Round Two, Challenge Three Voting
Underneath the cut you will find the drabbles and the voting for the third challenge of dmpp_ldws.
Nobody has been disqualified this week! :)
Notes
- Contestants are required to vote, but must not vote for themselves (if you do, your vote will not count).
- Please take into account this weeks prompt, which was this quote: The couple that fights the most is the one most in love... it shows they care enough to notice the other one screwed up and care enough to mention it to the person so they can fix it. When you stop fighting it means you stopped caring.
- Please vote with the number of the drabble, not the name.
elle_blessing
Title: The Weight of Us
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Rated for language.
Summary: After everything he's done and failed to do, she still fights. She fights with him and for him, and because he's forgotten how.
“You smell like something that belongs at the bottom of the dung heap.” Pansy raised her brow. A bottle hung precariously from his fingers and the amber liquid sloshed as Draco stirred awake.
“Shite. Shedevilpieceofshite.” It was a voice he’d dreaded hearing.
Pansy watched in disgust as the bottle fell from his grasp to spill on the wood floor. “I see you’ve been reduced to the lowly state of a Weasley.”
“Just fuck off, Pans. No one asked for your shite opinions.” The light shining through the drapes was doing nothing for his headache, and he leveled a glare at the woman standing before him - the perfectly put together and beautiful woman, he noted sourly.
“Perhaps you ought have asked for my opinions,” she said, heat lacing her words. “You wouldn’t be marked by the bloody devil, hungover and alone.” That she was hurt he’d left her, hadn’t trusted she could handle the path he had chosen, went unsaid.
“Maybe I should have,” he snapped. “I should have done a lot of things. I should have listened to my mother, should have been stronger, wiser, better. Maybe if I’d been bloody shite Potter, you’d be happy.” He stalked to the window and pulled the drapes shut.
Pansy wasn’t sure what she wanted more; to hex his bollocks or cry. She settled for slapping him across the face. “You left me. You left me with my father. How could you have done that?”
His cheek stung, but it was peripheral. Pansy’s eyes were glistening. Despite the anger tinting her words, he could hear the girl he’d fallen for before the world had come apart. “Pans…”
“No,” she bit out, shaking her head. “You don’t get to say my name like that and expect everything will be alright. You don’t get to wallow in your mistakes for years and even think you deserve anything we had.”
Her words sobered him more than any potion could have. He didn’t deserve her. He didn’t deserve anything - not after everything he’d done and failed to do. His threadbare existence in a shitehole flat with firewhiskey as a bedpartner wasn’t penance - it was bloody indulgence.
He sighed. “Why are you here? To rub in how I failed you?” He laughed mirthlessly. “I think I got it, Pans.”
She peered up at him. “Do you really have to ask that?” The moisture disappeared and she was glaring again. “It took me months to find you. Dedicated effort. Bloody hell, Draco. I hired several investigators. Why do you think I’m here?”
Before she could second guess herself, Pansy reached up and tangled her fingers in his hair. If there’d been questions, they disappeared as lips came together, drank. Despite the taste of firewhiskey on his tongue, he stole her breath.
For all the self-doubt that had brought him here, he kissed her as he always had; deeply, thoroughly, and intensely. She tasted like cinnamon spice and smelled of crushed rose petals. It was home. She was home.
leigh_adams
Title: Lost and Found
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG
Warning:
Summary: Love is lost, then found.
Silence.
It hung in the air, settling like a heavy cloak over the room's two occupants. One could've heard a pin drop on the marble floor, and even the elves had the good sense to stay far away from the ballroom.
Draco, immaculate in his tailored dress robes, stood by the ornate mantle, staring into the flames. They danced merrily, oblivious to the resigned air in the room.
He was fairly certain they were mocking him.
"What are you saying, Astoria?" he asked quietly, his voice traveling across the space between his wife and him.
Her heels clicked on the floor as she approached him from behind, and he didn't even look at her as she placed her antique diamond ring on the mantle beside his hand.
"There's nothing left to fight about, Draco," she said softly. "I just don't care anymore."
And as she walked out of the ballroom, leaving the trail of her perfume floating in the air behind her, Draco realized that he didn't care, either.
*~*~*~*~*
Fights with Pansy had never been like those with Astoria. Pansy pushed him to his limits and then beyond. She was unafraid to challenge him; she might have been the only person, man or woman, to challenge him. It had annoyed him when they were children, been percieved as affectionate when they were teenagers, and now, it had developed into something much, much deeper.
"You are nothing more than an overgrown flobberworm with the sensitivity of a head of Chinese Chomping Cabbage!" she spat at him, arms crossed beneath her breasts. Her nostrils were flared with her irritation, and there was a dangerous glint to her dark brown eyes.
Draco took a step closer to her. "What do you expect me to do?" he shot back. "I'm his father, not his nanny elf. He's the Malfoy and Black heir-"
"And he's five years old," Pansy reminded him, none too gently. "Merlin, Draco, Scorpius isn't like you or I. He doesn't have to live with monomaniacal parents whose only allegiance lies with some demented half-blood like we did."
"He's still the sole heir to two of the oldest and purest families in Britain," Draco rebutted as he took another step closer so that they were practically toe to toe. "And he needs to learn-"
Pansy sneered and reached up to poke him in the chest. "Don't punish him because Astoria left, Draco. Take it out on me, but not him."
Draco opened his mouth to protest her accusations but before he could, she cut him off- again- by reaching up to fist her hand in his hair, bringing his lips down to hers in a bruising kiss.
His hands moved automatically to her hips, pulling her flush against him. She was soft and warm, and her body molded easily to his.
"Why?" he whispered when she pulled away.
"Because I love you enough to tell you when you're being a gigantic arse," she murmured. "Now shut up and kiss me again."
terrayn
Title: Never Let You Go
Word Count: 500
Rating: R
Warning: profanity
Summary: Draco will never her go.
Everywhere, they are haunted by a ghost with a negative age, unseen, never unfelt.
When he falls out of bed, and she doesn’t, he tries to regret being a man of honor, of doing his damned duty by her. This, her, them - he might’ve refused it all if war, cowardice and ten years hadn’t taught him the futility of raging against Gods in the sky and gods on earth. So he tries to recall what they have in common instead; when she’s nearby, he can almost remember-taste, touch, feel-through the tunnel-long years to that bygone era of schoolyard one-upmanship and harmless flirtation, days he’d once called ‘simple’ without irony.
When he slides back into bed, and she hasn’t stirred, he thinks about the night that led them here. He tells himself that night was all nostalgia: a once in their new-lifetime chance to recapture glory days and those cocooning fantasies of being so much more in their fairy tale youth. Tracing the what-ifs behind closed eyelids, he dreams of second, third and fourth chances, of his blood boiling in anger, of gathering enough red courage to haul Pansy out of their mausoleum of a bedroom and force her glazed eyes to the sun. He wants to care enough to fight her back to life.
Twice a day, Draco murmurs, “You have to eat.”
“Leave me alone,” she always says.
One month, thirteen days and six hours after they return from St. Mungo’s, he wrestles her to the ground, ignoring her feeble lashing, gritting his teeth against her screams, and drags her into the bath. He submerges her in soap of amber and rose, her favorite scent; when she chokes on a sob and clutches the side of the marble tub, he slips in beside her and together they drift in lukewarm bathwater, silent and wound tight around each other.
“Why are you still here?” she asks after a while.
“Where else would I be?”
“I don’t know…celebrating in Bermuda, Maldives, Nice. Downing every Mojito in sight.”
Ice floods his veins, rage colder than anger. “Don't you dare say that-”
“You never wanted him!” she accuses, clenching fistfuls of his wet pyjamas. “That’s why you can go on. You never cared, never loved him-”
Draco grips her, white-knuckled. “I loved you. I loved him for you!”
“Don’t lie to me! You only married me because you knocked me up-”
He shakes her until she gasps. “Yes, but a hell of a lot can happen in seven months. You know what happened? I fell for you, Pansy. In love. And this is how you repay me?”
“I don’t owe you anything-”
“You owe me fidelity and love and death-do-us-fucking-part.”
She wrenches his hand over her too-flat abdomen. “I lost him, Draco.”
“I lost you both. I needed one of you to come back. It had to be you.”
“I know,” she whispers. “I’m…trying.”
He brushes her mouth with dried lips. “So am I. I’ll never stop.”
eonone
Title: Honey, I'm Home
Word Count: 490
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Brief language
Summary: Draco is late again, and Pansy's had enough.
“How many times have I asked you to owl if you’re going to be late?”
Draco rolled his eyes and closed the door behind him. Not even a hello.
“Please, Pansy, don’t start on me now. It’s been a long day.”
She was waiting in the entryway, arms crossed, voice terse. “Has it?”
Draco arched an eyebrow and shrugged his coat off onto the floor. He didn’t pick it up, just watched the tension creep into her jaw the longer the coat stayed there.
“Yes, it has,” he said coolly, stepping around her. “Don’t tear into me the second I walk in.”
Her shrill voice trailed after him. ”Don’t come in two hours late and then throw your fucking coat on the floor.”
Draco tossed his briefcase carelessly onto the sofa, then slunk down into his usual leather chair. Pansy came tearing in behind him, heels clicking smartly against the expensive floor.
“No more, Draco,” she said fiercely, his coat in her hand. “This is the third time this month. You think you can just waltz in hours late, no note, and then I’m supposed to cook and clean and rub your bloody feet because you had a hard day?” She flung the coat at him, then his briefcase. “Get out. You’re not staying here tonight.”
Draco got to his feet, startled. “Excuse me? This is my house.”
She raised her wand, and the look of absolute fury on her face had him skulking out the door before she had to repeat herself.
-
“Crazy bint, am I right?”
An hour and two drinks later, the bartender nodded sympathetically.
“I mean, all I ask for is a little respect, a kiss at the door and dinner on the table. Like wives are supposed to give their husbands. I give her a house, buy her jewelry. And what do I get? A nag. Nags about my clothes, my work, my fucking cufflinks. Don’t put that there, Draco. When are you going to be home, Draco? Why didn’t you send a note, Draco?” He took a swig of his drink and scowled. “Marriage.”
The bartender leaned against the counter and shrugged. “You know, I’d like to commiserate, but my wife stopped caring when I came home and where I left my dirty socks.”
Draco looked surprised. “How’d you manage that?”
The bartender gave a hollow laugh. “Oh, I didn’t manage it. I think her new boyfriend had something to do with it, though.”
Draco didn’t even finish his drink, just tossed coins onto the counter and left.
-
Their bedroom door was closed, and he didn’t test the handle to see if it was locked. Draco leaned against the frame and rapped his knuckles lightly against the wood.
“Pansy-”
She yanked the door open before he could even knock twice, like she’d been waiting. Even in the dim light, he could see her eyes were red from crying.
“Draco, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-”
He grabbed her face and kissed her.
“I’ll owl next time,” he promised, when they finally broke apart.
akashathekitty
Title: As We Never Were
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG-13
Warning: None.
Summary: Pansy is tired of fighting.
“Nothing happened!” Draco was insisting. He’d followed her home to do so.
“So you keep saying.” Pansy looked away, wondering why she felt nothing but exhaustion. A year ago, she would have screamed, cried and thrown things at walking in on Draco standing too closely to another witch, flirting too freely, touching too casually. Tonight, however, she really just wanted to pretend she hadn’t seen.
“But you don’t believe me,” he insisted. “I can tell you don’t.”
She believed him; she just didn’t care.
The truth of that hit her like a brick. She honestly didn’t care!
She took another long look at Draco. She’d always loved him, always wanted to be with him, but lately... it just hadn’t been the same. She was tired of all the high drama.
“Say something,” he demanded, looking every bit as tired as she felt.
Pansy had never doubted that Draco wouldn’t cheat on her. Cheating would go against everything he admired and wanted in a relationship. Yet he did crave attention, and silly little flirts satisfied that need in him. Especially now that Pansy had stopped feeding his ego.
“I know nothing happened,” she calmly replied. “You were just talking. It’s fine, really.”
His gaze flickered. “Where’s the trap? It’s never fine!”
“No trap. It really is fine.”
She turned away, but he grabbed her arm. “What is this? You don’t even care?”
She swallowed. How did you answer that question truthfully without hurting anyone? You didn’t. “Of course I care.”
“No. You don’t.”
She sighed. It seemed they really had to take this one tonight. “Ok. I don’t.”
“Thanks a lot, Pans! This is how you finish with me after all this time?” He abruptly let go of her as if burned.
Finish with him? Was that what she’d just done? “I don’t know, Draco. I still care about you. I still love you for that matter. But I just don’t...” She couldn’t find the words.
“You don’t want to be with me anymore.” He shoved his hands in his pockets.
It was the truth, but hearing it stated so bluntly still hurt. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. It seemed like such an inadequate thing to say, but at the same time, she meant it more than anything. She was so sorry she couldn’t even begin to describe it.
He shook his head. “Don’t be. It was only a matter of time.”
“What?” She frowned, blindsided by this new direction.
He attempted a small smile. “Nobody can go on like that forever, Pans. You either calm down or burn out. We burned out.”
“You too?” she couldn’t help but ask. Then she narrowed her eyes, recalling the past few months. Come to think of it, Draco hadn’t seemed quite as passionate as he used to. He’d obviously been going through the motions.
He nodded, looking embarrassed. “But I wanted us to work. I really did.”
She smiled a bit sadly and touched his cheek. “We both did. Sometimes that just isn’t enough.”
alley_skywalker
Title: Real Love Has Eyes...and Opinions
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG
Warning: none
Summary: Draco thinks Pansy doesn't love him and has to find out the truth the hard way...
Draco left her because he thought she didn’t love him.
Pansy always had something to say about everything he did: what he wore, what causes he supported, how he chose to spend his time… At first he found it amusing - the critical way she watched him and her hot flashes of anger when she saw something she didn’t like. She was even more beautiful and desirable when her eyes blazed and her cheeks flushed. But he didn’t understand why everything he did was always pointed out, why she couldn’t overlook anything. He felt used and unwanted, almost unworthy, though he would never admit to that out loud.
So he left her. She didn’t cry, He felt justified.
Draco met Astoria at a Ministry ball. She was beautiful and Pureblooded. She had none of Pansy’s passion but she gave him what he wanted. She loved the champagne he chose, his hairstyle, his causes, what he said, what he did. Draco was in love. He felt important, loved, perfect. So he proposed. She adored the engagement ring.
Before the ceremony, Pansy barged her way into his dressing room. Unceremonious and fiery as always, in a black gown more suited for a war memorial dinner than a wedding.
“Parkinson! I could have been naked!”
Pansy didn’t answer just looked him over from head to foot. “You should have chosen black robes. Not these dark green ones. These don’t suit you.”
“What are you…? Astoria thinks I look great in them.”
Pansy didn’t seem to hear him. “And who in the world chose Astoria’s wedding dress?”
“I did-I mean she did!”
“You did,” Pansy repeats scornfully. “I can tell. Only a male could choose something so vulgar.”
Draco threw his hands in the air. “What do you want, Pamsy?”
Pansy glared at him. “Tell me, what does Astoria think about politics?”
“She thinks what I think.”
“Music?”
“We have the same taste.”
“Fashion?”
“She-we-Pansy, what-?”
“Does the girl even have an opinion about anything?” Draco stared at her bewildered but realized he wasn’t sure of the answer himself. Astoria seemed to always agree with him. Was that bad? “Do you even know why she’s marrying you?” Pansy asked more softly, biting her lip. “Her parents are nearly bankrupt. They need to marry her off brilliantly and the faster the better, before anyone finds out…”
When he told Astoria he wasn’t going to marry her she cried. She cried. Then told him she had always thought him a “useless cad and a pathetic snob.” She slammed the door in his face.
Draco stood staring at the thick oak door for a few moments before choking out: “Fine. So you were right.”
Pansy slipped out from behind the velvet curtains. She put her arms around him and said quietly, “I know you left because I told you things you didn’t want to hear but I did because I love you.”
“Why wait this long to tell me?”
“Because back then you wouldn’t have understood.”
lokifan
Title: Sugar and Spice
Word Count: 498
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Epilogue compliant
Summary: Astoria is so kind, and he’ll never stop being grateful. But he prefers Pansy’s old rage.
He’d fallen for Astoria easily, sweet and simple as falling asleep.
She was so charming, and beautiful, too: big blue eyes and light hair that she wore up, tendrils of blonde curling about the nape of her neck. She was kind to him and careful with his bruises. In a world that had turned dark and harsh so suddenly, Astoria was a haven.
Astoria seemed innocent, but she was only two years younger than he was, and not stupid. She’d been fifteen under Amycus Carrow’s philandering eyes, she’d been a Slytherin faced with two more years at Hogwarts, and she’d known he brought the Death Eaters there. She chose him nonetheless and never mentioned his mistakes, and he would never stop being grateful.
She wasn’t like Pansy.
He and Pansy had been friends through puberty: sometimes friendly acquaintances from either side of the gender divide, later adolescent lovers. They’d taken all the rage of youth and first love out on each other. In sixth year, while Vince and Greg remained sullenly compliant, she screamed at him. Her shrieking voice and wet, raging eyes had cut deeply.
She hadn’t said he was weak, or evil, or cruel. She’d said he was stupid.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid! Draco how could you? You’ve got to stop, please, you must.” And she fell on him, her mouth open and clinging, and he shut his eyes and lost himself in her heat.
They’d fought throughout seventh year and beyond. The day after Draco was acquitted of treason he and Pansy spent seven hours ripping each other’s heads off via owl post before she consented to visit the Manor.
Two months later, he met Astoria.
He’d never planned to fall in love. He hadn’t needed to: Pansy was there, steadfast and confident in her ability to capture him. He’d never thought of another girl seriously until he was fifteen, and after that Draco needed her far too much to let go.
But Astoria was... so different from everyone else. She let him forget his mistakes, where Pansy’s barbed remarks recalled them.
He was sick of taunts, and sick of magnanimous forgiveness from the victors. Why shouldn’t he choose blissful oblivion over Pansy’s angry devotion?
He felt sick the afternoon he introduced Astoria as his girlfriend. After Astoria left, Pansy looked at him with her black eyes snapping. “How utterly boring, Draco. I hope you’re dumping her.”
“I’m asking her to be my wife,” he said quietly, and watched her eyes ice over.
“I see.”
She attended the wedding in rose-pink robes. She comes to every Slytherin night out and she has tea with Draco sometimes. He tells her about his life, tells her about foolish work decisions and the stupid gift he gave Scorpius. She nods and says nothing.
Narcissa once commented on their changed relationship: how nice it was, to see that they’ve grown up into mellow friendship after such a tempestuous relationship as teenagers.
Draco nodded, sick, and agreed it was better now.
Voting
Please copy the below into a comment (they are screened) and vote with the number of the drabble.
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Thanks for voting! And please make sure to spread the word around so we get as many votes as possible! :)
Nobody has been disqualified this week! :)
Notes
- Contestants are required to vote, but must not vote for themselves (if you do, your vote will not count).
- Please take into account this weeks prompt, which was this quote: The couple that fights the most is the one most in love... it shows they care enough to notice the other one screwed up and care enough to mention it to the person so they can fix it. When you stop fighting it means you stopped caring.
- Please vote with the number of the drabble, not the name.
elle_blessing
Title: The Weight of Us
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Rated for language.
Summary: After everything he's done and failed to do, she still fights. She fights with him and for him, and because he's forgotten how.
“You smell like something that belongs at the bottom of the dung heap.” Pansy raised her brow. A bottle hung precariously from his fingers and the amber liquid sloshed as Draco stirred awake.
“Shite. Shedevilpieceofshite.” It was a voice he’d dreaded hearing.
Pansy watched in disgust as the bottle fell from his grasp to spill on the wood floor. “I see you’ve been reduced to the lowly state of a Weasley.”
“Just fuck off, Pans. No one asked for your shite opinions.” The light shining through the drapes was doing nothing for his headache, and he leveled a glare at the woman standing before him - the perfectly put together and beautiful woman, he noted sourly.
“Perhaps you ought have asked for my opinions,” she said, heat lacing her words. “You wouldn’t be marked by the bloody devil, hungover and alone.” That she was hurt he’d left her, hadn’t trusted she could handle the path he had chosen, went unsaid.
“Maybe I should have,” he snapped. “I should have done a lot of things. I should have listened to my mother, should have been stronger, wiser, better. Maybe if I’d been bloody shite Potter, you’d be happy.” He stalked to the window and pulled the drapes shut.
Pansy wasn’t sure what she wanted more; to hex his bollocks or cry. She settled for slapping him across the face. “You left me. You left me with my father. How could you have done that?”
His cheek stung, but it was peripheral. Pansy’s eyes were glistening. Despite the anger tinting her words, he could hear the girl he’d fallen for before the world had come apart. “Pans…”
“No,” she bit out, shaking her head. “You don’t get to say my name like that and expect everything will be alright. You don’t get to wallow in your mistakes for years and even think you deserve anything we had.”
Her words sobered him more than any potion could have. He didn’t deserve her. He didn’t deserve anything - not after everything he’d done and failed to do. His threadbare existence in a shitehole flat with firewhiskey as a bedpartner wasn’t penance - it was bloody indulgence.
He sighed. “Why are you here? To rub in how I failed you?” He laughed mirthlessly. “I think I got it, Pans.”
She peered up at him. “Do you really have to ask that?” The moisture disappeared and she was glaring again. “It took me months to find you. Dedicated effort. Bloody hell, Draco. I hired several investigators. Why do you think I’m here?”
Before she could second guess herself, Pansy reached up and tangled her fingers in his hair. If there’d been questions, they disappeared as lips came together, drank. Despite the taste of firewhiskey on his tongue, he stole her breath.
For all the self-doubt that had brought him here, he kissed her as he always had; deeply, thoroughly, and intensely. She tasted like cinnamon spice and smelled of crushed rose petals. It was home. She was home.
leigh_adams
Title: Lost and Found
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG
Warning:
Summary: Love is lost, then found.
Silence.
It hung in the air, settling like a heavy cloak over the room's two occupants. One could've heard a pin drop on the marble floor, and even the elves had the good sense to stay far away from the ballroom.
Draco, immaculate in his tailored dress robes, stood by the ornate mantle, staring into the flames. They danced merrily, oblivious to the resigned air in the room.
He was fairly certain they were mocking him.
"What are you saying, Astoria?" he asked quietly, his voice traveling across the space between his wife and him.
Her heels clicked on the floor as she approached him from behind, and he didn't even look at her as she placed her antique diamond ring on the mantle beside his hand.
"There's nothing left to fight about, Draco," she said softly. "I just don't care anymore."
And as she walked out of the ballroom, leaving the trail of her perfume floating in the air behind her, Draco realized that he didn't care, either.
*~*~*~*~*
Fights with Pansy had never been like those with Astoria. Pansy pushed him to his limits and then beyond. She was unafraid to challenge him; she might have been the only person, man or woman, to challenge him. It had annoyed him when they were children, been percieved as affectionate when they were teenagers, and now, it had developed into something much, much deeper.
"You are nothing more than an overgrown flobberworm with the sensitivity of a head of Chinese Chomping Cabbage!" she spat at him, arms crossed beneath her breasts. Her nostrils were flared with her irritation, and there was a dangerous glint to her dark brown eyes.
Draco took a step closer to her. "What do you expect me to do?" he shot back. "I'm his father, not his nanny elf. He's the Malfoy and Black heir-"
"And he's five years old," Pansy reminded him, none too gently. "Merlin, Draco, Scorpius isn't like you or I. He doesn't have to live with monomaniacal parents whose only allegiance lies with some demented half-blood like we did."
"He's still the sole heir to two of the oldest and purest families in Britain," Draco rebutted as he took another step closer so that they were practically toe to toe. "And he needs to learn-"
Pansy sneered and reached up to poke him in the chest. "Don't punish him because Astoria left, Draco. Take it out on me, but not him."
Draco opened his mouth to protest her accusations but before he could, she cut him off- again- by reaching up to fist her hand in his hair, bringing his lips down to hers in a bruising kiss.
His hands moved automatically to her hips, pulling her flush against him. She was soft and warm, and her body molded easily to his.
"Why?" he whispered when she pulled away.
"Because I love you enough to tell you when you're being a gigantic arse," she murmured. "Now shut up and kiss me again."
terrayn
Title: Never Let You Go
Word Count: 500
Rating: R
Warning: profanity
Summary: Draco will never her go.
Everywhere, they are haunted by a ghost with a negative age, unseen, never unfelt.
When he falls out of bed, and she doesn’t, he tries to regret being a man of honor, of doing his damned duty by her. This, her, them - he might’ve refused it all if war, cowardice and ten years hadn’t taught him the futility of raging against Gods in the sky and gods on earth. So he tries to recall what they have in common instead; when she’s nearby, he can almost remember-taste, touch, feel-through the tunnel-long years to that bygone era of schoolyard one-upmanship and harmless flirtation, days he’d once called ‘simple’ without irony.
When he slides back into bed, and she hasn’t stirred, he thinks about the night that led them here. He tells himself that night was all nostalgia: a once in their new-lifetime chance to recapture glory days and those cocooning fantasies of being so much more in their fairy tale youth. Tracing the what-ifs behind closed eyelids, he dreams of second, third and fourth chances, of his blood boiling in anger, of gathering enough red courage to haul Pansy out of their mausoleum of a bedroom and force her glazed eyes to the sun. He wants to care enough to fight her back to life.
Twice a day, Draco murmurs, “You have to eat.”
“Leave me alone,” she always says.
One month, thirteen days and six hours after they return from St. Mungo’s, he wrestles her to the ground, ignoring her feeble lashing, gritting his teeth against her screams, and drags her into the bath. He submerges her in soap of amber and rose, her favorite scent; when she chokes on a sob and clutches the side of the marble tub, he slips in beside her and together they drift in lukewarm bathwater, silent and wound tight around each other.
“Why are you still here?” she asks after a while.
“Where else would I be?”
“I don’t know…celebrating in Bermuda, Maldives, Nice. Downing every Mojito in sight.”
Ice floods his veins, rage colder than anger. “Don't you dare say that-”
“You never wanted him!” she accuses, clenching fistfuls of his wet pyjamas. “That’s why you can go on. You never cared, never loved him-”
Draco grips her, white-knuckled. “I loved you. I loved him for you!”
“Don’t lie to me! You only married me because you knocked me up-”
He shakes her until she gasps. “Yes, but a hell of a lot can happen in seven months. You know what happened? I fell for you, Pansy. In love. And this is how you repay me?”
“I don’t owe you anything-”
“You owe me fidelity and love and death-do-us-fucking-part.”
She wrenches his hand over her too-flat abdomen. “I lost him, Draco.”
“I lost you both. I needed one of you to come back. It had to be you.”
“I know,” she whispers. “I’m…trying.”
He brushes her mouth with dried lips. “So am I. I’ll never stop.”
eonone
Title: Honey, I'm Home
Word Count: 490
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Brief language
Summary: Draco is late again, and Pansy's had enough.
“How many times have I asked you to owl if you’re going to be late?”
Draco rolled his eyes and closed the door behind him. Not even a hello.
“Please, Pansy, don’t start on me now. It’s been a long day.”
She was waiting in the entryway, arms crossed, voice terse. “Has it?”
Draco arched an eyebrow and shrugged his coat off onto the floor. He didn’t pick it up, just watched the tension creep into her jaw the longer the coat stayed there.
“Yes, it has,” he said coolly, stepping around her. “Don’t tear into me the second I walk in.”
Her shrill voice trailed after him. ”Don’t come in two hours late and then throw your fucking coat on the floor.”
Draco tossed his briefcase carelessly onto the sofa, then slunk down into his usual leather chair. Pansy came tearing in behind him, heels clicking smartly against the expensive floor.
“No more, Draco,” she said fiercely, his coat in her hand. “This is the third time this month. You think you can just waltz in hours late, no note, and then I’m supposed to cook and clean and rub your bloody feet because you had a hard day?” She flung the coat at him, then his briefcase. “Get out. You’re not staying here tonight.”
Draco got to his feet, startled. “Excuse me? This is my house.”
She raised her wand, and the look of absolute fury on her face had him skulking out the door before she had to repeat herself.
-
“Crazy bint, am I right?”
An hour and two drinks later, the bartender nodded sympathetically.
“I mean, all I ask for is a little respect, a kiss at the door and dinner on the table. Like wives are supposed to give their husbands. I give her a house, buy her jewelry. And what do I get? A nag. Nags about my clothes, my work, my fucking cufflinks. Don’t put that there, Draco. When are you going to be home, Draco? Why didn’t you send a note, Draco?” He took a swig of his drink and scowled. “Marriage.”
The bartender leaned against the counter and shrugged. “You know, I’d like to commiserate, but my wife stopped caring when I came home and where I left my dirty socks.”
Draco looked surprised. “How’d you manage that?”
The bartender gave a hollow laugh. “Oh, I didn’t manage it. I think her new boyfriend had something to do with it, though.”
Draco didn’t even finish his drink, just tossed coins onto the counter and left.
-
Their bedroom door was closed, and he didn’t test the handle to see if it was locked. Draco leaned against the frame and rapped his knuckles lightly against the wood.
“Pansy-”
She yanked the door open before he could even knock twice, like she’d been waiting. Even in the dim light, he could see her eyes were red from crying.
“Draco, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have-”
He grabbed her face and kissed her.
“I’ll owl next time,” he promised, when they finally broke apart.
akashathekitty
Title: As We Never Were
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG-13
Warning: None.
Summary: Pansy is tired of fighting.
“Nothing happened!” Draco was insisting. He’d followed her home to do so.
“So you keep saying.” Pansy looked away, wondering why she felt nothing but exhaustion. A year ago, she would have screamed, cried and thrown things at walking in on Draco standing too closely to another witch, flirting too freely, touching too casually. Tonight, however, she really just wanted to pretend she hadn’t seen.
“But you don’t believe me,” he insisted. “I can tell you don’t.”
She believed him; she just didn’t care.
The truth of that hit her like a brick. She honestly didn’t care!
She took another long look at Draco. She’d always loved him, always wanted to be with him, but lately... it just hadn’t been the same. She was tired of all the high drama.
“Say something,” he demanded, looking every bit as tired as she felt.
Pansy had never doubted that Draco wouldn’t cheat on her. Cheating would go against everything he admired and wanted in a relationship. Yet he did crave attention, and silly little flirts satisfied that need in him. Especially now that Pansy had stopped feeding his ego.
“I know nothing happened,” she calmly replied. “You were just talking. It’s fine, really.”
His gaze flickered. “Where’s the trap? It’s never fine!”
“No trap. It really is fine.”
She turned away, but he grabbed her arm. “What is this? You don’t even care?”
She swallowed. How did you answer that question truthfully without hurting anyone? You didn’t. “Of course I care.”
“No. You don’t.”
She sighed. It seemed they really had to take this one tonight. “Ok. I don’t.”
“Thanks a lot, Pans! This is how you finish with me after all this time?” He abruptly let go of her as if burned.
Finish with him? Was that what she’d just done? “I don’t know, Draco. I still care about you. I still love you for that matter. But I just don’t...” She couldn’t find the words.
“You don’t want to be with me anymore.” He shoved his hands in his pockets.
It was the truth, but hearing it stated so bluntly still hurt. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. It seemed like such an inadequate thing to say, but at the same time, she meant it more than anything. She was so sorry she couldn’t even begin to describe it.
He shook his head. “Don’t be. It was only a matter of time.”
“What?” She frowned, blindsided by this new direction.
He attempted a small smile. “Nobody can go on like that forever, Pans. You either calm down or burn out. We burned out.”
“You too?” she couldn’t help but ask. Then she narrowed her eyes, recalling the past few months. Come to think of it, Draco hadn’t seemed quite as passionate as he used to. He’d obviously been going through the motions.
He nodded, looking embarrassed. “But I wanted us to work. I really did.”
She smiled a bit sadly and touched his cheek. “We both did. Sometimes that just isn’t enough.”
alley_skywalker
Title: Real Love Has Eyes...and Opinions
Word Count: 500
Rating: PG
Warning: none
Summary: Draco thinks Pansy doesn't love him and has to find out the truth the hard way...
Draco left her because he thought she didn’t love him.
Pansy always had something to say about everything he did: what he wore, what causes he supported, how he chose to spend his time… At first he found it amusing - the critical way she watched him and her hot flashes of anger when she saw something she didn’t like. She was even more beautiful and desirable when her eyes blazed and her cheeks flushed. But he didn’t understand why everything he did was always pointed out, why she couldn’t overlook anything. He felt used and unwanted, almost unworthy, though he would never admit to that out loud.
So he left her. She didn’t cry, He felt justified.
Draco met Astoria at a Ministry ball. She was beautiful and Pureblooded. She had none of Pansy’s passion but she gave him what he wanted. She loved the champagne he chose, his hairstyle, his causes, what he said, what he did. Draco was in love. He felt important, loved, perfect. So he proposed. She adored the engagement ring.
Before the ceremony, Pansy barged her way into his dressing room. Unceremonious and fiery as always, in a black gown more suited for a war memorial dinner than a wedding.
“Parkinson! I could have been naked!”
Pansy didn’t answer just looked him over from head to foot. “You should have chosen black robes. Not these dark green ones. These don’t suit you.”
“What are you…? Astoria thinks I look great in them.”
Pansy didn’t seem to hear him. “And who in the world chose Astoria’s wedding dress?”
“I did-I mean she did!”
“You did,” Pansy repeats scornfully. “I can tell. Only a male could choose something so vulgar.”
Draco threw his hands in the air. “What do you want, Pamsy?”
Pansy glared at him. “Tell me, what does Astoria think about politics?”
“She thinks what I think.”
“Music?”
“We have the same taste.”
“Fashion?”
“She-we-Pansy, what-?”
“Does the girl even have an opinion about anything?” Draco stared at her bewildered but realized he wasn’t sure of the answer himself. Astoria seemed to always agree with him. Was that bad? “Do you even know why she’s marrying you?” Pansy asked more softly, biting her lip. “Her parents are nearly bankrupt. They need to marry her off brilliantly and the faster the better, before anyone finds out…”
When he told Astoria he wasn’t going to marry her she cried. She cried. Then told him she had always thought him a “useless cad and a pathetic snob.” She slammed the door in his face.
Draco stood staring at the thick oak door for a few moments before choking out: “Fine. So you were right.”
Pansy slipped out from behind the velvet curtains. She put her arms around him and said quietly, “I know you left because I told you things you didn’t want to hear but I did because I love you.”
“Why wait this long to tell me?”
“Because back then you wouldn’t have understood.”
lokifan
Title: Sugar and Spice
Word Count: 498
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Epilogue compliant
Summary: Astoria is so kind, and he’ll never stop being grateful. But he prefers Pansy’s old rage.
He’d fallen for Astoria easily, sweet and simple as falling asleep.
She was so charming, and beautiful, too: big blue eyes and light hair that she wore up, tendrils of blonde curling about the nape of her neck. She was kind to him and careful with his bruises. In a world that had turned dark and harsh so suddenly, Astoria was a haven.
Astoria seemed innocent, but she was only two years younger than he was, and not stupid. She’d been fifteen under Amycus Carrow’s philandering eyes, she’d been a Slytherin faced with two more years at Hogwarts, and she’d known he brought the Death Eaters there. She chose him nonetheless and never mentioned his mistakes, and he would never stop being grateful.
She wasn’t like Pansy.
He and Pansy had been friends through puberty: sometimes friendly acquaintances from either side of the gender divide, later adolescent lovers. They’d taken all the rage of youth and first love out on each other. In sixth year, while Vince and Greg remained sullenly compliant, she screamed at him. Her shrieking voice and wet, raging eyes had cut deeply.
She hadn’t said he was weak, or evil, or cruel. She’d said he was stupid.
“Stupid, stupid, stupid! Draco how could you? You’ve got to stop, please, you must.” And she fell on him, her mouth open and clinging, and he shut his eyes and lost himself in her heat.
They’d fought throughout seventh year and beyond. The day after Draco was acquitted of treason he and Pansy spent seven hours ripping each other’s heads off via owl post before she consented to visit the Manor.
Two months later, he met Astoria.
He’d never planned to fall in love. He hadn’t needed to: Pansy was there, steadfast and confident in her ability to capture him. He’d never thought of another girl seriously until he was fifteen, and after that Draco needed her far too much to let go.
But Astoria was... so different from everyone else. She let him forget his mistakes, where Pansy’s barbed remarks recalled them.
He was sick of taunts, and sick of magnanimous forgiveness from the victors. Why shouldn’t he choose blissful oblivion over Pansy’s angry devotion?
He felt sick the afternoon he introduced Astoria as his girlfriend. After Astoria left, Pansy looked at him with her black eyes snapping. “How utterly boring, Draco. I hope you’re dumping her.”
“I’m asking her to be my wife,” he said quietly, and watched her eyes ice over.
“I see.”
She attended the wedding in rose-pink robes. She comes to every Slytherin night out and she has tea with Draco sometimes. He tells her about his life, tells her about foolish work decisions and the stupid gift he gave Scorpius. She nods and says nothing.
Narcissa once commented on their changed relationship: how nice it was, to see that they’ve grown up into mellow friendship after such a tempestuous relationship as teenagers.
Draco nodded, sick, and agreed it was better now.
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