Neville
He stares at himself in the mirror, his hands shaking, his face contorted in pain.
With a deep breath, he convinces himself to stop, stop this cycle. This wake-up-brush-teeth-shower-stand-in-front-of-the-mirror-wallow cycle.
He's just hurting himself.
Luna
She runs a hand through her hair, her eyes trained on her stomach.
Despicable. This scar, the scar she sees every day – it's just a reminder of how easily she can be broken, and how difficult it is to put herself back together again. She is not Humpty Dumpty – she's just another war hero, with the marks to show it.
Seamus
The thin line that runs down his face leaves him marked – he is a marked man. Because of that one scar, everyone knows. He was weak – he'd given in. That one scar? It tells the whole world his story. His terrifying, cowardly, foolish story.
He had run. He'd shot some spells, and then, when a terrible mix of a curse and a flying object collided with his face, he was gone, like a flash, out of that building and into the forest, the Forbidden Forest, to hide behind a tree and wait it out.
Did people realize it? He thinks not. He thinks no one knows.
If only there was not the scar – not only on his face, but breaking through his life, ugly and bloody and scabbing. If only he were free.
Lavender
She paces, paces, backwards, forwards, backwards, forwards, her steps echoing down the hall. She has not been out of bed in days, and now she can find no where to walk. No where to go. Nothing to do.
She has been gone for too long, forgotten by the world and her friends.
They can forget. Because of her scars, the gashes along her face that sear every moment of every day, she cannot forget. She cannot live the lives they are each pretending to lead.
Dean
He tries to sleep at night, without the help of alcohol. He tries and fails, tries and fails, ceases to try.
It is too hard. He stares at his wall, a blank wall of white, horrifying and plain and terrible because of the starkness.
He stares and he remembers. He feels the pain of the scar above his eyebrow – the night Ted was killed. He fingers the mark on his neck – when he and his companions were nearly caught.
There are too many to name. Every scar tells an unforgettable story, but he wants nothing more than to forget.
Ginny
A flash – a bang – a scream. Someone is running, running with no destination. He has a mark, a huge mark down his otherwise pale forehead. He is running, and cannot stop. She yells at him – she begs for him to remember her. He does not.
Another scream. She must help. She is co-leader. She must get to them – where are they?
Even now, she feels the panic. Her rational mind tells her it is not real, just a dream, this is all over. She finds the boy, a crumpled mass on the ground. Upon turning him over, she finds the face of the running boy – never ceasing, always running – his eyes glassy, staring.
It sears her, sends a shock through her body, causing her to shake all over with terrifying speed.
She awakes with a cold sweat on her forehead, a warm breeze coming in through the window. She stands, and winces. Like every night, her leg, bloody and gashed upon beyond repair, is hurting her. Now is when she was attacked that night, she thinks. Because it happens every night, right after the same nightmare of a dead, running Harry.
Another flash of blood drips down her leg – and then nothing. Her face crumpled with pain, she collapses back onto her bed.
Sleep, she hopes, will save her.
It never does.
