Smile

She smiles too much. It is one thing you never like about her. But you love it all the same. You tell her in hushed tones that she’d be so pretty if she frowned. And she wrinkles her eyebrows but smiles all the same.

And she is always laughing. And the sound is too musical for your ears. But it is musical, and it’s welcome, and it lifts your spirits in a way you’re not sure if you like.

You kiss her in the hallways to make the smiles and the laughter stop. The silence is wonderful. And you try not to think about how intoxicating it is to be this close to her. How her lips are so soft, how her neck is so smooth, how her hair smells like strawberries and she tastes like dark chocolate. Two of the best things in the world. And when you pull apart, she is drunk on love and you are drunk on her. You walk away. She stands and smiles that same stupid smile.

And sometimes she grabs your hands in the corridor. And you blush, and you hate that. You push her away and she holds you tighter and people mumble and frown and glare. She doesn’t care. You do, and you’re not sure why.

You meet her in the corridors late at night. When there is no one awake and no one who will see or care. She is beautiful in the moonlight. Ethereal. But you never tell her that. You kiss her breathless and dizzy. You grab her by the arm, your grip too tight. She will have bruises in the morning. You take her to your room, push her on the bed. And when the clothes are off you have to think to stop yourself from gasping aloud because she is so unearthly beautiful. And then, no matter how much you want to, you cannot hurt her. You are gentle and slow and you hold her like she might break. Caress her smooth skin with your fingers and lips.

But when it is over, she climbs out from under the covers. She stands in front of your mirror, naked and glistening. She smooths her long red hair and tugs at the ends and frowns at her reflection.

“Am I beautiful, Draco?” she asks you.

And night after night, you say nothing. You want to scream out “Yes, god yes!”, but if you do speak it is to say how she might be, if only she were thinner, if only her freckles weren’t so vivid, if only her hair weren’t so red.

Every night, you tear her down. And you know what you are doing, and part of you wants to stop, but you just can’t.

And one night Pansy finds you on your way back from the library. She wraps thin arms around your waist and runs long nails down your stomach. Teasing you. And you feel desire rising in you. And when she kisses you, you kiss her back with even more force. You couldn’t care less about her, and all notions of gentility go out the window. She kisses you deeper and you back her against the wall.

And you don’t even realize where you are until you hear a gasp. You assume it is Pansy, but when you are pulled back, you know it is not.

A pair of angry brown eyes meet your hard grey ones. Your stomach drops and your face pales and the blood rushes back to your head.

You are both broken. You walk away, she crawls.

She didn’t give you a chance, you say to yourself later, when you scold yourself for not apologizing. Like she would have forgiven you anyway.

But it doesn’t matter. Because after that night, she doesn’t smile anymore.

She runs back to her room. There is a crash of perfume bottles as they hit the floor. Glass from the mirror shatters as she recalls every “You would be beautiful, if only . . .” remark you made.

She picks up the pieces and carves into her body. Scarring it forever. Marking her imperfections. And collapsing on the floor in a heap of tears, blood, and broken glass.

Of course, no one knows the details of that night. Not for sure. There are only the rumors. You cheated, that much is known for certain. And people whisper in the hall as she passes that she lost it. That she never talks to anyone anymore. Not even him.

Yes, him. He who you hate. Have always hated.

He wraps his arms around her shoulders in the Great Hall and draws her close to him. She keeps her eyes down on the table and doesn’t say a thing. His lips touch her cheeks, her forehead, her temples. Your blood boils.

And no one else notices that he holds her hand too tight. That bruises line her fragile wrists. She covers them, along with the gashes on her skin. But you know. You always know. Because you watch her like a hawk. As you have for years. As you will until the day you leave these halls.

And you learn that you were right from the beginning. She is beautiful when she frowns. Breathtaking when the tears are flowing down her cheeks.

Then, one day, she doesn’t come to dinner. There is a buzz in the hall. She hasn’t missed a meal since her first year.

“Where is she?” her brother asks. His girlfriend, Luna Lovegood, shakes her head and says she left her at the portrait in front of their tower.

No one in her house sleeps that night. They search the castle high and low.

But it is He who finds her. In the Astronomy Tower.

The rumors about that night are remarkably consistent. She died of her own hand. Put a pistol to her temple and pulled the trigger. There was so much blood, they say, they had to do a scouring charm to get it off the bricks. Have you ever seen a human brain, they ask. I saw hers.

And you wish you could have found her, in some sick way. Just because you wonder one thing.

When it was finally over, did she get to smile again?