Lynn's Note: Hiya peoples! We're here with our first co-written and co-authored story! We are: The Witches of Tamali!
Kaitlyn's Note: I don't know.... I'm having a brain fart today...
Summary: A journal is supposed to be a private thing. So when it's lost, and the worst imaginable person finds it, what's the worst that could happen?
Disclaimer: The plot is mostly Kaitlyn's, whereas most of the writing and editing was done by Lynn, and everything else belongs to J.K. Rowling!
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Chapter 1
Draco Lucius Malfoy, son of Lucius Xavier and Narcissa Yvette Malfoy, heir to the fortunes of Malfoy and Renwall, walked down the hall towards the library, arrogance evident in his every step. His step faltered slightly as he remembered what he was going to have to face this year. Just like every other year.
Harry Potter. Oh, he remembered the first time he met Harry Potter. That Potter could have gone places. With him. Draco Malfoy.
But the Saint of Gryffindor had chosen… Well, he'd chosen Gryffindor.
Potter could have been a Slytherin. Draco prided himself on being able to tell what house people would go into, and he had identified Potter as a Slytherin right from the start.
But somehow he'd been wrong.
He had never admitted that of course. No, if people knew that Draco Malfoy had been wrong, well… It just wouldn't be a good thing.
Therefore why he'd never admitted it to anyone or anything…except his journal.
His journal was his only solitude, the one place where he didn't have to come up with snappy comebacks or witty remarks. He could just be his normal self.
Because he really did feel normal sometimes, no matter that he was Draco Lucius Malfoy, son of Lucius Xavier Malfoy…a Death Eater.
Believe it or not, Draco didn't really want to follow his father in the 'family business.' He wanted to forge his own path, do his own thing, not just get it because his father was Lucius Malfoy and his mother was a Renwall. He wasn't like them. He'd known it all along. He didn't have the same…mentality. He didn't have the same goals and dreams, the same driving force inside of him.
Well, he had a driving force, of course, as all males have…but…you all know that one. No, he was not like his father. His 'father' was just a man that lived in his house and told him what to do... and be. A Death Eater. Yes that was what his father wanted. His father wanted him to be a Death Eater. Just like the rest of his family.
The rest of his family wanted it because that was what the rest of his family was—and for the longest time, that was what he had wanted as well. He'd wanted to be accepted, he'd wanted them to be proud of him… But after a while he'd realized something.
Nothing could make them proud of him. He'd learned that after winning his first match against Potter in sixth year. Instead of a clap on the back—at the very least—from his father, he'd gotten a smack across the cheek and a "you should have done better than that!"
The most encouragement he ever got was knowing that they thought he could do better. Then again, maybe they just said that in hopes he could do better. When he did something he was proud of he got "you could have done, should have done better," and when he did something he wasn't proud of he got worse. He shuddered just thinking about it.
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Draco heard someone sit down across from him in a secluded corner in the library, a place he'd staked as his within the second day of his first year.
"Go away!" he snarled, not bothering to look to see who it was.
"I think I might have something you want," came the silky voice of Virginia Weasley.
Draco sighed. "Why would I want anything of yours?" he snarled back to her.
"Oh but it isn't mine. It's yours," she said. His head shot up. In her hand was a large green book.
"Where did you get that?" he snapped.
"Where I got it is not important, right now. What I want to know is this: is it all true?"
Draco weighed his options. He couldn't tell her it was true... But it was stupid to say it wasn't. "Yes it is all true. Now may I please have my journal back?"
"Wait I want some things sorted out first…listen.
"Saturday
"The game was today. We won. I caught the Snitch before Potter.
"My father was there. He saw me beat him... But he didn't care. He hit me afterwards, said that I "should have done better." That seems like all he ever says to me, even when I beat Granger in OWLs for Potions.
"He said that I should have done better; I should have beaten her more, gotten more OWLs.
"I stayed up studying the entire night before. I was lucky I didn't fall asleep. I can't believe I'm even trying anymore. I don't think I'll try next year...
"But if I don't try... I might not live to see my 18th birthday.
"What would it matter anyway? Nobody would care, I certainly don't have a girlfriend that would care.
"I don't have friends that would care.
"My Father would only care that he no longer had an heir to the Malfoy fortune.
"And that could be fixed. So far as I know, Mother can still procreate," she finished, looking up at him, her eyebrow raised in question.
"What? Yes, my mother can procreate. Is there anything else you'd like to know?" he asked acidly.
"I didn't say a thing," she said, before continuing.
"So all in all maybe I should give up with the cutting and just do it once and for all." She cut off once again, and again looked at him raising an eyebrow.
"What? It was a passing thought."
She still looked doubtful.
He sighed and rolled up his sleeve. "Here. Look. One eensie, weensie, tiny cut. Okay? Satisfied? You really have no right to be reading that anyway!"
She sighed and turned back to the journal.
"I would end it all, but I somehow feel like that's giving in. I've stood on the precipice at least ten times before, but each time something kept me from jumping.
"I wish I knew what it was, whatever is holding me back. Sometimes I wish I could rid of it, whatever it is. Living is sometimes a lot worse than I imagine dying to be.
"Well for some people that is not the way, but with me... Well, it seems like I'm always carrying this burden. This burden to be like my father, as good as my father. But I don't want to be like him, and I know that as long as that stays the same the burden will stay.
"You wrote all of this in one day?" Ginny asked, looking up.
"Well, it's not like I have things to do, now is it?" snapped Draco, suddenly seeming very interested in a crack on the table, carefully avoiding Ginny's eyes.
Ginny frowned. "But what about Quidditch? That day was the one you won the match, wasn't it? Why weren't you celebrating with your House?"
"What? You think I would fraternize with them? They are all idiots, it's a wonder how they ever got into Hogwarts, let alone Slytherin."
Ginny gaped. She certainly had not expected that as an answer. Oh, sure, she had a very different view of Malfoy now then she'd had before she'd read his journal, but this...
This was mind-boggling.
This was not Malfoy... this was.. this was... Draco. Yes, this was Draco. She knew Malfoy, but she had never known Draco.
It was a rather scary thought.
"Close your mouth, girl. You look like a fish."
Ginny tilted her head. He wasn't even attempting to be mean. He looked tired, but not sleepy tired, exhausted. There were big black bags under his eyes.
"Draco. Do you sleep?" she asked suddenly.
His head shot up.
"Of course I sleep. Heavens, yes. Why?"
"You need some more of it then," she said, closing the journal and setting it on her lap.
"What right," he whispered angrily, "do you have to tell me what to do?" he asked rhetorically, before storming out of the library. She watched him snarl at a little first year who unfortunately—for him—happened to cross Draco's path.
She sighed. This was going to take a lot more than she'd originally thought.