Title: Falling

Author: Phoenix )

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.

Notes: Warnings for slash (of the boys with boys variety), character death, loads of badly written angst. This is me, working out my issues. Venture in at your own risk. Written for the "Seasons" challenge on the Armchair Slash Yahoogroups list. Dedicated to Jamie.

February is a month in-between. Straggling on the heels of January, it melts the remaining snow and coaxes the first few brave flowers into an early appearance. It promises exquisite beauty and then delivers a cold blast straight out of bleak mid-winter. It is a no-man's land of past and future blurred together, neither distinct.

This February morning was deceptively beautiful. Calm blue skies with just a few white fluffy clouds decorating them. The air was scented with green and growing things. There was a sound of trickling water somewhere, and birds that were returning along their migratory paths. It made me recall other springs.

It was a travesty.

I couldn't help but think that he would have loved this. It was surprising, really, considering how cold he could be, just how much he loved the flowers of February. How could it be so beautiful today, how could such beauty exist without him?

I remember when the call came. Five years ago, and the moment was clear and sharp in memory, as if it had just happened. "Harry, there's been an accident." I was enraged by how stupid it was, and how preventable. How could he do something so idiodic! He should have known better. He should have known.

On days like this I still catch myself laughing at a joke and thinking "Oh, I should tell Draco about that." And then the sinking sensation as I'd remember, and realize there was no way to do that now. He was dead. It was a desolate feeling, this permanent absence. It was a stone, cold and heavy in my chest. I carried it with me, everywhere.

It hadn't worked, in the end. My friends had warned me as much, and it turned out they were right. He and I were simply too different to coexist with any kind of sanity. We loved each other, yes, truly and deeply. But sometimes love wasn't enough. It was as though we brought out in each other not only the best, but the worst as well.

Finally, after months of painful craziness, I called it what it was: over.

Draco had been bitter. "You'll take me back yet, Potter," he had hissed.

I'd love to say I never seriously considered it, but that's not true. I missed him dreadfully. Well, I missed the good parts. The talks, laying in bed late in the morning discussing things I never did - never could - talk about with anyone else. The dinners, and the evenings after, when we'd walk and look at the stars and make plans. And the sex, of course. Oh, yes. Don't forget about the sex. There had never been anyone before or since who could make me feel the way Draco did. I suppose that had to do with the depth of my feelings more than anything. If I hadn't loved him as much as I did, as much as I do. Because I do. I still do.

I didn't missed the bad parts however. The screaming fights; Draco's increasingly erratic and outright bizarre behavior. Finding out that Draco had taken up the Dark Arts again - that was a blow I never recovered from. It helped me, I suppose, with my decision. At least it explained something about his behaviour. But every time Draco went over the top about something it felt like ice cold daggers twisting through my flesh. I couldn't understand how someone who loved me could simultaneously be so cruel and hurtful. And he knew - he knew how I felt. How could he not? My pain leaked from me in rivulets, puddling at my feet. He was compulsive, and I couldn't make him change. Eventually, something just broke inside me. I gave up, and ran.

I'd heard from Draco periodically after that - letters that spoke with double meanings. Hurtful words mixed with soothing suggestions. Promises with lies. Sugared poison. He would come back, if I wanted. We could even see a counselor, so I could 'work out' my 'issues'. I was sure he was still practicing Dark Arts, but I had no proof. At least Voldemort wasn't around anymore, so I didn't have to save the world. Good thing - I was in no shape for it. The world would have gone to hell if it had been left to me.

I never could say that I didn't love him. But then, when it came to leaving - it never was about not loving him. I just couldn't stand it anymore. Couldn't stand the dichotomy of being loved and cherished, on the one hand, and stabbed in the heart, on the other. Couldn't live with that twisted ambiguity.

And then the call came, and Draco was dead, and I fell to the ground, crushed like his precious flowers in a late winter hail storm. And the world had the gall to go on. It was surreal. I spent weeks haunted by something I once said to him: that it made me believe that the world was a good place, knowing that somewhere in it Draco was alive. No longer true, no longer. My friends worried about me - Hermione dropped by and made sure that I ate.

I dreamed about him. It was a precious sorrow, one I treasured and feared. He came to me in dreams. When I pointed out that he was dead, he explained it away, saying he'd been in the hospital for a long time. He wasn't dead, he was away on business. He wasn't dead, he was just... I spent night after night trying to convince him, but he wasn't having any of it. He always was stubborn.

There were nights when I would have given anything, done anything, said anything to bring him back the way he was. The way he was when... when it was good. I struggled to stop from blaming myself. Logically I knew it wasn't my fault, but I also knew that if I'd kept him with me he would still be alive. I would have found a way to keep him alive. Where there is life, there is hope. I had none now. There was no way to make it better, no redemption available for him now.

My friends had told me that I'd get over it. It would just take time. I'd meet someone else and settle down happily, and much better off than with Draco, in their opinion. Somehow it didn't work that way.

On the days when grief and regret didn't crushed me to the floor, I walked. Sometimes Hermione walked with me. We visited Hogwarts, walked around the lake, took trails through the Forest, no longer forbidden.

"Five years, Hermione."

She slipped her hand into mind, twining our fingers and squeezing reassuringly. "I know," she said simply.

"You'd think I'd be over it by now."

"Yes, I would have thought." She sighed. "Just goes to show I'm not as smart as I should be."

"Is it going to hurt like this forever?"

"I don't know, Harry."

"Not much comfort, are you?" I think I managed a small twisted smile.

"No." Hermione didn't smile. "And for that I'm truly sorry."

"You know what I think?"

"What, Harry?"

"I think that whomever said 'it's better to have loved and lost' was totally full of shit."

She nodded understandingly and we parted ways, me going back to my empty house and her to Ron and the kids.

February is a month of in-betweens. I wonder how long I'm going to be suspended here before I have the courage to move on. I suppose I hesitate because it will mean leaving him behind for good this time. But the truth is, he was lost to me already.

~fin~

REVIEW!


Back to Fanfiction :: Back to Seasonal Challenge :: Back to Armchair Main.