Dedication: For Angel, my beta and bud extrordinaire
Moniker:
The crowds had lessened as the hours went by, the weather driving away even the most devoted until only those who counted themselves the most bereft, his family, remained to say their good-byes to him. At least half the Wizarding population of England had come to bid a final farewell to the Boy Who Lived, or more accurately the Boy Who Lived No More.
Ron had been led away from the gravesite, firm hands from his family and fiancée drawing him back towards the sheltered gates at the edge of the graveyard, eyes still fixed upon the place they told him his best friend slept, tears long dried into acceptance though his spirit bore the weight of disbelief that Harry wouldn't be there, smiling and skinny and just everything that Ron never knew he could miss about a person. Hermione had found him, sobbing, the night before after a brief meeting with the remaining members of the Order of the Phoenix, having found himself turning, wisecrack freezing on his lips as the friend he thought to find grinning at his elbow remained stubbornly absent, and it struck Ron then that Harry would be absent evermore.
He stood now, silent as he watched his parents and Dumbledore seeing off the other mourners, the masses bearing banners for the fallen hero trickling away into the distance and Hermione cast him a glance every two minutes, making Ron's heart ache in an entirely different way than before, longing to simply nudge Harry and whisper 'See that beauty there? With the brown hair and a big sparkling ring on her finger? That's my girl mate, that's my girl.' And Harry would have beamed and teased him rotten. Ron's lower lip shook with a sudden dejected tremor, his eyes blurring suddenly from more than the rain. Harry should have been his best man, and the sudden notion that he would have to pick someone to fill that place, that position, instead of the person who most deserved it left Ron's teeth sinking into his lower lip to withhold the sudden sob that lurked at the back of his throat.
Harry. Was it a word that would no longer be spoken, used briefly to recapture the essence of a boy so precious to them all that the pain was so great they would rather ignore his life than acknowledge his death? Ron could barely say his name himself, hating the way the past tense phrases now grated on his brain, trying desperately to recall each and every detail of their time together, determined to immortalise each memory in recognition that there would be no more yet to come.
Harry. Harry James Potter, now buried beside his beloved parents, was already a fading memory, the bloody Boy Who Lived stepping in to claim all the credit and the heroism, the grief and loss that should have been focused on the 17 year old boy who loved Quidditch and dogs and rhubarb crumble was centred on the Hero, the Saviour. In time, Ron supposed, no one would remember to say Harry's name, he would just be the Hero, the Boy who Died to Save Us All, and no one but him would remember the boy whose eyes filled with tears that first Christmas together from the simple joy of a badly knitted home-made jumper.
Harry. Ron wanted to scream at the weeping masses with their Memorials to the Hero, his name was Harry and he just wanted to be normal and be happy and now he's dead. He's dead. Tears flooded Ron's eyes, hot, too hot, behind the redhead's swiftly closed lids, the rain trickling over his brow and plastering his fringe and lashes to his face. He was my best friend, he called out in his head towards the waning crowds, and now he's dead.
"Harry," he whispered and the word burnt his throat with tears.
And then he opened his eyes.
A figure stood in the distance, sheets of rain obscuring the form and identity of the stranger as they stood before the newly erected headstone, but Ron would have known that bright platinum mane anywhere.
In years past Ron would have run, gladly sped through the plummeting drops to seize Malfoy and drag him from this, the sacred place they made him leave his precious friend, and hurt him, make him bleed for the audacity of dishonouring Harry's final resting place with his hatred for the Gryffindor. But somehow, through days and weeks of crying both quietly and noisily for his fallen friend, the rage had subsided to the point of virtual non-existence, leaving Ron to walk softly, if purposefully, towards the rain-soaked blond.
Malfoy stood, shoulders hunched over against the weather, his back towards the advancing Gryffindor as he stared at the indisputable proof that his former rival was finally deceased. The proof of this, the large grey marble slab adorned with both Harry's birth and death dates gleamed wetly in the dull light and Ron watched for signs of joy and merriment in the so far stationary Slytherin. He was, as cliché dictated, clad entirely in black, his cloak clinging limply to his shoulders beneath the downpour, head bowed, and Ron could suddenly see the object clasped in the blond's pale hand. Ron stopped a few feet away from the Slytherin, unheard and unnoticed behind him.
Both boys stood in silence a moment, before slowly and with great deliberation, Malfoy stepped forward to position his charge against the headstone, pausing to run a loving hand down over the gleaming black wood of the handle, fingers lingering over the embossed silver lettering, both shining brightly under the glistening drops that fell steadily upon them as Malfoy stepped away once more.
Ron blinked. His broom. Malfoy was leaving his broom on Harry's grave?
A sigh broke through his bemusement as Malfoy sunk chilled hands into his pockets, steadily regarding his handiwork. He stood a further moment, body tense and unmoving in the face of the downpour, Ron's eyes boring a hole between his rigid shoulders, willing him into further motion to better explain his actions. Abruptly, Malfoy knelt before the headstone, fingers reaching up to trail through the water running in and out of the grooves, the letters and numbers ground into the cold stone.
"Potter," the blond said softly, slim fingertips pressing into that word inscribed before him and Ron's brow creased as those fingers trembled, stroking gently over to lift his other hand, palms and fingers pressed into the marble, the unused first name now blocked by Malfoy's spread digits.
"Potter…" he said again, voice now thick with something, heavy as though muffled, but Ron could see no obstruction before the blond boys lips, "Harry."
The word was weighed down with reverence and regret, throaty with bitten back emotion, and as Ron watched those trembling fingers clinging to his best friends name, he felt a dreadful twinge, a spasm in his gut for the pain in Malfoy's voice now twining itself with the look in his eyes that day Harry chose Ron to be his best friend and shunned the blond haired boy forever. Ron watched the slim pale hands fall away from the stone and even as he opened his mouth, oddly connected to the Slytherin in his grief, the silver prince vanished with a crack, a resounding splinter in the rain as Draco Malfoy left his tribute to the boy he'd hated for hating him, his own twisted grief still tangible in the air. Ron watched the raindrops running down the obsidian handle of Draco's Nimbus and felt a glimmer of hope for the memory of his friend. He was watching the raindrops spiralling over and around the polished black handle when Hermione came running up behind him.
"Ron, Ron, what's happened, Albus said he felt the presence of dark magic and... and... Ron, what's that?"
"It's Malfoy's broom," Ron told her quietly, never looking away from the black against his friend's headstone, "Doesn't it look like it's crying, Herm?"
Hermione gaped at her fiancé, both relieved and unnerved by the almost tranquil tone to his voice, trying to pull him beneath her umbrella as she squinted through the rain at the broom.
"Malfoy's broom?" she questioned, bewildered by the notion, "Draco Malfoy, that Malfoy, his broom?"
"Yup."
Albus Dumbledore came to a halt behind them, having made his way slowly towards the drenched couple, his war-wounds more pronounced in the cold weather and tragic day, eyes twinkling for the first time in what seemed too long as his eyes came to rest upon the young Slytherin's broom.
"Perhaps," he pondered aloud, smiling as Hermione started at his voice, "Perhaps it was all he felt able to give that bound his feelings to the occasion."
Hermione frowned, quick brain floundering for once as Malfoy seemed to shuck his bad-guy label for just that second too long. "But why was he here?"
The rain stung Ron's eyes as he kept on gazing at the Slytherin's homage to the Gryffindor seeker. "Harry," he said conclusively and smiled.
Fin.