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What ifs and Maybes

He walks over to the white marble tomb, which dazzles in the sunlight, nearly blinding him. He fingers his wand in pocket, relishing the smooth cool surface of it, reliving the moment when he pointed it towards the man lying in the tomb, years ago. He runs his hand on the smooth surface of the tomb, inwardly apologizing to him.

What if, he had defied his parents and him, when they first told him about his task? He had already been reluctant, but he had been a coward, too scared to disobey. What if he had accepted the old man's offer of help? True, it came at the last moment but he could've have stopped it all and joined the good side. What if…?

He relives everything that was and could have been again and again, until he feels the familiar pull of self-loathing and disgust at himself and he starts gasping for breath. Her voice floats into his head, telling him to breathe, to just breathe and he eventually calms down. He walks over to the Great Lake and lets his hand skim the surface and he reminisces about unfinished homework, trembling hands and short breaths. About the mission that consumed his mind and ravaged him, internally and externally, during his last year of school. It was years ago but he still feels the shame and loathing for himself. She alleviates it but only temporarily. He wonders if she will ever get tired of him and leave him. He knows that he'll never get tired of her, no matter how bossily or righteously she tells him things. He might get angry but never tired.

Maybe, in an alternate universe, he would've have been born to different circumstances, to a happy and loving family with no prejudices and no links to evil. Maybe, he wouldn't have been forced to do a job he didn't want to do. Maybe, he wouldn't have been a coward and he would've said no. Maybe, in another world, he would have been an innocent boy with bare arms, who could have been loved by her with all the love she was capable of giving. He thinks of this and gets the familiar feeling of sadness which is all that he seems to be feeling when she's not around.

He sees her coming down with her friends, smiling with her untidy brown hair flowing down her back. They never told anyone that they were together. He wonders who protested against it in the beginning. It might have been her or it might have been him or it might have been both of them. But now, he doesn't care. He stands up and walks over to them. He ignores the glare from the red head, returns the polite nod to his ex-rival and looks at her, with a smile tugging at his lips.

He decides that the boy who he was in school, who was afraid of doing things, belongs to the past. He no longer wants to stand around doing nothing like a bloody coward.

With these thoughts, he reaches out and grasps her hand with the hand on which a black monstrosity marred his pale skin, and basking in the gasp of surprise emitted by her, he feels content. His smile widens and it is mirrored on her face. Reluctantly, he looks away from her face to see the looks on her friends' face, realizing that such an opportunity to see his enemies (ex-enemies, his mind reminds him) flustered would be impossible to get again. He smirks at the look of anger and disbelief on the red head's face and feels a bit put out at hearing a soft, 'I knew it' , from her other friend. He looks at her face again and seeing the smile still on her face, he feels more than content; he feels happy.

Even if he knows that she doesn't love him (yet, his mind tells him); even if they have a love-hate relationship in which the lines between hate, like and love were being constantly blurred, until they resembled a smear of emotions in which it was difficult to decipher which was which, he finds that he prefers to live in the real world with her, instead of an imaginative world of what ifs and maybes.

A/N: Read and Review.