Chapter 11
Present Day
Draco dropped to his knees. It felt like he had been hit with a thousand crucios and like his body had been dismantled - each limb torn from its place and his heart thrown into a pool of acid. His throat was narrow as he struggled to draw in a single breath. His ears were ringing, his head throbbing, and even the slightest bit of light caused his eyes to burn.
None of that was real.
It couldn’t be real.
He didn’t want it to be real.
“Draco,” he heard a muffled voice say. The gentle pressure of a hand on his shoulder caused his head to snap over to his left, hoping and praying that it would be Hermione looking down at him, but it wasn’t.
“Draco,” Ginny said once more, her voice soft and compassionate.
“No,” he choked out as he shook his head. “No no NO!” his voice broke as he tightly covered his ears and hunched over, his forehead pressed against the cold marble floor. “She’s not dead, she’s not dead, she’s not dead,” he kept repeating.
“It’s going to be alright.”
“No!” he snapped as he shot up to his feet, his eyes frantically searching the room for the witch that he was certain he had just spent the last four months with.
“See!” he said as he pointed over at Hermione, who was still standing in the centre of the room. “She’s right there, she’s fine.”
Everyone looked in the direction he was pointing, only to see empty space.
“Draco,” Pansy said delicately. “There’s no one there.”
“Yes there is!” he argued as he began walking towards Hermione. “Look, I’ll even grab her-” Draco’s heart fell into his stomach as his hand passed straight through hers. He shook his head in disbelief as he reached out for her again. Draco desperately tried to grab onto her hand, her arm, waist, face, anything. He just needed to feel her, to know that she was there. But each time, his hand moved through her like thin air.
“This can’t-I don’t-” he stammered as he stared at Hermione, waiting for her to say that it was just a joke, a stupid trick that they were all playing on him, and that of course she was there, but she didn’t.
Tears streamed down her face as she looked into Draco’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, her voice cracking with every word.
Bile rose in the back of his throat as he ran his fingers through his hair. They were all coming back, the memories. All of the moments that he had suppressed for the last four months and the emotions that came with them.
Anger.
Frustration.
Sorrow.
Loneliness.
But the one that consumed him the most, the emotion that had left him completely debilitated and forced him to compartmentalise in the first place, was guilt. It ate away at him and each breath that he’d take would send a sharp and agonising pain through his chest, and now he was experiencing it all over again. It felt wrong to be still breathing, to be still alive. What good had he done that earned him the right to still live and not Hermione? The answer was none, which he decided was the reason that he was in this circumstance in the first place.
What better way to condemn him for his wrongdoings than to force him to live without the only person who gave his life meaning?
He stumbled backwards, reaching out to grab something, anything, to keep from falling. The room spun around him, and he felt as though he was suffocating. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t feel anything but the excruciating pain in his chest. He heard someone speak but their voice was muffled by the loud ringing in his ears.
He felt a scream building inside him, a scream of loss, grief, and anger, but before he could release it, he felt another hand on his shoulder. He wished people would stop touching him. He didn’t want to feel them, he wanted to feel her.
“Mate-” Theo said.
Draco grasped Theo’s wrist and twisted his arm back. “Where were you?” he asked. “Where were you this entire fucking time?! Why didn’t-why didn’t you tell me?” Draco turned to look at the rest of his friends. “Why didn’t any of you fucking tell me?!”
“We tried,” Harry sheepishly stated. “We all took turns coming to visit you, but each time you had Bippy turn us away. After a month we sort of just…” he trailed off as he looked down at his hands.
“You sort of just, what, Potter?” Draco snarled. “You sort of just moved on with your life? You sort of just went on your merry little way and moved on from her?”
“That’s not fair, Draco,” Hermione said.
Turning around, he looked at the ghost of the woman that he loved. “Fair?” he scoffed. “You think I give a damn about fair? None of this is fair, Granger! You’re not even-” his voice caught in the back of his throat. Closing his eyes, he drew in a deep breath before continuing. “You’re not even real.”
It felt like she had been hit with the killing curse all over again as the words fell from his lips.
“Just because you can’t touch me doesn’t mean I’m not real, Draco,” Hermione said quietly. “I’m still here with you, doesn’t that count for something?”
“That’s not good enough! I don’t want some conjured version of you that only I can see, I want the real you! I want to take your hand and put this stupid fucking ring on it,” Draco said as he angrily held up the small box. “I want to stand with you before our friends and say those damn vows and kiss you. I want to build our cottage, buy our flat in the muggle neighbourhood, and start a family with you, but I can’t, we can’t!”
“Draco, please,” she said as she took a step toward him.
“No,” Draco said as he raised his hand to stop her. “Don’t come any closer. I can’t… it’s too much and I… just don’t.”
His mind was a mess, a tornado of emotions that were all screaming at him. He wanted to destroy everything, to lash out at the world and make everyone pay for taking Hermione away from him. He felt the anger welling up inside him and he couldn’t take it anymore, he was about to explode. Turning, Draco walked straight past his friends, ignoring their questions as to where he was going, and slammed the door behind him.
As he stormed through the manor and out to the gardens, Draco began piecing everything together. It was right in front of him the whole time. Hermione would back away whenever he’d reach for her not because she didn’t want him to touch her, but because he couldn’t. She’d never eat the food Bippy would prepare because she couldn’t even pick up the damn fork. Even her breakdowns and the things that she would say - she was practically screaming it in his face and he never saw it. He ignored it all so that he could continue living in his fantasy world, and in the process, he made her suffer.
For the last four months, Draco thought that everything he was doing was for Hermione. He believed that he was helping her through the healing process but instead, he was destroying her. She died and he forced her to continue to remember the life that she wouldn’t get to have.
He felt like he was about to throw up.
Bursting through the door of the greenhouse, Draco looked around at the place that he had worked so tirelessly on. He walked to the centre of the room, his eyes fixed on the rows of flowers and plants, stopping when he reached the orchids. He had built this for Hermione in hopes that it would be a place that would bring her peace, but now Draco could see that all it did was bring her anguish. He had single-handedly tainted one of her favourite memories with her parents by building it.
Taking out his wand he whispered, “Incendio.”
Stepping outside, Draco stood back and watched as the greenhouse went up in flames. He felt so foolish for believing that he would be able to live a happy life with Hermione. He wasn’t deserving of happiness and this was the world’s cruel way of reminding him of that. He couldn’t stand the thought of living in a world without her, of having to face a future that was devoid of her warmth and love.
Finally, he allowed himself to scream. All of the rage, frustration, and heartache poured out of him as he strained his vocal cords until they gave out. He wanted to destroy everything that reminded him of the love that was ripped away from him. He wanted to rid himself of the memories, of the torment, of Hermione.
Heading back inside and now finding himself in the library, he scanned over the hundreds of books that lined the shelves. Draco had spent weeks tracking down the first editions of every book that he knew she loved. He had built Hermione her own personal library as a symbol of his devotion to her and of his admiration for her thirst for knowledge. But for what? She would never be able to read them. She wouldn’t even be able to pick up one of the bloody books.
Draco rushed towards the nearest shelf and made his way down the line of books, ripping the pages from within and throwing them across the room. He continued this cycle until he was surrounded by hundreds of shredded pieces of paper. He had just removed his wand and was preparing to set the room on fire, to cleanse himself of the memory of her, just like he did with the greenhouse, but then he heard his mother’s voice.
“Perhaps we don’t start a fire in the house,” Narcissa said as she stood in the doorway, her hands elegantly folded in front of her. “It would be an awful shame to lose a place that’s been in the family for centuries.”
A surge of pain coursed through Draco as he looked at his mother. He had been so consumed by the loss of Hermione that he had forgotten about the others he lost as well.
His mother, Remus, Tonks, and even his father. He hadn’t blocked out his death but he did suppress how Lucius died. He died protecting him. It was too much, there were too many people that he had lost, too many who had sacrificed their lives and it was breaking him. It felt like the weight of the world was on his chest and it was crushing him, breaking every bone in his body.
He was alone.
Everyone that he loved was gone.
Falling to his knees, Draco dropped his head in his hands and let everything surface. He could hear the screams of the dying and the clash of the spells ringing in his head like a never-ending chorus. He could vividly see the image of his father being hit by the killing curse, he could feel the warmth of his mother’s blood on his hands after removing the dagger from her abdomen, and he could remember the weight of Hermione's lifeless body as he held her in his arms.
He couldn’t shake the feeling that it was all his fault. If he had just done what was asked of him, if he had played his part as a Death Eater, and never searched for a way out, then he wouldn’t have fallen in love with Hermione and she would’ve never given her life to save him. His father and mother would’ve never had to fight to protect him and maybe, somehow, Remus and Tonks would still be alive too.
“Darling,” Narcissa said as she crouched down beside him. “I know it might not feel like it right now, but this feeling will pass. You will piece yourself back together and you’ll be alright.”
“I don’t understand,” he choked out between sobs. “If you’re gone then how can I… how can I still see and hear you?”
Narcissa pointed to the black stone on Draco’s ring.
“The resurrection stone,” she said. “Powerful enough to bring back loved ones but not powerful enough to do so fully.”
Draco remembered Harry talking about the resurrection stone during the Horcrux hunt. He had discovered it hidden within the golden snitch that Dumbledore had left to him. What he didn’t remember was how he came to be in possession of it.
As if Narcissa could read his mind, she said, “It was a week after the battle. You were so distraught. You would start your morning with a bottle of firewhiskey and then you’d end your evening with enough calming draught to sedate a troll. It broke my heart to watch you suffer so much, Draco.”
“You were watching me?” he asked.
“Of course I was, all of us were. Your father, Tonks, Remus, and Hermione. Although it may have seemed like it, we never once left your side,” Narcissa replied. “We also watched as you shut everyone out and locked yourself away. I think it was the loneliness that finally did it for you.”
“What are you talking about?”
Narcissa let out a sigh. “One day you sort of just snapped. I wanted so badly to reach out and hold you at that moment, to tell you that everything was going to be okay and that none of this was your fault, because it isn’t Draco.”
“But mother I-”
“It doesn’t matter what you did or didn’t do,” she said, cutting him off. “We all chose to do what we did out of our own free will, out of our love for you.”
Draco wanted to argue with Narcissa. He wanted to list off all of the reasons as to why it was his fault, but he had no energy and no fight left. He was drained. He was numb.
“It still doesn’t make any sense,” Draco said. “Potter had the resurrection stone before the war.”
“That he did, which is why you broke into his flat one day and demanded that he handed it over.”
As if her words were the key, the memory rushed forward and played out in Draco’s head.
“I know you have it, Potter!” Draco shouted as he pinned him against the wall.
“I told you that I don’t have it!” Harry replied. “I dropped it somewhere in the forbidden forest.”
“Where?”
“How the bloody hell am I supposed to know?! In case you forgot, I literally died in that forest.”
“Shame it didn’t stay that way,” Draco quipped.
Ignoring his remark, Harry asked, “What is it that you want with the stone anyways?”
“The fuck do you think, Potter?”
Harry’s eyes softened. He recognised the pain in Draco’s face, it was how he imagined he looked when he lost Sirius.
“Malfoy,” he sighed. “The stone won’t bring her back, you know? Not fully at least.”
Draco’s grip on Harry’s shirt loosened, his shoulders dropped and he clenched his jaw.
“I’m well aware,” Draco replied, his voice strained. “But a piece of her is better than nothing at all.”
Draco’s head pounded as the memories continued to assault his mind. He remembered it all. Leaving Harry’s flat. Searching the forbidden forest for hours. Finally finding the stone and seeing Hermione and the pang in his chest when he heard her say his name.
And then he remembered losing her all over again.
He had returned to the manor and was in the middle of talking to Hermione when he set the stone down on the table and turned around to see that he was, once again, all alone. He remembered taking an old ring of his and fusing it with the stone so that he could have it on him at all times, so that he could have Hermione with him at all times.
His hand shook as he reached for the resurrection stone. He was ready to have her back but was fearful that his alterations somehow interfered with the magic that made it possible for him to summon her in the first place. To his relief, when he picked up the ring, Hermione materialised before him.
He had gotten her back.
Then, the breakdowns began.
Hermione would voice her pain and frustration. She didn’t want to be confined to the restrictions of the resurrection stone. She wanted to be alive fully or she wanted to remain dead. Hermione and Draco fought for hours on end for the first few weeks.
“I know that I’m being selfish, I understand that!” Draco shouted as he frustratingly ran his hand down the length of his face. “But we can be together this way.”
“We can’t even touch, Draco!” Hermione argued.
“I know but–”
“And what about your future?” she asked. “What about all of the plans that you made?”
“The only plans I made are the ones with you!”
“You can’t just throw away your life, Draco!”
“You are my life, Granger,” Draco replied. “Without you, there’s nothing. I’m nothing.”
A majority of their fights contained the same argument, just worded differently. Hermione would say that he needed to move on and start building his life and Draco would shut it down by saying that there was no reason for him to do so if he couldn’t do it with her.
It was an exhausting first few weeks, but eventually, Hermione conceded. Draco was in an unimaginable amount of pain and she thought that if she just leaned into the situation and gave it some time, he’d heal. She had hoped that by her being there, she could help him process everything and then he could start living again.
Instead, Draco ended up suppressing everything. All of the traumatic events throughout the Horcrux hunt and a majority of the war were filed away and safely hidden behind occlumency.
He had changed the ending to their story.
~~~
Draco sat in silence for a while. He stared out at the space before him and tried to process all of the memories as they came to him. It wasn’t until he heard a collection of footsteps approaching that he finally blinked and pulled himself from his thoughts.
Looking over his shoulder, he saw Theo, Blaise, Pansy, and Ginny standing in the doorway.
“Where’s Potter?” Draco asked, his voice strained as he tried to hold back his tears.
“He’ll be back soon,” Ginny said. “He just had to go get something.”
Draco nodded slowly. “I’m sorry, Theo,” he said.
Theo cleared the distance between them and crouched down beside Draco. Hesitantly, he grabbed Draco’s shoulder and gently squeezed it, letting him know that it’s okay.
“I lost her,” Draco choked out as he looked up at Theo, tears blurring his vision. “I lost Hermione.”
Wrapping both of his arms around Draco, Theo pulled his body into him and held him tightly.
Unable to hold them back anymore, Draco surrendered, lowered his walls and let the tears pour out. Sobs escaped the back of his throat as he tightly gripped Theo’s arm.
“I’m here, Draco,” Theo whispered. “You’re not alone. I’m right here.”
Draco continued to release it all, to allow all of the hurt and anger to spill out in the form of tears that burned his skin as they rolled down his cheeks.
“Is this a bad time?” Draco heard Harry ask.
Lifting his head, Draco looked over at the doorway. And then he heard it, a small cry.
“Potter,” he called out. “What is–” he stopped mid-sentence when Ginny turned around, revealing the baby in Harry’s arms. “Is that…”
Ginny let out a sigh as she stepped out of the way and motioned for Harry to move forward.
Slowly, Harry approached Draco, knelt and said, “I know you lost a lot of people but that doesn’t mean you’re alone, it doesn’t mean that you don’t still have a family.”
Draco stared down at Teddy, unsure of what to say.
“I’ve done my best the past few months but I’m not what he needs. He needs his family,” Harry said as he carefully handed Teddy to Draco.
As soon as he was fully in Draco’s arms, Teddy’s eyes slowly fluttered open and his mouth pulled into a smile as he stared up at him.
“He has his mother’s eyes,” Draco stated.
“It’s about time you thought of me.” He heard a voice say.
Looking to his right, Draco met Tonks’ stare.
“I mean seriously, it’s like you don’t even care about me,” she teased.
“Dora? Is that… is that you?” he asked.
“In the flesh,” she replied. “Well, kind of.”
Getting up to his feet, Theo quietly motioned for everyone to leave the room.
“There’s my sweet boy,” Tonks smiled as she looked down at Teddy. “He has Remus’ nose, lucky for him.”
“I know I agreed to be his godfather but I don’t think I can do this, Dora,” Draco admitted. “I mean, I’m a mess. Can’t your mother and father take care of him? They’d be better suited to do so.”
“They probably would be but I didn’t choose them to be his guardian should something happen to me. I chose you, Draco.”
“I know but don’t you think–”
“I’m going to stop you right there,” Tonks said. “Look, I’m going to make this quick because, well, truthfully I feel like if I stay here any longer I’ll cry and I’d really rather not. I’d like to keep some of my dignity.”
Crouching down so that she was at eye level with Draco, Tonks said, “All of the good that could possibly come from our DNA is in Teddy. He deserves to grow up in a household that reminds him of such. I’m sure my parents would do an excellent job raising him but they aren’t who I want to do so. You are. I know it’s a lot to ask of you and that someone your age shouldn’t be given such a heavy responsibility but I need you to do this for me, okay?”
Everything in Draco was telling him to say no. To say that he couldn’t do it, that he couldn’t possibly raise a child at his age. But as he looked down at Teddy in his arms and then back up at Tonks, he knew that he couldn’t say anything but yes.
“Okay,” Draco nodded.
“Good,” Tonks smiled before standing up. “Take care of him, Draco. Take care of my son.”
“I will.”
The Next Day
“We’ll be here if you need us, Draco,” Pansy said.
“Thank you,” he replied before placing Teddy in her arms and walking away.
He didn’t think he’d be able to come here so soon. To be honest, he thought he’d never be able to. Theo told him that they could wait until everything wasn’t so fresh but Draco knew that the longer he waited, the more it would hurt.
Now standing in front of a piece of stone in the ground with the name ‘Hermione Jean Granger’ carved into it, Draco knelt, placed a bouquet in the grass and rested his forehead against the stone.
“We almost made it, Granger,” he whispered. “We should’ve made it.”
Reaching into his pocket, he removed the ring and ran his finger over the resurrection stone in the centre. Just as he was about to place it beside the flowers, he heard a voice say, “I always thought you looked handsome in a suit.”
Looking up, his eyes locked onto Hermione’s.
“Even back at school I thought that you did,” she admitted. “But if you had asked me back then I would’ve denied it.”
Draco let out a small chuckle. “Yes, well, we both know my head was too far up my own arse to ever speak to you at school in the first place.”
“That it was,” she giggled. Looking down at her hands, her laugh slowly faded and she said, “I would do it again, you know. I would sacrifice my life a hundred times over if it meant saving you.”
“Please,” Draco winced. “Please don’t say that.”
“It’s true though.”
“I never asked you to do that.”
“You didn’t need to. It was my choice and I’ll never regret it,” Hermione said. “This is your chance, Draco. This is your new beginning.”
“You were my new beginning,” he replied.
“I don’t have to be your end though. You have so much to look forward to, so much life to live. For the first time, you get to decide what you want to do and who you want to become,” she explained. “Don’t waste this gift by sitting around and missing me. I’m always going to be with you, even if you can’t see me.”
Draco shook his head as his eyes filled with tears. “It’s not the same.”
“How about this,” she began. “When you’re walking through town with Teddy, which you better do because they have some lovely markets, and you see a northern cardinal, know that it’s me. Know that, at that moment, I’m with you.”
“Why a northern cardinal?”
“My dad was gone for work for a few months in the states and when he returned home he said that every time he saw one he thought of me,” she said. “So now I want you to do the same.”
“There’s one problem,” Draco said.
“And what might that be?”
“They aren’t native to the UK.”
A smile crept its way across her lips. “Then you won’t be able to argue that it’s just a coincidence when you see one, you’ll know for certain that it’s me, okay?”
“Whatever you say, Granger,” he smiled back.
“Yup, I still love hearing you call me that,” Hermione said. “One last thing, I need you to promise me something, Draco.”
“Anything.”
“I want you to promise me that you’ll live a full life. Promise me that you’ll take risks and that you’ll laugh on the good days and cry on the hard ones. Allow yourself to be vulnerable, allow yourself to be human. You deserve to experience everything that life has to offer. Promise me that you’ll live, Draco. Can you do that for me?”
“Yes.”
“I want to hear you say it. Say that you promise.”
“I promise,” Draco said. “I love you, Hermione.”
“And I love you, Draco. I always will.”
“I hope you know that the second I arrive in whatever afterlife awaits me, I’m finding you.”
“I’m counting on it,” Hermione smiled. “Until then?”
Draco nodded and choked back his tears.
“Until then.”