Rating: PG-13
Fandom:: Harry Potter
Pairings: Harry / Draco
Timeline: No idea
Spoilers: none
Keywords: Angst, Character Study
Summary: "I used to try and reach out to the stove when I was little..."
Disclaimer: All belongs to JKR, the bitch. *sigh*
Author's Note: Don't ask where this came from because in all honesty I have no idea.
It's not even my usual writing style! ;-)
Warning: You are now entering a beta-free zone. Someday I'll get around to getting this damn thing looked over by someone, but until that day I have no doubt that horrible errors are lurking in here somewhere.
I always used to try and reach out to the stove when I was little, fascinated by the dance of the flames, curious about their heat. My aunt would slap my hand back. Don't touch. Until the day she didn't, and I burned my finger tips.
I still remember her smirk. See? But I didn't see, not then and not now. My hands, which always seemed to be cold, still itched to move toward the flames, seeking...
He was a cold flame. Distant, but no less dangerous. And every look from my friends told me don't touch. But I did anyway, when they weren't there to slap my hand back with their mere presence.
And this touch burned me... worse than the stove ever could, because this burn never eases. I can feel it inside at all times. A warmth I've never had before, a life - scorching me, hollowing me out. The only relief comes when I can touch him again. He looked up when I touched him and behind the ice and cold in his eyes was more heat than I had ever known.
But he didn't look at me, he looked into me. He looked past the masks and the bravery, the house colors, and damning scars... He saw a person I hadn't known existed until he looked in and found him, half buried and smothered beneath the expectations of who I'm supposed to be... of who, until then, I thought I was. He looked in and his fire burned away the lies and half truths and set something inside me free.
When I see him, my hand goes out of it own accord, to touch, to sooth the burn and to feed it's flame. His eyes come to mine, and there... I find myself within his gaze, real as I can be nowhere else.
His name drops from my lips, a chocked whisper, a plea. His eyes close, hiding their truths from me, but a tear leaks free, a benediction in its own right - cleansing, freeing, healing, and saving.
Those eyes open again and he nods, ever so slightly. A promise only to me. My own head inclines in return, my own promise to him.
It's all that can be done here, where anyone could look, see, know... Even this much is dangerous in case someone does figure it out.
My hand drops from him and the burn begins a new, flaring in my breast. I turn away, not from him, but from myself. For within him is the only place I'm ever truly alive. I walk back through the halls and he is lost somewhere in the crowds behind me. But his fire burns ever hotter inside me and my only true reflection remains safe within him.
