Every ship must sail away. What a ridiculous song, Draco thought as he sat with his feet on his desk at work, the sun setting slowly in the fake window behind him, drinking a glass of firewhiskey. Draco didn't normally stay this late, but as there was no one waiting for him at home, he didn't see the point in leaving.
"Fine, Draco. Fine!" she had yelled at him just last night. "I'm gone," she'd said, dead quietly, but Draco hadn't taken these parting words for what they were. He thought that all she'd needed was time to cool off, a time-out period, typical of one of their huge fights. But that was more than twenty-four hours ago. Normally, by this time she would have shown up in his office, either looking at him with those wide and innocent 'I'm sorry' eyes, or tapping her foot impatiently, arms crossed, waiting for an apology. But not this time. She had left. She was gone.
Every ship must sail away. Draco took a sip of his drink and swilled the liquid around in the glass. Maybe the song was right. Maybe all those people giving them doubtful looks out of the corners of their eyes, nodding skeptically during all talk of weddings and together forever, were right. Draco scowled and shook his head. They couldn't be. Not after all him and Ginny had gone through to get this far.
But she had walked out of their manor without looking back. She had left, and not in the normal go-to-hell-I-can't-even-look-at-you-right-now way that was normal for one of their arguments, but with sadness, with finality. Draco should have known it was different when she paused for a moment at the front door, as if waiting for him to call her back, to pull her into his arms, to sit her down and solve the problem together. But that was just it. He didn't even know what the problem was. It wasn't anything that had been spoken aloud, it was more their recent lack of appreciation for each other, the way they had somehow drifted slightly apart.
But that was the last thing Draco wanted. He loved her, loved her more than he had ever loved anyone, or ever would. She had taught him what it meant to be truly happy, that it was stupid to settle for an idiot he would never love like Pansy Parkinson when he could have so much more, when he deserved so much more. He never thought there would be someone in his life that he wouldn't be able to live without, but then again, Ginny defied everything he had ever known. Before her, he had been perfectly fine being betrothed to Parkinson and joining his psycho father and the Death Eaters when he became of age. But then he met Ginny, and it all went to hell. Suddenly he could think of nothing he wanted less than to have little miniature Pansys running around his house. But he still managed to screw everything up. Miraculously though, Ginny had forgiven him. After a lot of persistence and charm on his part, she had taken him back.
"But I swear," she had said, scratching his scalp with her fingernails as they sat together in an armchair in the empty Slytherin common room at 3:00 the morning they had gotten back together, "If you break my heart again, I'll have no choice but to kill you."
"Ditto," he'd replied, voice muffled, his face buried in her neck.
Draco took another sip of his drink. This is what I get for getting involved with a crazy Gryffindor, he thought with a grim smile, staring moodily into his glass. He couldn't just stick with one of the many considerably less complicated Slytherins who would have been more than happy to be with him and his large Gringott's bank account. But that was what intrigued him about Ginny. Her fiery temper, the way she just didn't put up with his crap drove him crazy and yet left him wanting more all at the same time.
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"What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be up to no good with that husband of yours?"
Ginny looked up at Harry and attempted to smile. It came off as more of a painful grimace than anything. She should have known that coming to the Leaky Cauldron was stupid, Harry came here all the time. "No I-we...sort of had a fight," she said lamely. The biggest understatement in Wizarding history.
"A fight..." Harry said, pulling up a chair.
"A huge fight," Ginny said with a sigh, stirring her butterbeer with her straw.
"What about?"
"I don't even know," Ginny said, and without meaning to, without even wanting to, the words were pouring out of her. "We're having problems. I love him, I really do, but sometimes he is so frustrating, I can't even-and not in the good way, you know? Not frustrating like God, Draco, just come over here and kiss me because I need you to shut up...Like frustrating Draco I don't think we should be together because we're so completely different and you drive me nuts..." she trailed off vaguely and Harry, not sure if she was done or not, stayed quiet.
"I don't know what to do," she said quietly, looking defeated. "I don't want to lose him, I...can't lose him..."
"You love him, don't you?"
Ginny nodded. "More than anything."
"Then you guys will work it out," he said simply. Ginny looked at him doubtfully. "No, I mean it. Look, you and Draco...I can't say that I was ecstatic when I first found out about you guys, but he makes you happy. And you, well, look at you. How could you not make him happy. You're sweet, you're funny, kind, loving...He'd be an idiot to let you go."
Ginny couldn't believe he was doing this. He was basically trying to persuade her to go back to Draco, who had been the bad guy in all Harry's hero stories since he was eleven. And after all that had happened between Harry and Ginny...If he of all people was sitting here telling her she should go and get Draco back, it must be a sign or something.
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Draco heard the ding of the elevator outside and footsteps getting closer and closer to his door. Draco spun around in his chair, facing away from the door and picked up his wand, muttering a spell under his breath, and the door closed. He waited for the footsteps to pass but they didn't, they simply stopped altogether.
"Draco," came a soft voice from the doorway.
Draco spun back around in his chair and put his feet down on the floor. There she was, silhouetted in the light coming from the lobby of the Department of Magical Law. He could only make out her outline, because he hadn't bothered to turn on a light as it got darker and darker in his office. Ginny walked slowly toward him and stopped at the other side of his desk.
"Good evening," he said coldly.
"Draco," she said, almost pleading. But Draco wasn't going to give in. He was sick of being the one who was always apologizing, and though it was normally for good reason, and he was usually the one at fault, it wasn't him this time. They had had a fight and she had left. She had left him alone in their enormous house, which in truth could only be filled by her and her bubbly personality.
"I'm sorry," she said softly. "I shouldn't have left."
"You're damn right you shouldn't have left."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "You were driving me insane."
"Yes," Draco said stoutly. "That is what I do."
"What was I supposed to do?" Ginny demanded.
"You should have stayed and talked to me instead of bailing because things are getting difficult. Ginny, it's us. We knew when we got into this that it wasn't always going to be champagne and roses."
"I know," she said, looking at her feet. Draco was surprised. He had expected a few more verbal retorts before they actually started talking. "I just...I felt like it's been too much of the fighting and irritation lately, and not enough of the...flowers and booze."
Draco sighed. "I've been thinking that too." Ginny looked up at him.
"I am sorry, you know," she said.
"I know," he said, sitting up in his chair and holding out his arms for her. She put down her purse and jacket and he pulled her into his lap. "I love you," he whispered in her ear.
"I love you too," Ginny said softly, and as he sat there with her in his arms, he knew everything would be all right. It wasn't going to be easy, but when had it ever been easy for them? Yes, it would be a hard road ahead, full of the complications what were par for the course when two people as different as them fell in love, but he was ready to take them on. He was ready to fight to keep the only person whom he truly loved. Every ship must sail away...well...maybe not every ship.