it hasn’t been long since the war ended. hearts are still broken. loved ones are still lost. families are still mending.
harry has been to every bloody funeral and memorial that he’s been invited to. he hasn’t had time to just sit and think about what he’s lost. how much things have changed in the last year. he’s an adult now and he doesn’t really remember when that happened either.
was it before or after he died again?
he’s holed himself up in some dingy old flat because being in Number 12 had just been so hard when everyone else he had known there was dead.
the box of junk on his bed is full of stuff he will probably never use again: a cloak and a map and a hawthorn wand that beckoned to him but wasn’t really his.
he signs up for auror training the next morning and flunks out within the year. hermione calls it trauma. he tells her he’s just tired. tells her that he should have stayed in the forest. in kings cross. she tells him to go to a mind healer, but he’s already used to the terrors running rampant up there
draco malfoy is living at the manor, watching his mother slowly go mad from taking care of his father who actually has gone insane. he fixes them tea and watches as his father throws another tantrum. his wand had been snapped and his mental state with it, so it seemed
draco is wandless and practically parentless and not even blaise or pansy are brave enough to see how he is doing. he knows that it’s too soon. knows that the malfoy name is still splattered over the papers as blood purists and radicals and death eaters. but that doesn’t stop it from hurting any less
his father is bedridden and his mother is anxious and the portraits call him a traitor and he doesn’t even know who he is anymore because everything he’s ever known feels wrong now so he just sits and helps his mother at his father’s bedside
its not a surprise when his father dies, the surprise is that his mother doesn’t break apart like he thought she might. instead she turns her focus, her need to fix things, onto him.
malfoy goes to a mind healer but he isn’t expecting anything. the person he was might as well have died in the war. he was nothing more than a shell now. sorry and confused and angry
it’s the day of his father’s funeral and the knock on the manors door is unexpected. his mother is here. no one else had been invited.
when he opens the door harry potter is standing in front of him, in the rain, drenched. he’s dressed appropriately otherwise even if he is dripping on the rug. draco’s arms are crossed as he waits for potter to dry himself but he never makes a move to do so. his hair, much longer and messier than it was the day he saved him, is stuck to his face in swirling curls and malfoy has to remind himself to breathe and not berate the man in front of him who saved his life.
the only person who showed up for him or his mother
potters glasses are foggy and smudged but his apology is genuine when he hands draco a wand. his wand. he doesn’t know how to feel about it.
draco wants to ask if his mother invited potter, if he was only there to gloat or tease him or do anything else that would make this horrid day so much worse, but his mother is just as surprised as he was and potter doesn’t do anything but apologize and tell draco it’ll be okay, even as he father’s casket clinks into place in the malfoy mausoleum
when he finally does ask why he’s there potter is smiling sad and self depreciatingly when he just says “i know how hard it is to lose people close to you.”
draco doesn’t realize he’s started crying until potter is hugging him and he wants to push the man away from him, wants so badly to show that he doesn’t still need potters help, but its barely been a year and they both seem to know better so he clutches the man tighter.
theyre both standing there, broken men with broken hearts but they’re thinking that maybe they can help each other start to mend things
tangentwithtanner
jacobvanloon
andulkaphoto
2087
pixelskylines
origamiaround
