Chapter Text
They go back to the diner to visit the jackalope head.
“I brought sunglasses for him, too,” Luna explains to Marcus, beaming as he holds open the door. “That fluorescent lighting can’t be good for his eyes—they’re incredibly sensitive, especially in the spirit realm.”
And Marcus still isn’t sure what any of that really means—like, where is the spirit realm? Is it some underground Dante’s Inferno bullshit or is it invisible?—but he squeezes her hand and flashes her a grin and thinks that at least the impromptu sacrifice of Draco’s horrible cherry-red Ray Bans is for a semi-good cause.
“Cool,” Marcus says, dropping into an empty booth. “Did you…uh, did you want another—grapefruit?”
Luna sits across from him, bouncing slightly in her seat, and immediately reaches for the ceramic R2-D2 novelty salt shaker. “No, my humors have re-balanced themselves,” she replies, breezily. “I want a bison burger. With chimichurri. And feta.”
He squints. “It’s nine in the morning,” he starts to say—until he’s distracted by a group of guys lounging around one of the window tables because holy shit is that Vince and Greg’s fucking drug dealer?
Marcus has only met the guy once, at that party he’d punched Potter at. Dolohov had shown up with one of his junior dime-bag minions in tow, a girl named Millicent, and he’d proceeded to Frisbee-throw his AmEx at Daphne’s forehead when she’d drunkenly demanded that someone, anyone, take her to go get Taco Bell—
“—prairie ghosts in Montana—” Luna is chattering on. “ —fascinatingly violent Silver Rush in 1860, Daddy refers to it as a miniature apocalypse—”
—and Marcus is almost positive that the shady-looking guy with the scraggly black beard and the brown leather bomber jacket who’s currently sprawled out in a rickety antique diner chair…well, his name is Antonin Dolohov and he is weirdly out of place in Butt-Fuck-Nowhere, Idaho.
“—baby formula and scarab beetles—” Luna continues, fiddling with an elaborate straw-wrapper accordion chain that she’d apparently just made. “ —always hated Horus, though, the point of sunshine shouldn’t be to overpower everything else—”
“Luna,” Marcus interrupts, lowering his voice and leaning across the table.
She blinks. “Yes?”
He glances furtively around the diner. “See those guys over there? By—by the jackalope?”
“The hipster and the drug dealer?”
“There’s a third, too.”
“He’s asleep against the window, can’t you hear him snoring?”
“Is that—wait, really? That’s what that sound is? I thought…I dunno, a search and rescue helicopter, maybe—”
“I like his hair,” Luna muses. “It’s hard to get blue to stay that bright. Do you think he’d tell me what he used to dye it if I woke him up to ask?”
Marcus blanches, opening his mouth to respond just as the Hipster—whose jeans are fucking painted on, Jesus fucking Christ, there’s no way that fucker’s got underwear on—begins to loudly complain about…everything.
“—don’t want any of those shitty corporate popcorn-machine IMAX theaters, okay? And this is what’s wrong with, with bucolic small-town America, right, this is what I’ve been saying, man—where’s the art? Where’s the culture? Who the fuck do I have to quote Reservoir Dogs to so I can get a cup of coffee that wasn’t made on the scoliosis-stricken backs of our third-world brethren? I mean, come on, paper filters? Just get a fucking Wal-Mart tattoo on your ass, you’re literally part of the problem—”
Luna wrinkles her nose. “He’s wearing an Alexander McQueen scarf,” she whispers, uncharacteristically incredulous.
“Tom,” Dolohov interjects, producing a duct-tape wrapped iPhone from his interior jacket pocket and shooting the Hipster a decidedly disgruntled glare. “Just…fuck, man, just shut up. If you need to rant about how the free-range egg industry is taking the ‘free’ out of our ‘freedom’…I don’t know, do it on your fucking blog or something, shit, it’s too fucking early for this.”
“Fine,” The Hipster huffs, jerking his chin at Dolohov’s phone. “What are you doing, anyway? Texting your dynamic duo Cro-Magnon stoner pals?”
Without warning, Blue Hair’s snoring dramatically increases in volume.
“I’ve changed my mind,” Luna murmurs. “I think he’s pretending to be asleep.”
Dolohov sighs. “I’m…you know. Checking my email. Reading TMZ. Going through Twitter. The fucking usual, Tom, what the fuck does it matter?”
The Hipster scowls at his corn beef hash. “Ah, yes, the plebeian socio-political construct of the Eternal Twitter Struggle,” he drawls acidly, poking at the jackalope head with the tines of his fork. “Hashtag boring, hashtag clueless, hashtag take me to the year 3000, hashtag Nick Jonas—”
Blue Hair suddenly sits up with an elephant-trumpet groan and fucking skewers the Hipster with a deeply unimpressed glower. “Look, fuckface, I don’t give a rat’s hairy rectum how much money my bro here happens to owe you—I will kick your scrawny white ass from here to fucking Coachella if you don’t quit your bitching. Okay?”
The Hipster narrows his eyes, fine-boned features shifting into a mask that’s kind of hysterically dangerous considering the chunky eggplant knit beret he has perched on the crown of his head. “Oh? With what, Scabior? Your drumsticks?”
Blue Hair snorts and waves his middle finger around in an exaggerated figure-eight pattern. “Hey, Ant-Man,” he grunts.
Dolohov looks up, expression cagey. “Yeah?”
Blue Hair smirks. “Do you think they even, like, have gun laws this many miles from a functioning airport?”
Luna emits a tiny little squeak of a giggle and claps her hand over her mouth. “I like his pants, too,” she confides to Marcus, tone dreamy. “They’re so plaid.”
(11:43 am) doesn’t a “””””group outing”””””
(11:43 am) sound like a hella fucking bad idea
(11:44 am) just
(11:44 am) endless misery
(11:44 am) and temper tantrums
(11:45 am) and soy chocolate fro-yo ending up in malfoys fucking hair again
(11:45 am) ha
(11:45 am) remember that joke i made about hair gel after that
(11:45 am) im the fucking best
(11:45 am) ?
(11:46 am) you were the one who started the food fight
(11:46 am) EXACTLY MAN
(11:46 am) i fucking
(11:47 am) i blackout or some shit
(11:47 am) like
(11:47 am) i can only listen to pansy and daphne talk about breadsticks for so long before my hindbrain takes over
(11:48 am) u feel me
(11:49 am) i think breadsticks are an inside joke with them
(11:49 am) wait
(11:49 am) really?
(11:50 am) like
(11:50 am) how
(11:51 am) keep a brother informed
(11:51 am) idk
(11:51 am) …
(11:51 am) ???
(11:51 am) !!!
(11:52 am) it would just be weird if they talked about actual breadsticks that often
(11:52 am) u know
(11:53 am) i mean
(11:53 am) blondie talks about ghosts way more often than they talk about breadsticks
(11:54 am) that reminds me
(11:54 am) we need a piece of your hair
(11:57 am) ?????????????????????????????????????????????
(11:57 am) and also
(11:57 am) FUCK no
(11:57 am) why not
(11:58 am) ?????
(11:58 am) uh
(11:58 am) bro
(11:59 am) maybe the sex fumes are scrambling your brain
(11:59 am) but
(11:59 am) you just asked me for a piece of my hair and provided me with absolutely no justification
(11:59 am) and
(12:00 pm) honestly
(12:00 pm) the context was
(12:01 pm) just
(12:01 pm) u know
(12:01 pm) HELLA questionable
(12:01 pm) like wtf man
(12:01 pm) does the ghost have a fucking spirit boner for pantene pro-v
(12:01 pm) luna wants to do a sacrifice spell
(12:02 pm) now that she knows its name is myrtle
(12:03 pm) and she thought that asking you guys for blood would be weird
(12:03 pm) oh my god
(12:03 pm) so hair is a loophole substitute
(12:04 pm) or something
(12:04 pm) idk
(12:05 pm) she needs genetic material
(12:06 pm) girls who wear as much pink as she does
(12:06 pm) should not be saying shit like “sacrifice spell”
(12:06 pm) and
(12:06 pm) “here let me gather some of your genetic material with these wicked sharp fucking sewing scissors”
(12:07 pm) that’s sexist
(12:07 pm) did granger teach u to say that
(12:08 pm) potter
(12:08 pm) actually
(12:09 pm) of fucking course it was potter
(12:10 pm) ANYWAY
(12:10 pm) if u touch my fucking hair
(12:10 pm) i will slap u with that giant slab of venison potter and malfoy brought back this morning
(12:11 pm) in protest of granger’s chickpea spinach omelets
(12:11 pm) everyone else already contributed hair though
(12:12 pm) even warrington
(12:12 pm) i had to agree to never call him cassie again
(12:13 pm) but
(12:13 pm) yeah
(12:14 pm) cassie is such a fucking tool
(12:14 pm) he gives really good birthday presents though
(12:15 pm) fuck yeah he does
(12:15 pm) like last year
(12:16 pm) he hired a contractor to fix that hole i punched in malfoys bathroom wall
(12:16 pm) and when I looked the guy up on angies list
(12:17 pm) he had like
(12:17 pm) ZERO COMPLAINTS
(12:17 pm) bro gives hella good presents
After lunch, they all wind up milling around the woods behind the cabin together.
Luna is clutching a pair of hugely intimidating binoculars with a sequined purple My Little Pony neck strap, Hermione has on knee-high argyle rain boots and a puffy white jacket that looks like it could conceivably double as a fucking airbag if the opportunity arose, and Blaise is shivering in a lime green Henley while muttering under his breath about black guys not being built for the fucking snow, shit, who’s saying rooster now, Malfoy?
Marcus slings an arm around Luna’s waist, and she burrows into his body, rubbing her nose against his shoulder.
Harry and Draco are both wearing hooded grey Washington Wizards sweatshirts—Pucey had made a joke about the happy couple finally matching; Daphne had promptly high-fived him—and Theo is playing soccer with a pinecone. Warrington and Pansy are arguing about which shade of fuchsia she should use for the cover of the portfolio she has to submit with her Parsons application.
“Does anyone want to help me look for chupacabra prints before we contact the spirit?” Luna calls out, tucking her fingers into the front of Marcus’s coat.
In unison, Harry and Draco seem to perk up.
“Aren’t those desert-dwellers?” Hermione asks, tone heavily tinged with exasperation. “In most Meso-American folklore—”
“If we only ever looked for things where we expected to find them, there would probably be far fewer discoveries of historical significance,” Luna interrupts coolly. “Chupacabra legends stretch as far south as the Andes Mountains, Hermione—there’s absolutely no evidence to suggest that they’re exclusive desert-dwellers.”
Hermione’s eyes widen a fraction, and Draco takes a hesitant step in her direction, hand outstretched.
A vaguely awkward silence descends.
“Right,” Hermione eventually replies, clearing her throat. “That’s…right. Of course. Chupacabra prints. Let’s…let’s do that.”
And then Luna is relaxing into Marcus’s chest again and Theo is blithely offering Hermione some of the whiskey in his ostentatious silver hip flask and Warrington and Pucey are making out against a Douglas fir and Daphne and Pansy are talking in hushed voices over by another tree, heads ducked and expressions pensive—
“—don’t drink all of it, fuck, what happened to ‘if you wouldn’t drink and drive you shouldn’t drink and ski’?” Theo is complaining, trying in vain to snatch his flask back from Hermione, who’s gulping from it like a fucking champ.
“I’m not skiing,” she snaps irritably, face screwed up with distaste, “I’m babysitting.”
And Blaise is staring at the compass app on his iPhone and looking around with panicked, wary confusion and Draco and Potter are pelting each other with snowballs, shouting about pillow forts and battle stations and I’m not the one who fucking cheats at badminton, am I, Malfoy—
“I like this,” Marcus suddenly says to Luna. “Being here. With them. And you. Especially you. I really…I like it, you know?”
Luna hums. “My mother used to say that love…it isn’t just about being happy in the present. That if you’re not surrounded by people who can make you excited for the future…that it’s not worth it.”
Marcus tightens his grip on her waist. “Yeah,” he replies, quietly. “That’s…I get that.”
She pauses.
She tilts her head back, a small smile hovering around the edges of her mouth—
And she doesn’t answer, not really, but she does lift herself onto the very tips of her toes to press a slow, soft kiss to his lips and he thinks—he thinks—
He thinks it might be a different kind of answer.
(7:00 pm) that
(7:05 pm) was
(7:06 pm) fucking CRAZY
(7:06 pm) like
(7:08 pm) myrtle the ghost had some shit to SAY bro
(7:25 pm) lunas pretty happy about how it went
(7:25 pm) yeah
(7:25 pm) although
(7:25 pm) i guess spirits aren’t normally so…whiny
(7:26 pm) ?
(7:26 pm) like myrtle the ghost
(7:28 pm) fucking read us the fucking riot act
(7:28 pm) hot damn
(7:29 pm) it was like facing malfoys dad
(7:29 pm) after we got detention for letting that bag of crickets loose in the girls locker room in the sixth grade
(7:30 pm) FUCK that
(7:30 pm) like for a man with hair like fucking rapunzel
(7:30 pm) hes hella scary
(7:30 pm) idk
(7:31 pm) he got me out of juvie early
(7:32 pm) and made sure snape was my parole officer
(7:33 pm) hes nice when it isn’t an election year
(7:36 pm) SHUT THE FRONT DOOR
(7:38 pm) malfoys dad is the reason we have snape in our lives
(7:38 pm) ??????????
(7:38 pm) ?????
(7:38 pm) ???????????????????
(7:39 pm) MALFOYS DAD
(7:39 pm) IS THE REASON
(7:39 pm) WE HAVE SNAPE
(7:39 pm) IN OUR LIVES
(7:40 pm) yes?
(7:40 pm) they never talk about how they know each other
(7:41 pm) but
(7:41 pm) they do
(7:42 pm) bro
(7:43 pm) dont play dumb
(7:43 pm) u know snapes my fucking idol
(7:43 pm) like i ASPIRE to his level of not giving a fuck
(7:44 pm) he fucking
(7:44 pm) WE CALL HIM THE SILENT KILLER
(7:45 pm) HE SENDS US EDIBLE ARRANGEMENTS WHEN WE GO A WHOLE SEMESTER WITHOUT SETTING ANY FOREST FIRES
(7:45 pm) HES LIKE SMOKEY THE FUCKING BEAR
(7:46 pm) IF SMOKEY THE BEAR
(7:46 pm) WAS REALLY SMOKEY THE BAT
(7:47 pm) AND NOW YOURE TELLING ME
(7:47 pm) THAT HES FUCKING
(7:48 pm) BEST BROS WITH LUCIUS MALFOY
(7:49 pm) like holy shit man i have so many QUESTIONS
(7:49 pm) like
(7:50 pm) do they have bro-cations
(7:50 pm) do they take selfies together
(7:52 pm) do they share hair care tips and pass them on to draco like the PRODIGAL FUCKING PAMPERED DRAGON BABY SON HE IS
(7:58 pm) TELL ME FUCKING EVERYTHING MARCUS
(8:00 pm) this conversation is really weird
(8:00 pm) im gonna ignore it
(8:01 pm) lame
(8:05 pm) oh
(8:06 pm) shit
(8:07 pm) luna and i saw dolohov at the diner this morning
(8:08 pm) he was there with
(8:08 pm) this guy with blue hair
(8:08 pm) and like this super tall douchey hipster
(8:09 pm) ?
(8:09 pm) jesus
(8:09 pm) idk who the hipster is
(8:10 pm) but the guy with blue hair is named
(8:10 pm) fucking
(8:10 pm) scabior
(8:11 pm) hes in that band vince and greg are always pretending theyre all into whenever they don’t want to admit they’re pretty monogamous with nicki minaj
(8:12 pm) ok
(8:12 pm) ?
(8:10 pm) no idea what the fuck theyre doing in idaho bro
(8:10 pm) maybe luna’s on to something with that fucking chupacabra treasure hunt
(8:12 pm) you called her luna
(8:14 pm) ANYWAY