PRECEDENT : Draco Malfoy II

58

Two days before August begins, I am not myself anymore. I never have carried a wand with me when I'm not at school and I haven't picked up the habit yet even though I legally can. I don't use it much at all except to try to improve the wards around the property. Mopsy hasn't come yet, but I do not think that she has tried.

Mostly, I stalk the shelves at my job and man the till. I'm a shift supervisor this summer so I am given keys to lock the store. With more responsibility, comes more pay. The pounds accrue in my bank account but I don't withdraw money. There are no expenses in my life. No books I want to buy, no oil paints, no new instruments to do magical experiments on, and certainly no impromptu rendez-vous with friends in London. My mother drags me to her friend's house once, just as she did last summer, and after that I lie to her. I slip out in the middle of the day claiming I'm going to visit work friends, but instead, I walk to a park in town and lie on my back.

I hate doing nothing, but I'm not sure what to do.

Since I'm the one who closes shop most nights, I could apparate home if I brought my wand. Instead, I walk along the marina. It's really the only thing I do willingly. The wind is so harsh I have to close my eyes to prevent them from watering. Even in August, the rushing wind over the waves is freezing. I dig my nails into my palm as I walk, disrupting my lifeline.

I wonder if that is what the two lines have always meant. Without Draco, I do not feel like Martina Louise Turner. This is the other life I have now. It's a fine one, I think. As far as break-ups go, I'm not sobbing. Just, processing I guess, in my own way. The only worry I have is that the two lines join each other again. If the absence of Draco is what brought on the change in my life line, his appearance might be how the two become parallel again.

At my house, I open the door. I can hear my mother's muffled voice from in the living room. My father has been working late, and I'm not used to her talking here. She makes a chortled sort of sound. A laugh, I realize, a beat too late. I'm not entirely sure how such a sound is even possible. My parents don't know about the upcoming war, so of course she is laughing. If she knew, I can't imagine that she would. Is it possible to smile while awaiting a verdict, when the sentence could be the gallows?

I kick off my shoes at the front door and walk to the stairs hurriedly. Perhaps she won't invite me in if she is distracted. I get to the banister and spare just a glance in the living room.

It isn't my father on the sofa. Draco sits, his blonde hair slicked back, wearing clothes decidedly too formal for this moment but almost muggle-looking. He looks better now. His skin is less grey. I hadn't expected him to look better. I hadn't put much thought into it all that much, but the health to him is unmistakeable. He smiles, looking over to the corner of the room, surely where my mother sits. He must have smiled like that in the last year, surely. I can't tell from here if he's occluding.

"Marty?" my mother calls.

Draco looks over at me. The smile drops. He stands up, peering at me. My hands dig into the banister. I'm exactly in the spot where I was after third year when I hurt the muggles who broke in. I can feel my hair lifting off my neck, static igniting it. I don't try to pat it down.

"There you are," my mother pops up in the doorway, blocking Draco from my vision. "You didn't mention you were expecting your friend Draco to stop by this evening!"

I lean up a bit but can't see past her. I'm not sure what he's told her, what the consequences will be for lying to her.

Draco is seventeen now as well. He too can use magic and the trace won't show that he's used it in front of muggles. While it's still illegal, I don't think legality is a barrier to him anymore. I glance at my Mum with a smile on his face.