To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pitch and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.
~ "Hamlet" 3.1
Ginny peered over the railing, nearly holding her breath to keep from being heard. The others thought she had gone to sleep an hour ago, and she had tried, but her thoughts kept her from sleeping. She had left her room intending to join the others who were still up, talking in the kitchen over mugs of hot cocoa, but when she heard them all whispering, she realized she wasn't in the mood for a crowd.
Though things had calmed down a bit over the past couple days, everyone was still more than a little tense. Despite the fact that Voldemort was gone for good, and most of his followers had been killed in the battle, there were still remnants of evil-doers hiding out around the city, stirring up unnecessary trouble out of spite. Because of this, Mr. Weasley and the remaining members of the Order, and even Percy, George, Harry, and Ron on occasion were out frequently, working over time to track down every last death eater and put a stop to their mischief once and for all. This left Mrs. Weasley home to fret over the girls to an almost unbearable degree. Ginny found herself hiding out upstairs more and more often when Harry wasn't around, and sometimes even when he was.
Hermione was down in the kitchen with the others. Ginny could see her sitting at the table beside Ron; their hands were clasped together tightly. Ginny could see Harry as well, sitting across from Ron, and she wanted to be with him, but she knew that even if she was, he wouldn't be thinking about her. Harry had been so preoccupied with tracking down the Death Eaters with the others that even when he was at the Burrow, he barely gave Ginny the attention she desired. She knew that he was just nervous and wanting everything to be safe, but she didn't like seeing him so intense. It scared her a little, and it made her lonelier than she liked to admit. Ginny didn't like the constant conversation about the battle and what came next. She had spent an entire year in fear, away from the ones she loved, not knowing whether or not anyone would live to the end, and now that it was over, she just wanted to grieve in peace, without dwelling on the remaining evil. No one else seemed to share her feelings though, so she stayed four flights up, staring down out them and eavesdropping without joining.
"I don't like him here," Ron was saying. He had made this complaint frequently in the past couple days.
"It won't be forever," Hermione encouraged him, as she always did.
"It's already been too long."
"None of us like it, but it's necessary for now." Mrs. Weasley reminded her son gently. "Until his parents are released from questioning, he has nowhere to stay."
"Why doesn't he stay locked up with his parents?" Ron retorted.
"He's just a child."
Ron snorted, and even Harry snickered a little.
"Ron, you know the Order wants him to be supervised. They think this is the best place for him for the time being." Mrs. Weasley stood from the head of the table and retrieved more hot cocoa to refill their cups. "Just stay out of his room and you won't even know he's here."
"You mean my room," Ron muttered.
Ginny rolled her eyes. She knew a part of the reason Ron was so frustrated was because he had to give up his room, so he and Harry were bunked with George. She glanced up towards the attic bedroom, thinking she had heard something. It sounded almost like muffled crying. Her curiosity was piqued, and she quietly climbed the steps upwards. She paused at the door and listened. After a moment, she was convinced she heard crying, but she wasn't sure what to do about it. She knew her mum would freak if she knew Ginny was going anywhere near him unsupervised, but she couldn't turn back now.
Taking a deep breath and one glance back downstairs to make sure everyone was still at the table, she quietly pushed open the door and peered inside the dark room. The crying stopped instantly, but she heard a few leftover sniffles, which he was clearly trying to muffle in the pillow.
"Draco?"
"What do you want?" he grumbled from the bed.
Ginny hesitated for another moment before stepping into the room and shutting the door securely. "I thought I heard something…" she didn't want to make him uncomfortable or angry by pointing out his tears. "I wanted to see if you were okay."
"If I'm okay?"
She could see the shadow of him sitting up in bed suddenly, and she tiptoed in that direction.
"Why the hell would you care if I'm okay?"
"I was worried," she told him honestly. "We've all been through a lot these past few days…it's understandable to feel distraught."
"Distraught?" Draco repeated. His voice still quivered a little, and it was obvious that he was confused about her presence in his room. "Yea, I guess you could say I'm a little distraught." Now his voice was painfully sarcastic. "My parents are being held for questioning, and I'm a prisoner in a house of one of the family that hates me more than possibly anyone else on the planet…sure, let's go with distraught."
"We don't hate you," Ginny told him.
"Sure you do."
"Not all of us," she insisted. "Ron and George call you a slimy git, and Hermione finds you a little unbearable, but they don't necessarily hate you…"
"I don't care if they do," he told her suddenly. "They should. I deserve it. I don't know why Harry didn't let me die. He should've."
"Harry couldn't let you die," Ginny explained. "He couldn't let anyone die if they didn't truly deserve it. You aren't a bad person at heart Draco. I'm certain of that."
"Why would you think that? I'm a Death Eater."
Ginny reached the table beside the bed and flicked on the light. Draco turned away from her quickly and she knew he was trying to hide his face so she wouldn't see his tears.
"You're not a Death Eater anymore Draco," she reminded him. "I'm not sure you ever really were. Harry told me what happened that night Dumbledore died. You had an opportunity to kill him, and you couldn't. You're not a killer."
"I might as well be."
"I don't believe that." She hesitated for a moment and then sat on the edge of the bed.
Draco looked at her suddenly and shifted his legs away from her. "Why are you here?"
"I heard you crying," she confessed.
He looked away again. "I wasn't…"
"Don't be ashamed. I've cried a lot these last few days."
He looked at her slowly. "I heard your brother died."
Now she looked away. She hadn't thought she had any more tears to shed for Fred, but she felt them burning her eyes now.
"I'm sorry," he told her.
"We all went into the battle knowing there would be sacrifices. Fred knew what he was getting into. He died bravely."
"Why don't you hate me?"
"You weren't responsible for Fred's death, or anyone else's."
They were both quiet for a moment, but Ginny thought she saw tears forming in Draco's eyes again.
"Why were you crying?"
He glared at her sharply, and for the first time Ginny wondered if she had made a bad choice in coming there, but then he seemed to completely crumble, and the tears leaked from his eyes again.
"When I try to sleep, my dreams remind me of everything I've been a part of…I see all the evilness and the pain and the suffering…" he continued to cry, now hardly seeming to care that she was there at all. "It haunts me. I just want it to stop."
"You have been through a lot," she agreed. "It's going to take a while for all that pain to heal."
"I've never been very patient. I just want it to stop now."
"This isn't something you can magic away."
"I wasn't thinking magic."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
He fell quiet again.
"Draco, what are you talking about?" She noticed his arm twitch, and his hand slide under the blankets. "What are you hiding?" Without giving it any thought, she reached out for his arm and pulled his hand out from beneath the blankets.
"Don't…" he tried to resist her, but he was still crying and didn't fight too hard. When his hand emerged from beneath the blankets, Ginny saw that he was clutching a small silver dagger in his fist.
"Draco!" She gasped and tightened her grip on his wrist. "What are you doing with that?"
"It seems like the only way."
"What does?" She didn't want to assume the worst, but when he held out his other arm and showed her the shallow cuts on his wrist, she had her answer. "Seriously?"
"I just want it to all be over."
Ginny took her hand away from and stood quickly. She stared down at him with her hands on her hips. "Then why don't you finish it? If you're too weak and pathetic to live the consequences to the bad choices you've made, then you don't deserve to live."
"I couldn't do it," he told her quietly.
"What?"
"I can't go to sleep without being terrorized by nightmares, but when I think about death…" he looked at the failed cut marks on his wrist. "That scares me even more."
Ginny sat back down and waited for him to continue.
"I don't know what to expect from death. What if it's worse? What if it's just an eternity of nightmares worse than anything I'm experiencing now?"
"I like to believe that death is peaceful," she told him. "When I think of Fred, and Tonks, and everyone else who died…I like to think that they're happy now…"
"But?"
"The truth is we can't know, and we won't know until it's our time to go. Until then though, we just have to make the best of what we've got to live with here."
"That's the problem though, isn't it? What am I living for?"
"A second chance." Ginny reached out carefully towards the knife and tried to pry it away from Draco's tight grasp. "It's not too late to make things right Draco."
His fingers relaxed and she took the knife away. As soon as his hand was free, he clenched his fist tightly and his body convulsed with sobs. Acting instinctively, Ginny took both his hands in hers and held them tightly. She felt the still wet blood on his left wrist and pressed her lips over the cuts. Draco's body tensed at her touch, but he didn't pull away.
"Ginny…" he just barely breathed her name, then he cleared his throat and pulled away from her slightly. "Will you please leave now?"
"Oh…I'm sorry…" she released his hands quickly. "I didn't realize I was bothering you…but of course…I just…" she shook her head.
"Ginny…" he sighed. "You aren't bothering me."
"Oh?"
"I just think you should go…" he stared at his hands, refusing to look at her.
"Is it something I said? I was just trying to help, you know?"
"I know." He reached out and tentatively touched her fingers.
It was her turn to tense at his touch, but neither of them pulled away.
"I'm not used to people caring about my feelings," he told her.
"I just don't like to see people hurting…"
Draco held her hands against his bare chest and stared deeply into her eyes. "What about you? Who takes care of your hurt?"
"Okay…" she started pulling away from him. "Now I think it is time for me to leave."
"I made you uncomfortable…" he released her quickly and sank back onto his pillows. His face contorted into a mixture of pain and remorse. "I'm sorry."
"Don't apologize," she soothed him. "It was a nice question."
"I just get the feeling that it doesn't get asked enough."
The way he stared at her was making her uncomfortable, but she couldn't look away. "I have a boyfriend." She wasn't sure if she was saying it to remind him or herself.
"I know." Draco seemed confused about her sudden statement.
"I shouldn't be here."
"Then leave."
She didn't move, and after a few moments of silence Draco reached out to take her hand and slowly pulled her back onto the bed. They were quiet again for a few moments, and Draco continued holding her hand. She shifted slightly and he reacted by moving his legs to give her more space on the bed.
"Draco…" she glanced down at their hands, which were still clasped tightly together.
"I don't want to be alone," he told her. "When I'm alone…"
"All you have is your nightmares," she finished for him.
Their eyes connected suddenly, he sat up, she leaned in, and their lips met. They stayed with their lips pressed together, barely moving, for a few moments before breaking apart. When they did separate, both were breathing heavily, and still staring deeply into one another's eyes.
"Ginny…" Draco's lips brushed against her cheek as he whispered her name.
Her entire body felt warm as she felt his hands rubbed across her back and his arms tightening around her. She let herself melt against his chest as their lips connected again. The kiss was more intense this time, more aggressive. Her hands explored his bare chest, as his slipped beneath her shirt, sending shivers up and down her spine. Moving up her back, his right hand cradled her head, his fingers tangling in her long hair as he pulled her closer to himself, increasing the passion of the kiss. When he began to remove her shirt, she stopped.
"What are we doing?" She sat up quickly and pulled her shirt back in place.
"Ignoring the pain."
She shook her head. "Draco, I'm sorry. I can't do this. I didn't mean to…" she smoothed down her hair and stood up.
"Don't be upset," he pleaded. "This was mutual."
Ginny headed towards the door swiftly and didn't turn around. At the door, she paused briefly, and still without turning around whispered: "Harry can't know about this."
Draco smiled slightly and shook his head. "I'll see you in the morning."