She shrugged. "Vaguely." She pressed her lips together; curved them into a weary smile. "I think it's safe to say," she said, "that he's not a fan of us being together."
Draco didn't return her smile. "I'm going to go to the Manor," he said. "You should stay here - I'm going to go over - and -"
She moved towards him; touched her fingertips to his bare arm. "And what, Draco?" she asked. "What could you possibly say to him, that could fix this?"
"Fucking - anything -" he said angrily. "He's playing with my life and now he's playing with yours -"
"I guarantee that if your father finds out you know I'm alive, he'll take your memories, too." She dropped her hand from his arm. Her eyes stayed on his: sad and tired. "And I don't know what will happen after that."
Draco's heart thudded. He didn't know, either. Belly had only known him for a few days, essentially. If he were to forget everything he knew about her, he wasn't sure that she would fight to get him back.
Now that she was closer, he could see the angry mark the necklace had left behind; a thin circle around her neck, a tiny red star at the top of her sternum.
"Where's your necklace now?"
She pulled it from her coat pocket; held the coil of fine silver in her palm. "It was hurting me," she said. "It's not hot anymore, but it was burning after your dad. . ." She trailed off. "It's weird, though - I don't remember it burning me after the war. And. . ." She frowned. "If it protected my memories from being taken last night, I don't understand why it didn't protect them from being taken before. Does that make sense?"
"You should put it on," said Draco. The words came out in a rush, in a single breath. And he knew she wouldn't like it, knew she would disagree, but he couldn't help himself. "You should put it back on, now."
Belly's expression hardened. "My mother is in the hospital because of this necklace."
"Because of an enchantment she put on it," he said. "Herself. She knew she would end up there, and yet she told you to keep it on."
Belly shook her head, looking all the more as if he had just betrayed her, somehow. "That doesn't mean I should do what she says."
"I don't see why not."
"Because she's not well," said Belly, her eyebrows furrowing. "She's not well - physically or mentally - and she doesn't know what she's doing, anymore. And I don't see any reason to keep the necklace on just because she wants me to."
"We know now," said Draco, trying to keep the impatience out of his voice, "that the necklace has nothing to do with your memories. All it does is protect you from attack. It keeps you safe."
"At the cost of my mother's life," she said furiously, and Draco gritted his teeth together. "I never thought it had anything to do with my memories," she continued. "I never thought that was why she told me to keep it on."
He stalked past her to the couch, flung himself down and glared at the wall.
She swivelled, following him. "So what?" she demanded. "You're going to sulk now? How's that going to help?"
They were quiet for long moments, letting her words hang between them. Then he said, finally, "We had a plan." He looked up at her. "Almost two years ago, we were lying beside the lake in school and we made a plan. We would leave this godforsaken puppet life and find a cottage in the middle of nowhere and be free from all of this shit. I guess if we'd done it sooner, you'd still be you."
Her eyes filled with tears, and he felt a stab of guilt. She was still herself, of course. She just wasn't his.
Wordlessly, she came to sit beside him on the couch. The necklace was gone from her hand now, tucked back into a pocket.
"It wouldn't have worked," he said. "I might have left my parents, but you would never have left your mother. You left Hogwarts for an entire year for her, when your father died. You would never have abandoned her just to move away to a stupid cottage."
Just like she wouldn't abandon her mother now. He didn't add that part, but it went unsaid. He saw it in the way she looked back at him - her gaze sad, but unapologetic. Unwavering.
She curled her legs under her and turned, fully facing him. "I want to remember," she said. "Do you have anything that could jog my memory?"
Draco thought of the snowdrop on his windowsill. His only remainder of her; a tiny, shitty white flower. He shook his head. "My mother threw out your things after the war."
She bit her lip, stayed silent. He watched her gaze fall to the coffee table, flickering back and forth between two random points there. She did that when she was thinking, or trying to work something out. He wished she knew something like that about him.
Then she exhaled quickly, and looked up at him. "I could watch your memories through a Pensieve," she said. "That's a great idea, actually. I don't know why we haven't thought of that before."
Draco didn't respond. He had thought of it, actually, but had hated the idea. Had selfishly hoped she would never bring it up.
"If you extract your memories, we can find a Pensieve - I'm sure there's one around somewhere that's available for us to use - and watch them." Belly's tired eyes widened with excitement. "We could watch them together, if you like."
Draco swallowed. His throat felt dry.
The fact that Belly didn't remember him was agony. The fact that he had to build up her trust all over again, to start from scratch - it was torture. He would do anything for some evidence - for anything that could prove to her that they belonged together. But he didn't want her to watch herself fall in love with him from his perspective.
He was ashamed of the way he had bothered her in fifth year, ashamed of the way he had annoyed and taunted her until she finally paid attention to him. He was ashamed of the way he had let her back into his life so easily time and time again, as if he hadn't known the danger that would put her in. He didn't know why she had fallen in love with him, but she had. She had loved him, and it had been good, and that had been that until she hadn't anymore.
And what else would she see, if she watched his memories? When he had used a Vanishing Cabinet to bring Death Eaters into Hogwarts, when he had stood at the top of the Astronomy Tower and pointed his wand at Albus Dumbledore's heart, when she found out that he had been lying to her for months. . . She had been so betrayed, by all of that. He remembered it vividly: scenes of that night still plagued his nightmares; Belly in his bedroom, backing away from him, the shock on her tear-streaked face. . .
He couldn't show her any of that. She would never love him.
If Isobel Young was to fall in love with him again, it needed to be of her own accord. Either through restoring her own memories, or if not. . . Well, he was just going to have to try all over again.
He shook his head, combed a hand through his hair. "I'm so tired," he said to her, honestly. "Can we talk about it later?"
Belly's face fell a little, her disappointment apparent. She wanted to talk about it now - he could see that. But he didn't know how to refuse her, right now.
He felt her fingers graze over his clenched fist; watched her offer him a small, half-smile. "Can we go to my house?"
He nodded, and together, they stood.
He showered and changed as she waited on the couch in his living room. Then they Apparated together to the countryside house, her small hand curled in his.
twenty-one
Start from the beginning
