Work Text:
“Do you love yourself?”
Draco’s heart stutters at the question, but he refuses to acknowledge it. He keeps his eyes closed, fixating on the sensation of her soft cheek against his chest, her hand caressing his neck, her legs tangled between his. He does not want to disturb the peace that he has finally allowed to settle within him. He does not respond.
Predictably, she grows impatient.
“Malfoy, I know you heard me.”
He merely hums in response.
Though he cannot see it happen, he is certain she rolls her eyes.
Silence stretches like a tightrope between them, her unanswered question precariously clinging on. Draco convinces himself that he is perfectly fine leaving it unanswered. But a question without a response is a lonely, dangling weight, and this question might be the loneliest of all.
Draco has never dealt with loneliness well; no one has ever shown him how to. So he deals with this question and its loneliness in the same manner he has dealt with the latter all his life:
“Does it matter if I do?”
He opens his eyes this time, catching for certain the roll of hers.
“I wouldn’t ask if it didn’t matter,” she responds with a huff. “I’m not one to ask irrelevant questions.”
He is aware of this quality of hers, of course. Admires it, even. He amends his question:
“Why does it matter if I do?”
“Because I love you,” she says. As usual, Draco marvels at the simplicity of her statement. It never gets old, the easy way she utters those three words. Everything with her is easy— peace is easy, happiness is easy.
And yet. Hearts that have spent too long in fear and suffering struggle to accept the ease. Ease is discomfort— a foot on the precipice waiting to fall, a leaf at its greenest before its death, a lilting symphony sure to end.
Ease should be enough, and yet it never is.
“I know that you love me, Granger. What does that have to do with loving myself?”
His question is sincere, but her head rears back as if she’s taken it otherwise. His arm tightens reflexively around her, a plea for her to stay where she is. A plea for her to stay at all.
“I just want to know,” she responds slowly as she settles back against his chest, “if you feel the same way about yourself that I do for you.”
Draco switches tactics, then. If questioning and denying its relevance doesn’t work, he takes the next best option:
“I love you, Granger,” he deflects, shifting his head to murmur it into her hair. The sunlight bathes her golden, and even after months of its proof, he still cannot believe he holds her brightness in his arms. “It is enough for me to be in love with you because that is all that matters to me.”
She falls silent once more, and Draco’s eyes fall closed in faux comfort. He knows this conversation is not over. She is relentless, this witch who lets him call her his, his witch who makes it so easy for him to relent.
“I only wish you would matter to yourself the same way you matter to me,” she finally whispers.
Though Draco is nothing if not a granter of her wishes, he wonders about the feasibility of granting this one.
“There were moments in school I thought I must have loved myself.”
They are sitting by the kitchen table, and his words extend a cautious invitation to reignite a previous conversation. He has no desire to answer her question, merely prod around it to humour her.
“Is that so?” Her cup of tea touches her lips, and Draco sips the exact same blend from his. How gratifying, to know how her lips taste right then and there.
“But it wasn’t love, not really. I only thought I did, until you made me realise how love actually feels like.”
Her small smile graces his world. “It certainly seemed like you liked yourself a bit too much.”
“Yes, well.” Shame tinges his cheeks. “I thought I was important.”
“You think I’m important,” she challenges.
“I was convinced I was important to the world. You are important to me.”
The only thing important to him, really, but Draco keeps that to himself. He has made it no secret, the extent of her worth to him.
“But you are important to the world,” she whispers into her cup, meek in a way Hermione Granger never is. “Now more than ever. Do you not see that?”
All Draco can see in that moment, really, is her magnificence, and the privilege she affords him of a window into her vulnerability. He is incapable of seeing anything else, nor does he want to.
“Granger, I have spent my entire life thinking too much of myself. I would much rather now just think of you.”
Her frown is unexpected. Draco loathes it immediately. She is displeased with him, for a reason he cannot discern. He has just told her something she ought to like hearing, hasn’t he?
When she casts her eyes downwards, his pulse jumps. He knows her well enough to recognise a calculation in her brain he is not privy to. A deliberation of his worth to her, perhaps, or an assessment of how long she can possibly stay with someone so utterly—
“I have to get ready for the day,” she says, standing.
His cue to leave.
“I love you,” he reminds her hurriedly, his beating heart tumbling out of his clumsy lips. “That’s something you should never question.”
“I know, but—” she catches herself. Hesitates. Fights an impulse Draco is suddenly so desperate to know. “Never mind, I love you too.”
It is one of those nights, and he stares at the rest of his body as if it were just as marred as his forearm. His skin is tarnished, his soul even more so.
At least he does not punish himself like he used to.
He merely stares and lets himself feel proud that he does nothing to worsen the scars. This pride tastes different from the pride he used to feel as a child. No, nothing at all tastes the same anymore.
It is one of those nights, and he forces himself to focus on the one thought that outweighs all others. He needs no Patronus; the life in her smile is enough.
It is one of those nights, and he wonders if he will survive this one.
He does. Thanks to her, he does.
“The war is over, Draco. Why do you keep hating yourself?”
Her eyes are tired, and so are his.
He does not know when the war ended. He is not sure it ever did. He is not sure of anything except the fact that he loves her. He loves her more surely than anything he’s ever done before. She has to believe it. She has to know it, because he is unsure of who he is if he is not the wizard who would die for Hermione Granger.
Her question does not matter, but he cannot lie to her. She deserves everything from him, everything he can give her, including his honesty. He wishes he can deny her, but he cannot. He stays silent instead.
She takes a step towards him. His hands raise in an instinctual move to take her in his arms. She does not embrace him. “It’s true, isn’t it? You hate yourself. Probably as much as you love me.”
His impulse is to deny it. Nothing can ever compare with his love for her. He loves her so much, more than anything. But he hears the truth in her words. Hears it echo around his head and his heart. The verity of it rattles him.
Finally, finally, he considers the question. Gives it the thought and care it deserves. He reaches out his hand to it, grasps the edges of its hanging weight.
A tear slips from his cheek. “No, I don’t love myself. I never learned how to.”
Her gaze grows defiant. “It’s a good thing I know how to. Let me teach you.”
The truth is, she had been teaching him all along. But that day, he finally starts to learn.