It's A Damn Cold Night

"Isn't anyone trying to find me?
Won't somebody come take me home
It's a damn cold night
Trying to figure out this life."

"Minerva..." he repeated, and she heard him, but didn't turn around. Her only perceptible reaction was the slight shaking of her shoulders as a pale, slender hand pulled her cloak a bit closer around them. Inside of her head, though, thoughts whirled through her mind. It was his voice, of that she was sure. His voice, the voice she'd drank during so many years of too sporadic classes, the only liquid she desperately, frantically wanted to be drunk with, the only melody that could ever touch her heart.

It was him, he who she'd loved for years, he whose smiles and frowns had made and unmade her world, he whom she'd believed in, always believed in, through everything, even through her own so often praised common sense. Until some hours earlier...

"Minerva." he now uttered a second time, and she felt a hand on her shoulder. It was a loose hand, though- did he then really trust her with what she was about to throw away- with her own life? Or did he simply not care? She felt her own spirits, raised for such a short, blissful moment at the sound of his voice, sink again and, through her dark eyelashes, she found herself staring into the tempting darkness before her. Now was the moment, she knew as she, instinctively, stepped a bit closer to the misty abyss. Now it was life or death and, though his hand was on her shoulder, it was her choice to make. It was so easy... so very, very easy... so easy...

"Minerva, please... please..."

It was all he said, but he didn't tighten his grip and she was grateful for that. The sadness in his voice was enough to break her heart- but wasn't it already broken? Hadn't he- or better, his absence- broken it sheer hours earlier?

On that very moment, with that very question, Minerva McGonagall made a decision, the decision, which would change her life.

She turned around.

She turned around and faced him, him who she'd loved, even though ever sensible fibre of her being knew it was wrong, it was forbidden by all laws of men and nature...

His blue eyes shone as they, finally, finally, linked with her emerald ones- after what felt like an eternity. They read the sadness- she could feel it. They read the pain... and they responded. With kindness, comfort and... and something else. Something she, even she, with all her so-called brains and intelligence, could not define. Not yet... not now...

"Professor..." Minerva muttered, in a voice which sounded hardly sure that it was still alive... It should have been over now. It should have...

But as soon as his arms went around her, she knew that jumping wasn't her fate. Had never been her fate. He lifted her up- she felt it, even though her eyes were closed. He lifted her up in his arms, she felt his staggering breath on her face and didn't even try to suppress a soft sigh from escaping her lips.

"Don't..."

His voice sounded strangely hoarse- almost as if he was crying.

"Don't do that ever again! Do you hear me, Minerva? Don't throw your life away- never. Please!"

His arms around her pressed her slender body against his more muscular one, and as her cheek came to rest against his, she realized her previous feeling hadn't been an impression. He was crying.

"Professor..."

"Albus."

"A-Albus, why do you cry? Why do you give a damn about... what I do... why do you? Why?"

The last bit had come out as a half-muffled, hysterical shriek, but deep down, they both knew it was a rational question. She did, honestly, wonder why he cared so much, why he shed tears over her.

And deep down, they both knew the answer.

"Because I love you, Minerva. Because I give more than a damn about you. And I am sorry because of it. I know it is wr-"

His sentence was muffled, though, after this strange- almost guilty- confession of love.

It was muffled by her face on his.

"Won't you, take me by the hand, take me somewhere new.
I don't know who you are but I, I'm with you
I'm with you."