9 Sep 2019, 01:16
The End of the Line
August 20, 2019
Mid-afternoon
Some things just have to change — but luckily, Diagon Alley didn’t seem to be one of those things. Over the past decade, Adam had picked up on one or two unavoidable variations, but the magical backdrop was always the same. Gringotts Bank towered ominously at the end of the street, a fortress of marble and gold. Ollivanders’, another staple business, was still proudly helping wands choose their wizards. They could never close. The Weasley brothers’ joke shop was certainly an eyesore, but the alley wore it with pride, and it was still drawing in plenty of business. Madame Malkin had her doors open for business every time Adam walked by, and the various bookstores, supply shops, and apothecaries around him were flooded with students facing the return to school. The menagerie that Adam had just left behind was a madhouse, but he’d managed to navigate it and come out alive. There was only one place left to stop before he had to leave it all behind until next summer.
Florean Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlour: the best part of any visit to Diagon Alley. Adam knew it had some dark history, something involving the wars before he was born, but his parents didn’t like to talk about it that much. That made sense — ice cream was a happy thing, and whatever had happened to the original Mr. Fortescue sounded anything but happy. It was a small place, not all that special to look at from the outside, but it was the inside that really mattered anyways. The glass cases absolutely stuffed with a hundred different flavors of ice cream, kept cold and delicious for kids like him. Adam had perfected his order over the years; he could see it in his mind as he and his brother approached the store for the millionth time. He could practically taste it on his tongue. It was so close…
...and yet so far. Though it shouldn’t have been a surprise, there was a massive queue between Adam and the front door. He stopped in his tracks and scanned the row of people with a loathsome and mourning stare. By the time he got inside, his ice cream could be sold out! Melted! Gone without a trace! It was no less than a catastrophe, and it brought Adam’s spirits crashing down in a second. There was nothing worse than a queue, except for one you hadn’t expected. His ice cream dreams dramatically dashed in an instant, Adam was ready to turn around and drag himself home. His brother, however, was apparently content to wait, because he gave the younger boy a light push towards the last customer, and they joined the tail end of the queue in silence.
Dean crossed his arms, drumming his fingers against his bicep restlessly before letting his arms drop back down to his side. Adam watched him fidget and tried to figure out what could be throwing his brother off. He was usually confident about, well, everything; or when he wasn’t, he covered it up with a brash cockiness that worked just as well. As they shuffled forward a few paces towards the door, Adam narrowed his eyes at Dean. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing.” Letting out a deep breath, the older boy glanced around and ran a hand through his hair. He was pulling out all of the stops, apparently. “Okay, you know I’m not going to be around this year, right?”
Oh, he should’ve known. “I’m going to be fine,” Adam groaned. Dean must have thought he was a lot more prominent in Adam’s school life than he was. Even still, this was a little much. He was thirteen, after all. “I don’t need—”
“That’s not what I meant,” Dean interrupted. Though Adam still wasn’t convinced, he shut up and gave his brother the chance to explain. "I won’t be at school, sure, but I’m…not going to be at home either. I’m moving out. Same day that you leave.”
He kept talking, saying something about their mom, but Adam wasn’t listening. There was a thundering noise in his ears that was blocking everything else out as he tried to understand what he’d just been told. Deep down, there was a part of him that got it. The logical part of him, the one that said that Dean was an adult; he had his own life now, and it was only a matter of time before he was gone. Somewhere between that little logical part and his brain, however, his heart had gotten in the way. A rush of emotions brought his train of thought right off the rails. Every summer, without fail, Dean had come home on the train. He was a jerk and he was annoying as hell, but he was always home, and Adam kind of relied on him. Even if he didn’t need his older brother around anymore, that didn’t mean he didn’t want him around. Call him afraid or call him selfish — the younger Harringtom wasn’t ready to let go just yet.
And beyond what Adam wanted, the whole thing was insane! Dean didn’t know how to do anything in the real world! He was only eighteen, an adult by definition maybe, but not by experience. He didn’t have money, or a job, or the common sense of a child. He needed his family just as much as they needed him. After their dad was left, they were all supposed to draw a little closer together. That was how Adam knew it was going to work out — they’d be hurt, and then they’d be closer, better. But here was Dean, running as fast as he could to get away. It was ridiculous. It was madness. It was...it was…
Adam didn’t know what it was. There were a thousand different feelings raging inside of him, and he was hardly keeping them contained. One minute he was angry, the next he was sad, the next he was almost jealous. It was all spouting out in his mind without control. He didn’t know how he was supposed to react. Did Dean want him to fight back and try to convince him to stay? Was it one of those situations? Or was he supposed to just let it happen?
“Where are you gonna go?” was the first question to leave his mouth, and Dean glanced at him with a pained expression. He was dreading this, that much was clear, and yet he was still making the decision. He waited until they moved up another place in the queue to answer.
“Scotland,” he offered, “with Bridgit. For a little while. I’m going to find a job and make enough to get out on my own. Then I was thinking Spain, maybe. Or…” He shrugged as if to say, who knows? That set off another tidal wave of anger in Adam. He’d let go of the wheel by this point, stopped trying to navigate the situation safely.
“So you’re running away,” he summarized bluntly. “From me? Mum? The house? We told you that we wanted to help you deal with Dad and you told us you were fine. Did you lie?”
“People are staring, Adam,” Dean warned, and they were. A dozen pointed hats were swiveling in the brothers’ direction. Some were decent enough to pretend not to hear the argument, but some weren’t so good at hiding their interest. The queue was an awkward place to have such a standoff, but Adam hadn’t picked the location, so Dean was going to have to deal with it.
“Good!” he snapped. “They can see what an idiot you’re being! You can’t live on your own, you don’t know how to do anything! Mum still washes your clothes half of the time!”
“I’ve got a life, Adam!” his brother retorted, snapping out of his composed bullshit. “Maybe you don’t think so, but there’s more than just you and Mum and the house! I might actually want to do something with myself other than being your babysitter and waiting for you to grow up!” He shook his head continued before Adam could get a response in. “I don’t want to be the one taking care of you two. I know that makes me a terrible person, but I’ve got to say it. I want to make sure you’re okay and all, but that can’t be my only job. Okay?”
“No,” Adam spat, even though he didn’t have anything to follow that up with. All he had were more childish knives to throw. “You’re stupid and you’re a coward. Congratulations.”
“And you’re thirteen years old,” Dean barked as they took another step towards the door. Ice cream was long out of the brothers’ minds by now, but they kept moving with the queue even still. “I thought you could handle this. I wanted to take you out and tell you like an adult. Get you this stupid dessert to help out.”
“So you told me while we were in the middle of the queue?” Adam shot back incredulously. Neither of them were shouting yet, but it was getting close. Their mother would be furious if she ever got word of the scene they’d caused in front of Fortescue’s. “Oh, yeah, I would’ve handled it so much better after eating! Great plan, Dean!”
“Shut up!” There was no more sympathy in Dean’s voice. His noble intentions were all washed away in the tidal wave of the argument.
“You shut up!” Adam’s voice cracked a little, and he felt his cheeks burn red with embarrassment. He could feel hot tears welling in the corners of his eyes, slammed by the full force of the situation and determined not to cry out in public. He was already a wreck as it was — he wouldn’t be pushed over the edge. “I don’t even want your stupid pity ice cream! I don’t want to see your stupid face! I hate you!” He shoved away from his brother and fell out of the queue, backing up onto the stone street. “I’m going home!”
“Adam!” he heard his brother shout furiously, accompanied by a few curt apologies to the people around him. Adam was already running, though, as immature as it might have been. He deserved to be immature, he thought. And besides, he could be much worse. He could run off to Spain on a whim. He could move to France and get a secret girlfriend. This was just the tip of the immature iceberg. He might have to deal with the consequences later, but at least he’d be around to do so.
Dean caught up to him as they reached the back of the queue. They’d spent barely fifteen minutes waiting for the door, and somehow his brother had brought everything crashing down. It was a special talent, he supposed. He pulled violently away as he felt a hand land on his shoulder, but Dean wouldn’t be warded off so easily, and captured Adam’s arm in an iron grip. Neither of them were talking, and he didn’t think that either of them would be able to, even if they tried. The brothers had exhausted themselves in passionate argument, burning fast and bright. Now there wasn’t much left but the cold truth.
No matter how many bandages they might slap on, how many apologies they might make, how many ice cream cones they might buy to try and compensate for the missed afternoon, something big had changed between Adam and Dean. One day it might be reparable, but to two teenagers lost in a world turned upside-down, the cuts made outside of Fortescue’s would leave permanent scars. Adam’s forgiveness had finally been tested beyond its limits. Dean’s patience had been worn threadbare.
It was the end of the line for them both.