Bound By Blood.

Ch.24~Secrets.

"I always thought when I saw you again for the first time, it'd feel like everything I was missing.

Death.

It felt like fucking death."

Recovered Translated correspondents between Order Member Alexandra Brooks, to Death Eater Mattheo Riddle, 2003.

Hogwarts, 1997.

Mattheo.

Alexandra Brooks.

Born October 30, 1979. Rough childhood. Had been Obilivated at only age six, to take away the memory of her mother trying to kidnap her back from her father. He took her for a better life, but lost him shortly after. Her favorite color is gray, which shocked me. Her love for books ran deeper than I thought, especially if she's sitting in her favorite chair in her common room. But she'll settle for the lake. She loves the lake. Her favorite class is Charms. She's a morning person, ugh. She met Hermione before any of the others, but her favorite is Ron. She hates spiders, anytime she has to use wax to seal letters. She says they smell horrible and she always burns her fingers. Speaking of burns, in first year, she burnt her hand so bad in potions she spend four days in the hospital wing. Her favorite candy is chocolate frogs, just for the card. She had a cat, up until recently. Harry left her door open and "Whiskers" never came back. Nothing calms her like thunder, and that ugly piece of metal she wears around her neck, is her family crest.

The last thing she has of her father, so yes, I felt like a dick when I called it "an ugly piece of metal."

And now, it was four in the morning, and I couldn't help but want to know more.

She was still in the same position as I pulled her into hours ago.

That whole conversation threw me through a loop.

From finding out all this information from her I never thought I'd ever want to know, to how it ended up.

She was a virgin.

That day in her room, with the jersey, she was so close to letting it all go, for me.

I would've drowned in guilt.

My anger that day was... and if she would've let me.

No.

I would've hated myself more than I already did.

As I lay there in the quiet darkness, my thoughts spiraled like storm clouds gathering above.

Alexandra remained curled against me, the gentle rise and fall of her breathing a balm for the turmoil in my mind.

She was still up, I could tell by her breathing.

She hasn't said anything since I said to wait for everything else until after the war.

I don't think she understood how I meant it.

All I meant, was I wanted her first time, our first time, to not be smothered in secrets, in hiding. In a dorm room she had to use an invisibility cloak to get too.

I could sense the tension in Alexandra's body, but I didn't dare break the quiet.

I was acutely aware that her thoughts were racing just as mine were, each of us grappling with the looming separation, like two stars that were destined to collide but found themselves light-years apart.

Finally, the quiet was shattered by her voice, soft yet firm. "What if... what if we don't come back?" The question hung in the air, heavy with potential outcomes that both terrified and haunted me.