Faith

Faith

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"And He said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you. Go in peace."

Luke 7:50

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She had known for a long time that this would happen. She knew that while he spent many countless hours battling demons in his head and dark moments of doubt in his heart, that she would be the one to do what he, It was said, could not. She had known since she was eleven that this cruel fate was what awaited her in her eighteenth year of life, a fate that any person would be frightened to live up to.

She recalls, even in this darkest hour, how she had first been notified of what was in store for her future. She recalled the wizened Headmaster pulling her aside after a particularly stunning dinner early in her first year. He beckoned her to come to his office. When she arrived, ten staff members and Hagrid awaited her, and she was told to sit in an oversized chair in one corner of the room, and to remain completely silent while they spoke to her. She protested, but her white-haired Headmaster insisted that it was very important that she understand the severity of the situation.

Maybe it was her youth, and maybe it was her slight arrogance, but the young girl did not fully appreciate the situation until a single blue tear fell out of the Headmaster's eyes. To her, the words he spoke had seemed to be somewhat of a cruel joke. How on earth could these people expect her, a muggle-born with only the extraordinary gift of being able to consume many books in few hours, to be the one to defeat the Dark Lord? Especially if, in the triumphant attempt to defeat him, her own life was to be ended? But she looked on as her much loved professors and even those who she didn't care much for and even those she did not know shed tears for the girl who they knew was fated to take the job that the rest of the magical world thought was delegated to a single green-eyed boy.

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Over the next six years, she thinks about the prophecy every single day. She thinks about it as she looks at the green-eyed boy and the way he suffers with his pointless knowledge about the other prophecy, the fictitious prophecy that was planted by a series of officials to cover up the existence of her own prophecy. She mostly feels remorse for the boy who is the unwitting pawn in this whole game (for she now considers this a game that must be won), cries often as she sees him die a little inside everyday with the false knowledge he carries like Atlas did the Earth.

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One day she makes a mistake. She looks at the green-eyed boy, who is rapidly approaching his seventeenth birthday, and for the first time sees the way his eyes light up when he is happy, and the way they become matte like a windy ocean when he is sad. She notices that his left eye is slightly larger than his right, and that the scar that mars his forehead goes from right to left thrice, and that when he laughs there is a single dimple on his left cheek. It is then, as she is walks beside him on a cold night outside the Burrow as the youngest Weasley sleeps and as the red-haired boy whose heart has been stolen away by the brunette girl's soft smile is struggling to catch up to his two best friends, that she knows that she loves this green-eyed boy more than he has ever known, and much more than she herself ever knew. She knows it, and begins to weep, and though he knows not why she cries, the black-haired boy puts two comforting arms around her and kisses her forehead.

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She lives the next five months in agony, her heart aching as she watches his mouth smile for the red-haired girl she knows as her best female friend, and watches as their lips meet in a thousand kisses she can almost taste on her tongue. She knows that it is wrong to fantasize about what it must feel like to have the raven-haired boy's mouth on her own, or to dream that he might one day recognize her eyes as the eyes he wants to stare in for the rest of his breathing days.

She feels guilty one day when the red-haired girl comes up to her and shows her a single gold band on her left hand, an effigy of the love and affection the black-haired boy has for her. The girl smiles excitedly and asks the brunette to be part of the wedding, which she hopes will take place before the year is over. The brunette smiles politely, pretending that her heart isn't breaking all over again, and excuses herself before she loses control.

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The day before the final confrontation with the Dark Lord, the boy is finally exposed to the truth about everything; the false prophesy, the real prophecy, and the place of the brunette girl within it. He sits in the same chair she had some six years ago, and stares at the Headmistress, who has long tried and failed to fill the void left by the death of the late Headmaster. He speaks no words for a long while after the elderly woman finishes. She is crying by the time the last few words leave her mouth, for the brunette girl is also in the room, her eyes pasted to the floor and her skin pale with fright. The knowledge that tomorrow this time she will no longer be breathing has finally hit her, after six years of knowing that it was coming, but never really understanding.

He stands up suddenly, and wraps his arms around her as he beings to sob quietly. His head slides down to her neck and his tears, warm and sticky, flow between her high-necked blouse and her skin. She remains still as a tomb, guilt washing over her as she feels her heart trembling with desire. His hands wind in her hair, and her breathing increases further as she tumbles closer to the edge.

He begs her not to go then, begs her to stay with him and her friends. His voice is torn by his tears and the abrupt convulsions of his body, and he slides down her between her breasts until his own form is on the dank wooden-paneled floor the tide of his black robe. He takes her hand in his own, and whimpers quietly that she should ignore the prophecy, that she should let him go instead. He says that he is sure he can defeat the Dark Lord, says that he can't risk his best friend's life before he risks his own. She listens to his words as her mouth runs salty with her tears, and suddenly she is whisked to a world where she is no longer the only hope for a desperate world to survive, where she is not destined to die so that many others may live, that she is rather a girl who is fated to live an long and happy life with the green-eyed boy she loves, and perhaps have children and die peacefully in her sleep when she is old and gray.

But then she sees his hand on hers, feels the heat between their fingers that she craved for the last five months, and sees the golden band that symbolizes the something she does not share with him, and, with as much haste as possible, she retreats to her chambers.

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I love you, he whispers once before she leaves the room with only a red cloak and her wand. She flinches at the words because she understands that he doesn't really love her like she loves him. She understands that he loves the red-haired girl and she understands that they will marry someday and have children that will have more children. She understands this and she can picture this in her mind, though it pains her greatly to do so.

Everything will be okay, she insists one last time. He shakes his head, and holds her body against his own. She feels weak in his arms, dizzy from her own emotional neglect, and pushes back against his body.

How do you know, he replies, his lips inches away from her own.

Because, she whispers softly, her lips pressing quietly against his own, her heart breaking one last time, I have faith.

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