Fic: Wish Long and Long (Part 2) (Dean/Seamus)

[wook77]

This was originally posted on slashfest and, now that we're allowed to post elsewhere... I'm posting here as well.

Title: Wish Long and Long (Pt 2)
Author: wook77
Requestor: chaeldub at slashfest
Fandom: Harry Potter
Pairing: Dean/Seamus
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: ~12,000
Warnings: Angst
Summary: You would wish long and long to be with him, you would wish to sit by him ... that you and he might touch each other.
Disclaimer: All recognisable aspects of Harry Potter belong to JKR and associated business partners. I make no profit from this.
A/N: Request was for "four years after the war, two friends find themselves crossing a line they never thought of". This isn't the original story I was going to tell. The original was smutty and dark but this story demanded a telling. A hundred thousand thank yous to my betas, yodels, janicechess, ficlette and why_me_why_not. Any and all remaining mistakes are my own. All Irish translations are taken from this site. Title and Summary taken from I Sing the Body Electric by Walt Whitman. Part 1.


Apparating was too much for Dean, as was Portkey. Instead, they took the ferry and then Seamus rented an auto for the rest of the journey to his da's farm. Dean flinched constantly, his lips pursed and his forehead wrinkled.

It was with gratitude that Seamus turned onto the lane. His sister, Fiona, was in front of the house, watching as the strange auto meandered closer. He could tell the moment she recognized him behind the wheel as her face lit and she ran inside. Before he could park, his mam and one of his other sisters, Mairin, rushed outside.

As soon as he was out of the car, they were fussing over him, brushing his hair out of his face or hugging him before touching his arm. Hearing a car door slam, Seamus turned and gestured towards Dean. "Mam, Fiona, Mairin, this is Dean."

"Cead Mile Failte!" His mam rushed over to embrace Dean but Seamus cried out and she stopped. "'Tis sorry I am. I'll be doing me best not ta forget again."

"It's quite alright, Missus Finnigan. I'm still getting used to it too."

Seamus gestured his sisters around the boot to start gathering up their bags.

"This way, then, we'll let the girls take care of your things. I'll show you your room." His mam gestured towards the house as she spoke.

"Girls?" Seamus demanded as they went into the house. Dean laughed and the sound was musical and peaceful.

That night found them sitting in the garden, a bird giving out a mournful cry as they settled into the bench. Seamus stretched his legs out in front of him and breathed in deeply. He could see Dean looking at him as he inhaled again.

"Do you smell that?" Dean shook his head. "Oh, Dean, breathe deep now. There's a lad. That is the smell of Ireland. It's a rich soil and a beautiful land. I'll take you walking soon and we'll explore the fields here, show you the wall I helped me da build when I was just a wee lad."

As the words slipped away, the silence grew as they both breathed. Seamus could see Dean drifting off to sleep so he stood and waited for Dean to wake enough to follow.

"Think you'll find your way to your room?" Seamus asked with a cheeky grin.

"If not, I'll just follow you since we're in the same room." Dean smirked as he shot back.

"Aye, well, there is that. Come along then. It's been a busy day for the two of us and knowing da, we'll be up before the dawn." Seamus reached out a hand to help Dean stand before he snatched it back. Dean only stared before pushing himself off the bench.

"Before dawn? You're taking the piss, yeah?" Dean asked as they started into the house.

"Afraid not, boyo."

When they reached the top of the stairs, they both turned into the first door on the right. A small light burned near the window and they both started to strip as they prepared for bed. Seamus couldn't help but snatch glances towards Dean. He told himself he was checking to make sure that Dean was alright and didn't need his bandages changed. He was lying to himself but he didn't want to acknowledge it.

After they were both down to their pants, they crawled into the beds on opposite sides of the room. "Ready, mate?" Seamus asked as he gestured towards the light. Dean nodded and Seamus extinguished the light.

His pillow felt hard as he turned onto his back. The blankets were scratchy and the sheets were far too stiff. Rolling back onto his side, he could see Dean lying on his side, staring at him. The faded light of the moon drifted through the curtains as they shifted in the slight breeze of the open window.

"Seamus?" Dean whispered. "You awake?"

"We just crawled in, of course I'm awake." They continued to stare at one another and Seamus felt warmth pooling in his chest. The room wasn't overly large and if Seamus reached while Dean did the same, they'd be able to touch.

"Thanks."

Seamus waited for Dean to continue. When he didn't, Seamus asked, "For what?", sounding confused.

"Getting me out of there and bringing me to your home. Thanks for helping me. I'm sure it's not going to be easy but I appreciate it more than I can say."

"You can thank me by not flirting with my sisters." Seamus teased.

"Cheeky bugger, you know I wouldn't do that. It would be like flirting with you." Dean teased back and Seamus couldn't help the small stab of hurt that shot through his chest. He ignored it though.

"Sod off, Thomas. They're pretty girls. Wait 'til you see Margaret Mary. She's a beauty, that one. It's a shame that she's married already."

"Will you tell me all the stories so I know 'em?"

"Aye, I can do that but in the morning, yeah? I'm tired as shite, that floor was fucking uncomfortable." Seamus held his pillow tighter, curling in on himself as he burrowed deeper under the blankets.

"Didn't have to sleep on the floor, git. Could've stayed at the bunker and just visited, you know. I didn't need you around the whole time playing nursemaid." Seamus snorted into the silence after Dean's declaration. "I wanted you there but I didn't need you."

"Go to sleep, sap." Seamus drifted off to sleep, the sound of Dean's breath soothing him as he went.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Seamus's prediction of before dawn proved incorrect as they woke to the sound of a tractor starting up in the fields. Seamus woke gradually, fighting to stay in the dream he was sure to not remember when he finished waking. They'd been walking hand in hand, he and Dean. The fields were green with the plants just starting to push out of the soil. Conversation was easy between them, like it'd been since they were eleven and Seamus had ducked into the compartment on the train that Dean and Neville had been sitting in.

The best part was that Dean was carefree again, peaceful and happy, instead of the slightly withdrawn and pain-filled young man he was now. Seamus would do anything to bring back that Dean. They'd learned their lesson the hard way, though. Time turners couldn't fix everything. Harry had tried it even though Hermione had lectured him for days on the dangers and how you couldn't fix the past. It had turned out alright in the end but it had required too much effort and too much time.

There were times that Seamus wasn't sure that that attempt wasn't the reason that the war had dragged on the way it had. He couldn't blame Harry for it, not now that he wanted the same thing. It wasn't even a selfish reason he wanted it, not really. He'd come to terms with his guilt over taking that leave - It had helped to bludgeon that Death Eater - that satisfying crack of fist into flesh had assuaged the guilt.

No, it was that he saw Dean watching as Hermione brushed a lock of hair from Ron's face or hugged Neville. He'd seen the envy and the want in Dean's eyes as Harry had come into Dean's room, triumphantly recounting a battle, practically skipping as he embraced everyone in the room. He wanted to give touch back to Dean because he couldn't conceive of never being touched by anyone ever again.

It was with these thoughts in his head that he finally woke to see Dean staring at him again. Seamus stared back, noticing the slight wrinkles pressed into his face by the pillow and the wrinkles on his arm from the blankets. Seamus envied that fabric. It wasn't fair that it was only human touch Dean couldn't have. It wasn't fair that Seamus realised what he wanted and Dean couldn't know.

"What were you dreaming about?" Dean whispered, as if afraid to break the moment between them.

"You and me. We were taking the piss and bumping shoulders. Do you miss it?" Seamus didn't need to define 'it', he saw that Dean understood by the closed expression on his face.

"Of course I do. Yesterday? I hated you." The words sliced through Seamus as his breath caught. "I hated that you were hugging your mum and I hated you for having that. Felt about two inches tall but I hated you and I hated myself for hating you."

Seamus didn't know what to say as they continued to stare and watch each other. He knew that his face was showing how much the words hurt; he could feel it pooling deep in his soul. It didn't make much of a difference that he understood where it was coming from. It still hurt.

"I don't hate you, you know. You're my best mate, more than, since we're being honest. I can't even tell my mum and family because they won't understand what happened, not really. I haven't even told them what we've been doing since we left Hogwarts. Can't do it, can't put that on my mum, she's already lost too much." Dean sounded so sad that Seamus couldn't take it much more, he wanted his Dean back, the cheerful boy with the quill in his hand, a devious smile on his face as he sketched McGonagall in a risqué position during Transfigurations.

Seamus didn't remember crossing the room and he didn't remember sitting on the edge of Dean's bed. If he'd thought about it, he wouldn't have done it but he wasn't thinking. He reached out a hand and touched the curve of Dean's chest where it rested under the blanket. "Christ, Dean. Christ." He couldn't think of anything else to say - there weren't words that properly conveyed 'so sorry you're stuck like this' after all.

The indrawn breath from Dean had Seamus flinching, pulling his hand back like that time he'd touched the hot stove when he was four. He even looked at his palm like it wasn't attached to his body.

"Do it again, put it back." Dean's voice was hesitant for all the demand.

There wasn't anything else Seamus could do but comply. They didn't break eye contact as Seamus's hand, shaking and scared, rested down onto the blanket once more. "Shay..." Dean trailed off but the wonder came through as Dean rolled to his back and Seamus's hand slipped from his side to rest in the center of Dean's chest. Seamus could see, in the grin and the relief, the Dean he'd missed. Hope bloomed as their smiles built, each feeding off the other.

"Does it... that is, does it hurt?" There was a flutter in his stomach as Seamus asked.

Dean didn't answer except to put his hand over Seamus's and he cried out in pain. Seamus snatched his hand back and jumped off the bed.

"Guess I'm not fixed after all." It was gut wrenching to go from that grin to this crushed expression.

"We'll get you fixed." Even as he promised, Seamus doubted that it would ever be fixed. The Healers hadn't been able to do anything about it, why did he think he could do it? As the breeze fluttered the curtains, he realised that he was standing in his pants in the center of the room. If they didn't dress and head down soon, his mam was going to come looking for them if she hadn't already left for her shop in town.

"Come on, lad, we'll get you an Irish fry. No one does breakfast like the Irish." As Seamus turned to rummage in his rucksack, he caught just a ghost of a smile on Dean's face and that was enough for now.

~*~*~*~*~*~

In the past, Seamus has cursed his mam and her ability to know far more than he'd ever wanted her to figure out. He had cursed her narrow-minded view of the war and Harry, how she'd only see what she wanted and wouldn't consider a disparate opinion. Their rows when he'd come back after Fifth Year and had shouted at her while she'd shouted back with the kitchen table between them. That summer was the worst of his life and he'd wanted to run away and become a rover or go to Dublin and earn his way in one of the shops there.

Dean had kept him from doing it, his sensible owls calming Seamus down while he'd sent back flaming remarks filled with vitriolic diatribes against his mother and the rest of his family for taking her side. They didn't know Harry, didn't know Cedric or any of the dead. They couldn't possibly know what it was to live with this. Some days, during that summer, Seamus wondered what it would be like to be in Dean's house where the war wasn't mentioned because Dean didn't have to bring it up; he could just say that he was doing well in his classes and leave it at that. His family didn't get the Prophet and didn't know the state of the world.

In all those days and years, Seamus had never considered what it would be like to be sharing his small room at the top of the stairs with Dean. At the time Seamus had decided they'd come here, he'd only wanted some time for Dean to breathe in the peace and serenity of the countryside, get a bit of colour back into his skin, add a bit of lightness to his step.

They'd had owls, of course. They weren't completely unaware of what was going on with their mates. It was getting harder to hide the owls asking Seamus when he was coming back to assist in the war; they needed him, they were feeling shorthanded with both Dean and Seamus out of commission, they'd been attacked and no one could cast a hex the way Seamus could, no one cheered the others when they needed it like Seamus.

Their last trip to St. Mungo's had given them a bit of hope as they'd discussed that morning when Seamus had rested his hand over Dean's side with the blanket between them. Since then, Dean had tried gloves but the leather had burned. Wool wasn't much better.

But after their last trip to St. Mungo's, Seamus appreciated his mam as she'd come along on the journey and had taken Dean home while Seamus had stayed to meet with McGonagall and the Order. Seamus pretended he didn't see the envy as Dean tossed one last look behind him, pretended he didn't see the abandonment in Dean's eyes as he left him for the first time in months.

They'd understood, some more than others, why Seamus was resigning his post. He'd be there if things got desperate but they were winning, at last, and that had come about while he'd been out of it. While Ron had shouted about Seamus leaving when the going got tough, Harry had been a quiet supporter who settled the argument. Neville had been a bastion of strength for him as well.

The arguing had taken its toll, though, as it had consumed a week of time that Dean had been left with his family and God only knew what his family had told Dean. They'd felt free to discuss potty training and Seamus's habit of running around starkers up until the age of ten in front of Seamus, so he could only dread the stories that they'd share when he wasn't around to keep them slightly sensible.

Seamus appreciated his mam more than ever when he heard Dean laughing like he had back at Hogwarts, before the injury and before the war. He wasn't sure how long he stood outside the kitchen door and listened to them talking but when he finally opened the door, his steps were lighter than they'd been in four years. His heart lightened when they included him in the conversation, arrayed around the table and with warm milk and his mam's biscuits in front of them. This, more than the air outside or the green of the fields, was what he'd missed and he hadn't even realised it until he'd gotten it back in this moment.

~*~*~*~*~*~

When he'd been little, Seamus had gone with his family into town to the small church there and listened as the priest had lectured, cajoled and laughed his way through the readings of Peter, Paul, Mark and Matthew. He'd worried over sinning for the longest time, sure that he would be going straight to hell for stealing his sisters' knickers to put on the sheep or that time he'd eaten all the biscuits out of the tin and then blamed Dermot for it.

His First Confession had been a scary proposition as he'd climbed into the Confessional and had chanted what he'd secretly written down on the palm of his hand. "Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned...". After he'd confessed to his transgressions - some he'd invented to make up for the ones he'd forgotten - he'd spent a good two hours on his knees reciting the Hail Mary and the Apostles' Creed and the Our Father.

It'd been years since he'd been to Confession as he'd never bothered with Confirmation. He didn't have time, what with the war and defending a home that didn't even know it was in need. Right now, however, he wondered if he'd get his soul back if he went into that Confessional and talked to the priest about what he was feeling, dreaming, wanting.

Surely watching his mate dress and undress and then waking up with Dean's name on his lips, sure that the sound was still trembling in the air, was enough to send him straight to Hell without the benefit of a trial, no matter what he confessed to or how many Hail Marys he recited with the Rosary in his hand. If that wasn't enough to send him to the Burning Gates, he was sure that those moments he was tempted to touch Dean, regardless of the pain he'd cause, would do the trick, possibly even get him an interview with the big man himself. He'd tried it without seeing the priest - late at night, in his bed, under the covers, thumbing over the beads and warming them in his palm as he'd recited prayer after prayer.

It hadn't worked, just like the monthly visits to St. Mungo's hadn't worked for Dean. After the initial excitement over that touch that haunted Seamus's dreams still, they hadn't found a combination of fabrics that allowed Dean to touch or be touched for any length of time more than a few seconds through a thick layer of cloth. The Death Eaters Seamus had attacked hadn't known anything and Malfoy had died and taken the secret of the spell to the grave.

There were times that Seamus wondered if God had damned the two of them because Magic wasn't approved by the Church. Hadn't the Church burned witches at the stake for being unnatural? Perhaps God had taken it into his head to damn the two of them this way. It wasn't fair, as Seamus wasn't even sure about Dean's thoughts on Church and such; neither of them had gone since they'd moved to Ireland and his mam hadn't forced them to accompany the rest.

So it was that Seamus found himself sitting in church between his mother and the aisle. He stood when required, the prayers and recitations pouring off his lips as if it hadn't been six years since he'd last been to church. He kneeled and prayed, his thoughts on Dean back at their house alone with a book in the main room. He stood and joined the procession of faithful as they journeyed to the priest in front of the altar. He opened his mouth to receive the Body and sipped the wine for the Blood. He walked back to his pew, kneeling in front of it for his recitation of prayers and his only prayer, repeated only the once in hope that it would be heard for being all that more fervent. Please, Lord, Dean, just fix Dean.

~*~*~*~*~*~

It was peaceful in the garden at this hour. With Mairin off with her lad, Margaret Mary at home with her husband, Fiona helping his mam with some project or another and Dermot and his da out for an evening at the pub, Seamus and Dean found themselves alone there in the garden while the fairy lights twinkled above them. They'd had five visits to St. Mungo's since Dean had been released. He wouldn't dwell on the injury or that Dean had refused to go back for more treatments, though, as that was for Dean to decide on.

Instead, Seamus dwelled on the small talk between them while the sounds of the farm soothed.

"Do you think your mum will make the brown bread for tomorrow's meal? No one else does it like she does." Dean sounded wistful and Seamus smiled into the growing darkness.

"Aye, if you ask her, I'm sure she'd be willing. If I'm the one doing the asking, I'm sure she'd tell me to piss off and make it meself." They both laughed before the silence settled once more.

Seamus wanted, so very fiercely, to lean over and rest his head on Dean's shoulder and to have Dean's arm come swinging around his own shoulders, holding him close. It'd happened in his dreams so many times that he just thought that maybe this time, it would be able to happen here and now. He'd never try, though.

"Need topped off?" Seamus gestured towards Dean's almost empty cup of tea.

"Anymore and I'll be up pissing all night." Giving credence to his words, Dean tossed the dredges onto the rosebushes next to the small bench where they sat, arms and legs almost touching but not quite.

When a bird starting singing in the trees in the back of the garden, Seamus looked to Dean and Dean looked to Seamus.

"They're playing our song," they spoke in tandem, grinning at one another before sobering and leaning ever so slightly closer. Soon, Seamus could feel Dean's breath drifting over his lips. If he closed his eyes, it was almost as if they were pressing lip to lip, kissing, finally.

"Shay..." Dean's voice was low and erotic and sent a thrill racing down Seamus's spine.

"I know, Dean, Christ but I know. Me too."

As night fell, they stayed as they were, a breath away from one another, pretending and dreaming. Conversation slipped away but that was alright with them. They didn't need the words because they knew.

~*~*~*~*~*~

Spring was Seamus's favourite time of the year. It always seemed like his forefathers, the ones that had fought for the land and the freedom of the Irish people, were sending their blessings out on that land as it started to bloom. Perhaps it was fanciful but he thought maybe it was their blood and sacrifice that allowed the plantings to be so successful and not the chemicals and sprays his da used to keep the crops fertile. He liked to think that it was because they were Irish and they were farming the land instead of bathing it in blood again.

It was during this spring that Seamus and Dean received the owl that informed them that the Wizarding world would also stop bathing the land in blood. Voldemort was dead; the remnants of his supporters were either dead, imprisoned or being tracked down. After over four years of war, there'd be peace but not without its victims.

One of those victims was walking beside Seamus through the fields while Seamus's new Irish Wolfhound, Dougal, gamboled about, chasing after rabbits. After almost a year of suffering, Dean seemed at peace with the idea that he wouldn't get better. They'd both become resigned to it, even if Seamus wanted more. That, too, was something that he'd resigned himself to. There wouldn't be more, no matter how much Seamus wished otherwise.

There wouldn't be walks in the fields with their hands entwined and there wouldn't be kisses under the shade of the giant old tree near the ruins at the corner of their land. There wouldn't be any hands ghosting down his chest that weren't his own nor would he be threading his fingers into Dean's hair, the roughness of it prickling his palms. There wouldn't be the brush of fingertips when they passed the salt between them and the shy smiles that touch would cause.

Seamus wouldn't trade this moment for those touches, though, not really. The lack of touch had created an intimacy between them, intensifying the small things. The inflection of words or the glances shared all too often between them, the assurance that the other would be there when one woke, all of those things meant more than a hand cupping a cheek or brushing a lock of hair from the forehead.

They finally settled at the rock wall Seamus had described to Dean those long months ago in their shared bunks. Seamus hopped on top of it, walking around with arms akimbo while Dean settled and watched. Hamming it up to make Dean laugh, Seamus pirouetted, catching his balance before he fell.

"Get down before you crack your skull, wanker," Dean laughed even as he ordered.

As always, Seamus was quick to give Dean what he wanted, flopping down onto the hard rock next to him. He wouldn't admit that his arse hurt from the rapid descent. Instead, Seamus rested his hand a hairbreadths from Dean's on the cold rock while their legs angled out to touch the ground. The temptation to touch was always there but Seamus tamped it down as he smiled at Dean. He knew Dean was doing the same as he smiled back at Seamus.

They didn't need the words between them, they showed it in all the little gestures.


Translations:

An Gorta Mór - Irish term for The Great Famine

Cead Mile Failte - Irish welcome - Literal is A Hundred Thousand Welcomes

céilidh - Irish for a party, normally informal and with music and dancing.

Tá mé chomh mór sin i ngrá leat - Irish for I love you so much.

As always, I'd love to hear what you think. Concrit Welcome

Comments

[stepps.livejournal.com]

Oh, lovely story! So bittersweet that Dean doesn't get cured and Seamus never gets to touch him :( Loved the features of Ireland, too.

Here via a rec on crack_broom

[wook77.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I really wanted to show that sometimes, you take what you can get and make your own happiness. I've thought up ideas how to "fix Dean" but that would only ruin the overall effect I was going for.

I couldn't resist adding my favourite bits of Ireland into the story. I love stepdancing and the music and the breakfasts and.... well, most everything, really.

Thanks again! I appreciate the comment!!!!

[secretsolitaire.livejournal.com]

Gah. I admit I was hoping you'd fix Dean somehow, but this ending is fitting in a bittersweet way. *sad sigh*

I adored the way you captured Ireland here though, the music and dancing and food and fresh air. I lived in Scotland for a while, and the ceilidhs I went to there are some of my best memories. ♥