Slight Remarks

Draco's parents did not realise the damage that their slight remarks caused. He would not say that it was completely their fault, but who else's fault could it be? Sometimes they did not realise that he was listening so they would stop worrying about his feelings, sometimes they just did not turn on their internal filters. If Draco's parents did realise what they said (which was rare enough to be called never), they made the mistake of assuming he would not remember or would not understand what they had said.

The first time this happened was when Draco was seven years old and he was sitting on his mother's knee. They were taking turns to read sections of a book whose name Draco did not care enough to remember. It was Draco's turn to read and he finished his part before looking at his mother. She was staring at him and when he called her name she gently but lovingly poked him in the stomach and said, "You're getting chubby."

The comment stayed with Draco, igniting a pain in him that he had never felt before. It felt like everything in his body was on fire and he just wanted to curl into a ball and disappear. By the time that he got his Hogwarts letter, Draco was hardly eating anything yet still he pinched his belly and said to his reflection, "You're getting fat."

* * *

The next time it happened was when he was eight. Draco had come downstairs without brushing his hair. He was proud of his naturally loose curls and how they looked bouncing softly as he walked. The small platinum ringlets were quite beautiful when they curling around his ears and face, despite straightening out and frizzing whenever they were brushed. Draco, being the first to the table, sat down and began putting food on his plate.

He had almost finished when his father walked into the room. His father was already dressed for the day and after taking one look at Draco's curls he sneered. His father told him to stand up and go upstairs to brush his hair because, "People can tell what sort of person you are by your hair, and anyone with curly hair is no Malfoy."

Draco was so embarrassed that he never forgot to brush and gel his hair before coming down ever again. He didn't want people to see him as anything but what he was—a Malfoy.

* * *

When he was nine, Draco's mother and father were both in the room. Neither one was paying him much attention, both too caught up in their activities. Draco's mother was completing her delicate embroidery and his father was reading a contract of some sort (Draco never bothered to learn what it said was because as soon as he figured out the first few lines, a new contract would take its place). Draco had completed the work that his tutor had set and had taken to pulling faces at Dobby.

He had just crossed his eyes, tilted his head to the side and stuck out his tongue at the elf when his father told him, "If you keep pulling faces you'll get stuck that way."

Draco immediately stopped pulling the face and looked back at his work. After that day Draco stopped pulling faces for fear of disfiguring his features. The feeling of pain grew and when Draco was alone in his room that night, he cried himself to sleep.

* * *

When he was ten, Draco sat at the table enjoying a glass of rich chocolate mousse. The elves had made it as a surprise for his birthday because Draco really, really, really liked chocolate. Yet his mother had not even waited until he had finished before she looked him in his eye and told him 'Stop eating chocolate, it causes acne'. Draco tried to ignore her words but after he put the next spoon in his mouth he couldn't help but put the unfinished cup down.

At age twelve, Draco sat at the Slytherin table with a face free of acne and unable to remember the taste of chocolate.

* * *