HP - D/B - My Not-So Happy Ending

[hackthis_archive]

If ethrosdemon and literaryll have their way this will eventually be a prologue of sorts to a different story altogether, but I just wanted to write this today, because, well, do I really need a reason? Exactly.

Blaise/Draco (NC-17)
Post-War, spoiler for HBP
Dedicated to ethrosdemon for being the best champion anyone could want, with much love for serialkarma who beta tested this twice. That's love, people.


My Not-So Happy Ending

Dear Bothersome Idiot,

I shall call on you at 10:03 Thursday morning, Grandpère Hermes allowing. Grandmère has banished him again, and he is drinking his way through most of my good fire whiskey.

I thought we might take a turn in the gardens, weather permitting. Try to keep yourself out of trouble, and free of foolish entanglements, until my arrival.

Blaise

Like all of Draco's mail, this letter was opened before it found him. Draco could've felt grateful that they allowed him to see this message at all since it wasn't really for his benefit -- his captors frowned upon unannounced visits -- but Draco didn't do gratitude well. Actually, Draco didn't do gratitude at all.

Besides, Draco knew Blaise would be coming on Thursday at 10:03 because Blaise called every Thursday at the same time.

Blaise, at least, had not abandoned him.


*


Draco had always believed in happy endings -- not of the sort that involved princesses and castles, that was entirely too heteronormative and plebian for him -- but the kind that ended with living parents and a home unfettered by Ministry wards and Runes.

Blaise said that Draco using words like "heteronormative" was far more worrisome than his childish delusions, but Blaise said a lot of things. Draco had learned through shouted curses and dead headmasters that things like happy endings didn't happen for people like him -- or Potter -- if they even existed at all.

Draco wasn't solipsistic enough to doubt that he existed; he had definitive proof of that. After all, one couldn't be punished if you weren't alive, breathing, and wondering when judgment would be passed by your unworthy peers. Draco was extraordinarily tired of the waiting. One hundred and twelve days and ten hours of being castigated for something he didn't do. One thousand, four hundred and eight days of feeling guilt for a curse he hadn't even said.

At this point, guilt was moot. Draco wasn't necessarily proud of the flagrant untruths being bandied about in his name, but surely they were better than being forgotten altogether. No, Draco being forgot would be altogether unacceptable, and so he suffered in ignominy and infamy, stripped of his wand and his fortune, shackled to a magical home and existence in which he could only marginally survive.

People had died to give Draco this meagre existence -- every day Draco was reminded of that. Thursdays, however, were different. On Thursdays Blaise visited, and if he ever noticed any significant changes in Draco demeanor or attire, he made certain to remark upon them. Blaise would not let Draco seep into the nothingness. Of course, they didn't actually discuss such things, that would've been terribly gauche and Gryffindor, but then again, they didn't discuss most things, which was obviously how they had lasted as long as they had. One war, four dead parents, six dead Slytherins from a class of twelve, and one life sentence that hung over them like so much fog.

There were relationships that were built on communication and self-expression and any number of things that Draco read about in his mother's copy of Deportment, Marriage, and How to be in a Pureblooded Marriage Without Hexing Your Spouse into the Next Dimension. Draco and Blaise weren't married, and Draco didn't have to turn a blind eye to Blaise's adulterous ways, so, already, the book didn't really fit their mold. Draco read it regardless, because there were only so many things that one could do when confined to their home for every hour of the day.

Without Blaise's visits it was entirely possible that Draco would've cut his own wrists out of sheer boredom, but since the Ministry had confiscated the family silver that was highly unlikely. His captors had also relieved him of his wand, so until he mastered the art of death by paper cut all Draco could do was wait, and then wait some more.

In the beginning of all this -- after the war, after all that Dark Lord business, after Draco had almost died for that scarred tosser, after he'd realized that no good deed goes unpunished –- Draco had lobbied relentlessly for his freedom, because he was no villain. Draco was a hero -- horrfying concept though it was -- but apparently only people like Potter could be heroes, and people like Draco, people who'd actually lost something in the war, were all to blame.

What Draco had done during the war didn't erase what he had done before the war according to the latest, feeblest, incarnation of the Ministry. They said he should've been happy that he'd been allowed to stay at the manor instead of being shipped off to New Azkaban.

Draco was not grateful -– but no one wanted to go to New Azkaban.

So Draco narrowed his eyes and gritted his teeth, and did not remind Granger of all the things he did for The Order during the war, because the fact remained that the entire wizarding world still thought of him as the murderer of Albus Dumbledore, and Draco did nothing to refute that claim. Severus had given his life for Draco and his mother –- fruitlessly as it turned out –- and Draco would not further mar his sacrifice. Not because Draco was so selfless himself, but because it was obvious that it wouldn't matter anymore. No one would believe him. Everyone needed someone to blame, and on a regular basis Draco blamed Granger, Potter, Severus, his parents, Blaise's parents, Slughorn, Dobby, his aunt Bella, the brooms his father bought the Slytherin Quidditch team, his own good looks, and the Dark Lord's inability to kill Potter like any decent Lord of Evil.

Sometimes, even Draco thought he had done it –- killed Dumbledore -- but then he remembered that he hadn't. And he wished –- well, wishes hadn't got him anywhere since the Dark Lord had threatened to kill his entire family. The fact of the matter was that there was no one left who believed he might've actually been innocent. There was Blaise, but Blaise didn't think him innocent as much as he simply didn't care if Draco were guilty.

That was a strangely comforting thought.


*


There was no bell to announce Blaise's arrival at the manor. No house elves came scurrying into the sitting room, pulling at the window hangings, annoyingly bright and cheerful, and reminding Master Draco that his shoes were still in the dining room. Draco simply opened the front door at 10:03 on Thursday morning and found Blaise standing there, magic from the wards still crackling and leaving a faint blue-tinged halo.

Draco rubbed the back of his neck, the ends of his hair tickling the back of his hand. "Great Salazar's Ghost –- were you attacked by a colourblind Muggle enroute?"

"Droll, Draco. Very droll."

Blaise was wearing the most appalling plum-coloured jumper that Draco had ever seen, but like every Zabini that Draco had ever met, Blaise pulled off the impossible by virtue of being very fucking hot. It was clearly genetic, because Draco had fancied Blaise's mother for years until he realised that being Mr Gemma Zabini tended to decrease one's life expectancy dramatically.

Even Draco had his off days when his hair was greasy and there were bags under his eyes because he couldn't sleep with all the silence of an empty home, but Blaise just looked like a very fit man wearing a very ugly jumper, which was exactly what he was.

There were sleep lines cutting across Blaise's cheek, and Draco raised an eyebrow as Blaise readjusted the purple jumper and brushed past him into the foyer. "Thank you so much for inviting me in; I see your manners haven't improved in the last week."

Draco snorted. "Sorry, I didn't recognise you for the appalling habiliment."

Blaise scowled. "Grandpère thought it would be an excellent thing to tell me about his 1978 touring experiences –- in detail. All of them."

"And you thought you should dress the part?"

"It was a late night. He felt he needed to reenact the entire year. This was the first thing I saw when I woke up this morning."

Draco shook his head. "Was that the year of the glitter and the orange hair?"

"Yes, and the year of the python and any number of other travesties."

"I'd forgot about the python."

"As had I, until 2:48 this morning."

A tiny smile turned the corners of Draco's mouth. Blaise's Grandpère, Hermes Blavatsky, had come from a long line of scholarly Ravenclaws, only to decide upon leaving Hogwarts that he wanted to be a rock and roll star. He'd left the wizarding world in search of fame and fortune amongst the Muggles, and had come to much acclaim, not for his music, but for his proficiency with a Chameleon Charm.

For any other family this would've been a shameful thing, but the Blavatskys had long profited from Muggle stupidity, and when Hermes had come home with the daughter of a much vaunted voodoo priest, the Blavatskys social status had benefited ten-fold.

Blaise's Grandmère, Ines, wasn't Draco's biggest supporter, but she didn't try to keep Blaise from Draco either, so Draco didn't see the point in making a mess of the matter.

Draco's eyes flittered from Blaise's flawless visage to the spider webs in the upper right corner of the foyer. There had been a time when some house elf would've been quartered for such lackadaisical housekeeping -– but that time was long past. Draco could feel Blaise's eyes apprasing his damp hair and slightly threadbare clothing. Draco didn't necessarily wash every day, but he cleaned himself thoroughly for Blaise, if only to maintain certain appearances, and if Blaise had any idea of Draco's nostalgic turn he didn't let on.

"What're you staring at?" Draco put as much surliness as possible into his query, but Blaise just snorted good-naturedly.

"Stop being endearing," Blaise tugged on Draco's moss-coloured jumper and nodded towards the back of the manor. "Let's have that walk," he said, turning away.

"I am not being endearing!" Draco huffed, following just behind.

"Pull the other one," Blaise's voice carried and bounced off the marble floors and fixtures as he moved down the foyer to the French doors leading to the garden. "It's got bells on it."

"I'll put bells on you." Draco's frown was wasted on the side of Blaise's head.

"You and what army?" Blaise countered casting open the doors to the garden dramatically. Unlike almost every other door in the manor -- which had come to decry their lack of usage -- these doors opened noiselessly.

"My army of one," Draco said proudly, inhaling the cool Wiltshire morning and taking in the overcast spring sky. It had rained the night before and would probably tonight as well. The rain helped Draco's insomnia somewhat, which in turn had made him more amenable this morning. Some Thursdays Blaise would call and Draco would refuse to leave the house, not because Draco didn't want to leave, but because he couldn't see the point. If he was enjoying a good sulk, he didn't want it interrupted. He was cursed to spend the rest of his days in the manor -– that didn't mean he had to bloody well like it.

"What I am, unicorn droppings?" Blaise gripped the doorframe and pulled himself upwards slightly, the purple jumper lifting to show a white long-sleeved shirt and a sliver of golden skin.

"Don't insult unicorns."

"Touché –- have you been practising all week for that?" Blaise's grin displayed no teeth, and Draco looked away. There was a slight, cooling breeze blowing in from the garden, and Draco could smell the untended flowers.

"You're such a girl," Blaise dropped his arms and stepped out on the veranda. Blaise had his Grandpère's piercing blue eyes, and they were just as unnerving as Hermes Blavatsky's stories about his debauchery-laden past. The charms, androgeny, and strange clothing were fine, but the concept of shagging Muggles gave Draco dysentery -- much in the same way that Blaise's manner of looking at Draco as though he were systematically stripping away twenty-odd years of defences made Draco uneasy.

"I am not," Draco retorted hotly.

"Are too."

Draco stepped through the doors. "I am not a girl."

Blaise laughed and stepped back. "What are you going to do -– make me apologise?"

Draco took another step forward. "Are you daring me?"

Blaise rolled his eyes. "You can't possibly still be this juvenile."

Draco's grin was all teeth. "Try me."


*


If Draco were the sentimental sort he would've taken photographs of the days he spent with Blaise at Malfoy Manor. He would've memorised the feel of Blaise's short hair, bristly against the flat of his palm, and the new nicks in the wall by the front doors where they always had heart-stoppingly physical sex before Blaise left.

If Draco were someone else, he would've thought about covering the furniture with dust cloths to protect it from Doxies and dust and anything else, but Draco was just himself, and that was never going to change. That was always going to be his undoing.

No one had bothered to point out that happy endings only happen until you close the book and then everything falls apart. Draco had to learn that particular lesson on his own.

Just ahead of him, Blaise collapsed in the grass, exhausted from sprinting over the lawn. "No more, no more," he gasped, rolling onto his back and trying to wave Draco away.

"You're out of shape," Draco said, standing over Blaise, the grey sky keeping him from casting a shadow. He'd not even broken a sweat.

"I am not out of shape," Blaise protested. "You can't honestly call riding a bloody broom exercise."

"You weren't riding a bloody broom."

Blaise squinted. "You picked a fine time to become rational," he said discarding the hideous purple jumper and rubbing his chest. "Besides, some of us have better things to do with our time."

Draco scowled because there was no other expression he could summon up.

"Oh, don't give me that," Blaise said, propping himself up on his elbows. "You won't be trapped here forever, then you can leave this dismal place for some place where they put Muggles on spikes, and you can go back to emptying the family coffers with abandon."

Draco's scowl slipped away. "You're trying to get rid of me?"

Blaise just grinned. "I'm always trying to get rid of you; obviously that's why I come to visit you all the time. Don’t be so emotional."

"I am not emotional." Draco kicked out and Blaise grabbed his ankle.

"You are one of the most emotional people I have ever met, save for Grandmère, but no one is perfect."

Draco's scowl came back in full.

"Oh, enough with the sullen business all ready," Blaise protested. "Do you want your present or not?"

Blaise brought Draco gifts when he visited. Tiny things: Quidditch magazines, sweets from Honeydukes, bottles of butterbeer, Draco's favourite tea. These were things Draco couldn’t get for himself due to his confinement, but would never admit to coveting, because that would be admitting to needing something he didn't have. Draco couldn't afford to need anything when he was cut off from the entire world –- but he appreciated the gestures all the same. He didn't actually say as much, but his entire relationship with Blaise was built on the things they didn't say.

Draco didn't say he'd killed Dumbledore, but he didn't say he hadn't, and Blaise was free to assume whatever he chose. Blaise never asked. Instead he kept Draco diverted with meaningless things, like childish taunts and rolling in the grass, and for a brief minute or two, Draco could forget that he was a prisoner in his own home.

Draco shook off Blaise's weak grip on his ankle, and dropped down into the overlong grass. Draco couldn't recall the last time someone had actually performed any sort of maintenance on the gardens. Since his wand had been taken away -– a seriously sore point of contention -– he'd had to rely on himself for everything. He'd come to realise that most of the fixtures in his home didn’t even work without magic, and he'd had to blow up half the greenhouse to get Granger and her toadies to give him some sort of preservative device for his foodstuffs.

They had taken his wand, but they hadn't taken his ability to do learn wandless magic or experiment with various Potions he'd unearthed in the pantry. Quite what he would do with an Amas Potion was beyond him at the moment, but one never knew when something could come in handy.

Blaise was fidgeting with his Grandpère's jumper, and Draco narrowed his eyes as Blaise withdrew something that flashed gold. It looked suspiciously like jewelrey.

"You're not trying to make an honest man out of me, are you?" Draco asked dubiously. "I've told you a thousand times that I'm commitment-phobic, besides, I hate gold; it doesn't go with anything. Couldn't you have got something platinum?"

Blaise's laugh was full-bodied and loud. It wasn't a laugh of indulgence or a snicker of derision – it was the sound of someone being truly amused; Draco had forgot the sound. After a moment, he laughed as well, but he almost choked on his own tongue when Blaise held something up for his inspection.

A tiny gold snitch fluttered on the end of a chain, and Draco narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. "All right, I might reconsider the marriage business," he said after a moment.

Blaise rolled his eyes and dropped the gift into Draco's lap. "Don't do me any favours."

Draco stared at the filigreed chain. The Snitch continued to flutter helplessly, and Draco pushed at it with one slightly ragged fingernail. Without magic more than just Draco's home had fallen into disrepair, and he narrowed his eyes as the golden colour of the Snitch seemed to shimmer and ebb under the pressure of his finger. It was inexplicably odd, and yet, Draco wasn't alarmed in the slightest. "What am I looking at?"

"Just a little charm I made," Blaise said blandly. "You can call him Felix."

Draco looked up sharply. Blaise's self-satisfied smirk spoke volumes.


*


Draco was not allowed to have overnight guests. That was the rule. Any person staying past midnight was subject to punishment by the Ministry. The first experience of having ten Aurors break down the front door at 12:01 Friday morning to find Blaise cleaning his teeth in the kitchen was enough to dissuade them from testing this rule any further. And so, every Thursday night at 11:15, Blaise began collecting his things to leave.

By 11:18 Blaise had accumulated everything he'd come with, and by 11:20, Blaise had Draco pressed up against the wall in the foyer, with his trousers down around his ankles and his shirt rucked up under his armpits.

By 11:50, Blaise had gotten off, Draco had gotten off, and generally they could be found in a naked, sticky heap, collapsed on the marble floor, bitching about its coldness. As far as schedules went, it worked rather well for Draco.

Draco wasn't in the business of complimenting anyone unnecessarily, or even complimenting anyone at all. He only had five visitors every week –- Blaise, Pansy, and the three wizards that came to bring him food and make certain he wasn't starting his own army of Death Eaters -– but every week Draco thought that Blaise might actually be the best thing that had ever happened to him. This had nothing to do with Draco's neediness and everything to do with Blaise's mouth on his and Blaise's hands on his dick.

Blaise's fingers were long and slender, slightly knobby, and they always managed to use just the right amount of pressure exactly where Draco needed it. Whether Blaise was jerking Draco off with erratic patterns designed not to let him come, his thumb rubbing the head of Draco's cock, or Draco was sucking on Blaise's fingers, his tongue swirling around the tips, Blaise was always there, in the moment, with Draco. He never let Draco be anywhere else for that span of time, and Draco had the teeth marks to prove it.

Snogging Blaise was like a marathon of wills, sharp teeth and slick tongues and how long could either one go without breathing, until Draco's knees began to wobble or Blaise stopped crushing Draco against the wall. Blaise's thumbs would press against the hinges of Draco's jaw, forcing him to open his mouth wider, or Blaise's fingers would map Draco's ribs and obliques, constantly making Draco aware of his body and the way it thrummed and twitched, responding to Blaise's ministrations.

Six days a week, Draco could recalling in minute detail the feel of Blaise's tongue licking along his spine, warm lips languorously brushing over each vertebrae as Draco panted against the wall, and Blaise's fingers stretched him open.

Sometimes Draco was the instigator, pushing Blaise against the front door and yanking at Blaise's clothing until dark gold skin was bared to his greedy fingers and mouth. Draco would pinch Blaise's rose-coloured nipples, rubbing them between his thumb and forefinger, and then soothing them with tongue while Blaise writhed against the mahogany door.

Sometimes Blaise pushed Draco against the wall chest-first, shoving Draco's trousers down around his ankles and fucking him until Draco's nails had gauged little bits of paint from the walls and his eyes had crossed from Blaise's weight sandwiching him against the solid surface.

In the back of his mind Draco understood that someone somewhere was watching them. This was not Draco having an existentialist crisis, this was Draco's reality. The wards had some sort of monitoring system, which meant someone somewhere was making certain that Draco was where he was supposed to be, when he was supposed to be there and that he wasn't somewhere else.

And every Thursday night, this was where he could be found, stripped naked, sweat adhering him to the wall, with his cock down Blaise's throat and that pink mouth working him hungrily, reminding him that this was why he was still alive.

Snape had given his life for this opportunity, Draco's parents had died for this location, and Draco had sacrificed and accepted judgment for a crime he hadn't committed, all so that Draco could at least have this time with Blaise.

All this just so Draco could pretend to have a normal life.

Invariably, Blaise left finger-sized bruises on Draco's hips, and mouth-sized bruises on the slope of Draco's shoulders, and the rest of the week, Draco would look at the gaunt, pale figure in the few uncovered mirrors of the house and remember Thursday.

It wasn't necessarily the happiest ending ever, but it worked for him.


--end--

AN:

Usual casting. Wentworth Miller photos provided by zsuness

Dedicated to K, with much love to H.

Comments

[serialkarma.livejournal.com]

Oh, god, that IS one godawful sweater, innit? my eyes!

Also, I forgot to say that one of the other editorial comments i left off was that when you mentioned Blaise's grandmere was the daughter of a voodoo priest, I immediately pictured David Bowie and Iman as Blaise's grandparents. Um. yes.

I could totally buy Bowie as a wizard, you know.

[hackthis.livejournal.com]

Also, I forgot to say that one of the other editorial comments i left off was that when you mentioned Blaise's grandmere was the daughter of a voodoo priest, I immediately pictured David Bowie and Iman as Blaise's grandparents.

Well, I would hope so, seeing as that's who I cast (http://pics.livejournal.com/hackthis/gallery/00007twp). ;)

[serialkarma.livejournal.com]

*dies*

You know I never pay attention to your casting, right? That's priceless.

[hackthis.livejournal.com]

I know you don't pay attention, but at least I know that the visualization worked.

[serialkarma.livejournal.com]

BRAIN

*nods seriously*