LUNAR (A Harry Potter Universe Fanfiction)

Twenty Seven. The Last Straw.

Evelyn was in her bedroom when she heard the knock on the door. She had gone into work that morning as planned, but she had come straight home from there. She and Margaret were supposed to go to yoga that evening, but Evelyn just couldn't bring herself to do it. When she'd told Margaret she was going to skip, she had put down the stack of books she'd been about to go reshelve and pulled Evelyn into a tight hug. She'd been really good about the whole thing, letting Evelyn handle most of the behind the scenes tasks while she worked with the kids.

It was too difficult to pretend to be in a great mood in front of a bunch of six year olds.

"Ev?" called her mum. "It's for you, sweetheart."

Evelyn got up, heart pounding. If Sean was here, she wasn't going to just forgive him, but maybe, maybe they could start to fix things. She was willing to accept an apology if it meant getting her best friend back.

But it wasn't Sean standing just inside the door. It was Marlowe. He was still wearing his quidditch robes. It appeared he'd come straight from work.

"Hi," he said. "Your friend Margaret sent me an owl."

Evelyn's eyes started to glass over. Marlowe pulled her into a big hug and said, "I just wanted to see if you were okay."

"I'm not," said Evelyn into his shoulder.

"I figured," said Marlowe quietly and he patted her on the back.

They sat down on the living room couch. Evelyn hugged a throw pillow to her chest and recounted the argument to him. It was the short version. She had relived it so many times in the past less than twenty four hours that all she had left in her was the watered down highlights. But Marlowe had seen Sean around her recently. He knew enough.

He was quiet for quite a while after she finished. She watched him frown down at his knees. "So did you break up?"

Evelyn shook her head. "I don't know," she said. "Maybe."

"When Caiti and I got in that big fight last year," said Marlowe, "I knew I'd messed up instantly, but I was too afraid to apologize because... well it's just hard to admit you were wrong, you know? I was really embarrassed. I bet Sean's just trying to figure out how to own up to it."

"It's different though. Because it wasn't just something that happened last night. It's been happening for months."

"Yeah," Marlowe said and he nodded. Neither one of them knew what else to say. The silence stretched on and on and Evelyn's mind filled with a thousand thoughts, but nothing she wanted to vocalize.

"Thank you for coming to check on me," she said finally. "You're a good friend."

Marlowe just shook his head. "You've been checking on me all year."

When he got up to leave a little while later, he pulled her into another big hug and made her promise to keep him updated and let him know if she needed anything.

"Don't say anything to him, okay?"

Marlowe frowned.

Evelyn took a deep breath and let it all out in a heavy sigh. "If he wants to talk to me," Evelyn said, "I need him to do it on his own. If it doesn't come from him, then there's no way to fix it."

Marlowe looked at her with this evaluating gaze she wasn't used to seeing from him. "Okay," he nodded.

"And don't tell Caiti, either."

Marlowe's face faltered a little.

"She'll send him an owl."

"Yeah," Marlowe breathed, running a hand through his hair. "She'll send him a howler."