requirement | dramione

0.03

september 2, 1996

The Gryffindor's words ricocheted in Draco's ears as he watched her walk away.

His feet stuttered beneath him for a moment, as if she'd knocked him out of balance.

She'd shaken him, truthfully, and he needed to regain his footing.

His right hand tingled where she had healed him. He brought it to his side, as if shaking it would somehow made the strange numbness subside.

His feet shuffled once again, finally dragging him down the corridor. Have to get out before anyone else sees. The Gryffindor catching him in such a state was bad enough to begin with; he wouldn't be able to manage every encounter this morning with slandering remarks.

Just her.

She'd called him evil.

His chest was tight and, even though he tried not to stare down at it, the knuckles on his right hand tingled and twitched like a nuisance reminder that she had been the one to heal him. It was perfectly Gryffindor.

He took to the back most passage way– one he'd found last year while working for Umbridge, just behind the painting of the Scottish witches who called him handsome and whined for his attention when he didn't bother to speak to them.

The portrait close behind him, locking him inside a tight stone passageway, unlit and cold. His back hit the hard wall, his hands instantly going to the tie that had suddenly grown tight around his neck. He sucked in a breath, desperate to calm that tightness in his chest and the sound of his own heart beat burning in his ears.

Panic.

He was panicking.

Again.

He screwed his eyes shut, the tie finally coming undone in his fist, but saw only the picture of Snape.

A shaking breath left Draco's nose. Furious. With Snape, with himself, with the fucking Gryffindor.

Did she really think he was a that much of a moron?

He'd wanted his hand to hurt. Needed it to hurt. Needed anything to distract him.

His breath hitched in his throat, violent and suffocating, but he propelled himself down the passageway stairs. His chest was so tight he could hardly catch his breath. Every time he tried, sucking in a gasp of air, all he could feel was the blood stain against his white shirt; the sound of the Gryffindor's voice as she told him he was evil; Snape's hooked nose as the professor pointed his wand against Draco's throat.

His hands ran across the stone walls on either side of the thin passage.

Was he evil?

He sucked in another breath, even though his chest ached and burned where Snape's spell had stuck him repeatedly. What a fucking fabulous teacher.

The blonde haired boy blinked, rather rapidly, as if something had gotten caught in his eye. He realized then that he was crying. His eyes and cheeks were damp. He was sure his skin had gone splotchy and his cheeks were red.

And somehow, even though he was aware of exactly what was happening, he couldn't understand why he was crying. Why his hands were shaking, nervous and panic stricken, for what?

Perhaps it was Snape's ruthlessness during their lesson; the way the professor did not relent on Draco until the young boy had landed against the wall and crumbled to the floor. Snape had told him that he was going to prove his point: Draco was nothing without his assistance.