To say that Norman didn't cry for the first week in a row after he remembered everything he had been through would be a lie, after all he really did cry and locked himself in his room at Malfoy Manor.
But Norman was stronger than that. He pulled himself together after his older brother, Draco Malfoy, a naive six-year-old, came to mock him for being weak.
Norman was never weak, after all he was once William Minerva, the hope of thousands of children.
Narcissa Malfoy, his mother in this world, told him her concerns, after all, Norman Malfoy had not cried once since he was born. Why would that change?
Because no one would ever fill the place the red-haired girl had in his heart. Not even the place that was saved for the boy with black hair and unnerving green eyes.
After days of insistence, his mother saw that asking why he was crying would lead nowhere, so she started to just give her youngest son a worried look.
His father, Lucius, had an odd way of showing affection. He didn't ask how Norman was feeling or if there was anything he could do to help, he just sat quietly beside Norman more than usual, offering him calm company. If anyone had told Lucius that he had started spending more time with his son, he would have promptly denied it.
But Norman never had a father figure, so Lucius was enough.
A father was never needed in his life.
At the age of six, Norman began to show more interest in reading. And, unlike most children his age, he enjoyed theoretical readings and practical explanations about the world he lived in.
He himself had learned the lesson long ago of the value of not knowing about his own world. The children's deaths would forever be branded in his mind.
His family found this strange, of course. However, they all supported him. Norman had always been the calm, stoic boy of the Malfoy family. A stark contrast to Draco, who was a noisy, if well-behaved, child.
Norman was the scholar. The ambitious for knowledge. Even “the politician,” in the words of some of his father’s friends who knew him.
William Minerva, or just Norman, was all of these and more. He was the leader.
With this sudden change in Norman's behavior, Draco's also changed. Norman was now praised by his parents and his parents' friends, while Draco had been somewhat left out. And, something Norman had always noticed, was that Draco hated being left out.
However, Draco was smarter than to just take petty revenge.
On a day when his parents were not at Malfoy Manor, with only Norman, Draco and the house elves, Draco went after his brother. As usual, Norman was sitting in the manor's library, reading tirelessly.
But the book was about Muggles. It was about Muggle behavior. It was about Muggle society.
And, nothing worse for a purist like Draco, who even though he was six years old already carried several prejudices, than seeing another pureblood interested in non-magical societies. Even worse if that pureblood was his brother.
Norman recognized Draco as he entered the library. His loud, thudding footsteps would kill him the moment he stepped into the demon world. Norman nodded in acknowledgement as his brother stopped in front of him, closing the book he held calmly and smiling weakly at Draco.
William Minerva had always been the go-between (unless it involved demons. Never when it involved demons.)
However, Draco had always been the opposite of a go-between.
He was explosive like the boy from his memories with two white stripes painted in his hair forming an 'x'.
The scowl on Draco's face, though childish, held a channeled anger. And Norman knew better than that. Draco had been waiting for this moment for months, maybe even years. Draco had taken a backseat to Narcissa after the whole nausea and vomiting phase, plus the panic attacks that followed his gaining of memories. And for Draco, as well as a little for Norman, Narcissa was more than important. She was their mother, but she was also their guardian and probably the only person who genuinely loved them.
Narcissa was almost like the woman with the neat bun of black hair. Quiet, but loving. Spiteful, but loving. Narcissa was his mother. But the woman had also been his mother. Narcissa would not change that fact.
And then Norman, at six years old—the age when children began to be taken away at Grace Field—was beaten by his brother.
But Draco was just a child and Norman had already lived another life. Draco was childish.
But Norman was always weak. As Norman Malfoy would be no different.
If he wasn't like William Minerva, then why would he be like a Malfoy? Norman was destined to be weak all his lives.
Draco's words, sharp and venomous, dissociated in his mind, which barely understood what was happening.
He only knew three things: Draco hated him; Draco was, most likely (since when was William Minerva not sure?) beating him out of jealousy; and Draco was choking on words about how useless Muggle societies were.
He could taste the metallic blood on his tongue, running down the side of his mouth. Was his eye open? He didn't know anymore. What was Draco even doing?
Who was he? Norman? William Minerva? Norman Malfoy?
The words he could understand and associate the most were spoken with venom. Draco was shouting in his ear, while tightly gripping the collar of his previously white shirt — now stained with blood — about the scum that was Muggle society and, if he wanted to know how they lived, Norman should not have the dignity of being born a Malfoy and living in that manor. Much less being his brother.
Draco screamed, over and over.
But Draco didn't consider him his brother. He never had. And he never would. And why did that hurt?
It hurt because the green-eyed boy would never do that. That boy, as analytical as he was, would never dare to utter such words. Of that, Norman was sure.
And then, still hearing his brother's distant screams, the deep hurt embedded in his every word, the jealousy in his every action, his vision blurred. Norman swallowed saliva, mixed with blood, weakly trying to wipe away the blood that dripped from the corner of his lips.
Maybe he passed out? Maybe it was all a delusion? Maybe even those memories weren't real?
No, those memories were more than real. The nausea, the loss, the demons, and the lives were real. It was all, absolutely every fragment, it was all real.
And if he found the boy who would never do what Draco did (why did Draco do that again? Who was Draco?), Norman would make sure to keep him by his side.
Because he had already kept it.
Just as he had already kept the girl with the red hair untamed.
Because Norman was like those demons that hunted him (maybe he still was? Yes, he still was), but even that didn't stop them.
In another life, they were a better family than the Malfoys.
In another life, even when Norman was a demon in human form, they were his companion, his confidants. His brothers.
It would be a lie to say that he would never be like those demons again (because he was still like them). But it would also be a lie to say that they would never get back together.
That, just because the three of them were family.