Lost Memories // Drarry

Chapter 32: Broken Mind

Harry watches as the grass blows in the wind.

He hasn't felt the same since that day. Like he isn't himself. Or rather that he is himself, but something is wrong. It feels like something is missing. He doesn't fail to see the odd glances and pitiful looks that he gets from everyone. Like they are all in on some horrible secret that he doesn't know about.

His mind is filled with gaps, holes where his sanity slips through as he desperately searches for what filled them. The memories are on the tip of his tongue, but he can only get a taste before they are snatched away from him. Sometimes his dreams are so vivid that he figures they have to be memories, but he forgets them soon after.

There is one that he can remember though. If he isn't plagued by nightmares, he is plagued by this specific dream. He dances with someone in an apartment. A record player emits an enticing melody from the corner of the room. A timer goes off. He is happy and content. He even owns a cat.

But he can never see who it is. Every time he looks, it is just an empty face or one hidden in shadow. He usually wakes up if he tries too hard to figure out who it is.

He has been able to piece some things together about his lost time. He got most of it from Hermione, but Harry knows that she is hiding something from him. It's not as though he doesn't remember anything from the past few years. It's just blurry. Like a dream that he is trying to call forth, but it is slipping just out of his reach. He gets glimpses and pieces and has a general idea of what happened, but some things don't line up.

He mostly just remembers mundane things. Some pieces of important events, but enough is missing to leave him confused. He remembers Malfoy having the Dark Mark. But even that is difficult to summon up an image for in his mind. It strains him and makes his head pound relentlessly. He remembers... confronting him in the bathroom. But the details elude him. Harry remembers being on the tower and Dumbledore's death, but Malfoy is like a painful blur in those memories.

Why is Draco Malfoy such a source of pain and discomfort for Harry? He must have done something awful to him. Perhaps he figured out that Harry knew his secret and tried to kill him. Or maybe that he just simply attempted to kill him for Voldemort. No... none of those seem right.

Last week, he was struck by a haunting memory that left him gasping for air. It was absurd. It had to be some sort of hallucination. His mind must have made it up. He must be going insane. But... it felt so real, so right, despite how wrong it is.

It was so simple, so innocent. Yet incriminating in its own right.

Draco Malfoy, laughing. That's all it was.

Yet it was so much more.

The way his hair caught the light and reflected it. The way his skin was illuminated by the sun. Harry drank in the sight as though it was his only source of water in a vast, never ending desert. He threw his head back with not a care in the world.

Harry's skin prickles as his eyes trace the brief memory in his mind.

It can't have lasted more than a few seconds and yet he can barely think of anything else. He still is struggling to process it. Perhaps he never will.

The way his grey eyes sparkled and crinkled at the edges. Harry felt like seeing this was somehow forbidden. No one ever saw Malfoy laugh like that. And yet it is exactly how Harry imagines he would.

And his laugh. Oh god. His laugh.

It sends shivers up his spine as the sound fills his head. It fills it to the brim until it spills over. How can Harry know exactly what it sounds like if he has never even heard it before? Sure, he has heard Malfoy's taunting chuckle, but this was genuine. It makes Harry want to join in.