Sparse dead leaves clung stubbornly to the branches of the few trees that dotted the little graveyard. A few choose the moment he passed by as some sign that they should give up the ghost. They drifted down as if in a trance, their brittle skin shrivelled, lifeless. The sight was yet another reminder of a moment shared between him and Colin, in the quiet hours of night that summer at the Manor. Mum gave me a book, after Uncle Ray died. Through the eyes of Freddie the Leaf I learned how death was a part of life. It all seemed so far away. But now there is a war approaching. I'm not sure how to face this part of life, Draco.
He walked slowly. Delaying the moment he desired, hesitant to know what storm would be unleashed within but driven by some strange need deep inside. He shouldn't be here. Astoria would be arriving now, expecting him at the New Year's Eve gathering they'd been invited to. But he couldn't face it. He had left work and walked for ages before twisting on the spot and finding himself in front of the little church where Colin's funeral had been held, the graveyard holding his attention in a way he couldn't quite understand.
He had been in this graveyard before. Magically hidden, he had watched Colin cry at his parents' funeral. It had been the sight of Colin in such pain that he had written that note, had told a child nearby to please deliver this to that man over there. He wished now that he'd stayed around to see how Colin had reacted. Wished he'd had the courage to approach him in person.
Colin's headstone was next to his parents, the snow pillowed on top, pristine. The decaying remnants of flowers lay in front. He shivered. Cast a warming charm. Colin Creevey was written in some fancy type of script. There were words written below the name and the dates of birth and death, but Draco couldn't take his eyes off the name etched in stone.
He wasn't sure what he expected to feel, but it wasn't this. He thought he would be angry, perhaps; or melancholy, or maybe there would be some sense of longing. Instead the same sensation he had been feeling these past few weeks invaded him once more, only this time he had no distraction to mute it, nothing in front of him to aid in shoving the thoughts away. He didn't have a word for the emotion. It filled him with a deep sadness, a kind of sadness where one expected tears. But Draco hadn't been able to shed tears since that night of the funeral.
A thick blanket of silence weighed down the air around him. The dark silence spoke too much truth. He couldn't bear it one more second. "Even in death you know how to make me talk to you," Draco said aloud. "You would always listen patiently to me, even when I said things that you didn't agree with."
The air was still, quiet. Expectant. "We were so young," Draco said to the headstone. "There's no way you and I would have worked, if we'd tried. I was so young, and set in my ways, and now I'm older and still set in my ways, and we would never have worked."
"But if I'd said yes back then, during the battle...if I'd agreed to be with you...would you be alive today?"
The sun was setting now, the orange hue of the sky darkening. Draco found himself continuing the one sided conversation. He talked about the fear he'd felt in sixth year and the comfort he hadn't wanted to admit he craved, comfort that Colin had provided. He talked about the high of flight and the way Colin's arms had felt around him and that light in Colin's eyes and cherry popper ice cream. He talked about the bloke he'd kissed days after the end of the war, drunk for the first time in his life and wanting Colin's touch so much he'd tried to find it in another body. He had never told a soul about it. He talked about his parents. His confusion from the last several months. The knowledge he was just beginning to allow himself to understand. He talked about courting Astoria, how he'd struggled to trust her at first. He talked about falling in love, months after they'd become engaged. How he still found himself looking for Colin in public places. How he didn't understand how he could love Astoria so deeply and yet he never seemed to stop - he stumbled over the word, unused to saying it out loud - loving Colin, regardless of the time that passed.
And that, Draco realized, was what his Mum had meant, wasn't it. Love knows no limits.
Somehow the knowledge stunned him in a way he didn't know what to do with. His breath came fast and shallow. "I still love you," he said in shock. "I never stopped. Why did I never stop."
The darkness was more pronounced now. Draco cast Lumos, the light shining brightly. His hand reached to touch the headstone. His eyes fell on the words written near the bottom. Time passes. Love remains.
Draco's heart jumped. "Because I didn't acknowledge what I felt for you in the first place," he whispered, the answer to his question right in front of him. His finger traced the letters.
"I still stand by what I said," he murmured after awhile. "We never would have worked. I may not be my Father but I can't be like my Mother. Or Astoria, even. She's right, you know. We have agreed to disagree about certain things. I can't accept that muggles and other lesser magical beings are equal to wizards. It's not right and I won't pretend otherwise."
An owl hooted in the distance. Draco shivered in spite of the warming charm.
"Sometimes I don't believe that I deserve the happiness that I have," he continued. "I grew up with this idea of what my life should be like. And maybe some things aren't exactly how I pictured but - this is what makes me happy. Maybe I don't deserve it. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to enjoy it. I only wish - as selfish as it sounds..." he paused, afraid. But he could almost hear Colin's voice soothing him, and he allowed the words to fall from his lips. "I wish I could have all this - and you too."
The thought lingered in the air, and Draco closed his eyes. "But most of all...I wish you were still alive."
He opened his eyes again. His wand light shone on the name written in stone. "I think Astoria blames herself for what happened. She doesn't say it but I think she does. I think there are others who blame themselves. And I - I should have done more too. I already have enough death on my conscience from the war. I didn't fucking need you too." He was angry now. "How could you be so stupid, Colin?"
The words seemed to echo in his brain. The anger dissipated as quickly as it had come. "I'm so sorry," he said hopelessly. "I don't know what else to say. I'm so sorry. For being so cruel. For not knowing what I wanted. And...for knowing what I wanted but being a bloody wanker about it."
He sat in silence then. He wasn't sure what else to say.
It was some time later that the headstone shone brighter, another source of light hitting it. Draco turned quickly. His heart stuttered. Astoria was making her way to him, her own wand lit brightly. He tried to steady his sudden nerves by taking a breath. It didn't seem to work. Astoria stopped a few feet away. She didn't say anything.
"How did you know?" Draco asked her.
The look she shot him was full of understanding. "When you weren't at home or at work and you hadn't shown at the party...I just knew."
Draco shrugged helplessly. "I couldn't - "
Astoria watched him struggle to find the words for a moment before she said gently, "I know, Draco, I know."
"I can't stop," Draco said. "I can't stop thinking about him. I can't stop caring, Astoria, and I didn't know, I didn't know." He knew his voice came out pleading. He wasn't sure if she understood what he meant. If he even understood what he meant.
But she gave a sad half smile and nodded, and looked over at Colin's headstone. "Do you love me?" Astoria sounded calm, accepting, as though the world didn't rest upon the answer. But he felt the weight on his shoulders at her words. He met her eyes.
"Yes," he answered quietly.
"Do you love him?"
Draco tore his eyes away and took a sharp breath. He looked at the words on the headstone. Time passes, love remains. Slowly, not looking at Astoria, he nodded his assent, unable to stop the truth from coming out. "Yes," he choked out.
"He loved you too," Astoria said, and Draco looked at her in shock. She held his gaze; she wasn't upset or hurt or jealous, but Draco could see sadness mixed with a calm acceptance. "He didn't have to say it," she continued. "But I could tell."
Draco looked away, back at the headstone, back at those words carved in the dark stone. He took another deep breath. "They can - they can coexist peacefully. I don't want you to think..." He trailed off, unable to find the words, but he needed her to know, to understand.
"I don't," Astoria responded gently. "I know you, Draco. Perhaps more than you have ever realized. I know how you feel. You may think you are mysterious, carful with your emotions - but I know that you're happy with the life you've made for not just yourself, but for me and our son. I also know that you have regrets. And I know you've had some moments recently where you have felt confused - I know that confronting the past has been hard for you." She paused for a moment.
Draco didn't speak, unsure how to respond.
"I also know that love is not a finite resource," Astoria murmured. "We love many people throughout our lives, do we not?" Her eyes searched for his again. She seemed to be waiting on an answer.
Draco could only nod, but it seemed that was all the answer she needed, for she continued.
"The more we love freely, the more our hearts expand to make room for it," she said softly.
There was silence as he stared at her, and she seemed to know he was processing her words, for she let the silence drag on in quiet contemplation. Draco looked into her eyes, but didn't see their lime-green depths: His mind roamed through time, his thoughts drifting back to what he'd shared with Colin all those years ago. They'd been so young. Kids who had been caught up in a war they didn't fully comprehend and emotions they had blindly followed.
It had taken Colin's death, and a trial for the killer, but Draco could admit it now. He had loved Colin, knew it with a certainty that he hadn't wanted to face but could no longer waste time denying. He had loved Colin the only way he'd known how to love, back then. He had loved him, and some of that love still remained. He could feel it in the way his heart hurt when he looked at the headstone before him.
Yes. He loved Colin.
But Colin had loved him with a selflessness that Draco had been unable to match back then. And Colin had loved him still, even all those years after he'd cruelly broken his Gryffindor's heart. He'd seen the look that Colin had given him that day he'd crossed the line. Some emotions didn't fade with time.
And yet - that didn't mean that they hadn't loved others, did it. Colin had loved - Draco hurt just thinking the name - Potter. He knew he had. He'd seen the way Colin had looked as he'd spoken about Potter. He'd heard Colin say it as he'd rebuffed his advances.
And Draco loved Astoria. He knew it with certainty. She made him feel safe, at home; she fit with him in ways he'd never imagined she would, that day his parents had told him that he would be courting her. Perhaps he hadn't chosen her, at first. But he knew he choose her now. His love for Colin lived inside its own box within him. His love for Astoria lived within another box. Neither one cancelled out the other.
Yes - he loved Colin.
But Colin had loved him. And he'd seen that look Colin had given him, that day they'd run into each other in Diagon Alley. Colin had loved him. Colin had wanted him to be happy.
"There is a word a client once explained to me," Astoria said quietly, her words shattering the silence and pulling Draco away from his thoughts. "The word is Han. Do you know what it means?"
Draco looked over to where she now knelt by the headstone. He hadn't even seen her move, so lost had he been in his mind. Her hand rested beside those words. Time passes. Love remains.
"No," he breathed out, unsure why she was telling him this.
"There is no literal English translation," she said. "It's a state of mind, I suppose you could say. A state of soul, really. The closest we can come to explaining it - it means a sadness so deep no tears will come. Yet still - there is hope."
Astoria stood up slowly, her hand dragging softly along the stone as she did, leaving light smudges of snow behind, and Draco almost laughed at the thought that Colin somehow would have wanted to photograph that moment. He sobered up quickly as she closed the distance between them and took his hand in her own. "You are allowed to feel everything you have been feeling," she said, her words dropping slowly, with empathy and an understanding that was just so Astoria that he felt a surge of affection for her curl in his stomach. "You are allowed to grieve for him, and for the life you wonder if you could have had. Just please - don't forget your family. We love you. We want to share this burden with you. You don't have to shoulder it alone."
Draco couldn't speak. He couldn't even nod to acknowledge her words. His heart felt like it would burst out of his chest with so many emotions he couldn't even name them all if he'd tried.
Astoria touched his cheek softly. He closed his eyes and lent into the touch. A moment passed before he felt her softly withdraw. When he opened his eyes, he saw she'd left, as though she knew that he needed to be alone once more. He watched the light of her wand carry her away. He looked back at Colin's grave.
Draco took a deep shuttering breath. He knelt down, his knees touching frozen ground as his hands reached to touch Colin's name. "Goodbye - and good luck, Colin," he murmured, and his heart leapt with overwhelming sadness and something else, something he couldn't name. He stood up, still gazing at Colin's stone. Astoria's words came back to him.
"Han," he said out loud, only just above a whisper. "That's what this feeling is. Han."
A sadness so deep no tears would come, she'd said.
Yet still - there is hope.