Balancing

(does she think she can serenade him or something?)

AN: Very quickly, Harry Potter isn't mine. My hypothesis is, however, that it does contain that spark that I'd seek to coax into writing. Also, yeah, this has a scene from Deathly Hallows and is in that general time period. Sorry.

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Can't really handle the balance, it's thinner than you'd think.

Cho gripped the broomstick more tightly. It had been too long since she'd flown. Whereas she thought she'd relax, she instead found herself frightened, frightened that she'd lost her touch, frightened that she couldn't avoid her thoughts even with the wind blowing in her hair and the feeling of blasting freedom.

It was different, though. She was used to a dull paranoia, the fear she'd would recognize more names on the list of the purged, the dead, the wanted fugitives. The fear that her family would be found and—and taken. The fear that she herself would be found one day—Apparate in the wrong place, let slip the Taboo name.

The fear that the Daily Prophet would arrive early one morning, in color, flashing that message. UNDESIRABLE NO. 1 CAPTURED. And with a picture of him, sunken and despairing, looking grim, beaten and bruised. Him, hopeless. Maybe not even thinking about that girl.

Could she really say why the first thing she did every morning was run to the newspaper to see? Had they ever been that close? Had it even been fun? Maybe half the times they'd met she knew she'd been crying and miserable about the other him, and...

She slipped into a familiar refrain. How could he have put up with it? She, Cho, always thinking of another boy, a boy that he had perhaps respected but, at least, envied—someone he had always been bitter towards. He, Harry, always comforting her—awkwardly, of course, incredibly awkwardly, because he was one of those boys who knew absolutely nothing about it, and felt like he never could—eventually drawing a smile. Together but with the unspoken barrier between them.

No, she admitted to herself. It had been miserable. The rumors. The grief. The arguments. The unspeakable Umbridge. The total inability to concentrate on anything.

By any objective standard, being alone had done wonders for her. Her nerves were steadier, her step more sprightly, and her whole bearing was assured and confident. But while she didn't think she was obsessed, she did know that in the back of her mind, it had been for him. Fighting Death Eaters, thinking in the back of her mind that she was upholding her end of his fight; on the run, wondering if she'd run into him; seeking news of him wherever she went.

It wasn't all she thought about, of course; she had moved on, or tried. She'd had a fling or two in the intervening year and broken them off disgustedly. She'd occupied herself with her task and her battles and her friends—those few that she could find; so many were in the grasp of the Ministry, voluntarily or not. But in idle moments, she thought of him and—what could have been.

A bird raced straight at her and she swooped the broom down, far too quickly, almost out of control. Everything was more sensitive than she recalled. She never could handle the balancing job, though. That was why everything had gone wrong in the first place; and so she stopped juggling and focused on her solitary task—doing what she could to erode against—You-Know-Who.

One day, she'd felt a sudden warmth on her chest and she wildly thought he was here and somehow she hadn't known it but her body had. But no. It was Granger's fake Galleon. For a moment she thought unpleasant thoughts about Granger. Maybe if the hex on the DA list had been less... scarring, Cho would never have fought with him. Maybe if she had warned them—and surely that was the point? Not to catch a sneak, but to prevent them?

So yes, she'd stewed about it for a while before realizing what the signal meant—Harry, at Hogwarts. Her thoughts blasted bast her—she thought he had come back, called her to him because he wanted her help and needed her to rescue him from the clutches of You-Know-Who, with Dumbledore's Army assembling to destroy him.

Ah, right. The entire DA. (Ginny's name, anyway, she thought darkly; Cho's first, but Ginny's then.) And Harry wouldn't be there; it would have been Granger, or whoever—no, Harry had been nowhere for a year. Not captured, not dead—hiding. In Gryffindor dwell the brave at heart.

And so she thought of ignoring it. But then again, even if he weren't there, what was she doing? Nothing. Tracking Death Eaters. Playing the vigilante. Why not at Hogwarts?

---

"How long is this thing, anyway?" she asked Lee.

He shrugged. "Who knows. Only way in, anyway."

They fell silent again. The flickering lights danced on the wall. Cho decided she didn't want to talk anyway.

Oppressive silence and trudging through a corridor.

But he was here; and Voldemort was coming, and everything felt final. Important events had always seemed to happen in May around here anyway—at least, they had for the past six years; why should they stop now?

Cho figured she had enough self-control not to make a fool of herself the moment she entered the Room of Requirement. She would see him, nod casually at him, and sit down. She would get to business. There were important things to do.

And when she saw him she did exactly that. He looked up at her—not much changed, slightly more bruised, slightly taller maybe? More rugged, and more confident; but at the moment, he looked as if someone had Confunded him. It made her feel—oddly normal. This had not been an altogether infrequent occurrence. She smiled at him.

"I got the message," she said, holding up the fake Galleon; and before he could drop that charming look of befuddlement, she sat down—with the Ravenclaws, out of general habit.

They greeted her warmly, but seemed rather surprised. "Cho?" asked Terry.

"Where have you been?" asked Michael.

"Around," she said. "Doing what I could." It was easy enough to forget how nice it was to be around friends you knew—the comfort in the old as well as the new.

And she looked up at Harry again; but he seemed distant. She felt oddly stricken. He'd seen her and things had seemed normal, but it had been a fleeting moment. She felt—not as if there was bad feeling between them, but rather as if there was no feeling there, a void.

The room quieted. Cho listened intently as Harry dithered for a while and then asked about the diadem of Ravenclaw. Diadem. Honestly. It was a fable. Like the Chamber of Secrets. Okay, so maybe that was a bad example. Okay, so maybe it was real, and Harry had his reasons for seeking it out. It wasn't really her prerogative to wonder if Hogwarts had any surface-to-air missiles.

Now that she thought about it...

She spoke up. "If you'd like to see what the diadem's supposed to look like, I could take you up to our common room and show you, Harry. Ravenclaw's wearing it in her statue."

He considered for a moment and looked at her. Not that she was concerned right now, but he seemed careless. He wasn't embarrassed to see her; he wasn't surprised, he wasn't unfriendly, but she was just there. It was a glance. Somehow this unconcern was more annoying than anything else.

And then he looked away again. "Listen, I know it's not much of a lead, but I'm going to go and look at this statue, at least find out what the diadem looks like," he said, and added something quietly to Weasley (well, the tall one. Ron) and Granger.

Cho stood up. I don't have any ulterior motives, do I? Absolutely none. Okay, possibly one. But then, Ginny was glaring at her.

"No," she said quickly. "Luna will take Harry, won't you, Luna?"

And she sounded positively tiger-like. Cho dispassionately wondered if that was the voice she used during her various snogging sessions with, say, Michael Corner and Dean Thomas and—well, she didn't keep track, but who could?

(All right, so there weren't that many, but Cho couldn't be blamed. Ginny had started it.)

Anyway, she didn't feel like getting in an argument about it. Unlike certain people, she felt like she could wait to talk, to friends, until after the greatest threat to the wizarding world in known history had been defeated. Maybe it was a maturity issue.

Cho sat down again and Harry and Luna climbed out of the room. She sighed. Despite her internal bravado, she had the distinct impression that he'd forgotten. That she didn't exist to him anymore. The look he'd given her—diffidence. You had your chance, but you couldn't keep your balance then, either; and once you fell off you couldn't get back on.

She wondered idly—what if I had been stronger?

And then she stood up, went to a shelf, and started brushing up on her defensive spells.

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AN: I am awfully bothered by the portrayal of characters as totally dependent on others. They have their own lives that don't depend on their romantic partners. Of course, I have lots of issues like this, so what I really mean is that it's a little contradictory for me to think of Cho relying so much on Harry. But then, so does the rest of the world.

I also regret how hard it is to choose titles and names. It's good because in fanfic you never have to decide on a character's name; it's fun to write a character who you already know, and weird to create one yourself—Steve, you think. I know a Steve; and you apply Steve's characteristics to your character; and invariably they're too real and too bothersome to work. But you still need a title; and so, why not allow yourself that touch of the dramatic, those words that sound awfully nice and therefore clichéd?

I believe this is where I say "to be continued?"