PRETENDING TO LIVE~ {The Lestrange Daughter #2}

𝟓𝟐. Initiation

It was almost nine PM when Valentine realized she hadn't seen Draco a single time that day. Typically he stuck by her twenty-four seven, although it wasn't unusual for him to disappear to his room whenever Valentine was summoned by their unwanted house guest. Other than that he preferred to stay near her. That's what made her realisation so strange. He hadn't been up for breakfast and he certainly hadn't made an appearance at dinner.

Bellatrix had spent ten minutes thinking up horribly embarrassing reasons why Draco may not have been present and when Valentine had asked her Narcissa if she'd seen him, she said that Draco probably just needed time to himself.

Valentine wasn't sure how to feel about that. She knew that Draco easily fell prey to his own thoughts and insecurities. Left completely to his own devices he could become extremely irrational and was apt to do things that only made him more upset.

This is what lead Valentine to his door.

Where's he been? We have the official initiation tomorrow as well. He can't miss that. I can't miss that. 

She rapped her knuckles on his door firmly and waited. Silence. She tried again.

"Draco?" She called through the door.

Is he asleep?

She counted to twenty and then knocked again.

Still no answer.

Finally, she decided that he must have been asleep, but if knocking wouldn't wake him, neither would her peaking inside and checking. So, she did exactly that.

She turned the brass handle and gently pushed the door open. 

"Draco?"

The room was dark and visibly empty. The bed was unmade, him not in it. He wasn't at his desk, or in the air chair by the window. The only source of light streamed out from the bottom of his bathroom door.

"Draco?" Valentine repeated louder.

Again she received no answer as she pushed the door closed behind her.

He must be taking a bath...but surely I'd hear something, wouldn't I? And why hasn't he answered?

She stepped towards the bathroom door and something in her gut pulled tight. She raised one hand and knocked.

Still no answer.

What the hell?

Valentine's stomach wrenched sickeningly again.

I could open the door and end up seeing the forever scarring sight of my cousin bathing, or something could actually be wrong...he's been so out of it lately, what if he's slipped and hit his head? It could be nothing. I could be overreacting. But he could also be bleeding to death on the other side of this door.

She knocked and called his name one last time. Yielding no success, she turned the handle and pushed open the door.

At first, she kept her eyes downcast, not wanting to see anything she didn't have too. She was able to see a figure in her peripherals sitting upright in the tub and immediately turned around.

"Draco, are you deaf?" She hissed. "I only knocked about ten times."

She paused and waited for a reply- probably some shouting and telling her to get out of the bathroom- but there was nothing.

"Draco, don't ignore me." She continued irritably.

Nothing. 

"Draco, answer me this instant...Draco?"