Title: La caricia perdida

Author: RonWeasleysGirl

Rating: R

Disclaimer: All appearing chars belong to JKR. No infringement is intended.

Archive: Whenever, wherever, just tell me before. The usual folks of course don`t have to.

Feedback: Please, folks, drop me a line if you liked it.

WARNINGS: THIS CONTAINS SLASH!!!! THAT MEANS BOY-ON-BOY ACTION!!!

Dedication: to Ines, because of various reasons.

And to Susanne and Rebecca for keeping me sane through more than Romance linguistics. You rule and: Am Samstag, 11 Uhr, sind Ferien...

Harry`s POV

I awake in a warm bed, warmed from body heat.

Like every morning, warm and comfortable.

The body next to me is heated from peaceful slumber, and soft, as it presses into my own, cuddling close to me, into my welcoming arms.

Fiery red strands of silky hair caress my skin and my hand slides over tender creamy skin as I try to wake my lover.

This skin which I got to know so well during all the time we have been together now, and during all the times when I had been the one earlier awake next to this sleepy-head, left with a lot of time to count the innumerable freckles on the cute face, shoulders or arms.

I gaze into a pair of beautiful brown eyes, heavy-lidded from sleep as they open unwillingly.

Brown eyes, glittering golden from the sun, which shines into the window of our tiny flat on this Sunday morning.

The crystal clear eyes of the person who has shared my life for the past five years now.

The honest, large eyes of the person who has stood by my side, loyally, without a doubt, in good times and in bad.

A person, so wonderful both inside and out.

Perfect.

But nevertheless it is not the person I love.

Because my heart is somewhere else and my secret love increases with every beat, with every second, with every blink of my eyes I grow further apart from my lover and fall deeper into this hopeless desire of my insane, aching heart.

I wish I could bring myself to say the truth, to admit my love has gone long ago, that I doubt whether it ever has been there.

So truly, wholeheartedly am I devoted to someone else, who has not the slightest idea how much in love i am, that I wish I could say it out loud now, into our bed-room, where we have made love so often while my thoughts have been far away.

While when I had closed my eyes, someone else`s voice had moaned my name.

Someone else who will never love me back.

And who nevertheless is on my mind always when I wake up here in my bed with someone I don't want to be with.

But I am a coward.

But how could I not?

Don`t want to see hurt in the pretty features of this freckled face, don`t want to see tears in those chocolate eyes.

Don`t have the right to break someone so wonderful by ruining all we had, all I had promised to kill the voice inside of me which had screamed for another future.

Another lover.

So I keep on pretending when I feel kisses from full red lips showering my face.

"Good morning, Harry, love...", a voice, fond, tender, loving, for me..

My heart breaks for the umpteenth time when I feel the unhidden emotions radiating from this bundle of innocent sensuality in my arms.

So I keep on pretending that I don't think of someone else when I reply:

"Good morning, Ginny."

I awake with the loudest of cries, panting, my heart beating in my throat.

Ron, next to me, jumps.

"Harry! You scared the hell out of me!"

Slowly, I orient myself.

Hogwarts, Gryffindor Common Room.

It must have fallen asleep over my Potions book after having revised for hours.

Two day until our school-leaving exam in Potions and we still are far from being prepared properly.

Well, we`ll never be prepared properly for Snape, but we try to make it as hard as possible for him to see us go with bad marks.

My heart beats as Ron stares at me with his cocoa-coloured eyes as if I am a mentally disturbed.

Then he goes back to his book.

I still tremble.

And I suddenly am more sure than I had ever been in my whole life what to do.

When I walk next to her the day after, my courage leaves me as smoothly as shooting stars burn out.

We have been out only a few times, have not even kissed yet and yes, today I can feel more than ever that she does not love me as well.

That the way her cheeks glow is not because of me nor the pride which shines in her large shy eyes when we are holding hands.

It is not because of the same reason Ron had held me when I had cried after we had lost more than one friend during the battles neither of the same reason he had been there when I had been the farthest away from being a hero, but a boy close to hysteria, close to losing his mind in the last labours of the war.

It`s not because of me that she is here with me, but because of Harry Potter, Headboy, Quidditch captain, the Boy-Who-Lived, The Boy-Who-Defeated-Voldemort and all the other Boys who are not me, but grades in their heads.

I don`t blame her, she`s a child.

I am not surprised when I see tears in her eyes, when I finish with "I`m sorry, Gin."

"I don`t understand why it hurts.", she whispers.

"See, I knew it. I felt it. We`re not for each other. I was not in love with you. You, you know?"

I know perfectly.

Maybe I was mistaken.

Maybe she is no child.

"I don`t even know who you are. You don`t deserve to be abused for my girlish dreams of the knight in shining armour."

Wise words.

Too wise for a 16 year old.

But the war has made us all more mature than it is good for us.

She sends me away and I rush to where I belong.

Ron.

If this is my last chance before I may never see him again, I will use it.

I reach the dormitory, out of breath.

"Ron."

I`m afraid.

Weak.

Vulnerable.

He`ll never love me back.

The fondness, which is shown on his face as he sees my pain is the love for a brother, for a friend, not for a lover.

"Harry."

He stands up and caresses my face, his eyes sad and worried when confronted with my fear-filled ones.

"Don`t look so tired. It doesn`t suit your pretty face.", he whispers and his voice is hoarse, as we stand there in the dim room, agonizingly close.

I grew dizzy, my knees are like jelly and my tears come unrestrained as I feel his hand on my face and his breath on my skin.

"I love you, Ron.", I whisper, almost sob and then I kiss him.

A kiss born from desperation from a man who has nothing left to lose.

My dream comes true and my tears come eve more when he pulls me tight as my legs threaten to not carry my weight anymore.

No hesitation.

Only the smallest, softest sound in the back of his throat, then he parts his lips and his tongue finds its way in.

It`s perfect, wet and soft and hot and wet and soft again.

No hesitation.

Only perfection, as he lays me down on his bed and makes love to me as if he had been waiting for it for years.

I barely speak a word, only hear myself whisper his name as I come.

We`ll utterly fail in Potions in the morning..

But we'll worry about that tomorrow.

The End