Not Going Back

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or the song by Blink-182 'Asthenia'.

Note: This is from Fleur's point of view, post-war, of how she thinks about going home from her insane asylum/boarding house thing. Sequel to 'All The Faded Girls', from Fleur's POV. Before she died she was given a chance to go home. Will she?


They've come up to me. I'm better they say. I have a chance to go home. But I don't want to leave Ginny. She's coming back I know it. But until then I must wait. I'm lying on my cot now, right beside hers, and I can imagine that she's coming back. I can imagine she's there. She'll listen to my stories. But until she's back I cannot go. She's heard all my stories, but I have one more that I haven't told her yet. I haven't said that I love her. My head is spinning right now as I lay down on my bed. I am staring at the ceiling that has the habit of going in circles as I trace the linens with my finger.

Today they tell me I am allowed to go home. I ask where that is. They tell me it is far off in France. My mother and father are dead, but my sister Gabrielle is fine and waiting for me. With Gabrielle's name memories flood into my head, blocking out the ones I have of Ginny and I talking. We've gone pretty deep before, we've gotten into the meaning of life, why we're even here. I do most of the talking, she'll agree or disagree, only sometimes telling me why. I treasure her words, and if you were to ask me about a conversation, I would remember the things she said, as she never said much.

But here they are today, telling me that I can go and leave my friend. I don't want to do this, yet I want to see my sister again. I need to be safe. They tell me the war is over, but in here, I can hide away from everything, the world stops and freezes. Time doesn't pass. I am protected from the dangers of the world and the mystery that encloses everything. I can't see any of it. My eyes rove the room where I am safe. Another night she hasn't come home. Should I give up hope? Should I go back?

Last night it came as a picture

With a good reason, a warning sign

This place is void of all passion

If you can imagine it's easy if you try

Believe me I failed this effort

I wrote a reminder this wasn't a vision

This time where are you Houston?

Is somebody out there will somebody listen?

She would smile at me when I woke up, I could tell she was watching me for awhile; she was always up before sunrise to give it someone to wake up to. She kept the sun company when it rose and when it set. I was jealous of it for awhile, it was her only friend. She loved the sun, and I loved her, a useless endless triangle of confusing love. Ginny and I were addled in the brains yet we knew more than anyone around here did. More than the men who had taken us from our captors and the women who give us the medicine we spit out anyway after they've left. They think they're gods for 'saving' us from the hell we were in.

We were better of in Hell. Now they think that they know everything and deserve to be worshipped for taking out innocents and making sure those who had forgotten knew how bad it was. That they are great for taking us here. We've all learned not to listen, pretend to be a bystander, and only nod. Say nothing to them that they can reply to; avoid using words at all. They all, even Ginny, think that I know nothing. I'm Martha to them, I collect no information and I don't remember a thing. When I first came here, maybe I was. But talking to Ginny permeated through the cover and I remembered.

I collect everything I hear and I savor it within myself, using it silently against them, displaying some of it to Ginny in my stories. She doesn't know that they are all the truth. She thinks I am mad like the rest of everyone here does. I quite like it, actually, I can reign superior in a way, but no one knows. It is like doing something wonderful with no one around, not being given due credit. I know that I am not crazy. I know that I understand what's going on. I understand Ginny may not be coming back, but I still can't leave.

Should I go back should I go back should I?

I feel alone and tired.

Should I go back should I go back should I?

I hope I won't forget you.

Out there is loud and shattering. If I were to go out there I would lose my mind. When is Ginny returning? I wake up now on her schedule, knowing she wouldn't care. I pray to the sun to bring her back safe to me. It seems I have become her, I won't talk or get up, and I'm staring at her sun, knowing she's staring at it too. I know she barely misses me, and if she gets back and I have decided to leave, she wouldn't care. She'd look to the sun I am so desirous of… and she'd love it.

I am now pleading, beseeching to the sun to have her back. It has been five sleepless nights for me, and I know how she feels now, hollow and lost. It has gotten to the point where I feel like dying, but know I can't. The sun is betraying me. He won't bring her back, yet he never said he would. I only presumed he would. I realize that the sun would only deceive me, as it was not for me. It was bright, anxious, and exciting like Ginny. The moon is what I begin praying to. Exotic, forlorn, wistful and dark in its very own sense: like me.

Now I must think on the most important issue I have yet to face. Should I go home to Gabrielle, leaving everything behind, leaving my superiority and my friend? Do I dare stay here another night, when Ginny isn't coming back? I don't want to go home now, but can I leave my young sister there in Paris without me? I've already done that. She brought me here to die, but then I found Ginny. I should go home and thank her, but then I'd never see the return of for what I was thanking her. Does she know that I already imply thanks to her?

My head is made up of memories

Most of them useless delusions.

This room is bored of rehearsal

And sick of the boundaries

I miss you so much.

I'm lying in my bed now, alone, tired, too energetic to rest. My eyes are bright with tears and my head is heavy with thought. I don't know when this occurred. I suddenly fell into higher thinking and now I see why I must stay. Outside is raw, bitter, and full of the scornful cries of lost soldiers. I do not want to enter a world of crying and mourning women clad in black. I need to add no more tears to the lost soul that is counting everytime I cry. So it is with this note that my body becomes like led. I am quite aware I'm dying.

The ceiling is spinning around and around and the moon refuses to stop it. I am not going home, as I am determined to see Ginny, and hold her, and tell her I love her more than I've loved anyone in my entire life. And being part Veela, everyone loves me, which makes it hard for me to know who really loves me and who is just enraptured by this curse surrounding me. I break free from the cosmic and mental ties keeping me to this earth.

My eyes are open and candles are lit (I hear their flames it is so quiet) but darkness is pressed upon my eyes like endless rain. It is pushing and killing, I feel absolutely nothing; I am anesthetized. I give myself a good mental kick and then realize that I wanted this all along. To not go home, and to be gone. But in a way I am going home. Where is Ginny? I need to tell her something… I don't remember what.

Should I go back should I go back should I?

I feel alone and tired.

Should I go back should I go back should I?

This time I don't want to.

Should I go back should I go back should I?

I feel alone and tired.

Should I go back should I go back should I?

I hope I won't forget you.

It's funny, by the choices we make the way things happen. I missed her by a day. As they took my body out of the building she brought hers in.

Fin.