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Every scar on Draco's body was a testament to his strength, to the life he had lived. He'd seen the darkest side of humanity, he'd seen darkness even in places that should have held only light, he'd seen the darkness inside himself.
The earliest scars were the ones he'd made himself, his wand pressed to his thigh in the girls' toilet at school, with softly whispered cutting curses. It had given him a sense of release. It was the only way he could feel in control as his body did things he didn't want it to do, as curves appeared where they shouldn't and blood flowed from between his legs. If he was going to bleed, he wanted it to be his choice.
From the first time he'd told them, Draco's parents had always accepted who he was. They'd bought him new robes and cut his hair just so, understanding that, though his father's hair fell long over his shoulders, their son needed something different. They'd helped him pick a new name, one that fit their family's traditions and made him feel fierce and bold. They saw him for the boy he was, and they loved him. But there was nothing they could do to stop his body from changing. Wixen medical practices didn't even recognise people like him. They could heal curses and grow new bones overnight, but they couldn't – or wouldn't – stop what they considered normal bodily processes. It was simply something he had to learn to cope with.
And he did cope. He coped poorly, but he coped nevertheless. He was strong and bold and fierce. He was a Slytherin and a Malfoy. He was a dragon. He bound his chest tight and held his head high. He would survive against all odds.
The next scar he'd gotten, and he did consider it a scar, was the ugly tattoo-like thing on his arm. At the time, he'd been proud to receive that one. The Dark Lord very rarely marked women. Draco knew of only one woman who’d gotten it and she was insane, so Draco considered it to be an affirmation of who he was. The Dark Lord saw him strong and capable; the Dark Lord looked at him and saw a man, a man who was worthy of that mark.
It didn't take long, of course, for him to realize that none of that was true. It was all smoke and mirrors. The Dark Lord only saw another person he could manipulate, another person to do his bidding. But it was too late by that point.
The hideous skull on his arm had directly led to his next set of scars. The set he'd gotten from Potter.
Potter had never been able to leave him alone. To be fair, they'd never been able to leave each other alone. Draco had been as guilty of that as Potter had, wanting to prove himself as a boy, a man, just as worthy as the Chosen One. But the fight they'd had that day was unlike anything they'd ever done to one another before. Draco had been desperate and lonely, cowering in another girls' bathroom. Bleeding in the girls' room had become something he was entirely too accustomed with. Potter had been bold and reckless with fire in his green eyes. He'd almost killed Draco that day and if it hadn't been for Snape, he would have. Afterward, Draco often wished that he would have.
Then the battle had happened right at Hogwarts. Potter had arrived again with fire in his eyes, but that time had been different. Rather than almost killing him, the messy-haired menace had saved him. He had no scars, no burns, from that encounter. Only the inkling of an idea that masculinity could be merciful just as it could be fierce.
He had other scars from the battle though. He'd gotten some minor cuts as he'd been caught in the crossfire, but most of his battle scars were invisible. The trauma of watching his classmates die, of watching parts of his beloved school crumble and burn, the trauma of seeing his parents desperate and defenseless. Those images would forever be burned into his brain.
When all was said and done, though, and evil had been pulled out of their community by the roots, things began to change.
Draco had to work with Potter and his friends, with the Order of the Phoenix and Dumbledore’s Army and all the rest, to heal their world and restore peace. The Wizengamot had made sure of that with a weighty community service sentence, but he really hadn't minded. For the first time in his life, he felt like he was a part of something good. At first, everyone was suspicious of him, but he worked hard and kept his head down and eventually they began to accept him, to see him as an equal. They did not judge him for his smooth face or his narrow shoulders, for the things he was so insecure about. They didn't even speculate on it. They saw him as the man he was and he felt himself healing right along with the rest of their world. The inkling of an idea that had sprouted in that fiery room that Potter had saved him from began to grow roots. Maybe there were ways to be a man that didn't involve a chip on his shoulder and a show of bravado. Maybe he could be a softer man, a wiser man. Maybe his masculinity was rooted in his soul and not in the ways he performed it or the body that he had.
In time, Hogwarts was restored and their world was at peace. Hermione Granger was fighting for social justice and Harry Potter was rising through the Auror ranks. Draco didn't begrudge them their fame. He had begun writing children's books under a pseudonym. He was wildly successful, much to his surprise, but he preferred to keep his own fame to himself.
Luna was a surprise, too. The best surprise of his life. It had been three years since the war when she found him.
"Draco," she approached him one day on Diagon Alley, completely out of the blue. She was wearing purple dungarees and holding a blue ice cream cone. "Would you like to go on a date with me?" She spoke directly in her lilting voice. Her blue eyes shone with light, but Draco could see past that, could see that she had scars of her own.
"I…" he hesitated. "Luna, you were locked in my parent's cellar for months," he said finally, not really answering her.
"Yes," she said with a small smile. She fiddled with the carrot-like charm on her necklace. "But that wasn't your fault. You deserve happiness as much as I do, Draco."
He gazed at her with a kind of wonder before finally agreeing. "Alright, Luna. I'll go on a date with you."
And he had. He'd gone on more than one date with her. She was funny and care-free, she was deep and soulful. She lifted him up and he kept her grounded and they fit perfectly together. He'd struggled to tell her that he hadn't been born a man, that his body didn't match what she surely wanted, but he needn't have worried about that.
"You don't have to hide your chest around me, Draco," she said one night as they snuggled on his sofa. "Unless that makes you more comfortable. You're a man because you're a man, not because of your body."
Panic flooded his brain, his heart pounding hard beneath his bound chest. "How… did you know?" he wondered, his mouth suddenly dry.
She turned to face him and began rubbing gentle hands up and down his arms. "I know you, Draco. You're perfect. And I love you," she replied simply.
"I love you too," he whispered in awe. He had never imagined letting someone know all the imperfect parts of himself, the parts he hated most. He had never dared to dream that someone might love him for those things. Though he loved Luna for every part of her – her joy and her light, her quirks and eccentricities, her beautiful scars – it still filled him with wonder to realise that she felt the same way about him.
"You know," she said thoughtfully, "Muggles have different medical practices than wixen do. They're more accepting in some ways. I've been reading about it and I think you should too." She didn't push. Draco didn't think she'd be capable of pushing. She just gave him options and her own gentle acceptance.
He did read up on the things she'd told him about. He read the articles she'd given him over and over, until the pages were soft and crinkled. With a sense of amazement, he found that muggle medicine could deepen his voice, could let him grow a beard, could flatten his chest. Hope filled his heart as he, Draco Malfoy, pureblood wizard, ventured for the first time into the muggle world. That is what led to his favourite set of scars.
It took nearly two years, but it was two years that Draco gladly waited. He visited a gender clinic and met other men just like him. He began giving himself weekly shots, sliding the needle into his thigh between old scars with joy, finally finding true release as his shoulders broadened and his muscles grew, as the man in the mirror slowly began to look like him.
When the time for his surgery came, he gratefully put his trust in the muggle healers he'd been working with and said goodbye to his hated chest forever. The recovery had been brutal, but it was nothing he couldn't handle. Luna and his mother had taken care of him, making good food for him when he couldn't cook, helping him to reach things when he couldn't lift his arms. And he knew that every minute he spent resting, confined to his sofa as he healed, would be worth it.
Every scar on Draco's body was a testament to his strength, to the life he had lived, to the man he was. He stood in his bathroom, pulled his green vest over his head, and looked in the mirror. He didn't think he'd ever get tired of looking in the mirror, at the scars underlining his flat chest. True, they were just two more scars among many, but the others were scars that were only proof of his misery, had only threatened death. These were scars that had given him hope and joy and life.
Draco smiled as Luna came in the bathroom and stood behind him, looking over his shoulder into the mirror. She wrapped her arms around his waist, the moonstone engagement ring on her finger iridescent and shining. "My sexy man," she said softly, running a finger through the hair that had recently started growing on his belly.
He smiled back at her through the mirror and covered her hands with his, weaving their fingers together. "Thank you for seeing me," he said, knowing that she had brought so much joy and goodness to his life. More than he had ever dreamed of.
"I've always seen you, you know," she said. "I'm only glad you can see you now, too."