ʜᴇᴀᴠᴇɴ ᴏʀ ʜᴇʟʟ ⟶ ɢinny ᴡeasley

xxi

TW: mentions of death and suicide. if you think you might be triggered by this topic, please skip the chapter.

Ghostly eyes looked back at Jude in the graveyard. Despite the cheery photograph they had placed on the stone that promised to eternally remember Fred Weasley, Jude stared at the grave and wondered who was more dead. The Slytherin silently wished she could take the place the Weasley brother had, convinced that way she would find a rational justification for the emptiness inside her. She momentarily wished she had died that May 2nd on the Hogwarts grounds, she wouldn't have cared about the manner, only the outcome. What she was left with now was far worse than the paradise that most likely awaited someone like Fred Weasley.

"I wish I was dead," Jude acknowledged on a sigh with her gaze lost on Fred's grave. The rainwater drenched her completely, but even that didn't make the young woman try to seek shelter. She didn't deserve it. She probably didn't even deserve such a dignified, heroic and brave end as all those who died in the battle. Jude was convinced that what she really deserved was the hell that was left for her even while she was still alive.

It had been barely a month since the event. For Jude, going back to her life was not an option. She had no one left, though she had long known she had no one even when her father was still alive. He didn't want her for anything other than his Death Eater missions, Jude had long since come to terms with that no matter how much she tried to think otherwise. After all, what kind of child wants to accept that their father doesn't love them? Jude had tried everything to get her father's attention, but her efforts, even the greatest of all, had been useless. Now Jude was dead, and William was dead for real.

All efforts continued to be futile. Jude still didn't know how she hadn't succumbed to the temptation to let herself fall from a seventh-story window, or throw herself with utmost discretion onto the Muggle train tracks. Not that she hadn't thought about it, because Jude thought about death constantly. No one would miss her, after all. Her name would be marked in a minor news item in the local paper, there wouldn't even be a funeral because no one would claim her, much less would anyone look for her name among the obituaries in the day's press. She would leave quietly, just as she had come into the world, and no one would notice her absence.

Still, there was a part of her that didn't encourage it. Perhaps it was the fact that she was still young. Her seventeen years lived told her that she still had a lot of living left to do, good or bad. Maybe it was the unrecognizable and unacceptable fear that caused her to disappear so quickly. Lean forward, close her eyes, and suddenly, nothing forever.

"I wish I was the one laying where you are now. The worst part is that you would never switch positions right now. You would never let me be where you are right now. You told me once, remember? I fell off my broom in third year, rain was pouring and I couldn't see anything. I ran into a post and fell to the ground, and even though I only had a broken bone, I was so scared that you looked me in the eye and said that you'd never let me die. Not on your watch," Jude breathed. "I told you you were being stupid and you just winked at me, because you knew I would never admit aloud that you actually calmed me down. You would never let me take your place even though you probably hated me to death these past years."

It was the first time Jude had spoken so much since the war. She had escaped her mansion without a trace, determined to get as far away from that whole world as possible, as fate seemed bent on keeping her alive. She had reluctantly used part of the Travers inheritance to rent a small apartment in Londonderry, far from Hogwarts, magic and anyone who might know her. She had gotten a modest job in a coffee shop, where no one knew her except for being the quiet, new waitress, something that comforted her somewhat, so for the moment it was enough.