Author's Note – Quidditch League Round 12 Entry
Team: Tutshill Tornados
Position: Chaser 2
Prompt: You can't see colour until you meet your soulmate
Additional prompts: direction (word), destined (word), blush pink (colour)
Word count: 1,851 words
FYI: fem!Harry returns for another chapter my loves. This time we've stepped outside our comfort box and paired her with burly Charlie Weasley, so enjoy!
Extension used: No (4 of 5 previously used)
Life & laughter in bright technicolour
Holly Potter had grown up knowing she was different. Not only for the slew of odd things that were always happening around her, but because she couldn't see colour. Aunt Petunia told her she was colour blind but Holly knew that that wasn't the problem. Other people in primary school had been colour blind and they had been able to see different hues and pigments – they just didn't see them in the right way. Whereas she couldn't see colour at all - the world around her existed in varying shades of grey, each just as blank and lifeless as the next.
She tried to explain this to Aunt Petunia once, tried to show her through her words that she just didn't see things the way others did.
That was the first time she heard the word 'freak' used in place of her name. From that point on, Holly avoided being outwardly different with everything she had in her. She put her head done and determined that the only direction safe for her to take was the one that pointed straight ahead – no turns or changes in sight.
Not seeing colour was a clear identifier that she did not belong, that these were not her people and that they didn't see the worth in attempting to change that.
As the years went on and Holly learned of her magical heritage, she also learned why she couldn't see colour of any kind. It was the way of the wizarding world, a trick of fate that showed one their destined partner, according to the elderly wizard Ollivander. "Those that carry a wand also carry the burden of living life largely without the one they are made to compliment."
"That's ridiculous," eleven-year-old Holly had retorted at the time. "What happens if someone doesn't meet their destined partner? Or they meet their partner and they begin seeing colour, but their partner can't see colour after meeting them? Are they meant to remain alone forever?"
"Hardly, Ms Potter," the old wizard had replied. "One does not need to find their soulmate to live, nor do they need them to give and receive love. Soulmates bound through this branch of magic, however, share a bond stronger than others. They share a bond blessed by Mother Magic, a true gift indeed."
She walked away from the store that day, only three years ago, not feeling any better than she had when she'd arrived. The idea that this bond was blessed by the very core and foundation of their magic only terrified Holly more – surely, she wouldn't be so blessed. Someone like her, who'd lived so many days in pain and misery, wouldn't be so blessed by Mother Magic. She'd had too many days of misery, too many days where the dull ache of pain was the only thing that kept her going. Because she couldn't see colour but she could feel – the pain reminded her that, pigments aside – there was more to be had in the world then shocking technicolour.
That was a word she'd heard Mrs. Weasley use once or twice before, when she'd been describing what finding your soulmate was like. She'd had to ask a question or two before she understood the emotion Mrs. Weasley was trying to convey, but she eventually had a firm grasp on the idea. And as wonderful as those in said bond made it seem, finding her destined partner still held a sort of awful kind of anticipatory awe over her. Because, based on what Mrs. Weasley had told her, finding one's soulmate didn't automatically connect you. Life didn't fade into the background; you didn't become an entirely new person. Instead, the red tether that ran along the pathways of destiny simply tied itself to another, one that was not the same as your own but did hold the potential to become your true partner.
As the Girl-Who-Lived and the seemingly inevitable vanquisher of Voldemort – regardless of what Dumbledore and the wizarding world tried to say, Holly always anticipated the worst – Holly didn't like the uncertainty of a partner she couldn't choose herself. Her current friends, those she had fought for and with and who were now her family more than anything. How could she trust that her destined partner would accept the direction her life would lead her in? Thought it might not be the straight and narrow path she had initially laid out for herself when she was younger, Holly knew she was still aiming directly for a conflict that had been years in the making.
Would her destined partner accept that? Would they support her in the trials and tribulations that would colour her life?
The soulmate bond didn't build in blind obedience – she'd asked that of Mrs. Weasley, too – so who's to say that she'd meet someone that would either be strong enough to accept the direction her life would take her or determined and patient enough to wait for that direction to change?
It was a question she often wondered about but never really contemplated deeply until the faithful afternoon she tumbled out of the Weasley's fire place. Having left Mr. Weasley to sort out her relatives, she groaned loudly as she cursed her inability to land with any kind of grace. Flying on a broom, diving at high speeds from impossible altitudes, none of that caused her any trouble at all. Having to calmly and carefully navigate the floo network had alluded her for years.
As she once again tumbled out of the fireplace, she grumbled under her breath and cursed the magical form of transport as though it was the floo network's fault she was so uncoordinated with her feet on the ground. "Fuck me!" she cursed, propping herself up on her elbows as she directed her gaze upwards. Thankfully Mrs. Weasley hadn't heard her expletive too busy scolding Fred and George a short way away. The only witness to her misfortune was the tall, well built, grinning man in front of her. Holly watched him without blinking, dazedly recognising that her subconscious was exploding as rays of colour and pigment lit up the world around her. When she had thought of this day, never would she have assumed that it would be one of the Weasleys – assuming the man was indeed a Weasley - that would be the cause of such an event. It was almost enough to distract her from what the man was saying.
"I mean, you're only fourteen, people would talk," he said, laughing in a way that was friendly without being lecherous.
He offered her his hand and she took it silently, still focused on the face of the man in front of her. Having gone so long without seeing colour, Holly had grown used to reading the eyes of those who approached her. Judging their ambition, their goals and their true intentions from the depths of charcoal that peered at her. But in this new world, where life was no longer dressed in grey and she was afforded the treasure of being blessed by Mother Magic, the first thing Holly's gaze tracked was the explosion of colour across the face and neck of the man in front of her.
The colour she saw was the softest, lightest pink, blush pink, she'd later learn. The colour of feeling, of emotion racing through the body so quickly it couldn't help but light up one's skin as it brushed it so gently. She'd one day chase that colour all along the planes of his form, though she hadn't known that then.
She could only watch as the colour slowly crept further down his neck the longer her eyes perused him, though it still wasn't enough to make her speak. It wasn't until her eyes finally made their way back to his that she spoke, her voice quiet from the sudden onslaught of feeling that was rushing through her body.
"We'll have to revisit it another day, then," she said, holding out her hand. "It's nice to meet you, I'm Holly Potter."
"Yeah, I sort of figured," he said, chuckling as he took her hand in his firmly but with a gentleness that was in stark contrast to the callouses that she felt lining his palm. "Nice to meet you, I'm Charlie."
"Charlie," she responded, testing the word out on her tongue, eager to feel his name cross her lips so she could match it to the colour that flew across her gaze with each blink of her eyes. She reluctantly let go of his hand, letting her own drop back down to her side, tingling like she had been stunned. "It's nice to finally meet you, I've heard a lot about you."
"Likewise," he said, his excited grin settling in to a gentle smile. "I hope I live up to the hype."
"I hope you do too," she said, causing Charlie to laugh again. She decided then that she enjoyed making Charlie laugh, enjoyed being the cause of that lovely shade of blush pink making its way across his face and neck.
That day, more than any other she'd lived thus far changed her life. From that point she had a friend, a confidante, a partner that stood by her side with no goal in mind other than supporting her. It was different than what she'd imagined – she and Charlie still had their own paths, but they were both riding those paths in the same direction. It gave her hope for the future, hope that she did not have to be the only one that traversed her path, that one day Charlie might walk hers or she might be able to join him and traverse his own pathway. Whatever the case, Mother Magic had done well, she decided, to pair her with someone that sought to protect her in ways that didn't take away from the fact that she was strong, independent and capable.
It would be years before Charlie became anything other than a friend to her. Through dragons, interfering ministry workers, tragedy and death, Charlie would be the one to support her through it all. It was only after she'd seen to her destiny and her pre-determined path had been cut short, that she took the time to ponder whether it wasn't time for her to take another path, one currently tended to by her soulmate. Jumping onto that new path seemed so easy after the Battle of Hogwarts – neither Holly or Charlie caring about what the rest of the world saw or thought as they sought comfort in each other. Before long no one would blink or look twice, so used to Charlie's constant presence by her side that the adjustment from friends to lovers – and later to husband and wife – was a small one to make.
Regardless of how she'd gotten here, of the misery and darkness that had coloured her earliest experiences, to the real-life hues that had become her new normal, Holly wouldn't trade it for anything.
Because getting to laugh and live life with Charlie was so much better when done in bright technicolour.