The Burn of Acid Tears

Chapter 4

I had realized the gravity of how W.o.W. Messaging was punished. I should have known... it was one of Voldemort's skills. He used it to his benefit to call upon his followers: the Death Eaters. I remember Father telling me this when I first began to know about the way I was supposed to act in the ways of my dark heritage. Our Lord had created the origins of the spell, but I wondered why our school would be teaching it. Why would it be in our textbooks?

I shrugged it off. It didn't concern me at the moment so what did I care? I had been concentrating on my marks in my classes. My philosophy was that maybe if I showed the same interest in the same subjects as Hermione, then maybe she would begin to see me with new eyes. I have never been one to pray, but I had been down on my knees lately. I just hoped that there was some force that could possibly see me for a person, not the slime I really was, and aid me. Although, I couldn't help thinking of Potter...

It still confused me to no end when I found out that he still had insecurities. How could someone be around people who worship him and still be so uncomfortable? Well, he certainly has a quaint way of showing it!

But I could help but feel saddened by his situation. It was the first time I had felt true emotion for someone other than Hermione. It felt abnormal. Even my responsive journal, (modeled after the Dark Lord's own that made its appearance in my second year, although not harboring the same evil entity) began to write back, questioning my sexuality. In a characteristic rage, I threw the book across my room. I knew I was only as straight as I could be, but there wasn't anything romantic there. It was something... some connection that I still couldn't define.

Still, as I sat thinking hopelessly, I tried gaining my nerve to talk to her that day. The way that the darkened, showering sky reflected my mood only made me ponder if the weather could mock me in the same ways that my peers were. Damn it, isn't it my bloody right to be locked in my room as I damn well please?!

But I still knew that I couldn't keep something like this up forever.

I sauntered down to the common room, taken aback at the fact that it was almost empty. My jumbled mind drifted to the thoughts of where they could be, before I actually realized that I didn't care. But that still didn't keep midnight snogging sessions from innocently creeping into my head. All I knew was that I desperately needed to be left alone, struggling to sort out my emotions.

~*~*~*~

Nice way we can sort out our "feelings" Draco...

Look, I'm really beginning to get irked at the idea of you reading my thoughts. Don't you have anything else to do? Or shall I tell you to sod off here?

There was an odd silence for a moment. My head ached from the aftermath of the echoed message, but I felt the silence causing more damage then the words. My classmates were looking at me funny, seeing as the asphondale I was supposed to be repotting was hanging in mid air as I waited, sweating for what was about to come.

I don't think you understand that human emotions can be downtrodden with those sort of snide comments... It may have been the fact that I had to shake off the excess dirt that had been dumped onto my head by Blaise, but I noticed the waver in that last sentence.

Potter, you crying? Again, another long silence.

N-no. Just... I've got to go to Transfiguration... I'll message you later.

Potter! I warned, planting asphondale seeds with fury. What's going on? I need you to tell me how to do the reading minds thing, or else I know you'll never tell me anything!

All in time...

~*~*~*~

And here I was, back on my stupid bed, loathing in self-pity as I tried not to cry my bloody eyes out. It's not like me at all. I never cry... not even at family's funerals did I shed a mournful tear, but this year has filled to the brim with such tears. Bitter, burning and caustic I knew acid could only be sweeter.

Bu there was just something that had to catch my blurry eye. What if something was seriously wrong with him...? I had to find out, but there was no way to reach him; he wasn't responding to messages and this forsaken emotion had taken over every abject I thought I had control of.

Then, I knew. It was time for me to get out my invisibility cloak again.

I couldn't help noticing the chill wafting through the dense air as I walked the path to the Gryffindor House. The quivering excitement of wandering the school at night had still stayed with me after all of these years, and it made my morale even more apt to reach my destination... only this time it wouldn't be for the same person. I also found it odd that I didn't find anyone on my pathway there.

As always, I missed the squeaky wooden floorboard just at the inside of the opening to the tower. However, it didn't bother me all that much. Everyone seemed to have passed through some unknown vortex and disappeared from this world. I did hear the faded trace of life coming from the winded staircase. Leading into the unknown depths of the other dormitories.

Wonderful, compelling music forced my feet to move forward, drop the cloak and enhance my curiosity. My bare feet echoed a very eerie slapping sound in the surprisingly warm floor, even if my numb toes couldn't feel it. The warmth of the strumming coming from the music source was urging me forward.

And as I open the door, who should I see there, but Potter, strumming an old acoustic guitar, like the ones I had seen in books for Muggle Studies class, but there was something about the way he was sitting cross-legged on his bed that made me wonder if this was the same Harry Potter that he reflected towards the outside world. Here he was, singing to some Muggle song that was pleading to me in the same way the melody was. I sat down on the bed, absorbing the words to something so comforting, I knew I would never want to leave...

Another turning point a fork stuck in the road

Time grabs you by the wrist directs you where to go

So make the best of this test and don't ask why

It's not a question but a lesson learned in time

It's something unpredictable

But in the end is right

I hope you had the time of your life

So take the photographs and still frames in your mind

Hang it on a shelf in good health and good time

Tattoos of memories and dead skin on trial

For what it's worth it was worth all the while

It's something unpredictable

But in the end is right

I hope you had the time of your life

It's something unpredictable

But in the end is right

I hope you had the time of your life

It's something unpredictable

But in the end is right

I hope you had the time of your life

And all I could do was stare into those emerald eyes as he strung the last ringing note into the teeming air around us.