Ten years after I began at Hogwarts, Sebastian Sallow is back. And he's Professor Sallow now. He disappeared after the fall of Ranrok and Rookwood, after I lost Professor Fig, and after Ominis and I couldn't keep him from losing himself. But I never...
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You are grounded, Sebastian. You are calm. You will remain calm. You will use your lungs. You will use your bloody brain.
"All set?" April's voice calls from the bathroom. "I think I'm all ready."
With a final, massive inhale I stand up from my cross-legged position in front of the stunning floor-to-ceiling stained-glass window in the living area. I had meant to write April a poem to calm my mind as she hopped into the shower after our little quest to Hogsmeade. I quite enjoy the habit of writing again. And she seems to enjoy what I've written which feels bloody amazing.
But that effort did not go well, so I found myself in meditation instead. Glancing at the paper next to me my eyes practically roll themselves at my idiocy and I have to admit my quiet, grounding moment made me feel only marginally better about the evening ahead.
Paper in hand, I mutter "incendio" to burn the damn thing before April gets her hands on it.
F is for fucked. "My brain is..." U is for utterly. C is for centaur, quite obviously K is for Kai. Bloody Kai. I is for "I think something is wrong with me." N is for "no, I know something is wrong with me." G is for "good luck, you knobhead." HELL.
Not my finest work.
"Hey, what's that?!" April calls towards me as she walks through the kitchen and catches the sight of the final flames lapping the cursed paper into nothing but ash and I have to shake off the pain of it having just reached my fingertips.
"Hmm? Nothing!" I wave her off. "Bad poem. Should never have seen the light of day," I assure her with a charming smile I know she won't be able to resist, and a diversion of pulling her face towards me with both hands for an overly-large kiss to her forehead, accented with a loud "MUAH!"
Though an amorphous, guttural sound from her throat doth protest, my angel's nose crinkles, a smile forms, and as her dimples shine, making me feel confident all is well and I indulge in simply taking the sight of her in for a moment before we join the others.
"Merlin's beard you are beautiful," I tell her, relishing the fact that my thoughts of that nature can pour forth, completely unfiltered.
Her hair is loose and low in fluffy waves that cascade to her shoulders, the front rolled off her face and secured low with a length of cerulean blue ribbon that reminds me of her magic. She wears a gorgeous blouse of a coordinating powder blue that pulls teal tones out of her green eyes and is embellished with delicate shirt-y details I'm sure I don't have the vocabulary to describe. Her gray woolen skirt lazily sways with its heavy weight as she moves. Her small feet are in flat, black leather loafers. And every one of her features looking up at me is more breathtaking than all of the works of the great masters, combined.
I always appreciated April's natural beauty. It's not the kind of beauty one has to try for, but simply is. Less of a curated, trophy-earning orchid of symmetry and precision, and more of a wild, vining rose that insists on splashing itself with more colors than its devoted gardener would have intended, and is as lovely for the way it cranes towards the sunshine and dances from its trellis in the breeze as it is for its very nature. Tonight, she seems especially striking.
