A/N: Hello to those reading, welcome back! I just wanted to add a quick not that I have almost completed the Fic and that I will be posting once or twice a week. Reviews and criticism welcomed!
Chapter 2: Draco
Another morning for Draco brought the golden glow of the sun. He took a deep breathe, taking in the floral scent of the women asleep next to him.
Pansy.
He wanted to turn away, guilt churning in his gut. He had spent another night here instead of being at home with his wife.
"Good morning," she whispered, scrunching up her nose at the sunlight.
"Good Morning," he whispered back before untangling himself from her.
"You're going back to her," Pansy said bitterly, sitting up. Her hair was sticking up in all direction, and in almost any other circumstance, he would laugh.
Draco froze at her tone. This happened almost every morning now as if the guilt didn't hurt enough; she made it seem like he was using her as if she wasn't using him. As if she didn't spend the entire night crying on his shoulder because of her nightmares.
"She's my wife," Draco said, "I have a duty."
"You and I both know that you don't go back because of your duty," Pansy said, taking a drag from a Muggle cigarette, "you're just too much of a coward to say how you feel. That's noting new, but you have responsibilities to more than just your family, you know?"
Draco stiffened at the ruth of Pansy's words, and with a sneer said, "I have to go."
"Tell me Draco," Pansy called, "Do you think that maybe she could love you if you tried? Maybe try finding comfort between her legs instead of mine."
"We've never slept together." Draco hissed, angry at the accusation, "You know that."
"Do you think that it matters what we have and haven't done?" Pansy said, "All she knows is that you disappear at night and come home in the same cloths as the night before. Suspicious, don't you think?"
And just like that he walked to the green fires of the Floo calling out Malfoy Manor, Pansy's "See you tonight" following behind him. He stalked out of the Drawing Room and into the small dining room, where he found his wife sitting patiently with a cup of tea cooling in front of her, her hands neatly folded in her lap.
"Good morning, Husband," she said cooly, her eyes not leaving the extravagant breakfast laid before her.
"Good morning, Wife," he replied, unable to look at her.
Draco made his way to the seat next to Hermione, the seat to the right of where his father would sit in a few moments. He waited silently, and before he could say anything, his mother and father walked in the dining room with smiles on their faces.
"Good morning, Draco dear," Narcissa said before elegantly taking her seat across from Draco, "And to you as well, Hermione."
"And to you, Narcissa," Hermione smiled before lifting her cup of tea to her lips.
"Draco." Lucius said in stoic acknowledgment, before slightly bowing towards Hermione with a small smile, "Hermione dear, you are looking well this morning."
"The same could be said about you, Lucius," Hermione replied, her lips curling upwards.
It was a strange friendship between Lucius and Hermione, Draco had noticed. When she first married Draco, Lucius wouldn't look her way without sneering, muttering Mudblood under his breath. She took it all in stride and ignored him because it seemed that their plan of uniting society was working. It wasn't until Narcissa has fallen ill one summer with Dragonpox that he had begun to see Hermione in a different light. Hermione spent every waking moment by Narcissa's bedside nursing her back to health, telling Narcissa stories that she would find amusing. It was then that Lucius let his walls fall and he slowly accepted the witch as more than just a political convenience. He had begun to see her as the daughter he dearly wished for.
They began their breakfast in silence, the soft clicking of utensils on porcelain the only sound in the large room. It echoed off the walls which made Draco cringe slightly. It reminded him of the when the Dark Lord would dine in his home; everyone filled with to much fear to speak.
"I assume you two had a pleasant night last night," Narcissa prompted giving Hermione a knowing look.
Draco almost choked on his tea, his eyes widening at the idea of his parents finding out about Pansy.
"Same as every night," Hermione said with a smile that didn't quite reached her eyes, though his parents either didn't notice or chose not too.
Lucius chuckled, "Might we hear the pitter patter of little feet soon?"
Hermione stiffened and flushed, and Draco held his teacup a little tighter.
Neither Draco or Hermione answered. Instead, they busied themselves with finishing breakfast. Narcissa must have taken this as a positive sign because beamed at Lucius who had a dreamy look in his eye.
Lucius and Narcissa left the room quickly after saying their goodbyes to Draco and Hermione, leaving them alone.
"What was so special about last night?" Draco asked as he turned to face his wife.
"We got married four years ago yesterday, Draco," Hermione said, standing up, smoothing out her dress, and placing a kiss on Draco's cheek, "Happy Anniversary." She whispered before smoothly walking away, leaving her half-finished tea behind.
Draco sat in the silence. His hand tracing where Hermione's lips had landed, gooseflesh prickling his skin. He finished his breakfast alone, hey eyes occasionally wandering over to Hermione's abandoned tea cup, the contents now cold to the touch.
He spent the rest of the day in his study, filing paperwork and counting the hours until he could see Pansy again. He needed to talk to her about how he forgot his anniversary, and he needed brood around a bit before coming home the next morning.
As soon as the sun began to set, he got dressed and went over to her as quickly as possible. He curled by her fireplace and watched the flames reduce anything he threw into it to ash. He was there for hours before any found he in the same position she always did; knees were drawn up to his chest and his right arm tightly wrapped around them. His left arm, however, was barred from any clothes that would obstruct the Dark Mark from his sight. He would spend hours staring at it. Sometimes he would try to dig it out of his skin, but it never worked. It would always be there. He's always known that but it disappointed him none-the-less.
He felt someone sit next to him, huddled close and sigh. When his eyes closed, he would see a wild, bushy mane instead of silky locks. He would feel scars and bumps from years of fighting in a war under his fingertips instead of Pansy's smooth, soft baby skin. Black eyes would turn brown, and the world would melt away.
When he was in such a state like he was most nights, she would talk to him about nonsensical things; the clothes she bought that morning, the weather, the color of the drawing room and how she disgusts her it but won't change because it reminded her of her mother. Anything to distract him forms his thoughts. Eventually, he would talk, adding to the conversation about clothes and the weather.
When he would wake in the morning, either on the floor or one of the guest rooms in the house and he would go straight to the shower and rub his skin raw. He would let the guilt wash away, and before the sun would rise, he would rush out of Parkinson Manor straight to what was his and Hermione's bedroom.
Draco would sit there and watch Hermione sleep almost the same way he would watch Pansy. When she would begin to stir, he would disillusion himself and watch her prepare for the day from the corner. He would watch her undress, the beautiful expanse of her skin barred for him, and slip into the shower before putting in her robes and heading down for breakfast.
Sometimes he would catch her looking at what should be his side of the bed with disappointment. It made his heart flutter every time.
She had burrowed into his skin and his heart, and for the life of him, he didn't know how. He figured she had always been there, that he was born with Hermione's name printed on his skin.
Pans had once asked him why he didn't leave her, the Wizarding World had since been repaired, and he could be free from Hermione if he weren't happy. But Draco couldn't leave, he didn't want too. He knew that even if he wasn't, and would never, be the husband she deserved, he was too selfish to let anyone else have her. She was his, even though he didn't show her.
He had slipped into Pans's bed that night waking her up with gentle words and huddling close, not wanting to be alone like he had that morning.
Not wanting to feel like the failure he knew he was.
He loved and cherished Pansy's Friendship, and in another life, he would have married her instead, even if they never loved each other that way. With Hermione he was calm, settled, he wanted to build a life with her, one that he never saw with Pans, one he still hoped would bring love into his life.
And as the night went on, the room was filled with his quiet sobs and mental words until the sun rose, and just like every morning, Draco left to find his ever-patient wife sitting at the table waiting for breakfast.
