July 7, 1893 - Bixby Home, Bartonburg, Hogsmeade

While the paper said that the family wished for privacy Lottie knew, she just knew that Alvin needed a friend. He'd looked after her during their school years and been just that friend to her, and there was absolutely no way she'd be able in good conscience leave Alvin on his own. So instead of visiting Christabel today she'd arrived at a different part of Hogsmeade to be there for a friend.

The butler had almost turned her away, in fact he would have, had Alvin's elder brother not come across the scene. She didn't know Rufus well but she remembered him from her school days. There were new lines on his face now, a sadness that seemed so at odds with what she remembered of him. He'd led her into the parlor and went to find Alvin.

Lottie had drifted to the window as she waited, taking in the street outside. Flowers were blooming and ducking their heads against the rain. Wasn't it odd how flowers seemed bent when it rained? People when they grieved did the same thing. They stooped down as if their grief were rain.

The door opened behind her but Lottie didn't hear it. In fact she jumped when Rufus showed Alvin in and barely noted when he'd left the room. "Oh, Alvin!" She sighed. He'd never looked worse. She floated toward him and wrapped her arms around him in a hug. Something that was quite common in their school days, but so few people ever thought her hugs were common these days. A shame, for it really was the best way to show someone you were there for them.

Alvin Bixby

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

If he'd been drifting before, Alvin was truly lost now. Now, losing his career seemed to pale in comparison to losing Sloane. He had been there when it had happened. Alvin had watched the lightning hit her, watched her fall, seen her hit the water and be swallowed by the waves.

The shock had a firm hold on him and he didn't know how to let go.

Wally and Harry seemed insistent on believing she was simply missing, but Alvin knew better, there was no surviving that. He was too overcome with guilt to argue with them or keep them from continuing to look. He didn't do much of anything. Thank Merlin Rufus seemed to be able to hold things together well enough to see to everything that needed to be handled.

The news of a visitor had him looking at his bother like he had lost his mind. Only when Rufus disclosed it was Lottie downstairs did Alvin drag himself from his bed and staring a hole in the ceiling. He had cried himself out in the privacy of his room, but the evidence was clear on his face, mirrored in the eyes of everyone around him.

The hug barely registered and he stood there without moving, shoulders drooping, face sullen.

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She was unsure how long they stood there, her holding on him like ivy to a tree trunk, but she didn't mind. He needed her support more than she needed a response. Finally she let go and took him by the hand leading him over to the couch and pulling him to sink down beside her. Then, as if he were her sister, she guided his head to lean on her shoulder and wrapped an arm around him. Lottie was never one for fussing and took comfort in quiet moments. It seemed as if Alvin, like Christabel, just needed someone there, someone to shine a light when the shadows got too dark.

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

Alvin didn't even have the energy to return the hug. He knew he should, but Alvin knew these days didn't make much sense and he certainly couldn't wrap his head around any of this. Even with his front-row seat to his sister's death, Alvin couldn't make heads or tails of the situation.

The persistent haze that had settled over him had him following Lottie blindly. Rufus had made himself scarce which was helpful but even as Lottie tucked him onto the couch next to her, he could feel a fresh wave of tears at the corners of his eyes. "I was there," he whispered. Nobody outside the house knew he'd been there, Alvin knew he wouldn't be able to handle the stares, but this was Lottie and she knew him perhaps better than any of his brothers. "I watched it happen." He choked out, unable to get past that as he dissolved into tears again.

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His voice was like the whisper of wind against her ear, soft and hardly there. But the words brought with them a storm as did the breeze from the ocean. Lottie tightened her grip, her mind, ever eager to indulge in creativity, tried to grasp what it would be like to not only to have Lycoris die but to see it happen. She could feel the sorrow soul deep already just at the thought and a tear trickled down her cheek and in to Alvin's hair as she rested her head on his own.

But then the wind blew fiercer, the storm cluttered her mind and she felt as if her soul itself would break with Alvin's pain, with his tears. Lottie shifted, her fingers tilting up his face and wiping the tears from his face as they fell, her own companion tears leaking unnoticed down her cheeks. "Some are born to sweet delight. Some are born to endless night." She mused, William Blake's words hardly above a whisper. Her sweet Alvin had been through so much, his own endless night seemed ceaseless these days and yet all she wished for him was sweet delight.

She leaned her forehead on his own, her hands gentle on both his own, feeling the scars fate had been so cruel to give him. "It plays again and again, an endless haunting." Her own words vines of her thoughts. Then I'm the barest whisper, "I am here now." She would support him, hold him through this nightmare. Find some sweet delight of her own soul and wrap him in it.

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

Alvin was used to Lottie's quotes and the fact that he hardly ever knew what she was talking about. Normally it amused him or confused him. Now he just found it comforting. This was normal, even if nothing else was.

He hated to see the tears on her cheeks as she guided his face up to look at her. Lottie was an empathetic soul and for that he was grateful, but he still hated to think he was causing her any distress. "It doesn't feel real." He managed, trying to reign in the emotion in his voice. He felt like he was drowning in it, like any minute the wave would overwhelm him completely. "I tried, but I couldn't reach her." The swells had been too high and with only one good arm, any chance had been minimal.

Alvin closed his eyes, forehead pressed against Lottie's, trying to take a deep breath. It seemed impossible, all of it. How was he supposed to live with this?

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Oh dear soul. Lottie nodded her head sagely. It made perfect sense to her that he might think it a dream. Then again there were many things that felt like a dream to her. Often she felt she were within one only to fund herself walking out in the gardens or eating dinner with her family. It was such an unnerving feeling but she had grown use to it.

His words broke her heart. She could so easily picture it, him swimming toward the waves. The wind gusting. Alvin shouting his sister's name until his voice was hoarse. She squeezed his hands in support, silently encouraging him to bare his soul if he needed. Words seemed trite and distasteful in such a moment.

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

Leaning back, Alvin blew out a steadying breath. How many times was he going to have to do this? They still had a funeral to get through and who knew how many people to have this same conversation with. Alvin was tired. He wanted to skip all of this and jump ahead six months when it wasn't so fresh, when people wouldn't look at him with abject sympathy or hear their apologies day after day. Merlin he wished he could something, anything other than this. He wished he still had a workshop he could throw himself into without a care, something physical to keep him busy and tired.

Stretching out his neck to either side, Alvin ran a frustrated hand through his hair. He passed Lottie a helpless sort of grimace, completely at a loss for what to do or say. "I don't know what to do." The admission was hoarse, painful; he sounded pitiful and he hated that too.

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The look on Alvin's face made her ache. She considered him for a moment, her head tilting to the side. There had to be something that might help him. A small glimmer of an idea nudged into her consciousness and slowly she considered it, making sure to test the curves of it, feeling if it might work. "Perhaps you might write?" It always soothed her. And based on what she knew of famous authors it might sooth him as well as they had dealt with worlds of woe that Lottie had never braved. She imagined even a letter to Sloane might help. Merlin help her, but if she ever lost one of her siblings she would write. She wasn't sure, but she thought writing helped Christabel too in the months since her husband had died.

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

"Maybe." What good it would do, he didn't know. Writing certainly wasn't his thing, had always been bad with letters and keeping up with correspondence, but maybe he could at least put it all down and go from there. It wasn't like anyone had to read or he had to share it with anyone.

"Everything feels so useless." Losing a career obviously paled in comparison to losing his sister, but losing both in such a short time was simply maddening. He couldn't throw himself into his work. The physically tiresome labor of making a broom would at least relieve the tension in his shoulders. Painting could never do that for him. He felt like maybe he was the useless one.

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"There is still meaning, below all the hurt." Lottie assured him, laying her palm on his chest above his heart for a moment as if it were a butterfly on a flower before dropping it back to her lap. Was this why people found religion? Did they look for something to heal such a gaping wound? Did they use it to find a use? None of it would bring a loved one back, but perhaps they turned to the church like Lottie did to writing - to help understand the things to large to hold in the world alone.

Her musings wandered down this path as she lapsed into silence, weighing the comparsion of religion and writing, twisting the words as if she were writing it. Her fingers longed for a quill to capture the thoughts, to form them into perfect words on creamy parchment, as they so often did, but instead she focused on remembering each turn of phrase and thought, imprinting them into her mind to refine them later.

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

Leave it to Lottie to be the optimist here. Alvin couldn't bring himself to disagree, even if he felt like the meaning was that the world was far too cruel. Sighing heavily, he leaned back, letting Lottie get lost in her thoughts with no disruption from him. He was going to need to find an outlet for all of this weird pent-up energy. Maybe boxing would be good. He didn't need to grip anything for that, just shove his bad hand into a glove and punch. It was a thought. Probably a stupid one, but a thought nevertheless.

"Thanks for coming by." Even with the rest of the house dealing with this in their own way, they had all agreed not to entertain too many visitors. Clearly Lottie knew better than he did, because he did feel a little less alone with her here.

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"Hm?" Lottie blinked at his words, being brought back to the room with Alvin but having no clue what he'd said so she gave him a soft smile and laced her fingers into them. "I'll stay as long as you need me to." Lottie told him as she had told Christabel on her first visit. "Even if it's just to sit here quietly."

  

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Perfect Lottie vibes courtsey of MJ <3

"I would like that." He could handle sitting in the quiet. Lottie had always been good for that. They could sit and do their own thing without talking and be perfectly content with it. She was a day dreamer and he was a lost cause. It would be good for him to at least have somebody to be near so he couldn't sink too far.

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