Stop All the Clocks (This Is the Last Time I'm Leaving Without You)

chapter 14

Harry can't bring himself to take Draco's funeral seriously. It starts with the casket. They weren't able to recover Draco's body, but for some reason his parents have bought a casket for him. Harry stares at it as some witch who'd barely known Draco rambles on about how the world is a poorer place without him in it. Harry doesn't need some witch to tell him that, and that casket just doesn't make any goddamn sense. It's glossy black, the sort that looks as if it'll collect smudgy fingerprints if anyone touches it, and trimmed in gold. Obviously the best that money can buy, but what's the fucking point of it?

The witch comes to a rambling, tearful end and steps down from the podium they've wreathed in white gardenias and lilies. She brushes against the side of it and one of the lilies comes loose and falls to the floor. Harry stares at it, bland white against the pale marble. Draco has always loved the riotous color of springtime flowers best, the daffodils and poppies and snapdragons and tulips, and of course the heavy and fragrant roses that are just now beginning to bloom in the Manor's gardens, and Harry can't understand why they didn't pick any of those for him. Draco always looks best in colors; with his fair complexion and white-blond hair, he's always been especially suited to deep emerald greens and rich royal blues. The lining of the casket is probably white. White silk, Harry imagines, and he's suddenly glad that Draco's not trapped in there.

The witch gives him a long, pitying look as she goes back to her seat, and Harry looks away as the next person steps to the front of the room. They wanted him to speak, of course they did, but the absolute last thing he wants is to get up there in front of all these people he doesn't know and open himself up, baring his pain like a spectacle. It's not theirs to see, not when he doesn't even know what to do with it yet. His grief is still an unruly dog at this point, yanking him this way or that on a whim, while he's helpless to do anything but stumble along after it. In time, Harry thinks it will settle down and follow complacently behind him, but for now he can't trust himself to hold it together. He hates giving speeches, anyhow. Draco knows that. He'll understand.

So instead of Harry, they get Pansy Parkinson.

It's the sort of bitter irony Draco would have found terribly amusing, Harry thinks, that they're all gathered here crying over an empty box draped in drab wreaths of flowers Draco hates, while people he hasn't spoken to in years make great and lumbering speeches about how hard it is to live without him, when none of them had ever lived with him in the first place. They didn't wake up beside him each morning or make him breakfast or do his laundry or spend long and quiet evenings with their head in his lap and his fingers in their hair. Draco didn't make them tea in stupid mugs or dance with them to Muggle music or kiss them like he needed them as much as he needed air. Harry takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. It feels ridiculous for him to be jealous of the grief of others and he tries his best to let go of it. Draco affected a lot of people, and it's not for Harry to say how justified they are in their loss.

But then there's Parkinson, saying how dearly she loved Draco and how much she'll miss him, and a lone tear trickles down her cheek, and Harry's anger comes rushing back. That stupid bitch. She hadn't even spoken to Draco since she found out he'd begun dating Harry. Draco never lets on how hurt he is by it, but Harry knows Parkinson's rejection has cut him deep. She's his oldest friend and she just turned her back on him after one little argument. Draco explained that it's because they'd planned to marry someday. Her blood was pure enough to beget a Malfoy heir, and Draco never planned to fall in love with anyone so they'd agreed to a marriage of convenience some years down the line when they were both ready to settle down and raise a family. But then Harry came along and Parkinson's never forgiven him for it. "It's all right," Draco always says with a small shrug whenever the subject of Parkinson comes up. "She can't stay angry with me forever." And she didn't stay angry forever. Just five years. But now it's too late, and Harry sincerely hopes that she regrets the hell out of it for the rest of her life.

Parkinson doesn't mention that in her little speech. Instead she talks about her friendship with Draco. Childhood antics. Adventures they shared at Hogwarts. How much she'll miss him now that he's passed on, and a flash of irritation curls through Harry because that's wrong. Draco didn't pass anywhere. 'Passing on' makes it sound easy and peaceful, just slipping away from one place to the next, and Draco's death wasn't like that. It was sudden and painful and Harry wasn't ready for it, none of them were.

"He died," Harry says quietly, and there's a flash of movement from his right as Hermione turns to look at him. He doesn't care. "He fucking died. He was killed." Those words sound better, sharp and ugly words for a sharp and ugly thing.

"Harry," Hermione whispers, and he shakes his head.

"Draco is dead," Harry mutters to himself, and now other people are turning to look at him too. It's the first time he's said those three words aloud, and they hit him hard. They sound ridiculous and not quite real, so he tries them out again, "Draco is dead."

All of a sudden, it's too much for him. He can't be in here, he can't be staring at that empty box and those awful flowers and trapped in here with all these people who pretend they love Draco when they don't, they don't, and they'll never love him the way Harry does. He stands, ignores the attention he gets, the stares, the pitying looks, and the way Parkinson's words falter. He steps out into the aisle, fixes his eyes on the door at the far end of the room, and leaves as quickly as he can without actually running.

Though he's only been in this part of the Manor a handful of times, Harry knows it well enough to get out of it. The ballroom is at the rear of the house, and from there it's just a short walk down the hall to a set of French doors leading out to a broad porch overlooking the lawns. Harry goes through it, gulping in breath after breath of fresh damp air. At least the weather cooperated today. It's overcast and spitting down that hazy, misting sort of rain that gets into everything. It's the perfect weather for a funeral.

Harry crosses the porch and starts to go down the steps, intending to disappear into the gardens for a while. But he remembers Draco taking him out there after the first time Harry had dinner with his parents, how tense an affair it had been with Lucius and Harry both obviously hating each other over poached salmon and grilled asparagus. Somehow they'd managed to remain polite through the dessert course, and then Draco had taken him for a walk in the gardens and spent ages kissing him among the roses. On a whim, Harry had plucked one of the roses from where it grew, its petals heavy and red as blood, and tucked it behind Draco's ear. Draco had laughed and left it there as they'd gone back inside to say goodnight to his parents. Lucius had looked disapprovingly at Draco, but Narcissa had tugged Harry aside and said that she hadn't seen this side of Draco in years, and was so glad to see Harry bringing it back out in him. At that point in their relationship, Draco's casual ridiculousness was something Harry still found baffling and new, but it would eventually become one of the things he loved most. Draco had worn that ridiculous flower for the rest of the evening, until it had fallen out later that night from the force of his thrusting into Harry's willing body, tumbling off the edge of the mattress. Harry never picked it up from where it'd fallen between the bed and the nightstand, and he vaguely wonders whether it's still there all this time later.

It's around the same time of year, a little earlier in June than that night, but Harry still doesn't want to see the roses blooming. There are a lot of things he doesn't want to see anymore. He sinks down until he's sitting on the middle step, heedless of the puddle seeping into the seat of his trousers. He pulls his knees up to his chest and clasps his arms around his shins, and thinks that maybe he can just disappear, if only he can curl up small enough.