Breath Mints / Battle Scars

Chapter 32: XXXII

January 11th, 1999

Dearest gormless bureaucratic wazzocks,

If there ever was a time to drop your high and mighty principles, grow a soul and send those bloody drugs, it's now.

Because he just walked into the dormitory and asked me to beat the shit out of him.

And that's just -

That's...

If that doesn't prove you've failed him, I don't fucking know what does.

I don't know what happened. He probably won't tell me.
But I can tell you he needs those drugs.

Send them, or I'm going to hex this journal so it turns your fingers green for the rest of your miserable fucking lives.

And yes, you can record that as an official 'threat of violence.'

Fucking go for it.

Theo

January 22nd, 1999

It reminds her of the way a balloon deflates.

Slowly. Pathetically. Going from full and colorful and smooth to small and dark and wrinkled without much warning at all.

That's what it's like watching him. And it's all she can do.

Watch.

In a matter of days, Malfoy has become a mere shadow of himself. He's lost weight. Five pounds, if she had to guess. His cheeks are gaunt, the skin under his eyes a violent and obvious shade of purple. His lips are still blue - she knows why now. But everything else is new. His posture, his behavior. He even blinks more slowly, though she's rather furious at herself for having any idea at what rate he should be blinking.

As far as she can tell, he hasn't attended a single lesson since that night in the Astronomy Tower - which means he's probably failing most of his classes. He doesn't even bother with robes. He cycles through the same three jumpers over and over again - black, charcoal gray, forest green, black, charcoal gray, forest green.

And this is only what she's observed from meals.

She's been sitting next to Ginny, back at the Gryffindor table.

That first morning after, she'd had to will quite the artificial backbone into being in order to get her legs to move in that direction.

But when she'd managed it, Ginny had taken her hand instantly under the table. Squeezed. And even without the verbal confirmation of anyone, it seemed generally accepted that she was allowed to sit there.

After all, they'd never actually forced her to leave.

Most of that had been her own doing. Her own fear and uncertainty multiplying and spreading like a virus each time she got a dirty look.

She knows full well it will take time to be on speaking terms with Ron. But Harry did manage a 'good morning' today, and Ginny has been gradually bringing her into conversations.

It's timid. Tepid.

But it's more reassurance than she's had in weeks, and she refuses to push it. Regardless of how childish she finds it all to be.

Malfoy's situation, on the other hand, seems to be rapidly spiraling out of control. If his appearance isn't enough, the behavior of the other Slytherins certainly functions as its own bright, flashing red flag.

They're watching him as though they're waiting for him to detonate.

And she realizes she is too.

Realizes that, at any given moment, all of the trauma and the fury and the abominably bad choices that make up Draco Malfoy could finally culminate into something explosive. Could finally bring him down. Collapse his cracked, teetering stone pillar of stoicism - the only thing keeping him standing. They're all just waiting for it to happen.