Her hands are interlaced at the base of her neck, and she's hunched over, elbows pitched against the table. She turns her head, eyes finding his. A vein pulses under his eye. There's only a small distance between them, but the words get lost. She never has the right words for him.

"When Dad died..." she starts, and then her voice peters off.

He stares at her, mouth parted in confusion. He already knows this, has seen her face dissolve as she spoke about her father's death. She knows what she needs to say, except she can't get her tongue to form the thoughts.

"Draco, I–"

She pushes her palms against her eyelids until the insides are dappled with color. "Dad was an organ donor," she says. She hesitates over the next words. "And you needed a transplant."

He inhales. Her eyes are still closed, afraid to break whatever momentum she's grasping. "As soon as he was a match, I knew what I had to do. Before that, even. I–Draco." She drops her hands onto the table; she can barely see him through the smear of tears. "I took him off life support, and they did the surgery. You needed the organ, and–"

"Why didn't you tell me earlier?"

"I didn't want you to worry. You needed to focus on recovering."

"That wasn't your choice to make." His voice is low and strained. Lines crack against the leather from where his fingers grip the armrest. "You should have told me. Hermione, it's been weeks."

She flinches. "I didn't know how to tell you."

"So you lied to me instead? You just let me believe the donor was a stranger–"

"I never said that." It's a stupid point she fixates on, semantics. But she's taken on so many roles already, she doesn't want to add liar to the list. She hears her mother's voice in her head: A lie of omission is a lie, Hermione, and she squeezes her eyes shut to disappear the words.

"Right. You just conveniently forget to tell me. How can you even look at me, Hermione? How can you…" he trails offs.

"It wasn't ever really a choice, Draco. I would have done anything for you."

He rises, arms crossed as he walks towards the window. His face is half-turned towards her when he speaks. "Not a choice. As in, forced. You felt forced into a decision."

"What? No, that's not–"

"You'll resent me, for the rest of our lives–"

"Draco, that's not what I meant." Panic presses into her, and she digs her finger into the splintered skin of her thumb. "I would never–"

"But you will, Hermione. For fuck's sake. Every time you look at me, you'll think of him. How could you not?"

"Draco, I love you." It's wrong, all of this. Her declaration sounds like an excuse.

He leans a shoulder against the window frame. His heavy breaths are the only noise in the room. She's staring at the pink flush crawling up his neck when he next speaks.

"I promised your father I would look after you, Hermione." The syllables crack, and he clears his throat. "All I ever wanted was to support you, to lessen your burden, and now I've become a charity case for you."

"Draco, I don't think of you as–"

"Look at me," he yells, pulling at his sweater until the fabric outlines the ostomy bag. There's a frantic, desperate quality to his words. "There's a fucking hole in me."

"Draco, this is what marriage is, taking care of each other."

"Then tell me how I can be a husband to you." Redness mottles his neck. "Tell me how to be a husband to you, because I don't know how."

"Just talk to me." Her voice pitches upwards, the edges laced with frustration. There's a lower plead to it as well. "Tell me how you feel, what you feel. Don't hide from me. Don't go behind my back and make decisions. Merlin, Draco." She doesn't want to do this; she doesn't want to bring this up, but now it's out there, and she can't stop. "The money, France, Tabitha. Why didn't you tell me anything? I'm your wife, not a child. You should have discussed this with me. You should have told me. Instead, I found out from Theo."

"I should have told you? I should have discussed." He rakes his fingers through his hair, leaving deep grooves in the pomade. "When? When should I have spoken to you? You were barely around. You could barely talk to me. I wanted to prove, once and for all, that I could do something for you. That's why I went to Patagonia, but I couldn't even–"

"You've never needed to prove anything. All I ever wanted is for you to love me, Draco."

"I have. And look at what it's done to me," he yells, and then his mouth snaps shut, eyes widening.

She's so stunned that she can only stand there. Rigidly, he sits down on the window seat and stares at his fingers, like he'll find the words there. He's hunched over, forming a question mark with his spine. As she walks closer, his shoulders hiccup, and when he looks at her, there are tracks of silver on his face. "I didn't mean that."

She sits next to him, heart vibrating in her throat. His shoulders shake, and she presses a palm between them, like he's done for her so many times. He lets out a strange, strangled sound and folds his torso into her lap, hands gripping her knees. "I'm sorry," he repeats, the words collapsing on themselves between breaths.

Their unwieldy conversation has tumbled over a cliff. She's staring at the smoking remains, shattered, at the bottom of a ravine.

"I think you do mean that, Draco." There is no malice in her words. "And it's okay." He soaks into her jeans, and she slopes her hand down his spine, feeling the soft cashmere. She stares out the conservatory window, watching how the panes fracture light into a rainbow. Vaguely, she notices a wetness on her chin. When looks down, she sees she's dripping onto the back of Draco's neck.

They're lying next to each other. She's never seen Draco like that, the way he curled into her, devastated by guilt. They've been quiet all evening. Before bed, she approached and he shrunk away, lips flattening, like he worried what his words would do.

Now, she turns toward him, and he's looking up at the ceiling. "Draco, we should talk."

His mouth twitches, but he continues to stare up, chest rising in even, long breaths. "I don't know what to say."

"Draco, please look at me."

He turns, shifting onto his side. His eyes are still red-rimmed. "I'm sorry."

"Please stop saying that." The moment is a blister, and her nail is poised above, flirting. If she punctures the sac, the wound will either heal or fester. "You're angry, Draco. You can say that you're angry."

"I can't be angry with you." He fists the duvet and then releases. "I don't want to be angry with you."

"You deserve to be angry."

"How can I be angry after what–Hermione, you did something unimaginable for me. I wanted to help you, and I couldn't even do that."

"You almost died for me, Draco. I'd say the scales are more than–"

"No, no, that's where you're wrong." His voice shifts, frustration rising over the swell of remorse. "Things have never been equal between us. My whole life, I've owed people. My parents, for the privilege of my childhood. Snape, for sparing me the–and you, Hermione, for choosing me. Do you think I don't see how your friends treat us? Nobody in your life thinks I deserve you. Not even Cadric thinks I'm capable."

Where was this coming from? "Draco, I don't care what other people think."

"I care." He sits up, pulling the duvet tight to cover his abdomen. "The war ended years ago, but I am still a leper. Merlin, Hermione. Do you have any idea what that's like? I was a child, and people condemned me like a man, and now I'm a man, and people only see a Death Eater–"

"That's not true. You fought on our side. We–"

"But no one cares, Hermione. Things were different in Australia. No one knew who I was there, but then we returned to London. We got married, but I couldn't provide anything. I had no trust, no money. No one would hire me." His voice flattens, the hills and valleys of inflection crumbling. "I couldn't even start a business. No one wanted to work with me."

Her mouth is dry, and her words come out horse and unsteady. "Is that why you didn't tell me about the firm?"

"My cultural castration is humiliating."

"Why didn't you tell me you felt this way?"

"You never asked." His voice is a thin, cold blade. "I didn't think you had time to care." He closes his eyes. His voice softens. "I just mean, you were busy."

"I'm here now," she says. "Tell me how to help you."

He shifts, gazing out the window. She stares at the whorl of his ear, eyes tracing the delicate spirals, like maybe she can transfer her words into him this way.

"I don't want to be angry, because I know you tried your best. You saved my life. I–But maybe that's the problem. I don't know how to navigate a marriage where I am always indebted."

"Draco, please tell me how to fix this." She shifts towards him, sliding her hand along his shoulder until it reaches the bones of his clavicle. Her chin is parallel with his neck. He inhales and her forearm raises with his breath.

Reaching up, he curls his hands against hers. They stay like that for a moment. She's waiting for him to turn and face her. But then, gently, he loosens her fingers and drops her palm onto the mattress.

"I just need time, Hermione. I need you to give me some time."

He lays down, face disappearing as he turns. She's left staring at the back of his t-shirt. There's a hot coal in her mouth, melting all the tissue. Saliva mixes with the metallic taste of blood. She sits there, swallowing air, trying to breath through the pain. Later, after Draco has fallen asleep, she slides her fingers against her tongue, feeling the dips from where she's bitten through.

When she wakes up, she reaches over, on instinct. Draco's side is still warm, the bedsheets rumpled with sleep, but he's already gone. She sees him in flashes throughout the week. Her husband haunts her: he shrinks into the shadow of the corridors, retires to bed late to avoid a conversation.

Time is meaningless in this purgatory. Activities bleed into each other, one long swath of red: breakfast, solitude, dinner, sleep. She thinks of the melting clocks again, all the time, hemorrhaging. Evaporating. Once you lose time, you can't ever gain it back. Once you know something, you can never unknow it.

One afternoon, voices cascade from the conservatory, and Hermione's feet bring her there before she's planned out her words. Pansy, Theo, and Blaise sit around Draco, and they're smiling. She can't see Draco's face, but he's turned towards Pansy, whose head is rocking up and down, lips pulled wide.

Blaise spots her first, and he stands up. "Granger," he says. Theo stands next, and after a beat, Pansy follows.

Draco turns to look at her, his expression blank. "Hermione," he says. "They stopped by to visit."

"Would you like to join us?" Blaise asks. His voice is warm and welcoming. She remembers the crumbs of kindness he offered her in the hospital, which weren't much, but enough that she won't forget.

"We're drinking Earl Grey," Theo says. Her favorite, he knows. His expression is inscrutable, but his posture is devoid of the hostility from their past encounters. "Pansy also brought some macaroons, from France."

They stare at her. She tugs at the bottom of her shirt, embarrassed at the toothpaste stain there. "Thank you," she says, "but I have to take care of some things."

"Cryptic," Theo says. "A secret mission?" His mouth quirks up, and she can see now that he's trying, but she's not ready to accept his olive branch yet.

The dynamics in the room are off-kilter. It's Draco, she realizes. He doesn't seem particularly happy to see them. He seems resigned, the same way he looks at her sometimes. The other three are compensating. She can see it in their posture, the way they keep leaning towards him.

"I have to go to my parent's house, to pack up their–" she stops, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. The mood in the room sinks, and Pansy looks down at her hands.

"Do you need me to come with you?" Draco asks, but his tone is flat and automatic, like he's reading from a script. She shakes her head in rapid jerks; her brain feels tender and bruised.

"No, please don't." She swallows. "You should enjoy time with your friends. It looks like you're having a good conversation." The words sound more bitter than she intends, and she knots her hands together before turning away, unsure of how to salvage this moment.

"Hermione," he says, and she almost pauses, but a whispering starts in the room, and Draco only calls her name once.

She runs her fingers along the craftsman door panels before sliding her key into the lock. The welcome rug reads "The Grangers." It feels profane to scuff her soles on the lettering before she enters, careful about tracking in any dirt.

The stink slams into her, short-circuiting her other senses, making her eyes water. In the kitchen, bananas hang from a silver hook, and tiny, black gnats crowd the lines of their mottled, oozing skin. When she opens the fridge, she sees a chunk of cheese disfigured by moulding circles; sunken-in apricots with bits of rotting skin; blackened strawberries attached to wilting stems.

She busies herself with tossing everything into a trash bag, ignoring her wand. There is catharsis to be found in manual labor, or, at the very least, distraction. She scrubs the counters, flecks of grease jumping onto her coat. The sinks glistens by the time she's done. Standing there, she grips the kitchen countertops, shoulders hunched towards her ears.

The dinner table is covered in a fine, grey mist, and she dribbles her fingers against its surface, marking her presence. Her parent's home is a museum, a curation of artifacts that brutalizes her as she enters the living room, squinting at the photographs on the mantel. The remote balances at the edge of the coffee table, like it had been tossed there.

She shouldn't have put this off for so long, but she's not sure where to start. She'll have to box up her parent's lives, sort some of it into storage, throw away the rest. The task feels impossible when every item is a portal into another memory; memory is all she has left.

The stairs creak in rhythm to her steps. At the top, she pauses; her parent's bedroom door is ajar, and she can see the unmade bed, an anomaly for them. Their phone call had come early in the morning. Her father had described the A&E visit as a precaution. I'm sure we'll be back by night, he had said, even when mum couldn't get out of bed.

She sits down on the step, perches her elbows on her knees.

Their morning hadn't gone as planned: routine disrupted, items displaced. There are clothes strewn on their bedroom floor, a pair of socks wilting on top of her mother's nightgown.

There's a burn in her throat, the familiar prick in her eyes.

She imagines her mother's face, the look she probably cast over her shoulder before leaving the room. Her mother hated mess. She would have wanted to hang up her nightgown, iron out its silk wrinkles.

The pressure in Hermione's throat grows; she jams her knuckle into her forehead. If she starts, she won't stop. There are things that need to be done. She can have time, later, to break apart.

Through the balusters of the stairs, she sees father's blue poplin pajamas. He loved that set; she should have come back and packed it for him. There were always more important things to do. She hadn't been able to enter their room.

She's ten-feet from the door, just a couple of steps. She could pick up the clothes, fold back the duvet, restore order the way her parents would have wanted. They way they had taught her to. Make your bed first thing in the morning her mother used to say. It sets the tone for the rest of the day.

The years seem insurmountable then: all the milestones she'll live through without them. She's most frightened by what she'll continue to forget, what will dissolve with the ravages of time: her mother's eyes, her father's laugh, how she used to sit between them on the couch, her feet in her father's lap while her mother palmed her curls. She can imagine a day, years from now, waking up to white gaps inhabiting the neural spaces where her parents used to live. She can imagine their faces, blotted out, the edges charred, like a cigarette burn on a photograph.

They had thought they would come home, have time to tidy up; they never did.

Returning from her parents' house to the manor heightens the stark reality of her life. She feels like a phantom, able to flit through life, unnoticed, unwanted. After a silent dinner, she retires to a stone pavilion in the manor gardens. She thinks of this place as her haven; she's never seen anyone else here. It's the only place she feels she can breathe in the whole manor.

Rain drizzles down, but Hermione doesn't bother to cast a repellant charm. The front of her shirt darkens from the mist. She watches the watermark elongate, sinking into the bite of cold.

"It's dreadful weather, isn't it?"

Hermione startles. Narcissa stands by the stone columns. She looks past her, to the rain-slicked grass. There's not a trace of dirt or wetness on Narcissa's ivory gown. The matriarch walks towards Hermione and sits on the stone bench, smoothing the creases in her dress.

"You've found my little alcove," Narcissa says.

"Oh, sorry, I didn't realize–"

Narcissa smiles, the dip in her cupids bow stretching out. Draco's mouth is a perfect replica of hers. "No, not at all. I'm glad you've found it. It doesn't get much use anymore. I had it built, actually, for Draco."

"Oh."

"Has he retired for the night?"

Hermione nods.

"A pity, that he's not out here with you. He loves the rain, you know. As a child, his favorite pastime was flying in the rain. He'd come back into the house, muddy, with this ridiculous grin on his face–"

The image makes Hermione smile.

"It drove Lucius crazy–"

The smile drops.

"They would have these awful fights. Not just about that, but many other things. Lucius can have quite the temper, though perhaps you've seen it in Draco as well."

Hermione's heart beats a fast, heavy rhythm in her chest. Narcissa sounds almost wistful.

"Lucius was strict, much sterner than I. There were certain values he tried to ingrain. Dignity. Honor. Respectability. Responsibility. I think sometimes Draco must have felt the world on his shoulders." She glances at Hermione. "Were your parents strict, Hermione?"

"No, they weren't."

The older woman smiles. "Something to think about then, when you two have children."

This entire conversation is so ridiculous that it takes a second for Hermione to realize what Narcissa has just proposed: a degradation of the Malfoy line. Surely–

"I don't always agree with Lucius. But I've always seen him for who he is. And, for better or worse, I love him."

Hermione has exhausted her responses. She stares at the cracks splintering across the stone floor.

"I don't expect you to understand what our family was like, but we do love Draco. It is painful to see him so miserable."

Hermione wants to laugh then. "You think I make him miserable? Is that the implication?"

"I think whatever you two are doing right now makes you both miserable."

Laughter tickles her throat, like carbonation. She wonders what the other woman thinks of her: the orphan hiding in the garden.

"As a mother, what is most important to me, above all else, is that Draco has someone who sees him, exactly as he is. Who loves him, exactly for who and what he is. Can you do that, Hermione?"

The tips of her ears burn. She feels like a schoolgirl being scolded by a teacher. "I always have," she says. "But I don't know how to make this right."

"It's a pity that we think about the world in these terms, good or bad. Wrong or right." Narcissa lips quirk up, the precursor to a true smile. "It would be far more productive to consider truthful and untruthful. I don't presume you'll heed my marital advice, but I've always considered honesty the value a marriage both fears and cannot survive without."

"I thought you would be happy to see my marriage fail. I thought that's what you and your husband would have wanted."

Narcissa's mouth puckers, and Hermione regrets the words immediately. She can tell the other woman is trying to be kind.

"I want Draco to be happy. I'm less concerned with the means of how."

"He won't speak to me."

It feels worse, to admit this out loud. She had kept it a secret in her mind, where it wouldn't hurt as much. And now here it was, floating in the space between them.

"My son is a prideful man. It's a casualty of being a Malfoy."

"I'm not sure how to start."

"Then you're thinking too hard."

She opens to her mouth to respond, and Narcissa rises. "It's late," she says. "We should head back. You look like you're freezing."

The library is dark, but Hermione doesn't want to announce her presence yet. Instead, she waits for her eyes to adjust, making her way gingerly between the rows, looking for a leak of light. She finds Draco in the very back, settled in an armchair he must have dragged near the window. He's wearing reading glasses, face illuminated by the glow of the hearth.

He looks up as she approaches. She's holding the leather notebook.

"Hermione," he says; his eyebrows furrow. "Is that my notebook?"

She shakes her head. "It's mine."

"You've seen Susan recently?"

"No, that's not why I have it."

He stares at her, waiting, and a part of her wants to back out, eject herself from this conversation. She had planned a speech, revised it in her journal, and then torn it out. He would find the ripped edges in there. She didn't need a speech to tell him what she wanted to say. All she needed was bravery.

"I said I would give you time–"

His lips thin, weariness spreading across his features.

"And I will give you all the time you need–"

The weariness drops away, confusion taking its stead.

"But there are some things you should know first."

She clears her throat. Maybe she's making this more dramatic than it needs to be, but these are all her cards. Her defenses are depleted.

"I am so sorry." she says. "I will be sorry for the rest of my life for all the ways in which we lost each other. I never wanted to lose you. I wanted to forget so many things, but never you."

Her voice starts to shake then, and she imagines his hand on her back, his voice ghosting across the shell of her ear: Breathe, Hermione.

"I know I did awful things. I am so ashamed that I can barely breathe. But Draco, you also stopped talking to me. I know I wasn't there often, but when I was, I could never tell what you were thinking. I could never tell if you even wanted me around. I couldn't see past the onslaught of my grief, and I know that's my fault, but it was just so difficult."

There's a lake at the bottom of her vision, and the water wobbles until she has to inhale and look up. "You think you're indebted because I chose you over my father. You think that was my impossible choice, but it wasn't. Draco, he was going to die. Do you really think I didn't know that? I'm the brightest witch of my age. Of course I knew that."

She lets out a laugh then, but it's only a short, sharp one. "I knew, as soon as my mum died, but I couldn't just stop trying, because then I would have given up on him. What I did to Cadric, I–" There is a hole in the center of her chest, where all the oxygen has escaped. Her shoulders hunch, like she's deflating. "But how could I give up on trying to help my father? I don't give up on the people that I love. I don't know how, so maybe I did make a decision, to say goodbye to him rather than you, but life is full of decisions, Draco."

There's snot dripping down her face. She grabs her collar and presses the fabric under her nose, tries to calm her breathing.

"Hermione–"

"No, please don't. Please just let me get this out in one piece."

She exhales, a small, strained noise that sounds like choking. "I want to make this work with you. I love you, all of you, for who you are, but you have a decision to make, too. You have to decide if this life, with me, is still what you want. And if it no longer is, that's okay." The syllables splinter, a mountain pitched between oh and kay.

"You don't owe me, Draco. And if you can't stay in this marriage anymore, that's okay." She tries to smile; her lip trembles. "As long as you are on this earth, alive, I will be fine."

She blinks, and the blurry film in her vision clears for a second before it liquifies again. "We've spent a lot of time worrying about each other, and now I want you to worry about yourself, and trust that I will be just fine."

He hasn't moved a muscle. His eyes are wide with surprise.

"You don't have to say anything right now, but you should read this." She holds out the notebook, and he frowns. Her fingers graze his, and she wants to linger in this moment, just in case it's the last time he touches her. "Take as long as you need, Draco."

Forcing her feet forward, she turns to leave. Narcissa had only been half-right. She could say all she wanted to Draco, but she couldn't make him stay with her or love her any more than she could resurrect her parents, or undo the war. There wasn't enough magic in the world for all that she wanted to fix. So this was the last thing she could give him, the only thing she had left: time.

The hydrangeas have wilted, and Hermione takes a moment to run her hand along their mottled, brown petals. She has forgotten to water them. What an apt metaphor, she thinks, and she smiles despite herself. She looks at their red door, the beige welcome mat, the stone planters flanking the entryway; all the accoutrements of the life she and Draco had tried to build together.

The house is quiet and dark. She's not sure why she's here, but there's nowhere else she belongs. Crookshanks is with Molly and Arthur, and as Hermione enters the foyer, she wishes he were here, soft fur butting against her ankles. Outside the window, dusk flirts with the landscape, and she trails her finger along the wall as she makes her way upstairs. In the bedroom, she pauses for a moment. The bed is pristine, untouched. She walks to Draco's side. The surface of his bedside table is clear; he hates any barriers preventing clear access to his wand, but inside the drawer, there are stacks of books: Nabakov, Dostovesky, Pasternak, a selection of the authors she's recommended. Behind them, there's his own leather notebook, and she considers it, but she doesn't; she slides closed the drawer instead.

She sits on the bed and scrutinizes their bedroom, without Draco. If she focuses, she can almost hear the sound of his footsteps, making his way around the room, opening the closet, the sound of his clothes hitting the floor, the feel of his hand on her neck. She leans back, sinking into his pillows. Her skin thrums as she traces the stitching of the pillowcase. Her eyelids droop, obscuring some of the room. She wonders where Draco is, if he's sitting in the library, poring through her pages. She feels a small sense of relief, of unburdening. No matter what, she had told him her truth. She could live with that, even if it meant she did it alone.