a/n: thank you to elly32, heyHEYOhSorry, and tmtcltb for reviewing! hope you enjoy.
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[dormant II]
Friends.
It's a terribly pitiful day when that's what the people around her are considered to be.
What a sad fucking word to associate with a group of gossiping girls. Pansy is on the verge of gouging her eyes out with the nearest stirring spoon or plastering on a smile so tight that one could practically bounce a knut on it. At this point, she's rolling with the latter.
Now that she thinks about it, Pansy has never really had a friend since the dawn of her birth—unless playing her house elves count. But even that had an expiration date—the eve of her seventh birthday when her mother nearly fainted with all her pent-up rage at Pansy's refusal to play with anyone except the elves. Maybe she liked them better. Elves didn't have the choice to not be her friend. They were just always there for her. And maybe that's what she liked the most.
She only goes to the twice-a-month soiree at Millicent Bulstrode's house to appease her mother—whose eyes have begun to twinkle at the mention of any prominent bachelor on the market or a girl friend she goes out with. Meddling mother, through and through.
Pansy can barely eat without getting shifty, judgemental looks from the girls around her, and if that isn't the most annoying thing ever, she also has to deal with—
"Merlin, I mean, did you even hear what Tracey Davis did the other day?" Millicent covers the snide snicker following her accusal with her polished hand. Old money and flirty smiles procures the best manicures around, apparently.
"What?" Astoria says, leaning forward on her knees to absorb all the gossip she can. Pansy doesn't hate the younger witch. Everyone appreciated gossip—but Astoria, oh, she thrives on it.
"She and Zabini were totally groping each other. Someone caught them in a back room together, naked from the waist down." Millicent purses her lips before taking an extended sip of her tea. Many of the women surrounding let out looks of sheer disgust, and Pansy couldn't help but roll her eyes.
"What. A. Slag." An ex-girlfriend of Blaise grits out. Mary Liddle, she thinks. "She just can't keep her claws out of men, can she?"
And Pansy is seething.
Pansy speaks up for the first time while shifting uncomfortably in her crimson skin-tight skirt, "So, she's a slag because she enjoys sex? If she wants to have sex, let her. How the fuck does it affect you?"—Astoria Greengrass let out a small choked noise voicing her surprise, and Pansy fucking relishes in it—"If she wants to enjoy the act, let her. There's nothing substantially wrong with liking sex; she's a person with a reasonable desire — just like you and me. And besides, I hear what people,"—as in Millicent nosy Bulstrode—"say about her. Most of that bull isn't even true. You're just putting her down for dating Zabini. And it seems to me he's the one you should be mad at, not her."
"I — I," the girl stutters. What an imbecile. She can barely even form a cogent thought if it didn't include putting down someone.
"Pans—" someone else starts to say, but Pansy's already sauntering out of the tea room without another glance back. She makes sure to grab more than three biscuits on the way out.
·
"I'm getting a migraine," Pansy declares, flopping onto Draco's couch in one heap, not really caring that her skirt likely rode up on her thighs. She pronounces it like 'mee-graine' just to get a rise out of Draco—and his previous adventures with women who barely understood the difference between an i and an e—and by the dark look on his face that passes just as quickly as it came, Pansy succeeds.
"You seem so chipper, today," Draco comments off-handedly, keeping his gaze trained on the television in front of him. See? Obsessed with Muggle things. Ironic, really. Some Japanese horror movie is playing, and the excessive use of blood and gore made Pansy cringe, but Draco is so absorbed in it, his eyes are gleaming with joy. Sickening.
"I've had a bad day." She waits for him to say something—anything—in response, but when he doesn't, she lifts her nose from nuzzling into his couch and kicks him on the side of his stomach. "You know, if you cared about me, you'd ask why I've had such a bad day."
"Good thing caring about you isn't an issue, then," Draco shoots back without even blinking. She clicks her jaw shut. He sighs in resignation a couple seconds later and grumbles, "Why've you had a bad day, my dearest Pansy?"
"If you must know, my budding spring tulip, all my so-called girl friends are all absolute cunts."
"You just realised this now, my supple succulent lilac of love? Talk about living underneath a rock."
"I fucking hate it when you start using those weird phrases of yours, Draco."
He shrugs effortlessly, and she toes him again. "You know, you have to leave in roughly—" he pulls the sleeve of his jumper down to glance at his watch, "—twenty-seven minutes. I'm expecting company, and you can't be here all mopey and morose. You're going to drag down the aura that I'm trying to replicate for the mood."
"Aura? If that's some deranged way to say 'get out of my flat, Pansy, I need to fuck my girlfriend,' then how about you try a more direct approach. Why don't you just say 'get out of my flat, Pansy, I need to fuck my girlfriend.' Say it with me, 'Get out—'"
"Ha ha bloody ha." Draco glares at her viciously before clearing his throat, "It's Neville. He's bringing over this new film collection that we need to watch tonight, and our agenda doesn't include you finally coming to the conclusion about how obtuse most of the people you talk to are."
Something in her stomach stirs uneasily. Right beneath her navel. Like she might vomit all over Draco's expensive Persian rug or her heart might concave into itself until it dissolves in the acid sitting baselessly in her torso. After running her fingers over those fretful gifts Marcus left on her back—because apparently being slammed into a wall isn't the best of surfaces for something she's always thought to be an act of love—she couldn't help but remember just who she was thinking of that night. She left the violet bruises as a painful reminder of what it feels like to succumb to her loneliness.
A soft sort of heat rises to the back of her neck before encompassing her face. Pansy rolls out her neck to feign indifference at the mention of Draco's best friend, but one of her hands trail up the marks on her spine. And then she does what she does best—plasters on a frigid smile and twists the situation to her favour.
"I really appreciate the invite, Draco." She sighs and checks her dark nails. "Shall I sit on the right or left of you? Also, what films will it be this time? Last time you made me watch those dreaded ones about that man who kills people for a living and fucks those bimbo blondes on the side. Terribly cliché, if you ask me."
"You're not invited," he clarifies in a gruff tone.
Like hell she isn't invited.
"Good thing I'm staying anyway." She snuggles into his couch and shoots a responding feral smile at his petulant scowl. He loves her. Really. "What's for dinner? I have the grumbles."
·
"Butter or no butter?" Pansy asks as Draco plops on the couch, legs spread wide and gathering up as much space to push her off the couch. He gets a bit grumpy when things don't go his way, you see. Draco merely grunts in reply, passing off the bowl of popcorn without a glance. "That wasn't even a bloody answer."
"No butter," he mutters, scraping his nails through his scalp angrily. "Longbottom hates the grease."
"What a darling you are," Pansy replies, leaning over to tap Draco on the nose. He swats her hands away. "You and your hidden lover discuss how to properly dress popcorn, of all things."
The doorbell shrieks loudly through her ears—because Draco refuses to get the chimes fixed after he accidentally kicked a football into the thundering bells—and Draco pushes off the couch to greet Neville bloody Longbottom.
And then he glides in—not walks because apparently he's incapable of walking with his thundering, pounding feet slamming into the ground. Longbottom rounds the end of the hallway, eyes shifting between her and the television with mild, placid indifference.
He's tall—like, really tall—and Pansy can't help but notice how he towers over Draco, who keeps his face neutral as he whispers to his friend something that makes Longbottom nod in understanding. Warmth unfurls in her belly like silky pink ribbons.
Longbottom holds up a bottle of lemonade and cocks his eyebrow at Pansy, silently asking her if she wants a drink. She slips on an unreadable look on her face—right beside the purse of her lips and the cross of her legs—and shakes her head, once, twice, to let him know that she doesn't want some silly Muggle fizzy drink.
Minutes later, all three of them are squished on Draco's only fucking couch in his fucking flat because he's a fucking piss-poor interior decorator apparently, and nothing but the buzzing of the television as Draco flickers through the settings resonates through the room.
A recurring thought runs through Pansy's head—that maybe she should've left when Draco nonchalantly tried to kick her out an hour ago after her little whining fest. But doing so would make her admit something she hadn't ever wanted to, that maybe, just maybe, she's more lonely than she realises. If she goes home now, all she'll be doing is sipping on Chardonnay and painting her toenails again. Here, at least, she finds comfort in the silence engulfing her, because at least there are people around her to share the same experience with her.
"What film this time?" Draco questions, glancing over at Neville on the right side, who's busy eating popcorn one piece at a time.
"I thought we could dig into Star Wars for the first time? I heard about it from Dean the other night over drinks."
Draco nods sagely, and Pansy itches uncomfortably at her pale pink skirt, pulling the hem down slightly. She leans her neck back to stare at the ceiling while the two of them discuss something or the other about how they need to start at the fourth movie and Draco's just so utterly confused at the notion, he's taken to wanting to call up Granger and ask if the director was on narcotics when he released the movies out of order.
Pansy is still wavering between buggering off from this bromance session—maybe she could slip out the door while the two of them are in their next intense conversation about vases—and sitting idly by the two of them. Because right now it just feels. So. Fucking. Awkward. to be here, of all places.
Draco slips the tape into the Vee-cee-something, and Pansy immediately shifts over on the couch, wishing she could hide between the cushions because Neville Longbottom is staring hotly at her again. Maybe he's deciphering her like some type of Arirthmancy problem or something, but Pansy fucking hates him for doing so.
She meets his eyes. He smiles, slow and lazy. She morphs her face into one of revulsion or confusion or contempt or something in between; anything to make him stop showing off his little dimple just by the corner of his mouth.
The phone in his house—another one of Draco's ventures into the Muggle world—rings loudly, leaving Pansy to snap her neck back fast enough that she's genuinely surprised she doesn't leave a crick in her neck. Draco stands up, mumbling something about his bloody neighbour's drinking problem, and leaves the room.
Neville takes a second to inhale sharply. "You a fan of Muggle films as well?"
As if she's utterly disgusted at the fact, she grunts a harsh, "No."
He barely even blinks at her revolted look. "Then. . .?"
I'm just here, she wants to yell at him, stop fucking pestering me. But instead she smirks viciously and goes with, "I don't know. I decided to see what it'd be like to finally sully myself."
He shoot her a pointed look—something saying that he doesn't quite believe what she's trying to insinuate. It's patronising. She loathes it. And then he turns his head away with another blazingly hot look etched onto his face.
Pansy squeezes her eyes shut and breathes deeply.
Fuck.
She definitely should've left when she had the chance.