Title: all beyond saving by children
Date: 5/9/12
Rating: T
Pairing: DM x HG
Summary: 31 days prompt - Hermione comforts Draco as best she can after another day at work.
It had been a hard night to be an auror. Draco ran his fingers through his hair, staring blankly at the cup of tea in front of him. He hadn't bothered to get up to get the sugar; it was taking all his concentration to slow the trembling.
He just didn't understand people- how could they do the horrible things they did? His arm burned in a reminder of his own sins. When the door to the room opened, he flinched. He hadn't expected anyone to notice him in the lonely conference room- it was much too late for anyone to need anything in there.
Draco didn't need to look up; he knew who was there. He could smell the faint scent of lilacs from where he sat. "Malfoy."
Hermione crossed her arms, her eyes narrowed as she watched him. With a sigh, she reached across the table to pull his tea to her. His fingers let it slip passively from his grip as she put in a sugar cube and stirred it. "You did all you could, Malfoy."
Silence.
Hermione sighed and pushed the tea cup back to him, seeing the shake in his fingers as he took the fragile looking cup back. Was the shaking anger? Or something else? She'd been there- she'd seen the desperation in his eyes as the child had ran back into the burning building. He'd already been holding onto two children of his own, and she'd only caught the movement out of the corner of her eye. Then the child was in there, and Draco was yelling, yelling, screaming with his voice so hoarse and the look in his eyes had frozen her solid, she didn't know how- "I couldn't save them."
Hermione looked up from her thoughts, catching Draco's grey eyes with her brown ones. "We did what we could," she said simply. She wouldn't admit that she'd returned to her own office to trash it in anger and frustration. There was nothing to be done.
"Why did he go back?" His voice was strangled.
"He saved his brother," she reminded him softly.
"But he died, Granger!" Draco was bending the spoon, his fingers white as he gripped it. Wiping up the sloshed tea with a napkin, Hermione removed the spoon from Draco's finger and set it gently on the table.
"He made his choice, Malfoy."
In the quiet, she could hear his breathing, his ragged breath as he struggled. After a while, she stood. "I'll see you in the morning." Hermione's fingertips just barely touched his shoulder as she left. Days like these tested them, and she knew it was hard. As much as it tested her, it tested her coworkers, her team. And Draco would be fine. In the morning, they'd be fine. Because they had to be.
There was more work to be done.