Chapter 5: decrescendo
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
- "Fire and Ice", Robert Frost.
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The lights in the restaurant are low, and it's raining outside.
"But you already know what I'm going to tell you."
"You're leaving."
She nods, and then there is silence and the sound of rain in the gutters exclaiming something, emphatic and hurried and just beyond her reach.
"I had a dream last night," she says, after a while.
"But you haven'tsince the war?"
"It wasn't like those dreams, exactly. I don't remember much of it. Ron was there."
"Oh, Ginny"
She takes his hands across the table, almost crushing his fingers. "I love you," she says, but renewing those words won't make them shine again. "I loved you," she says, thinking better of it. "Did you love me?" She wonders if what she's doing to him is fair, and hears her mother in her mind- nobody ever said life was fair, dear.
"Yes." And she knows it's true. Then he meets her gaze, grey eyes intent. "For what it's worth."
She nods again, and reaches out to touch his face. "You still have this" There is a scar, a faint white line, just below his eye.
"When we were living in that apartment."
"When I threw the vase." She pauses. "I never thought it was that deep."
She's stopped crying now (she's cried for two days), although she's pale. She holds his hands because she can feel him trembling.
"It feels like there should be more than this," he says in a low, rough whisper.
She nods and is silent, looking down at their twined hands.
"I'm sorry. For everything."
"So am I." Oddly formal. So much for bruises, and for broken glass.
He watches her let go of his hands slowly, deliberately.
"So this is it." He looks as though he might cry, but she knows Draco better than that.
"I guess. Take care of yourself, Draco." She turns to go.
"Wait," he says, and she waits, turning back to him. He pulls her into his arms and holds her for a long time, shaking. It rained like this the night Ron died, and Draco was with her then as well. "I'll miss you," he says, so quietly that she might have imagined it.
On impulse, she pulls away a little and looks up at him searchingly.
"It was worth every second," she says, and kisses him hard, because her mind is screaming that this is the last time. When he rests his head on her shoulder and whispers "Go, Ginny," she can barely hear him over the roaring in her ears, and when he lets her go, her mouth forms the word goodbye but she has no breath left to make it heard. When she gets outside, it is still raining, although, really, it should have stopped by now.
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not over yetreview?