𝐂𝐇𝐄𝐂𝐊𝐌𝐀𝐓𝐄
chapter twenty-seven; A Very Marauder Sleepover
" And I still always look at you when you're smiling, because, hell, how am I supposed to look at anything else? "

  SIRIUS BLACK UNDERSTOOD complicated families. He got it. In every length, Sirius understood broken parents made broken children. That this kind of hurt lingered. That, sometimes, when family came back and whacked you with reality, you may just need to break down a little bit.

  So he didn't judge Salem as she cried in the Marauders' dorm. None of them did. They weren't too sure how she'd managed to surpass the staircase, but once seeing glassy eyes, no boy was focused on this.

  Salem had gone for Sirius first, which wounded James' ego but not his heart. 

  Because James wanted to fix everything, he wanted to make all the bad go away, but Salem needed it to be bad. Just for a little. She needed to be allowed to cry and curse her parents and the very magic intertwined with her soul.

  "Hey," James cooed, crouching beside Sirius' bed Salem had taken claim of, "How are you?"

  "Shitty," She replied, sniffling harshly. Sirius hadn't asked much. He'd scooted over and let her curl into a crescent moon and cry, rubbing her back gently. James was the first one to dare. "My mum's horrible."

  "I think our mums would get along wonderfully," Sirius mumbled, almost pulling a half-smiled out of Salem.

  "What happened?"

  Salem sighed, flipping onto her back and looking up at the curtains draping around the four-poster. But, she felt as though she was being too mean to James, so she held her hand out, palm up, and instantly his fingers intertwined with hers.

  "I think if I talk about it I might cry again. And I've embarrassed myself enough for one night."

  "There's nothing embarrassing about being sad," Peter spoke softly from his own bed.

  "Thanks, Peter."

  "Yeah."

  Salem soaked up silence. Remus' heavy breathing from where he was attempting to remain awake, Sirius' arm against her own to remind her she was grounded here, James's thumb running over the back of her hand, and poor Peter Pettigrew picking at his comforter.

  "She never told my dad about me. He didn't leave."

  "That's fucked."

  James felt his heart get a little lighter at the corner of Salem's lips tugging up, due to Remus's blunt comment.

  "So he talked to her. Brought her. So that I didn't have to wait 'til summer to talk to her about. . . everything."

  "How did that go?"

  "She started talking about you all and I left."

  Remus sat up at this news, which mirrored all of the boys as they were at full attention now.

  "She. . . knows who we are?"

  "Yeah," Salem whispered, "I wish I'd never told her."

  "You needed to," Sirius' voice made Salem turn her head just barely, "Going through that alone is far worse than your mother having a lasting dislike for us."

  "Except that, I love you lot."

  "And we love you, too, Sal."

  Peter smiled shyly as Salem sat up, sending him a warm smile.

  "I just. . . I dunno. Is it shitty to say I care about everyone I've met this year more than my own mother? She only liked me when I was happy. When I only relied on her. But then I came here and. . . after third year. . . it was like suddenly I wasn't her daughter, I was a project."

  "Hey," James whispered, resting his chin on the side of the mattress, "Your family shouldn't be people that share the same DNA as you. It should be the people who care about you. Don't think you owe her something for giving birth to you."

  Salem smiled weakly, letting her hand leave James' only to gently rest against his face.

  "Thank you."

  "We haven't done anything."

  "You've done more than you think," She shrugged, sighing deeply, "I'm really sorry for showing up and. . . crying."

  "Don't be. This is what family's for," Sirius smiled reassuringly, earning a side-hug from Salem.

  "And you can stay here. As long as you need."

  "Thanks," She twisted her lips to the side, "But I should probably get to bed. I'm. . . exhausted."

  "You could sleep here," James blurted before he could think, "I mean— if you want— I could sleep on the floor— or Sirius' bed—"

  "I'm not going to kick you out of your own bed, Potter."

  James turned a shade of scarlet.

  "But I would like to sleep here," She continued quietly, "I'm not ready to be lonely just yet."

  So, after a bit of rearranging, Salem and James laid in his four-poster bed. He'd never wanted to sit still for too long, stay in one, quiet place for longer than a second, but he found himself wishing he could lay on the somewhat lumpy mattress with Salem forever. Even if their limbs weren't entangled, even if they were balanced on either edge of the small bed, miles stretching out between them in the inch that laid vacant between their arms, just to be there with her was enough.

  "Sal?"

  She turned to him, finding his chocolate eyes even in the dark.

  "Are you okay? And I mean. . . really."

  "I will be," She whispered, "I have a lot to work out with my parents. My dad tries to be a mediator, but. . . I mean, he can't. He's not impartial."

  "We're all here for you. Whenever you need, whatever that means."

  "I told my mum I love you."

  James stilled. His breath was captured in his lungs like a bird in a cage, unable to believe the words that had tumbled from Salem's lips.

  "And do you?" He asked quietly, "Love me?"

  "I used to think I'd never know what it meant," Salem spoke honestly, forcing her voice quiet, "That, even if beyond every reason, there was a boy who liked me. . . really liked me, broken or healing or healed. . . that I'd never be able to love him. Because I didn't think my dad loved me, and at some point, I felt like my mum stopped loving me, too. Because the first crush I had tore me apart and screamed that no boy could ever like. . . me. But then you came along."

  James watched her patiently, his puppy-dog eyes focused on the faint outline of her face in the dark room, illuminated only by the half-moon poking through a window shyly.

  "And, it's not just a feeling with you. . . it's everything. I'm not scared to kiss you or hold your hand. I don't think you'll wake up one morning and decide you don't care about me anymore. Maybe it's some cosmic coincidence, that I just so happened to get to know you during the time I stopped pitying myself and did something about my life, but you're still here. And I still always look at you when you're smiling, because, hell, how am I supposed to look at anything else? I love you, Potter, maybe in a strange, cynical, misconstrued way of mine, but I really love you."

  "I think love is different for everyone," James whispered after a long silence. "I think the way you define and feel love isn't the same as how I do. But, it's not the same as how Sirius does, or Fitzgerald does, or Lily. I think we all have things we think love means and is made of. And, every once and a while, two people are lucky enough to love eachother in their own ways enough, to where it becomes more. It becomes 'in love', and that's what I am, Sal. I'm in love with you."

  Salem found herself turning onto her side, shuffling the feathery pillow loudly to meet his eyes in the dark. And without much thinking, Salem inched closer until the ocean between them became nothing meeker than a puddle. Their makeshift pajamas flirted in ways the teens struggled, warm confused limbs danced until finding comfort, and before either knew it the only sound filling the dorm of rowdy boys was a steady stream of long, deep breaths, accompanied by Sirius Black's snoring.

  And Salem Gerard wouldn't have had it any other way.

( AUTHOR'S NOTE. )
sorry it's been so long
since I updated this??
I haven't been very active
lately aH