#missing moments fic

[ashotofogdensoldfirewhiskey]

Can you please write a fic for the prompt “late night chats”?

The sound of Ron’s footsteps treading up the stairs to the dormitory slowly fades, and they’re finally alone in the Common Room. 

Ginny makes a show of checking to make sure the coast is clear, and then she burrows happily into Harry’s side, snuggling deeper into the squashy sofa by the fire. His arm snakes around her waist to pull her in closer. They should probably go to bed, too, but it seems wasteful not to eke out every moment she can, to wring this weekend completely dry of moments with him. 

“Thought he’d never leave,” Ginny says with a sly grin. “I was ready to sit on your lap just so he’d get the hint.”

“Were you?” Harry says with interest. Then, he turns his head toward the stairs, and calls, “Ron?” as though to summon him back. 

Ginny snorts and pokes him in the side, and he turns that devastating smirk back at her - flashing green eyes, crooked lips, the hint of a dimple - the one that’s had her slowly losing her mind for months. 

She still can’t quite believe she’s allowed to kiss the smirk off his lips, now. She does, just to prove it’s real. 

Every moment alone they’ve stolen has taken on this oxymoronic tone: bodily tangible, like she can reach out and grasp their growing tangle of feelings as easily as a Quaffle, but wholly surreal, like they’re some elaborate daydream snatched from her subconscious. Both, and neither. 

She pulls back and smiles at him, and he does too, something wry creeping into their expressions, something that seems to say, we’re nauseating but I can’t help it. 

He’s made her so quickly greedy for more, the git. It’s been two days of kissing and banter and touches, overwhelming and not enough. 

“Tell me something,” she says, suddenly, “that you haven’t told anyone before.”

His eyebrows raise slightly in surprise, and Ginny’s plunged immediately into the vulnerability of her question, the implication of it. I want to be closer, she’s asking, do you? But, she’s not in Gryffindor for nothing, and so she holds his gaze and withstands his onslaught of silence. 

“Hm,” he says, looking thoughtful. “About what?”

“Anything,” she shrugs. “Whatever.”

Harry furrows his brow, stares ahead into the middle distance, and Ginny holds her breath, waiting to find out whether he’ll hand her a key or if she’ll have to keep knocking, knowing already she’s succumbed to knocking at his door until her knuckles bruise. 

“I dunno if my dad was a good person,” Harry says without preamble. 

Ginny doesn’t know what she’d expected him to tell her, but it hadn’t been that. “What makes you say that?”

He stares at his knees and explains about the Occlumency lessons with Snape. The memory he was never supposed to see. His father, every bit the bully Snape had always claimed. 

“--that’s why I wanted to talk to Sirius, last year,” Harry admits. “When you helped distract Umbridge. Stupid, I know–”

“It’s not stupid,” Ginny says fiercely. She feels the weight of it, what he’s told her. Wondering about someone who isn’t around to ask. Grieving someone and the idea of them at once. “What did Sirius say?”

“He said he grew out of it,” Harry says, though his tone says loud and clear that this explanation hadn’t been satisfactory to him. “But, I dunno. Means he was still a git before, doesn't it?”

“Maybe,” Ginny agrees. “Or maybe that was his worst moment.”

“Pretty shit moment.”

“Yeah,” Ginny admits, leaning her head on her hand, propped up on the back of the sofa so that she’s turned to face him. “Pretty shit. But I’d hate it if my future children only got to see me… oh, I dunno. Hex Zacharias Smith. Or slip that itching powder into Romilda Vane’s pumpkin juice.”

Harry shoots her a look. “When did you do that?”

“She tried to give you a love potion and got my brother poisoned, Harry.”

Harry snorts. “Remind me not to get on your bad side.”

“Well, that’s what I mean. We’ve all had shit moments that’d look terrible without proper context. My future children wouldn’t have any idea what Romilda had done to get on my bad side, would they?”

“I suppose,” Harry says, though he still sounds unconvinced. “But I don’t reckon there’s any context that’d make him look much better. I’m not saying Snape was a saint, I’m sure he gave as good as he got. But it… my dad was humiliating him. On purpose.”

“Mm,” Ginny hums slowly, mulling it over. “Do you reckon Sirius was right? That he did grow out of it?”

Harry swipes a hand through his messy hair. “He must’ve. My mum married him. Sirius and Lupin said he was better. But, I dunno. Maybe he did. I’ll never know, anyway.”

Ginny reckons that’s the real problem - the never knowing. Forgiveness is a difficult thing to offer when the person isn’t around to ask for or receive it. 

“I wish,” she says wistfully, “you’d got to see more. People can’t be all bad, I don’t think. I’m sure Sirius and Lupin have hundreds of memories that you would’ve liked him in. Makes it easier not to like him in that one.”

Harry’s lips part, and then he nods. “Yeah. Me too.”

She’s still thinking about it when Harry shocks her. “What about you, then?”

“Hmm?” she asks, confused. 

Harry jerks his head at her and nudges her knee with his own. “Your turn. Something you’ve never said to anyone.”

Ginny meets his eye, the warmth billowing through her chest like a cloud of candyfloss. He wants to know her, too. The thought - I like you more than I’ve ever liked anyone - threatens to spill from her lips, but she holds her tongue, wanting to offer him something of equal weight. 

“I use the bathroom on the second floor whenever I can,” she says, knowing he’ll understand which one she means. “Just to prove I’m not bothered by it. Only, it does bother me. Maybe that’s why I keep using it.”

He looks stricken. “Do you still think about it a lot? The Chamber?”

Ginny shrugs, perhaps a bit more nonchalant than she actually feels. “A bit. Still get nightmares sometimes, but not as often as I used to.”

“Yeah,” he says, and she’s struck for a moment by the fact that they might be haunted by the same ghost. “Me, too.”

She shoots him a commiserating look, and continues. “But it’s not about… about Riddle, really. I mean, it is. But it’s more about… me.”

“What do you mean?” His stare is so piercing, like he’s trying to see straight through to her soul. She imagines he can. 

“I dunno. It was awful, obviously, what happened. But when I think back on it, what actually bothers me…” she chews on her words, trying to articulate the vague shame that always clings to these memories, “is that I was so stupid.”

“What?” Harry says sharply. “You were eleven. That diary… it’s… you weren’t stupid.” His words are so firm that it steals her breath. “That was a powerful bit of Dark Magic, you couldn’t have done anything.”

“No, I know that. Logically, I know that. But, I dunno. I wrote so many pathetic things in that diary.” She tries to laugh, but it comes out a bit scratchy. “I was so lonely, after Ron left for school. So desperate to go off to Hogwarts and have mad adventures and play Quidditch and… meet you.” She stares down at her hands, the embarrassment threatening to overwhelm her. “I just hate that he knows all that, that I was this pathetic, desperate little girl–”

“He doesn’t,” Harry says. “The version of him you wrote to is gone. The real one doesn’t know any of it.”

“Oh,” she replies, coming up short. “How do you…? Well, never mind, you haven’t got to answer that, I suppose–”

“It’s not that I don’t want to–”

“No, I know,” Ginny says quickly, unable to bear some platitude, not from him, “Really, you haven’t–”

“Whatever you wrote in that diary died with it,” Harry says firmly. “I promise.”

Ginny nods, and lets the words sink in. Ever since Riddle had come back, she’d wondered whether pathetic little Ginny Weasley was somewhere in the back of his mind. Weak. Stupid. An easy target, close to Harry. The relief that she might just be anyone – no one, even – to this version of Riddle, is palpable. 

“Thanks,” Ginny breathes. “That makes me feel a bit… better.”

“You weren’t pathetic,” Harry says, like the thought is so absurd he’d never considered she might feel that way. “It’s quite impressive you managed to resist it for so long, actually.”

Everything that had happened with that diary has been so tinted with shame, with weakness, that Harry might consider her brave for it… it feels so antithetical to everything she’d ever thought, she nearly laughs. 

“Right,” Ginny says, deflecting away with a joke. “I’m sure all those roosters thought I was very impressive.”

To his credit, Harry doesn’t laugh. “That wasn’t you. It was him.”

Easy to say, harder to feel. “The Department of Mysteries wasn’t you, either.”

Harry stares at her, and she holds his gaze unwaveringly. She can see she’s made her point, can read in the pull of his brow that Harry understands exactly the weight of a guilt so heavy that words can’t lighten it. Just as plainly, though, she can see that he hates that she’s carrying it at all. 

Fair enough, really. She hates that he is, too. 

She breaks eye contact and nestles back into his side. She lifts up his hand with hers, plays absently with his fingers. “Why haven’t you ever told Ron and Hermione about your dad?”

He considers for a long moment, letting her play with his hand and pulling her in closer with the other. “Dunno, really. Just felt… defensive, I suppose. Like whatever they’d said, it would’ve bothered me.”

“I get that.” She winces. “Did I upset you?”

“No,” Harry says quickly. “It’s not like that, with you.”

The words melt in her heart like honey, covering everything in sweet, sticky warmth. She ceases her mindless fiddling with his fingers and looks up at him, knowing her face must be an open book, knowing it must be apparent that he’s got her whole honey-coated heart in his hands. “It’s not like that with you, either.”

He stares back at her, deep into her eyes, and for the first time it occurs to her to check her own palm for his.

He leans down and kisses her deeply, and she pulls herself up and snakes her arms around his neck. This thing has always been irritatingly there, for Ginny - the way she can read exactly what he’s thinking without even trying, the way she trusts him absolutely, the way he makes her heart skitter like she’s in a free fall. 

It’d never honestly occurred to her how powerful it would be to have it reciprocated. To have him understand what she’s saying so completely, to have him offer her something vulnerable just because she asked, to feel his heart hammering against her own. 

It’s been two bloody days, and yet she’s slipped past the point of no return with him already. Perhaps she’d started there. 

She pulls back from the kiss, feeling breathless. Harry looks a bit winded, himself. 

“We should probably go to bed,” he mutters, eyes still locked with hers. 

They should, probably. 

And they will. Eventually.

[mo-online]

TSC 2 IS CALLED THE GOLDEN RAVEN AND JEAN'S BIRTHDAY IS 11/9 TO MIRROR NEIL'S 1/19 BECAUSE THEY'RE CONNECTED EVERYBODY SHUT THE FUCK UP I CAN'T HANDLE THIS AT 3 AM

[the-torchwood-archive]

Jack and Ianto and the coat thing.

I adore the progression of this. From season one, where he's handing Jack his coat or carrying in on his behalf, to season two, where he's the one dressing him. There's an intimacy to it, a familiarity. Using his hands to turn Jack into the Captain. Stepping into a role and ingraining himself in the fantasy.

It also evolves throughout season two. The slight struggle as Jack turns into it in Reset, the fluidity with which Ianto settles it against his shoulders in Stolen Earth.

The coat is such an important part of Jack’s identity, of the standards he has set for himself. It speaks volumes that he’s embraced Ianto into the ritual, into the upkeep of the image.

[wesstars]

touch

jenna ortega x fem!reader (no pronouns)

summary: jenna, your lovely girlfriend, has been away filming for far too long, in your opinion. she thinks so, too. wc: 2.6k tags: explicit, MINORS DNI. all characters are 18+. phone sex, masturbation, bad dirty talk lmao, this is basically all bad dirty talk, light D/s dynamics, name calling/slight degradation, praise, reader is a soft dom, strap-on referred to as “cock,” horribly excessive use of italics, feels a bit odd writing rpf… a/n: @crazyoffher :) returning the favor!

masterlist

6:01 pm

call u in a sec?

A grin lighting up your face at the text, you hurriedly type an affirmative reply as you unlock your apartment door. Dropping your bag, you kick your shoes off, sighing as you shed your coat. Making a beeline for your bedroom, your eyes slide shut as you flop down on your gigantic bed. You’d washed the sheets earlier, and they were feeling extra soft. If Jenna were here, she’d be rolling around in them, covering her own scent with one of fresh linen.

Usually, she was—you were lounging in your shared apartment, a wide open space near the top of a sleek, tall building. Every evening in LA, the two of you could be found here, the appeal of a night in far exceeding that of a night out. A bottle of wine and a packet of popcorn to share wasn’t rare either, the expensive drink wasted on you two young lovers. 

Everything had happened so quickly, but you loved it. A chance meeting on a plane had led to a long conversation about anything and everything, so common for new couples, and one-drink dates across busy nights had culminated into a fateful party invitation and an equally fateful blushing confession. Your relationship was wild, and crazy, and everything you could’ve wanted. A year later, Jenna had surprised you with a set of keys. It was a certain kind of promise that made those long nights, waiting for a phone call from half a world away, so worth it.

As if on cue, your phone buzzes in your pocket. Seeing the ID, you instantly pick up.

“Jenna?”

“Hey,” her familiar voice comes shyly through the speaker, a comforting sound. “Are you busy?”

“No, I just got home from work.”

Jenna hums in a way that tells you she’s plotting something, and her little stifled giggle just confirms your suspicions. You fake a sigh, happy to venture into her ploy.

“Jenna, did you have something to drink?”

“No.” She huffs a laugh. “I just miss you. Tired of me already?” She asks, with innocent veneer.

“Of course not,” you say. “It’s good to hear from you, you're so busy now, I had to talk to your secretary,” you teased. She was busy, but you’d already done the calculation of Jenna’s timezone to yours—for her, filming would’ve just wrapped up in the midnight hours. For you, the setting sun was just beginning to stream through the glass walls, and you pressed the button on the nightstand to draw the curtains.

“Well, if you’re not busy,” Jenna presses on casually, “I miss you.”

“I miss you too, Jenna,” you smile. It was a dialogue you two had often, something you never tired of. 

“Mmm,” Jenna’s voice tugs in your stomach, lilting into a whine at the end of her emission, “I miss you, baby.”

Your mouth goes dry; it’s an automatic reaction. Damnit, this girl—she knew what kind of effect she had on you. You were glad the room was dark, because if you had to face your own blushing cheeks in the light, you might’ve just collapsed. You pull the phone away from your ear long enough to take a deep breath. “Do you, Jen?” Keeping your voice composed, you roll the end of the duvet between your fingers to keep you grounded.

“Miss you so much,” she says, the rustling in the background telling you she’s rolling on the covers. She lets out a lilting laugh, the sound sending a swooping, giddy feeling into your stomach. Jenna’s trying to lure you in; it was her game: enticing you with that docile, persuasive tone.

You decided to play, though you held back just a bit. “How much?”

“Some of your clothes still smell like you,” she says in lieu of a direct answer. “So I’m wearing your big shirt, the black one.” You’d been wondering where that shirt went, one you often slept in. Even now, you can see in your head how Jenna looked when she stole that shirt: it cut off at her thighs, the kind of sacrilegious short that inspired crimes. It reminds you of countless times she’d surprised you, when you slid your hands up under the hem to find—

“What else, Jen?”

“No bra,” she replies sweetly, laughing lightly at the end. 

“No bra, huh,” you repeat. You can practically feel your pupils dilating, the heat around your collar. “Good.”

“And this,” Jenna sighs, “lace number I got here; it looks like the one you gave me last year.” 

Your jaw clenches, and you glance at the clock, looking but not seeing. You remember what she’s talking about—a pair of panties, an expensive little excuse for fabric that grew dark at the slightest moisture. Jenna’s birthday had ended in a long, long night.

“It’s red,” she says, “just like my nails.”

Fuck. Everything feels hot, and you can just picture her in that standard issue trailer, lights dimmed, alone in a way that should be illegal. “How much time do you have?”

“Not a lot… got an early morning tomorrow.” There's a trailing edge of disappointment in her voice, but you’re familiar with her—she’s looking, hoping for you to guide her, to push her in the way only you know how.

You breathe in, deeply, your own desire quickly falling prey to Jenna’s. She had you wrapped around her little finger, that’s for sure, but she trusted you to hold her down. “Hand in your hair, Jenna. Gentle,” you instruct.

You hear her sharp inhale, but you have no question that she’ll listen. When Jenna gets like this, playful but pliant, you know she’s willing to go with just about anything you ask. It’s torture for you, each second you wait. “Now pull.”

Her responding whimper sends a bolt of heat down your neck, and you let out a silent breath. Jenna loved it when you would touch her hair, even when it was as innocent as just braiding it. The haze in her eyes when you’d tug on her locks, telling her how good she feels, was your favorite. “Harder. Do you like it?”

She breathes out, “yeah.”

“Good,” you say. “Tell me what’s been on your mind to get you eager like this.” She’s shy, you hear it in her sigh, even though her hands are still running in her hair. “C’mon.”

“I miss your mouth on my neck.” The words tumble out of her almost immediately, and you dare to wonder if that’s been on her mind all day. The bruises you’d left there before filming started were long gone, no doubt. She’d begged you to make them darker, and you were all too happy to please. “I miss the car, before the airport…”

Those frantic, heated ten minutes you two were able to spare in the car before Jenna’s flight were chastised by her manager and makeup team, but you wouldn’t have traded them for anything. “That’s perfect Jen,” you coax gently. She liked your encouragement, you knew. 

“And…” it’s as if something snaps in the air on the telephone line, pushing both you and Jenna’s inhibitions to the ground. “I wish you were here,” she whispers, the cliche line sending equally cliche butterflies rushing through your lower stomach. “I’d be on my knees for your cock right now, and you’d pull my hair, so I’d-” she whines, a small and breathless noise-“suck it so good ‘cause I know where it’s going next—”

“Fingers in your mouth,” you interrupt, blood rushing in your ears. “And listen to me.” If you’d let Jenna keep going, you might’ve just booked a plane ticket right then and there. You can hear her obey you through the speaker, moaning softly. “Play with your nipples under your shirt. Be gentle.” It’s a warning, you know she knows, and a reminder that you control her pace.

“Mmm,” she hums, complying. It’s practically confession on bended knee, how her muffled whimper makes something shoot through your lower stomach.

“Press down on your tongue.” You hear her breath shaking, right in your ear. It makes you bite your tongue to keep from moaning out loud. “Don’t gag, don’t be greedy, Jenna.” She whines around her fingers, and you know her telltale little cry as she touches herself as instructed. You can hear that she’s not being as gentle as you wanted, but you had always been weak for your girl.

“You wanna put on a show for me, honey? Twist.” You wouldn’t know it, but Jenna instantly closes her eyes at the word show, her pulse spiking.

Jenna’s uneven breaths are pure song to you through the speaker, and it puts your every nerve on edge, remembering how she would sprawl on your sheets, just like how you were now, happy to be over or under you. She’s so vocal tonight, every exhale coming out with a small oh, and it makes you wonder if it’s because of something more than just the distance and time between you two.

The cadence of her breathing matches your stuttering heart. “For someone that likes having her mouth stuffed,” you mutter, “you sure wanna talk real bad.”

The whimper Jenna lets out is enough of an answer.

“Alright babydoll, you can take your fingers out.” Almost immediately, you can hear her panting. You keep your voice even, despite the heat on your cheeks. “I bet you’re soaked, aren’t you?”

Her voice is raspy when she speaks. “I am…”

“Two fingers in your cunt.”

“What about-” you can hear her swallow- “what about my underwear?”

“Push it to the side,” you say, dismissive. You could practically see Jenna like this, warm brown hair splayed on the pillows, shirt rucked up to her breasts, with enough want to end a war.

It’s silent on the other side of the line, save for the shallow breaths you hear her taking. “Are you waiting, good girl?”

She hums an affirmative. 

“Go ahead, I won’t make you beg right now,” you say with a nonchalance you absolutely do not have, “fuck yourself.”

Her breathy laugh in response would drive a saint to sin, and she’s only all too eager to comply. Jenna’s shudder comes out in her moan as she shoves two fingers in herself, shameless in her need.

You close your eyes, her quiet little moan telling you all you need to know. The impatient groan she gives you is just vulnerable enough to be desperate, and it makes your head swim.

Jenna’s voice is small. “You know…”

“What is it, darling?”

“Wish I could put this on a camera for you, baby,” she whines, breath hitching. “Wish you could watch me right now.”

The mere thought of it is enough to have you biting your lip, hard enough to bleed. With the way that Jenna loved to perform, the idea had occurred to you before, but you were always too hesitant to bring it up. “You want me to see you, don’t you? Blushing and wanting all by yourself,” you mock, your arousal overriding your rationality, “you need someone to fuck you, is that it?”

“I need you to fuck me, fuck me so hard that I don’t remember it all, and,” her voice breaks, “you’ll make me watch our video later, to make me like this again.” You close your eyes again, your knuckles growing white around the sheets fisted in your hand. 

“Like what, Jenna?”

“Messy, and-” her voice climbs higher with a gasp-“needy.”

The words cling in your mind, ivy on a terrace. It only takes half a moment for your mind to conjure her up again, flushed cheeks and two fingers deep in her pussy, framed by red lace.

“Is that what you are, mmm?”

She gives a moan, and you laugh because she’s embarrassed. It’s nearly pathetic, how bad you wish you could see Jenna’s face.

“Want…” There’s a hesitant pause. “Want your hand around my throat, too.”

God, no one knew how to play you quite like Jenna did. “Jenna,” you groan, your facade rapidly crumbling, “you’d look so pretty like that, baby.”

“Yeah,” Jenna agrees mindlessly, “I like it ‘cause…” her voice is strained in a way that you just know she has her head thrown back, strong and delicate, “you’re so gentle.” It’s with a bleeding intimacy that momentarily makes you forget you’re thousands of miles away from Jenna, and the only thing you can think of is her warm eyes on yours, just begging for you to touch her.

She quiets down, and in the damning silence that follows, you hear her fucking herself. And because you know your girl, you know she wants you to hear.

“That’s filthy, Jen,” you say, matter-of-factly. It makes your head spin, the knot in your stomach tightening.

“I know,” she whines, and you can hear her going just that bit faster. “Fuck-” she exhales sharply- “I’m—I’m close.”

“Already?”

“I’m sorry,” Jenna whispers, and you know with every hitched moan, she’s hitting that spot inside of her. She’s not sorry, and you certainly aren’t either. “I can’t help it…”

You hum noncommittally, feeling anything but. “Don’t come until I say, alright?”

Jenna moans right into the receiver, and you can tell she’s frustrated to high hell. You laugh lowly, something cruel, and it only serves to fuel the way your fingers crave the smooth of her skin, how your tongue wants for her taste.

But that’s when you hear it, blazing through the fog in your mind, of brown eyes and pink lips. “Please…”

“Please what?”

She falters, breathing ragged. “Please let me…” A beat.

“Let you…?” You press on. 

“Please,” her voice edges on the right side of desperate, the side that makes all of you pulse. “Baby, I’m so close…”

“I know,” you say simply. 

There’s a silence that hangs in the air, and you know without seeing that Jenna’s cheeks are so red with her embarrassment that you could’ve slapped her and not gotten that same glow. You wait, patiently, nails biting into your skin.

“Let me come, please.” Her voice comes out like a quiet sob, resistance broken by her desire.

Letting out a long breath, you press the phone harder to your ear, feeling your fingers tremble. “You’re such a needy slut, Jenna.” She whines again, pleading and keening.

“I know,” she’s soft with it, “I am… so, please?”

You bite your lip, mind swimming, letting her plea hang in the air. 

“Come for me, Jenna.”

It's quiet, at first, and then you hear it—a soft, little ah from where she’s clapped a hand over her mouth, and then muffled moans spilling out from behind as she tries so desperately to not let anyone else hear. You clench your jaw, wanting so bad to tear Jenna’s hand from her mouth just so you can take in every little whimper, quiet her with your mouth instead. But you whisper praises into the phone instead, coaxing her through her orgasm. She comes hard, you can hear it in the way she pants after she’s calmed down.

Jenna’s breathing evens out, and you know it before she does—she’s asleep. Your eyes close again, fist clenched in your bedsheets. It wasn’t the first time that she’d fallen asleep right after she came, and it makes a soft little grin play on your lips. The other end of the line is a loving, sated silence. You keep your voice low, not wanting to wake her.

“God, the things I’m gonna do to you, Jenna.”

--

please do not repost, reproduce, copy, translate, or take from my work in any way. thank you!

masterlist

[dukeofthomas]

"Jason just needs to see things from his family's perspective and understand how much they love him (despite them never actually communicating or showing him through their actions)" is out. "The batfamily putting a single bit of effort into understanding Jason and reconciling with him on his own terms" is in.

[loveinhawkins]

Eddie lingers by the Lite-Brite, while Robin and Nancy thunder downstairs in search of the bikes; Steve can hear the echo of their voices as they go, Robin insisting that she get, “—the coolest looking bike, Nance, that’s only fair considering your goddamn outfit nearly strangled me,” followed by Nancy’s answering laughter.

Eddie doesn’t look like he’s heard them at all. Looks like he’s in a world of his own, actually.

His fingers trail through the air, creating a path of golden shimmers. His eyes are wide, entranced, and he suddenly looks so peaceful that the sight actually threatens to choke Steve up.

Maybe it’s a small thing compared to everything else. But Steve thinks it’s monumental: how despite every horror that he’s witnessed, despite everything, Eddie’s still reaching for the light.

The thought is familiar, a reminder of how he’d felt just minutes before, hearing Dustin and Erica’s triumphant giggles—hope and affection catching in his throat.

He’d almost forgotten that all of this could be fun, too.

Eddie’s fingers keep weaving—he doubles back on himself several times, like he’s trying to draw the light into his palm. There’s no discernible pattern to his movements, no half-formed words Steve can make out—he only sees Eddie’s complete and utter contentment in doing nothing but this: just drinking the moment in.

It makes Steve think of how he used to consider the Fourth of July as a kid. Before the big fireworks show, when it felt like time had slowed, like the whole world had narrowed down to just him and a dazzling sparkler in his hand.

Steve watches on, leaning against the doorframe; he wants—suddenly, desperately—to give Eddie all the time in the world.

But he has to settle for counting out increasingly long seconds in his head. Then he suppresses a sigh, gives a gentle tap, tap along the wall.

“Eddie,” Steve says softly. Then, when Eddie still hasn’t heard, just a touch louder: “Eddie.”

Eddie startles, blinking rapidly. His eyes refocus, land on Steve—but a slightly dreamy, captivated quality remains, as if he’s still seeing an afterimage of the lights.

“Oh,” he says, sounds almost sheepish.

“Hey,” Steve says, smiling. “You doing good over there? You look like you found proof that, like, Santa’s real or something.”

Eddie chuckles under his breath, but he doesn’t reply.

His hand returns to that spot again, dipping in and out of the light like he’s sat by a creek, fingers dragging through the water.

“Y’know,” Eddie begins, so quietly. Achingly wistful. “If it was all like this… I wouldn’t mind it.”

The feeling hits, tugs on Steve’s breastbone. It doesn’t hurt.

He keeps looking at Eddie, at the flickers of gold reflected in his pupils, and he silences the part of himself that insists he shouldn’t have time for this, and just thinks it anyway.

You’re beautiful, Eddie Munson.

That’s all. Nothing else, no qualifications.

Maybe here, things can be simple. Just this once.

Eddie drops his hand. The light fades away, but he’s staring at Steve, like something else has inexplicably been lit up right in front of him.

“What?” Steve says.

“Nothing,” Eddie says, almost a whisper. “Sometimes I just. I just think. You, um—you look at me like…”

Slowly, slowly, Steve steps further into the room.

“Like what?”

Another step.

Eddie shakes his head. “Nothing,” he says. Adds nonsensically, “Must’ve been a trick of the light.”

“I don’t think so,” Steve says.

He reaches out a hand. Feels the warmth beneath his palm.

Eddie lifts his hand, so hesitantly. He edges ever closer, until the shimmery trails from their fingertips begin to merge into one.

Until their hands intertwine.

For a moment, Eddie stands frozen, and Steve’s ready to draw back.

But then Eddie inhales. He’s not looking at the lights, not anymore.

He’s looking at me, Steve thinks.

Perhaps has been for a while.

“Yes?” Eddie murmurs, lips barely moving.

“Yes,” Steve says.

He leans in.

The kiss is a small thing, really. Warm, tentative touches—a stumble before finding each other in the dark.

Such a small thing.

But to Steve, it’s monumental.

He feels it in his chest, like a tidal wave, and as he brings a hand up to cradle the side of Eddie’s face, he thinks that the lights are somehow in his chest too, like they’re both swallowing flecks of gold until they’re glowing with it, until the beams’ll shoot out of their fingers, their toes, the ends of their hair.

And here, in this house that’s frozen in time, it somehow feels like they’re stealing more of it, precious seconds, minutes—hell, give me hours, Steve thinks euphorically, give me years—

“Steve!” calls Robin’s voice distantly, and they both jump. “Get your ass in gear or I’m gonna slash your tires.”

“Uh, have a little patience, puh-lease!” Steve returns, a role reversal from all the times she’s run late for him to pick her up.

Eddie blinks, looks as if he’s holding his breath again; his eyes flicker over Steve’s face, like he’s expecting him to pull away.

Steve doesn’t.

A tender, lovely smile spreads across Eddie’s face.

And then they’re laughing into each other’s mouths.

And laughing leads to more…

“Harrington,” Eddie says, but he’s smiling too much for it to come across as remotely serious.

“Just a little longer,” Steve says—feels like he’s back in high school, joyful and silly.

Eddie laughs breathily; Steve presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth, swallows the sound.

“If Buckley slashes your tires, you’re gonna have to, like, book it alongside us.”

“Or we could share a bike.”

A disbelieving, fond chuckle. “Steve.”

Eddie breaks away only to lean back in and kiss Steve’s cheek instead—and for some reason that’s the thing to make Steve’s breathing truly catch.

They’re still holding hands; he rediscovers that fact when Eddie grins slyly and pulls him to the door.

“Let’s go.”

“All right, all right, jeez.”

The room is left in darkness, but they’re laughing as they race each other downstairs—and though the shimmers have dissolved, they’re still leaving light in their wake, wherever they go next.

[startanewdream]

A small Harry and Minerva moment, set after the final battle, in honour of Minerva's birthday.

*****

"I am not coming back," Harry blurts out. Next to him, Minerva's only reaction is a flicker on her spell: for a moment, the broken chairs of the Transfiguration classroom get extra pairs of legs that make them look like spiders.

When the chairs go back to normal, she turns to Harry with an impassive look.

"I imagined so."

Harry blinks. "You did? You never mentioned anything."

Minerva shares his surprise. "It was not my place to say anything. You are of age now."

"So all this time I've been helping here at Hogwarts, you just knew and went along with it?"

"Would it please you if I say I do not agree with your decision?"

"Yes, actually."

There's a hint of a smile on Minerva's lips. "I think you should come back to school."

"Oh." Harry looks down at his feet before moving to fix the bricks on the wall. Despite what he just told her, it's undeniable that this was not what Harry wanted to hear. "You think I am not ready?"

He sounds young. It's difficult to match this adult Harry — nearly eighteen-year-old, tall like his father, and spotting too many scars for his age — with the eleven-year-old who was sorted into her House, but that's the memory that resurfaces: Harry is eleven and he was caught out of his bed at night, losing 50 points to Gryffindor. He'd looked upset at the idea of being a disappointment.

That's how he looks now.

"You are of age," she repeats, her voice more tender than she allows herself around him, lest she betrays her soft spot for him. Harry's eyes are hungry as he turns to face her. "You faced more than any exam could measure — you faced things that cannot be measured." She thinks about the unconfirmed tales of a sacrifice and master of death, and it's not easy to match this with a boy worried about homework and deadlines. "From an educational point of view, I believe your time at Hogwarts has concluded."

Harry watches her. "But?" He guesses.

She allows herself a little smile. "But education is not all Hogwarts has to offer." She remembers seeing that scrawny kid laughing as he first took flight on a school broomstick; three friends sitting outside on a winter afternoon, bundling up next to a warm blue fire and sharing tales; a boy and his girlfriend, walking hand-in-hand through the halls, oblivious to any gossip. "I would be glad if you returned only to enjoy your Seventh Year as a common student. No threat. No drama. Just school."

"Just school," he repeats, his gaze far away now as if he could see it. Then Harry blinks. "Hermione and Ginny are coming back. Ron is not, though."

Minerva nods. She won't say it, but sometimes she wonders if the fact that Ron Weasley isn't returning isn't what's weighing most on Harry. Inseparable like brothers. Like father, like son.

"Do you think my parents would be okay with it?"

This time, the question baffles her; she's glad she wasn't transforming anything because it might have been disastrous.

"I do not believe I am qualified to answer this, Harry," she says.

"Ah, it's just —" He holds the back of his head, ruffling his hair, unaware that this was what James did when he was embarrassed. "You are one of the last people that knew them."

And this, as far as Minerva is concerned, is a terrible thing. James and Lily would be only thirty-eight if they were alive. She has lived now nearly four times what they did; how is it that there are now so few people that knew them?

Harry looks young once again. She knows he's made up his mind — and like Lily, he's adamant once he's decided something —, so this need for validation isn't what she associates with the young man she saw standing up to Voldemort one month ago.

But for all his deeds, Harry is just a boy who grew up longing for his parents — parents who had loved him fiercely, she knows. She doubts Harry might ever do anything that James and Lily wouldn't support — God knows Minerva supports him, and she isn't even his relative — but she also thinks they would insist that Harry return to his final year.

Seventh Year. That had been the year when James and Lily were Head Boy and Head Girl, and the future had looked promising to both. That had been the year when they had started dating; when the darkness of the war hadn't yet tinted their lives. When they had been the happiest. How could they not want the same for Harry?

But that's not what she tells him. "Yes," she lies calmly. "James and Lily would approve it."

Harry breathes easily. "Thanks." He moves to fix another desk, not noticing how, a long time ago, someone carved JP+LE in the wood.

Harry's spellwork is good. He might enjoy some refinement, but she doubts he will be fixing desks in his future job, so instead of commenting on it, she just lets it slide.

"Of course," she notes with a hint of humour, "if you came back, it would not have been all fun. I would have high expectations for you."

"Quidditch?" Harry guesses. "I'd say that Gryffindor is safe in Ginny's hands."

"I enjoy the Quidditch trophy in my office," she agrees. "But alas I was thinking about another responsibility. A Head Boy badge would suit you." Harry's eyes widen; she is once more sorry for not insisting harder with Albus that Harry should have been made prefect. "As it did your parents."

Harry smiles. "I would enjoy that."

"There are tons of paperwork, I might warn you — though not unlike being an Auror." Harry chuckles. "But either way, Harry, your parents would have been proud."

As I am proud of you, she thinks.

[umbrellajam]

Azrael: Agent of the Bat #56 - No Man's Land Dick: "Scared, kid?" Tim: "Not really. A little nervous, I guess." Tim: "Who am I kidding? I'm scared. I feel like those soldiers must have felt right before D-Day." Dick: "D-Day, as in World War Two? You must stay awake in history class." Tim: "We're only up to the Spanish-American War, but I saw the Spielberg movie. Really bloody." Dick: "I hope it doesn't get that bad." Tim: "It won't, will it?" Tim: "Will it?"

Okay, several things I enjoy about this moment.

1. I'm just being so well-fed in terms of great Dick & Tim interactions in this era. Cataclysm, Brotherhood of the Fist, Road to NML, breaking into NML in Robin #67 with classic annoying-older-brother!Dick and Tim panicking about his safety when Dick does a quick death fake-out (typical, honestly lol)... And now with an introspective moment to themselves in the calm before the storm - in Azrael's book no less, lol! I wonder if this came from Dennis O'Neil as something he wanted to include or if it was collaboratively planned as a building-tension moment by the writing/editing teams plotting NML.

2. Tim confiding in Dick my beloved <3 But also - Tim lying at first that he's not really scared, before deciding to just be honest. He has these moments of such earnestness at times (not only with Dick (also YJ, Bruce, Steph, Cass), but often) and they're even more striking because of how prone he is to lying, secrecy, glossing over things and pretending to be fine, etc. most of the time.

He's still pretty young here, barely 15 if that, and his tendencies definitely get worse over time, but he's already wrestled with lying to his Dad, Ariana, Steph, and his other friends, already pretended to be fine to Dick's face in Contagion and Legacy when he was actively dying or under threat of doing so again, refused to tell his Dad he was ever even sick, lied to Bruce's face about Secret, etc... It just sticks out to me so much whenever he chooses to go - yeah, okay, I'll be open with you right now even if it makes me vulnerable.

3. Dick not answering him!! Is that last panel, where we can't see him over Tim's shoulder even though he's positioned right behind him in the others, implying that Dick straight up vanished in order to avoid having to lie or be vulnerable himself lmfao? (I mean, probably not, but the thought is v. funny.)

On the other hand, Dick's silence as a type of honesty and vulnerability in and of itself... We know that as much as Dick likes teasing Tim, he also likes to comfort him, to be that figure of strength and reassurance to him. For him to be the one asking Tim if he's scared in the first place, and then not be able to scrape up anything more than "yeah, hope it doesn't get as bad as literal D-Day" and foreboding silence when Tim admits that he is scared...

It makes me think of that contrasting moment in Murderer/Fugitive later on, where Dick does tell Tim the comforting lie, that he'll always be safe with Batman and Nightwing, that everything will be okay, and desperately wants Tim to believe it.

No such comforting lies in No Man's Land, apparently.

[popponn]

note: happy birthday fishman. please just come home already. i want to poke this cutie a lot.

you stare in disbelief at the pile of plushies in your hands, then at the empty ever-rotating crane game machine, then finally at the half-fish half-man who you get the pleasure of calling employer and boyfriend.

"...how?" you ask, still dumbfounded.

rafayel—who casually keeps a finger gun pose shamelessly in the middle of a public arcade—smirks even wider, "who do you think you are talking to?"

"someone who always misses the plushies," you answer quickly without a missing beat, before adding an afterthought, "usually. on every turn."

this response immediately makes him drop the finger gun away from his chin. changing it into a childish (and very adorable) hands on the hips pose. as animated as his gestures are, his face morphs into a pout, "hey. that's just me holding back so this place could still have a business."

"..." you doubt it, really.

"what does that face mean?" rafayel's eyebrows frown even further—which serves as enough warning that you probably should start giving him praises or you will have another spiel of how "you don't love him and even the jellyfishes that eat grass agrees with that". no one wants a repeat of that.

and also, you love him enough to think a preening smug rafayel is better than a pouting annoyed one.

"it means—" you poorly try to hide your smile, "—that i am very thankful that a really handsome guy gets me all of this. so much that i couldn't believe it."

predictably, the air around rafayel soon matches a peacock more than a fish. "hmph! good!" he says, in a manner that sounds like he will demand some spoiling the moment the two of you get home. or so you think, before he opens his mouth again and eyes the other machine a few steps behind you, "why don't you let this handsome guy get another round of plushies for you then?"

(five minutes and eight rounds later, the plushies in that other machine remain untouched.)

[ywpd-translations]

Ride 800: Blue sky of joy

Pag 1

1: A climb's outcome is always

2: decided at a place that's close to the sky

4: You bet everything on it, and when the wheels cross the finish line

5: The winner....

Pag 2 / 3

1: raises their hands to the sky and rejoices

A blessing for Manami, the wide sky is Hakogaku's blue!!)

Pag 4

1: The first day's mountain prize goes to Hakone Academy's number 13, Manami Sangaku!!

3: He clearly raises both his arms up to the sky!! For the third year in a row the mountain prize goes to Hakone Academy!!

The sky... is so blue!!

Pag 5

1: I feel alive!!

2: Hakogaku...!!

Kanagawaaa!!

The kings!!

3: Manami took it!!

He beat Mountain King!!

Pag 6

2: Amaziing!!

3: Manami-saaan!!

You're so cool!!

Hakogaku is so strong!!

4: The strongest!!

Manami-saaan!!

6: Waaaaaa

7: Amazing, what a nice scenery

We really climbed to such a nice place

I don't know why, it's strange...

Pag 7

1: but everything looks brilliant

Pag 8

2: The vividness of the greens

The vitality of plants

3: The birds' chirping

The buzzing of insects

Pag 9

1: I can feel the life of every living being

2: Manami-saan!!

You were so cool just now!

It was so exciting!

Manami-kuun!

I took a video!

3: The scenery looks brilliant, doesn't it, Manami

4: In road racing, “victory”

5: is something that's so important it changes the way your body feels

Pag 10

1: Not to mention that it's against the opponent against who he lost for two years in a row

2: The delight makes your cells vibrate all throughout your body

Here's a bottle!

Ah, thanks

4: Manami, that... you managed to get so far while going through so much suffering, you worked so hard and endured

(I threw it away

But I didn't answer)

5: This is

Pag 11

1: a “rewarded joy” for all of that

2: Manami

Hakogakuu!!

Manami-kuun!!

Pag 12

1: Congratulations

Pag 14

1: Thank you for fighting with all your strength

3: After the mountain line there's still the finish line

Keeping your energies for the team is part of the strategy

4: But you used all your strength until your limit to fight against me

5: So, I'm thankful

Pag 15

1: Ah... yeah, but... I couldn't... win...

Even though everyone worked hard to push my back...

2: You're amazing, Manami-kun

You're even stronger than that time on Minegayama

3: Well... at the time I was still at around 75%, I was still in the middle of it

Yet I could still get a lead on you

5: Honestly, this time, when there were around 100m left I thought I couldn't win

But

6: I didn't know until the very last moment

7: You got stronger too!!

Pag 16

1: No no no no

That's not true at all, not true at all

Woah....

2: I just followed, I just did the best I could

3: Aren't you self aware?

That means

4: I just practiced very hard...

That those two control the practices

Their base power has grown

5: Mo- more importantly, huh... I'm sorry!!

Pag 17

1: Huh.... right before the finish line... uhm... I...

Actually...

3: In my mind I referred to you as “Sangaku” without any honorifics!!

4: In....

6: In your heart?

Without honorifics?

Pag 18

1: Hahahaha

2: Hahaha

Huh!? What kind of reaction is this!? Huh!?

3: I'm- I'm sorry

I just... I was really excited at the end!!

4: It's fine

6: I'm actually glad you referred to me without honorifics, it's like... we got so much closer

No, but... I... huh

I don't dislike it...

7: But I guess adding the “kun” really feels like the most natural thing...

Ugh....

8: Besides

Pag 19

1: While you're shouting inside your heart you don't have to add it

3: And at the end, I too, inside my heart

4: I called you “Sakamichi”

6: That, that makes me happy

Right!

7: Ah... now finally...

8: Uhm.....

Pag 20

1: We fulfilled our promise... thank you

Yeah....!!

2: We haven't reached the finish line yet, so we can't rest (haha)

This... this time, since we raced for the mountain stage we still have to keep running even if our race is over

Looks like there's still a little more to go

Ugh...

Pag 21

1: Buaah, yeah!!

It's Hakogaku's victory!!

2: You're too loud!! San-na!!

It's Hakogaku's victory, buah!!

How many times are you gonna say it...!!

3: I'll say it over and over again!! Manami is stronger than Onoda!!

Ugh...!! Onoda-san..!!

4: Humph

Pag 22

1: Amazing, amazing, he's really so cool!!

Uh... he's cool, I guess...

(Tobirama-kun is acting cool)

2: He did it

3: Yeah, and thanks to him

4: The team's morale is rising!!

6: This is bad... Hakogaku-san's power is increasing

What do we do, Hotshot

Pag 23

1: Don't worry, even if they raise their power, let them do it

5: Or, Naruko, are you worried that their morale is rising?

7: Worried? What is “worry”, some sort of rock?

8: That's right. Us third years, me, you, and Onoda have already increased our base power with a program

Pag 24

1: that was sure to make us stronger!!

3: Kakaka!!

4: Huh... what's that... “base power”!?

Pag 25

1: Does that mean they're getting stronger?!

2: Those two's pressure is suddenly rising!!

Pag 26

2: Imaizumi and Naruko's....!!

3: They're getting stronger... than last year

Is this connected to that time at the beginning of spring...

4: when the third years didn't come to practice for a week?

Pag 27

1: Hakogaku's morale is rising? That's just what I was looking forward

Yeah!! I can't help but feel excited!!

2: The “finish line” is waiting!!

[ashotofogdensoldfirewhiskey]

Can you write something hinny that includes the phrase “you are everything to me” or something in that vein of romantic confessionals?

This turned out a big angstier/sadder than you might've hoped, but here it is anyway <3

It wasn’t a very happy birthday, all things considered. 

There had been cake - chocolate. Presents - more than usual. Singing - respectably on-key. Guests - so many that they’d spilled out into the yard. All the typical ingredients for an excellent party. 

But.

Mum had been crying when she’d frosted the cake. 

Ginny had received a new broomstick (Harry), a lovely necklace (her parents), expensive French perfume (Bill and Fleur); a particularly good haul, even for seventeen. And yet, she’d swallowed the lump in her throat when, rather than a customary box of Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes products, she’d opened new Quidditch boots. Happy seventeenth, from George, the card had said. Just George.

Their plucky rendition of Happy Birthday sounded hollow without Fred shrieking an off-key upper harmony. Mum had always said he ruined it, all those years of birthdays with seven kids. Now, without it, the song seemed broken beyond repair. But, asking them not to sing it at all had seemed worse, somehow. 

Mum and Dad and Bill and Fleur and Charlie and Percy and Audrey and George and Ron and Hermione and Harry and Kingsley and Hagrid and Luna and Neville and Hannah and Andromeda and Teddy and…

No Fred. No Lupin. No Tonks. No Collin. Their absence was glaring. A dementor that sucked all the happiness from the room. 

She’d put on a brave face through it all. Eaten the cake even though it tasted like tears, thanked them all for the gifts that had broken her heart, cheekily conducted a song that she’d rather never hear again, tried to breathe around the gaping chasm her brother had left behind. 

Not a very happy birthday, at all. But they’re trying to make it one, and perhaps eventually the trying will work. 

One has to hope. 

For now, the firewhiskey will have to supplement. 

Ginny is pleasantly buzzed by the time the non-family guests have gone. Mum is busying herself in the kitchen, trying unsuccessfully to hide a new bout of tears. Her father and brothers - sans George - are all lazing around the den, half heartedly listening to the wireless - Wasps vs. Tornados. George had gone up to bed an hour ago, but Ginny couldn’t blame him. Hermione, Percy, and Fleur are talking about the Beauxbatons exam curriculum, something Ginny wants exactly zero part in.

One person, she notices, is conspicuously absent. 

She finds him out on the swing in the garden, looking out over the orchard, a glass of what appears to be firewhiskey in his hand. 

She allows herself a moment just to look at him - disheveled hair and handsome face and sharp jaw. She knows, logically, that Harry is safe now, and yet she can’t quite quell the old instinct to drink him in. One last look at him, like she might never get another, like she’ll have to cling onto this one, ration it out to recall when she needs to. 

It’s stupid, anyway. The memory of him had never been even close to the real thing, but in that long year apart she’d never stopped trying to remember the exact shape of his eyes, the way he had a dimple in his left cheek when he smirked at her, the way his hands were solid and sure and so good at making her feel things she’d never–

“Gin?”

He notices her standing there, and offers her a half-smile through the darkness. She can just make out the glint of his eyes behind his specs. 

“Thought you’d left,” she says, aiming for teasing but ending up somewhere just shy of it. “Alright if I join you out here?”

“Of course,” he says, as though offended she’d even asked. “Plenty of room.”

There is, but she snuggles up next to him anyway, her added weight causing them to sway gently on the swing. He drops an arm over her shoulder, and a kiss to her temple, and pulls her up against him. The vague thrum of anxiety that had plagued her all day seems to quiet under the warm weight of his touch. 

“Happy birthday,” Harry says. He’d said it earlier, with everyone, but she likes hearing it again, just for her. 

Ginny hums. “Yeah, I suppose. Mum’s crying again, and George went up to bed ages ago. Dead grim in there. Dunno why Mum insisted we do this whole party when it’s made her so bloody miserable, I’d have been alright with a normal dinner.”

“It’s your seventeenth, though,” Harry points out. “Suppose she wanted it to be special. It should be special.”

“Well, we put on a good show of it, anyway,” Ginny says, reaching over and snatching the glass of firewhisky from Harry’s grip and stealing a gulp. She relishes the burn of it. 

Harry lets out a small breath of a laugh, pinches at her side for her thievery, but he lets her do it anyway. He tugs the glass back out of her grip once she’s finished and takes another gulp himself. 

“It’s what we’ve got to do though, isn’t it?” Harry says suddenly. “Pretend it’s alright until it is.”

“Doesn’t seem like it’ll ever be alright, really,” Ginny says cynically, snuggling deeper into Harry’s embrace. “Or at least, it’ll never be the way it was.”

“No,” Harry agrees, and he sounds more serious than she wants him to. 

God, what is wrong with her? She used to be better at this: lightening the mood with a joke or some good banter, fighting off the gloom. She doesn’t want to sit out here on her seventeenth birthday with her boyfriend and talk about death.

After a minute, she can sense Harry is searching for words. She leans back so that she can look up at his face, and finds he’s staring straight ahead, chewing on something. He seems to be on the precipice of speech, but then he takes another gulp of his drink. 

“What is it?” Ginny breathes. 

“Nothing,” Harry says quickly. “It’s stupid.”

“No, it’s not,” Ginny says firmly. She can’t imagine ever finding anything he has to tell her stupid. 

He looks down to meet her eye, and god. He makes her feel too much, like her heart is overbrimming and spilling out over her bones. 

“I just…” he struggles. He seems to find his words. “I was just thinking that I’m really glad I chose to live so that I could be here at your shite birthday party.”

“Oh, thanks,” Ginny snorts before the entirety of his words strike her. “I really appreciate–” She cuts herself off and sits up straight. “Hang on. What do you mean, ‘chose to live’?”

Harry averts his eye and takes another sip of firewhiskey. 

The question hangs in the evening air, and as the silence swells, Ginny realizes she isn’t sure that she wants to hear the answer. 

They’d spent weeks, filling each other in about the last year in dribs and drabs. She doesn’t yet have the full picture of all he’d been through, of all that had happened, but she doesn’t begrudge him. There are sore spots in her own past she’d rather not press – not yet, not just now – things she hasn’t been able to find the words to say to him yet. 

She reckons the same is true for him, too. She’d never wanted to press him, but it had not escaped her notice there is a gaping hole in her understanding of what had transpired in May: Harry, dead in Hagrid’s arms. 

He’d gone into the forest to die, and he’d come out alive. That’s all she knows, and frankly it’s all she’d mustered up the courage to ask. There seem to be too many painful doors to open down that particular avenue, things like why didn’t you say goodbye and did you know you’d come back and were you scared and I thought you were dead and I felt like I was too. 

They hadn’t touched it, and yet Harry seemed to be offering it to her, now. 

“What do you mean?” she says more softly, more bravely. “You chose to live?”

And so he tells her. Slowly, and stilted, but his hand is warm in hers. Snape’s memories. Learning that he had to die. The long walk into the forest. Finding Voldemort. 

“...I closed my eyes and I thought of you,” Harry says, like it’s just some part of the story, like he’s not breaking her heart and stitching it back together in one with these words. “So that you’d be the last thing I saw, and then he did it. Avada Kedavra. And I was gone.”

He presses a hand to his chest, and Ginny can picture the green light striking him there. She can’t fathom any of it, how difficult it must’ve been for him to walk to his own execution, how scared he must have been, how he could possibly still be sitting, living and breathing, beside her now. She grips his hand so tightly that it’s a wonder he has any feeling in it at all. 

Harry shifts uncomfortably, and his words are awkward now. “I still don’t know if any of it was real, or if it was just something I imagined while I was… wherever I was. But I… I spoke with Dumbledore. Or… I imagined I did, I dunno. About a lot of things, but mainly that I could choose to go, you know, on. Or I could go back and live again, if I wanted.”

He explains of the protection his mother’s love had left him with, that had tethered him to life despite the Killing Curse to his chest. 

Harry’s grip on her hand tightens, and he turns to meet her eyes fully for the first time since he began speaking. He wipes his other hand wearily over his face, and sighs. “I’m sorry, I’m a bit drunk. This is… it’s your birthday. I didn’t mean to–”

“Harry,” Ginny interrupts gently. “Go on.”

Harry inhales, bracing himself against the memory. “I knew if I chose to come back, I’d be coming back to the war, and Voldemort, and everyone I loved dying. And for a minute the thought of just… leaving it all behind, being at peace with my parents, and Sirius, and Lupin…”

Ginny can imagine how strong of a pull that must’ve been. She grips him harder, as though he’s facing the choice again at this moment and she might be able to tether him to her with her fingers.

“But then I thought of you, and the life I wanted – I want, with you. And I knew I had to come back, even if it meant dealing with all of the shite that came with it.”

Just like with the rest of it, he doesn’t seem to realize that he’s said anything of any particular import, but the words burrow under her skin and make a home there, painful and vulnerable and hopeful. 

“I’m sorry,” Harry says anxiously, interrupting himself as he looks at her expression. “Shit, Ginny, I didn’t–”

Ginny realizes she has tears streaming down her cheeks. She wipes them away impatiently. 

“--shit timing, it’s all a bit heavy for your birthday, isn’t it?” Harry babbles. “I just said it because I know today was dead grim, and you’re right, things will probably never be the same. But I just kept thinking that I’m so glad we’ll get to do it all again next year and for the first time that doesn’t seem like–”

She cuts off his anxious babbling with a kiss, hard and searing, and she holds his chin in her hands, precious, appreciating how very close she came to rationing memories of him for the rest of her life. 

She pulls away, her head still spinning with all that she’d told her. She needed to think about it, ask more questions about Snape and Voldemort and Horcruxes and blood magic. But most pressingly: “Let me see if I’ve got this right. You’re telling me that I’m the last thing you thought of when you went to die, and the reason you decided to live?”

Harry stares at her. “Well, when you put it like that– I suppose, yeah. Yes.”

Ginny shakes her head slowly, helplessly. “Harry.”

“I love you,” Harry says, like this is all the explanation that’s needed, because perhaps it is. He’s said this to her every day for weeks, but this is the first time she truly appreciates that love is a verb; that he’s not describing a state of being but rather something he’s actively doing: loving her. 

“I’m not always the best with words–” Harry continues, and Ginny nearly chokes. “--but you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, and it’s not even a competition, really. You’re everything. I didn’t mean to put pressure on you, or anything, I realize now how that all sounded and–”

“I love you, too,” Ginny says fiercely, ignoring any out he’s offering her, like she’d want one. “And I want to talk about the rest of it, all of it. I can’t believe you had to– I don’t even want to think about–” Ginny shakes her head. “You haven’t put any pressure on me, other than I don’t know how I’m meant to respond to that in a way that measures up–”

“No, you don’t–”

“But I love you,” Ginny presses on. “So much. And that’s what I want with you too, all of it, everything. I always have. I’m… so glad you came back because I don’t know what I’d have done if–”

“Gin–”

Ginny kisses him again, desperate. Harry says he’s the one who’s no good with words but Ginny has never been less articulate in her life. Instead she tries to pour the contents of her heart into the fingers she runs through his hair, the grip of her hands over his chest where his heart beats reassuringly beneath his warm skin, the press of her lips against his. 

She pulls back, eyes wet, breathing heavily. Harry’s looking at her with that soft wonder that he sometimes gets, an expression she might understand a bit better now. “That was the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard, but if you ever try to go off alone and die again, I will kill you myself. Don’t you ever do that again, alright?”

Harry grins. “Alright. I think I can manage that.”

“Good.”

A grin spreads across Ginny’s face, and now they’re just two grinning idiots on a swing who want to spend forever together, and for the first time there isn’t any glaring obstacle in the way of it. She allows herself to picture it - a nice cozy home to share, a wedding, kids with messy hair and green eyes, a life that might grow around the grief in her chest. 

She settles back into his arms, snug against him, miraculously alive and hers. She loves him so much it has nowhere to go. 

“I am sorry your birthday was shite, though,” Harry says. 

“It wasn’t,” Ginny says, and she means it.

[gods-perfect-idiots]

something something blood-soaked hands cradling your face something something

anyway here's the post btw

[bonesandthebees]

sigh feeling nostalgic for my old fics/the old community these days. I miss it man.

[etchy-a-sketchy]

Obsessing over this fic

Doodled this for it!

[royalarchivist]

Pac: What are you guys talking about?

Foolish: Uh, we're talking about Cellbit's, um– Wait, Pac have you never seen it?

Pac: No?

Foolish: WHAT?! [...] Wait... has Pac never gotten to choose?

Pac: Choose the- the what? The- the room?

Fit: Ohhh, Pac– I think while you were kidnapped I think is when Cellbit started showing us all these rooms, so yeah, you might have to choose.

Foolish: I wonder what room Pac would choose...

Fit: It's hard to say.

Tubbo: Knowledge! Knowledge!

Pac: Knowledge? You think I'm a knowledge guy? Oh, that's so nice Tubbo! But I'm just– I'm dumb. I'm just a dumb random guy, you know?

Tubbo: Aww, don't put yourself down, king. D:

Pac: I'm a fraud.

[ Full Transcript ↓ ]

—

Tubbo: [Talking about Cellbit's Element rooms] Oh, yes I have, oh they're fcking sick!

Foolish: Yeah, did you end up choosing one? I can't remember.

Fit: Did you choose one?

Tubbo: I did! I chose the yellow one.

Foolish: Knowledge...

Fit: KNOWLEDGE

Foolish: Nerd!

Pac: What are you guys talking about?

Foolish: Uh, we're talking about Cellbit's, um– Wait, Pac have you never seen it?

Pac: No?

Foolish: WHAT?!

Pac: Oh, I see some rooms– I saw some rooms, but not– I think not a lot- all of them.

Richarlyson: [Hits Pac so he looks at his sign, which says] OH WAIT KKKKK Pai should we show them the castle?

Foolish: Wait... has Pac never gotten to choose?

Pac: Choose the- the what? The- the room?

Foolish: Holy sht–

Fit: Ohhh, Pac– I think while you were kidnapped I think is when Cellbit started showing us all these rooms, so yeah, you might have to choose.

Pac: Oh, I didn't- didn't choose any room!

Richarlyson: NO KKKKKKK DAD CELLBIT AND DAD TAZER CRAFT NEVER MET

Fit: Ohhh, yeah.

Pac: Oh yeah.

Fit: Richarlyson could probably show you around too, yeah, he knows all the lore behind all the rooms.

Pac: Oh, I see. Yeah, he could definitely– or maybe Cellbit, you know? I don't know, it's usually hard for me and Cellbit to kind of like, be online at the same time. Usually when Cellbit joins, I'm kind of like, logging off. But yeah– I never choose a room! Oh yeah, I want to choose it maybe.

Foolish: [Crouches and walks up to Pac, staring at him] I wonder what room Pac would choose... I can't–

Pac: [Crouches and stares back at Foolish, nodding]

Fit: It's hard to say.

Tubbo: Knowledge! Knowledge!

Foolish: [Overlapping with Pac] I don't want to start saying any–

Pac: Knowledge? You think I'm a knowledge guy? Oh, that's so nice Tubbo! But I'm just– I'm dumb. I'm just a dumb random guy, you know?

Tubbo: Aww, don't put yourself down, king. D:

Pac: I'm a fraud.

Tubbo: Noooo. D:

Pac: [Whispering] Unfortunately.

[mirmi]

15x03 – I Love To Squander Promise