Title: Point of Return
Author: Penguin ()
Source work: Snog by Yasmin
Rating: Pg-13
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
I didn't see him until I was about to step through the opening, into the darkness beyond it. I turned around and he was standing behind me. Light fell from behind him and was in my eyes, and at first he was only a silhouette with a blue aura. Then he moved a little so I could see his face, his eyes and the blond hair. I don't know what I expected him to do. Hex me, curse me, impale me on the sword he carried. I didn't expect him to smile in a grave sort of way and speak to me.
"Make sure you come back," he said.
I laughed. It was strange; I didn't find it funny in the least, but that laugh just came out.
"If I do, it won't be for you," I said.
The smile died.
"I know," he said. "But come back all the same."
"It's not likely."
"No. But I'll be waiting for you".
He touched my shoulder as if for luck. I turned away from him and climbed through the opening.
* * *
There was darkness like I had known there would be; there was struggle and pain and there were riddles and duels. I did well. And when I had come through all the challenges and finally met Him, I did well again. I killed him. He nearly killed me too, but when we lay on the stone floor side by side, as we had fallen, I was the one still breathing. I was tired, so tired, every joint and every bone aching, every inch of my skin bruised. It was dark around me and I didn't know how I would ever be able to return.
Then I heard Draco's voice inside my head, from far away and long ago, or so it seeemed:
"Come back. I'll be waiting for you."
And then I knew I had to.
* * *
I was told afterwards, by Dumbledore, that it was Draco who went to get me. I don't remember it myself; the darkness had taken me. I woke up in a hospital bed three days later, and Draco was there, true to his word. He had been waiting. His smile was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes � light from the window, and his smile. But then I was pulled into Mrs Weasley's arms and didn't see anything but floral patterns and red hair for a long time, while she sobbed and hugged me so tightly I could hardly breathe.
When she had left, Draco was still there.
* * *
A few weeks later, when I was well again, as well as I was told I'd ever be, we had dinner together in the Great Hall. There weren't a lot of people there; most of them had gone home. I don't remember what we had to eat. I only saw Draco.
It was so strange that I had never noticed his beauty before. Creamy, silvery pale... so smooth. But not cold. Strange that I had never seen the fire in him before, either.
I watched him so intently the entire time we sat there, that there was no time to notice anything else. I watched his lips and his eyes and his hands, and they all spoke different languages � his lips made conversation, his eyes said "please". His hands were bolder. They said "I want you".
It was... magic. Ridiculous as that comment is, it really was magic.
When I lay on the stone floor next to my enemy's dead body, I thought I'd never get warm again. But by the end of that dinner, I was warmer than I had ever been.
Draco was warm, too. We went outside, and I wondered if my hands were saying the same thing his were. From the way he looked at me then, in the soft dusk of the summer evening, I think they may have been. His eyes were direct and shy, bold and frightened.
He was wearing a brown silk shirt that brought out his colours. His eyes were a clear, almost radiant grey and his cheeks and his lips had a pink tinge I wanted to touch and own.
I pulled him in under the big chestnut tree, under the canopy of new little parasol leaves, and didn't let go of his arm. We stood there for a while, motionless; feeling the other's breath on our face, feeling the close warmth of another human body. So different from lying on the floor next to someone who was really not there, who was already getting cold.
I pulled Draco in under the tree, but he initiated the kiss. An arm sliding round my back, the other hand on my shoulder, and then his mouth on mine. That mouth that had held conversation while his eyes had pleaded. The grey eyes fell shut now. My glasses were knocked askew but I closed my eyes, too, and felt his lips on mine. Tentatively at first, and then firmly. Warm touch, warm and alive, and his tongue sliding into my mouth.
Oh, Draco.
We kissed for so long we lost track of time. Perhaps it wasn't long at all. It could have been minutes or all our lives. At some point, Draco let a finger slide down my arm, down the sleeve of my green top, pinching the fabric. He smiled, more with his eyes than with his lips, mumbled "Slytherin", and sunk back into the wonderful warmth of the kiss.
* * *
It's years ago now, but when I think back on that evening, I believe we have been returning to that kiss ever since. Sometimes I think it sealed something, and other times I think it opened the door to the rest of our lives. Or perhaps Draco's words did that, that horrible day when I went through the opening into the darkness.
"Come back. I'll be waiting for you."