To Touch the Sun

Someone once said that man is inherently good, but I think he was a Muggle, so I never gave the sentiment a second thought.

Good. Now that's a subjective word. What's good for one person may be bad for another. Take my father, for example. His idea of good is obedience to a deranged half-blood's command to torture, maim, and then kill ten year old children. Muggles, of course. Somehow I don't think "good" is typically the word most people would assign to that situation. But, as I said before, it's all subjective. Funny, though, because I suppose it really shouldn't be.

I think "good" should be an absolute, like truth, although I've never had decent examples of that, either. Helping an old woman who's dropped her shopping bags in the street: that should be good. Forgiving someone who has maligned you: that should be good, also. Hexing a father of four who is a long time enemy into the mental ward at St. Mungo's: that should not be good. Definitely not good.

I didn't always used to believe that, though. I wasn't raised with what most would call "traditional" morals. I wasn't taught that sharing is expected, nor that Little Jimmy is just as important as I am. Au contraire. I was taught that you should take all that you can, because, if you don't, someone else will. I was also taught that Little Jimmy is inferior to me, merely an imbecilic waste of time and space, a bug to be squashed.

Oh, yes, I was taught all this and more. You wouldn't believe the things I've been taught. If I told you even a portion of it you would run for the nearest waste bin and spill your stomach's contents into it. No, really. But what would have you running even faster is that fact that I believed it. I believed it all.

But let me say something in my own defence. I hadn't been taught in the same manner as other children. Other children were taught the difference between good and bad while their fathers exemplified proper morals. Other children were bounced on their fathers' knees while being told, "I love you." Other children were given a chance.

Oh, but don't pity me. Please. It's degrading. I'm just saying it like it is. I may not have been given a chance, but in all of life's rubbish that I've endured I always had a choice. No one, not even my father or his disgusting little master, could take that away from me. I wouldn't let them. Everything I have done has always been my choice. It was the only part of life, in fact, the only part of my existence, that I could control.

Now, granted, my actions didn't always reflect this lauding of having a choice. I usually went along with my father's ideals because, hey, it was easier. No pain, no pain. Good motto for a young man being threatened with the Cruciatus Curse for defiant disobedience. In short, I allowed my cowardice to rule my choices.

Oh, I'll admit it. I'm a coward. Yes, indeed, a one hundred percent, yellow-bellied, bend-over-and-take-it-up-the-backside coward. Hmm, doesn't sound very flattering when I put it that way, does it. Oh well. Fact remains.

What? Don't believe me? Trust me. I'm no self-assured, devil-may-care, let-me-dish-you-out-a-can-of-whoop-A-with-a-little-cream-and-a-cherry-on-top-for-effect-for-crossing-my-path-because-I'm-a-bad-A-with-the-means-to-do-anything-about-it kind of guy. No, I don't take that much stock in myself. If I did, why would I have hung around with two bodyguard sized blokes for seven years and let them fight my battles for me? I may have a big bad daddy with lots of money and connections to those who could open up a can of whoop-A, but as for myself, I'm just a bully. I call people names and then let my big friends protect me. I flaunt my wealth and the newest toys that wealth has bought me. And I run like an injured dog with my tail between my legs when someone who actually is self-assured and brave gives me what-for. Yeah, that's big bad me, alright.

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if I had stopped taking the easy road and started making my own choices based on right rather than easy earlier. I had the chance, you know. "Weasley? I've heard some degrading things about you and your family from some very biased and unreliable sources, but what do they know? I'd like to find out for myself," could have come out just as easily as, "Some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort."

I wonder. Would I be standing here now, staring down the wrong end of a smoking wand for refusing to torture Muggles, if I had forged my own path those many years ago? Ah, yes. The unattainable "what if." I don't know why I'm even contemplating it, really. As if wondering about the past could have any bearing on my present or my rapidly approaching, yet probably short-lived, future. No, wondering won't change anything, nor will remembering, but somehow I can't manage to stop doing either.

I remember one day in mid-May, just before graduation, I was on my way to the Great Hall for dinner. I had a lot on my mind, as per usual. Roast chicken or meatloaf? Transfiguration essay or Quidditch practice? Direct a rude comment towards Potter or direct a rude comment towards Weasley? Yes, always things of utmost importance on my mind. So, needless to say, I was a bit distracted when I slammed into a towering mass of walking books that said "oof" when they tumbled to the ground. So distracted, in fact, that I immediately knelt down to pick up and restack the mobile library. Only when I heard a female voice, a very familiar and none too pleasant female voice, utter my surname in what I could only interpret as surprise did I actually become aware of the situation at hand: I was kneeling down, subservient in nature, gathering up two oversized volumes of blathering reading material and handing them over to...

"Granger," I said in an unfortunate mixture of surprise and distaste. Mistake number two: never mix two differing emotions at the same time. The impact is greatly diminished. Oh, and mistake number one? Never be so distracted that you actually begin doing something decent for a person you can't stand. Which leads me back to Granger.

After my realization of just what it was I was doing, I none too gently shoved the books at her. She looked at me with those surprised filled eyes and whispered, "Thank you."

Thank you. As if I had purposefully seen it was her and went out of my way to pick up her books for her. Right. And my father doesn't dream of power and glory. But that's neither here nor there.

"Thank you for not noticing it was you who came barreling into me?" I asked nastily. "Don't flatter yourself. I was just distracted and didn't realize it was you."

I turned to walk away then. And I would have made it successfully out of her presence, too, if it hadn't been for something particularly odd.

"Have you ever touched the sun, Malfoy?" she asked abruptly.

I stopped rather confusedly at that. "What?" I barked feeling rather annoyed at being taken so off guard with her oddity.

"I said, 'Have you ever touched the sun?'" she repeated.

I looked at her like she was a particularly sticky bit of gum on my shoe. "What do you think?" I returned spitefully.

"Just answer the question, Malfoy," she challenged.

After shifting my weight to the right and placing my arms across my chest I answered haughtily, "No."

She looked at me as though contemplating whether to continue or not, and then decided to. "Is it hot or cold?"

The conversation was getting stranger by the minute. "The sun? Um, hot," I replied condescendingly.

"How do you know?" she countered.

"Because I get sunburned in the summer?" It was supposed to be a statement but came out like a question. I blame it on Granger's oddness.

"You're like the sun," she said simply.

What was that supposed to mean? "Are you saying I'm hot?" I asked. I genuinely wanted to know.

"Hardly," was her response. "What I mean is, you've never touched the sun, but you know it's hot because you can feel its warmth. I've never seen anything but the spoiled, nasty Draco Malfoy, but I know there must be good in you because I've felt moments of it." And with that she left.

All that because I accidentally picked up her books?

And that brings me back to what originally started all my musings: good.

What is good? Helping people? Forgiving them? Refusing to hurt them at the risk of being hurt?

Oh, great. What in the name of Merlin am I doing? I am openly defying those who seek to do evil upon the land and upon me unless I pull it together and just do what they want me to do.

But, somehow, I just can't do it. Like I said, I'm a coward. How can I actually pull my wand on a defenceless kid my own age with blond hair just like mine and watch him writhe around on the ground because old slit-nosed red eyes tells me to? My stomach churns just at the thought. No, I can't do it. I'd rather endure it than inflict it.

Did I just say that? Hey, maybe I'm not as morally sterile as I thought. Too bad that won't save me in the end.

But you know what? I don't care. Can you believe it? I will very surely be tortured to within an inch of my life; my mind and my body will undoubtedly be ripped apart with the force of a million white hot pokers; my spirit will be broken, maimed, and rendered extinct; yet I don't care.

Even now, standing in front of Voldemort himself (I don't even flinch at the thought of his name), his hand gripping his wand in simmering anger, I surprise myself. I am not begging for my life, not prostrating myself before him pleading for another chance and offering up my first-born into his service, which is undoubtedly how I got here in the first place. I don't avert my eyes from the slits bleeding deathly red that stare me down. The panic doesn't rise inside me. Absurdly, I feel none of these things.

Instead, I feel calm, and not just a resignation to my impending fate. I feel a calmness borne of, dare I say it, peace. At least I think it's peace. I'm not terribly familiar with what it's like to feel peace, but I assume that's what this is. I will most assuredly be physically and mentally tormented for my blatant defiance and disrespect, but something tells me I'm going to be just fine. Funny, because nothing about Imperio, Crucio, or Avada Kedavra is fine. Not in the slightest. Perhaps my soul is telling me that although my body is set for certain destruction, it is not. Could my so called death bed confession have actually spared my blackened soul from eternal damnation? My mind is too desensitized, too tarnished to actually believe any such nonsense; but, still, I hope.

Hmm. Perhaps Granger was right. Perhaps there is some good in me after all. Who would have thought? Me--an intolerable bully, a lazy git, a supposed Death Eater in training--good? The thought is laughable. In fact, I do.

I laugh as I realize that someone, the insufferable know-it-all of the Golden Trio, no less, managed to see through my carefully constructed façade into where not even I could see. What do you know? I'm a good guy after all. Yes, that is truly worthy of my laughter.

Someone else, however, isn't nearly as amused.

I look up at Voldemort (his name is just getting easier and easier to say). If it's possible, his eyes are becoming more red by the second. I swear that at any moment his head will spin and smoke will come out of his ears. That image makes me laugh even harder. And why shouldn't I? My swift and impending doom is certain. Why not enjoy the last bit of humour I will ever know in the flesh?

So here I stand on the eve of my destruction, no, the eve of my redemption, laughing madly at the most feared, most dangerous wizard ever to have darkened the earth. They must think I've lost my mind. Actually, I've never been thinking so clearly before in my life.

I continue to laugh as the thing before me raises his wand and points it at me. I'm not afraid, and the feeling is exhilarating. I spread my arms out wide and tilt my head up, my eyes closing as I savour the moment. I used to take this stance when catching snowflakes on my tongue as a child, back when I was untainted and life was pure, and somehow it feels appropriate for now.

Suddenly I open my eyes and look at the slowly darkening sky above me. It's red and orange and purple and pink, and it's absolutely breath taking. I lower my eyes to the horizon and see the last bit of the sun duck behind a mountain in the distance. The sun. What a glorious creation. It sheds light on the deepest darkness and brings warmth to the coldest soul.

I close my eyes again and tilt my head back up to the sky just as a flash of brightness light up my eyelids. I smile, for this is not an ending, but a beginning. I smile because I've finally made my own self-discovery. I know who I am and what I am. And as I picture the beauty of the twilight just beyond my closed eyes I realize that now I know what it's like to touch the sun.