I'm Your Man 2/5
Chapter 2
'My flowers had just about given up in despair,
so with the exception of a few plotted plants from the florist,
we're flowerless for the first spring in years.'
Just as I had been taught I laid my hands flat on both sides of the keyboard to indicate that I had completed the sentence. Harry Potter was looking from his typing exercise book and onto the screen in front of me. His eyes scanned my efforts for any little mistake. He frowned and I knew I was in trouble.
“What is a “plotted plant”?”
“A plant that plots” I said glibly but I still cringed when I felt the stinging hex on my arm. It had been the fifth time that day. .
If I were to roll up my robe sleeves the skin of my bare arms would be red and inflamed. His wand was merciless in its precision.
“Type it again Draco and this time without any errors.” He said impatiently and deleted my screen.
Something turned in my stomach at his tone. An angry Harry Potter meant an unpredictable taskmaster.
My fingers moved through the keyboard slowly. Even thought I had been practicing for the better part of a week I had yet to be trusted with the job I was hired for.
My flowers had just about given up in despair,
so with the exceoption
A slashing hex cut the back of my hand and a trickle of red blood oozed out. Harry roughly grabbed my hands and placed them back on the keys.
“Do it again...and get it right. You're wasting my time.”
I said nothing and moved through the exercise once more. My hands were shaking a little making the small letters even more difficult to find. I wasn't supposed to look at them. I made another mistake and this time he slammed the book on my desk. I ventured a glance
and met his cool green gaze. "I'm sorry ... sir. I've only written in scrolls and this muggle way is very difficult for me. " He didn't say anything for awhile. I felt myself shrinking under his gaze. My father would roll in his grave if he saw me doing so. That is if his body had not been cast to the North Sea when he died in Azkaban. I'd been locked in the closed ward by then.. I was startled when he spoke calmly. "This was Hermione's idea and she has a good basis for it. All knowledge in this society is concealed in some scroll or text that will eat your hand if you don't use the right incantation to open it. We had to decipher a bloody book of fairy tales to get to the truth about Voldemort. And now we have all this information...narratives, interviews, the strategic plans from the Death Eaters, pensieve memories. Everything we have assembled to get the record straight once and for all so that the next threat to the wizarding world can be handled differently." "So that next time we won't have to rely on a seventeen-year-old boy to save us." I ventured. He narrowed his eyes but nodded. "And putting it here..." I pointed to the screen. "...is the best way?"
"This will make it accessible especially to the muggleborns who will not grow up hearing about Albus Dumbledore, Voldemort..." "And Harry Potter" I interrupted and rubbed at the slash mark on my right hand. "Yes." "I see. But it is still very hard." I said quietly and waited for his answer.
In all my years watching Harry Potter I had become quite good at deciphering what
he felt. Therefore the look on his face told me that he was going for my jugular. But
even then I wasn't prepared for his questions. "What do you do when you get home?" he asked coldly. "I d..don't know...I guess---I guess I go to sleep." I stammered. "Why do you take those potions Draco?" My heart sank. "I don't know"
He moved towards me slowly like a predator. "Is it that sometimes the pain inside comes to the surface...the guilt for what you did just gets too difficult for you to deal with? Are you trying to excape?" Oh God. "I don't know." "Maybe you want to lose yourself. Dream your identity away. Forget that you chose to follow him. Forget that you almost killed Katie Bell and that you let a werewolf disfigure Bill Weasley." "Please stop." My breath was trapped in my lungs. He advanced even more so that he
stood in front of me. I could not raise my eyes to meet his. "You were so proud to have been chosen. You wanted to murder an old man who had shown you nothing but fairness." "No.. don't." I wanted to fall asleep. Forever. "And then you got away with it Draco. You didn't go to Azkaban and got to go back to your manor." "My parents.. they..." "They got what they deserved but you didn't. St. Mungo's is not prison." "I know." He leaned down to my level. "So you see the problem. There is no escape for you.
You don't deserve it. Have I made that perfectly clear?" "I don't deserve it." "Never again." "Okay." I agreed. "Now you know what I want you to do? I want you to stay in this room the entire night. I want you to remain in that chair and stare at that keyboard until you memorize where each letter is. Incarcerous!" Thin white ropes sprang from the chair I was sitting in. They surrounded my body until I was secured to the chair and unable to move. I wiggled a little but they would not give. I sat back against the chair and closed my eyes. He left without sparing me another glance. Some moments later the lights were extinguished and the floo connection was turned off. Hours later, when I could no longer feel my limbs, I wondered about the emotions coursing
through my imprisoned body. I found something comforting in those ropes holding me trapped.
Something that was entirely missing when I went home.
Peace and Harry Potter.
TBC.