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+------- Thread: flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh (/showthread.php?tid=707)
flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh - Maevie Golding - 12-02-2025
Sunday, July 24 1921
11:27 am
11:27 am
Maevie had spent two weeks at St. Mungo's and the rest of term at home.
Even if she had wanted to go back, her mum wouldn't have let her. Not after what had happened.
It still sat deep and anxiously within her heart, the memories of the carnival turned torture. Like a sticky, inky weight attached to her insides like tar that simply wouldn't scrub off. She still woke sometimes, sweaty and panting and frantic, the scars on her hand throbbing with a phantom pain, Rae's twitching body flashing behind her eyes, Ever's screams echoing inside her skull.
But it had gotten better over time. It only happened about once a week now.
Logically, Maevie should have turned her back on Hogwarts and the strangeness that was its magical world. Where a school had been infiltrated but never properly smoked out, where she had been awed stupid and then violently rattled awake.
Where a colourful dream had been twisted into some nightmarish horror story.
But she had begged and begged, for months and months because somehow she couldn't let go of it despite everything. Despite the violent push into reality and out of a child's wonderland -- bubble plopped -- Maevie needed to go back.
Eventually her mother had relented, by virtue of her brother's help. Begrudgingly and with noticeable reluctance but eventually even she hadn't stood a chance against her daughter's insistence anymore.
Maevie understood. Why her mother preferred her going back to muggle school. But she had promised to be careful, to write every week, to never go anywhere too late or alone, to keep an eye out and that Rosie would take care of her. Rosie didn't know that but that was beside the point.
And now she was back.
Her suitcase sat on one of the bottom bunk beds, opened and half-emptied. Clothes lay strewn across the sheets, seemingly with no order, trinkets scattered about haphazardly. The letter to Rosie was mindfully put away in her nightstand's drawer, for later. She'd have to go find her.
But first she had to get order into this chaos. Maevie bent over half the bed to reach a skirt that had somehow landed back there, not hearing the footsteps approaching from behind.
RE: flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh - Everleigh Ravenstone - 12-02-2025
Being at camp was both soothing and anxiety producing. Ever and Alice had arrived soon after the facility opened, after a not so great start to the summer at home. Things weren’t right.
What was wrong? She had no idea, but there was something. Just out of reach in her memories, that seemed to be getting worse with time away from the dark tower. There were certain triggers that would send her into a talespin. There was no preparing for them. No avoiding them. In the blink of an eye Ever would go from quiet and dazed to screaming and panicked.
Thankfully, since coming to camp, the panic had been curbed. No attacks had taken her back to that dark place. It probably helped that she avoided all contact with people, hiding in the meadow, finding a cave that no one knew about, and avoiding the dining hall all together. So far, her methods were proving successful.
Ever was headed out to the cave when she decided to grab her sketch pad and journal. Running back into the dorm, she stopped suddenly at the person standing in front of her.
Maevie
Her body took over, which was good since her mind wasn’t a happy place these days. In a blink, Ever was pulling Maevie into a hug. She was here, whole, alive, not screaming, not burning. Having Maevie leave the castle didn’t help Ever’s anxiety. Seeing her here, in the flesh, erased a lot of the visions Ever’s overactive imagination had conjured up.
Words didn’t come easily to Ever now. With a jumbled mind, sentences were hard to string together, so she tried to keep things to a minimum.
“Hi. Missed you.”
RE: flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh - Maevie Golding - 12-05-2025
She felt her more before she saw her, walking into her peripheral vision just as Maevie straightened, skirt in hand.
But the other girl was moving before Maevie even had a chance to register what was happening.
A brief shock rendered her speechless, freezing her into place as arms wrapped around her out of nowhere, rattling alarm bells in her head that screamed for her to run, to fight. Her first instinct was to push back, grab the nearest object and hurl it at whoever had come to attack her. Scream at the top of her lungs, never helpless again.
But the voice that followed quickly slowed the frantic urge to flee, smothering the adrenaline that had pushed into her system as realization kicked in.
Maevie gasped in relief, dropping the skirt to the ground as her own arms came up to tightly wrap around Everleigh and pull her close. She hadn't seen her friend in months, had wondered, considered to write but hadn't had a clue how to get a letter to Hogwarts without an owl to carry it. Immediately the picture of a girl hanging from the windowsill, drenched in blood and crying in pain flashed into her mind.
She squeezed her eyes shut, pushing the memory back down. "Hi, Ever," she muffled into the girl's shoulder, holding her a moment longer before releasing her again. Stepping back, Maevie held Ever by the shoulders, smiling into her face. "How are you? Are you okay? I've missed you so much."
Turning, she intertwined one of her hands with Ever's, using the other to make room on her bed, pushing away clothes until a half circle formed. With a gentle tug Maevie indicated for them to sit. "How is your summer?"
RE: flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh - Everleigh Ravenstone - 12-11-2025
For the briefest of seconds Mae didn’t respond to Ever’s hug. Then, in a blink she was hugging her back. Ever sighed in relief, holding on tight. Pulling back, Maevie smiled wide, it was remarkable how her whole face lit up with the simple action.
Ever didn’t smile much anymore. Well, to be honest, she didn’t smile much to begin with. Resting bitch face, was what someone had said. Not in a nice way. Now, after everything, those muscles in her cheek didn’t get much exercise.
"How are you? Are you okay? I've missed you so much." Mae pulled her to sit, intertwining their hands together. The connection felt strange. Almost making her hand itch. She wanted the touch and the familiarity of having her friend close, but it also ignited her flight or fight response. Tingles ran over her arms, her legs became restless, she pulled her hand away abruptly with a look of sorrow in her eyes. “Sorry… Sorry. It’s hard. Can’t, um.” Words didn't come easily now. Jumbled in her head, the ones she wanted to say didn’t always come out right.
Everleigh sighed, frustrated with how this reunion was already failing. Sadness in her eyes. "How is your summer?"
The new question brought her back to the present. Grounding her in the now, halting the desire to bolt out the door.
Ever shook her head. How did she convey the hell she was enduring? The nightmares, the constant issues with her parents ignoring her pain. The looks from her family and other students, the memory flashes from the tower, and others that made no sense but also made perfect sense. Why? She had no idea. Her entire life was a mess.
“It’s bad. Not good.” Her face screwed while trying to form the words. Once an eloquent girl, able to debate the smartest of adults. Now, she was barely able to string three words together in a coherent thought. “Yours good? Missed you… Um… You ok?”
RE: flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh - Maevie Golding - 12-19-2025
The smile on her face fell into a million pieces as Ever pulled her hand away, so abruptly the movement drew a startled gasp from Maevie's parted lips along with it.
Confusion narrowed her brows, hurt shining in her eyes as she looked up from where the other's hand now rested and into her face instead, searching for an answer to the sudden rejection that stabbed her in the heart.
“Sorry… Sorry. It’s hard. Can’t, um.”
Sorrow clouded Ever's eyes, the stumbling words cracking something in Maevie as she watched her friend struggle to express herself, as she withheld how different she was from the fierce, well spoken girl she had known her as. From before...that day. Maevie realized that she hadn't seen her since, that she had no idea Ever might have recovered differently from what they'd all endured up in that horrible tower.
Somehow she had simply expected them all to be like herself. Shaken still and caught up sometimes, jumpy, mistrusting perhaps. Never had she even considered the possibility of a different outcome, that one of them might be so thoroughly changed that it would be hard to recognize her.
Not just the chopped sentences, but something about the overall air surrounding her. Frustrated in a different way than usual, confused, unsure. So unlike herself.
Maevie swallowed the shock and the sadness that painfully pushed against her ribcage, conjuring a smile to her lips instead, loosening her shoulders that had stiffened. Trying to put on a brave face in the face of her friend's suffering that felt harder to endure than her own.
"It's okay," she tried to reassure, pulling a knee up instead and wrapping her hands around. "I understand. It's hard for me too sometimes." To be touched too suddenly. Their hug had shown just how fragile she still was at times. Yet, her battles didn't compare, paling next to what Ever was going through.
Not a good summer.
It slashed another crack through her heart to hear those words, her smile flickering for a moment. "I'm doing okay," she said though, wishing she could wrap her arms around Ever but not wanting to risk her to feel uncomfortable again. "I had to convince my mum to come back here, to go back to school. She almost didn't let me. She thought it was too dangerous but my brother and I managed to convince her in the end."
She stopped herself, noticing she was rambling again, biting her lip before smiling a little brighter, to try and chase the shadows that had swept into the room despite the bright sunlight falling in through the windows. "Maybe we can go swim together! Or whatever you like. You could show me around."
RE: flowers after the storm ~ Everleigh - Everleigh Ravenstone - 12-23-2025
Ever saw the look in her eyes. The sadness. The Rejection. She felt it and was sorry, but there wasn’t anything she could do to fix it. Ever could barely string three coherent words together, let alone explain her thoughts and feelings.
"It's okay, I understand. It's hard for me too sometimes." Ever looked at a spot over Mae’s shoulder. Not making eye contact helped. When she looked at someone in the eyes it was like they were looking right in her mind. No one wanted to see what she was thinking.
Ever’s head nodded absentmindedly. It was easier to just nod and agree then actually converse. It worked at home with her parents who didn’t want to hear her troubles. In fact, they actively avoided them.
"I'm doing okay. I had to convince my mum to come back here, to go back to school. She almost didn't let me. She thought it was too dangerous but my brother and I managed to convince her in the end."
It was funny, the way different parents reacted to the events. Mae’s mom wanting to keep her home and protected. Ever’s ignoring the situation all together. “I’m happy. Glad. I’m glad you’re here. Back.”
Ever’s eyebrows pulled together. She was glad Mae was here at camp and coming back to the castle. WHY WAS THAT SO HARD TO SAY?!
"Maybe we can go swim together! Or whatever you like. You could show me around." Hmm… Swimming? That wouldn’t be bad. Water wasn’t a trigger for her at all. Showing her around would be ok, if one word descriptions and a lot of pointing was up her alley.
Giving Mae a quick nod, a definitive yes without the words. “Swimming?” She asked, not actually wanting to ask the question, but conveying that yes, she wanted to swim. The inability to converse was getting annoying. Ever walked over to her bag and took out a bathing suit, holding it up with a small tentative smile on her face. Hopefully telling Mae through action that she wanted to swim, instead of actually saying it.