Chanson d'Automne

La Chanson d'Automne dans Mon Coeur

It all happened in the space of one afternoon in autumn. From feeling warm in the comfort of my couch and wanting some hot chocolate, to having sheets of ice wrap themselves around my heart, wounding it. It was a normal afternoon, but you came and changed it. With your retreating footsteps followed my heart like a dead leaf on the ground. I don't blame you, but remembering how it happened takes the very breath from my lungs and weakens me.

I don't know what you were thinking of as I watched you walk away from my home. I am willing to guess that you are disappointed, hurt, and probably even angry with me. How could you not be?

The circumstances are perfectly understandable: It's after graduation and you though that it would be a good time to take me up on my offer of asking you to live with me. I can't imagine how you'd still remember that. If my memory serves right, it was on your third year at Hogwarts when I invited you to stay here after this whole mess got cleaned up.

Looking at it from this point, I guess the saying "When a door closes, a window opens" is quite truthful in a negative sense as well as positive. The war might have ended and I needn't go to Azkaban, but now there is a different war to face. We all have had to cope with some permanent changes, some more than others. In my case, I've had to face my feelings. There's no need to hide them anymore. No one's out to get me. After they've been suppressed and neutralized for so long, I finally have to stand up to them.

This afternoon only served as a reminder of how much I need to search myself for honest answers that will decide the course of the future; a future that is not just my own, but of others too.

From the moment you entered this house, I knew that something big was coming. You looked rather anxious, shuffling on your feet and grinning like you used to way back when. Your excitement was infectious, so I became enthusiastic despite not knowing what it was that you were up to.

When you finally told me that you wanted to stay here, I froze like a deer in headlights. I was caught off guard. Yes, you explained that it was because you decided to move out of the flat that you shared with Ron and Hermione. "They're married now, wouldn't it be more than a bit awkward to have me there?... Sure they don't mind now, but I don't want them to start getting bothered by me." And you made it clear that it was only going to be a temporary setup. "...But it's only going to be for a month or two. I really want to scour for the best flats with good prices."

You have to understand that the offer was enticing, but I couldn't. One month may seem like a short amount of time if you count work and personal activities in, but the real problem is that I don't trust myself. Not when you're around. There are still so many things to figure out, and I've not even begun to sort out my feelings for you. No, it's not the same as before. I feel different around you. And I don't even want to start mulling it over now. All I know is that whatever this is can't happen.

To let you into such a close and private space would be the end of me! I'll only ruin the both of us with my recklessness, and I'll never be able to forgive myself as I know that you will never be able to forgive me.

From that point on in our conversation, it pained me to go on. Your smile was so sweet that it sanded me layer by layer until it felt as though only an onion skin stood in the way of asking you to stay with me and hoping it would be for forever. Refusing made me feel like the biggest jerk and coward. You looked so disappointed. It was obvious that you didn't expect for a single second that I would decline.

To make matters worse, I came up with such a bullshit excuse. "I'm sorry, Harry. I don't think that now is a very good time. There are still some things I need to do before everything is settled properly. Besides, you need to learn your own way around real life. I'm not always going to be around, you know." Absolute rubbish because you're the bloody Hero of the Wizarding World. Out of stupidity, I had to further devastate things by giving and insisting that you take some rent money. Merlin knows that you don't need it.

It was awkward in the end, and I apologize for that. You should never have to feel awkward with me. Yet I'm so glad that you handled it with such grace. You didn't impose or get mad, and I sort of wish you did. It would've been easier for me to weasel out. If you had prompted me for a better answer (or excuse), I would've walked out of the room and left you there.

I wouldn't have told you the truth. No, that I could never do. The truth is that I love you more than I'll ever allow you to know in a way that you'll never learn of, for I will never say it.

The sun is setting into the autumnal skies. I feel the temperature drop. A shiver runs through me, even though I am indoors. Where are you? I'm sorry that I couldn't let you in. If you're feeling cold, then my insides are freezing with a dull ache. I feel more and more like keeling over to die in melancholy, but I won't. I will spend this lifetime trying to make it up to you. For now, I will give in to my cowardice and avoid meeting you in person until I have it all worked out. I hope that I will be able to send you letters with the autumn breeze and pray that your heart will not freeze towards me like the coming winter.

The End