Chapter Text
“She’s going to kill you when she finds out Malfoy.”
Potter was probably right, no matter how much Draco hated to admit it, what he was doing was extremely risky, and offensively fucking stupid. There had been a new dark object alert at a worn down, barely standing, house on the far edge of London and Draco was determined to get it before anyone else, it’s not like he had anything to prove as a former deatheater who may or may not have tried but failed at killing Dumbledore. The point was he had to come out of this house, which is rumored to have booby (haha) traps all over, without a scratch or else Astoria, his fiancé, will have his head on a stake.
The story between Draco and Astoria is a unconventionally romantic one. They were arranged by their mothers who would whisper and gossip about how “Oh they’ll have the cutest little babies” and “how do you think their wedding night is going to be spent?” and with that Draco promptly went to his room, locked his door, cast a silencing spell and screamed into his pillow. He was twenty one years old, he had no interest in settling down..that’s until he saw Astoria after all those years away from Hogwarts, he was star struck as soon as he saw her, now at twenty-three, he is planning (or more so his mother, while he gives the occasional “uh-huh”) a wedding, and praying that he doesn’t get murdered for going on the one mission he promised not to.
At least he had Potter with him.
“I mean seriously mate, she’s going to ban you from having sex with her for like a week”
Nevermind fuck Potter.
“Shut up potter” Draco hissed as they both enter a dimly lit room on the second floor of the barely standing house when he sees a journal with a vague green glow to it.
Harry puts his arm out which causes Draco to run into it with a “hmph” and sends him a deadly glare. The Harry sneaks over to the glowing object. It was very..peculiar, It reminded him of Tom Riddles diary but with less harmful intent, almost as if it was calling out his name. Harry’s fingers skim the cover of the journal and that’s when all shit hits the fan. The walls start trembling and little specks of debris falls upon their shoulders.
Now Draco would call himself a resourceful person, i mean that’s why he was in Slytherin right? self preservation and all that crap. But at that moment, all he could care about is getting the Boy Who Lived out of the house because if Draco came back and Harry didn’t..well that would raise some questions. Everything happened quickly, Draco grabbed Harry, Harry tried to grab the journal, Draco pulled him away and started running with him, down the stairs, through the hall, through the front door, Well harry made it through the front door, Draco had tripped over a loose floor plank and crashed into a weirdly placed coffee table.
“DRACO!!” Harry screamed and tried to push himself through the rubble that was all coming down at once, there was crashing, and dust, and noise, and then nothing. Harry couldn’t see Draco, and in that moment everything stopped. The reformed Deatheater was trapped under piles of walls and rubble, his legs successfully being crushed by pounds of brick, and his body not being at his own will..And yet the only think he could get himself to actually think about was if he’ll be home in time to get a good wank in. Priorities.
Everything went black.
—————————
Hospitals have always been Draco’s least favorite place, when he was ten he had fallen out of a tree after trying to save a baby bird who couldn’t yet fly, but instead stepped on a weak branch and fell down, landing on his arm resulting in a emergency to St. Mungos. He swore up and down that they were trying to break his arm even more with all of the poking and prodding that they were doing, and after that he swore to never set foot inside a hospital again. Ten year old Draco would be quite dissatisfied at this moment.
The blinding white lights override his senses as Draco slowly opens his eyes and blinks a couple of times, was he dead? surely not, his mother had promised him that when he died he would be greeted with all the sweets in the world and father promised that the most beautiful women would bow down at his feet.
He now realized that maybe that wasn’t the most normal thing to be telling your five year old. That’s besides the point.
Before anymore thoughts about his dysfunctional childhood could pop into his head he lays his eyes on his fiancé, his beautiful, amazing, murderous looking fiancé.
Astoria’s heels click across the shiny hospital room floor and as she reaches him he expects a kiss, or at least a loving embrace. Instead he gets quite a powerful slap to the shoulder. “What the HELL were you thinking Draco? you could’ve been killed! you could’ve died!”
“Merlin woman-“
“Don’t! i specifically told you not to go on this-“ Astoria’s voice cracks and she buries her face in her hands, it hurt draco deeply to see her like this, sure he’s impulsive and makes rash decisions but never with the intention of hurting her. His cold hand wraps around her small freshly manicured ones and sits up.
or at least he tries to sit up.
why can’t he sit up?
Eyebrows furrowed he lets go of the brunettes hand and slaps his legs a few times. Nothing. He tries to wiggle and move them. Nope. He looks down at his legs and shakes his head running his fingers through his hair. Why can’t he feel his legs? He sniffs and looks down his groin and hesitates before letting his fist come down on it. Yep. He can definitely feel that. Let’s hope Astoria didn’t want more than one kid.
Astoria jumps back and looks down before brushing hair from his face “Draco! have you gone mad-“
“Mr. Malfoy?”
A lady, probably in her mid fifties with salt and pepper shoulder length hair and dressed up in healer robes walks into the room with a soft smile as if everything is fine in this world. Must be nice.
“I’m Healer Brown, that was quite the accident you had there. You were stuck under the rubble for about three hours, though you blacked out after the first hour. It truly is a miracle you survived, you suffered a concussion along with a broken rib and some other sustained injuries”
Draco blinked at her before trying (and failing) to sit up again. He huffs and pushes himself up on his forearm and twists his upper body to face her more, about to ask why in the fuck knuckles he couldn’t feel his legs before he sees someone who he swore was a hallucination. He was hallucinating right? The mess of curls pulled back loosely into a high ponytail, a lilac blouse along with some muggle jeans (which didn’t annunciate her new founded curves at all, thank you very much) and a clipboard in hand.
“Granger?”
Apparently his tone wasn’t malice enough because she only responded with a soft smile before nodding. That fucking swot. he turns his head back to the healer and only then realizes that Astoria is sitting next to him and rubbing his back.
“So is he good to go home? we have a awful lot of planning to do for the wedding” Astoria all but spits out to the healer.
“Well we will have to make sure everything is-“
Draco cuts Healer Brown off almost immediately “Why did you numb my legs”
A look of confusion passed across the Healers face as she moves more to the bed, his eyes shifts to hermione only to see her face holds the same look of confusion with maybe a hint of curiosity. Draco notes that she had gotten tanner, her freckles more prominent, and her lips fuller. He looks back at the healer.
“Can you feel your legs Mr. Malfoy?”
Draco rolls his eyes “obviously fucking not”
If Healer Brown was offended by this, she made no move to show it. Instead she shoos Astoria off the bed and takes the sheets off of his lower body and squeezes his calf. “Can you feel this?”
“Nope” he says win a bored tone as he watches her.
She hits his knees with a little hammer looking thing “Here?”
“Nothing”
“What about here?”
“Nada”
Healer Brown promptly leaves the room, dragging granger with her, for what felt like hours before walking back in with a slightly more serious look on her face.
“Mr. Malfoy i’m sorry to tell you this but you’re paralyzed, you see when the rubble fell on-“
Draco couldn’t focus on what she was saying. Paralyzed? What does she mean paralyzed? He can’t be paralyzed. His job requires his legs, his mansion has at least a thousand stair cases and at least a dozen just to get to his and Astorias living quarters. And what about Astoria? Surely he wouldn’t be a suitable candidate as a husband if he has no use of his legs. no. he can’t be paralyzed. he simply refused to be.
He was brought back to reality to the sound of Astoria arguing with the Healer, something about how she was a “incompetent fucking saggy titted bird who didn’t know the first thing about Healing” and the Healer only looking mildly offended as she tried to calm his love down.
Draco interrupted their little squabble.
“Am i ever going to get use of them again”
Healer Brown looks at him with sad eyes. Fuck he hated pity.
“You must understand Mister Malfoy, the nerve damage done to your legs is incomprehensibly severe. There is a chance that you will recover but the truth of the matter is that if you ever do recover it will be a long hard and painful road. That is why i have assigned Miss Granger to be your personal Physical Therapist, she will work with you everyday on getting your strength back in your legs, as well as working in your chair”
Draco tuned her out for most of the part until he heard Granger and chair. His eyes shoot to Granger pushing a chair on two oversized wheels in and his jaw clenches. Sure he’s heard of wheelchairs before, but he had never actually seen anyone use one, he thought it was just a bloody muggle custom.
“I don’t understand” Astoria spits out as she stands up from the bed she had apparently sat back on without his knowledge. “He can’t be in a- whatever that is!”
This time Granger stepped in “Do you want someone to carry your fiancé everywhere? I understand this is less than suitable but until we figure out if we can regain enough strength in his legs, this is his only method of transportation”
There was silence.
Draco laid back down on his back and looked up.
There was silence before heels were clicking across the floor and out into a hall and a sobbed followed.
He turned his head ever so slightly to look at Granger who were giving her the same sad look Healer Brown did.
“don’t fucking look at me like that Granger, i don’t fucking need your pity nor do i need your help, get another Physical whatever and leave”
“I can’t exactly do that Malfoy” she expressed in a calm voice.
“And why not”
“Because i was the only healer out of the dozens asked, who actually agreed to work with you.”
And with that she left, Healer Brown following close behind, the only person left in the room was him with the wheelchair parked in the center of it, and on too of it sat a book, one he assumed Granger had forgotten was there. At this moment he wished life was like a book so he could sneak to the last pages, just like he did when he was younger and far too impatient, just to make sure everything would turn out okay.