Dulcet Tones

music i heard with you was more than music

bread i broke with you was more than bread

now that i am without you, all is desolate -

all that was beautiful is dead...

(Conrad Aiken)

He looks deeply into the fire, contemplating the dancing flames, wondering, dreaming of another place, another time...

"Draco, dinner's ready." He looked up from the fire to where she stood, her sparkling brown eyes smiling at him and smiled.

"What's for dinner?" he asked as he stood up and put his arms around her.

"Lasagna."

"With extra cheese?"

"With extra cheese."

His fingers trail over the gleaming body of the saxophone as he sits, his silver eyes brooding. He hasn't played in so long...almost a year...not since...

"Play something."

He smiled, "What?"

"Anything."

He lifted the instrument to his mouth and fitted his fingers over the knobs, ready to play a tune he'd been working on - for her. As the soft dulcet tones of the saxophone rang out, he saw her close her eyes and relax into the depths of the armchair.

This was what they had worked for, fought for, killed for. The war was over. Had been for a long time. As the Magical community took a step back to assess the ravages of war, they had decided to leave that world for another. There was no home for either of them to go to, no family to welcome them. War heroes, renegades, they left in search of a new life - together.

It hadn't taken them long to settle down. They traded one job for another, one life for another and settled down to a life lived happily ever after.

He slowly gets up and stokes the dying fire; and sits back down, the blazing fire throwing his face into sharp relief...

He saw her looking at him, watching the shadows on his face as the fire slowly died.

"Why did you stop?"

"You fell asleep."

"Did not!" she said indignantly as she stifled a yawn.

"Come on sleepyhead...let's go to sleep. It's late," he lifted her in his arms and carried her to the bedroom.

The sunlight streams in through the window, waking him up. He gets up stiffly after having fallen asleep in the armchair...

She opened her eyes and found him watching her, lying next to her, the sheet flung carelessly over his hips.

"What?" she asked self-consciously.

"I like watching you," he said simply as bent down to kiss her.

"You're strange," she replied as she kissed him back. "Now get out of bed, get dressed and go to work or you'll be late."

'Work.' He shrugged.

"I don't feel like going in today." He still hadn't told her that he'd quit the day before. Sitting behind an office desk was really not his thing.

She turned around to face him, "Are you ill? You don't look ill. Do you want to come by the clinic later on?", her brown eyes brimming with concern.

"I'm feeling fine," he replied, knowing full well what would happen if he told her the truth.

"Then what is wrong? Something is, I can feel it."

"I quit my job yesterday," he said finally, slowly.

"Again?!" She looked at him, anger and exasperation mixing in her voice.

"Honey, let me..."

"You can't keep doing this. This is the second job you've quit in as many years. What is wrong?" she cried out.

"Nothing. It's just...the life we had...after that..."

"The life we had, Draco. HAD. We don't have it any longer. We left it, for this life. And I know it is hard, but you have to try..."

"I've tried, damnit! What makes you think I haven't?" he asked as he flung the sheet away and got out of bed.

"I've tried and tried till I got tired of punching stupid figures into equally stupid machines. I hate it. This life, the restrictions, being tied down. I hate everything," he yelled as he smashed his fist into the wall. His knuckles burst open as the blood began to pour out. She ran to him, afraid and concerned - she had never seen him this way. She took his hand and led him to the bathroom where she washed his injured hand before bandaging it.

He watched, angry and ashamed of himself, as she effortlessly albeit tremblingly dressed the wound. She turned away to put the first-aid kit on the shelf. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her back against him, burying his face in the crook of her neck.

"I am sorry."

She turned in his arms to face him.

"I love you. You do know that, don't you?"

She smiled, "Yes. I know."

"It'll be alright. I promise," he said fervently .

"I know."

He picks up the lone coffee mug standing on the kitchen counter and watches the steam rise out of the mug, slowly...

"I'm leaving now. I'll see you in the evening." She kissed him lightly on the cheek before walking out of the door.

He sat at the kitchen counter, cradling his third cup of coffee and wondering what to do. Try as he might he could not get the stricken look on her face out of his mind. It was as though he had physically slapped her. He cringed as he remembered her trembling hands as they had bandaged his own. He had acted like a coarse, rough brute and no amount of 'I love you's would change that. His mind went back to when he had quit his first job. She had looked at him the way only she could, her soft brown eyes liquefying his insides, and told him that she would take care of them for as long as it took for him to realise his dreams. He had wanted to protest - the idea of her taking care of them when it should have been the other way round was unthinkable for him - but had desisted knowing her strong views on women's liberation. So he had simply gone up to her and kissed her.

He wished he could do that now. Suddenly he desperately needed to talk to her, see her again before the evening.

The insistent ringing of the telephone brings him out of his reverie. He lets it ring...

"Hello?"

"Hi! It's me. What are you doing for lunch?" he asked, hoping, praying madly that she was free.

"I had an appointment, but that just got cancelled. Why?"

"Meet me at half-past one at The Piazza. Window seat."

"Okay, but wha..."

"See you then. Bye."

He goes to the bedroom and slowly begins to get dressed. Half a hour later, dressed in a dark green shirt, black trousers and jacket, he leaves the apartment...

It was half-past one. Where was she? Sitting at the window seat he looked out, his eyes scanning the milling hordes of people as they crossed the road. He smiled to himself as he fingered the small box in front of him. He opened the black velvet box and looked at the pearl ear-rings she had admired months ago at a shop window. They were perfect.

He looked up again and this time his face broke into a smile as he saw her crossing the road and coming towards the restaurant. He waved at her; smiling she waved back. He saw her hesitate for a fraction of a second before the car hit her. He watched as her body hit the hood of the car before it toppled over and hit the pavement. It was over in a moment - but it had taken an eternity.

He ran out of the restaurant to where she lay, blood everywhere, barely breathing. He knelt by her side, tears streaming down his face as he took her hand in his. He heard the sirens of the approaching ambulance from far off.

"Hold on honey. You'll be fine. I promise."

"I know," she smiled as she fainted in his arms, her blood staining the clothes he wore.

He walks slowly to where she lies, his blank soul-less eyes staring at the ground - he hasn't seen her in so long...

He stepped out of the ambulance and followed her into the hospital as she was wheeled into the Emergency. Hours or maybe minutes later she was wheeled out of the operating room and down the corridor to a private room. As he began to enter the doctor took him aside, "Mr. Malfoy, your wife has a broken leg and a fractured rib; her left lung has collapsed and she is bleeding internally. I am sorry, but there is nothing more that we can do for her."

The old doctor watched as he disbelievingly walked in to where she slept, her pale face a striking contrast to her auburn hair. He sat down beside her on the bed, his hand gently brushing her hair away from her face. She opened her eyes and found him watching her.

"What?" she asked hoarsely.

"I like watching you," he said as he took her hands in his and kissed them, tears streaming down his face.

"Please God...please..." he sobbed uncontrollably as he felt her slipping through his hands.

"Draco," she whispered softly. He raised his head to look at her.

"I am sorry. About everything...I love you," he said haltingly through tears.

"I know," she replied, tears spilling out of the corner of her eyes.

He leaned down to kiss her, capture a lifetime in a heartbeat, eternity in a moment. When he let go of her, she smiled - and looking at her he realised he would never love anyone as he loved her. She shifted just a bit on the bed to make room for him. He lay down beside her and wrapped his arms around her, as he had done so many times before, as he would never again. He touched his forehead to hers and as their tears mixed he whispered four words, trying to convey through them all he had ever felt for her, all that he would forever feel for her.

"I love you, Ginny."

"I love you..." her voice trailed off and he felt her go limp in his arms. And he cried as though there were no tomorrow, he cried for the time they had lost, for the love they had shared; he cried as his heart broke into a million pieces, each piece desperately crying out her name, willing her to come back, willing her to bridge the gap between life and death and return to him. But most of all he cried for her, for the girl he had fallen in love with, the woman he had married on a bright June morning - her gown white as the lilies she wore in her hair because they were his favourite flowers.

He cried for the man she was leaving behind, alone, incomplete, desolate, dead within...his world having soundlessly crumbled around him as he had watched helplessly.

He walks up to his apartment and rings the bell before he lets himself in. It's been a year since she died, it feels like a lifetime, and he still expects her to open the door for him. He rings the bell sometimes, just in case she does open the door, but she never does.

He enters the apartment and goes to the mantelpiece where he places the bouquet of white roses in front of her photograph - because they were her favourite flowers. He kneels in front of the fireplace and lights the pile of firewood before he sits down in the armchair. He picks up his saxophone and adjusts the knobs on it.

"Happy Birthday, Sweetheart," he whispers as the soft dulcet tones of the saxophone ring out into the silent night.