Chapter Text
“Do you have to chew so bloody loudly, Goyle?”
Goyle turned to look at Draco dumbly, shepherd’s pie dribbling out of the corner of his mouth. “What?”
Draco bit the inside of his cheek, fighting back the urge to scream. How could they be so stupid? “Just… shut up.”
“Didn’ say noffin’,” garbled Goyle, turning back to his pie. Draco grimaced in disgust as the wet, sloppy munching resumed.
He turned his attention to his own plate, sitting in front of him, untouched. He picked up his fork and poked at a roast potato absently, with no intention of actually eating it. When did he last eat? He tried to think back, but the days blurred into an amorphous grey mass in his head, impossible to pick apart. Doesn’t matter, he decided. It couldn’t have been that long ago.
Abandoning his plate as a lost cause, Draco turned his attention to the Great Hall around him. There was the Slytherin table, with Crabbe and Goyle inhaling their dinner, Blaise talking to some fifth year girl, Pansy whispering about something with Millicent. None of them were paying any attention to Draco. It was like he wasn’t even there.
That was something he felt increasingly these days. That no one could see him, that he was a ghost, drifting through everyone’s ordinary, mundane teenage troubles, in another world entirely. Dating, Quidditch, sneaking out at night to nick firewhiskey from the kitchens – it was all so inconsequential. He couldn’t understand how they could care so much about things that mattered so little. They were all wrapped up in their tiny, senseless lives, hustling and bustling past him while he was standing still, frozen in the horror his life had turned into.
Draco’s gaze moved past their table, glazing over the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables, lingering on the Gryffindor table – on Potter. He appeared to be engaged in a heated discussion with the mudblood and the Weasley. Draco was too far away to hear what they were saying, but really it wasn’t that hard to guess. Planning their next act of heroism, no doubt, he thought bitterly.
It wasn’t fair. Potter was always the hero. He didn’t even have to try, everyone just loved him. Flocked around him. He could get away with anything. And all the girls would go on about how brave he was, how much he had suffered. Draco had even heard Pansy say it. The audacity.
But what had Potter done, really, but manage to survive all the trouble he’d gotten himself into? People went on about his burdens. They didn’t know anything about burdens. None of them did, Potter included. Anything that Potter had done had been silly, childish mishaps, that paled in comparison to what Draco had been ordered to do. To what would happen if he would fail.
His chest felt tight at the thought, like there was a something heavy weighing him down, and he berated himself for thinking about it again. He needed to stop thinking about it and just do it. Except that it wasn’t like he hadn’t tried. Like he wasn’t trying.
Draco’s eyes wandered to the teachers’ table. Snape seemed to be watching him, but looked away when their eyes met. It was a while since Draco had demanded to be left alone with his mission; Snape was full of unhelpful ideas and he was just in the way.
Dumbledore’s seat was empty – another of his mysterious disappearances, no doubt. Draco couldn’t help but feel glad; he found himself avoiding the headmaster almost subconsciously. Whenever Dumbledore looked at him, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he knew. It was a stupid feeling, because how could he possibly know? And why would he let Draco walk around the school like nothing had changed if he did?
The fact of the matter was that Draco was getting paranoid. How could he not? He was running out of time, fast. The end of the school year was getting closer and closer and he was all out of ideas. Besides, Dumbledore was hardly ever there anymore. What if he just left and didn’t come back? What would Draco do then?
His thoughts were spiralling in tighter and tighter circles. His mother, his father, the Dark Lord, what he would do if Draco failed, Dumbledore, Snape, his father in Azkaban, his mother crying, Snape telling him to get on with it… And Potter, bloody Potter, who could never, never keep his nose out of anything.
Draco was vaguely aware of how shallow his breaths had become, of how shaky his hands felt, of the dull ache where the mark was that he knew had to be entirely imaginary. He had grown accustomed to the signs of panic setting in; he knew he had to get out because he was minutes away from making a scene.
He got up abruptly, ignored Crabbe’s full-mouthed “Where you goin’?”, and tried to exit the Hall as fast as he could without looking like he was running.
He leaned back against the cold stone wall outside, trying to catch his breath.
Why was this happening to him? He didn’t ask for this. It wasn’t his fault that the Dark Lord was disappointed with his father. It wasn’t his fault that he had been ordered to do this. He didn’t even want to kill anyone. None of it was his fault.
But he was going to pay the price anyway. There was no good way for this to end. If he failed, he was as good as dead. So were his parents. The best he could wish for was that it would be quick, that he wouldn’t want to punish them more. To make them suffer.
And if he didn’t fail… His hand tightened around his forearm. This didn’t feel like the right future. And if he did this… It would be his only future. Come what may.
He was really shaking now, and breathing wasn’t getting any easier and, right on cue, there was the prickling in his eyes. He pushed himself off the wall almost forcefully.
This time he did run.
He bolted up the stairs, hurtled along deserted corridors and slamming blindly past the toilet door, coming to a crashing halt at the sinks, leaning heavily against the porcelain.
He was gasping now, struggling for air between huge, wracking sobs. The room was spinning and blurry with tears so he screwed his eyes shut and wished that he was dead, that all of this would just stop already, that he didn’t have to exist any more.
It was almost frightening how frequent the thought was now. Not just in moments like this, but all the time. He could be in class, sitting in the Great Hall, lying sleepless in bed, and there it would be, out of the blue, unprovoked and unasked for.
I wish I was dead.
He would be up in the Astronomy tower and every time he looked out the window a voice in his head would tell him, jump. If you just jumped this all would be over. And he dismissed the thought because he would never make it out of the window before someone stopped him, and can you image what he would look like, smashed against the rocks below like that?
But then he would be in Potions class and he was hyperaware of all the ingredients around him, of all the different ways they could kill him. And he would have to fight the urge to slip them into his pocket for later. For those moments so late at night that it was almost morning, when the rest of the dorm was asleep but he had woken from yet another nightmare, or had never fallen asleep at all. When he found himself twirling his wand in his hands; he knew the curse, so what if he just used it on himself?
“You come more often now. Do you miss me?”
Draco was half expecting the voice, but it still startled him.
“No,” he said hoarsely, “I don’t.”
Clearly it was the wrong answer, since Myrtle made an affronted noise and dove into a toilet behind him with a splash. Draco couldn’t be bothered to apologise. What did he need some mudblood ghost for, anyway?
He jumped back when the ghost reappeared out of the drain in front of him.
“Why are you crying again? Did someone hurt you?” she crooned.
Draco looked up at her and saw his face in the mirror behind her, distorted by her translucent body. His face was red and blotchy, his eyes bloodshot, his hair dishevelled. He turned away in disgust.
“Leave me alone,” he said, more to himself than Myrtle.
“I just want to help you.” She reached out a hand to touch his face and he shivered as it passed through his cheek.
Shaking his head, Draco backed away. “You can’t.”
He wiped his eyes hastily on his sleeve, praying he could get back to his dormitory without being seen.
“Wait! Don’t go!” Myrtle called after him, but he was already out of the door.