If somehow had told me ten years ago, that I would be here with him, I would've laughed in their face. But now, things are different. People are different.
Now I sit here and marvel at how delicate he is. Despite his sharpness and often overbearing overconfidence, he was fragile. I had once damned his pride, but now, I couldn't imagine living without his pride in me, sustaining me. It was different to be his source of pride.
He cried when he told me he loved me. I hadn't even thought he was capable of tears, or any emotion outside of contempt. I remember the feeble way he bowed his head in deference to me. It took days of coaching myself into believing that this was indeed reality and not some strange dream of mine to actually believe it. Even now, there are still some seeds of doubt threatening to take root, but one look into his melancholy eyes and I dispel all of that.
It was months before he could find the courage to hold my hand. He would examine each digit with his eyes carefully, never actually touching me. This close scrutiny scared me at first but then I saw the fear in his eyes and knew I had to be strong. He would never ask, but I knew he needed me to. Any sort of physical contact was a big step for us. My name alone was a struggle itself.
"You don't belong to me," he whispered one cool summer night years ago. I disagreed with him and told him so by kissing him gently. In retrospect, it seems ironic that I was the one who initiated our first kiss, or that we fell in love in the first place. He was hesitant to kiss me back, but he eventually gave in. "One day you'll wake up and realize how wrong this is," he sighed unhappily, when it was done. It upset me that he was so scared of committing to this; he was so scared of feeling anything. The man I loved was a self-professed coward. War had made him meek, and I would have to protect him.
We had always met in secluded areas. The press was ruthless in their search of gossip surrounding the most famous class of Hogwarts graduates. Somehow I convinced him to partake in muggle activities, which he actually enjoyed. We would disappear for a weekend and waste away on the beach at Brighton Pier. He even took me to Paris for my birthday. I spent most of my day walking along the Seine, slowly adding to my library with every stop at every book vendor. He just smiled and followed me as I reveled in the Parisienne atmosphere.
The first time we made love it was strange. Though neither of us were completely new to the act, it was I who took his virginity. It was the first time he actually made love, and not just sex. He walked around with a contented glow for a week after, just like people in love did. Whether or not he would admit to it, there was still an innocence surrounding him. He was cold from the war, as were most people. The call to arms rang shrilly in my heart when I was with him. I had to be a hero again.
Our relationship was and will always be a strange one. It wasn't a typical fairytale, so the ending itself was unusual. No marriage is perfect. That I learned quite early in the game. His views on marriage were modeled after a couple who in the end barely knew each other. I couldn't deny that they had loved each other, but their love seemed empty. There was no knowledge to support it. In the beginning, we fought. I wasn't what he had expected from a wife, and he wasn't at all what I had expected in my husband. I'm sure most people had envisioned my children with vibrant red curls, or melancholy green eyes. My children instead had my dark brown hair, but his eyes.
Those eyes had been a tremendous presence throughout my life. I've seen the entire spectrum of his emotions. I had seen how cold and ashen they become, and then how bright and unbelievably breathtaking.
I sit here now, laughing at how strange life is. He kisses my round stomach softly, which I encourage him to do remembering how distant he used to be. With my hand in his, we sit together and we watch our children chase each other across the lawn. My mother and father are here with us, as well as so many of our friends. But now, with his fingers entwined with mine, I only think of the distance between us, which disappears a little, day by day.