Disclaimers: I will never reap any monetary rewards; only creative satisfaction. Spoilers: Takes place within the events of book two. Thus, spoilers for book two (has anyone not read book two?!?). Pairing: Percy/Oliver Date: Started in March 2001- then abandoned in a fit of pique until June, 2001 Summary: The long day into the night when Ginny had been taken into the Chamber of Secrets. Oliver's POV. Warnings: None. Totally PG for a change- perhaps even G- except for one use of the word 'hell'. Archive: Anywhere, but please let me know so I can visit your site! Notes: I wanted to write a fluffy, PWP smutfest to go with "Don't Beg" and "Playing Games." I wanted to do one from Oliver's point of view, like I did "Playing Games" from Percy's. Well, we don't always get what we want, and what I got was all plot and no smut *sigh grumble grump*. This takes place the year before both of the others, so I guess you'd call it a prequel.

For my Bestest, for my CL, and for Cairnsy.

___________

"You are all I'll ever want but this I am denied Sometimes in my darkest thoughts I wish I'd never learned What it is to be in love And have that love returned."

-from "Written in the Stars" from the musical "Aida" by Elton John and Tim Rice.

He's asleep, finally. I didn't think he'd ever calm down enough to sleep, but he has, and I am grateful. I love him. I love him enough to let him go, if that's what he wants. It will be like tearing out my own heart, taking away my breath. It may very well kill me, but I will let him go. He murmurs a bit in his sleep, and I realize I am holding him too tightly. He may wake, so I consciously try to relax. Life is perfect when I hold him in my arms. His warm, soft body pressed to mine in a very intimate way. I fell in love with him when I was thirteen. I longed for him for over a year before I found out he felt the same way. He was one of my roommates, and he was so scared and shy those first years at school. He'd have horrible bouts of homesickness that I tried to soothe away. We all had them at one time or another, but his were somehow worse. He was so determined to be at the top. He studied all the time. Driven, is my Percy.

I was drawn to him when I met him the first night here at Hogwarts. He was tall for his age, but thin and painfully shy. He entered Hogwarts with the burning desire to live up to his older brothers' reputations. You ask me, that is a horrible thing to do to an eleven-year old kid. Overachievers, all of the Weasleys are. Bill was Head Boy, and Charlie Captained the Gryffindor Quidditch team to the Cup a couple of years in a row. Percy had to live up to so many expectations. Most of all, he had his own expectations. His own far exceed his family's expectations of him (well, perhaps not his mother's). This year has been particularly difficult. His youngest sibling, Ginny, is here at Hogwarts for her first year and he has been worried about her for some time. I don't see much of her.

She is a shy girl, quiet, nothing like her older brothers. I think it is easier and harder for her to be here at school behind her older brothers. All of them are brilliant wizards, talented and smart. Being a girl, the expectations of her family are different for her, but she seems to want to fit in, and excel. Odd things are going on in the school, though. Things the prefects are told that don't trickle down to the rest of us. I hear lots of them because Percy tells me things, or Fred and George will know. It's difficult to keep anything from Fred and George. They have an incredible talent for finding things out. And then today…

I was in the common room working on Quidditch strategy with Fred and George. The twins are almost maniacal in their deviousness of creating plays. They strategize like it's second nature. We were trying to do something normal in this time when nothing is normal. Ron came in with Harry Potter in tow, and told us Ginny had been kidnapped. They overheard the teachers talking about it. I don't think I ever saw the wicked sense of fun drain faster from my teammates' faces. Ron was so pale he looked almost green. They were shell-shocked. Percy was with Professor McGonagall when she came to tell us we would all be sent home the next day. He stood with her, with the other prefects surrounding him, but I knew looking at him he had walled himself inside so as not to disgrace himself by crying. No one but Percy would think it a disgrace to weep in times like these. She's his sister. Sometimes I hate the way he does that. He thinks it a weakness to share himself- his emotions. As if having them makes him less somehow. Although I don't blame him for thinking that way, the way his younger siblings pick at him so. At one point, when our relationship was new and I first knew I loved him so deeply, I wanted to put a stop to it. Percy wouldn't let me. They might know, he told me, they might suspect. He was convinced if the twins knew about the two of us they would make his life a living hell. Knowing Fred and George as I do, I could see his point, but I know they would be glad he found some happiness. I mean, I know they are.

Percy doesn't know this, and won't until he is ready to tell them the truth himself, but they already know. They understand him far better than he thinks, and this is something they are serious about. The twins and Percy may not relate very well to each other, but Fred and George are very perceptive when it comes to Percy- and Ron- and even Ginny. They may be irredeemable scamps, but the caring they have for him showed clearly when they cornered me after practice one day to make sure I wouldn't hurt Percy. Harry was new to the team- and Quidditch… Everything magical, really- and the girls were explaining exactly what their job as chasers was. They sort of carried Harry along with them back to the castle answering questions, and the twins turned on me. It was almost comical. They were thirteen, I was fifteen, and they ganged up on me after the others had left. I mean, I'm no slouch, but even at thirteen the twins were solid. And there were two of them.

My team. Me, the third years, and Harry. The youngest team age-wise, and we were the best team by far last year, and this. We could- we can- play rings around all three other teams. Anyway, they pushed me up against a wall and told me they knew all about Percy and me. I tried to bluff, but they weren't buying. They said something about a map and knowing we were together- had seen us together. I gave in. They were afraid I was setting Percy up for a world of hurt. They were afraid I would humiliate him. Once I convinced them I loved him, deeply and would do anything to keep from hurting him they smiled at me, friends again. I asked why they were so protective of him, after all, they humiliated Percy all the time. They responded with their odd brand of twin logic that they were his brothers. It was their duty- no, their privilege- to take him down a peg or two whenever possible. But he was their brother- and woe to anyone else who was out to hurt him. Like I said, the twins have a skewed sense of reason.

After Professor McGonagall left, Percy sent a brief note to his parents, and I watched as he passed right by his siblings and climbed up to the dorm alone. The rest of the Weasleys and Harry had formed a small circle of worried faces, but they didn't seem to notice one of their number was missing. I followed him. How could I not? I love him. I followed and held him as he cried and raged and beat his fists against the bed, the wall, my body. I locked the door of the room, knowing not one of our other roommates would notice- or comment. He raged and screamed so hard he retched, and I held his head as he struggled to get himself under control. All the while I murmured stupid, inane, comforting things. Platitudes that I hated, even as they rolled off my tongue. I had nothing more to give him but these... These stupid words that do nothing but draw me into the probably erroneous thought that I was some comfort to him.

Ginny. She is most probably dead. I can't see how she can be anything but dead. I try to hold out some hope for Percy's sake, but it's pretty thin. It's a horrible thought. The only girl in a family of rambunctious boys. The cherished baby of the family. And Percy will blame himself. I know he will. If Ginny is lost, Percy will blame himself and cut everyone out of his life that had anything to do with this year. He will shut me out, ask me to leave. And I'll go. I'll go because I love him. I'll go, because if I don't, he will end up hating me, and that is something I couldn't bear.

It won't matter that I love him. It won't matter that he loves me. It won't matter that his family will not blame him, the professors will not blame him, Dumbledore will not blame him. He will blame himself because she is his responsibility. She was given into his care by his mother at the beginning of the year, and he takes his responsibilities very seriously. He will blame himself for not following up his questions on how pale she has been. He will blame himself for finding happiness with me when she was so miserable. He will believe it all his fault that she was taken, and left to die alone. What was it Harry said was written? "Her skeleton will lie in the Chamber forever…" At that point there will be no hope for us, and it kills me to see it all so clearly. If Ginny is dead, so is the most important thing in my life: the love I share with the boy lying in my arms. He may never recover. I hope I am wrong. Oh, I hope I am wrong and he won't let me- make me- go. Please, please, if there is a god out there to watch over wizards and witches, keep watch over him tonight. I can do nothing but hold him and weep. I try not to wake him as my tears fall unchecked. I am trembling now, too hard for him to miss. If I open my eyes, I am afraid I will see he is awake. Please, let me stay here, in this warm cocoon, wrapped around this person who means more to me than anything else in my life. I don't want to face this truth. I don't want to face tomorrow without him.

He is stronger than I will ever be. I need him so much. Much more than he needs me. Please. Please.

Please. Fin.