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Draco had never visited his cousin Sabrina before and it was becoming more obvious to him every second that he was over at the Spellmans' house why that was. He'd only been there for ten minutes but he could already see why they had been exiled from the family. Every other family member that he had met so far had reeked of old money, but not Sabrina. There was old money there - the house also stood on a graveyard - but it he didn't know that she was related to the House of Black then he never would have guessed.
She stood there in front of him, her arms crossed across her chest and this expression on her face that he just couldn't read. He wasn't great at reading people in the first place, and that came from leading a rather sheltered childhood where he was only really allowed to associate with the people that his parents picked out for him. He understood why they had to be so picky, but he didn't think it was something that he would be able to forgive him for in a hurry.
"Why are you here?" Sabrina asked slowly. So far she had let him into her house and made him a cup of hot chocolate but neither of them had really spoken, except for Draco to tell her how he took his hot chocolate.
The question was a big one, one that Draco didn't really have the answer to if he was completely honest, but when you took into account the fact that he had travelled across the Atlantic to get here, he knew that he would have to tell her something .
"I need a place to crash." He said quietly. He didn't like asking for help, nor was he used to it, but desperate times called for desperate measures and he was desperate. "I...Things went... pear-shaped at home."
"Weren't you meant to be getting married tomorrow?" Sabrina asked an eyebrow raised in a way that he was fully aware meant that she was judging him.
"It got called off." That was the cliff notes version. What had really happened was that Pansy had chickened out at the last minute. They both knew that she didn't and couldn't love him; they had known that since they were told at the age of seventeen that they were meant to get married, but they also both knew what their duty was. They both knew what they had to do to keep their bloodlines pure and strong.
"Oh," was all Sabrina said as she turned her attention to her own cup of hot chocolate for a moment before she looked back up at him. "Why was it called off?"
Draco drew a sharp breath in through his teeth. He wasn't even really sure what the answer to that question was. All he knew was that he and Pansy had been stood in the middle of the ballroom in the Malfoy Manor, finalising table arrangements when she had stopped and turned to face him. He'd never forget the look in her eyes or the tears that filled them.
She'd told him how she couldn't do it, how she couldn't condemn herself or her children to live that life. He could still feel her lips on his cheek from the kiss she had given him before she had taken off, leaving him to explain to both sets of parents that there wasn't going to be a wedding. It was probably one of the worst things that he had ever had to do, but that was why he had run. He didn't know how he could continue to live under the same roof as his parents when he had just let them down. It had taken the family long enough to regain their standing and this was a blow that they didn't need.
Now Draco didn't really care about their standing within Pureblood Society, but he knew that it meant a lot to his father and that meant that it meant a lot to his mother. Draco loved his mother more than he could ever express and he was willing to do whatever he could to make her happy - this was what he had ended up engaged to someone he didn't love in the first place.
"We just - uh - we weren't compatible." He said quietly in answer to her question when he realised that she was waiting for him to answer it and that him standing there, staring at her as he zoned out, was not the way to go. "We wanted different things."
"And so you decided that a trip to visit your father's cousin was what you should do next with your life?" Sabrina sounded sceptical and he was well aware that it now looked like he had skipped out on the wedding but he didn't have the capacity just then to be able to convince her otherwise.
He nodded in answer to her question. "Yeah, thought it would be nice to see your side of the world and clear my head."
Sabrina was silent for a few moments before she gave a nod that mirrored her own, almost as if she could relate, which he really hoped that she couldn't. He wouldn't wish this feeling on anyone, not even Potter.