He’s been sitting there staring at me for what feels like hours but really can’t be more than five minutes. I don’t really mind. There are certainly worse things. And if he’s going to stare at me, then I’ll stare right back. No one can accuse a Malfoy of being shy, after all. So, he’s been looking solemnly at me, opening his mouth as if to speak and then closing it again, and I’ve been admiring the line of his neck, the fluff of dark hair at the nape of his neck, the way his glasses slide down his nose and he pushes them back up unconsciously. He’s a sweet little thing when he’s nervous, all blushes and stammers.
He opens his mouth again, and I smirk at him. He used to hate that, thought it was me trying to be superior. Well, of course it is, but not to him. As if I’d try. As if I’d need to try.
He can’t meet my eyes. Surely to any outside observer it should be clear who has control over this situation.
I picture us in my mind. I’m sitting ramrod straight, my hair perfect as ever, my robes immaculate. Potter looks positively disheveled and he’s hunched over in the chair. My imagination decides to take this a bit a further, and I picture myself leaning forward and taking hold of his robe, pulling him across the table and kissing him. I can almost feel his lips pressed against mine, smell his skin, feel his erection pressing against my leg. Potter never bloody shaves. I complain about it all the time but secretly I like the marks he leaves against my skin, which is so fair it’s almost ridiculous. It’s a sign of pedigree of course, but sometimes I feel like I’m made of bone china, and if you held me to the light it would shine through me. He mutters something while I’m contemplating ravishing him on top of the scones, and I have to ask him to repeat it. He’s not the most understandable at the best of times; I suppose it was that dreadful childhood of his that made him so quiet but really, when no one can understand you maybe it’s time to think about elocution lessons.
When he repeats himself, I almost wish I hadn’t asked. He looks at me and, for once, I can’t tell what he’ s thinking. He’s normally an open book to me but he must have been working on a stony expression for weeks. I couldn’t tell you if he’s happy, sad, regretful, angry, lying. Anything. I can feel my face taking on a shocked expression of its own accord; I certainly don’t have anything to do with the way my mouth is dropping open. Perhaps the Weasel put him up this. It’s the sort of thing he’d do, persuade him that it would be funny, that it’d be a laugh to see me taken down a peg or two.
“Is…is this your idea of a joke?” I ask him. No sense in letting him know I’m fuming inside with righteous anger. If it is a joke, I’m going to string that redheaded prat up, and no one is going to be able to stop me.
“Would I joke about something like this?”
My brain suddenly spirals away from the pleasing images of the Weasel dangling in mid air, and moves onto the far more serious matter of What The Buggery Is Going On? I wonder if playing it coy will help, so I smile at him. “I rather think you might.”
I don’t think he would at all, of course. Potter doesn’t have a sense of humour to speak of. But still, if I keep it along the lines of a joke, maybe he’ll break down and smile at me and tell me yes, it is, I was only joking, I still want you.
“I’m afraid not. You may choose to joke about things like this, but I don’t.”
Ow. That was uncalled for. I can’t remember one instance when I’ve joked about us. I treat Potter as a deadly serious matter, except when I’m tickling his feet. He’s got surprisingly nice feet. I only have to run a finger across his toes and he squirms away, pulling his legs up to his chest. I can’t help but make jokes about something like that, especially when he squeals like a girl.
He’s staring out of the window now, as if I’m no longer worthy of his attention. This simply will not do. I refuse to lose him; he obviously doesn’t know what he’s saying. I pull all the manners my mother taught me around myself to the surface. “Why, then?” I ask him politely but frostily. He’d better have a good explanation. No one treats a Malfoy like this. We are the ones who tell our various amours to leave: it simply doesn’t happen the other way around.
“Must you have an answer? It doesn’t really matter why, does it?” he says.
He doesn’t even seem to be listening to me any more. It’s like I’ve ceased to exist. I wonder if shouting will have any effect on him, and yell, “Of course I do, you idiot! Why now, after all this time?” across the table. It’s getting no reaction so I decide to try something slightly more personal.
“You seemed perfectly content, particularly when I-“ He cuts me off before I can mention the incident with the bananas and chocolate sauce, with an even more disinterested, “Why make me spell it out for you?”
Nobody around is paying any attention to us whatsoever, and I realise he must have cast a Silencing Charm. He obviously realised I’d try to cause some sort of scene. I’m torn between feeling pride in his ability to read people (something that I honed in him), and becoming completely enraged with the temerity of the stupid bastard. I open my mouth to ask him again but he starts his sentence before I manage to get a word out, and as I have been taught manners, I wait for him to finish.
“Look, this never should have happened at all. I know it and you know it. We just don’t…feel strongly enough toward each other to make this work.”
Even if I hadn’t been fucking him for the past few months, I’d be able to tell he’s lying through his teeth now. His fingers are twisting in the folds of his robe like he wants to rip through the fabric. He certainly felt strongly enough about me when he pulled me aside after Potions class and, instead of punching me, kissed me. The memory still gives me goosebumps, vulgar as that term may be. Pansy certainly never kissed like that: unsurprising really, since - despite her terribly mannish traits - she hasn’t got as far as developing stubble. No matter if he is lying though; his assumption is downright rude.
“How dare you presume what I feel? Of course, I-“
“Don’t say it! Don’t say anything you’ll regret.”
Of course, I love you. Of course. No matter what stupid thing you do, Potter. No matter who your ill-advised friends are, or who you work for, or who you kill. I love you, and you don’t ever seem to understand how much it costs me to tell you that.
He still isn’t looking at me, isn’t saying anything. His robe slides through his fingers like water, and he frowns at it as though it’s the material’s fault he can’t get a grip. I can tell his palms are sweating. I can tell the last thing he wants is for me to reach over and take his hand in mine, and part of me wants to do it just to see what he’ll do.
I don’t.
I stand up in silence as though I’m about to leave, and walk to the door. He stares out of the window again, and to be honest, I’m getting really fucking sick of his fascination with whatever’s out there. I glance out. Just fog. Not exactly the most scintillating of things.
It’s tempting to just go, to be honest. Whatever’s brought this on, I’m sure it’ll wear off in a few hours and then he’ll come back, and we’ll make up. I find making up after a fight with Potter is one of the best bits of knowing him. He’s more energetic when we’ve been apart for a while, more urgent, rougher. But this time, I’m not so sure he will come back. I decide it’s worth forfeiting what dignity I have left, and I lean down, place a hand on his shoulder. He turns to face me and says, “Don’t touch me.”
I jerk my hand back. If he’s going to be like that, then I don’t want anything to do with him. And yet, I still can’t get it out of my head that this is just some stupid game he’s playing and I open my mouth to try and tell him again that I love him. Before I get past “I-“, he yells, “No!” I draw back as he stands up, because once Potter gets into one of his moods you really don’t want to be near him. China gets smashed, glasses are broken – it’s not pretty.
“No, you don’t. You may think you do, but you really don’t.”
I’m not used to having my toys taken away from me. This is not something that I am prepared to accept, but he’s made me so angry that I scream out the worst insults I can think of, list every name I could ever have called him, tell him I fucked Hermione while he was out being a hero, tell him that she loved it and she begged for more and I’d have done Ron as well if I wasn’t afraid of diseases. I’m sure that’ll get a reaction, because God knows Potter hates insults directed at his friends more than he hates any directed at himself, but he’s not listening. He’s staring out of the window again, and for one second I think I’d give up all the magic I have if I could just shut the blasted thing and make him look at me.
I’m ready to launch into the list of people who I’ve fucked that were better than him, when he says, so quietly, “Stop it.” He’s still trying to look like he doesn’t care, but I can see he wants to cry. I can see it in the way he blinks behind his glasses, and the way he runs his hand through his hair. Five minutes ago, I’d have tried to kiss him and make it better. Two minutes ago, even. But now, I want to see if I can make him cry. I stare at him, trying to look like I’m challenging him when really I’m memorizing the curl of his hair, the curve of his cheek, the shadows on his face.
He opens his mouth again, and I brace myself. “Say it – tell me you hate me. I know you’ll mean it.” That one sentence tells me all I need to know. This is all some fucking game to keep me away from him, to make it easier for me when he dies. Bloody Gryffindor, hasn’t got a clue. Quite clearly I’ve made peace with the fact that he’s going to die. I know what Voldemort’s like, and I can tell you, it’s pure luck he’s survived this long. I wouldn’t cry at his funeral, but I’d put lilies on his grave for years afterwards. He doesn’t quite seem to have grasped this, and I suppose I can’t blame him because it’s not exactly the sort of thing you bring up in intimate moments. “That was the best sex ever, and by the way, I wouldn’t cry at your funeral.” It’s not very well bred. Nonetheless, if this is what he wants:
“I hate you, Harry Potter.” I always knew I should be an actor. I sound exactly like I did in first year, resentful and petty and poisonous. I think I’m going to go out on a high note here, so I pivot elegantly on my left heel and walk out. I hope he’s standing in there, gobsmacked. I hope he’s close to tears. I hope he feels like he’s been stabbed in the gut. Because I feel broken, like one of the china teacups he takes such delight in dropping.