Tell Me When it Hurts
By NeuroticMuse413
DISCLAIMER: Don't own Harry Potter. Really wish I did. But I don't.
SUMMARY: ONE-SHOT. The final war is going on outside, but in an empty, neutral classroom, Draco and Ginny find themselves alone and hurt with little chance of ever seeing each other again. It was meant to be a goodbye. It was meant to be an apology. But nothing is ever that simple. What happens when both realize the moment they step outside, paradise dies out?
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The kinky version's going up on Coloured Grey soon. I'm thinking of co-writing it with a very good friend of mine. Add me on MySpace for special bulletins when that happens. Enjoy the "clean" version. And someone review on Quarter Moon! It's nearly at 300 and I'm getting antsy. Love you all so much for reading.
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"Does it hurt?" Draco asked her, pressing his cold hand against her shoulder wound.
She looked up at him through her eyelashes with great distrust. It was hard to believe he cared. She was fighting the urge to tie him up in a corner like a dog and blast the classroom behind her. "It could be worse."
"Right. The Chamber. I remember."
"You should," Ginny said, trying not to growl. "It was your father's little game, after all."
"My father doesn't play games."
She laughed slightly. "So trapping little girls in secret chambers with giant snakes and trying to kill their boyfriends is just a sport then? Is it like hunting for him? Oh I bet he plans it all in advance, the real calculating type… has a little section of his closet for clothes that can't be traced to murderers just in case and a naughty and nice list for when he goes around England and distributes toys to the children of the anti-Christ--"
"Oh shut up!" he said, pressing the wound. He'd grown tired of her imaginative ranting, mainly because his father really did lay out his clothes out in advance, schedule meetings with Death Eaters about plans for world domination and whatnot, and was known for bribing wizards during the holidays to hide some secret activities. "Ginny, I'm not my father. I know I'm the last person you'd like to see, especially after what happened to Ron. I'm a spoiled maniacal genius--" he said and stopped to watch her squint as if contemplating using him for food. "—but you're alone, bleeding under a desk in the one classroom that doesn't hold potions. I think you can do a lot worse than me."
"Nope. No worse. You're it."
"I'm the ACTUAL last person you'd ever want help from? Last on your list?"
"Let's just say, if it were you or Neville, who hasn't been able to stop blowing up books in the last six months, I'd pick Neville."
"Well, I've always wanted to be on top, just never figured it'd be of your hit list."
He lifted his hand and saw the blood must have started to coagulate. The bleeding would soon stop and he would be free of her. He just wasn't sure if that's what he wanted. There was so much left to say.
His wand was broken in two in a corner. He kept looking at it as if expecting it to be fixed on its own. He was used to that in the Manor. He'd throw things in tantrums and elves would magically fix them by the time he calmed down. He had nothing now.
"They think you're dead, you know," she whispered. "You could run and hide and no one would bother you."
He ripped off a piece of his shirt and said coldly, "What do you care?"
"I think you do… I see how you look at me, Draco."
"What? Disdain not clear enough for you? How about blind hatred?"
"That's not what I meant and you know it," she said as he wrapped the pieces of shirt around her slender arm.
"You want the truth?" he asked, finally looking her straight in the eye. He stopped when he saw them. They pleaded for him in a sincere way, not the demanding blank stare of his usual entourage.
"You're doing it again," she said softly. "You're looking at me like that."
He swallowed the lump in his throat and drew in closer. "Tell me to stop," he whispered, his voice creaking, closing in more and more.
"I can't," she said. "I don't want you to stop."
And he smiled and caressed her face just before their lips brushed together. He could feel her tremble, her breath quicken. He would have kissed her. He wanted to so much. But he couldn't bear having her hate him any more than she already did. He couldn't be selfish to her, not when this meant goodbye.
So he pulled away just before they embraced their kiss, but she wouldn't have it. A spike of adrenaline reached her other arm and she pulled him back in by the back of the head and kissed him so hard, she worried she'd broken teeth. It wasn't sweet. It wasn't slow. It was a fire that needed to be quenched. It was desire, pure and unrequited no matter how hard they grabbed at each other.
He felt her tear fall on his cheek and pulled away, falling back onto the floor. "I'm sorry," she said.
"Did I hurt you?" She shook her head, despite the taste of blood in her mouth. She couldn't look him in the eye. She was calm but he struggled to find breath. It was taking more out of him to pull away than to kiss her. When they had kissed, he felt the fire but inside he was calm as an ocean at mid-day slumber.
There was an awkward silence. He dragged himself against the wall beside her and avoided her gaze again. "Peanut butter," he whispered after some time of listening to the chaos outside. "You had peanut butter for lunch."
She giggled reluctantly and wiped away a tear. "Harry's out there, you know."
"You still love him. I know. I wasn't trying to hurt him."
"It's alright," she said. "I could tell."
He felt guilty, suddenly exposed. "What else could you tell?"
"That it was mutual." He snapped to see her eyes. "I've been looking too, Draco. I resisted as long as I could but I care. I'm sorry about what happened in class--"
"I'm sorry I decked your boyfriend," he interrupted quickly. She disregarded.
"But it was true. I had been thinking of the lake. I saw you watching me and I wanted to be there with you. I wanted to help you, save you, and I couldn't," she continued, fully drowned in tears.
"You couldn't save me, Ginny. I was having too much fun." He laughed it off and went back to staring at the stained floor. His hand gently drifted towards hers on the ground. He caressed her arm.
Outside, the earth trembled. Magic was falling apart as they knew it. Draco was dead to the world. Harry would never be the same. His crusade had no place for her, and she was tired of feeling hopeless and set aside like a present for a time that would never come.
So, when the earth shook once more, she drew in closer to Draco's warmth and comfort, to the ease of being in love with a man who did not exist. To drift into a world without consequences.
When it shook again, he wrapped his arms around her. When it shook again, he kissed her. And when the fire grew too strong, Draco found himself undressing her, embracing every curve and inch of skin looking for that goodbye.
The trembles became a welcome but he began to pull away. "No," she whispered and begged him back with her eyes.
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He got up and walked to the window. "Come with me," he said. She opened her eyes wide, reached for her clothes and prepared herself to run. "I won't just run away. If you come--"
"This is the end, Draco. I do care, more than I could ever have imagines, but it can't go beyond this room. You get a new life. I get to reclaim my old. Just… Just go and forget about me," she pleaded, standing beside him, her hand on his heart.
"I could kidnap you, you know. I wouldn't have any remorse. I'd just take you and run and we'd live out our lives among the Muggles in peace," he said, trying to hide the break in his voice.
She suddenly felt a calm shiver down her spine and kissed him lightly, and responded, "Then you never loved me because you'd know I'd never be happy… But when this is all over, when Harry wins, if you come for me, I'll run with you."
He put his arms around her again and she wrapped a sheet around them. "So this is goodbye, proper and real?" she asked, a devious smile on her face.
His arm rounded her bare waist again. "Just tell when it hurts."
"It won't matter, love. I'll just beg for more."
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When they dressed to leave, he couldn't let go of her hand. It was such a calm feeling, just having her there constant and steady, his firm hold on reality and on hope. She extended her hand and froze. She couldn't touch the knob. He sighed and let go and turned it for her, never breaking their gaze.
"One year," he whispered. "I'll come back to this very room. I don't care what I have to do. I'll come back. Meet me here."
"You can't promise that. I can't either. Our lives are expendable. We're background noise now. If we stay like this, yes I'll come. In one year to this day, no more no less," she replied softly. "But if this is goodbye…"
"I think I loved you."
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One Year Later.
Ginny waited by their tree by the lake till night went to sleep and the morning sun caressed her face. She'd been waiting for that sign to move, trying to recall a time when it was alright to think of him in this way. To miss him. The war had just come to an end. She wished she'd have thought of him more in all this time. Maybe she did but there was a part of her that told her it was unnatural and one-sided and sent those thoughts away. But now, there was nothing to keep him away.
Harry was waiting for her at Godric's Hollow. He was saying his goodbyes and was taking her around the world, just them. She was ready to go, all packed and exhausted. She couldn't imagine leaving without saying goodbye to Draco, without fulfilling her promise. She knew she couldn't be happy with Harry with Draco's presence still clawing at her heart.
She passed a final hand over their initials on their tree from that night by the lake and took the first steps towards Hogwarts at dawn. The great grounds had been covered in vines, not upon the walls but the ground itself. Small slivers of grass tried to break free but died in the struggle. It was as if the thin, brittle arms of evil reached for the innocence inside.
The school was empty now. It closed its doors April 13th and promised never to reopen as long as Voldemort lived. It would open again in December. Harry would be returning to teach. He'd asked her to come with him. She still hadn't given him an answer. She hadn't given him lots of answers.
She stumbled past the vines, past the Quidditch field, and in through the front doors with a sudden yearning that made her not walk but run to the room, imagining him standing there waiting for her as if he'd never moved.
She realized, as she caught her breath in front of the door with the knob she could never bring herself to touch, that she missed him like a part of herself. She'd left her heart in that room. She didn't want to, because maybe it wasn't the most rational thing to do, but she did and now she had to face the shattered pieces.
She turned the knob, trying to convince herself it was empty. She pushed it in but it wouldn't open. The hinges had jammed. She laughed at herself and her foolishness and took out her wand to open it then pushed it in hard. She nearly collapsed onto the other side.
She was right. It was empty.
She sat down and waited on the floor by the teacher's desk. She started to think if classes had ever resumed after that night, if anyone had drifted by the spot where they made love and ignored it as if just another corner. She stared at it now, doing everything she could to remember the night. It was a year, which for a long time felt like forever, but now it was nothing. She felt like she'd never left. His memory was as alive as the skin that held her heart and kept it from exploding.
And as she relived the moments in her head, she drifted to sleep.
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He didn't come. She should have known. When she awoke, it was minutes to midnight and she still sat on the floor, now fully drowned in tears. She couldn't stand it anymore and ran from the room, from Hogwarts. She rested against the Quidditch field, letting the emotions escape, those hidden jabbing sensations that she'd held in for so long.
She stormed to the lake, to the tree where they'd carved their initials and pulled out her wand to scar them away forever, to erase him, when a warm and strong hand grabbed her wrist firmly and turned her around. For a moment, she thought her breath had escaped her for fear of getting caught in the sudden fire.
His hair was still platinum and shined in the moonlight of the lake behind him. He wore black and blue and shiny shoes, and his lips seemed to curl into a smile that mirrored her own. Devious and wanting. He released his grip when her shock subsided and slowly took a step towards her, pinning her against the tree.
He kissed her lightly on the lips. It wasn't goodbye like last time, like every time. It was hello, a caring hello with a future. And suddenly, there was a part of her that felt content and safe and warm in the wet night air from the lake.
"Hello," he whispered so close that the warmth of his breath sent the shivers from his kiss away.
"You're late." Her eyes twinkled with newfound courage.
"I'm sorry. I've hurt you." She gulped. The courage died. The thought of Harry tore her apart. He noticed the smallest change in her smile and said, "He's waiting for you, isn't he? I've kept with the news. The entire world is waiting for your answer."
She looked away. "I don't care about the world. It's done its waiting. It can wait forever and then forget you the moment it gets its fill of news."
"Forget the world. Tell me. Do love him?"
"Of course I do! I've loved him since I met him! But do I love the boy or do I love the man he can be?"
He backed away and let her slide down the thick trunk. She wanted to cry again. He looked her over, their initials still above her clean as day. She'd grown but it was still Ginny, the essence of her. It was like a calling to him, to help her. He'd never realized that they might need each other, that he should set aside his own foolish desire to make her happy. It was clear, like the initials. He couldn't imagine anyone else there with him as he grew, a constant calm that he could lean on.
He grew desperate, seeing her turn to answer him. So, he said quickly, grasping her arms, "Forget him. Do you remember that last thing I told you? Up in the room?"
"You thought you loved me."
"I was wrong, a fool. I knew I loved you. I still do. I need you, Ginny. I want you to be there with me when the world comes back into place. You're the only thing that, believe it or not, ever made sense. Would you--"
"Please don't," she said, caressing his cheek. She wrapped her arms behind his neck and pulled him in.
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She opened the door to their room. Harry was in bed, sleeping. It must have been 4 in the morning but she didn't care. She didn't even bother to hide her disheveled hair and clothes. Parts of her were cold and wet from the lake, others just bare and exposed. She didn't care.
"Baby…" she whispered and he turned to face her.
"Hey," he whispered back. "I was getting worried."
He went to kiss her but from the taste, he knew. She wasn't his anymore. She never was. "Harry… There something you should know…"
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The end.
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