[you know the drill i'm not supposed to be updating blah blah blah]

Chapter 19

"How is Bertie?" James asked as he pulled on Bea's hand, allowing her to fall onto the couch beside him with Sirius to the other side, "I'm positive it was his crying I could hear."

"Can't blame him though," Lily whispered, fury lacing her tone, "if I had known-"

"I think if we all had known," Remus cut her off, squeezing the girl's hand, "then he wouldn't stand a chance."

"He didn't stand a chance when Bea found out," Sirius said, and she turned to offer him the smallest of smiles.

"We haven't all been together for so long," Bea whispered, leaning into James with his arm around her and her legs over Sirius, "I miss it."

"We miss you," Violet said, leaning over to squeeze your hand, "and you have no idea how glad we are that you got out without expulsion."

"It was pity," she rolled her eyes, "it's not like I'm using their sympathy to my advantage but if I had to do what I did to Killian again I would."

"The only difference is that we would be there to help," Lily piped in. It was very clear to Bea that Lily wished to speak about something...or rather, someone.

"Something wrong, Lils?" Bea asked, pushing herself further into James who leaned down to press a kiss to her head.

"Wha- oh...no, nothing," she smiled, shifting on the armchair and scraping her hand through her long hair, "how is...how is your friend Beau? He looked pretty furious."

"Oh," Bea would've smirked if she wasn't terribly exhausted, "he's alright...he told me to thank you for him actually."

"He did?" she squeaked out, eyes wide, and Bea thought it was entirely adorable.

"He saw you with Macy," Bea said, "it was a really nice thing you did, taking her away from that."

"She didn't need to see it," Lily sighed, "how is she?"

"She's alright. She's been coping on her own so long that the very thought of talking about it is far too overwhelming, but she's still coping," Bea sighed, "she got justice, and that's great but it doesn't stop what happened to her."

"Do you want to talk about something else?" whispered James in her ear when he watched her throat bobbed and her eyes glaze ever so slightly, and she silently nodded, "so we were talking about O.W.Ls."

"You were?" Bea asked, wide-eyed. She hated the thought of her owls, the fact that she was certain she would only pass one was terrifying her, but she wasn't sure she was entirely ready to go back to classes, though she really did need to.

"The boys and I still have all of our study notes from last year," James said, and the three others nodded, "so we've put them all together for you."

Her eyes lifted to him, and her lips parted, and he only smiled at her, squeezing her hand tightly, "course Lils gave us her potions notes for you because the rest of us are utter shit, so she contributed too."

Her eyes snapped to Lily who smiled with a nod, and she could feel her eyes brimming with tears she didn't want to let spill. Her friends had a way of surprising her with their love that she could feel her aching heart healing with every second she sat there.

Sirius moved suddenly when the first tear fell and wrapped his arms around her so tightly that her muffled sobs could hardly be heard. She clung to him, gripping onto his shirt and allowing him to stroke her hair with quiet whispers of how much he loved her and how much their friends loved her and would do anything for her.

Because she seemed to forget that.

And they seemed to forget that she was there for a while, but they hadn't forgotten...they would never forget about her and now it seemed as though it was entirely new for her to have people who cared about her so much.

"I missed you all so much," she hiccoughed, eyes stinging and a happiness bubbling in the pit of her stomach that she hadn't felt in a long time.

"We missed you too," her friends whispered together, and soon did all of them huddle over her and Sirius, limbs tangled as well as breaths and it was so warm and close together, but she wasn't overwhelmed. She didn't feel the need to flinch away or frown and she didn't feel horrible at the sudden contact with her friends.

Because she missed them. She missed them so much and a hug like the one they were sharing wasn't scary or new or uncomfortable, but it was familiar and filled with so much love that wrapped around her tightly.

And she knew she wasn't better.

She knew she would have days, so many days that she wished to curl up and cry and forget about everything, but everyone had those days. She had many of them, much more than what someone usually did, but that didn't make her any less normal than her friends.

And she was finally accepting that.

She was accepting that she had been through tons, she had been through so much that she could hardly think about it without nausea swimming in her stomach but that was all a part of her growth. That maybe someday she wouldn't have that nausea...that maybe it would be a dull pain of hatred and not something that could truly impact her growth.

And until then she was perfectly happy being herself, being the girl who now painted and who loved her friends and who didn't want to die. The girl that couldn't quite yet go to class but who still managed to show up to every single herbology lesson just to show that she was thankful, because words couldn't describe how much she owed to Professor Sprout, but those lessons every week was a start of how much she owed the woman.

But the same woman didn't think Bea owed her a thing.

❁

Her detentions annoyed her greatly.

The last place she wished to be on her worst days was in detention sitting at a desk and doing work she didn't have a clue on, but then, there was always one thing to make her feel better and that one thing was her boyfriend.

Every single detention that Bea had, James would always be there with something else that landed him in the classroom with her. At first, it was major things, like hexing the girls that hurt her feelings by saying they wanted him, and doing it right in front of McGonagall so she had to give him detention.

But then the Professors caught on to what he was doing, and when he tied his shoelace in the hall and McGonagall said, "Detention Mr Potter...this Thursday," he realised that he didn't need to go all out to be with Bea.

She had snuck some of her art supplies with her into the detention classroom. Her thinnest paintbrush, a bucket of water that she levitated behind her and one of her many cans of paint and her canvas was James' arm.

She was trying to involve magic with her paintings more and more and she was greatly enjoying it, but she wasn't surprised when she cried in her gallery just yesterday when one of the un-bloomed flowers that she had painted had turned into a tiny bud.

They were all growing at different rates...the flowers she had painted and the ones she had yet to paint would grow differently too, but when she was truly happy - and the pain had left...her garden would be full.

"Stay still!" she huffed, glaring at James one more time when he jerked his arm away and almost messed up the tiny little flowers she was painting.

"It tickles!" he exclaimed, leaning his chin on his free hand whilst he watched her concentrate. He had never seen her paint before, she wouldn't allow him into her gallery and he knew she had her reasons, but it was incredible to be able to just watch her.

It wasn't much of a surprise to him that she wished to take up a hobby when she arrived back at Hogwarts. She always needed something to do, and before, her essays kept her busy when she wasn't doing anything else, and now she could hardly lift her quill to parchment so that idea fell away quickly.

But even if he never saw one of her paintings ever, or she never wanted him to see anything she had ever worked on...as much as it wouldn't sit well with him - he didn't care, because if it made her happy then he wasn't going to object to that.

He leaned down slowly, trying his best not to move his arm and soon caught her off guard by pressing his lips to her cheek. He was sure his breath caught in his throat at the sight of her smile and even the blush that painted her cheeks red and she found his eyes shortly after, sitting down her paintbrush and pushing herself out of her seat just so she could reach him.

"What was that for?" she asked, hands resting on either side of his face and her smile reaching her eyes to the point that he had to stop his own from burning with happy tears.

"I just..." he shook his head with the smallest smile, "I sometimes can't believe how lucky I am to have you."

"James..."

"No, I don't - I don't want to talk about it in that way...the way that you might not have even been...here." He took a deep breath, making sure not to move his arm so that it wouldn't smudge the still drying paint, "I mean...I look at you and I see this girl who is just...you're just so brave, and talented...merlin you are so fucking talented - and beautiful but I mean, it's not just beauty.

It's like...it's - I guess it's like looking at a masterpiece. Think of a painting, and you look at it and you think...man imagine being the person who painted that, imagine being the person who gets to proudly show that off. That's what I see when I look at you Bea, but don't take that the wrong way because you're not an object or anything...you're just, I can't help but wonder what I ever did in this world to be the guy who gets to be this close to you and to see that smile and to kiss those lips and to proudly show the world that holy fuck I'm your boyfriend."

She was grinning, and it met her eyes to the point that they crinkled with delight because she had missed him so much, she missed his blabbering and the fact that he was so cheesy sometimes that she couldn't help but love him even more even though it was hardly possible.

And with her hand clutching her wand, she grabbed his arm covered in paint, whispered something so softly that he couldn't hear it and tapped his skin and in just a few seconds was the painted flowers on his arm rearranging to spell out something.

And he smiled. He smiled so widely because in that smile, and in her eyes, he could see happiness he hadn't seen in a long time, and as he looked down at the words on his arms he knew that she had planned that, and she was painting that just to show him and tell him and make sure he remembered because it was true, it was so true.

But the Bea that had been there in previous months, the one that hardly ate or hardly left the gallery or hardly had her friends wouldn't have been able to think of something like that. She wouldn't have been able to think of something romantic to do for him as her boyfriend because it was the least of her problems and it seemed like she hardly cared.

But she cared a lot, and she wanted to show it again because he was the most incredible boy and he was her most incredible boy.

So, he took another look at the words arranged in flowers on his arm, then lifted her chin and kissed her mouth and whispered, "I love you too, Bumble."