Stanza
By soul release
Author's Note: Ahah, felt like writing Cho, so I did. I actually don't hate her, isn't that amazing? P Yes, this is a rewrite of a story that I wrote a while ago, called Poetry, but I changed it a bit to make it better.
She creeps up to her bedroom one night, and shuffles through the organized components of her trunk. It's a bit messier than usual, just like she's been lately. The papers scratch against her perfect hands and scratch them, leaving paper cuts, but she ignores them because she knows there are deeper wounds than these.
These will heal; some won't.
Her hands brush against what she's been seeking – folded, albeit slightly ripped parchments clipped together and tied by a ribbon (she's a perfectionist like that), meant to be buried a long time ago. Now that it's resurfaced, she winces expectedly and shuts her eyes and breathes into the warm air. It's fragranced with afternoon roses.
She remembers a bit of when he used to write her poetry in the morning, of the perfume of her hair, the blossoming of spring flowers, the color of her eyes that are so ordinary but he managed to write five pages on them anyways.
And maybe it's a bit silly to go back and read through all the memories she has promised to hide forever. They still hurt like a sharpened edge that cannot be softened by time, even after all these years, and even if she's faced the fact that he's dead, he's gone. Every word written was carefully planned, contained his essence; every stanza was like his first confession in the courtyard in the December evening years ago. Every letter carries the essence of him. She still loves him, truth to be told.
She remembers first meeting him; he was two years older, and she remembers seeing him during breakfast and thinking how handsome he was – because he was with his gray eyes and honest face. She remembers bumping into him in the corridor while hurrying to Flitwick's class, and he helped her pick up all her books with her trying desperately help by scrambling around clumsily, thinking that she's never met a nicer boy than him. She remembers him asking her quietly yet sincerely whether she would go to the ball with him and giving her the first set of sonnets he'd written. She remembers kissing him for the first time after the Ball, under the mistletoe, under the stars, and she remembers that clearly because it still burns in her dreams like a vindictive wraith of nights poisoned by tears and choked sobs.
So maybe it is a bit stilly to go back to read his poems because she finds herself crying through the whole night till morning, her cheeks soaked with tears, clutching those pieces of parchment over her heart made hollow over time, each word, stanza echoing through her mind. It makes her sad, feel helpless. She thinks of the times when she discovered an owl perched on her window, carrying her daily dosage of poetry from him. And it makes her wish she can go back because things were simple then, not like now when he's dead and gone and she's still left in the dust, confused and torn and tattered in his memories, still not able to quite let go of him. She's smart, but always a fool.
She just wants to remind herself of the only boy she'd ever truly loved.