Most people loved the little magic countdowns on their wrists. They could look down and see what they assumed was the proof they'd find true love and spend 70 years together. It was reassuring. It was hopeful.

Astoria hated hers.

She remembered with too much clarity the day her governess has thought it would be a good idea to practice maths using that number. "We'll just look at today, look at the day on your wrist, and calculate the day your soulmate will pass through the veil," she'd said in a chirpy voice. Daphne - lucky Daphne - had a day so far in the future it seemed eternal to their young minds.

Astoria did the sums three times. She was good at maths but she didn't like the answer so she kept trying again, hoping she'd carried something wrong, or transcribed a digit.

May 2, 1998.

"That can't be right," the governess had said. "That's ... ." She did the problem in her head and her smile got tight and sad. "Well," she said with a chirp that had become false. "Many people never find their soulmate."

Was that supposed to make it better?

At Hogwarts Astoria crossed her arms and scowled at other girls as they giggled about their dates and who could their soulmates be. Draco Malfoy, of all people, understood. He'd slouch in the common room and make fun of the twittering girls and their romantic notions.

"When does yours die?" Pansy demanded one day, tired of his mockery. Draco knew how to find people's weaknesses and she'd had it with his knife thrusts and quips about how they all obsessed over death.

"May 2, 1998," Draco said. He quirked his brows up at their shocked silence and sneered his best Malfoy sneer.

Astoria looked at him curiously. "Strange," she said into the faux sorrow of the room. "Mine's the same one."

"That is weird," Draco said. They were friends after that. Friends who never mentioned the number that bound them, or how it crept closer with each year. Each month. Each day. Until they stood, hand in hand, and looked out at the bodies laid in the Great Hall. The rows of unfinished lives stretched out in front of them.

"Did you ever find out who?" Draco asked.

Astoria shook her head.

He squeezed her hand more tightly and said, "Me neither."

Maybe it was nicer not knowing when the person you loved would die, she thought looking at him. He had ash on his face, and his clothes smelled of fire. She leaned up against him there in the hall and decided things were better with a little uncertainty. You couldn't live your life in the shadow of death. She wouldn't from now on.

. . . . . . . . .

A/N - Thank you to ff-sunset-oasis for the prompt on Tumblr