Title: Everything is Grey
Parings: Rose/Draco. If this gives you the heebie-jeebies, please don't read! You have all been fully warned.
Rating: M for adult themes, language, eventual lemons, and unusual parings.
Disclaimer: I have yet to wake up as JK Rowling (unfortunately), thus I own nothing.
A/N: Hello, everyone! So this is the first story I'm publishing on my new account, after a long hiatus away from fanfiction.
Inspired from the song Colors by Halsey. (Watch the music video to fully understand why)
Fully compliant with the epilogue, but does not follow cannon with The Cursed Child. Although, I have taken some bits and pieces (like Astoria's death), and incorporated them. Post-Hogwarts, next-gen. Drama, smut and a little bit of fluff.
You're dripping like a saturated sunrise
You're spilling like an overflowing sink
You're ripped at every edge but you're a masterpiece
And now i'm tearing through the pages and the ink
Everything is grey
His hair, his smoke, his dreams
And now he's so devoid of color
He don't know what it means
And he's blue
And he's blue
7 April 2028
"Did you hear me? Mum!"
My voice was loud and pleading, but the volatile words did nothing more than elicit a cold, evading stare given out by the older witch. She stood tensely across from me, confined within the enclosed space of my single-bedroom flat, her brown eyes seemingly glued onto a solitary square inch of decretive-rug beneath my leather couch. I implored yet again, though this time, with little hope towards much of anything back in return. I already knew better.
"Shite. Please, mum...can you just look at me!?"
Apparently, the request was too great.
She answered with nothing in response. Not even so much as a livid scoff or angered huff of breath in my direction. She wasn't yelling. Why wasn't she yelling!? Merlin, I was so incredibly prepared for that. So ridiculously anticipatory of her to be furiously shrieking loud enough for my bleeding neighbors to hear, with rage over what I can only imagine to be the most horrifying revelation she'd ever come to know. Yet still, nothing came.
I was prepared for much different.
For volatile cursing, for demanding questions, for death threats of all different types...but Godric have mercy, not this. Anything but this. Anything but silent, forged indifference.
Disappointment mixed with aloofness was coated noticeably across my mother's normally warm and caring face. The disturbing facial expression being worn by her was undoubtedly enough to make even the wickedest of sinners wish to repent.
And of course, perhaps that was the point.
Silence. Deafeningly loud silence had fallen upon my small flat.
I couldn't take it any longer. My hands started violently waving with nonverbal expression, my voice speaking with a feigned sense of confidence. "Fucking Merlin's beard, mum. Get off it! You're acting like I've just told you I'm terminally ill with only 90 days to live!" I paused, taking a quick breath to steady my harsh words. "Though apparently, by the looks of it - that would have been the better alternative in your eyes. Wouldn't it?"
The flippant proclamation could have easily been classified as childish, but I didn't care. I wanted angry; I wanted yelling. I forged forward with my heated monologue, spilling out various emotions as they crept through to my speech.
"I'm sorry, alright!? Is that what you wanted to hear? For me to apologize, and say this was all some massive misunderstanding? That it was just some huge mistake? A lapse in judgment? And so bloody what if it wasn't, huh? I'm so done with lying. I won't do it anymore. I can't...I physically cannot. I'm sorry you had to find out this way. Really, I am, but it's not like I can take any of it back.
"At this point…you know what? Honestly, I wouldn't want to. Even if I could. So I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm not standing up here, weeping like the sodding child you obviously still think I am, bu-
"I don't think that at all, Rose!" the interruption was quick and snippet, her eyes finally meeting coldly with my own. My mouth snapped shut, waiting for further elaboration over her objection.
Sighing she continued, an unexpected amount of softness within her composed tone, "Quite the opposite, actually. I've always thought of you as such an incredibly mature young woman...My own daughter: so poised and self-confident. Responsible too. More so than any of your cousins ever were, even the older ones. Kind as could be, and Merlin, so forgiving." Her eyes were glistening with moisture; I could tell from even across the room. "Especially of all the many mistakes I've made."
Fucking hell, I could not handle this. I'd take a swift punch in the face or a painful kick to the shins over...this. Silence was better. ANYTHING was better. Wouldn't it just be easier for her to spit in my face and call me a treacherous slag? She knew exactly what she was doing, and it didn't stop. It. Didn't. Stop.
She continued gently, "You're stunning, Rose. Inside and out. You've grown effortlessly well into your beauty, more so than I ever did. So physically striking. But even more importantly, smart as hell. Wise beyond your years...even back as a young teenager and before. You know when Lily and Gin would get into those petty mother-daughter arguments? I'd just sit there and scoff. I was always so incredibly lucky with you. Never Rose - I'd think to myself. Never us."
Gods, a part of me just wanted for her to disown me right then and there. To snuff out both our misery, quick and painless.
I couldn't take it anymore.
I finally spoke up in response before she even had a fighting chance to finish her humiliating lecture, "Well I'm sorry to burst you're incredibly inaccurate and delusional bubble, mum." The tears were unmistakably there. Welling up around my hazel eyes, threatening to spill over at any given moment. I choked out pitifully, "I'm sorry you think I'm perfect, and I'm not even close. I'm a walking disaster most of the time. The biggest disappointment. Honestly. I could write a novel over my flaws and it would probably top the best seller list-
"Oh believe me," she nodded in agreement. How was she so calm? "I know all those too. You can be incredibly rebellious sometimes. Overly trusting. Fearless at one moment, and then horrendously insecure at another. There's never a middle ground with you. But believe me, the good has always well outweighed the bad. And when I look at you Rose, and see all those marvelously good things...it's sometimes so easy to forget-
I met her stare. Her piercing and patronizing gaze of disappointment. The distressing look I deserved every demeaning ounce of.
"I sometimes forget that you're only twenty-two. Twenty-two, naïve, reckless...and with still so much damn growing up to do."
Her words finally pushed me over the edge with their straightforward and brutal honesty. A weak sob escaped from my parted lips, my eyes soon crying freely without feasible control, despite my best efforts at restraining the tears. Sobbing like the bloody infant I was trying so desperately not to seem like. She was so level-headed, and at that moment, I absolutely hated her for it. Because I was not, nor had I ever been. She was right; she was so painfully right.
"I know," I agreed, wiping away the salty teardrops as they continued to free-fall down my freckled face. I maintained such an utter loss for words, completely overtaken by paralyzing emotion. She didn't push - she didn't pry. She let me stand there, wallowing in my own self-destructive misery, without speaking so much as a single remark of condolence.
It was me who finally broke through the rigid tension, the only thing which popped into my whirling thoughts making the air around us even stiffer.
"You forgot 'idealist', too... I'm an idealist with an unhealthy, romanticized vision of the world around me," I somehow let out a small chuckle despite the pathetic waterworks, the next few words causing my mum's face to grow stone-cold all over again. "At least, that's what he always says."
"Well," she spit back venomously, her eyes looking disgusted. "There's one thing we can agree on."
"Do you hate me for it?" The question was impulsive, spilling out from my lips with little forethought from conscious reasoning.
She waited a single moment before answering. "Of course not." Curly brown hair shook along with her head as she readily disagreed. "You're my daughter, sweetheart. I could never hate you."
"But you hate him?" It was more of a statement than anything, my eyes averting away once the declaration left my tongue.
My mother didn't even bother replying. She didn't need to. Her icy silence, yet again, said more than words ever could.
"I need you to tell me everything," she finally whispered hoarsely. "Everything, Rose. The truth...No sugar coating, no evasion of detail. The whole story. You at least owe me that. Help me understand. Because truthfully, at this point, I still can't believe you."
I cringed, knowing the truth was one she didn't want to hear, almost as much as I didn't want to admit. She was going to hate me for it, no matter how much she claimed she never could.
"The whole story?" I weakly choked out, as if replaying the words over again in my mind would change their definitions.
I didn't want her to know it. I should have just lied avidly in the first place; I had become ridiculously proficient at doing so after-all. I didn't want her to carry around the heavy burden...the internal searching of where in Merlin's name she went wrong with raising me.
But she wanted to know. She was just like me: needing all possible bits and pieces of information available. All evidence and truths to stack up before being able to fully assess the whole situation. To finally make an ultimate decision.
Probably the inevitable verdict of disownment and never speaking to her only daughter ever again, I could only assume. I wouldn't have blamed her for it. The fact that she still hadn't stormed out of my flat in a violent storm of rage was already mind-blowing enough.
"The whole story, Rose."
It took a few long, drawn-out seconds before I weakly nodded my head. Taking a sharp inhalation of breath, I proclaimed my defeat with little remaining reluctance. I knew the charade was over...
"Alright."
A/N: The following chapters will be written depicting past events which lead up to this one. I'll line them up chronologically, so hopefully that'll soon clear up any confusion.
While in the midst of writing two other unpublished fics, I had the idea for this one just sorta pop into my head, and it wouldn't go away until I finally wrote something down. This was originally meant to be a one shot, and I DON'T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED! I've got about 4 chapters pre-written already, so I figured I'd let you guys read some of it.
Yes. I am aware of how violently strange this all is, so spare me your flaming reviews over the unusual pairing. I wanted to do something different and completely just for fun…So here we are.
I don't have a beta so please forgive any grammatical/punctuation errors which may be present. I try my best, but proofing is definitely not one of my strong suits.
Thank you for reading! Please review and let me know what you're thinking.