SLITHER IN! → S. MALFOY

ACT IV, PART II: TORTURE HIM, TORTURE!

C H A P T E R  T H I R T Y - T W O
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               JOELLE PARKINSON NEVER TRULY WONDERED why or how her mother could make her feel as though she was the least loveable child of hers when she was an only child, and her mother was Pansy Parkinson, and she was sweet to her father and to her guests and even to their gardener, who, with his crippled teeth and deep wrinkles arose in her nothing but disgust. And yet, when in first course she received no congratulating letter on behalf of her mother, - in fact, she had never received a letter from her mother unless it was something urgent, and then it would be two hastily scribbled lines, — Joelle Parkinson felt as though she could rip apart everything red and everything gold and everything Gryffindor about her.

                       To be honest, she had always wondered.

And now, with Scorpius Malfoy facing his back to her as she sat on his rather uncomfortable elaborate desk chair, she realised that she had never been loved by a Slytherin, and she would never be, not even if she tied a green tie around her neck.

     The greenish tones of the lake illuminated Malfoy's eyes as he spoke to her. "...so I took it. Father... he would have killed me. But I was young. And, though I immensely do doubt it, — stupid. Besides, he never found out."

            Joelle rose her eyes from the closed diary in her hands. It was bound tightly by a leather belt, — so tightly, in fact, that it's leather clasped the book suffocatingly.     

"Can I—?"

          "No," Malfoy said hastily, walking up to her and grabbing the diary out of her hands before throwing it onto the bed of his dormitory, "And—" he eyed her then, carefully,—"did you know that your mother and my father were friends?"

Joelle gave him an incredulous stare. "Really?"

    Malfoy smirked. Looked back at the lake. "Best of friends. And yet, there was a witch—" he closed his eyes for a desperate moment—"and she loathed him, that witch. And he thought that he loathed her, too. But, you see," Malfoy picked up a quill from his desk, and, not looking at Joelle, spun it in his fingers, "Hermione Granger was deep in his thoughts, so very deep-" Scorpius gritted the words out as if it pained him-"that she would always be either in his heart or in his head. And then he married my mother."

           "Oh. That's a sad story, now," Joelle muttered, her thoughts racing, "But- why did he not try and... build something with... well,— her?"

               Malfoy snapped the quill in half and looked at Joelle, surprise so evident in his features soon masked by stone. "She was a mudblood."

           There was a pause, so heavy that Joelle thought the windows of Malfoy's dormitory would shatter under the pressure and the lake water would burst into his room drown them until they were two bloated corpses swimming amongst the Great Lake's sea creatures.

She looked at her watch. "I should get going. I bet that pair is still sitting in our Common Room, not like I care, but Rose does ask a lot of questions lately-"

           "What pair?"

            "Well, Albus Potter and Rosie Granger, of course." Joelle watched with curiosity as Malfoy frowned. When he said nothing, she continued,-"you know, I heard they kissed on their last Hog- what are you doing?"

            "I want you to wear it." Scorpius slipped his tie off from around his neck and handed it to her. Joelle stared. "Are you deaf, Parkinson?"