the trial ; d.m

30

There is no discretion in her question. She asks it loud and clear, knowing Theodore's at work and there's no chance of him arriving home any time soon.

Draco's expression doesn't flicker.

"I hardly remember a thing from that party, Riddle." She notices how drained he sounds, as if this conversation is sucking the life from him with every word he's forced to speak.

"Well that's a load of bollocks and we both know it."

He stands with his back turned, and she can only imagine what his expression is saying.

She continues, "We're not at Hogwarts anymore, Draco. We're no longer a pair of complicated teenagers— not supposed to be anyway. Enough with the games. It's pathetic."

He hastily jerks around to face her, lifting his sunglasses, that he hasn't bothered to take off, from the bridge of his nose so that she must be faced with his emotionless eyes. Boring their way into her gut with their emptiness.

"I can't stand this silence. I feel like I'm losing my sanity over it all. And you won't even look at me, let alone speak to me. Apart from the other night— which was uncalled for, by the way. You never needed to step in like that. I don't know why you acted like you cared. I just don't understand—"

"Did you enjoy it?" he cuts her off, the tone of his voice slicing clean and harsh through her sentence like a blade.

His eyes now blaze into hers, scorching her with their fiery venom. "When you fucked him that night."

She chokes. "What? How do you— You saw?"

"Was I not supposed to? Did I interrupt your special moment with your loyal, loving husband?"

She recalls vague flashes of Draco's face in her memories of this moment, though she thought it to be a hallucination. Perhaps even a figment of one of her dreams.

"I hardly even remember—"

"Oh, fuck off with that, Geneva. Yes, you were pissed out of your head, but no one forced you to fuck him. It's okay though. I'm not angry. Not really. He's your husband after all. What the fuck am I?"

"Well you can hardly blame me! After how I found you," she hisses in return, defending her corner.

He laughs manically, distaste seething from him.

"I suppose you have a point," his grin remains and her anger exceeds her. He's not even trying to defend himself.

"So what am I to you then? The only female in close proximity that you can shag in your boredom of this imprisonment?"

Draco lets out an abrupt, manic laugh, as if she's just said the most ridiculous, childish thing.

"If that's what you want to believe," he shrugs. There's no flicker of feeling in that stone cold expression of his. No quiver of regret in that perfectly set jaw.

But then he continues, his tone flipped on its axis. "If you would be stupid enough to make yourself think that I would even be interested in looking at another woman when your presence consumes the entire fucking room, then so be it."

What?

She stops, shortly, eyes wide in awe at his words. She can't think of what to say. Words are completely lost on her.

"But yeah, Geneva. I did see you two that night. And I know you did it just to spite me. To make me jealous and to make me suffer this ridiculous effect you appear to have on me. And I hate to say that it fucking worked, but it did. Because all I wanted to do that night was find you, explain that whatever you made yourself believe was complete bullshit, and that not a single part of me would rather have a woman who isn't you. So you can go ahead and delude yourself into believing that I only use you to cure my boredom in this period of time that was supposed to be perpetual hell. You can believe that this is just a game. And you can hate me for it. If that what you wanna do, it's fine by me."