| Title: Broken Futures. (1/1) Author: Joyful ([email protected]) Feedback: Pretty, pretty please with sugar on top? *gets down to grovel on the gravel* Spoilers: GoF, near the end. Rating: R Disclaimer: JKR owns 'em, not I, I only own my very twisted mind, which nobody wants, so please don't sue. All you'll get is my dysfunctional laptop, a pair of figure skates, and a bill to repay my student loans. "Funeral Blues" belonged to Wystan Hugh Auden, before he died. Summary: Percy muses after GoF. Rather dark. Notes: For my awesome beta, Shala-Chan, and for Eggbert, though she doesn't know that she inspired me to write this. =D -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I once heard someone say that when it seems like you're trapped, and there's a light at the end of a tunnel, then it's probably a train. I thought that that person was such a pessimist, but now I know it's true. Everything was going so well. I was filling in for Mr. Crouch, though I hadn't a clue where he was, and everyone was believing me that I was carrying out his orders. I was judging the Triwizard Cup, which meant I was able to be there, and it looked like Cedric was going to win. I had thought it so funny when Cho Chang was chosen as the person Cedric would miss the most. Nobody would have ever believed that she was simply his best friend. In fact, if I hadn't known it myself, I would have thought they were a couple. We had planned it that way. Cedric and I had such wonderful plans. After he graduated this year we were going to come out to our families, and he was going to move in with me in he small flat I've just moved into in London. He was going to go to university to study journalism, and then, hopefully, get a job with the Daily Prophet. It was going to work out so well. And now, there is no hope. I have so many memories, but they aren't enough. I only have about a year and a half of memories when I should have so many in front of me. It was part-way through my last year at Hogwarts when Cedric and I revealed that we fancied each other. I can remember that first kiss as clearly as if I has just now broken it. He was a sixth year and a prefect, and as Head Boy, all the male prefects on campus reported to me once a week. I remember that when Bill was Head Boy, he told me, that he would schedule appointments to meet with each prefect one on one, and develop a relationship, so that they would be willing to come to him with problems. So I followed his advice and did the same. After a while Cedric and I were meeting almost every day. It was about a month before my graduation that we confessed our love to each other. Graduation was the most bittersweet experience of my life. I was ready to leave school and join the real world. I had a job lined up with the Ministry of Magic, and I couldn't wait to start it, especially considering how much we needed the money. But at the same time, it killed me to know I would have a whole year apart from the man I loved, before we could be together. I remember the night before graduation, that was the first time we ever made love, and it was the most beautiful experience in my life. Once I had my apparating license I was at his family's house almost every night. As soon as everyone was asleep, I'd go into his room. Even if all we did was kiss and cuddle, I was content. Then I got my own flat in Diagon Alley, and I couldn't wait for him to move in with me. I remember when he told his parents he was going to a friend's for a few days, and instead, came and stayed with me. It was over Christmas holiday, and it was the happiest four days of my life. To quote the muggle poet W. H. Auden, "He was my North, my South, my East and West, My working week and my Sunday rest, My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song: I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong." That was the poem he wrote when his lover died, "Funeral Blues," and never before have I ever read something that so perfectly expressed what I felt. Every line in that poem is me. So now I've learned that love doesn't last forever. It ends, much, much faster than it begins. You think you've finally found what you need to be happy, and then, the fates take it away from you again. My Cedric, my love, is gone. Dead, by the one creature I hope I never meet. Not for my sake, but for Voldemort's. Yes, I say his name now. If he has a name, he's easier to kill, and if I can, I will get my revenge. But not yet. In time. For now, I must sit, and wait, and mourn and cry. For now I sit here looking at the broken future that lays before me. It once held such promise, but without Cedric, I see no reason to even have a future. I am merely existing now, no longer living, until the day that I take my last breath, and am once again united with my world. I just pray that it isn't too long. +end+ [back to the HP archive] |