Intoxication

He's drunk. It's an intoxication. An addiction. A high. It's the best drug he's ever tasted. But it's not the taste that I worry about. It's the after-taste. It's the smell that creeps out from it when it's been left to sit too long in the open. That rotten stench that snakes out of the cupboard door and curls around you dangerously, beckoning you to find its source and take it. To take it and do what you want with it.

Power.

Prestige.

Glory.

He wants all of them. Everything he can get his hands on. To him, nothing's out of reach. It's all his. The moon, the sun, and the stars. The universe. It doesn't scare him. It doesn't phase him. To him it's a simple, widely accepted fact. They're his. Or at least, they soon will be. No one can hold them from him. He's their keeper.

But it scares me. It scares me beyond anything I've ever encountered. He's no Dark Lord, no, he's much worse. Much worse in a personal, intimate way. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is fearsome and ferocious, he doesn't come home to me. Night after night. My home. My kitchen. My library. My bathroom. My bed.

It's not physical. He's not a physical person. Even when he's in one of his moods he will never be able to fill a room the way Professor Dumbledore could. There just isn't enough of him there. No, it's all emotional. All intellectual. He plays mind games with me. With himself.

He's got himself tricked. He can't see past his own face in the mirror. It's always been about himself in his mind. He can't see me. Night after night, I sit there waiting for him. An everlasting vigil. Waiting for the triumphant return that I know now will never come. I've lost him to that awful world where you can only see what's in front of you. Not what's around you. Not what you left behind.

But, I know how to take care of him. I know his limits. I know how much of him is really there. If only he could see that he doesn't need to be anyone special for me. Just to be there. Maybe a morning, just one, where I would walk into the kitchen and see him sitting there reading the Daily Prophet and he would smile. Or maybe just open my eyes and see him still lying next to me. His arm thrown carelessly over my stomach in the reckless way it used to be. Before all of this. When the power was a dream. Nothing more then child's play. Something to be sought after but never attained. It will never be fully reached, though, not even down the path he's chosen. None of it's enough for him. He wants more. Always more. Nothing's good enough for him anymore. No childhood dream could be this twisted.

He's wanted all of this for himself. He's never offered me his winnings. His moon. His sun. His stars. Himself. But it wasn't the winnings I wanted. All I ever wanted was a piece of him. A little piece I could say I truly knew and understood. A piece I could hold onto and cherish. Something so that I would know that he loved me. Something to prove what he says, not just time hardened words that have lost their excitement. Their whispered passion. Their eagerness. Their truth. But I know that what I want doesn't matter anymore. Whether it ever did, I don't know.

Leaving would probably be the best for me. To keep me whole. I could find someone else after some time has passed and I've recovered. But I think leaving would destroy me more then staying has. As different as he's become, he is part of what I've become. The boy who whispered his secrets in my ear is still there. I know he is. I just have to find him. I've never stepped down from a task before, and while I might not be a Gryffindor, I think I can summon enough bravery to sit here a few more sleepless nights waiting for him. He'll come home sober one day. And he'll smile.