Can\'t You See?

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.
Author’s Note: Ahh, procrastination. Just a random thought, hope you enjoy. It’s rather depressing.

All things inside \'~\'s are thoughts.

***

He looks stressed; she can see it in his stormy brown eyes. She gets up quickly from her cozy spot on the couch, where she had been waiting for him for the past two hours.

“Honey, you’re a bit late, today, aren’t you…” she says softly, reaching out her arms to get a hug from him.

He glares at her. “So what do you want me to do about it?” And thrusts his jacket roughly into her arms.

She says nothing, and quietly slips away to hang his coat, while she hears him stomp off toward the kitchen. She pastes on her good-stay-at-home-wife face, and hurries into the kitchen.

“I made chicken potpie today, I know how much you love it,” she says with a shy little smile. She wants to see the anger in his eyes relax a bit, as he surely will recognize her love for him shining out of her eyes.

~Can’t you see how much I love you?~

He says nothing and grunts, sitting at his customary seat across from her. She sighs, and quickly gets the potpie out of the oven, where it was keeping warm. Quickly, she dishes it out onto two plates, and sets one before him.

Dinner is a silent affair. A few times, she attempts to ask why he’s in such a bad mood, why he is so late coming home today. He says nothing and glares her into quiet submission.

~Can’t you see it?~

Feeling rather disappointed, she clears the table and watches her husband finish off the last bit of wine in his glass. He still looks angry.

“Look, honey…Tell me what happened, maybe I can help…”

In two seconds, she is on the floor, and he, towering above her. There is a stinging pain in her cheek, where an angry fist had made contact with it a split-second earlier.

She looks up at him, fear beginning to cloud her eyes. It’s beginning again – she had pushed him too far, she should have just left him alone. Well actually, she’d tried that before, and been accused of being cold and indifferent.

“Why don’t you ever shut up! Can’t you see I’m in a bad mood, you stupid little wench!”

She closed her eyes tight, as a quick blow hit her in the stomach, temporarily winding her. He is kicking her fervently, and his eyes dance with dark glee.

~I am your stress relief. I am your love. If you being happy means that I am miserable, I can bare that. I love you so much, can’t you see?~

It had not always been like this. Like most married couples, their first two weeks had been paradise. And then came little squabbles over things such as leaving the toilet seat up, or forgetting to clean out the hair from the bathtub after a shower.

The first time he hit her, he had apologized, apologized over and over again, bought her presents, kissed her, and held her to him, promising never to do so again.

She had smiled meekly and told him that she would do anything to make him happy; she was his, and his only. He was free to do to her whatever he liked.

She told him this again after the second time he hit her. And the third. And the fourth, fifth, sixth… She had lost count by now.

Magic potions and nifty spells got rid of bruises and scars. But there was never a magic spell created to mend a broken heart.

~I love you…no matter what. Break my body, if it will save your mind.~

The physical pain would end soon enough. She could endure it, if it only meant that he would be happy.

~I love you. I love you. I love you. With all my heart and soul.~

He was all she had left in the world; her family, all her mentors and close companions slain by a brutal war. He was all she had left to love, all she had left to cherish. And he must never leave her. He must always be happy, even if it meant that she would have to suffer some pain. Pain is momentary. Pain goes away.

~Can’t you see I love you more than I love myself? So, so much more?~

He grabs her hair and shakes her violently.

“Why did you stop screaming? Scream, bitch!”

He wrenches her auburn hair harder, and she screams.

“What happened? You’re aging! You’re ugly, you’re old! Why don’t you put on make up for me? Why don’t you dress up? You’re ugly, you’re a worthless hag!”

~He only says it because he is angry. He only says it because he is angry. He only says it—
I love you. No matter what you say or do.~

Tired and satisfied, he finally throws his broken wife away from him.

“You’re worthless. You know that? You don’t deserve me.”


Late in the night, she will sit up in bed, holding back sobs. Tears course down her face, and land softly on the blanket. She dares not be any louder, for fear of waking her husband.

He needs his sleep.

She bunches her nightgown in her hands, gripping tightly. Wondering why she is crying.

She begins to tear at the delicate, light fabric of her nightgown. These silent moments at nights are her only outlet of fear and pain.

Her body still aches. Her mind still rings with those words he was screaming at her. She still doesn’t know what got him in such a horrible mood in the first place.

Ugly. Old.

She is not more than a few days past twenty eight.

~In my world, there is no one but you.~

Worthless.

The tears flow so violently, that she begins to softly shake. She tries to hold back the sobs with all her might, terrified of what might happen if she disturbs her husband’s slumber.

~You are my one and only.~

The bottom of her nightgown begins to look like a hashbrown.

~You can break me. You can break me in every physical way possible. If only you are happy and content.~

She quietly slips out of bed, no longer willing to risk her husband waking up, and slips into the bathroom. She turns the light on, and stares into her bloody, bruised reflection, the artificial lights giving her face an eerie glow.

He likes her to keep her wounds for at least two days (unless company is coming) so that she may learn her lesson more completely.

~I am not worthy of you. You are my lord, my liege, my king, my all.~

She wipes away her tears. She cannot understand why they began in the first place. Maybe they were brought by memories of when she was the top student in her class, of when she would go walking freely in the streets and hear wolf-whistles. She has not left the house for at least three months now.

Maybe she is thinking of how he used to be, sweet and gentle.

~I will never leave you. I can never leave you. You are everything to me.

I love you.

Can’t you see that?~

***

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Sorry, no smut. =D