Title: Letters
Author: Morgana Soulfire
Author Email: morgana_soulfire@hotmail.com
Rating: PG, one naughty word, a brief one
Furniture: writing desk

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended

 

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Harry folded his hand around the quill again, wondering how to start. It never seemed to flow at first, like there was some kind of dam inside him. He pulled his finger and thumb along the centre of the dark red feather, tapping the gold nib on the heavy wood of his writing desk.

'Draco,' the letter began. He had written that over an hour ago. He dropped the quill in a sudden anger and impatience. Ink splattered slightly from the tip, staining the page and sitting on it unctuously, refusing to sink in. He was about to swear -- shout in anger, but he took his bottom lip between his teeth, sinking into the flesh until the pain filled his mouth with sweet saliva and his eyes with sweeter tears. A small whimpering growl escaped him
as he caught the page up in one hand, crushing it and hurling it at the wall, no longer caring if it went into the bin or not. He banged his head down on the table and hooked his arms heavily over the back of it, crushing his face into the sweet, woodstain smell of the desk.

The tears in his eyes overflowed, pooling on the desk without that satisfying tap. He was too close to it for that. Harry clenched his jaw tightly causing the bones under his ears to hurt and his teeth to squeak past each other. Why would no one trust him -- believe him -- when he told them that Draco hadn't totally gone? He told them that his lover would be
back. Harry had written a letter every week to him, telling him what happened, asking him where he was. Harry's friends let him post these letters, having given up on telling him that no one would receive them. He always shook his head.

"I know I have the address right," he would say. "This time, he'll get it."

When he didn't reply, Harry just said it was because thy had no paper where he was stationed, and that he couldn't risk giving away their position. Harry thought longingly about where Draco might be stationed for this war. His division had never come home completely, only a few of them. Harry had come back a long time ago. Everyone else had. The streets were war-torn, but the country and Ministry were too poor to replace them. Maybe they had won, but Harry knew that, until Draco came home, victory was bitter in his mouth.

They had had a party. A huge celebration of victory, and it was nice, but Harry spent the whole time gazing down the rubble-filled street, looking for that familiar figure, that slight lean to the right with that huge pack over his shoulder, the sun glinting on his white-blond hair, his army-issue trench coat blowing in the breeze. It never came. Sometimes it was like a mirage. Harry had put an upturned crate he found under the window, so that he could watch that trapezium of light at the end of the road. After a while, he could blink and it would still be there. Only when he blinked, Draco would be standing there too.

Harry wasn't stupid. He knew Draco wasn't here. But he would come back. Hermione and Ron, although they had pretended to be happy for he and Draco at first, were trying to tear him away, saying that Draco was dead. What a stupid thing to say. They just wanted him, Harry, back to themselves. They were jealous. Jealousy had stolen their minds and made them twisted demons, bent on destroying Harry's soul and his never-faltering devotion to Draco. He could see past their sweet-faced platitudes. "Oh Harry, why don't you just leave it? Come on, please?", "Harry, he isn't coming back." They were bitter, filled with hate for Draco because of some stupid childhood game. This wasn't a game anymore!

Harry lifted his head up, massaging life back into his cheek where it had been pressed against his desk. On the wall behind it were hundreds of photographs -- some Muggle, some normal. Draco waved to him from every single one. Harry was in some of them -- the earlier ones that Hermione and Ron had taken. Hermione and Ron -- there were different coloured patches on the walls where the paint hadn't faded, protected by photos. Now it was
revealed to the light where the pictures had been torn down.

Draco,

It's dark here already. I don't know what the weather's like where you are.
I hope it's sunny and warm for you. You look so beautiful when you tan. It
was raining earlier today, and I thought of that time when we were running
to the docks, waiting for your father. The streets are damp now, and the
sun's made the air smell all dusty. The roads have been destroyed -- broken
down for something or other. You'd be so angry. They destroyed the place.
Your father sent a letter to say that the railings around the Manor have
been taken, but that was a while ago.

I wish I could see you. I miss you so much. When are you coming home? I know
I always ask you that, but I need to know. I can't live without you. They're
all dead against me. They want me to think that you aren't coming back. I
know you are. I know you are.

But why are you still there? It's almost a year since the war ended. Why
can't they send you home to me now? What could possibly be keeping you
there? Oh Gods, it sounds like I doubt you now. Please don't take it that
way. I'm not angry with you. I just need you here with me.

Your mother recovered from her flu, you'll be glad to hear. Severus is
alright, too, but he had to have Muggle surgery to help him. Albus died the
other day, but he was old. I guess maybe the war was all he was living for.

Tell me you'll come home this time,

Endless love, unconditional and true,

Harry.

He kissed the paper, folding it and wiping the tears away with the back of his sleeve. He scrawled an X on the back of the page, rolling it up and tying a gold ribbon around it. Back when Draco had been able to reply, he had tied silver around them, and written an O on the back. Every morning, Harry would lay in bed and watch the ceiling as it went from grey to white to goldish and dirty, waiting for the tap of an owl's claw on the window.

It didn't come.

He slipped the letter into his pocket, slinging his coat around his shoulders and picking up his keys, locking the door of his flat behind him. Harry walked out into the street, relying on the spot of light from his wand to guide him down the streets. He entered the owl shed at the end of the road. A few were still there, so he chose the most robust looking one.

"Find Draco Malfoy for me. Give this to him," he told the owl, tying the letter around its foot. The bird launched itself out of a window when he was done, and Harry watched it swoop out over the docks, following the path of the moonlight south across the water.

He walked home more slowly, unburdened by the urgency of his previous journey. He stuffed his hands in his pockets, looking up at the sky over London. Why had he come here, of all places? Because Draco knew it. They had come here together, to wait for Lucius to come home, almost three years ago now. That would make it ... two and a half years since he had last seen Draco. Some nasty crawling part of his mind pushed the thought that what Hermione and Ron said might be true, but Harry shook his head to himself.

"He's coming home. I know he is."

Harry's words echoed feebly off the buildings around him, twisting into the scummy water lining the gutter. He kicked at a stone.

"Stop talking back at me!" he shouted. The echo was stronger this time. "Stop taking the piss out of me! You're just like the rest! I'm the only one here in the world who trusts you, who believes in you, and you throw it in my face without even bothering to write to me..."

He fell to his knees in the dirty drainwater, burying his face in his hands and crying, screaming furious tears that burned his eyelids and coursed streaks of fire down his face.

"Maybe they're right," he called. "Maybe I was wrong to think you'd come back. Maybe you are dead. I won't write to you anymore, seeing as you don't care what I think or do."

Unable to address all this in one, Harry collapsed forwards into the murky water, drifting into a sleep of sheer emotional exhaustion.


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Harry, my dearest love,

I'm so sorry that I couldn't get back to you. Your letters are the only
thing that have kept me going, although I think I lost some weeks. I miss
you so much that it hurts, but what hurts more is that everyone gave up on
me. So it's been a long time. Wars are like that. They told me I had a coma.
That's all I know. I woke up to find about a hundred letters beside my bed,
and I read them all. There's nothing better in the world to wake up to,
Harry, than your face, but this was a close second, I swear.

I'm coming home, Harry. I'm coming back to you. I don't know how long it'll
be, but they said that we're coming home for sure. I knew you'd never give
up on me, Harry. I knew you'd wait for me until I came home. I would never
die knowing that you still loved me. I couldn't do that to you, because I
couldn't hurt you like that.

Wait for me, please, God, wait for me.

Yours, forever and true, you're the only thing that keeps me going. Death
would never part me from you. My love for you is stronger than that.

Draco.

Harry wrapped the silver ribbon around his trembling fingers, breathing in the muddy scent of the paper and the faint lingering trace of Draco that clung to it. He clutched the short letter to his chest, unable to cry. 

"I told you," he breathed, half to himself, half to the world. "I told you."

He took his coat and flung it around his shoulders, reading the letter over and over whilst he did so. He held it tight and pressed it to his lips, running to the door and slamming it behind him. Harry ran down the stairs and out into the street, walking fast, stumbling a few paces, jogging a bit, then walking again, trying to get his arm into his sleeve.

Suspended slightly over the horizon by the shimmering of the summer sun, was a silhouette. A tall figure, leaning slightly to the right with that huge pack over his shoulder, coat billowing in the wind. Harry dropped his coat, running as hard as he could. The figure threw the pack to the ground, getting closer and closer until Harry could see the sun glinting off his white- blond hair. A shimmering well of emotion erupted inside Harry as he crashed into Draco, his arms holding his lover tight against him and his lips desperately seeking Draco's. Harry's tears melted the grime on Draco's face as they clung to one another, breathing hard, laughing and crying at the same time.

"Oh God I missed you," Draco breathed, burying his face in Harry's shoulder and digging his fingers into his back. "I love you, I love you..."

Harry clung to him, throat aching with tears and joy, salty water pouring down his face. He tried to say that he never gave up, but the words wouldn't come out. He was about to say 'I thought you weren't coming', when Draco croaked something.

"You never gave up on me," Draco smiled tearfully, pulling back to look at
Harry's face. "You knew I was coming back."

"I almost lost hope," Harry faltered, wiping his face. "I told myself that you weren't coming back, because it hurt so much not to hear from you when you were alive."

Draco gazed at Harry as a fresh wave of tears, filled with shame and remorse, overtook the boy. He leaned forwards and kissed the tears from Harry's eyes.

"It's over now. I didn't think I would be back either. I'm here now. We're here. I'm never going anywhere ever, ever again."

~Fin~
 

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