All clear this chapter Snitch
It was well into an evening spent constructing towers from scrabble pieces when she remembered her earlier text.
"Oh by the way, George wants you to call him. He had big news apparently."
Fred threw in the last slice of apple into his mouth before standing. In spite of the cold he had only tossed on his jeans, complaining that his shirt would be too dirty to wear home when he had to leave and there was no point anyway. Hermione was pretty sure he just liked watching the way her eyes were drawn to him every time he stretched.
She grabbed her phone from the bathroom and pulled up George's contact info. She let it ring once before handing it off to Fred.
He slid into the bathroom, just as George picked up. Greeting his twin in a compilation of words that may have been English or old Latin. She slid in her ear buds, giving him privacy as she mentally ran through the steps of her first scene in Rite of Spring.
It was approximately ten minutes later when she realized sound had stopped vibrating through the wall. About five minutes after that Fred emerged slowly, a troubled look on his face. She paused her music and stood.
"Everything okay?"
"I'm heading out."
"What?" she asked. "It's still dumping snow out there. You won't make it more than two blocks before you freeze."
"I'll be fine," he grumbled.
"Is someone hurt? Are George and Ang-"
"They're fine. Everything is fucking fine."
"Jesus." Hermione held her hands up. "What had gotten into you?"
"Don't worry about it. I'll get out of your hair. Let you get back to your life."
"What? Fred what are you-"
His eyes met hers, a hot anger just behind the surface. She flinched and the smallest shred of guilt dripped onto his face before he wiped it clean. He glared at her as he pressed her cell into her hand.
"You got a text."
When he pulled away she had to force herself to look down. It felt dangerous breaking eye contact with his quiet rage still simmering under the surface. She checked the dim screen, her newest text emblazoned across the front of it.
Malfoy (6:54 pm) I'll send a car. Just come dressed for me in that black number you wore last week. And for the love of God tie back your hair or something. I hate it when it gets in my mouth.
She looked up and he was staring at the floor as if he could set it on fire. His jaw clenched tightly mirroring his knuckles.
"Seriously? This is what you're upset about."
"Just a few days, right Hermione?" Fred replied darkly.
The coldness sounded out of place in his voice. Like stumbling across a cave in the middle of summer. It didn't fit him at all.
"Fred you're being ridiculous. There is nothing going on with me and Malfoy. Look at the damn text chain."
"I don't need to see the text chain. I don't give a shit if you're fucking around with Malfoy."
"I'm not and obviously you do."
"I don't," he growled, snatching his jacket from the rack by the door. "Where's my goddamn shirt?"
"Probably wherever the better part of your personality went. If you find it please bring it back."
"Shut the fuck up, Hermione."
"Don't fucking talk to me like that."
"Or what? You'll never speak to me again?" he hissed, pinning her with a heated glare before looking away. "Boo-freaking-hoo."
"Fred. Stop it. You're being hurtful."
"What do you care?" he shot. "It's just a quick fuck for a few days right. Nothing messy or permanent?"
Hermione inhaled sharply, those weird sticky feelings that had been floating about them stalwartly pushed away and ignored were congealing, trapping them in just as effectively as the snow.
"Come on," she pleaded. "Don't do this."
"Why the in hell not?"
"It's not fair to me."
"It's not fair to anyone. Seeing that text just reminded me that this was all isolated. That once the snow melts this will be over. Even Malfoy of all fucking people will get to see you more often than I will."
"He's in my program. Of course-"
"It's not about that cocksucker Malfoy. God!" He threw his hands up in the and attempted to pace the room before figuring out that it was too small. "I just realized that this is all just few fucking days where I get to have you before we return to the real world and I can't do it."
"Don't-"
"No. It's true. I'll go back to seeing you in passing, maybe not even that because we don't go to the same school anymore and after this outburst I doubt you'll want to make time for one of our shows. For the first time I am regretting dropping out because it means I can't find a way to throw myself in your path. And I know I sound like a goddamn head case but I can't help it. "
Her heart ached to comfort him, the emotions she had been pushing down bubbled up again with a vengeance. She knew she couldn't though. It crossed a line she couldn't stand behind once the snow melted.
"You knew it was all I had to give at the start of this." Her voice was meek, never having been one to fight past this first blow of pain.
"Of course I knew. But it's different now."
"Why?"
"Because now it is staring me in the face."
She fell silent as he continued to glare, anywhere else but her. She shifted awkwardly, trying to figure out the right words to say that would put them back where they were five hours ago.
"I can't change what I am."
"You could fucking try. I am not asking you to give up your dreams, Hermione. I am just asking if you want to date."
"Fred. I can't be a partner right now." When he opened his mouth to speak she cut him off. "No. Listen. I spend every waking moment of my life dancing or working. There are some nights when I get home and have sleep for dinner because I am too exhausted to even be hungry. My friends constantly complain that I work too hard and they never see me. I can barely keep myself alive, what makes you think I can manage to keep you happy?"
"Christ Hermione, don't you get it? I know all that. I don't want you to give it all up. I'm not asking for much. We don't need a whirlwind romance with long walks on the beach. I can just be around when you need me. "
"You would feel pushed to the side, because you would be," she corrected. "We would just start having more and more fights like this until you grew to resent me. So please. Just let this be what it is."
"I want more and I know you do too. How can you not feel it?"
She didn't like that tone in his voice. The soft pained sound a wounded animal made. She had a sinking feeling of what was coming next.
"Fred. Don't."
"But I-"
"Stop. You're angry and trapped and it's confusing you. You'll look back on this in a few days and laugh yourself silly over it."
She shook her head violently, letting her hair cover her face. Her hand grasped blindly for the door knob.
"Don't tell me how to feel Hermione. You don't get to just say no to this. It doesn't work that way."
"Well I am," she said with a shaky voice.
"Fine then. You are. But I still l-"
"No!" She ripped open the door so hard it slammed against the wall. She grabbed her boots before charging down the hall towards the stairs.
"Hermione, wait!"
She ignored the sound of him swearing as he looked around the apartment for his clothes and shoes. Turning to the right of the elevator, she shouldered open a door and ran up the stairs. She didn't hear anything behind her but she still kept running, letting herself focus on her screaming muscles rather than whatever nonsense he was about to say. Her breath was ragged when she ran out of stairs, the door to the roof taunting her. Fresh air flowed into the confined stairwell around poorly sealed cracks, stoking her need to escape. She should have run down, down and outside into the snow that started all of this.
In a rage, she tried the knob, screaming in frustration as it loosely shook in place but stubbornly remained shut. She pulled on her winter boots and kicked at the metal, no doubt alerting the whole building to her vandalism in the process. She let the years of pent up frustration out as she beat at the door. Dancing was her life and she loved it, but love wasn't always easy. Sometimes it meant giving up something you really wanted for the endgame you just had to hope was worth it.
With one final kick the latch snapped and the door swung outward a few inches before being stopped by the snow. She threw herself against it, her weight forcing it open just enough that she could slip through, falling into a world of white.
The sky was heavy with cloud cover, blocking out the moon and stars. With the exception of the emergency light from the stairwell, she was surrounded by darkness. She took deep dragging breaths, letting the shock of cold ground her. The snow easily covered her knees, making her movements slow and labored. She stomped her way back into the stairwell, grabbing the cracked plastic shovel tucked in the corner.
In what would later be thought of as a fit of hysteria, she set about clearing the heavy wet drifts from the roof. She pushed whatever was in her way to the side, clearing out a space just barely the size of a small stage. The work was hard, and though it kept her muscles burning against the frigid air, she wished she would have thought to bring a coat.
She was only a quarter of the way done and already regretting her decision when she caught a flicker of red and gold by the door. She paused her labor of insanity to stare at her thick down parka and frayed golden scarf her mother gave her from Christmas last year. She begrudgingly pulled them on, eyeing the footprints that were too big to be hers before resuming her clearing.
A few minutes later the sound of a second shovel joined her. She didn't bother stopping when Fred passed her going the opposite direction, her muscles shaking as she threw another shovel full off to the left. By the time they met in the center his cheeks were flushed red.
"I'm sorry," he huffed, shoving the last of the snow from the middle of her impromptu studio.
Hermione wanted to keep fighting. She really did. It was easier to let the anger drown out the other uncomfortable emotions she couldn't let herself feel. But her body was tired, and he looked so sweet even after shoveling a ton of snow off her roof without even asking why.
"No. I'm-"
"Stop it. I was being irrational," he sighed, unzipping his jacket at the neck to cool down. She spoke, if only to stop herself from staring at the dark bruises she had left on his neck.
"I just…I can't have more. We can't be more than this. I wish we could but... I'm sorry."
"And I'm ruining the whole damn thing aren't I?" he questioned leaning on his shovel. She recognized it from the lobby and hoped that he asked permission. He looked boyishly handsome, his hair windswept and a self deprecating smile painted on his face.
"No... But you are making it impossibly hard."
"I'll try to stop doing that."
She shook her head and smiled weakly. "Then you wouldn't be you. You like things your own way, and it's usually the harder for it."
"Me?" he asked with a laugh. "I suppose you have a reason for chucking a thousand square feet of snow off your roof."
"I was going to practice but now I'm so tired I think I may just get all the steps wrong."
"Who cares?"
"I do," she responded, affronted.
"Then make it up as you go. Dance something else, something only you could."
"I don't do modern ballet," she scoffed, letting him take the shovel from her.
"But you could."
"I don't even have mu-"
Fred smiled broadly, his eyes shooting toward a case leaning against the wall. He sauntered across the cleared space, snapping open the latches and leaning against the slight outcropping from the stairwell, trying to keep clear of falling snow.
"What do you want to hear?" he asked.
He tucked the rest under his chin and ran the bow across the strings until they sang. Hermione wanted to be snippy or too shoot off some snappy comeback. It felt much too easy to just let her anger melt away. But when she saw the gentle way his hands held the violin's neck she felt her heart flutter.
She thought for a moment, watching the snow fall around them, blocking out the buildings and sounds of the city until it was just them. The wood of his instrument caught the amber light from the stairwell, flashing the same copper as his hair.
"It's later." She shot him a challenging look as he puzzled out her meaning. When he finally picked it out he smiled and pulled his chin away from the rest. His gaze softened as he watched her.
"It's not not done yet."
"Make it up as you go."
She stuck her tongue out at him as he laughed. She sashayed to the center of the cleared space, setting her feet into fourth position, one hand raised above her with the other curling over her stomach. When she just looked at him expectantly he just shook his head before tucking the instrument back under his neck.
The first notes were misplaced and stuttered, like he hadn't worked out the beginning. A frown pulled at his face, clearly uncomfortable about presenting an unfinished piece. She closed her eyes centering herself. She could wait for the music to guide her or she could inspire her own magnum opus, hidden away from the world that would never see it.
Hermione took the first jump, both figuratively and literally. She settled into a demi plié before leaping forward with his next note, stretching her tired legs. His bow stuttered, coughing out another short note just as her right foot hit the frozen asphalt of the roof heavily.
She was awkward in her movements, her hair scattered about and in clothes that hid the fine, graceful movements that made ballet what it was. But so was he, picking at notes and bars to match her until he found a rhythm they both liked.
Eventually he mastered it, the notes starting slow as she pirouetted and and leaped, kicking her feet out as she glided gracefully across the snow and ice. It wasn't perfect. The piece grew too fast and she struggled to keep up. Her shoes were too cumbersome and she just avoided pointe completely. But as his playing built to a lonely powerful climax she threw back her head and smiled, leaping through a tour jete with reckless abandon that may have broken her ankle if she had slipped. At this moment it hardly mattered to her.
Sensing the end of the piece she spun in a Chaine, letting the repetitive turns build with the music moving faster and faster as she circled across the stage, struggling to keep her balance. Just as the last note fell her body gave up, slumping where she stood before she could so much as form an ending turn out.
"Hermione!"
She laughed as her head spun, staring up at the slow flaked sheet of darkness with a childlike wonder. Her chest burned at the cold air and the already accumulating snow stuck to her curls and melted on her back. She could feel her legs itch with the muscle memory reminding her that she was doing it all wrong.
It was marvelous. She hadn't danced like that since the day Mistress McGonagall appeared in the rundown studio frowning at her overweight ballet instructor.
Fred kneeled next to her, worry leaking into his expression, just as a muted applause echoed around them. He glanced around in confusion, taking in the rooftop, devoid of an audience.
"They're clapping for you," she said, her voice soft and breathless.
He glanced back at her and laughed, running his bow across the strings in a jaunty tune. The applause deepened, leaking through windows and glass to display gratitude for a moment of sound in a sea of nothingness.
He pulled the violin tight against his chest, rolling onto his back next to her as they stared at the falling snow. Around them, new instruments picked up the idea, various pieces streaming from different windows. None of it fit and was closer to cacophony and chaos more than music but it was something special nonetheless.
When she started to shiver he laced his fingers into hers with a tight smile. He pulled her to her feet, brushing a kiss on her near frozen lips with his breath searing across her skin in warm clouds.
"It should have been for you."
Notes:
Magnum opus:
The master piece of an artist's career. The best of the best. The end game. Fin.
Demi-Plie
A knees halfway bent position with arms out that usually precedes a jump.
Pirouette
A spin on one foot with a the other foot touching the knee.
Pointe
Almost all classical ballet is done on pointe at some point. It is when the ballet dancer goes up on their tip toes then does impossible feats of human strength and conditioning.
tour jete
A high graceful leap in which the dancer spins mid air.
Chaine:
repetitive tight turns, usually in an oval or to a particular spot on stage.