21 October, 1893 — Leonid Fisk's House
And I could tell you were disappointed with that answer so I carried on, said
"I mean I've loved a lot of people in my life, or I thought I have
I guess I've written them all off when they leave, or I leave them
You know, because, that means, doesn't it
That means that it couldn't have been love to begin with
So why not just write it off?
Victor had expected the Spirit Division fellow to be angrier than he was, when the whole mess was sorted out. Victor had lied (or at least omitted rather most of the necessary context) in order to get him to take him to the Dempsey house in the first place, after all. Whatever irritation he might have been feeling at being blindsided seemed to have been tempered by pity after whatever he'd overheard through the door, though. Back through the floo and at the Ministry, Greengrass had seemed more mopey than anything. That was fine by Victor, who wasn't up for much conversation. He certainly wasn't up for revisiting the whole situation for Desiderius Morgan, so he had slipped back out the Ministry door and onto the streets of Hogsmeade before Greengrass could tell him whether or not his presence was required in the Spirit Division for anything else. If they needed him to make a statement or something, they knew where to find him, he supposed.
It occurred to him halfway back to the house that they might actually hunt him down for something a little more aggressive than making a statement. Christabel's brother was soon to be the Minister, and he'd already threatened to have Victor magically removed from the house. He might pressure the Spirit Division to issue a restraining order, or an arrest, or something — or maybe they'd do that even without Ozymandias pressuring them to, given how much of a loose canon he'd acted today. (He had not exactly been planning to storm the Dempsey house and threaten to search it top to bottom in order to find Christabel, even if she didn't want to talk to him, but that was in effect what had occurred). The idea of going home and waiting around for someone to come and lecture him on ghostly etiquette, or give him a slap on the wrist and tut tut about his behavior, was positively odious. Particularly since Beatrice, she of the well I simply don't understand why you can't be bothered to knock, and nevermind that you no longer have hands, would of course be at home to observe the whole thing and look smug, and lord it over him for years to come.
So he simply didn't go home. There was nothing positive waiting for him at home. Bea had made it clear that she saw his continued existence as inconvenient. Christabel only cared about herself. The only purpose in hovering at home would be waiting for depressing things to happen — the Spirit Division to come chastise him or Christabel to come fetch her things and try to make another scene where she could play the victim. He didn't want to go home and wait for those things. He didn't want to go home until all of this was over, and all the unpleasant things were far behind him. And he had time, was the thing — he could disappear, for a week or a month or a year, and it wouldn't make the least bit of difference to anyone. The only trouble was figuring out where to go.
It was lucky that he still remembered which building it was; he hadn't been here in months. Talking to Leo had the same depressing aura that talking to Christabel had had, since his death: he felt that just by existing in the room he was reminding them of their grief, and their grief reminded him of what he had lost, and it ended up unpleasant for everyone. After this latest fight with his wife, though, he wondered if he had been unfair to Leo in drawing those conclusions. He'd had far more conversations with Belle, obviously, because she'd lived in the same house — but it was clear to him now that she had only ever held her own feelings close to her heart, and had never cared much for his. Maybe in his interactions with Leonid he'd been projecting all the negative feelings from conversations with Christabel. Maybe he'd been cutting himself off from someone who might really care about him, in the name of trying to make it easier for them both.
It was the right house, though; he recognized the furniture when he drifted in through the side of one of the walls. By this point it was evening (he had wandered the woods on the edge of Hogsmeade a while, thinking) and Leonid was home.
"My wife left me," he announced, then, "Oh, sorry. Was I interrupting anything?"
It occurred to him halfway back to the house that they might actually hunt him down for something a little more aggressive than making a statement. Christabel's brother was soon to be the Minister, and he'd already threatened to have Victor magically removed from the house. He might pressure the Spirit Division to issue a restraining order, or an arrest, or something — or maybe they'd do that even without Ozymandias pressuring them to, given how much of a loose canon he'd acted today. (He had not exactly been planning to storm the Dempsey house and threaten to search it top to bottom in order to find Christabel, even if she didn't want to talk to him, but that was in effect what had occurred). The idea of going home and waiting around for someone to come and lecture him on ghostly etiquette, or give him a slap on the wrist and tut tut about his behavior, was positively odious. Particularly since Beatrice, she of the well I simply don't understand why you can't be bothered to knock, and nevermind that you no longer have hands, would of course be at home to observe the whole thing and look smug, and lord it over him for years to come.
So he simply didn't go home. There was nothing positive waiting for him at home. Bea had made it clear that she saw his continued existence as inconvenient. Christabel only cared about herself. The only purpose in hovering at home would be waiting for depressing things to happen — the Spirit Division to come chastise him or Christabel to come fetch her things and try to make another scene where she could play the victim. He didn't want to go home and wait for those things. He didn't want to go home until all of this was over, and all the unpleasant things were far behind him. And he had time, was the thing — he could disappear, for a week or a month or a year, and it wouldn't make the least bit of difference to anyone. The only trouble was figuring out where to go.
It was lucky that he still remembered which building it was; he hadn't been here in months. Talking to Leo had the same depressing aura that talking to Christabel had had, since his death: he felt that just by existing in the room he was reminding them of their grief, and their grief reminded him of what he had lost, and it ended up unpleasant for everyone. After this latest fight with his wife, though, he wondered if he had been unfair to Leo in drawing those conclusions. He'd had far more conversations with Belle, obviously, because she'd lived in the same house — but it was clear to him now that she had only ever held her own feelings close to her heart, and had never cared much for his. Maybe in his interactions with Leonid he'd been projecting all the negative feelings from conversations with Christabel. Maybe he'd been cutting himself off from someone who might really care about him, in the name of trying to make it easier for them both.
It was the right house, though; he recognized the furniture when he drifted in through the side of one of the walls. By this point it was evening (he had wandered the woods on the edge of Hogsmeade a while, thinking) and Leonid was home.
"My wife left me," he announced, then, "Oh, sorry. Was I interrupting anything?"
Fabulous set by Lady!
