Pain Is Pain, No Matter What Form.

30) Aria's POV:

Draco left and the silence grew. I knew they wanted rid of him for some reason but I didn't know what.

"We know." father stated.

"You know what?" I asked.

There are so many things that he is referring to but if it is what I think it is then I am a little bit screwed.

"Yesterday, when Severus had you in his office, he got rid of your robes because they aren't the most comfortable to sleep in. He noticed that your cardigan seemed to be sitting funny and he saw the bandages on your arms. Long story short, we know what the bandages are there for. We want you to know we are here to talk when you need it and we are here to offer help to get you to stop. Severus assessed how bad they were, it is getting to the point where you could kill yourself with the next cut if you do it in the wrong place and too deep." dad placed a hand on my knee.

I looked over at father and he was close to tears.

"You don't know anything about it. You know nothing about why I do it. You can't help me. I am broken and I will always be broken. I cannot be fixed." I muttered and found a new interest in the table.

"Aria love, look at me." father sounded as though he was crying.

I looked over at him to find the tears pouring down his face. He rolled up both sleeves and I saw they were lined with so many scars, most of them self inflicted, some looked like he had been kept hostage or something.

"I grew up in your grandparents home and ran away at the age of 16. Your grandparents were horrible to me. They were all Slytherin and death eaters. I was a Gryffindor, I brought shame on the family. They would use the cruciatus curse on me, I was beaten black, blue and bloody, the chained me to my bed at night so I wouldn't escape. I tore myself apart. Your dad was too clever though and figured it out. He saved me. I was broken once. But if your dad never came to my rescue, held me in his arms, gave me kisses every now and then, remind me my heart is still beating, I am still living, I am human, if your dad wasn't in my life, you would never have been born, I wouldn't be here. You aren't broken. You are lost. You have someone in your life who wants to make it better. Heck, you have more than one person who wants to help you, I only had your dad. With support from friends and family, you can get yourself back onto the bright road. Don't let us stand by and watch you hurting, let us snuggle you tight and bake cookies and dance with unicorns and laugh till our heart's content. Let us in and let us help." father moved himself over to me and pulled me in tight at the end.

I sat on his lap and I allowed myself to cry on his shoulder. He does care, he does understand, he does want to help me. Everyone around me does. Why haven't I realised it before? I do now, things are going to change. Dad came and joined us in our hug and we stayed like that for a while. Someone cleared their throat and we all turned around to see Draco standing there. The group hug broke up and I stayed sitting on father's lap.

"We need to get going unless you want to miss Muggle Studies." Draco held out his hand.

I jumped up, ran over to him and kissed him. He seemed taken by surprise but eventually relaxed. We broke it up and I blushed because we had just kissed in front of my parents.

"What was that for?" Draco asked.

"For being you." I took hold of his hand.

I ignored the sounds coming from my parents and we both left very red faced. This is the first I feel that I genuinely smiled in a while. It was good to see a new way of looking on things. Everything will get better, I know it will. With so many people that I care about being my guides, I will be back on track in no time.