Chapter four, signed, sealed, and uploaded.
R&R, much appreciated. Hope you like.
"Yes, yell." There was a hiss of impatient longing behind the words. "Draw attention. Make them come. Let them all hear."
Silence. Softly; pointedly; calling the bluff: "I won't. If you want them to hear, you yell."
"I told you specifically that you had better be in class this morning."
Draco looked down at his hands, not speaking.
Looking at Draco, Severus tried to decide the best course of action. A punishment that would leave him well out of the mix, but which would impress upon the boy...ah, that was it. Glaring at him, Severus continued, "Detention. And five points from Slytherin."
"What? You can't take points off your own house!"
"I can and I did. And it's your own fault." Glaring at Draco, he added, "And if you don't get out of my office this minute, you will have a week of detentions and another ten points taken off."
Dejectedly, Draco asked, "Eight o' clock, then?"
"I have no idea when Filch will want you in his office. I'll have him send you a notice," the man replied coldly.
With a sneer, Draco spat, "Filch? You can't even be in the same room as me long enough for a detention?"
"You are a delusional child. I do not feel like encouraging you. Now get out of my office before I throw you out," Severus said calmly.
"You didn't seem to think of me as a child last summer."
"Whatever you have convinced yourself to believe happened between the two of us in just that: a fabrication made up from the wild imagination of a spoiled, little boy. I am not your father. I will not indulge you simply to keep you placated."
Before Severus had a chance to react, Draco stepped closer to him. The lack of space seemed to suck the air out of the small room. The fire burning in the grate grew warmer and Severus was sure there was something he was suppose to be doing at the moment... Images from Lucius's summer banquet flashed in Severus's mind like a black and white slide show:
Draco walked over to where Severus sat, alone in the sitting room off the ballroom, away from the crowd. The boy held out a drink to him.
He declined.
There were words then, but they were absent from the pictures moving through Severus's mind. No words. No time for thought. By the time the little memory-picture-Severus reacted to Draco's closeness, there were already alcohol-dampened lips pressed to his own.
Severus slapped the boy. Hard. There was blood. There were words then. Angry words. From both of them.
Draco's retreat was marked by the tinkling of broken glass on flagged stone as the wine he'd tried to offer Severus fell to the ground...
The memory of the closeness from that night moved in on Severus once more, suffocating him.