Chapter Text
Hermione couldn’t remember the last time she slept. It could’ve been hours or days, she didn’t know. She was drowning, and barely able to stay afloat.
If Draco could feel, he’d call this emotion, numb. He was lost in an endless ocean of nothingness.
Perhaps it is easier to fall together than it is to fall alone.
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Hermione closed her eyes and took one long breath. If one more petition for increased regulation of the thickness of cauldrons appeared on her desk, she was sure she would crumble. She lay her head on her hands, closed her eyes, and massaged her temples.
Perhaps Ginny would decide not to go to that night’s gala. She could stay at home and curl up by the fire, she had just received a large order of books, so she could lose herself in their pages. The gala was another flamboyant occasion hosted by ministry officials in an attempt to pretend that everything was ok, and that they were not harmed by the second wizarding war.
They were not, in fact, okay.
It was so startlingly obvious, that a child could notice it. Harry had started to recede from the public eye entirely, his eyes sunken as he stayed awake all night,researching possible rising threats to the shaky foundations that had began to rebuild after the war.
Ron, Ginny reported, didn’t come home at night. He would trail into the burrow in the early hours, his shirt misshapen and his laces untied. He would sport a fresh bruise each time, and his knuckles were forever painted red.
Hermione felt as if she were floating, as if she were on a cloud, peering down at herself. She watched as she carried out menial tasks, as she fought to keep her eyes open, so as to prevent her from being torn back into that darkness. Each time she slept, she returned there. Malfoy Manor.
Hermione didn’t sleep much, and that was that.
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The gala was held in some minister that Hermione had forgotten’s family manor in a grand ballroom, and it was clear that the ministry had spared no expense. A large chandelier glistened in the middle of the room, as guests, dressed in their best wizarding formalwear mingled and danced.
Hermione stood at the entrance, and as she descended a short flight of steps, she gripped her gown tightly, the light fabric weaving between her fingers. She could recognise a few figures. Seamus Finnigan stood with Cho Chang, who had recently became the youngest ever captain of the Tutshill Tornados. Hermione noticed that although she was nodding along to Seamus’s chattering, she was softly tracing the woven ‘C’ bracelet on her wrist. Seamus too was wrapping and unwrapping his arms around himself, as he glanced repeatedly around the room.
Oh, Hermione thought, Dean
A nearby Dean cleared his throat and held his glass of wine close.
Hermione loosened her grip on her dress and her gaze wandered over the room. She knew many of the guests and could see Harry, speaking lowly with the Belgian ambassador in a dark corner of the ballroom. Ginny was close by, her booming laughter at what was most likely her own joke causing Hermione to smile slightly. Hogwarts’s new Herbology professor, Neville along bottom was speaking animatedly to what Hermione believed to be was Newt Scamander’s grandson and Luna Lovegood. She continued her gaze across the room until she laid eyes on a tall figure with his back to her. He was wearing fine,the finest wizarding robes that money could buy, and his piercing blonde hair was-
oh, Hermione thought, and then the figure turned, as if called, but he couldn’t have been, because Hermione could not form any words.
The world was suddenly running, running, slipping
her feet, falling underneath her
a forest floor, no, a manor
A voice,screaming
No, her own voice.
A yell,
an unforgivable.
Darkness
Stormy eyes met her own.
Oh,
Malfoy.