Warning: Slash. Boys digging boys. Don't like it? Go AWAY!
A/N: Kinda written on a whim. I guess I've just really been feeling the need to project love amidst all the hatred these days. Please forgive the sappy shite.
Nothing Left to Fear
Right now he's not home; he's off at the airport, picking up Dean. Although he does know how to apparate, he insists upon using Muggle transportation. A result of growing up in the Muggle world, I suppose. Seamus thinks it's quaint, Muggle life. Perhaps this is why he insisted we live the way we do. There are very few magickal things about our lives these days, and I am becoming rather fond of it. Living like Muggles has taught me the value of what we've got, both materially and between us. If only my father could see me now.
Times like these, when Seamus is away, I find my mind wandering to thoughts of my father and all the things he made me do. It's been two and a half years since he was taken away, and still I feel nothing. Perhaps this is a residual effect of the way he raised me. He always taught me never to cry, never show weakness, never care or feel. Caring and feeling were for the weak-minded, emotions not for a Malfoy. But if that were truly the case, then why do I so deeply love Seamus?
The Dark Lord was resurrected at the end of my fourth year at school. I knew what was coming, though it scared the hell out of me. Voldemort's return meant that I was destined to follow in my father's footsteps. Not that I wouldn't have, anyhow, but it just seemed to cement the deal. Sure enough, at the beginning of that summer holiday, I was unwillingly initiated as a Death Eater. Incapable of showing the courage to tell my father to get bent meant that I was going to have to hurt endless amounts of people, wizards and Muggles alike. For an entire year, that is exactly what I did. I was my father's assistant in the Muggle Tortures division of Voldemort's twisted regime. When I returned to Hogwarts for my sixth year, I told Dumbledore what I had done. Instead of turning me in like I expected him to, he just nodded sadly and I then supplied him with a great deal of information regarding Voldemort's activities. This information later led to the destruction of the Dark Lord and the capture of every Death Eater. Including my father.
Should I feel guilty for my lack of feeling for the man? I should miss him. I want to miss him. But I can't. He wasn't necessarily a bad parent or even a bad person. He was just stupid and weak of mind and heart. All right, so branding me with the Dark Mark and holding me to him indefinitely might be considered bad parenting. The worst part of it all is that I can't even feel pity for him. All I can feel is elation that the world is without him. I don't care to think of all the horrid things I watched him do. Thousands of people died at his hands. Lucius knew no remorse, and that is why I feel nothing for him.
Several people died at my own hands, and I will never forgive myself for what I did. Cowardice forced me to obey my father's lord and master. Voldemort never owned me like he owned all the others. Whether he knew this, I cannot say. He must not have, being as I ended up being the one who sold him out. Never once have I ever regretted doing it. Had I not, I would not be watching my friends raise their children, I would not be sleeping beside Seamus every night, my mother would not be anticipating her wedding, Harry would not be coming over for dinner tomorrow, and Justin would not be right beside him. Not a day goes by that the atrocities I committed don't go through my mind at least a thousand fucking times. Justification for my actions has never once even crossed my mind; there is no excuse. The only thing that allows me to go on with my life is knowing that I am sorry for what I did. Every day I try to make up for it as best I can.
Seamus has been my saving grace. Near the end of our sixth year, Voldemort was gone, the Death Eaters had all received the Dementor's Kiss, and we started shagging on a very regular basis. For a year that was all we did. Until I realized that I was hopelessly in love with him and decided that I was going to do everything in my power to make him the happiest person to walk the face of the Earth. I think I'm doing a pretty good job of it. Rarely do we fight, and when we do we end up making up with such intensity that we usually wake the neighbours. It scares me, how in love with him I am. Every time he enters a room my breath catches in my throat. Every night the butterflies in my stomach flutter with wild abandon as I ascend the stairs in anticipation of seeing him.
Were I to die tomorrow, I would die content. I am happy in the knowledge that I loved as fiercely as is humanly possible and been loved as strongly in return. I am happy knowing that he would never hurt me. After all the fucked up things I've done and all the fucked up things that have been done to me, I don't think there's anything left to fear. At the end of it all, there are people who love me and people that I love, and that makes up for everything. If there is one thing I have learned in the short time I have been alive, I have learned that the only important thing is to always have the capacity to love. Seamus has given me all of that and then some. My heart, my soul, my passion for living resides in him. And he knows it.
*****
Um, told you it was sappy. And perhaps a bit disjointed. Ah, well, that is my style, after all. So what do you think? Huh?