Porcelain Doll

Just Like Riding A Bike

Summary: We've all read it. Harry is abused and comes to Hogwarts to get loved and healed; but what if he wasn't the one hurt? What if Draco was the one in pain and nearly broken? Draco's determination to please his father and strength to survive lands this snake in the lion's den. Read on as little boys are thrown into a war and slowly learn to trust.

A/N I have come back to my home fandom for a little rest and relaxation. I need to remember what it is like to enjoy something again and that is what writing is to me; something to feel good about. So here you go. My take on a few tropes I see all the time.

Pairings: As you can probably guess this will be Drarry eventually, but that is pretty far in the future, I want to give them plenty of time to heal and just be children. As for side pairings; to be perfectly honest I have no idea despite the fact I've had the basics of this idea stuck in my head FOR YEARS. You have no idea how hard it was not to write this when I was too swamped with other things.

Go ahead and suggest pairings and characters you would like to see more of in stories. Of course I reserve the right to include or not include things I don't like, but that doesn't mean I won't listen to you. I'm pretty friendly and open minded so don't be shy.

The rating on this story is MATURE mainly due to subject matter and language, not necessarily sex however I don't know what will happen as it progresses. Though like I said that is far in the future of the story.

Chapter One

Draco Malfoy didn't like crowds. Rather detested them in fact. His father took long commanding strides that Draco somehow had to keep up with while still maintaining an unruffled appearance or a stinging hex would hit his back. If he slouched; another hex. Or ran, or jumped. All would be met with a stinging hex to back or neck. Even if it wasn't his fault. If Knott wanted to make a fool out of himself by running amok through the alley then that was his own business and Draco shouldn't allow himself to be drug into it.

Being out in public was bad, being home was worse, because then his father didn't have his own mask to maintain and no longer had to keep the spells discreet. Lucius was creative and cruel, rarely if ever leaving marks, but he drove his lessons in hard.

After every trip out Draco had to recite his list of offenses back to his father, and for each one a new punishment would be doled out and woe betide him if he forgot one.

Only once had Draco gone to his mother for sympathy, once. His punishment for seeking solace made whatever injuries he had prior to that seem like a scraped knee. It was not worth the pain. Narcissa Malfoy herself was a product of pureblood upbringing. Obedient and submissive to a fault, she was a trophy for her husband and that was all she was taught to be. His mother loved him, but she feared her husband more.

By the time his Hogwarts letter arrived he was losing hope and sanity. He just wanted it to stop, all of it. He wanted to please his father, but nothing was good enough. School was his one chance, gaining the top spot would surely gain his approval, it just had to otherwise he didn't know what else to do.

Then he met him. The boy with scruffy black hair and bright green eyes. Nothing too out of the ordinary at first. His father always coached him into making sure new people were worth associating with. He didn't realize until later that he had asked the wrong questions or he might have known sooner just who he was talking to that day at the robe shop.

The boy had looked so scared! He looked lost and confused, but when Draco asked he did say his parents were a witch and wizard, he could hit himself for not thinking that the boy could have been an orphan or something. It had happened so fast.

Then there was the train. Crabbe and Goyle weren't his friends. He didn't know what you would call them. They hung around him because he was a Malfoy and his father knew their fathers. He didn't actually like either of them. Telling them to go away was bad manners and would get him in trouble so he just had to bear it, his father had taught him long ago to put up with unsavory people for the sake of reputation.

It was all for his father. When he thought he could make a connection with the famous Harry Potter, at the expense at that blasted Weasley no less, it was perfect.

That was until those scared eyes blinked up at him, and a slim pale hand skittishly took his own, "Why don't we all stand together?" He offered. Overwhelmed by the sights and sounds around him Harry was reaching out and taking all the offers he was getting.

Both Draco and Ron seemed absolutely repulsed by the idea. Ron in particular pulled away from the platinum blonde like Draco might bite him, "Harry no, you don't want to be friends with someone like him!" He snapped.

"Save your breath Weasley," Draco tried to stay calm, his dad wouldn't like it if he got mad. "I'm leaving." With that he walked away, Harry looking between the two wizards with a confused and hurt expression. What had he missed?

There was no room for a Malfoy and a Weasley to ever be friends.

Of course as Draco was leaving another student just had to run into him, a girl with bushy brown hair and buck teeth, he was so mad he didn't even stop to talk to her he just pushed past and let Crabbe and Goyle deal with her.

Hogwarts was beautiful. He couldn't show it though. Nothing could be better than the manor. His family earned that, so it was the best of the best, nothing was greater.

He eyed the hat warily as it sang, the song scaring some while relieving others; to him it was nothing he wasn't prepared for. He'd been drilled on this moment since the beginning of forever it felt like. Slytherin house was waiting for him. He was already waiting to see if his father's initials were still carved into the headboard of one of the beds in the dorm. He simply had to make his father proud.

One word would change his life forever, "GRYFFINDOR!"