it’s not what he thought the night would go like. the weather is warm, a beautiful evening. there’s barely a breeze and there’s an anxiousness in his stomach. he stands beside cole, seeing the gryffindor out of his peripheral. deep breaths, deep breaths. they’re on the edge of the lakeside, and cyrus is parts astonished and paranoid, eyes wide as he faces the lake and he wondered, “am i really going to do this?”
it’s only when cole looks at him that he realizes he’s said that out loud, and it’s true. his heart is thrumming hard against his heart, and it’s a bit stupid. it’s something so small but he supposes, people are afraid of anything - spiders, sharks, dementors… and here he is, afraid of a body of water. there’s no fear in the upwards sky - cyrus would know. he flies it all the time, for quidditch, leisure. face your fears.
yet here he is, facing against the body of water in the face of the lake, and is he really going to do this? he has to - - he nods curtly, ignoring anything that’s buzzing in his ears, and heart and he decides to ‘deep dive’ (rather unprofessionally) into the lake and it –
sucks. learn how to tread water before you swim, children. don’t go straight into the deep end, because he thinks his lungs are filling with water, and he’s choking and reaching for the surface ( why was this a good idea again? ) he’s never had a panic attack before above ground, and to have it below, it’d be an unfortunate circumstance. there’s flashes of people that go through his mind – cypress, miguel, evelyn, ben, - and he’s in a frenzy, reaching for salvation that isn’t quite getting to him, and he’s drowning. he thinks.
“Looks like you are,” he replies to the question that had surely not been meant for his ears. But the wind had carried the words and he had felt the need to say something in return. Ever since arriving at Hogwarts, Cole has been willing the weather to get warmer so he could go swim in the lake. He wanted to spend afternoons leisurely reading on the shore, letting the sun kiss his skin. He wanted to feel the cool water against his skin and disappear under the surface, let silence fill his ears, let himself float and stare at the sky.
But they aren’t on the beach right now. They are standing at a higher point that’s overlooking the dark waters. A position that’s going to allow them to dive straight into the lake instead of waddling in shallow water until they reach the deeper part. He feels calm. He’s never been into the lake before, but he’s been waiting for this. He knows how to swim. The water has never scared him, not when it is calm like this. He watches Cyrus go first, and waits for him to resurface…but he doesn’t.
A flurry of thoughts take over his mind. Was this spot a dangerous one? Had there been rocks that were too near the side? Was the lake not as deep as they thought over there? Why is Cyrus not resurfacing? That was the most important question and one that prompts him into action. Just as he is about to jump into the water, he sees pale arms cutting through the water, a pale face flashes for an instant before being swallowed back by the water. He jumps rather than dive, preferring to risk breaking a leg than getting a concussion if there really are rocks below.
His body enters the water without any resistance. He swims back to the surface and takes a deep breath as soon as his head is out of the water. Rapidly, he looks around and nothing. He can’t panic. He rapidly swims over where he last saw the pale arms and tries to remember what he learned so long ago. He doesn’t have anything that he can throw at Cyrus so the boy can hold on to while Cole safely swims him back to the shore. But there’s no way he’s going to just leave him there to drown.
He dives under the water and keeps his eyes open. It doesn’t take him much time to find Cyrus. He rapidly swims over to him and positions himself behind him before grabbing him under the armpits and swimming back up to the surface. He keeps him pressed like that against him and moves his head in direction of the shore. He can make it. It’s not too far.
