A/N: Thanks so much to everyone who's shown interest and support for this story! The amount of love so far is insane and I can't thank you enough. I know the tense and the POV are throwing some people, but thanks for sticking with me. My response is: Well, you wanted inside his head! lol

Friday, June 5, 1998

It's my favorites for breakfast. Pumpkin pastries, ordered special from someplace where pumpkins are in season. My favorite jams and scones. Eggs, beans, sausages.

And it all tastes like ash.

Father reads the paper, eyes unmoving. Mother stands to pace the room, teacup and saucer in hand. I stare at the pumpkin biscuit on my plate.

The Notts were taken yesterday. And the Goyles. Pansy's father. Pansy was probably taken in for questioning, but I know they won't find any Unforgivables from her wand inspection. She'll be released quickly.

"Why did they wait?" Mother whispers. "Why haven't they taken us yet?"

"To see if we would run," Father replies, and turns the page.

I wish we had. Years back. I wish I'd been sent to Durmstrang like Father wanted.

"Remember," he says, "you may ask for a member of the Wizengamot present while you are questioned." He lifts his teacup. "The Auror's Office must abide by your request. I highly recommend –"

"Thank you, Lucius," Mother says, eyes trained out the window. "But I'm quite done with your 'recommendations.'"

A crack.

Hix, one of the grounds elves pops into the room.

"Master Malfoy," he squeaks, eyes wide. "They are here."

Father closes his paper. Mother finishes her tea, and grabs up her napkin, pressing the cloth to her lips.

I stare at my breakfast, and wonder if I will ever see this much food again.

Father stands, and we follow him out of the dining room and into the entry hall. We stand in a straight line, facing the front doors. I feel Father turn to me.

"Be strong, Draco. This isn't forever."

"You don't know that," I say.

"You don't have to answer any questions until a member of the Wizengamot is available. Remember that," he says, straightening his sleeves. "If you need me, you will need to write to me—"

"What would I possibly need from you," I hiss at him.

I feel his eyes on me as I keep mine trained on the front doors. My mother clutches my hand as the doors explode open, and about twenty Aurors storm through it. Our wands fly from our pockets – not my wand, still my mother's – and a spell kicks my knees out so I fall on them. I raise my hands in the air, as my parents do the same.

They are yelling things, and I'm trying to follow direction. I see my father dealt with first. Restraints placed on him, and he is taken out. Then my mother. That is harder to watch.

Then it's my turn, and a young Auror, barely twenty-five, restrains me. I might recognize him from Hogwarts. As he hauls me to my feet, his fist pops into my stomach so quickly I don't even know what happened. My air disappears and I fold over, seeing lights.

He drags me forward, and tugs my head up to his face, fist in my hair, and sour breath against my nose.

"Happy Birthday, Malfoy."

Friday, August 27, 1999 - later

Someone must have informed my mother that I was being released. She was to meet me for lunch before the trial reconvened in the afternoon, but when the guards escort me to a holding area, she is there, grinning like a loon.

She throws her arms around me, and I'm ashamed at my appearance. Greasy and unkempt. She whispers loving words to me and my eyes drift to see Rita Skeeter there too.

"Oh, how handsome you are Draco!" Her eyes dance over me. "But we'll have to clean you up a bit first."

There's a shower down the hall, and my mother gives me soap and shampoo. The ones I would use at home. I'm curious as to how she knew to bring them. The showers in the bowels of the Ministry are nicer than the ones at Azkaban, and I'm finished in five minutes, still unused to the idea of endless time. Time that belongs to me again.

When I return to the room in a fresh set of robes – new robes, bought just for me – I finally ask Rita what she's doing here.

"For the Prophet, darling!" Rita takes my elbow and leads me to a side room where a photographer is set up. "We couldn't have you seen leaving the Ministry today with that Azkaban grime on you. No, we'll need to take a few photos here, and a few of you and your mother leaving."

I frown at her. "Are you my press agent?"

She giggles and bats my arm, and I assume that's my answer. She dries my hair with her wand, and I let her set it just so, feeling awkward about having someone's hands on me.

I think my mother has been the only person to touch me in fifteen months. Just hugs on her monthly visits. Or the guards gripping my elbows as they led me around.

Skeeter directs me to stare into the camera and the light blinds me as her photographer jumps around.

After a short lunch, I am brought back to the courtroom, and vials are placed before me. I am handed my wand, and I hardly recognize it. I wonder if it will even still respond to me. Doesn't it belong to Potter now?

As it slides into my hand, it hums, and at least it recognizes me.

I spend the rest of the afternoon digging through my mind and tugging at memories like weeds. I have to label each wisp of silver as it drops into a vial, and discuss the significance of each memory with the Wizengamot. It takes hours.

My mother is waiting for me when I am done. I am taken to Azkaban to clean out my cell, and then I am released into my mother's custody. They take pictures as I leave.

As we're leaving, I think of my father, somewhere in that castle. While my mother has visited me once a month since her release, I've never once been allowed to see my father while I was in Azkaban, and as I leave the fortress behind, I hope I can leave him behind as well.

Mother and I arrive back at home. Just as I left it. Only now it is just Mippy who greets us. And I wonder what I'm supposed to do with all this space. I wonder how Mother can bear it.

We're in the entrance hall, near the fireplaces, and Mother asks me what I'd like to do.

"Sleep, I guess?"

"Are you hungry?"

I'm about to answer her when I see that the doors to the drawing room are pulled closed. She follows my eyes as I swallow.

"I don't much like that room anymore," she says. "Or the dining hall. I take my meals in the east wing now."

I blink, trying to block out the image of Professor Burbage's body hitting the dining table.

"Let's renovate it. Both of them."

She nods at me and smiles. She lets me go to bed. I climb the staircase, almost getting lost along the way. I finally find my bedroom, but only after I pass the room next to it. I move quickly past it, to keep myself from looking inside.

Monday, December 23, 1991

"And they just let him on the team!" I slap my hands down on the table. "The Hogwarts guidelines say that first years aren't even allowed brooms, but McGonagall just hands him one, clearly playing favorites, Father."

"Yes, Draco, you told me in your letters." He sips his morning tea.

"And isn't it strictly against the rules for a first year to be on the team?" I say. "I've been looking into it in the library but I haven't seen it referenced."

"I believe," Mother says, "that first years may try out, but that they may only use school brooms to do so." She pats the corner of her mouth with her napkin.

"How is that fair! Father, there must be something you can do about this, truly."

"Don't worry, Draco. You'll be on the team next year, and you'll be able to best Potter without resorting to rule breaking." He flips the Prophet pages. "How are your classes? Do you expect good marks?"

"Yes, Father." I pick at my toast. "I'm top in Potions, and very highly ranked in all other classes."

"How highly?" His eyes are now off the paper, looking at me with interest for the first time.

"Second, I believe," I say, lifting a haughty brow like he taught me.

"Excellent, Draco," Mother says.

"And who is in first?" he asks, his mouth twisting.

I narrow my eyes at the table, tugging at the napkin in my lap. I growl, "Hermione Granger."

"Granger," Mother says, looking at Father with squinted eyes. "I don't know the Grangers, do you?"

"Is she related to Hector Dagworth-Granger, the potioneer?" Father asks.

I scoff and say, "Merlin, no. She's a Mudblood."

"Draco," Mother coos. "You can't use that word at school."

"Well, I'm not at school, am I?" I glare at her.

"Watch your tone," Father says. I pout, and stab at the remains of my breakfast. "A Muggle-born girl at the top of her class? Is she a Ravenclaw?"

"Gryffindor," I sneer. "Best friends with Harry Potter."

"Ah." Father shakes his head. "That explains it. Everyone at that bloody school has gone soft for Potter and Dumbledore. I'm sure she's not actually receiving better marks than you, Draco. They are boosting her scores."

I look to my mother and she raises a brow at Father, before sipping from her teacup.

"Do you really think so?" I ask, greedy. "That's unfair! She's so irritating! She jumps up and down like she has to use the loo every time a professor asks a question. She's constantly scribbling notes – and her handwriting is just awful – and she tosses completely useless information out at all times, even though you didn't ask for it." I pick up my juice glass, but have another thought before I can sip. "And she spends all her time in the library at my favorite table! Every time I go in there, she's sitting there, reading Hogwarts, A History or some other mundane book, and I'm just so sick of her!"

I cross my arms and frown at my plate. Father turns a page in the newspaper, but Mother is watching me.

"What does Miss Granger look like? Is she of a pretty sort?" she says, bringing the teacup to her lips. I scowl at her and I see Father turn down the pages of his newspaper to eye her.

"No! She's hideous! She's got this great mane of ugly brown hair – I'm surprised she can even see half the time – and she's never dressed appropriately. And don't even get me started on her teeth—!"

"Oh, what a shame for her," Mother says, straightening the tablecloth. "So, she has no redeeming qualities at all then?" She lifts her eyes to me, and I feel my father shift next to me.

"Not a one!" I scoff.

"Narcissa," Father says, and it sounds like a warning, but I didn't hear the cause. "He's eleven."

"And?" she says. "I was eleven the first time someone called me a 'hideous excuse for a Black' in the Great Hall."

"Yes, but I was thirteen," Father says, frowning.

"You scoundrel." Mother winks at him.

"What are you talking about?" I look between them both. "Mother, you're prettier than both your sisters combined."

"Yes, your father knows it now, and he knew it then, too." Mother flips her hair over her shoulder, smiling at her husband. I'm about to heave in disgust when Father speaks.

"Draco, have you gotten to know Miss Parkinson? Or the Greengrass girl?"

I shrug, picking up my fork again. "Yeah, they're okay. They're bloody stupid."

"What a pity all girls can't be as bright as Hermione Granger," Mother says. She sips from her teacup and watches me.

"Yeah, I guess…" I trail off and frown at my eggs.

Saturday, August 28, 1999

Waking up in my own bed is strange. I can't sleep on the mattress for the first night – too soft, too many pillows – so I take the covers down to the floor and sleep next to my bed. Mippy finds me there the next morning, causing a huge scene.

I can't find the stairs for a long time either. Heading down to breakfast with mother in the mornings is mentally taxing.

I spend a bit of time flying. I find old brooms and try flying around for a few hours the first days. My muscles have atrophied in Azkaban.

I'm offending Mippy with my appetite. The little thing is so excited to cook for two that she goes completely mental the first week. She makes five course meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Mother is able to take small bits of each and thank the elf, but I can't eat more than soup and bread. The sweets and the spices make me sick.

Skeeter visits on Monday. My mother sets us up in the library, hovering over the tea cart. She wants to talk about my social life. I laugh. I have none.

"What about Blaise?" Mother says. "Does he know you were released? I could get in contact with his mother?"

"And set up a playdate?" I shoot at her. She glares back at me and turns back to fixing Skeeter's tea. "He's in Italy still."

Skeeter sits forward, almost falling off her seat. "To see you out with old chums from Hogwarts – especially those who were not as heavily involved in the Final Battle as others – will do wonders for you, dear." She taps her chin. "What about Miss Parkinson?"

I watch my mother's eyes turn to me, deferring to me. I think of the stack of letters, postcards, pictures that Pansy sent me over the past year. They were thrown out upon leaving my cell, unanswered.

"I'm not sure where Pansy and I stand."

"Well, all the better to find out then!" Skeeter grins and her quill jots notes behind her head. I frown, and glare at it. "Speaking of beautiful, single women," Skeeter coos, "when can we see you out on the town!" She takes me in with greedy eyes.

"Out on the town?"

"Courting, dear!" She giggles, and the sound is obnoxious. "You're… what? Twenty-five?"

"Nineteen."

"Even better!" Her eyes gleam. "The world wants to know what the Malfoy heir does in his free time! Who he's seeing, how many he's seeing." She nods at me, secretively. "You, Draco Malfoy, are a commodity. And we need to present you as such to the world."

"I'm an ex-Death Eater, with no friends and no purpose," I hiss at her.

"Only if you allow yourself to be." She winks at me.

The next day Skeeter publishes an article about my calendar. A beautiful schedule created by Skeeter herself, detailing my day-to-day life. I actually try to follow it. Whoever's schedule this is, he sounds like a very interesting person.

I leave the Manor for the first time that day. I get a haircut. Skeeter's schedule says I spend time at Florean Fortescue's for lunch every day, so I decide to pop in to grab a sandwich.

Entering Diagon Alley that day is a big mistake. It is August 31. The last day of supply shopping before the Hogwarts Express leaves on September 1. The streets are overcrowded, the storefronts packed, and I am too recognizable.

My chest seizes and won't let me breathe as parents pull their children away from me, and Slytherin fourth years try to send me a wave before their friends tug their arms.

I Apparate home. A failed mission.

But at least Skeeter prints on Wednesday that I had been in Diagon Alley, helping the young Slytherins pick up their robes.

When Mother asks me to head back to Diagon Alley that Saturday, I refuse.

"Draco, this book has been on hold for almost a week. I really need to pick it up."

"Then pick it up. Why do I have go?"

"I have a terrible headache, Draco," she says, pressing her knuckles to her forehead like some damsel in distress. This should have been my first clue. "Besides, it's Cornerstone. I know Morty would love to see you." She turns away, her voice drifting. "Maybe you could spend time there like you used to?"

I roll my eyes and head out on her errand. Diagon Alley is considerably less crowded, but still a weekend bunch, so I have to dodge the casual strollers, and weave through the day-trippers. Seeing Cornerstone again after quite a few years is like breathing fresh air. The store on the corner with the door at an odd angle.

I panic for a moment, wondering what Morty thinks of me, but I realize he still does business with my mother, so he must not feel too strongly about the Malfoy family. Or at least the Malfoys that go by Black.

I pull the door open, relieved to find no crowds. There never were crowds here. It was delightful to people-watch and daydream when I was younger, watching from a perch that Morty let me climb to as classmates wandered in, or hiding from my parents when they came to collect me. Or waiting for her to come in to browse –

I clear my head as I step up the two steps to the counter, trying to rid myself of the memories of watching her choose books.

And like a spell, she emerges from the stacks to the right. I stop, standing on one foot as the other is mid-step. She flutters to the counter, and my eyes widen when she steps behind it, suddenly pulling receipts from a drawer, like she works here. Like she belongs.

"I thought you worked for the Ministry."

She spins. Her eyes grow wide at the sight of me, and I see her breath catch in her throat.

Terrified. Of me.

I frown. Her eyes wander over me, and I feel warm as she examines me. I raise a brow, waiting for her answer.

"No," she says. "I mean – I mean yes, I do, but not on the weekends." She stares at me. "On the weekends I work here."

Her voice is tight, startled and cautious. Her eyes bright and breathing shallow. I look away before I concentrate on the rise and fall of her chest any longer.

"Obviously," I try, condescending. "But why?"

She opens her mouth to answer and no sound comes out. Her tongue is pink. Her eyes dance over my face and I want her to scowl at me. I want her to call me a Death Eater and tell me to get out. I want her to be familiar.

Then suddenly: "It's a bookstore. I like books."

I feel the air leave me before I can decide if it is a laugh or a sneer or a chuckle. "I remember." I turn my eyes away from her, trying to dismiss her. "I'm picking up a book."

She jumps. Like she's been shocked. "Yes, of course!" The sound is abrupt and it shakes me from whatever trance she has me under. "Did you have it reserved?"

I see her move immediately to the Ms, and I say, "It's under Black." She looks at me quickly, and the feeling of shame washes over me, the feeling I associate with Malfoy. "It's my mother's order."

I watch her calculate that information. She pulls the book and smiles. She begins speaking, something about goblins, but I watch her teeth, and her lips, and the light in her eyes, and I find myself jealous of the book in her hands, the book she smiles at. I feel dizzy and just before she looks up at me, the ghost of her smile on her cheeks, I remember what I'm missing. A barricade. I throw up a wall, hasty, grey stones. Something I should have had in place from the moment she popped out of the stacks, but she surprised me. Her eyes land on me and I'm hidden behind the stones.

"Your mother has excellent taste in books."

"I'll be sure to let her know." I feel my face relaxing.

She's handing me the bag and we're done. The business has concluded. But I want to stay.

"Why Cornerstone?" I take the bag from her.

She opens her mouth again and no sound comes out. And I revel in making her speechless for the second time today.

"I believe it's because it's located at the corner of Diagon Alley and Hor—"

"I know why it's named Cornerstone," I cut her off. Has she hit her head? "Why are you working here and not Flourish and Blotts? I would have thought you'd love to help the first years pick up their text books and buy their parchment. Host monthly Gilderoy Lockheart fan club meetings."

She's looking at me with wide eyes like I've just said something marvelous, and I can't for the life of me remember what we're talking about.

"I suppose I like Cornerstone because it's more out of the way. Less likely to be recognized here." She looks away, blushing. And I can't even comprehend what it must be like for her now that the war is over and she is a household name. She knows now what it was like for me.

"I used to come here during the summers for the same reasons." My eyes wander to the perch Morty would let me sit at. Where I could watch her…

"I never saw you here."

I look back at her, and it almost looks like she would have wanted to.

"That was sort of the point, wasn't it?"

She nods at me, and I guess that's goodbye. I take in her face one last time, in case I don't get another chance, and tilt my head at her.

How idiotic. I should have said goodbye or waved. I shake my head and sigh as I exit, wondering if she's already disappeared behind the stacks.

I take the south side of Diagon Alley, and I pop into the Daily Prophet main office. I ask the woman at the front for a copy of every paper printed since June of last year. Her eyes bulge out of her head, and I tell her to have them delivered to Malfoy Manor, at their earliest convenience.

I get home and I toss the book next to my mother on her couch in the library.

"Did you see Morty?"

"No, he wasn't there."

"Oh. Did you run into anyone else interesting?"

I stop on my way out the door, turning to see her lifted brow from this side of her book.

"Hermione Granger works there," I say, watching her.

"Oh?" She's still. An excellent tell of hers.

"But, you already knew that."

She lowers the book and blinks at me. "Did I?"

I shake my head at her and head upstairs. Mippy appears an hour later, carrying Daily Prophets from June 1998. I tell her there will be more coming, and she squeaks, disappearing.

I start with June 5, 1998. There is a brief mention of my birthday, but it is eaten by the news of the Nott, Goyle, and Parkinson arrests the day before. I toss it away. There was an evening paper on June 5, detailing the arrest of the Malfoy family earlier that day. I flip through, trying to re-acclimate myself to society. I continue looking through each day until finally on June 12, a picture of the three of them graces the cover. They began their testimonies of their glorified camping trip that day. Within a week my mother was out of prison and I suppose I owe Potter a thank you for that.

I place the June 12 paper to the side. I find another picture of the Golden Trio on the cover of the June 26 Prophet. I remember this one. Weasley said he wanted to be a Quidditch star, like the leech that he is, and Potter said he'd work for the Ministry.

She wanted to go back to Hogwarts. Just as I had suspected she would, but it frustrated me just the same. The same thought strikes me as when I read this paper in Azkaban a little over a year ago: How could she go back to that place after everything? Why wouldn't she want to move forward? She didn't need her N.E.W.T.s or her final year. There's not a person in the wizarding world who would have denied her anything.

I toss that paper on top of the other one. I delve through the rest of June, noting things that are now of interest to me, like Cuthbert Mockridge's retirement. A year ago, it was a glance through the pages, looking for any mention of my trial date. I laugh now at how optimistic I was.

I finish with the Daily Prophets from June 1998. The ones I set aside, I use a quick severing charm with my wand, and before I can second guess myself, I have cut the articles out.

I go to my closet, to the dresser in the back, and I crouch to open the bottom drawer. I find it just as I left it. A shoe box and extra blankets. I pop the top of the shoe box, and find her face staring at me from the Prophet clippings from years ago. On top is Skeeter's piece about her dating Krum and Potter at the same time from fourth year. I don't remember why it was on top. She's hugging Potter in the champion's tent, turning as the camera catches them, eyes wide and scared. Just like last week at my trial.

I place the new clippings from the June papers inside the box, close the top, shut the dresser drawer, and turn off the light in the closet.

Mippy brings in the July papers.

I don't sleep.