The Paper Owl by Lyndsie
Past Featured StorySummary: The expanded drabble-verse, which delves into their relationship over the course of a lifetime. Guest starring magical origami.
Categories: Works in Progress Characters: D/G Offspring, Draco Malfoy, Ginny Weasley
Compliant with: All but epilogue
Era: Post-Hogwarts
Genres: Romance
Warnings: None
Challenges:
Series: Inside the Paper Owl
Chapters: 2 Completed: No Word count: 1619 Read: 8336 Published: Nov 01, 2006 Updated: Apr 03, 2007

1. Beginning, End, Middle by Lyndsie

2. Sins of the Father by Lyndsie

Beginning, End, Middle by Lyndsie
Author's Notes:
This story is based on the drabble-verse I created for the weekly challenges here at FIA Forums. The sections titled 'The Formal Introduction' and 'The Fond Farewell' are the drabbles for the Chance Encounters (The Avian Encounter) and 'Photograph' (The Ageless Memory) challenges, respectively. What comes after is entirely new. I plan to begin each new chapter with one of the drabbles, filling in the gaps between what happens in the first two posted in this chapter. This first chapter is very short, but if you read this week's drabble challenge entry, you should see why.

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
The Formal Introduction

She is deathly afraid. The bird is looking at her with murderous intent, and she knows that it is so close it could do permanent damage.

“Ouch!” she shouts as the bird alights from her hand, dragging a claw along her arm unnecessarily. She is examining the scratch when she hears a shout from nearby.

“Blasted bird!” All she sees is the bird flying in the face of a man in a dark coat before she rushes to shoo it away. There is an awkward silence as she realizes who it is that is now sporting a gash down his left cheek.

“Sorry,” she spits out eventually. “I didn’t have any Knuts with me, and I didn’t know the Prophet had such vicious owls.” She cringes at what comes out of her mouth. She wants to exclaim, “But I’m really not poor!” but knows better.

“Err, shall I buy you a drink, make it up to you?” Again, she is appalled at herself. She is sure she is turning violently red at the way his brow is creased.

“I thought you said you hadn’t any money,” he responds after poking at his cheek.

“No, I said I haven’t got any Knuts,” she snaps back, instantly regretting it. “Well, I mean to say, every time I pay them more, they fly off before I can get any change out of their little sack.” She is sure she is imagining the twitch at the corner of his mouth. She realizes she isn’t when he begins to laugh at her.

“All right then,” he responds after a moment, “but you don’t mind if we keep away from Eeylops?”


The Fond Farewell

The photograph was old now, its edges yellowed and curling. The gnarled fingers that held it were thickened with age, and the hand was trembling slightly.

It was, quite literally, a freeze-frame of the happiest moment of his life, taken by accident by a long forgotten girlfriend of one of the twins. They were only in the background, but her smile still warmed him, even from behind the heads of the children playing in the park. It was a static testimony to what had once been.

The figures never moved, and he was jealous of their timeless perfection.


The Story

Being a writer was hard. Sometimes he had absolutely no inspiration. Sometimes he wondered why he hadn’t taken the Ministry job secured for him by his father. Then he remembered how he hated working in offices, pandering to the whims of incompetent superiors. He much preferred pandering from home.

Right now, his biggest problem was with nerves. He considered scrapping the idea of continuing trying to work, but a secret part of him hoped he might be busy all night. The realistic part of him knew that, yes, he probably would have time to finish his piece before tomorrow. He still wanted to finish now, in case things went well enough that he ran out of free time. Except, the same reason that he would have no time was the same reason for the nerves. He had a date later that night.

No woman had ever asked him to go out before, unless you counted Hogsmeade weekends. He decided that he was far enough behind his hormone-driven youth that he really couldn’t—and besides, he didn’t much like to look into the past. It was surprising really, the entire thing. The bird attack was surprising, as was the unexpected kindness of the girl revealed behind the owl. Even more astonishing was that she hadn’t minded being seen in public with him. She had even been an intelligent and funny companion. But the most surprising thing of all wasn’t even that she was a Weasley, but that he had actually enjoyed her company. Since returning to England, he hadn’t really liked being around people.

They’d been getting up to leave, but she hesitated. Looking up at him, she’d smiled and bit her lip, and asked him to dinner. He’d said yes. It was yet to be decided if all the surprises had made him immune to more, or if he was in some sort of shock.

He pushed back his chair and sighed.

Being a writer was hard.
Sins of the Father by Lyndsie
Author's Notes:
The first three sections are all previously-written for the Forums drabble challenges (the first part is the very first drabble written in this universe). The last part is a gift drabble for KateinVA/mugglechump, because she wanted to know more about why Draco leaves.

I think I've officially skipped part of the timeline, and my idea of putting all in order is out the window. Oh well!
“Do you like it?” she asks, eyes shining with excitement. It is the first place she has had that is truly her own, and her enjoyment of this fact would be humorous if it wasn’t so sincere.

He looks around, facing her, taking in the worn furniture and careful decoration. He knows that most of it has come used from various relatives of hers, but she has taken everything of theirs and made it uniquely hers. He is proud of her, but also sad that there is nothing here that reflects his contribution to her life. It would be impossible, since her family does not know about them.

As he turns around to take in the rest of the room—mostly for her sake—a small object catches his eye. On a little shelf next to the window rests a paper owl, folded and charmed so that it had flown about the room for a few hours after its creation. He knows this because he made it for her a long time ago, intending for her to unfold it and read the message inside. But she was so enamored of it, so taken with the thought of his small present, that she never opened it. He smiles, but she does not see.

“I like it very much,” he responds after a moment.

One day, she will open the little owl.

--

“That’s how you feel?”

He clenches his hand, a reflexive gesture he picked up years ago. “That’s the only way it can be right now. I’m not saying forever, but—”

He stops, in order to duck the shoe that comes flying at him. It’s his own shoe, and its mate comes quickly after it, along with several other objects that he recognizes as things he’d given her. She is shouting, but he doesn’t make out all the words in his haste to avoid the flying objects.

There is one thing he understands, though. “Get out!” she screams, stopping short of throwing her favorite lamp at him. Suddenly, she sucks in a shaky breath and collapses boneless onto the nearby sofa. In a soft, broken voice, she continues, “I was all right with you never saying... it to me, because I believe actions speak louder then words.” She looks up at him, and he feels a nearly physical pain lance through him with her gaze. “But this is your child, and you won’t even…” A sob breaks through her words. He finds that he cannot speak.

After a moment, she stands, and softy mutters, “Goodbye”. She walks away, locking herself in the bedroom. When she hears the door close behind him, she begins to sob.

Later that night, after she has cried herself numb, she enters the room strewn with all the things that meant something to them. A bolt of panic shoots through her as she sees her precious little paper owl lying crumpled and smashed on the floor. She feels the tears start again as she kneels down next to it, softly touching its broken body, as though it were a real animal. That’s when she notices the ink on what had been an interior fold. Gingerly, she picks it up and reveals it.

There, in the little bird that had stood for years as testimony to his presence, she finds words written in his hand.

Love you.

--

He knew the exact moment that his world shifted. Time slowed to a crawl as he watched the ruffled pillow arc to the ground, crushing the origami figure he’d crafted years ago. Before he knows it, he is alone in the room.

He looks down at the mangled little bird lying forlornly on the floor. The revelation sings through his veins.

He is like the bird. He is broken, damaged; he is nothing.

They are better off without him.

--

Those of you who are left will waste away in the lands of their enemies because of their sins; also because of their fathers' sins they will waste away.
Leviticus 26:39

Once upon a time there lived a little boy, who had the best dad in the whole world. He bought him toys and read him stories. He taught him how to fly his training broom. He let him eat sweets when mum wasn’t looking.

But little boys have to grow up, and growing up is hard. The world of his father was comforting, it was familiar in its static certainty. But that world was gone, sunk under the weight of its own darkness. He was the scion of an accursed house; his blood ran with that of a traitor, and his name was vilified.

The world was changed, and he was a relic of the past. She belonged the new order. The offering of it to him was in her very gaze. But how was he to accept it, when he was so tainted?

He wanted to give his own child sweets in secret, and to buy presents for her. He wanted to teach her who he was and to help in forming her identity, but how was he to that when everything was gone, and wrong? In resurrecting the past in her, he would be visiting his sins upon her. And that was not something he wanted to live with.
End Notes:
Edited 4/9/07 because I somehow left out the most important part of the second drabble - what was inside the owl! I think the reason that I chose to phrase it that way was because we had just read "Dos palabras" by Isabel Allende in class. The phrase "dos palabras" (two words) in Spanish has the same connotation as "three little words" does in English. (Te amo - I love you.)
This story archived at http://www.dracoandginny.com/viewstory.php?sid=4863