Wasted Potential (Drarry)

wasted potential

Third year hadn't been too out of the ordinary for Harry Potter up until that point. Aside from the fact that an escaped murderer was after his throat and Hermione was acting a bit off and he had a random magical map which allowed him to stalk people and Voldemort was still existing in some form... okay, maybe Harry Potter wasn't really having a normal year. But, what else should he expect? Normal didn't really seem to follow him around, after all. He had saved the whole bloody wizarding world from a powerful, psychopathic maniac at the ripe old age of one year old! No, normal wasn't possible for Harry Potter. The only constants in his life at that point were subtle glares from Professor Snape in Potions, the evenings of Quidditch practice that always left him fulfilled and happy, yet exhausted, and the obnoxious, egotistical presence of Malfoy, who always had something demeaning to say to Harry in the halls, throwing in a hateful sneer just for good measure. On the subject of Malfoy, Harry had many thoughts. Never had he met such a prejudiced person, so bent upon bullying others for their own gain and personal pleasure. Even his Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia, and Dudley did not perturb him in the way that Draco Lucius Malfoy did. At least Harry could pass off his family's behaviour as their close-minded Muggle ways and their prejudice toward only him, as the son of Lily Potter, whom his aunt was not on good terms with even at the time of his mothers death. There was just something inexcusable in the way Malfoy paraded around acting as though all people were below him, other than his esteemed father and his pureblood mother, and their associates. He had such pride in his ideologies which were so misguided and full of hatred and bigotry, and yet Harry had to wonder even then, if Malfoy really knew what he was talking about. This disturbed Harry even more, the fact that one of his peers could be so easily indoctrinated into an evil idea such as that of blood supremacy, that of classism, and that of the legitimacy of the Dark Arts. And more than either of those admissions, Harry hated what he saw underneath Malfoy's horrid attitude: wasted potential. He had had enough classes with him, and had engaged in enough discourse with him, to know that Malfoy was intelligent and full of intellectual verve. He hated that a boy so mean, so... narcissistic, was so unfairly apt, rational, and charming. Now that you as the reader understand Harry Potter's thoughts on Draco Malfoy, our story may begin. On a cold December night in his third year, Harry decided to have fun with one of his favourite hobbies as of late: exploring the castle using the Marauders Map. He had received it from Fred and George Weasley, who had figured out how to use it (no surprise, really), when he had wanted to slip out to Hogsmeade undetected. Now, Harry knew that roaming the castle in the early morning hours when the man who indirectly killed his parents was after his throat was probably a very, very bad idea, but for some reason he didn't fear the deranged man. He thought that this could possibly have something to do with the fact that he'd confronted Voldemort in some form three times in his life, and was already so used to mass-murdering psychopaths searching for him that he was somehow desensitised to danger. Besides this, the magic involved with the map was quite intricate and very complex, and he also carried a burning curiosity as to who had written it. The only clue he had were the four nicknames (at least, he assumed they were nicknames) on the front cover: Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. But in the end, he supposed that it didn't really matter who wrote it, because its function was currently serving him well. The map showed every passage and tunnel in Hogwarts, even the secret ones that were hidden in walls and underneath trapdoors. Beyond this, the map also showcased the locations of every person in the castle, and their name. It was very useful for both evading enemies and stalking friends; therefore Harry could sneak out in the dead of night and not have to worry about Filch, Peeves, or Mrs. Norris. A sense of adventure overwhelmed him as he crept out of bed, padding past Ron and Neville and being as careful as possible not to wake them. With his Invisibility Cloak and the Marauders Map in hand, he snuck into the common room, where a roaring fire still blazed in the fireplace, emitting a warm, muted glow and heating the entire space. You could tell that it was Christmas time too, for the entire room was draped in pine garlands and silver tinsel, and several Christmas trees stood around the room, full of shining lights and ornaments. Harry plopped down on one of the couches and began forming his plan. There was a particular room in the castle that looked extremely intriguing, a secretive place that was probably very off limits to students (obviously). He'd been wanting to have a glance at it for weeks, but he hadn't had the chance to do so yet, having been preoccupied with sick rats, vicious cats, fighting best friends, too much homework, terrifying dementors, death omens, a sulky "injured" Malfoy, and a moody Professor Snape. As his eyes roamed over the map, he couldn't help but smile and marvel at the names of every student, teacher, ghost, and employee in Hogwarts. Most of them seemed to be asleep in their dormitories or private sleeping quarters, and the remaining few were in their common rooms, presumably suffering from insomnia or a mischievous spirit (like Harry). Then, a movement on the map caught his eye. Someone was roaming the dark, deserted castle halls, and it wasn't Filch, Mrs. Norris, or Peeves. It wasn't even Dumbledore, McGonagall, Hagrid, or Snape. No, this was something much worse, Harry decided as he furrowed his brow and scowled in some type of quiet resentment. Because just outside of the Slytherin commons, Draco bloody Malfoy was walking along the corridor. Harry's mind began to filter through all the possibilities. He wondered if Malfoy was planning to prank someone, and was just sneaking about, making preparations... not too bad, he decided. He could be out, trying to steal something from a restricted area... slightly worse. He could be in consorts with Sirius Black, discussing plans to give Harry a slow and painful death... pretty bad. He could also be in consorts with Death Eaters, Voldemort, and his father... definitely bad. He could be subjecting another student to a Dementor... very, very bad. Or he could be sneaking out to meet another student, a girl perhaps, to do things Harry didn't even want to think about... probably the worse option on the list. At any rate, Malfoy was definitely up to no good and planning to do something nefarious. Harry made up his mind almost instantaneously. He was going to find out what Malfoy was stalking the halls during the middle of the night for. So, he pulled on the Invisibility Cloak, tucked the map into the pocket of his robe, and grasped his wand tightly in his hand before sneaking out of the common room into the cold, yet lit, stone corridor. He observed that Malfoy had ascended the stairs from the dungeons to the ground floor, from the ground floor to the first floor. He watched with interest as Malfoy continued to ascend the stairs, moving quickly and with determination, but seeming to have no destination. He moved erratically, darting in and out of rooms, hiding in alcoves even if there was no Filch in sight, and finally coming to rest on the fifth floor. He was in a secluded nook near the northeast tower. Harry frowned at this, even as he continued to descend the staircase to the fifth floor to see exactly what Malfoy was doing. Why would Malfoy go to the trouble of sneaking out of the common room if he didn't seem to have had a goal in mind? Maybe he was meeting someone, and the other person just hadn't arrived yet. Even so, Harry thought a fifth floor alcove to be a rather odd place to arrange a meeting, and at any rate he didn't see any other people moving towards Malfoy's location. Harry finally arrived on the fifth floor after carefully sneaking through the halls and down the finicky staircases. He crept through the alleys on the fifth floor and stopped just around the corner from the secluded area Malfoy was surely in. Harry sighed softly and with a bit of exasperation, thinking that his stalking of Malfoy hadn't been very interesting so far. He peeked around the corner, ready to confront the Slytherin, but what he saw instead shocked him more than any of the propositions that had crossed his mind earlier. No, Malfoy wasn't planning a prank or consorting with the enemy or even meeting a girlfriend. He was crying. It took Harry a second to recover from the surprise of it! Out of all the incomprehensible, highly improbable, unexpected things that had happened to him in his life, Harry had never thought he'd be seeing this. Draco Malfoy crying! Ha! What an ironic thought! But even as Harry stood there, he knew that this was no laughing matter. Because Malfoy wasn't just crying. He was bent over himself, his blond hair hanging over his face, occluding his eyes from view, and his arms were wrapped tightly around his legs, which were drawn up to his torso. His whole body racked with violent, short sobs- the kind of sobbing you do when you've just found out that your favourite pet died, or that someone you love is in danger. The kind of sobbing you do when something in your life is changing drastically, when you don't have any hope left. The kind of sobbing Harry was all too familiar with. Some type of incredulity washed over Harry as he stood there, motionless and invisible, in front of Malfoy. It was strange to see his rival looking so vulnerable, so scared, so human. He'd gotten painfully used to Malfoy's whimpers and moping about his broken arm, even weeks after it'd been healed, and it had had some "boy who cried wolf" effect on Harry. The only difference in this case was that Malfoy wasn't just crying wolf. He was screaming it. He hadn't just had a soft cry in his bed with his curtains drawn, or moped around in the common room with that hardened face bullies get when they want to conceal their emotions. He'd purposefully gone as far away from his people as possible, going so far as to sneak out of the common room to a fifth floor corridor, before opening floodgates of tears. And while Harry wondered why Malfoy was crying, a memory from the summer before surfaced in his mind. He'd taken a handful of Floo powder, shouted "Diagon Alley" and hurtled through the fireplace system, landing in a dark and dingy looking shop that definitely wasn't in Diagon Alley. He'd begun to explore the store, Borgin and Burks, and wondered how he'd gone wrong when he saw Malfoy peeking through the window, his father close behind. He'd panicked, not wanting to explain to Mr. Malfoy or to Draco why he was in a strange shop alone, so he had hidden in a stone cold sarcophagus. He'd watched as Mr. Malfoy strode into the shop, covertly giving the creepy man at the counter a box, and how Malfoy had seemed strangely subdued. He'd observed the way Malfoy responded to his father's quietly barked orders in an apprehensive, yet slightly sardonic submission. Lastly, he'd noticed that Mr. Malfoy had commanded respect in a sharp, precise, totalitarian manner, which was not dissimilar to Harry's own experience with male authority. For some reason, that memory had stuck with him over the past year, and it gave him a burning feeling in the pit of his stomach. Harry didn't really have any knowledge when it came to human psychology, but he supposed that being ordered around like a servant instead of being nurtured like a child was extremely emotionally damaging. Hell, Harry didn't have to have any knowledge of psychology to confirm the truth of that statement. His head was so fucked up after thirteen years with the Dursleys that he was surprised that he even knew his right hand from his left. Anyways, all of this just reinforced, in Harry's mind at least, the idea that Malfoy had wasted potential. Wasted potential or not, something had to be done about the situation in front of him. Malfoy was still bawling hysterically. Harry watched as he lifted his head and drew his arm back, tossing a ball of parchment against the wall, muttering under his breath.