Gravity Happens

Charlie eased his way up to his room very carefully. Whatever Eve had given him had helped, but it would have required a miracle drug for him to bounce back on his feet after a fall and kick from a dragon. He grimaced violently as he lifted a foot to ascend the second set of stairs, tightly grasping the rail with one hand and his head with the other. Having defeated the stairs, he stared down the long hall towards his door and groaned quietly to himself. Why did it have to be Eve? Of all the women in his life, why did it have to be Evelyn Carrick to land in his camp, in his home, back under his skin. Because fate has a sense of humor, that’s why. Charlie finally reached his door and gleefully lifted a hand to the knob when a loud thump and a curse came from behind him. Turning quickly, then kicking himself for doing so, Charlie stood and listened at the other chamber door. A string of profanity was followed by a tirade on the ills of being of diminutive stature. If he didn’t fear it would end his life, Charlie would’ve shaken his head in defeat. She’s back in his life, living across the hall, under his skin, and this time with no magicked stairs between them in the night. Brilliant.

Once in the safety of his own chambers, Charlie threw himself—lowered himself carefully onto his bed. He tried to allow himself to be soothed by his space; usually, the richness and warmth of the burgundy colors and deep brown woods had a calming effect on his troubled mind, today, however, it was useless. He leaned into his pillow and closed his eyes tightly, seeking to shut out the world, but the voice in his head only screamed louder. She left! She left! She was gone! No word! No warning! She just vanished from the earth, from his arms, from his world without so much as a bleedin by-your-leave! And she just waltzes back in like they never…were. Charlie ran his hands through his hair, sat up, and leaned over to his bedside table. After a considerable bit of shuffling things around, he drew out a small red box with the Gryffindor crest on it. Settling back into his pillows, he took a deep breath and opened the box for the first time in years. It smelled like history. He pulled out a broken bit of silver chain, a curly lock of mahogany hair, a black velvet box, a rock that looked suspiciously like a shark’s tooth, and a small stack of photographs.

The first photograph contained a young couple on a windy beach. The boy in black swimming trunks, a much younger Charlie Weasley, with shorter hair was waving enthusiastically to the camera while a young girl with curly brown hair pulled into a pony-tail, rode piggy-back. She had her arms wrapped tightly around Charlie’s neck and laid a big fat smooch on his face. She turned to the camera and laughed, her gray eyes sparkling with love. A big wave then crashed against Charlie’s legs and he mock-stumbled around in the surf, both of them laughing. He spent a long time gazing into the past, staring at the unabashed joy on his fifteen-year-old face, and moved on.

The second photograph was of four teenagers battling gnomes at the burrow. In the center of the frame was Liam Stewart, once Charlie’s best friend, whirling a lumpy brown thing around his head and let out a silent “whoop!” when he sent it soaring into the distance. A pretty blonde girl, Gillian, to Liam’s right, was struggling with a particularly angry gnome who had grabbed a handful of Gillian’s hair and was pulling with all its might. Gillian was shrieking for help and young Eve was rushing over from the right to help when she was intercepted by Charlie. Charlie-in-the-picture scooped up Eve, mid run, and took her to the ground, tickling her mercilessly while she squirmed.

Charlie swallowed a chuckle when he flipped to the third picture. It was slightly blurry since he had taken it himself on a moving car in the London Underground. It showed Charlie and Eve at sixteen, cuddled together and proudly holding up muggle fake I.D.s, identifying them as Albus Willoughby McGonagall and Minerva Eudora Dumbledore. The lights behind them blurred together as the train car sped through the tunnel.

The next picture was much older and was taken at Bill Weasley’s first junior Quidditch match, with Bill in the foreground, jumping up and down excitedly with his broom, his freckled face as beet red as his hair in his jubilance. A second glance, however, would lead the eye to notice the commotion in the back of the photograph, with a smaller red haired boy giving a tiny brown haired girl a decisive kiss on the mouth, and then being shoved promptly in the dirt. The little girl stomped her foot indignantly and marched away.

The final photograph was of four teenagers sprawled lazily in the sunshine beside a lake. Gillian was curled up on Liam’s lap, his chin on her head, as she twisted her a bit of her hair around her finger. Charlie was stretched out on his back with Eve lying half on him, half off, with her arms folded over his chest. They were all smiling and Eve was proudly wiggling her left ring finger, which sparkled almost as brightly as she did.

It was the final photograph that did him in. The sharp, burning pain in his chest drove out any memory of a headache. That day…Charlie threw the pictures back in the box and tossed it onto the bedside table, clenched his eyes and tried to stop the memory, and the gut-wrenching sense of loss, from taking him over…

It was their last full day at Hogwarts. N.E.W.T.S. were finished, bags were packed; all that was left was tomorrow’s ceremony. Then it was goodbye to childhood and on with the rest of their lives. Charlie dashed through the castle halls, poking his head in classrooms, the great hall, even girl’s bathrooms. Eve was around somewhere, he just had to find her. Had to find her before it burned a hole on his pocket.

He was jogging around the grounds, peeking into her favorite nooks when he bumped into someone. A screech was accompanied by a flash of golden blonde hair. Charlie reached out and steadied Gillian before he bowled her right over, “Oh, Merlin, sorry Gill,”

Gillian steadied herself on Charlie’s arm and smiled up at him, “No harm done! Can you believe this is it? This is our last day!”

“Yeah, mad, isn’t it?” Charlie agreed, looking over Gillian’s head for a glimpse of chestnut curls.

“So when are you—“

“Sorry Gill, you haven’t any idea where Eve is?” Charlie interrupted

Gillian tried not to look put out, “Oh right, she mentioned something about meeting you in the forest by that one tree you both like so much—“

“Thanks Gill!” Charlie was already racing off. He circled the lake wide and entered the Forbidden Forest, hurrying along paths known only to himself and his girl, till he came to the great tree they had claimed for their own. Its trunk was eternally scarred with games and jokes and declarations of love, carved over years of friendship and romance. But something was missing—Eve was missing. Charlie ran right under the tree and looked around, confused.

“Charles Weasley, you really are so thick sometimes,” Eve dropped gracefully from a low branch to the ground behind him. Her hair was pushed back wildly, so dark in the shadows of the forest. She wore nothing but a little white sundress, mussed by her climb, and there was a darkness to her eyes that Charlie recognized, a smokiness in the silver pools which made his breath catch and his body tighten.

“Evie—“

“Shut up, Charlie,” Eve reached up and grabbed his neck, pulling him flush against her as she rose up on her toes to kiss him soundly. Charlie could feel the urgency coursing through her body as he backed her into the tree trunk. She clawed her hands up his neck and into his hair, pulling herself even further into him. Their lips melded together perfectly, tongues warring for dominance as Eve pressed her breasts into Charlie’s chest. He growled low in his throat as she sucked his tongue down deeply, rippling her own beneath his, releasing and pulling away to take his lower lip between his teeth. She chuckled huskily, and held his hair firmly in her fingers as she withdrew his mouth, tugging on his lip and releasing. She slid her teeth down his neck and shoulder, teasing with her tongue and lips, suckling on the base of his throat.

Charlie’s ardor surged, his thick arms pressed into the tree behind her, trapping her. He groaned as she stretched the neck of his t-shirt and nibbled on his collar bone. He rolled his head back and brought one hand around to Eve’s thigh. He knew how to play this game. While she ravaged his neck and mouth, he deliberately slowed his breathing, rubbing her thigh in slow circles, just above the knee. Eve mewled and wrapped her arms around his neck again, licking his lips beseechingly, kissing him softer, and spreading her legs farther. Slow, slow circles he traced on her leg, ascending so slowly. Eve pulled her head back, looked into his eyes. Charlie watched her face. She nibbled unconsciously on the swollen plumpness of her lower lip, her eyes dark and clouded as her thighs trembled. She wanted him to touch her, and he would, in time. Circles, tiny circles, his fingers meandered up her soft skin, lingering a while. Her breath came short and quick; supple breasts rising and falling in time; pressing against the thin fabric of her dress. Charlie knew what she wanted, but loved to make her wait. She shifted her hips, rolled her body closer to him, but still he took his time, prolonging her torture. He lowered his head to hers, covered her trembling lips, and made love to her mouth in time with the circling of his fingers. Almost there, he could feel the heat pouring off of her, her damp skin pleading to be caressed. Eve moved a hand to massage the thick hardness she knew she’d find but Charlie grabbed her wrist with his other hand, pinning it over her head against the tree. His tongue danced with hers, stroking the roof of her mouth, the ticklish spot behind her teeth. His fingers slowed further still at the very top of her thigh, he could feel her muscles contracting desperately as he skimmed across her skin, agonizingly slowly. Eve was in a quiet frenzy, trying to shift her body into his hand—but he wouldn’t allow it. She tried to accelerate the kiss, but again, he wouldn’t have it.

Charlie was throbbing himself, his hardness trapped in the unlovely prison that was pants, but he bided his time, drawing her out. Eve’s breasts were covered in a fine sheen of desperate sweat; she purred softly in her throat, begging him to touch her and finally he put a finger to her. So gently he was barely touching her, he drew a single finger over her naked heat, back and forth, over and over her skin. The hand around her wrist tightened as he sunk his fingers deeper into her, “Oh, baby, you’re so wet for me,” he whispered in her ear. She moaned in reply, writhing futilely beneath him. Taking another step closer, Charlie’s control broke. He drove his fingers deep into her core, pounding furiously into her soaked skin as she worked herself frantically on him. His mouth scored over her neck, tearing at her delicate skin, suckling behind her ear. He finally released her hand, allowing her to wrestle violently with his pants, freeing him as she pressed herself harder against his hand. She shucked his shirt off expertly and took his manhood in hand. Her small hands fluttered teasingly over his length, squeezing the base of his shaft, spreading the moisture from his tip over the head, tugging gently on the fullness of him, “Fuck this,” he growled and pulled his fingers out of her. With both hands he lifted her by the hips, pressing her into the tree. She reached up with one hand to grab the branch she knew would be there, bracing herself between the tree and Charlie, who positioned himself at the pulsing entrance to her body. He locked his eyes on hers and took a deep breath as he plunged in, burying himself to the hilt in her tight, slick sheath. Eve sighed with completion as he filled her, stretched her with his familiar weight, “Mmmmmmm,” she purred as he began to move in her. Eyes heavy, she watched him strain to control himself, but she didn’t want him to control himself. She tucked one foot against the tree, thrusting her hips out even farther to take him deeper yet, and dragged his mouth to hers with her free hand. She manipulated the muscles inside her body to milk him deeply.

With a broken bellow, Charlie surged forward, piling into Eve’s body again and again, blindly savoring the feel of her body squeezing down on him, caressing his dick from the inside as he slammed into her and out of her, knocking the breath out of her as he ravaged her. With one hand he guided her hips and the other supported her ass as she thrashed recklessly, meeting him thrust for thrust. She mewled with every shove, her sounds of pleasure enflaming his fervor even more. On and on they went, obsessed with the feel of each other, with consuming each other until they finally broke as one—the friction of his pounding body against her clit sending her soaring and the wild contortions of her body pushing him over the edge. Her scream of ecstasy mingled with his roar of her name reverberated through the trees long after they were spent.

Together they came and together they crashed, lying blissfully exhausted against their old tree, Charlie’s forehead leaning against her bosom, her head rolled back against the trunk, fingers lazily brushing back Charlie’s sweat-soaked hair as they panted out their afterglow. Eve laid a soft kiss on Charlie’s hair, “Merlin, it’s always so good with you,”

“That’s because we’re made for each other, baby,” he straightened, pulled his pants up, then took her face in his hands, “because we’re perfect for each other,” he kissed her tenderly, first her eyelids, then her lips, tasting the salt of their combined sweat on her skin. He lowered her back onto her feet, but her legs were too shaky to support her, so she sunk gracefully onto the moss. She leaned back against the tree, allowing the air to cool her flushed skin.

“I can’t believe this is it. This is the end of Hogwarts for us, all our history, our whole lives have been this place,” she said, a mixture of sorrow and hope.

Charlie joined her on the ground, “Don’t think of it as an ending, Evie, think of it as the beginning of everything else. We’ve got so much to come. We’ve both got our apprenticeships coming up, we’ll work out of the same camps and play with dragons all day and each other all night and holiday with our families and Liam and Gillian and get married and have a passel of brats someday, this is just the closing of the first chapter, we’re not done with anything!” Charlie grinned and took her hand in his.

Eve began to rub her thumb over his hand unconsciously, looking at him, “You think so?”

“I really hope so,” he said earnestly, digging around in his pocket, “I can’t even imagine my life without you in it, Evie, you’re everything I’ve ever needed and I love you so much. Sometimes I think about what it would be like to lose you and it scares me so much I can’t even move. I want to marry you, Eve, and make babies with you and love you forever,”

Eve stared into his eyes, perfectly aware of how serious he was, “You won’t ever lose me, Charlie, I’m not a person without you. Tomorrow’s big and scary and unknowable but as long as I have you, I know everything will be alright,”

“Marry me, Evelyn Carrick, say you’ll marry me, please. I’ve got this ring here,” Charlie opened a little black velvet box with a diamond and sapphire ring inside, Eve gasped, “I know it’s not very big, but it belonged to my grandmother and I can always get a bigger one when I’ve made some money and—“

“OH, Charlie!” Eve threw herself at him, and kissed him full on your mouth, “you’re so thick sometimes, I swear, it’s the most beautiful ring I’ve ever seen!” he slid it carefully onto her ring finger.

“So does that mean you’ll have me?” he asked.

“Forever and ever!” she cried, “I love you Charlie.”

“I love you too, Evie.”

Sometime later the couple emerged from the forest and found their best friends lying out on blankets by the lake. Eve squealed excitedly and showed them her engagement ring. Liam clapped Charlie soundly on the back and offered congratulations and Gillian hugged them both saying dryly, “Ooooh, nobody saw this coming,”
The foursome spent the rest of the day reminiscing in the sunshine, and discussing all their hopes and dreams for the future. Gillian made several passing people take pictures of the group so they could remember “their last, best day” forever, and sent copies to everyone the following week.

If Charlie had known then that in less than a week, Eve would disappear from his world for the next six years, that day would have been a lot different, he reflected. But that day did happen, was one of the happiest of his life and was now the most painful to recall. Because Eve did fall off the face of the earth for six years. Until now.