A/N: This is where this story really begins to earn that Angst tag. I actually wrote this entire story for this one chapter - I was in a similar situation where I lost someone I really loved in my life and I was an absolute loon for years after it happened. My therapist recommended I write about it, and so it formed inspiration for a lot of my original writing, but also fanfiction. Some dialogue in there is borrowed from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
So yeah - trigger warnings for character death, loss and grieving. I apologise in advance :/ it will get better in the next chapter though.
-xxxx-
'Yep, on balance, a really fucking shit year,' thought Demelza, grimly, as she ran back out of the Great Hall moments after the fighting began. It had been five minutes and she'd already lost track of Colin in the resulting explosions and chaos, and her heart was lodged firmly in her throat, a heady cocktail of dread and fear and adrenaline rushing through her veins.
-{Flashback}-
"I'm not leaving Hogwarts, Dee." Colin said softly but firmly as they waited to evacuate with the rest of the school, fingers laced together. "You should go, but I won't."
"Don't be ridiculous, Col!" she hissed angrily, but he was implacable.
"All that's needed for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing. I've survived this year in Hogwarts and that's nothing short of a miracle and you know it. Dennis and I owe your dad more than I can say for the papers but those won't hold up in the real world if You-Know-Who wins, Demelza. And I just… I can't. I need to do this for Dennis. And myself. And the life I want with you, Dee. I want everything with you..." She looked at him, really looked at him, pale but resolute, his blonde curls on end, and capitulated. There was no time to fight.
"Fine. But then I'm staying too." Now he looked angry. "You can't – you're a fifth year, and you're too young!"
"I'm two weeks younger than you, so don't give me that bullshit Colin. I told you before. I can't leave you, I'm not going to leave you, so don't you dare try to make me!" frustrated tears spilled out of her eyes as she squeezed his hand.
After a beat, he nodded sharply, mouth tense. They quietly made their way ahead where Dennis stood near the other fourth years and beckoned him to the side to say their see-you-laters, shooting down his protests firmly and melting away behind a column as the professors grew closer.
They stood together, silent but watchful, as the crowd thinned, only turning to look at each other when it became clear that they hadn't been missed during the evacuation. A beat stretched between them before they were in each other's arms, foreheads pressed together, tears falling from their eyes.
"I love you, Elsa. If this ends up being my last chance to say it… I just want you to know, that loving you has been the greatest gift I've ever had. I'm not going to say goodbye, I'm going to say see you on the other side, because we're going to make it, and we're going to have the life we dreamed of, bright-eyes. I love you, I love you, I love you…"
"Don't you fucking dare leave me Colin, and I swear I'll do my best to come back to you, too. You saved me, you are my heart. I love you more than I ever thought I could be capable of loving anyone or anything in this lifetime or the next. You come back to me, and we'll laugh at these overly dramatic things we said to each other. This isn't goodbye, Col, this is au revoir. I love you, be safe, I love you…"
-{End Flashback}-
She made it to the grounds, having mostly avoided direct spell-fire so far, helping out in other battles from behind debris as much as she could. Colin, Colin, where the fuck was Colin? She was getting frantic now, he was nowhere to be seen, and she taking bigger and bigger risks trying to get him in her line of sight, popping out from behind cover every time she saw a flash of blonde.
And suddenly the chunk of stone she was hiding behind was blasted apart, and she scrambled back and to her feet just in time, screaming "Stupefy!" four times in quick succession, wand snapping out four times, but her hands were shaking and her aim was off in a way it hadn't been since she was eight years old, and now she was duelling this adult man in a black cloak and a white mask who was sneering and taunting her but she couldn't hear it, couldn't hear anything over the roar of various creatures, human or otherwise, spells like artillery blanketing the night sky and the cries of the dead and dying all around.
She dodged two cutting curses – thanks, Harry, for all that Bludger practice last year, she thought irreverently, and jumped straight in the path of the third, a whip of fire curling around her calf and ankle and making her fall straight down to the ground with a howl of pain. She petrified her opponent when he stopped to crow and cast a few Episkeys to staunch the flow of blood, but that battle had already taken a lot out of her and now she'd been spotted, and Demelza had a sickening feeling in her stomach that she wasn't going to make it. I'm sorry, Col… I really am.
She lost track of time and of the spells she'd done and dodged and the damage she'd both inflicted and sustained. She could hear roars, she wondered vaguely what was happening in the castle behind her, but she couldn't afford to let her concentration waver, not even a minute.
In the end, it didn't matter. She took a cutting curse to the stomach and dropped like a stone. She could hear people retreating, heard a cold high-pitched voice from very far away, but she was beyond caring, beyond thinking, beyond anything but the burning sensation in her stomach and the cold in her limbs…
She came to, a little later, to a voice frantically casting healing charms and holding her hand, begging, "Demmy please, please wake up, Demmy!" and she realised with a start that it was Ginny, looking battered and bruised and hysterical until she figured that Demelza was awake.
"Gin… Col… where?" she managed, and Ginny looked miserable as she admitted that she didn't know.
"It's all right, it's okay. We're going to get you inside." Ginny was holding her hand, stroking her fingers and her hair, and it made her think of her mother, a mother she'd never known. It also made her think of Margaret, and the summer before last...
"But I want to go home, I don't want to fight anymore," Demelza ground out, but she wasn't even sure anymore what she was thinking of. Inexplicably she thought of Colin's bedroom, and smiled faintly.
"I know," and it sounded like Ginny was crying but her eyes were dry, "It's going to be all right."
Demelza nodded, looking up at Ginny, but she could see Colin out of the corner of her eye, or maybe that was her mind's eye, or maybe that was a hallucination, and she regretted not having said goodbye after all, but really all she could think of anymore was the burning in her stomach, spreading into her chest cavity and making it so unbelievably hard to breathe-
-And then she fell unconscious for the second time that night, and blissfully, knew no more.
-xxxx-
When she came to, again, it was the morning after Battle and her father was at her bedside, white-faced and trembling, holding her hand with his eyes closed.
"Dad…?" she managed, every inch of her in pain, and his eyes flew open.
"Oh my God, Demelza, you're awake! Heather! Madam Pomfrey!"
They came running up, and the next few minutes were occupied with tearful reunions, and apprising her of the victory, and several nasty potions shoved down her throat, and as the pain became more manageable and her head less woozy she realised the glaring omission by her bed.
"Where's Colin?" she asked abruptly, a growing horror in her chest. "Where is he? Is he very badly hurt? Is he here or at St. Mungo's? Where is he?!"
"Demelza…" her father said, heavily, putting a hand on her shoulder even as she reflexively jerked away from him, her eyes widening and her head shaking, no no no I'm not listening no I can't hear you no no no, "I'm sorry." His head bowed, and Demelza's world shattered.
She could hear nothing but a high-pitched whine in her ears, everything was moving in slow motion, her mouth was open, she knew, her throat was hurting, was she screaming? She could hear the sound of her heartbeat, pounding in her ears, growing, blocking out the piercing whine, tears burning the scratches still littering her arms and neck and face and shoulders, and all she could see was Colin, laughing, smiling, lovely Colin, her lifeline, snapped; and she could feel herself becoming hysterical but it hurt to breathe, fingers clawing at her chest because it felt like her rib cage was crushing her heart and she didn't want to breathe but also she couldn't stop her traitorous lungs from trying and she could see blurry indistinct images leaning over her, and people talking, and trying to touch her but it burned where they touched and then someone raised a wand and whispered a spell and she was out cold again for the third time in two days.
When she came to, Dennis was sitting by her bedside, and they cried together, silently. Little Dennis Creevey, as she'd always thought of him, looked painfully older than when she'd last seen him. It hurt her, how much he looked like Colin, how when she saw him out of the corner of her eye, she thought it was him and she'd turn her head and see Dennis instead and it felt like losing Colin all over again. She knew she could never really see Dennis again as just Dennis, not without seeing Colin too, and it hurt, it hurt to know she had not only lost the love of her life and her best friend, she was going to lose the only real support system she may have ever had. He was her world, and then he was gone, and she didn't know how to be Demelza without Colin. She understood her father with a sudden wrenching clarity in a way she never had before, and she wished she could go back to a time before she could relate to him so very clearly. What were the odds, that she'd suffered a similar fate to her father? Them cursed Robins, she thought, and involuntarily grimaced a bitter smile.
She snuck out to the makeshift morgue once Madam Pomfrey let her go, without telling anybody. She needed to see him for herself. He looked peaceful, almost as though he was just asleep, and she felt a terrible urge to shake him awake, but his hands were icy cold and his chest wasn't moving. He seemed smaller and frailer than she remembered, almost as though in life his personality had made him seem bigger than he really was. A single curl stood up from his head, and she fought the urge to ruffle the rest of it – it wasn't Colin anymore that she'd be touching, and she'd rather hold memories of him warm and alive in her heart than him as a shell. She couldn't remember how long she sat there, staring at him, the thoughts swirling through her head too many to separate. She was numb, drained, done. She'd honestly thought this was going to be hardest part, but it wasn't.
Seeing the Creeveys though, that was the hardest thing she'd ever done, their faces blank and unseeing almost, Margaret looking as though she'd aged ten years in ten minutes. There was no need to express condolences to each other, they knew. She drew level with them, they pulled her into their arms, and they'd all collapsed into tears together. There was no celebration for them, for any of them. She murmured her apologies for failing Colin, for losing him in the thick of the fight, and they forgave her, but she couldn't forgive herself. She didn't know if she would ever forgive herself.
She was a ghost, insubstantial, moored only by how much her heart hurt. She stood there listlessly when Professor McGonagall, wan and lined with sorrow in her eyes, quietly broke to the Creeveys exactly how Colin had died. "It was the Avada Kedavra," she had said, quietly, "painless. He didn't suffer. And he helped save us all, Mr. and Mrs. Creevey. He was protecting two other fallen students, both of whom survived thanks to his selflessness and bravery. My condolences are not enough to express what a loss Colin spells for Hogwarts, and the Wizarding World as a whole. I am so, so very sorry."
She felt angry too, at Colin, for dying and she knew it was unfair and tarnishing his memory to think that way; but she couldn't help it. God fucking damnit, Col, how could you die? And why on earth were you trying to be a hero, trying to protect others – how could you leave me like this?! And then there were moments where she wished she'd died too, so she didn't have to deal with the agony of being alive in a world where Colin didn't exist, and she felt so guilty at that too, because Lord knows her father would've had to deal with this feeling instead, and she didn't want to wish this pain upon anybody. And then she felt guilty about being so broken, when Margaret and Will were burying a son and Dennis was burying a brother, and she was just the girlfriend; but she couldn't bargain herself into feeling less miserable in order to be strong for them. She didn't, couldn't be strong for anybody. She couldn't even be strong for her own self. Will had asked her, quietly, to make a speech at Colin's funeral, let her know that the Muggle story was going to be that he'd tried to intervene in a mugging gone wrong and had lost his life trying to save two classmates, and she'd almost refused because it seemed like too much, too hard to flagellate herself emotionally over her boyfriend's body for everyone to see. But then Dennis had taken her hand, and told her that Colin would've wanted to hear what she had to say because she really was the one who knew him best, and though it hurt to hear that clear voice just then, with all the inflections and quirks just slightly wrong, it was just something that she then knew she had to do. What was one more unbearable moment in this quagmire of suffering, anyway?
Ginny came and found her, the next day, sitting blankly under a tree staring out on to the lake. Guilt suffused her cheeks when she saw her, remembering that Fred had died too, and she hadn't so much as sought her out to give her condolences. Not to mention that Colin had really been Ginny's friend before hers, they'd all been close, Ginny was hurting too.
"I'm sorry, Ginny," she said, before she got too choked up to continue, but Ginny stopped her, falling to the ground next to her, "I'm sorry too, Demmy," she whispered, "so sorry." They sat there for a while, in silence, neither of them pushing the other to talk, until Harry came out to look for Ginny and Demelza motioned to her to go, turning away so she didn't have to see the two of them be couple-y – she couldn't bear the sight of a happy couple just then.
-xxxx-
The next day was Colin's funeral; the day she had been dreading, and when she woke in the morning, alone in her dorm, after another night of tossing and turning and crying and barely sleeping; she almost didn't go. She didn't have a speech written or planned, didn't know how the hell to put the turmoil in her stomach into words, and she didn't think that hurling abuse at her boyfriend for dying at his funeral of all places was the right way to go about things.
Heather had dropped off some clothes for her before they'd left the day before, letting her stay at Hogwarts with the rest of the mourners until the funerals were over, but she figured she would go back to her father's after Colin's – the only one she really wanted (if one could use that word for a funeral) to attend anyway, other than Fred's (for Ginny's sake) and the memorial service for all the deceased that would probably happen at the end of the week. The thought of being at Hogwarts was weighing on her, making her anxiety spike. There were just too many memories in this place. She got dressed mechanically, in a simple black dress and shoes, contemplating tying her hair in her signature tight plait before remembering, with a sudden stab, how much Colin liked her hair down and wild. But there was no more Colin to play with the curls, no more Colin to fiddle with the hair-tie. She'd grown up with silence all around her but now the lack of sound was louder than anything she'd ever heard, and it was driving her so mad that she'd taken to talking out loud to herself in a feeble attempt to fill the deafening quiet.
She left the hair down; and went to the Great Hall to take the Portkey along with any other castle residents who wanted to go. She was expecting just Ginny, and perhaps Harry, but many other DA members were there, all of them coming up to her to murmur condolences and give her hugs. Ginny squeezed her hand, her own eyes swollen. Her anxiety spiked even more, and she could hear some shallow panting breaths from somewhere. She realised, with a start, that it was her, when Anthony Goldstein of all people took both her hands in his and drew her to the side, putting an arm around her shoulders and coached her breathing into slowing down. His eyes were shadowed, and she realised it must've been weighing on him too, a little bit. Colin wasn't easy to forget.
They Portkeyed to the grounds, and after meeting her father and Heather briefly, Demelza went up, ahead, to sit with the Creeveys. Margaret was sobbing openly into Will's chest, while a steady stream of tears dripped down his cheeks into her hair. Dennis was gripping the hand of a Gryffindor girl she'd seen him hanging around in his third year, a slight figure with mousy brown hair, Muggleborn, who had apparently been in hiding through the same resistance network that had hidden the Creeveys when Dennis and Colin had opted to sneak back into Hogwarts for their fourth and sixth years, respectively; shoulders shaking, face wet and shiny. She looked at the casket, closed, so the sight of his unmarked body wouldn't raise any eyebrows amongst the Muggles, and willed the tears to come and moisten her throbbing, dry eyes, but they wouldn't. She wondered if she'd ever cry again, but then she saw the picture of Colin they'd selected for display, one that she herself had taken that damnably perfect summer, and suddenly the tears wouldn't stop.
She tried to pay attention to the speeches that came before hers, but it was too hard, especially the one delivered by Dennis which focused on their childhood and the first few years at Hogwarts. The idea of a baby Colin was too hard to think about, knowing that that child had grown up to die before he was barely a man. She wondered if it was always going to hurt this much, this strongly. She vaguely heard herself being introduced as Colin's girlfriend and started to get up, no notes or speech in mind. The walk to the front seemed so far away.
"I'm not sure where to begin, how to explain what Colin meant to me, and I think anything I say couldn't possibly do him justice. I met him at age twelve on the way to boarding school, and at the end of that first train ride together I already knew he was special. I'd grown up an only child with a busy father in a small village, and I was always quiet. Colin, as you all know, was the very antithesis of silence. We were the unlikeliest of friends – but we were the best of friends. I didn't know I could talk, and open up, and share before I met him – and the most talkative boy I'd ever known surprised me by being the best listener I'd ever met. Colin was kind, and thoughtful, and caring, with the eye of an artist and the heart of a hero – I always thought, hey, he'd make some person very lucky someday. I just never thought I could be lucky enough to have that person be me," and at this her voice broke, and she had to clear her throat to continue, swiping at her eyes.
"The first time Col kissed me, he ended up telling me the films his mum was so fond of knew what they were talking about after all. He was right, because we had a fairy tale relationship from that moment on. And Colin really was a Prince Charming where it counted – he may never have been very great at the flattery bits, but he always stood up for what was right. He went into that encounter knowing there was a good chance he was going to end up injured or worse… but he did it anyway because it was the right thing to do. And while it kills me to know that I'm going to have to live in a world that doesn't have him in it, I also know that I am an immeasurably better person for having had him in my life for as long as I have. A hundred years wouldn't have been enough for me to not feel bereft at his loss, but a single moment with him was enough to have changed my life. I love you, Colin; thank you for giving me the gift of you for as long as you did."
-xxxx-
Life went on but it also stood still. Demelza refused to attend a single victory party – the very idea of one sickened her to her stomach. She went for a few more funerals (more than she'd planned on, though after the show of support at Colin's she figured it was only right to attend those for the other fallen DA members – it couldn't hurt as bad as that one did, anyway), including Fred's, and cracked her first smile in a week when she saw the fireworks that George had set off afterwards to give his brother a proper send-off. She couldn't imagine what George was going through. But then, the fireworks made her think of Colin even though she really didn't want them to – the problem was that everything made her think of Colin - because they reminded her of when the Weasley Twins had made their great escape in her third year, and Colin had been so excited he'd been bouncing clear off his feet to see them.
She threw herself into flying, because at least when she was in the air, she could trick herself into believing Colin was sitting there, on the field, watching her go. She tried to throw herself into studying, because she was going to have to take her OWLs eventually, and mundane things were somewhat of a distraction. She threw herself into babysitting Paul, because again, here was something she could do that didn't make her think of Colin over and over. And she spoke to her father, more openly, more candidly than she had her whole life, about Ministry life during the war and silent resistance, and about her mother.
He told her about grief, and about how unfair it would feel to watch people move on with their lives while you suffered inside, but how time would eventually heal all wounds. How being happy in the future wasn't wrong, but how feeling however she was feeling at the moment was all right, too. He apologised to her, for not having been able to sort himself out in her childhood, told her he would support her no matter what, and held her when she cried about not being able to look at Dennis without seeing Colin, and therefore having lost the both of them in one fell swoop.
-xxxx-
She took her OWLs in June, along with the rest of her class, shunning any attempt at conversation; and kept to herself mostly during the summer. She met Ginny occasionally, and Dennis, and suggested to Ginny that George and Dennis might benefit from talking to each other – they'd both lost a brother and Colin might as well as have been Dennis's twin. She asked Ginny how she was holding up and faring, how her parents were doing, what her plans were moving forward, but wouldn't give more than one-word answers when pushed about Colin. Meeting Dennis was always painful for both of them, it was too raw, and they did it less and less as the summer went on.
She got her OWL results back, a month after she gave them, and the collection of mostly Es (perhaps some of those were pity Es? She really didn't think she'd done well enough to deserve any Es, but at least she didn't fail any of her subjects) helped her cement a decision she'd been mulling over all summer. She spoke to her father, and then she wrote to Headmistress McGonagall and requested a meeting, and then she did some more writing after that meeting, and then she received a letter that she'd been waiting on and realised there were two conversations she really needed to have.
The first was Dennis, who was extremely understanding. He gave her a hug, wished her best of luck, and told her to take care of herself. He also tried to give her Colin's camera and pictures, but she told him to keep them. She didn't want any reminders.
The second was Ginny, which didn't go well at all.
"I need you to know… I've decided I'm not going back to Hogwarts for my sixth and seventh years. I requested a transfer to Ilvermorny and it's been accepted. So… I leave in a month."
"You what?!" Ginny exclaimed, startled. "You can't just… you can't just leave, Demelza!"
"Why not, Ginny? I can't go back in there. I don't ever want to go back in there. He's literally everywhere in there for me, and I can't take it. I won't be able to take it!"
"Demmy you can't just run away, Colin wouldn't have wanted that-"
"I DON'T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT WHAT COLIN WOULD'VE WANTED!" she screamed, and it's as if a dam had burst. "HE LEFT ME GINNY, AND ALL I CAN FUCKING THINK ABOUT IS HIM!" She was sobbing now, great big hiccoughing cries, in a way she hadn't done except for at night when she was all alone.
"I can't eat because all I can think about is mealtimes with him. I can't sleep because all I can think about is sneaking around his house or Hogwarts to sleep with him. I can't fucking breathe because every time I do I keep thinking of how he can't do that anymore. My birthday is coming up and I'm dreading the reality of a world where I'm older than him, where I keep getting older than him! I spent every minute of my life for the last five years with him, either physically or mentally, and as unhealthy as that sounds, I don't know how to be Demelza without him! I just can't. I think about home and I only think about him because he was my home, not my actual house or Hogwarts. I close my eyes and I picture the moment I got the news. I'm literally haunted in my sleep by images of what he looked like when I saw him. I feel so guilty because he was only at Hogwarts because of me! He didn't want to leave me Ginny, and they both wanted to try to fight with the DA, and so I asked my father to make Colin and Dennis forged Blood Status certificates and we put the Creeveys into hiding through Justin's resistance network. I got him what he needed to be there that night and then he died and I can't help but think that it's because of me. If I would've just refused – if he'd just gone into hiding with his parents, he would've been alive, but I was selfish, I wanted him with me at Hogwarts, and so I made it happen. I can't go back to that place and go for fucking class and do my assignments, Ginny. I can't fly over the spot where he died and play a fucking Quidditch game. I just can't do it. At least at Ilvermorny I'll still graduate, and get a job there, I guess. I can't… Britain doesn't have anything for me anymore, at least not now."
Her sobs had grown steadily quieter as she went on, and at the end of it she felt… cleansed, despite the fact that her face was blotchy and eyes swollen and she had a headache building in her temples.
Ginny looked at her, and while her eyes were watery and shimmery with tears, her voice was firm and steady when she spoke. "It is not your fault that Colin passed away, and while I know that it's hard to accept that, I hope someday you will. What the two of you had was special, we all saw it. I'm going to miss you Demmy, but I hope that Ilvermorny gives you peace. Keep in touch – maybe not now, but when it doesn't hurt so much to think of us here." And the two witches leaned forward and hugged, and Demelza let herself sag in relief at having gotten through the conversation.
Next step: Ilvermorny.
Au revoir, Colin.