Can't Escape the Past
He’s not paying attention to the city around him. He’s too busy thinking about what she had said.
She’d had a really lovely time.
Hermione Granger and he just had a successful date. He feels light enough to apparate without his wand.
Draco’s so distracted, he doesn’t sense it when the man behind him is joined by two more. Nor does he notice them pulling their wands from their pockets.
When the pain hits his back, the noise that comes from his throat is more from surprise than pain.
His body goes rigid and he falls to the ground, unable to see the men attacking him.
They don’t say anything so he isn’t sure how many or who they are.
He tries to think of a way out of this. He tries to shout. Nothing works.
He is frozen and terrified as they surround him. A pained moan comes out of his throat as a kick lands on his back.
Draco can hear laughter.
More kicks land across his body and he wishes he could at least curl in on himself but he can’t.
“Get him up,” a voice Draco’s never heard before says.
Two men hoist him to his feet but he still can’t move. The spell will wear off soon but not before they finish beating him.
A sucker punch to the stomach followed by another to his face elicits another groan.
“You should have spent your whole miserable existence in Azkaban, Malfoy,” the man hitting him says, spit landing on Draco’s face.
He can’t lift his head enough to see him, but the voice is angry. Draco just wishes he could place it.
“C’mon, let’s go before someone comes,” one of the men holding him up says.
This time, he’s certain he’s heard the voice before.
They drop him on the ground and run away leaving him to suffer in the cold air.
It takes his body a few minutes to depetrify and it takes another few before he can stand up. He has to lean against the wall, wiping blood from his nose and his mouth.
It wasn’t the first time he’d been attacked. Though it was usually a single hex or a tripping jinx.
He’s closer to Granger’s flat than his own but he can’t go back there. He can’t let her see him this way.
It takes him twice as long to limp home and as soon as he keys into his flat he strips off his coat and climbs into bed.
He should clean his wounds, check his ribs, maybe take something for the pain, but his entire body feels broken.
Maybe he should have gone back to Granger’s. She’d have healed him for sure.
No, Draco doesn’t want Granger to know what happened.
He wants to live in the world he was living in an hour ago. A world where Granger, the person with the most reason to hate him, doesn’t.
She had managed to give Draco something he hadn’t quite realised he was missing.
A reason to leave his flat.
He can’t go to work tomorrow. Not like this. And he can’t go to a doctor, he hasn’t got any muggle money. Or any idea how to find one.
He has to go to work. If he misses a day he has to provide a satisfactory reason as to why. Draco doubts that Auror Brently will accept his being beaten by a gang of wizards as “satisfactory.”
Draco lets himself lean into the feeling of self pity that he had been separating himself from over the last few weeks.
It takes a long time and he doesn’t sleep very well, but he does manage to drift off after ruminating in his misery.
He’s not sure he can move.
It’s the middle of the night when a change of position wakes him up, yelping at a pressure in his side.
He’s definitely broken a rib or two.
Draco moves as gingerly as he can manage out of bed and heads for the bathroom, leaving the light off.
Starting up the shower, he peels his clothes off gently.
Everything hurts.
His nose is so swollen he can barely open his eyes.
Hissing, Draco eases into the hot water, lifting his hands to scrub at the dried blood on his face.
Everything hurts and Draco can barely keep it together.
He manages to make it into work, once again grateful that the wizarding store won’t open for hours.
Though the first customer of the day winces when she sees Draco’s face.
It's in a right state. He’s hoping Laura will heal it for him when she comes in. A quick Episkey and Granger never needs to know.
“Are you alright, son?” Denny, Draco’s favourite regular asks.
Denny is a seventy-something year old man who comes straight from the bank after cashing his pensioner’s check.
“Yes, Sir,” Draco says, taking the man’s newest selection- a Grisham novel with a boat on the cover- and ringing it up.
“At least tell me the other guy looks worse?” Denny asks.
Draco shrugs. “I don’t know. I didn’t get a good look at them from the ground.”
Denny whistles.
“That’s not right. A real man makes it a fair fight. You in some kind of trouble, kid?”
Draco chuckles. Some kind of trouble. That’s one way of putting it.
“I was what you’d call a troubled youth, Sir. Past doesn’t always stay in the past.”
Denny nods, handing over his money and pulling the book right back out of the brown bag Draco had just put it in.
“Gang problems?” Denny sounds intrigued more than fearful.
Draco shrugs, non committedly. Sure, the Death Eaters were like a gang.
“You should go to the police. Wouldn’t want anyone else getting hurt by these boys who attacked you.”
“Don’t worry, Sir. I’m the only target they’ve got nowadays,” Draco says, handing Denny his change.
It’s true. Draco is the only real Death Eater that is out of Azkaban. Or at least the only one that is so easily recognizable. Plus, he’d been a prat in addition to being a Death Eater. It wasn’t exactly a wonder why people held a grudge.
“Take care of yourself. And get your nose set. You’re too good looking to have a crooked nose.”
Draco smiles and nods at the old man, a bit tickled by the compliment.
He wonders what Denny looked like as a young man.
Probably good looking.
“I will,” he confirms.
Denny leaves, his new book tucked under his arm and a pep in his step.
Laura still hasn’t shown up. It’s half past three and she is nowhere to be found. Which is not good because Granger will be in any minute and then Draco will have to explain what happened last night.
A sound next door sends Draco into the stacks, trying to think of a different explanation.
Like he walked into a wall.
Or fell down a manhole.
Or joined a boxing club.
“Draco?”
Fuck, of course it’s Granger. He should be at the counter, smiling and flirting, like he’d wanted to.
“One sec,” he says, but then realises there is no point. There is nothing he can do.
“Are you alright?” She asks.
“Just don’t freak out, Granger,” he says, walking back out of the stacks and cringing when he sees her face.
“Oh my god, what happened?” She freaks out.
“I’m fine,” he reassures her.
“Fine? You look like you fell from the Astronomy tower,” she comes out from behind the counter and lifts a hand to cup his chin, eyeing the damage.
Draco pulls back but it strains his chest so he doubles over a bit and lets out a quick yelp.
“What happened? You have to tell me,” she insists.
He shakes his head, a bit dizzy.
“Will you at least let me heal you?” She asks.
Will he? Should he? Draco had been attacked by wizards who probably had every reason to hate him. They’d probably lost family members in the war.
“Hold still.” Granger doesn’t give him a choice. “Episkey.”
“Fuck,” he curses as his nose sets back into place. Well, at least it hurt.
“Where else are you hurt, Draco Malfoy?”
He likes her like this. Stern.
“I might have a broken rib or two,” he acquiesces.
“Lift up your shirt,” she commands.
He does as she bids, wincing as she presses her cold hands to his bruised skin. He notices that she also traces the lines of the serpent tattooed into his skin.
“Who did this?”
She huffs, casting a diagnostic spell.
Draco watches in awe as she not only heals him but eases the pain pulsing through his body with a few well cast healing spells.
She’s incredible. Not that he thought any different.
Brightest Witch of her Age and all that crap.
“Feel better?” She asks, pulling the hem of his shirt down, her fingertips grazing his hip gently.
“Thank you, Granger. You didn’t have to do that.”
“Of course I did! You were hurt. When did this happen? Who was it? Were they wizards?”
“I don’t know who it was, but yes they were wizards. I was jumped on my walk home last night,” he decides to tell her.
“Oh Draco, I am so sorry. You’ve just been in pain all day then? You should have called me. Or Laura at the very least.”
“I haven’t got a mobile.”
What a pitiful excuse that is.
“We’re going to have to get you one. We’ll go after work,” she states, making it clear he doesn’t have a choice in the matter.
“I’m just supposed to sit around waiting for you to be done?” He asks, finally managing a bit of cheek.
“Yes. You can run out and get us dinner. And then you can tell me everything you remember from last night.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Draco should have known she wouldn’t just let him pretend it hadn’t happened.
Granger faces everything head on.
It’s another of her best qualities.