Title: The Pressure of Perfection

Author: mintapotter

Overview: When Draco's own problems are spinning out of control, he needs more than ever to reach out. But what if the one person that could help him is the one he keeps pushing away?

Warning! (eventual)SLASH! Guy/Guys! If you no likee, you no readee.

A/N: Ok, this is my third fic and I hope you enjoy it as much as the last two. In this Draco starts of a little OCD and it goes from there. This one is going to be updated every Friday as well, but this is sort of a testing chapter to see how you like the plot line. Please give me all the feedback you can in you're reviews, it only ever makes my life and writing better!

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Chapter 1 - Pressures of Perfection

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I can't believe what he made us do today.

Care of Magical Creatures has never been my favorite class, especially because we've always had to share it with the Gryffindors. But lately everything had been so damn disgusting and dirty and positively vile that I couldn't believe this was sanitary or legal. Not to mention that, but my week already looked bleak so this was just another stupid class to live through.

It was such a scorching hot day that before class even started most people had shed they're cloaks and opted for rolled up sleeves and loose ties. Even the ever uptight me did it, rolling my sleeves up to my elbows and undoing my green and silver silk tie enough to undo the first two buttons of my shirt.

Hagrid plodded out of his hut a moment or two later, already beaming about whatever it was we were doing today. To start the class we were put into pairs with people from the opposite class and lucky old me got who you wonder? No-one other than the infamously tall Ron Weasley, that's who. He had the nerve to scowl at me when Hagrid pulled our names out of the enormously moth eaten hat in his hands, and then grudgingly plod over to meet me.

"Well, I'm just as pleased to see you as well Weasley." I said this in such a sickeningly happy tone that he didn't even reply, just scowled some more at me. Truth was that I actually was happy to see him, technically. Last time I had been paired with Potter and we were both sore from the fight that had erupted at that. At least Weasley I could control a little bit, although he was so much bigger than me by now he could easily knock me unconscious with a few well places punches. But I had the upper hand here; I had the tact of mind to keep him at bay.

"Well, today's class'll be centered aroun' these gorgeous buggers! Aren't they wonderful?" Hagrid had kneeled down to pluck what looked like a huge weed from the ground and emerged instead with a rabbit like animal with shiny black fur and enormous eyes. Truth be told they looked like a sickening excuse for the cute bunnies that frolicked on the Hogwarts grounds but I kept my mouth shut for once.

"Now you'll have ta' look fer the big dark green leaves a' the top, but don' be surprised when you find one o' these! Anyone know what thi' is?" Granger's hand shot straight into the air, and nobody else even tried to guess at it. Hagrid nodded at her and she smiled brightly and replied.

"That is a Faustus, a burrowing creature that's leaf like ears can be easily snipped and used in many medical potions for anxiety. They don't even feel it, but they can bite with a poisonous after effect if you snip too closely." Hagrid beamed at her, the prize student.

"Hermione here gave you all the explanation I was gon' to, so get to work wi' your parters. Find a shady patch, tha's where they live. One of you'll hold them and the other'll snip off as much as possible. Whomever I give the scissors'll be the one who clips them, alright? You'll be marked on how much you collect and you'll be docked marks for hurting any of em." He then walked around and passed out sets of shears to various students, giving our pair to Ron.

"Oh that's just peachy, lets let Malfoy do all the dirty work." I grumbled and walked away towards a shady section of the forest and plucked up a rather huge one, while Ron silently began to clip parts of the ears off and collect them in a pile.

"Gods Malfoy it's only a bit of dirt! It's not going to kill you. Hold it a bit further down." Ron was being very… civil today and I didn't feel like starting any huge fights while he was holding a sharp pair of shears, so we worked in hospitable silence for a few minutes until he broke it with a question.

"How's your first week back going Malfoy?' he asked, continuing to snip at a new Faustus as the one we had finished hopped about around us and then started to rebury itself.

I for one was stunned beyond words. Ronald Weasley was making small talk with me? What was the world coming to?

"Umm…not too bad so far. It's about to get worse though." I sighed and he nodded and flicked his long red bangs from his eyes, thinking.

"Why is that?"

"Well my Father is quite obviously supposed to be in Azkaban but somehow managed to pay his way out for a visit here to speak with me and Dumbledore. That is a feat I even didn't think he'd manage but I guess he pulled it off. So that's why my week is going downhill. I don't even know why he's coming but it'll be all of the papers by Friday, mark my words." I drabbled much too long that time, and abruptly stopped speaking as I realized I had given away too much information. "No-one is supposed to know that, so you can't tell a soul. Not even your dearest Golden boy or brainiac, got it?" Ron scowled for a second and then nodded once before continuing in silence.

I was astonished yet again. Why was he being so civil and nice and understanding all of a sudden? Why did he care how my week was going, about what I was dealing with? And then it clicked.

"You just asked that question to find something out about me didn't you? You wanted some information about my Father and all our evil doings and now you have it. I can't believe I even spoke out loud to you, I must be freaking losing my mind to trust the likes of you." Ron stopped snipping and I dropped the Faustus half way done, and we just stared.

"You really think that? You are the most paranoid person I have ever met. Ever heard of small talk?"

I scowled and opened my mouth to retort but it was already the end of class and Hagrid was calling everyone in. I smirked at Ron, something that never failed to piss him off and then strode away, picking up my cloak and bag in one fluid motion.

"Where the hell do you think your going? We need to hand this stuff in!" he yelled from behind me. I turned around and gestured at my now brown stained shirt and hands and smiled at him.

"I need to clean up after getting so dirty. Thanks for finishing up for me." He looked about ready to run forward and throttle me as there were so much clippings to carry he would definitely be late to Potions. Luckily for him, the hero Potter came to save the day and I could slip away to the Prefect bathrooms to clean up.

My hands were stained with mud, my shirt streaked with dust and my pants' knees had dark grass stains that shone a little on the black fabric. None of this seemed salvageable, so I threw them all out and snapped my fingers for a house elf to bring me up new ones.

Normally I'd be a little grossed out, cleaned up with a charm or two and then be on my way. But I remembered that my Father was coming tomorrow and he never accepted any signs of unseemliness. I sighed wearily and turned on the taps, waiting for the water to warm up. This wouldn't go over too well. Not well at all.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Quiet down. For today's class I have discussed a few options with the Headmaster and to uncomplicate things from now on you will now be with your partners from Care of Magical Creatures whenever we are paired in this class. This way I won't waste my time deciding who should be with whom." Half the class was groaning about they're pairings, the rest were happy to be with the people they had been chosen to go with. Harry turned towards me and gave a sympathetic grin.

"Hey, at least Malfoy's good at potions, right?" I just scowled and then scanned the room for him. His telltale blonde hair was nowhere to be seen on the Slytherin part of the room, and he definitely wasn't sitting on our side.

"Yeah I guess so… have you even seen him since last class? He left before us from Care of Magical Creatures and he's never skipped a class of Potions before without a reason." Harry turned to scan the room as well, then shrugged and started to gather his things.

"No clue, maybe he just felt so ill from all the hard work he needed a little nappy time." He smiled and then walked away towards his partner. "Tell Snape and maybe you can go with us?" Harry's partner was basically the nicest Slytherin we had never known. Felix, a bright guy whose parents were both in Ravenclaw and who wasn't a complete ass towards all Gryffindors had been paired with him so Harry was actually really happy with the arrangements. I nodded and walked up to Snape, him sitting behind his desk and pointedly ignoring me.

"Professor Snape? Professor Snape? My partner is absent." Snape pretended not to hear me so I just sighed with frustration and started to walk away.

"And who might your partner be Mr. Weasley?" he drawled slowly like it just took so much effort to speak to me.

"Draco Malfoy sir." His eyebrows shot up, a surprised look like I have never seen on his greasy face.

"Was he perilously hurt in your last class as so he couldn't make it?"

"No sir, he went to wash his hands sir." Snape seemed more alarmed now than before, not understanding the idea of his prize student skipping class.

"Since you cannot possibly finish this potion by yourself Weasley," he started, adding plenty of hints to my abhorable abilities at potion making, "you can go and try and find Mr. Malfoy and return either with him or without him and a reason. Understood?" I nodded once and started out of the class, mouthing 'YES!' to Harry from across the room on my way out.

I got to skip potions as long as I came back later with an explanation. This must be the best moment of my Potions career! I walked slowly through the hallways, checking two bathrooms for Malfoy just to be sure he wasn't in them as I steadily made my way up the castle.

No sign of him in the dungeons. Not on the first floor. Not even on the second or third floor. I kept slowly searching, knowing that I probably should go to the Hospital Wing first but I was leaving that until last. Eventually there were only ten minutes left before break began and the only bathroom left was the Prefects bathroom.

Of course Malfoy's in there! He's a Prefect, why would he even think of acquainting himself with the lower class bathrooms on the other floors!

"Marshmallow delight." The portrait swung forward for me to enter the bathroom and as I stepped into the enormous room the sound of running water could be heard from a far side of the space. Sure enough Malfoy was standing over a porcelain sink in the furthest back corner from the door, scrubbing his hands with vigor. His shirt was discarded into a nearby wastebasket, as were his old black slacks. He wore a fresh new pair of pants, crisp and ironed to perfection. His white button up shirt wasn't done up at all but the sleeves were rolled up high and his tie hung limply and undone around his neck.

"Uh… Malfoy? What the hell are you still doing here?" I asked him, and he jumped in surprise at me, not having noticed my entering.

"Well, some of us have standards of cleanliness and this is what you would call washing your hands Weasley." He addressed me like I was 4 years old and then went back to the sink and continued scrubbing.

"Malfoy, how long have you been up here?" he flicked his white blonde hair from his eyes and shrugged.

"No clue. A few minutes I guess. I just can't get the dirt out from under my nails…" he murmured, squinting into the basin at his hands. I walked closer to see, and gasped with shock.

His hands were an angry bright red, the colour your skin turns when you get a really nasty scratch and it inflames. At his wrists the colour returned to its normal paleness of the lightest tan. The water rushed about them and he continued to scrub under his nails with a cloth, then threw it too in the wastebasket and tried with the nails from his other hand. The water flowed pink now, all the edges of his nails were bleeding from being butchered for so long.

"Malfoy, stop it." I whispered in astonishment. "Stop it, please." He didn't though, so I grabbed his hands away and then flicked my hand toward the tap to cause it to stop flowing. His hands were cold as ice; the water had been kept on its most freezing limit.

"Do you know how long you've been up here?" he shook his head no, no longer using any well placed insults to reply.

"It's nearly the end of Potions; you've been up here for more than an hour." His eyes widened with surprise, and then he shook his head again, not believing me.

"Look at your hands Malfoy, they're fucking bleeding you've been scrubbing them so long! And feel them? No you can't because they're nearly frozen, there's probably no more hot water coming up here!" I let go of his hands and he just stood and stared at them amazed, like this was the first time he had noticed any of those things. He reminded me of an astonished 6 year old child told some amazing fact about something they had never known.

"Why are you doing this Malfoy?" I whispered, keeping my eyes on him and walking away to grab a fluffy white towel from the rack and wrapping his hands in it.

"My Father is coming tomorrow. He hates it when I get dirty, hates it. He nitpicks everything, everything. If there's nothing wrong with me then he has nothing to be mad about. Right? Right? If I'm perfect when I see him then he can't be angry with me. He can't be, right? And my nails were just so dirty. So dirty." he kept repeating his sentences and words, staring off at the opposite wall as I tenderly dried with hands and cast a few simple healing spells on them to help them mend.

"Your Father can find mistakes about anything, anytime, any day. That's what he does Draco, he messes up other people. It's actually his job to bring other people down." I gestured him to sit down on a low bench and walked away to get a few scented creams from the counter. They were magically pre-warmed and filled with the best of everything, so within half a minute of rubbing them in his skin was turning from an angry red to a light pink, and the temperature of them was almost back to normal. He no longer so aggravated and distant, he was quickly returning to normal.

"Not a word of this Weasley, no matter how tempting. Promise me?" he whispered eventually. I looked up from his hands and gave him a little smile.

"'Course. I'm not evil you know. But we have to make up something to tell Snape about why you were absent."

Draco sighed with relief at this and nodded thoughtfully. "Just tell him that I was worried about my Father coming and someone in Gryffindor told me there was an urgent message about his arrival. I waited for a long time to get it but it was some sick joke, and by the time you found me class was over. He never asks twice about what I say, trust me." He carefully buttoned his shirt and tied his tie, and then walked over to the sink furthest away from the one he had been using and tried to fix his hair. He huffed and just mussed it up, the sunlight streaming in from the open window making it glow like spun gold.

"Let's get out of here before one of your retarded friends storms in and kills me for keeping you." He was right back to normal Malfoy now; he strode efficiently towards the doorway without a second glance back at me.

"No problem at all, helping out that is." I muttered and then set off after him to catch up. I walked with him silently all the way towards the dungeons through he now empty halls and then after a brief explanation to Snape back up again to supper. Everyone was already in the Great Hall and we met not a soul in either direction.

"Thank you Weasley." He whispered and then stepped through the doors towards his Slytherin friends, and I just walked bewildered towards the Gryffindor table.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

A/N: You likee? You hatee? You TELLEE! Sorry for pissing you off but I live for feedback so if you've read this far along you owe it to yourself to review. Please do!

!REVIEW!

(luv, mintapotter)