Murder to Malfoy - D.MALFOY

[48]

Draco had been in the hospital for about two days, being given various potions and muggle medications for the infection that the now healed wound had given him. Through it all, he slipped in and out of consciousness and upon occasion muttered various things during these minimal conscious moments. Ivy had been present for some of them, only leaving when her parents said she needed to get some decent rest or when Narcissa wanted a moment alone. She would have stayed despite their looming romantic relationship, since he was in this situation due to her mostly. Fin would not allow her to believe it was entirely her fault, for her own mental stability more than anything. They knew what guilt did to her and no one wanted her to spiral down that dark path again.

So when a discrete groaning of pain came from his direction, she didn't really turn her head to check since she had done so too many times before. She just remained writing the essay she had been working on for school, it seemed spending hours on end in a hospital without service in the wings did amazing things for her work ethic. She had done her own homework and the essays for him that she knew the content for, hoping it would be a helping hand when he eventually woke up. "Ivy?" a small whisper, almost sounding as if it was miles in the distance, picked up her attention from the papers and had the constant worry in her stomach flipping into pure relief.

"Hey," she smiled softly, placing the papers and her pen onto the bedside cabinet next to his bed. "How you feeling?" she asked while taking one of his hands into both of hers, clasping tightly yet not so tightly that it could hurt him any further.

"Like I got stabbed with a rusty nail," he whispered, weakness ringing clear in his voice. Despite the pain he undoubtedly felt, he chuckled softly and then regretted it instantly. He winced, loudly and so she flinched in sympathy pain

"You're not supposed to move Draco," she smiled softly and hopefully reassuringly while brushing the clumped pieces of his hair away from his face and mildly warm forehead. "Your mum's downstairs getting coffee and snacks."

"You've been talking to her?" he winced, once again trying to move into a more comfortable spot had caused him more pain than it was worth.

She nodded softly, wondering if the healers would be able to give him a pain-relieving potion any time soon. "Of course. I never disliked Narcissa," she smiled so he knew it was the truth. He didn't know what it was, maybe relief or something similar, but something swept over him as the words left her lips. She didn't actively hate both of his parents at least. "Do you want some water?"

He nodded briefly, trying to cause himself the least amount of pain possible. She let go of his hand and stood, grimacing at the brief pain that shot through her knees from having sat in the same place for far too long. She walked to the end of the bed and grabbed one of the glasses, using the agumenti charm to form water in the glass. While it filled up, she noticed that he was simply staring at her. It wasn't a creepy sort of stare, more of an observatory one. He just couldn't help but notice the slight bags under her eyes that certainly weren't there before, or the way her shoulders were slouched in order to avoid getting shootings of pain up her spine. She simply looked worn out, odd due to the events just a few days ago. "They're predicting that you'll be home in about a week's time. Fully functioning, able to walk and run without any pain or anything. That's the magic of healing potions," she half chuckled while he drank some of the water, hand shaking indiscreetly. She chose not to notice it.

"I hate hospitals," he sighed, grimacing as he glanced around the room.

"Yeah me too," she agreed, sighing softly. The hospital had always had negative connotations, now it just had another negative experience to add. "But it's not that awful once you have a leaving date."

He raised a brow, not quite getting what she was talking about, "You don't have to be here if it makes you uncomfortable."

She smiled softly, placing her hand in his upturned one, "I'm not going anywhere Draco. You wouldn't if it were me."

He chuckled then winced once more, momentarily forgetting all the pain due to the distraction. He didn't regret it though, in fact in a weird way it made him feel somewhat better. "You seem to have me figured out."

"I'd like to believe so, though you are full of surprises. For example, how come you never told me that you slept with the blue teddy bear I won at the fair for two years?"

She watched as his pale and rather sickly looking complexion gathered some redness."Did she tell you that?" he asked quieter than before, as if he did not want the person in the next room to hear his secret.

Ivy laughed softly and nodded, "She did. Don't worry, I think it's cute. And I totally forgive you for stealing it, seemed like something of great importance to you." She smiled at him then, once the silence had been developed for a few moments, she lay her head on the bed and found her eyes drifting close with sleep that she so desperately needed as it had been stolen from her for so long.

"I still have it, in the back of my wardrobe somewhere," he added after a short moment of thinking, gently circling a coil of her hair around his finger. The silence fell onto them again, as if she had fallen asleep or was far too tried to think of a come back to such a confession. Draco truly believed that she had slept right then and there, head rested comfortably on the bed while the rest of her body was uncomfortably strewn onto the chair which she sat on.

"Draco?" she whispered after a few minutes, voice soft yet heavy with sleep that her brain so desperately craved.

"Mh?"

"Did you want to come to Italy with Fin, Fin's partner, Cedric, Blaise, Luna and me at the end of next week?"

He smiled softly even though she could not see, "Will they all be okay with me going? I wouldn't want to impose."

"You wouldn't be. . Plus Fin clocked whatever you were feeling toward me weeks ago, so it wouldn't be a surprise really."

His brow crept onto his forehead, the conversation he had had with Fin previously had clearly been quickly forgotten but now it swept back into his mind, "They did?"

She laughed softly, lifting her head from the bed, "Oh yeah, you're not very secretive."

"Damn."

"I think it's a good quality. I'm definitely far too secretive," she shrugged softly, having felt recently that her secret had begun to eat her up on the inside. Some things just had to remain a secret, for her own benefit and the benefit of those involved in the few that had other people.

He sighed deeply, brow still raised. "There is a way to fix that you know."

She laughed a little too loudly, almost disturbing the ill person in the room opposite his, "Smooth as always Malfoy."