Remembrance is the pain

Hesitance is the torture

Circumstance becomes the gain

Severance becomes the cure

It was early morning when Draco Malfoy awoke with a start. A dream had caused him to wake from his comfortable sleep in the Slytherin common room. He was staring blindly into the dark, his breathing heavy. "It was a nightmare, just a nightmare." He said quietly to himself. He couldn't hear anyone else stirring in his dorm. That was good.

His mind kicked around in his head trying to recollect it, but it was gone. If his dream was about anything frightening, it had to be about You-Know-Who. You-Know-Who felt like Draco's own form of a Dementor, just the thought of him sucked all happiness out of the world. 'Why did he choose me? Why? I can't do it!'

Draco rested his head again on his pillow. He ran his fingers slowly through his platinum blond hair and he shifted around to find a comfortable spot. But there was something wrong. When he shifted his body he could feel a wet spot down in his pants, a small sticky wet spot at the end of his now obvious hardness. 'Oh my god!' he thought, 'please don't tell me I was dreaming of You-Know-Who!' He smiled at his ridiculous thought. There was no possible way that could happen.

He crept out of bed, as quietly as possible, and made his way to the bathroom. He didn't need the light now that his eyes were adjusted to the dark. His hands pulled the waistband of his pajamas off his skinny hips and sent them around his ankles. On the clean tile floor, he sat down against a wall, somewhere near the sink. He lifted his hips just enough to send the underwear down to his ankles too. Taking a towel from the rack above his head, he rubbed at his exposed hardness with it and hoped that it didn't get on his bed sheets. 'How long has it been,' he thought, 'since I last had a wet dream? And who, who could've sparked one now?'

When he felt the hardness go down, he crept back into the dorm, the towel around his waist and the soiled clothes in his hand. Crabbe was snoring so loud that it covered the sounds of Draco's trunk opening and closing as he got a clean pair of pajamas. He was grateful that the rest of his sleep was dreamless.

The next morning at breakfast, Draco was still trying to remember just what his dream had been about. He remembered only slightly some of its details.

"Did you do your paper for Trelawney yet?" grunted Crabbe to Goyle. Draco regretted sitting in between them now. If they were starting a conversation on homework, it could go on for a long and boring time.

"No," Goyle replied, "I didn't even finish doing that thing for Professor Sprout. You?" Draco continued to sit silently, his pumpkin juice cup in his left hand and an empty fork in his right. 'It was dark in the dream, I tried to turn the lights on but they wouldn't work.'

"No, I never do Sprout's homework."

'I was cold, I remember because I felt a desperate need for a robe, but I didn't have one on.' Draco tapped his fork on the table with the counts of his heartbeat. 'Yes, and I walked into a room I thought would be small, but it wasn't.'

"I did Snape's work, but that was a little easy with all the help he gave."

'My hands felt at the walls for something, for what?' Draco's teeth were clenched in thought. Crabbe and Goyle didn't notice. 'Why wasn't I in a robe? Why didn't I have my wand?'

"Yeah, Snape's is easy," said Crabbe, chewing on some bacon. "I wish Slughorn was easy. My mum keeps wonderin' why I am now failing Potions after I was doin' so well."

'Who was in that room with me? A voice, there was defiantly someone speaking to me.' Draco dropped his fork on the table and brought the pumpkin juice to his lips. 'That doesn't sound much like a wet dream.'

Draco's first class was Herbology, but it didn't matter to him what the difference was between Lovegrass and Bloodgrass. Crabbe and Goyle still stood at either side of him, but they were too thick to see Draco in heavy contemplation. They were still talking about work for all of their classes.

"I don't remember anything in Astronomy, I fell asleep," said Goyle.

'God Dammit!' Draco was clenching his Bloodgrass like a strangler on his victim's throat. Images swam through his mind from his dream. The dark room flooded his eyes and that cool air brought him goose bumps again. His hands felt the table in front of him and he imagined the clammy stonewalls. He could picture himself walking deeper and deeper inside.

"At least you can fall asleep in Astronomy. If you feel asleep in Hagrid's, you might wake up with your legs eaten off," Crabbe replied.

'My chest was bare, my back was against the wall, then what?' Draco thought.

"Isn't that right Malfoy, you know from personal experience," said Crabbe to Draco, who wasn't paying any attention. "That stupid bloke almost let your arm get eaten off!" Crabbe placed his big sausage like fingers on Draco's shoulder. Draco let out a gasp and jumped away from Crabbe and crashed into Goyle's massive chest.

"Don't touch me!" Draco spat suddenly. 'That was it! I was walking in that room and someone touched me just like that!' Some of the class snickered at the sudden outburst and at Crabbe's stunned face. Draco couldn't hear them. He was too caught up in his own mind. The image from the dream was so vivid and clear. He could see it perfectly and wondered why he didn't remember it before. 'The hand that touched me was so like mine. It was my skin color and it was about the same size, but it defiantly wasn't my hand. It was another boy's.' Draco gritted his teeth and swelled his chest slightly. 'Impossible, no wet dream of mine contained a boy.'

For the rest of the class, Crabbe and Goyle remained quiet while Draco strangled his Bloodgrass more brutally then ever.

He knew his plans were all falling through. 'Nothing is working! I can't just approach him face to face. He is too strong. I'll end up in jail with my disgraced father!' Draco was fighting his mind again. It was torturing him by his second class. 'My father. Wouldn't someone understand why this had to be done? He would, my dad, he would do this mission no questions asked. I'll never be as strong as him.' Draco closed his eyes to hold back his emotions. He had to stop thinking like this. It was only distracting him.

Crabbe and Goyle sat silent at his side. They had no question in their minds about Draco. Draco noticed Goyle's dull gaze to the front of the class. It said nothing of fear or responsibility. 'Life must be easy,' Draco figured, 'being a lapdog.' Goyle's only responsibility was to Draco; his only fear was that Draco would abandon him. Draco turned his head to face Crabbe and saw the same blank stare, free of the weight of responsibility, free of everything except dull questioning at the new lesson.

'But that is how I stared, when that hand touched my shoulder in the dream. I was confused yet I felt no fear.' Draco could see the pale skin of the hand and the extending arm, even a flash of another bare chest, young and skinny. It was so like Draco's, but it wasn't in ways that couldn't be described. 'No fear? No fear of some boy who thinks he could have his way with me? Hmm, No anger either.' Small images flashed into Draco's memory. The two chests pressed together, breathing at the same pace, then two pairs of lips connecting. There were hands gliding across silk smooth skin. There was lust in these movements, lust that Draco was sure he would never have for a boy.

'Why am I remembering this now?' Malfoy thought as students all through the class stood up and gathered their things. He didn't know what to think of. The two things on his mind seemed to him like cruel torture. 'I'd rather have sex with a boy then have to kill for my father sake.' Draco stood up with Crabbe and Goyle and took another look at both of them. 'I wonder which one they would choose.' Draco smiled, something he hadn't done in awhile, thinking of Crabbe and Goyle kissing.

At lunch it seemed as if the whole dream was coming together. 'I was looking for him in that room, that's why I wasn't afraid when I found him. That's why when he touched me I seemed so ready. We kissed so quickly, I didn't even hesitate, and he had me against the wall. His hands crawled all over me. I accepted him. I let him touch my chest, drag a finger down my spine, run his nails through my hair, force his tongue into my mouth to play with my tongue. I even let him undo my pants. I let him do it with my eyes closed in ecstasy.'

Crabbe and Goyle were filling their plates full of food, but Draco left his plate empty. He had his cup of pumpkin juice in his left hand, but it never reached his lips. Instead of eating Draco spent his lunchtime glaring across the table, deep in thought.

'I remember switching places with him. He was against the wall and I was running my lips softly up his neck. They connected with his skin in tender kisses. My hands ran through his hair, which I know was dark. I can't remember his face though.'

A couple of Ravenclaws thought that Draco was glaring at them and they began to look nervous. Crabbe and Goyle sneered at them till they turned back around.

'I was running my lips down his chest. He was breathing as heavy as me. The lust in the air was so thick it was suffocating. It felt like years of tension was finally being released. But how could I feel all that in just a dream?' Draco let his eyes drift upward toward the ceiling. 'He was speaking to me as my lips moved across his skin. His voice was so familiar as it seemed to speak right in my ear. "I will take your fear…" he began to say.'

"Who do those Ravenclaws think they are? They think they can take us?" Crabbe said to Goyle.

"They've got to be slow, those blokes," replied Goyle.

'Why would he say that to me? How could he know that those words were exactly what I wanted to hear? Did I know him?' Draco tried to picture all the Slytherins he knew with dark hair, but none looked anything like the boy in his dream. The answer to the boy's identity seemed painfully obvious, but Draco still couldn't think of who it was. 'It wasn't real. The dream wasn't real.' But as Draco remembered reaching a hand into the other boy's pants, the dream felt more real then the bench he was sitting on or the goblet in his hands.

Draco's chest felt tight and his grip on the goblet grew stronger. 'I pulled down the boy's pants and turned him toward the wall. My own cock was out, but I don't remember how it got that way. I was hard and ready. There was no hesitation as I entered into him. I fucked him with lust and affection in my heart. It couldn't have been just a dream.' The recollection was causing his cock to grow hard, but Draco didn't try to hide it from anyone else at the lunch table. It was as if he could feel the events of the dream again right here. He could feel the heat and the tightness enveloping his organ. He could feel the pressure at the base of his spine as if he was going to come right here. 'A dream, it was such a good dream. That boy, fuck, I wish he were real.'

"Are you alright Malfoy?" asked Crabbe, worried about his friend's flustered face. Draco didn't pay any attention to Crabbe's question. He was utterly lost.

'His face is just a blur. I'll never know what he looks like.' Draco looked at his pumpkin juice glass. His eyes searched the surface of the liquid, as if looking for the face, but the only reflection was of Draco's eyes. 'It's not important anyway.'

Pansy Parkinson stopped the conversation she was having with another Slytherin girl. She looked at Draco worried.

"Maybe he is just thinking really hard." Goyle suggested to her. "He has lots of responsibilities." Pansy shook her head slightly.

"No, there is something else," She said softly as she reached her hand to touch Draco's arm. "Draco?" she questioned, "What are you thinking of?" Draco glared at her, angry to be interrupted.

"What does it matter what I'm thinking Pansy, just let me think!"

"I'm sorry. So sorry." Pansy apologized, turning again to her friend. Draco stood up from his seat and without saying a word to Crabbe and Goyle, walked hastily out of the Great Hall.

The next classes passed by like seconds. Draco's hands never left the table to take notes or practice charms. The only parts of Draco that moved in his classes were his eyes as they blinked slowly and his pulse as it jumped around fiercely in his veins. His feet moved to carry him to the next room, where he continued to do nothing but think.

Ever since Pansy had laid that hand on him, ever since she had brought him back, Draco had been completely absorbed in anger. It enveloped him and caused him to picture things he didn't want to. He was thinking of his task again. His task to kill Dumbledore.

So many scenarios drifted through his thoughts. Bloody, cruel scenarios and cunning plans, but these things would never be executed. Dumbledore could never be executed by Draco's hand. He could feel that truth like a stab in the heart.

Draco's feet were traveling on their own accord through the Hogwart's halls. Draco didn't care where they took him; he wasn't planning on going to dinner.

' "You will do as I tell you Draco! Your father couldn't do what was required of him and if you can't do what I have instructed you to do, what use are the Malfoy's to me?" Voldermort stood over me. His robe touched my fingertips and kneeling that close I could feel cold radiating from him, as if his insides were made of nothing but ice. "I would rather take your life, Young Malfoy, then have to deal with your family's repeated failures. Do you understand me?" '

Draco's feet took him up a flight of stairs to the second floor.

' "I understand my lord, I'll do as you say. I swear it will be done." My eyes raised to the snakelike face. There was a slight grin, or at least I thought it was a grin. That damn face, so cruel, it was so cold. "Those were your father's exact words," he said, "when I sent him to fetch me the prophecy. For your sake, I hope those words don't cause you to repeat the same failure." '

The second floor was deserted as Draco walked down the center of the hall as if walking a plank. His eyes pointed to his feet. He caught rays of light here and there in the corners of his eyes. The sun shot the colors from the stained glass at him and he slowed his pace. He was in East wing. The stained glass of the knight in the forest was at his left. He could not help but to look at the colors streaming through the glass. It was such a brilliant green.

'His eyes!'

The stained glass trees, the eyes in the dream, they were the same brilliant green. Draco ventured his mind back to the dark cold room, heated with the passion of the two boys. It took away some of the weight on his shoulders, just enough to let Draco breathe in the air around him and enjoy it.

'Where have I seen these eyes before?'

The sun continued to play its games, streaming through the window in such a way that the green rays danced across Draco's face, as if the eyes were blinking.

'The eyes seem so familiar.'

The answer came in a flash, a flash of an image in the back of Draco's mind. It was an image of a face on the floor, the nose bloody, the mouth twisted in pain and in rage, and the eyes flashing violently. This image right before Draco covered it with an invisibility cloak.

' "I will take away your fear, your burden. Just come with me Draco. Please, just follow me. I will bear your burden." '

"NO!" Draco screamed at the glass. He bent over himself; hands pressed to his face and continued to wail.

'Harry's eyes, Harry's face, Harry's voice. It's all there.' Draco lifted himself up and took one last wide-eyed look at the glass before taking off down the hall.

'I will never go with you. I could never.'

He walked faster and his heart beat menacingly in his chest.

'I can't…I must…I must kill and you cannot help me.'

A bathroom was up ahead. It was a place Draco used to go to vent out his frustration. He saw the door marked 'girls' and without hesitation, pushed it open.

Draco walked to one of the sinks and turned on the cold water. The snake's head of the faucet trickled slightly before letting loose a stream of cool liquid into Draco's hands. He splashed his face over and over, feeling that every splash released just a little of his pain, his confusion, and his burden.

"What are you doing in here," said soft unearthly voice from behind Draco. Draco knew it was Moaning Myrtle and she was just the person he wanted to speak to. "I thought that you didn't want to talk with me again." She began to sob and whine as only a ghost could. "After a month I figure you would never come back, it's not like I really matter anyway."

"I'm sorry Myrtle, but I need to talk to someone." Draco turned the water off and faced the ghostly figure. "I had a dream and it's got me feeling insane. Please listen to me." He tried to make his face look apologetic but it was too twisted in anger to be convincing.

Myrtle shrugged her shoulders. "Sure why not? I've got nothing else to do in my eternal existence."

"I dreamt that Harry...Harry told me to go with him. He told me he would take my burden." Draco thought it was best not to mention that he said this to him while they were having sex. "But how could he ask that of me Myrtle. The Dark Lord would surely kill me, even though he is going to kill me anyway when he discovers that I'm too weak to kill him!" Draco felt his face get hot and his eyes start to water. He felt scared, confused, and hopeless. Myrtle listened, saying nothing and hardly understanding.

"I don't…I don't want to die. I'm too young. My father, if only he could've just done what You-Know-Who asked. I don't want to die! How could my father ask me to die for him!" Draco covered his eyes with his hands.

"All I want is for someone to take my place, someone to be here instead of me. I want my life back! I don't want this death sentence! He told me…he told me he would take my burden, my fears, but he is a liar!"

Myrtle looked away, not being able to stand seeing Draco breakdown in front of her. "Draco," she said to him while looking at the sun stream through the window, "it was just a dream."

There was a pause as Draco walked back to the sink and clutched the edge tightly in his hands. The tears were still falling from his face and his body convulsed from his emotion.

"I need him, I need someone. I just can't do it. I can't. I'm going to die." Draco was saying softly. "I need someone. I can't. He says he'll kill me. He's going to kill me." His words sounded like a hymn as he whispered them to the foggy, cracked mirror. He continued to mutter and the tears streamed harder, faster down his cheeks.

"Don't" Myrtle said from one of the cubicle she had gone into, not being able to watch Draco. "Don't…tell me what's wrong…I can help you."

"No one can help me," Draco said louder. His body was shaking severely and his insides were turning. His body was trying it's hardest to force out the torturous emotion that enveloped him. His burden, the weight on his shoulders, was engrained so deeply within Draco. It was so apart of him that his storm of tears could not wash it away.

"I can't do it…I can't…It won't work…and unless I do it soon…he says he'll kill me…" Draco's hands were white from gripping the sink. He took a deep breath and heard the voice again in his head.

'Please, just follow me. I will bear your burden.'

He looked up, ready to see his own face in the mirror, but instead of just his face he saw those green eyes, in the mirror with him. Harry's face, just over his shoulder. He could see again in his head the scene from his dream. 'The hand, so like mine, touching my shoulder. He is right behind me…just a dream.' Just the flash of those eyes in the mirror was torturous. 'Liar! Those eyes lie!'

Draco wheeled around and drew his wand. He flung a stunning hex at Harry, but with the tears in Draco's eyes, he couldn't see that well.

'I must punish him for lying to me, for giving me relief before taking it back.' Draco blocked the jinx Harry threw at him.

'He must feel my pain.'

"No! No! Stop it!" Moaning Myrtle shrieked. "Stop! STOP!" Draco didn't listen and he attempted another curse, but Harry blocked it.

'He must feel the torture that I have to feel.'

Harry tried a Leg-Locker curse but it hit a sink at Draco's left, causing it to explode and spill water everywhere.

For a second Draco could feel the lust and passion of the dream fill his body again. For a second he felt the opiate fill him. Flashes of memory swam through his mind. The lips connecting, the hands stroking, the sun through the stained glass, the bleeding furious face on the floor, and the eyes. The eyes burned in his head just as they burned now in Harry's face. The second passed, the opiate was gone, and the burden weighed again on Draco in full force.

"Cruci-" Draco began, putting all of his anger and fear into the spell as he could, forcing the burden out of him that could not be forced out with tears. But he didn't have time to finish his spell and relief never came.

"SECTUMSEMPRA!" Harry shouted. Draco's heart skipped beats in shock as he could feel the pain of deep gashes being torn into his body. The wand fell to the floor, followed by streams of blood, spilling gracefully onto the water soaked floor.