FAN FICTION: Ballad for Dead Friends (You've Left Me Now)
Ballad for Dead Friends (You've Left Me Now)
Pairing/Characters: Bella Swan/Harry Potter (illusions to Bella/Edward)
Summary: Between them there’s one set of parents, two long lost loves, and three best friends, plus a million more acquaintances that they feel bad for forgetting but who weigh them down just the same.
Rating: PG-13ish / Word Count: 1013
Notes: This takes place way after Eclipse but only shortly after Deathly Hallows. However, no spoilers for either because I changed like… everything. And time is a funky thing that I bend at will. This originally started out as a drabble inspired by this awesome fic but then the plot bunnies bounced their little asses all over my head and it turned into this big epic thing that will probably not be the last in this universe. So anyway, I would love to hear what you think since I've been working on this for months.
-
The last day she ever sees Edward, the sun is shining.
She doesn’t know if that’s fitting, ironic, or something else entirely, but she spends every afternoon for a week thinking about the answer while she waits for him to come home.
He never does.
-
She meets Harry at work, years later.
He sits in her section, orders the special without looking at the menu, and has trouble counting out the money for his bill after three hours of watching his soup grow cold.
His accent had already given away the fact that he was far from home but, watching him struggle from her spot behind the counter, she realizes that he’s running from a past like hers.
So she offers him a sad smile to match his own when she switches out one of his twenties for a ten and, when he gives her an earnest thank you, she wants to tell him that there’s no place he can run that will make it better.
Instead she just sends a no problem his way as she clears his dishes, even though she’s sure it’s as untrue as anything could ever be.
-
He comes in the restaurant every night for weeks, sitting in the same booth, and ordering the same thing that he never does more than pick at. His eyes never stop staring off into space and his face never gets any less sad but she knows she was the same way for years so it never stops her from offering him an encouraging smile that he always returns.
It’ll get better is what she tells him one day when she can’t help but say something, anything.
His face is surprised and slightly confused but his tone is colored with desperation when a really? comes out his mouth. She can’t help but lie when she sees the depression in those bright green eyes of his.
Definitely.
-
On one of the nights, she sit’s a piece of pie on the table next to his bill and he looks up at her the same questioning eyes that she’s grown used to during a month of visits.
You looked like you might need it.
His smile is still small but open, unlike his eyes, which tell her stories of being guarded for years.
-
When it comes to their pasts, they only share the bare minimum, specializing in broad generalizations and glazed-over-details.
She leaves out important facts and she’s sure that he’s done the same but she knows all about his magic and his war, and he knows all about the mythological creatures that really do exist.
Most days, that’s enough.
-
Secrets have always made her restless but the two of them lie like people who have armies of skeletons in their closet (except her closet is full of vampires and werewolves, while his is full of witches and wizards) and her stomach never feels quite right anymore.
Even the small lies have started to get to her.
You sure you okay? Nadine questions as Bella picks up her table’s order off the warmer.
Of course, just tired.
You always look tired, try getting a full night’s rest, sweetheart.
Can’t, she adds belatedly, I’m always here at night. She says it with a smile that Nadine takes lightly and she smiles back, rolling her eyes, and heading back out to her section with a plate of extra creamers.
She misses the days when the only scary thing in her closet was the Boogeyman.
-
Moments blur into months and weeks pass in a flurry of nothingness, but everything about them seems to stay the same and the causalities never seem to let them be.
Between them they have one set of parents, two long lost loves, and three best friends to weigh them down, and that’s not counting the millions of acquaintances that they feel bad for having forgotten (but have just the same).
She’s long since learned to stop expecting a change but his wounds are still fresh enough that he doesn’t know what to do without a hope to hold onto so he tries to keep his grasp tight.
She hopes that she’s still around when he finally lets go for good. He’s going to need someone to pick up the pieces.
-
Her night shifts at the diner mean that the share only a couple overlapping hours in bed together but they start every night on opposite sides of the bed, facing opposite sides of the room, with only their pillows touching. Sometimes he holds her hand when he thinks she’s sleeping and on those nights, she works extra hard to keep her breathing calm and steady as his thumb rubs slow circles on the back of her palm.
She always lets him keep up the charade, swallowing but staying quiet ,even when we she can feel the bed vibrate along with his quiet sobs, because that’s what they both need, the charade.
-
She doesn’t love him like she loved Edward or like she loved Jacob, both of them are long gone and they took those intense feelings with them, but she does know that she loves Harry, albeit in a very quiet sort-of different way.
She doesn’t tell him how she feels and he doesn’t tell her anything of the sort either, but the way he kisses her forehead when he leaves in the morning makes her thinks that maybe he doesn’t have to.
And that it makes it all that much harder.
-
She doesn’t believe in the word forever anymore and he doesn’t believe in making promises to anyone so they don’t talk about a future together, apart, or at all.
They live day by day and hold each other up on the days that it’s hard to stand alone.
And she enjoys it while she can because she knows years from now, he’ll have grown up and moved on without her, like everyone’s done since Edward pressed his lips to her throat and finally made good on his promise all those decades ago.
Pairing/Characters: Bella Swan/Harry Potter (illusions to Bella/Edward)
Summary: Between them there’s one set of parents, two long lost loves, and three best friends, plus a million more acquaintances that they feel bad for forgetting but who weigh them down just the same.
Rating: PG-13ish / Word Count: 1013
Notes: This takes place way after Eclipse but only shortly after Deathly Hallows. However, no spoilers for either because I changed like… everything. And time is a funky thing that I bend at will. This originally started out as a drabble inspired by this awesome fic but then the plot bunnies bounced their little asses all over my head and it turned into this big epic thing that will probably not be the last in this universe. So anyway, I would love to hear what you think since I've been working on this for months.
-
The last day she ever sees Edward, the sun is shining.
She doesn’t know if that’s fitting, ironic, or something else entirely, but she spends every afternoon for a week thinking about the answer while she waits for him to come home.
He never does.
-
She meets Harry at work, years later.
He sits in her section, orders the special without looking at the menu, and has trouble counting out the money for his bill after three hours of watching his soup grow cold.
His accent had already given away the fact that he was far from home but, watching him struggle from her spot behind the counter, she realizes that he’s running from a past like hers.
So she offers him a sad smile to match his own when she switches out one of his twenties for a ten and, when he gives her an earnest thank you, she wants to tell him that there’s no place he can run that will make it better.
Instead she just sends a no problem his way as she clears his dishes, even though she’s sure it’s as untrue as anything could ever be.
-
He comes in the restaurant every night for weeks, sitting in the same booth, and ordering the same thing that he never does more than pick at. His eyes never stop staring off into space and his face never gets any less sad but she knows she was the same way for years so it never stops her from offering him an encouraging smile that he always returns.
It’ll get better is what she tells him one day when she can’t help but say something, anything.
His face is surprised and slightly confused but his tone is colored with desperation when a really? comes out his mouth. She can’t help but lie when she sees the depression in those bright green eyes of his.
Definitely.
-
On one of the nights, she sit’s a piece of pie on the table next to his bill and he looks up at her the same questioning eyes that she’s grown used to during a month of visits.
You looked like you might need it.
His smile is still small but open, unlike his eyes, which tell her stories of being guarded for years.
-
When it comes to their pasts, they only share the bare minimum, specializing in broad generalizations and glazed-over-details.
She leaves out important facts and she’s sure that he’s done the same but she knows all about his magic and his war, and he knows all about the mythological creatures that really do exist.
Most days, that’s enough.
-
Secrets have always made her restless but the two of them lie like people who have armies of skeletons in their closet (except her closet is full of vampires and werewolves, while his is full of witches and wizards) and her stomach never feels quite right anymore.
Even the small lies have started to get to her.
You sure you okay? Nadine questions as Bella picks up her table’s order off the warmer.
Of course, just tired.
You always look tired, try getting a full night’s rest, sweetheart.
Can’t, she adds belatedly, I’m always here at night. She says it with a smile that Nadine takes lightly and she smiles back, rolling her eyes, and heading back out to her section with a plate of extra creamers.
She misses the days when the only scary thing in her closet was the Boogeyman.
-
Moments blur into months and weeks pass in a flurry of nothingness, but everything about them seems to stay the same and the causalities never seem to let them be.
Between them they have one set of parents, two long lost loves, and three best friends to weigh them down, and that’s not counting the millions of acquaintances that they feel bad for having forgotten (but have just the same).
She’s long since learned to stop expecting a change but his wounds are still fresh enough that he doesn’t know what to do without a hope to hold onto so he tries to keep his grasp tight.
She hopes that she’s still around when he finally lets go for good. He’s going to need someone to pick up the pieces.
-
Her night shifts at the diner mean that the share only a couple overlapping hours in bed together but they start every night on opposite sides of the bed, facing opposite sides of the room, with only their pillows touching. Sometimes he holds her hand when he thinks she’s sleeping and on those nights, she works extra hard to keep her breathing calm and steady as his thumb rubs slow circles on the back of her palm.
She always lets him keep up the charade, swallowing but staying quiet ,even when we she can feel the bed vibrate along with his quiet sobs, because that’s what they both need, the charade.
-
She doesn’t love him like she loved Edward or like she loved Jacob, both of them are long gone and they took those intense feelings with them, but she does know that she loves Harry, albeit in a very quiet sort-of different way.
She doesn’t tell him how she feels and he doesn’t tell her anything of the sort either, but the way he kisses her forehead when he leaves in the morning makes her thinks that maybe he doesn’t have to.
And that it makes it all that much harder.
-
She doesn’t believe in the word forever anymore and he doesn’t believe in making promises to anyone so they don’t talk about a future together, apart, or at all.
They live day by day and hold each other up on the days that it’s hard to stand alone.
And she enjoys it while she can because she knows years from now, he’ll have grown up and moved on without her, like everyone’s done since Edward pressed his lips to her throat and finally made good on his promise all those decades ago.