Mirror
By Nina
Dedication: Rachel, who is just as perverted as I am
Disclaimer: If I owned Harry Potter, I would be driving my Volkswagen hippie van around town and drinking my endless supply of Sprite.
It is looking in the mirror, it is touching one's own skin, it is tasting one's own blood when she wants to bite him.
He was, always had been, and always would be her brother, but with him she was so home that it wouldn't matter. And tasting one's own blood never tasted so wonderful.
Sometimes when the house is empty and the only sounds are breathing and tree-whispers she imagines that he takes her in his arms and plants seeds of desire all along her body until she is shaking and bleeding with want. She likes dreaming that way, light-headed and empty-handed, naked in her bedroom.
Sometimes she can't sleep and she lays beside his snoring frame in his bed and pretends she is his Hermione, bent to his curves and staring at the back of his head, hands on his back. Sometimes he mumbles Hermione's name but she is so absorbed in her pretending that she knows that she is her, and is surprised to look in the mirror and see strands of red hair.
And when Hermione died, her brother came home red-eyed and empty, and she told him to close his eyes and imagine her again and she ran her tongue across his lips, her hands in his hands, her teeth grazing his skin when she looks for a place to sink her teeth into.
And when she opens her eyes she is looking in the mirror, though his hair is shorter and he has no traces of femaleness in his face or anywhere on his body. He is dumbstruck and red and his eyes are still shut and he can only croak three syllables she had heard him say so many times that summer behind his closed door when Hermione came to visit.
"I love you."
And Ginny knows he thinks she is Hermione, but it doesn't matter because she can have him for an afternoon, even if her name isn't the one he screams. It is still her skin he is touching, it is still his blood she is tasting, it is still the mirror they are looking into.