Ultraviolence

Chapter 28: Christmas

Song: First Love/ Late Spring - Mitski

Like most things you hope will never come, Christmas arrived in haste. I hated the capitalistic tradition and it would only have set us back anyway. Or so I thought because he barged in on the last day of classes to say that he was staying for the holidays and that I should too.

I didn't want to go home, not yet, not with so many unanswered questions swirling in my head. I would have probably spilled my guts by Christmas Eve and the whole thing would've been ruined. Or maybe they already knew, maybe they erased my memories or would do it again. The last time Draco went home things turned ugly. So, I stayed, and thankfully Pansy did not. She was constantly pretending like I didn't exist anyway so it wasn't that much of a difference. But still, it was nice not to have to carry the weight of our dead friendship every time we were alone together for a change.

My new roommate though was a real pain in the ass. Especially when sleep wouldn't come, which was almost every night. I stared at the ceiling and tried not to laugh when he grunted in annoyance.

"I can't fucking sleep, her bed is too hard," Draco moaned.

"You were the one who wanted to move in here while she was gone," I sneered.

Something about "it makes more sense" "I can sleep for longer if I'm already here at dawn" "Blaise is still pissed at me I'm paranoid. I can't sleep." Blah blah blah. I only agreed because it meant I could sleep for longer and, to be fair, because I was scared of sleeping in this cold dungeon alone. All the Slytherin girls had gone, except for two twins in their first year and an orphan 4th year. But still, it was fucking creepy at night.

He groaned again. Scorpius leaped away from his side and took refuge on the carpeted floor.

"Do you want your mommy?" I laughed.

"Shut up."

The window groaned too, the cold wind was extra heavy tonight. And very loud. A small part of me was grateful that he was here with me, that we were still on speaking terms after all that had happened, that he was helping me. I wish it would just shut up, let the much bigger other part take over.

"Do you want to cuddle?" I asked him.

"Really?" He sounded as though hell had just frozen over.

"No," I laughed, feeling just a little bit bad. "Now shut up and go to sleep."

Our routine became a force of habit by the start of January. We'd wake up and then head to the potions classroom together, always walking silently and rather sleepily. This particular morning though, as we cut herbs together, he seemed more cheerful.

"What's so funny?" I asked harshly. He was smirking ever since we sat down, too.

"You don't like to admit when you're wrong do you?" a soft chuckle, and then he shook his head.

"I know you saw me by the lake the other day," his smirk faded but left a condescending look on his face. "I told you, didn't I? They'll never like you." I had the impression that he had thought about this for a while.

I didn't like myself right now either. I let him get inside of my head, I couldn't stop myself from thinking that he just might be right. Even if I did explain to Ginny and Neville that I had found the sweater laying around in my common room, an awkwardness lingered during meetings and every other time we saw each other.

The serpent emblem was too infamous, I suppose. It was silly of me to think they didn't mistrust me, even if it was just a little bit. I couldn't keep denying that it wasn't there anymore, or that it didn't haunt me either.