Scorpius Malfoy walked forward with his hands clasped tightly around the handle on the casket. After having walked for so long his arms were starting to feel weak from having to carry the large wooden object for so long. He looked over to his left to see the other pallbearers. Most of the ones that were working for the funeral company had stone cold faces that let none of their emotions slip through. Although one of the workers wore a face that held just the smallest amounts of disgust if you looked at him for a long time.
The long trek through the Malfoy grounds made Scorpius's arms feel like they were going to be ripped off of his body. The perfectly trimmed grass of the path towards the family cemetery rustled unsatisfyingly against his boots. His hands started to cramp up and his grip started to loosen. Scorpius had to start shifting his grip every few steps in order to continue to carry the casket. All of the other pallbearers were noticing his very obvious struggle but none of them moved to help him.
Just when he thought that he could carry the casket no longer, the procession started to slow. They had arrived at the Malfoy family cemetery and the casket was unceremoniously placed before the large hole in the ground.
Scorpius stood without moving as people began to mill around him, preparing for the service that was going to follow. His gaze was locked onto the mahogany casket that he had just struggled to carry the distance from the manor. For some reason all he could think about was how long this ceremony was going to last so he could return to his room.
He knows that he should feel sorrow. That is what people feel when something bad happens to their family. They feel sad when their family is hurt and wish with all their heart for their loved one to be better. Yet he did not feel any of this sorrow. No sadness. No urge to cry. No urge to feel anything worth feeling.
Eventually people stopped mulling about and the ceremony started. An old wizard stood in front of the others and began to say words that felt wrong coming out of his mouth. Scorpius didn't listen to the words as he instead remembered the last time that he had seen the man.
His family had stood along with the others in the church when the ceremony had ended. They easily found themselves walking out as no others had wanted to sit next to them.
They were one of the first people out of the church and the old man requested to talk to them away from the growing crowd of exiting people. His mother had asked to sit at a nearby bench and wait while they talked to the man.
He found his way towards the bench and stared at the crowd of people exiting the church. They talked openly and warmly. Some hugged each other and others gave firm handshakes. Such sights were very rare for Scorpius to see. He only saw such open signs of affection when he came to these Sunday meetings and when his mind decided to wander.
He would imagine a huge family gathered together under one roof. One that embraced often and sat around a crowded table. The air always felt warmer whenever he would think about this other family. Even when there were fewer of them crowded together this warmth would stay with them. In times like this when all he felt was the cold of the bench he would slip into the warmth that the family had for each other.
Raised voices coming from where his parents were talking caught his attention. He turned towards them and saw his mother look very angry at the old man. She was talking very animatedly with large sweeps of her arms and got very close to the man's face. She was loud enough that Scorpius could hear some of what she was saying.
"What gives you the right to kick us…"
Ahh.
That makes sense then.
Scorpius would have to be foolish to not see how others always stared at him. Strangers would dislike him immediately without him having done anything. Even when he could meet people his age when their parents would come to them, those early formings of friendship would be promptly cut off by the parents' panicked fleeing and disgusted looks.
It looks like the disgusted looks had taken over too many people at this church too for them to stay for much longer.
Throughout his recollection Scorpius had kept his gaze staring at the old man as he talked. The man seemed taken aback from the long look and stuttered in his speech. Scorpius looked away so the man would not give him a look.
He started to look around again and he saw the pallbearer who had been wearing a disgusted face earlier staring straight at him with a strange look. It takes Scorpius a second to place the look but once he does another memory comes to him.
Scorpius and his father were walking down the streets of Diagon Alley. He looked into the window of the Quidditch store and his eyes were locked onto the newest model of broom that was getting main promotion.
His father looked at him and smiled at the way his son could not tear his eyes away from the broom. He eventually had to lightly drag his son forward in order to take his attention back.
Scorpius's eyes were then attracted towards Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. It was the loudest of all the stores on the Alley and the flashiest. His father had told him that they could not enter the store and something within Scorpius felt a tear from that knowledge. Always seeing the other children explore within with the strange and fantastical objects with completely strange and flashy uses.
His imagination could vividly imagine the interior of the store. Where you could look down on lower floors from higher ones. Where the more mundane objects were located on lower floors and things became more strange and dangerous as you climbed higher. How they were only allowed to go so high before they would get in trouble. Where sometimes a product would activate with seemingly no one intentionally activating them, which was obviously coordinated by George hiding in secret. And how they could see former Death Eaters right outside the front of the store.
Scorpius blinked heavily as he felt his head swim for a minute. The strange thoughts confused him for a second before his father pushed him forward with an exasperated look on his face. His father wasn't looking around him while they were walking and accidentally knocked into someone.
It was an old woman who fell down to the ground from the unexpected collision. People around them saw the old woman laying down in front of them and quickly moved to help her. His father leaned down in order to offer a hand up in apology and to help her up.
She looked about to accept the hand until she got a good look at his face and her face transformed into one of disgust. She violently slapped the hand away from herself and crawled on the ground in order to get away from him. She let out a startled cry as she looked furiously at them.
Scorpius couldn't fully understand what was happening. Before he knew it there were people stepping in between them and the old woman and others helping and comforting her. Scorpius saw in the face of the people anger directed right at his father. Some started to push his father back and others started to yell and after a few minutes aurors came to break up the commotion.
When they saw his father at the center of the crowd they brought out their wands and quickly shot stunners out at him. In the next minute they had apparated and Scorpius was left there alone. Now that his father had gone the crowd that had gathered let out a cheer and soon started to disperse.
Scorpius stood alone in the street as the hustle of the street began to pick back up. He stood there distracted to the point where someone accidentally knocked into him.
He fell forward onto his knees and painfully skidded them on the ground so that they were both bleeding.
No one moved to help him back up.
Scorpius looked away from the angry man and started to look over the other people. Most were looking in various directions, none of which included the man who was still talking. Some of the hired servants were looking unsettled towards the unsure future that was in store for them.
As his gaze travelled around the people he saw staggeringly few people. The amount of people who were not being paid to be there could be counted on your fingers.
Scorpius stopped his traveling eyes when the old man's speech was seeming to be ending. There was no polite gesture extended in order to comfort him and he just stared blankly at the coffin in front of him.
All he could look at was the name engraved onto the coffin and think back to the last time that he had seen the person who laid inside.
Scorpius stormed out of the floo in a near run. Anger was coursing through him in a violent swirl that he could not control. He felt his cheeks flushed and his chest kept heaving in extremely heavy breaths. He couldn't stay still for long and started to pace around in circles while he waited.
After what felt like an eternity another person stepped out of the fire. Scorpius's father stood carrying his customary cane and was putting most of his weight onto it. The sight caused Scorpius to become angry again.
"What was that!" he yelled at his father. "Why didn't you say anything back!"
Scorpius had been wandering around a muggle playground interacting with some of the other children. He knew that companionship from other wizards was not likely to come quickly at all, so he had decided to try to find some muggle children to be around. And besides he knew from whenever his imagination would wander that when his mental self interacted with muggle children they were much the same as wizarding children.
He was riding on the swing whose name he got from his imagination, talking to one of the girls who were the same age as himself when he heard a loud scream. Quieter screams were common here on the playground as the kids chased each other but this scream seemed not like the others and it sounded close to him.
Scorpius looked around and saw a boy near him with his mouth wide open. The boy turned around and ran to an adult that was nearby. The boy got the adults attention and gestured wildy towards him.
Scorpius couldn't make out what the boy said but he did catch one phrase that caused him to stand up and already start to walk away.
"Death Eater!"
Scorpius had a strange relationship with that phrase. His mental self knew that word to mean a strictly evil human that had given up everything that made them good. He, however, knew people who had gone by that title. Whenever he was near his family and that phrase was used he knew that bad things were going to follow. Flashes of new churches, arguing parents, and sitting with bloody knees in Diagon Alley flashed in his mind. Yet then memories of his family would flash next to them. His mother bringing him soup, his father teaching him to ride a broom, his grandparents showing him how to play wizard's chess.
Scorpius had already been walking away when the woman that the boy had gone to fetch grabbed onto his arm. The next minutes were a flash where he was dragged back to their house, his father was summoned, and the woman's yelling began anew. Scorpius decided to escape the situation by letting his imagination wander, but he was met with an incredibly odd sensation.
Instead of transporting to another place he instead was staying where he was. He tried to slip into his imagination again but he still remained there in the angry woman's house. But something was different about it.
It was like he was viewing the room from a different person. He could see everyone in the room, including himself. His body just looked like he was not paying attention. And there was another person in the room.
A girl that looked to be about his age looked incredibly angry. She was staring directly at the woman with an intense gaze. Where did the woman get off on halting the fun they were having? They were just sitting on a swing! Why weren't they allowed to play at the playground just like everyone else!
Scorpius's head swam for a second and he took a step back. The movement seemed to catch the attention of the girl.
The two stared into eachothers eyes and Scorpius's perspective felt entirely out of whack. It was like the sensation of realizing that you are thinking about your thoughts which caused you to start speaking in your mind the thoughts that you had already had, yet the thoughts that you were speaking were limiting having future thoughts and that process was continuing on and on and on until Scorpius finally broke eye contact with the girl.
Anger at being kicked off of the playground swam through him and he soon found himself unable to stand the woman screaming at him any longer. He stormed out to the fireplace and flooed back to the manor. He waited and paced until his father came through the fireplace.
"Scorpius, they have a right to not want to see us. In the past we hurt a lot of peop-" his father said before Scorpius cut him off.
"I don't care what you did in the past! I was just sitting on the swing and I got kicked off of the playground. What gives them the right to do that? I didn't do anything wrong!"
His father seemed taken aback by the anger that Scorpius was showing. But his expression soon settled and he gestured for him to follow him.
As Scorpius was following he saw that his father's clothes were very messy. Dirt stains were all over his clothes as if we were rolling around on the ground and there were flakes of blood on his cheeks.
HIs father led him to a sitting room where they sat around a small table. His father had a complex look on his face but Scorpius was still too angry in order to identify his expression.
"Scorpius," his father began. "I know that this is not fair. I am so very sorry but there are going to be many things that are going to be very unfair and there is very little that we are able to do to change that. You know that family history and why people hate us so much. We've never tried to hide that from you."
"I get the family history," Scorpius bit back. "What I don't get is that you never try to do anything to change things."
Scorpius's father gave him a long look before saying "There was a time when I thought taking performative actions would change things too. I got myself in a lot of trouble for trying to take action and some very good people got hurt because of it."
"This has nothing to do with that. I'm not going to go off and kill people, I just want to live my own life."
"Most people just want to live their own lives. But I've had a lot of effect on other people's lives. For every person that I hurt there are 50 of their friends, families, and neighbors that were affected by it. There are a lot of people who I've punished too much and even more people who don't think that I was punished enough."
"I don't care about you! I just want to be me!"
"And I'm sorry Scorpius because there are always going to be people who hate you for who you are and more importantly who I am."
Scorpius couldn't listen to his father go on any longer and instead decided to run off. He ran as fast as he could straight towards the floo gate and wished desperately to be anywhere that wasn't there.
He flooed into a shop and quickly left as soon as he could. When he got on the street he just started running for as long as he could. He did not stop until he felt as if his sides were going to burst. He collapsed onto a nearby bench and sat there staring into nothing for a long time.
Eventually his focus went to his imagination and the strange sensation of returning to where he was happened again. He saw the girl sitting next to him on the bench curiously looking at his body.
"Are you real?" he asked the girl. His body did not move at all but he could still hear the words in his head.
The girl looked at him and asked "Are you real?"
Scorpius shook himself loose from the memories and found himself standing next to the open grave. The funeral workers were lowering the casket into the ground that held his father. They had put him fourth of the five caskets that were being buried today, in between his mother and his younger brother. On the other side of his brother his grandparents lay in their own caskets.
Scorpius stared at the graves slowly filled up with dirt, unable to break eye contact with the wooden objects until they were entirely covered by feet of soil. When they finally finished filling the graves the old man waved his wand and tombstones appeared on all of the graves. Then the old man made another wave of his wand and flowers sprouted up in front of each of the five graves.
Then, the funeral company and the workers of the mansion and the old man left the cemetery and Scorpius was left alone as he stared at the five tombstones. He didn't know how long he stood there, just staring down at the tombstones that sat there.
There he stood only 9 years old completely alone in the world, as his entire family stood there staring lifelessly back at him. Just like one of his memories.
He finally flooed back to the manor and saw an ocean of red-
No.
Those memories were still too painful to recall.
After a long time Scorpius felt a press in his head and felt a connection to the girl open in his mind. The girl was sitting in a tire swing from her emotions Scorpius could tell that she had been watching most of the funeral through his eyes. The girl gave a sense of her sympathies and Scorpius gave the worst attempt of acknowledgement as possible. The girl caught on and didn't try to cheer him up again.
Scorpius had been spending a lot of time seeing through her eyes through the last few weeks to distract from the disasters unfolding around him.
"Scorpius," a voice said behind him.
He turned around and saw Blaise Zabini waiting for him. A slight feeling of dread took over him and he left to go with Blaise to start his new life.