After-haze
Whirl_gig Edit 14.09.09: Many thanks to lash_larue for the fabulous beta job and the lovely words.
This is quite a serious sort of entry, so if you're not in the mood for seriousness, don't keep reading.
I lost a good friend recently. It was awful, and I wrote about it a lot, because it helped me to figure a few things out. Then, yesterday, when I was re-reading certain parts of DH to help me write part 2 of Interested, I couldn't get this idea for a different story out of my head and I've written it pretty much all in one sitting and it's about the journey Ginny and the Weasley's go through after losing Fred.
Title: After-Haze
Word Count: 3000ish
Pairing: Ginny/Harry
Rating: R for language, references to character death and implied sexual situations, but it's not bad at all.
Summary: Post DH. Ginny finds Harry in the dormitory because she has something she needs to ask him.
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After-haze
Ginny wanted to know. She couldn’t help herself. She needed to know if it had really happened. She needed to know how it had happened; not just in the vague, non-descript ‘some sort of explosion’ way. She was filled with a perverse desire to know exactly what had gone on in the seconds, minutes, hours before, and what had happened immediately after. When exactly had his heart stopped pumping, his blood stopped running and his body stopped breathing. What he had said, how he looked, what he was doing, was he even really gone? Because it couldn’t - it just sounded stupid. Who had been there, how it had felt, how it had smelt, even. Ginny wanted to know.
She had gone up to the Gryffindor common room at some point during the night, or it might have been the day, who could tell anymore? Who even cared? The bodies had been cleared away and were lying in the Great Hall but she didn’t want to be there anymore. She didn’t want to hold her mother in her arms anymore or watch her dad’s resolve crumble. She didn’t want to see anyone else’s heart break. She was sick of being hugged, sick of being cried over and sick of being sick to her stomach when she saw them lined against the wall. So she had left, her footsteps echoing dimly on the marble staircase, the clamour of the hall fading slowly as she made her way up the charred steps. Scattered orbs littered her path and she thiought she might have brushed up against a shoulder and mumbled an apology on her way there but she wasn’t sure. The portrait hole had been left open and she crawled through, shutting the door on the confusion and noise filtering up from the great hall as she straightened and stared unseeing at nothing. She isn’t sure how long she stood there, letting the quiet of the common room settle like dust around her, falling silently to the carpet beneath her feet.
She had thought that she needed to think, but up here in this stillness she realised that her thoughts made no sense. Up here, she felt like the only living person left in the world, and the thought was so terribly lonely that she just sat there next to the empty hearth for a while. She had been broken completely open, everything was hazy. The golds and the reds of the familiar place dimmed around her and she was vaguely aware of feeling cold but Fred might be gone forever and so it didn’t matter. Merlin, that sounded like the most ridiculous thing she had ever heard. That he could go from existing to just not all of a sudden, didn’t make sense and all she could think about, all she kept picturing, though she had never seen it, was the hand falling off her mum’s clock because Fred had gone somewhere magic couldn’t find him. This was so very dramatic that she tried to brush it away but it didn’t work. No one would ever be able to find him again.
But. But she had to make sure, absolutely sure that there hadn’t been some terrible mistake; that she wouldn’t wake up tomorrow to find that this had all been a dream from which she would wake, shaking her head and thinking, “Merlin, that was weird.”
She knew, she knew it had happened, but, what if?
She couldn’t ask Ron, because he didn’t seem to know what had happened himself. She couldn’t ask Percy, because he had muttered some words about a “stupid joke” that “wasn’t even funny”, and she got the feeling that he blamed himself a little bit, which was too sad for words. She couldn’t ask George because she wasn’t even sure he could hear her. She wasn’t even sure she could hear herself.
He had been asleep when she entered the dormitory, curled on his side amongst the blur of velvet red, and for a moment she didn’t want to disturb him, but he must have sensed her presence because suddenly he was stirring and stretching and sleepily blinking his eyes open. He fumbled to put his glasses on and his eyes became focussed, alert as he saw her standing there. He shifted in the bed, a movement that seemed to say, I’m here, and he sighed, once, and held out his arms as if to say, I’m so sorry.
Ginny nodded, finally, and (because he was here and he was real and he owed her this at least), she asked him how.
*
Hermione comes into the kitchen of the Burrow, arms full of books, face full of tired and eyes full of worry as she searches him out and finds him sitting on the counter next to the stove. The sight is so endearingly ordinary that Harry wants to hug her and the feeling intensifies as she says, “I was up all night,” - of course she was- “trying to find something that would help me to verbalise it. I went through poems and verses and articles, and,” she sets the books down on the table with a heavy thud, “I found some. They might help.”
Harry sees that she is trying, that she hates feeling impotent and can’t stand the idea of not being able to solve a problem. He knows that books and words have always been able to give her solace, but -
“But nothing seems to fit,” she says. “They’re not-“
“Enough,” says Harry.
“Yeah.”
And they stand there in the kitchen together not saying anything, because they are both a part of this and outside of it, and they don’t know what to do.
*
It’s the third night after the battle, and Ginny and Harry are sharing her single white bed. Normally this wouldn’t be allowed but normal is a place so very far away from right here that everyone just sort of turns a blind eye. A part of Ginny feels as though she is taking advantage of this situation and that this is a bad and wrong thing to do, but she has locked that part up somewhere very small and out of the way (maybe behind her left knee), because right now she needs him and he needs her.
She is lying with her head pillowed on his chest, which turns out to be a mistake because from that position she can hear his heart beating against his chest and without warning the tears come, slowly at first but then in earnest, until she is gasping and shaking in his arms as he whispers sad nothings into her ear. He holds her until she has calmed down eno and he looks down at her, a questioning look on his face.
She is curled against his chest, all arms and hands pressed between their bodies and she taps the place where she can feel the beat and says, “It’s your heartbeat. You have one.”
And Harry groans and pulls her closer and mumbles something into her hair; something that might be I love you but all that matters to Ginny is the solid press of him against her and the feel of his arms around her and she sighs and thinks that might be enough for her to get to sleep tonight.
*
Sometimes Ginny gets so angry she can't stop shaking. It happens at stupid things, like when the florist asks her if she minds waiting till she has finished serving someone else. An unreasonable surge of fury will course through her, scaring her a little bit because she has never been a really angry person before but all of a sudden she feels like yelling at everyone, at everything. Yelling things like, 'are you serious, you moron? Don't you know that my brother just died?' because she doesn't think she should have to wait to talk about the flowers for the funeral; she in fact shouldn't be organising a funeral at all because Fred should be here with her instead, chatting the assistant up while winking at Ginny as she rolls her eyes at him and the whole thing is so ugly it hurts. She can't believe she uses Fred's death as an excuse for being a bitch but she can't stop and the worst part is that she doesn't really want to.
*
Ginny has a lot of time to think, because no one is saying anything, except by accident. And so Ginny thinks.
She thinks it's funny that she spent her entire year worrying about Harry and how he was and if he was still alive because people sort of expected him to fail; to die, but he didn't and Harry is here and her brother isn't and wasn't that just completely ironic? That she could have been spending every last second with Fred instead; squeezing out every possible moment til the last drop was gone so that now she wouldn't be left with this horrible guilty pit in her stomach that told her she wasn't a good enough sister. That she should have tried harder, been better, somehow. She thinks that the funny thing about someone close to you dying is that before it happens to you, you think that you would die too. You think that you would just give up and lie down beside them because that’s all anyone should be able to do, right?
But then it happens and Ginny thinks it is stupid that she doesn’t die; that she still has to do normal things like eating and sleeping and showering and using the bathroom. It’s stupid that her body still needs this, that it hasn’t shut down along with her heart and her mind and she hates how useless it is to do these things but she does them anyway. Ginny sees the looks on people’s faces; the too understanding glances passing between friends and knows that they are thinking that it is a Good Sign; a Good Thing, that she is showering, eating. She can't stand the fact that these normal activities of daily living have become an accomplishment for her, but even more than that, she hates that she can do these things at all; feels as though she shouldn’t be able to because her brother has died and there must be something terribly, terribly wrong with her.
Ginny wonders about these things that make up a person; these hearts and these minds and these bodies encased in skin. She knows that skin can be touched and tasted; she knows that it can shiver and grow and breathe and that these are all good things. But she has learnt that it can splinter and bruise and bleed; that it can be ripped and torn from your body, and she has learnt that there is nothing you can do about it. If someone wants to kill you, it isn't that hard to do and she hates how fragile people are; hates that Fred wasn't (as it turns out) ten feet tall and death-proof.
People are saying things; things like ‘stay strong’ and she hates that because she doesn’t think she should have to be. She thinks that for right now, she gets to be selfish. But then she sees the looks on her parents' faces and the not-look on George’s and she tries very, very hard to keep it together. She has learnt to cook. (Spaghetti, mainly, but no one seems to care.)
And then there is Harry, Ginny thinks. Harry, who knows loss better than almost anyone, but he doesn’t get it, not really, because he has never had anything for very long before he lost it again; he never had the chance to get used to ‘having someone around’ in the way that families do. Because that is what a family is; people who are just there; completely, indescribably there when you need them most but also, even more importantly, when you think you don’t need them at all. But now there is one less person in her world; one less person who will nag her and call her names and stick up for her virtue and make her laugh and make her cry until she laughs again. Fred is (was) a permanent part of her everyday world and he has been ripped from it in a way that makes her want to yell and scream in anger and she knows that if Fred were here he would be yelling too.
But he isn’t, and she has to say goodbye, and she doesn’t want to do that with anger in her heart.
*
It is a week before Ginny smiles. This happens on the same day that she has done her hair and worn something other than pyjamas since it happened. It is also, incidentally, the day of the funeral and she is upstairs, leaning against her bedroom door for a moment, trying to breathe.
Then she hears Fred’s - no, George’s - voice say Gin, very softly, and she thinks she might have imagined it but, no, there is someone knocking on her door and then she has opened it and he is standing there, inexplicably smiling and holding a wand. For a moment she feels a ripple of fear and thinks he might actually have gone mad, but then the wand emits a loud squawk and flips into a shapeless animal thing and George is laughing, saying something about a piece of shit prototype Fred had come up with, running up to George, face shining with thirteen-year-old pride and George had just taken the thing out of his hands and started hitting him over the head with it, just because he could. Ginny smiles then, a real smile and feels the bubble of something strange gurgle up from inside her. She realises that it’s laughter and they sink to the floor together, picturing Fred’s face falling into annoyance at George and suddenly Ginny can remember the last time she had seen Fred (she couldn’t remember before) and she gasps in relief because if she hadn’t been able to remember she would never be able to forgive herself. Sitting on the floor holding George up, her stomach hurting from laughing so much, she feels like she can breathe again.
*
Luna is going to write a book, she announces seriously to Harry four days after the funeral, turning up at the Burrow with sheafs of parchment and a quill behind her ear. She isn’t sure what it’s going to be about yet, but she thinks maybe everything, which is why she needs to do the research, she nods wisely. Harry can’t wait to read it.
He is in the yard with Luna now, trying very hard not to be sceptical about a new method Luna has devised for de-gnoming the garden (it’s one similar to the pied piper, though with less death at the end) and he looks up as he hears the back door open. Ginny is standing on the patio, leaning over the railing watching them. She looks better today, and Harry pulls a face at her, rolling his eyes in Luna’s direction as Luna pulls a short flute from her pocket and prepares to play. The ghost of a smile flits across Ginny’s face and then is gone, like a child scurrying home just as dark begins to fall and Harry wants to grab onto that moment, keep it locked away forever because it is proof that he can make her happy, even if it is only for a second. It makes him feel powerful, like the feeling you get when you make a baby laugh, but then the baby turns away and is more interested in putting their feet in their mouth than in looking at you and you wind up feeling worse than before because you know what you are missing out on.
*
Sometimes Ginny walks into a room and stands there for a while, and then walks out again because she can't remember what she is doing. She is too busy wondering.
Wondering whether he knew, whether he could see his life as though on a timeline; the ones of your own life you had to draw at Hogwarts during ‘Personal Development’ lessons with McGonagall. (Reach for your goals, children. But please make sure they are not ridiculous ones, Fred. You will never be the first black wizard to fly solo across the Sahara on a flying carpet.)
Could he see where the end was marked, hazy and indistinct at first but becoming clearer as he edged closer? And what about in those moments; those final, fleeting, forever-moments just before it happened, whether he knew, and whether he chose to leave laughing, because in a horrible way it fits, slotting into his life like the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle, but when you stand back and take a look it makes an entirely different picture from the one you imagined.
*
One night after Fleur has disappeared, Harry has gone to bed and Hermione has gone home to arrange her parents' house, Ginny walks into the kitchen to find her family (minus one) sitting around the table.
She is greeted with a chorus of Hey Gin’s, and her mum beckons her over and Ginny does something she hasn’t done since she was a little girl and climbs, rather awkwardly, into her mum’s lap. Molly doesn’t mind and she strokes Ginny’s hair and Ginny closes her eyes, letting the talk of the others wash over her as she leans into her mum’s chest. She can hear her mum's heart beating and Ginny smiles, because she is glad that her mum’s is so strong.
Beside her, Ron and Charlie are pissing themselves over some story George is telling about Fred trying it on with Angelina and Bill keeps interrupting him, shit stirring them by saying that he, Bill, taught them everything they knew, at which point Arthur puts his two cents in by reminding Bill exactly who it was that had gone screaming up the stairs after finding out where he came from and suddenly they are all laughing until they are crying until Percy calms down enough to say in an imitation baby voice, chin wobbling, “You mean, I wasn’t delivered by an owl?” and they are laughing again, Molly’s shoulders shaking so hard that Ginny’s head is bouncing around but she doesn’t care because she feels so close to normal and she doesn't want to let that go.
*
Later, she goes up to her room. She stands there for a while, just watching Harry breathe in the shadow light filtering through the curtains. Something stirs within her and she is suddenly right here, in this moment, in a way she hasn’t been in weeks. And then she is beside him, under the covers with him and he wakes up and their faces are too close together and suddenly they are kissing and kissing and kissing, like kisses are light and they are stuck in the dark, trying to get out.
Afterwards, they lie there cramped on the single mattress and Ginny feels compelled to talk, to say something, anything to reassure Harry that she is getting there, wherever there is.
“I’m trying,” she says to the ceiling.
He rolls toward her, slipping an arm around her waist. An ‘I know’ is mumbled into her back and Ginny tilts her head towards his and then they are kissing again, and Ginny feels as though each kiss is one stitch back together after being broken open for so long.
*
Bill and Fleur leave first, because they have to get back to Shell Cottage and Bill has to go back to work. Gringotts is still a mess and he punches Harry lightly on the shoulder, jokingly blaming him and Harry dips his head and smiles ruefully.
Charlie slips out almost without anyone noticing, saying something about fresh air and needing to get away. Ginny doesn't like how lonely he looks as he heads towards the apparition point, satchel slung over one shoulder and hands in his pockets, kicking idly at the grass pooling around his ankles.
Then Ron leaves to go to Australia with Hermione, who can't hide how excited she is to see her parents again, even though she is trying very hard. Ginny doesn't begrudge her for the fact that her family is whole and untouched and she hugs her tight and already misses her. She tells Ron to be safe on those air thingies because if anything happened to them-. Well.
Percy is next, leaving the house to go back to the ministry, but he's 'going to do it right this time' and Ginny sees how completely he has changed and hugs him every morning before he goes.
George is spending more and more time at the shop, interviewing for a new Assistant Manager and each night when he pops by for a visit he looks at Ginny's hopeful expression and shakes his head.
"Not yet. But there's a guy coming in tomorrow I've got a good feeling about."
Her parents visit Fred everyday, before Arthur goes to work at the ministry, and Molly helps with the clean up wherever she can.
And Ginny? Ginny can cook more than just spaghetti now, and she has promised to read Luna's first draft.
*
And so the world-heart beats on, on, on. Water does not cease to run through its river-veins, the earth-skin breathes in, out, in. Days spin by and some things (but not everything) are lost in the pain-haze of the then and the now.
Until.
She looks up. Brown eyes meet green.
“Hi.” (I’m still here.)
She will be okay.
- End -
A/N: Some lines I have quoted without realising it until I just re-read this!
"kissing and kissing like kisses are" - I've just realised that this is from Pariah, by Maegunnbatt, but I think the original line is something like "kissing and kissing like kisses were air" - one of my all time favourite fics.
"watches (Harry) breathe in shadow light" - this is from a song called 'Space they Cannot Touch' by Kate Miller-Heidke,
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