Bargaining
It was well over a month before I saw her again during a summer party at the Pucey's. Ginny had mentioned at our first meeting that she worked with Gemma Pucey, but I had no idea they were friends. Or maybe they weren't. Maybe Gemma invited her for the same reason they had been inviting me out for the last six months: to help me get over my loss and get back into living as a single man.
For whatever reason, Ginny was there, and though it had been four months since her husband's death, to me she still seemed as sad and alone as she had when she had first come to the Department of Mysteries, though less angry than when I had last left her house. Her eyes appeared brighter and she carried herself well, so well that others may not have noticed her lingering pain, yet I sensed it was an act, and I knew from experienced it was a difficult one. I remembered having to do the same after the divorce: put on the happy face and play at appearing normal, when inside I hated everything going on around me and just wanted to be alone.
Ginny had moved away from a small group of Daily Prophet reporters and had gone to sit under a tree by herself, a small plate of food in her hand. I decided to take her a drink and offer some company, knowing how awkward it was to sit alone those first few months when you went out on your own but were so used to sitting with someone you loved.
"Good afternoon, Mrs. Potter," I said, smiling at her. "Do you mind if I join you?"
She gave me a rueful smile. "Of course not, Graham. But only if you call me Ginny, remember?"
"All right then, Ginny," I replied. "Next question: would you like a drink?" I offered her a cup of sparkling lemonade, and she smiled gratefully at me.
"Thank you," she murmured. "I couldn't carry it all. I'm surprised you're being so kind to me after our last meeting, though."
"The one where you cursed and threw things at me?" I replied as I sat down next to her. "I wouldn't hold that against you after all you've been through."
"I would," she replied. "I was a fright."
"You had reason to be," I said, hoping I sounded sincere in my understanding and acceptance. "So how are you doing?"
She took a moment to reply, as if trying to decide how to answer the question when a virtual stranger asked, as opposed to a much closer friend. I had always given strangers a hazy half-answer that effectively closed the subject when they asked about the divorce. Finally she shrugged. "There are good days and bad days," she said, remaining vague as well. "I suppose it just takes time."
"It does," I replied, thinking back to my first months after the divorce. It had been mostly bad days at first: days where I couldn't fathom living without her, days when I had been so angry it was a wonder I hadn't run off and done something stupid. There were days when I had almost called and begged her to come back, and days I had barely got out of bed. Until finally the bad days had started fade, though even now truly good days were still few and far between. Most days just were: I went to work, did my job, went home to my empty flat, and continued on till morning, when it all started over. "It takes a lot of time. Maybe forever."
She gave me a funny look, brown eyes gazing into my face with--of all things at that moment--sympathy. For some reason, it moved me and almost made me glance away. "You know about loss too," she stated.
I hardly thought that losing my wife to a cad in Australia was the same as losing a husband to a crazed murderer. Yet we did have some things in common: we had both lost our spouses and were still trying to move forward and learn to live on our own again. Sitting there on the grass beside her, I felt a sudden, almost physical connection with Ginny that I squashed almost immediately; why, I wasn't sure, but it didn't seem like the right thing at the moment. She was clearly still hurting, while I thought I had managed some semblance of healing.
"It's not the same," I murmured, but she set down her plate and shook her head.
"No, it's not, but it's similar. We're both trying to understand and accept what's happened, figure out how to start a new life after so many years of being with someone else all the time."
I said the first thing that came to mind. "How long were you together?"
She smiled and glanced off into the distance. "Twenty years," she murmured. "Give or take a few." Turning back, she picked up her plate and pushed her food around without taking a bite. "What about you? How long were you married before the divorce?"
"Ten years," I replied. Ten years that still felt like a lie some days. Maybe I hadn't lost my spouse the way she had lost hers --my wife was still alive, after all, even if she was on another continent--but there were times when I felt like I had lost just as much: ten years of happiness, of memories, of my own life wasted. Which was probably wrong: Gemma had told me over and over that I still had the good times to remember, and I tried, I did. Yet sometimes the bitterness kept me from appreciating the years we'd had together; I still questioned whether we had ever truly been happy, whether it had ever been real.
"Do you…do you miss her? Or miss being married?" she asked. I glanced at her in surprise, for it seemed a very personal question to ask a man she didn't know all that well. Yet she had started our conversation in the Department of Mysteries in a similar straightforward way, and I found myself appreciating it. Very few people actually asked me about it now, and as I had done from the beginning with her, I tried to be honest.
"I miss being married, yes," I replied. "And I miss her, even though I know it wasn't meant to be. She's gone and never coming back."
"Never coming back," she repeated, a poignant look on her face. "Yes, I miss Harry, too. I miss being married--waking up next to him and falling asleep in his arms, even fighting and making up. So much it hurts every day, and I'd give anything to see him again."
The conversation was growing uncomfortable, so I tried to steer it away. I knew those thoughts would only bring her more heartache, having already seen her desperate desire to find a Horcrux. "Have you talked to anyone? Since he died?"
She raised an eyebrow. "Have you?"
"My wife wasn't murdered," I pointed out rather bluntly; she didn't flinch, so she had apparently accepted that much, at least. "She left me."
"All the more reason to talk to someone," she replied. "So have you?"
"No."
"Neither have I." She paused and set down her plate, obviously not intending to eat anything. "But maybe I should. Maybe we both should."
"I've talked to my friends," I replied, rejecting the idea of a therapist just as I had every time Gemma had suggested it. "And my family. It was six months ago. I'm fine." Most of the time, at least.
"I've talked to my friends as well," Ginny replied. "And my family won't shut up asking me if I'm all right. I think I might like to talk with someone who doesn't walk on eggshells around me."
She was giving me a speculative look that I could read immediately. Raising my hands and shaking my head, I refused. "Sorry, I'm not that person. I don't know the first thing about helping someone through a loss like yours."
"Yes, you do," she said. "You've studied it. You've experienced it. And you've already helped me."
"I haven't--" I started to protest.
"You came to sit with me," she replied. "And you helped me when I came to the Department of Mysteries, even though you knew I was wrong, if not temporarily insane. And you kept Harry's glasses safe. Thank you for giving them to Hermione before you left."
"You're welcome," I said quietly. And for the first time, I found myself thinking…maybe she was right. I had done those things, and maybe I had somehow helped her. She did seem to be doing better than last time I had seen her. Perhaps we could help one another, even. I wouldn't mind talking with someone who didn't shy away from the hard questions like everyone else did, and she seemed able to handle my bluntness.
"Look, I'm not sure what you want from me, exactly," I started, and she shrugged.
"Just a friend, I guess," she replied. "An honest one. An experienced one." It was as if she were reading my mind.
"Never mind that I have access to the Department of Mysteries?" I asked. Though I was slightly suspicious, I tried to keep my tone light, and to both my surprise and relief, she laughed, though it was short and still sad.
"No, I won't ask you about that stuff anymore, I promise."
"Good." We sat in comfortable silence for several moments, before I cleared my throat and plunged on, some inner voice telling me it was all right. "Then maybe we could have coffee sometime."
She smiled, and if it seemed somewhat brighter than when I had joined her, then I was probably just imagining it. Yet deep down I felt like something was different, and I was looking forward to seeing her again, no matter reason.
"I'd like that," she replied, and I smiled back.
And that's how it really began.
* * *