Origami // Draco Malfoy

Chapter 8: Bittersweet

"What did he want?" Draco raised his voice so that I could hear him from across the hall. He was practically shouting, but nevertheless made no effort to move closer and expected me to come to him. He pointed at the closed door of the D.A.D.A. classroom, inside sat Professor Lupin, who I had just had a very strange conversation with.

"None of your business," I said sharply when I reached him. "What do you want?"

He didn't reply to that. The only thing that came out of his mouth was, "Goodness me, Willows. You look awful," which wasn't shocking. Draco loved to rub in other people's insecurities as if they weren't aware of them before he pointed them out.

"Bug off, Malfoy, will you?"

He was right though. My eyes were still red from crying in front of Lupin and my attempt at fixing my hair this morning had failed miserably. The already messy ponytail could not hide the frizzy strands of hair from poking up and the bags under my eyes were still the same shade of deep purple as a few hours ago. I felt just as bad as I looked too. Every single muscle in my body seemed like it was giving in to gravity. I had to force myself to remain standing. And to top it all off, my vision was one big hazy fuzz. Everything around me, the students, the teachers, the lights, and now Draco, all seemed to move at a dragged pace.

"Fine, I'll ignore the terrible state you're in. Not for your sake, but we have a Transfigurations test next week," He took a step back as though my tiredness was contagious.

"I am aware."

He looked at me with a puzzled frown, "So, when do you want to meet?" According to him, I was an idiot for not suggesting a time and place already.

"I thought you were good at Transfigurations?" I asked. I knew I agreed to help him, but I honestly didn't think he would want to be around me again.

"I'm terrific at it actually," He boasted, "I just can't get this spell right and you said you would help me."

I sighed, loud enough to hint that I was doing this against my will, "Fine. Tomorrow? After dinner?"

Without even listening to my suggestion, Draco said, "No, today. During dinner. We're going to my common room again."

Was he being serious? "Why did you even ask me if you were just going to tell me what time we were meeting?" I asked irritably.

"I've said it before, Willows. I'm a gentleman."

"Whatever you say to yourself to make you sleep at night," I scoffed.

"Seems like you should be telling yourself some of that too," he said, pointing at the dark circles under my eyes. "Tonight. Same place. Same time. Don't be late."

.⋆✲*☾*✲⋆.

I had a free period at the end of my day so, I was waiting in the library until Draco would be finished with his final class. Barely anyone was here. Everyone was either in class, sitting in the Great Hall, already waiting for dinner, or playing with the snow outside. I looked around, taking in the surroundings of the cosy library. Everything around me was dripping with Christmas spirit. In every room of the castle were placed at least 3 Christmas trees, all heavily decorated and lit in the different House colours. I thought about how I used to spend Christmas at home. It was one of the only days my brother Jason would dare to look at me. When I was ten, the last year at home before I left for Hogwarts, he had given me a tiny music box that used to belong to my mother. When you turned the little lever, it played the song my mother used to sing to me whenever I was crying in bed. Without it, I wouldn't shut an eye. That melody hadn't left my mind since. I still keep the music box on me at all times to remind myself that dead doesn't mean gone. My mother's song keeps being sung, now just by myself. I was three when I celebrated my last Christmas with my parents. Even though I couldn't remember much of it, I could still envision my parents, my brother, and I sitting together at a heavily decorated table full of lights and holly. I remembered my dad and Jason pulling hard on a Christmas cracker and my brother almost falling off his chair when the cardboard snapped in two. I also remembered my dad then giving the paper crown that was inside of it and placing it on my head. The memory felt so peaceful. I was so careless, so unaware of the things I was about to lose.