The Alternative to Loneliness

Ch. 16

Still a Problem Left

Luna had been asleep for hours. It had been nice to listen to her breathe and murmur about pinecones and knuckles and such as she did so. It made Colin wonder what he sounded like as he slept and if watching him was as enjoyable as watching her.

But it did no good for his state.

The last photo shoot should have meant the end of it all. Draco was so mad about Harry, there was no doubt they'd be together right now doing exactly what Harry had asked for.

Only it was that very thought that was keeping Colin up.

Luna had awakened two hours ago from her nap to find that he was still awake and had wasted no time in attempting to relax him. It was great while they were together and he'd forgotten for a time the events of the night and the weeks previous. However, they could hardly go to sleep together like that and once they were separate, his mind was consumed by the images he saw every time he shut his eyes.

"Colin?" Luna murmured and rolled over, encircling his chest. "You are still awake."

"Yes, I'm still awake."

"Did you not sleep at all, then?"

He shook his head. "I'm really sorry, Luna. I know you're trying to help and all and it's all fine when we're having sex, but once we stop it's back!"

"Well then perhaps we shouldn't stop."

Colin's eyes widened. "Can we even do that?" he gasped, then cleared his throat. "Luna, I don't want to just have sex with you because it's the only way I can sleep. I couldn't ask you to do that."

Luna nuzzled against his neck and sighed. "Do you not want to have sex with me?"

"NO!" he said. "I mean...I mean, I really do! And...of course I do! I love you and I love feeling you and...and...it's just that...Luna, I can't depend on our sex to sleep."

"I'm sorry."

"Why should you be sorry?"

"Well, you see," she explained, undoing one of her arms from around him to trace little shapes on his bare chest. "I so very much enjoyed when we had sex the first time and it was nice to see you so relaxed and I was happy that it wasn't just me who had enjoyed it and when you suggested the afternoon naps, I thought it was so wonderful because then I could feel like that with you every day, maybe even several times! I suppose I was very selfish in that, wasn't I?"

"No, you weren't," he assured her. "I enjoyed it, too. I just didn't want to take advantage of you. Especially now that it is not working."

"And I suppose I was taking advantage of your inability to sleep without it," she said. "So it really is not working at all anymore?"

"Only...only...Luna it just won't stop now."

"Then we must find a way to make it stop for good," she said. "I shall make some dreamless sleep potion and you can use that while I research. What exactly do you see when you close your eyes?"

He pulled a face and tried to squirm down into the cushion of linens beneath them. "I'd really rather not talk about it," he mumbled.

"Well, that may be so," she said gently. "But it is because of these images that you are unable to relax and sleep. If I know what they are and we are able to discover a way to eliminate or banish the images from your mind, then you will be able to sleep."

He sighed, defeated. "Alright, if you say so. Well, at first I just saw Harry naked in my head. All the time, doing the things that I had taken pictures of him doing in the shower."

"They are the pictures I saw in your Dark Closet?"

"Yes. When you thought that I loved him." He felt his insides squirm at the thought. "And then in bed. And then he was angry. And...and now..." He shuddered.

"It's alright, Colin," she said, kissing his ear. "Now you see Harry and Draco together naked in bed with each other, don't you?"

He made a strangled sound and nodded. "That's not exactly what I want to see when I close my eyes."

Luna nodded, tapping her fingertips on his chest. Then she smiled. "That is all because of pictures," she mumbled. "Well I do have a few ideas, if you will be patient and meet with me directly following our final classes today."

"Er...alright. Where should I meet you?"

"If you will, meet me in the Room of Requirement."

~*~^~*~

Seamus practically bowled over Blaise the next morning. Blaise hardly wasted a moment being surprised when the Gryffindor shoved him into an empty office. "What HAPPENED!" Seamus asked after smothering him with an extremely long and involved kiss. "He didn't come back to the dorm all night!"

Blaise smirked. "What, you mean Harry?"

"You know I mean Harry! Did Draco finally get him into his room?"

"Harry begged him," the Slytherin replied, his eyes shining. "Had little Creevey take a picture of him starkers in Draco's own bed with the words, I Love You Draco. Please Make Love To Me written in the air above him."

"He must have been there all night," Seamus said, looking intently into Blaise's eyes. "He wasn't in his bed this morning."

"No, he most definitely wouldn't have been in his own bed this morning, because the whole of Slytherin house saw him walking arm in arm with Draco through the common in yesterday's robes!"

"Ooo, I would've paid good galleons to see that!"

Blaise chuckled as he kissed the Irish boy. "It was priceless to see the look on everybody's face. Knowing the lord of the honourable name of Malfoy was a Gryff-loving pouf! Of course Vin and Greg are still trying to figure out just why exactly Draco didn't have them dispose of Harry."

Seamus rolled his eyes. "Good Merlin those two are denser than a ton of lead! What did Pansy do?"

"Detatched her tongue from Theo's throat long enough to scream that she would never forgive him and would curse his name to the ends of the earth."

"God, what a drama queen. But I see how long it took to jump into somebody else's pants."

"Ever the opportunist," Blaise agreed. "But Merlin, you should have seen those two. One things for sure, they can take their names off the roster in the Virgin Club."

"I hated that club," the Gryffindor groused. "The club activities were no fun!"

"Which is why you hurried up and shacked up with me," Blaise said, pushing him up against the wall.

Seamus' eyes flashed with desire. "Making up for last night?" he murmured.

"Making up for fourteen years," Blaise breathed into his ear and nipped at his lobe.

Seamus filled his lungs with the lingering scent of Blaise' vanilla shampoo and closed his eyes. "You've got a lot of making up to do," he said with a shudder.

~*~^~*~

Draco strode into the Great Hall with Harry, still in yesterday's robes and still on his arm. The entire room hushed when he appeared in the doorway, and as he walked along Slytherin table with Harry still by his side, the students and teachers all began murmuring. It reminded Draco of a simmering potion.

Blaise hadn't arrived yet, but Draco knew as soon as he and Harry sat down and the entirety of Slytherin House moved away like a giant ripple, that Blaise would be the only one to sit with him and Harry. He had never got the chance to thank his friend for kidnapping him last night. If he hadn't, it was most likely that Draco would have spent the night in his large bed alone.

Where in Merlin's name was he, anyway?

Then a thought struck him and he looked toward the Gryffindor table, thinking maybe he had decided to go public with it and sit with his lover. But there was no sign of Seamus, either. They were most likely finding a quiet classroom to shag in for breakfast, he thought idly as he let his eyes drift over the faces present.

Then his eyes stopped and he frowned. Ginny Weasley was pulling Colin's face out of a bowl of porridge. Even under the pale mealy cereal, he could see the deep, dark circles under the Gryff's eyes.

"Draco?"

The blond jumped and turned to find Harry's face concerned and a little hurt. "What?"

"Weren't you listening to me?"

Draco drew an aristocratic hand through his hair. "I'm sorry, Harry, I was a bit distracted. What were you saying?"

"I was asking if it was alright for me to be here if I'm not a Slytherin. Why were you distracted?"

Draco pointed across the hall to the Gryffindor table, where Luna had now joined Colin and Ginny and was wiping porridge off his face. "It appears your little photographer was up all night."

Harry frowned as well. "He shouldn't have been. Luna had a spell..."

"I wonder--"

"His nightmares," came a voice behind them and both boys started.

"What nightmares?" Draco asked, turning to find Blaise taking his seat beside him. "He never said anything about them to me."

"He mentioned nightmares last night," Harry mumbled.

"Well of course he didn't mention nightmares to you, dear," Blaise told the blond. "It was in your employ that they began, after all."

"In my...what? Do you mean to tell me it's my fault he's having nightmares?"

"Indirectly. I'm sure he doesn't hold it against you. Really, I think he's more upset with Harry about it."

"ME?!" Harry exclaimed, put off. "What did I do?"

"Well, its your nethers waving in front of his face every time he closes his eyes, which is why he can't shut them."

Harry gaped, speechless.

Draco furrowed his brow, then immediately stopped. He did not wish to ruin his skin with any unsightly lines. "I can't say that I like the idea of him seeing my Harry in the nude every time he closes his eyes."

"Neither does he, which is why he can't sleep."

Draco's frown deepened. "He did mention he didn't sleep much, but I thought Lovegood had a handle on that."

"Oh, she did," Blaise said, nodding. "Perhaps it's gone beyond manageable."

Harry looked lost and still a bit green about the idea of Colin having the image of him naked imbedded in his mind. He stood up, intent on confronting Colin.

Blaise, however, caught his robe and yanked him down to his chair again. "That's not the best idea, Harry," he said.

"And why not? It's my body he's seeing and I don't like it!"

A few of the students nearby turned to look and Blaise smiled at them all. Then he turned back to Harry, scowling. "It's no good yelling at him for seeing something he doesn't want to and can't stop seeing. Why do you think he doesn't sleep? So he can't see it!"

Draco turned to Blaise. "Don't yell at Harry. I don't blame him for being upset. What are you getting so tetchy for, anyways?"

"Luna's beside herself because of it and if you make it worse--"

"Wait, Luna's beside herself?" the blond interrupted. "Since when did you become close with Lovegood? And since when has she ever been beside herself about anything?"

"Since preschool and I can tell."

Draco gaped. "First Finnigan and now Lovegood? What else aren't you telling me?"

"What about Seamus?" Harry asked, latching onto the one thing he could. All of a sudden, he was feeling a bit over his head, sitting here.

"Potter," came a sneering voice from behind and all three turned. Snape's greasy hair shone in the Great Hall's morning light. "Go back to your table and five points from Gryffindor for disturbing the peace."

Harry and Draco both gaped. "He was not disturbing the peace," Draco shot. "He was having breakfast."

Snape looked at Draco and then back to Harry. "Another five points for not following directions. Now get to your table before I make it fifty."

Harry stood again and glared at Snape. Instead of head to Gryffindor table, he left the Great Hall, leaving Draco and Blaise both fuming.

~*~^~*~

Colin collapsed several times that day with exhaustion. If neither Luna nor Ginny were around, though, he was left on the floor for people to step around until he woke up enough to continue on. He had not been able to sleep a wink and any energy he'd had had been used up in his and Luna's attempts to get him to sleep.

Harry hadn't been at breakfast that morning, not that he saw anyways after he'd gotten the porridge cleaned from his face. And he was so busy nodding off over his stew to notice if Harry was at lunch. It was all fine with him, as every time he saw the older boy, the images became worse.

But finally the day was over and rather than go to the Great Hall and fall asleep in his liver and onions, he dragged himself to the Room of Requirement to meet Luna.

When he arrived, the door was already there, meaning that Luna was already inside. He slumped against the door and turned the knob, almost falling into the room when it opened. Then he stood there and gaped.

The entire room was made of mirrors and there was a small nook covered in blue velvet and some pillows. And on the pillows was Luna in a lacey garment that didn't even pretend to cover anything. Colin's eyes widened and despite his exhausted state, felt himself wake up immediately.

"Hello Colin, you have brought your camera. Lovely."

"I always bring my camera," he said and walked toward her. "Er...Luna, what's this all for?"

"To cure your nightmares," she stated, rolling onto her side to reveal her pale front.

The lighting in here was fabulous, with the mirrors reflecting some unseen light at just the right angles. They hit her skin in a way that made it almost glow. His hands moved to the camera around his neck of their own accord and his fingers started twiddling dials as he looked on at her, transfixed.

She was propped up on one large red satin pillow, her long off-blonde hair spilling over her shoulders and leading his eyes to the swells of her chest, which were covered only by a piece of dark blue lace. He followed her curves down her waist, then up over her hips to the flowing shape of her legs.

"Is the lighting alright, Colin?" she asked, her pale eyes piercing out at him from her soft face.

"The lighting's perfect!" he squeaked. "Um...Luna?"

She smiled. "Colin, will you take my picture? I will do exactly as you direct to make them the best pictures. You know what looks best."

He swallowed, but found it extremely hard as his mouth had suddenly gone dry. "Do...whatever..." he stammered.

"Yes," she said, sitting up. "And if the lace works against the picture, I will gladly remove it."

Colin gaped. He had been with her several times while she was unclothed, but he had never really had a fair look at her before. The first time had been as close as he had come, but the closet didn't allow for much of a view. Here, though, he would be able to see every part of her lovely body. The combination of the deep blue velvet and the lighting on her skin made her radiate where she lay. He wanted very much to see her completely and only as she was, but was afraid to ask it. Instead, he managed, "I couldn't ask you to do that."

"But why not? Do you not wish to see me so?"

"Well...I mean I do. A lot. And I mean really, a lot! But Luna, don't just do it because I may want it!"

She leaned forward, presenting him with a view down into the crevice of her chest. "Colin, I like being looked at by you. I like knowing that I make you feel a certain way that nobody else can make you feel. You do like looking at me, don't you?"

He nodded, not even bothering to hide the evidence of just how much. "Y--you really don't mind?"

Luna shook her head, the radishes she wore hanging from her ears swaying. "Please take my picture, Colin," she said. "How would you like me to be?"

It was several seconds before Colin set the camera on the floor and stepped up to the set where Luna sat. He set to work, arranging the red satin pillows, then the blue satin pillows on top of them. "The blue looks best against your skin, but it is good to have the red between the pillows and the floor," he said, his voice coming out in an eager rush. "Now...sort of sit like this with your knees bent like that and your legs coming over at this side. Your ankles crossed just so. And lean here against the pillows."

He stepped back and looked, trying to picture it as a photographer would see a subject, but it was very difficult with Luna as she was, only the lace keeping him from seeing her completely. He shook his head and tried again, then stepped forward. "It looks a little put-together," he said. "Here, try this. Stand up and walk around some. Just to get the thought of a photo shoot out of your head. Now try to think of something that will put you in the mood for the type of picture you'd like me to take and just think about that while you walk. When you're in that mood, then come back here and just lay down however it feels right."

Luna tucked her legs under her and then rose up. But instead of walking around the room, she stepped up to Colin and wrapped her arms around him. Then she kissed him, so long and deep that his knees almost gave out. It didn't help that he was already so exhausted he could barely stand. One of her hands slid around to his front and he shivered. She ran it up his chest and took hold of his tie, where she began loosening it.

He was just starting to lose himself in the kiss when she stepped back. He felt extremely rumpled, his tie hanging almost completely untied and his shirt open a few buttons, his hair no doubt in a mess on his head.

He really wished it hadn't stopped and he heard a groan of protest sneak out of his mouth as she walked back toward the set and settled down, lounging back against the bed of satin pillows. One arm was curled on the top of the pile, her head tilted back and her hair spilling out and around her. Her other arm was resting lazily upon her hip, her hand hovering just below her stomach.

He raised the camera to his eye and looked at her through the viewer. His hands were shaking, but he managed to take a few pictures. Then he zoomed in on her face and could see that her lips were pink and plush from their kiss. Her cheeks were a pale rose and her eyes intense and heavy with passion. She was looking straight at him, the look drawing him closer to her and he almost dropped the camera.

No, she'd wanted pictures! he reminded himself and cleared his throat. "Er...that was really...really...I liked it. Um...just do...follow your instinct on it."

"Colin," she said and he watched her lips form the words. "If the pictures were for you, what would you wish would happen?"

"W-w-w-well, your br...I...hand is..."

She smiled and laid her head on the pillow, stretching herself out a little. Her eyes closed and she said, "I will imagine. Will you take these pictures, as well?" The hand below her stomach found the lace of her garment and slipped beneath. Colin could barely hold the camera now.

As the photo shoot continued, Colin found it harder and harder to handle his instruments, but as Luna had asked, he took her pictures. Though there wasn't much lace covering her, it took her quite a while to remove it all. Then after a long time, she moved from the velvet and silk nook to the mirror floor, the parts of her he would not have seen in the shot reflected back up to him.

Finally he could no longer keep hold of his camera and felt it slip from his hands. Luna was there before him now and she caught it gently in her pale hands. "I would like to show you something," she whispered, setting the camera down beside them and taking hold of his now-undone tie.

He looked ahead as she began to kiss his collarbone and noticed that the image of them reflected back. Not only could he feel her kisses, he was watching it happen. "Luna..." he moaned as her mouth went further down his chest, his shirt now unbuttoned all the way. He felt himself sink to the floor. The velvet blanket was now under them.

"Yes Colin?" She urged him gently to lie on his back as she continued her attentions. He could now see them on the ceiling, as well, framed in dark blue.

He closed his eyes. "I can see our reflection," he managed.

"I know," she murmured against his stomach. "The images of us together will be in your mind for you to see when you close your eyes."

Colin opened his eyes in shock and was greeted by the image of her hands running down his sides. "Do you mean this...this is how you're trying to get rid...get rid of my nightmares?"

Luna rose up and her face appeared over him, blocking him from the view of her body against his. She smiled. "Yes. You can have pleasant dreams now. And so will I."

Then her face disappeared and he found himself looking at them again in the ceiling. Maybe she was right, he thought a moment later when he closed his eyes and the image of them together was still in his mind.