Somehow, Malfoy's harsh words in the following days didn't seem to make me upset anymore. I had expected such cruelty from him, but my brain was also ignoring the tone they carried when he was the one saying it. Similar to when Graham shouts at me...
If I could get myself to pretend that the boy I agreed to let help me had a sliver of care for me somewhere inside him, then my toxic brain wouldn't try and plague my thoughts with the idea that he was plotting something else deep down and had other intentions to hurt me.
I didn't think he would use me— or maybe I just hoped he wouldn't. I had seen the hurt and pain in his eyes when he had told me about his similar past. I saw how he looked at me when he did give me the time of day. And he had been going out of his way this week to keep Adrian Pucey from stalking me like wounded prey.
Sometimes, I could tell when Malfoy's behavior was a giant act to make me believe he hated me. But others, the look on his face proved how much he meant his short-tempered insults.
There had been a few times where I got lucky enough to be in the presence of Theo, who had convinced his best friend Adrian that he would do the right thing and tattle on me if I went against Graham's rules, but in reality— he never would.
Then we had my precious boy, Blaise. The light of my life and apple of my eye. He had found a way to sneak around at night and meet with me so we could talk all about our lonely days and express how much we had been missing each other. We talked about our plans to run away one day and how the two of us would get out of here for good. But we both knew that we were shouting into the wind.
We'd never escape.
I walked myself to Transfigurations that Thursday morning, and it felt good that the air was easy to breathe. It seemed it had felt that way ever since Malfoy claimed he could help me battle the dark emotions I felt. If he could just help me learn to fight back like he had, maybe Graham would finally stop all of this, and the two of us could be happy together.
"Rookwood." I rolled my eyes from the annoying voice that had been trailing me like a puppy dog all week. He was present for almost every step, breath, and shiver I had every day. He was starting to become unbearable, and I realized that he was far from being my friend— unlike the other 2 Slytherin boys he thought were helping him out this week.
"You weren't at breakfast." He snapped next to me when his strides caught up. I put some space between us and hugged my books against my chest.
There was something in his voice this morning that didn't settle well with me. It reminded me of the harsh way Graham would speak to me when I had done something wrong.
"I wasn't hungry." I lied. If I ate a real meal, I'd most likely give in to the temptations I had been feeling of throwing all of it back up again just for the hell of it. So I decided not showing up to the dining hall wouldn't be such a waste of my time.
"That's not how this works." He snarled through a laugh. "You broke the fucking rules. Rules that I'm supposed to make sure you follow." He hissed at me. I looked at him out of the corner of my eyes and felt any courage I may have possessed slip from my body when I saw his stare.
"Why would he care if I went to breakfast or not?" I asked him quietly to draw attention away from us. Adrian was really finding more ways to make me loathe him. "Maybe I slept in."
"Don't lie to me, Rookwood. Zabini wasn't there either." He seethed with a harsh glare. That was news to me. I hadn't seen Blaise all morning. "I will send him an owl. You know that right? I'll send it right after classes." He warned me. My throat closed off as the curious students watched us stopped in the middle of the hall. I gave him a startled look.
"I was alone in Graham's bedroom with my cat! I'm not lying-"
"What? You take me for a fool?" He laughed bitterly. "I'll tell him you lied to me." He told me seriously. His fists clenched around the spine of his books and his knuckles turned white. "You know that he gave me permission to punish you, right?" Students started to murmur around us, and my eyes widened from the filthy words that left his mouth. "I don't have the same morals as Nott. I'll do exactly what Montague told me to if it means I did everything I'm supposed to-"
"Merlin, the entire lot of you are so selfish!" I laughed at him coldly. I felt like he had just exposed my secrets for everyone to hear. That I was allowed to be punished. The words still made me sick as they rung in my ears. "We have class, Pucey. Let's go." I stepped towards the room, but Adrian's hand snatched my wrist and stopped me.
I couldn't tell if I was more terrified by the judgmental looks I was being given by those around me as they watched, or by the way Adrian had grabbed ahold of me. I attempted to free myself, but he yanked me against his chest and looked down at me with daggers for eyes.
"You're hurting me." I whimpered as I looked at his hand shaking with my wrist in his grasp.
"You fucked up, Rain. Again. You ruin everyone's lives. Your mother's, your father's, Graham's... You screw everything up." His lips started to curl back into a smirk that resembled all the men I hated. The men that saw no issue in treating the woman around them like they were nothing. "How does it feel to lose all the time?"
"Pucey, that hurts." I told him quietly as he looked down on me. He let his lips travel next to my ear before he twisted my arm between us.
"Oh, but this is only the beginning, darling..." his voice sent shivers down my spine.
I ripped my wrist away from him and left him behind in the hallway he had embarrassed me in. I wanted nothing more than to be alone as I sprinted away. I need to get to my room. I can hide in there. He can't get me. Just run. Run away as fast as you-
The wind was knocked from my lungs as I turned a corner of the corridor and my chest slammed into another. Panic and pain ripped through me for a moment as I worried he had taken one of the secret passages and caught me already. Cold hands caught my shoulders that raised with a gasp for clean air, and instead of jumping away from the touch, I suddenly felt safe.
I met the eyes that brought me back down to earth despite their bitter edge, and a sense of relief overcame me. Somehow, his recent fascination with me had allowed him to pick up on a few of my triggering quirks. He knew my breakdown was coming just from the color of my face and the crazed look in my eye.
"What happened?" He cleared his throat as he observed me. He made sure I was steady on my feet before he let me go. I would have withheld the truth any other time, but I felt my heart rate increasing as I looked back over my shoulder and darted my eyes around the now empty hall for any sight of Pucey.
"Rook," he snapped his fingers in front of my face to drawl me back to him. "Tell me what happened." He looked down on me. That glimmer of hurt that he hadn't shown me for days had reappeared in his eyes as he let down his hard wall and let me through to him.
I stammered for words because if Adrian knew that I had told on him, he'd only find more ways to make me miserable. He wasn't on my side, and me making his life harder meant he wanted to make me feel the same way. But then the blonde in front of me captivated me in a way he never had before.
His cool fingers found the bottom of my chin and lifted my face towards his own. He tilted his head to the side and the new sweetness I had suddenly found in him flipped something in me.
"Don't lie to me anymore. You can trust me." He promised quietly. "I can help you, you know that." I gulped as I felt my hesitation start to bury itself.
"Adrian- he's after me. I need to go." I shook my head and tried to take off again. Draco's arm crossed my chest and caught me from running any further.
"What do you mean he's after you? Is he bothering you?" He hounded me with more questions. "I can get him to go away."
"He yelled at me that I broke the rules. He said he'd tell Graham-"
"When did he do this?" His voice clipped. It didn't appear that he even cared about what rule I had supposedly broken. His main concern at the moment was that Adrian had upset me. I tried to ease my dry throat by swallowing, but nothing seemed to help and my breathing was still quick.
"Just now- in the hallway- everyone was going to class and-"
"He said something in front of other people?" His worried eyes moved onto my own. I sucked my lip between my teeth and nodded slowly. "Was it bad? Are you okay?" His concern grew and he inched closer to me.
"He said he has permission from Graham, and that he can punish me if he needs to-" Draco's jaw started to tighten as he listened. "And now- people are going to think the rumors they heard are true. They're going to know about- about-" my breathing escalated as I thought about people knowing what happens between Graham and I behind closed doors.
"Adrian's mad at me. He wants me to feel bad." I wavered in front of him while I searched for the courage to tell him all of the truth. I lifted my arm and drew my robe back slightly to reveal the mark around my wrist that was already forming underneath. "He hurt me, Draco." My voice came out in a whisper as I acknowledged the information out loud.
I watched as the silver sparkle slowly slipped from Draco's eyes and the black pupils took over. He had stiffened as he heard my words and saw what had been done. Malfoy didn't scare me, but he suddenly looked like the old Malfoy that I used to know. The Draco I had found recently was gone in an instant.
Only the Marked and cold blooded boy looked down at my arm. Ready to strike and kill like the snake that slithered on his fair skin.
"Go to your room." His voice was deathly cold as he shoved past my shoulder and left. I knew better than to follow. I would only bring more harm than good. I took off for the dungeons to achieve exactly what I was originally searching for— sanctuary in my dorm.
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*
"Blaise?" I broke our comfortable silence as I sat between his legs and laid back on his chest. He stopped whatever it was he was up to behind my back to answer me.
"What is it, love?" He was half paying attention to me, and the other half was focused on a study guide he had made for our potions exam the following day. Only Snape would manage to ruin the mood of a Friday with a memorization test about ingredients.
"Where were you this morning?" I was just curious. His absence was what raised Pucey's brows anyway.
"I, uh," he paused for a moment like he was putting all his jumbled thoughts together, "I had to send a letter back home. There's some stuff going on, and I had to take care of it." He said coolly.
"What kind of stuff?" I asked him lowly. I used my wand to reignite the blue flame I had started to keep us warm in our outdoor escape.
"Things with my mum." His voice came out clipped.
"Oh. Is she alright?" I asked. I heard more shuffling of his paperwork.
"She's with a new man." Blaise scoffed under his breath. I wrapped my arm over one of his legs just to feel his presence even more.
It was always hard for Blaise to get any attention back home because his mother only took care of herself. Blaise got the bare minimum of the things he needed, was set to join the Dark Lord's forces one day to ensure their family safety, and his mum found man after man to spend her quality time with— each ending in breakup or divorce.
"I take it you don't like him," I snickered. He shrugged behind me and finally put his school work away.
"There's just things that make it... complicated." He snaked his arms over my shoulders and hugged me against his chest. "I'm getting it sorted out. Some changes are just going to need some adjusting to." He sighed. I placed my hand over his forearm and his lips pressed into the back of my hair.
"Have you seen Malfoy today, by any chance?" I asked slowly. My eyes flickered away from the Blake Lake for a moment, and I thanked Merlin that he couldn't see my face.
"Are we dead?" Blaise asked seriously.
"What?"
"It's just— we must be dead if you're asking me a question about Malfoy." He laughed. I elbowed his propped up knee, and he hissed from the assault.
"I was just wondering." I muttered.
"Well, why are you suddenly wondering?" He teased.
"Pucey was being an asshole to me today, and Malfoy was sort of a witness," I lied to protect the arrangements Draco and I had been running, "and I think he went to take care of it, but I haven't seen either boy since..." I felt my voice drop off towards the end.
"That's not really something to worry about." He chuckled by my ear. "Malfoy has his ways, and it's probably best if neither of us know what went down between those two." He rubbed his fingers over one of my freezing hands.
"Like I said, I was just wondering." I repeated. A silence draped over us that calmed the storm brewing my mind. The storm that Pucey had caused and the anxiety of Malfoy continued.
"So, are you two friends now?" Blaise remained casual as he burst the question that had been lingering in my own head for far too long. But I shook my head because I knew the answer.
"No. He just kind of witnessed what happened today and stopped Adrian before he could embarrass me any further." I responded. "In the right place at the right time, I guess. I think he just didn't want attention drawn in any of their direction." I shrugged. My exhausted eyes rested while Blaise hummed.
"That's logical. Malfoy hates having to clean up everyone else's mess when they find themselves in trouble." Blaise said softly. Then my mind traveled in the direction of another boy that I had been thinking about a lot today.
"When's Graham coming back?" I could almost hear Blaise rolling his eyes, but he pretended to be unbothered when he did respond.
"Any day now." He promised. I nodded softly and my heart started to race as I pictured his face. "You miss him?" He already knew my answer, but I think he was hoping for the alternative deep down.
"More than anything." I sighed.
✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*
It was like the prayers had been answered, but worry still filled my gut when I entered the scene in the common room. The boys I had either grown to trust or hate with everything in me sat on the leather couches in the center of the dark room.
The split on the bridge of Pucey's nose was enough to tell me how an unscathed Malfoy had handled the earlier situation. Goyle's voice dropped into a hushed whisper when I finally snuck back in from my visit with Blaise— but sneaking did nothing when the entire lot you needed to hide from the most was in your path.
Each of their glares had found its way to me in the silence, and I felt something inside of me die with the tension. That group on the leather couches, Malfoy included, were always predators and I was always the prey.
Any other day, the sight of this gang wouldn't have even made me flinch. I would've kept walking and not even batted an eye in their direction. They wouldn't have taken notice of me either, but this time I had drawn the attention to myself from gawking at them.
Through the years, I had forgotten how to exist on my own. This week had been a healthy reminder that I was a ghost of the person I used to be, and an empty shell of the person I could have been had my life been different. There was giant hole in my chest because a piece of who I was anymore had been missing from me.
I knew too well what types of things the group of slippery boys before me had been discussing, but instead of avoiding them, it felt like an intoxicating magic had drawn me a few steps closer.
"Graham?" I froze in place as I stared at the tired boy seated in an arm chair across the room. He rested his temple against his fist while his elbow propped itself up on the armrest. His dark eyes flickered up from the coffee table in front of him to meet my voice, and my heart swelled when I saw his chocolate eyes— despite his drained appearance.
"Hey, bunny." He smiled weakly. He sat up straight in his chair and motioned for me to walk towards him with as much energy as he could manage. My eyes wavered towards Adrian who I hoped kept his mouth shut before I swiftly cut across the room.
"We're in the middle of talking about important... business." Goyle hissed at Graham as his eyes followed me.
"What do you think she's going to do, moron? Tell on us? Spread information?" My boyfriend hissed back before his hand caught mine and dragged me down in his lap quickly. My arms found his neck and I ignored the voices of the surrounding boys as I pressed my chin against his buff shoulder and held him.
It was obvious he had grown stronger in the few long days we had been apart. The idea both haunted me and surprised me. I leaned back a little and still felt like his husky voice was on a loop. Hey, bunny. My head was spinning as I finally smelled him, felt him, brushed my fingers over his pale cheeks. All while he watched every part of me, his familiar eyes doing something to me in the deepest parts of my being.
"When- How-" I searched for the right question. "I didn't even know tonight was when you were coming back." I breathed out. He lolled his head to the side against the back of his chair and tucked my hair behind my ear.
"I didn't either." He gave me another beaten smile while he stared at my lips. "Just a change in plans I guess. I don't know when I have to go back, I'm supposed to hear in a few days." He mumbled sheepishly as his eyes grazed me.
"Montague, are you even paying attention? Or are you too busy playing house with your slag again?" Pucey spat across the sitting area, grabbing both of our attention. Why did my mind wait for Graham to spit something back at him in my defense? Instead, he gave the same typical answer he always did.
"I'm listening. I can admire a pair of breasts and use my ears, dipshit." Graham cleared his throat when the conversation picked back up and he gave me his full attention again, making my chest flutter from the way he kept his gaze on me.
"Did you miss me?" He practically whispered. I nodded softly and twisted his hair between my fingers. "I'm glad." He grinned. "I missed you." He moved his fingers against my ticklish hip to mess with me. He chuckled at my scowl before his fingers laced in my hair and he pulled my head to his to make our lips collide for the first time tonight.
I had missed this feeling so much, but it was happening again. That panicked voice in my head. My mind was playing tricks on me because the butterflies didn't sting around in my belly. It just felt like lips touching lips. No fireworks behind the sensation. The race in my heart didn't pick up. It was like we were back in his library with a pair of silver eyes watching our every move.
When Graham pulled away and gave the boy's his attention again, my eyes moved to the one I had been thinking of. The one I had been thinking of a lot recently. He must have felt my gaze staring at him because he moved his observant eyes over to me to give the stare right back. A hand over his mouth as his chin rested in it, and no emotion to his features. Except for his stare for me burning in his eyes before he looked away.
My heart was pounding. My skin was prickled with shivers. I felt something.
I'm in troubled waters.