Dust To Dust
"Beauty is a fragile gift."
The library was incredibly alluring to Luna. Particularly the lighting, which was emitted from small table lamps under which young faces squinted at old pages with an unearthly and beautiful fascination. It was not too dim, but nor was it draining, instead bathing everyone in a soft yellow glow; warming to the bone.
Everybody looked exquisite in the library. Moreover, the place was suffused with the scent of knowledge and learning visible in the wrinkled-paper faces of the old and bright, curious eyes of the young; shining like pebbles on a streambed. Luna imagined herself to belong to both and neither of these categories, and indeed she did not resemble the others.
Sometimes she read. Bringing down old tomes of ancient verse, delighting in the feel and smell of the worn leather binding and the yellowed pages. Sometimes, she allowed the edges of these pages to cut into her skin, and she imagined that understanding of the Greek or Latin verse pouring into her. Sometimes she would let her eyes drift over the characters themselves, dragging one finger over the letters as though it were Braille. She did not need a foreign tongue to understand the elegance of Ovid or Sappho. No. It gripped her like a fever, and Luna sometimes thought her heart would burst.
Through these pages she lived and loved and felt much more than what experience had given her. She watched Isis gathering twelve pieces of deadened flesh together, her features marred by blood-tears and terrible anger. She watched the face which launched a thousand ships twisting into a smile as Apollo raced over the sky. She watched Orlando's eyes moving under his eyelids in fitful sleep and wondered if he dreamt of his transformation.
Sometimes, Luna couldn't bare it anymore. She would lean back in her chair, and look up to the streams of sunlight which poured in through dirty windows. Dust, visible in this light, fell in such a quantity that she felt buried and breathless. Luna was enchanted by her exhalations. With each breath, the grey matter swirled outwards; prompted into a waltz. Luna wondered if the daring particles which veered away from the united wave carried a part of her with them. She wondered if someone on the other side of the room would unsuspectingly breathe in her air and turn, look at her in acknowledgement. Perhaps.
The library gave her life, and in return she gave herself through breathing, and through the insistent pressing of her fingers on the rosewood tables.
The dark eyes of Pansy Parkinson were concentrating on several scrolls in front of her. Her quill scratched against the parchment, apparently without care, as she didn't seem to look at what she was writing. Luna watched as dust settled on Pansy, dulling the sheen of her black hair without detracting from her striking beauty. The pale eyes of Luna Lovegood sparkled as she pouted her lips and expelled air in the other girl's direction. Luna smiled, and repeated her gesture. Pansy growled irritably.
"Listen Loony, if you don't stop breathing so loudly I'll give you something to sigh about."
"Promise?"
Blood rushed to the cheeks of the Slytherin, and she coughed to hide her embarrassment.
"Just be quiet, alright?"
Loony Luna Lovegood smiled back at the girl agreeably. At least a part of her had been inside Pansy, even if it was not how she had imagined it. Well, she considered, dropping her twinkling eyes back to the 'Ulysses', it was a start.