The door opens, “Remus, what took you so long?” She leans against the doorframe, her arms crossed, and her lips curled into a tricky smile.
“Oh, shut up”, I’m quick to answer her welcoming hug, “I got you the food requested, you should love me.” I show her the bag of fast food in my hand, and she laughs. She excitedly watches as I unpack the food in her messy kitchen. The apartment is old, very old, but to her it’s new, brand-new. She moved in only a week ago, and she’s been constantly calling on me to come over and help her with this, help her with that. There’s no working stove yet, all she’s got to cook with is an ancient microwave. I’ve never seen her happier. Dressed in a pair of worn-out dungarees and her messy hair is held in place by a scarf she’s twisted to use as a hairband. I’ve never seen her more beautiful.
“Alright, Rem”, she claps her hands together after finishing her meal, “Let’s get to work.”
---
“I should start demanding salary”, I add another stroke of glue to the wall and then brush my hair out of my face with a sticky hand. “That’s the amount of work I’m doing with this flat. With your flat.”
“Shut up, you love it.” She turns away from measuring wallpaper and looks at me. Her eyes glue to my hair, and her hand feels soft against my forehead as she strokes away a lost strand of hair out of my face. My breathing feels uncontrolled, and I can smell her from where I’m standing. Like entirely herself.
“You’ve grown so tall”, she says, looking at me with soft eyes. Are there tears I see in the corners? I straighten my shoulders, and for once I don’t feel completely out-of-place in my lanky body. Everything just feels okay with her, and sometimes I wish she didn’t refer to us as ‘just friends’. “Yes, I have. You, though, clearly haven’t.”
“Of course I’m not taller. You grow taller, I grow smarter.”
“That’s how it works?” I feel a smile itching at my lips.
She returns to her wallpaper, a bright, yellow one that’ll light up her living room, “Hmh. That’s how we work.” I already miss her, and my stupid heart twitches at the ‘we’ in her words.
“Are you done with the glue?” I’ve forgotten about the glue, I’ve been watching her instead. “Sure”, I reply, rolling some extra glue for good measure. This could be our flat, I think to myself as I help her to fit the cut piece of wallpaper onto the wall. This could be us moving into our own flat, and now adding colours to our new home.
“Remus, Remus”, she shuffles on the ladder, trying not to get too much glue on her hands. “We’ve encountered a minor problem?”
“Minor what?”
“Minor as in that the ceiling is not entirely straight all the way. It’s slowly decreasing with…”, she measures with ruler she conjured up from her dungarees’ pocket, “0,5 cm per meter.”
“Is it cause for panic?” I ask, playfully smiling at her in her puzzled state. She lightly sneers at me, we both laugh. “No, because we can put up fairy lights and cover up the crack. Plus, it’ll look aesthetic as fuck.”
I smile, “We?”
She fiddles with the buttons of her jeans overalls, “Of course, what’s the point of you being so tall if you can’t help me to put up fairy lights?” I laugh until my cheeks hurt.
---
“I’d say we’re done for the day”, she exclaims after brushing out any air out of the wallpaper. The room is now half yellow, half grey, like two parallel universes have met in one room. “Wouldn’t you say so, Remus?”
She never calls me ‘Moony’, like my other friends do. Of course she knows about my lycanthropy, she bloody figured it out before I even got the slightest chance to tell her. She’s really right, all this time I’ve grown taller, she’s grown smarter and smarter. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s a true genius by now. And so kind. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s got two hearts of pure gold, either. And I love the way my name rolls of her tongue in her accent, in her voice.
We’re sitting on her floor, right in the middle of the mess, now with cups of chocolate milk in our hands. I’ve spelled a simple ‘lumos’, since we had to cut off the electricity to avoid being electrocuted while we were drenching the walls (including the power outlets). The small ball of light is floating a bit above our heads, and her glasses reflect the yellow glow. I miss her eyes.
“How do you think I look?” She looks into her cup, talking quietly. I blink a few times, not wanting to make my answer too quick. She’s so smart, she already must’ve figured out my feelings about her, but I like not to risk anything.
“Well, apart from the glue”, I reach forward and scrape off a bit of blue from her cheek. I try not to let my fingers tremble as I touch her, “I’d say you look wonderful.”
She smiles and places a hand on my cheek, keeping it there for longer than she really has too. “You’re not too shabby yourself, Remus. Actually…”, she trails a finger down the bridge of my nose, making me squeeze my eyes shut, “I’d say you’re quite handsome.”
I wish she wouldn't say so. I wish she didn’t look the way like she does. I wish she’d never take her hand from my cheek.
She doesn’t.
---
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