IT IS COMPLETE: Dwindling Pieces, Resipiscence
Series Title: Dwindling Pieces
Title: Resipiscence
Word Count: 18,116
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Implied H/D, R/Hr and D/OC
Warnings: Implied sexual scenes/situations, Character insanity
Summary: How did it start, this tangle, this mess I got myself into? Was it finding you in the bathroom, screaming? No, I did not pity you then. It was your flying, into the clouds where there was little air, only to fall to the ground, blue and broken. Someone had to save you.
After a ten year separation, in which he and the Wizarding world have done their best to heal and move on from the lost Boy Who Lived, Draco Malfoy is faced with an unexpected reunion that threatens to destroy his sense of reality.
This story: As Harry slowly resurfaces, Draco's world grows continually bleaker.
Disclaimer: Not mine, don't sue.
Dedication: To tall_randall and ourwitchriver, both of whom, after two years, still believed I would finish this. And to my f-list, who has been just as encouraging as ever. benightedfate, because i love her, devils_fantasy, because i love her too. And so many more I can barely begin to name you all. ♥
A/N: Two years is a big gap, but this WIP is DONE. You may see the obvious and subtle differences in my writing - having been inundated in different sorts of literature from all around the globe and different centuries for the past two years, my style has most definitely changed. So please, don't hurt me for that. And yes, the parts that are Harry's POV are hard to read, but he's crazy, he can't help it. I've split this story into four parts, so you can stop part of the way through if you have a headache. Please, bear with it, and let me know what you think!
READ THE FIRST TWO STORIES BEFORE THIS ONE. It will makes things easier to understand!
Status: COMPLETE
Jump?
Disintegration:
Part 1, Part 2
Lassitude:
Part 1, Part 2
Resipiscence:
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, End
Resipiscence
There are muggle television screens in the air. They have no body, no plastic. Screens without dimensions, they flicker and they blink. One shows a boy; a man; a man-boy. A man-boy, running running running into woods and across fields and into air and into nothing. Running running running. And there’s no life anywhere but his life, but it’s draining and becoming like the fields and air he runs through. Desolate. Forgotten.
There’s another screen and the man-boy in it shields his face and guards his mind but it’s hopeless. It’s coming and it’s spiraling through and down and into him. And his black hair is matted and he’s lost proper vision and his eyes no longer see in front of him, because all he sees is nothing. Nothing, nothing. And guilt.
And it’s not my guilt. It’s not my guilt and not my fault and Merlin everything is closing in on me. It’s not my guilt, the people don’t scream for fear of me, not me. Not me. It’s not my guilt. It’s not my guilt. It’s not my fault. It’s not my guilt.
And he stuffs his ears with dirt and grass and anything that will block them but he still hears the screaming and the terror and the blood. The blood, the blood that became rivers and pools that day, so many swam through and they fell asleep in them because of one spell. And they wouldn’t wake up.
Wake up, wake up, wake up up up up, wake up. No, don’t fall asleep, don’t fall, no sleep, sleep, don’t sleep, don’t fall. Please, please, please. It’s wrong, this is wrong, it never should have happened. I tried, I tried, I thought I won. I thought I made it right. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sorry. Don’t fall asleep. It’s not my guilt. It’s his, and he’s swimming with you and you are all sleeping. No. No. Don’t sleep, I can’t sleep. No, no.
There are screens filled with pools. Screens that scream with the noise and the horror. Millions of screens stacked upon millions of screens, all with pools. All with the pools the man-boy fears, dreads, watches them fall into. And they’re all there, lying in the pools, the rivers, the waterfalls and he’s running. Running, running.
One screen is invisible. It seems invisible, because it only shows the world the man-boy sees, the one that’s ever changing. It’s colors and there’s no horizon and no vertical point and it’s all moving, waves of malleable world that shift and twist around to become everything. But everything is only the color and the screens. And the shrieks and things in the screens.
He knows, for certain, that there’s one screen somewhere, somehow, that’s of the man-boy before he became a man-boy, before the shrill cries. And he was only a boy, and there was water on his back and in his eyes. And in his eyes he could see, could feel another boy, another boy he touched and felt and -
“You’re mine.”
Maybe there are other screens before that one, that one that’s different, and the man-boy is certain there are others… He just doesn’t remember.
But he does remember that the world hasn’t been color for forever, that it was but then it wasn’t, and it was fading, disappearing, over-powered by the screaming. But the color suddenly bled in again, after so long, and he doesn’t know why. But he does know that new screens came with the color, new screens, and he doesn’t know how they got there, how they keep appearing in larger numbers, but he knows that they do.
White screens. Screens of white. And glass. Where in the world, where am I?
With the color he’s positive there came a numbing, a chilling, a comfortable sense that was familiar but not. It was different from his forever in monotone. And when the color came and the numbing there, he would have jumped and whooped with excitement, but he couldn’t move, he can’t move. He can’t move his eyes from the screens, but if he could he would look down and he’s convinced there wouldn’t be a body there if he tried finding one. And he can’t move nor see his hands, so he’s sure that they’re not there either. But he sees his hands, body, him in the screens, the ones he can’t look away from, so he never looks down.
A new screen appears. With the color it comes, and he can see, see so clearly. Eyes. He can see eyes the color of the monotone his world once was, and the man-boy can only stare. And the world stops, and the colors don’t move, and the chilling numb comes back with those eyes. Things are tinted, tinting, tainting, tainted green. The man-boy gawks. And there is no screaming.
No screaming. Gone. Screaming gone. Those, those eyes, everything’s green but those eyes…
And then the screen disappears.
No, no, no no no. Screaming. Screaming. No, no screaming, it was gone, gone. It shouldn’t be back. It was gone. The eyes made it go away. Those eyes, I know those eyes. They make everything go away. No, stop, stop. Stop screaming, I can’t. I can’t do anything. Can’t help, heal, can’t do anything. Stop, stop. I told you, told you stop. Told you it’s not my guilt, not mine. Please stop. Stop, please, please stop.
The screens don’t not blink. The screaming never stops.
New ones appear, new screens, but they only flicker and there’s nothing in them but words. Words. And they shut off the screaming and resound, round around and round. There’s no understanding, no use understanding, but it continues and the words stop the screaming when they’re there.
And the eyes; the eyes belong to that voice, the man-boy knows, but he doesn’t know how he knows. But there’s only the voice and there are no eyes, and eventually the voice fades and the screaming comes back.
There are bed straps in the screen. A new screen. And the screaming gets louder and louder. The bed straps fall, away, and then there’s a hallway and the hallway moves toward and away and then there’s someone, someone, a someone with eyes. And the screaming, it’s awakening everything and the screens with the pools are flooding the others, ruining, spoiling them all.
But those eyes. They’re not monotone, but muddy. They’re not monotone, but they could be, they are, but they’re not. And the screaming continues but the world stops moving, and the eyes are in the man-boys arms.
I don’t understand, why, why is the world stopped but the screaming not. Why, why? Eyes, those eyes aren’t right but they are and I don’t understand, don’t understand at all. They should fit, should be right, but they aren't, they don’t belong, but they have to. I don’t know, why, why, why don’t I know?
The pools begin to invade the screen, staining it, but the man-boy holds onto the eyes and he won’t let go, never let go.
Why, tell me why you don’t fit? Why, why isn’t there the voice, why aren’t the screams stopped? Why do you not fit but do? Why, tell me, why, why, make me understand. Don’t leave me, no, don’t leave me, make me understand.
Green, the screen turns green. The eyes fall closed and then are gone. And the world moves and the colors with it and there’s a rage and betrayal that joins the screaming and they shriek together, entwined. And everything’s moving, moving, swirling, twisting, molding -
Everything is too quick, moving too quick. Too many screens, I don’t know what’s going on, I’m lost, gone, lost and I don’t know where I am. I’ve never known, never known, but now I know I don’t know -
And then it stops.
There’s a deathly silence, and the screams fall into the pools with those who won’t wake up, and the colors are stopped and the eyes… The eyes are right and monotone and get closer and closer. And there’s a hand and the eyes are open and they stare, only ever stare, and they’re closer and closer and nothing moves, sounds, breathes, only feels and it feels like there should be water spraying onto his back and-
“Mine.”
There’s a new screen, a flickering screen, with only words, but he can’t hear them, because there’s another screen, and there’s a woman, a bottle of pent up energy and she’s red and dark and raging and he unstops her and she’s falling, falling, falling and draining pouring emptying…
And the screen turns green.
The colors, the world, the everything turns green.
And there’s that screen, the one before with only words, and he can’t understand, but the man-boy tries, tries…
But there’s a screen, a red screen, a new screen, and the man-boy is there. With him is a man, a red man. And the man-boy tries to remember where he’s seen the red man before. With them is a woman, the bottle woman, but there’s no red, no dark, no raging. Now in her base is a light, a gold light, and it grows and grows and swells and it tickles the man-boy’s eyes.
And he laughs. And there’s no screaming, no sound but laughing, good laughing, but there are screens and screens and new screens and it’s all moving so fast, too fast, and, and -
There are muggle television screens in the air. They have no body, no plastic. Screens without dimensions, they flicker and they blink. One shows a boy; a man; a man-boy. And he’s listening to something he can’t understand, shouldn’t understand, that he didn’t understand before, not until his world turned green, and what he hears now will echo and forever keep the screaming stopped.
“Harry…Harry…Harry…”
And he knows that voice. It belongs to the eyes, the ones that stop everything and remind him of showers. But he doesn’t recall whose they are.
*
Down the hall now. There’s a persistent clicking as I stride. It’s the sound of authority, the sharp sound of heels on stone floor. Striding, storming. There’s no time to pause, no time for the sound to be muffled. Quiet be damned. If Rene wakes, then Wilone will take care of it. There’s authority here, in my hands, eyes, my feet, and if it wants to stir the dead with its noise, then I refuse to stop it.
It was once the sound of my father - a prelude to his imminent arrival. It was the sound of him angry, of him controlling, of his power. Wherever, whenever - this sound was his. It was the last sound he ever made before I killed him. Before I killed him so immediately, barely allowing the betrayal to cross his face. Before his nose was in the ground. Before the echoes of his footsteps faded.
I wanted him to die thinking he was powerful, and then with a sudden realization know he was not.
I didn’t even let him beg for mercy.
Because Malfoy’s do not beg for mercy.
The sound is now my sound. And in the wake of it wizards and creatures alike should fear me, as I once feared my father. As all should fear a Malfoy.
But there is no one in these halls, in the corridors that I stride down. There is no one here to fear me. And what is authority when there is no one around to control?
And even then, even when I am around people, or people are around me, I no longer have a grasp of control. I mean, you - you’re a lunatic and I don’t have the power to keep you strapped to your bed. I can’t say no to Hermione, and kick you out. I’m not even powerful enough to keep the Weasel out of my own house anymore.
Weak.
“Master?”
A house elf. Toti, I think. I thought I left it behind in my chambers after it notified me of Weasley’s intrusion upon my home.
I do not pause, but continue to stride and allow it to struggle behind me.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Wealsey says he’s come to see Miss, sir, but he didn’t go to her chambers.”
“And where did he go when he didn’t go to her chambers?”
“To Master Harry’s chamber, sir.”
Damn him.
“Thank you, Toti. That will be all.”
Who does that Weasel think he is, coming into my house? And without invitation. I would bet my entire fortune he didn’t even come with Hermione in tow. He’s just here to see you, to steal you, and I won’t let him do that.
Where is Hermione, anyway? I remember the study, and…
Wilone isn’t here anymore.
The noise in the hall stops. There’s a tapestry in front of me, and more, more are lined up along the hallway. Rugs, one with a loose string. The house elves will be punished for not taking care of them properly. Lights, filling the hall. Vases, portraits, crystal and glass. Everything I can see but my mind… My mind…
Wilone’s not here.
My fist slams against the wall, and my nails, they wait for the satisfaction of biting into the stone. But they bleed, and they hammer the wall again and again and the blood lashes out. My order, my order - what happened to it? What happened today? There was the study, Wilone dismissed, Hermione on the ground, Rene crying…. And you, and you in the doorway. And then in your bed, you wouldn’t stay down, but that was after Weasley came in, and -
He’s here. I need to get him away from you. He’ll take you and that’s not allowed; you’re my responsibility.
Responsibility? I’m taking this all too seriously now.
I rub my temples with the tips of my fingers. They’re ice against the fire of activity in my head. I’m numb but filled with a raging that I can’t place. I need to find order of some sort, otherwise I’ll lose myself completely. I don’t know, don’t care where I’m coming from, only where I’m going.
I must get there now.
The clicking, the ticking of heels begins again against the stone, then rug. I try to build a momentum, build up the authority again. Try to feel it in my toes, in my knees; imagine my father, as he used to be in all his distorted, false glory. And I’m there, I’m there, watching, imitating, I feel it growing, swelling, bursting -
“Draco!”
And deflate.
Turning sharply around, I see not Weasley, but Hermione. She waves briefly at me.
I, in my concentration, passed your room without even realizing it.
That’s what happens when you take your mind off your goal, boy.
I resist shaking my head of my father’s voice, letting it ring. Instead of dying it grows louder with every reverberation, and I struggle to stalk straight toward Hermione. I’m feeling weaker, but my fingers, my arms, my legs stay taut, forcing myself to stay tall. I see myself reaching for Hermione’s arm, but she’s laughing, her eyes are closed. Around the noise in my head, I know this is wrong - Hermione doesn’t chortle, doesn’t smile and hold her stomach in glee as if she had been hit a weak combination of Rictusempra and the Cheering Charm. But there she is; pulling Weasley with her as she side-steps me. My fingers are closing on air, and I - stop. And I hear them walking down the hall, talking softly, and I can picture them affectionately, lovingly, holding hands.
Disgusting.
Now they’re gone, gone before I can do anything about Weasley’s intrusion. And there is a sinking, piercing feeling in my gut, as if your friends have stabbed me with a sharp spoon, using it to shovel out small chunks of precious organs one small piece at a time. My life those pieces hold are being replaced with growing, scathing clumps of misery and jealousy. It’s deathly cold, and if I didn’t know better I would have thought I was reliving my visit to Father in Azkaban again.
I feel completely, mortifyingly, absolutely, undeniably - alone.
Wilone and Rene have left. Hermione has gone happily with her husband. And I - I am left in their wake, with my father’s infamous words dying inside me. Swirling down like an unhappy ending. A fish in a toilet bowl. A quail beneath the wheels of a carriage.
And I listen to the silence of the tapestries, of the lights, the sleeping portraits, vases.
But then, a creak.
The sound. The sound is bedsprings. And now, with the agonizing pain violently pulsing in my gut, I slowly make my way toward your door. It’s ajar, and through it I see your shadow - it can only be your shadow - moving against the half light of night that serves as your backdrop. I know, there, sit your hard eyes, your boney fingers, knuckles, your mouth; all creating You. A masterpiece of madness.
Behind you, the stars, like faint eyes, are falling closed out in the distance, beginning to vanish. The night is no longer really night. It borders on the edge of day, dawn, and it’s stuck there. On a see-saw, a balance, tipping from one side to the other and back again. It can’t make up its mind.
And it seems, neither can I. I do not know whether I should stay, or go. But my body seems to have made up my mind for me; like the night I betrayed, I killed my father. What I thought or felt didn’t seem to matter.
As I weakly, foolishly, step in, my body lured by you and your chaos, I know you see me.
And you moan.
*
There is a screen in the air. And in it, eyes watch; fearful, dull eyes. Eyes like slate, suddenly arousing a vibrant burst of color and calm, snuffing the screams in the man-boy’s head. A moan sounds, and as it echoes the screen swells, filling the man-boy’s vision. The eyes, encased in shadow and light, flicker, and shake. They are, very nearly, nearly almost, like the piercing ones, the eyes he felt in showers and cold tile. The eyes, with a voice, that say his name.
The man-boy; he stands. And slowly, he watches as his joints straighten. There is a darkness that shrouds, that surrounds him. If he was not trapped behind the screen, he would be suffocating. The eyes falter with every step he takes. The man-boy, he grows, and before him the walls bleed. The plants darken, droop, wither, seeping a green into the stone, and it flows in rivers. The screen is tainted dark green, like a forest at twilight, and the curtains fall soundlessly behind him as the windows creep open. Slow currents of energy are slinking, slipping, sliding into the room. There is, he hears, an early song-bird on the railing outside the window, and gradually its song fades, the notes and the melody losing pace, losing pitch.
And plummets, to stone and sleep.
The eyes watch, ever watching, and do not blink.
Suddenly an old screen, cracked and fading, invades the man-boy’s vision. Its edges are dull, chipped, and the picture within distorted. But in it, clearly, the same eyes watch. And the man-boy listens as a voice close to him cackles, close to him sneers;
“That’s what happens when you take your mind off your goal, boy.”
It is deep, and it is mocking, and he watches as a lone figure stalks down a hall, as the lone figure turns its head briefly and faces the eyes. And the eyes, they are shaking, they are dull, and in a flash of green light, the lone figure slumps mid-step, its face lost in bleak betrayal.
The eyes watch, ever watching, and do not blink.
“Are you happy?” The eyes are flooding. They waver as they move farther from him, from the figure on the floor. “My father’s dead. I killed him.”
The world, now red, blurs. Laughter, bubbles, bellows, bursts in and through him, and the man-boy is shriveling inside. The laughter, malevolent laughter, like a foreign virus, controls itself, controls its host, and as the eyes turn and flee the man-boy’s mind is dying, entrapped in screens and preserved with memories as his body flees.
But the laughter, and the screams in the screens, follow.
The aged screen disappears. And in its place the eyes are staring, staggering forward. The green that seeps from the walls, the plants, the bird, and now the eyes, is thicker than blood, and the eyes are closing, falling to the ground.
But the man-boy’s starting forward, and he sees his limbs; they are moving of their own accord and catch the eyes. And there’s a spark, a jolt of a curse, like muggle electricity, that runs through his arms as they come into contact with the eye’s… arms. The limbs and the folds of fabric, soft and slick against him. And there is something in him, something that is starting and moving, twitching. And now he knows, and he remembers.
The body, the boy with the eyes shudders as he whispers,
“Dr-draco.”
*
I am alone, and in front of me there is a hall of tile, ever and forever ongoing, it seems. And walls, sectioning off areas of the hall; maybe like shower stalls. I walk down a few paces, and listen. There is no echoing of footsteps, but drops. Slow, clear drops that fall into thick puddles, or pools. Steam and noises rise from a stall a few paces away, but as I move toward it, I hear something slump to the floor behind me. Like something lifeless. I know the sound well enough; I’ve killed before. It’s the sound of hopeless finality at its utmost as it falls to hollowness. I turn to find Hermione on a rug, like one from the Manor, and slightly green. Not green, as if she was sick, but green… luminescent green. And down the tile hall, you appear; but somehow, you have always been there, slick in sweat and steam. And you are stalking toward me.
Suddenly, green steam floods from faucets in the stalls. I try to step back, step away from being blinded, from your advancing footsteps that sound like drops. But by some unknown force, I am pulled toward you unwillingly, and your name is escaping from me. It’s being punched out of me, squeezed out of me as my ribs are pushed further and further into my lungs, piercing them like a cold, dry frost. And as I say it, my throat is thick and crackles.
“Harry, Harry.”
I grab my neck in rage, in horror, fear, and my lungs are quickly reduced to nothing. I feel my forehead crease and my eyes grow wider, larger as I struggle for air. Sinister green spots are appearing before me, running in circles around me, twisting menacingly around and in and through me. There are no more drops, I notice, as I fall to my knees. But I hear the song of a song-bird die, and I feel the plants wilting, and now, I am falling. And I know, soon, I will sink to utter hollowness, utter despair, too.
But as I fall, feel the steam puff past me, up and up past me, puffing, I hear - you. I hear you. And it’s worse than the tile that will break me, break my fall.
“Dr-draco.”
I start awake, my eyes snapping open, and instantly feel the cool cotton sheets on top of me, hear wind rustling through the trees and the sun filtering though a sliver of an opening between the curtains. My head… hurts. It pounds repeatedly, like a woodpecker in my skull, trying desperately to get out. It is too heavy to carry, my neck too weak, and so I let my eyes wander about the room.
Morning. A normal morning, or as normal as a Manor morning can be. The curtains are drawn, the wall hangings straight, the plants - dead. I blink, but before I can think any more on it, I am shuddering. I am freezing, clammy; awoken because of an unusual dream. They’ve became oddly persistent since you’ve arrived here. I guess my conscience doesn’t deem me worthy of proper sleep any more.
Maybe it’s not a terribly normal morning after all.
Dreams; terrifying, indiscernible dreams. No one, in their right mind, ought to have such dreams. I am an unfortunate exception. But there was a time when you were, too. But for you, we all knew it was your connection to the Dark Lord that caused them. You couldn’t keep him out of you, couldn’t block him, and every night you watched people die, watched them look at you in horror, in pain, in agony, and you killed them. It was your hand, the hand of the madman you were tied to, and their blood on his hands was like blood on yours.
I watched you, most nights. As you lied there, tossing, turning, tumbling off the bed and retching. But you’d never wake up, and I, for fear of you drowning in your own vomit, fell after you, held you, got my hands dirty like no other Malfoy would. I shamed my family every night, rocking you like a baby, and unbeknownst to you I would kiss your eyelids, stroke your nose like my mother used to do to me. And eventually, painstakingly slowly, you would mumble, you would moan, and you would finally sleep peacefully. Within the stone walls of Hogwarts, under the noses of everyone we knew, I held you, murmured to you. In the absence, the death of my own mother, all I knew to do was to return her love to someone who needed it like I did. And I despised you, hated you, shrunk away from touching you, but you needed me. You told me so yourself. You needed me. And I needed to be needed.
I was - helpless. I loathed it.
How did it start, this tangle, this mess I got myself into? Was it finding you in the bathroom, screaming? No, I did not pity you then. It was your flying, into the clouds where there was little air, only to fall to the ground, blue and broken. Someone had to save you. I had just arrived from my mother’s funeral, and I heard her, as clearly as if she had been behind me, and she told me to save you.
What could I do? I would sooner die, rather than betray my mother.
So in the grass, I found myself tugging and dragging you, swearing I would kill you if you died. And that day, I saved you. But when you thanked me, weeks later, I stared at your cursed, wretched, unkempt hair. And I turned and walked away.
I saved you that day for my mother. So that my mother would be avenged, and not live in a world of grey smog, floating through brick and stone. I saved you to save my mother.
But in my need, my loss, I lost myself in your need, and in your loss. That was the only way I seemed capable of living.
I think I learned to love you, but I mentally choke on the word. But you left me, broken and in pain, and I have dreamt of you every night since you left me. I have wanted you back, have lost myself in my pain and desire. But now that you’re back, I feel my old pride, old habits come back to me, and I want to get away from you.
I feel tired - extraordinarily tired, as if I’ve not slept at all. It’s like one of those mornings where I’ve been reading a case all night, planning and re-planning what needs to happen the next day - to the extent that I forget sleep is actually necessary. In fact, I don’t even remember going to bed, let alone changing out of my clothes.
That is when I realize that my hip is unnaturally warm. That something lies there. And with my realization, that something begins moving, tracing circles and patterns into my skin, onto my bones; as if, by my recognizing it, it has sprung to life. I stiffen, my thoughts and my limbs turning to stone and falling heavily into the sheets. I wish, with growing terror, that I could sink into the mattress and bury myself, wish my trembling heart would stop. My insides are frozen and pierced with the icicles forming in my blood.
I wish I had not woken up. Because I know I am supposed to be alone.
If, by some sick chance, it was a house elf next to me, I might have the life left in me to laugh. Or to hex it to hell and back. But I can feel the springs in my back, and beside me, and the weight pressing on them is far too big. Bigger than an elf, longer than Rene, and far heavier than Wilone; there is someone in my bed and I wish with all my soul it is someone I do not know.
But I am certain - as simply as I am certain the curtains in this room are not mine - that you are lying beside me.
I try to move my head toward you, but my heart shudders and my neck is stiff. My eyes move instead, and if I had still been breathing, my lungs would have stopped functioning immediately. You’re closer to me than I thought, and faintly, I feel your breath sweep across my face. Your eyes are bright and focused, lucid, and like green sparks they dance. They are rough and frightening, scraping past and through every inch of me, collecting everything that I am, that you can see. I feel raw, exposed, vulnerable, helpless. But I cannot move, and I cannot leave.
Your fingers are still moving, and my gaze shifts downward. You’re not dressed, but your legs are wrapped and twisted in the sheets. Your hair, your scarred body - your entire appearance looks as if a hurricane has passed through you, as if you lied on your side and festered like a bad splinter all night. And I, with sheets lying calmly on top of me, am seemingly untouched.
Without warning, your nose is near my hair, smelling it, tasting it. And your mouth by my ear, shakily;
“Draco.”
I cannot think, but feel my heart thunder in my chest and my mind shrivel and shake. Of their own accord, my eyes are closing and my neck arching. My stone-like limbs are yielding, melting into the soft sheets in the wake of your breath, of your fingers. I try to resist, try desperately, but with every movement, they are intense, frightening, forcing me to let go. I cannot help but feel these fingers, light and lulling, hypnotizing and taking advantage of every vulnerable feeling, every secret fear that exists in me. You scare me, every fiber of my being shaking uncontrollably, but you are warm, your hands inviting.
In your presence, I quiver and dread. It is almost familiar in an unwanted way, the feelings uncannily like those I experienced around my father. But by the pain in the small of my back, and in the warm flush of my chest, I know you are different, that somewhere in you, you are sane. And I know that, as surely as you are capable of saying my name, you need me. I want to give in to you, let you make me feel like you used to make me feel. My stomach is knotting and my throat collapses, my head is lolling to the side. I could not possibly move now, not when you’re touching me. I am helpless to you; so awfully helpless.
Like a prayer, your finger tip touches my eyelids, slides down my nose, and I gasp slightly.
I will give in to you; if only because I need to be needed.
<< LASSITUDE (part 2) || RESIPISCENCE (part 2) >>
Title: Resipiscence
Word Count: 18,116
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Implied H/D, R/Hr and D/OC
Warnings: Implied sexual scenes/situations, Character insanity
Summary: How did it start, this tangle, this mess I got myself into? Was it finding you in the bathroom, screaming? No, I did not pity you then. It was your flying, into the clouds where there was little air, only to fall to the ground, blue and broken. Someone had to save you.
After a ten year separation, in which he and the Wizarding world have done their best to heal and move on from the lost Boy Who Lived, Draco Malfoy is faced with an unexpected reunion that threatens to destroy his sense of reality.
This story: As Harry slowly resurfaces, Draco's world grows continually bleaker.
Disclaimer: Not mine, don't sue.
Dedication: To tall_randall and ourwitchriver, both of whom, after two years, still believed I would finish this. And to my f-list, who has been just as encouraging as ever. benightedfate, because i love her, devils_fantasy, because i love her too. And so many more I can barely begin to name you all. ♥
A/N: Two years is a big gap, but this WIP is DONE. You may see the obvious and subtle differences in my writing - having been inundated in different sorts of literature from all around the globe and different centuries for the past two years, my style has most definitely changed. So please, don't hurt me for that. And yes, the parts that are Harry's POV are hard to read, but he's crazy, he can't help it. I've split this story into four parts, so you can stop part of the way through if you have a headache. Please, bear with it, and let me know what you think!
READ THE FIRST TWO STORIES BEFORE THIS ONE. It will makes things easier to understand!
Status: COMPLETE
Jump?
Disintegration:
Part 1, Part 2
Lassitude:
Part 1, Part 2
Resipiscence:
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, End
Resipiscence
There are muggle television screens in the air. They have no body, no plastic. Screens without dimensions, they flicker and they blink. One shows a boy; a man; a man-boy. A man-boy, running running running into woods and across fields and into air and into nothing. Running running running. And there’s no life anywhere but his life, but it’s draining and becoming like the fields and air he runs through. Desolate. Forgotten.
There’s another screen and the man-boy in it shields his face and guards his mind but it’s hopeless. It’s coming and it’s spiraling through and down and into him. And his black hair is matted and he’s lost proper vision and his eyes no longer see in front of him, because all he sees is nothing. Nothing, nothing. And guilt.
And it’s not my guilt. It’s not my guilt and not my fault and Merlin everything is closing in on me. It’s not my guilt, the people don’t scream for fear of me, not me. Not me. It’s not my guilt. It’s not my guilt. It’s not my fault. It’s not my guilt.
And he stuffs his ears with dirt and grass and anything that will block them but he still hears the screaming and the terror and the blood. The blood, the blood that became rivers and pools that day, so many swam through and they fell asleep in them because of one spell. And they wouldn’t wake up.
Wake up, wake up, wake up up up up, wake up. No, don’t fall asleep, don’t fall, no sleep, sleep, don’t sleep, don’t fall. Please, please, please. It’s wrong, this is wrong, it never should have happened. I tried, I tried, I thought I won. I thought I made it right. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sorry. Don’t fall asleep. It’s not my guilt. It’s his, and he’s swimming with you and you are all sleeping. No. No. Don’t sleep, I can’t sleep. No, no.
There are screens filled with pools. Screens that scream with the noise and the horror. Millions of screens stacked upon millions of screens, all with pools. All with the pools the man-boy fears, dreads, watches them fall into. And they’re all there, lying in the pools, the rivers, the waterfalls and he’s running. Running, running.
One screen is invisible. It seems invisible, because it only shows the world the man-boy sees, the one that’s ever changing. It’s colors and there’s no horizon and no vertical point and it’s all moving, waves of malleable world that shift and twist around to become everything. But everything is only the color and the screens. And the shrieks and things in the screens.
He knows, for certain, that there’s one screen somewhere, somehow, that’s of the man-boy before he became a man-boy, before the shrill cries. And he was only a boy, and there was water on his back and in his eyes. And in his eyes he could see, could feel another boy, another boy he touched and felt and -
“You’re mine.”
Maybe there are other screens before that one, that one that’s different, and the man-boy is certain there are others… He just doesn’t remember.
But he does remember that the world hasn’t been color for forever, that it was but then it wasn’t, and it was fading, disappearing, over-powered by the screaming. But the color suddenly bled in again, after so long, and he doesn’t know why. But he does know that new screens came with the color, new screens, and he doesn’t know how they got there, how they keep appearing in larger numbers, but he knows that they do.
White screens. Screens of white. And glass. Where in the world, where am I?
With the color he’s positive there came a numbing, a chilling, a comfortable sense that was familiar but not. It was different from his forever in monotone. And when the color came and the numbing there, he would have jumped and whooped with excitement, but he couldn’t move, he can’t move. He can’t move his eyes from the screens, but if he could he would look down and he’s convinced there wouldn’t be a body there if he tried finding one. And he can’t move nor see his hands, so he’s sure that they’re not there either. But he sees his hands, body, him in the screens, the ones he can’t look away from, so he never looks down.
A new screen appears. With the color it comes, and he can see, see so clearly. Eyes. He can see eyes the color of the monotone his world once was, and the man-boy can only stare. And the world stops, and the colors don’t move, and the chilling numb comes back with those eyes. Things are tinted, tinting, tainting, tainted green. The man-boy gawks. And there is no screaming.
No screaming. Gone. Screaming gone. Those, those eyes, everything’s green but those eyes…
And then the screen disappears.
No, no, no no no. Screaming. Screaming. No, no screaming, it was gone, gone. It shouldn’t be back. It was gone. The eyes made it go away. Those eyes, I know those eyes. They make everything go away. No, stop, stop. Stop screaming, I can’t. I can’t do anything. Can’t help, heal, can’t do anything. Stop, stop. I told you, told you stop. Told you it’s not my guilt, not mine. Please stop. Stop, please, please stop.
The screens don’t not blink. The screaming never stops.
New ones appear, new screens, but they only flicker and there’s nothing in them but words. Words. And they shut off the screaming and resound, round around and round. There’s no understanding, no use understanding, but it continues and the words stop the screaming when they’re there.
And the eyes; the eyes belong to that voice, the man-boy knows, but he doesn’t know how he knows. But there’s only the voice and there are no eyes, and eventually the voice fades and the screaming comes back.
There are bed straps in the screen. A new screen. And the screaming gets louder and louder. The bed straps fall, away, and then there’s a hallway and the hallway moves toward and away and then there’s someone, someone, a someone with eyes. And the screaming, it’s awakening everything and the screens with the pools are flooding the others, ruining, spoiling them all.
But those eyes. They’re not monotone, but muddy. They’re not monotone, but they could be, they are, but they’re not. And the screaming continues but the world stops moving, and the eyes are in the man-boys arms.
I don’t understand, why, why is the world stopped but the screaming not. Why, why? Eyes, those eyes aren’t right but they are and I don’t understand, don’t understand at all. They should fit, should be right, but they aren't, they don’t belong, but they have to. I don’t know, why, why, why don’t I know?
The pools begin to invade the screen, staining it, but the man-boy holds onto the eyes and he won’t let go, never let go.
Why, tell me why you don’t fit? Why, why isn’t there the voice, why aren’t the screams stopped? Why do you not fit but do? Why, tell me, why, why, make me understand. Don’t leave me, no, don’t leave me, make me understand.
Green, the screen turns green. The eyes fall closed and then are gone. And the world moves and the colors with it and there’s a rage and betrayal that joins the screaming and they shriek together, entwined. And everything’s moving, moving, swirling, twisting, molding -
Everything is too quick, moving too quick. Too many screens, I don’t know what’s going on, I’m lost, gone, lost and I don’t know where I am. I’ve never known, never known, but now I know I don’t know -
And then it stops.
There’s a deathly silence, and the screams fall into the pools with those who won’t wake up, and the colors are stopped and the eyes… The eyes are right and monotone and get closer and closer. And there’s a hand and the eyes are open and they stare, only ever stare, and they’re closer and closer and nothing moves, sounds, breathes, only feels and it feels like there should be water spraying onto his back and-
“Mine.”
There’s a new screen, a flickering screen, with only words, but he can’t hear them, because there’s another screen, and there’s a woman, a bottle of pent up energy and she’s red and dark and raging and he unstops her and she’s falling, falling, falling and draining pouring emptying…
And the screen turns green.
The colors, the world, the everything turns green.
And there’s that screen, the one before with only words, and he can’t understand, but the man-boy tries, tries…
But there’s a screen, a red screen, a new screen, and the man-boy is there. With him is a man, a red man. And the man-boy tries to remember where he’s seen the red man before. With them is a woman, the bottle woman, but there’s no red, no dark, no raging. Now in her base is a light, a gold light, and it grows and grows and swells and it tickles the man-boy’s eyes.
And he laughs. And there’s no screaming, no sound but laughing, good laughing, but there are screens and screens and new screens and it’s all moving so fast, too fast, and, and -
There are muggle television screens in the air. They have no body, no plastic. Screens without dimensions, they flicker and they blink. One shows a boy; a man; a man-boy. And he’s listening to something he can’t understand, shouldn’t understand, that he didn’t understand before, not until his world turned green, and what he hears now will echo and forever keep the screaming stopped.
“Harry…Harry…Harry…”
And he knows that voice. It belongs to the eyes, the ones that stop everything and remind him of showers. But he doesn’t recall whose they are.
*
Down the hall now. There’s a persistent clicking as I stride. It’s the sound of authority, the sharp sound of heels on stone floor. Striding, storming. There’s no time to pause, no time for the sound to be muffled. Quiet be damned. If Rene wakes, then Wilone will take care of it. There’s authority here, in my hands, eyes, my feet, and if it wants to stir the dead with its noise, then I refuse to stop it.
It was once the sound of my father - a prelude to his imminent arrival. It was the sound of him angry, of him controlling, of his power. Wherever, whenever - this sound was his. It was the last sound he ever made before I killed him. Before I killed him so immediately, barely allowing the betrayal to cross his face. Before his nose was in the ground. Before the echoes of his footsteps faded.
I wanted him to die thinking he was powerful, and then with a sudden realization know he was not.
I didn’t even let him beg for mercy.
Because Malfoy’s do not beg for mercy.
The sound is now my sound. And in the wake of it wizards and creatures alike should fear me, as I once feared my father. As all should fear a Malfoy.
But there is no one in these halls, in the corridors that I stride down. There is no one here to fear me. And what is authority when there is no one around to control?
And even then, even when I am around people, or people are around me, I no longer have a grasp of control. I mean, you - you’re a lunatic and I don’t have the power to keep you strapped to your bed. I can’t say no to Hermione, and kick you out. I’m not even powerful enough to keep the Weasel out of my own house anymore.
Weak.
“Master?”
A house elf. Toti, I think. I thought I left it behind in my chambers after it notified me of Weasley’s intrusion upon my home.
I do not pause, but continue to stride and allow it to struggle behind me.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Wealsey says he’s come to see Miss, sir, but he didn’t go to her chambers.”
“And where did he go when he didn’t go to her chambers?”
“To Master Harry’s chamber, sir.”
Damn him.
“Thank you, Toti. That will be all.”
Who does that Weasel think he is, coming into my house? And without invitation. I would bet my entire fortune he didn’t even come with Hermione in tow. He’s just here to see you, to steal you, and I won’t let him do that.
Where is Hermione, anyway? I remember the study, and…
Wilone isn’t here anymore.
The noise in the hall stops. There’s a tapestry in front of me, and more, more are lined up along the hallway. Rugs, one with a loose string. The house elves will be punished for not taking care of them properly. Lights, filling the hall. Vases, portraits, crystal and glass. Everything I can see but my mind… My mind…
Wilone’s not here.
My fist slams against the wall, and my nails, they wait for the satisfaction of biting into the stone. But they bleed, and they hammer the wall again and again and the blood lashes out. My order, my order - what happened to it? What happened today? There was the study, Wilone dismissed, Hermione on the ground, Rene crying…. And you, and you in the doorway. And then in your bed, you wouldn’t stay down, but that was after Weasley came in, and -
He’s here. I need to get him away from you. He’ll take you and that’s not allowed; you’re my responsibility.
Responsibility? I’m taking this all too seriously now.
I rub my temples with the tips of my fingers. They’re ice against the fire of activity in my head. I’m numb but filled with a raging that I can’t place. I need to find order of some sort, otherwise I’ll lose myself completely. I don’t know, don’t care where I’m coming from, only where I’m going.
I must get there now.
The clicking, the ticking of heels begins again against the stone, then rug. I try to build a momentum, build up the authority again. Try to feel it in my toes, in my knees; imagine my father, as he used to be in all his distorted, false glory. And I’m there, I’m there, watching, imitating, I feel it growing, swelling, bursting -
“Draco!”
And deflate.
Turning sharply around, I see not Weasley, but Hermione. She waves briefly at me.
I, in my concentration, passed your room without even realizing it.
That’s what happens when you take your mind off your goal, boy.
I resist shaking my head of my father’s voice, letting it ring. Instead of dying it grows louder with every reverberation, and I struggle to stalk straight toward Hermione. I’m feeling weaker, but my fingers, my arms, my legs stay taut, forcing myself to stay tall. I see myself reaching for Hermione’s arm, but she’s laughing, her eyes are closed. Around the noise in my head, I know this is wrong - Hermione doesn’t chortle, doesn’t smile and hold her stomach in glee as if she had been hit a weak combination of Rictusempra and the Cheering Charm. But there she is; pulling Weasley with her as she side-steps me. My fingers are closing on air, and I - stop. And I hear them walking down the hall, talking softly, and I can picture them affectionately, lovingly, holding hands.
Disgusting.
Now they’re gone, gone before I can do anything about Weasley’s intrusion. And there is a sinking, piercing feeling in my gut, as if your friends have stabbed me with a sharp spoon, using it to shovel out small chunks of precious organs one small piece at a time. My life those pieces hold are being replaced with growing, scathing clumps of misery and jealousy. It’s deathly cold, and if I didn’t know better I would have thought I was reliving my visit to Father in Azkaban again.
I feel completely, mortifyingly, absolutely, undeniably - alone.
Wilone and Rene have left. Hermione has gone happily with her husband. And I - I am left in their wake, with my father’s infamous words dying inside me. Swirling down like an unhappy ending. A fish in a toilet bowl. A quail beneath the wheels of a carriage.
And I listen to the silence of the tapestries, of the lights, the sleeping portraits, vases.
But then, a creak.
The sound. The sound is bedsprings. And now, with the agonizing pain violently pulsing in my gut, I slowly make my way toward your door. It’s ajar, and through it I see your shadow - it can only be your shadow - moving against the half light of night that serves as your backdrop. I know, there, sit your hard eyes, your boney fingers, knuckles, your mouth; all creating You. A masterpiece of madness.
Behind you, the stars, like faint eyes, are falling closed out in the distance, beginning to vanish. The night is no longer really night. It borders on the edge of day, dawn, and it’s stuck there. On a see-saw, a balance, tipping from one side to the other and back again. It can’t make up its mind.
And it seems, neither can I. I do not know whether I should stay, or go. But my body seems to have made up my mind for me; like the night I betrayed, I killed my father. What I thought or felt didn’t seem to matter.
As I weakly, foolishly, step in, my body lured by you and your chaos, I know you see me.
And you moan.
*
There is a screen in the air. And in it, eyes watch; fearful, dull eyes. Eyes like slate, suddenly arousing a vibrant burst of color and calm, snuffing the screams in the man-boy’s head. A moan sounds, and as it echoes the screen swells, filling the man-boy’s vision. The eyes, encased in shadow and light, flicker, and shake. They are, very nearly, nearly almost, like the piercing ones, the eyes he felt in showers and cold tile. The eyes, with a voice, that say his name.
The man-boy; he stands. And slowly, he watches as his joints straighten. There is a darkness that shrouds, that surrounds him. If he was not trapped behind the screen, he would be suffocating. The eyes falter with every step he takes. The man-boy, he grows, and before him the walls bleed. The plants darken, droop, wither, seeping a green into the stone, and it flows in rivers. The screen is tainted dark green, like a forest at twilight, and the curtains fall soundlessly behind him as the windows creep open. Slow currents of energy are slinking, slipping, sliding into the room. There is, he hears, an early song-bird on the railing outside the window, and gradually its song fades, the notes and the melody losing pace, losing pitch.
And plummets, to stone and sleep.
The eyes watch, ever watching, and do not blink.
Suddenly an old screen, cracked and fading, invades the man-boy’s vision. Its edges are dull, chipped, and the picture within distorted. But in it, clearly, the same eyes watch. And the man-boy listens as a voice close to him cackles, close to him sneers;
“That’s what happens when you take your mind off your goal, boy.”
It is deep, and it is mocking, and he watches as a lone figure stalks down a hall, as the lone figure turns its head briefly and faces the eyes. And the eyes, they are shaking, they are dull, and in a flash of green light, the lone figure slumps mid-step, its face lost in bleak betrayal.
The eyes watch, ever watching, and do not blink.
“Are you happy?” The eyes are flooding. They waver as they move farther from him, from the figure on the floor. “My father’s dead. I killed him.”
The world, now red, blurs. Laughter, bubbles, bellows, bursts in and through him, and the man-boy is shriveling inside. The laughter, malevolent laughter, like a foreign virus, controls itself, controls its host, and as the eyes turn and flee the man-boy’s mind is dying, entrapped in screens and preserved with memories as his body flees.
But the laughter, and the screams in the screens, follow.
The aged screen disappears. And in its place the eyes are staring, staggering forward. The green that seeps from the walls, the plants, the bird, and now the eyes, is thicker than blood, and the eyes are closing, falling to the ground.
But the man-boy’s starting forward, and he sees his limbs; they are moving of their own accord and catch the eyes. And there’s a spark, a jolt of a curse, like muggle electricity, that runs through his arms as they come into contact with the eye’s… arms. The limbs and the folds of fabric, soft and slick against him. And there is something in him, something that is starting and moving, twitching. And now he knows, and he remembers.
The body, the boy with the eyes shudders as he whispers,
“Dr-draco.”
*
I am alone, and in front of me there is a hall of tile, ever and forever ongoing, it seems. And walls, sectioning off areas of the hall; maybe like shower stalls. I walk down a few paces, and listen. There is no echoing of footsteps, but drops. Slow, clear drops that fall into thick puddles, or pools. Steam and noises rise from a stall a few paces away, but as I move toward it, I hear something slump to the floor behind me. Like something lifeless. I know the sound well enough; I’ve killed before. It’s the sound of hopeless finality at its utmost as it falls to hollowness. I turn to find Hermione on a rug, like one from the Manor, and slightly green. Not green, as if she was sick, but green… luminescent green. And down the tile hall, you appear; but somehow, you have always been there, slick in sweat and steam. And you are stalking toward me.
Suddenly, green steam floods from faucets in the stalls. I try to step back, step away from being blinded, from your advancing footsteps that sound like drops. But by some unknown force, I am pulled toward you unwillingly, and your name is escaping from me. It’s being punched out of me, squeezed out of me as my ribs are pushed further and further into my lungs, piercing them like a cold, dry frost. And as I say it, my throat is thick and crackles.
“Harry, Harry.”
I grab my neck in rage, in horror, fear, and my lungs are quickly reduced to nothing. I feel my forehead crease and my eyes grow wider, larger as I struggle for air. Sinister green spots are appearing before me, running in circles around me, twisting menacingly around and in and through me. There are no more drops, I notice, as I fall to my knees. But I hear the song of a song-bird die, and I feel the plants wilting, and now, I am falling. And I know, soon, I will sink to utter hollowness, utter despair, too.
But as I fall, feel the steam puff past me, up and up past me, puffing, I hear - you. I hear you. And it’s worse than the tile that will break me, break my fall.
“Dr-draco.”
I start awake, my eyes snapping open, and instantly feel the cool cotton sheets on top of me, hear wind rustling through the trees and the sun filtering though a sliver of an opening between the curtains. My head… hurts. It pounds repeatedly, like a woodpecker in my skull, trying desperately to get out. It is too heavy to carry, my neck too weak, and so I let my eyes wander about the room.
Morning. A normal morning, or as normal as a Manor morning can be. The curtains are drawn, the wall hangings straight, the plants - dead. I blink, but before I can think any more on it, I am shuddering. I am freezing, clammy; awoken because of an unusual dream. They’ve became oddly persistent since you’ve arrived here. I guess my conscience doesn’t deem me worthy of proper sleep any more.
Maybe it’s not a terribly normal morning after all.
Dreams; terrifying, indiscernible dreams. No one, in their right mind, ought to have such dreams. I am an unfortunate exception. But there was a time when you were, too. But for you, we all knew it was your connection to the Dark Lord that caused them. You couldn’t keep him out of you, couldn’t block him, and every night you watched people die, watched them look at you in horror, in pain, in agony, and you killed them. It was your hand, the hand of the madman you were tied to, and their blood on his hands was like blood on yours.
I watched you, most nights. As you lied there, tossing, turning, tumbling off the bed and retching. But you’d never wake up, and I, for fear of you drowning in your own vomit, fell after you, held you, got my hands dirty like no other Malfoy would. I shamed my family every night, rocking you like a baby, and unbeknownst to you I would kiss your eyelids, stroke your nose like my mother used to do to me. And eventually, painstakingly slowly, you would mumble, you would moan, and you would finally sleep peacefully. Within the stone walls of Hogwarts, under the noses of everyone we knew, I held you, murmured to you. In the absence, the death of my own mother, all I knew to do was to return her love to someone who needed it like I did. And I despised you, hated you, shrunk away from touching you, but you needed me. You told me so yourself. You needed me. And I needed to be needed.
I was - helpless. I loathed it.
How did it start, this tangle, this mess I got myself into? Was it finding you in the bathroom, screaming? No, I did not pity you then. It was your flying, into the clouds where there was little air, only to fall to the ground, blue and broken. Someone had to save you. I had just arrived from my mother’s funeral, and I heard her, as clearly as if she had been behind me, and she told me to save you.
What could I do? I would sooner die, rather than betray my mother.
So in the grass, I found myself tugging and dragging you, swearing I would kill you if you died. And that day, I saved you. But when you thanked me, weeks later, I stared at your cursed, wretched, unkempt hair. And I turned and walked away.
I saved you that day for my mother. So that my mother would be avenged, and not live in a world of grey smog, floating through brick and stone. I saved you to save my mother.
But in my need, my loss, I lost myself in your need, and in your loss. That was the only way I seemed capable of living.
I think I learned to love you, but I mentally choke on the word. But you left me, broken and in pain, and I have dreamt of you every night since you left me. I have wanted you back, have lost myself in my pain and desire. But now that you’re back, I feel my old pride, old habits come back to me, and I want to get away from you.
I feel tired - extraordinarily tired, as if I’ve not slept at all. It’s like one of those mornings where I’ve been reading a case all night, planning and re-planning what needs to happen the next day - to the extent that I forget sleep is actually necessary. In fact, I don’t even remember going to bed, let alone changing out of my clothes.
That is when I realize that my hip is unnaturally warm. That something lies there. And with my realization, that something begins moving, tracing circles and patterns into my skin, onto my bones; as if, by my recognizing it, it has sprung to life. I stiffen, my thoughts and my limbs turning to stone and falling heavily into the sheets. I wish, with growing terror, that I could sink into the mattress and bury myself, wish my trembling heart would stop. My insides are frozen and pierced with the icicles forming in my blood.
I wish I had not woken up. Because I know I am supposed to be alone.
If, by some sick chance, it was a house elf next to me, I might have the life left in me to laugh. Or to hex it to hell and back. But I can feel the springs in my back, and beside me, and the weight pressing on them is far too big. Bigger than an elf, longer than Rene, and far heavier than Wilone; there is someone in my bed and I wish with all my soul it is someone I do not know.
But I am certain - as simply as I am certain the curtains in this room are not mine - that you are lying beside me.
I try to move my head toward you, but my heart shudders and my neck is stiff. My eyes move instead, and if I had still been breathing, my lungs would have stopped functioning immediately. You’re closer to me than I thought, and faintly, I feel your breath sweep across my face. Your eyes are bright and focused, lucid, and like green sparks they dance. They are rough and frightening, scraping past and through every inch of me, collecting everything that I am, that you can see. I feel raw, exposed, vulnerable, helpless. But I cannot move, and I cannot leave.
Your fingers are still moving, and my gaze shifts downward. You’re not dressed, but your legs are wrapped and twisted in the sheets. Your hair, your scarred body - your entire appearance looks as if a hurricane has passed through you, as if you lied on your side and festered like a bad splinter all night. And I, with sheets lying calmly on top of me, am seemingly untouched.
Without warning, your nose is near my hair, smelling it, tasting it. And your mouth by my ear, shakily;
“Draco.”
I cannot think, but feel my heart thunder in my chest and my mind shrivel and shake. Of their own accord, my eyes are closing and my neck arching. My stone-like limbs are yielding, melting into the soft sheets in the wake of your breath, of your fingers. I try to resist, try desperately, but with every movement, they are intense, frightening, forcing me to let go. I cannot help but feel these fingers, light and lulling, hypnotizing and taking advantage of every vulnerable feeling, every secret fear that exists in me. You scare me, every fiber of my being shaking uncontrollably, but you are warm, your hands inviting.
In your presence, I quiver and dread. It is almost familiar in an unwanted way, the feelings uncannily like those I experienced around my father. But by the pain in the small of my back, and in the warm flush of my chest, I know you are different, that somewhere in you, you are sane. And I know that, as surely as you are capable of saying my name, you need me. I want to give in to you, let you make me feel like you used to make me feel. My stomach is knotting and my throat collapses, my head is lolling to the side. I could not possibly move now, not when you’re touching me. I am helpless to you; so awfully helpless.
Like a prayer, your finger tip touches my eyelids, slides down my nose, and I gasp slightly.
I will give in to you; if only because I need to be needed.
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