Confined | d. malfoy

Eight | Certain

A week passed, and then another.

Not a single word had been spoken between Draco or Vera, and their friends had quickly caught on to the fact that they were mad at each other- they just didn't know why.

Both Malfoy and Blackwell refused to acknowledge each other. Not in Potions, not in Astronomy, not at meals, not during friend group hangouts in the common room.

Neither Draco nor Vera addressed the situation when Blaise, Ella, Theo, or even other students asked them about it. It was like they were both trying to forget- in their own ways

Vera put every free second into schoolwork and quidditch practice, trying to place all of her focus on anything except for the feelings she'd developed for someone who had treated her terribly almost her entire life.

Draco dove into working harder on his task: that bloody cabinet he'd lost too many hours of precious sleep working on. He hung out with his friends- minus Vera. Anything he could do to distract him from her... he did it.

He tried harder in his classes, knowing perfectly well that he wouldn't even need to pass his classes if the Dark Lord would eventually take over. When he first got the dark mark, he reveled in it.

The attention he gained from both his mother and aunt while his father was locked away made him feel respected and powerful- but the first time he felt the ache and pain that occurred whenever he was summoned by Voldemort himself made him rethink every idea and belief his family stood for.

Vera felt the same way- except she'd felt the same resentment to the Dark Lord and his methods of thinning the half-blood and muggle-born population.

Just because they tried to forget about that night in his room didn't mean it was possible for them to. The way he touched her, the way she kissed him back... everything about the moment seemed so perfect- except that it was perfect in all the wrong ways.

•••

"-are you two going to act this way forever?" Theo tossed a wadded piece of paper into the fireplace that lit the entire Slytherin common room. "Honestly, it's getting quite annoying when you're both speaking through us."

Draco looked over at Vera, who didn't even bother to look up from her Potions book.

She wasn't even mad at him anymore. She'd excused his anger as being an act carried out by his drunkenness, but she would still pretend like she hated him as long as it would take for her to lose any and all feelings for him that had sparked ever since that night.

And Draco most certainly didn't hate her. It was anything but that. He'd ruined the moment by yelling at her and he wouldn't forgive himself until she agreed to forgive him- only... he didn't know that she'd already forgiven him.

"Well, I'm going to bed. It's late and I'm tired," Eloise stood up and so did Blaise and Theo- almost as if it had been planned.

"Yeah, I'm awfully tired," Theodore gave a yawn that was somewhere between mildly genuine and completely fake.

"Don't you two have a, um, Astronomy project to work on?" Blaise sent a smirk across the room as he backed away in the direction Ella and Theo had gone.

Draco and Vera rolled their eyes in sync, just as Blaise slipped away as well. There were only a few students still up besides them, leaving a calm and quiet environment for the pair to sit in peace.

"They just want us to talk to each other, you know that, right?" Draco was the first to break their two-week-long speaking break.

"I'm aware," Vera spoke with a sarcastic tone. She pulled her Astronomy textbook into her lap and flipped open to the passage she'd been reading earlier while attempting to complete her portion of the group project without having to consult Draco for help.