Author's Notes: This little ditty was written for my wonderful beta, Marcia, in celebration of her birthday. It was inspired by the Keith Urban song, "I Can't Stop Loving You." No, it is not a song fic. And yes, I believe I am the only one in the fandom who connects KU to D/G. *shrugs shoulders* It is now a terribly belated birthday fic. Still, the thought and the love are there so Happy Belated Birthday and a Happy Valentine's Day as well, Marcia!
Many thanks to Black Alnair for the covert beta and to seegrim for the helpful behind-the-scenes consultation while Marcia wasn't looking. It was a blast pulling the wool over her unsuspecting eyes. Let's do it again sometime...
Broken
She is as still as death, wrapped in white cotton sheets with winter's tainted moonlight splashing over her figure, drenching her in its unnatural glow. He has seen death many times. Is this what she would look like? Would her crossing be a peaceful one, or would she lose herself in the netherworld without him?
He stands across the cramped room and turns away from her still silence to stare into the tumultuous void of night, remembering the final two years of the War when he lost himself among the darkened signposts, when he could no longer hear the calling of her voice or remember the resonance of her touch, when his heart lay dormant in his chest.
And it is night.
He had exploded out of the War a changed wizard, unable to recognize his reflection in the murky post-War world. Did his life have a purpose? He did not know and could not remember. He was lost in the echo of the War, in his inability to heal in the midst of a broken and confused wizarding world.
And it is night.
She had found him rotting inside a Muggle pub, drowning facedown in some concoction of Muggle toxins. He never asked her how she had found him nor did he remember their conversation or how he ended up going home with her. Can an inebriated heart find its way home?
And it is night.
He awoke to her touch, to the foreign feeling of her gentle kisses on his face and the tender stroking of her hand in his hair.
Touching... touching... touching... invading.
She had invaded his cloistered world with her uninvited touch. His open eyes were upon her. She saw him and stopped, flushing a bit before kissing him. Her arms closed around his unresponsive body, her face against his chest as she told him he was home.
An explosion of excruciating, life-giving pain ripped through him. He mumbled an incoherent response before turning over and away from her, taking the sheets with him and burying his face in the pillow. Perhaps the body had a memory as well as the mind.
Many minutes later, he stumbled out of bed and Apparated away. She wrapped her arms around his pillow and buried her face in its sacred softness, suffused with his scent and wet with his tears. Tears that had no special healing powers, but she had the power to heal him. Or did she?
And it is night.
She dogged him for three months, pushing him to the brink in her adamant refusal to let him go his way and she hers, to let them dissolve in the way realities dissolve, truths dissolve, people dissolve.
And it is night.
When he could not self-destruct in a bottle of Firewhiskey or Muggle toxins, when he could not shut her out of his life or brush off her affection, he surrendered to her greater power. He let her love him, and she took him home until her home became his home. He joined her Resistance and fought for her. She believed it was the way to a better wizarding world. He no longer believed in anything but her.
And night wanes.
He sighs and turns his pained eyes to her and the poisoned cocoon of warmth she has spun. When did he acquire this habit of losing himself? He lost himself in the War and now in her. How did she bewitch his world to fit her and only her? Things between them are out of control, and he is in trouble. He closes his eyes and places his forehead against the frozen glass pane.
As dawn breaks, he wonders if he is breaking.
She rises to find him sitting in the kitchen staring at his morning cup of tea. He stands and takes her suitcase. They stare at one another before heading out the door to Kings Cross Station. They don't speak. She's catching the first train out.
Is he breaking?
The blast of air from the trains whooshing past blows her skirt and her hair and his tenaciously strung heart. She reaches over to take her suitcase from his hand, tugging on it to release it from his reluctant grasp.
Is he breaking?
"Draco."
He can't hear what she's saying. He's gone deaf and dumb. As he watches her board the train, he wonders if he'll see her again, wonders what will become of him without her.
Yes, he is breaking.
He doesn't go back to drinking or to his Muggle pubs. Instead, he returns to the cool isolation of his flat, missing the cosy warmth of her home. When she doesn't return, he volunteers for the extra assignment, the one no one will take. And he continues fighting for her.
Broken.
A month later, he opens his eyes, squinting at the rush of sunlight piercing his skull and filling his world with its blinding brilliance. Her scent is in the air. Her voice fills the room.
Broken.
"I go away for a two-week assignment and come back to find him like this? No, absolutely not!" Ginny gets out of the chair beside her fallen wizard and marches up to Zacharias Smith, poking her finger into his chest, her furious face in his. "I don't care what the Healer says. He is NOT going on any more assignments with you. Do you hear me?"
"But Ginny, he's the one who..."
"No!" Her hands are on her hips. "I can't believe you let him volunteer in the first place. Shame on you. I turn my back for a second and you slit my throat."
"Ginny, Kingsley says..."
"No! I don't want to hear anything more. Are you bloody well deaf?" she yells, flushing a rosy red.
"No, we're not deaf, Gin," Draco mutters, a bit hoarse but with fully functioning tympanic membranes.
She spins around at the sound of his voice and stares at her newly conscious Slytherin. Her heart explodes at the sight of his open eyes on her. And Smith slips out the door, unnoticed.
"Draco!" she cries, rushing to him and throwing her arms around his neck, squeezing him until he feels dizzy. It's the most delicious dizzy he's ever felt. "I was so worried, you stupid, stupid wizard."
He shushes her and throws his aching arms around her, drawing her close to his warmth and the steady beating of his heart. When she begins to cry in relief, letting loose her pent up anxiety and fear, he holds her tighter. "Don't cry, Ginny."
She nods in the crook of his neck and continues crying despite his gentle admonishment. Many minutes later, she lifts her puffy eyes and tear-streaked face. "I'm never going away on assignment again. " He strokes her worried face, trying to ease her fears and take away the sleepless nights he has caused her. "You do crazy things when I'm away."
He nods. "I do."
"Since when did you develop a hero complex? Or were you contemplating suicide?" She laughs nervously, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.
When he doesn't respond to her, she peers into his eyes, watching his soul adrift and out to sea. "No, Draco," she whispers, the tip of her nose against his, panic in her voice. She collapses against him, holding her crazed wizard close and whispers into his ear, an edge of desperation falling into her words, "I'll never leave again, Draco. I promise. Never." She feels his arms crushing her until she can barely breathe.
And day has begun.
During the War, Draco lost his twisted sense of object permanence, misplaced it somewhere amidst all of his other lost belongings. But she is back, his beautiful northern star, and she is all he needs. Ginny cradles her broken wizard in her arms. She will hold his heart in hers and be his guiding light, taking them through the long day into night.
- Fin -
Author's Note: Thanks for reading. -fallenwitch
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