Don't look back, I'll reach for you

template by Punki of Adoxography

@jesse - outfit

    Jason's movements were hardly ever limited by his status as a muggleborn anymore. Sure, he couldn't go to any school and had to live with Lord Parkinson, but he really didn't think it was so horrible. He may have missed Hogwarts, but that was really the only way in which his quality of life had deteriorated since he was let out of the Ministry. Before that, everything was much worse. While the makeshift apartment in the ex containment cells were far better than living in Kolna and gardening until his hands bled, it still did a lot to hurt his mental state. Even now, he couldn't spend more than a handful of hours inside without going out for at least a walk through the gardens. In comparison to what he'd had before, though? This was a walk in the park. Even better, because Lord Parkinson actually seemed to care. He made sure his sister was treated well, he let him visit his family whenever, he got him tutors so he wouldn't fall behind on his education, and apparently it wasn't like what they were getting at Pyxis. He learned the actual useful stuff. His wand didn't work, but since he was sixteen he couldn't go around doing all that much magic anyway. Even in Lord Parkinson's house he had no reason to do any more than the basic charms that his wand allowed. Anything else the house elves could get for him. Was it really selfish of him to just want to forget every horrible thing he'd been put through and just accept that this was his life now? Comfortable, safe, taken care of. He liked this.

    There were, of course, days in which he got nostalgic. Usually he went to Diagon Alley, or tried to distract himself by studying or flying or gardening or practicing his cooking. Sometimes he even went to London to visit his mother for a few hours. His life was fine now, but he still missed the normalcy of before on occasions. He didn't want to tell Lord Parkinson, he knew that the man did his best for Jason to be comfortable and have everything he wanted, he didn't want to hurt his feelings. It wasn't his fault, after all. He was the only good thing about this entire ordeal. Today he couldn't help it, though. He didn't distract himself with any of the usual methods, he didn't try to fight the feeling. Maybe it was the heat that was getting to him, maybe he relaxed more as the summer holidays came in, even though his life had felt like a constant holiday lately. Who knew? Jason just asked Lord Parkinson to be allowed to go to Hogsmeade today. For old times' sakes. With school being out, it was unlikely that there would be other students or any of the Death Eater professors, so Lord Parkinson agreed. Jason had flooed over early in the morning and spent hours and hours walking around through the crowd. He bought some candy from Honeydukes to share with Dea and then bought himself some food at the Three Broomsticks. It was too crowded and noisy for him to feel comfortable there, really, so he went out in search of somewhere quiet to sit. The only empty place was the station, barren without people or trains. He sat on the edge of the platform, legs dangling down towards the rails, and took a bite from his sandwich, looking out into the forest.

I saw these chains locked on my wrists

Around my neck no shackles missed
I'd tried to shake them off and flee
Nowhere to go without a key
@jason | WORK OUTFIT boots

Jesse was, what we in the biz like to call, ghetto happy. The boy never had much growing up-- never had anything to his name, really-- and now, even in the face of such adversity, he was finally starting to get his life together. Well, as much as was possible given his circumstances. He felt like he finally had a family for once. Truly, Delia, Jesse, Piper, and Arleigh; they were close to him now, closer than he had ever let anyone get before Kolna. Something about having everything stripped from him had changed him, if only for the better. He was more patient now, knew to keep his mouth shut a little more, and he gave a shit about people. Well, certain people. Everyone else could go fuck themselves. OK, maybe he hadn't changed that much. But at least the registration had. He could actually have a home now. A home with no curfew, and thanks to that he had been able to have a job that brought in a bit of money. Back when he could only work the mines things were rough; he had taken to stealing, something he was good at but never really liked to do, and selling drugs on the side. 

This job wasn't exactly much better in the way of legality, but it paid a hell of a lot better. Much better than the mines paid which was a big fat zero. It would have been nice if, when they changed registration, they had gotten rid of these pointless fucking muggleborn jobs but nooooo they kept them. It was from his pointless muggleborn job that Jesse was arriving back at Hogsmeade via portkey. They had put the damn entry of it across town, Merlin knows why! Maybe so that he'd be more apt to run into a death eater along the way and be smited straight to hell on a torture train. The very thought of such a torture train existing had brought Jesse's attention to the actual train station as he was walking past, taking the top portion of his coveralls off and tying them like a loose jacket around his waist. It was hotter here than the mines by far and he was looking forward to going home an-- Wait? Jesse stopped in his tracks looking at the back of a person who looked vaguely like someone he....once knew. "Jason?" He called a bit confused. Wasn't Jason dead, or some shit? He had vanished, right? He was supposed to be dead? Maybe?

Don't look back, I'll reach for you

template by Punki of Adoxography

@ jesse - outfit

    Hogsmeade had a lot of memories for him. He'd always loved wandering around, peering through the windows, spending time with friends. It was nice, it was a break from school and time he could just spend having fun. Of course, his budget tended to be smaller than most of his friends' so he couldn't get as many butterbeers or as much candy as them, but he'd never been a material person anyway. Making memories was what had counted, so here he was now, looking around the place he'd so loved to come and visit. It was nice to be back, but it was also not nice. He had to admit that, because coming back here reminded him of the school he would no longer be attending. How marvellous Hogwarts had been, how much he'd loved being there, and now it was all gone. Oh, the castle was still there, of course, but he would never go back to it. No, Dea had thought that it would be better to hand themselves in rather than be hunted down through the corridors, so they did. It had only been a matter of time before they were taken away anyway, really. Then they'd been taken to Kolna and it was like stepping into another reality. Suddenly, Kolna was all there had ever been. With the draft coming through the windows and the thin mattresses and leaking roofs. It got under your skin and seemed like a never ending chasm. Like it was total. He'd tried to stay cheerful, of course, and mostly he had managed. That didn't change the fact that every day he was there made his past outside of Kolna seem more and more distant, and perhaps less real.
    A voice knocked him from his thoughts and Jason blinked, eyes focussing once more on the rails on the ground before him. Then he looked up, towards the voice, and- that was Jesse. What was Jesse doing in Hogsmeade? Of course he knew that muggleborns had mostly been released, that was why he was allowed to leave the Ministry and go to live with Lord Parkinson, but- well, he wasn't expecting to run into anyone here. Not that he was displeased, of course. Jesse was a friend. Perhaps not as much of a friend as Dev or Tav, but he was great. Older than him by several years but cool and fun to be around. So he stood, somewhat shy smile rising to his face as he held his sandwich to his chest. "Jesse, hey- didn't expect to run into anyone here." He shuffled his feet nervously. "What's up?"
    The truth was that probably everyone in Kolna thought he was dead. That was what happened to people who suddenly just up and disappeared. They either fled or they died, and since it was unlikely for him to have fled without taking his sister with him, death was the logical choice. He'd never really reached out to anyone in Kolna since. Tav, yes, but that was only recent and she was in Pyxis now. He couldn't really explain it. Usually talking about things helped him, but being bitten had really just made him numb for a long while. After that, the whiteness of the rooms he was kept in did the rest. Kept a bit stuck. It was hard to communicate with the outside world. It was hard to want to communicate. Like Kolna before it, the containment rooms had done a lot to wipe away all existence of the outside world. So now? Now he had... continued. Instead of reaching out to old friends, he'd kept going. It was awful of him, he knew, but looking back to his days as a human was hard. Especially when the moon approached and he was reminded that he wasn't who he used to be.

I SAW THESE CHAINS
LOCKED ON MY WRISTS

AROUND MY NECK NO SHACKLES MISSED
I'D TRIED TO SHAKE THEM OFF AND FLEE
NOWHERE TO GO WITHOUT A KEY

Death was nothing new to Jesse. He'd seen his fair share of bodies and it wasn't as though this had just been a recent thing. The first had been when he was seven when he had been walking home from school; the last had been in April, just before he had left Kolna for Pyxis. In between there were countless faces and names that he didn't remember and many he didn't know. He had watched people freeze to death in the night and he had watched bullets blow through people and steal their last breath away. He had seen it all and at this point he felt mostly numb to it. He hated that, really. The numbness was nothing to be grateful for. It took the sting of losing someone away but in a way it was almost inhumane. Almost like their lives held no value and Jesse didn't like that. People's deaths aught to be worth more than just a shrug. They aught to be, but they weren't. 

When Jason had disappeared he worried about the boy. Had it happened at an earlier time in his life he'd have worried quite a bit more but in Kolna they were all just trying to survive. There was no room to worry like he once had. There was no room to grieve or process-- it was simply something that he had to get over. There was never an explanation as to what happened to him. No one had seen him being taken, no one ever found a body, and no one suspected him to have run away.  Jesse didn't think he would have done that, not without at least finding a way to come back for Medea or take her with him. The only other explanation they had was that he was dead. It wasn't as though he was the first muggleborn to die or go missing, nor was he the last. In a way Jesse never really got the chance to mourn his death. He had worried and wondered for some time; then one day he just...didn't anymore. 

Jesse had stopped worrying about him but he had never stopped wondering. People just don't disappear. Deaths just don't go unnoticed. As the figure he had called out to turned he found that both of those statements were true. People don't disappear and deaths don't go unnoticed because Jason wasn't dead. A smile spread on Jesse's face as he headed toward the boy. "Didn't expect to see you here either, mate!" Or ever again. He gave the boy a playful bat on the arm in greeting. "I'm doing well, what's up with you? Where the hell have you been? I thought you were..." Jesse scrunched his face slightly, not really wanting to say the word. He laughed dryly, "I thought you were long gone."

Words: 472

Don't look back, I'll reach for you

template by Punki of Adoxography

@ jesse - outfit

    Truth be told, Jason didn't think he could ever talk to someone of his old life ever again, back when he'd been in the holding cells of the Ministry. Not because he wasn't allowed to, since he was, but because he couldn't bring himself to. In a way, it felt like being bitten had killed who he used to be and that by going back to all those familiar faces, he would have to pretend to still be the same. He wasn't the same, he would never be the same. Not just because of the literal change into being a werewolf but because of everything that came with it. Sure, his senses were sharper now and the closer he got to the full moon the more pain he felt. Sure, he changed into a wolf once a month and Cassian was teaching him how to get through the night without needing wolfsbane. Those were all the explicit changes, those were all things he could live with and hide perfectly well. What he meant were the changes to who he was in his daily life. From the way being in so much change left him quiet and more subdued than usual to the whiteness of those holding cells that had gotten through his skin and into his head. He was different now and it was hard to pretend that he wasn't, even though he had to. Being a werewolf wasn't something he could go screaming from the rooftops, for security reasons, but also for emotional reasons. Jason just didn't feel right telling it to anyone- even telling Medea had been more because he thought it was something he owed her rather than a choice he was comfortable with.
    It was still horrible of him to have let them all believe he was dead for so long. Tav didn't, but that was because Dea told her. Devin didn't think he was dead either, but that was because Octi had told him, and Octi knew because Cass suggested he write to someone and see how things were. The other Gryffindor wouldn't ask questions and wouldn't suspect anything, that was the only reason Jason had dared write him and it had even only been just the one time. Jesse hadn't heard anything and was now looking at him as if he were some sort of miracle. Confused but happy, and his words... well, it wasn't anything Jason hadn't already been aware of. He offered a rueful smile, both apologetic and a bit awkward. "Yeah, that seemed to be the general assumption. Not surprised, of course. It was the logical assumption to make." Jason shrugged a bit, sandwich still in his hands. "I'm alright, though. They just- something came up and they moved me, there were a lot of very sudden changes. You- they let you out of Pyxis, then? How is everything?" That was easier, talking about other people. The less questions asked, the less he had to either lie about or acknowledge. Without the truth, what he could tell anyone about his current situation was... well, he was living with a pureblood Lord and got all sorts of freedoms and new clothes, like being adopted by a new rich dad while all the other muggleborns were forced into slave labour. Why should he feel guilty for not suffering? He shouldn't but he did.

I SAW THESE CHAINS LOCKED ON MY WRISTS

AROUND MY NECK NO SHACKLES MISSED
I'D TRIED TO SHAKE THEM OFF AND FLEE
NOWHERE TO GO WITHOUT A KEY
@jason

Death wasn't something that was new or unheard of to Jesse. He'd been around death since he was small: drug overdoses, car crashes, people freezing, and people tortured into an early grave. No, death wasn't inexplicable. What was hard to wrap his head around was the sudden presence of his mate Jason. Just...there, right before him! How?! There were snatchers all over, Jesse knew that, and with the Death Eaters so plentiful at times....How was he not dead? How was he not at Kolna with the rest of them? Not at Pyxis either. The boy was younger than Jesse, too, he should have been there. Unless he was in hiding, though, if he were he was doing a shit job at it! Standing around in the open holding....sandwiches. Not a whole hell of a lot was adding up to him.

Still, Jesse grew up in a way that was different than most. Not everything could be spoken out loud where he came from. Sometimes, it couldn't even be spoken about in hush whispers over the phone. There were certain things you simply didn't ask. Because the less you knew, the less likely you were to come up missing or dead. Truly liked to joke that he was one of the most unquestioning people in the world, but that was his raising. If Jason wanted to tell him where he was, then he would have. The boy seemed to skirt around it, though, and Jesse gave one single nod and not a second thought more. He breathed in catching his breath behind a smile and shrugged. "Glad you're alright, mate, getting moved around is a lot better than the alternative." Jesse chuckled feeling a bit awkward himself. How do you carry a conversation with a non-dead-previously-dead person?

"Hm?" He hummed in question before realized that, yeah, it wasn't all that typical to enter Pyxis and then actually leave the damn place. "Oh, yeah! Me and a few others graduated in June. At least that's what they called it, graduating, pretty idiotic really. I feel like you actually have to learn something from school to be able to graduate from it--" Merlin, if given the opportunity he could complain about Pyxis all damn day. Salty bastard as he was. "But, yeah, they gave us the boot. Sent us back to work, as you can tell," Jesse gestured to his clothes with a half-cocked smile. "What about you? You- ah, you're not in school? They've got to have you working then, haven't they?"

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