[disclaimer: Only Anya is mine…and I think even that may be vice-versa…]
Jigsaw
By Adele Elisabeth
"Are you afraid?" (femmeslash)
"You'll regret this," Anya repeated for the fifth time, though her hands didn't cease busying themselves with the buttons on Hermione's robes, her voice matter-of-fact, almost painfully so. "You'll wake up and you'll see me for what I am and you'll hate yourself for it."
"Are you afraid, Anya?" Hermione raised an eyebrow, gazing down at the shorter brunette.
Anya never backed down from a challenge.
Falling in love with anyone was dangerous. Falling in love with a Gryffindor down right stupid. Falling in love with Hermione Granger was just plain suicidal.
Somehow, Anya didn't care anymore. She didn't know how that had happened. Only that it had. She loved listening to Hermione talk -- about anything, it didn't matter. Even her stupid, pointless campaign for house-elf rights (though Anya refused point blank to wear an S.P.E.W badge, no matter how Hermione cajoled and wheedled and finally pouted and sulked). Anya's beautiful Gryffindor lover had an equally beautiful voice, and sometimes, late at night when they sat curled up together in front of a fire in the library, Anya liked to pretend that that voice and that beauty was all hers, and just for her, and she was going to have it forever.
This was foolish. Insane. Mad. It was all going to end in tears. Sooner or later, Hermione was going to realise what she was sharing her bed with. A cold little ice princess of Slytherin, who'd watched her father murder once, and could honestly say that it had never bothered her. They were so different, Anya and Hermione. Anya would never tell the other girl that she loved her, though Hermione had no problem with whispering it into her ear at just the right moment, or mumbling it before she dozed off to sleep in the smaller girl's arms.
Because she didn't. Corsos didn't love, not like this.
She didn't love Hermione. It didn't matter that she was going to lose her. Nothing lasted forever.
She didn't love her.
She didn't love her.
She didn't.
"Why don't you ever tell me that you love me?" Hermione looked up from the book she was reading as she asked the question, quietly, matter-of-factly.
"Because I don't," Anya replied, not bothering to look up. You didn't survive six years of Slytherin House without learning how to lie. Sometimes you had to lie to yourself, too.
She pretended that she couldn't see the tears that were slipping and sliding silently down Hermione's cheeks.
Anya Corso was a puzzle that Hermione was determined to figure out.
Anya said that she didn't need anyone, but she held Hermione like she didn't ever plan on letting go. Anya was cold, hard and dangerous, but she melted against Hermione and purred like a kitten. Anya never said she loved her, but Hermione remained certain that she did.
In other words, Anya made no sense at all.
Somehow, Hermione couldn't bring herself to mind.
"Why do you never tell me that you love me?" Just another piece of the puzzle, Hermione told herself firmly. A key to understanding. That's all.
Anya didn't look up from her book. "Because I don't."
"Oh," Hermione said quietly, looking down at the tome that was suddenly so very heavy on her lap.
She didn't realise she was crying until a tear splashed down on the page, at which point she entertained the irrational fear that she'd have a lifetime of detentions from Madam Pince for staining a book. She almost laughed at herself.
She spilled the book from her lap as she rose, pale with fury, "You, Anya Corso, are a hateful, miserable, bitch!"
With that proclamation, she turned on her heel and fled from the library, from Anya's confusing and infuriating influence on her life, from...from...
They don't talk about love anymore.
It's all right, though. They need each other, and, for now, that's enough. That's enough.
Hermione doesn't think she'll ever forget the expression Anya had worn as she fled the library. Not ever.