when they became villains [draco malfoy] {book 2}

Year 6 - 150

TW: panic attack

Astrid Ninomae pranced into the Great Hall with a smile on her face.

He had waited for her to come - waited to see what she'd look like, how she'd act. He saw the content smile and once again he couldn't understand a single thing at all.

Chin held high, on that Christmas morning, Ninomae even looked to have a skip to her step. Draco had barely slept the night, tossing and turning, woken up by every smallest sound, woken up from his feverish dreams by the nightmarish sound of her scream only to find it was all in his mind. But there was she, walking about perfectly fine; he was sure, had she any music she would've danced.

Again, he tried to think, but his mind kept scrambling, pulling open doors of locked content, unable to find just quite what he needed in all of the clutter. Draco felt slow and stupid. He also felt horrible. His head hurt. His stomach kept turning at the slightest thought of her, even worse at the thought of her sobs. He felt dizzy. 

Ninomae was... she looked fine. And it muddled him.

He felt he had to hate her, why still he didn't know. He also thought it was easier hating her that way - when she was so at ease and he was slowly breaking apart - but the continuous echo of her scream helped remind him it was all an act. Or maybe it was some manic episode...

His face angled towards the breakfast plate, he watched her sit down with nothing but his eyes. One leg slung in front of the other, taking her seat over the wooden bench. Her skirt rode up, momentarily hiding behind her long white shirt entirely, until her waist disappeared from his view. It was long-unseen hunger with which he saw her look over the foods that appeared on the table in front of her, grabbing this and that of the celebratory feast that she would like. His heart squeezed momentarily once she popped a blueberry in her mouth, grabbing it off the top of a cake she had no interest in eating.

In honour of the holidays, a huge Christmas tree had been placed at one corner of the Hall, though still smaller than what Draco usually had at home. With fewer gifts underneath it too, but that he supposed was because most students rather preferred giving others gifts face to face and not through a tree. 

That was what Draco had wanted to do the previous night. Well somewhat... he wouldn't have admitted it to her and that moment in time he had cringed at it himself but, walking up to her room, he had intended of inviting her over to the Room Of Requirement. Of course, he would only say it was so they could work on the cabinet. He had even taken a bite of the cake he had stolen from the kitchens just for it to look like he had grabbed it for himself and not as a mini Christmas Eve present for her. Draco didn't know what he had been thinking but he had seen an elf carrying blueberries and he had taken all of them to give her too.

But then of course he had screwed it all up.

Well... Draco didn't like to think it was only him who had screwed it all up, but he could recognise that at large he had gone too far. The moment he had spoken the words about her father, he had regretted them. The moment he had begun regretting, his foolish pride had hit in, reminding him of all things she had kept saying about his.

If Draco really thought about it... had it ever really even been any different? Had there ever been a time in life where she didn't mention his father even if she knew what the man meant to him?

It was easy to paint her the villain. Too easy. After the Susan Bones incident, Draco had compared her to his crazy aunt to the point it had become ridiculous. Wild hair. Wild eyes. Cackles. Her little nose held snobbishly high. He had been painting her a villain and forgotten even if so at times, she was no less of a human than he was. Looking back at it, sitting in the Great Hall, Draco couldn't believe he had forgotten Ninomae was capable of emotion as well.