This is [[Nott]] a home

[Tabitha Selwyn]

I think I’m better off alone
You always disappear
Even when you’re here
This is not my home
I think I’m better off alone

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Tabitha Selwyn had been staying with her kind-of sort-of boyfriend Theodore Nott for a few months now, and still she felt as out of place as she had since the day she got her. Constantly he looked at her like she was some sort of burden, and had on many occasions told her just how lucky she that he had chose to let her stay. Lucky. Sure. She more often then not she was quite confidant she would be much better off on her own. Well, maybe not better off. She wouldn't have the clothes she had now and certainly would not be fed as well, but she would be happier. Much happier.

Her eyes flickered around the room, taking in the same surroundings it had been taking in for months now. Grey. Grey walls, grey curtains, grey carpet, grey bedding on top of grey sheets. She ran her small hand across the comforter, the type of material obviously expensive, sighing softly. She missed her room, at her house, with her father. It was quite girly, and very not like you would expect from the seventh year Slytherin, but it was just the way she liked it. The walls were white, which matched very well with her white and light blue comforter. Everything was off set by the darker blue of her carpet, and just seemed like a fairy tale bedroom. It all seemed like a dream now.

Looking ahead, there was an antique dresser with a huge mirror. Honestly, it was beautiful. Her blue-grey eyes flickered across the hand carved wood surrounding the mirror, the brass handles on the drawers, before settling on her own reflection. She barely recognized herself anymore. She had lost quite a bit of weight, and now looked almost sickly in the dark. Her once baby round cheeks were almost sucked in now, and her cheek bones very prominent. Her once favorite blouse, white and ruffly around the arms, now hung loosely around her frame. This is what this place has done to her. She was barely a skeleton compared to what she use to be.

Most would get sad at that realization, but Tabby was so tired of being sad. So, she switched to an emotion that she liked tons better, and knew as well as the back of her hand. She got angry. Why did she let this place get to her like she did? Why did she let him get to her like he had? Her mother had neglected her all her life. Took care of her when she absolutely had to, but for the most part it was up to the maid and the cook to raise the dark headed child. Never, though, had it even gotten close to bothering her the way it did to get neglected by Theodore Nott.

There was no reason for her to truly care about him. He was dark, moody, and her drank all the time. Sure, they had a few moments back at school, but even those felt like years ago, when it had only been a few months. When she had come to stay with him, she felt like things would be different. She had done a lot of growing up, and was truly ready to be what everyone expected of her. A housewife, cleaning up the house, maintaining the area. But he wouldn't let her touch anything. They had maids for that, they had cooks for that, etcetera etcetera. So what was she then? His girlfriend? They didn't talk, they didn't touch. She was a guest.

Something she didn't want to be. Especially in a room like this. Her eyes flickered around the room once more, narrowing at all the grey. Grey. Grey, grey, grey everywhere she looked! Huffing softly she jumped off the bed, yanking the dusty comforter of the bed, revealing....grey fucking sheets. Growling to herself she yanked that off the bed too. Still, she wasn't satisfied. Her hands gripped the decorative curtains on the bed frame and tore those down too. By then, tears started to fill her eyes. She hated this place. Hated it with everything about it, and everyone in it. With a small last cry, she snatched the curtains off the window, pulling them down as she fell to the floor. She sat there, her face in her hands, sobbing gently. She hated this place.
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tag; Theodore
word count; 732
comments; It's not as great as I had hoped, but there ya go.

[Theodore Nott]

I don't need your tears
I don't want your love
I just gotta get home

He had been a silly boy, such a silly boy living only in his own little world. There had been room for nothing else in that world but old pictures of a smiling family, something that once existed, and the shame and hurt. All the wallowing had made him lose sight of what was real and what mattered. The cause. That greater good people spoke so fondly about. There were issues in the world, serious ones that needed to be taken care of. Some had tried to find a cure but all had failed. Need he say more than Death Eaters? His father had failed in the end and his beliefs had failed: everything the man had worked for turned into rubble as he-who-must-not-be-named terminally perished from earth. But now there was a new generation who was not blindsided by the obsession of one wizard but instead saw the world from clear and untarnished spectacles. He was lucky to be a part of the organization. He should be. At first he had joined Grendel for the wrong reasons, namely vengeance for his father and a misplaced sense of honour, but now he felt as though he had been given a second chance to change his destiny and finally live his own life on his terms. This was no group of Death Eater's which he was born into, but a free choice not made by anyone but him.

After Theodore graduated from Hogwarts he had tried to be someone else, someone the Ministry would condone. He had sought work or even the simplest of internship in potions. Thereby he had disowned his name and the deeds of his father in return for a different status in the wizarding community, a lesser one where he might blend into the crowd of half-bloods and muggleborns. What a joke he must have been. Looking back he was almost thankful that he had been rejected all the positions he applied for. At the time it had wounded his pride that no one would touch him with a barge pole, that his attempt for redemption for the Nott family was spat on, but they were right.. absolutely right.. a Nott did not belong amongst the common masses. If nothing else, he should always bear his name with pride and never neglect his heritage. That had become increasingly important after his father's death. Theodore Nott was the only one left of the once great family of Nott.

The blatant realization that he had to grow up, had not entirely been the result of graduation and the loss of his father. Back when summer had passed, he had stood at a crossroad; forced to make a decision concerning a girl. How trivial it sounded now, and how childish his actions had been. The decision having to be made concerned a fellow Slytherin, a girl who had been his girlfriend. Funny how he had always despised that word, girlfriend. Tabitha Selwyn had never been his friend, and he had never really thought of her as just a girl. For better or worse she had been above the term. Instead she had been a nuisance, a snake, a constant source of anger and agony to him, but most importantly she had been his.

They had of course not admitted it at the time, both constantly testing each other’s skills at ignorance and nonchalance to see who was superior, but the relationship they had started went much further than your everyday crush. She had taken a part of him the first time she touched his cheek, and not in the romantic fairy-tale kind of way. No, she had taken a bite of his mind, soul and heart, chewed on it and then spat it out. At least that was how it felt inside when he remembered their moments together; like an aching yet infectious wound. At least that line of thinking would justify him doing exactly the same towards her or possibly something even worse.

Theodore wondered what had been her breaking point in the end. Was it the loss of her father? Her mother disowning her? Having to move out of her childhood home? Or had it been brought about by his negligence? When he seldom thought about this, an old all-devouring flame lit up in his gut and made him hope, nay pray, that it was his fault that she was in such a pitiful state. That he could have such an impact on her, win their twisted little game, well, it was a stirring thought. But the grown-up Theodore, the one standing below the staircase right now, did not think along those lines, did he? No, he thought along the lines of looking forward and taking joy in fixing (her), instead of breaking (her)..

Nowadays his own thoughts sounded and felt like those of a complete stranger. Especially the idea of fixing Tabitha was absurd now that she finally felt the same loss he felt.. no, wait.. the same loss he had once felt. But he had to think differently: like an adult, like a man not troubled by the past, like someone completely different than his father. Just the thought of continuing his old life trapped in his own mind with no other company than the long gone ghost of his mother and his father's dead youth ideals, was enough to make Theodore want to lie down and never stand up. So he kept standing, and although there were times when he could not even recognize himself in the mirror, he carried on.

Right now it was not so much his thoughts that carried him forward as it was his feet. Theodore began the quite long rise from the bottom of the staircase to the next floor. He sought Tabitha, although he could not claim that it ever was much of a 'search' to find her in the manor. She hardly ever left the guestroom anymore. Well, there was that and of course the fact that he could hear things crashing from the same area. Unless his house-elf suddenly had started a riot, he was pretty sure it was her temper flaring.

Crossing the hallway in a few strides he caught a glimpse of himself in a mirror. It was not just mentally that he had taken the leap into adulthood, but also when it came to appearance. Much had changed since his seventh year at Hogwarts. Gone was the boyish look he had about him with the neatly tamed hair and smooth skin, and replacing it was something a bit more sinister. Now he kept his dark brown hair long in the back, and his face always carried the mark of a few day old stubbles. There had been evident changes clothing-wise as well: he wore dark tailor-made suits and when he went out for whatever occasion, he added a likewise dark robe. The changes he had done had been very deliberate for who would respect a fresh-faced kid just out of school?

Brushing his thoughts away, Theodore focused on the task that laid at hand. It was pure circumstance that the noises coming from her room should appear in the very moment he headed towards the guestroom to see her, but it did not make his task much easier that he now had to deal with her angry. At least he thought she was angry. Maybe she had fallen from a chair and hurt herself? Reaching the doorway leading into the room, Theodore paused. The view that met him was not what he had been expecting. Instead of seeing a fallen chair and Tabitha sprawled out on the floor, he saw a room that had been practically torn to pieces by a fury, the latter which sat on the floor, hands covering her face. Suppressing a twinge of anger Theodore resolved to a more stoic approach, one that was much more like old Theo than new Theodore. Still he could not help it around her. Leaning against the door frame, Theodore crossed his arms and spoke out into the room:
"I like what you've done to the place."

[Tabitha Selwyn]

We had fire in our eyes
In the beginning I
Never felt so alive
In the beginning you
You blame me but
It's not fair when you say that I didn't try
I just don't want to hear it anymore

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NOT FINISHED!
DO NOT READ!


Her tantrum had solved nothing. Tabitha Selwyn sat on the floor in admits of all the grey things she had just torn down. Grey bedding, grey sheets, grey curtains, it surrounded her, swallowing her up in a worm hole of misery. She sobbed uncontrollably for a moment, warm tears streaming down her once full cheeks, before finally finding enough self control to suck it up. She was better then this, all of this. With a small sniffle, the tears stopped streaming, and she let out a sigh. She shut her eyes, wiping her salty hands off on some grey thing or another that had wrapped itself around her frail body, her muscles uncoiling from their tense position. This was really just too much. Her hands went to her face once more, this time not to cry, but to hide. Hide from the ugly house, ugly room, and that terribly ugly stranger in the mirror.

"I like what you've done to the place."

So many emotions in her body, so many thoughts in her head, and so very many slashes through her soul, it was all almost too much to take. Tabby prided herself in being the girl who was never shaken.

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