Disclaimer: Everything belongs to JKR.
Thank you again for all the continued feedback and support. I very much appreciate it. More author's notes at the end.
VIVAASA
by: carpetfibers
Day 364
He hears her breathing and knows she is still awake.
"Your favorite color isn't really green, is it?" she asks, moments later.
His lips quirk tiredly, and he shifts to face her. "Yes it is, but I'm not terribly mad about silver."
"Hmm. . .I've never particularly cared for gold, although it does go nicely with red, most times." She sighs and takes his hand, tracing over his fingers lightly. "I rather like blue, though."
"It suits you. I always thought you ought to have been with that lot instead." He speaks of things much as she does, without specifics and with the unvoiced agreement that there be no need to mention names or titles.
"You wouldn't have done too badly there yourself, you know," she points out and he laughs, the sound light and weary and fond. "Really, you might have," she insists. "All it would have taken was some dedication, some application."
"No. . . I was exactly where I ought to have been," he tells her, the darkness granting him the chance to speak as he wants. She inspires him to honesty and he doesn't mind it. "Ambition and cunning are decent sorts of traits. We- none of us- knew how to rightly use them, though. It was a constant contest, each person attempting to drag you down in his attempt to climb ahead."
"Draco, you don't have to-"
He shushes her and tucks her cheek against his chest. "What were you like when you were younger?"
Her hushed sigh tickles his bare skin. "My mum would say I was precocious, but to anyone else, I was an annoying little sprog. I was always asking the very questions I oughtn't, and it got to the point where I wasn't invited to the birthday parties or play dates anymore. It was alright, though, because I had my da and my mum, and somehow, even then, I knew that was enough."
He can picture her then, so much smaller and slighter, and imagines he would have enjoyed bullying her even then. "I wish-"
"I used to see you after class, in the greenhouses. I never wondered about it then, but now I do. What would you do in there?" she interrupts, and her lips kiss cold words and letters on the curve of his sternum.
"Read, sometimes- I'd sleep mostly. There was one patch of moss, in greenhouse four, that lent me the most pleasant sort of dreams, empty of everything." He remembers the solace the damp underbrush had given him in his later years at school. And when the greenhouses had been closed to him, he had escaped to the bathrooms and a soggy ghost. He clutches her and orders, "Tell me a story."
"What sort of story?" she asks, and his throat vibrates with the faint caress of her breath.
"It doesn't matter," he says, closing his eyes. "A good story."
He is nearly asleep when she speaks again. "There was once a little girl who lived in a little house in a little wood, and every day, she did the same little things. The days passed, each one a little less hard than the last, and after a while, the little girl convinced herself she was happy."
She stirs, and and he feels the lingering damp of her cheeks. "Until one day, she came across a little, lost dog. Something struck her when she saw his little, lost face, and so the little girl brought him back to her little house, and the days passed, each one a little better than the last. The little girl who had lived alone for so long stopped feeling so lonely, and the little, lost dog stopped feeling so lost."
Her voice trembles, but her words do not falter. Her hand tightens in the sheets, and he does not open his eyes. He knows she is crying, but he has still not learned courage. "After a while, the little house in the little wood began to feel much bigger, and the little girl began to call it home. She came to her home every day, found the little, lost dog waiting for her, and they were happy. But you see, the little, lost dog had not always been so little, or so lost, and his time in the little woods was a limited one. The day finally came for the little, lost dog to return to his world beyond the little wood, and the little girl, because she loved him so very much, she-"
"Hermione," he whispers, the run of her syllables a tender enunciation against his lips. "Don't-"
"I know," she cries, and her soft tones break. "I know."
She inhales once, sharply, and then her warmth twists back to its side of the bed. She does not release his hand, and in the morning, when he slips away from her, he sees the wet pillow and the stain across her cheeks. She sleeps on, and he knows that when she wakes, she will see the empty bed and empty closet and missing suitcase, and then- then, she will know. He doesn't recognize the strange emotion that chokes him as he leaves her bed and flees the small flat.
The humidity swallows him, and in the park, he picks up the portkey thirty seconds early. Ten minutes later, in the privacy of a Ministry office, his wand back in his palm and his will free to charm and hex and jinx and transfigure to its full content, he weeps. He weeps and for once, he regrets.
End Day 365
A/N: No worries- it's not over yet. I intend on this continuing through for another two weeks with (hopefully) daily updates. I just wanted to share the meaning of the title. It was sort of an accidental discovery that I liked, but, right-- 'Vivaasa' is (roughly) the Sanskrit word for 'exile.' What charmed me about it, other than it being a Sanskrit word, was the 'viva' which is so very much like the Latin for 'to be a live' which is 'vivo vixi victum.' For those of us who studied Latin's child languages, we have the French 'vivre,' the Italian 'vivere,' the Portuguese 'viver,' the Spanish 'vivir,' and the Romanian 'viaţă.' Perhaps it's not connected, maybe it is- but yes, the title is, in a way, a pun. We have 'Exile' and 'To Live.' Just thought to share.