requirement | dramione

0.35

thursday 

december 6, 1996

Draco didn't see the Gryffindor for some time after that. Frankly, he chose not to see much of anyone. His bed quickly became the only safe place in all of Hogwarts– green velvet curtains drawn together tightly.

He'd felt like this before– a day or so at a time. Missing lessons, skipping every meal, opting for taking his shower in the dead of night when there was no risk of someone approaching him. This time, it was the third night that threatened to swallow him whole.

His bones and muscles screamed at him to move. He'd stopped feeling hungry which, somehow, made him feel worse. And when he desperately wanted to sleep, he'd close his eyes and see his mother's face. Or hear the Gryffindor crying. Or watch the sight of their notorious Dark Lord, who'd sit proudly at the head of his death-ridden table, and pick Draco out of a swarm like a fucking reaping.

The other boys in the room were fast asleep, snoring as if it were the easiest thing in the world. He hated the taste of the jealousy that came to the roof of his mouth. Half of him wanted to start screaming and shouting. To throw a fucking fit. An absolute tantrum. Just to wake them all. Just so they could feel a fraction of how it felt.

How could they sleep? Really, how could they possibly sleep, so perfectly content, when everything outside of this fucking castle was falling into chaos?

He loathed them all for it. For not knowing. Hated each and every one of his peers until every single deep, sleeping breath began to sound like sirens in his ears. Out of fear that he might truly begin screaming, Draco abandoned the dormitory and climbed into the common room.

The comparative quietness of the common room was eerie and uncomfortable. It rose goosebumps on Draco's arms and down his spine. He would have thought to throw a jumper over his tee shirt or atleast pajama pants over his boxers if he hadn't been boiling in the dorm.

That was it, then. He was cold, alone, and could feel a fresh migraine settling behind his eyes. It all felt quite fitting. Be it karma or fate or some curse that had been put on him.... Perhaps he was simply meant to suffer. He would bear it, he told himself, if it meant that his mother would never have to. He nodded his head into the darkness of the common room.

The darkness was whole and unwavering. Enveloping. If he didn't move, he was sure it would take him completely. But there was low, dim light coming from the hot coals in the fireplace, so he forced himself to kneel before it. He whispered a quiet command, and the coals gently grew into long flames, like green hands slowly reaching out of the fireplace.

The Slytherin fireplace had long been banished from the use of the FlooNetwork and its varieties of spells and tricks for communication. He'd checked thoroughly. Last year, the Ministry had employed the Floo Regulation Association to monitor the fires at Hogwarts, but there was a gray area when it came to unmonitored fireplaces outside of the school, reaching in. A slower recognition time. It only meant that someone outside of Hogwarts would want to contact him. Even with the unlikeliness of that happening, Draco still sat and wished.

He stared into the green flames and let their brightness hurt his eyes. Who was using the fireplaces in Malfoy Manor now? And his poor mother. The thought of her, alone yet surrounded, in their manor was sharp in his chest.

If he could only talk to her– even just for a moment...

He wasn't sure how long he watched the flames and tried to be hopeful before he returned to doubt. The way fantasy turns to deception and good dreams fall back into reality.