A/N: I made a YouTube video awhile ago, and somebody commented saying that it would make a good fanfiction. So here you are. I'll put a link to the video on my profile for those of you who haven't seen it (if you want to, I mean, it kind of gives away the ending.) Hmm... I don't think there's anything else... Chapter 1, then...
Here Without You
Death. Death was a terrible thing, but not quite as terrible as the feeling it results in. A feeling of loss, like something is missing.
Completely opposite from that of a secret. When you have a secret, everything seems to fit, to make sense – even if only to you. The problem with secrets is, they can't be told. Often enough, the vital person is the one missing. Missing. So then, perhaps death wasn't all that different from secrets.
Either way, Harry knew quite enough on both subjects. Enough, at least, to have a strong opinion on both, one he could gladly share with anyone who found it in them to ask.
Harry Potter once again found himself kneeling next to her lifeless form. But this time, unlike the many others, he wasn't dreaming. He was also, it seemed, actually him this time; Harry typically observed the scene from above. Disconnected from it all, but still forced to watch the scene fold out repeatedly. Harry found the worst part of this whole experience was knowing what was going to happen and not being able to stop it. Now, though, he was lingering beside her, not doing a single thing. So he wasn't dreaming.
Harry subconsciously knew he had to do something, but a mixture of doubt, shock, and happiness had him feeling unusually numb – like he'd been recently Stunned. A rough wind blew Ginny's brilliant hair across her inert face. The fiery red contrasted beautifully with the paperwhite tone of her skin. Harry placed one hand on the smooth stone beneath him and the other firmly on Ginny's forearm. He wasn't dreaming now, so a single tear thrust down his cheek, freezing halfway – not to imply he hadn't cried in his dreams, many times he had woken to a wet pillow and watery, reddened eyes. But now, it was different… more real. A cascade of tears followed the first as Harry realized, with a start, that it wasn't real. He blinked, and reality took hold of him. Turning his head to the left slightly, Harry confirmed that he indeed wasn't in the deserted Chamber. He was, however, kneeling on a dark, hard, wood floor with his right palm pressed weakly against the glass of the Mirror of Erised.
Harry looked back through the glass. Ginny was still lying there, still beautiful, still… gone.
Despite his determination to be back at her side, his mind simply wouldn't. It wasn't the same anymore: she seemed so far away, too far, as if in a completely different dimension. Which, he gravely mused, she probably was. Harry stared at her hopelessly.
The longer he studied her face, the more real it became, until Harry found himself recalling Ginny, himself, and Hermione laughing at Ron last summer at the Burrow after the latter had fallen from his Cleansweep. Ginny's smiling face seemed to move in slow motion as she brought her head back slightly, mid-giggle. It seemed impossible to Harry that it had been only months ago she'd been so… alive.
Harry let out a choke somewhere between a laugh, a cough, and a sob. And as he looked through the shining glass of the old, dusty Mirror, even the famous Harry couldn't help himself from the tears that piled down his face.
