Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Seriously.
A/N: Written for Challenge #196 ~ Music at femslash100.
A/N2: As always, reviews please. They are very much appreciated and I'd even offer a cookie or a hug (whatever rocks your boat) for everyone who reviews!
A/N3: I've said it before and I'll say it again, the FSAC:DD09 (google it if you don't know about it) is open for voting soon! So please vote! You don't have to vote for me, but do vote!
The radio is turned up so loud it should drown out unwanted background noise, but the music is coming out in stunted gasps, stuck on unpleasant notes and coloured with static; and the silence of abrupt deaths and even more abrupt lives hangs heavy in the air. The lyric makes no sense and Ginny wonders if she should just turn the damned thing off, but she knows Pansy needs the distraction even if it were in the form of an annoyance.
On the nights they manage to get the radio playing, they do not go beyond cuddling. Pansy lays her head down on Ginny's shoulder and draws sloppy circles on Ginny's bared stomach. She kisses random spots on Ginny's skin and hums along to songs she barely recognises. She keeps her eyes closed and drifts in and out of dreams with a sigh on her lips. It is not a perfect setup, not even an ideal one, but Ginny much prefers it to the scream Pansy usually lets out. On those other nights without the buzzing of a faulty radio to keep them company, Ginny makes up for the silence and nightmares by exhausting the both of them so that they fall into a dreamless sleep.
They are gentle in the night, holding and touching each other as if they were fragile, as if it were the first time all over again. They come with gasps and near silent moans, tears down their cheeks and calloused fingers in wet heat.
The walls are thin and people can be so unconsciously loud. The music from a struggling radio, if you could call it that (broken and muted in a way music should never be), filters through and strangles at the sluggish air.
Worst of all, Hermione can hear the way Ginny's voice slides over Pansy's and it conjures in her tired mind (because that is all she does: think, think and think, except when she does not and what does she do when she does not think?) a scene that does not belong in this grime and smudge they all like to call the War: something with a pink tint and a rosy scent, tangled limbs and flawless skin, morning sunlight on clean sheets and she imagines clean kisses and warm hugs. Only she has seen enough of Ginny and Pansy to know that the scene must be black and white, sharp angles, scars and bruises, and the silence is more than likely a deadly reminder; and love (for she has also seen how they look at each other) the only flicker of colour.
Even so, to an unwilling listener, the two of them sound so much like good tidings and even her painfully clenching heart manages a little flutter in sympathetic joy (or is that acknowledged defeat?).
Perhaps it is in retaliation (and again, perhaps not) that she finally gives in to Fleur's advances. She (needs) wants to burn out the images of Ginny from the backs of her eyelids.