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“When you walk away, I count the steps that you take, do you know how much I need you right now? “When You’re Gone” by Avril Lavigne.
The first rays of a golden sun were just beginning to creep through a pair of emerald curtains and on to the closed eyelids of one petite redhead sleeping in a bed other than her own. Ginny moaned softly as she rolled over to press herself into the warm chest sleeping next to her. She smiled, still lost in the denial of sleep, as a pair of arms wrapped themselves around her.
“Don’t go,” a husky voice whispered in her ear.
Draco Malfoy had been fully awake for at least an hour before the sun, just drinking in the sensation of his girlfriend’s body pressed softly against his own, and the smell of her crimson hair as it tickled his face. More than anything, he wanted her to stay, stay with him instead of going back out into the real world, the world were she practically denied his existence. But she always left, so what right did he have to expect anything different on this morning?
The very sound of his voice seemed to cause a stir in her, as if it made her suddenly realize that she wasn’t supposed to be there in the first place. With a jolt, she began to disentangle their bodies, and claw her way out of the delicate cotton sheets.
With a heavy sigh, Draco helped her make her escape, letting her go without any protest, and dutifully beginning to retrieve various pieces of her clothing from the floor.
Ginny grabbed at her possessions in a semi crazed haste, muttering about being late. If she saw the mournful look in the pair of silver eyes that watched as she put her clothing back on, she ignored it. Once all of her things were off the floor and back on her body, she pressed a quick kiss to the side of his face.
“I’ll see you tonight, maybe,” she called over her shoulder as she made her way to the door at a quick clip.
With an unwavering gaze, Draco stared after her, watching listlessly as she made her was from his bedroom and out into the common area of his flat. He hated this part, hated it so badly he always thought about it the moment she’d walk into his flat some nights. Normally, after he watched her close his front door, he’d lay his head back down until he had to get up. But it was her sweater, her dark blue sweater, which sat mockingly in the chair across from his bed that set off a spark in his chest.
Without hesitation, he stood, grabbing her sweater and the gray button up shirt he’d been wearing the night before, he threw it on over top of his dark pajama bottoms.
The sweater, still clutched in his hand, held her vanilla and cinnamon scent perfectly, but it was bitter to his scenes. Bitter, because just like she did every morning, she had walked away.
“Gin, wait,” he called to her just as her hand reached the dull brass knob of his door.
She turned to him in a huff, placing her hands on her slender waist and fixing him with a stair to frighten off any mere mortal.
“What is it Draco? You know I have to go before they notice I’m gone.” The “they” she was of course referring to, was Hermione Granger and Luna Lovegood, her two roommates who expected her to still be snug up in her own bed. The bed in the flat she shared with the two of them, not the one belonging to Draco Malfoy.
“Don’t leave,” Draco stated simply, still holding her sweater down by his side.
“I don’t have a choice,” Ginny insisted, tugging the woolen jumper from his fingers. “You know that.” She reached her hand for the door and pushed it open without a second thought.
But Draco wouldn’t let the conversation end, not today. He followed her as she made her way down the stairs, knowing she couldn’t Apparate until she was completely out of the building. When he caught up to her, he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.
“Honestly Draco!” Ginny sighed in exasperation, “You know I have to go!”
“You don’t,” Draco said in a soft and certain voice, his famous clam refusal to show emotions wavering slightly. “Look Ginny, why don’t you just tell them?”
Ginny recoiled as if he’d burned her.
“Tell them?” she shuddered, looking at him incredulously, “Draco, you can’t be serious.” The blond nodded, his eyes letting her know just how serious he could be. Ginny flinched visibly. “Draco, I can’t!”
The hurt in his eyes was the only thing that betrayed him, but Ginny was too busy being shocked to see it, or care that it was there. He took a step back from her, gazing at her intently as he spoke:
“I’m tired of being your secret, Gin. I’m tired of only being a shadow in your life. I want to take you out, spend time with you during the day. Do things that normal couples do. I’m tired of you being ashamed of me.” There was an eerie calmness to his voice, which caused Ginny to take another step back.
“Draco, I’m not ashamed -”
“Then say you’ll stay, today,” he interrupted, his façade finally breaking as a hint of desperation found its way into his voice.
“Draco…”
“Don’t you get it Ginny?” He asked, his blond hair, still messy from sleep, slipping over his eyes to mask the fear he didn’t want to admit was there, the fear that like always, she was just going to walk away.
“Did you know?” he started with a shaking breath, “Did you know that on the nights you don’t come, your side of the bed stays perfectly made? Or that you always leave at least one piece of clothing? I don’t normally chase you to give it back because I want you to have a reason to come back. Whatever it is, it always smells like you, and normally, I can’t even pick it up because I don’t want to even think about your damn perfume when I can’t put my arms around you.”
Ginny blinked her eyes at him, her breathing shallow as she stepped in towards him.
“Draco,” she whispered, slipping her fingers though his fringe and placing them back resolutely on her hips. “I can’t tell them yet.”
A bitter laugh escaped Draco’s throat.
“Six months, and you can’t tell them yet?” he asked in disbelief, “So what, I’m good for fucking, and that’s about it? I want more than that Weasley.”
Ginny visibly recoiled at the harsh edge in his voice.
“I can’t do that yet,” she pleaded, watching as it was his turn to stepped back, his head shaking from side to side.
“Then I can’t do this anymore,” Draco muttered cynically, turning his back on the redheaded girl now close to tears.
“Draco Malfoy! Don’t walk away from me!” She called, for once in their six month relationship, she was the one afraid of being abandoned, realizing now that he could leave her. Her words made him stop, but when he turned his metallic gaze upon her, she could see the damage she had done shinning angrily back at her. Just like everyone else, she had let him down.
“Don’t you dare talk to me about walking away. Every time you leave me, every time you walk away, I count the steps that you take. I stand there like an idiot until I can’t see you anymore, a little piece of me always wishing that you’d just turn around, but you never do. I am not walking away, Ginny. I’m giving up.”
Without another word, he turned his back to her for the second time, silently retracing the forty-seven steps back to his bedroom.
Author notes: A/N: Alright, so Draco might have been a little OOC, but I felt like it fit. This story is over, for now at least. Reviews are always welcome. Thanks for taking the time to read!
~PS
The End.
Pipperstorms is the author of 21 other stories.
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This story is a favorite of 10 members. Members who liked Forty-seven Footsteps also liked 1339 other stories.
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