Splintered Promises

Splintered Promises

Ah! That time between the deed and the fall

is not up to all

but to one

who has eyes

and a sense

of time

***

Words can be hidden inside of themselves. Take goblin rebellion. Meanings? No line, none, lie, bribe. Or transfiguration. Meanings? Trait, fist, no gain. Finite Incantatum? Taunt, fine, can't tame. And finding them was far more interesting than actually reading the assigned material.

Ginny was sitting with her back against the chair and an open History of Magic book across her legs in the common room with Harry.

And she was terrified.

Ginny was so sure that someone would find her out and that would be horrible. It had just been too easy. Her heart sped up rapidly if anyone addressed her and she had been jumpy all afternoon and night as a result. Dinner was a catastrophe. She hardly ate anything and tried so hard to avoid looking across the hall (five sneaked glances told her she was wasting her time), that her mind felt tight, like it was being compressed into too small a place with too much information to bear.

Someone must know.

But the thing was, nothing had happened so far; life was beginning to go back to the boring pendulum swing that was comforting. She and Harry were doing their homework for tomorrow's classes in the common room; it was empty and there was a fire in the grate. Everything was fine.

Except for that it wasn't- not in the least. And all because of Draco. She had no idea what was going on with them- as soon as that though entered her head, she almost laughed at the absurdity of it. As if anything could happen. She had a boyfriend; she couldn't go sneaking off with another guy.

Only she had. And now she had no idea what to do.

She had contemplated telling Harry, but then nixed that idea immediately. What good would it do? It would just cause trouble; and for what? To clear her own conscience? How selfish was that? To add to all of this, she had no idea what Draco was feeling or if he even felt anything. With him, everything was possible- not that she actually knew him. Because really, she didn't. Ok, she knew him in the sense that his eyelids fluttered down when he kissed and he smelled like night air and he-

"Ginny? Are you even studying?"

Harry was grinning at her when she raised her eyes from her textbook. His hair was messy and his eyes were the same color as gems and he looked completely at ease. It made her sad in a way she had not expected.

"What? Oh- yes. I mean, not really. How did you know?"

He stretched out a crick in his neck and replied, "I think it was the glassy-eyed look or the fact that you haven't turned a page in half an hour. Or maybe it was your leg."

She blinked at him. "My... leg?"

Laughing, he moved from the couch he was lying on, sat down next to her, and nodded to her leg. She was wearing her school uniformed skirt. Against it her leg looked pale, marred only by a wild design of black ink strokes. She must have not noticed that she was drawing on her own leg with her quill. She burst out laughing.

"Obviously you were inspired to become an artist in the past hour," observed a clearly amused Harry.

"Obviously," agreed Ginny, trying to cut off her laughter. "Oh, wow, that reading assignment was much more distracting than I thought."

Harry looked away from her leg and up at her eyes. "What were you trying to distract yourself from?"

She blinked. "The... um, dullness of the....assignment." What had happened to her?

He looked mystified. "Ginny, you make no sence."

"Part of my charm," she replied with a nervous laugh.

Harry looked at her, grinning. It made her feel terribly guilty.

God, he really doesn't know. He thinks I'm still this perfect girl... and now I have to act like it.

So she closed her eyes when he kissed her. She tried so hard to lose herself in him like she had before. She ran her hands up his back, knowing she should touch him, but feeling as if she hadn't any right. His hands were gentle on her, slightly calloused from Quidditch as they ran through her hair. And just the thought of that stupid, stupid sport moved her mind. Suddenly she was with another boy and his hands had been strong, bending her, pulling her towards him-

"Prefect," she whispered to Harry, slightly breathlessly, as she pushed him away.

Harry pulled back, looking confused. "What?"

"Prefect," she informed him quickly, trying not to look at him. They were in a very awkward position on the floor with him half on top of her while she tried to prop herself up on her elbows. "And the duties that I have... as Prefect. I have them tonight and I have to, um, do them... like, now."

Harry was bemused. "Um, alright then." He helped her up from the floor and she straightened her clothes self-consciously. "See you later then?"

Ginny looked up from the ground, flustered. "What? Oh- of cource." And with a swift kiss on the cheek, she was gone through the portrait hole.

Harry stood there for a few seconds, watching the portrait swing shut after her and shook his head. What on earth was that all about?

***

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

Ginny chided herself as she made her way around the deserted school. She was so monumentally stupid. If she kept this up, this sort of scared timidness- almost like a frightened little rabbit or something equally as stupid- someone was going to catch on. It wouldn't be that hard really, to put it all together. It's not as if she was a particularly subtle person and if Draco said anything, even jokingly, well, she was screwed, basically. Swearing, she turned a corner to the Charms hallway, barely seeing it.

"Ah. The sun sets and she appears."

You have got to be kidding me.

He was standing there, leaning against the stone wall as if he did so every night. Maybe he did, she though scornfully. Don't assume he's here for you. But that didn't stop her heart from speeding up until she was sure he could hear it.

She walked towards him, trying, she hoped, to look unconcerned with his sudden appearance. "That's rather poetic for you, isn't it?" She sighed, then and moved more until she could see him properly. "You know I could give you a detention for this right?"

Draco raised an eyebrow. "I'm terrified," he deadpanned, then checked himself at her expression. "No, really, I am. All that rule breaking," he continued, smirking now, "and at night too, really excites Filch. And believe me, that is not something you want to see."

Unwillingly, she felt a smile twitch the corners of her mouth. She forced it back down. "Well, in that case... maybe I'll let you off with a warning this time."

He grinned, remembering. "Special treatment?"

Her heart sped up. "You wish," she said. It really was amazing that he had as much an effect on her body as on her mind when they weren't even touching.

But then they were.

He brushed away a tendril of her hair. How had he gotten so close? "What do you wish?" His voice was unconcerned, his eyes impassive.

She closed her eyes. I wish you didn't smell so good. I wish I had never gone to you after the game today. I wish I could be normal and not do these things to the person I care about. I wish I could be as good as he thinks I am. I wish you weren't here, knowing you have an effect on me. I wish I could still kiss him and not think of you. I wish you would go away.

I wish you would never leave.

Forcing herself to open her eyes, she met his. "I wish you would never tell." And she kissed him.

***

There is an art to temptation.

It starts with a secret; no one can know. That's the easy part, the subtle part. The real challenge is the manipulation. You have to be in their head, catch on to their thoughts and don't let go. They want you there. They want those thoughts of 'what if,' and 'can I,' and my personal favorite: 'I want.'

Temptation is selfish- to all those involved. It has to do with desire and betrayal and doing exactly what you shouldn't. So don't cross that line.

Make them do it.

Make them want that uncertainty, that sort of snake with the forbidden fruit that they want to choose.

Because it is a decision. It all comes down to that line that is so plain it glows against your heart, burning right through to the core of what you are. It's either right or wrong: two paths marked.

So blur it out until it's not clear anymore.

It's not easy; it's not nice or safe, but we all do it.

We all play the game.

***

Ginny was trying really hard to pay attention. She kept her eyes focused on McGonagall as the stern witch paced the room and Ginny forced her ears to listen to the lecture on the day after she had cheated twice.

"Spell reversal charms are a basic spell; yes this is true. However when the spell to be undone is more complex, the more difficult it is to reverse. For instance, to reverse a body bind spell is fairly simple. It is- I hope- a skill you have mastered in your previous classes. Contrastingly, to reverse, let's say, a complex human or animal transfiguration spell, a great deal more effort and power is needed to be successful. Today we will be attempting to use the finite incantatum incantation on these rabbits that were once turtles. If done accurately, this spell shall reverse the animals to their original state. Now, to perform this higher level of..." Her voice trailed off.

Ginny propped up her head on one hand and gazed distractedly at her teacher's wiry head of hair that strained her facial features to prominence, but not really seeing it.

She was going back in time to last night when she and Harry were studying. Well, they had started out studying; but, as they were alone in the common room having skipped most of dinner, their books soon lay forgotten near the fire- at least for a moment before she pushed him away just to hurt him again.

It was a very strange feeling to be kissing Harry right after- and before- kissing Draco. And she couldn't help comparing the two. Harry was more gentle to the point of frustration, timid but nice all the same. And his hair was very dark and adorably untidy and his eyes were intense to stare at, but it just felt... weird after Draco. Now Draco was anything but timid. He knew exactly what he wanted and never asked permission. His eyes were hard to look at, a stormy gray she could get lost in if she wasn't careful. And he was fierce in a way that kissing Harry never was. In fact, he was everything Harry wasn't. He was cold and smug and spoke his mind. He could grab her to the point of pain only to hover over the heat on her skin until she shook with an apprehension that made him grin.

She blushed in her seat and shook her head to chase away thoughts. Comparisons are stupid, she told herself. Stop that. She tapped her quill distractedly against the wooden desk. Knock on wood, she though wryly. She realized that this was a very appropriate time to do such a thing because she did not want to get caught. She knew she should feel bad, and she did; she really did, to a point where that pain was almost physical. But she was quickly learning that it was just so much better to ignore that because then life was easier as her choices disappeared.

But it did make its appearances.

Today, for instance, she had been walking hand and hand with Harry to lunch; Draco had been coming from the Great Hall and they had crossed paths. They had not made eye contact although she did try to. It would have been nice, if he had looked at her. Maybe a little smirk that only she would see? But all he did was brush a little closer to her than any other person would, and just that, that little nothing, made her feel more than she did holding hands with Harry. And that, in turn, made her stomach twist up when she looked at Harry again with his easy smile and bright green eyes that noticed nothing. It almost made her want to tell him- almost. How easy would it be just to say it, right then? But she didn't- not about the game, or about the night before, or about the hallway that day.

Secrets, you know, are relative.

***

Draco was waiting, and it irritated him. He hated waiting for others; he should be the one to keep everyone else checking their watches, but if anyone broke the rules, it was her. Her, with her long red hair and freckles and that frustrating mixture of innocence and experience that drove him up the wall- in a good way of cource.

The only thing was that he couldn't predict her anymore.

He was sure that she was going to break it off before now. His bet was that she wouldn't even start. But she had. That day in the locker room when she had come, shivering and sneaking around, had surprised him as much as his team's defeat didn't. The blush that spread up her chest and neck when he looked at her made him realize something else: Harry really didn't have her after all.

Sighing, thoroughly annoyed, he leaned against the desk in the deserted classroom, watching the moon shine through the glass in the window, a light in a room of darkness, until he heard the distinct sound of her footsteps. He grinned.

She always came- always.

***

"When do you have to be back?" His voice moved over her skin like a whisper.

She kissed him, her mouth like a brand. "Not for a while; I can stay."

"Good." And he pulled her on top of him. She giggled into the part where his neck met his collar bone and he felt it all the way down to his bare feet on the blanket that they had conjured out of nowhere; stone was cold and uncomfortable.

"I just have this stupid essay to write for McGonagall; I swear she has something personal against me. She assigned eighteen inches on-"

He silenced her with a kiss that was anything but sweet. "I really don't care."

She frowned, knowing he didn't really mean it. "You just pretend to be interested don't you?"

"Part of my charm," he quipped, running his hands along her skin until she breathed him in, shaking slightly.

But she was determined to not let him have the last word. "But I do have to be back soon; I promised Harry he could help me with it when we do our homework tonight when I get back. Which means," she said, pushing away his hands, "that I actually have to go now." She made to get up, but he pulled her back down next to him, multiplying kisses.

"Oh yes," he said into her ear. "Harry, your study partner," and she felt his smile against her neck. "Do you guys even do anything anymore?"

She pushed him away, fighting down her own embarrassment. "He's my boyfriend. Just because I don't share every little detail-" She broke off, knowing he was just riling her up; so she smiled sweetly and crawled over him until his eyes were half-lidded. She put her face close to his. "Wouldn't you love to know if I'm the same with him as I am with you?" And with a laugh, she slid off of him slowly and pulled on her uniform, smoothed her hair, and made to walk out the door.

She had made it maybe four steps before he called her back, laughter in his voice.

"Uh, Gin? You might want to come back here."

She narrowed her eyes. "What?"

His teeth were a white flash in the darkness. "Your neck..."

She sighed, not believing that she almost forgot. "Can you...? I can't see."

"Come here."

She walked over to him, now sitting up, and she knelt down next to him, pulling back her hair from her face so he could fix her up.

He moved his wand from the bottom of her ear to the opening of her blouse, a low light emanating from it. She could see his face now with him to preoccupied to notice her looking. He was pale, unsurprisingly as it was winter, and his eyes reflected the light from the spell; gray turned almost into white, like blindness. It highlighted the bones of his face and she swallowed; maybe she should have kept her eyes closed.

"There," he said, softly. "You're fine."

She looked at him as the wand light faded into the darkness, his face still imprinted into her mind like the edges of a memory coming back, and she ran a hand through his hair, suddenly not wanting to leave. He leaned into her touch and ran his fingertips up and down her arm, slowly, until she sighed and leaned against him.

"I thought you had homework."

"It can wait."

***

The guilt stops after awhile.

It happens suddenly- one day the thing that tore you apart isn't there anymore. But it's not like you still don't know it's wrong; it's that it ceases to matter. Feelings that came after you just fall away and without any threats, there is no fear. So, really, what do you have to feel bad about? No one's coming after you- you're fine. Keep telling yourself that. Keep turning off your mind.

Lie to yourself until it's true.

But once something leaves, another has to take its place. In this case: satisfaction. Or at least, something resembling it. Whatever it is, it makes you find amusement is everyone else. How can they not know? Do they not see the heat that comes off my skin in lazy waves? My hair that looks like I've just been flying? The electricity still fizzing on my nerve endings?

Maybe they just didn't want to see what he could do to me. Maybe it was better to not think about that. I wonder if- assuming you do it enough-you can make yourself believe it.

***

Care of Magical Creatures was on Fridays. Ginny made her way through the melting snow with the rest of her class, clutching her clothes around her; it was freezing.

"And then Terry said that I was being ridiculous," Hannah practically shrieked for the whole class to hear. "Which is just so ridiculous! He's the one who's so caught up in his stupid Quidditch when he's barely good enough to make the team. But do I tell him that? No! And you want to know why? Because I am actually a good person. I'm not going to poke a hole in his over inflated ego just because he's got a giant broomstick shoved up-"

"Gather 'round, gather 'round," said Hagrid jovially, beckoning the 6^th year class towards the snow dusted paddock. "Got a real treat for yeh today."

Ginny moved up with her friend, Hannah, currently in a fight with her on-again-off-again boyfriend, Terry Boot, to see what today's "treat" was this week. Last week had been kelpies and the week before that had been mutant gnomes the size of large dogs. She was really beginning to dislike this class.

And then she saw them.

Unicorns.

They were pawing the ground with their golden hooves and made all the snow around them look dirty. Their eyes were a deep brown and seemed skittish, like cats let loose in a room full of rocking chairs. Ginny couldn't take her eyes off of them.

"I know this is a bit differen' than most of the stuf' I've been teaching you so far this year, but Dumbledore though' it might be a good idea to... ah, 'branch out' a bit." Hagrid stroked his massive beard. "So, I brough' out the ol' unicorns like I did a few years back as most of yeh seemed to like them." He clapped his gigantic hands together and gestured to the unicorns. "Now, unicorns- oh! An' feel free to give a few pats as I'm talking'. Girls first though; they don' seem to like the boys as much. Anyways, as I was saying, unicorns-"

Almost all the girls in the class immediately approached the paddock, slightly warily though as they noticed the sharply pointed horns between each dark eye that glistened in the early morning snow. Ginny stood in line behind Luna and waited her turn as she listened to Hagrid talk about the many properties of their blood. Slowly, as no one wanted to stop petting the suprisingly docile creatures, Ginny moved up until she was right in front of one. It had an unmarred coat; there was no stain or spot anywhere and its horn was like that silver dust sort of makeup that some girls in school wore that Ginny though made them look like Christmas decorations. But on the unicorn, it looked very nice. In fact, the unicorn was all around perfect. Smiling, Ginny reached out her hand slowly to pat its neck.

And it practically decapitated her as it swung around abruptly to the other side of the paddock. Stunned, the class lifted its eyes to Ginny and then to the unicorn standing very still, far away from them. Its dark eyes were fixed on Ginny, looking- if she had to guess- all knowing and very disapproving. Shrugging it off, she turned to Hannah, who looked back at her questioningly. She laughed and turned back to Hagrid's lecture. But she didn't have to ask her professor why, out of all the girls in her class, the unicorn disliked her. She didn't even have to read in the school's library books to learn why it ran away. She already knew why the purest creature of all didn't really take to her.

She understood perfectly.

***

It becomes routine after awhile. I would study and do my homework with Harry or Hermione or Ron and then I would go upstairs and reapply my perfume, brush my hair, but never change my outer clothes because that would be suspicious. Then I would go out the portrait hole and walk purposefully to the place we had decided on previously. He might be there already or I may have to wait for a bit. But he would come eventually.

Later, I would crawl back into the portrait hole and feigning exhaustion, say I was going to sleep. As I swept around the group with their wide bright eyes and unconcerned manners, I would grin, thinking, you don't know me at all.

***

Ginny was being good. She was making rounds on a normal school night like she was supposed to as Prefect from 10:00 pm to 10:30 pm on Thursday nights. She had studied with Harry and kissed him before leaving the common room. And she was not meeting up with Draco as he had detention with Flitwick for "something too stupid to even explain," so, yes, she was being good.

She had already walked through the corridors near the Transfiguration classroom and the North Tower, a place she had caught more people than in any other location, and the main part of the dungeons. All she had to do now was a quick sweep of the East wing and she could be in bed by 11:00.

Leisurely running her hand against the stone wall as she walked, she made her way to the first corridor she had to clear. She kept her wand out despite knowing this search was fruitless. She really didn't care who was sneaking out or what trouble she might be stumbling in on tonight, because, honestly, it was so pointless. Not only did most students know what corridors were going to be checked at what time, it was a Thursday night and nothing unexpected happened then.

A giggle interrupted her lazy thoughts.

It was coming from the classroom about twenty feet ahead of her. Sighing at yet another prepubescent snog session that she ran into about once a week, she unlocked the door with a spell and cast her eyes to the young couple.

His hands ran up her arms and tangled in her hair as he moved his mouth to her throat, making her sigh. Her hands were busy running up and down his back and Ginny knew that he would be getting goosebumps because he always did when she touched him there.

They did not notice her, did not realize she was there.

So she banged the door against the wall with a smack that ripped them apart and, turning from the room, went back into a world that was closing in by the second.

Braced for the voice that would echo, she spun around and looked at him incredulously when he told her to.

"Pansy? Did you lose a bet or something?" Sarcasm is like a cast against your heart, holding it in place.

"Yeah," he smirked, "never play cards with Crabbe- he always cheats."

She folded her arms across her chest. "I'll keep that in mind."

"You can not seriously be mad at me," he laughed, his eyes widening.

When she did not say anything to that, he took a step towards her and reached out his hand, a smug smile quirking the corners of his mouth. "Ginny, angel, come on, don't-"

She flinched away from the taunting endearments he liked to cut her with. "Don't. Touch Me."

Coldness floated like a cloak around him. "Fine." He shrugged, lowering his hand. "It's not like I promised you anything anyway."

That night was the first time that Ginny realized that when you dance with fire, it will, even after warming you, sear you with a casual flicker of its flame.

***

I almost got caught once. Not by Harry, thank God, although it would have gotten back to him eventually. Actually, it would have immediately because it was Seamus and Dean who walked past the classroom near the Great Hall during lunch that day. Their voices were carrying and I was always nervous about these meetings in the middle of the day, but he told me it was fine and I went along with him.

I usually did.

Anyway, I heard their voices and I realized that Draco hadn't locked the door so I tore myself away from him and lunged for my wand. It took all of two seconds, but it felt like running through a dark tunnel waiting to see the light to know you are safe.

Of cource he though the whole thing was hilarious and my flushed face, disheveled clothes, and absolute terror made him laugh out loud.

Which made me hit him.

I slapped him hard, a red brand across his cheek, and he told me that if I ever did that again he would hit me back. I asked him what was so funny about us getting caught and he said that it wasn't that that was funny.

He said it was how scared I was of being found out. "You've already crossed more lines than I can count," he smirked, "what more do you have to be afraid of?"

I realized that day that even unlocked doors have their own secrets, that voices are like smoke signals, that he really didn't know me at all.

***

Ginny had been a bad mood for the past couple of days and Harry had no clue as to why. He had tried asking her what was wrong which turned out to be a bad idea because all he got from her were bitter remarks that "there-was-nothing-wrong-and-why-the-hell-would-there-be-something-wrong-and-go-away-now-please". He only asked once.

So he then tried to ask Ron; he was her brother after all. Maybe he knew what was wrong? But Ron had no clue- big surprise. He tried Hermione next, who assured him she would talk to Ginny as the two girls had become quite close this year. But Hermione had returned empty handed. Harry nixed the idea of going to any of Ginny's other friends as he didn't know them that well. He was stuck.

And, to cop it all, he felt supremely inadequate. He was her boyfriend. He was supposed to know how her mind worked and how she was feeling and know immediately what he could to do help. A real boyfriend didn't go around to all her friends and ask for help. A real boyfriend just knew.

He stared at Ginny who had now taken to glaring into the fireplace with her homework in her lap. He wondered what she was thinking.

***

It took a long time for her to be alone.

In fact, it wasn't until about 1 am that Harry, Ron, Hermione, and the rest of her schoolmates finally decided to go to bed. She assured them that she was fine and that she just needed a little more time to finish her homework; and no, she didn't need help, but thanks for the offer. Not that she was fooling anyone, she knew. Ever since she walked in on...them...Ginny had been a foul mood and couldn't hide it anymore. People came up to her constantly to ask what was wrong and she had to tell them at least five times that she was perfectly fine, just a bit stressed from all her schoolwork.

Not that anyone believed her.

And why should they? She was far from fine. And not just far from mentally fine. She physically hurt. She expected herself to feel angry, hurt, and very, very betrayed- stop and marvel at the irony. But she never expected that jolt of pain right in between her ribs that happened whenever she thought of them together. She never expected the almost constant headaches and the pain in her joints as if it hurt just to keep moving. No, this was the last thing that Ginny expected. Well, she thought bitterly, at least she still had Harry.

Yes, Harry; she still had Harry. Harry, who had no idea what was going on. Harry, who had no idea how to help. Harry, who was as clueless as ever and even more adorably pathetic for it. Harry, who she felt she was finally getting karma for hurting, not that he even knew about it.

She turned a page in her book listlessly, feeling morose, just as the portrait hole opened and Draco walked in.

Her head snapped up from her homework and she stared at him. He looked terrible. His hair was mussed about his head and his clothes looked slept in. Dark circles haunted his eyes.

Good, she thought grimly, feeling no sympathy.

He moved from the portrait hole and into her direct line of sight. Shoving his hands deep in his pockets, he looked down at her on the chair, her homework piled like little defense barricades around her.

"Hey," he said, almost shyly, standing near the opposite chair a good five feet away from her.

She blinked at him, incredulously. "Um, hi?"

"I was thinking we could talk."

Her mouth twisted into what might have been a smile, or maybe not. "You thought wrong." She gestured towards the portrait hole. "Please leave," she instructed, pretending to be interested in the Middle Ages' Civil War. "I'm busy."

"Ginny-"

"What?" she snapped. "Do you have something you want to say?" She glared at him, voice like ice. "Save it; I really don't care."

He looked at her, and for the first time, she felt a little bit scared of him. He seemed at the breaking point, one thread wasting away until he would snap. And she really didn't want to be there when it happened. She also wished he would leave so he wouldn't have to see her like this, and she was terrified that someone might come down and see them together; no lie could explain that, no matter how beautifully weaved it was.

"And I," he said coolly, "really don't care if you care. I just spent half an hour trying to convince your very nice portrait to let me in. I had to- well, I'm not going to tell you what I had to do. Suffice to say I won't do it again. So listen to me," he told her firmly, "when I've gone through that much trouble to talk to you, when, by the way, you have been avoiding me for the past week."

"Three days."

He rolled his eyes, then looked suddenly somber. "Listen," he said, rubbing the back of his hand over his eyes, and Ginny was struck painfully at how awful he looked. "I'm not good with things like these- to say something without poetry or quotes, or anything at all. So I'm just going to say this." He took a breath and sat down on the couch next to her chair. "You're different than her in a way I can't explain or really understand. And I like that, that you're different, that you laugh with your eyes and that your hair shines in the torches in my dormitory." He reached out and pushed a lock of it behind her ears; she closed her eyes automatically at his touch. "I like that you can be angry with me and tell me off and that you don't have to agree with me all the time. I like that you make me do things that are right. I like that... And I... I choose you."

There was a pause for several moments; it took a bit for Ginny to realize what he had just said. She smiled at him. He smiled back; maybe everything would be alright.

Still smiling, she asked, "So, you choose me?"

He grinned at her. "It wasn't even a decision."

"But you still chose me."

"Yes." Isn't that what I had just said?

"Are you serious?" She was still smiling, but there was an emotion behind her eyes he couldn't place.

Draco had a nagging suspicion that he had made an error in judgment. "Yes..."

She got up abruptly and Draco tensed, but she merely walked over the fireplace and picked up a hot poker. Draco tensed even more, eying the hot metal warily.

"So, I was pretty much an option, then?" She jabbed the hot iron into the coals. Fire sparks raced up the chimney like they were being hunted.

"That's not-"

"You chose me." Her voice was like a tightly wound musical instrument, high and piercing. She jabbed at the fire again and then looked at Draco in disgust. "Get out."

"I'm not just going-"

Ginny actually threw the poker into the fire where it sat, melting quietly in the flames. "Get. Out."

He left.

Ginny, breathing very shallowly, extinguished the fire and sat in the dark. She put her head down and did not move for a long while.

***

A heart doesn't break. No, really, it doesn't. A break is an accident that is fused back together by the glue of regret. It's a split into pieces that are found and never lost. It can be fixed as easily as a childhood mistake.

But not when it shatters. And it's not just because someone got careless and let it fall away from them; it's because that they threw it away from them and when it hit reality it just couldn't take the pure force of that impact.

So it's different from a break in that way. There aren't a few pieces that know how they go back together to function.

There's a million. And there's no point in even trying to put it back together; it will end up all wrong in the end: a lie with a promise, a secret with distrust, love and nothing resembling it. But even though everything's not the way it used to be- it still functions. But it's different. Those little pieces travel through you and lace you with the past. They move through your blood to every particle in your body until it consumes you. But the thing is... you still work. Your lungs still breathe in truth and your mind is as smooth as a whisper. Your heart still beats. But it's pounding now, beating with a pressure that shudders to your body exactly what will destroy it: Never again...

Never, never, ever again.

***

Ginny hated the snow near the Pitch. It didn't matter if it was new; everytime her boots crunched into the ground, her head was filled with all the old memories of unheard laughter, wolfish smiles, and moments so stretched out they almost snapped in half. Maybe it was because of those memories, playing like a movie she didn't want to see, that she called out her impulsions again.

He turned and she noticed how he changed the weather; air solidified into the consistency of cement and the snow moved under her feet. It really wasn't because of luck that they were alone. She knew his habit of walking around the grounds after matches when everyone else went to celebrate or drown their sorrows.

She had never asked him why he did it.

Sometimes she felt like she never really saw him. Other times she wondered if they knew each other too well with the easy conversation and the times she could feel when he entered a room.

She forced herself to concentrate on the present so to not totally lose herself in what had been. So she drew herself back. The cold was mocking as it raked her skin; his eyes looked right through her.

Sometimes you can choose to see only what you want to. Now, for instance, she blocked out the images that she didn't want to see: his hands on another's hair, his voice moving over someone else's skin.

Instead, she saw him grinning at her from across a full classroom until her cheeks burned and she could swear they were the only ones there. She saw him slip notes into her bag in a crowded hallway, a secret that no one would see. To block out these memories would be to deny what she had done and she had past that delusion long ago. She wanted to talk to him because to do anything else would be to face reality and she really didn't want to wake up. So she talked and without thinking about what she was saying, words spilled from her mouth like secrets.

"You were right," she said, stepping closer to him where he stood, clutching his broomstick with an ungloved hand, red and raw from the cold. It was a vulnerability that struck her.

"You were right," she repeated. "You didn't promise me anything. And I don't know what this is- but I know it's wrong." Her voice shuddered in the wind like moth wings against glass. "I'm not even supposed to be here...with you."

She looked up at the tower where in a room there would be streamers and warmth and laughter and wondered why more than anything, she would rather be in this cold. "And it sucks," she continued slowly, coming even closer to him until she could see the yellow in the snake's eyes on his uniform, the tension in the air.

She forced herself to look at him. "Because I like getting what I want as selfish as that sounds."

Her breath shuddered in the wind and she realized that this was doing nothing at all. She was saying the wrong things and he would notice. But did it even matter? He told her exactly what she wanted to hear and she walked away. She thought of him doing the same, turning from her until she couldn't see him anymore. When he said nothing she felt the air harden further.

"I should leave." She looked at the ground, at the snow. "I should go."

His voice was not unkind, but there was a slight mocking to it that reminded her of all that he knew. "So go."

She looked up, her eyes catching his. Her voice was glass breaking. "How can you just let me go?"

There is a breaking point, for everyone. It happens when her eyes are so brown you could drown in them, when the air is so sharp that it bites at you, when choices are so clear that they cut you.

"I can't," he said and he crossed that line.

***

Harry was looking for what was missing.

It wasn't the butterbeer that slowly slid down his throat nor the congratulatory slaps on the back that burned into him that he had done what was needed. It wasn't the laughter that echoed until his heart beat followed its pattern or the aura of celebration that pulsed through the room and through everybody inside it. That was all there with him.

It was Ginny who wasn't.

He had assumed that she would meet him up there after she congratulated him right after the game, but then maybe she had gotten separated or held up by a professor who saw her in the hallway. Glancing around the room, he took in Ron, tall and vivid, talking to Hermione avidly about the match.

"That bludger nearly took my head off, but I knew about what speed it was coming at me because Nott's got this real nasty way of chucking it-"

"It is rather amazing how you can just gauge the speed of an object like that when there are so many factors that affect its motion. I suppose it could be muscle memory from-"

"The only memory I have of it is when it didn't go through the hoop." He was grinning at her that told Harry plainly that she was all he saw.

"I seem to have forgotten that bit," she quipped.

"I could tell it again."

"Or I could get Luna to give me a recap." Hermione pretended to look around the room, her laughter struggling to escape.

Ron looked disappointed at this. "I don't think she's allowed in our common room."

Hermione turned her eyes to his. "Well, then, I suppose you'll just have to tell it to me again."

"No, I mean... it's fine if you-"

"Ron," said Hermione, putting her hand on his arm for the briefest moment, "I want you to tell it to me."

"Really?" His smile was a painting.

She nodded and Ron, grinning like an idiot, told the story that Harry was sure Hermione had already had memorized.

Looking at them, he saw the way Ron's eyes stayed on her, how hers glanced down occasionally, pink creeping up her cheeks from the butterbeer or perhaps from something else.

He looked more and saw the window they were standing in front of.

It was a backdrop of snow peaked mountains rearing above the forests that bordered the snowy grounds: layers of landscape that he knew so well.

But something was marring the picture.

Or rather, someone. No, more than one. Two people were standing in his line of sight. He could see them like two moving dark shapes against the white snow. They were tangled up in each other, so completely that they might have been one person. They could have been anyone, any two people in love.

Before, this might have made him jealous; that others had what he did not. But now he knew what they felt. He knew what her laughter sounded like when she couldn't keep it inside of her, how her breath stirred her hair when she fell asleep on top of her homework at night, how she could make him stop in his tracks, amazed at what he had.

Turning away from window, he went back to the party. He knew Ginny would come to him.

She always did.

***

They were laughing as they stumbled around the room, knocking into desks and clutching at each other, trying not to break apart even as he lifted her shirt over her head and they had to. He pushed her up against the wall and she let her head roll back, goosebumps erupting all over her body.

When she was here, late at night, with him, everything else fell away. There was no smell except his cologne, no feeling except his body on hers, no sound except for their heavy breathing that echoed like ghosts around the room.

But then there was.

There was a noise and it was the sound of a reprimand, sharp and painfully unaware to its victim until they noticed that, for once, it was more than just her and him. It was the sound of times changing, of secrets getting out. It was the sound of betrayal that finally was realized.

She did not notice at first. She was too wrapped up in his hands on her waist, pulling her impossibly closer, his leg in between hers, the heaviness in her body, to take awareness about anything else.

Until the dry gasp cut the quiet like a sharp knife, slicing the air with its brutality until even she felt the sting.

Then she tore herself away from Draco, shoving him away from her and, wiping her mouth with her hand, turned to face Harry who looked at her like he had never seen her before in his life.

Moments can freeze like mercury in a thermometer, so still that you can never even remember how it used to move like blood under glass.

Ginny lunged for her shirt on the floor and yanked it over her head, willing it to keep covering her eyes so she would not have to see anymore. This sudden movement goaded Harry into action and he turned, without a word, and left the room. Except for the tension that was like a violin string so tightly wound that its music would be piercing when released, nothing might have happened at all.

Draco was looking at Ginny. She looked impossibly small now, like she was curling into herself. Her shirt was wrinkled and eyes were so wide and dark they reminded him of tunnels so deep that there was no light at the end of them. He reached out for her, sure she was going to collapse or faint or do something and she would need him. She bolted away from him and through the open door after Harry, leaving Draco alone, his senses clouded with her fading perfume.

***

It was like a gust of wind by my ear that whispered my wrongs. It grew in volume until my heart raced and my ears pounded with it. By the time it was screaming, I was already gone.

It's not like I didn't expect it to happen, but that was a future so far ahead that it was blurred- so small and distant that I might never get there. And if the thought ever had occurred in my mind, it was twisted into what I wanted, never left to its own shape that reveals my mistakes, that never spares my reality like closed eyes.

I think sometimes that if you live something so many times in your mind, you don't know what's real anymore. Places change, people act differently, and you can do no wrong. But the thing is that's never really how it happens.

You might wonder why I did it. I'm not really sure myself. I think I know why I didn't leave him: it had something to do with what he saw in me. He saw my wishes, everything I should be: nice, considerate, selfless.

And I liked that.

With him I had no past, only a white future that covered what I should have said so completely that it might have happened at all. I could be the best with him. And when he looked at me, his eyes showed me the mirror I always wanted. And so being, me, I had to strike at it, until what I saw fell at my feet, reflecting false promises.

It's funny isn't it? That my biggest lie was my strongest truth? And that my "sincerity" was really as conniving as poison that crawls through the body until a shaking becomes a shuddering so severe you can't help but know what's been done to you.

So on that day I just stood there, always between them and slowly filling with so much emotion that the fabric of what I made in my mind ripped open to show me what I really am. I could feel him still close to me, his breath stirring my skin to a fever, and him, in front of me and I realized something about his eyes. In them, that mirror that I always hated with a twisted adoration had cracked apart for him too.

I did not move a muscle; if I did, I would shatter apart.

***

She had no idea what to do.

So she ran. She chased after him, not knowing what it would accomplish, but the thought of just leaving him to walk away was unbearable.

She didn't have to go very far. He was walking quite slowly and turned when she called for him.

"Harry! Harry-wait! Please. Just listen." But she had no idea what to say.

He looked at her, blankly. His hair was, as usual, messy, and his usually bright green eyes looked darker than usual. And when had he gotten so tall? Here he was, undeniable. All those nights she blocked him out, all those nights she gave no thought to him because the idea of what she was doing was that hard to comprehend, that difficult to take in. And now it wasn't. It was small waves lapping at her feet that would soon rise up, crashing over her until she couldn't fight them off. Oh, she was drowning all right; only this time, she had unleashed her own flood.

"Did you want to tell me something?" His voice was calm, like he couldn't be anything else.

It was worse, a thousand times worse than what she could even have imagined. He was looking at her like she was a stranger, not someone that he had kissed, studied with, someone whom he had eaten with, laughed with, been around as for as long as it mattered. She was nothing to him, and that hurt more than anything.

She was gasping as if she couldn't get enough air. "I-" she choked. "God- I- I'm so-" She couldn't even get the words out. It wasn't that she wasn't sorry; she was so very much that she felt she might bleed the words out. But it wasn't enough. Nothing, nothing, would ever be enough to erase what she had done.

And so he left when he realized that she had nothing more to say.

And so she sank, a wilted flower, to the floor and braced herself for the flood.

***

The world can fall off its axis; did you know that?

It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it just plummets to a place that it's never been before. But that is way too much information to take in, that the world has changed forever and you now have to live in this foreign one where everything is different and nothing can bring you back to how it was. So you sort of shut down. You curl up like paper in a fire until there may be nothing left when the fire finally burns itself out and cools.

And you focus on what hasn't changed. The walls have the same pattern, old stone that is cool on your fingertips and back as you slide down it. Your hands are the same size and shape. The lines in them fascinate you and you never want to look up from a life you can read and understand.

That is fine and that is safe, but it's when people talk that you realize you don't speak the same language anymore. Only some people can break through that barrier to get to you.

But only some.

"Ginny." It was distant.

"Ginny." There were footsteps.

"Ginny? Oh God, come on. Are you serious?" His boots gleamed against the floor.

"Gin- Could you at least look at me?" He knelt down beside her and she did not look up.

There is a place in you that you don't even know exists where you can go and feel no pain at all. And you have to go there sometimes and hide from the reality that is guilt and pain that never stops drawing blood. You find this place by accident when your mind realizes that your body can not endure. You find it after breathing is an act you've forgotten, after a long time of drowning. You find it when it all falls apart. It's not that the pain is completely gone though. It's just more of dull throbbing at the ridges of your body like a fine mist you can't shake off.

His hands were on her shoulders and he shook her lightly, but enough that she raised her eyes to his, a connection that did not stir her awake from this.

"He'll be fine," he told her forcefully, words that evaporated.

Anger can jerk the world back to being crooked.

"Yes. Because you know him so well." Her voice was coming back to her and there was a pounding in her ears that made her hate him. She looked at him, at gray eyes that she thought she knew, and a memory bobbed to the surface of her mind.

They had gotten into a fight. It was not uncommon, but one of this magnitude was rare which made it that much worse. She wasn't sure what had even started it, but it had escalated to a point where she wanted to run and never look back. She had turned to leave and he had asked where she was going. When she did not respond he asked if she was going back to him.

Like you care, she had snapped, ready to walk out of his life.

And he had laughed.

That made her spin around and ask him what he thought was so hilarious that he couldn't control himself.

He had looked at her and said malice in his voice, You think that if he knew, if he knew about what you do to him, he would still want you?

She had frozen. You don't know that.

Oh yes I do, he softly said. He wouldn't want you afterwards, not if it was me.

"Ok, so I don't know him that well. But I do know you and-"

"You don't know me." Her voice surprised him.

He glared at her. "Right, sure. You can tell yourself that-"

"Because I'm right," she spat, shoving him from in front of her. He actually looked surprised as he was knocked back to his heels. "And right now I don't give a damn what you think and just believe me, when I say that you don't know, and never did."

There was a pause of several moments. It felt like hours.

"You don't know me," she repeated, a broken record. "You don-" she choked, gasping. No, not here, not right in front of him.

But you can't stop a heart from breaking.

He took her by the shoulders and told her to stop. Her body hitched under his hands.

"Look at me," he instructed and she did.

"I do know you." His voice fell onto her like rain. "You hate cauliflower because you say it's the one vegetable that has no color. When you were six you broke your arm falling off your brother's broomstick and told your mom that one of the lawn gnomes did it. You smell like flowers even when you don't put on perfume and you look amazing when you kiss me."

She was feeling drowsy and his breath so close to her skin felt like snow.

"The only class you don't pay attention to is History," Draco continued, his white-blonde hair mixing with her own, "because you said that the past is something useless and people that get stuck in it never move forward. You hate sugar quills and wool blankets and the color blue and crying." He brushed his thumb over the mother-of-pear sheen on her cheek; trying to erase the pain or take it for himself she would never know. "You hate to cry."

He signed and put his forehead to hers. "So don't tell me I don't know you- just don't."

***

How Ginny made it back to the common room, she had no idea. How she had done it, how she had actually walked up stairs, given the password to the portrait and almost walked into the common room, she did not know.

As soon as Ginny had given the password (fletus) to the Fat Lady, the portrait had swung open to reveal a thinning party and Hermione, breathless, crawling through towards her.

"Come with me," she instructed before Ginny had a chance to fall apart at the prospect of facing a room full of people who, by now, probably knew that conniving Ginny had broken Harry's heart. Ginny turned wordlessly and followed her. At this point, Ginny was broken down; she would have followed anyone's instructions if just for something to do that was not under her control.

Hermione led her down the corridor and into an abandoned classroom. She pulled up a chair and put it next to another one; one for each of them. Ginny stared at them. They looked so stiff and painful. She sat anyway.

Hermione sat down in the other chair. Ginny looked at her. She was wearing a knee-length plaid skirt and gray sweater. Her hair was in a long curly ponytail. She looked like a girl who had never made a mistake in her life. Ginny analyzed her outfit of a short wool skirt and V-necked shirt and felt self-conscious. She tried to tug it down over her legs. It wouldn't budge. She tugged harder. She tugged and pulled and grasped at the material in her fingers, trying to make it better.

"Ginny," said Hermione calmly, prying her fingers away from the skirt.

And suddenly it was all too much. Her stupid outfit was too much, Hermione, sitting there, like the image of innocence was too much. She could feel him, all over her skin, and that was too much. He had branded her like a mark she couldn't scratch off. But she tried. And she raised her hands to her skin, trying to erase the feel of him. And she was crying so hard it hurt, great gasping breaths that tore her lungs to pieces, crushed her heart, shattered her mind.

"Gin- Ginny! Stop, just stop." Hermione was reaching for her and Ginny pulled away from her, but her body was no longer hers and she fell to the floor, knocking the wind out of her. And she cried those shuddering breaths that her body couldn't take. And all of a sudden Hermione was holding her, clutching her as if she might hold her together.

"Shh... It's ok; you're fine... fine... shhh."

She knew she didn't deserve it, knew she shouldn't have such comfort after all that she had done, but she took hold of it anyway, desperate for any escape. And through her messy tears, she gasped, "Everyone knows, don't they?"

Hermione pulled away a little and looked at Ginny and said, very firmly, "The only people that know are Harry, you, me, and whomever you have been sneaking around with."

This slowed her crying. "What?" She sniffed and sat up, detaching herself from the older girl, looking confused.

Hermione looked at her, at this young girl whose hair was stuck to her wet cheeks like licks of flame, this pretty girl who had made a terrible mistake- perhaps more than one.

"I assume, by your reaction, that Harry found out," Hermione said dully, looking at Ginny for a response.

The younger girl stared at her. "Yes," she said, breathless, "and you did to...but that's because he told you."

Hermione shook her head. "Ginny," she replied softly, wiping the other girl's cheek with her thumb. "He didn't have to."

"He looked that bad; I know." Her eyes went downcast. "I saw him."

Hermione opened her mouth to explain. "I haven't seen Harry; I don't know where he is. I was going to go looking for him when I ran into you." She looked at Ginny, hard. "Do you know where he is?"

Ginny shook her head miserably. "He ran off, after..." Her voice faded away into nothingness like lost memories. Then she looked up at the older girl. "Wait...how do you know if no one told you?"

Hermione signed. "Ginny," she said softly. "How could I not know?"

Silent tears fell like rain down Ginny's face. "Go," she said, abruptly. "Find him."

"But-"

"Hermione, just... just go. Help him; find him, for me?"

Ginny looked so sad that for a fleeting moment the older girl wanted to stay, but then she thought of Harry, alone, and with one last pitying look, left the room.

Ginny crawled her way over to the wall. It was nice to have something to lean against. It made her feel that the world had not edges that you could fall off of, but barriers that kept you grounded. She closed her eyes, bowing her head as if to pray. The silence was defining. It drove her mind in lazy circles, made her heart slow to a painful pace close to nothing, made the world stop. She did not know how long she sat there. Long enough for her bones to ache as if more time had lapsed than she had lived, long enough for her eyes to shut with the glue of tears, long enough to not have enough of them to tell the world her pain. And she felt, as she had not felt in a long while. It hurt, though not as much as everything else.

References:

"The sun sets and she appears." --- Buffy

"Secrets, you know, are relative." --- Jodi Picoult ("Darkness...relative")

"I would grin, thinking, you don't know me at all." --- Jodi Picoult

"I should go...So go...How can you just let me go...I can't." --- Cassandra Claire

"A place in you that you don't even know exists..." --- Jodi Picoult

"Multiplying kisses..." --- The Bible; Proverbs 27:6