She tucks her legs in and keeps her chin down, a small ball in the plush leather loveseat. Her brow just barely visible from over her knees, she methodically surveys the room she is in, obsessively listing, sorting, categorizing, and analyzing what she sees.
Something to keep her broken mind working, she defends the activity vehemently. The saner part of her, however, protests, knowing the aberrant behavior to be dangerous to her mental health.
A ferocious downpour lashes persistently against the glass wall across from her, behind the other, vacant sofa. She shudders delicately as voices run through her head; soft and ominous, the touch of an absent lover.
"Mione, love, why so silent? Come run away with me, and forget this forsaken hellhole. Your obligations are no more. No more...no more...no more...no m -
"Stop it!" she shrieks in breathless panic, holding out her arms as if they were a shield. "Go away, go away, please..." Her voice fades to an unintelligible whimper, but laced with an obvious fear.
And then, almost mechanically, she stretches out her limbs, straightens her disheveled hair, composes her face, and folds herself back up again, arms encircling legs like the charmed vices used on particularly fidgety creatures being Transfigured.
She does not move as the door is suddenly opened, as the quiet, repetitive tap of footsteps make their way into the room, as, just meters away, a throat is loudly being cleared. Finally, it is a voice, sharp and familiar, that jolts her from her trance.
"Granger?"
Her head snaps up so quickly there is an audible crack. It takes a minute or so for her to register the face, and when she finally does, her shock fails to work its way into her voice. "Malfoy?" she manages in a dull monotone.
He is different, but only just. His frame is slightly sturdier, and he carries himself straighter, but his ashen face has not changed. His eyes, perfect spheres of dusted granite, are as guarded as they always were, but they are glazed over with something new, different, and heavy.
"I didn't know if it was really you," he begins awkwardly,"when I saw your name in the appointment book. A prank, maybe." He slowly lowers himself into the opposite seat. Clad in a long, dark suit jacket that pays homage to the wizarding robes from Hogwarts, the elegant material flows gracefully along with his movements.
He chooses his next words carefully. "What are you doing in Canada?"
"What are you?" Hermione retorts coldly. Clumsily, she tries to return to a normal position, but her worn-away boots skid noisily on the carpet.
"Careful," Malfoy chides, a ghost of a smirk settling on his lips.
Hermione scowls in embarrassment, looking down at her lap. "I was sent here, if you must know. By somebody."
Draco nods, an almost imperceptible bob of his head. "I thought so. And did you come here of your own accord?"
She snorts loudly. "What do you think?" She lets loose a long, irritated sigh. "The same somebody sent me here. To...whatever you've got here."
They fall into an uncomfortable silence. Hermione can almost feel it, clawing furiously at her fingers, heating her cheeks until her face is blotchy and hot with red. It continues relentlessly, until, having thought of something, Hermione frowns thoughtfully.
Draco raises a thin, golden eyebrow, reading her face. "You're wondering why I used an alias, yes?"
Nodding absently, she plucks a pamphlet from her jacket pocket. "Dr. Seamus Bulstrode," Hermione muses softly, flapping the pamphlet in his direction, followed by an amused chuckle. It is good-natured, but sharpened by some kind of subtle malice generally not associated with her. "I should have known."
"Yes, well. New life, new name." He stares at her pointedly. "My father is a convict, after all. My name has even appeared in Muggle newspapers. Why take chances?"
Cocking her head arrogantly, Hermione eyes Draco with suspicion in her eyes. "Malfoy, a psychiatrist. When did you find helping people a cause worthy of you?"
"Granger, the all-knowing, valiant, golden Gryffindor," Draco sneers venomously, clearly offended. "Why would you not think so little of me?"
"No," she protests, taken aback. "I was just wondering..."
"Mother and I moved to France, after the war," he interrupts evenly. "She didn't want me to go back to Hogwarts. It took some time, but she managed to enroll me in a prestigious, Ministry-run school there, specializing in wizarding psychology."
"Girard's," Hermione cuts in. "I've heard of it."
"A professor there thought I needed the experience, so he contacted a colleague staffing in an American Muggle university. I took a few courses there. Of course," he confesses unabashedly, "I was disgusted at first. But the Muggles are more intelligent than they tell us to be."
"Of course they are," Hermione snaps, remembering her own parents; the stories from relatives, praising how the two had excelled, shining with unprecedented confidence and brilliance, through dental school. You have their wits, her aunt once proudly told her.
Retired now, they live in a modest apartment in Wales.
After the war, Hermione had located them in Sydney, wandering and helpless. Fortunately, a quick trip to St. Mungo's brought everything rushing back to them, but the guilt still remains, a hard and rocky boulder in the pit of her stomach. Hermione, crumbling and jobless since the incident, continuously relies on them for financial support. It only contributes to the unpleasant mass of stone and shame, but she reasons to herself, I have no other choice.
Which, she knows, is far from the truth.
"I moved here," Malfoy continues, gesturing around him, "afterward. I treat both wizardkind and Muggles." He shrugs indifferently. "For the money, of course."
"But," Hermione says, ever the intellectual and curious despite herself, "the treatment? I mean, you've learned both the wizarding and Muggle forms of the science. What do you do to the patients?"
Draco's gaze is shrewd, yet, as always, demeaning. "It varies, Granger. I have my own treatments, but I don't waste an opportunity to use the traditional charms and spells practiced in wizarding psychiatry - only on the wizarding community," he assures. " L'Île-Dorval is rather small, and quaint; we don't keep many secrets. Muggles here know of us vaguely, but keep to themselves. That, in itself, is admirable -"
Hermione almost smiles. "That was praise...you're changing!"
He acknowledges this, nodding. "Haven't we all, after the war? Frankly, I don't know what to think. The prejudices seem to be falling away, but it only makes everything more confusing. I-I socialize with Muggles!" His eyebrows raise up below the fringe of his pale hair, as if he has just realized this. "A decade before, the idea would have been ludricous."
Draco stops short as he notices something below, near his feet. Piqued, he brandishes his wand from inside his coat and crouches, searching through the carpet.
"Damned bloody spiders!" he mutters, fingers combing through the fine threads. "A teenage witch from America magically altered their chromosomes or something - they're immune to extermination and Vanishing charms - there it is!" It is large, and scurries from under the seat and over his fingers. "Ah - Avada kedavra!"
The eerie green light lingers for a moment or two, then flashes away. Reciting a hasty Banishing Charm, the spider exits the room, flying, and Draco calmly returns to his seat.
Looking up, he finds Hermione completely bewildered. Her hands, shaking and clammy, clasp onto one another. Her eyes are misted over and distant, an unrecognizable color.
"It's legal," Draco says defensively. "The spell, here. On insects, small rodents, pests in general."
"No," Hermione whispers, almost inaudibly, her words riding on her breath.
"I know," he continues persistently, albeit more sympathetically. "The memories. I'm sorry - maybe I should ha -"
"No, its not that," she interjects, stronger and louder this time. But her voice is still full of shards of broken glass, weak and scattered and lost. "Spiders - he hated them. Ron."
She blinks rapidly, as if trying not to cry, and puts her face in her hands.
Draco's collected demeanor falls away, leaving his face a battlefield of contradicting emotions. "I heard about it," he says, so quietly that they can still hear the silence through the little holes in his voice. "I'm sorry."
Hermione's face slowly lifts. Her eyes are open, but they are empty, the bottom of a clear, glass bowl.
A/N: okay okay okay
so
this is my first story on fanfiction. and i realize everyone seems so ooc OHMYGOD I KNOW ITS KILLING ME and it just gets progressively worse because...well, i can't write in one sitting. i started this when i was 12 (well, i'm only 13 now, but still one year is a long time for me haha) and i keep on forgetting about what i wrote about earlier. and i'm too lazy to scroll back up and check ok sorry ugh. it was a stupid mobile interface.
AND THAT ALSO HAPPENS TO BE MY EXCUSE FOR MY COUNTLESS NUMBER OF TYPOS. god i haaaate typos. they are SERIOUSLY the bane of my existence. but with mobile they're kind of inevitable so...*sigh*
if you read, pleeeaaaaaaase review. even if you're not logged in, just...please. anything.
to be continued.