The Way We Were
She walks down the hall of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, full of confidence, her eyes seeking for something in the distance. It's the first day back to school after Christmas and the hall is full of students happy to see each other after weeks. Soon, she smiles, her glance stopping at a gang of Seventh Year boys; she has found what she was looking for.
"Hi, baby," she tells the blonde boy once she has reached them.
He turns and smirks to her. "Hi, love. How was your Christmas without me?"
She looks indifferently at her fingernails. "Well, I had better days." She raises her eyes and he can see a mixture of innocence and challenge in them. He stares back and soon she's smiling and he's laughing, hugging her tightly.
"Merlin, people! Find a room! Or go shag in the bathroom … or something …" one of the other boys says, looking pretty annoyed.
They laugh once again and he pulls her away from his friends.
"Well, Weasley …"
"Well, Malfoy…"
Her eyes flew wide open. She doesn't need time to adjust to her surroundings; she's too familiar with them. Slowly, she turns to the side, trying not to wake her husband. She sits up and studies his face with a nostalgic look in her eyes. Soon the look turns into a smile, and nostalgia into sadness. Her dream has distressed her; her thoughts are back to those days.
"Do you love me?" she asks playfully.
"Yes," he answers immediately without hesitating at all.
Smirk. "Do you trust me?"
He laughs. "No."
This time it's a smile. "Smart boy."
They are not who they were anymore, she thinks as she plays with his hair. Too many things happened and life changed too fast for them to remain the same; they had fought for their love too hard, too passionately, that in some point of the course, they lost each other. Or maybe it was the difficulties marriage had that made her believe that. Grown-up life was different than they had thought: their lives had turned out differently than they had planned they would.
What kind of thoughts are those, Rose? she asks herself. They would never lose one another— she knows that. But at times like these, she can't but worry; can't help but be afraid of time. And as she recalls days like those she had just dreamt of, she wonders how they could have been so much happier and easier and simpler.
He murmurs something in his sleep and she smiles tenderly to him. She loves him so much. So damn much. Rose Weasley and Scorpius Malfoy weren't meant to fall in love; neither had had any intention to. But it came natural to them. Everything had come easy to them, then. Until they had grown up and they are full of responsibilities and worries.
And they have so many things to take care of: work, children, money, parents who still hate each other. They argue more now but less passionately. They argue and get really angry with each other. But she wouldn't change a thing. She wouldn't change a single day, a single hour, a single minute they spend together.
Because she knows very well that, at the end of the day, there's a person for her to turn to. And she likes who that person is. He might not be the ignorant, spontaneous boy she had fallen in love with; he is the man whom she loves with every inch of her being. Who will stand next to her through everything. The man who makes everything in the routine of everyday life much more better.
She may look back to the way they were but they way they are is fine by her. She is never bored with him. Never tired of him. She's just tired of being responsible. But a last glance to her husband can make her forget even that.
Written for "The Challenge That Must Not Be Named- Round 1", a contest in HPFC.
Prompt: They Way We Were- Barbara Streisand.
Now beta read by never-ending-nights-with-you, one of the challenge judges. Thank you!
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