These Old Blueprints
Draco’s parents are far too busy when they are tasked with caring for a baby. It’s necessary to have a heir, but a bother nonetheless. The house elf is around much less when he’s busy feeding and dressing the boy.
Draco is nine months when he begins to stand on his feet and toddle around. He is eleven months when he begins to speak. Much to Lucias’ dismay, there are no qualified children's instructors in the entirety of Europe. This is why they decide to have Draco self-study with some additional 'guidance', per se.
As he grows, Draco learns quickly to read, write, and memorise. He learns to listen for his parents' footsteps outside of his door, to check how they’re feeling. He learns to come into rooms quietly and paste on a smile, just in case.
_____
Yet, in the midst of this, Draco still doesn't know what to expect. He doesn’t feel that the standards they set are quite fair. Sometimes, the words begin to swim before him, and his head hurts. One day, when a low whine escapes him, he learns his lesson.
“What did you say, Draco?” His father’s glare quickly silences him.
“Nothing,” he mumbles, his head bowed. “I didn’t say anything.”
Lucius slaps him across the face. “Look at me when I speak, boy.” The sting of his hand is sharp but his tongue feels sharper. Draco nods with wide eyes.
“You’re a smart boy, Draco. You understand the importance of your studies, so why is it that you complain? Do you want to grow up to become a teacher? A janitor, perhaps?” Lucius sneers. “You know I want the best for you. I am only doing this because I care about you. Don’t you realise that? If I didn’t, I would be just like other parents. I would let you do whatever you want, all day. Do you want that?”
“No.” Draco’s voice is small, but not smaller than how he feels now. Lucius snarls in reply.
“No, what?”
Draco pauses for a moment, confused.
“Don’t you believe you owe me some explanation or apology? What do you mean by ‘no’? Do you think you can take back your actions and pretend you never made them?” Draco’s father is growing larger, still, and Draco smaller. They wait in growing silence until Lucius stands up. His chair screeches against the tiled floor. Draco cringes and tries to keep his face straight.
“Stupid child,” he spits. Draco's vision is blurring quickly. He blinks and feels a wet stain creep down his face. As his vision clears, his father’s mouth quirks up into a smile for a moment. The moment is short, though, because his mother is standing in the doorway. Her hand rests on the brass handle, and she seems tentative to come in.
“Draco.” Her voice is hushed. “You know we care about you. Can’t you at least try to understand that?”
“You’re too gentle on him, Narcissa.” Lucius throws up his hands and walks towards the doorway. “We’ll never get anything done with you around. Why do I bother?”
“I was only trying to help, dear.” She walks to him frantically, but he brushes her off and strides away. Draco winces with each loud step he hears in the distance. The distinct sound of a door slamming comes only a few moments later.
Narcissa gives him a knowing look, slightly scolding. “You know what to do. Talk to him at least.”
Draco nods, but to be honest, his voice is gone. He can’t seem to quite find it. He walks up the stairway slowly, hoping that somehow it’ll grow and that he won’t ever reach his father’s room. When he does reach it, though, he can’t quite walk inside. Draco feels a little silly standing there. His breaths are so loud he’s not quite sure that he’d be able to hear if his father started walking towards him. He needs to concentrate and fix the mess he’s made. He closes his eyes, breathes in and out, and rests his forehead on the door. The smooth wood looks a warm brown, but it feels cool. It's soothing, in a way.
Just as he begins to calm down, Draco hears something. The latch of a suitcase clicking shut and the swish of his father’s outdoor cloak wrapping around his shoulders. No, his parents just got back after weeks. They just got back, today. He can’t possibly be leaving. Not yet.
Draco doesn’t quite know how, but the door is open now, and his father is standing there in front of him. Lucius doesn’t bother to glance at him and pretends not to notice as he pushes Draco aside, suitcase in one hand, and walks to the stairs.
This would be a great moment for Draco’s voice to come back.
“Lucius. What is going on?” His mother sounds almost frantic.
His father’s smile is cold and doesn’t reach his eyes. “You heard what I said. Why do I bother? With the both of you.”
They’re all standing at the front entrance, and Draco feels like he’s watching everything from outside of his body. This is so stupid. He should do something. This is his fault. He should say something. His voice is still stuck.
_____
He sprints away. The piano. He needs to play the piano. It can speak for him. His fingers frantically open the lid, shuffling through pages of sheet music, before he finds the right song. He stumbles over each key as shaky breaths heave out of his lungs through his lips.
Somehow, he doesn’t realise his mother has come into the room until he feels her hand dragging him off of the bench. She stares at him in shock and disgust. “Do you think this will fix anything? Do you think it will change anything? Why won’t you apologise to him? Talk to him.” Draco scrambles away, hastily scrubbing at his face.
He finds a roll of parchment and a quill, and dips the quill into ink. The black liquid spills onto the sheet. He should be frantic, but somehow this moment feels so far away. Draco rips off a fresh corner and writes.
I’m sorry. I'll study and work harder. I know you care very much about me and my future. I’m sorry for not appreciating you enough. Please stay. Please don’t leave.
As he rushes to the front entrance, he prays hopes that his father is still there, but his luck is the same as ever. He’s greeted by an open door and his mother glaring. “Hurry.”
Draco’s feet are bare against the gravel pathway, and he feels a sharp sting as something sharp embeds itself into his right heel, but he runs faster still. His father is right there. Five steps away. Four. Three. Two. One.
Draco grabs at his robes, desperation visible in his eyes. His father turns around and looks down at him. A few seconds pass before anyone speaks.
“Do you have something to say?”
Draco can see his mother out of the corner of his eye. He brings his hands up, both cupped together and shaking. In the middle of his palms is a small ripped corner of parchment with messy writing scratched out.
His father only bothers to stare for a second at Draco before he spins back around and continues to walk. No matter how many times Draco tugs at his sleeve now, Lucius doesn’t turn around. He only stops when his mother approaches and rips him away.
She snatches the paper from his hands and throws it onto the floor. Her lips move, but he can hardly make her words out, and the chirping birds in the distance grow quiet as the ringing in his ears amplifies.
The sun shines so brightly as he walks back to the house, head down. It's too sunny and too nice outside for this to be happening. Draco bites his inner cheek until the tangy metallic taste of blood comes to his mouth. The world doesn't orbit around him, what does he expect? He runs up the stairs, shuts the door to his room, and curls up on the thin carpeted floor.
His mother’s words echo in his head. They're louder this time. “Do something. Say something. Why do you keep trying to give him this piece of trash? If you just behaved, this would have never happened.”
His own words and thoughts come next. "It's your fault. You should have known better. You hurt your parents. You-"
Draco finds that the words stop when he hits his body and head, and he makes his way to his bed and burrows under his covers. Here, he can almost pretend that it's going to be okay.
He wakes up with heavy eyelids and a faint hope that what happened was a dream. The moment he sits up, he knows by the scab on his heel and dried blood on his bedsheets that it wasn’t. He hides the bruises on his body with long sleeves. He scrubs the blood off his bed carefully before heading downstairs to tidy the parchment and ink from the night before. His father returns the day after. They all pretend nothing happened.