Credence has had a troubled childhood, and as a result of the abuse he suffers at the hand of his adoptive mother, he comes to crave affection from others. Any kind of affection. Aurelia knew him long ago. She was the only one to show any care for t...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
It had been a few months now. She cried until there was nothing left inside but a raw emptiness that nibbled at her like a starving rat. Her irises were threaded scarlet and eyeballs hung heavy in their sockets. Her whole body was limp like each limb weighed twice as much as it had before and just moving it was a slow, painful effort. The sun still shined in the sky beneath the thick layer of clouds, but Credence would never see it, the birds still sung in bursts of melody, but he could not hear it, for him there was no beauty left in the world. It made Aurelia wonder if there ever was.
She wrote letters sometimes to deal with her mourning. Aurelia could have written a million letters, each one the same as the last in sentiment and cadence. Only the word arrangement ever changed. It boiled down to one thing, 'You should be here, I'm sorry.' Ultimately, she was uncertain if that was selfish or not and even if it was, to hell with the rest of the world and their opinions. Credence should have been there, alive and well. Her heart felt as barren as the moors on a desolate winter morn knowing that he was gone.
It wasn't the longest she had been without him. During her days at Ilvermorny she would sometimes go half the year without even a thought, but this was different. She knew he was alive back then, now he was gone. That truth still refused to sink in. She use to treat it as her obligation to get him out from New York, and to be there for him after so much time away. Like she owed him for the comfort he gave her when they were younger, or that she just felt sorry for him. Now she knew it was nothing of the sort. She truly did think of him as one of her closest friends, and the distance nor the drastic shift in his self-esteem should have changed that.
Aurelia was riddled with regret. She scarcely attended work, and though Grindelwald had been captured, it meant very little to her. When they had revealed him from under the fake face of Percival Graves, Aurelia had been so distressed that she thought the room was empty. Like she was alone.
Aurelia was plagued by the knowledge that, once again, she could have done more. Maybe if she'd arrived at the station earlier instead of cowering on the streets, or if she'd insisted he leave the very moment she gave him that ticket, then he'd still be alive.
Newt had returned to England soon after the incident; the very next day, to be exact. However, Aurelia wasn't there to give him a farewell.
Porpentina had tried to visit her but pretending that she wasn't home was becoming a new skill; keep the lights off at all times, stand flat against the wall so she couldn't see her through the small window on her apartment door, and make sure every breath is quiet. Aurelia did dread when she brought along Queenie though. It was near impossible to become invisible with her around, and shutting off her mind was not something Aurelia was even remotely talented in.
The witch did try to get on with her daily life, but the streets seemed a lot more crowded than before except for the corners in which she use to see Credence; those were left barren.
