sortinghat_logs | If hearts were unbreakable; then I could just tell you where I stand

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If hearts were unbreakable; then I could just tell you where I stand

WHO: Billy and Rapunzel
TONE: Mel-an-cholic. Also awkward.
RATING: PG-13
WHEN: 18/1/12; just before lunchtime
WHERE: just outside of the Hufflepuff common room
WHAT: Ever since they got back from break, things have been a little awkward between Billy and Rapunzel. The cutesy schmoopy honeymoon phase is over, apparently, and Billy's not sure what he did wrong. So he's taken up the completely awkward and socially unacceptable habit of stalking her. It started with just going to wait for her outside the Hufflepuff common room so they could talk, but then he lost his nerve. About twenty times later, he's stopped kidding himself that he's actually going to ever get up the nerve.

Until he gets B-U-S-T-E-D.
STATUS: ONGOING

Billy already had Rapunzel's schedule memorized before things got awkward between them. But now he was timetabling it down to the minutiae: for instance, she usually left the Hufflepuff dorm at 11:56 for lunch, and always in a hurry. So when he heard the passageway open up ten minutes ahead of time and heard her voice approaching, he froze for just a split second too long. He cursed himself and scrambled behind the barrels that weren't hiding the entrance, but it was too little, too late. It was also too noisy, too late, although Billy could hardly pay attention to that over the sound of his pounding heart.

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As Rapunzel exited the passage way, calling something to another Hufflepuff over her shoulder, she thought she spotted something out of the corner of her eye... It was the noise that really got he attention, though, and caused her to face forward, then look around.

"...Billy?"

Balls. Billy took a minute to consciously relax his face from the grimace that his tic had frozen it into when he heard Rapunzel call his name, before he showed his face.

"I can explain."

Except he couldn't, because the normal go-to excuse (kitchens) wouldn't work this close to lunch.

"Can you, Billy?" Rapunzel asked, her voice raising in pitch. "I'd love to hear it!"

Billy blinked and squinted a few times and looked like he'd just been slapped. The corner of his lips jerked hard as he opened his mouth trying to come up with words, but couldn't get an excuse past all of the other feelings that he was choking on.

It was kind of pathetic-looking. It was also a pretty good demonstration of how his tic had gotten ten times worse lately.

"Yeah, uh, you leave for lunch every day at eleven fifty-six," he blurted, and kicked himself. "I mean, I've definitely not been coming down here and pacing around outside your common room every day since you kind of stopped talking to me." Shit. His face burned with embarrassment, and he really kind of just wanted the castle to come to life and swallow him. Or, you know, Rapunzel to hex him already and have it done with.

Rapunzel froze for a moment.

"Why do you know that?"

And then in all came gushing out. She didn't think Billy was crazy, but she was scared and confused.

"What, have you been stalking me? I don't get any privacy? You... Why? Billy, why are you doing this?"

He blinked and his head kind of jerked a little, but after the tic passed his expression settled somewhere between heartbroken and ashamed, with a generous sprinkling of lost and confused.

"I-It's not stalking!" he argued. "I...I haven't followed you anywhere or anything, I've just been...watching you walk away from me." His face was flushed all the way to his ears, and his shoulders slumped as if he could swallow his own head between them. He looked to the ground, shoving his hands in his pockets.

God, he wanted to spill everything, tell her how much it hurt every time because it felt like she was pulling away from him more and more, and how every time he saw her he realized all over again how wonderful and beautiful and perfect she was, and how much he didn't deserve someone like her, and of course that just killed any conviction he'd worked up all over again.

Instead, he just stood there and blinked, trying to hold back the itch in his eyes.

"Billy, I... I don't like that. Why didn't you just talk to me?" Rapunzel asked, feeling more calm after her outburst.

She knew Billy. Billy was a lot of things, but not a stalker.

"...Walking away from you," she added, a bit bitterly. "You make it sound so awful."

But see, Billy was hurt, and once Rapunzel dialed it back down his eyes flicked up to her, completely bare and torn open.

"I wanted to," he said softly. "That's why I started. But then, I," he blinked and shifted his weight a little from foot to foot. "Nevermind," he murmured.

He looked up at her bitter comment. "What should I call it?" he asked, but there was hardly any sound to his voice. "Avoiding me? Ignoring me? ...Did I do something wrong, Rapunzel?"

'No, tell me,' she wanted to say, but she knew she wasn't in the position to ask anything of Billy, especially when she heard him go on...

"You didn't do anything wrong. I just..." She sighed and tilted her head back. "It's complicated."

Position or no, she could ask the world of him and he'd give it to her.

Billy blinked, but relaxed his shoulders a little so that they weren't hiked up somewhere around his ears.
"Can you try to explain?" he asked softly, with an unspoken 'because it hurts, when you don't' tagged onto the end.

"I hated hearing her say all those awful things to you..." Rapunzel began in a whisper. "I know how hurtful she can be, but that... That was worse than when she says it to me. For me it was, at least. You don't deserve that, Billy."

She sighed, closing her eyes before going on. "And I'm still so used to listening to her... It's a little scary not to. But mostly, I... I'm scared. I don't want anything bad to happen to you."

Billy came out fully from his hiding place, moving closer to Rapunzel, listening so quietly that he was actually holding his breath without realizing.

But then he was close enough to touch her, and all the raw little threads of hurt ached in his chest. He didn't know what to say - he was really bad with emotional words - but he looked down at her hands, and then reached out and took both of hers in his.

"I'm sorry." For stalking her? Yeah, that wasn't his finest moment. For challenging her to get out of a situation that everyone but her could see was bad? For loving her?

He squeezed her hands gently in his.

Hell no.

"...Thank you," Rapunzel whispered, returning the squeeze. "And I'm sorry for not explaining sooner. I just.... I don't know what to do, Billy."

Billy scrunched up his shoulders and looked troubled, not meeting her eyes. "I don't know either," he admitted. "But can't we try to figure it out? ...Together?"

It was Rapunzel's turn to squeeze hands, and she nodded, before realizing he wasn't looking quite at her.

"Yes. We can... I really do love you, Billy," she said, gently. And then her expression grew melancholy again. "But....."

His head snapped up and he looked at her like her little 'but' had hit him like a brick. He held onto her hands like he was afraid she'd pull them away - not tight enough to hurt, but...definitely tight.

"...But?" he asked, and there was almost no sound to his whisper.

"Well, that's just it. I love you. Not like... Puppy teenaged love. I really love you." Though her words were kind, her tone was strict. "So... I want our relationship to be handled maturely. And that means if something's wrong... We talk to each other. No avoiding..."

And then she gave him a punch in the shoulder. "...Or stalking."

He cringed a little at her tone, even though there was a part of him that was elated because she loved him but he knew that he couldn't just fixate on that part and ignore the rest of what she was saying.

Still, he must have been fixating a little bit, because her punch took him completely off-guard, and he actually stumbled a little - jeez, she probably packed more of a punch than he did! A bunch of emotions flashed over his face, then: hurt, confusion, and then finally resignation.

"I deserved that," he admitted.

"Yes," she replied sadly. "You did."

She was quiet for a moment, then added. "So... I won't avoid you when there's problems anymore, but you can't do anything like this again, okay? Will you promise me that?"

Billy stared at her for almost a moment too long, before nodding.

"Yeah," he said with a weak smile. "I promise." He wanted to take her hands again, wanted to touch her, wanted to assure himself that she wasn't going to walk away from him, that he wasn't imagining things or dreaming.

But instead, he just balled his hands into fists at his sides.

"Thank you, Billy," Rapunzel breathed. "We'll make things alright again. I know we will."

She gently brushed back his hair, then kissed his cheek. "And I'm holding you to that promise," she added, seriously.

Billy gathered up all of his courage and screwed it to the sticking place, hesitating only a split second before moving to catch her lips in a soft, shy kiss before she pulled away entirely.

He smiled cautiously, like he was afraid that that gesture would break the spell and make her leave him standing there alone. "You have my full permission to slug me again," he said lightly, but still completely sincerely.

Rapunzel blushed brightly at the kiss, surprised by it, but then she smiled at him.

"I'll keep that in mind, Billy."

YES GOOD SHE WAS SMILING AT HIM AGAIN. He lit up and even uncurled a little from his hunched shoulders, even though he was sure that he was blushing too.

He looked down at her hands, and took one in his, tangling their fingers together and looking back up at her.

"From now on, together, right?" he asked.

"Yes, together," Rapunzel agreed. She brought their linked hands up to her mouth and kissed each of his fingers.

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If hearts were unbreakable; then I could just tell you where I stand

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