3 for erik/roxy and 5 & 31 for bat/grim? (sorry i couldn't choose😂💖)
Original Eroxy art by @mira-shard, just cropped and color-modified a bit by me...and also tagging @cursebreakerfarrier because Batticus! 💙
It had been a very, very late night at the Auror office. So late, in fact, that Erik didn't make it home to his new wife until almost four in the morning. And once he did, he ended up on the couch, his half-awake brain deciding it was better to stay out in the living room and simply wait up for Roxy, rather than wake her up by to trying and failing to sneak into bed.
But you know what they say about best-laid plans. Erik didn't even realize he'd dozed off on the couch until he sleepily blinked open his eyes a few hours later, to find Roxy resting on the couch beside him.
Her dark eyes were half-lidded and sleepy, around their softness.
"Shh," she whispered. "It's okay..."
Roxy curled up beside him. Her pregnant tummy rested beside his stomach -- a sensation that always made Erik's heart flutter despite himself. She was getting so big -- his child growing inside of her, their child...was getting so big...
'They'll be here soon,' the thought returned to his mind for the third time that week. 'I have to get up...'
He moaned lowly and sleepily made as if to rise from the couch. "...Mmm'I've got work soon..."
"Not until noon," said Roxy calmly. Erik wrote his schedule down meticulously on the calendar in his home office, so she always knew when to expect him home.
"I've got to be up in five hours..."
"Then sleep until then. You can always Floo into the office...I can pack you a proper breakfast for you to eat, when you get there..."
Roxy's eyes softened somewhat.
"...You're running yourself ragged, Erik," she said quietly. "You need to rest."
"No rest for the wicked," Erik mumbled sleepily.
"Then it's a good thing you're the farthest thing from that," Roxy shot back patiently. "Now get some sleep."
Erik wanted to protest the matter, but his brain was just not awake enough to make any further snappy remarks. All he could summon up was,
"Can't sleep...I've got...stuff to take care of..."
"You can take care of all of it after you've gotten some sleep," Roxy said very firmly.
She slid the elastic band out of his long ponytail, smoothing the freed blond curls out around his face.
"You can take care of both of us after you've taken care of yourself," she whispered a bit more affectionately beside Erik's cheek, before giving it a soft peck.
Erik exhaled quietly, and Roxy knew at last that he had given in. He tilted his head enough to messily capture Roxy's lips with his, his tongue sleepily wandering between both of their mouths before he broke the kiss. He mumbled something indiscernible, before he drifted off, collapsing back onto the couch and falling still.
Roxy smiled down at her sleeping husband, her lips both twinged with fondness and slight sadness, before placing another gentle kiss to his jawline, resting her head over his heart, and closing her eyes.
5. A Reunion Kiss // Batticus (Reincarnation AU)
At the end of their sixth year, it all came together for Atticus. Reading the Daily Prophet’s old editorials of Professor Atticus Grimsley -- of himself, in his previous life, chronicling the life of the vampire so many had called “Bat Varney” -- had suddenly made everything come together and make sense.
His visions hadn’t been of the future -- they’d been of the past. Barty hadn’t been having dire predictions of Bat dying horribly and him being powerless to stop it -- he’d been remembering when Bat and he had died two hundred years ago. Ceci hadn’t been terrified of Barty becoming a vampire -- she’d felt remorse and fear, remembering when Bat had become one, with his soul trapped in Barty’s corpse. Bat’s intense irrational fear and nausea about blood -- his horrible, sleep-destroying nightmares that featured war, death, and destruction -- Atticus’s own strong feelings about Barty’s face looking “wrong” and Bat’s of Atticus not smiling enough --
Feeling a kind of exhilaration he’d never known before, Atticus rushed out to Hogsmeade. There was a statue of Bat Varney somewhere there, wasn’t there? That’s what Dumbledore had said...
And sure enough, that was where he found Bat. Not just the statue -- but Robert Bellamy, as well. For at the same moment Atticus had been reading all those books and researching on his own, Robert had followed Atticus’s lead in another direction, which brought him to the Flumes, the family who now owned Honeydukes Sweetshop, and -- in turn -- led him right to the plaque and statue the Honeydukes family had helped fundraise so long ago.
When Atticus caught sight of Robert standing before the statue of his past life, he for a moment found himself unable to breathe.
Robert was so much smaller than when he was the vampire Bat Varney. But of course he was, Atticus thought, of course he was -- Barty was always taller than him...in both of their lives, he was always taller...
And yet his posture was just the same. The modest, yet confident straightness of his shoulders -- the agility of his step even when he stumbled trying to move closer to the statue...the way his hand lingered in mid-air, unable to touch the statue itself...
Atticus wasn’t sure why this thought affected him so much. Yes, perhaps he hadn’t been expecting to find Robert in Hogsmeade after all this -- hadn’t expected to see him immediately after everything coming together, but...it did. His heart was swelling up in his chest to a size he couldn’t contain.
Atticus’s voice came out oddly strained for a reason he could hardly put into words. The sound made Robert stiffen, his shoulders almost slacking at his sides. Then, as if in slow motion, he turned. His handsome face was very pale and stained with tear tracks, but it didn’t matter. His wide black eyes held the same sharp gleam they always did -- the same bright, resilient flame they’d always had, since the moment they’d first met...
And then through those tears, he smiled.
And all at once, Atticus felt the emotions of two lifetimes come crashing down on top of him. The sight of Bat was too much for him to take.
He was here. He was here -- he was alive -- !
Atticus’s own eyes flooded with tears. He choked, cupping his hand over his mouth and bowing his head as he struggled in vain to compose himself.
Robert’s smile faded at once, his expression instead being overtaken by concern.
When he stepped forward as if wanting to comfort him, though, he found himself faltering. ...As if he were once again that vampire who had to constantly fear getting too close to the ones he let into his heart...
But he wasn’t that vampire. He was alive. Really alive, fully alive -- he was here, and real, and human, and --
The nightmare he’d had most recently of the red-eyed man who so resembled Barty with a stake through his chest and his head ripped off panged through Atticus’s mind and heart again, making him choke in strangled grief.
Because that red-eyed man, Atticus now knew, was Robert. The boy he’d grown to care for so much, the first real friend he’d ever made in his life...being killed horribly, torn away from him, by one of the most dangerous Dark wizards in history.
But he wasn’t dead. He was here. He was alive.
The word “alive” had never felt more relevant to Atticus than it did in that moment. It just kept echoing in his head, louder and louder, even as he crumpled in on himself with sobs.
He hadn’t even realized how slowly Robert had approached him, how tentatively he was reaching out to him, until Atticus blinked up through his tears and saw him suddenly standing there.
“Grim -- ” Robert started, his confident voice sounding oddly shaky.
But Atticus didn’t even give him a chance to fully respond. In an instant, he’d thrown his arms out and latched onto his friend, hugging him with all of his strength.
It was all he could say, at first. All he wanted to say, after what felt like years of not saying it. And it must’ve been, Atticus thought to himself -- he must’ve had no reason to say it, after Bat had died...and yet now, he did -- he had the best reason in the world to say it...because Bat was here. Really here!
And then, as if to make the moment better still, Robert grabbed Atticus. He clung to him, bringing a strong, shaking hand up on the back of Atticus’s head and almost cradling it. He was crying too -- Atticus could hear it in his voice as it ghosted his ear.
Robert held Atticus in a grip that was somehow unbreakable as iron and as gentle as a lover’s, simultaneously. It was so true to him -- being strong enough that he could’ve likely destroyed anything, and yet only ever using that strength to be useful to others...being a fortress to protect, or beams to support, rather than a weapon or a monster. And right now, he supported Atticus, easily keeping the smaller man on his feet even as he felt like his legs might give way.
Bat was here -- he was here -- they were here. They were together again, and alive, and happy, and...and human. Bat was human. They could touch without Bat’s blood lust acting up. Bat could use magic. Bat could become a professor, like Atticus had in his past life -- they could both be professors someday...
Atticus’s heart was aching in the best possible way. Before he could stop himself or even question what he was doing, he brought his lips up to the side of Robert’s temple in a quick, emotional kiss.
“I...I know now, Bat -- I know what our visions mean. I know who I am, who you are -- what happened to us -- they weren’t predictions at all, Bat, it was our pasts -- when I was Atticus Grimsley -- when you were Bat Varney, and Robert Harker, and -- ”
Robert’s voice was just as choked as Atticus’s was.
“...I...remember, Grim. ...I remember...”
He buried his face into the crook of Atticus’s neck, his strong hands clutching at Atticus’s head and back.
“I’m sorry,” Robert murmured. “I’m so sorry...”
“Sorry?” choked Atticus, unable to hold back a laugh. “Bat, you came back. We came back, we’re here, we’re...”
Laughing a bit harder through his tears, he brought a hand up through Robert’s curls, as if thinking to comfort him.
“...We’re happy, Bat. I’m happy. Because you’re here.”
There was a pause. Atticus felt Robert steady his grip around him, placing his lips right beside Atticus’s neck.
“S’all I wanted, Grim,” he whispered against Atticus’s sensitive skin.
Atticus’s face was flushing, but he barely noticed.
“What was?” he asked gently.
Robert’s lips beside his neck spread into a smile.
Atticus felt fresh tears spill down his cheeks as he closed his eyes.
“...Me too, Bat. ...Me too.”
The world had been becoming steadily darker this last year, and yet now, right now, it was brighter than it had ever been. These lives they were living, with all the meddlesome little obstacles they’d had to contend with -- Robert not being able to afford new robes or a new broom, Atticus’s father not approving of his friends -- suddenly seemed like Heaven.
31. Catching the other before they fall // Batticus (HPHL timeline)
Bat had been more than prepared to protect the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, when they chased down the vampire who’d been using his name to cause havoc outside Hogsmeade village. He’d been a soldier once, so he was more than used to protecting his comrades. It was merely that it had been a very long time since he’d had any “comrades.” And so when Bat managed to fight off the vampire by putting him in a headlock and wrenching him away from Atticus, only to get thrown off the roof of the building Bat and Atticus had chased the vampire up onto when he tried to flee, Bat was very startled when a hand appeared out of nowhere to grab onto his before he could fall to the ground.
Bat looked up, completely taken aback, at Atticus. His face and expression were full of concern and urgency.
“Hold on!” said Atticus. “I’ve got you!”
Atticus’s pulse through his skin was making Bat’s heart and lungs slam hungrily at the inside of his chest.
“L-let go!” Bat said in an unusually urgent voice. “I’m fine! Just -- he’s getting away -- ”
“Not if I can help it,” Atticus said firmly.
The professor could see Bat’s visible discomfort as his eyes flooded with red. Very quickly, he pulled Bat back up onto the roof and let go, taking several steps back so as to give his counterpart space.
“Drink as much as you need -- I’ll cut him off -- ”
“Stop!” Bat said before he could stop himself -- and, as it turned out, before he could stop Atticus either, since the professor immediately charged after the other vampire called Varney.
His heart was beating so hard, it hurt -- damn it, he needed blood -- but he also needed to calm down -- he wasn’t used to caring about people as individuals like this -- feeling scared for their individual safety, like this --
Scolding himself internally for not having better control of his emotions as well as his blood urges, Bat took several huge swigs of blood, wiping his mouth before charging back out into the fray, even as his eyes still shone completely, monstrously red.
Affectionate Moments Prompt!
