Love Letters to You

Harry likes to think that growing up with the Dursleys hasn't quite affected him as others might have. 

Sure, he quietens when tension runs high, and he eats quickly while in the hall, but it is not like it cripples him. 

His childhood with the Dursleys taught him many things. 

Reading the subtleties and emotional cues being one of the lessons Harry is best at. 

Maybe that is why he looks twice at Elara Black, who, though she wears her usual smile, seems almost meek while surrounded by her friends. 

Today, the Slytherins are wilder, more outspoken than most times. There's an excited, almost energy that makes its way within the Slytherins'ranks, a buzz that makes the First Years febrile as they throw what they think are discreet glances at Elara. 

Harry knows that something is going on when there's that nervous, excited energy that seems to buzz within the Slytherins'ranks. 

Even Malfoy, already well-known as a simp for his cousin - Harry ignores that he too could qualify like so - is freer in his joy and love, pressing kisses to Elara's head and tucking ebony locks away from her eyes. 

Nott, an almost cocky glint in his eyes as he makes eye contact with Harry, waves his wand and kisses the back of Elara's hand as a small show of silver and emerald fireworks explodes before them. 

It is a heartwarming sight to see the Slytherins warm when they are cold, gentle when they are the first to resort to sneers and insults. 

Yet, somehow, Harry cannot bring himself to feel that fondness he usually feels around Elara. 

Because though she is at its center, the sun that pulls everything and everyone else towards her like a siren that is impossible to resist, she isn't happy. 

Harry knows when to take caution and for all it seems, to cease to breathe, when there's bitterness and sorrow that haunts his Aunt Petunia's every step on Halloween. 

He could recognize its taste blind. 

So why, why does Elara Black's smile hold the same shadow? 

It's past midnight when Harry gets to the Astronomy tower, breath hurried and hair messy from his run.

He doesn't quite know what pushed him to rush like a man with death biting at his heels toward the tower. 

Maybe because while searching for Elara - it is not stalking, he swears so - he noticed she was nowhere to be found in the agglomeration of dots huddled in the Slytherin's common room as if the entire House had decided to reunite there. 

She isn't by Malfoy or Zabini's side. 

Instead, she is alone in the Astronomy Tower. 

The Marauder's map lacks details, for nothing prepares him to see Elara seated so close to the edge of the balcony, feets dangling in the void and wind whipping at her hair. Her back is to him and her face is tilted up, as if basking in the moonlight. 

"Black?" his voice is hesitant, as if fearful that she will let go of the balcony ramp. She stiffens a bit at his voice, glancing back at him. But she doesn't ask him to be gone, doesn't object to his presence. The Gryffindor takes a step forward, and then another. They carry him to the balcony, and he leans on it, hand to his cheek and eyes never leaving the Slytherin. 

"Potter," she greets. "What are you doing here?" 

Harry snorts. "That should be my question." He then frowns. Being closer to her allows Harry to see the faintest trembles in her limbs, her lips that have a hint of blue on them. "You're freezing, don't tell me you forgot how to cast a warming spell." 

His teasing words don't get the same mischievous smile and witty words it usually would. 

Instead, Elara's lips curve into a small smile. Smaller than he's used to seeing and impossibly sadder. 

"Hmm," she acknowledges his words yet makes no move towards her robe's pockets, where Harry is sure her wand is hidden.

Harry blinks slowly, taking in Elara Black in all her glory. She looks good even with the cold biting at her. The stars make her eyes glisten enough that Harry notices they are duller, tired. 

The fire that she usually is contained, smothered. 

The taste of grief and sorrow lingers in his mouth like a curse. 

She still looks so very cold. 

"Focillo," Harry casts. He sees the warmth settle in Elara's bone, her shivering subsiding. 

"Who would have thought you know the spell?" Elara is gentle, shy in her teasing tonight. Harry gives her a crooked grin, and she seems to soften at the mere sight of it, always more tender when it is just the two of them. 

"I know, I surprise myself sometimes," he answers, a hand bashfully rubbing the back of his neck. He is curious though. "Why didn't you cast the spell?"

How long has she been up there for her pink lips turn to blue? 

How long did she just let the cold bite at her limbs and face till even her nose pinkens under the moonlight? 

Elara's answering shrug is a fragile thing, a small move of the shoulders that is both vulnerable and uncaring. Her voice wavers. "It seems, it seems that my magic doesn't quite agree with me right now."

Which doesn't sound normal. 

Harry thinks it's concern that makes him move closer to her. 

"You ok? Should I bring you to the infirmary?"

She giggles. "No need, Potter. I'm fine."

But she's not. 

Because Elara Black would never be found sitting so close to the edge, a tired frown creasing her brows and magic not at her beck and call. 

She seems to read the concern literally bleeding of him because she continues, generous in her reassurances, "My magic's just being prickly, " she waves off his concerns like they are a trivial thing. "It's lashing out." 

"Why now? What happened?"

Why is it just now that Harry notices? It seems painful, like a wound never attended to till it festers. A wound she carries for years, so much so that she can almost act like it never exists till it wretches her back again in its agony 

"It's my birthday," she says nonchalantly. 

Harry didn't know. 

Though it would explain the Slytherins' celebratory mood. 

Harry swallows thickly. "Happy birthday," he tells her gently. 

"Thanks, Potter, that's kind of you." Elara's voice is kind but a tad too steady. She doesn't look happy like one usually is on their birthday. 

Instead, she looks miserable. 

It isn't a good look on her. 

Harry thinks that Elara Black looks her best happy. Mischievous.

He doesn't know what possesses him to presume something that most would find utterly riddiculous. Yet, he asks anyway.

"But it's not a happy day, is it?" 

Usually, Elara would quip back right at him. Something like, "look at you being intelligent for once." 

But silence is all his answer, almost as if she is afraid to respond, to break the wall of glass that separates the two of them. 

Would she lie? 

Or tell the truth? 

"It usually never is." 

And that sentence, so easily said by the girl who smiles like the sun, breaks a small bit of Harry's heart like a shard of glass that falls to the ground. 

Elara is closer to him now, further away from the edge that she dangled her feet in like a promise. Harry opens his arms and carefully gives a tug at her. 

Trust me. 

Let me be there for you

There's a pause as Elara looks at him. 

The silence is hesitant in the way one would look at the ground from high above before jumping. 

Elara stumbles into his arms, her small frame melting into his as he backs off a bit and sits down. Harry puts a hand on the back of her head. Her hair, ebony and silk on his hand, smells like fruits, apples, and sweetness. 

The dungeons a few weeks ago smelled like that during one of Slughorn's lessons. At least, to him. 

Her breath is warm on his collarbone, soft like a small breeze. Like a kiss. 

"I got you," he tells her softly, intimately in her ear, and she nuzzles her face in the crook of his neck. 

"You're warm," she whispers back. 

It makes Harry's heart swell. 

I'll give you as much warmth as you want, he wants to promise her. 

I'll be your fire like you are my sun. 

But his shyness, his desire not to break this delicate moment make his words impossible to say as they stay stuck in the back of his throat. 

His arms tighten around her, trying to give her all of his warmth in answer. 

They stay like that for a few minutes. 

A drop of water drops on his shoulder. Harry's emerald eyes flicker up, but the dark sky remains bereft of any clouds or rain. 

"Elara," he tries to say, trying to catch a glimpse at her as his arms start to loosen around her slender frame. 

But her arms tighten. 

Like a snake coiling around its prey. 

Like a soul begging not to be left alone. 

"Stay-" she whispers wetly. "I- I don't want you to see me like this." 

Harry nods, letting his cheek fall on the top of her head. He presses a kiss there. It is adoration and care locked into a small press of the lips. Another drop of water wets his shirt, and she shakes slightly in his arms. 

"Always."

It is not every day one can see Elara Black or even Harry Potter soft. 

Vulnerable and so open when the world has taught them always to hide. 

Hide behind bravery and recklessness, hide behind sharp words and sharper spells. 

But when it is just the two of them, it's different. 

No one would believe it. That they could just hold each other and be so content that the mere memory of that moment could feed a thousands of Patronuses. 

But the stars? 

They believe it.