she's harder to handle than you think, son

Felix grinned. “Babes, you know how I feel about aioli.” It he had to die today, Felix would opt to drown in a barrel of aioli. 

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“Jesus Christ on a cracker, we get it, you’re rich.” 

If Maeve had to die today -- mm, best to keep that pickle jar unopened, she decided. They were up high enough, that when you leant forward as far and safe as one could, you could pretend you were flying. It was too dangerous for Mae to fly tonight, so she stopped early on and waited for the carriage to come to a halt.

“That means you’re paying,” she hissed, now in search of corndogs. “Unless you want a wedgie with your skid marked pants again.”

Maeve wobbled atop a ladder leaned up against number 5. She inhaled sharply, the chilled air making her throat sore. The ladder steadied itself after a few beats. She wouldn’t have been a complete goner, but nobody had a desire for lying in the snow with broken bones. Not unless you had a death wish. On second thought, she half-joked to herself rather grimly.

She waited for some lonely soul to walk past and inquire what the fuck was up.

Felix grinned. “Yeah. Maybe I just like getting under your skin.” This was hardly surprising news. Since the moment they met, he managed to irritate to Mae simply with breathing. The good kind of irritation, he hoped. The kind where they stuck together regardless of what life had in store. “Wanna go ‘round another time then eat our weight in corndogs?” 

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Seeing as she was glued to her seat, she did not oblige. Was it sheer fear or the uncomfortable nip of winter keeping her frozen? Maeve knew the answer herself, but was unable to face it today. To be free of his stare, that’s what she wanted. Her throat hurt too much to speak anymore, but if she fled as quickly as the sunshine, more questions were only to be planted. Fucking hell, she hated this. The simple task of existing no longer seemed too difficult, but it’s all she had to do for the next half hour before being home. Tucked into her patterned duvet. Stuffy in arms.

“If they don’t serve garlic mayo, they can’t have my business.” She felt herself choking on the words, but had managed to speak them believably. 

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“It’s, like, a prodigal son, I think.” The words came between grunts, finished off with a single kick line finale, as the toe of Marlene’s Doc Marten shoved the final box towards Maeve. She opened the box, coughing through clouds of dust, and pulled out a string of garland that had thinned with time. Only as she finished wrapping it around her cousins neck did the words register. “Ew, you listen to Kansas?”

“What. The fuck. Is a Kansas?” Maeve wished to be strangled with the garland rather than explain what the hell she was asking about in the first place. If there was nothing she loved more, it was leaving people on the edge of cliffs. She didn’t abandon Marlene today, though, following up after a clear of her throat. “I don’t know where I’ve heard that song before, but it was stuck in my head when those cunts had me.” She did not shy away from the subject, going between hot and cold feelings towards it by the day.

That bothered Felix, maybe because he always thought of Mae as special. “Doesn’t mean you’re not important.” He paused for a moment. “Important to me.” Somehow, the pair had managed to figure out how to be friends again, but that didn’t erase the fondness he still maintained for her. How much Felix cared about her wellbeing. He wagered that would never go away. 

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“Why did you wait until we were three stories off the ground to say that? Do you want me to jump?” Maeve huffed loudly, her curtain bangs blowing about her forehead. She wasn’t going to dissect her feelings today and definitely no day soon. Leaving the emotions, for lack of a better word, unlabeled was never going to change. They could stay in their pretty, compartmentalized box until one day she was too bored and too stupid and released one of the demons.

She was on high alert and the distractions wouldn’t be welcomed. That’s what Felix had always presented himself as. Friend, second. Her arms crossed her chest, hiding the novelty Santa Cruz emblem on the jumper’s chest.

“All I care about right now is a corn dog.”

Maeve made no move to leave the Ferris Wheel as it came to a halt at the bottom, letting guests off one at a time. Hazel eyes were stuck to the horizon, the sun disappearing. She felt like hiding away, too, and understood now why it went away so early in winter. Mae gulped.

Felix’s face fell. “Fucking hell. That’s heavy.” He couldn’t fathom a better response, despite knowing his words fell short in every way imagineable. Maybe all he could do was be there for Mae. “You alright?” 

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“I’m at a fun fair on a Friday afternoon. Everything’s peaches.” Sure, Maeve did not want to get into it, but that also could been because there was no beginning point. What layer of the fifty did you pick at first to ensure the Jenga pile of her emotions didn’t come clattering down as boisterous as thunder? “It’s not as crazy as everyone makes it out to sound. Have you picked up a paper recently? You’ll find hundreds of Mae Bragnams. My story isn’t special.” 

She remembered why she went on keeping her brain switched off with Felix. It was easier than answer questions. Even the simple, caring ones. “Quit making me think,” she finalized.

Every surface was sticky with icing, but Maeve had stopped caring after only five minutes of wrestling with moist paper towels. The urge to lick her fingers clean was apparent through the entire meticulous process of placing gumdrops up the gingerbread castle’s moat. The sweets had been color coordinated with the Scottish flag, while a familiar holiday melody played a loud chorus. It was about the only music Maeve could tolerate. There was no other reason but nostalgia, her foot thumping along to the extraordinary sounds of trumpets and bells.

“What’s wayward son mean?” Mae asked, breaking any silence or concentration she’d previously been holding onto. She adjusted Santa’s hat on her blonde head of hair, the white pompom attached bouncing from her forehead.

“I don’t think he’s a doctor. But I did see him on the news, telling the weather, and don’t you need a doctorate for that?” Felix’s brows furrowed. “Oi, I’m clean as a whistle.” Although he had been particularly itchy after a romp with Alecto Carrow once, but that ended up being bed bugs from a shitty motel mattress. “You gonna clue me in on what happened?” 

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Maeve held onto the edge of the carriage’s seat, expecting the inevitable now to punctuate that sentence. It never came, rendering her next sassy reply useless. She kicked back after that, throwing one leg over the other. The rips of her jeans allowed the brined air to kiss the skin of her thighs. The head wound she’d sported into a muggle hospital had properly been fixed up by a real healer here in the wizarding world. She looked good as new and could’ve fooled the untrained eye that she felt it, too. Even the scowl she wore was familiar as ever, but the storm kept brewing inside of her chest day in and day out. Her mind was a wreck not even the endless sea could calm.

“Anti-Magic Coalition pricks. I don’t even know if that’s who they were. They could’ve been pretending.” There was no disguising the disgust the group of middle-aged losers had felt towards the trio of wixen, though. With an organized group or not, they didn’t believe in the good of magic. Mae didn’t know if she did anymore either. “I wouldn’t trust their luck in poker, when they’ve decided to fuck with the least magic person alive. Besides yourself, of course.”

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She was stalling, distracting herself from telling too much. Shouldering the burden all on her own, because that’s what Maeve did she kept it all to herself. The barest of information about who had hurt her, likely to shield him from the horrors and realities of the world, but that was his job, he was the big brother, he was meant to take care of and protect her— and he had failed. He cleared his throat at her question. “Yeah— ehm— I’ll get some for ye, bring ‘em round.”

He watched her carefully, worried that at any moment she might crack. “Yeah, well might have a go-round with ‘em if I ever run into them. They got no right. No right. You haven’t done anythin to earn that. They can’t just lump all wixen in as one. You ain’t done nothing.”

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“They didn’t make too much of a statement, though, did they?” It was to prove a point, that she’d walked away with stitches only. But Maeve was also asking, because she had not bothered to check in about Dorcas or James. It was clear that shame had burdened her, as it should’ve weighed on any sane person’s conscious. She gulped.

Mae did not glance up between serving up sausages and random odds and ends in the kitchen onto their plates. Knife and fork in hand, Mae sliced herself up a piece of meat and buried it into mustard. “Mm,” her tummy rumbled as she welcomed the warm food into her mouth. It took her another moment of food before she settled back into the conversation of things, surely Lex still in shock that she’d stumbled in so casually. Casual because every minute felt more unreal than the next. Absolutely brutal feeling, that.

“I’ll wake mum and da after I have a sugar waffle, alright?” Though all she wanted was a shower with her own soothing shower gel. Sleep deprived as hell, she wouldn’t see the silk pillowcase soon. They’d know the tales of Puddlemere, herself, James, and Dorcas soon. They’d see embarrassment in her stormy eyes as she admitted she does not know where they’d be, because she cannot remember where they’d been held. Where was sleep when you needed it? Not close enough.

“You know I’d come back to haunt you, and then you could never be rid of me.” Felix flashed a shit-eating grin. “Oi, that’s not on me. I was too busy trying to get ahold of my dealer who’d gone shrimpin’. Besides, I’ve always liked that photo of you. The evil really shines out of your eyes.” 

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He was right, because at least Maeve still had the ability to run and lock him outside of her hideaways as she always had as primary aged kids. Maeve perked an eyebrow up high, using air quotations as she questioned him, “And when you say dealer, you mean doctor? What venereal disease were you left with, chump?” A perfectly acceptable thing to ask when deflecting. Her lips remained stubbornly pursed.

“YOU’RE ALIVE, AND I’M HAPPY ABOUT IT!” Felix squealed, loud enough that the other group above them gave dirty looks.  

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“The only thing that’d make me happy is pushing you from this basket.” Maeve settled into her favorite pink and orange striped jumper that came out nearest the first snowfall of winter. It was about that time and one of the only things that brought her comfort. Welcomed comfort, that was. “I assume you were part of the executive decision of posting my face all around Tasmania.”

Mae didn’t know whether to thank Felix or kill him. That was the usual mood. “You could’ve at least had Lex choose a photo from after my nose job,” she joked.

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“See, what’d I say? A brat.” He mumbled, not ready to let go just yet, needing to know she was safe with him for just a little bit longer. “WixBurger knows what’s going on. School too, I went tuh WixB first they were worried when ye missed yer shift since that’s not like ye at all.” He pulled back, eyes surveying her face. “The ministry do?” He asked, his voice low. “I swear to Merlin and Morgana if they did this to you because of a fucking curfew, I swear I’ll sic the whole of the wizards’ council on the bastards.”

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“Believe it or not, people worse than politicians exist.” She was off to forage for herself through cupboards and the refrigerator next. If she didn’t eat a Cumberland sausage within the next two minutes, she would absolutely melt into puddle much out of place for a November night. A piece of dark chocolate was shoved into her mouth as she balanced a bottle of Coke and the jar of English mustard on the inside of her elbow. “Have mince pies popped up at the shops yet? It’s about that time of year.” 

Maeve busied herself with a pan on the hob, knowing none of this is what Lex wanted to hear, needed to hear, or deserved to hear. Her throat was cleared as a sausage was tossed into the hot Teflon. She added an extra one for her brother. “I’ve been staying in a hotel for the last bit of time, because why would I want to come home to tell my wizard family the Anti-Magic Coalition has been fucking with me? They’d have been better off taking you. You can work a wand, for fuck’s sake.”

“Do you insist on breathing?”

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Lex’s head snapped to the sound of her voice so quickly he wasn’t sure which emotion he was overcome with more, joy that she was safe, that he could see her in front of him for the first time in what felt like years, or irritation that, that was her take away from his efforts to find her. “That’s my favorite picture of you, you absolute brat.” He said, breathing short in his chest as he’s flooded with emotion.

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“You’ve got no taste, never had. I look like a tart slumming it. Slumtart Millionaire.” Maeve audibly gulped following her quip, her knuckles turning white as she gripped Lex’s t-shirt within two palms. It’s the best I miss you she could muster. There was a bandage at Maeve’s temple, a handful of stitches underneath. It came into view as she stepped away and let him go. She should have them taken out soon. “Have you heard from WixBurger?” It shouldn’t have been a concern of hers, when worry and lack of sleep wrote lines underneath her brothers eyes. Her heartbeat quickened. Who else had been shocked into oblivion? Her parents were the people she wanted to see the least, but most.