Chapter 7

From black and white sprang red. Beauty instigated drastic terror, while hiding cleverly behind its deception. Yet weren't we all covered in façade? You and I both pretended to play the part of characters we new nothing of. In spite of this I found my Juliet falling for your Romeo.

I believed that you would revive my dead heart that had dried so long ago by all my tears of salt. But something deep within me, buried in unknown wisdom called out, whispered to me late in the night when no other earthly voice could be heard. It spoke harsh words of warning.

What once was, will be reflected in future's mirror.. What the past has hidden, will again be uncovered.

Pieces cannot be remade to fit color. No matter the strength.

Those bits of foolish advice were forsaken for peaceful dreams of you. In those sweet nightmares you would come to me and declare you love. We would run away and live on a steep rocky cliff overlooking the azure ocean tucked away from the world. We would grow old together and die loving one another. And so with a smile I would always awake. For once it all seemed tangible. Until I awoke in Ron's arms.

It was all so ironic that he did not seem to notice my new found love. He, who watched so closely, overlooked this as a sign of recovery. My bright eyes and rosy checks were like awards for him to display to the world, showing them that it was he who had saved me. Yet it was only ever you, the same one who also scarred me. Who had once made only darkness, now brought light.

That very light echoed throughout my life. It calmed me, to the point where I never yelled at Ron. Instead I remained isolated from him, which he thought was perfectly normal for a recovering suicidal person. It was my way out, this excuse. I no longer felt the guilt of leaving him, because it was very rare that I ever spoke to him. Ron was not offended by our lack of conversation in the least.

No, he preferred long nights of sweet dreams, and holding me tightly as though I was always his. He felt that he protected me from the shadows of the night. Yet I only wanted to escape to you. Ron's small arms felt nothing like yours. His were smooth and toned. Yours were worn in and strong. When you held me I felt like no one could touch me. Like the world would never find us.

Nonetheless I would wait out the night, counting down the minutes when Ron would leave for work, and I could run away to the park to see you. Escape to my new found paradise. We would spend mornings sitting side by side on an old wooden bench watching people's lives unfold before us, afternoons wandering throughout the rose gardens, and twilights splashing in the fountains. It was a fairytale, the park.

"Draco," I said softly in your ear as I took your hand and pointed it towards the glowing lights, "Look, fireflies."

You smiled and guided my hand upwards, "Stars. Remember?"

I laughed, "They were all there."

"Just like I promised."

"Draco, do you ever think about what it was like…" I trailed off as your body tensed beneath me. Broken promises echoed in my mind, words that now meant almost nothing. Yet ironic that now they were fulfilled.

"No," you said as if to end it. We were stepping over the line into dangerous untouched territory, in which you never spoke off.

Yet I could not make myself stop persisting, "Don't you wonder where we all would have been if it had not happened?"

You looked at me sadly, as if the whole world was worth sacrificing to take it back. To make it all better.

We referred to your betrayal as it. We never needed to say it out loud, it was just something understood. In all reality I was more comfortable talking about it than you. For whenever she was brought up you'd turn your head away remain silent.

"I mean would I be with Ron? Would we be in England? Would life be…I dunno…perfect?"

"I don't know, Hermione," you said exasperated. "I don't want to think about it."

"Fine," I said and let the silence fall between us.

Suddenly the fireflies didn't seem so beautiful. And the stars less bright, as if some were missing. Like someone had taken them away, trapped them beneath blackness.

"Ron's waiting for you."

"I know," I said still gazing at the glow. "Goodnight."

As I walked through night, words flowed in a mind, a poem I had once written, long before I had ever understood what loneliness was. Yet now as I danced across the pavement, wet from rain, these phrases I had etched in parchment long ago never seemed more gracefully fitting.

Darkness falls into a velvety blanket

Silence encompasses the world

Its creatures unmoving

Then a shadow of the past

Something long forgotten

Passes over

A memory is remembered

Evoking pain of a life overlooked

A faint light appears on the horizon

As a new day begins vanishing a painful past

Never to be found

Why? Why wouldn't you answer me? Fate doomed me curious in nature, but it withheld the very information I craved for. I needed to know her name. Nothing more, nothing less. A name made a person, and a person made it real. Reality made sense to me, made me move on. But without it then I remain trapped forever in what ifs.

I don't know what's worse, loving you and not knowing or forgetting you and knowing.

Suddenly I found myself at my doorstep; the questions of last night's wandering mix together, become one, and surround every good memory I ever had. My eyes closed trying to regain a sense of reality, yet when they reopened I saw Ron standing at the door.

"Good morning Hermione," he said with a smile and coffee cup in hand. "Where have you been?"

"Running," I said immediately becoming very out of breath. "I couldn't sleep, so I fancied a run."

"Oh," Ron said while handing me a cup of my own.

I sipped slowly and watched him, his beautiful red hair disheveled from the night, his pants still too short, and his blue eyes slightly out of focus. This is what I had. Blonde hair, grey eyes, and lightly tanned skin were what I wanted, but would never have. Strange it was how everything was so close within my grasp, yet so intangible.

What is love? Is it always so two sided? Is hate always connected with it, as closely as betrayal? I wonder can people ever really find their soul mate and live without temptation or rage for the rest of their lives. I mean are people capable of that, love itself never ending? Or is it society's myth?

Maybe love is just all a part of fate's twisted nature. We were not all meant to live in ease and comfort. Yet how unfair it is that we can do nothing to avoid it, for fate controls us all. We have known that since the beginning of time. Sophocles thought enough about it to write it down in to words, to show the world. He left his mark scratched into time's rusted books, aged and yellow.

Now that I think about it, are you what I want? You promise me the impossible, the incredibly brilliant but things never to be known to mortals. Or would I prefer Ron? A man who makes small promises, such as washing the dishes, or taking me out. He never breaks them, and never forgets them. They are always finished.

To fly away happy with the predicament of being alone is all I ask for. I don't want these choices. This power to destroy a man's happiness, for it shall happen. I want to go to a place where rose petals litter the soft green grass. A place where the sun shines coolly on lily pads floating lazily by on small waves. Where the trees grow into the sky, with no limits. Where time slows to almost nothing. A place where fireflies dance all day.

Yet even in my mind I can't see it. Only misconceptions of old cobwebs and yellow stained pages, where the words are scratched out so many times that it means nothing.