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| title: Beetles date: august 19, 2002 Harry has got these eyes, Ginny thinks, the colour of beetles. Not those beetles, not those bottled in brine in the Potions Dungeon, not those that are spliced open by inexpert student hands -- those beetles you see in magazines and books. As Ghosts of beetles that come whispering on your skin, then leave with the insistent beating of wings. Leaving you wondering -- was that a daydream? Was that nothing but the thoughts of air, carried to you on a breath of longing? Those beetles, flashes of heavy neon as the light hits their body; Ginny thinks, brushing her hair. Those eyes. Those startling looks and those frightening gazes. Harry isn’t stupid, but he can be; but he can also be older than anybody in the room, because McGonagall can be a myopic old woman and Dumbledore can be an eccentric geriatric, but Harry is always Harry -- constantly centred, always reluctant to grab the light, but always doing so anyway. Giving off flashes of green. Ron hates it, she thinks, giving her head a final stroke and shaking her red hair out. She goes to sleep and dreams of heavy rainforest trees, moist air, snakes coiling around the surface of everything and beetles lazily settling on their scales like precise snowflakes. |
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