It'sFlaversham

Olivia Flaversham, or Liv for short. 18. Hufflepuff Alumni. Cruse Breaker. Amateur Detective. Single.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict

He disagreed. It used to frustrate him how differently they saw his situation but now, all it did was make his heart ache. There were quite a few people who viewed his circumstances as being alive and in a way he supposed they were right. He could talk to people, he still looked like himself…but the things he had done, things he couldn’t tell Olivia…those things weren’t done by Michael Darling. Michael Darling was a recovering drug addict who loved his family and couldn’t even bring himself to fight a werewolf even at the defense of his own life. He had killed so many werewolves…runty werewolves, weak ones but he did it all the same. He could feel the last of Michael’s good soul slipping away and what it was leaving behind was monstrous, vicious and cruel. Who he was, no longer had a destination, he was the destination. There was no coming back from him.

All that said and being what it was, it didn’t seem to be doing him much good to dwell on it or give it much thought and it was so hard to explain t to others. “I’ve been very curious to find out. Nothing I hope,” he said absently, “a second chance would also be cool, even if it were just as a dog or something.”

The Knight bus was coming. Olivia heard its tell tale whiz as it zoomed through London. “I hope there is something out there. I would like to think that the time we spent with those we love could live on past our existence.” Olivia would love to see her mother again. She felt jipped by life. She wanted more time with her. She had an eternity of questions. An afterlife was hope to get those questions answered.

 The screeching of the brakes filled the air. “Anyway, Michael, I do hope to see you soon.” She offered him a hug. “Thank you.” Olivia grinned without having to hold back the tears.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi

Denahi gave a slight chuckle. “I’ll admit, I do sometimes focus in on one thing to the exclusion of all else.” That,  coupled with the fact that he’d spent the majority of his life taking care of his brothers meant that dating, at least, was not high on the list of things to focus on. Earning money, keeping up his grades at school, making sure neither of his brothers wound up in too much trouble, between all of those there was little time for most anything else. 

The whizzing sound of the Knight Bus was faint but it came quickly and the brakes squealed to a hault. “As long as you’re not excluding the important things, you’ll be fine.” Olivia took a deep breath and pushed off the bench. “It’s time to face the music.” She hopped onto the bus and waved good-bye.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

Denahi laughed. “No, nothing like that. She looked perfectly fine. She was really nice too, could talk for hours about ancient Greek mythology, and made one heck of a chocolate cake. I was just more focused on earning money than I was on earning dates.” That hadn’t actually changed between that summer and this one.  

“Ah you’re one of those ultra committed types, aren’t ya?” She nodded. “Nothing bad with that. That’s how I was when I was a student.” Yeah, she thought, and the one thing keeping you from being a cat lady is your extreme ailurophobia. 

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

“If you can’t die then you can’t live,” he said solemnly, looking away, “life isn’t a starting point…or a destination, it’s the journey but…if there’s not destination then there’s no journey in the first place. See, I know it looks like I’m alive,” he said desperately, “I get it, I do but…I’m not…I can’t die because I’m already dead..” he finished quietly, looking at his hands, “I don’t regret it anymore though, if I hadn’t died, my sister and brother definitely would have. They’re really smart you know,” he said, leaning his head back to look up at the moon again, “my sister is a brilliant story teller and my brother is just plain brilliant. I’m glad I could help them live. They deserve it, more than I did anyway…It’s still too bad though.”

“There’s no destination because you think there isn’t one.” Olivia touched his hand gently. She didn’t recoil from the coldness of his touch. She was coming to terms with death. It was her only companion these days. “You’re always so down on yourself but you speak so highly of your siblings. Find a destination. A ship whether full of a crew or a ghost always finds a shore.” She leaned back and gazed up at the stars. “What do you think happens when you die, like really die?” Olivia thought she knew. Heaven seemed so real when she was younger but then Hogwarts happened and changed everything. She was sitting on a bench waiting for an enchanted bus with a vampire. 

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

“I’ve never worked with Goblins,” Denahi said. “But I did work one summer for a very grumpy and very elderly man who was convinced that I was only working for him to get with his granddaughter.” He shook his head a little bit at the memory. “I wasn’t, by the way, I took the job because it was the one that paid the best.” Despite the old man, that job had been rather enjoyable. 

“Pretty much the same thing except one has sharper teeth that are real.” Olivia chuckled. “You weren’t even a little bit interested in her? Did she look like the rear end of a hippogryff?” Olivia was trying to figure out if he was serious or kidding. Something told her he was serious, he didn’t seem like the joking type.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

“If you can’t die then you can’t live,” he said solemnly, looking away, “life isn’t a starting point…or a destination, it’s the journey but…if there’s not destination then there’s no journey in the first place. See, I know it looks like I’m alive,” he said desperately, “I get it, I do but…I’m not…I can’t die because I’m already dead..” he finished quietly, looking at his hands, “I don’t regret it anymore though, if I hadn’t died, my sister and brother definitely would have. They’re really smart you know,” he said, leaning his head back to look up at the moon again, “my sister is a brilliant story teller and my brother is just plain brilliant. I’m glad I could help them live. They deserve it, more than I did anyway…It’s still too bad though.”

“Michael,” she looked at him and reached to touch his hand, “stop beating yourself up over it.” She gave him a half hearted smile. “I think you’re so used to being the problem child that it’s hard not to beat yourself up over your lifestyle choices.” She shrugged and leaned back to look at the moon as well. “What do you think will happen when you die? Like for real die not vampire die.” 

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

“Well, Gringotts has got be and interesting place to work. So that’s got to make being a workaholic at least a bit better for you than it is for the rest of us who have boring jobs.”  He was only being mostly sincere. Any job could be terrible if you spent too much time at it. Even one like working at Gringotts. 

“Have you ever worked with Goblins?” Olivia shot him a side glance. “They aren’t know for their kind demeanor and loving embrace.” Olivia loved her work but she wasn’t going to miss it while she was at her dad’s house. Two whole weeks of Goblin free sorrow. 

“I get to do fun stuff every so often. The recent influx of people with powers has made it pretty busy.” Olivia wasn’t exactly sure what to call the muggles with powers and she wasn’t really concerned with what they were doing. She, too, was once a muggle.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

“Not planning on it, no,” Denahi said, chuckling a little bit himself. “I guess I’m just hopeful for if it does happen.” Denahi knew that in all likelihood they’d go their separate ways and never see each other again. And that was just fine, honestly. They didn’t know each other, he was just some random guy who’d started talking to her. 

“Thank you for your honesty.” She laughed. “I work at Gringotts so the odds of seeing me again are pretty high if you have an account there.” Olivia had to interact with a lot of people on a daily basis. “Then again if you don’t have one, you’ll probably never see me because I’m a workaholic.” She flashed a sarcastic grin before looking around for the bus wondering where the hell it could be.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

“Everything I guess…I probably won’t stop being sorry for it ever,” and considering that he was going to potentially live forever, that was a pretty intense thing to say. “I’m sorry that you have to go through this, I’m sorry for running into, you know, like this…” he shrugged and looked away. He was sort of half dressed and he could only imagine how it must have looked…but then again maybe she didn’t see it. “I’m sorry for how things turned out between us…I always wanted things to turn out differently.”

Olivia nodded. She couldn’t blame him for blaming himself for all eternity since he would live for it anyway. But, it wasn’t his fault, she thought, that he was the way he was. “The only way you can be sorry is if you waste the new life you’ve been given doing what you used to do.” Olivia was staring at the stars. “People die everyday. They die when it is their time. They die when it isn’t their time. If you waste never being able to die, then you would owe them an apology.” She paused. “As for us.” Olivia had resigned herself to never talking about it again. She was finally putting those feelings into a box and storing them away. “I guess you can say I did, too. But life just doesn’t always work out the way we want it to.”

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

He smiled and laughed ruefully, sticking his hands into his pockets, “no, I suppose it wouldn’t huh?” His gaze turned back to her, sort of, mostly he just sort of watched her from the corner of his eye. She caused him a fair bit of stress and worry but she was uniquely worth the strain on his heart.”I’m sorry,” he said again, he said that a lot to her, “for everything.”

“This is more so our typical line of conversation. This feels normal compared to the conversations I have at work.” She wasn’t going to miss that place for the next two weeks. While she loved the challenge, she was getting sick of picking up the slack of the Goblins. The new muggle squib potion takers, or whatever people called them, were creating an inundation of new accounts. Her father’s funeral was a tiny gem in disguise. 

“What are you sorry for?” She gave him a side glare. “You didn’t do anything, did you?” She tried to hide her usual accusatory tone. Some habits died hard.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

Dead Days || Self Para

“Olivia took a deep breath. She was about to speak in front of a tiny group of her father’s friends. Her father was an only child and didn’t speak to his distant relatives. She checked her hair and walked into the dimly lit room. 

The voices hushed and Olivia took her place in front of the room. She glanced back and took a look at her father in the coffin. “Everyone here knows me da’.” Her Scottish roots peeked through. “He was a child at heart. He lived to make toys.” Olivia let a tear roll down her cheek. “When I was a little girl, he made me the most beautiful ballerina. He told me that she was meant to be my angel. She twirled and twirled until all her gears wore out. I cried for days. He told me that there could be worse things in life.” Olivia choked up. He reminded her that she had time to enjoy her toy and that things break. When she was young, she couldn’t see what he was trying to tell her. He was trying to explain death. Like toys, people weren’t meant to last forever. “Me da’ always snuck a lesson in every way he could.” 

Olivia was not prepared for the next portion of her responsibility. She had to read a passage from the Bible. Olivia hadn’t picked one up since her mother died. It was partially because she was mad at God and partially because at Hogwarts there was no need for it. In the muggle world, it was needed. Muggles needed hope for the deceased. Muggles needed guidance. Olivia had to read the scripture in order to respect her father and what he would have wanted. He would have wanted a proper muggle funeral.

“I am going to do a reading from the gospel of John.” She gave the small crowd a moment to open their bibles as she lifted the one in front of her open by the bookmark. “The Gospel of John, chapter fourteen, verses one through three. ‘Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” Olivia placed her hand on the Bible and looked out at the room. People were nodding and others were putting their bibles down in their laps.”I know my father is there now. He is preparing a room for each and every one of us. And you all know he is not patiently waiting!” The room erupted in laughter and Olivia found herself laughing through her tears.

In Scottish tradition, Olivia was the first to pay her last respects while everyone lined up behind her. “Ya know, Daddy, I love you.” She kissed him on the brow while she laid her hand over his heart.

Olivia waited in the back of the room as she watched her father’s friends say good-bye. The sight brought her back to her mother’s funeral. Olivia was young but it was still clear in her memory. It was one of the worst days of her life. Probably the first of many if Olivia had to compare any days prior to her mother’s death.  

Another tradition was to flip over the chairs after the last respects. Everyone laughed and jokingly told the ghosts to move. “This woulda been Hiram’s favorite part!” One of the attendees shouted. Olivia smiled as she flipped over her chair. The funeral director approached her and asked if she wanted to close the casket. She shook her head. It was too hard for her. She didn’t want the last thing she remembered of her father’s face was the darkness obscuring his features as the lid came down. She wanted to remember him as if he was sleeping. 

After the funeral, Olivia went back to her father’s house. She walked through the empty house and let the echo of her heels fill her head. She entered her father’s study and sat in the big leather high backed chair. She pulled open the lowest drawer on the right and pulled out the amber liquid filled glass bottle. She poured a glass in one of the tumbler glasses he kept in the drawer. She brought it to her lips and began to laugh. She smelt the sweetness of the drink before she could take a sip. It was caramel water.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

Denahi nodded. He couldn’t be sure exactly what she meant, but given recent events around Hogwarts, it wasn’t too far a stretch to believe that she’d been caught up in it in some way. Everyone had been caught up in it. “Well we can always hope that next time we meet the circumstances are brighter.”

Olivia’s hope was in low supply. She had just pulled her mood back up from the depths. She was starting to feel normal, well her version, again. Chats of the war died down. The newest scandal of the muggles and potions was taking the forefront. Life was going on. Then life threw a wrench in and ripped her hope away. But, Olivia was good at masking herself. She grinned and let a faint chuckle escape. “Oh are you planning on us meeting, again?” 

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

“Yeah but it…feels like one…” he said, “eating was satisfying, yeah, and sometimes it was almost as good as blood is now.” He studied his hands and looked up at the moon, “It feels addictive, it feels like this unbelievable high and everything is better while feeding. It’s kind of unreal…” He shook his head, “this is a really bad conversation topic, it’s so messed up, I’m sorry.”

Olivia shrugged. “It doesn’t bother me.” Truth be told, Olivia wasn’t much for small talk anyway. She liked meaningful conversation. Talking about the weather just made her feel awkward. There was so much going on in the world that idle prattle was wasteful in her eyes. Olivia had also gone through quite a list of traumatic experiences for her 18 years, talking about her friend’s blood addiction was low on the list of horrible things that could possibly happen. 

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

Denahi was glad that she had laughed. That was one good thing this awkward situation could bring. He knew only too well how she must feel. This might even have been the first time she’d laughed in a while. “I’m Denahi. It’s nice to meet you. You know… despite the circumstances.”

“I’m not sure if you would be surprised or not but I’ve made friends in much worse circumstances.” She thought about the war for the first time since after prom. She felt a pang of sadness for the loss of her classmates. Then she wondered why there was so much death in her life. What was it about her that death liked? Why did it always follow her?

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

He sat on the bench beside her but he sat at the edge, as far away as he could without causing her to comment although he suspected she might anyway. He had to keep her at a distance and make special efforts not to become any more attached than he was. “I’m…” he paused and sighed, shaking his head a little, “I’m here satisfying that new addiction of mine,” he said, electing not to give any details.

“I wouldn’t call it an addiction.” She paused. “Are we talking about,” She hushed her voice before the last word, “blood?” It was still hard to imagine Michael as a vampire. To Olivia, he would always be goofy little Michael; even if he can kill her with a pinky. “You kind of need it to survive. I wouldn’t call my food an addiction. If so, I need some serious intervention.” Even though the topic of their conversation wasn’t conventional, she was happy it wasn’t about what happened. It was a nice way to get her mind out of her problems.

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Liv & Denahi

[cuteasamouse-liv]

wise-wolf-denahi:

“Believe me I know, I’ve had… too much experience with them.” He shooks his head a little bit. It still hurt. “That being said, I also know that there’s very little that actually makes you feel better after losing someone. And I know you don’t know me but, if you do need a friendly ear… Well, I can relate.” Yikes that was awkward. “I mean, you obviously don’t have to.”

Olivia chuckled. It was the first time since her father’s passing that she was really able to laugh. There was something funny about people stuck in an awkward situation. Although, spending seven years in the Hufflepuff house, everything can be found funny. It was a friendly disposition most of them shared. “I’m not easily swayed into things I don’t want to do. Thanks for the option, though.” Olivia wished she could say she was a good judge of character but she believed in the good in people. She knew people were capable of bad things but she knew they were capable of good, too. “I’m Olivia, by the way.” She wanted to believe that this friendly stranger was good.  

[cuteasamouse-liv]

The Knight Bus || Mike & Liv

[cuteasamouse-liv]

gentleman-blood-addict:

He froze, he didn’t even breath, his own dead heart twisting for her. “I’m sorry…” he said stepping towards her, he almost reached out but held back, remembering her reaction the last time he had touched her. He didn’t want to put her through that again, not when he was trying to give her some form of comfort, not that it was really possible considering the circumstances.

“Do you want me to wait with you?” he asked, assuming she was waiting for the bus to come pick her up.

Olivia patted the bench next to her. “Feel free to take a seat then.” She held a balled up tissue in one hand and dug into her sack for another. “What are you doing here anyway?” Olivia had the question in her head but her father took precedence. Once her outburst was satiated she was able to focus. Although, the grief came in waves. There was no telling what could bring her back down and that terrified her.