Drarry drabble.
Podfic is here: .com e chess-pieces-in-a-war-shooting-star-drarry-drabble/ (replace spaces with slash signs)
Warnings: Pre-slash, basically?
Streaking light, lighting up the darkness,
Draco closes his eyes, and wonders if love will ever come his way, like that shot of light streaking through the sky. He wonders if bright smiles and warm hands will find his. He is lying on the top of the Hufflepuff house table, the wooden surface digging slightly into his back, but he doesn't mind. This is what he likes doing when he can't sleep; watching the night sky from inside the castle. He never can sleep, these days.
The Great Hall is warm and feels kind, when he lies here, night after night, watching the galaxies move, watching the shooting stars, and wondering if he really wants to continue down this destructive path. It's dark thoughts, but it's... it's okay. Because just wondering, and wishing on secret stars doesn't do you any harm, does it? It doesn't do any harm when you in the dark of night wish you didn't have to be dark. Because everybody has a job to do, and this is his, and if he doesn't, if he doesn't, his world will crumble, and his mother, his father, Draco himself... They will be ripped apart. Forever.
"Hey Malfoy," a soft voice says. He looks up, and a pair of bespectacled green eyes meet his. No venom in the voice, no malice at all. Is it a trap? Potter has been watching him quite closely.
Potter isn't holding a wand. Draco's own is lying inches from his hand, and he knows how to defend himself if necessary.
"Hi," he drawls, replying to Potter's greeting, and wonders if Dumbledore's enchanted the stars shooting across the ceiling to really give you what you wish for, even if you didn't know what you were in for when you wished for it. Like a Mirror of Erised. Is it a fire he desires? Is it letting go of everything special, and especially letting go of stupid dreams of bright smiles and warm hands?
It doesn't feel like it is. Nor does it seem like fighting is what Potter wants.
But still... Even if Potter isn't looking at him in a threatening way, even if he isn't holding a wand, the kid beat him up when they were fifteen. Okay, Draco had deserved it, but it doesn't mean he has to like it, does it? He grasps his wand quickly, and points it at the skinny, raven-haired boy, as he, in one fluid motion sits up, so to be better positioned.
"I don't want to fight anymore," Potter whispers; it's almost a whimper, and he wonders if another star just heard his prayer.
His wand trembles.
He doesn't know, that just a few months from now, he'll be standing at the top of a tower, and look into a pair of weakened, old eyes, who offers him a way out of the darkness. He doesn't know, that his wand will tremble, and that he will lower it. He doesn't know that green light is going to flash anyway, and that the extended hand will never reach his. He doesn't know, that it was never up to him, in the end. He doesn't know, that he and the emerald-eyed boy in front of him, are nothing but chess pieces in a war.
He lowers the wand, and looks Potter in the eye.
"Me neither."
He wonders if Potter will mind if he takes his hand. Another shooting star, and he wishes for it.