Backwards
Karla
The same thing happens to everybody,
the statue of Janus is a useless waste,
the truth is that after forty years of age we have our real face on the back of our heads,
looking desperately backwards.
It is what in all truth is called a commonplace.
You can't do anything about it, that's about the strength of it.
Feelings like this should be forbidden. Feelings like this should not be felt. It didn't feel like cold rising throw the body. Yet it felt just like it. It was freezing, it was deadly freezing, God, it was mortal and this wasn't life at all.
Yet it felt just like it.
And you try, and you try, you try so hard to fucking remember how it was before, when you could still cry, when you could still feel it right. And you wonder if you ever felt it at all, if you ever tried at all.
The snow covered the bodies, not completely; it wouldn't have made any sense. It covered them all and it covered them partially. It covered enough. Enough to know feel, not enough to know that this wasn't real.
- But it is not. - He said, lost in the dark sky. It was morning yet it was dark. He covered his eyes with his fists. He tried to remember which was the last time he cried was. - Was it with Sirius? Was it after Dumbledore?.
- It was today. - Tom said in a cold voice, colder than this air, colder than the snow under their naked bodies. - Just now.
And his tears weren't frozen; they weren't even washed away from his cheeks.
- Oh, yeah. - He whispered in parsel. - I forgot.
- They are waiting. - Tom whispered back.
- Let them wait.
What is the colour of her eyes?. Hermione. You can't remember. You saw her this morning, you saw her before getting naked, before open it. And you can't remember. What was the sound of her voice? What was the colour of his eyes? Ron was sleeping, yet you should have already learned it by heart.
Lives like this should be forbidden. Lives like this should be ended. And you try and keep trying, fuck, try harder Harry, damn it. When was it? When did you stop seeing, talking, breathing, remembering the eyes of those so-called friends?
- I was a boy. - You remember, little, but still a memory, a freezing memory.
- You were never a boy. - Yes, in your memory there is the colour of his eyes, the sound of his voice, the feeling of his touch. The dying sense of everything living but you and he.
Everything about you is about Tom Riddle. This forbidden life is his life.
Yet it isn't. This isn't life.
And you wonder if your mom died in vain. You wonder that she may perhaps be crying in heaven, seeing you dead as she. If that makes sense, you never believed in hell or heaven, you never had any fantasy. Or at least, you don't remember having any.
Yes, she did, Harry. She died in vain and you've lost.
- I was twelve. - That's his voice, your voice. And you hate it, having the same voice, the same life and death.
- No, you weren't. - You can feel him smile above your head. How many times have you dare to look at him at the face? You are a coward, Harry; you can't even look at the eyes of your lover, of your murderer. - You shuddered in my arms like you were as old as I am. You screamed like you were always seventeen.
- But I was twelve. - And english seems so distant, so vane. When did you forget how to speak it?
- No, you weren't. - Close your eyes now, you know he speaks the truth. - I fucked you like you were always seventeen.
You lost the instant you surrendered to him, the instant you closed your eyes, the second you opened it again, he, the locket. Because the first time, the night in the Chamber, the first time you lost your memory, the first time you were with him. That night you didn't open anything. He did fuck you hard and fast and it hurt, God, it hurt, it hurt so badly that you couldn't feel it at all. You couldn't remember it at all.
And you smiled at Ginny when you both woke up. You got her out of there, you smiled at Ron. And you lived; you couldn't remember losing your memory, losing your feelings, your life, and the sacrifice of your mother.
The memories of your life faded in that very moment. You stopped remembering the colour of everyone's eyes, the sound of everyone's voice, the language you used to understand. But you could never remember why and when and who, who made you forget.
It was his touch what made you forget. The lifeless feeling of your skin against his. The burning ache of having his lips all over yours, of having all he inside of you.
The cold voice in your head that ever since reminded you at night, whispered softly at you ear, that you, Harry, the chosen one, the saviour, their saviour, had already lost.
Because you lost Harry, you lost and you weren't twelve, you were never twelve.
It wasn't until you touched the real locket when you felt it again, the lifeless feeling, and the burning touch in your skin. It was his all along.
And you opened it. And you let him fuck you again, hard and fast, and cruel and damned and ruined and God, it hurt, it hurts. You knew how to open that locket from that very moment. You always knew what to find in that cave.
- You know how to destroy me. - He's playing with you. He knows you need him, he knows you are dead; he's already taken you with him.
- Why do you keep making them feel you?. - Every time Ron and Hermione wear the locket it burns inside. The though of them having him near their bodies.
- Are you jealous?. - Do not open your eyes, he's still playing with out.
- Yes.
- You won't destroy me. - It isn't cold anymore. You try to touch some of the snow below you. There isn't. - It's grass.
No, you couldn't destroy it. You claimed that Ron had the right to do it, suck it; you didn't fool anyone but them, Harry. Your so-called friends, whatever names they have. You don't remember anymore.
But you knew then, when it was, what it was. You knew and you kept longing for the burning touch, for the lifeless sound and when you had the cope hanging from you fingers, you died a bit more.
And you couldn't destroy it, you couldn't claim that Hermione had the right over it.
Something fell inside you when they did destroy it. And the need of finding that touch again was what kept you alive. Do not fool yourself Harry. You are already dead, you already lost. The horcruxes weren't anything, that what you need is inside the forest, that who you need is inside you.
- You are going to die. - The blue eyes looked right throw you.
- Yes.
- You could live, with me, with my remaining soul, the one waiting in the forest.
- I died when I was twelve.
- That's a mirror Potter, you are talking to yourself. - A curious student said. - I... will go to the hall to be cured.
- What did he say?. - Tom said from the mirror.
- I don't know, I don't remember english. - Knowing that you had to die was nothing, and yet it was everything.
You always longed for an excuse after all. You always longed to let them know how dead you were.
Notes:
This is the antithesis of my other fic Forwards, for the challenge of angst vs happiness. This is, obviously, angst. And I must confess that I like Backwards the better, but, that's just me and angst, we have a connection.
Reviews are made of the sweetest love. That indeed states that reviews are be made of Harry. ;)
The verse at the beginning is by Julio Cortázar and from Hopscoth.
April 7, 2009