All rights and privileges to Harry Potter are copyrighted trademarks and property of J. K. Rowling, Warner Brothers, and all peoples associated. The characters of these fictions are used WITHOUT permission for the entertainment purposes only. This work of fiction is not meant for sale or profit. As if anyone would actually pay money for this thoughtless drivel. And even if they like it, it's right here and money is not required. So there! Bottom line: I don't own them I just like to play God with them. Like an ant walking back and forth across my feet for what seems like miles upon miles. Or a bug with a magnifying glass as it slowly burns into nothingness. Ahem Yes, I don't own them. Never have. Never will. Sigh...
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With Thyme
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When I was six the one thing I wanted above all else was the end of the war, for the sole reason that I wanted my father back. Not that I didn't want more death, but I wanted my father back. And today I hate myself for it. I remember asking my mother when Father would return and she responded, "These things happen with time."
Five years later I had my first crush. I wanted more than anything for this girl to like me. I asked my older brothers what to do. Bill smiled a secretive smile and Charlie explained, "These things happen with time."
It was three years later that I developed his first crush on a guy. I wanted him to like me. At the time I had no idea what love was, but I wanted to try it out. I asked my friend for advice and Penny shook her head and said that "these things happen with time" and that I shouldn't push things.
It was also around then that I discovered the main ingredient in a love potion is thyme.
This was the first time that I had ever done something outside of the rules had to be perfect. The potion nearly took a year to make. I thought that it was worth it.
After a night of flesh upon flesh, I really thought it was. His body was as beautiful as I had imagined. Quidditch had toned him well. But nothing was as beautiful as he was inside. No one had seen this before I had and I wanted to expose it to the world.
He didn't want me to.
As I absentmindedly caressed his chest, I asked him what would happen when his friends figured it out.
He told me to live for the "here and now."
We were always able to see each other during the day: at meals, at prefect meetings, during classes. Every night since then we met in the prefects' bathroom, in the Slytherin locker room, in the abandoned dungeon three rooms down from the current potions class, in the passageway that very few knew about but Bill had told me, in the Forbidden Forest, never in the Astronomy Tower.
This carried on for two years.
His friends were, one by one, turning to the Dark Lord; so I asked him what he would do when the time came.
He said to worry about the "here and now."
What he really meant was "they are my friends and I cannot abandon them, not even for you." But I did not figure that out until just recently.
Two nights before the NEWT's a student, a first year or maybe a second, found us out, and I was worried about what would become of us.
He told me, without any other fancy words: "here and now."
A year found us still together. He had turned to the Dark Lord and now I asked what would happen when we confront each other under orders to kill.
He kissed my forehead tenderly and answered sweetly to live for the "here and now."
He has. And he is here to remind me of that whenever I stray.
But he has strayed away from me. The potion has not worn, that I know, but he has left me. He is just strong enough of a person to combat it.
A month later we are face to face as the world around us crumbles into flashes of green light.
"Weasley."
"Higgs."
We face each other, wands drawn.
Here and now.
I want - more than anything else - someone to be there to tell us "these things happen with time."
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Fin.
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A/N: This has been lurking around my computer since... before I started with Superstars. Before Marcus, there was another Slytherin for Percy. I think I never posted this because I was waiting for there to be a category for Terence, but whatever, I'm posting it now.
