A desperate phone call

“Ne’Os Emof is dead! The dreadful man is finally dead!” The people had been chanting those two sentences ever since the news had been printed on the front page of the Daily Prophet, but Nerissa didn’t join in, instead she gathered the few items of clothing Ne’Os had allowed her to bring with her when she had left with him numbly; she had not yet begun to feel that overwhelming joy and relief that would have swept over her upon hearing such news. The truth of that matter was that she had not yet allowed the fact to sink in, for she feared that she would only be crushed with bad news the second she did- what if he had somehow managed to fake his death, and came after her once more?

And so she didn’t allow her heart fill with excitement, becuase she was so scared of having her happiness taken away from her all over again. She didn’t have much of that joy she used to be filled with, left in her, and if she wasted it all on a fabrication of the real facts, it would be gone.

-

Nerissa walked down the gravel road, dragging her feet along the small rocks, a bag with a few apples and her clothes inside over her shoulder. She had her hands jammed in her pockets, shivering so violently she could swear she could hear her bones rattling about- it may have been the middle of summer, but it had been raining the entire night prior, and the air was moist and icy.

The young girl was hugged, and patted on the back by random witches and wizards who were dancing about the streets, waving their hands in the air as if a war had been won in their favor. She smiled, but it was only a ghost of the grin that should have been upon her face; scared and feeling rather lost, the only thing Nerissa wanted to do was to sit by a warm fire, and to see her best friend again… the one whom she had missed so terribly.

“Ne’Os Emof is dead! The dreadful man is finally dead!”

Nerissa nodded and inhaled, Yes, the Prophet says that he is dead, put do you people really think that that was the last of him? Nerissa wasn’t stupid, she had talked to the man about what would happen to him if he ever died; he had told her himself that he had a plan, just incase, and the idea of being caught escaping frightened Nerissa out of her wits.

-

“Andrew… please answer…” Nerissa pleaded, holding a payphone to her ear as she shivered in the small phone booth. Luckily she had remembered the boy’s phone number from when they had gone camping and they had swapped numbers- where is my cell phone? Did it fall out of my pocket in Knockturn Alley that evening? Nerissa pondered all the possible ways she could have lost her ancient phone- she didn’t care, really, where it had gone off to, but it was easier for her to think of such things, than to wonder what she would do if her friend didn’t pick up his phone; her home was no where near, and to walk there would take days, if not weeks.

“Andrew, Andrew please, it’s me, Nerissa, please please come help me,” Nerissa spoke to the answering machine, her voice shaky and uneven.

Andrew had been asleep in his bed. After the events in the large battle of Grimmauld place, he was bruised and cut in many different places. He had bandages allover his body to help stop the bleeding. He groaned slightly as he was interrupted from his nice sleep by his ring-tone on his Droid. He lazily flung his arm to the right, trying to find the night stand that he had his phone on with his charger. He knocked over his alarm clock, and the container for one of the potions that he used when he was hurt last night. Waking himself up, he sat upright and then grabbed his phone and looked at the caller ID. 'Private Number'. He clicked the green button on the screen and put the phone up to his left ear. "Hello?" he asked tiredly, holding back a yawn. Yet there was no answer. The call must have went to the answering machine, so he pressed a few buttons on the touch screen and it went to the voicemail. "You have-1-new message. First unheard message." he phone said and he rolled his eyes in annoyance. His heart sunk to his stomach as he heard Nerissa's voice. His arms grew cold and so did his face, as it looked pale white. She was asking for help. Immediatly, he throw his phone on the bed, and got dressed into a white t-shirt, a gray jacket with the Volcom emblem on the left, gray jeans, and black and white shoes. He ran over to his bed and grabbed his Droid and immediately apperated to London, which the number had been registered in.

-------

Andrew landed on a street in London, ignoring the peoples questions about why he had the 3 bandages on his face, and the gauze on his hands. He had no time for it. "Nerissa!" he called running to where the phone had been listed on his map "Nerissa! Where are you?!" He was glad he wore his gray jacket, as it was a very cold day in London for some odd reason. He continued to run and stopped at a corner nearby to catch his breath. His was still fatigued from the large battle.

Slowly, Nerissa hung up the payphone and leaned against the dusty, fly coated glass of the phone booth and slowly slid down until she was sitting there. She felt safer in the small place, because she knew that she was the only one who could fit inside it when she was sitting there like that, and if she closed the door and put her foot up against it, no one would be able to get inside. She considered staying there until someone she recognized noticed her, but then she shivered and remembered that the cold would make her ill before long- and that was without it raining again, but there was a cloud overhead and Nerissa could only guess what kind of storm the heavens had in store for her.

“Well, you never believed in karma, but it looks like karma believed in you…” Nerissa said through a sigh, staring out at the streets, watching as the joyful people danced around with each other. She wrapped her arms around her midsection, and was glad when it stopped the violent shivers for the most part.

But it wasn’t long before a new shiver ran down her spine, one that wasn’t due to the cold, icy air, but a shiver of fear; she had heard someone call her name. “No, no, no, no,” she whimpered, It’s Ne’Os, he’s back already and he’s angry I left the bar- but she had been wrong, for it wasn’t Ne’Os she saw walking down the brick streets, it was Andrew.

He had received her phone call.

Quickly, Nerissa climbed to her feet and grabbed her bag before sliding the door to the phone booth open. Run, her brain told her, and so she did, she ran as fast as her legs could carry her, her sneakers squeaking quietly when she slipped through puddles from the rain the night before. Without warning Nerissa knocked into Andrew, wrapping her arms around his neck as if begging for protection. “He’s not dead, I know he isn’t he told me so- He’s going to kill me if he finds out I left, Andrew. I wouldn’t have called you but my house is just too far to walk and its so cold out here- what happened to you?” Nerissa’s words flew out of her mouth like a cloud of butterflies desperately trying to escape being captured by a young child swinging a small net around.

[So sorry, I had to do chores and then my sister hogged the comp]

Andrew embraced Nerissa as they began to hug and then listened to what Nerissa had to say. "Don't worry," he said feeling his heart race against his chest. He was glad to see her again, after everything. "Matt killed him. I was there when he did, and that's the reason why I have all these bandages everywhere." He didn't want to tell her the whol story about what happened at Grimmauld place. He was still ashamed at the fact that he and the others had lost it and had to leave with their tails beneath their legs. "Look let's just get out of here okay? We can discuss this somewhere with heating." He couldn't stop smiling. He had fought a lot to try and find her and finally he did. Well at least Ne'Os was for the moment.

[Not a problem]

Nerissa finally allowed her heart to fill with that joy she had been telling it not to upon hearing Andrew’s voice. He said the Minister had killed Ne’Os, but that still didn’t assure her that he wouldn’t come back- she pushed the thoughts aside to the best of her ability in order to keep that frown off of her face. She nodded, “Yes,” she replied, hopping to get out of the cold. She opened up her pack and looked through it for some sort of jacket, only to find a few t-shirts, what she really needed was a traveling cloak, but she hadn’t thought of taking one of Ne’Os’ when she had left.

It was as if Andrew’s smile was a contagious; when she saw him smiling she couldn’t help but grin herself. The doubt she had felt earlier was still there nagging at the back of her mind, unfortunately, but being near her good friend again helped her ignore the feeling. “I missed you, and I’m sorry that I left with Ne’Os…” she said quietly, gazing out at the streets.

Andrew smiled warmly and felt sucessful in this lon journey. Well he hadn't been the one to kill Ne'Os, but then again a dead Ne'Os was a good Ne'Os(soz Ne'Os xD). He pushed away some of Nerissa's bangs that had been drenched in the rain and said "I don't care about the past. I'm glad you're alright now." He moved away from Nerissa reluctantly and then almost felt like he was about ready to scream 'woo' again. But he held it in with all his might, even though his smile had said everything. "Alright," he said, extending his hand out to Nerissa "let's go."

The last time Andrew had gotten so close to Nerissa, she had flinched and backed away slightly, but no such thing happened when he did it then. Her heart rattled the bones that made up her ribcage as it hammered away so loudly she wondered if Andrew could hear it. Knowing that her voice would come out as squeaky as a mouse, Nerissa decided not to reply, but instead, simply nodded her head, her messy- she hadn’t had the chance to comb through it since she had last been home- red hair falling over her shoulders, and accepted Andrew’s hand, walking forward with him.

She wondered how the Minister had managed to kill Ne’Os, and how Andrew had gotten those injuries, but she didn’t ask because he hadn’t told her, and she could only assume that the reason was because it hadn’t gone too well. Nerissa inhaled, the damp air filling her lungs. It tasted of freedom.

There weren't many places to go to on those streets, or else Nerissa would have staid inside in order to avoid the cold, but she figured Andrew had at least some sort of idea, for he seemed to be leading the way just fine. Nerissa didn't exactly know her way around the streets of London, simply because she usually spent her time cooped up in a greenhouse rather than wondering the streets- though it really didn't seem like a choice then. "Thank You," she said when she got her voice back, hoping he would be able to hear how appreciative she really was by her tone of voice.

Andrew was glad that he had his friend back, and felt like everything was starting to look up now. He and Potter's Army still had a lot to do to bring back peace to Hogwarts, but for now he would just enjoy the time he had. He continued forward with Nerissa, and then apperated with her back to his apartment. They appeared inside the living room area and then said "Sorry for the sudden apperation, but I figured this would be the best place for now. Not a lot of people have heard of Ne'Os here." He let go of Nerissa's hand and then walked over into his bedroom. He reappeared with a fresh towel and handed it to her, not even concerned that he was wet as well. "I really missed you, Nerissa," he said looking into her eyes.

The Apartment...yes it is very small

Spoiler:

Apperation was probably Nerissa’s least favorite way to travel- she had figured that out the first time she had ever apperated with anyone, and the fact that she had been taken by surprise by Andrew’s sudden choice to apperate made it even more sickening to her stomach when she arrived in Andrew’s apartment, dizzy and ready to fall to the floor. “Ugh…” she groaned, but didn’t complain further; at least she was out of the cold, and off of the strange streets of wizard-London. She leaned against the nearest wall until the room stopped spinning, and then breathed deeply to cure her nausea. Nerissa looked around the place slowly, feeling a lot safer there than she had in The Blood Bank, where she had felt as if she had been watched 24/7 by the vampires that filled the place.

Nerissa took the towel she was given and wrapped it around her shoulders, hugging the warm, soft fabric to her skin, feeling both relieved and comforted. She felt rather weak having to call for someone to save her and take her in like she had, but it really hadn’t been a choice she could have made herself. She snapped her eyes up in Andrew’s direction when he spoke again, her thoughts being interrupted just in time. “You have no idea how glad I am to be around you again,” she replied honestly with a light smile, looking down at her hands when she couldn’t think of much else to say; she didn’t know how to put her gratitude and joy into words.

Andrew didn't know what he could've said in that moment. Hee wanted to say so many things, things he couldn't put into mere words and phrases. He looked up for a second and then looked back down, still feeling his heart beating against his chest. "So umm..." he said calmly and still couldn't think of what to say still "...are you alright?" He wanted to say, ask, do something but had no idea what the consequences would be. He just stood there, like a wall, and waited for an answer, his face still red and straight now instead of smiling.