I don’t understand,
Your love is so cold,
It’s always me who’s reaching out
For your hand.
And I’ve always dreamed
That love would be effortless,
Like a petal falling to the ground,
A dreamer following his dream…
Where is your heart?
‘Cause I don’t really feel you.
Where is your heart?
What I really want is to believe you.
Is it so hard to give me what I need?
I want your heart to bleed,
That’s all I’m asking for.
Where is your heart?
I know that you’re true to me;
You’re always there,
You say you care.
I know that you want to be mine…
Where is your heart?
Wind whipped through the dismal grayness of Godric’s Hollow as a lone figure made its solitary way through the empty streets. Shivering, Jocelyn Freemonte drew her cloak closer about her, her long black hair whipping around her face as she did so.
This walk home was, she knew, unnecessary. She could, after all, Apparate. But what was the point? Her “home” was even grayer and more dismal than these streets. No, she preferred the walk, the elements reminding her that her physical senses, at least, were still intact, could still be touched. Her cheeks could still burn from bitter cold, her eyes still sting with rushing wind. She released herself to her senses, forgetting, for a little while, the hollow deadness inside her, remembering what it was like to feel alive.
It was over all too soon. In less than twenty minutes she was stepping over her threshold. Her hair hung limply in the stillness of the indoors; the sting on her eyes and cheeks was warmed away, and soon she felt nothing at all.
A light and noise coming from the kitchen told her that her husband, Hector, was already home, but she had no desire to investigate. He would doubtless bore her with a long and inevitably dull description of his day at the Ministry, where he worked in the Department of Magical Games and Sports. Jocelyn, who was a passionate Quidditch fan and had even played for her house team at school, had been excited when he’d first announced he’d got a position in the department … until Hector had added that he would be working for the Official Gobstones Club. Jocelyn could not think of a more boring office in the Ministry, including the International Magical Trading Standards Body. In that sense, she supposed, it fitted Hector perfectly.
She couldn’t skulk in the hallway forever, however, and she may as well get the tedium over with. She frowned. Was it ever over with?
“Hullo, Joce’,” Hector greeted her as she entered the kitchen. “Have a good time at Lily and James’s?”
She gave a noncommittal shrug, then, because she knew she had to vocalize at some point, added, “All right.” In truth, it had been nothing short of torture. Lily, James, and baby Harry, all reminding her of the life she didn’t have but so desperately wanted. James, reminding her of the man who still “ who had always “ held her heart … or what was left of it. Sirius Black.
She hadn’t spoken to him in more than three years. Not since the day they’d escaped from Death Eaters together at the end of their seventh year. Or rather, she had forced Sirius to escape from the Death Eaters. He had wanted to stay and fight them, and been furious when she’d forced him to Apparate out of danger. She had realized then that they could never be together. But she had still given him her heart…
Hector’s expectant gaze brought her out of her dismal reflections. She heaved a quiet sigh.
“How was work?” she questioned resignedly.
Jocelyn lay awake that night, as she always did after visiting Lily and James. Lily and James, happy and in love. Compared to Jocelyn and Hector who were …
But she’d been over this so many times, ever since Lily and James’s wedding day. She had watched Andromeda and Ted that day, wanting what they had: love, and a magic no wand could conjure. She’d thought Hector could fill the void Sirius had left; thought he could give her everything Ted gave Andromeda. It was laughable now, in a horribly twisted way. If anything, Hector had only made her feel more hollow.
He was the very antithesis of everything Sirius was “ that was what had attracted Jocelyn to him in the first place…
She frowned. Had she ever been attracted to him? It all seemed so long ago now…
She wasn’t going to say she loved him but wasn’t in love with him. She was not going to fall into that pitiful cliché. She didn’t know anymore if she’d ever loved him in any sense. She was very fond of him, certainly; his steadiness had been a breath of fresh air, a long-needed change from the constant turbulence in her relationship with Sirius. She gave a wry smile. Turbulence had been painful; predictability was unbearable. Numbness was more excruciating than allowing herself to feel.
Not that she fooled herself about a life with Sirius. She would never have been enough to interest him permanently. She would have held his attention for a few months, maybe a year. Then he would have been off, eager to return to the war, to shake her off, along with all her qualms and “be careful’s”.
Passion would have turned to frustration: he, frustrated because she wanted to hold him back; she, frustrated because she couldn’t. But even temporary passion would have been better than the resignation with which she had begun her life with Hector. Perhaps, when it had come down to it, Sirius would have shown her how to fight past her fears, the same way James had shown Lily.
But what was the point of speculating? It didn’t matter anymore. She had Hector. Good-natured, easy-going, constant, steady, responsible, reliable, tranquil, predictable Hector. A good man. A model husband. She supposed other women would have said she was lucky to have him. He always remembered to tell her she looked beautiful, and never forgot to tell her he loved her. But it was in the same detached, emotionless, matter-of-fact way he said everything. His eyes “ his touch “ his expressions “ were all cold. “Passion” wasn’t in his vocabulary. Sometimes she wondered if he even had emotions.
At the moment he lay beside her, inches away … but not touching her. He never touched her if he could help it. She could hear his breathing through the darkness, steady and constant, just like the rest of him.
“Hector,” she said softly. “Hector?”
Only his steady breathing answered her. In; out; in; out.
“Hector,” she whispered, “where is your heart?”
In; out, answered Hector’s breathing. In; out.
“Do you even have one?”
In; out; in; out; in; out.
Jocelyn gave an involuntary shudder. A new, horrifying question had occurred to her.
“Do I?”
She had numbed herself to pain for so long. Every twinge was stamped out, every pang ignored. She wasn’t even sure if she knew how to feel anymore. She didn’t even know if she had the capacity. Pain had become so foreign to her that the slightest bit would break her. Or perhaps she was so deadened it could no longer affect her at all.
Could the skin feel if the nerves had died? Could a heart bleed if it had disappeared? Did a person exist if their soul had vanished? And if not, what was the point of carrying on?
“I wanted to feel,” she whispered to the darkness. But what was there to feel when her life companion was a man who was heart-less … soulless? What other option was there but numb existence?
Once “ in what she remembered almost as a stranger’s life she had merely heard about long ago and half forgotten “ she had been passionate … fiery … risk-taking. Then, with her mother’s murder, fear had crept into her life, slowly … so slowly … and before she had even acknowledged it, it had taken over.
What are you so afraid of? asked the long-silenced voice of the person she had been so long ago.
She frowned. What was she so afraid of? Not specifics “ fighting … the death of her loved ones … war. Ultimately, what was she afraid of?
But that was obvious…
“Being hurt,” she answered softly.
Numbness had crept in after the fear, an alternative to the pain, enveloping her, promising to protect her.
It had been a cruel and empty promise, she knew now. It had not protected her at all. It had destroyed her.
She didn’t feel pain anymore, it was true. But the problem with numbness was that she didn’t feel anything. Joy … love … compassion … it had all become foreign to her.
“I wanted to feel,” she repeated almost desperately, willing someone “ anyone “ to understand. And then, for the first time since the last night she’d spoken to Sirius, the voice of her old self “ her real self “ passed through her lips: “But not enough.”
Her breath caught in her throat as something “ some emotion she could not explain ““ rose in her chest. Beside her, the steadiness of Hector’s breathing was suddenly broken. He was stirring, waking slightly.
“You say something, Joce’?” he mumbled groggily.
For one moment Jocelyn had a wild desire to tell Hector the truth “ something she hadn’t told anyone since she’d severed ties with Sirius. She wanted to ask him if he had a heart, if he had emotions, and if so, where he kept them hidden, and why. She wanted to have a real, raw, honest conversation with him … like the kind she used to have with Sirius. She wanted to let down the walls she’d built around her heart, let someone look and see if any part of it was still there. She wanted “ truly wanted “ to feel.
But then instinct “ old habit “ took effect again. The walls refortified themselves; her head “ logic “ over-ruled her heart. It always did.
“No, nothing, Hector,” she whispered, tears pricking her eyes once before the numbness consumed her again. “Nothing at all.”