way to go, tiger | Lorenzo Berkshire

࣪𖤐 Y4 | 21 . Love isn't easy

CIGARETTE DAYDREAMS — CAGE THE ELEPHANT
'You can drive all night, looking for the answers in the pouring rain.'

Cassie gets discharged a week later. She misses a whole week of lessons. Poppy had her monitored the whole time, Remus by her side and Sirius as Padfoot at her feet. Sometimes he got up onto the bed with her and rested his head on her stomach. Her friends visited as often as they could— they'd been lying to the girls and Harry all week.

Cassie still hasn't spoken to Cedric about Eddie, but she needs to. She won't be able to relax until
she does. But for now, Enzo has her on bedrest in his dorm. The boys are in there as well, catching her up on notes she missed. Pansy sits on the edge of Enzo's bed, twirling Cassie's hair soothingly.

Cassie hasn't told anyone about Cedric. She's planning on at least telling Enzo or Mattheo after she's spoken to him, but for now she keeps quiet. Cassie listens to their notes and essays, writes them down and takes it all in. A week of school is a lot to miss at Hogwarts.

After they finish their little study session, Draco asks the question they've all wondered but have been too scared to ask. "So like, you just tried to kill yourself? It was that simple?" he asks. They'd all refrained from asking that question while she was in the hospital. It doesn't surprise them all that Draco was the first to break.

Immediately, Theo swats his arm for asking that, but Cassie just chuckles. "Essentially yeah. I was really angry and so when I transitioned, the wolf was confused with all this rage I had. It just tried everything to get rid of it. It realised the anger came from my chest so it thought the only solution was to rip my heart out."

"That's... wow." Draco says, taken aback by her answer. He can't even begin to visualise that.

"Fuck, I'm so glad you're alright now. Imagine if it had worked." Blaise sighs, rubbing a hand over his face.

Cassie frowns, "Now that Poppy is aware this kind of thing can happen, she's already made a potion I can take that reduces my emotions as a wolf."

"Does it also stop you from scratching yourself like that?" Pansy asks. Only Pansy and Enzo have seen the scar across her chest. Poppy said to refrain from getting it wet so poor Pansy has to help her bathe. Enzo'd seen it because, well, it's Enzo and she loves and trusts him. She made it very clear she was only showing him the scar, not purposely flashing him on a random Saturday night.

"I can't say just yet, but I bloody hope so. They just keep coming— and they just look like shit, don't they? I mean, they're horrible to look at." she says, grimacing at the pain of sitting up off Enzo's chest.

"I wouldn't say horrible." Mattheo comments. "Discomforting? Yeah, but only because I know how you got them. It's the thought of you going through that makes me feel like discomforted, not the scars themselves."

Cassie smiles at her best friend. For the son of the most notorious war leader, Mattheo has a huge heart— which only beats for his friends. Without his friends he's nothing. They are the one thing in his life that gives him a reason to live.

"Right, I'm gonna get a shower so I'd appreciate it if you'd take this conversation up to the common room, because the last time I showered with Theo in the next room, he stole all of the towels and put them in the common room." Blaise sighs.

Everyone laughs, especially Theo. "He was screaming at me for twenty minutes straight!" he says through his laughter. Eventually, everyone gets up and leaves the boys' dorm.

But as Cassie sits in the common room, she can't help this horrible pressure on her chest. It's not from the scars— that's a different type of pain. This one is more deep, like it's in the smallest crevices of her chest. It's a weighty feeling, one that feels like it's pulling her down with it.