Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.

Revival
—

Harry Potter was perfect for her in every possible way.

And then he died.

—

She is everything he hates.

She is just a Weasel. Poor. A blood-traitor.

He supposes, were she from a respectable family like his, that she could be considered funny. Pretty. Perhaps even beautiful, someday.

—

She pities him.

At least she still has her family. He lost both of his parents.

(Though that isn't really a bad thing, in his case.)

—

He spends months at Grimmauld Place after the war, and he wants to leave but knows he can't because his old friends will kill him if they find him now, after what he did for the good side.

She's there, even though he knows for a fact that she doesn't have a reason to be, and he knows better than to think it's because she's keeping him company.

They don't speak unless it's to call each other derogatory terms, and he hates that he enjoys arguing with her.

—

There's a hole in her heart that should be filled with Harry. There are things inside of her that can only be brought out by Harry.

So how does he make her tingle the way Harry used to?

—

He thinks that she has a very lovely smile. And her laugh is absolutely contagious.

(He doesn't know where thoughts like that come from.)

—

Her hair smells brilliant. At least better, he thinks, that the prison cells in Azkaban.

He swallows his pride and tells himself that he doesn't mind staying in this awful place with nothing to look at but her, because his life is worth too much to be cut short like someone unworthy – someone like Harry Potter.

Besides, her body isn't half bad and he thinks her eyes are a lovely shade brown, though he'll never tell her so.

—

She couldn't save Harry, but she is sure she can save him, if he'll let her.

She refuses to lose again, especially to a Malfoy.

—

She knows he has the Mark, but still, when she sees it for the first time, she can't help but react.

Does that scare you? he asks with a sneer.

Nothing about you scares me, she says simply, and even though it couldn't be further from the truth, she loves the way it bothers him. Challenges him.

—

He hears her crying in her sleep one night, calling out Potter's name.

Absolutely fucking pathetic, he thinks.

It's only Potter, after all. He didn't know anyone actually thinks about the Boy Who Lived (And Then Pitifully Died) anymore.

Harry Potter served his purpose. And he died, which just showed how pathetic he was.

It bothers him how everyone thinks Potter was such a hero, but it bothers him most that she does, too.

He is older now, but he still hates Potter with everything in him, because that idiot always had to have all the fame and glory and everything else.

And won't it be the ultimate victory if he takes the one thing Potter doesn't get to have?

—

She wants him, and she knows the only reason she feels that way is because she isn't supposed to want him.

She wishes she could be simpler. How does anyone put up with her?

—

Hermione warns her to be careful and says she shouldn't trust him, but she doesn't listen, because this hasn't ever been written about in a school textbook, so what can Hermione possibly know when it comes to this?

—

It's just sex.

She tells herself this over and over. Sex. Not worry, not commitment. Certainly not love. She had that with Harry, and he is not Harry.

He will never even come close.

Why doesn't that bother her?

—

He doesn't think he's even capable of love.

If he is, he still wouldn't love her.

—

She stops thinking about Harry when she's with him. She doesn't remember that Harry was slow and gentle where he is fast and rough.

She doesn't care.

—

She closes her eyes and she can still feel warm breath hitting the curve of her neck, hard muscle under smooth flesh, damp and silky hair between her fingers.

But whose?

—

She isn't looking for love, and she knows that she won't find it here with him even if she tries.

She believes that there is one person out there for everyone.

And who is she to steal someone's one just because hers had succumbed to the death he'd been destined for since birth?

—

She remembers going through this with Harry and telling Hermione everything, because Hermione would listen and understand and offer sound advice.

She wants to tell Hermione now but can't, because then her brother will find out, and her brother can't find out.

She knows it would be disaster. And the smallest voice inside her head, the one that sounds so very similar to Tom, tells her it would be brilliant, as well.

—

Wherever Harry is, she thinks that he can see her now. And she thinks that he hates her now, too.

She'll never admit that a part of her really likes that idea.

It's so incredibly liberating to know that this one silly action has the potential to affect everyone in her life.

She has all the power, and sometimes she wants to keep her cards close, but other times, she wants to reveal all her secrets just to see the reaction.

She gets pleasure from seeing the concerned way her family regards her, the looks they exchange when she mentions that she's stopping by Grimmauld Place before meeting Hermione for lunch, and she is too far in to realize that she gets that from him.

She has spent enough time working to please everyone.

—

He is unlike anyone she has ever known.

He has been through as much as perhaps even Harry, and yet he still lives on in with a way about him that is so true and so raw and so human.

And yet none of those words can accurately describe him.

He's a liar, and she knows that. He's a bad person, and she knows that too.

But he doesn't pretend to be anything other than what he is, and she thinks that she likes him very much for just that reason.

—

He has too much to drink one night and tells her that he wants her, wants her in a way he has never admitted to wanting anyone before.

She feels a flicker of something inside before stifling it, and then she whispers the cold truth (is anything left between them really all that true?)in his ear before walking away.

—

He watches her go, and when he is left alone with his thoughts, they taunt and mock him until he is out of his mind with hate, both for her and for himself.

He packs up his things and he goes back to Malfoy Manor, deciding he'd rather lose his life to a betrayed Death Eater than lose his head (and even his heart) to a confused Weasel.

—

She goes back to discover an empty room which he should be pacing, where his things should be meticulously arranged on the desk and where his clothes should be neatly folded and stored.

The room is bare now and looks like nobody ever lived in it. It occurs to her that even when he was there, it didn't look lived in. He never really lived at all, did he?

She gets the news four days later by way of the Daily Prophet, page three, article six.

—

She thinks of love and knows that although he thought he did, he had not truly given her it. But he gave her many things. He gave her a glimpse at a life and an independence that she thought she'd wanted for herself, and he gave her the clarity to realize she really doesn't want that.

—

She doesn't go to his funeral, though she knows when and where it's held.

Instead, she goes to Grimmauld Place and throws out the handful of items he'd left behind, knowing that he hadn't left them for her anyway.

Then she smiles and goes home to the family that loves her, because it may seem like she lost another one, but somehow, from where she's standing, she doesn't quite see it that way.

—