They drank long and hard. They talked about light topics, like their students, grading papers, the struggles of being a teacher, anything but the elephant in the room.

"There are some crazy rumors circulating about you, you know." Harry humored. "I heard that you threw a potted plant at a student." Malfoy frowned, "I did throw a potted plant at a student." Harry's eyes widened. "Why did you do that?" "Because I heard him whispering that you were the one who beat me up." Harry chuckled darkly, but Malfoy's expression remained grim. "Then I heard another kid say that my mother sent me a howler, and it beat me up until I got like this," he gestured to himself. "Idiots. They don't know what they are talking about." Malfoy said solemnly. He took a long drink from his glass.

It was a while before Harry responded. "Malfoy, do you… remember what you were, erm, screaming about that night." It was Malfoy's turn to chuckle. "Not exactly, but let me guess, was it about my mother?" Harry slowly shook his head. Malfoy took a deep breath. It looked like he was trying to formulate exactly was he was about to say in his head.

"As you know, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was particularly… fond of my parents. In particular my father." He paused. He looked like he was fighting a war in his head, a war between secrecy and honesty. The flames from the now dying fire contorted his face with dark shadows.

"He knew that the easiest way to get to my father was through me, but I was so essential to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named plans, that he knew I could not be touched. That means the second easiest way to bend my father's will was through my mother." He gave an involuntary shutter. He wasn't crying, but his voice was no longer stable. "He tortured her. For every mistake my father made, he tortured her. He tortured her and made me watch." His voice was barely a whisper. Harry watched him, not daring to interrupt.

"He thought that making me watch my mother in agony would scare me away from disobedience. He was wrong. One night, when he had forced his Death Eaters to cut her with knives, I took my wand and killed them. That was the first time I had ever killed anyone." Another pause. "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was furious. I was so foolish. I thought that me killing his servants would make him punish me instead." Malfoy gasped for air. His knuckles had turned white around the glass he was holding. Harry was afraid that it was going to break. He was afraid that Malfoy was going to break.

"He touched her. He tied me down and forced me to watch. I was screaming so loudly. I didn't care how old I was. But nothing compared to the screaming my mother did. I watched her tears fall down her face; I was so helpless. I was so stupid. I watched my mother get raped, and it was all my fault."

His breathing was heavy, almost as it was the last time. He hadn't moved since he sat down, but he looked like he had just run a marathon. Sweat trickled down his head onto his neck, soaking the rim of his robes. "After he was- finished with her, I was the one who had to clean her up. I was the one who had to re-dress her, to clean her of his touch. My father was upstairs the whole time. When he came down, he beat me. He didn't use magic, just his bare hands. And I just lied there. I lied there and took the pain that originally should have been mine, not my mother's."

A loud shatter filled the room. The cup in Malfoy's had had broken. Dark amber liquid poured onto the floor. A piece of glass lodged itself into Malfoy's hand. Blood started to pool in his palm, but he made no move to take care of it. Harry stood up quickly and kneeled beside Malfoy, carefully avoiding the glass-strewn ground. He quickly transfigured a broken shard of glass into a pair of tweezers. Without saying a word, he got to work at pulling out the glass from Malfoy's hand. His work was sloppy at best; he was no doctor. Malfoy stared in fascination. He seemed strangely separated from the fact that his drunken enemy was yanking pieces of glass out of his hand. "Bloody hell, Malfoy, what did you do?" Harry muttered.

After wrapping his hand up in a piece of fabric he transfigured, He quickly vanished the glass on the floor, and put the now almost empty fire whisky bottle far away from Malfoy. Harry was now sitting on the floor, leaning against the arm of the chair Malfoy was still sitting in.

"So, the piece of broken statue I had in my hand that Friday…." "Yeah, it was sort of a trigger for me." Malfoy's words were slurring. Retelling his story drained him of his energy. That, and the fact that it was almost two in the morning. "And you didn't heal your bruises as a… reminder?" Malfoy nodded his head. "The same thing used to happen to me." Harry said quietly. This seemed to catch Malfoy's attention. He was no longer slouched over. He sat up, as if he were trying to urge Harry to continue. "Towards the beginning, I spent most of my days in almost a trance. I kept on reliving the deaths that I was responsible for." His voice remained quiet and steady. He fixed his gaze on the fire.

"All the deaths that could have been avoided, all the loss that shouldn't have happened, all because of me. I remember lying on the floor covered in vomit and liquor. I remember wanting to fall asleep and never wake up. It was Ginny who found me, actually."

There was a long silence. Malfoy though that Harry had fallen asleep. He was about to lean forward and check, but Harry spoke once again. "She cleaned me up. She made me take a shower. In fact, I am pretty sure she bathed me." Harry took a second to try to remember, but he must have decided it wasn't important and continued. "She made me eat, she hid my liquor, she put me together again. And then she left. I remember it was raining that day. She didn't say goodbye, but that was how I knew she had left for good." At this, Malfoy did lean forward to see Harry's facial expression. He was surprised to see that it was blank. There was no anger or hurt like Malfoy expected to see. There was nothing. Malfoy was thinking of something to say, but Harry beat him to it.

"I still have nightmares you know. Every night. Every morning I wake up covered in sweat, shivering, and hoarse from all of the screaming I did mid-dream. It was so bad McGonagall had to come and wake me up once. She thought something had happened to me." A weak smile played across his face. Both boys sat in silence. The only sound that could be heard was the dying ashes of the fire.

"Well that was- well, I- I did not expect that, Potter."

"Neither did I, Malfoy." Malfoy flinched.

"Potter?"

"Yeah?"

"Call me Draco, not Malfoy."

Harry broke his gaze from the ashes to stare at him in surprise. "Yeah? What happened to, 'Never call me Draco'?" Harry said, doing a weak impersonation of his voice. "Well, now that you practically know my whole bloody life story, I figured that you should call me by my real name." Harry nodded thoughtfully. "You can call me Harry, if you'd like." Harry offered. A faint smile played across Draco's lips. "I was going to whether you gave me permission to or not."

They sat for a little while longer, until all of the sparkers in the ashes had burned out. It was three thirty in to morning. Both boys were very drunk, and very tired, yet only one of them had to wake up for work the following morning.

Harry slowly stood up and faced Draco, who was still in the armchair. "Goodnight Draco." Harry stumbled out of the room before Draco could respond.

Draco, who was supposed to be sick, heaved himself out of his armchair and down to the basement, where he would fall asleep with all of his clothes on, on top of the covers of his bed. A couple of floors above him, Harry was doing the same thing.