Choices

"There are always two choices. Two paths to take. One is easy. And its only reward is that it's easy."

I read this quote somewhere and wrote it on a piece of dirty paper. I carried it in my pocket until it fell apart.

There are certain choices I have made in my life that will effect me for my entire life. Like:

When I stopped eating Red Meat.

When I threw myself in front of Ginny Weasley and was hit with a spell that shattered every bone in my arm. It was healed, or as healed as it could possibly be.

Every time it rains, my shoulder aches and I have nightmares that are so gruesome and horrifying I wonder if I am insane.

And that Draco Malfoy is the most exciting man I've ever known. I know, -I know what you're thinking.

Aren't you Harry fucking Potter's best friend?

Harry's life is dangerous, and dark, and he is a hero. And from the outside, that's exciting.

But I was there, through it all. I was in it. Way the fuck in it. It was confusing, and frightening, disheartening, and lonely.

Harry is sad and broken, in a pitiful way. And he lets no one in. I can not help him. He is not the type to be saved.

Harry Potter saves lives, but he takes nothing in return.

He can not allow himself to love, or be loved. There is no special place in his heart for anyone.

It belongs to everyone, equally. Even now that there is no danger, he is still too afraid to risk even a tiny portion of his heart to any one individual.

It must remain intact.

Harry Potter is a beautiful tragedy, but he does not excite me. He took the easier path because it was his right to do so.

And Ron.

Ron excites me. He gives me butterflies, excites me. Flowers in the morning, excites me. Knight in shining Armour, excites me.

But when our bodies are tangled in the sheets and he is so tender and giving and docile.... it isn't his face that I see.

He knows it, but he does not fight. Because love must be simple to be true. It must be easy. Like real bliss is often quiet. I don't believe this, but he does.

And him. He who is dark, and passionate and pale like death. The man who scares the hell out of me with his intensity, the man who whimpers when he fucks me. Whose words send jolts through my limbs.

His sadness is so beautiful. So perfect in his loneliness.

He who is so complex. So nothing-is-easy.

He excites me.

Sometimes it feels as though he needs me like air. I am fire in his arms. He creates such heat, that I burn with fever days after.

I am not exaggerating.

It's like the time my parents took me to a Muggle Amusement Park for the first time. It took them six hours to convince me the Roller Coasters were stable enough. My father even did the math. When I finally did get on, I was so terrified I couldn't stop smiling.

He's a lot like that.

Draco never chose a side in the War. I tell myself he never took anyone's life. And then, that he never saved anyone, either. I don't know how to hold this against him, though. He is cold and rigid and calculated, and too self-serving to be the villain or the hero. He has chosen nothing. He belongs to no one. He is his own entity. His own enemy. His heart, its own hero.

But then he looks at me like he's dying. Only you, Granger, his eyes seem to say. Only you can have me, save me, have me, save me.

And I know he can't save himself because, Draco Malfoy doesn't save lives. And so I have to, because I'm in it. And if he falls, I fall, because that's who I am.

...

He tells me to meet him there tonight. For awhile I convince myself I won't go. I get a sick pleasure out of imagining him waiting and pacing and yearning for me. I am the one with power now, after everything.

But then reality sets in, and I've got thirty-five minutes to be there, and suddenly I am in the midst of a nervous-breakdown because I can't find my shoe.

Neither of us have any power anymore. It's the magic in our veins. It has mingled, and indulged, and screamed ecstasy. And it tastes like addiction.

I knock on the door, and within seconds Im lost in his heat.

"I thought you weren't coming."

"So did I."

"I would have come after you."

"I'll keep that in mind."

My shoes are thrown off and my hair is pulled down. My lips are red and swollen immediately, maybe even before he kisses me. I am always ready for him. He knows this, but he still takes pleasure in teasing me until I'm oblivious.

He undresses me like my clothes are the enemy. I hear the ripping and feel the pressure on my skin as the fabric fights back.

His lips are everywhere, he mumbles through kisses.

"Need you, now, inside you ... made me wait ... bitch."

Incoherent ramblings of a mad man. And I'm too lost.

"Which one of us is crazy?"

He smirks.

Oh, God.

He enters me, right there, pinned against a wall, a portrait of his father banging against my head with each thrust.

"I think, pant, we both know, pant, the answer, pant,
to that."

"huh?"

His fingers are digging into my hips, and I think to ask him if he is afraid he might fall if he lets go. He's holding on that tight.

Suddenly, we're on the floor, he slips out of me and I scream in frustration. And then his lips are on my breasts, he is kissing me; insanity as worship.

I hate that he makes me this way.

"I hate you so much."

"Like hell you do."

Oh, fuck.

His lips are like melting ice to the heat. He licks and kisses and nibbles and I open wider for him and admire the stark contrast of his paleness against me, olive and dark and freckled. We truly are beautiful together.

His hands are on my breasts and I take one long delicate finger and lightly suck the tip. He is amused by my audacity and stops to smirk.

Oh, that smirk; I almost come apart right there.

"Come on baby," he whispers against my skin and the chill it sends through me is electrifying. "Come for me."

I can not speak, so I whimper

"Tell me," he says, his hands now dancing lightly on my thighs.

"Tell me and I'll finish this for you. Isn't that what you want?"

"W-what- Oh, fuck!"

I contemplate pulling his hair. Think better of it.

"Tell me why you're here. Why you came. I know you didn't want to," he says huskily.

"Because I-" his fingers begin teasing me and I almost lose it again- "I, UGH! Because I fucking need this, Dammit!"

"Why?" he asks softly, and he truly does look curious and this strikes me as too out of place.

What is he asking me? What does he want to know?

The heat in my body is still there, but my mind now comprehends that its presence is required.

"Because ... oh, God, because I love you."

He plunges his fingers into me and I scream. In my daze, I am surprised to hear him moan.

His promise is within my own.


...


I know why it all began. I wanted to make a mistake. I can and will admit it. It was a liberating, and terrifying realization. I wanted to be reckless, to not be cautious, for once. The war changed me, just like it changed him, and Harry, and Ron.

Harry, who finds meaning in drunken shags and forgets to call in the morning. He is happy enough. Happier than one would expect, but he's strong in that way. Harry, who forgets to call everyone, including me. He is pushing the world away, as forcefully as he once had to embrace it. I do not blame him.

And Ron. Ron who is so desperate for acceptance still, and so very simple. His eyes are sad most times, with such a simple sadness that you can see every piece of it. Never allowing the intricacies of reality to seep in, because he has been dealt all of the heaviness that his simple soul can take.

And Draco, who hid for so long. Hid beneath his resentment and anger. Draco who now feels everything he has ever held in, was not allowed to say, pouring from his veins in a mad rush.

I wonder if we are the only two that will be ok, or the only two that won't. Is this even stability?


...


-A mistake.

I thought that was all that it would be.

Some things just aren't supposed to make sense. Until, they are meant to, that is.

I have decided that I will never, ever be okay with that. And so I have my own strategies, my own way of dealing with things. I am predominantly a collector. Dusty, well kept moments, with varying sentimental value.

The ends always tie together so nicely. I see to it. I will it that way. They just must.

And yes, I am frayed about the edges by my effort, but that is my sacrifice. Everything else appears perfect, for a time, and I benefit from this illusion.

Some may call me complex.

My life is a series of patterns, and what looked hopeless, pointless, disposable years ago, may all make too much sense, may suddenly, become everything, at any moment. And so I keep a series of memories, moments, lost opportunities, mistakes, and should have beens; patterns within patterns, with me at all times. So that when it comes, when that moment comes, I will
be prepared.

Because you can never be too prepared.

....Some may just call this calculated.

I am essentially a pattern. And it shouldn't surprise me one bit that someone may have come along, and figured me out, without saying so much as a word about it.

I wouldn't say it either, because I just don't say things like that.

The first time he had me, I knew that it wasn't a mistake.

I remembered each moment we'd ever shared; it was closer to any near-death experience than anything else I have ever experienced. and that's saying something.

The Cyrenaics thought that every man must seek his own pleasure as the highest good. Pleasure is an end in itself, and men ought to pursue it single-mindedly. As every man's perception of pleasure is unique to him, he must find his own measure of what is pleasurable and good. The Cyrenaics also believed that men can only truly know what they are feeling at the moment, and thus each man must seek the immediate gratification, the pleasure of the moment.

-And in that moment, when I was finally filled with him, I knew I had never felt so complete. I had never known true pleasure. Before Draco, I never believed in true destiny. I still don't. But destiny, it can be made real. I believe that we can choose our own. And the first time he took me, I chose him.


...


When he goes. he leaves me empty, and so I let myself burn nearly to death in his arms, because I know the heat will too quickly turn cold.

He is inside of me now, whimpering like he does, like he can't take it, and it is overwhelming. We both cry because it is so ... nothing is easy, but this.

"I love you I love you I love you," he says, over and over. And he's never said this before. Suddenly he can't say it enough.

I feel reality completely slip away and everything turns black, and then red, and then it's all white. The mini-death. So fitting, that I should die a little in his arms.

He was the first person to ever truly hurt me. The day he called me a mudblood, I think I died a little right then. And now, he is bringing me back from paralysis, and killing, annihilating, the emptiness that was me.

That he was partly responsible for.

So many little choices, everyday. And then the big ones. The ones that make it count.

I shatter in his arms and he whispers soothingly to me until I am put back together, a little more whole.

I can feel that he's about to let go.

"Draco," I whisper, panting and meeting his thrusts. I am almost disappointed that it will be over soon, but the need to take him where I've just been is powerful.

I tighten my walls around him and drag my nails down his back. I whisper dirty things that I will redden with the thought of later, but I do it anyway because he can't get enough of me, Hermione Granger, talking filthy like that.

And it's all "Fuck, Granger," and "Never something so dirty, so pretty. Sodirtysodirty"

"Deeper, deeper, deeper."
There is no deeper than this.

Soon he is trembling and thrusting so hard I know I'll be sore for days. A sadistic voice inside of me rejoices, that some part of me will keep this moment fresh.

I feel him jerk and he pushes into me so deeply that I can feel him in the very center of my being.

He holds on so tight that I might pass out and then collapses. I whisper soothingly until he is put back together.

He pulls himself from me and falls gracefully to my side. I have never met a man with so much grace.

This moment; delirious and fulfilled. Tucked away, for safe-keeping.

And then, with a 'It's been a long day' kind of smile he tells me how he needs me, wants me, loves me. That I save him.

He does not know that I too, am self-serving.

His war is my war, his pain is my pain.

Objectivism would be easier, as would simply not giving a fuck, but I believe in moral duty.

I believe in love and compassion. This is the harder path. His struggle is my struggle.

I See every point of view, hear the cries of children, understand their tormentors.

Compassion must be dealt even-handedly. Everyone was someone's child once.

And so his solution is my solution. Salvation only realized through cooperation. This is the most risky of paradigms;

Greatest gamble.

Greatest reward.

His peace, shall be my peace.

This is my choice, had been before I'd even known I'd made it.


...


He is breathing softly beside me now, but how long will it last?

For an instant I see his blood mocking me for all that it is worth, holy and knowing and pure, and I see him look at me as though I were a Goddess.

And then, just to loathe myself a bit for his rejection, I pretend I see nothing at all.


...


We're still so far away. He looks at me expectantly, once the heat has left him, and I hear the message loud and clear.

He would never say it; never tell me to leave. But I know by now, from the few times he has allowed me to wake in his arms, the awkward, stiff movement as consciousness slips in, as he senses my presence, that I should just go.

I collect my tattered clothing, and my pride, and begin the walk of shame. But before I reach for the door, he does something different. He reaches for me, he kisses me, and I am suddenly afraid that it's goodbye.

He leans down, presses his lips to my forehead, pulls back, kisses my closed eyes.

"Come by tomorrow night, I have something for you," he whispers into damp eyelashes.

Tomorrow is my 21st birthday.

I blink, and blink again, and he smiles a smile that reaches his eyes.

I notice that the fire is still there.

And I know that finally, he has chosen me.


[end]