NOTE: Welcome to Chapter Nine.. as always.. let me know what you think by reviewing. It takes about three seconds of your time and makes me ridiculously happy.
Nine
I cannot remember the Lord's Prayer
I cannot remember, oh
but I don't care
I cannot recall my best friend's face
blurs
and outlines, eternal fall
Blaise had been able to sleep perfectly fine for the past month and a half or so. He had not seen Theo at all, either, which made him believe that his visits were nothing more than hallucinations due to lack of sleep. He still thought about him, though, he would never be able to stop that. It was on a cold November morning when Blaise woke up terrified. He could not remember what Theo's voice sounded like. He did not need an invisibility cloak, blending into the tint of the shuddering shadows was a talent he was praised for. He remained carved into the castle walls, a relief embedded in the stone. Slipping through the castle, Blaise found himself walking aimlessly along the shores of the lake.
He stood on the brink, looking out over the abyss of the waves, the ignited ringlets that hopped and jumped along each breath of the wind. Stepping forward, Blaise lunged forward into the spray, entwining himself with the water.
father forgive me
He cupped his palms and dipped them into the deep.
for I have sinned
He slowly poured the droplets over his chest, staining his white shirt.
its been too long since my last confession
He scrubbed at his arms, tore at his chest, trying so hard to clean himself, to purge away whatever he had inside of him, whatever made Malfoy keep hinting to him that he should become a Death Eater, whatever it was that made him dream of torture, whatever it was that was dragging him into the depths of his own mind.
Dropping his arms to his sides, Blaise gazed out longingly at the surface of the lake. It looked so inviting, the siren waves kept snatching at him with their frothy hands. Blaise leered at the water, he thought it was wrong how wanton it was, how splayed out the deep looked, begging him to enter. the calm cool face of the river asked me for a kiss. Leaning forward, Blaise began to oblige.
---
Hermione was restless. She had lain in her bed, twisted around the sheets, waiting for sleep to descend. Nothing ever came. Her chest just felt tight, she could not breathe in her room. Having taken Harry's cloak and the map, Hermione managed disturb him at all. She escaped out of the castle, avoiding a muttering Filch and an impish Peeves to find herself out in the crisp clear air of the open sky.
Hermione breathed in deeply. It was beginning to smell like winter, yet it still had that tinge of the autumn. She walked silently on the vast lawn of the school, watching the way the grass bent underneath her foot. Suddenly, she heard a slight splash coming from down near the lake. Hermione slipped through the trees and peered towards the dark mere. Blaise Zabini stood knee deep in the freezing water soaking wet from head to toe. As she watched in fascination, he slowly lowered himself beneath the surface.
When he didn't come up after several moments, Hermione began to get very afraid. Pulling off the invisibility cloak as she ran, Hermione plunged into the lake. Shivering she splashed her way towards Zabini's form and mustered all her strength to wrench him from the waves.
Zabini came up sputtering, water poured out of his mouth and seaweed stained his cheek. "Granger! Why do you--" he paused to cough up some murky liquid, "keep meddling in my life? You'd think someone would be able to drown in peace these days."
Hermione ignored his protests as she pulled him towards the shore. Once she had reached the sandy coast she collapsed upon the rocks upon the sand. Sighing, Zabini flopped down next to her, panting as he lay on his back and looked up at the sky. Lifting a finger, he began to trace the patterns that the stars made in the empyrean. Tiny constellations, pinpricks of light dotted the sky. A beaded rosary, a chain of fire held together by manmade lines.
Hermione followed the movements of his finger as he began to speak, "Did you ever think about how amazing the sky is? All of those deadly fireballs seem so innocent from here, tiny eyes that gaze down at the earth. It's kind of sublime. The sky is one of the reasons why I think Theo was right about God," he dropped his hand back to his side before continuing, "because despite all of the devastation, we still have beauty that's greater than us."
"The stars can fall," Hermione murmured, "the sea can drain away, mountains may fall apart, stone may wear away- but there is always beauty in the world. Something so fragile, so gentle, can remain forever and ever while the strongest substances of the earth are destroyed."
"I believe in God," Blaise whispered, "because I believe that whoever it is, it is evident in every drop of splendor in the world. The stars are just another reminder that God will always speak more eloquently than I, that God will always write better poetry than I ever will."
Hermione sighed, "I think the sky is terrifying in its beauty. There's no room for us, the stars are laced with the curves of those mythological immortals. We are both twitches in the universe. But you, you're restless. You want to embark on some sort of adventure, but you're prematurely condemned. Memento mori."
Blaise was surprised, "Who knew you were such a realist, Granger? I thought you were filled with the idyllic Gryffindor outlook on life," he ignored Hermione's glare, 'but you're right, you know. The trail is crushed, there are footprints fossilized knee-deep in the earth that restrict us."
Hermione felt her eyelashes brush her skin, she could barely hear herself speak, "You're an enigma, Blaise Zabini."
He turned his face towards her, watching the way her breath rose in spiraled puffs, "I'm not that complicated," he reassured, "I just—I am empty."
She nodded slightly, "You're not a star, you're a meteor. You're the fading embers on the ash."
He sighed and, at a loss for his own words, chose another's, "that time of year thou mayst in me behold, when yellow leaves, or none, or few do hang upon these boughs which shake against the cold. bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang." he paused, listening to the flutter of her eyelashes, "in me thou seest the twilight of such day, as after the sunset fadeth in the west, which by and by black night doth take away, death's second self, that seals up all in rest."
Hermione softly interrupted him, "in me thou see'st the glowing of such fire that on the ashes of his youth doth lie, as the death-bed whereon it must expire, consumed with that which it was nourished by."
"I answered you before- it's my turn now. Who are you, Granger?"
She refused to answer. Not now, not this time. A promise passed from her lips to his ear.
Much later, when Hermione had made her way back to her own bed, she slowly fell into the confines of sleep. As she fell, however, she murmured the last couplet to herself, "this thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong, to love that well which thou must leave ere long." Floors and hundreds of stones away, Blaise's voice echoed her own.
lyrics are vision of heaven by bloc party. "the calm cool face of the river asked me for a kiss" is the poem "suicide's note" by langston hughes. the end quote is sonnet 73 by william shakespeare. coughreviewcough.
