Rating:
PG-13
House:
Astronomy Tower
Characters:
Draco Malfoy Harry Potter
Genres:
Slash Angst
Era:
Multiple Eras
Stats:
Published: 06/26/2002
Updated: 06/26/2002
Words: 1,951
Chapters: 1
Hits: 6,073

After The Fact

Abaddon

Story Summary:
Sometimes, you have to ask forgiveness, even when you know you don't deserve it. A future-fic. Harry/Draco.

Posted:
06/26/2002
Hits:
6,073
Author's Note:
Another AU 'what if' type of thing. Angst and pretty much my first attempt to consider things like sexuality discourses within HP.

After The Fact.

A HP slash!fic by Abaddon.
-----------------------------------------------------

The letter was handed to him by his lawyer. It was quite a plain envelope - simple, white, with no watermark or obvious signifier of its make. There was no stamp, of course, as the letter had neverbeen posted.

He had put it on his desk almost casually, and done his best to ignore it whilst he caught up with business and personal correspondence. But it had lain there, always on the edge of his consciousness, its mere existence burning itself deep into his awareness, causing a hundred, a thousand different questions to rise up like banshees of the mind, haunting him.

And so, after two days of never quite banishing it from his mind but never allowing himself to fully acknowledge it, he finally picked it up. He would have recognised the hand on the front, his name made out in that darting, frenetic scrawl, even if he hadn't know who had written it, and how it had come into his possession.

He grabbed the letter opener from the desk - silver with a filigree handle, the family crest marked out in precise detail - and sliced the envelope open. He held the letter between his fingers as the envelope fell to the floor underfoot, now forgotten.

The paper was just as mundane, and for all he knew, it could be been bought from the local Muggle supermarket. Noticing that his hands shook slightly, he unfolded the paper, and quickly glanced across the initial formalities. It was dated two years ago, and didn't even mention his name. A bitter smile flickered across the man's face.

He could have at least mentioned my name. But, he supposed, the first line more than made up for it.


I'm sorry.

Draco snorted. Did he think you could wipe away the past thirty years with a few words? It was so typical of him, him and his bloody earnest Gryffindor morality. Except there was nothing left to say.

I know you're probably snorting right now. Ready to call me hypocrite, or fool, or worse. I probably deserve it too - except you know, it's not nice to speak ill of the dead.


The man sank against the chair, smiling softly as his eyes continued to scan the words, almost too caught up in memories to read what was actually being said.

And this letter will probably open up a lot of old wounds, and might even cause you pain. That wasn't my intent, but then, it seems that despite my best attempts, I've done nothing but cause you pain. And I'm sorry for that, as well. But of all people, you deserve some kind of last words. An explanation, if you will; the things I could never say when I was alive.

"Oh, Harry," Draco breathed, the temptation to put the letter down, rip it to shreds, burn it, anything rather than acknowledge its truth almost overwhelming. But with typical resolve, he kept reading. After all, did he not deserve the truth?

Firstly, I want you to know I never forgot that night we shared before Graduation. It was perhaps the most idiotic thing to do - we were still both rivals, and more than a little tipsy, and what were you thinking anyway, daring me to have sex with you? And what was I thinking, in accepting?

Draco laughed. He could almost hear Harry's rueful tone in the words: a mixture of mortified embarrassment and joyful humour.

I suppose I wanted to prove something. I dunno. I mean, I'd noticed you before - noticed in the sense of thinking you were good-looking, but I'd never acted on it. How could I? Then you gave me an excuse, and suddenly I was confronted with the reality of having sex with Draco Malfoy. Not that we actually 'had sex'. For some reason my mind refuses to brand what we did as 'sex', although you wouldn't have thought it had any particular significance at first.

If I remember, we roamed the corridors for an hour, ducking around other similarly drunken seventh years (it was the night before Graduation, and the War was over, and we all wanted to live a little, I guess.) It was so difficult to find a deserted classroom, remember? We tried Charms - and there was Dean standing back against the desk, Seamus straddling him, hands all over each other and doing some serious snogging. You just raised an eyebrow, looked at me, and shut the door: they never had a clue. Of course, we both then cracked up. I can still picture the way you looked in the torchlight. And then, of course, you kissed me.


A tremor ran through Draco’s body, but he suppressed it, and clutched his fingers into a fist, so that the trembling wouldn't show itself.

After that, finding a room became even more... needful. Eventually we did, tumbling in, your hand on the door, the other in my hair, I was too busy being kissed and attempting to kiss back to notice, really. The only thing I could see was you. You charmed the door behind us so that no one could get in, and then... the only thing I could hear was you. Or touch, or feel, or smell, or anything. You were my entire world for that one night.

I guess the remnants of alcohol in our bloodstream helped as well: overcame our natural inhibitions, allowed some truths to be shared that otherwise never would have been mentioned. I always respected you, even if I hadn't liked you, Draco. And you were... a challenge, I guess. No one else could ever get my blood on fire the way you could. Obviously, I was amazed to hear you felt the same way. I mean, I presumed that you might lead me on and turn me down flat, and there was always the suspicion that following that night, you might tell all of Hogwarts that I was a shockingly bad lay. But to hear the tenderness in your voice, and the way you treated me, I knew you weren't the person I had thought you might have been. It seemed more like you were the Draco Malfoy I'd always dreamt about, that night.

You made me feel as if we had all the time in the world: even for a blushing virgin like myself to get over my acute embarrassment. Lying on the bundle of robes in some disused classroom was certainly not my idea of romance, but with you there, it didn't matter. Nothing mattered except you and I, and our lovemaking. That's the
only word I can use to describe it. It seems almost sacred, the way we touched one another, the way we were with one another. Caring and gentle and you knew everything I wanted even before I did, it seemed. You possessed me and brought me to the quickening and loved me, and I'd never realised how much I needed that. From you, Draco. If I was meant to be with anyone, it was with you.


Draco saw a small drop of moisture hit the page in his hand. He blinked, wondering where it came from. Then he realised he was crying.

Then the morning after came, with all its doubts and fears. You were, of course, the perfect gentleman, and indeed, the perfect lover and boyfriend, and I'd like to believe that perhaps for just that moment, you were both to me. I, as you know, dressed hurriedly, and ran off to breakfast. We didn't get to see each other much during the graduation ceremony, and then with the bother of moving into my new place, and trying to find a job and the like, I didn't exactly have time to keep contact with a lot of people. Then when you finally tracked me down, I was a bit of a bastard, I'm sorry. I didn't respond to your letters or your messages or anything. Then when you came to the house, I told you to go away.

I'll never forget the look on your face: the hurt and the betrayal you must have felt, before it was pushed beneath the façade. The first person you'd ever shown your humanity to, and he just kicked you in the teeth, as it were.

I'm sorry, Draco. But now I'll attempt to make some vague form of recompense, by explaining why, although it's far too late now (obviously) to change anything.

From the beginning of my introduction to the wizarding world, I knew I was an icon. The Boy Who Lived. People looked up to me, although I never wanted them to. It also became very clear in that mess with Rita Skeeter that my personal life was also the focus of much attention. As a teenager, I was pretty asexual. I mean, there had been a few crushes on girls that I did nothing about, and then there was you. It was very clear to me the morning after that I was indeed capable of having wonderful sex - and emotional fulfilment - from being with a man: that man being you. I know that if we started going out, I would become "The Boy Who Lived An Alternative Lifestyle": a poster-child as it were for queer witches and wizards everywhere, let alone the queer community in general.

What if we didn't work out? If I ever dated a woman, after you, it would invalidate what we had done, and been. People would consider you my 'experiment' with homosexuality, or at worst, my mistake. How could I reduce you to that, a mere symbol of my sexuality? I didn't know what I wanted, what I felt, apart from the fact I wanted you - and I decided I couldn't be with you. I didn't want to be yet another symbol, another cause.

I was tired of it.

So I ran, rather cowardly. I pushed you away, so neither of us got to be symbols. I thought that was far better; I could live with that, and I have. Of course, you might have noticed from the wizarding tabloids that my personal life is still the subject of much scrutiny. After all, I've never had a girlfriend for very long, and therefore the question often gets asked about my sexuality. Truth betold, in the past thirty years, I've only ever found one person interesting, either emotionally or sexually.

You, Draco. When it's late and I've had far too many Scotches, than the memory of that night rushes to my head, and fills me with remembrance of a time when I knew I was loved, and wanted, and I loved and wanted in return. My imagination haunts me with 'what ifs’; where I had the courage to be with you, to share my life with you for however long you were willing.

Like I said, I'm sorry. I don't deserve you, and these words are purely for my selfish benefit - after all, if you're reading this, I must be dead. Which means I'm probably torturing you for no good reason.

I guess I felt guilty. I wanted to make sure that you knew it had nothing to do with you. You were the most important person in my life.

I love you, Draco.

Harry.

Draco folded up the letter, placed it back in the envelope, and tossed it into the fire in his study. He forced himself to look at it as it burnt away to cinders, and then turned back to his desk, his entire body stiff with self-control. There was work to be done.  And he had no time for dreams.