Summer Loving

Chapter Four:

Submerged, Vesper felt fully the complete solitude that had so stifled her existence; cool. Blue. Wet and numb. What a wonderful life, she thought to herself. Vesper blinked; her mind was a fog of mystical music and drums, of reggae and soul; a black haze drew closer to her in the water and she allowed herself an easy yet half-miserable smile as she met his teasing grey eyes. A hand drew forward and pulled her closer…

The First chance meeting between himself and this teasing little girl in the cold golden hue of her family library had enthralled him; obsessively, and even though it had only been just a few cumbersome days since he last saw her he was now wrapped in the fragility of her silver foil. The great weight of her unexplored existence tolled him and inadvertently he trapped himself in his own creation of her hype. He often began to think of her as more than just a fifteen year old girl, inexperienced and woeful and began to revere her, calling to her in prayer as if she were some lovely vengeful being, a single complete embodiment of the Furies from the Greeks and Romans, forever bound to respond to his worship; not of the eternally faithful, sacrificial type but the aggravated passionate aggrieving sort. Bound to die away once the spell of 'The First' was broken, bound to because his sort of passion, his sort of worship never endured; his faith never sustained but it when it was in form, it was deep, true and real or so he thought.

He could not at first understand his obsession with her; he had a keen interest in girls and was often successful but it was never an obsession, which usually took shape and in the form of poets and books, historical figures and the technological advances of the Muggle World. Rarely had it ever occurred to him that a girl was capable of warranting that sort of attention and adulation from him; and then he saw her, peeping at him through the spaces of the shelves. He wasn't in love; he wasn't enamored; these were words were similar in strength to what he felt but not exactly what he felt. It was most simply put, passion. However, when he met her again at the Sullivan's Mansion, he completely got it. He understood himself; in the disparaging loneliness and sharp sadness of her eyes, he saw his own ever mirrored.

Are you lonely just like me?

The question cropped up quite often to him as they had walked to the lake but he never spoke; he led her like one would a child, by the hand, soft and supple and limp in his grip. In the little time that he had spent with her, he had quickly realized Vesper was very childlike, tripping over rocks and trudging through, occasionally wiping her brow in the sticky hot air. He also found that he didn't find it very particularly appealing but rather exasperating, and also that it was very easy to get attached to this notion for when they stopped at the lake, he was quite absentminded and unaware, and so made a gesture to help her take off her dress like one would a child to which she naturally responded quite harshly, ripping herself away from him with a forbidding glare and telling him to turn his back to her so that she might slip into the water unwatched. He did so and couldn't help but feel a strong sense of loss having been kept from her at her own choice but that quickly transformed into anger that physically conveyed itself as a sexual dominance; by the time he looked upon her, bobbing in the water, he was sure she felt it too in his lingering gaze.

Whether it was in this that she had redeemed him or she was simply embarrassed for him, once in the water and silently watching him, Vesper then pleasantly encouraged him to take his clothes off and join her in the water. Confused but still angry for keeping away from him, he hastily removed his shirt and tossed it aside and jumped in the water, much to her pleasure; he heard the echo of her laughter deep underwater and he quickly swam to her, beneath her and slid his hands up her bare legs. Feeling his touch, she wriggled away like a spooked fish but she came back quickly, to feel his gentle teasing grin with her finger tips, pressing her face and mouth nearly to his not in the fashion of a kiss but like the animals that craved familiarity and he welcomed it, even bobbing forward to mirror her movement to encourage such familiarity. He made her smile brighter and he warmed, snaking a hand through her hair but that was the limit to their interaction; she swam off, and when he followed, drawing a hand a pulling her closer, she evaded him and gestured him to leave her alone.

He was forced therefore to explore the lake for a while, keeping away though he so desperately wanted to be near her. He had once been told by Mickey not to overturn the rocks on the bed of the lake for there might be some snakes; he did anyway, never one for heeds and such. A black little fish nibbled at his toe before it zoomed away. He identified a crab too and found a frog with its hundreds of jelly eggs among some reeds but this scientific exploration was not why he accompanied Vesper to the lake. Wet and careless, he trudged out of the water and sat on the bank by the reeds, watching her reflection under the surface; birds chirped somewhere above him and the whole area creaked and twitched with life. Dirt and mud clumped between his wet toes and he felt cooler and calmer after the swim. In her presence, his obsession was nothing more than an interest though he knew how comically tormented he would be once she was to leave him; if he allowed it.

"All done?" He drew breath as she finally emerged from the water and sat beside him, all the while keeping his gaze low and averted; even still when she engaged him, he did not look at her.

"Yes, I had a nice swim." Vesper paused almost as if contemplating and then spoke just as brightly, "Do the Sullivan's really own it? This lake?"

She ran her fingers through her short black hair, tracing them off her face and rubbing clear and dry her eyes and face, he saw from the corner of his eyes. He never bothered responding to her question and instead shifted his weight to his arms by leaning back on them. "Do you like it?"

"It's really…its lovely. You ought to know that." She managed a quizzical smile, as if probing and he endowed her with a brief glance and a very clever, very daring smile.

"Find anything interesting?" She asked and he looked around as if to contemplate his options.

"…frog eggs and a crab." He said offhandedly. He liked her less and less by the minute; she was being untrue to herself, her lonely absconding self and it was repelling him. He wanted to talk of her loneliness, his own, their compatibility and its remedy; he wanted to inquire after her, and be given to read her like one would scour a book but at her most pleasant, he deemed her a nasty hypocrite. He continued with this mental derailment of her and her self, hyperbolic terms springing to him and he caught on in this silent condemnation of her in the quiet of her company, in her ignorance and suddenly it was gone. His beautiful fantastic vision of her godliness suddenly just…it was gone. He understood it quite quickly; it was quite a recurring process. His passion for her was gone and Vesper Ada McDonald was no longer The One and the power of The First was quickly a mere memory; looking within himself, he realized he still felt for her deeply, but it was no longer to the blown up magnitude of its original bloom. She was human to him now, and not a god, with a capacity for flaws and ability to irritate. As such, he could destroy her and preserve himself.

Even though they were sitting side by side, he still loomed over her petite little form lazing in the sunlight and it must have been one of those telepathic things were two individuals read each other perfectly in terms of future action because suddenly he decided he would kiss her again and from the flicker in her deep blue eyes, he knew she had already decided she would accept.

He believed he had seduced her against her will that night in the library; now, she was melting into his embrace in search for solace but she wouldn't find it in him; hypocrites rarely were rewarded and she was going to be punished but he did not know that it was susceptibility to vulnerability that had refrained her from him, not hypocrisy as he had so cruelly judged. He warmed her like she had him earlier in the water and this was her cautious way of associating to him. He was to realize this only after.

Lowering his eyelids he leaned forward into her and she tilted her face up to him to catch his mouth; he met her pretty eyes as he nuzzled close to her mouth, closing his eyes and pressing against her soft mouth; he felt her lashes tickle his cheek and he eased a hand gently across the stem of her neck, supporting her as he took deeper into the kiss. He coaxed her gently through kisses to open her mouth and flicked his tongue against hers, warmth spreading in the pit of his stomach to the lobes of his ears; he felt free, warm and one. His lips were wet and she tasted like a curious amalgamation of honey and salt, predominantly salt. It was only when he brought his hand to cup her cheek that he realized the salt was from tears that had now streaked her cheeks. Sorrow and regret immediately overwhelmed him and he ripped away from her, transfixed by her sad lonely teary eyes that were now red. He couldn't take his eyes off her, staring at her as though she had just poisoned him. Under his pressurizing tense gaze, her face cracked and creased and she surrendered to a brief silent cry, fiddling with her hands and occasionally wiping her cheek. He just watched her, nearly astounded by himself and his awry sense of justice.

Vesper was done rather quickly, aggressively rubbing her face between her eyes and nose, patting her cheeks so that by the time he saw her face, it was still red but impassive but he didn't realize she had taken his acknowledgment of her tears as a breach of trust; henceforth, he was condemned.

She walked to her clothes, wore her dress over her undergarments and came back to him to gather her shoes and socks. He was too stricken to do anything but watch her wet hair swing about and cling to her face; as she slipped her feet into her shoes, she looked down, lids lowered and the corner of her lips so subtly creased that for a moment he likened the expression to that of his brother's. He was being judged; harshly and cruelly and such a scowl usually pertained that there was little he could do to repent for forgiveness. He was dependant on time.

Vesper turned her back to him, her movement slick and swan-like, walking down the path, dress swinging to and fro and walking far away from him as though he were just another feature amongst many others.

A/N: sorry for updating real late and its also relatively shorter, but I hope you enjoyed that from Grey Eyes' perspective! I will try to return to Vesper's perspective soon enough, hopefully by the next chapter but this little bit from GE's POV was important because I wanted to show the premises for why he is so interested in her and the nature of his obsession that has been exaggerated for plot purposes. Review it, but only if you want more.