled up with a mug in her hand as she leaned into his side? How many nights had they both lost sleep because they didn’t want to be parted?

It seemed...almost foolish now.

”... ...I’m sure that things can be repaired,” she offered weakly. ”You-...always were good with your hands.”


WORD COUNT: 583
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

Alain let his gaze wander the small cafe, taking in the equally delapidated state of what was once a beautiful seating area with a deli counter. Pie plates had lined one of the counters and they'd let people buy a piece by the slice. Around Christmas, the mince pies had been their most popular treat. This place had once been burgoning at the seams with people coming in and out from dawn until close.

He kept his mind off the proximity of his wife's fingers, the mug in his other hand grounding him enough to keep him calm despite the slight increase in his heart rate. Taking an absent sip, he didn't really taste the liquid. It had never been his favorite, but literally anything was better than whatever they had been giving them in prison.

Muggles would have had a field day with the conditions of Azkaban. They all seemed so... intent on humane practices in their own little sphere of the world. The wizarding world was much different, it seemed.

Breathing out slowly, Alain let his blue gaze slide to Victoria, a very slight smile lighting his lips. She was always looking on the brighter side of things. It had always been like her hidden talent. Keep him calm and looking on the lighter side of things. Were she at her full frame of mind and had their marriage not fallen to pieces around them, she might have been even more forceful and adamant about it.

"I am still good with my hands... I think," Alain said softly, pulling his mug against his chest. The chairs, all made by hand by him and his brother, were in disarray. Some were broken and splintered and others were intact. He silently wondered if that was the best place to start. At least when he started to feel the dragging of despair and sadness he would have someplace to sit and watch his decimated Kingdom. From the hottest and most popular seat in the house too.

This bakery had been his castle. One of the few places in his life where we had ever felt in full control and where nothing could touch him. Who would have ever guessed that any of this would happen? Alain surely hadn't. Victoria had been blindsided by it.

"I think I'll start in this room," Alain said quietly, nodding more firmly to himself. Yes. This was the best place to start to rebuild. "Most of the good memories were made here," he admitted very carefully, "I want to put it back together before they all fade away into nothing." All because he missed the normalcy of his life. It was a wonder what over a year had done to this place. With his gaze still on his wife, he finally turned more toward her, almost forgetting the mug in her hand.

It took everything he had to ask her anything, but he thought it might equate to him offering the olive branch. "Would you like to help me?" he asked carefully, "This was as much your domain as it was mine."

516 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

No, it wasn’t. Though she had done her level best to help him maintain the bakery in her off time, this was where Alain had truly thrived. She had come in from long, dreary shifts at the Ministry to find him hard at work back in the kitchens, flour all over his face and apron as he worked on a new kind of dough, or a fresh batch of cookies that were meant to go out onto the shelves for the hungry patrons. Alain hadn’t truly needed her in order to keep things running smoothly, unless of course it was to mind the counter. When he got busy in the kitchens, his mind tended to focus on his task, and that sometimes meant that he wasn’t always paying attention to the needy customer on the other side of the door.

But...as Victoria turned back to look at him, she couldn’t help feel just a little sorry for the poor man. He was trying. He was trying so desperately to regain a small fraction of the life that he had had before Azkaban. Back when they had been happy and healthy and unburdened by the trials of life and reality.

”I don’t really know what I could do,” Victoria confessed. ”I didn’t do much aside from choose a few colours to make sure things didn’t clash too horribly. This-...this was very much your domain, Alain.”

And he had kept it like a king. There wasn’t a single day when he left without having wiped down the tables several times and straightened the chairs to his satisfaction. If there were leftover treats, he often gave them to his employees so that they didn’t go to waste. It was only every now and again that he dared to bring anything back to their home, for fear that they would become far too accustomed to the sweets...and that it might inevitably show in their figures.

Her blue orbs traveled around the room for a moment, taking in the damage once more. Anything to avoid that look in his eye, that desperate sliver of hope that gnawed at her stomach and filled her with guilt. It made her feel as if she wasn’t doing enough to try and help him make this transition back to every day life...but the truth of the matter was that Victoria was just as lost as he was. She didn’t have the faintest clue of how to handle things now. One move in the wrong direction caused her so much pain that she sometimes ended up a crumpled heap on the kitchen floor.

She sighed softly. ”I don’t suppose I can do much else though,” she admitted softly. Not when she was bound to a desk at work and unable to do the thing that she had loved most. All of those years spent trying to earn a place as an Auror, a means of making her father proud...had all been wasted. Victoria hadn’t made a mark on anything. One failed mission and it was all over.


WORD COUNT: 525
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

This was what he had been dreading, slowly and reluctantly pulling his gaze from Victoria's form. Of course she didn't. A blatant removal of herself from all the help that she had given him. He silently figured she just didn't want to have much, if anything to do with him any longer. The distance between them was so wide it was hard to miss. Even a blind man could tell that they weren't close.

Not anymore.

He was starting to think that they never would be again. The fact that they hadn't gotten to fixing anything in the last nine months since he had been released from prison was making that more and more clear by the day. Alain was simply waiting for the shoe to drop. Or for him to come home to find all of her things gone. He was almost entirely sure that they wouldn't last to this coming Christmas.

Not like this. Not with neither of them saying anything of value that could change the tide of their relationship at that moment.

"Yeah," Alain said absently, not finding anything else to say to keep her there. Instead, he glanced around for a cleared off the table, setting his mug down and moving about to try and right the chairs in complete silence. After a few minutes, he found himself humming a tune. Any tune. Anything to break the deafening silence of the room and to keep him from finding more grief and debilitating fear. "Yeah, I suppose you're right," he said very quietly after a few more moments.

The fact that this room in itself was in such disarray made him the most frustrated. The most troubled and the most stuck. This had been where most life had been. Sure, the back had been lively and busy, with his arms and face nearly constantly covered in flour, but here was where he had been able to see the fruits of his labor in action. The joy that his food had brought people. It had been difficult not to feel absolutely elated at being in the cafe.

Almost as if someone had cast a spell on the whole of the building.

There was no spell now. It was just a cold room filled with broken furniture and shattered glass. Alain reached first for his wand and then stopped himself, his hand trembling slightly at the thought of touching it. So he simply went to the back to find a broom, dustpan, and to drag the bin back out into the main area. He started by sweeping up the remnants of their dishes and other crockery, keeping his gaze entirely off of his wife and focusing more on his task.

"You don't have to," he finally said after she finished speaking again, "I just thought..." then he shook his head and silenced himself, choosing instead to work rather than force them into a conversation that they weren't ready to have.

Even after nine months they still couldn't talk about anything. What was all of this? What type of reality had he come home to?

516 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

They were so hopelessly lost, and Victoria was beginning to think that their relationship had been shattered beyond repair. For nearly a year he had been locked away in that terrible place, without the ability to see her. Had his brother gone to visit him? Had his father and mother?

Part of her would forever think that she should have found a way to get there herself, even if the rest of her family had been unwilling to help her. Broken and confused, Victoria should have summoned the strength to stagger out of the hospital and somehow find a means of getting there. But the journey would have been difficult. Azkaban was a place that precious few people were granted access to, for the prison was located in the middle of the ocean and almost always surrounded by storms and high tides. Without their wands to aid them, the inmates were forced to accept their new reality and succumb to the madness that was often induced by the presence of the Dementors. Any tiny sliver of happiness was sucked away.

She was beginning to lose hope that there was anything they could do to save their marriage. All those years of friendship...the years spent loving one another and building each other up...all of that felt like it would soon come to an end. All because she had gotten hurt during one of her very first missions as an Auror, and landed in the hospital. Because she hadn’t been tough enough to handle the job that she spent so long training for.

Her father likely thought she was a failure and was just too kind to tell her so. Her whole family was probably ashamed of her for being unable to handle herself, but they took pity on her because of the fact that she was incapable of doing her job. She had been without her husband. If they hadn’t gone to her side in the hospital, she would have been completely and utterly alone.

”Alain…”

He had already turned away from her, anxious to look anywhere but into the face of the wife who had betrayed him. Her heart sunk into her stomach. Nine long months and they could still barely stomach the idea of looking one another in the eye. Her shoulders began to slump, her grip on her mug faltering slightly and sloshing hot liquid into her hand. Victoria gasped sharply, doubling her grip with her other hand as she drew the other away. It stung with a force that she hadn't felt in a while, the liquid hitting the floor rather quickly and creating a small puddle at her feet.

Not only was her marriage a mess, but she was only adding to the disaster that had become his precious bakery. Vic grit her teeth a little, trying not to let the sting get to her. "I'm sorry," she managed, breathing slowly so that he might not see how she hurt. "I'll get a cloth..."

WORD COUNT: 502
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

Alain had been entirely ready to go about his tidying by himself. He understood that Victoria couldn't do too much, not with her injury that still constantly plagued her. He just honestly wanted the company. The idea of being alone, even here, where he had never felt such a way before, was stifling. If she did leave him there to his own devices, he wasn't sure how the rest of the day would play out. Likely not well if his nights of sleeping alone were anything to go by.

But the sound of her sharp gasp and liquid hitting the floor had him turning sharply from righting one of the last chairs. The last of the ones that hadn't been destroyed, at least. Dropping it mid-turn, Alain took only four large steps across the room that was much to big for such a feat to be possible. The adrenaline was there already, coursing through his veins alongside the bitter bite of worry and sadness.

"No. Leave it," Alain said quickly, reaching for her hands. He took the mug from her and quickly searched for a flat surface to set it on. He finally settled on the floor, putting the mug down with a rather sharp thud, though the ceramic didn't break as one might have expected. All thought of distance was gone as that instinct took over. The instinct to get to her, to be at her side because Victoria had been hurt.

He had been running to her side when he had gotten the call about the failed mission. He had been heading right for the hospital, having no other thoughts on his mind. Nothing about revenge or anything near close to the sort. And yet, he had woken up here with a stone turning his stomach and a silent, intense fear that he had done something horrible. What it had been, he hadn't known. But the subsequent trial and imprisonment had solved that problem rather quickly.

Now that he was out, he wanted nothing more than to make up for all of their lost time. Sure, dealing with the struggles and mental maladies that now plagued Alain was difficult, but he was sure that he could find his footing if Victoria would just look him in the eye. Something, anything to let him know that he had a single chance in the world of being able to hold his wife again.

"I'll get the cloth," he instructed, trying to usher her into the back of the bakery. "Let's get your hand under cold water," he coaxed, his brows knit together in worry. He didn't think anything about having touched her, one hand against her lower back and the other holding the hand she had burned. "You have nothing to be sorry about," he murmured, a double meaning dripping off his tongue.

As they moved, Alain found himself accidentally kicking over the mug he had only just settled on the floor. He paused and stared at it, finding it really hard not to laugh in the moment. Then he squeezed his eyes shut and breathed out sharply, the strain and frustration clear on his features. "Water, water, water," he whispered mostly to himself in an effort to force him to keep his focus on Victoria and only Victoria.

The fact that literally everything stressed him out or frustrated him was not something he wanted to visit right then. His only concern was her and he would not allow himself to be derailed by something as simple as spilled tea. Crying over it would do nothing for the situation, even if he did have the overwhelming urge to burst into tears.

611 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

Tears rimmed the bottom of her eyes despite her best efforts to keep them at bay. The sting had caught her by surprise, and her body was reacting the way that anyone else might have reacted to such a shock. The tea water had been hot. Too hot for her skin to handle.

He had crossed the room and removed the mug from her hand so quickly that Victoria barely had time to register what was happening. And already he was beginning to mutter about needing to find cold water for her to put her hand under. His fingers wrapped around her injured hand, the other at her lower back as he guided her back into the kitchen area where the sink was located.

As he unintentionally kicked the mug, Victoria flinched a little. The clatter was rather loud, and she could tell that the mug had been chipped if not broken in his haste to help. But she had also noticed that this was the very first time that Alain had voluntarily initiated contact between them since returning home almost nine months earlier. He had reached for her a few times out of habit, but he had never actually touched her. The distance between them seemed only to grow uncomfortably as they continued to live in the same house, almost avoiding one another like ghosts in the night.

The cold water immediately brought relief to her skin, causing her shoulders to sag as she slowly began to exhale the breath that she had been holding. A little more fiddling with the taps brought the water to room temperature so that she didn’t risk damaging the skin any further. ”Sorry,” she murmured again.

There were so many things that she had to be sorry for. She hadn’t seen him while he had been in prison. She could hardly look him in the eye because she was afraid of finding someone other than the man that she loved in his bright blue eyes. And when the rest of the world continued to condemn him for viciously attacking another human being, Victoria couldn’t find the voice that she needed to stand up for him.

Her good hand held onto the edge of the sink as she slowly breathed in and out. Little by little the ache began to disappear until all she could feel was the water trickling along her skin. She knew it would hurt the minute she turned the water off though. She’d need to use magic in order to heal it properly once she had managed to clear her head.

”It should be okay in a minute,” she told him gently. ”I can heal it. I just...need my wand…” She was sure that she could remember the simple incantations to help alleviate the pain of the burn. She'd used them often enough when Alain had hurt himself on the ovens and refused to have it looked at by anyone else. He had always been rather stubborn.

It was something that she had loved about him.

WORD COUNT: 511
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

Now that he had his hands on her, Alain was finding it that much more difficult to let her go. He had spent so much time avoiding even the slightest brush of their arms or hands, but his hand resting against her back, and the realization that it was her warmth that he was feeling against his palm was what had him freezing. There was one long moment where Alain considered leaning into her, either to be closer to her, or to embrace her. There was a part of him that was desperate to hold her the way he had done before he had been sent to prison.

But then Alain remembered the look of fear on her features when he had first come home from Azkaban a broken man. A man that had apparently hurt someone after spending his entire life ensuring that nothing of the sort happened. And all he could see now was the fear and the way that she had recoiled from him in those few moments.

His hands pulled away from her and he purposely took a few large steps backward. There was distance again and he reminded himself that he wasn't to touch her. That was the last thing she wanted. The very last thing he would ever deserve. As much as he missed her, needed her, he couldn't force them to fit back together. Things didn't work like that. Alain had destroyed that trust when he had attacked another person and left Victoria abandoned in her hospital bed, not knowing what had happened to him once she had woken up months later.

"Right," Alain said very slowly, steadying himself and then turning on his heel without another word to go and look for her wand. Then he paused, remembering she likely had it on her person, so he trailed back to her and let his hands ghost against her sides until he was able to reach into her pocket and pull out her wand, which had been stuck on the side of the hand she had burned. He slowly handed her her wand to her other hand, trying not to touch her again. His fingers brushed hers, however, and he immediately dropped his gaze to the floor and pulled away again.

Once more putting distance between the two of them, Alain leaned back against the damaged counter behind the sink, watching her back as she watched. "You don't have to be sorry. For anything," Alain said very carefully, sounding the words out as slowly as he could manage, showing that he was putting effort into his thoughts. "Especially not to me," he continued, "Estranged or not, I am still your husband." His throat felt tight and he had to tear his gaze away from her back. "I can't judge or condemn you for anything. You've done absolutely nothing wrong and none of the blame rests on your shoulders," he finished.

Then he chose to stare at his hands, noting a few of the small scars he had gained while in Azkaban. When clawing at the walls and trying his hardest not to lose his mind had been the only thing keeping him even remotely grounded.

532 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar

[VICTORIA GREYSON]

...so he had found her wand for her and pressed it into her good hand.

Despite the fact that he too was a wizard, in possession of a wand that was capable of the very same magic that she needed to heal her burn, Alain had elected to hand over her own wand rather than try to help her further. If Victoria hadn’t wanted to break down and sob before, she certainly did now. That one gesture was enough to assure her that their marriage was virtually broken beyond repair. Though he had guided her into the kitchen, his hands had removed themselves from her body as soon as he seemed to realize what he had done. In place of the hand at her back, she felt nothing but a biting cold that chilled her to the bone and caused the goosebumps to rise on her arms and chest.

The tears that had previously formed because of the physical pain now returned because of the emotional pain. She turned her head a little when she felt them slipping down her cheeks, trying to hide their presence from him. It felt like a sign that they were well and truly done.

He told her again that he didn’t need her to apologize. That despite their estrangement, he was still her husband...but for how long? Was that even true anymore when he could barely stand the idea of touching her like that? It was so unlike how they had been before, when Alain had barely seemed able to get enough of her naked skin beneath his hands. But she was broken now, Victoria reminded herself. Scarred and battered beyond repair...even the healers at the hospital hadn’t been able to remove the now permanent marks on her side.

Victoria lifted the hand that now clenched her wand dangerously, rubbing the back of it against her eyes. ”I can’t-...” But the words wouldn’t come.

Her shoulders slumped and she ducked her head to try and hide the broken look in her eyes. Done...all she could think about was how their marriage had suffered. How they were finished because they couldn’t communicate anymore. Maybe he didn’t want this now. Maybe he needed it all to end…and wasn't that what her brother had suggested to her only a few short days ago? That perhaps a clean break was needed for either one of them to have a hope in hell of regaining their lives?

WORD COUNT: 419
TAGGED: ALAIN GREYSON
NOTES: --

[ALAIN GREYSON]

[googlefont=Libre Baskerville]

i'm a wolf.

Oh rabbit, my claws are dull now so don't be afraid

What had he done that had made her so emotional? She had said that she had needed her wand, and his mind wasn't moving fast enough to understand. He was thinking of his wand at his side and drifting away on thoughts that the idea of using it made him rather sick to his stomach. The kind of sick he knew would also end with him trying not to panic alone in the guest room when they returned home that night. He couldn't touch it. He wouldn't do it.

Especially because he wasn't sure that he could even cast a spell, to begin with. Since he had returned from Azkaban, he hadn't used a single lick of magic. He took his potions on time, but instead of brewing them himself as he usually had, his mother had started to send them along. Alain had been absolutely relieved when the older woman had entirely understood how he felt about his own wand. It was a notion that he hadn't been able to tell Victoria, unsure of how, like everything else, she would take such knowledge.

But the thought struck him now that maybe he should. He wondered if she had intended for him to heal it for her and the plea for her own wand had been an opening for him to--

He was an idiot, wasn't he?

Approaching her slowly, his hand spread along against her lower back once more, his previous reservations about touching her gone in the moment. "Victoria," Alain said very carefully, "I think... you should," he finished slowly, his brows furrowing. "I have not been able to... touch my own want since I got back. Have you seen me do magic since I came home? The thought of using my wand makes me..." he slowly drifted off, dropping his forehead against her shoulder as he took in a very slow breath. One that would stop the trembling of his hands on her body. His other hand trailed up her arm, his hand cupping hers around her wand.

"It makes me feel sick to my stomach," Alain admitted quietly, "I can't touch it without falling into an absolute panic," his breath was a weak whisper now. Then he found his voice to be a little stronger, "I can't heal you as you want me to... but I can hold your hand like I am," the werewolf offered slowly, hoping beyond hope that such an offer would be enough. "I'm sorry... I can't do... so many things now," he tried to let humor lace his words, but it just came out pitiful.

Alain desperately wanted to be the man that Victoria had fallen in love with. That she had married on a beautiful spring day. He had dressed in the traditional Scottish garb of his former Clan family, glowing like the sun when he had set his gaze upon her. But things had changed. Whatever he had done to the man that had hurt her, something he didn't remember no matter how hard he tried, the consequences had destroyed him. The dementor's kiss was as terrifying as many before him had said.

524 words - VICTORIA GREYSON

template by punki of adoxography - hidden scrollbar