Jan 07, 2012 11:46
ron,
07,
the temper matches the hair,
stupid noble boys,
tl;dr time,
family,
it's a quiet angst,
diaries are evil but privacy is needed,
what big brother doesn't know,
a chamber's worth of secrets,
youngest and only girl of the lot,
canon says: ginny is rarely weepy,
claire bennet,
departures,
stupid noble reasons,
harry potter,
special place for the boy-who-lived,
be a gryffindor,
fred
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Ginny wanted to be alone, but nowhere was enough. Her own apartment was too much, the Quidditch pitch is the scene of too many bright and shining things. The cabin is the last place anyone would think to look for her and it's the last place she wants to be, but there are a few things she needs before she tries to disappear, too. So, yes, she is in Harry Potter's bedroom, having taken the window rather than the doors through the cabin and risk being seen (windows, Merlin, she and Harry always used windows here). It's another one of those moments that steal her breath, seeing a room interrupted so soon after seeing so many. Unmade bed, laundry in a hamper, half-full rubbish bin, broom against the wall.
She doesn't even know why she's here, not really. She finds the gold envelope she'd given him for Christmas sitting on the bedside table and opens it to pull out the photograph. Her jaw tightens at the sight of it, unposed and unplanned happiness in a snapshot. And when Percy's knock sounds, she doesn't even register it at first; because by the time her brother finds her, she's sitting on the edge of Harry's bed and looking down at this slip of a memory in her hands. And then the door creaks, just a little, and her head snaps up and she looks over her shoulder, and something in her eyes hardens.]
Bugger off, Percy.
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[Once is a mistake, twice is a coincidence, three times is a pattern. Someone vanishes, he tracks down his remaining siblings, they tell him to go away, and he says no. Twice now, so it's a coincidence, but he has an ugly feeling of certainty in his heart that he doesn't care to acknowledge that it's probably going to become a pattern before too long. He pushes open the door and steps in, closing it behind him (but not all the way; even now, he leaves an escape route open, just in case).
It's hard not to take the hardening of her eyes personally, to remind himself that she's upset, isn't mad at him (well, probably not, maybe she is), but he crosses his arms over his chest and pointedly does not bugger off.]
What are you looking at?
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Ginny's shoulders tense when the door swings shut and while Percy may think he's leaving an escape open, to her she feels all the more caged in for being caught in a room with a brother she's still uncertain about. His question has her fingers clutching at the photograph almost protectively and she ignores it; she doesn't rise, not yet, but she's poised like a tightly wound coil and her words are low and sharp when she speaks again.]
I mean it. If you're here to get me to talk about my feelings or whatever, hard luck. I don't do that. Go away.
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[He knows he oughtn't be, though he probably should be. It's why he's been making such an effort to reach out to his siblings, especially this awful week, because by helping them not be alone it means he's not alone, means the guilt and nightmares and the awful crushing tightness that sits just behind his heart and threatens to squeeze the breath out of him can be pushed down and ignored and left to be dealt with later. (Thank Merlin for 'later,' it's a godsend.)
He doesn't move from near the door, doesn't come closer, but doesn't leave.]
I'm not leaving.
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[The words come fierce and fast now, riding on the back of a scoff as she finally stands with her wand in her right hand and the photo still in her left. She hasn't raised it at him, but his presence and her temper are enough to send angry gold sparks flying from the tip of it, and she has half a mind to hex him until the batbogies chase him out of the room. But does she really? Ginny knows deep down that she cannot keep doing this, she cannot keep shoving people away when it gets difficult in the City because that's what she's done for years. Barely anyone knows any of the secrets she holds close to her heart because she has become so good at burying them; better, even, than she has back home. She isn't proud of it.
Out of the corner of her eye, she sees a flash of emerald wool and her heart stops for a second. Always leaving his damn jumper lying around for her to find. Doesn't he want it? It's enough to throw her off and her next words are crumbled at the edges.]
I've been alone long enough, Percy; this won't kill me.
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[Though his posture is squared and confident, his eyes keep flicking to her wand, the gold sparks coming out of the end and vanishing against the floor in tiny explosions, and it's enough to make his heart hammer against his ribs and have to consciously resist the urge to go for his own wand, because this isn't a hostile situation, this isn't somewhere he needs his wand, and he is fine.
He forces himself to look at her face, and he doesn't miss the way her words seem to fold in on themselves. When he speaks again, it's quiet, but still firm.]
Please.
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[The anger comes quickly, as always, burning through the coldness in her heart and the backs of her eyes (because that is anger, not anything less or more heartbreaking than that, and she's blinking it away furiously). A part of her realises, as her voice rises to hide the cracks in it, that this is almost exactly the sort of fight she had with Harry nearly two years ago after Fred left the first time. The almost desperate demand for a solution she knows, she knows, does not exist is far too familiar and damn it, it's another memory with Harry in it-she knew this would happen, why can't she drop it and move on?
Why can't Percy? Can't he see all she wants is peace and quiet? Doesn't he understand that this reaction is exactly the sort of thing she wanted to avoid? Because she doesn't trust herself to be anything less than this whirlwind of a Gryffindor and a Weasley who has lost too much in too short a time; and she isn't ready to cope with that, not yet, not when she hasn't lived that night-long battle that robs her of more than just a handful of familiar faces.]
You can't fix this. [You can't fix me.] You can't bring him or any of them back.
[And she punctuates the last word with swipe of her right arm that throws her wand onto the bed so that she can press the back of her hand to her mouth, horrified to feel a sob starting to choke her throat. No. She can't do this now. Not here, not in front of Percy, not in front of anyone. Together, Weasley, pull it together!]
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- but he will be damned if he doesn't at least try. Fortune favors the brave, and it's always been the Weasley way to throw yourself in headfirst, even if your chances of success. He might have tried his best not to be a Weasley for a long time, but he can't re-write that any more than he can stop the world from turning.
And that's why, when he hears that awful choked sob that she stifles halfway through, he's moving without thinking, moving to touch her, to hug her, to be something besides an awkward stranger with the same color of hair.]
That doesn't stop me from being here for you when I can be.
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It's not just Harry leaving that's undoing her here and now. It's a brother she knows she'll lose when she returns home-if she returns home-and it's the best friend who held her together when no one else was there. It's the king who took the place of her older brothers when they were gone, the artist who became as close to a mother figure as she could find here, and the victor with the trident who reminded her so much of her brothers and Harry all rolled into one careful mask. And she held it together throughout the months as they winked away, one by one, but this is the last straw.
She recoils a little at the brush of his hand but doesn't pull away entirely because all her energy is pouring into keeping the tears at bay, the sobs, the breakdown of this witch who has survived so much and hates it each time.]
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I'm here. It won't be all right but it'll be better than it would be if I weren't. Please.]
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Ginny reaches up her free hand to rest over Percy's at her shoulder, curling around it as if she's about to throw it off. And she does, but it's unexpectedly gentle, slipping out from under it after giving it an imperceptible squeeze. She takes a deep, shaking breath and squeezes her eyes shut until the burning stops.]
It's fine. [Her voice is soft but firm, not enough, but as best as she can manage.] I'm fine, Percy. Sorry, I'm just-tired. Had a long night. Anyway...
[She turns back to face him, cheeks remarkably dry if flushed with the effort of keeping them that way, and she shows him the photograph of her and Harry caught in a tender kiss, the barest ghost of a smirk flickering to life at the corner of her lips. (But it doesn't quite reach her eyes.)]
You wanted to know what I was looking at?
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He also accepts her excuse, because he understands tired, understands long nights, understands the need to keep himself under control even if he's holding onto that control by the thinnest string.
He lowers his head to look at the picture, and his eyebrows lift slightly.]
This was taken recently?
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She lets him inspect the photo without ever giving the indication that she wishes to let go of it and answers in a soft but ever, ever so slightly gentler (almost teasing, but it's too early to say) tone.]
Earlier this winter, I suppose. I just found it on my device and thought I'd... pass it along. [His face when he'd opened up the envelope...] You did ask.
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It's a ... nice picture.
[Be civil. Be polite.]
You look very happy together.
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Yes, Percy must have seen it. You look very happy together. She likes to think he means it. Ginny nods a little, looking down at the photograph again, biting down her lip as she feels the heartbreak threaten again.]
Yeah. Hope you aren't just saying that because I'll hex you otherwise, since... [She pauses, then continues in a softer voice.] Well, since he makes me happy. Always has. [She takes a breath then mutters with a bit of a defensive note,] I suppose you think it's a bit silly.
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And he'd seen it in the City, of course. He hadn't missed how happy she was, how happy he was, the joy they radiated. Of course he won't ever entirely approve of Potter for his little sister (this has less to do with his status as Savior of the Wizarding World and more to do with the simple fact that No One is Good Enough for Percy's Little Sister), but he's never been able to deny her something that makes her happy.
And he knows how important it is to have someone you care for, especially in war, and how much it hurts to cut them off because you have to, not because you want to.]
No. I don't think it's silly at all. I think it's important, having that sort of connection.
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