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Back to You by PixieDust86
Story Notes:
I originally started this story as CharmedLife19 a decade ago. I had a bit of inspiration recently and finished it so...enjoy.
Prologue: Dying on the Inside (Part 1) by PixieDust86
Prologue: Dying on the Inside (part 1)

December 25, 1997

The tears fell down her cheeks as she attempted to wipe them away. Her chest ached from sobs of heartache. No, it couldn’t possibly be heartache, for she had lost her heart after she had just barely given it away. Her mother had always told her to be careful whom she gave her heart to; she should have listened, she should have heeded the advice.

She was a fool, a complete and utter fool. She couldn’t believe how stupid she had been and now, here she was on Christmas day, hopelessly alone, surrounded by family and friends who insisted they knew and loved her. But they didn’t know her. Not anymore.

They didn’t know what had happened during the past four months of her life. They didn’t see how badly she was hurting. They didn’t know. They would never know. She could never tell them, for they would never understand.

Ginny scoffed at how they all thought she still longed for Harry Potter, her brother’s best friend since his very first day at Hogwarts. She knew Harry was beginning to see that she was no longer the same timid little girl he had first met all those years ago. It was only a matter of time until he came to her, giving up his heart to her in exchange for her own. But she didn’t want his, and she would never be able to give him hers.

Slowly she pulled herself up out of bed and into the bathroom. She washed her face, careful to make sure that all signs of her early morning cry were gone. She forced a believable smile onto her face, hoping that the people who awaited her downstairs would still see the innocent girl they had always known. They hadn’t seen through her strong facade yet, though she knew it was only a matter of time.

Taking a deep breath, she turned and grasped the knob of the bathroom door and in the same instance caught a glance of herself in the full-length mirror. She had changed in so many ways since she once stood in front of this mirror as a little girl longing to be a woman of beauty; a woman who men would gladly seek after. She frowned as she looked at the woman she had slowly grown to be. Sure, men looked at her and they wanted her. Sure, they thought she was beautiful. But the truth of the matter was, if they looked into her soul, into the vacant space in her chest that used to house her heart, they would no longer see the sweet little angel whom had once lived there.

Looking into her own eyes once more, she longed to see the light she knew had been there the last time she had looked into this mirror. The light that had been there not but four months ago. The light she had seen before she had left to start her sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And slowly, she closed her eyes, trying in vain to remember what she had felt like at that moment of her life. Trying to remember every bit of that moment and the moments of her life between now and then. When had it all gone so terribly wrong?

Letting out a breath she hadn’t even known she was holding, she knew the answer to that loaded question. The answer couldn’t be penned back to a specific day or time, but to a long series of events. And inevitably, every event led back to him.


This story archived at http://www.dracoandginny.com/viewstory.php?sid=7628