Title: Uncomfortable
Author: Dancing Rain
Author Email: dancingrain7@yahoo.com
Rating:PG
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.

She walks into the room after him, and it's the same way it always is with her. He sits in an armchair and she sprawls on the couch in the other corner of the room. He shifts his legs against the footrest, and she crosses her ankles and stares.

He hasn't spoken to her in weeks. There's no point; she knows how he feels.

He used to think he had grown too old to be locked in cupboards. He used to think he'd left the sensations of stifling air and walls against his elbows far behind.

But she is on the other side of the room and he can feel her against his elbows just as clearly as he had that day three weeks ago, when she had pressed her thumb against his arm and her lips against his chin. She hadn't been quite tall enough to reach his mouth.

He thinks the oxygen must have filtered out by degrees. It is the only explanation he has for how he could have come so close to suffocating without even a gasp.

**

She knows it's her fault. She can feel it like the heavy wool winter cape her mother used to make her wear above her robes when she was still too young to cast her own warming charms. It settles against her chest and she thinks the weight is good. It reminds her heart not to flutter when he's in the room, reminds her that there are things she has broken.

It all began so strangely. She had always known Harry was at risk, that there would come a day when the old grey men of the Order would carry him off into hiding. A day when she would need to learn to live without the daily ritual of his voice at breakfast, of his confident grin before launching himself into the air on his broom.

She'd never expected to be sent away with him. She was in danger, the grey men said. She had been His target once before.

Now the war is raging and despite the lack of news from the world the battle has settled here. The room feels too hot and she shifts her robes away from her legs, stretching in a way she imagines as catlike against the sofa.

He is staring at the ceiling, and his fingertips are white against his knee.

Story is © 2003 by Dancing Rain and may NOT be archived without prior permission of author.