Tie a Ribbon

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Tie a Ribbon

“And did you see his face?” Fred, or George, exclaims, the not so buttery beer, gripped precariously in his hand sloshing about, threatening to add yet another stain to the already drenched Common Room carpet. “I mean, when Harry grabbed the snitch, from two seconds before Malfoy wrapped his grubby little fingers around it—”

“See it? I memorized it!” Shouts back George, or maybe Fred? Perhaps it wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had, suggesting that, instead of the usual fair of Butterbear, to celebrate a splendidly triumphant victory over the Slytherin Quidditch team, we dip into my reserve of muggle liquor. I say this, because the honed skill of distinguishing the Weasley twins has begun to diminish around, oh, beer seven or eight. But haven’t we earned it?

“And don’t forget the man of the hour!” Ron yells, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and jostling me vigorously about until the bottle I had been holding slips out of my hand and smashes on the floor.

“Really, Ron, can’t you be more careful?” Hermione seethes, pulling out her wand yet again and waving it over the mess. “The house elves have to clean this up you know. How would you like it, getting up at the crack of dawn and cleaning up other peoples’ messes?”

“Well, it depends—do I have to leave the bed before or after our morning snog?” Hermione fakes a gag and pushed Ron’s face away when he leans in, practically horizontal, for an exaggerated kiss. I take the chance to slip out from beneath Ron’s arm and scoot away towards the window, where a tiny pocket has opened up.

It’s easy to see why everyone is so happy, and it’s not the liquor. We’d had some hard losses this season, and there was even talk of calling it quits before today’s game, of just bowing out gracefully, our tails between our legs, and trying again next year. I think, maybe that was why, when we finally decided to board our brooms, we tried so hard—everyone knew that this was it. And damn if we didn’t deliver. Even as the snow began to fall, we were on fire—literally, as least for a second, when Alice was caught by a “misfired” hex from the Slytherin crowd.

Really, it was over before it even began. The Syltherin team, thinking they could just coast through the match, had already written us off as an easy win. So really, maybe that was why we won; they weren’t really trying. Say what you will, the score still stands: a whopping 200 points to 20. And thus, the celebration, with more bravado than usual.

Even without the entire tower crammed into the Common Room, the incendiary logs crackling away in the fireplace would have been enough to make the room sweltering, especially when I’m still wearing my Quidditch uniform. After I relocate some forgotten bottle to the floor, I put my shoulder against the windowpane, pushing until the panel gives with a satisfied groan.

The rush of biting air that smacks against my flushed face is heavenly, and the weight of maturity slinks from my shoulders as I slump against the stone ledge, my head lolling out in the blackness. I take tiny breaths, trying to compress my lungs into tiny wads of chewed gums in my chest, inhaling less and less until I don’t even have to breath at all, and can just hang suspended in the cold.

Suddenly, and idea strikes me, and I dart among jostling merriment until I reach the corner of the room where we had dumped our brooms in the rush to celebrate. Finding mine on top, I grab it before darting back to the dark rectangle that seems a portal into serenity. Without a word, I mount the ledge, straddling my broom, and kick off.

“Hey! Harry, the match’s over!” Dean Thomas cries to a chorus of laughter as every crowds the window, shouting catcalls or demanding aerial tricks. I wave a goodbye and float, up and away from the outpouring of light, until the tumult of Gryffindor tower is nothing but a low hum behind me.

With careful maneuvering, I’m able to bend back and lie down across the broom, my face up towards the stars. The straw nips the back of my neck, so I inch a few centimeters up until I can rest comfortably. Above me is so much navy blue, a canvas with three, four coats, pocked by stabs of white that supposedly form patterns of bulls, lovers, gods in the sky.

When the end of term rolls around, along with the usual list of friends, enjoyed freedoms, time away from overbearing parents, stars are mentioned among the things that shall be missed while away. I’ve never felt the need to ask where exactly, but I’ve gathered that many of my classmates live in fairly urban areas, masked among the muggles, and thus are denied the pleasure of the blotless night sky. At the Dursley’s, I fair no better, so I try and soak up as much of this tiny pleasure I can, free as it is.

The snow stopped falling hours ago, the ground below swathed in white silence, as if the land had gone blind. So it is no surprise when I hear the unmistakably crunch of footsteps across the grounds, even from this high. Without even having to sit up, I can tell they are human—no animal, magical or not, could make such a distinct noise as two feet, clad in boots, marching off into nothingness. Rolling my head to the side, all I can make out is a dab of dark cloth hurrying towards the mass of trees marking the Forbidden Forest.

If this had been any other night, if I had been any other person, I would have continued just what I had been doing, namely, escaping people for a while, and enjoying odd joy of oblivion. But, I was the Boy-Who-Lived, my team had won when the whole world though we would lose, and I had a hunch.

I keep pace with the figure making for the tree line, descending gradually, until I touch down at the edge of the forest, just as he disappear into the woods. My broom across my shoulder, I take care to step where he has made a path for me, remaining almost inaudible until the canopy of the forest casts me into shadow, and I stumble in my haste to keep up.

“Who’s there?”

The voice, the pitch heightened due to fear and ravaged by the dry, cold air, is familiar. Instead of answering, I slip my wand from my pocket, my words forming into puffs of white air before my face as Draco Malfoy and I burst into a circle of illumination.

“Oh…it’s you.”

“Nice to see you too.” I smile, despite slush that, no thanks to a double layer of socks, has managed to seep its way across my toes.

“No, it’s not—” He begins, blushing, I will assume for his vanity, because of the cold alone. But before he can finish, I grab his wrist with my free hand and with no resistance and no effort, draw his body to mine, and lay my lips upon his.

Heat and blood rush to my cheeks, but this is not why I continue to kiss him, letting my wand drop from my hand and imbed itself in the snow as I snake my greedy fingers into his hair and the excess fabric of his robes. But all reason and thinking cease as his arms encircle my neck, clinging as if beneath his feet there was not frozen ground, but instead an abyss, and I, his only lifeline to salvation.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper when, after what I would swear was hours, we part, pulling back just enough to speak, his ragged breath warm against my cheek. “For winning, today.”

“No you’re not,” he hisses back, and I know I have said the wrong thing. That this was not what he wanted to hear, that in fact, my condolences, no matter how sincere, will only be construed as pity. He back away, first a step, then two, until he has created a space around himself, entirely his own that I am afraid to violate. We stand there, silent, two boys who are in fact men, among the silent observers of generations, their boughs laden with snow and memories. Finally, he turns, and says, “I want to walk a bit.” I bend down to recover my wand, and then scramble after him, not caring now how much noise I make with my steps, only wanting to remain by his side as he forges ahead.

I allow him to lead us, though, after a series of turns that take us back across our own trail, I begin to suspect he has no direction and is just wondering for the sake of motion. He is not one to remain still, not indefinably. Even in bed, he must squirm, no matter if he is sleeping or fucking. Whenever I can actually find him in a stationary moment, I like to lay my head, ear to nipple, cheek to creamy chest, and listen to his caged heart, railing against his chest, as if demanding to be freed.

He was fidgeting at the London train station, when I came to collect him a week before the term started last summer, after I had asked him to spend the end of vacation with me in a flat my friend had let me borrow. His reply, though including his acceptance, came full of hesitations and concerns—how was he to handle a week on the streets of muggle London? I told him that he would be put up in an apartment, not left on the streets, but still he insisted that so many non-wizards, so close together, made him nervous. Yet he came all the same, standing there, tugging at the end of his button down shirt, seeming naked without his usual flowing, noir attire.

“So you made it alive I see?” I had asked him, kissing his cheek lightly, feeling the downy caress of his hair against my forehead.

“Barely.”

Try as he might, Draco would not help but stick out, whether he was stopped in the middle of the street, confused my the traffic lights, or terrified by the confined offered by the lift in the flat. Ultimately we ended up spending most of our time in the apartment, watching television (“You mean those people are really in there?”) and ordering in Chinese food. When the week was up, and our luggage was packed and ready for the train to Hogwarts, we walked one last time around the block as the sun began to sink, melting the tops of the buildings into an orange haze, setting the sky awash with warm hues. As we rounded the corner of our street, a vendor was just wrapping up his blanket of wares. Not wanting to miss one last opportunity, he stopped us, waving enthusiastically.

“Sirs, sirs,” he said, “please, take a look. All hand made, high quality.” Most of it was junk, carved bobbles and tiny wooden figurines. I was about to thank him politely and say that, no, we weren’t interested, when I noticed a mass of ribbons, haphazardly bunched together, elegant in their simplicity.

“What’re those?”

“Ah, very good eye. These are Wish Ribbons. Tie them around the wrist of someone you care about, and make a wish. When the ribbon falls off, your wish comes true. Only one pound.”

I fingered through them, finding an emerald strand and pulling it out. Through the whole interaction, Draco had stood aloof, unsure of what to say or how to act, and he jumped with I lifted his wrist, draping the green band around it and tying it into a knot.

“What’s this?” He asked, lifting his wrist to his face.

“Nothing,” I shrugged, “just something to remember your visit by.”

For a moment we stood eye to eye on a London street, cars and pedestrians bustling by, as we looked, without grand gestures or overtures, at each other, blinking every now and then.

“Sir,” the vendor said, politely tapping my shoulder, “that’ll be one pound please.”

The thought came to me now, that I had not asked Draco whether or not the tiny ribbon had ever fallen off. At first I had looked for it, spying it when he raised his hand in class, running my fingers over it when we were alone together, bodies flush against the other. But then it had faded from my mind, exams, Quidditch strategies taking its place. And so I grabbed his wrist again now, halting his progression, and pushed the sleeve of his robe up his arm, and say, brilliant against the pale backdrop of his skin, the emerald ribbon.

It was frayed to the point of being almost unrecognizable, and if I had not bought it and tied it myself, I would have though it some aged string wrapped there to remind him of some necessary chore. But it was nothing so mundane, or rather, nothing so important. It was nothing more than a gesture, made, then gradually forgotten, one day in London on our first vacation together. I wanted them, for some inexplicable reason, to rip it from his wrist, and toss it in the snow, and damned be to whatever worth I had given it. As I hooked a finger beneath the most worn part, Draco took my hand, and pulled it to his lips so he could kiss my palm.

“I’m not mad, you know. About the match today. Really I’m not.” It takes me a second to remember just what he’s talking about.

“The…match?”

“I mean, can I blame the snitch for practically jumping into your hand? I mean, I do every chance I get.” He’s smiling now, widely, his grin making him appear almost stupid, silly and sick with happiness. “All I’m saying it, if I had to get beat by some bloody wanker, I’m glad it was the wanker I’m in love with.”

The word slips between us, creating a cushion that pushes me back, before I collapse onto it and him, slamming against a tree trunk, our mouths moving against each other like dogs starved over weeks. We are trying to devourer the other, one seeking to eat the word he fears has changed everything, the other wanting nothing more than to dig more, thousands more of that word out of the other so that he may shout them to the world, and whisper them into the ear he is now nibbling, moving down the neck to the collarbone.

The frigid air is a burning chastity, and it is all I can do to stop from tearing our clothes and exposing our flesh to the biting cold. Instead, I fall to my knees, soaking the legs of my jeans as I push the hem of Draco’s robes up and his pants down. His sex, wet at the tip, bobs in front of my face, moored at a crop of blond curls, vibrant even in such pitch as this night. The taste against my tongue is salty and strong, and the shudder that passes through Draco’s body reverberates all the way down my throat. My hands attempt to explore at the same time they hold up Draco’s clothes—his hands are occupied in my hair, lost and tangled, but not seeking escape or freedom.

My tongue moves along the underside of his member, the sides, the top, the vein, pulsing with blood, toying the tip, the slit. His nails dig into my scalp as I move faster, his legs pimpling in the cold. There is a gasp, half choked in his throat, as he gives a jerk and finishes in my mouth before letting his weight fall heavy against the tree, his hands reaching back to support him.

I swallow, wiping my mouth on the back of my hand, then pull his pants back up and dropping his ropes. I rise, and let him kiss me, his tongue reaching out to grace mine.

“I…you too. You know?” It was not how I wanted to say it, but he smiles, understanding.

“Yeah, I know.” He moves his hands to zip up his pants, and as he does so, the ribbon catches on a jutting piece of bark, snapping with a silent flourish, and falls to the ground. He bends to pick it back up, but I stop him.

“Leave it.”

And we are just two men who were once boys, staring at each other, words already spoken, until he takes my hand once more, and leads me back into the light.

Fin

Thank you for reading. Comments are always appreciated.

P.S. Have you looked at the stars with someone you love tonight?