Relapse
The day that Percy drops off the girls is both a happy and sad one.
With the money that Audrey had provided, they were able to get everything the girls needed for school brand new, give or take a few second-hand books here or there. It had been a both a long and short ride to the train station to drop them off at the platform.
The goodbyes felt like they lasted seconds, him hugging the girls as tight as he can. He’s half-expecting Audrey to show up, he told her the date and time he was dropping the girls off and invited her to join them. Divorce or not, they were still parents. But she doesn’t come. He can tell that Molly is disappointed by it, but he tells her to not worry, and that Mum will write soon.
He hopes he’s right, and that Audrey doesn’t make a liar out of him.
In the end, he stays at the platform for as long as he, watching and watching until the Hogwarts Express is just a black dot in the distance. He hopes the girls will make friends, Lucy especially. He hopes they will have fun and not spend all their time studying like he had.
He goes back to his empty flat, alone.
That was that, then. The girls were out of the house for the next six months until Yule. Percy would see them after the holiday for the New Year. He was set to go back to work in a week. He had his empty flat and Penelope as his neighbor and whatever the situation was with Oliver.
Oliver.
The divorce was over. Percy had gotten what he had wanted. And Oliver, kind and sweet and funny with his warm laughter and smiles that lit up a room who for some inconceivable reason wanted Percy as much he wanted him.
Oliver’s out of town again for another game and won’t be back for a week. Percy wonders if he should once he returns and ask him out. On a date. A proper date. Maybe they could get Indian food.
Still, that leaves him alone with the empty flat.
He takes a nap, leisurely screeching out of bed around one in the afternoon. It’s the middle of the workday. Now that everything is handled, and he doesn’t have the girls, he feels… bored. Bored isn’t the right word. Listless, perhaps. Antsy. He makes himself lunch and catches up on some paperwork that Penny brought him from the office. He busies himself by reading until the sun sets, gets fish and chips for dinner at the chippy around the corner, and goes to bed.
He wakes up, sweating from a dream he can’t remember the next day. He sees Penelope off to work, and go back to that empty, empty flat.
It’s stupid. It’s not like the girls had really lived her before, but he feels so lonely without them. He never considered what it would be like to be alone. He feels like he’s rotting.
The girls write. They’ve both been sorted to Gryffindor and Percy can’t be prouder. He writes his parents to tell them the news. They’ve gone on holiday to Spain, and they deserve it. The international owl would take a while to greet them. He thinks about waiting to send it, but they’d want to know. Once that’s out of the way he’s back to empty, empty, empty.
It’s that emptiness, that does it in the end. He finds himself walking to the nearest pub at ten in the morning. He sits down. Orders a drink. Some kind of ale or something.
He spends longer than he’d like to admit starting at it.
He had quit drinking after that night he’d gotten sick, when Penelope came to visit him, and Audrey shoved him into the table for the first time. He wanted to have a clear head and disliked not being control of himself. AT the same time… he missed it. He really, really missed it. He disliked the act of drinking- pouring it down his throat and feeling his stomach swell with fullness. But he liked the feeling. He loved the feeling. He adored the buzz, the distant floaty feeling he got when he had just the right amount. He loved how his muscles relaxed, and the world felt easier, brighter. He felt more capable.
He considers this, staring at the glass. It’s been a good ten minutes, but the bartender doesn’t seem to mind or care. You don’t go drinking at a pub at ten in the morning if you’re okay.
Percy thinks he can do this, thinks he can just pay for the drink and walk away. But there’s a little voice deep down inside of him, whispering. Promising. Like a siren leading sailors to their doom.
Percy reaches for the glass with a surprisingly steady hand. The condensation from the glass feels cool against his fingers. He lifts the glass. Puts it to his lips.
He heads toward his doom.
The next few hours are a bit of a blur. He drinks the first glass so quickly it’s done in seconds despite the roiling shame in his gut. He had made a promise to himself and broke it. But he finds that he doesn’t care. He orders another, and a mixed drink. Those, two are done in minutes.
The heady feeling hits him in warm cloud of what feels like bliss. It feels like a loving embrace. Percy knows it’s not, but he doesn’t care. He can’t get himself to care anymore.
He orders a fourth and slows down. Not wanting to make a fool of himself in public. The fourth drink he sips, timing carefully the seconds between each. He feels buzzed but not quick drunk yet. He pays his tab and leaves. Heads to the nearest store and picks up a bottle of muggle liquor. He takes it back to his empty, empty, empty flat.
He can’t find a clean glass and ours the vodka into a mug. He finds orange juice in the fridge and dumps a splash of that into the cheap liquor and downs it. It is disgusting and he chokes on the taste, and his stomach cringes in protest. He almost throws it all up but forces himself to swallow and keep it down.
Percy jumps onto the couch, not bothering to take off his shoes. He stares at the ceiling fan as is goes around and around. Things suddenly feel lighter and fuzzier. He feels good. For the first time since all of this happened, he feels good. He knows it’s just because he’s drunk, but he can’t help it. He feels silent tears rolling down his face. He shuts his eyes.
When he wakes up, it’s dark in the flat. He barely manages to stumble from the couch to the kitchen sink where he promptly spends the next ten-minute retching- his stomach protesting and needing to get something out despite its emptiness. He drags himself to his room and stumbles to change into baggy shorts and a t-shirt. He sways on his feet as he goes into the bathroom. He loses his balance suddenly, and he falls back, crashing over the edge of the tub and brining down the shower curtain with him. He feels pain blossom on his hip, but it feels muted. Numb.
Percy pulls himself from the tub after an unknown amount of time. His head is pounding and his mouth tastes stale. He shuffles back into the kitchen and refills his mug with more orange juice and vodka. He downs the mug until his head stops roaring, and then he keeps going.
He thinks he hears knocking on the door. He yells at whoever it is to go away and blacks back out.
The next time he any sense of awareness at all, he finds himself laying on the floor of his flat, his stomach flipping and his head screaming and he’s slightly damp. He frowns, trying to take stock. It wasn’t water- it was piss. He’d been so drunk he’d blacked out and hadn’t been able to take his sorry arse to the bathroom.
It’s humiliating.
He lets himself lay on the floor for a little while longer, feeling sorry for himself. He misses the girls. He’s not even sure what day it is. He’s supposed to be back at work next week. What he he’d just gone a week-long bender?
He groans and pulls himself off the floor. His legs are shaking, and his eyes are crusted and gummy. On unsteady legs he shuffles to the bathroom. The shower curtain is still in the tub along with the rod, and Percy finds he doesn’t have the energy to care. He simply tosses it out of the tub and turns on the faucet. He lets it fill while he’s still wearing his clothes and once it’s full, finally strips. He doesn’t bother washing anything or grooming himself, he just takes of his clothes and unplugs the drain. He spends an inordinate amount of time sitting in the tub, long after the water is gone.
When he feels like he has the strength, he manages to pull himself from the dry bathtub and shoves a shirt and pants on. He notices that the pants are on inside out, but he doesn’t care. He wobbles over to his unfamiliar mattress and collapses onto it. He blinks, and its daylight again. He’s feeling a little more solid but still ill as he stumbles into his living room.
The floor is a mess. There’s kitchen towels strew across the floor, probably Percy drunkenly trying to clean up a little. There’s a broke plate on the floor, and an entire empty handle of vodka sitting on his counter. He doesn’t even remember buying it. He’s not sure how he was able to buy anything while he’d been so right and truly plastered.
He finds his wand and waves the mess away, and collapses onto his couch. His stomach is roiling and groaning- he wants to eat something but knows if he tries, he’ll throw it up. He’s got some hangover relief somewhere, but he can’t find the energy or the drive to go searching for it.
He feels awful. Not just because of the drinking. But because he’s thrown his sobriety away. It’s not like he was trying to be sober, but still… drinking had been a big part of his life with Audrey. Like they both had to drink in order to stand each other. He wasn’t sure when it started. After the war he’d have a rough go of it, and then he’d stopped. Then he’d met Audrey and things spiraled again.
He groans into his hands.
There’s a knock at his door.
Percy freezes. He wonders if it’s just the muggle post, but the knock comes again, this time sharper.
“Percy! I know you’re in there!”
He knows that voice. It’s George. Percy leans back on his second-hand couch, wishing his brother would go away.
“I’m not leaving!” George calls through the door as if he’s heard Percy’s inner thoughts. Percy sighs. George could theoretically just unlock the door with magic, but he’s too polite to do so. Luckily, Percy’s not. He waves his wand, and the door lock clicks open.
Sure enough, it’s George, standing in the doorway. He’s got a brown bag in his hand. When he sees Percy sitting on the couch, he quirks an eyebrow.
“Rough night?”
“You can say that.” Percy says bitterly. “Shut the door.”
George does so. Then he walks across the tiny flat to the kitchen island. He upends the bag onto the countertop. Containers of food pour out onto the surface. “Mum’s been worried.” George says in lieu of explanation, which Percy supposes is explanation enough.
“What day is it?”
“Wednesday.”
“The date, George.”
“The 14th.”
Percy sighs, still not having moved from his couch. Three days. He’d gone on a three-day vodka induced bender. No wonder he felt awful.
“Penelope tried to check on you earlier, but you told her to go away.”
“Why are you here?” Percy asks tiredly and George eyes the empty handle of vodka on the counter. George picks it up and studies it, giving a low whistle.
“Have a party?”
“No.”
Percy shuts his eyes and throws his arm over his face, trying to ignore the cramping in his stomach.
George is quiet for a moment.
“Hungry?”
“No.” Percy bites out.
“Too bad. Mum made stew. Go take a shower, you stink.”
Percy pulls his arm away from his face. He really doesn’t want to do anything other then lay on his shitty couch, but George is staring at him in such a serious manner it’s enough to make him stand and go to the bathroom.
He very quickly showers and changes into clean clothes. His old clothes from before are still damp and he tosses them into the sink to deal with later. He doesn’t think he spends a lot of time in the bathroom, but when he goes back into the kitchen area there’s a bowl of stew and some bread waiting for him. George is leaning on the counter, drinking tea from a chipped mug that Ron had insisted Percy get when they were furniture shopping. When George tilts the mug, you can make out a middle finger at the bottom of the cup.
Percy sits down at the counter on a stool and only stares at the stew. He’s hungry, but the idea of eating makes him ill. George fumbles around for something in his pocket and tosses to Percy. It’s a small vial of hangover relief potion- although it’s an odd color.
“Little something I’ve been working on. Ron helped, too.”
Percy frowns. He’s wise enough now to know not take anything the twins-, George offered. His brother rolls his eyes dramatically.
“Fine if it’s cursed or whatever you can hex me. Swear it.”
Percy sighs. He’d usually put up more of a fight, but he honestly just doesn’t care anymore. It’s like he’s numb all over. He uncorks the vial and drinks it in one goal. It doesn’t taste bad- it doesn’t taste like anything at all, really.
It’s like someone flicks a switch. One second, he feels like he’s about to keel over and die, the next he feels normal. The tightening muscles all slip into a relaxed state, his head stops pounding. George chuckles.
“Clever, right? Wormswood. Who knew? Gonna try and make a new product for the shop.”
“Thanks.” Percy says, and finding he really means it.
Despite the relief, he still can’t seem to handle the idea of eating much, so he just pokes at the stew while George watches on.
“Where have you been?” Percy asks mildly. George shrugs.
“Well, I wanted to come with you to the divorce court whatever, but Mum insisted you needed space. And then you yelled at Penelope, and she said you needed space, and you haven’t answered letters so…”
Percy looks to the windowsill. Hermes isn’t home, but there is a stack of letters propped up next to it.
“Sorry.”
“Eh, you’ve be out of contact for longer.”
They both wince at George’s sad attempt at a joke. His brother sets his mug down and joins Percy on the next stool.
“Perce, I need to talk to you.”
Percy sets his spoon down and looks at his younger brother. He’s aged, just like the rest of them. His red hair is thinning a bit, there’s specks of grey. His laugh lines are embedded wrinkles into his skin. Percy wonders, not for the first time, what Fred would look like at this age. Would they look the same? Would they age the same? Would they have matching wrinkles and moles and dark sunspots?
George was still bright and funny and joyous, but he’d matured for sure. Being a father helped with that. In fact, becoming a dad is what gave him a spark back in his own life after they lost his twin. For the first time, Percy realizes how old they’ve both gotten. When had that happened?
“You didn’t kill Fred, Percy.” George says suddenly. Calmly.
Percy nearly falls out of his seat with how hard he jerks in surprise.
“I- what?”
“I talked to Charlie. He said you felt like you killed Fred. I need you to know you didn’t.”
A wave of emotions hits Percy all at once- horror at George trying to comfort Percy for killing his twin brother. Anger that Charlie spilled the beans. Pathetic, because whatever George had given him had worked but he was still coming off a three-day drinking binge. He stumbled over his tongue, trying to find the right words to say.
“I did, though. I distracted him. It was my fault.”
George looks oddly calm. He doesn’t tear up. His browns don’t furrow. He looks on his older brother plainly. Openly.
“It was that wall that killed him, Percy. Not you. It was the Death Eaters. Voldemort and his followers. People who believed that they were better then others. Bad wizards and witches. That was what killed him, not you. And Fred would be rolling over in his grave if he’d heard you saying you were the one who killed him.”
George leans forward, crossing his arms on the counter in front of him. He gazes out of the small kitchen window.
“If I’d been allowed, I would have held him until he rotted through my fingers. I would have clutched him tight until we were both dust. I miss him every day. Sometimes I can’t stand to see my own reflection in the mirror.”
Percy is quiet for a long, long time. George never spoke about Fred. Not like this.
“I don’t know what to say.” Percy says quietly. Honestly.
“Some tragedies are too big for words.”
Percy feels like the breath is knocked out of him. What was George trying to do? Offer forgiveness? Pity? Mercy?
“You know, Percy something I’ve come to find out when it comes to grief. It’s tragic and awful and brave.”
“What is it?”
“When a heart breaks, it does something much worse than stop. It keeps beating.”
They sit together quietly.