Chapter 4

There is a great hollowness inside of me. My senses and emotions are dulled. No longer can I feel the icy wind upon my face, the little snow daggers penetrating into my pores. When the frosted branches cut into my skin, I sense nothing, only seeing the blood red droplets fade into the snow. There is no warmth left inside. The soft petals of a frozen rose neglected.

I wonder how the world can pass before me when I find nothing of value or importance. My family is extinct, wallowed away into wraths of tragedy. My beloved mother, who once shed tears at the smallest bruise, never cries. My father's bright laughter has been drunk away by the false illusions of alcohol. And my remaining brothers have all drifted apart into a great dark ocean of whirlpools.

Yet, it seems that compared to you I have the magnificent dreams of fairytales. Somewhere deep within the intransigent walls of my heart I find pity for you. In your eyes I see the same emptiness I feel within. You have been hollow your entire life, void of Dumbledore's profound greatest magic of all. And here I stand, once radiating that love of Harry, my family, and myself.

Last night you showed me a life I couldn't imagine, one of bitterness and unfilled hopes, a life without meaning. I wonder if your mother ever loved you, if she ever kissed you goodnight and pulled the covers up close to your chin. Did she sing you lullabies? Or cry when you started school? But, instead was she empty too? Was she lost into a dark world that her parents and husband had forced her into like you? Did her eyes glow, or were they glazed over in a deadened haze?

A blurred world strained to focus before my eyes. And so I stayed on the small bridge long after you left, pondering nothing. My mind became an empty road of unopened doors that were all shackled and locked invisibly. Unable to explore the deep waters of my conscious, I reverted back to memories of Harry.

We had been sitting silently beside the fireplace contemplating the complexity of life. The warm red chairs encompassed our bodies, like glowing embers. The old grandfather clocked rung loudly in the kitchen, it chimed eleven times. Only when the heavy silence return did organized chaos erupt. Brilliant flames of vibrant green burned the cedar logs. Lupin's voice, usually soft and quiet, rang out into the comfortable air.

"It is time."

"If you're going I'm coming with you," I said, standing up before he could tell to stay.

"No Gin," Harry replied firmly, his tone filled with fear. "Not tonight. Go with Ron and Hermione."

"Oh, stop being the hero, Harry. You can't do this alone. You can't just shove me aside with them. I'm going with you and you can't stop me," I said stubbornly.

He looked at me with those deep emerald eyes and whispered, "No."

I leaned backwards, surprised he had not exploded when I accused him of playing the hero. At a loss for words I fell forward into his arms.

"Promise me you won't follow."

I burrowed my head deeper into his neck and nodded.

"I love you Gin, you know that right?"

I nodded again, taking in his familiar scent, trying to imprint it in my mind.

He lifted my chin and kissed me deeply. I tasted his tears. That was when I knew the end was coming. Tonight someone would die. The Wizarding World would change forever in a horribly clichéd light.

Life froze before my eyes as I tried to take in all of him, so that if the worst happened I would be able to remember everything. A million moments compacted themselves in my mind like a neat little box with his name etched across the side.

Finally, he kissed my forehead and told me he'd come back. I believed he would.

As Harry walked out into the snowy night I whispered, "I love you," knowing that, despite the wind's loud howl, he would hear.

The winter sky I gazed into last night looked the same as it did the night he died. Except in the past a small part of me thought he would be coming home. That same bit of reckless hope was felt again. In you I glimpsed a new unthought-of dream. I saw in your heart a rising horizon, like the darkness was over.

Then today I looked into the mirror for the first time. I didn't see some shadow of a girl, young and hopeless, lost in grief. I didn't see the alabaster face that usually accompanies those empty eyes. Instead I saw someone waiting. For her to understand herself. For her old love to come back. For her ambition to finally be fulfilled. Waiting for her dream to come true, waiting to know what that dream really was. For disaster. For death. For beauty. But most of all for chances.

For it seems that hidden, buried within the very darkest depths of my mind it waits for change, for a beauty to instigate drastic terror. I don't understand what that may mean, but it weighs heavily in my heart. It occupies the small space that has not yet been broken.

So today I walk the deaden streets, covered in ice. The footsteps of so many lives whisper in the gentle sunlight, echoing off red brick encrusted with tenacious snowflakes. A few other courageous wanderers have ventured out, in curiosity, to see an empty city beautiful in its loneliness. They pass by quietly, mismatched vagabonds searching for a purpose. We all are. Every soul that explores this refuge is seeking a mysterious untold adventure that has yet to bloom before them. Yet we find the need to look, to let our tired eyes gaze outwardly, miserably hopeful.

As my feet carried me down the frosted walkways of muggle London, I fell away into the all too welcome numbness. But out of the blessed silence your voice came, dark and husky like the shadows that followed me.

"Weasley," you called out again in a slightly harsher tone.

"What?" I asked, spinning around quickly.

There you stood, another lost person, 'displaced'.

"What do you want?" I asked my voice softening.

Your tormented face was fighting an internal battle.

"Malfoy…"

"Look I wanted to know…if you hated me?"

"What?" I whispered, my eyes turning cold.

You followed me for days, with a sad dream hidden behind your eyes. I had thought you were one of my kind, another wanderer, searching for who the hell knows what. But you bring up this, this hatred we all once ravaged in?

"Look never mind…" you trailed off, letting your thoughts trail freely into the wind.

"That's not what this is really about is it?" I replied, interrupting the hollow silence. I could see it in your overcast eyes. There was so much more.

"Maybe this is all wrong," you said softly, questioning yourself.

Yet doubtfully, you stepped closer, narrowing our space. Suddenly I felt like I had known you all along. The mental difference we had experienced was erased, into this new circle, this new dance.

"Maybe…" I stammered.

Then you pulled your long ungloved hands out of your leather pockets and cupped my chin, raising it to you. Slowly we leaned into each other, discovering the secret ecstasy hidden on the snowy streets. Like lucky vagabonds we found our fate, discovered our long awaited purpose.

Yet I can't help wondering if maybe you were right, it is wrong. I still love Harry. But this feels like being unleashed from a caged eternity. Freedom.