Chapter Three
A loud crash startles Percy awake and jolts him out of the pleasant dream he was having. The first thing he notices as he pulls himself out of sleep is the unbelievably chilly wind wracking through his body. A totally different feeling than the pleasantly warm one he fell asleep too. The next thing he picks up on is the tree branch, dense and splintered, laying at the bottom of the cot. It narrowly missed landing on Percy’s already injured ankle. The boxes that once held the cabin owners belongings are now squashed under the branch.
“Fuck.” The window on the wall opposite the cot is now broken, glass covers the ground below the sill. Luckily, the frame of the window and wall seem to be still intact. Hopefully, Oliver has something to patch the window up quick.
Percy pulls himself out of the bed and hobbles towards the room housing Oliver. The idea of waking someone up in the night makes Percy feel anxious, but the issue requires immediate attention, so he ignores his worries and knocks on the door. The knock on the door is loud and echoes throughout the home in the silence of the night. The only other noises is the faint hollowing of the storm. He awaits a response, none comes.
He knocks again. Still no answer.
Waiting a moment longer, he finally decides just to enter. This simply can’t wait. He’s already broken into one place today; he might as well add more trespassing crimes to his list. He pushes open the door and reveals the cozy looking bedroom. Earlier, he was in such a rush to changed he had not taken stalk of what the room looked like. Now, with the glowing light cast upon the room from the large window, Percy can make out the colour scheme of this room. It’s a slightly more muted allowing for a more palatable version of the decor from the main room. Oliver lies in the middle of the bed wearing black boxers and a loose orange jumper. His blankets are slipping off the bed from his obvious rolling around, revealing an image of the man’s muscular form that could rival those sexy holiday calendars. The man appears to be in a deep sleep, mouth wide open as he lets out low snores.
“Oliver, wake up.” Percy speaks up, trying not to startle the other too badly. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work. Oliver bolts up in the bed, hair mused and eyes squinting as he yawns and looks around in confusion. “Sorry to wake you, but there’s a situation that you might want to know about.”
“What?” Is the only response he gets. The man’s voice comes out deep and raspy from lack of use.
“A tree branch seems to have broken through the window of the room I was in.” Percy provides as clarification. Oliver just stares blankly before getting up and wandering passed Percy. Due to his injury, Percy decides to wait for him in the living room. There’s no reason to follow him. He will notice the mess in spare room right away.
“Fuck!” Percy chuckles softly to himself at Oliver’s annoyed shout.
The man then wanders out of the room and to the back door. He comes back with a tarp and some supplies to attach to the broken window.
“So, you can’t sleep in there anymore.”
“Really?” Percy questions.
“I’ve put the tarp up but until the storm goes, that room will be too chilly to stay in.” Oliver looks thoughtful for a moment and glances at the clock. It reads 3:48 a.m. “Come on, I’ll set you up in my room.”
“Huh?” Percy sputters out. He’s not some blushing virgin but the idea of being in some strange man’s bed sends his mind spiralling.
“I’ll take the couch. Can’t have you sleeping there with an injury like that.” This man truly was too kind. What the fuck is wrong with him? Percy has never experienced this level of kindness or care in his life. Maybe from his mother but her care always came with overbearing and unbelievably pressure that only Molly Weasley could achieve. Percy never felt peace or safety, not after the twins were born. Now, in some strange man’s house in the middle of the mountains, in a strange cabin he was feeling safety and cared for like never before. Even his past partners weren’t this kind to him. If he’s honest, some of them were actually super fucking toxic. Marcus had a mean streak like no others. If there was one thing he was thankful for the twins existing, it was when they discovered Marcus was hitting him and removed that man forcefully from Percy’s life.
That was the last time he’d dated anyone. Since then, he’s avoided any and all potentially romantic encounters with men. Not that men often approach him, but he makes sure to give off an air of unapproachable that the Malfoys could only dream of accomplishing. Now, he’s going to sleep in the bed of some strange man. That’s already freaking him out enough as it is, but Percy can’t help himself from offering:
“We could share? I mean, there’s no way I could kick you out of your own bed and it looked like there was plenty of room. It’s only for one night or two.” Percy tries to offer a smile despite his nerves.
“Ah, sure. If you’re comfortable with that.” Oliver smiles at him and grabs his arm to help guide him back to the man’s bedroom. They set up on the bed, lying awkwardly next to each other for a while. Oliver shifts every minute but is careful not to touch Percy and Percy stays as still as a rock with his limps pulled tightly to his body. Eventually, Oliver stills and the soft snores leaving his sleeping form fill the air.
Percy is finally able to drift off to sleep shortly after that.
Waking up in an unfamiliar place, in an unfamiliar bed with a body beside him is startling to say the least. After a deep and satisfying sleep, the kind that makes you confused as to who you are and leaves you waking up with marks on your face and drool everywhere, Percy finds himself struggling to recall the events of yesterday. The pain in his ankle is a quick reminder, though. He really needs to ask this man if he has any pain meds Percy can take.
The man groans beside him and rolls over. This brings him slightly closer to Percy’s form. With this distance, Percy can make out a couple small moles and freckles dotting the man’s face and neck. Percy blushes. Stop looking at this man! He shouts at himself internally.
Glancing around the man, he locates a battery powered clock attached to the wall. It’s in the shape of a lion and makes Percy cringe at the ugliness of it. It reads 9 p.m. Fuck, that’s way later than Percy ever normally gets up. Even on weekends or holidays, he is still always awake by 5 a.m. or 6 a.m. at the latest.
Percy feels a slight annoyance at his injury for stopping him from being able to easily getting around Oliver, out of this bed and into the kitchen for some much needed coffee, provided this man keeps some of the holy liquid in his house. Instead, Percy must lie here and wait until the man beside him decides to also get up. Given his lack of movement and snores, Percy assumes that won’t be for a bit longer.
Percy pulls out his phone from where he’d stuffed it into the pocket of the PJ pants Oliver “lent” him. Still no service. Obviously no emails or messages received either. The wind still howls with the storm explaining why the signal is still unavailable. He really hopes Dean is at the lodge waiting out the storm and not worrying too much about Percy.
Dean Thomas is loosing his mind. Firstly, he actually manages to convince Percy to join him on his trip. Finally getting the chance to get to know his friend better. Secondly, he looses Percy day one of trip and he is probably the reason Percy has now disappeared in the storm and died for all Dean knows. What are the chances he finds safety? Or got saved? Or managed not to die in the snow? Very fucking low, Dean assumes. Lastly, he is now faced with his greatest fucking enemy yet. Seamus Finnigan. The ski lodge’s search and rescue team leader. Who is refusing to do anything about Dean’s missing friend until they are certain the storm is no longer dangerous to travel in.
Sure, Dean understands that it would not be beneficial to send out people to save Percy if those people will just also end up trapped or injured, but fuck that. His friend is out there. Shouldn’t they have machines and tools and plans in place for this shit? Plans that aren’t just sit and wait it out.
Of course, Dean tried to leave the building and search for his friend on his own. He’d only ended up back at the lodge and not out searching for Percy when the initial storm hit because Seamus’ team rounded up the people on the hills and brought them back to the lodge safely. The man had promised Dean when he found him that his friend was probably getting grabbed by one of the other crew members and would be fine. Only when they got back to the lodge and a head count was done, Percy was found to be the only missing person. Dean had gone ballistic and tried to leave the lodge mid storm.
Now, he finds himself locked inside his room at the lodge with this crazy Irish fucker who is refusing to let him leave. He even went so far as to handcuff Dean to the bed in the night so he could sleep without worrying Dean would run off and “get himself killed”. The intern wouldn’t have to take things into his own hands if the fucking rescuer would actually go out there and do his job if rescuing Dean’s friend.
“It’s morning already, can you fucking un-handcuff me. It’s really fucking painful.” Dean whines.
“Oh, sorry. It shouldn’t be.” Seamus apologizes and Dean feels slightly bad for lying. But at the same time, this fucker deserves it. How dare he fucking tie Dean Thomas up without it even being for consensual sexy fun times. Not that Dean would ever consider doing anything with this guy. Maybe if he’d actually gone out and saved Percy then Dean would have considered it. The man was awfully handsome and broad. He clearly labour intensive job and worked out regularly. Plus he had a nice smile. It’s almost too bad that the man isn’t helping him. With the way he looked, Dean would put out quite easily. His job kept him busier than he’d like. It’s been ages since he’s had the chance to fuck around like he did in his first year of college.
Dean shakes his head and focuses on the mission at hand. He needs to get out of these cuffs, away from this man, and go save his friend. No way is he going to tell the Weasleys that he lost their son in a snow storm on some random mountains in the middle of winter. Mrs. Weasley would die of heartache, come back and kill him, then die again.
Dean Thomas was royally fucked.