Tainted Love

Cold

IRIS

The sun was high in the sky by the time Iris made it back to her apartment. She felt like she was drifting. She had been drifting since the moment Draco dropped his cigarette and dragged her in by his bruised hand.

It wasn't always a bad thing, the drifting. While they were fucking she felt like she might have entered another plane of existence. She was floating, ascending, finding a place that the lost people below her would aimlessly search for for their entire lives.

It was so effortless with Draco. She never had to search for approval in his face, never had to search for feelings. There were feelings in abundance. When she looked at him she ached.

She left his apartment in a sort of haze. She knew with cold conviction that she could not stay there, but her body was hazy and she had to close her eyes as she left his room. Blink herself back into her logical mind.

She had drifted past the big golden lift doors, past the old woman who sat in the desk in the lobby. She had drifted down a couple blocks on Diagon before apparating, then she had drifted up the stairs at her own apartment.

Something about seeing her bed unmade made her come back to herself.

Iris had left her apartment that morning with the intention of confronting Draco fully formed. Her stomach had felt heavy when she apparated, sick with anticipation. She would make him lay out whatever was happening between him and Pansy. She would make him tell her how he felt, how he really felt.

But she hadn't done any of that. The sight of him alone had put her off.

His knuckles looked worse than they had last night from across the bar. His eyes were reddened as if the blood vessels behind them had burst open. He was holding a cigarette between his lips. His arms were shaking.

There was only one empty bottle, but it was the remnants of black Firewhiskey.

He looked hurt. Really hurt.

He kissed her like she was healing him. She couldn't really deny him that, or at least she didn't want to. It would be unfair of her to bring up her grievances with him when he was clearly roughed up from whatever had happened to him the night before.

It occurred to her now, standing in her apartment, that it was unfair to her, too. It was unfair that she shouldered his anger and ignorance, shouldered her own hurt and confusion, just because he might be hurt. She was hurt, too. The things he did hurt her.

But he didn't care about that, not really. Or maybe he did.

She didn't fucking know. She didn't understand him, not at all. Maybe if she hadn't given in to him she would.

He didn't need to manipulate her into fucking him. He didn't need to lift a finger, didn't need to say a word. Iris manipulated herself when it came to him. One look at him and her entire mindset shifted. Her original intentions dissipated.

And the consequences hit her now. She could not go on like this.

Her nose stung the way it did before she cried. She blinked a couple of times in rapid succession, trying to stop her body before any tears could fall. She had never cried over Draco and she didn't intend to. She was better than that.

But it wasn't Draco she was angry at now. She was angry at herself.

Whether he knew it or not, he needed her presence there. He drank her in like she was an antidote to whatever poison Pansy had fed him the night before. It felt good, that. Being better for him than the alternative.

But that momentary feeling was not worth the confusion she felt now.

Whatever they had argued about, it was big enough that Draco was still pissed off about it in the morning. She wondered whether he and Pansy might be done for good and felt a brief bout of happiness at the thought. Maybe not happiness. It was more like relief.