Title: Pansies and Snapdragons
Rating: T/G
Disclaimer: The Harry Potter universe and characters contained therein are property of JK Rowling and her associated publishers etc. No copy right infringement is intended.
Summary: They are not here to reminisce. They are here to hide.
Pansies and Snapdragons
Careful steps walk down the cracked asphalt. They are delicate small steps balancing precariously on impractical shoes. She would have made her mother proud, if her mother were capable to feel such things for her now.
The sun falls sharply on her bare arms and she's not sure why she ever wished for heat during the long cold Scottish winters at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She's not sure that she'll ever become used to the mildness of the winters here in the southern half of the world, or that she'll ever be able to stand the bright burning summers. She has little choice in either respect. She knows she will stay where ever he will stay, and that she will go wherever he will go. That was her choice.
She glances at the garden beds that surround the old sandstone building, which is so old, yet, still so young. The age of this building is nothing compared to her father's estates, or those that had once been her husband's. She knows that the old buildings of her childhood are banished from her, and so are the ancient halls of her short lived attempt to make Malfoy Manor a happy home. Why she had ever though t she could make that place a happy one escapes her completely every time she thinks of it. But she was young then. She is still young now, but her uncertain world has aged her.
The wind makes the pale petals flutter, and their fierce little faces shimmer as small ripples move underneath them. She wonders how anyone can think those flowers beautiful. They are short and clumsy plants, living only to flower and then die. She wonders how a mother could name a child after them.
She wonders how a woman could live with such a name.
But they are no longer her namesake and she should not wonder these things as unimportant as they are. She has a new life now; a new life and a new name.
A blonde man waits impatiently for her, perched on a bench. He glances up and sees her. His eyes are narrowed in a glare.
She dismisses his expression.
"You're late," he tells her and his voice is snappish and impatient.
She flinches back at his tone, but does not reply. She waits for her husband to stand. Her arm slides into his, and they walk away from the young-old sandstone building and the pansies noiselessly
Black swans skim the murky surface of the pond. She knows that underneath the smooth surface of the water that the birds' webbed feet are paddling ungracefully, propelling it forward.
She sits down on the grass with a sigh, and her husband looks at her with concern. She shakes her head dismissively to warn him off. She doesn't feel like talking. A cool delicate hand rubs her upper arm and she brushes it away.
"It's nothing, Draco," she tells him, forgetting momentarily that they have new names now. Her husband looks at her warningly, but does not reproach her for her slip.
"It's everything," he replies petulantly instead.
She looks at him. His grey eyes are focused on the pond and the shrubbery on the island in the middle.
"It's not like home," he tells her.
She knows this already. She knows this every time she sees and hears the Muggles walk past. Oh, they look the same as those at home, but there is something different in the way they hold themselves, and in the way that they butcher the English language with their savage uncultured accents.
"It's not meant to be like home," she replies nonchalantly, leaning her head into his shoulder. She feels his breathing change and she turns her eyes towards him.
"What is it supposed to be like then?" her husband asks with his head still lifted determinedly.
She continues to watch his chin, before following his gaze out to the island. A pelican sits regally on the island's shore and she watches it. Its giant presence wards away the swans and ducks. She fingers the hem of her skirt, tracing over the floral pattern.
"Like this, like we're lost, like we don't belong. We're foreigners here," she replies.
"We're pretending we're on holiday," he says, finally looking down at her.
"And aren't we?" she asks sitting back up away from him.
"We can't go back, Mackenzie," he tells her, using her new name. It is the reproach she didn't get earlier. The sound of her new name makes her shudder more than the thought of her old.
"I know," she tells him and moves away.
"We've caused too much damage."
She doesn't think that he's talking to her anymore, but it still stings, the reminder that they have to stay here; in this place so far away from friends, from family.
"You understand, don't you?" the question is pointless and she stands up and looks down on him. She's not quite sure she likes what she sees. He was never classically handsome. He was always too delicate, too needy, but she fell for him anyway.
"I understand perfectly," she tells him quietly and turns away.
He doesn't call out after her. She knew that he wouldn't. She knows that he knows that she chose him. She knows that he knows she won't leave him.
The shade of weeping willows at the top of the hill is cool and refreshing. They provide a quick respite from the foreign spring heat. She slows down her steps relishing the newfound cool air. A row of snapdragons have been planted in the garden bed around the base of the trees. The blooms piled up on top of each other bounce, and nod. She smiles sadly at them, and turns to look down at the scene below her.
She can see her husband's blonde head from here. No doubt he can see her too, he hasn't moved from their spot near the pond. She sighs heavily.
"Parkinson?" a voice asks. Its rich deep and sounds so resolutely like home that she turns without thinking.
"It is you," the owner of the voice begins. She's facing a young man not much older than herself. A face she recognises, and she wants to desperately smile and reminisce, but it's out of the question. They are not here to reminisce. They are here to hide. "I'd thought you and Malfoy had died in the war. What on Earth are you doing here?"
"I'm sorry," she replies. "My name's Mackenzie." She cringes when her aristocratic English accent is not as well hidden as she had practiced.
"Oh," the young man stares at her. "Are you sure?" The man's dark eyes are probing, and she desperately wants to say no.
She nods. "I'm sure, yes. I'm not your friend."
"It's just that you look so much like her, and you even…" the young man shakes her head. "Never mind."
She watches as the young man walks away. The snapdragons bounce in the slow spring breeze as the woman's feet move past them.