i s o b e l
It took Isobel almost two weeks to work up the courage to visit Draco again.
Two weeks, spent going over and over her thoughts. Spent avoiding her mother during the day and sneaking to the kitchen for meals in the night. Lying awake under her duvet, wondering at how quickly everything had changed.
She had rummaged through all of her possessions; sorted them and rummaged again; to find any evidence of Draco. A t-shirt, a book maybe, or another letter. But nothing. The only evidence that Draco Malfoy might once have loved her consisted of a thousand scribbled words on a crumpled, tear-stained piece of parchment.
When her mother left the house, Isobel would wrap a blanket around her shoulders, move to the living room, and think about it all from the couch instead.
She took to crying, a lot. She had never thought of herself as a particularly tearful person, but in those two weeks, she cried again and again. Confusion, sadness and fear swept over her in waves. Immobility. Helplessness. If it was true - if Draco really had loved her, and she him, what was the point in pursuing any of it? She didn't remember their relationship; he remembered it, but thought her dead. And there was no logic in seeking comfort from a person she barely knew.
But her thoughts sprang back to him, again and again. His hair, his shadowy eyes. His apartment. His letter.
One Saturday, she woke up and her sadness had dissolved into anger. In the pit of her stomach, she felt a deep resentment towards not only her mother, but towards the world. Towards everyone who had pushed her into this corner. So, she caught onto that anger, she grabbed it, twisted it; urged it to grow and spread. She kindled the flame so that it might turn into fire.
Maggie had already left for work, so Isobel pulled on jeans and a jumper, tugged her curls into a ponytail, and took the Floo Powder from her mother's room.
She navigated Diagon Alley with ease this time, keeping her head down and avoiding eye contact. She bought her own Floo Powder, aware that her mother might notice her own supply was dwindling. There was a loose floorboard in Isobel's room, under which she kept her unsent letter to Ginny. She would store the powder there.
Then she Apparated to the alleyway near Draco's apartment. She made her way to the corner of his street, from where she could see into his living room. Despite the daylight, lightbulbs gleamed from around his apartment. But she couldn't see him, so she waited.
It was October now and getting cold, so she pulled her coat tighter around her. She fidgeted with its zip, not comfortable to be back in the company of her own thoughts.
It was a late Saturday morning and the street brimmed with pedestrians, but anxieties gnawed at her mind. Every thought she'd had about Draco Malfoy and his family; all of the bad things they had done. Every worry her mother had ever bestowed on her about Death Eaters, about leaving the house, about walking alone and telling no one where she was going. Every nightmare that had plagued her since the war.
Sometimes, when she closed her eyes, she would see it all again. Bodies, tears, and blood. A blinding green light. She would close her fingers around her necklace, take a deep breath, and push it from her mind. But the memories remained nearby, waiting patiently for her to return to them. They never left.
A light flicked on in Draco's apartment, and Isobel felt that she could breathe again. Her eyes followed him as he stretched out his arms, pulled off his hoodie and changed into another one. Ccrossed from one room into another.
As he boiled water and chose a mug from his cupboard, she watched. She watched the way he left his teabag in the water for far too long. Watched the way he stood in his apartment, staring at everything and nothing. Watched his chest rise and fall as he drank his tea; watched his eyes close and open.
Watched his gaze pass over her, seeing right through her.
Sadness radiated from Draco Malfoy with intensity. It followed him like a permanent shadow; like a cloak he couldn't take off. Like he had been caught in the rain and would never be dry again.
The letter in Isobel's pocket wasn't enough to confirm that he had loved her, she knew that. But Draco walked with the disposition of a person who had lost something important; lost a part of themselves, and to Isobel, that was confirmation enough. Because for the past year, that had been exactly what she had felt, too.
She didn't remember loving him, and didn't love him now. She didn't even know him, now, and given that she wasn't yet ready to tell her friends she was alive, it felt wrong to tell him. She didn't trust this ghostly boy, yet. But it still felt wrong to disregard him.
So she stayed.
She watched the days grow shorter and colder from that street corner, with her back against red-brick wall. Watched Draco move through his apartment with changing clothes, his white-blond hair growing longer and his posture more slouchy. Blaise Zabini visited him on occasion, she noted. His mother also showed up briefly, now and again, and they would Apparate away together. Only Blaise stayed.
She mastered the routine of stowing her Floo Powder under the loose floorboard in her room, of keeping Draco's letter in a pocket. Of going to see him regularly, as if that might help her decide what to do next.
Once in a while, he would leave his apartment. The lights would flick off, half a minute would pass, and Isobel would see him cross the lobby on the ground floor. He would descend the building stairs two at time, and walk off to the city. Isobel would consistently be unnerved by the starkness of the opportunity to approach him. How easy it could be to cross the street and tap his shoulder. But she would, perhaps conveniently, consider it for a moment too long. And then he would be gone.
She began to take the same comfort in seeing him that one might take from the presence of a friend. There was safety in his familiarity; stability in his routine. She felt herself grow closer to him, began to look forward to each time she could next see his face. A window and a street separated them, but she hadn't spent so much time with another person in months.
And then, one cold day at October's end, she saw someone else. A girl.
The girl greeted Draco with a hug, and crossed his apartment with the comfort of being in one's own home. She brought yellow flowers with her, which she arranged in a vase at Draco's windowsill. She wore expensive clothing and red lipstick. Long, shiny brown hair cascaded in waves down her back.
Isobel felt sick.
She watched Draco lean back against his kitchen counter as he spoke to her, hands in his pockets. The girl listened attentively. She was captivating as she spoke; all hand gestures and facial expressions.
The girl moved to look out the window. Isobel turned quickly, covering her face with the hood of her coat. When she looked back, they were talking again; sparing not a second glance for the girl on the corner.
Moving away down the street, Isobel brushed a tear from her cheek. Then she scorned herself for crying and broke into a run, back to the small alleyway.
Without pausing for thought, she Apparated straight home from London for the first time. The tall trees of their driveway curled over her head and shivered in the breeze, welcoming her home.
Draco Malfoy was not hers, she reminded herself, as she entered the countryside house. She tugged down the zip of her coat and flung it over the coat hanger. She did not remember loving him; did not even know him properly. He did not know that she was alive.
She didn't know why she felt so very abandoned.
