Letters I Can't Send

5

Draco's POV

Laying on one of the cots in the hospital wing with Y/n sitting in a chair next to me, writing in some leather notebook of hers. I watch her for a moment, scribbling away on the parchment.

She must sense my staring because she looks up from her notebook and looks at me skeptically. "...What?" she asks.

I shake my head and turn my gaze elsewhere. But I see from the corner of my eye, her closing the book and slipping it into her bag. Then she speaks.

"Why did you do it?" I look over at her once more. She has one leg draped over the other and her arms crossed over her chest. Her head tilts to the side as she stares at me, like she's trying to contain her anger. If she is, she's doing a hell of a good job.

"Do what?" I ask, knowing full well what I did. I try my best to hid the smirk creeping up onto my lips.

She hits my shoulder with the back of her hand with surprising force. "You know what, you twat," she hisses.

I laugh at that. "Do they say that in Massachusetts too? Twat?" I watch as she rolls her eyes and glares at me.

"Hagrid seems nice—don't go messing up his first year teaching, Malfoy." She says.

"Oh, but I'm so good at it, aren't I? Messing things up, I mean." I gulp and hate that those words came from my mouth. My father told my that for years, and swore I wouldn't give in to them, but here I am, admitting to a girl that all I do is mess things up. It must be true then. I try to keep the memories of my past off my face. She can't know and she never will.

"Merlin, let's hope that's not true," I'm glad she says that and not something else.

"Yeah, well..." then Madame Pomfrey comes in and sets a cup of water on his bedside table and without saying a word, picks up my arm and takes a-not-so-gentle look at it. She bandages it up tight into a sling—I wince but I don't say anything.

"It was the hippogriff, ma'am," Y/n says.

Madame Pomfrey nods absentmindedly like she wasn't paying much attention to her. "Take this," she holds out small white pill in her hand gives me the glass of water. I do as she says. Then her attention shifts from me to Y/n. "I'll count on you to stay for a little while longer so you can escort Mr. Malfoy back to the Slytherin dormitories to change his robes for dinner."

Y/n looks at her wrist watch. It must be past 3 in the afternoon already. She nods and takes a book from her bag—a real book, not her leather notebook. And Madame Pomfrey leaves, telling us that were free to leave in a half hour.

"What are you reading?" I ask her. She holds up the book for me to see the cover. It's Pride and Prejudice. "So, you like books?" she nods and I can't help but notice the way she pushes her y/h/c hair so casually behind her ear and flips the page, looking at the next page, eager to read the next words.

"What are you looking at?" she asks without looking up from the pages of her book. I'm caught a bit off guard by that sudden remark. I don't even know I'm looking at her until she mentions it.

"Nothing," I say and look away. After a few moments, I break the silence by saying, "I didn't expect the new girl from Massachusetts to be a romance novel reader," I say a small smile finds its way to my lips.

"I didn't expect the blond pretty boy to be such a dick," she says and finally looks up at me. I smirk even bigger at both of her little nicknames for me.

"Pretty boy?" I say, amused, and shift a little on the cot to face her, she's now flustered and stuttering to find an excuse. "Oh, no need to deny it, new girl. It's quite alright. I've been known to be very attractive...but it's lovely to hear it come from your lips, Ellis," I say it as a joke, so why doesn't it feel like a lie?

"Shut up," she says, but I can tell she's hiding a smile and a light blush is forming on her cheeks. It's...endearing in a way, charming. I push the thought from my head. "We should leave, anyway." She stands from her chair and waves her arm for me to follow.

"I don't think it's been a half hour, Ellis," I smirk and shake my head at her as I stand from the cot.

"Does it look like I care?" she says as she walks out the door, me at her heels.

She has this—this fire, and I can't explain it. There's a lot of things I can't explain. Especially with her.

.........

She leads us back to the common room that is still empty—everyone must still be in class.

"Go change," she tells me and plops on to one of the leather couches in front of the fire and takes out her notebook. I wonder what she does in that notebook.

"Sheeeeeesh, okay, mom." I huff and then smirk when a terrible, scandalous thought crosses my mind. "But with my injured arm, what if I need help changing?" I watch for her reaction.

Y/n merely looks up from her notebook and glares at me. "You're repulsive, you know that?" she says. I smirk and take a few steps toward her spot on the couch. She rolls her eyes.

"Go change, you're fully capable of doing it yourself," she stands and drops her notebook on the couch where she sat. She turns me around by my shoulders and pushes me towards the stairs that lead up to the boy's dormitory. Firm hands on my back gently pushing me away. What a combination.

Her hands fall from my back as soon as I reach the first step and I hate to admit it, but I miss the feeling of her hands on my back. I push the thought away and start up the stairs.

"Don't take too long!" she calls from the bottom up to me.

"Oh, of course not, love. Wouldn't want you to miss your pretty boy too much, would we?" I tease when I reach the top. I can hear her huff of annoyance from all the way up at the top of the steps and it makes me grin.

a/n: more on the way! =)