Malfoy Amongst The Chaos

There For A Friend

<14>

Wanda

My heart is pounding as I approach the portrait hole. I feel sick, I feel jittery, I feel like I'm struggling to breathe.

Why? I want to ask myself. Why am I having such an extreme reaction? Why is my head spinning?

Harry is right. Harry is right.

My hands are trembling as my magic writhes within them, every ounce of impossibility just vanished. It all makes sense. His change in demeanour and attitude, the way he now walks the castle virtually alone, skips lessons, is in detention for missing homework, even right down to what I've been noticing for weeks now - he looks ill, he's lost weight, that tiredness hanging under his eyes...

Fuck. Oh, fuck. 

I have to tell someone.

"Dilligr-"

The portrait swings open before I can finish speaking and I jump as somebody appears in the entrance, wiping their eyes.

"Hermione?" I ask in a breathless whisper, my heartbeat skittering wildly.

She shakes her head, sniffing hard, "Go and see for yourself." she says.

My first legible thought is Ron. What has Ron done now?

I climb through the portrait hole as she disappears into the corridor, schooling my muddled brain into a viable thought process - I have to get him out of my head. I bump into Harry, who appears to be following after Hermione, and notice the troubled look on his face, "Are you alright?" I ask him, hardly recognising my own voice. 

I catch him by the shoulder and he blinks, glancing behind him. "Yeah - I - it's Ron." he says.

Of course it is.

I turn away from him and force my feet forwards, into the common room, into the masses of heat and noise and light and movement. Heart pounding, I reach the edge of the crowds - I can't see Ron anywhere, but he must be here - somewhere amongst this celebratory madness. My instincts are shouting at me to turn around, my magic flying through my veins like a dragon - roaring, burning, screaming to be heard over the noise - it's warning me, it's saying be careful, it's saying don't go in there, don't do it-

I try it anyway.

Drawing in a tight breath, I slide into the throngs of cheering, laughing students despite every whisper of common sense telling me not to. I nearly stagger as the atmosphere doubles in thickness and the din assaults my eardrums, my magic is panicked, I'm losing my composure already- merlin, this is bad - this is awful - I can't breathe - I can barely move - the noise, the colour, the oodles and oodles of bodies... I suddenly feel like I have two heartbeats, my head is fit to burst and the volume of this celebration threatens to eviscerate my skull. 

My hands are starting to burn - Ron - find Ron - but I keep thinking about it. I keep thinking about him as I'm trying to force my way through the raucous Gryffindors. Malfoy. Malfoy. Malfoy. His arm. His arm. His arm.

I gasp and stop pushing my way through - my magic volcanoes in my chest, heat stretching like a web over my skin. 

No headspace, no headspace, no headspace.