D E A N T H O M A S
member of the order of the phoenix, remus lupin’s biggest fan, and one hell of a wizard.
its first year and dean is scared. he’s 11 years old and not sure if he can work out how to send letters by owl. he doesn’t know if he’s even going to be any good at magic. he has to make sure that he eats and showers and does his homework. which he has to write on parchment, with a quill. then there’s a troll in the dungeon. and his friends almost die. and from then on he refuses to go anywhere alone, asking seamus to come to the bathroom with him is embarrassing, but he’d rather that than die on the loo. the rest of the year is quiet for him, but he’s always on edge. he goes home for the summer. he doesn’t tell him mum.
its second year and dean is scared. he’d heard that word in passing last year, but now having it spat in his face. mudblood. there’s a monster trying to kill them, and none of the teachers know what to do. he draws the curtains around his bed, trying to silently cry into his pillow. some of the other boys are half-bloods but not the way he is, they don’t understand. but seamus sneaks sweets in for him in the gaps between the curtains, and he shares looks with harry, letting him know that he believes him. he talks to hermione more than ever before, they share a quiet understanding and it helps, until she gets petrified too. he stops going to class. he stops going anywhere. seamus stays with him. their dorm may not be safe, but its warm, and something about being there makes him feel brave enough to make it through the day. he doesn’t get petrified. harry kills the monster. he goes home for the summer. he doesn’t tell him mum.
its third year and dean is scared. he doesn’t even get to school before dementors attack the train, then just when he thinks the nightmare is over they’re all around the school and they’re there to stay. someone’s trying to kill harry, again, but this time its a murderer responsible for his parent’s death. hogsmeade is fun, and lupin is the greatest teacher muggle or wizard that dean’s ever had, but it doesn’t stop the panic rising in his stomach every time he looks down a dark corridor, or finds himself alone. then his one safe haven is attacked, and suddenly the curtains around his bed aren’t as mighty as they used to be. he wanders at night, wand in hand, unable to sleep or even close his eyes, seamus finds him curled up in the window and sits with him. it becomes their new routine, eventually they just don’t bother going to bed, and stumble upon the warmth of sitting close under one blanket. sirius turns out to be innocent. the dememtors leave hogwarts. he goes home for the summer. he doesn’t tell his mum.
its fourth year and dean is scared. death eaters are a big deal according to just about everyone, but hogwarts feels safe again. and despite harry somehow making himself the most hated boy in the world, the tournament is a laugh and the weasleys twins are making it even more entertaining. he’s spending more and more time alone with seamus, he never quite got his sleeping back to normal so they spend their evenings and early mornings on the sofa in the common room, careful to make sure no one sees as they both know if anyone saw them they’d say they were ‘cuddling’. they walk back from hogsmeade alone, their hands brush and dean completely freezes, and then seamus is interlocking their fingers and pulling him along and dean doesn’t know what to do except hold on tight. there’s no time to talk about it or process because its the third task and cedric is dead, voldemort is back. he can’t stop crying, seamus tries to help. he goes home for the summer. he doesn’t tell his mum.
its fifth year and dean is scared. he’s been writing to seamus all summer, but something was off, he doesn’t press him about it out of fear that he’ll stop writing. then they get back to school and they meet umbridge, who is definitely the worst person on the entire planet. harry and seamus fight, and it takes all of dean’s strength not to punch harry in the face, cause he’s right, and his- seamus is just being an idiot. but he comes round and they join the da and sneaking around together makes dean’s heart go crazy. one night after narrowly escaping malfoy and his little gang, the two find themselves squashed into what has got to be the smallest corridor in the whole of hogwarts. their laughter fades away when they notice how close their faces are, if dean moved forward just a little their noses would bump together, and then if he- seamus stops his thought process by crashing their lips together, its clumsy and nervous and they can’t move their arms enough to hold each other but its the best thing to ever happen to dean, and he can’t stop smiling. but it turns out the night they almost got caught, was the night they got marietta. each time he sees a bandage wrapped around one of his friend’s hands all he wants to do is cry. he can’t look at seamus, they don’t talk and he doesn’t know why. he starts dating ginny, he doesn’t know why. he goes home for the summer. he doesn’t tell his mum.
its sixth year and dean is scared. this is the year he realises he’s in the middle of a war. he keeps pretending to like ginny, and he feels like she’s pretending too, but they never talk about it, they never talk at all. there are days when seamus avoids him completely, days when they share a sad smile from across the room, and days when dean wants to stride over to him in the great hall and bring their lips together in front of everyone. but he doesn’t. quidditch is a good distraction, until ginny is so screamingly in love with harry that even she can’t keep up the preface anymore and dumps dean, leaving him with not even a fake girlfriend to turn to. one night, when he’s halfway up a staircase, the whole thing shifts and strands him at a dead end, so dean just sits, chin resting on knees and arms wrapped around himself. he doesn’t know how long its been when he feels a hand on his shoulder, he doesn’t need to look up to know its seamus, who sits down next to him without a word. and suddenly it’s just like old times, shoulders pressed together in silence as they both think about what they can’t say. the staircase takes them back to the common room, and things are better, but they don’t fully mend them in time because albus dumbledore is dead, and the two boys stare at each other in horror as they realise that dean isn’t safe here, or anywhere. he leaves hogwarts. he doesn’t tell his mum where he is.
its seventh year and dean is terrified. there were so many stories from his childhood about runaways and they always seemed so exciting, probably because they missed out the parts about scavenging for food, sleeping on the ground, and being hunted by snatchers. he listens to potterwatch when he can, the familiar voices of lee and the weasley twins keeping him going. he knew his luck would run out eventually, but never did he think he’d be chucked in the dungeon of draco bloody malfoy’s house. but he’s never been happier to see harry potter, he’s safe now, with the order, but when they ask him to fight dean can’t say yes quickly enough. he hoped he would be there, but dean had barely climbed through the portrait hole when someone leaped into his arms and held on so tight he could barely breathe. he put seamus down, their arms still wrapped around each other and dean spares no time in kissing him, and seamus kisses him back, and the cacophony of noise that erupts around them doesn’t even matter. he knows they’ll have to fight soon, but in this moment they’re safe, and they’re together, and dean holds seamus’ face and smiles down at him like he’s the luckiest boy in the world, because he is. he punches his fair share of wizard nazis, hexes even more once he gets a wand, he knows he can’t save everyone, but none of these twats are taking seamus from him. and they don’t, because the good guys win.
dean and seamus sit in the great hall under one blanket, holding hands and pressed together as dean lays a kiss on seamus’ head, the other boy turns into him more, clearly exhausted amongst other things that they’ll have to deal with later, but dean can’t help but smile. he looks around at the people it seems like he’s known his whole life and realises one vital thing;
he’s not scared anymore.
