Painkiller - A Drarry Fanfiction

Part 005

Echos ring through the walls. Harry! Where are you going? How could you know what you want or not? You haven't heard anything! Get back down here! You know better than this, Harry! Harry! Harry!

I barely notice my feet leading me to my room, my hand slamming the door shut, or my body burning up from the inside out. There isn't enough in me to notice. Every sense is drowned out by noise. Rain hailing on the window, pules thundering through my ribs, brain swarling like a tornado—even the air is deafening.

My breath is harsh enough to painfully catch on my throat as it tries to escape, but not harsh enough to actually leave me. It hurts, stings, and throbs. I feel lightheaded and weak. I could collapse. As a blur glosses over my eyes, I can't keep my legs from giving out underneath me.

Ministry... Magic... Wizard... Caseworker... Harry...

The twisting bug in my brain whispers, chanting words full only of terror over and over and over. I wonder if this is how people go crazy. Right now, I would tear my own ears to shreds if I could. The fantasy of silence could make me do anything. That's pretty close to crazy.

Silence. That's what I need. Complete, still silence. For everything to shut the fuck up. Maybe that would help me fall asleep and wish on the stars to make today all but a dream. Or, no—who am I kidding—I don't deserve a dream.

Please, please, tell me this is a nightmare. Even that's enough for me.

I can't tell if the wet on my face is sweat or tears. Whatever it is, it's revolting and embarrassing, but miraculously bearable compared to magic, to the wizard in the house. I pull my trembling knees into my chest, burying my burning cheeks in the wrap of my arms. I shrink myself desperately, the smallest I can be. My body finds support only in my own limbs. Sinking into the soggy wood of my door, I accept what is on my face is tears.

/////

I'm not sure how long it took, but everything begins to settle.

The drumming of my heart fades, the flashing circles on the back of my eyelids shift dark, and the buzz in my bones cool to a pause. As I pull myself to my feet, I realize how numb my legs are, how stiff my spine is. I come to see that the little tingle near my elbows are thin, red dents—marks left from my nails digging into my arm. The skin of my cheeks feel tight with dried tears and sweat. My clothes are equally heavy, damp, and gross.

But as the world comes back to me through the fading crashes and ringing, linear thought also returns. I wish whatever is infecting my brain would fall out of my ear if I knock your head hard enough on a wall. I never liked the concept of thinking. That's what makes people spiral into cycles of suffering, but unfortunately humans are born to think. How sad is that.

Pulling the hem of my shirt up, I scrub the cry out of my face until the skin feels like it's peeling. I breathe.

I choose to not think, to not be sad. I choose to let my weary body take over the worms in the skull. I choose to be completely, fully, certainly fine.

My legs take me down stairs and I recognize it as the muscle memory of heading to the kitchen for lunch. My eyes notice the clock flashing the numbers twelve-fourteen as I leave my room. My entire physical form avoids the door to what was Dudley's spare room with every nerve I have.

I'm completely, fully, certainly fine. I choose to be.

/////

All three Dursleys are gathered around the television, chuckling and commenting as if they weren't stiff to their bones out of fear only an hour ago. I ignore them—and the gripping tension in my jaw—the best I can. Just make it through lunch, I tell myself, and maybe I could take an afternoon nap. That sounds okay.

"Oi, Potter," Vernon says.

I don't know why he notices me when I didn't notice him. Jaw still tight, I hinge to face him, only barely. "Yeah?"

I'm not surprised to hear his voice back to normal, no longer awkwardly pitched. "Look at me when I'm talking."

"I am."

"What did you say, you prick?"

"I am."

A huff of disbelief. "Do I look like I'm in the mood to deal with your shit attitude right now?"

"No. Is it because you're hungry? I'm quite literally a step away from the kitchen if that's the case"

"Watch your mouth, boy."

"Of course."

Some shuffling, maybe Petunia intervening.

There's a bit more push behind Vernon's voice now. "Where is this confidence coming from, eh? You think another person being in the house is gonna stop me?"

I'm not sure which part got to me. Any part would have gotten to me, I suppose. As much as patience is a day to day practice, it never gets much easier. At least, no one in this house tries to make it any more so.

"My confidence comes from being in the same crippling intolerant mood as you are, Vernon," I spit, snapping towards his siren red face "Actually, that would be dishonor to you, wouldn't it? I mean, you're just so tolerant, even to let a stranger—a wizard—into your home. To allow the Ministry of Magic to drag you back into the disaster you were so happy to escape after your sister-in-law died. And to tie me—the thing you tried especially to keep away from all of this because of my parents—back to the magic freaks. You're on such another level of tolerant, I honestly don't know how the fuck to keep up."

Somehow, the tip of Vernon's shoes are an inch away from mine now. His words crawl down my chest thick and heated, barely squeezing through his gritting teeth. "You should thank God for all that tolerance, boy. You would be in a lot of pain if there was just a little less of it."

I stare straight into his veiny, yellowed eyeballs. "Thank God."

Vernon's sweaty hand clamps down on my shoulder. It's heavy and twitching. I decline the chills that attempt to slither down my spine, the cringing fear that spreads through my bones. "Get your ass in the kitchen," Vernon demands.

I don't lose a single word. "Didn't I say I was just about to?"

/////

I only realize how roughly I'm handling the pots and pans when Petunia shoots a glare at me from the living room. I don't care to change it, though. Tossing an oiled pan on the stove, I zone out to the clattering of steel and wood.

You think another person being in the house is gonna stop me?

I grip onto the wooden spoon in my hand, sucking in a breath. There's a knot in my stomach. It's taut and twisting.

You think another person being in the house is going to save you?

I don't need saving...

You think a wizard is going to save you?

No one is saving me...

You think magic is going to save you?

There's breath—between my lips, in my mouth, through my throat—but nothing passes my lungs. I can feel it, an hour ago, all over again. Disgusting, terrifying, embarrassing.

The spoon escapes my grip and tumbles into the sink, loudly rattling. I stumble to turn off the gas before anything more than my fingers give up on me. There's sweat drops forming on my temples.

I'm completely, fully, certainly not fine. Why can't I choose to be?