Disclaimer:
Waah…me want Harry Potter! (JK Rowling): No, you can’t have him.
A/N: Not
bad, I guess.
How dare he.
It was the only thought running through her head as she stared at the figure
standing with bent head. For a split second she did nothing but stare at him.
He was thinner, now, gaunt, almost skeletal. His black robes were worn, and
even torn in some places, but always neatly mended. Almost a smile twitched at
her lips as she remembered how vain he had always been. Then the smile
disappeared as the memories disappeared, replaced by hate. “How dare you.” It
was not a question, or an exclamation, but a statement. A statement of hate, of
loathing. Her eyes hardened and she allowed herself a grimace of hate.
He just
stood there, his icy eyes a void of grey expanse, as they always had been. But
now they were no longer a façade so much as a total lack of emotion. Deadness.
She shivered as she watched his platinum blond hair, always so sleek, just hang
there, limp, as devoid of life as the rest of him. Roughly she shoved her pity
away, glaring at him. “You dare—you—no respect, you couldn’t,” just as before,
in their school days, she was reduced to sputtering incoherently, incapable of
articulate speech by his mere presence. Only now it was worse, because what he
had done was so much worse than a mere school prank. So much worse…
“You hate
me.” This, too, was not a question but a statement, something inevitably true.
His voice was as dead as the rest of him. It was true, it was so true, more
than he knew, but he swung his gaze on her, grey eyes meeting brown ones, and
the acceptance of the fact was so matter-of-fact, without self-pity or contempt
or answering hate, that she stammered, hesitated. “I—I—”
“It’s all
right,” he said, with just the hint of wryness in his tone. “I hate me too.”
She could find nothing to say to that, and for a while they stared together at
the white expanse of snow that was Harry Potter’s grave.
“You know, I
didn’t think I could do it,” he said in an almost conversational tone. “We went
to school together, after all. It’s remarkable what you can do when the life of
someone you love hangs in the balance.”
This was
news to her, and she whipped her head around sharply, staring at him as if to
determine with the sheer intensity of her gaze whether or not he was telling
the truth. He wasn’t looking at her though, but at the memorial that marked the
grave. “He stared at me, like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He looked
like he’d seen a ghost, he was so white. You know, I remember exactly what he
was wearing. One of those infamous Weasel sweaters—” and here she could have
sworn a ghost of a smile flitted across his lips—“and a pair of those torture
inventions you call jeans.
“Did he say
anything? Do you remember?” the words were out of her mouth before she could
stop herself, and she winced in impatience at her weakness.
“How could I forget?”
“What did he say? Tell me. Tell me!” Her voice was low, but it
carried with it all the intensity of her sorrow for the past four years. Her
hands curled into claws, her face jutted into his.
He muttered
something, and she bent closer to hear. “Draco? Draco?” his voice was so low,
so clear for a moment she heard Harry, saw Harry, pale, his green eyes
disbelieving, staring up at the blond boy with a wand in either hand. His voice
changed, and she knew he was mimicking himself four years ago. “Saying it twice
won’t negate it, Potter. This isn’t English class.” His face contorted as he
whispered, “The war’s over, Draco. Voldemort’s dead. You don’t have to do
this—Dumbledore wouldn’t have wanted—” his hands balled into fists, then he
made a spasmodic gesture, and she knew what had happened after that.
“Why?” she asked, staring up at his face. “Why
did you do it?”
“He swore he’d do it,” and he was crying now,
actually crying, tears running down his cheek, Draco Malfoy was crying, and she
was standing there stupidly, little Miss Know-It-All had no idea what to do.
“Father—he said he’d kill her, he’d kill Mother, and she was lying there, she was
crying, and she was looking at me, I had to—I had to!”
“How did you do it?” she asked. “How did you
make yourself?”
“It was easy—too easy,” he whispered. “I just
had to see—remember, everything he did to me, everything he ever did, and
then—then, see Mother, dying, her blood pooling out and Father laughing—” he
broke off, and she saw that he had stopped crying. “Dumbledore said I wasn’t a
killer…he was wrong.”
“No,” she
whispered, and she surprised herself with the intensity of it. “No, Draco
Malfoy, don’t you dare say that! How dare you say that! Dumbledore was never
wrong—he was never wrong! If he said you weren’t a killer, then you aren’t a
killer.”
“It’s too late for that, Granger,” he said,
laughing. But it was a bitter laugh, a laugh devoid of any happiness, a laugh
that was a parody of a laugh. “I killed Potter, and that’s all there is to it.”
“Malfoy—if there’s anything I can do—if
there’s anything I could—”
“Sorry,
Granger,” he said. “Welcome to the real world. There’s nothing you can do. My
life is hell, and nothing’s going to change that now.”
“There has to be something,” she insisted.
“There’s always something.”
He studied her, carefully. “Maybe there is
something, at that. If you don’t mind—”
And with
that he stepped forward and crushed his lips against hers. The kiss wasn’t very
long, not really. He didn’t try to prolong it, or go beyond it, like the other
men she had dated had done. It was the kiss of a desperate man, who knows that
nothing he will do or can do will change his fate, the sweetness of his lips
intermingling with the saltiness of his tears. Then it was over, and he stepped
away, smiling slightly, the first real smile she had seen on him since he had
disappeared.
And just like that, he was gone, with no trace
of him left behind. Even his footprints were soon obscured by the flurry of
snow that came descending down.
How dare he. The thought ran through her head. But
somehow, Hermione Granger found that she didn’t mind so much after all.
