when your demons return

There were many things Jack was not aware that she needed to hear. She didn't know that she needed to hear that she had been a good guardian to Sunny, but the throbbing feeling in her heart told her that she must have needed to know it. Jack had always been conscious of the relatively loveless childhood she had grown up with. It was hard to live with parents who seemed disapproving at every turn, who seemed unable to please. And Sunny had almost lived such a life - a life of constant rejection from the two people who should have held her closest. Jack knew it was best to hope that her brother and Skye would one day be able to take Sunny back, but she also selfishly hoped to never part with the little girl, too.

She dropped her head, staring at her hands that rested in her lap. She picked at her fingernails, sincerely touched by his words. She had feared that she was not doing all she could for Sunny, that she would be another disappointment to the small child who had already faced so much. It would have broken her heart to continue on thinking that Sunny would have been so much better off without her as a guardian.

"I - thank you," she said, finally raising her head. "I don't think it's a job anyone can ever be certain they're doing right - 'specially since I'm not a mum." She forced a small smile and looked at him. "But -hey. Thank you for all your help, too. It's nice to know I don't have to take her to Quidditch practice with me. And she adores you - absolutely adores you. So... thank you."

Max wasn't expecting this gratitude. It was a bit strange coming from Jack but Max was touched none the less. He never thought he would hear her thank him for anything. Nothing this genuine anyway. He smiled at the redhead - a sad sort of smile that thanked her too, and had an odd impulse to reach over and take her hand in his. Max, of course, resisted this thought and would later wonder where it came from. Instead he leaned back so his head rested against the wall and he tried to find some comfort in their odd arrangement.

"You're welcome." he murmured, not sure how else he could show how grateful he really was. After a moment he added, "I love her too, you know. She's the best thing that's happened to me in a long time. I've never met someone like her.. so full of life and, well, sunny." He considered for a second, flashing through memories. "It's the whole house, Jack. All the pets and kids and werewolves and even the boggart. I'm just really lucky you let me stay because I've honestly never been anywhere that feels so much like home." He laughed, partly to himself, and nudged Jack's shoulder gently. "Even if I'm only here to pay half the rent." He added as an afterthought, only half teasing.

Max wasn't sure how she would take his words. He hadn't planned them but he knew that they felt more vulnerable than he was used to. He was never that strait forward about his feelings surrounding Layabout Lane, especially not with himself.

This was the most sentimental Jack had been... ever. Jack was not the sort to say nice things, sweet things, even if she thought them or even if she wanted to say them. She just... didn't. It must have been the relief from their safety, the adrenaline of the fight, the embarrassment of the reveal of secrets. Jack, who so often bit back the truth and supplied one less devastating, found that honesty was springing to her lips without forethought.

Damn. She definitely didn't sound as badass as she would have liked to sound.

She nodded at his words, staring forward at a fixed point on the carpet of the office, letting his words soak in. Yes, they had a nice living now. It was something Jack was not accustomed too. There had been the frostiness of her first home, as her parents dealt with her abnormalities; the estrangement in the dorms as she had never been very easy for her peers to like; and the constant tragedy in the home she had shared with Nemo Omara. No, home was not an unknown word to Jack, but the idea of home being happy and safe and full of love was completely foreign.

"I'm glad it feels that way," she said, roused by his nudge. "The happy thing, not the half the rent thing." She grinned at him. "I'm glad it feels so... inclusive. It's been a long time since I've had a home that is safe, let alone kind. I finally got one right."

Max had never seen Jack like this - a fact that managed to give him hope and worry him at the same time. He could only attribute this change to the appearance of her dementor. It had rattled her - that was the only explanation to her openness. There was no other reason she would suddenly trust him as she now seemed to. But right now Jack seemed calmer than he had ever seen her and Max would have hated to disrupt that peace. He could ask questions later - right now she deserved some sleep.

"I'm glad too." he murmured, letting his building sleepiness take over a little more. "We should probably get some sleep. You warm enough?" he asked at no more than a whisper. It was summer but the dementor had left a chill in the room. Max snuggled down into the his pillows and pulled the blankets up slightly. In no time darkness clouded his vision and he slipped into a miraculously dreamless sleep, the constant sound of Jack's heartbeat keeping time with his own.

- - -

Max awoke early the next morning, his back aching slightly from sleeping on the hard floor. He was only twenty-four, but he was already too old for this kind of stuff. It took the man a moment to realize that in his sleep he had laid his arm across Jack's middle. Immediately Max's eyes became saucers and as delicately as possible (to not disturb Jack) he moved his arm back to his side. He scooted away from her as if she was contagious, trying to make as little of a disturbance as possible.

When the threat of their closeness had been eliminated he stood up and stretched, relieving some of the tension in his back. Max headed for the door but stopped before he opened it and looked back at the two sleeping girls. They looked so peaceful laying there, it was all he could do to not go back and lay with them, pretending he was asleep for just a little while longer. With an expression of contentment on his face Max opened the door and stepped out into the hallway, closing the office behind him.

It was only after he was half way down the stairs did Max realize he had had not been attacked by leaving the room. The boggart had disappeared, which was amazingly good luck considering he had just jumped out of safety. It must have given up sometime that night and left. Max turned back, planning to go and tell Jack the good news, but stopped and continued down to the kitchen. She would figure it out when he wasn't there and he would hate to disturb her peace.

When he arrived in the kitchen Max flicked his wand and turned on the lights, which only helped along the brightness of the first rays of sunlight that were coming through the windows. He turned on the coffee pot and sat at the table, his head in one hand as he recalled the events of the night before. He had a headache, a sore back, and a sour taste in his mouth that only got worse the more he thought about his own dementor. Daisy was always in the back of his mind but now she occupied the forefront with a vengeance. He needed to take a trip to St. Mungos. He needed to today. It was the only thing that would settle his mind.

This was much more intimate than Jack knew how to properly handle, so it was with the greatest relief that sleep began to settle onto her tired mind. If Sunny could sleep so soundly with danger on the other side of the door, so should she - a fully capable witch - be able to sleep without anything to disturb her. With a matured wizard at her side, she should be able to sleep like a baby. But the boggart was much more than fear - it was the promise that evil always returned, that the past never died. And Jack had a good, new life. She could not let it be jeopardized.

Her eyes had just fallen on Sunny's sleeping form when Max suggested that they follow the little girl's lead and sleep. It seemed they did that - followed the self assuredness of the little six year old muggle girl. She nodded in agreement and pushed herself down, swinging an arm around Sunny who immediately moved in her sleep to rest her head upon Jack's stomach as Jack laid her head back. "Yes, I'm warm," she said. She let her eyelids close, and she was going to force herself to fall asleep without thought. Thought in this situation would lead to panic. She needed to sleep.

Yes, she was warm. She couldn't remember ever being warmer.

Feeling a new presence in the room, Max looked up just in time to catch Jack's expression as she napped at him in an all-too-familiar way. He let out an internal sigh - Jack was back. Max had raised his head from his hands and now looked her up and down. She certainly didn't look like the peaceful woman who had been laying next to Sunny. No, she was more of a lioness now. Normally this version of Jack was enough to inspire some sort of awe and respect from Max but today he simply looked at her with tired eyes.

"Sorry." he replied, giving her a weak smile of assurance. Everything about Max was tired and he knew it wasn't all from lack of sleep. The smell coming from the coffee pot on the stove called to him and he stood to go and check it. With relief he saw it was done and turned off the flaming burner before pouring himself a mug full. Steam rose from his mug and the warmth flushed his cheeks a rosy hue. Turning back to Jack he asked "Want a cup?" So casual, he even amused himself. Who poked the lion when you had the chance to walk away?

"I didn't see anything out of the ordinary on my way down, but we should probably do a full sweep of the house before we leave. I'll feel better once I'm sure it's gone."

Jack was feeling aggressive, and Max was giving her no opportunity to express these feelings. She wanted to argue with someone. She wanted to yell. She wanted something to challenge her so she could properly express the power she felt she had lost the night before. She had been weakened by the boggart and, true to Dyllan form, had to take it out on someone innocent so she could regain her sense of strength. Fragile was a very dangerous state of being for Jack. Especially because Max had witnessed it all. She really needed to prove to him that the person he had seen the night before was not her at all. She was Jack Dyllan - she was a warrior. Fearless, emotionally detached, unshakable; all that good stuff.

Now, if only she could remind Max of it. 

His smile did nothing to cajole a good attitude out of her. She merely crossed her arms in front of her, staring back at him. "Sorry," she scoffed. Some part of her wanted to kick herself for being so foul, but she did not seem capable of stopping herself. She felt as though she was watching herself scowl, responding, "I don't want coffee, no."

She moved to the front windows, spreading the blinds with her thumb and forefinger as she peeked out. "Well, did you check outside? That's where it came from." She moved to the other window, the one that the trunk had been thrown through. "Ah, f*ck," she said, quickly pulling her foot up. A shard of glass had embedded into her foot. She hopped over to the chair and sat down, pulling her foot onto her lap before quickly removing the glass.

Although it was a part of life when you lived at Layabout Lane - Max just wasn't in the mood to deal with a grumpy Jack. Something had gotten under her skin since the night before and he was too mentally exhausted to really worry about it. All Max really wanted to do was get to the hospital but visiting hours didn't start until nine, making leaving early completely pointless. So instead he raised his eyebrows as he leaned against the counter with his coffee.

"No, I didn't. I just got up. I'll check in a minute."

Max didn't want to go outside and search for his demons. If they felt like disappearing than who was he to chase them back down? As for as Max was concerned, if the boggart wasn't in the house than he didn't really care where it was. Their front lawn was no exception. He tensed up slightly as he heard a slight snap in his normally calm voice. It took a lot for the Hufflepuff to get irritated but last night had clearly been enough. Tension lay across his face and his muscles were slightly clenched, no matter how casual his posture looked.

"Careful." Max echoed, a second or two after Jack stepped on the glass. He would have been more concerned but if her swearing were any indication she was unhurt. Just upset. On any other day Max would have jumped up to grab a mop or ran to the bathroom to get her medical supplies but today his mind wasn't working quite right. He felt foggy and cranky and tired and.. defeated. The only thing that Max was sure of was that everything would be better if he could just see Daisy. It had to be.

Jack remained at her chair, her leg propped up, her foot resting atop her knee, her bare foot marred by a trickle of blood. Even with this in mind, she still had it within her to be irritable. "It could be inside in a minute," Jack grumbled back, working the glass out of her foot, having been unable to respond immediately as she had been busy getting stabbed in the foot with glass. Jack was in a very dangerous way, because she felt vulnerable, and every attempt she made to right the situation only seemed to dig her grave even deeper. She simply wanted everyone to either leave her alone or fear her like she was the wrath of God incarnate - why was that so difficult for everyone to do?

The thing was... she was still a little anxious about the Boggart, and that bothered her. The last time she had battle a Boggart, it had been no more difficult than dealing with flobberworms, and yet she had holed herself up in her office like a child afraid of a monster under the bed. It bothered her that she had gone from the tough one in the house, the one they called when there was a particularly terrifying insect that needed to be escorted off the premises, to the one that had refused to open the office door and face down her fears. Sunny had seen it but, worse somehow, Max had seen it. And, irrationally, this seemed like the very worst thing in the world she could have let someone witness.

She sighed, throwing her foot down. "Fine then." She stood up, plucking her cardigan around her a little more snugly. "I'll go look for it. Since I do everything around here." She strode towards the door, adrenaline managing to block out the fear that would surely hit once she found herself alone in the yard, potentially with a very irrate Boggart.

He wanted to go after her, he really did. The mixture of irritation and protectiveness that surged through his veins as she made her exit was completely unfamiliar to Max and confused him. He wasn't an angry person but this emotion felt oddly like anger. A worried churning in his gut as she went outside, paired with a healthy slice of annoyance at her defiance. Jack's attitude had never bothered him before, so Max couldn't quite place why her aggressiveness bothered him so much right now. Maybe it was the contrast from last night. He hadn't really expected things to change between them, had he? But for a second he had allowed himself to hope without realizing it.

Max waited for a moment, listening for any screams or shouts. When the coast seemed to be clear he moved to the window and pulled aside the drapes to get a clear view of the yard and watch Jack as she inspected things. He took another long sip of his coffee. The caffeine was slowly working it's way into his bloodstream but instead of it's normally warmth it just seemed to irritate Max more. He watched her red hair bob around the yard, inspecting it for the boggart he was now sure had disappeared. She turned back for a moment and when her eyed laid on him he gave her a slight wave and tilt of the head. In his mind it had been friendly, but in reality it came out the slightest bit hostile.

"She's gone mad." he mumbled to himself. The only explanation was that she had a twin who had taken her place last night. There was no way this snarling beast of a woman was the same girl who had looked so beautiful under the moonlight. But the worst part was that she was still beautiful. Insane, but beautiful. Max shook his head slightly, as if to physically clear it off all thoughts that compared Jack to anything remotely pretty. It was an out of place thought that was too dangerous to duplicate.