A heartbreaking scream cut through the oppressive silence of the cemetery.
Flo crouched in front of the grave and screamed. She screamed and sobbed.
My first instinct was to run to her and drag her away from there but I was numb.
Seeing her like that, so broken, felt like I was breaking myself.
We had moved quite a distance away from her at Floʼs request but that distance was now bridged by the other four, Newt in the lead.
What had paralysed me had probably awakened life in the older man, for he was by far the fastest at the grave.
Only now was I aware of everything that was happening at the grave, but I didn't manage to tell the others in time before Newt found out for himself.
He was still rushing towards his granddaughter, but when he was almost an arm's length away from her, he was thrown back.
Luckily for him, Jacob was standing right in the direction of his flight and saved him from hitting the ground.
Quickly I hurried over to the confused group.
"A Protego," I said breathlessly, which only earned me more confused looks.
"A wandless Protego," I tried to be a little more specific.
"I... But... I've only read about it so far," Professor McGonnagal stammered, looking back and forth between me and Flo.
I too had read about it. Mainly because I had wanted to protect myself from the Dark Lord at the time but I had failed.
Which wasn't surprising, because there were very few documented cases of such a protection spell.
Protection Spell.
All she did was protect herself.
No matter what we did, as long as she didn't want it, we wouldn't be able to get to her.
"We won't be able to get to her until she lets us."
"But we can't leave her there. You can see she's suffering," Jacob protested.
Of course you could see that, we weren't blind or deaf.
"I told you it was a mistake to send her to that school and now look at her," Queenie now interjected with her reproaches.
"Oh and you know so much about children because you have so much yourself, or what?!"
The professor got really angry and I just stood here watching three grown people behaving like toddlers.
"I told you not to force her to come here!" the professor now went after Newt, who had gotten himself up enough so that Jacob didn't have to prop him up.
"I would never force her to do anything unlike you!"
"I'm just trying to protect her!"
This was pure chaos, everyone was blaming everyone else and for a long time it had been personal accusations that were at stake instead of Flo.
Meanwhile, no one noticed how Flo slumped even more in her place at the grave.
Now the protego she had put around herself was actually visible and not just an indefinable glimmer.
And she had changed too.
I was surprised that she was still in control of her animagus and not crouching there completely transformed, but slowly this control seemed to slip away.
Black cat ears and a furry tail now showed this loss of control.
Her protective barrier grew stronger the more she lost control and no one noticed.
No one was interested in her.
No one saw her.
And suddenly anger boiled up inside me.
These people were her family, all she had left and they were fighting over trifles.
They put their problems above Flo's, didn't even notice them.
They were like me.
I was like them. Selfish and blind.
But that would stop, right now.
"Stop it! All of you!", I loudly interrupted the arguers and immediately all attention was on me.
"Are you even listening to yourselves?!
You're arguing about things that aren't important right now, that can wait!
Flo is the only thing that should be on our minds right now.
Look at her! Look at her! This girl is not okay, even if she says she is.
She is not strong right now but broken and vulnerable.
And she has been for a long time but no one is looking!
This protego is protecting her from exactly one thing and that's us.
We who have nothing better to do than argue in a graveyard."
I was talking myself into a rage but it felt really good to let it all out and I was far from finished.
"We are a pathetic bunch of people who should be supporting her, instead we are a grandfather who sends his only grandchild to a school he himself hated, in a foreign country where she knows no one!
Her godmother who only works and didn't even spend time with her goddaughter on Christmas, when it was so clear how hard it was for her!
An aunt who has nothing better to do than rummage around in other people's minds!
And an uncle who is the most normal of the bunch but still doesn't look.
And me. The arrogant, egotistical boyfriend who would be dead without this girl but doesn't deserve it.
Who doesn't deserve her!"
There was silence.
I had shouted out all my anger and it felt good.
It felt incredibly good to have said all that, even though I could now vividly imagine the consequences.
I expected everything from being shouted at to being slapped in the face but nothing.
No one did or said anything.
It was dead silent.
And then my ring warmed up.
The emergency button.
There was no time to explain what had happened, and I didn't want to explain why the others would have to wait now, because Flo had explicitly called me.
I didn't even know myself.
We were only two steps away from Flo and I had overcome this faster than anyone could react.
And by the time they did that and realised what I had done, I was already inside the protective protectorate.
They tried to follow me but were not allowed to pass.
I was now with her.
She wanted me to help her.
Now that her protective shield no longer surrounded her, her sobs were even louder.
The screaming seemed to have died down, but I wasn't sure it wouldn't come back.
She crouched there on the ground, hitting the earth in front of her over and over again. A few sprigs of lavender had not survived this attack.
My chest tightened at the sight.
She had to get away from here. No matter what she said or how strong she thought she was, she had to get out of here and as fast as possible.
She had let me in but that could have been unconscious because she still hadn't noticed me or she was simply ignoring my presence.
Whatever the reason, I had to use it to get her out of here.
She would never leave voluntarily, the only way was to force her.
And I knew well enough that Florentine Daisy Scamander could not be forced to do anything unless she was surprised or physical force was used.
And that was exactly what I would do.
I was physically superior to her, we had established that enough yesterday.
If I took just one step towards her, I could touch her, take her away from here.
The fact that she was still cowering on the floor wouldn't make it any easier but it was the only way.
One step and I grabbed her by the waist, pulled her to her feet and thrown her over my shoulder in one fluid movement.
I only now realised that this was the easier part of the whole thing.
She was kicking and pounding at my back and I was having all the trouble I could to hold her up there.
"Put me down!", she screamed, increasing the punches against my back.
"I want you to put me down! I want to stay with her!"
Desperation, pure desperation spoke from her.
Her protective spell was weakening, probably because all her strength was now directed at the punches and kicks against my body.
I continued to hold her convulsively.
"I have to stay with her! Damn it Malfoy put me down already!"
Malfoy. She called me Malfoy again.
"No. We're going now," I replied in a firm voice.
A stabbing pain ran through me.
"I HATE YOU MALFOY! I HATE YOU!"
Each word a punch against my aching back.
Hate me Flo, hate me if you must but please let me take you away from here, I pleaded silently.
I felt like crying, my back was on fire and the girl I would give my life for hated me.
The looks on the others' faces were completely aghast as I stepped through the now so weak Protego that it would have stopped a fly at most, with the still loudly protesting Flo over my shoulder
"We have to go, now. I hope the appareer lock is off, because I will not be able to carry her a kilometre," I said as calmly as possible without being impressed by Floʼs protests.
No one said anything for a moment until Newt spoke up.
"We can go."
And with a plop, we were gone.
We apparated directly to the front of the house and I was glad that it had worked so smoothly.
"Take me back, now!" shouted Flo from my back but I skilfully ignored that.
"Her plateau. Take her to her plateau, that was always her favourite place," Newt explained matter-of-factly and opened the door to Floʼs room for me.
Getting her up the ladder was difficult but eventually I was able to put her up there.
Now she was sitting in front of me while I was still on the ladder and she was glaring at me.
"You really are the worst person in the world," she hissed at me, pretty much reminiscent of her Animagus form.
"I know Flo, I know," I muttered and descended the ladder again.
She didn't follow me, she just stayed sitting up there.
"Get out of here! I hate you!", she screamed and threw her necklace at me, hitting me in the back of the head before it hit the ground.
Maybe I should have picked it up but instead I walked out of the room without saying anything else and closed the door behind me.
I had lost her.
High this morning on the sofa with her in my arms, I couldn't have been happier and now she hated me.
And all I wanted to do was protect her.
Newt, Professor McGonnagal and Jacob looked at me with wide eyes as I stepped back into the living room.
From the kitchen I heard the tea kettle, so I assumed that was where Queenie was.
"What happened?" The professor was the first to find her voice again.
"She's angry at everything and everyone. We shouldn't go in there for now. When she calms down, she'll come on her own," I explained matter-of-factly, although I didn't really want to do anything but cry.
Then there was a bang in my back and we all flinched.
"She's going to hurt herself," Jacob exclaimed in horror.
She wouldn't, at least that's what I hoped.
And then something happened that I never expected could ever happen, Professor McGonnagal agreed with me.
"I think we should really give her time.
Her animagus protects her, when her emotions get too strong it takes over. He would never let her hurt herself."
As strange as it sounded, it made sense.
Her animagus was like an outlet, she could control her emotions through it better than any other person I knew and if it got too much, she would just be able to relinquish that control.
And again there was a clang in Floʼs room.
Newt sighed in defeat.
"Goodness, what happened to you?" exclaimed Queenie, startled, as she strode into the living room with the teapot.
She quickly put the pot down and came over to me. Her fingers touched my shoulder and it burned like hell.
I had ignored the pain radiating from my back for the last few minutes, knowing it would be green and blue by tomorrow anyway, but now that she was touching my shoulder I remembered the stabbing pain that had run through my body in the graveyard.
"What is it?", I asked tensely.
"She hurt you," she whispered, and the tremor in her voice was unmistakable.
I swallowed.
This was hard, the shanking and kicking had been painful but nothing I didn't understand but if Queenie said I was hurt there was far more there than bruises.
"It would be easier for me to heal it if you took your shirt off," she explained calmly and I nodded.
I followed her into the bathroom because I certainly didn't want to undress in front of everyone.
I unbuttoned the shirt and slipped it off.
Without saying anything Queenie healed my wounds.
She walked back out of the bathroom when I told her I would follow but I wanted to freshen up a bit.
That was a lie, a huge lie.
I slid down the cold wall and pulled my knees to my body.
I had failed, in every way.
I had been blind, stupid and selfish.
Had put everything on the line without knowing it.
And now I had lost her for good.
She hated me, despised me.
My buttondown was still in my hand and only now did I dare look at it.
It was destroyed. The entire right shoulder was torn, as if a werewolf had attacked me.
But it had been Flo.
What was I doing here anyway?
I didn't belong here. Didn't belong in a home where everything wasn't perfect but you loved each other.
I didn't belong in this family and I never would.
Flo was right when she said I was the worst person in the world and there was nothing I could say against that.
I loved her but I wasn't worth it.
Get a grip Draco, you're still a Malfoy.
You get up now, you go back out there and then you take your life in your hands.
I magically repaired the shirt I had been wearing underneath, but left the buttondown destroyed on the floor.
I washed my face and in the same breath I let the water run over my head.
My hair was dripping and I dried it with a towel.
No more of that clawed back perfect Draco, he was long dead.
I would take my life in my hands and my first act was to wear my hair as wild as I wanted.
I had just had a meltdown in a bathroom, I wasn't perfect at all, so why should my appearance be?
"Are you alright?" Queenie asked as I stepped back out of the bathroom.
I wish I had an aunt like her.
We were just sitting at the table drinking tea and not saying a word when we heard Flo's door.
I had a feeling that my thoughts could have been heard.
Flo came out of her room looking completely exhausted. Her hair, which she had braided in the morning, was wild and certainly no longer a hairstyle.
Her clothes were dirty, probably from the cemetery, and her little black ears were still sticking out of her hair.
That alone would have been enough to see that she was not well, but when I looked at her face, I realised the full extent of it.
Her cheeks were red and shimmering from all the tears that had run down them.
But what was worst was her eyes, they were puffy and red from all the crying, which was not surprising but I had never seen so little in them.
They seemed almost dull and empty instead of brimming with character.
Newt was the first to move and walk towards her. For a moment I was afraid she would push him away but when he took her in his arms she let him.
That broke the dam and the others came up to her and hugged her.
I took advantage of the moment to get into Flo's room.
That's how she must have felt when she came into my room after the break-up with Astoria, it looked like a battlefield.
I had never seen so many books on the floor and now I also saw what had made the noise, she had literally torn down her plateau.
The ladder was on the floor and the wooden beams of the bodes were scattered around the room.
Somewhere under an overturned bookshelf I found my bag, which I grabbed because I was leaving.
She hated me, so what was I still doing here?
The door slammed shut just as I was looking for her necklace.
"Hey," she whispered softly and I looked up.
There she stood, forcing herself to smile slightly but not yelling at me.
That last one in particular was something I was quite happy about. I wasn't able to say anything.
"That was me, wasn't it?" she asked shyly, and only then did I notice the piece of fabric in her hand.
My buttondown.
"Yes," I said quietly, trying to maintain eye contact.
I wasn't even angry with her, not in the least. This had been her way of dealing with her grief and if it had helped her even a little to punch me or scratch me, I was glad to have helped.
"I know what I said to you," she began softly. "And at that moment, I meant it. I've hated you for the last hour for dragging me away from there."
"Thanks, for the reminder," I rolled my eyes.
As if I'd ever forget.
"Thank you for dragging me away from there."
"You're contradicting yourself," I stated dryly.
"I'm emotionally unstable, you shouldn't believe everything I say.
But please stay."
And of course I would stay. If she wanted me to, I had no choice but to comply.
I would do anything if she asked me to.
Although she didn't even have to ask, I would do anything for her, whether she asked me or not.
But this was not something we could do alone.
We would need help, maybe not with cleaning up but with everything that came after.
It was something I had never thought to say, because for a long time I would have thought it would make me weak.
But it wouldn't, it wouldn't make me weak.
And even if it did, I was allowed to be weak too, right?
"I'll stay on one condition," I explained and she looked at me with wide, questioning eyes.
"You have to let me make an appointment for you with Mrs Morgan."
Mrs Morgan was the psychologist Professor McGonnagal had hired after the war. She was supposed to help the students who needed psychological care to cope with the traumas of the war.
At the beginning of the school year I had made fun of it because only cowards and weaklings would need someone like that, but as so often in my life I was wrong.
Mrs Morgan would be able to help Flo, I was convinced of that.
Whether she could help me was another question but I would try.
"You need professional help," I finished my service, voicing the problem.
But not just her problem. "And so do I."
A tear ran down her face and I couldn't watch her cry anymore, it hurt me so immensely to see her like this.
I took a step towards her and wiped the tears from her face. As soon as I was within her reach she wrapped her arms around me and started sobbing.
Great, now I had made it worse instead of better.
"I'm scared Draco," she mumbled between sobs and I stroked her back reassuringly.
"Me too. But I'm here and I'm not going to leave you alone, okay?"
She nodded heavily against my chest.
We could do this. We could both face our inner demons.
As long as she was with me. As long as she gave me her smile, I would have the strength to do anything.
I had known for a long time that I loved her, but only now did I really realise what that meant.
It meant to love her not only for her laughter and her courage but also or even more for her demons, her fears and for all the things she hated about herself.
To love her for things that were not easy, that required more than a stupid comment and for things that made her become something real.
To a real person with problems and fears and not an idealised image.
She wasn't perfect, no one was, but those imperfect things were what I loved about her.
And for me she was perfect.
