A/N: So huge, huge apologies for taking so long to update! I've been totally flat out at work and writers block is plaguing me... I only hope that the length of this chapter can maybe make up for it a bit! (And my creative juices have begun to flow again it seems!)
 Again, just as a warning, there are references to self-harm/depression in this chapter. Please keep yourself safe while reading, and if you've any questions, don't hesitate to send me a wee message!

The silence was profound. Draco was looking in abject horror; he had begun to tremble again, the hand that Hermione had clasped around his wrist could feel him trembling. She didn't know what to say; she didn't know how to react – considering that she was staring down at an arm which was covered in cuts, and knowing that they were not there accidentally. Draco's face had changed from horror to fear, he tried – in vain – to pull his arm away from Hermione's grip but she held on tightly, not willing to let him remove his arm.

"Draco, what are these?" She repeated, her voice hushed; her heart was beating incredibly rapidly within her chest as the enormity of what she was looking at hit her. "Draco?" Hermione repeated when he didn't answer, she was looking from his face to his arm. "How did you get these?" Again this question was met with silence; she gave his wrist a little squeeze to try and instigate a response from him. However the reaction she received was not the one she expected; as she looked up from his arm, she saw his eyes had filled with tears.

"I did it…" He whispered, Hermione's grip on his wrist had loosened and without warning Draco had wrenched his arm free and held it to his chest protectively.

Whilst she had kind of expected that was the instance, she was totally unprepared for what he was actually saying to her. He was admitting to be the one who had caused those cuts to himself, and Hermione was terrified – this was way too much for her to be dealing with. Right now, with a damaged Draco in front of her, she should really be concerned about him, but the only thing that she could think about was that she didn't know what to do or say now. So she stood, staring at Draco and trying to get her brain into gear – what was she supposed to say to him? Should she be going right now to get Madam Pomfrey or his head of house, someone – anyone – who was better qualified to deal with this situation? Questions, possibilities, implications were reeling through her mind, and Draco just sat there, looking utterly miserable. She took a few steps backwards and leant on one of the counters, and trying to desperately figure out what to do. First it had been the drinking, and when she had found out the reasoning behind that she had sort of understood – his loneliness, his isolation from the rest of the students, and she had tried to counter that by reaching out to him, by being a friend… But now this – what he was doing, cutting himself? Was that for the same reasons, or was it deeper? Did he really need proper help – more than what he was letting on? She didn't know what she should do – her heart was hammering in her chest; but she couldn't avoid the situation forever, she couldn't just leave – she needed to sort this out, find out what this was and why he was doing it, and then establish how and what to do next. When she opened her eyes, Draco was leaning forwards in his seat with his head in his hands, and once more Hermione felt a wave of pity for him wash over her. It wasn't for a few seconds that she realised that he was crying – and not just a few tears, really crying; tears were streaming down his face and dripping into his lap. It was heart wrenching to see, all of his inhibitions, all his Malfoy pride put to one side; and in that instance, she acted on instinct. She walked over to him, put her hand round his wrist, pulled him gently to his feet and embraced him. For a few moments he just stood limply, but then he wrapped his arms around her waist. Conscious that his ribs were still damaged Hermione didn't hold onto him too tightly, but it was the reverse for him. He clung on to her like he was drowning and she was his only life raft, burying his head into her shoulder. Hermione wondered when the last time he had actually been hugged, perhaps before his parents had been taken away… She could feel his back shaking from his efforts to try and stop crying and she held him tighter.

After a considerable period of her just holding on to him he appeared to regain some control of himself, pulling back from Hermione and using his sleeve to wipe his face.

"I'm sorry." He muttered rather gruffly, hiccupping slightly.

"What are you sorry for?" Hermione asked incredulously.

"Because – I didn't want you to see that, I didn't want anyone to know…" He responded, grasping his right hand around his left forearm. "I don't want you to think less of me…" He sat down rather heavily in the chair that he had been using and stared at the floor. The contrast between the redness of his eyes and the usual paleness of his face seemed even more pronounced under the white lights of the room.

"Give me a second," She said, grabbing one of the chairs and dragging it across, placing it in front of Draco's chair and sitting down. She bent low in the seat, trying to be able to look Draco in the eye, but Draco didn't seem to want to look at her. "I don't think any less of you Draco." She said kindly. "I just… I don't understand. I need you to explain to me." This appeared to confuse Draco as he looked up, his eyebrow furrowed.

"To explain…?" He repeated nonplussed.

"Yeah," She nodded. "Why… I mean… oh I don't know, I'm not sure…" She sighed, "I just want to know why?"

"Explain?" He questioned, still looking confused. "I don't think I can explain…" He said honestly, "I wouldn't know where to begin…" He was fiddling with his fingers, interlocking them and then pulling them apart, perhaps out of discomfort.

"Well, how long have you been…?" Hermione paused, she didn't know what to call it, was 'cutting' too insensitive? Or 'hurting yourself' avoiding the subject too much? She didn't want to upset him even more, she cleared her throat: "How long have you been doing it?" She gave a small nod indicating to his arm.

"Since June…" Draco responded dully, Hermione was doing the math in her heat – so five months.

"And in June…" She continued, "When you first…" She made a small movement again. "Why do you do it for the first time?" She finished, rather awkwardly; Draco stayed very still for a little while, his face screwed up as though trying to remember.

"I can't really remember… I was a little bit, well… drunk." He responded timidly. "I just remember wanting that mark gone… I didn't want it on my skin, so I had kind of thought I might be able to cut it out."

"You know it will fade though… it won't stay so dark for so long now that Voldemort is gone." She said, trying to not sound too patronising or offensive, but at the same time wanting to understand.

"I know." He sighed rather resigned. "But you don't understand what it's like…" He gesticulated rather wildly, and ran his fingers through his messed up blond hair; it sounded as though he was getting frustrated and she didn't want that.

"I know I don't… so tell me what it's like so maybe I'll understand a bit more." She placated; Draco sighed a couple more times and ruffled his hair up even more, perhaps trying to think how to answer that question, or perhaps trying to avoid it.

"You know when most people make a mistake, and it gets talked about for a couple of days, then everyone forgets about it?" He asked, Hermione nodded. "But then there's some mistakes that people make that aren't forgotten so quickly?" She nodded again. "Well my mistake is branded into my arm, and whenever I see it, or anyone sees it, they keep on talking about it, they will never forget it." Hermione nodded once more. "I just wanted it to be gone, even though people will still talk about me, if it's gone then it's not such a burden for other people, and me to know about." Hermione listened to him closely, as he tried to unpack his analogy for his reasoning behind what he had been doing – and as his voice grew more and more dejected she realised just how much the whole 'Death Eater' status must still be affecting him. "I just can't stand this…" He repeated, "So I tried to cut it out back in June, like – properly."

"What do you mean 'properly'?" She asked, suddenly confused about what he meant.

"Well I don't mean like that," He answered, pulling up his left sleeve, revealing the cuts again. "I thought that if I cut a chunk out, like a rectangle and cut underneath it then I might be able to take that whole section of skin with that bit branded into it, out of my arm…" Hermione's stomach lurched inside her as Draco spoke so calmly about removing a chunk of his own flesh. "I wasn't able to do it obviously…" He continued; perhaps allowing him to just speak without any kind of interruption was cathartic to him, and now that he was talking she didn't really want him to go silent again. "Although I think if I had really tried that night it would have been more likely that I would have actually cut off my arm…" He admitted, "So I didn't manage to do what I wanted, but…" He suddenly came to a halt, looking up at Hermione. "I'm not crazy." He stated very firmly.

"I know you're not." She replied seriously.

"I just – I know that a lot of what I'm saying makes it sound as though I'm crazy." He said, "And I don't mean the passive, sort – of – compliment crazy… I know that explaining this makes it sound like I should be locked up."

"I don't think you're crazy Draco…" Hermione responded again. "But I don't understand some of the things you're telling me – I need you to break it down even further…" Some of the awkwardness had gone between them' Draco had stopped running his hands through his hair and he sat back in his chair slightly, opening himself up a bit more. "So the first time… in June…" She continued, still not quite grasping the full concept of what she needed to, but beginning to understand some of the foundations; she was aware that he might close up on her again – and that she wanted to comprehend his situation, but didn't want to annoy him at the same time. "It was to try and remove the Dark Mark from your arm, right?"

"Yeah," He agreed, sounding rather relieved that Hermione had grasped that concept.

"I get that part…" She went slowly, trying to stay on his good side. "But when you realised that that wasn't going to work, what did you do next?"

"I realised that I wasn't going to be able to cut out a chunk that night, but by the time I realised that, I had already… I had started to try." He explained. "And…" He stopped again, once more fiddling with his fingers, there was a long silence as he seemed to consider what he was about to divulge. "It made me feel." He eventually finished his sentence.

"Made you feel what?" Hermione inquired.

"Anything." He answered simply in a low voice.

"What do you mean?" Draco sighed heavily, and almost absent mindedly he ran a finger over the cuts on his arm.

"I…" He tried, but his voice cracked and he paused; Hermione waited, wanting him to answer rather than substituting for him; but suddenly his lip was trembling and he looked upon the verge of tears again. "Since the end of the War everyone's been celebrating…" He said thickly. "And that's good! I'm glad the Dark Lord is gone, but what do I do now?" It's the same old story, but I'm a Malfoy, I'm a traitor, and I can't really be part of the celebrations cause I was on the wrong side." He sighed for what seemed the millionth time. "And it's so conflicting!" His voice raised several pitches in exasperation. "Because I'm glad that the Dark Lord is gone! Alright, at first I was honoured when I joined up properly, because that's what I had always been led to believe was the right thing to do… But that just shows how much of an idiot I was! And as much as it was an 'honour' when I first joined up, I never enjoyed it… Not with what they asked me to do." He went quiet for a few moments, and Hermione knew that he was thinking about Dumbledore. "I never really had a choice, especially when they all moved into the Manor…" He shuddered involuntarily, "Then it was even more like treading on eggshells, you could never tell when he was about to flip out… or what might set him off. It was horrible, it just felt wrong."

"But at the Manor – when Harry, Ron and I were captured by those snatchers – you helped us." Hermione commented.

"I – what?" Draco spluttered. "No I didn't… how?"

"You didn't let on that it was Harry when Bellatrix was asking." She answered truthfully, "I don't think you realise just how much of an advantage that gave us… it meant that we were held rather than Voldemort being called straight away, and in the time intervening-"

"You were tortured!" Draco interrupted her fiercely. "You can't seriously be thankful for that!"

"In the time intervening," Hermione continued. "Dobby was able to arrive to save us. If you had told Bellatrix straight away that it was Harry, she would have summoned Voldemort and Harry would probably be dead and well… the outcome might have been very different… you saved Harry's life, and probably mine too…" Draco seemed to be chewing his lip in deep thought.

"I'd never thought of it in that way…" He admitted slowly.

"Well now you might." Hermione patted Draco's knee gently. "I distracted you… sorry." She said when she realised she had taken him away from what he was trying to explain.

"No… no, it's interesting to hear what other people think." He insisted, "It's a different point of view, I had never thought about it like that."

"But you were explaining to me about why…" Hermione tentatively brought the subject back to what it had been.

"I don't think it's possible to explain without…" He started, then stopped.

"Without what?" She prompted.

"I don't know how to explain how it feels…" He replied, rubbing one of his palms across his face. "Feelings are feelings, that's why you don't put them into words." He stated rather parrot fashion.

"Try…" She pleaded.

"It's…" He tried, and then paused. "It's nothingness…" He finally spoke. "It's just like… emptiness. It's like there's this hole inside of me and everything that I should feel is just dropping out of the bottom… and it doesn't matter what I do, or what I try, it's just always there and nothing fills it…" His head had dropped again and he sounded quieter and more dejected than ever before.

"How long have you felt like that?" Hermione asked, "Since June?" Draco shook his head. "Before then?"

"Probably since about last year." He replied honestly. "And it's just kept getting worse…"

"What's made it worse? Or has it just gotten worse on its own?"

"I dunno…" He shrugged, "I thought it might get better when the War ended, you know – with the Dark Lord gone, I thought things might be better… but then everything with my parents, and I found out just how involved my father actually was… it just…" He shrugged again, "It just – I never managed to go back to how I had been before, I don't even know if that's possible…" Hermione thought about what she should say next, trying to pick what bit she should tackle first.

"Have you spoken to your parents recently?" Draco shook his head.

"Not since they were taken away in June." He answered, "Not that I really want to talk to them… Especially not my father, I just – I can't believe!" He broke off again. "I'd always thought my parents were mostly decent people… I've come to understand the older I got, what being in league with the Dark Lord really meant, but I never thought they were capable of the things that they've done… I mean, you think it must only be psychopaths that are capable of murder… My father used to talk big, but I didn't genuinely believe that there was action behind it…"

"But you couldn't have done anything to stop your father, you weren't responsible for his actions!" Hermione told him.

"Maybe not… But I could have got away… I wish I had gotten away." He was speaking quietly, his voice heavy with regret. "I'm ashamed to be a part of that family… and I never ever thought that I would be saying that… Two or three years ago I thought being a Malfoy was one of the highest positions I could have – I've come to realise recently that actually you can't get any lower."

"But your surname isn't the only thing that makes you who you are Draco." Hermione pointed out.

"But it is the first thing that people will always judge me on…and the reputation that precedes it." He answered quickly. "I'm just fed up, I don't particularly want to be like this for the rest of my life… So I've been trying to figure out how to make this awful feeling go away so I can start again with… I can just never be, I'm never…" He struggled, "I'm always going to be empty." He concluded in a monotone voice.

"You don't have to be empty Draco." Hermione spoke gently.

"But I don't know if it's possible not to be empty…" He refuted, "I've tried everything I can think of… I tried to move on, I tried to make myself forget with alcohol, I tried to let myself sleep and it didn't work! I tried to distance myself from everything that I'm used to, I came back to school because I thought might be easier to start over again at Hogwarts, but it turns out that I couldn't have been more wrong, because everyone here just sees a Death Eater – and being made Head Boy just made it all worse because they all know that there are better people than me that came back, so now everyone is just waiting till I screw up so they can point the finger at me and say 'Look! I told you so – I knew he was just a pile of shit!' so I'm not going to be able to start over here – so the alcohol isn't going to work, and coming back to school hasn't been hugely beneficial… And then there was this." Draco pointed at the cuts on his arm. "At first I thought I could cut it out in one go – then when I realised that wasn't going to work I thought I might be able to cut it out layer by layer, and by the time that I realised that wasn't going to work either, I kind of liked the way that it made me feel when I was doing it… like the pain makes me feel alive, makes me feel anything apart from the nothingness, so in keeping doing it I've tried to obliterate over the mark and be able to feel some kind of feeling, but I'm not doing very well at that either! It's all or nothing, and it gets messy, and I know it's wrong, but it works for me… so I don't think I'm ever going to not be empty, because I know I won't be able to feel anything if I stopped doing the thing that makes me feel alive…" Hermione waited for a few seconds once Draco had finished his rant, wanting to give him time to regain himself after admitting so much.

"Have you thought about talking?" She eventually said, when there had been enough time for him to recover.

"What do you mean?" Draco asked rather blankly.

"I mean talking about how you've been feeling… or not feeling. Maybe that would help you start again, if you got all the things that are really digging in your head out?" She suggested.

"I don't know…" He bit his lip, "I'd never really thought about it. I wouldn't want to burden anyone, it's my problem… I shouldn't have to force them upon anyone else."

"You know, other people don't always think that listening and helping as a burden…" She said, "Not everything has to be burdened alone Draco… what you said earlier – that feelings are feelings so they shouldn't be put into words, I think that's a bit mixed up… because feelings are feelings and have to be expressed to be completely understood… if you bottle them all up then of course they're going to become a problem." Draco seemed to mull over what Hermione was saying, but then he seemed to come up with another objection.

"I don't even know who I would talk to…" He stated rather matter of factly.

"Well," She took a breath, "There's me…" Draco just stared at her, and she felt a little bit uncomfortable as he continued to stare, apparently still processing what she had just said.

"But it's not your problem…" Draco refuted after a few seconds.

"And I'm telling you that it doesn't have to be just your problem." She insisted, "I really don't mind, I wouldn't have a problem with you talking to me about what's going on in your head – well, we've kind of already been talking about it a bit, haven't we?"

"I guess…" He agreed, "I just… I never know what to say, how to put it into words."

"Well perhaps you don't need to say anything," She said, "Just knowing there is someone there that you can talk to if you wanted to, might make things a bit easier for you…" She reached out and laid her hand on his knee again, wanting him to understand how sincere she was about this offer.

"Maybe… Yeah, thank you…" He was still looking down at his knees as he spoke. Hermione waited, considering everything that had happened that evening – Draco's wounds from his attack, his honesty and acceptance that perhaps what he was going through didn't need to be kept to himself. She didn't think he needed to bear all the weight of everything that he had experienced, and all of the prejudice of the other students, alone. Draco seemed to be thinking along the same lines, because he nodded slightly once more and said: "I want you to know that when I say thank you, I really mean it…" He repeated, "I'm not just saying it. You're the only one who has actually been decent to me…"

"I know Draco…" Draco looked up at her, his eyes were now perfectly dry and Hermione noted the crystallized shade of silver that they were. His face was very close to hers, only a few centimetres apart, but neither of them drew back because of the distance. Hermione's heart rate had inexplicably sped up in her chest, she wasn't sure why, but she wasn't averse to it.

"Thanks…" He murmured again, much quieter this time and with a small smile. And without another word, or any instigation, their lips met.

A/N: Thank you so much for sticking with me for this long - I hope you're enjoying reading this story, and I'd love to know what you think/feel about this chapter and story so far! :)