Part Three : Lion
The windows of the classroom rattle and I glance towards them, wondering why March is such a contradiction. It just so happens that my line of vision runs right into Potter and I frown, arms crossed. At least he is across the room. At least he isn't aware of my gaze. At least he isn't next to me, taunting me with that smirk and that slight dusting of hair down the back of his neck.
But he is in my thoughts, and that is enough to ruin the entire period.
It seems ironic we must endure History of Magic with them, struggling through Binns' tireless tirades of history. Most are asleep. Some are daydreaming; others gaze about the room. Only that Muggle Granger seems to be listening.
Thankfully, Potter seems lost in his own world.
(Emerald city and dusky sky as soft as flower petals. You're flying, aren't you, Potter? Lost in that realm of smoky dreaming.)
But I was thinking about March. Not about Potter. The way March is first a lion and then a lamb, roaring its defiance to the sky and then whispering zephyr sweetness in lilac lullabies. Only it never does. That is the romanticized spring, and the spring I see is angry. (A ghost of Winter, her elder brother, staggering and blowing fit to knock down brick houses. What about porcelain statues, o Spring of tempestuous breath? Can you huff and puff and blow my father down?)
An oxymoron, March is. Ambivalent. Beloved hatred, light darkness, extinguishable life flame. It is black and white all at once and I do not like the gray it merges into. (Ashen gray squares and turbulent marble; no chess game can be built on such shades.)
So March is a lion. Which makes March a Gryffindor, which I can certainly see. Blustering and self-righteous, stinging and pompous and proud all at the same time. Does he like March, I wonder? But I don't have to wonder. March is a month for dreamers and those forgotten; a harbor of buffeting storms that nevertheless leaves you feeling cleansed of Winter's contaminating touch.
Potter is too straightforward to be a true dreamer. Still, he has grandiose schemes. And he lives in his own mind of regrets and castles of air. But he remains an enigma to me, a face that taunts me with its ever-changing, unreadable expressions. And his writing is that of a four year old - this coming from one who was forced into precise penmanship, but nevertheless.
Meet me outside Hogwarts after History.
There is no name, but I would recognize that scribbling anywhere. And I probably shouldn't want to go, but he is enough of a mystery to tempt me. So when the bell shakes us all from our respective reveries and sends us scattering through the halls, I find my way into March's trembling embrace. (Limbs of entangling silk with early buds on the branches and angry voice in my ears. Where is he?)
Just when I think it's a ploy to make me look stupid, I see that familiar figure loping across the grounds towards me. (He is wolflike today, graceful gait carrying him to my side.)
"Where the h-" I begin, when he launches a tirade of his own.
"Where's your broom?" he demands, staring at me as if I've grown a tail and two horns. (What am I now, the Devil?)
"Am I not allowed to walk anymore?"
"I told you we were going somewhere," he snaps, teeth gritted.
I pull the parchment from my pocket, smirk glittering on my face like some hideous mask. "Yeah? Did you write it in invisible ink?" I hand it to him, the one line, and watch those cold gems of eyes scan the words.
"It was implied," he growls. "Anyway, we can stop by the locker rooms, they should have an extra one." The wind rushes around us, shrieking through the gray afternoon. "Well?" he demands with one leg over his broomstick. "Are you going to get on or what?"
"With you? I'll pass, Potter."
"Malfoy," he says patiently, "get your bloody ass on this broom."
"Or what? Why should I?"
I don't resist when he grabs my wrist and yanks me on, though I have good reason to. "This broom is not made for two," I grumble as we leave the ground behind. I cling tightly to the handle, unable to stop my knees from squeezing his sides to stay on. "And it is not the right weather for flying! What the hell are you thinking?"
He doesn't answer, probably concentrating on maneuvering through the clutches of springtime gales. We lurch forward and I find myself with my face buried in his shoulder. (Cinnamon and lilies, the faint tang of regulation Hogwarts soap. If I close my eyes, I can focus on that singular fragrance-) If it is possible to lean further off a broomstick, I do not realize. It's a relief to land beside the squat building near the Quidditch field.
"You do realize," he teases, grinning, "that rumors will fly if anyone saw us?"
"That isn't funny." I shoulder past him and into the building, retrieving one of the school brooms. It isn't in the best condition, but I hardly expected more. He is waiting impatiently when I come out and kicks off before I can even mount, hovering above me like some angel-harbinger of death.
"Are you coming?" he shouts over the wind as I rise beside him. I roll my eyes.
"Where are we going?" I call back, but he is already speeding ahead. Cursing the old broom, I rush to catch up. The wind whistles by, robbing my limbs of all lingering body warmth. "You know," I try again, "we could get expelled for this. Not supposed to leave school grounds."
"Ha. You fly well," he yells back to me across the chasm of air between us, ignoring my words. "But so unnaturally. Too precise. Don't you feel it?"
"Whatever, Potter," I shout, unwilling to argue.
"I'm serious, all right? The wind in your ears, the open skies - the freedom! Can't you see? It's glorious!"
"I can't hear you." I pantomime his voice not reaching my ears, not wanting to acknowledge his words. Without warning he comes swerving towards me, almost knocking me off as he goes shooting past. "Potter! Get the hell away; what do you think you're doing? We could've crashed!"
He grins mischievously. "Nah, I have faith in my flying abilities." Reaching out to grab my sleeve, he adds, "Tag, you're It."
I stare at him, nonplussed. "What?"
"Oh, for God's sakes - it's a Muggle game. Someone tags you and you're It. When you catch someone else, they're It."
"Simple games for simple people? How juveni-"
"It's a kid's game!"
"Yet you still pl-"
"It was a joke, Malfoy."
"Whatever."
"Shut up."
"Sod off."
"Fuck you."
"Muggle lover."
"Asshole."
Needless to say, we ride the rest of the way in silence. I am almost afraid to break the glasslike stillness of the air between us, but when I see where we were landing I cannot help it.
"I can't believe you! You have no right to bring me here!"
He swoops towards the ground and I have an itching urge to fly off without him, to never let my feet touch that cursed ground. I don't want to see. I don't want to know. He's doing me no favors by bringing me here; he'd better know that -
"Coming?" And I find myself landing beside him amongst those stark markers of stone, gazing about me.
He takes my wrist before I can resist and I somehow don't have the heart to shake off that hesitant touch. Petal smooth and cool as March sky, treating me like fragile porcelain. I want to tell him that I'm not made of glass, but I can't. (Under his touch, maybe I am.) "We don't have to go there," he says carefully to me, as if speaking to a small child. "That isn't why I brought you, actually. Look. Malfoy, over here."
I follow his gaze to the tiny headstone, eyes tracing over the letters. "Lily and James Potter," I read aloud over the breeze. "Together in life, together in death." I feel the mockery spring to my lips but his shoulders quake and I watch, surprised, as he sinks to his knees.
"No one remembers them," he forces out between muffled sobs. Who is glass now? His grasp slips off my wrist. I have never heard his voice like that, choked with emotion. "You know that? You know? After all the ceremonies and tears and speeches, look what's left! No one even comes here anymore!"
I crouch beside him, jeans swiftly dampening at the knees. "Are you crying, Potter?" It is not a malicious question, only a curious one.
He moves to wipe his eyes and smudges a bit of dust across his cheek, soon turned to muddy tears. He stares at me through the watery lenses of his crooked glasses, chin set. "No."
Unable to resist, I reach one finger to wipe a tear from his cheek. He watches me; blinking droplets from his eyes, and we both stay crouched like that in the mud for a long, long moment. Waiting. "You are crying, Potter."
He stands. "I have," he retorts, "allergies."
"All these flowering trees," I concede, glancing about at the bare branches reaching like skeletons to the dusky curtain above (skeletons with their flesh robbed by the nimble fingers of Winter, tendrils of ice clinging to their stark limbs). Perhaps Spring has not yet come - the Spring we have come to expect, anyway. "Why did you bring me here, Potter?"
His eyes are red-rimmed but still that glowing green and full of light, fixed upon me. "I wanted you to see. I-"
"Did you bring Weasley here? Granger?"
He looks away now, gaze flickering through the cold cemetery. "Maybe someday. Not today." I don't answer, don't have one. I'm not sure if I want to see, but I ask anyway.
"Where is she?"
He doesn't look at me, but his voice is soft. "Not too far. Over here." I follow him down the path; both of our robes are gathering dust at the hems. I recognize it several rows away, the towering memorial of marble. (Spend your money, Father, not your time.)
"That's-"
I stop him. "I know." There are petals scattering the frozen grass, torn remnants of a mourning crowd that then separated to drink tea and bicker over her jewelry. I pick up one discarded flower and absently tear at its mottled petals. Narcissa Malfoy. No delicate saying, no together in death, nothing of the sort. There are only cold marble angels with their wings anchored to the ground, their stone faces serenely aloof. "You - you come here a lot?"
He shrugs effortlessly, eyes like frozen jungles fixed upon the monument - as are mine. "I guess. Why don't you? Don't you miss her?"
There is something of a truce here, a different feeling. The ridiculous mockery doesn't come as easily to my lips and he does not stare at me with the routine antipathy. Something tells me that here, among all these quietly forgotten stones, we are but the same color. (No black, no white, only cold gray marble that stays solid against March's breath.) I look at him silently until he meets my gaze. "I don't know how to," I say honestly, feeling the wind sweep across my skin. "I don't know. Maybe. Do you?"
He looks away, his fingers curling about the handle of his broom. "Yeah. Yeah, I do. All the time."
I would tease him, I suppose, only I don't know what he would do. I don't know what to expect. So I simply gaze at my feet and the scattered roses and the frosted ground. (March must snore when he sleeps, I think; always rumbling, always restless.)
"We should go," Potter tells me quietly, and with a glance at my watch I know he is right. By the time we return, dinner will be over. I expect no questions from Crabbe or Goyle, though Pansy might send me a few curious looks. I'm sure he will meet with plenty from his companions. I'm just as sure that he'll lie.
"Don't tell," I say, not entirely sure why.
"I'm not going to." He climbs, almost reluctantly, onto his broomstick. "Er. Will you be coming back?"
I climb on my own broomstick, feeling the worn handle beneath my fingers. I think about him flying, the grace, think about my own inadequacy on such a means of transportation. For a moment he isn't Potter, he isn't someone that I have to hate. He's someone I can probably wonder about, be curious about. Maybe I can even be impressed with his flying.
But I blink, or the wind shifts, and the moment is gone.
"No." We kick off the ground at the same time and are buoyed by the fingers of air, lifted to the sky in all its ashen glory. "It's out of the way."
He is flying closer than before, both of us bobbing through the air side by side. I can see him frown. "You could come with me, if you want," he offers. His voice is raw in the blustering wind. "I didn't find my parents' until the last time I came. I'll be coming back, 'cause of that, I guess."
"No."
"Even if-"
"No, Potter!"
Maybe he realizes he's pushed me too far. Maybe he recognizes the tone in my voice. (You aren't supposed to know me. You aren't supposed to recognize the voice inflections, the shift in my expressions, the rigidity in my flying. You shouldn't. So why do you?) In any case, he shuts up.
The land below is thawing slowly, the last droplets of Winter slowly soaking away. It's only visible from the sky, but here and there are stretches of soon-to-be-flowering trees and patches of muddy grass. Were we walking, the March afternoon would look the same as February or January, but I suppose we know better from up here. Things look different.
Hogwarts, too, looks strangely new from our higher perspective. It looks more like the fortress, the shelter it is, rather than some sprawling castle full of oddities and ridiculous wastes of time. I almost look at it as -
No, but that's not right. Home isn't something I should be familiar and warm towards; home is a cold house filled with porcelain statues and magic plastic flowers that never wilt. Home is where my father reigns on the throne built with the power of our family tree; home is a place even a warm fire cannot heat.
"You try to keep so controlled," he says, almost conversationally, and I am startled out of my trance. "Is it that hard to let go?"
"What are you talking about, Potter?" I snap in reply.
"Flying. I mean, stop being so stiff." He raises an eyebrow at me. "You aren't your father, you know."
Something flares defiantly and I scowl back at him, voice carried all too clearly by the wind. "I know that. Of course I know that." And, of course, I would. "I don't need you telling me how to fly, either. I've been on a broom since I was two." Pointedly, "Longer than you."
He shrugs, refusing the bait. "You fly too awkwardly."
I let my feet stop on the frozen ground and dismount, hoisting the broom at my side. He does the same, following me. "If I wanted flying lessons, Potter, I wouldn't be asking you." When he doesn't reply, I just turn towards the broom closet and shove the borrowed broomstick back into the shadowy interior. There is a clatter, and I don't much care. "Yes, Potter, our little field trip is over. You can run back to your own tower now."
He still persists in tagging along at my side as I stride back to the castle, his broomstick swooping perilously near to dragging in the grass if he isn't careful. "We missed supper," he says, toe prodding in the dust as he watches me squeak open the main doors. "You want to come to the kitchens?"
I glance back at him, one foot on the dusty marble of the main hall and one still poised on the doorstep of the frigid spring afternoon. Or is it early evening? Either way, the shadows flicker about his face and his half-smile and maybe I am tempted to say yes. (Trading laughter by the fire, eating as many pasties as the elves can possibly con us into eating, maybe forgetting and slipping into that gray area where he isn't himself and I am not me and we are both just two sitting and laughing and merging into blissful gray where lines don't exist and black and white is a prejudice we've long since rejected-)
"Yeah, right, Potter. Run along to your own friends."
And we part ways in the shadowy corridor, one first-year student scurrying by and granting us a curious look as she nearly drops all of her books. He doesn't quite look at me and I don't quite look at him; neither of us says goodbye.
Thanks.
But I don't think I can say it; I don't think I can admit that much to him. Nevertheless, I stand and watch him walk away before I slip through the back passageways to the Slytherin tower.
Outside the wind whistles and rattles at the windows, branches rising against the backdrop of shadows like a warning finger. (A beckoning finger?) I feel empty like a lonely house with blowing curtains and dusty rooms, haunted by a ghost of smoke and frigid breath, a soul that drifts like an occupant through my frame but never make a home there. It is chilling to realize that you are nothing but blood and bones and bile, an abandoned house that no one can stand to live in. (The rent, I hear, is quite cheap.) Still, I have no home. No home but my father's, which is naught but an ice castle. Still hiding from the grip of Spring in the sanctuary of Winter's breath.
March is a Gryffindor, but I love him anyway.