someday, somehow → d.malfoy [discontinued]

031

"je suis blaise."

the beauxbatons girls giggled giddily in such a way that made artemis highly uncomfortable. she made brief eye contact with the towering boy, and he showed her an awkward smile before directing his attention to the group once more. one of the girls remarked with a beet-red blush, "his pronunciation is so endearing!" before asking him in her own heavily accented english whether he was fluent in french. blaise, ever patient and courteous, replied that he did not. this seemed to delight the girls—and artemis knew they were so very delighted over this fact—for they could gossip and swoon over blaise all they wanted, without him understanding a thing. it was cruel, somehow.

why did she come over here, again? and with blaise, for that fact. what a stupid, regretful thing to have done—now she'd forced herself to endure all of their fakeness. fortunately for her, it seemed that blaise had picked up on her distaste and, acting her saviour once again, asked if she wanted to dance again to the song which had started playing—supposedly, one of his favourites of the weird sisters. artemis was not inclined to refuse, when he had so graciously offered her an escape from the beauxbatons group. she took his hand and shot a half-hearted farewell to the girls, who seemed rather dejected at blaise's sudden departure.

it did not matter—they did not matter. not to a laughing artemis, whose hand dragged blaise into the dancing crowd. he took her hands in his own, and they begun to move their limbs about with such a lack of grace one would never expect from two such individuals of their backgrounds. everything disappeared; the crowd was merely a curtain which divided this moment from real life. the music—upbeat and bright—brought glowing smiles to the two adolescents' faces.

"you regularly dance to this song, then?" artemis said, leaning closer so blaise could hear her. he grinned, before leaning down so his mouth was close to brushing her earlobe.

"never heard it in my life," he remarked. as he pulled away, two things happened; blaise removed his hold on one of her hands and reached to the back of her head, removed the clip and watched her dark hair tumble over her collarbones as he slipped the clip into his pocket. both at his remark, and at his theft of her hair accessory, artemis laughed, loud and free, with her head tilted backwards and her eyes shut. nothing mattered; for they were as rich on joy and youth as anyone could possibly be.

.

"i've had better,"

pansy complained, as she downed the last sip of her berry-red drink. draco only hummed in response, finding that his pulse had returned back to its normal state. his date babbled on, as she so often did, whilst he made no effort to listen. his eyes wandered, before coming back to pansy once he'd determined there was nothing amusing enough to hold his attention for long. he wanted nothing more than to leave. there was too much noise, too much commotion, and he'd had quite enough.

"want to get out of here?" he blurted out, shocking both himself and pansy. raising her dark eyebrows, pansy smiled and entertained his suggestion.

"sure." and this time it was his turn to entertain her, as she dragged him by the hand from the great hall, which buzzed with the chatter of hundreds of teenagers. they ended up at the entrance of the garden, decorated with fairy lights. it was noticeably quieter here, and draco allowed himself a deep breath of fresh winter air. the moon hung, a small crescent, atop the forbidden forest. "it's nice here," pansy whispered. draco only hummed in agreement, before turning his head towards her. "draco—" pansy muttered, leaving her lips parted ever so slightly as she gazed up at him.

she did look quite pretty; all dressed up in her soft peach-coloured dress. gulping, feeling his heart flop around in his chest like a helpless bird; he lowered his head slightly. through his eyelashes, he saw pansy lower her gaze to his lips, and then felt her hands come up to his clothed chest. exhilaration raced through his blood—this would be the moment he'd (somewhat ashamedly) been anticipating for a number of years. he felt her warm breath against his chin first, and then the sticky lipgloss she'd applied religiously throughout the night. clumsily, their lips fell together.

his heart was a heavy stone, dropped into the black lake. he felt it reach the bottom, and barely stir the sand. whatever expectations he'd built for himself shattered before him. he wondered, briefly, why people enjoyed kissing another person so much; when all draco felt was the wetness of pansy's mouth, and the tightening of her hands around his dress robes' fabric. he pulled away from her. pansy's eyes were still closed as he opened his own, her coloured eyelids twitching once before she revealed the warm brown of her eyes. draco felt her fists release his robes, and saw her take a step away.

she said, "i'm sorry," and then," i don't think—" hurriedly, draco jerked his chin in a nod.

"yeah, no," he said. "that was a mistake, and i'm sorry for—"

"yeah."

"yeah." draco felt that there had come between them a mutual understanding; that what they'd done was not to be repeated, and that they'd forget about it. it was as if everything around them had dropped suddenly—the music from within the castle scarcely reached his ears, and the insects hiding in the bushes had somehow quieted. pansy's skin was illuminated amber by the ever-moving lights of the fairies as they hummed past. he said, finally; "i might head up now. feel free to stay longer with the others."

"no, i'll come with," she replied. "it's nearly midnight anyway."

what a disappointment, draco thought. with the way some people talked about it, he'd expected his first kiss to feel explosive, blissful. but it had felt far from such a thing; it only felt like wet flesh on flesh. he continued walking with pansy; looking back into the great hall once more, only to purse his lips once he'd spied artemis and blaise dancing again. he watched blaise whisper something into her ear as he released her hair from its silver clip, and he watched as it tumbled gracefully over her shoulders like a curtain of silk. artemis laughed with such joy as he'd never before seen on her face. stop, he commanded his wayward thoughts. he was still intent on being mad at her, no matter how petty the reason might be.

the heels of his and pansy's shoes clicked in an unsatisfying rhythm as he followed her through the entrance hall, into a connecting room clothed in semi-darkness. moonlight shone faintly through its window, but did not prove to be particularly useful for his adjusting eyes.

then, pansy came to a halt abruptly, in such a way that draco, who had not been paying much attention, nearly caused her to topple forwards. he'd seized her shoulder, and the opposite elbow, before such a thing could happen, however. he was just about to snap at her for it, until she muttered, "sorry," as her cheeks flushed pinker than her dress with embarrassment. pansy left draco perplexed at the end of the hallway as she rushed away with haste; no doubt towards the dungeons. he scanned his surroundings; taking in nothing abnormal in the stone walls or lavish christmas decorations. but his head snapped to a dark corner within the room, where two girls were embracing and giggling. draco blinked once, twice, before he realised that their mouths were intertwined—that they were kissing. and then, after another few moments, he'd realised that one of them was hadie knight.

oh, he thought, before finding the common sense to follow a startled pansy to the slytherin common room.