07. "The Animal Song"
When superstars and cannonballs are running through your head
His face, etched with pain, floats before her mind's eye just before the dreamless sleep potion fully comes into effect, and sharp pain cuts through her heart again. What is going through his head? He won't talk to her. Something's gone too far, too deep, and she cannot reach through it.
It feels like falling. It feels like drowning. It feels like a nightmare that she's taken the potion against.
The potion will not help with things outside the dreams.
A small voice adds, in her mind. 'The potion doesn't always work. The potion doesn't work for him.'
She wants to break through. To reach and grasp him and stop the drowning. Who's drowning? She is. He is. He won't talk to her.
I've got to break away
So take my hand now
Take her hand. Holding hands. That is such a small thing, isn't it. It doesn't involve words even; maybe that's why he won't talk to her, words are too confusing. But how can she know what it's like if he won't tell her? It's easy to claim 'you don't understand', but how can one fully understand when one's deprived of information?
Does he want to be helped? What if he truly thinks he deserves suffocating, self-destroying himself...?
That thought makes a tear leak through her closed lids.
He mustn't. He is loved, he is loved by so many. Doesn't he see that punishing himself, he's punishing those who care for him too? Doesn't that matter?
No, she cannot accept that. Everybody is egotistic, but he truly cares for those he's let in his heart.
He must see that...
He must accept help.
He must help her.
No, this isn't about her. And it is. And it isn't.
She's not helpless. She's only hurting for him. She doesn't hurt for herself, does she? Or is it her who's selfish? She wants him by her side. She wants to help him. To take away the loneliness. She wants him to take away the loneliness, the darkness, the fear, the whatever-it-is that he's staying the hell away for. Is it for him that she wants to help him?
What is wrong, what is right?
Her mind lets go, because she doesn't know anymore.
The tears stain the pillow, potion or not.
Compassion in your hands
Would you like to make a run for it
Would you like to take my hand
Muse: Tonks
Fandom: Harry Potter
Album Claim: Savage Garden - Affirmation
Word count: 371