balancing act

“I can’t believe you’ve been living here,” Dorcas said, eyes trying to take everything in at once. She knew that Regulus’ family was very wealthy, she’s just never really seen it with her own eyes before. Marlene has been staying with him for a couple of weeks now, both of them just working on music together all day everyday.

She came to visit Dorcas last weekend, which meant it was finally Dorcas’ turn to come here. Regulus had invited her anyway, along with all of their other friends, so it was a perfect excuse to take a break from work.

Marlene snorted, already used to the extravagant mess of the house. She hadn’t been at first, and had called Dorcas the first night she arrived, talking loud and excited about how nice it was. The pictures didn’t do it justice either.

“He wanted to hire a cleaner, you know?” she said, making both of them a drink. Regulus had a fully stocked bar, and Marlene had apparently been practicing her mixes. Dorcas was not surprised. Regulus was used to his flat, which was large considering it was just a flat, but not exactly the size of a whole house. “I told him it was the rich snob in him and that he should just clean himself.”

“You called him a rich snob?” Dorcas asked with a laugh.

“Well he is!” she defended.

“I heard that!” Regulus called from the next room over. He was with James, barely coming out to say hello to Dorcas when she arrived. Nobody else had shown up yet, and she was more preoccupied with Marlene to care about his lack of hosting skills.

Marlene rolled her eyes and produced two identical drinks. “One for you, my love,” she said, purposefully making herself sound more posh.

“Why thank you,” Dorcas said with a head nod.

“Would you care to go somewhere… more private?” Marlene asked, raising her eyebrows a little and starting to back away.

And yes. Dorcas would like that very much. Really she has wanted it from the moment she stepped inside this house, to just whisk Marlene off somewhere where they could be alone. But she was good and patient, and so she waited and let Marlene give her a house tour, and she caught up with Regulus and James and has done a very good job keeping herself together.

Marlene wastes no time and practically slams the door shut. She carelessly set her drink down on the dresser, not caring when some of it splashed off the sides. Dorcas normally would have commented, but Marlene had already pushed her onto the bed, climbing on top of her. Dorcas didn’t know where her drink went, and she didn’t care. It was the last thing on her mind when Marlene’s tongue was in her mouth.

***

God bless whoever put Remus on this Earth. Genuinely. Lily would be a bit lost without him at this moment. She was very obviously and very awkwardly avoiding Pandora. Things were sort of… up in the air. Their lives were hardly compatible. Lily worked on tours, she traveled for work and lived in a tiny one bedroom flat that was the cheapest she could find. Pandora was a successful ballerina with one of the most prestigious companies in the world. They were different people.

And Pandora sucked at communicating. Really, the two of them never seemed to accomplish anything when they spoke, and if they did find the right words to say, it never got interpreted right. They hadn’t had any sort of exclusivity talk, or a ‘what are we doing’ talk. It was just completely unlabeled and unclear and Lily was confused.

She was confused because Pandora was absolutely her favorite person to talk to. She was funny, and she spoke a mile a minute and changed topics in the blink of an eye. And she was so smart, she knew literally everything about everything it was insane. And she liked looking at Pandora. She was beautiful and had these eyes that Lily always got stuck on. She would lose her train of thought every time Pandora would make eye contact with her, and Pandora would just smile at her, which never helped Lily’s inability to speak because Pandora’s smile was… Just. Everything about her was insane in the best way. Like there is no way a person like her exists. Even just hanging out with her is one of Lily’s favorite things. They can just exist in silence, or Lily can and Pandora chatters and doesn’t really expect anything back. Or vice versa, because sometimes Pandora just wants to listen to Lily rant about a coworker or when she talks excitedly about the classes she’s taking for her certification. 

So, yeah. It's safe to say that Lily is quite enamored with everything about Pandora. The issue is that Lily has no idea how Pandora feels because she doesn’t ever tell her. They never talk about it; Lily doesn’t even know how to begin a conversation like that.

About a week prior to this party that Regulus invited everyone to, Lily kind of exploded. She doesn’t do well with so much uncertainty, and Pandora seemed way too nonchalant about the whole thing. The conversation went a little something like this-

“This girl on the bus was hitting on me and asked me for my number,” Lily said, starting off the conversation and hoping that it would lead to a real conversation.

Pandora looked up. She was coloring in a drawing of a dog that she had done just a couple days ago. Lily, at first, thought she saw Pandora’s jaw clench. And then it was gone, and she smiled and let out a small hum, looking back down at her drawing. “Was she cute?”

Lily blinked, honestly unable to believe her ears. “Was she cute?” Lily repeated slowly.

Pandora shrugged, not even looking at Lily anymore. “Yeah. Like did you give her your number?”

And, because she was an idiot, Lily said, “Yeah, I did, actually.”

Pandora didn’t even seem fazed, calmly coloring. “That’s nice.”

“Nice?”

“Mhm.”

Lily took a deep breath, but it did nothing to dispel her anger. “Are you fucking kidding me? You don’t even care?” she said, just exploding. She’s been holding it in for far too long, and now it’s going to volatile. 

Pandora finally looked up, eyes colder than they normally were for Lily. “Should I?”

“Oh, my God. Oh, my God,” she said, shaking her head. 

Pandora stood up. “I would like for you to leave.”

Lily bit her tongue. “I would love to leave,” she said, grabbing her jacket from the same hook she put it on almost every day.

“Good.”

Lily hesitated for just one second before literally slamming the door to Pandora’s flat. She didn’t look back once.-

So… they haven’t spoken since. Neither of them have reached out to the other, and Lily feels incredibly awkward.

Remus was keeping Lily to himself essentially. Pandora had intercepted Lily one time and said she wanted to talk to her. Since then, Lily has been staying far far away. 

Everything is just so messy, and she misses Pandora. But Lily can’t do it casually. She doesn’t want to be casual with Pandora.

And then Lily’s whole plan fell apart.

“Liliana Evans,” Sirius said, walking up to her and Remus with a big smile. That smile meant trouble though.

“My name isn’t short for Liliana,” she told him. Normally she would have smiled and played along, but seeing Pandora has put her in a bad mood for the rest of the evening, apparently.

“It’s not?” Remus and Sirius said at the same time.

Lily shook her head. “Nope.”

“Hmm. Well, regardless, I need to steal my boyfriend back.”

Lily’s eyes widened in panic. Pandora has been hovering around, almost always in view like she was waiting for the first moment that Lily was alone. “You can’t,” she said, latching onto Remus’ arm.

Sirius pouted. “I miss him.”

“He is helping me.”

Sirius raised an eyebrow. “He’s enabling your behavior.”

She shrugged. “Same thing.”

Remus stood up, causing Lily to let go. “He’s right. I’m enabling. Go talk to her.”

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

Remus patted the top of her head. “You’ll be fine. It’s just Pandora.”

If only Remus knew how wrong he was. It wasn’t just Pandora, because Pandora was more than just. She was somehow more than herself. She was everything. She was the sound of a timer going off, and she was the smell of bleach, and she was watching the clouds, or guessing when the light would turn green, she was a bag of cheddar and sour cream chips, she was watering the plants. She was in all of the little things, and she was plaguing Lily’s mind. It was infuriating. 

“I think I would rather die.”

Sirius smiled at her, already pulling Remus away. “You got this!” he said in a stage whisper because Pandora was already walking over to her.

Lily took a deep breath. If she was doing this, then she was going to be stubborn about it.

***

“And that’s Cornelius,” Barty said, pointing at the sky.

Evan frowned. “You’re just making these up.”

Barty grinned at him. “Oh, absolutely, I am. Took you a lot longer to catch on than I thought it would.”

Barty has been pointing at random stars and giving them awful sounding names. He didn’t know anything about stars, not in the way Regulus did. But he was laying outside on a blanket with Evan, and Barty felt a bit restless eventually.

Evan hummed. “Maybe I just like listening to you talk.”

Barty turned his head to see that Evan was already looking at him. “That’s good. I like to talk.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

Barty rolled his eyes, shoving him away. “Idiot.”

Both of them looked away at the same time. Barty had no idea what Evan was thinking about, but Barty was thinking about what he always was. Their wedding. It wasn’t even the idea of holy matrimony that Barty was getting stuck on, it was Evan. He was doing all of this with Evan. His best friend. This was going to be their life forever. It was going to be laundry, and dishes, and stargazing, and dogs, and kids, and domesticity.

And Barty was excited for their forever. He didn’t care if it got hard, or if it got boring and repetitive because he was going to have Evan.

If Barty is honest, he didn’t ever see himself here. He never saw himself past the age of sixteen, really. back when things were dark, and there was nothing to look forward to. Barty had no talents, no aspirations, his own father hated him for being trans. It was a bad time.

Evan was always there though. Regulus was too, of course, but it was different. Evan didn’t have to be there. They weren’t always close, and then one day they went to see a movie together because Regulus wasn’t allowed to go. And then Evan was always there, and Barty fell in love with him.

“You got quiet,” Evan said.

“So did you,” Barty pointed out.

“I want a dog,” Evan said.

Barty smiled up at the sky. “Okay. We can get a dog.”

“Can it be our ring bearer?”

“Are we having one of those?”

“If we get a dog, then yes.”

“What do you think about kids?” Barty asked him, because they’ve never really discussed it before.

“I like them.”

“No, I-I mean for us, I guess.”

Evan didn’t answer right away, which was fine. It wasn’t like Barty was suddenly proposing they have children or anything- except for that was exactly what he was doing. Not right now or anything. But… someday.

“I want kids with you,” Evan said eventually.

Barty let out a sigh of relief. “Thank God.”

Evan reached down and entwined their hands together. “Someday, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Barty said, in love with the idea of someday.

***

Marlene wasn’t expecting it, if she’s honest. They were making out in the hot tub when Dorcas pulled back suddenly.

“Is everything okay?” Marlene asked, head tilted a little.

“I love you,” Dorcas blurted out, and they both stopped. It felt like the world stopped, actually, and Marlene forgot how to breathe. She had accidentally told Dorcas she loved her a couple of weeks ago, and she had meant it. And she knew Dorcas had a hard time accepting that, and that she wasn’t really ready to return the sentiment. Marlene didn’t need her to, and she was fine with waiting.

Which is why this came so far out of left field. Dorcas had given her no signals that this was going to happen tonight, and Marlene felt wholly unprepared.

It was one thing to know that Dorcas loved her, and it was another to hear it.

“You…”

“I love you,” Dorcas said again, and she was smiling now, and she was looking at Marlene with love, and it was so wonderful.

Marlene didn’t know what to say, but she felt herself slowly start to smile as the full weight of it hit her. “You love me.”

“I love you.”

Marlene drew her back in, unable to help herself from kissing her. And they just repeated it over and over to each other. A chant, a whisper, a prayer.

They loved each other.

***

Lily Evans was the most frustrating woman on this planet.

Pandora dragged her into one of the many empty rooms in this huge house and locked them in there. Lily didn’t say a word the entire time, and now she was just standing there, facing Pandora with her arms crossed.

“You’re not going to say anything?” Pandora asked.

“No.”

They were both angry at each other, clearly. Although Pandora doesn’t understand why Lily is mad at her when Lily was the one who was giving her number out to other women, not Pandora.

They stare at each other for another minute, and then Lily’s arms fall and Pandora is stepping into her space and kissing her like she’ll never be able to do it again. She breathes Lily in, and the two of them both go stumbling from the force of it. They don’t break apart, and instead Pandora presses Lily against the closest wall, crowding in even more. She wanted Lily to consume her, to let Pandora burrow into her skin and make a home there.

And maybe this is why they never get anything done, and maybe Pandora should have stopped them so that they could talk first, but she missed Lily. She missed her so much, so she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t do anything except lay Lily down gently on the bed and lower to her knees. She couldn’t do anything except  enjoy the sounds Lily made and pretend that everything was okay. She couldn’t do anything except worship her.

And then, when it was all over and Lily was about to leave, Pandora remembered that she wanted to talk.

“Did you go out with her?” she asked, still naked in the bed and just watching as Lily put on all of her clothes.

Lily stopped. “With who?”

“The girl. From the bus,” Pandora said, trying to be nonchalant about it when in reality she was seething with anger. And jealousy, a lot of jealousy.

“I- I didn’t actually give her my number,” Lily said slowly.

“You said you did.”

“That was just…”

“To make me jealous?”

“Yeah,” Lily admitted softly. 

“It worked.”

“What?”

“I was jealous.”

“Well, you had no right to be.”

Pandora frowned. “I had every right to be.”

“You didn’t! We weren’t even dating!”

“What are you talking about?” Pandora asked, sitting up. “Yes we were.”

“News to me.”

“What did you think we were doing then, Lily? Just hanging out?”

“You never told me any differently.”

“It was implied!”

“It wasn’t!”

Pandora bit her tongue. “Well, now you know.”

Silence hung between them for a couple of seconds, their anger dying as everything set in. Lily didn’t know that they were dating, which was ridiculous in Pandora’s mind.

“I didn’t know,” Lily said, her voice much quieter now. “I- I don’t know. We never talked about it, so I didn’t know what it was to you.”

“Everything,” Pandora said without missing a beast. “You’re everything. I- I was so mad. I thought you were cheating on me, or trying to break up with me without actually having to do it.”

 Lily let out a small laugh. “I was trying to get you to ask me to be your girlfriend.”

“We already were girlfriends.”

Lily sat down on the bed. “Yeah, well I didn’t know that.”

Pandora took a deep breath. “That’s my fault. I- I’m not good at those conversations, and so I just assumed that you knew.”

“I should have just brought it up.”

“Me too.”

Lily sighed, leaning in and kissing Pandora. And it was sweet, and simple, and not full of all that tension from earlier. “So, for clarity’s sake-”

Pandora laughed. “Shut up.”

Lily smiled with her. “Okay, but seriously-”

“Yes. We’re girlfriends,” Pandora interrupted. and honestly she’s never been happier. They didn’t leave the room the entire night, declaring it as theirs for the night and not caring if somebody else was supposed to sleep in there.