WHAT YOU DO TO ME | Draco Malfoy

Year Six - Part Seven

It was a week after Christmas when Clara found me in the great hall. I was surprised to see her, and she didn't look well at all. Honestly, I hadn't gotten a good look at her in months. She looked emaciated, like she wasn't eating or sleeping well. Her hair looked dull and lifeless and her eyes were sunken in.

"I'm going to be blunt, you look like shit." I told her cooly as I continued to read my paper.

She narrowed her eyes at me, "Real nice way to talk to family, Olivia."

"Do you want something?" I sighed and put my copy of the Daily Prophet down to give her my full attention.

"I know about you and Malfoy." She whispered.

I went rigid as her words cut through me. First Blaise, and now Clara. This thing was starting to snowball. Soon all of Slytherin would know, and then the rest of the school would too including my friends.

"What do you want from me?" I asked her cautiously.

"Relax. I just want to talk." She said calmly before looking around the great hall. "Not here though. Come on." She stood up from the table and looked at me expectantly.

"I'm in the middle of drinking my tea." I protested as I held up my cup to show her.

"Ollie!" She whined. It was weird hearing her call me that after so long, but it made me realize how serious she was being. I took one last large gulp of tea that burned the back of my throat and followed after her.

"Where are we going?" I asked as I followed her out of the castle. "You're not going to take me into the woods and murder me are you?"

"Don't tempt me." She said as she led me past Hagrid's hut and into the Forbidden Forrest.

"It's looking more and more likely that you actually might murder me." I said as I climbed over half of a fallen tree to catch up with Clara. She seemed very determined to get somewhere and was not slowing down. Eventually she stopped when she found a small clearing where the lake came in through the trees.

"What is this place?" I asked as I sat down on a rock. The sunlight fell through the treetops and cast a faint, golden glow on the frozen over water.

"I found it my first year here." She told me as she stared at the water. "I liked to come here when the Slytherins would all gang up on me."

"I didn't know they did that." I said softly, "I thought they all accepted you right away."

"They only acted like that when you were around because they knew how much it upset you." She frowned. "I was so desperate for any sort of friendship that I clung to those moments as much as I could."

"That's why you treated me so badly, then?" I asked.

"Exactly." She nodded, "When I was being horrible to you, they were being nice to me."

"What about Theo?" I asked her.

"What about him?" She snapped. She seemed sensitive at the sound of his name.

"You were so obsessed with him." I told her.

"Yeah, well that's definitely over." She said darkly. "I think I clung to him so hard for the same reason I was desperate to be their friends. I needed to feel accepted by them because I live with them. Theo was the only one who made me feel wanted there even if it was just physically."

"Clara I'm sorry." I frowned. "I had no idea."

"Well it's worse." She said as tears welled up in her eyes, "Things are getting bad, Ollie. I don't think you understand. There are whispers... rumors about whats coming. And you... you're with Draco? He hates us, Ollie. He hates us."