Author's Note: Hello everyone! This was a drabble I posted on my tumblr, but I liked it so much that I wanted to share it here as well. I was asked to write a "gutwrenching Dramione drabble" and this is what I came up with. Let me know what you think!
The waiting room at St. Mungo's was tense, to say the least. Populated by far too much red hair, Draco was beginning to feel like he couldn't breathe. Pacing wasn't helping — he had walked the length of the room too many times already, his path visible on the threadbare carpet. His mother and father sat in the corner of the room, backs ramrod straight as they tried not to judge the Weasley hoard too harshly. Blaise leaned against the wall near them.
"Draco, why don't we get a cup of tea?" Ginny's voice was small as her fingers lightly brushed his arm. She had her youngest sleeping against her chest. "Maybe by the time we get back they'll have Hermione back —"
Before she could finish, a Healer had crossed the threshold. She looked nervous, wringing her hands as if she would rather be in a room with twelve patients with dragon pox than face the most notorious wizarding families of the decade. She was older with grey hair bundled on top of her head, and Draco hoped that meant she was better at her job. At least, better than the last Healer that had come through.
"You have news?" he asked before sixteen Weasleys and five Potters could speak up.
The Healer nodded. Her nametag read Healer Pogsworth, and on a normal day Draco would've found her name humorous. "It's a little more complicated than we originally expected," she began slowly. "Your wife's body — well — it can't, that is, it's not —"
"Oh, will you spit it out already!" Lucius' sneer was audible from the far corner of the room.
Healer Pogsworth straightened her back. "We might not be able to save both of them."
A rush of cold air. A sick swooping sensation in his stomach. Overwhelming silence. Draco was sure he was falling through the floor, crashing into each ward in St. Mungo's as the earth swallowed him whole. The waiting room around him ceased to exist.
"What do you mean?" he finally croaked.
"We need you to make the decision," she replied.
"You can't —" He felt like falling over, like crawling into a hole until this terrible dream was over. This wasn't real. It couldn't be real.
"Which one, Mr. Malfoy?" She sounded more urgent this time.
"You can't ask that of me!" he cried, the situation finally breaking. Ginny rushed forward, somehow free of her child while he decided the fate of his own. Her hand rested on his arm, the weight reminding him that reality was this. "That's my wife! And my child! THAT'S MY SON!"
"One of them might die —"
"THEN LET ME DIE FIRST!" he roared. He crumpled to the floor, a broken man.
Author's Note: And before you ask, this will not be continued, it's just meant as a stand alone drabble.