I
The scene is an empty cafeteria. Old rustic lamps are covered with a duvet of dust and condensed memories. Wooden floor creaks and it’s kind of charming how that sounds sometimes – like rusty see-saw or muffled squeaking of mice under your bed. Wrinkled curtains give off acrid scent, and yet it’s so pleasant and it reminds you of your grandfather’s pipe and black tobacco leaves.
You’d say he looks as if he’s praying to a cup of coffee. His pointing finger is tapping the porcelain and the smallest one is resting on the sticky table. There is something written, or rather inscribed with a fingernail on the center-piece. It says enigmatic things like I was here and waited. Now, I’ve moved on, darling. A.M. 1977. It’s amusing, slightly, because he’s waiting too, and he wants to move on, too. Though, he believes that the stranger from the 70s didn’t want to escape life. Or did he?
**
‘Your eyes look like chocolate,’ he says as he watches her from under his falling fringe. They are sitting in the library and they are acting as if they were strangers, or rather a curious pair made to be in the presence of one another. She raises her head, rolls her indeed chocolate-coloured eyes and smiles gently.
‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ she answers and turns her head to see if anybody’s watching them. ‘Your hair looks like Dumbledore’s beard.’
He snorts. ‘Who’s being absurd now?’ But he is smiling too, and he does it in this warm sort of way that would seem inconceivable for anybody who knows him and yet it’s so familiar to her.
‘And your cheeks are a bit like peaches,’ he smirks.
‘Are you hungry?’ she asks, amused.
‘Kind of.’ And when he looks at her then, she is almost certain that he isn’t thinking about food. ‘Let’s get out of here’.
Her head is still bowed and she looks uninterested. But then you can hear her quiet whisper and twenty minutes, same place.
II
The scene is a crowded street in the center of a big city. Though it’s late and people should be safely sheltered in their homes, it’s buzzing and it’s strangely alive there. Moonlight is oozing gently from between navy-blue clouds and it shines and shines as if it wanted to outshine all those lonely street lamps.
His skin looks grayish in the moonlight. It’s kind of peculiar. He should be pearly white, or silver, or crystalline. You’d think that he could be easily seen in the dimness of the late afternoon hour. Yet, he remains transparent, ash-coloured. People do look at him. Their crooked glances and chaotic thoughts only prove that he can’t hide. They stare at him when he wants to escape, to merge into those masses of anonymous ones. But that’s the paradox of him and he can’t help but laugh dryly at their predictable actions.
**
‘What are you going to miss the most?’ he enquires as he draws circles on her back. They are sitting on the windowsill in his room. Their legs are touching as they hang outside.
‘You ask as if you didn’t know already,’ she says and looks at him pointedly.
‘The library, of course,’ he states without any hesitation.
‘The library,’ she smiles but continues. ‘I think I’ll miss this crisp air in the morning when I open my window too.’
‘I’ll miss meals and classes,’ he says.
‘Really?’
‘Yeah, I have a thing for crowds,’ he chuckles.
‘You talk as if it was already ended,’ she reflects after a minute and catches a piece of his shirt to occupy her hands.
‘Are you afraid it will end?’
‘Well, you are rarely wrong.’
‘But I have been. A few times.’
‘But still.’
‘I don’t think it will. End like that, I mean,’ he brushes her hair off of her face. She leans into his palm.
‘Stick to being not mistaken then.’
III
The scene is an old cinema full of screechy chairs in rows and the screen in the colour of sun and ivory. The dust can be seen floating in the air as it is illuminated by the off-screen light. There is this couple consisting of two ancient lovers and their slower and slower beating hearts and ragged breaths destroyed by nicotine smoke, shouts and innumerable glasses of wine. There can be heard the sound of electricity running in wires inside walls.
He likes the seconds before the film starts the best. There is this silence that sucks all outside noises like a black hole. Ten seconds left and he feels the anticipation in his stomach. Nine, eight, seven and he starts to imagine the beginning. Six, five, four and he sees white scratches on the reel reflected on the black screen. Three, two seconds. One second and the projection begins as the milky wave of tiny pictures hits the flat square on the wall.
* *
She is shouting at him. ‘I can’t do it anymore, Malfoy! I can’t hide like that and pretend nothing is happening!’
His eyes are closed. ‘Be reasonable, Hermione. I can’t go and flaunt about you in the common room like you were some prize easily won.’ She huffs but she knows he is right. ‘You know that it’s only for the better. Besides, I don’t see you telling Potter and Weasley about me either.’
‘You know I would if you just let me.’ And she doesn’t lie to him. Though, she might be a bit afraid of their reaction. Rejection, to be precise.
‘And what would you say? That I reformed and think that actually this mud in your blood is honey?’ His agitation can be seen on his face – forehead wrinkled and lips pursed.
‘Cut the sarcasm, please,’ she scoffs.
‘What do you expect us to be on the outside? A pair of star-crossed lovers? I am your knight and you are my damsel in distress?’
She rolls her eyes. ‘No.’ And she knows that she made a fool of herself again. He is right, again. ‘I’m sorry.’
He walks to her and catches her hand in his. She breathes heavily but doesn’t move. ‘It’s just.. sometimes I feel that if everybody knew, this whole thing wouldn’t feel like a day from somebody else’s life.’
‘But it sort of is.’
There is a sad smile on her lips. ‘I guess.’
IV
The scene is a silent room inside an abandoned house. The place seems windowless at the first glance, but then one can spot a large window covered with emerald green curtains that match the walls and carpets. There is a polished table in the middle and six chairs waiting for somebody to sit on them. The room is spotless and it’s curious how and why because nobody has lived there for so long.
There are strangers, aliens, unknown creatures that lurk from behind closed doors and watch him walking inside his old room in circles. They emerge like puffs of dust when somebody is dusting down the bedclothes and they dance around him. He is not afraid because he is used to this feeling of coldness. He lived with different kind of ghosts for eighteen years of his life, and it’s not so out-of-ordinary to feel warm in the house made of ice and cursory glances and frozen, prejudiced minds.
**
‘Green suits you,’ she tells him. She is sitting on his lap because she refused to sit on the wet grass. It is very early. The sky is not even clear yet.
‘I thought you are prejudiced,’ he jokes and moves his arm so as to put a sleeve of his greet shirt to her face and check how does it match with her eyes.
‘I exaggerate sometimes,’ she admits and removes his hand from under her face and puts it on her neck.
‘I know,’ he says and he touches her cheek with his chilly one, ‘and you are biased.’ She pokes him in the arm. They don’t talk for a while.
‘Are you cold?’ she asks because she can feel him snuggling closer and closer to her.
‘I don’t feel cold anymore,’ he answers.
‘How is that so? I’m almost freezing here,’ she shivers in his arms.
‘Let’s just say some things require getting used to,’ he smiles and there is so much irony in it.
‘You always talk in riddles,’ she echoes her thoughts.
‘It’s easier that way.’
“Easier? It seems evasive to me.’
‘That’s the point.’
‘You don’t have to hide anything from me,’ she speaks quietly as if doubtful of his trust in her.
‘I’m not hiding anything from you. I’m protecting you.’
V
The scene is a ballroom. There are green and silver and marble white adornments all over the place. There are tens of people in black robes and expensive dresses and shining jewellery. They are standing in groups and they are talking quietly about some uninteresting topics. They are stiff and poised and, as it is expected, artificial in their friendliness to each other. Hundreds of glasses are being filled with red wine and there might be waterfalls of it, but who’s counting?
He is sitting in the corner of the spacious room and he is observing a couple in the distance. They look so out-of-place and he understands them so well. It’s a bitter realization because he didn’t expect it to feel so right and so not revolting. He is dignified, clad in pricey clothes, well-spoken and well-behaved and it should mean that he fits. But it doesn’t. There is a whirlwind of thoughts in his head and he wants to escape and be alone, or with someone who is not acting and pretending. He knows he can’t just go and leave, so he just chooses not to hear. Or see. Or judge.
**
‘Granger,’ he acknowledges her.
‘Malfoy,’ she replies.
They are just a pair of strange people in the same room. They are two acquainted people doing the same thing. They are both trying to avoid each other but the lack of space and the intense dislike are like magnet which should push away the opposing poles, but, strangely enough, it draws them together.
She wants to ask him which shelf he is going to start with but she doesn’t want to talk to him. ‘Malfoy?’
‘Granger?’
‘Where do you start?’ she doesn’t look at him.
‘Left shelf,’ he is surprised he answered without snapping at her. She is astonished he didn’t curse her. They do not speak at all after that.
‘Granger?’
‘What?’
‘Move.’
‘Where?’
‘I don’t care,’
‘Me neither.’ There is silence from both sides. He won’t tell her she is touching him. She won’t let him know she feels that his left shoulder is touching her right one.
‘Granger!’
‘What!?’
‘Move.’
‘Why?’
‘You know why.’
‘Malfoy.’
‘What now?’
‘Nothing.’ But she doesn’t move. And he tries not to care.
VI
The scene is an empty cafeteria. Old rustic lamps are covered with a duvet of dust and condensed memories. Wooden floor creaks and it’s kind of charming how that sounds sometimes – like rusty see-saw or muffled squeaking of mice under your bed. Wrinkled curtains give off acrid scent, and yet it’s so pleasant and it reminds you of your grandfather’s pipe and black tobacco leaves.
There is a man sitting by the table. His green robes hung from his shoulders lazily as if they were resting after a tiresome fight with furiously blowing wind. There is a mug standing next to his left hand. The right hand is scribbling something on the surface. This might be a quote of a famous poet, some once heard saying, or it might be just a sentence which settled itself in the pit of his mind – I am here waiting. And I will move on, darling. D.M. 1998. It’s amusing, slightly, because it is written under a very similar inscription, and he muses how people’ lives are alike.
**
‘What are you going to do now?’ she asks him, looking straight into his eyes, hopeful.
‘Well, there is no turning back. I need to hide.’
‘Are you scared?’ she whispers and he doesn’t answer.
‘I don’t know when I will see you next, though,’ he catches her face in his hands and tries not to turn his gaze from her.
‘Why?’
‘I have to get back home.’
‘No.’
‘I need to do it.’
‘No, you can go with me.’ Her voice breaks.
‘I don’t know if I am ready to do it.’
‘Please,’ she pleads.
‘I have to think about this. It’s not easy. It won’t change anything.’
‘Of course it will!’
‘I..,’ he stops and kisses her and walks a few steps away. ‘Meet me in the same place in three days.’ She nods and doesn’t go after him. She waits.
Director's Cut by vasta
Chapter Endnotes: I'm sorry for any mistakes. English is not my first language, but I do what I can ;)