Cold and dark.
Dark and cold.
Had his world ever been any other way?
He thought that it might have... during the stretches of time in which he was capable of anything approaching rational thought at all.
It might have... once... a very, very long time ago. He thought there might have been light... warmth... voices... the faces of people he loved.
Not that he had anything but the vaguest concept anymore of what any of those things were. Light, warmth, love - they were like glimpses of memory gleaned from a long-ago dream. He thought he knew what they meant - or at least, that he should know what they meant - but when he tried to pin them down they simply flitted away, usually taking his ability for coherent thought with them, for a while at least -
and then he was alone again with the dark and cold. Drifting.
How long had he been here? Time was another concept that had become maddeningly elusive. But, if he had to guess, he supposed it must be close to... a hundred years?
Did that seem right?
Well, it depended.
Was a year much different than a minute? Or an hour?
But to know the answer to that, he'd have to know what an hour was.
Hour... hour... funny word.
Rhymed with flower.
Wait... what was a flower, anyway?
He seemed to remember that flowers were... pretty... pleasant... smelled nice.
Hermione.
Yes, that was right. He'd had a flower, once. A flower named Hermione.
Hadn't he?
Hermione. Hermione. I love you, Hermione.
But then he was thinking too hard, and so everything flew away again.
And he just knew that it was dark.
And cold.
OOOOO
"- and then we blamed the whole sorry mess on Seth, do you remember! And they never even questioned us because you were always such the perfect little Ravenclaw! Merlin, was he pissed - wouldn't even look at me for a month. I can't imagine how long you got the silent treatment for -"
"Just a week and a half," Ronnelle whispered hoarsely, lips quirking upward into an expression that very nearly resembled a smile. "I baked him cookies. Works every time."
Matt's breath caught in surprise and his hand tightened on hers. He'd been sitting on the edge of her bed, just talking to her, quietly and constantly for... well he didn't really know how long, but it had to be a couple of hours, anyway. A couple of hours at least.
In the constant dim silence of the hospital room, time lost much of its meaning.
"Ronnelle?" He leaned close over her; brought up his other hand, pressing the backs of his fingers gently to the side of her face. "How long have you been awake?"
"Not long." She swallowed hard; winced, slowly blinked open her eyes. Those astounding, pale eyes. It took them a moment to focus on him. "Is there water?"
"Yeah," he breathed, feeling sucker-punched by those eyes, just like always. He didn't think the effect they had on him would ever lessen. "Yeah, 'course there's water. Hang on a sec, all right?"
She gave a ghost of a nod, and he disengaged; crossed the room to a sliver of counter near the door, where a pitcher'd been left by the night attendant. Returning with a glass, he saw that she appeared to be struggling to retain her tenuous grasp on consciousness. Her eyes were trying to drag themselves shut again; trying hard by the look of it.
"Hey, 'Nell," he murmured, sinking back down beside her, "do you think you can sit?" His mind was replaying the last time she'd sat up, and the damage it had done. He was pretty sure that her ribs were more or less knit back together by now - a healer had been in to check on her relatively recently and had appeared to be satisfied with her condition - but God, that hurt in her eyes; he wasn't sure he could stand that again.
"I dunno. One way to find out, I s'pose..." she levered herself up onto her elbows, her movements tentative; ginger. He caught the flash of pain that crossed her face; the sharp little inhalation of breath; the way she bit down on her lip.
"Ronnelle, are you -"
"No, s'oh... kay," she managed, cutting him off, trying to keep a brave front. And God, he'd give anything to take that pain away from her, just lift it off of her and onto himself, like reaching over and grabbing her Quidditch equipment bag when they were trudging side-by-side back up from the pitch and she was tired from a long practice, or a game well played.
Why couldn't it be that simple?
Why did he get the sick, sinking feeling that nothing was ever going to be that simple again?
He handed her the glass and she drank, then collapsed back against the pillows. "Thanks," she whispered, her eyes falling shut again. "Is Seth still okay?"
"Yeah, he's fine." Matt reached over her to place the now empty glass on the nightstand. "He's still out. He was starting to come around a little while ago, but the healers put him under again. Said he needed more rest. But he wasn't badly hurt or anything; you got him out before the fire started."
Eyes still closed, Ronnelle's brows knit together in consternation. "There was a fire? I don't think I remember that."
Damnit, damnit, damnit. He'd gone and put his foot in it again. The last thing she needed to hear right now was that her entire house had burned to the ground. Merlin, he was an idiot.
It never occurred to him, of course, that he was an utterly exhausted, emotionally wrecked kid. Not for a second. Then Ronnelle's eyes flew open again.
"What about Seth's ferret? That's the whole reason we went back - he wanted to make sure she was okay. Did someone get Blanche?"
Matt shook his head miserably, hating himself for having steered the conversation, however unintentionally, in this direction. Even so, he wouldn't lie to her. Not to Ronnelle. Never.
"No, 'Nell. We were preoccupied with just getting the... the people out. No one remembered Blanche. I'm sorry."
It was amazing how quickly the facade she'd been trying to maintain crumbled. Her eyes slammed shut but not before he saw them start to shimmer - they looked like quicksilver when she cried. She pressed her mouth into a hard line and he knew that she was fighting to keep the tears at bay - it was a losing battle. A second later she clapped both hands to her face and was sobbing.
"Oh, Ronnelle." Matt's heart had clenched so hard he found it difficult to speak. "Come on, don't, please don't."
"But you don't... under... stand," she gasped out through the tears, "he's gonna... hate me... even more now! He was... was depending on me... to help him... help him... oh God, Matt! Somehow I let everything get... all bollixed up... it was my fault, it was all... all my..."
"Ronnelle, no! NO! How could you think that! No one saw the danger, no one - and none of it was your fault. You did everything you could for Seth, you got him out of there, you're a bloody hero -"
"No, no, no, no!" She was crying so hard by now that she was having trouble stringing words together. "You'd never think that if you knew... if you knew what... A hero would've... would've... figured out... a way to... to... make things right, not just - not just go... along with - oh God - Matt - I'm gonna be sick..."
As with most things, she was right. Before he even had time to react, she'd thrown herself halfway off the bed and was retching violently onto the floor.
"Ronnelle -!" He lunged after her; caught her around the middle because it looked as if she were in very real danger of slipping over the side of the bed altogether.
Then, for a very long time, he simply held her as she heaved herself dry. He noted, distantly, that the mess vanished as soon as it touched the floor; the rooms here were apparently charmed for ease of clean-up.
When it was over, except for little tremors like aftershocks that continued to wrack her slim body every few heartbeats or so, he pulled her back from the edge of the bed, snug up against his chest, one arm cushioning her head and the other slung over her waist, so that the two of them ended up essentially... spooning.
He found that he was - had been the whole time, apparently, without any conscious awareness of it at all - quietly shushing her, murmuring soothing nonsense words, and gently, absently, stroking her hair.
"S'okay, love... Ronnelle, it's okay. It's over, I've got you, and you're okay... shh, shh, you're okay..."
She gulped in a couple of deep, hiccuping breaths, and then she was crying again. Not sobbing anymore - no, at this point she was just crying; weakly, exhaustedly, like a tired, lost, hurt child.
Because that's exactly what she was.
"But it's not... okay and... I'm not... okay and... nothing's ever gonna be okay... again... because I can't... I can't... stop remembering... and Seth, he wouldn't... even... look at me. He hates me already and now... now when he realizes... that I couldn't even save that stupid ferret, I couldn't even do that much, he'll never look at me again and I, I, I just want... my mum... Matt, where's my mum?"
"I dunno, 'Nell... but I know she'll be here as soon as she can. And I'm here til then. I won't leave you. Just try... try to rest, okay?"
She nodded, not lifting her head from where it lay, fever-flushed and tear-sticky and too warm, on his arm. (His arm that was rapidly falling asleep - but he didn't care.) She tried to swallow back her tears then, but only ended up choking on them instead. Coughing, she curled herself tighter into a ball - and he curled up tighter around her.
Eventually, the spasm ended; he realized she had an arm pressed tightly across her ribcage again.
"That really... really hurt," she whispered, her voice sounding weirdly detached; far-away and almost... dreamy. He actually groaned then, into the curtain of her spun-silk hair. This was ripping him apart.
"Matt, um..." he voice seemed to be fading more with every word. "Can I have more water? And maybe some toothpaste?"
"Yeah," he said hoarsely. "I'll get a healer too. You should be... looked at."
"No!" The amount of panic she managed to infuse into that one word was surprising. "No, don't leave. Please, I don't... want to be alone."
"Shh, okay. Okay, Ronnelle." It went against his better judgment, but he could not have denied her anything in that moment. If she had asked him for the moon, he would have found a way to get it for her. So he only disentangled himself enough to sit up and pour her more water, and rummage through the small drawer that was set into the bedside table, hoping against hope that maybe, just maybe there'd be some toothpaste stocked inside.
He was in luck.
She managed to lift her head maybe two inches from the bed, squeezed some toothpaste directly into her mouth and followed up with a swallow or two of water; he actually had to grab the still-mostly-full cup away from her as her grip began to loosen, her eyes falling shut from sheer exhaustion.
"Thank you," she breathed without opening them again, and then, "Matt, can you... would you, um... hold onto me again? I'm kind... kinda cold and..." she trailed off, her words dying away to be replaced by a shallow sigh. Then her breathing evened out and he realized that she was asleep again, just that fast.
"Yeah, 'Nell," he said quietly, settling back down against her and drawing her lightweight, hospital-issue blanket up over them both. "Of course I will. I'll never let you go."
He fully intended to stay awake. Honestly, he did.
It just didn't work out that way.
OOOOO
What did light look like, again?
Draco had been pondering that one for a while.
He supposed, in the end, that it must look like... well, like an absence of dark.
Right. That made sense.
So, what did an absence of dark look like?
And therein lay the problem; he couldn't remember.
Damn it, damn it, damn it.
Wait... damn what?
Oh bugger all, he was thinking too hard again. He'd learned what that meant, what would happen next.
No, no, no, no, NO...
...Hermione...
And the nothing crept back in, closing over his head like cold water.
OOOOO
Matt woke slowly, groggy nearly to the point of stupefaction. He had no idea how long he'd been asleep, just that Ronnelle was warm and heavy in his arms, pressed up against him and... and... Merlin, it was the strangest sensation.
At first he thought he was still caught in a dream, but... no... groggy or not he was awake, and Ronnelle was... was...
What... in the hell... was she doing?
"Mmph -!" He made a small, muffled sound and his eyes flew open to lock, startled, onto her silver ones - just as, never breaking the eye contact, she deepened the kiss. She actually flashed an arm around to the back of his head, splaying her fingers in his hair, and pulled him in deeper.
And it was... amazing.
And he was still so disoriented.
He came very, very close to letting his own eyes slip shut again and just going with it... but then he came back to himself and realized just how terribly wrong this was.
It was those drop-dead gorgeous eyes of hers.
There was something so eerie and unsettling about her steadfast gaze, so unnaturally, searchlight-intense. And the expression behind those mercurial eyes - they were absolutely blazing with a gut-wrenching, desolate, hopeless despair.
So he steeled himself, gripped her by the shoulders, and pushed her gently, yet firmly away. Having broken the connection, he found that he was panting.
"Ronnelle... what... what're you..."
"Don't talk." Her voice was a hoarse, raw whisper. "Please don't talk, Matt, I just... I just need -"
"I don't know what you think you need, but this isn't it," he said, he said, voice thick, still trying to get hold of his heart-rate and breathing.
Her eyes flashed pure desperation.
"It is, though - it really is. You don't understand, I've been thinking... and, and... thinking... and this is all I can come up with, this is... this..." She pressed her eyes briefly shut; drew in a deep, shaking breath. "I can't... think of any other... way to... God, Matt, you have to help me, it was all wrong, it was - it was - and I can't... stop... seeing it, and... and feeling... feeling..." her slim body was wracked by something that seemed half shudder, half sob.
"Merlin Ronnelle," Matt croaked, "please don't -"
"But you can help me! You can make it all go away because... because if I do it all over again, the way it's supposed to be, with you - then it'll be like... like what do the Muggles say, recording over..."
"No." He couldn't rip his gaze away from her eyes. They were dry now, no tears threatening... but they were red-rimmed, and glassy, and just... so deeply, fundamentally wrong. He reached up to smooth a stray lock of her starlight-colored hair back, off her forehead. "I wish it worked that way, Ronnelle, but I don't think it does, it -"
"It does, though! It has to! Matt, it has to because I can't think of another way and... and... I'm usually good at thinking things through, if there were any other way I... I..." Her breath was hitching, making it difficult for her to get the words out. "Please. Matt. Please. Please. Help me get... get... him... out of... my mind!"
"Ronnelle, I can't. I can't, it's not right." He felt the truth of this statement even as he spoke, but still he wasn't sure whom he was trying harder to convince, her or himself; because there was a part of him - a sizable part of him, to be perfectly honest - that would have absolutely loved to proceed. He was a teenaged boy, after all, and - God, what she was offering him -
He ground down on it, forcing it into submission. Swallowed hard - his throat was painfully dry. "You're not thinking clearly, and I won't take advantage of that. You're too... valuable to me, I -" his voice dropped to a rasping whisper - "I love you too much to do that to you."
She just stared at him for a long, heartbreaking moment of silent desperation, her eyes burning into his, begging, begging.
"Please, Ronnelle," he choked out, because she felt so good in his arms and it would be so easy to close the distance between them again, just meld his lips to hers and... and lose himself in the sensation and just forget for a little while, and he could feel his fragile control slipping, a fraction more with every heartbeat and, and... "you've gotta stop, just... c'mere, all right?"
He tightened his arms around her, tried to pull her closer, but not in the way that she seemed to have in mind; just to hold her, to soothe her, to press her head to his shoulder and let her feel his arms around and... and maybe impart to her some modicum of security, of peace.
Ronnelle, it transpired, had other ideas.
"No! Get off!" She tensed against him, shoving him away, breaking their embrace. Her voice was nearly a snarl now. "If you won't help me, you won't help me - fine, but don't try to mask it with... with pity, Matthew Potter, that's the last thing in the world I want from you! If I repulse you now, then so be it, but at least have the decency to be honest with me about it!"
"Ronnelle, what! No, you can't actually -"
"Oh, don't backpedal now! It's all right, really, I can hardly fault you, I mean I wouldn't... want me... anymore either, after... after..."
Her breaths were piling up nearly to the point of hyperventilation now - crying would actually have been better for her, healthier, but it seemed she was entirely out of tears.
"Ronnelle, for fuck's sake -"
"Shut up!" There was more than a touch of hysteria in her voice. She propelled herself into a sitting position, even though doing so caused her to blanch whiter than a sheet. Matt shot up too, reaching instinctively to steady her, but she wrenched herself away from him, scooting backward on the bed until she was pressed up against the headboard.
She was practically panting now and looked positively manic. All he could do was stare at her, dumbfounded. He was completely out of his depth.
"Just... be quiet a minute... all right? Let me think. I need to think." She had pulled her knees up to her chest; now she raised both arms, resting her elbows on her knees and clenching her hands in her pale hair in a completely unconscious gesture of despair nearly beyond endurance.
"Ronnelle -" his voice was a hoarse whisper.
"I said shut up and LET ME THINK!"
In a lifetime of friendship, she had never yelled at him like that before. Stunned into silence, he watched helplessly as she dropped her face to her knees and laced her hands tightly over the top of her head. It was uncanny; she was mimicking almost exactly, though neither she nor Matt knew it, the posture that her father had adopted when waiting on the floor outside Hermione's room all those hours ago.
Matt was just drawing breath to speak again - though with no clear idea of what to say - when she raised her head once more.
"Okay," she said, in a voice that seemed scraped raw. "I can think of one other way. Do you have your wand here?"
Matt felt something go cold inside of him at this. It was despite deep, deep misgivings that he finally, reluctantly nodded.
And knew, even as he did so, that he was making a grave mistake. But damnit, he couldn't lie to her. Not to Ronnelle.
"Good. I need you to Obliviate me."
For a moment he simply continued to stare at her; blankly; stupidly. He couldn't have heard that right.
He COULD. NOT. have heard that right.
She misunderstood his expression.
"I know it's underage magic, but you really needn't worry - my dad knows people at the Ministry, he can get you off; he's done it for Seth loads of times. That boy just doesn't understand the concept of -"
"You're mental."
His voice came out flat, almost... dead. It felt as if something inside him, some hitherto unrealized but yet crucially important part of himself, had broken at the sound of her speaking those words. He shook his head... groped for more words. Couldn't find any. There were only two words in the whole, wide world at that moment. So he spoke them again.
"You're mental." And then, a long moment later, after struggling, hard, to reassert some sense of control over himself, "I'm not going to Obliviate you, Ronnelle."
"But I told you -"
"This isn't about underage magic, Jesus Christ, Ronnelle! I did loads of it when your dad and I - when we - I could fucking care less! This is about - don't you get it, what you're asking me to do? I dunno how to Obliviate anybody - and I'm sure as hell not gonna have my first-ever go with the person that matters... matters most to... I mean, what if I were to get it wrong! ? I'd fuck you up for life!"
"No, you don't get it!" and she was screaming now, right back at him, "Matt, don't you understand, oh my God, I'm ALREADY fucked up for life! I'm sorry, but the ship has sailed on that one - someone beat you to the punch! I can't... live with this, I can't... and I won't... the things that... happened, the things that I DID and Seth... the look on Seth's face... there's nothing you could do, NOTHING, that can possibly be worse than... than..." she broke off, fighting vainly for composure. Sucked in several deep breaths, gulping the air as if she were drowning.
Finally she shook her head, back and forth, just once but with a definite air of finality. Her voice, when she spoke again, was barely audible - but her words were crystal clear. They impacted him like hurtled shards of frozen metal; like ice.
"Get out."
"Ronnelle -"
"No! Get out! If you won't help me then just get out! Get out of my room, stop looking at me like that, I asked for your help, not your pity! I mean it, I never want to see you again, just get out, get out, get out!"
As an added bit of punctuation, she threw a pillow at him. It hit him in the chest, and broke the paralysis that seemed to have overtaken him.
"Fine," he said, distantly amazed at how cold and hard his own voice had become. But what else was he supposed to say? He could not, would not do what she was asking him to do, and if she wanted to punish him as a result, then so be it. He was exhausted; he didn't have it in him to fight with her anymore. "You're completely nutters, Malfoy, but fine. If that's what you want -"
"It is what I want, just get out, get out, get OUT!"
This time he had to duck, and even so he only barely missed getting hit in the face by her water glass, which shattered against the wall scant inches from his head.
"GET! OUT!"
He spun on his heel and left.
OOOOO
Seth and Ronnelle had always been more different than alike in any number of ways, and their sleeping patterns were no exception. Seth got on with quite a bit less sleep than Ronnelle, and whereas for her waking was usually a lengthy, one might almost say languid process, Seth had a habit of coming back to awareness with a suddenness and completeness that was downright uncanny.
It was the case now, as - despite the fact that he'd been magically sedated for hours - he came fully awake and alert in an instant. And one more instant - just time enough to glance across the small room - was all he needed in order to deduce that something was very, very wrong. He sat up, shoving the thin, white hospital blankets off himself.
"Ronnelle?" His voice was croaky with disuse and the last fleeting vestiges of sleep. "Ronnelle, are... you okay?"
It was a silly question; obviously she wasn't okay. Didn't even look to be within shouting distance of okay, actually. The fact was that she looked positively deranged - which was, of course, what had prompted him to ask the question in the first place.
At the sound of his voice she stopped her pacing - for that's what she'd been doing, pacing the length of the boxy little room, back and forth, back and forth, between their two beds, muttering furiously to herself all the while. She'd been doing this since shortly after Matt had left the room, some twenty minutes or so ago. She turned to face her brother, reaching up distractedly to shove a quantity of her sugar-white hair out of her eyes... which were, Seth saw, positively wild.
He swallowed convulsively. This was not good.
"Hi, Seth," she said, and her voice was just as queerly distracted as her gesture had been. "Matt says your ferret died. Just one more way I failed you - you can add it to the list. Now be quiet a minute, all right? I'm trying... trying to remember..." she trailed off and resumed pacing. She was using the fingers of one hand to massage her temple - a habit she had when studying or thinking hard. Her other hand was clutching a dark, slender length of wood; a wand, Seth saw, his eyes widening.
But not hers. He knew her wand by sight almost as well as he knew his own.
Really not good. His anxiety blossomed into outright fear.
"Ronnelle -"
"I said, shush! I have to make sure I get it right! I've never actually performed this spell before, not... outside of a classroom setting..."
"But you can't do magic, here, Ronnelle - we're not at school."
"Oh right, like that ever stopped you! Seth! Please - please just let me concentrate."
"But..." his throat felt painfully dry and oddly tight; constricted. There was a burning, prickling sensation at the backs of his eyes. His next words came out as a whisper. "I just want you to be okay, 'Nell. You're scaring me. Please just be okay."
She stopped again; she was standing near the wall, now, right beside one of the nightstands that flanked her bed. She looked at him for a long moment and it seemed as if - just maybe - she was actually seeing him. He felt the tightness in his chest and throat start to ease, just a little.
His relief, however, would be short-lived.
"I'm not okay," she said, her tone heartbreakingly matter-of-fact, voice so low that he could barely hear her, for all that they were only a few feet away from each other. "I'm not, but I will be. Matt forgot to take his wand -" she raised it a little, letting him see it clearly for the first time - "and so I will be. Just give me a minute, Seth - all I need is a minute, and a little bit of quiet, and then... then everything will be fine again. I'll be fine again. I won't have to... have to... keep seeing..."
She trailed off again, mouthed a few more words in silence, then took a deep, shaky breath. Locked her eyes on his again; flashed him what she seemed to think was a reassuring smile. It wasn't. Then she swallowed hard, pressed her pale eyes shut, and raised the wand, pressing its tip against her temple, the one she'd been massaging a moment ago.
"Ronnelle, don't! I'm sorry! It was my fault, everything was my fault, and I'm so sorry - I'll make it up somehow, I'll... I'll... I don't know, but I'll think of something, I swear I will! Only please don't do that, please!"
"I have to, Seth," she whispered, eyes still closed, "but it's okay, I promise, I know what I'm doing... I think..."
The door to the room slammed open then, surprising them both, and Matt strode in, looking grim and angry; face set, jaw tight. Unbeknownst to either of them, he'd spent the past twenty minutes pacing the hallway, mirroring almost exactly her movements inside the room.
"Listen, Ronnelle," he started, "we're going to talk about this, and -"
He broke off abruptly as he registered the scene he'd walked in on; the stoney expression falling from his face, his eyes widening with alarm. His next words - "oh, shit" - were breathed more than spoken.
Ronnelle's eyes had opened again at the sound of Matt's voice; she pressed herself backward, up against the wall, keeping as much distance between them as possible. Her breath was coming in shallow, rapid little pants; her hand shaking as she continued to hold his wand to her own head.
As he watched, aghast, first one tear and then another streaked silently down her face.
"Ronnelle." His voice was low; steady; outwardly calm. Something around the edges of it, though, hinted at his quickly mounting panic. "Ronnelle, put it down."
She shook her head, back and forth, just once - but with finality. "I have to, Matt," she whispered. "I can't live with... what happened, I can't, I just can't."
"I know. I just -" he swallowed hard - "I'll do it, okay? I changed my mind - I'll do it. This isn't something you should do to yourself, you know that, that's why you asked me in the first place. I'm sorry I said no, I've been thinking it over, I'll do it, Ronnelle, just give me the wand."
She just looked at him for a long, long moment - long enough for him start to hope that maybe he'd gotten through. Then she laughed - a single, short burst of bitter, mirthless laughter that was really more than halfway to being a sob.
'You're a terrible liar, Matt," she said. "Just... bloody awful. You always were - it's the Gryffindor in you, I expect. Though I don't think you've ever lied to me before."
"Ronnelle, I'm not -"
(Though of course he was - he was breaking one of the cardinal rules of his life. Anything, anything to get her to put down that god-forsaken wand. He would never forgive himself for leaving it in the room, never never never never -)
"Please don't make it worse." He could hear in her voice, see in her eyes, that she was gathering her courage and focus in order to do it.
"Ronnelle, no, you CAN'T!" He was practically screaming now, the thin veneer of calm completely blown away, his voice breaking with panic. Seth's eyes were flashing back and forth between them, wide with horror and why wasn't anyone coming, surely somebody must be able to hear the shouting, or were these rooms soundproofed? Merlin, why wasn't anyone coming?
And then it happened. She slammed her eyes shut, the wandtip still pressed to her temple; sucked in a ragged, hitching breath - and he was moving then, moving like greased lightning but it was still too late, too late.
"Obliviate," she whispered, and there was a flash of light and then the wand was tumbling from her hand and Matt, still in motion, close to her now but not close enough, could only watch helplessly as she crumpled - her head impacting the corner of the nightstand, hard, as she fell.
"Seth," he was yelling, even as he reached her, "get help, GET HELP!"
On some distant, marginal level he was aware of Seth launching himself off his bed and racing for the door; then he was on the floor beside Ronnelle and she was all he saw, all he cared about - everything, she was everything and God... God, he had failed her and now...
"Ronnelle," he croaked sickly, reaching with shaking hands to turn her - gently, so gently - onto her back. Her face was wax-pale, her eyes closed. "Ronnelle, look at me, c'mon."
Very slowly, she opened her eyes. They were dreamy; unfocused. Empty.
"No," Matt whispered hoarsely. "No, Ronnelle, come on, I said look at me, at me."
She blinked. Frowned. Still with that eerily, terribly wrong expression of vacancy behind her gaze. He was hovering right over her, their faces only inches apart, but she wasn't seeing him. He was sure of it. He knew it.
She wasn't seeing anything.
"My head... hurts," she whispered then, her voice barely more than an exhalation. And she wasn't talking to him either - didn't seem to be talking to anyone, actually, except maybe herself.
He answered her anyway, barely able to speak around the Quaffle-sized lump of grief that seemed to have lodged in his throat.
"S'okay, 'Nell, help is coming. Seth's getting help."
She actually cocked her head a little in response to that - or at least, for a hopeful second or two he thought it was in response to that - but then he realized that she'd cocked it, if anything, the other way - away from him.
"Why yes, that would be wonderful," she murmured, lips curving upward in the hint of a smile. "I would absolutely love some strawberry pie."
"Oh God, Ronnelle," he virtually groaned - and then a new rush of horror overtook him as he noticed something that he hadn't before; blood was pooling on the floor beneath her head like some garish, nightmare halo; staining her silver-white hair a deep, shocking crimson.
And then her eyes were rolling back, falling shut and he was screaming, not even words anymore, just screaming - and then the room was full of people and he was being hauled backward, pulled away from her, kicking and thrashing, fighting to stay beside her and half-shouting, half-sobbing her name...
And then they must have sedated him because suddenly there was nothing anymore except darkness and quiet and a sensation of floating... and an afterimage of wide, beautiful, but hopelessly empty silver eyes.
OOOOO
For a long time, his body had shaken and his teeth had rattled. He was over that, now, though. didn't even need to clench his jaw anymore.
Not that it wasn't still hideously, howlingly, bitingly cold. It was. It was just that... well, it was hard to explain, really. But Draco supposed the closest he could come to finding words for it was, that he and the cold were... merging, somehow. His body, or... whatever passed for his body in this place... had stopped struggling against the cold because...
Because he was becoming the cold.
He was being... absorbed into it, somehow. Into the cold and into the dark and into the... nothing.
And once that process was complete, there would be nothing left that was Draco at all, except, he thought, for maybe some faint, residual sort of... echo.
And he found he didn't mind.
In fact... he rather welcomed the idea.
Being Draco was not, at the moment, terribly appealing, after all.
To be nothing... or rather, more accurately, to be one tiny, insignificant part of a much larger nothing... well, he wouldn't have to think anymore, would he? No, never again. And thinking brought confusion, and frustration, and pain. And worse still, it brought the briefest, most tantalizing, most torturous glimpses of... of what?
(A good life. It was a good life.)
To be able to almost see... almost hear... almost touch... almost taste those memories, and then have them flit away the moment he got too close, the moment he nearly got a real handle on them... it was torment beyond belief.
And he was tired of it. God... he was just so tired. Tired, and cold, and sad, and... done.
He was done. Done being Draco. Done being anything.
Let it take me. I'm ready. I've given everything I had. There isn't anything LEFT.
And he had an inkling that he might be able to speed the process of... of... dissolving if he just... just let go. Let the cold, black silence carry him away.
So he dragged in a final, deep, shuddering breath - held it - released it -
(Hermione, Hermione, Hermione...)
And relaxed.
