thesnowcrane
Disclaimer: All characters belong to JK Rowling.
A/N: Mm, I had this little inspiration out of nowhere, and it kind of led me to this… It's just a little scene I had played out in my head. This is my first one-shot I have actually written in present tense, so it's a different style for me. Hope you all enjoy, and please R&R!
"Love is something that returns."
-Cha Song-joo; Stairway to Heaven
The leaves are whirling about, the wind piercing and cold. A young boy of seventeen is wandering among the leaves, his mercury eyes stoic. There is nothing wrong with it; he is often seen walking along the road, every day, always alone, always stoic. He stops as his feet subconsciously lead him to the spot he stopped at every day. His spot. Their spot.
His eyes wander up the long walls of the tower and they are suddenly alert as he recognizes someone. Her. What is she doing here? He stares at her, unable to look away, until he sees her gaze move down to meet him. Even then, he doesn't look away.
She laughs softly, almost inaudibly. "What are you doing down there? Come up!" Her voice sounds the same, cheerful and blissfully innocent, but he knows better. He knows she's a good actress.
"I don't want to," he answers rather lamely.
She looks down at him as if seeing him for the first time. She shrugs. "Your choice, I guess. You never were one to listen to others, right?"
Something in her choice of words stirs something in him, and suddenly he finds himself moving toward the familiar stairs in back of the tower. He walks slowly, finally reaching her, and then he stops.
He knows she knows he's there; she always knows. Or rather, always knew. "What do you want?"
She points absently to the seat on the ledge beside her. "Come and sit."
Obediently, he walks next to her and sits, their legs now dangling off the edge, synchronized. "Do what I'm doing," he hears suddenly, and he turns and faces her. Her eyes are closed and her arms are spread wide, and she is smiling. "It feels like you're flying. Flying across all your pain, floating above all possible worries. You're living in a world of black and white, with no grey in between."
He looks at her, and marvels once again at her choice of words. He had lived in a black and white world before; everything was clean-cut, and nothing was in between to mar it. Now, he lives in a grey-scaled world, where nothing is right or wrong, but are just blurs that pass him by. It turned grey when he met her. When he loved her.
"Why aren't you trying it?" She presses him again.
"Maybe I don't want to live in a black and white world anymore," he replies evenly. Truthfully, he doesn't know why he is refusing to go back to that clean-cut world. Perhaps he has changed, too, without his knowing.
"Oh? I thought you did. That's what you told me," she murmurs softly, her eyes once again on the sky above them.
"I did. But now, I don't know anymore. I have discovered that maybe grey isn't too bad. Grey... Grey can change the way you think, the way you look at life... The way you act. It can change the very person you are." He looks at her while he says this, hoping she understands what he is trying to say. She does.
But her eyes are sad as she replies, "But Grey can also show you that life is complicated. Grey shows you that you may want something, but it may be forbidden… It can show you confusion, helplessness." She pauses, and her eyes glisten in the growing dark. "Like us," she continues. "Exactly like us. Our love was a forbidden love, rejected by everyone we knew. But that didn't stop us from dwelling in Grey, did it? We did it anyway." She smiles suddenly, and voices her last statement that he would hear from her that night. "I'm glad we stayed in it, though. I'm glad we did, because it's nice, sometimes, to stray from your black and white." With that, she leaves him alone. No farewell, no good-bye. They don't need those petty words. They never did, and never will.
She's sitting in the tree, swinging her legs carelessly. He's down below, smirking up at her. "Don't you think you should be a bit more careful?" he sneers. "No one's here to save you. Or rather, no one down here wants to save you."
She is undaunted by his words; she smiles softly, almost pityingly, down at him. "Maybe you should try going up here, too," she suggests. "You look like you need a person to talk to you, though you always hide it."
He sneers at her yet again, although her words hit him in a way he will never say. "I wouldn't talk if I were you; it might throw off your equilibrium."
She cocks her head to the side. "Scared, are we?"
His eyes narrow, and he immediately walks over to the tree and climbs up, proving to her that her words are wrong. "I'm not scared of anything, especially the likes of you."
She shrugs nonchalantly. "Okay."
Truthfully, he does not like climbing trees and would rather much be on the solid ground. He has had bad experiences with trees and does not wish to repeat them. "Whatever. I'm getting down."
It happens in slow motion. He is moving toward the trunk, and he slips. He falls with a hard thud on the ground, and he stays there, unmoving. She dashes down almost immediately. "Oh my gosh, are you okay? What happened? Is anything broken?"
He lies there, still in shock. At her questions, he laughs. "I'm fine, Mudblood." There is no menace in his words.
She sits back and stares at him. Suddenly she laughs, "What exactly were you doing?"
"Climbing down," he snaps.
She shakes her head at him and helps him up, offering her hand. He takes it, after hesitating, and gets up. "Thank you."
She smiles warmly, "No problem."
Memories of their times together somehow all come to his mind at once; at first he tries to fight them off, but to no avail. They keep coming, and he lets them. The first day he sees her and how he makes her cry; the day he calls her that dreadful name; the time she slaps him; the first time he realizes she is beautiful; the time he caught her conducting secret meetings; the first time they talk civilly; the first time they hug; the first time they kiss…
"I'm glad we stayed in it, though. I'm glad we did, because it's nice, sometimes, to stray from your black and white."
And stray he did. It seems that they were meant to be; he did not know it then, but he knows it now. If he had not ventured into the dangerous world of grey, how would he have known the great thing called love? If he had stayed, shielded, in his world of black and white, how would he know how bright the sun beams?
He stays there a little longer, seated on the cold ledge. And finally, when the night is darkest, he closes his eyes and slowly spreads his arms out…
"To realize a mistake; to not lie; to love one another; to not kill. Those are very simple things, but these times won't allow for them. There is no green on this planet, even though we want it, though want it so badly. A place where we can live peaceful days with no wars, or stealing: a sacred place, where people can live as people. Yes, there. That place is called..."
-Trigun; Paradise