Trust
Chapter 2 – The Inside
The door blasted off its hinges and four figures sprinted inside. One of them siphoned the smoke inside its wand as the other three scooped Neville off his knees and into their arms. Within seconds he was carried out of the room and the figures set him on a camp bed in the other room. The haziness was beginning to subside, but with it came the pain in his arm once more. Neville became severely aware of this as one of the figures then pulled his sleeve up forcefully examined his arm.
“It looks like you got out of that one just in time,” The figure before him said. “Any longer and we would have had to remove it,” he finished this statement giving his arm a playful shake.
The jolt of it all hit Neville hard. The more he felt the pain in his arm merely reminded him of the terror he had just faced. He couldn't get those eyes out of his head. Those cold merciless eyes raping his mind as their owner ripped his wand through his flesh.
Neville looked down at his arm, afraid of what he might see. He was shocked to see his black blood being wiped away, leaving the dark mark in its thick black form. The smoke not only proved a necessary initiation test, but it was what gave the mark its horrifying look upon a death eater's arm.
Neville tilted his head back on the sofa in which he lay, but after a moment of rest, a voice that was not one he had heard moments before came into his head.
“Neville?”
The cold, harsh voice that was taunting him in his pain and barking orders at the others was now replaced by one filled with warmth, though at the moment it bled with fear.
“In here,” Neville heard himself say. He looked around, slightly shocked to find himself in the room he slept in the night before. The door opened to reveal long red hair that was even visible in the thick blanket of darkness. Ginny walked into the room to find Neville sitting on his bed, his back against the headboard and one knee lifted up from the bed, providing an armrest as he read his thick book in the moonlight.
Ginny said nothing, but simply looked at him. Neville returned the gaze only momentarily before returning to his book.
“So that's it, then?” Ginny suddenly burst out. Neville looked up to find that she had crossed the room to the foot of his bed. “We're not even going to talk about it?”
“What's there to talk about?” Neville asked calmly.
“Why didn't you tell me you were going to go through with this?” Ginny asked furiously. “Ron knew! Harry knew! Hermione knew! Even Luna knew! Everyone but me!” She was in tears now and Neville knew why. Yes, he deliberately told her nothing.
“It wasn't your concern,” Neville said. Why do I have to go through this again? He thought.
“Wasn't my concern?” Ginny repeated. “I am a member of this organization!”
“McGonagall told me to only inform those I deem TRUSTWORTHY!” His last word rang in the silence. Ginny's mouth hung open, aghast at the statement she just heard.
“You're saying you don't trust me?” she whispered.
“Caught on, have you?” Neville spat. Was I this horrible to her? He thought again.
“When have I given you reason not to?” Ginny pleaded with him.
“Maybe in our sixth year, the night Dumbledore died.” Ginny said nothing to this as Neville continued, “I told you to cover me and you just sat there. If Harry hadn't given us Felix that night, that curse Malfoy shot at me would have hit me dead on.”
“I told you that I was sorry,” Ginny whispered desperately, her eyes gripped shut to stop her blinding tears from falling.
“Oh, yeah, that's always enough for you!” Neville said. “ 'Oh, I didn't mean to nearly get you killed, Neville!' Just like you 'didn't mean' to make me feel worthless in our fourth year?” Ginny's face grew hot.
“You're still bitter about that?” She said furiously! “Is that why you've acted this way to me?”
“Well, that and the fact that I'd trust your assistance in battle about as much as I do Ron with a broken wand.”
“I can't believe you!”
“Do you even care,” Neville said savagely, “about how you make me feel? No, because you don't know what it's like to think someone likes you then have them ditch you after the first dance!”
“You're pathetic,” Ginny said.
“And you're manipulative,” Neville finished, then continued before she could retort. “You get away from me as fast as you can, then Mr. Popular Ravenclaw makes a move, making you see that you can make popular boys fancy you. Then you go after two of my roommates, two of the most popular boys in Gryffindor I might add—”
“Do you even hear what you're saying?” Ginny said. “You're still obsessed with things that happened in school, Neville! Harry broke up with me and I don't see any sign that he and I will get back together by now!”
“What's your point?” Neville asked, suddenly aware of how far the conversation had gone.
“My point is, if you wanted to ask me something, you could have done it long ago!” She said quickly, but as soon as she did, her eyes went wide and her cheeks flushed deeply. Neville, however, considered this.
“And be your little practice session for the better one that comes along?” Neville whispered. “I don't think so...” Ginny was crying again. She tried to rest her hand on his, but he jerked it away.
“I chose this because I thought I didn't matter,” he said. Ginny's head jerked up, her eyes wide with shock. “I wanted to show you that I really could do something right. Maybe it would get the image of me at school out of your head.”
“But Neville,” she said, “I never thought you didn't matter.”
“But I matter the least.”
“That's not tr—”
“Just go,” he said. It was the crack in his voice that told him. He really did love her and he cursed himself for it. That first schoolboy crush that he so desperately tried to destroy was too resilient to break off. It was when she stood from the bed and began walking toward the door that she spoke once more.
“I'll be going with Hermione to the rendezvous tomorrow night,” She said, refusing to look at him. Neville looked up at her silhouette, her hands clutched together and her head shadowed by her wonderful hair.
“I just want you to know, Neville, that I'll always—”
SLAP!
“Wake up, filth!” Neville heard, and bolted upright to find Ginny's polar opposite, Bellatrix Lestrange looming over him. “It's not over yet...” Bellatrix growled menacingly.
Cursing the severity of reality, Neville gingerly raised his head and wondered if fate would be kind enough to let him see her again. Even if he only had a second to say it, he wanted to say he was sorry.
But 'sorry' doesn't make things what they used to be.
Just then, a loud POP! blasted from behind them. Neville shot around and saw Snape holding a large bottle, which at the moment was spewing pounds of bubbles onto the floor in apparent celebration.
“You didn't think that after joining our ranks there wouldn't be a party, now did you?” he said jocularly as the room erupted with cheers.
Neville looked around in confusion as his new compatriots began to shower themselves with laughter and sparkling elf-wine. Gingerly standing from the sofa, Neville rubbed the mark on his left arm, the scar tissue still fresh.
This was it. He was inside and an opportunity presented itself in the greatest form. Just witnessing their exuberant behavior, he knew he could get a lot of information out of them, but that was not at present on his mind.
He remembered the dream he had, but particularly what Ginny said about school. He knew he had gone too far not telling her about all this. He did need to let some things go.
Some time had passed and Neville had to admit he was having a good time. Shots of firewhiskey came one after another as the party became more rambunctious by the minute. It went on late into the night, and soon only Neville and a handful of others were left.
“Hey, Pritchard!” Neville heard from his left. Turning to see who it is, he found Draco Malfoy holding a bottle of firewhiskey in his hand. In a way of showing clearly how pissed he was, Malfoy haphazardly made his way through a mess of passed-out Death Eaters and threw an arm heavily around Neville's shoulders.
“I r-r-remember you f-from school, don't I?” He said with a speech-slurring smile. Neville, feeling particularly warm in the cheeks as well, decided to play along.
“Yeah, Draco,” He said, leaning his head toward him. “We were in the same house!”
“Oh, what a small world it is!” Draco yelled, throwing his arms out and dribbling his liquor across those on the floor. “You...” he blinked, “you-you-you're... a very nice guy...”
“Well, thank you, Draco.”
“I...” he started again, but difficultly. “Well, I think that you're a great audition.. er... audition? ADDITION! to our... erm.. group.. here, and... er...” he slumped slowly on Neville's shoulder, and after mumbling something about Pansy fancying him, fell to the floor in a heap.
Seeing him on the floor, Neville pitied him. He remembered what he had done, in particular what he had done to him, and cursed the pity he felt. Still, he wanted to get even with the little rat after everything he had done. Maybe Ginny was right; maybe he did need to move on from these grudges he had from the past.
But then he remembered something Harry had told him one night. He mentioned hearing this heap on the floor before him in a certain girl's bathroom, crying to a certain ghost that haunted a toilet in that very girl's bathroom.
Well, Neville thought, still feeling that rosy feeling in his face, one last bit of immaturity can't hurt.
Draco woke up the next morning to the laughter of the others. Upon seeing himself in the mirror, he saw there were tear-marks drawn under his eyes, and the phrase “Myrtle loves you, Draco!” written across his face.
He would later find out that the ink could not be removed.
Trust by blackhairedweasley
Chapter Notes: The following contains Prompts 5 - 7, the last being the humor prompt which contains alcohol abuse