For @drarrymicrofic prompt: “Bond” wc 690 / TW: Grief
“No, you—you don’t get to come in here, Ron, and—"
“Harry—”
“No! I love him. I have for so many years. So many wonderful years.”
His eyes burn. The back of his throat is dry. He tries to swallow, but the lump there is thick and impossible, and it is this small, stupid failure of his body to obey him that finally breaks him.
The tears spill on a sob.
“I know it never made sense to you, and I’m sorry for that. I am. But you don’t get to come in here and tell me it’s time to move on.”
“We’re just worried about you,” Ron says desperately. “All of us. We just think if you saw a Healer, then maybe it would help.”
Harry doesn’t want to hear it.
He can’t.
They don’t understand. They never have. Harry knows they tried, for his sake, and he loves them for that, but they never got Draco.
They never saw him properly.
They never saw all the small things that made him who he was. The things reserved only for Harry.
The soft kisses on Sunday mornings.
The cups of tea in matching mugs.
The Seeker matches they played in the garden.
The arguments over shoes never put away.
The lazy sex after a hard day at work.
The little inside jokes. The secrets. The language they built over years of loving each other.
The acts of service Draco did to ease Harry through a world that seemed hell-bent on making every day harder than it needed to be.
Draco would fill their water bottles before bed.
Draco would do the weekly food shop.
Draco would sort the laundry.
Draco would feed the cat.
Draco would... would... would...
He won’t anymore.
Harry presses the heel of his hand to his mouth, but it does nothing to stop the sound that tears out of him.
They never knew Draco. They only saw who he used to be, not the man he had become. Not someone brave and kind and so fucking sweet that he made sugar in tea seem bitter.
They didn’t know the man who saved Harry’s heart and soul.
“Get out, please,” Harry says. Pleads. His voice is weak and rough. He drags both hands through his hair, not caring when his fingers catch on a knot. “I can’t do this tonight. I’m allowed to be—"
“You are allowed to feel whatever you want to feel, mate,” Ron says quickly. “I’m not saying you can’t. I’m just saying it wouldn’t hurt to speak to someone. To at least try.”
Ron looks at him, eyes wet, mouth twisted tight. It’s pity. It's not meant to wound but it does. It cuts sharper than any jab from Draco ever did.
“Please, mate.”
Harry stares at him. “If I say yes, will you just go?”
Ron swallows. “Yes.”
“Then yes. I’ll speak to someone.”
Ron looks as if he wants to say something else. To offer comfort. To say one of the soft, useless things people say when they don’t know what to do with grief this ugly. But Ron and Hermione and Ginny and everyone in the world and their mother have said it all a million times already.
There are no words that can reach the place Draco left behind.
Nothing can resolve the ache Harry has carried since that boring, shitting, wanking Wednesday morning nine months ago.
It should have stayed boring.
It should have been tea and paperwork and Draco complaining about the weather. It should have been a kiss at the door and a promise to pick up dinner. It should have been any other day.
But it wasn’t.
Because Draco had decided to die like a fucking Muggle and get hit by a car.
Thankfully, Ron says nothing else.
He nods once and leaves through the Floo.
The moment the green flames die down to embers, Harry makes his way into the kitchen and pours himself another glass of whisky.
People talk about bonds as if death is enough to break them.
Harry knows better.
Some things only tighten when pulled apart.
