Flower Petals

-24-

James and Lily, Sirius and Lupin. They were only 21. Ron, Harry, Hermione, Draco, Luna, Neville, we're 17. Ginny, Alli and Paula were 16.

War knows no age, and cares not who it takes.
It just takes.

It's important to remember how they were children. How they had dreams and first loves and heartaches, they had expectations and ideas for the world that some of them never were able to share. They were children, sometimes we forget.

Today two children captured by war and violence would have a day unlike any other, uninterrupted by evil and expectations. To remember, as we all should, that they are young and alive.

It was morning at the Burrow. Harry was off gathering things from the Dursley's, and Hermione was silent for everyone but him.

It seemed for once that things were quiet.

There was a summer air that drifted through the house in the mornings, and a chill running in the halls at night. Today the sun rose over the rolling hills of green, swaying in the morning breeze.

By the time Ron and Alli reached the Burrow last night it was morning again, the morning after Draco had stolen away his own lifetime, where Paula had spoiled her life in the light, and Ginny fell to her own heartbreak. They explained, fervently though they were exhausted, to Molly why they were home, why they could not go back. The twins and Ginny were still at the castle, packing and preparing for the beginning of the end. Harry insisted Alli would be safer with the Weasley's then at the Dursley's and Ron agreed, so there she was in the Burrow guarded and suffocating.

They ate, well, Ron ate. Though neither of them knew within all the craziness if it was breakfast, dinner or lunch.

Then suddenly, it was night again. The day had passed and the darkness felt as though it had never seized around them, they were back just as they had begun, in the castle foyer surrounding Dumbledore's lifeless, bloody body.

They'd agreed they needed each other silently. Molly sent them up to bed, Ron held Alli's hand up the staircase they'd run up and down on as children, but this time they didn't separate at their rooms. They needed to be chained to each other in comfort and in grief. Everything was all done without words like they were carrying out a dance.

Ron turned around to close the door, keeping his back facing Alli. She changed into one of his shirts. (Which on her was nothing short of a ball gown) She threw her pants to the side, sliding on some of his shorts (tying the drawstring so tight she could puke).

Ron grabbed his shirt behind his head with one hand tossing it over his shoulder. They walked hand in hand to brush their teeth. Staring at each other in the mirror to find comfort or love they could grasp onto.

Ron sat criss-cross on his bed and Alli on the edge as he brushed the knots from her hair, being as gentle as he could. His fingertips grazed her scalp every time he ran the brush through, Alli closed her eyes to focus on how it felt to have him there with her. Taking deep breaths in, synced with Ron's.

He laid down underneath his quilt, holding the blanket up for her so she had a space, he held up a single arm too. She crawled to him, exhausted. He enclosed her with the blanket and his arm into him. They held each other and she nuzzled into him, scared of what tomorrow could bring. However the longer she laid next to him the more she felt safe, his bed smelled like tea leaves and kettle corn.

Alli didn't have any nightmares, Ron had scared them away, but she heard Draco in her dreams, warning her and screaming to her through the blankness before Ron's safety ushered it away.

She had never been so bare with him, it was a different kind of naked. Ron thought she could've been gone when Dumbledore came crashing down, and Alli had lost two loves in her life, both of them had been scrubbed of doubt, they needed each other, to say anything otherwise was a waste of time.