Sundays

Sundays

There once was a boy. That's how the story started. And they all lived happily ever after. That's how it should have ended. That's how everyone wanted it to end. Fairy Tales can be treacherously deceiving in that manner. There are too many loose ends in war for happy endings. A muggle writer once said, "There are no happy endings, because nothing ever ends." This is a fact that I am made painfully aware of every Sunday. Every Sunday for the last twenty-two months.

Sunday is God's day. A day of rest. For me, it's a day of penance. My steps are slow as I climb the stairs to the closed ward of St. Mungo's hospital. The nurses and healers all nod, they expect me and let me continue on my way without questions. I know they want to ask, but are content with the understanding that I'll be here again, next Sunday. The hall is long. It's white and sterile. The few windows are barred and covered with a series of unbreakable charms. The wards are thick here. There is pale morning light dripping through the frosted panes, giving my walk an edge of surrealism. Like the hall is extending and his door is never nearing. Perhaps it's just my mind hoping I'll never reach the end of the hall, hoping I'll give up and turn away and save myself from being subjected once again to the guilt. The sound of my feet hitting the tile is heavy and echoes through the empty corridor. I'm his only visitor. I'm always his only visitor.

The trick of the light and the subconscious protection of my mind aren't enough to keep me from reaching his door before long. I tap the door with my well worn wand and whisper the password. A handle appears out of the twisted stainless steel that dances along the middle of the door. I hold my breath as I push through the entrance.

Today is one of his more lucid days. Lucid, perhaps is a relative word. He's standing by the window and appears to be watching the play of light and color on the semi-opaque glass. Some days he's just locked away in the recesses of his mind and doesn't even hear me come in. The slight movement in his jaw and flicker of his eyes tells me he knows I'm here. We don't exchange greetings. We hardly ever do.

There's a light cream chair in the far corner that I always sit in. It's a comfortable tall backed armchair with dark wooden legs. I'm probably the only one who's sat in it. He prefers the floor or the bed. The hue is just different enough from the rest of the room that I feel as though I were sitting somewhere else. An office or maybe a waiting room. I cross my arms and slide a foot around the front left leg. It is a waiting room.

I watch him etch one slender pale finger down the little area of glass he can reach. It's like this every week, as I take in his appearance. He's the picture of innocence, his face is soft and the light even rounds out his sharp jaw line and pointed nose. I'm astounded by the lack of color in him and the surrounding room. Or maybe it's not the absence like I'm used to thinking, but really the over abundance of emotion in him that I've never seen before that combines like light and radiates white like an aura that separates us.

There is tile from the floor to midway along the wall. It's white, of course, with white grout. It's glazed and reflects the room like a wintered mirror. Above the tile the wall is papered with a heavy Victorian print. It's matte white with a lightly embossed eggshell floral pattern dancing up in evenly spaced lines twelve inches apart. The ceiling is plain and not worth looking at. He spends hours at a time staring at it's emptiness. There is a single window along the length of the room, opposite the door. It's tall and wide, letting in a vast amount of that surreal morning light. The bars extend three inches from the frame and are covered with a thin metal grate made of squares only a few inches wide. It's enough to put two fingers through and graze the glass with your fingernails, but not enough for a fist to smash through. Breaking the window that bends and distorts the reality it shields. The metal is painted white.

The chair I sit in is opposite the single bed with it's white linen and cream covers that extends from the wall left of the door. The bed is centered and there are several feet of either side of empty space. There is a single dresser on the wall next to me, it's painted white as well. There's nothing on its surface. I don't even know if there's anything in the drawers, perhaps sets of the pale hospital dressing robes. They are stark and plain, so contrary to his old fashion sense. They are made of a thin material and are shorter that usual, ending at the knees. There are thin slits up the sides to the waist. Under the robes the patients wear long pants made of matching material and soft white undershirts. I've seen several go barefoot, but he prefers the little cloth slippers that cover his toes and leave his heals exposed.

I think what bothers me is that it looks like he's developed some sort of sick camouflage, like a rabbit in winter. Only his eyes aren't bright enough to differentiate him from the snow background. He used to stand out like a pearl on black velvet in the school uniforms. Now, I can hardly tell where the robe ends and his skin begins. He's thin. He was always thin, but now it's a sign of muscular deterioration instead of the mark of a well trained sleek seeker. He seeks nothing now. I seek too much.

His hair dangles lightly by his ears and over his eyes. It's short in the back and gains in length as it reaches the front of his head. I think it makes him appear kinder than how he used to wear it, slicked back and thick with vanity. But the color hasn't changed. It's as white as it's always been, as white as the walls, the robes and his skin. His eyes are the only things that glint with life anymore. They are slate blue now, as they watch the scenes that he can't really see through the window. But I've seen them range from a dark midnight blue to a lucid gray. Lucid again, is a relative word.

"Draco?" The name is still funny on my lips. He's never been Draco to me, but now, now he can no longer be Malfoy. Ever.

I wish I knew where his thoughts were.

***

I can hear his footsteps as he approaches. They could only be his footsteps. The healer's steps are soft and non-intrusive. His are the opposite. With every drop of his heal, my safe little white box is exposed.

He whispers the password so I don't hear it. So I can't use it to leave. Where would I go? There is a red light shining through the window. I wonder what it is. It's not a fire because it doesn't flicker. It stays constant. Then moments after it appears, it is replaced with a green light and somewhere I remember that it always turns to green and cycles through its colors many times a day. I no longer care about its explanation. He's sitting now. Like he always does. A foreigner in a strange land. Why does he come here? And where did the green light go? Now there is only yellow and now that's gone too. Maybe he chased it away. Maybe it escaped into his eyes. No, they are too dark now. Not like I remember. Now they reflect pity instead of bright life joy anger intensity--

"Draco?"

--hate. I hate it when he uses my given name. I never gave him permission to use it. I hate how he carelessly comes and goes. He mocks me with his casual presence, because I have no exit. My only escape is into the past... I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same, they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families...You'll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort, I can help you there.

Unknowingly I extend my hand. My fingers hit the glass and I'm brought crashing into the present. It's as cold as the empty air of rejection. Why is it that the only memories I can delve into when he's here are about him? Why can't I escape into childhood when Harry Potter was just a name and not a person standing as a constant challenge with eyes that demand attention? Always waiting for answers I can't give him.

"Go away." Part of me swells with pride that my voice is every bit as malicious as it's always been.

Just go away and don't come back. I wouldn't let you in if I could stop you. I'll never let you in here. I tap my head, forgetting that I wasn't speaking out loud. He pretends he doesn't notice the gesture, pitying my vulnerable mental state. Stop pitying me. I was fine until you walked in and sat with all your glory. Stop thinking about me. I can see the wheels turning behind his dark jade eyes. Jaded. He winces when I tell him to leave. Jaded. Rejected. Ironic the only scene I can replay in my head is the one where he turns away from my hand over and over and over like a useless muggle record. I think I can tell who the wrong sort are for myself thanks and now you come seeking something and calling me by my given name as if I ever gave it to you.

My fingers and joints feel so stiff and I stretch them on the white metal grate that protects the glass from my insanity. Like I'm a disease, as if I could get within reach of the outside world through a super cooled liquid laced with magic. Red means stop, and I freeze. The lights dance on the window again and I wish I see their source, green means go so I turn away from the window. He's still there in that chair. His chair. It's like it just sits there waiting for him to fill it. I hate seeing its empty longing, but the nurses always right it when I throw it to the ground. The ground looks so solid soft with its quiet reflection, like snow on a walkway. I don't remember sitting down on it, but it feels like home now that I'm here. On the ground, something solid, because even the walls shift when they want. Right now, they are sliding backward to an infinite distance and all there is, is the ground I'm sitting on but its turned black and I remember this is what night looks like.

The night. That night. I was looking for him. Today I can never seem to lose him. He was so hard to find that night so hard to search out. But like always we managed to turn up in the same place at the wrong time. He didn't see me. He didn't know I was there. The last line of defense. He saw Lucius, but he never saw me until it was too late and I had him in my sights. I had him on his knees. And he looks at me and he looks at me. I'll die Draco I'll die Draco I'll die, DRACO you'll die Draco. Die like the weakling child you are. Malfoy is more than a name, it's a linage in strength and honor. There you are on the ground crying, get up I said GET UP can't you be a man for once in your life and take a punishment without blubbering like a little girl you pathetic wretch and I hate you. I hate you I hate you I hate you, "I HATE YOU--"

***

He's staring at the ground for several minutes before he sits. He holds onto it as if he's about to fall off the world. His eyes are so bewildered. And then he's standing again, walking and acting out motions in his mind. His hand is extended like he's holding a wand and I know what he's pointing at in his mind. Waves of confusion flow across his face and he turns suddenly crashing the palms of his hands into his forehead.

"--I HATE YOU, I HATE YOU!"

He is yelling at the air and I don't know if it's directed at me anymore. He issues a noise that rocks me to my soul because I've heard it before. A scream of relentless suffering and he's on the ground again. His hands fumble along the floor tile. His eyes are glazed over in tears. Everything is shaking, even his voice.

"What have I done? What have I done? What have I done? What have I, father? Father? Oh God, oh God... wake up... wake up...!" He's screaming again.

Two healers burst through the door and grab his forearms and haul him to his feet. Under their clenched knuckles I can see the rows of thin scars along the underside. Some of them I have watched him make. It is so unsettling to watch him extend his arm against the wall and with a perfectly rigid face gouge into his own skin with nails that the healers keep cutting. As with any wizard, if they want them to grow they will. And his are always sharp. It's a red line drawn in contrast with the white of the room, the white of his skin. I wonder if that's why he does it. I would too if I were constantly in this monotone universe.

They are struggling to restrain him. He kicks and fights, but he's too weak now to do much damage. They lower him to the bed and one holds him down while the other secures the leather straps. They look like plain leather belts, taut against his biceps and wrists, but I know they were created with spells; somewhere they leak a black energy. The last ones are in place on his ankles and the healers step back from the bed. He's arching his back and it looks like he's in pain, screaming and trashing against bonds that won't be broken. The tall heavy set healer holds his head and neck, forcing down a potion into his mouth. Draco looks at me with eyes that say betrayal before his body falls limp.

"Mr. Potter, I think it's best if you go now. He won't wake up for several hours."

I glance back just once to the boy I never called friend to see if his rapid breathing has steadied. His face that was contorted moments before has returned to the soft unguarded innocence of a child in sleep. I don't say anything to the healers as I turn and walk away.

***

The walk through muggle London is dreary today. The sky is gray and I flash back to Draco's betrayed eyes. The streets are full of puddles and there is a chill in the air that seeps into everything. April is a deeply confused month. There are few people on the streets. Everyone is home with their families or raising their voices in hymn at sporadically placed churches. There are no churches where I walk. I shove my hands into the pockets of my light coat and look down to watch my feet. I have no want of prayer.

Twenty-two months since the end. The end to win all or lose all, it was thought. For me it has been a combination of both. There were too many who died for it to feel like a victory, yet the reign of terror caused by Lord Voldemort and his followers was stopped. The wizarding world was free. Free to celebrate and then to mourn. So many families had been ruined, but at least they could look forward to better times now. I should have been right there with them, toasting a glass to downfall of a tyrant. Instead of joy, instead of triumph I just feel empty. I'm not the child I once was. The things I've seen. The things I've done...

I gave everything to the war with no thought to a life after. I didn't expect to live, not when so many hadn't. I did what was fated for my life and it should have been over, now I'm living with a lack of destiny. I feel like I cheated death. Instead of moving on I'm stuck in this period of repetitiveness where I live from Sunday to Sunday when I am forced to recall the moment I should have ceased. It's like that Ray Bradbury story where the man who was death refuses to reap the lives of his children and they are caught in a perpetual state of dying.

I'm dying on a weekly basis.

There's not a lot that's clear about the night of the final battle. It was a frenzied onslaught of wizards and creatures, roving dementors and rampaging giants. The air was thick with magic residue, it felt electric. Everywhere smelt like burning hair. There were so many spells, curses and hexes streaming overhead and on all sides. How I got from point A to point B or ended up where I did I don't remember. There is a series of disjointed gruesome images, flashes really, that pop into my vision just before I fall asleep. That's the closest thing I have to recollection of the first hours of the fight.

There is one scene, however, that I can recall perfectly. Crystal clear and pristine. I was running, running toward something that looked like it was letting off black light, if that's possible. Maybe it was really a hole that was sucking in light from the air. Then Lucius Malfoy was ahead of me, blocking my path. He looked haggard, covered in blood and sweat. His Death Eater robes were half torn from his body, yet he stood tall and powerful. We have a history of final battles, him and I, always he is so close to killing me and always I escape. It would have been foolish to think he hadn't noticed. So when he saw me he couldn't refuse the chance to try to amend his past failings. I counted on my luck. I raised my wand to send him to Hell and from somewhere on my left a jet of light ripped through my hand. My wand took an eternity to hit the ground.

It bounced once.

In the split second it took for me to respond the caster sent me into a world of pain. The Cruciatus Curse. I know its effects, I've been on both sides of the wand. When it was lifted I was already on the ground and Draco Malfoy was standing over me and between his father and I. His wand pointed down at my forehead. At my scar. There was an unbelievable amount of hatred in his eyes. All I could do was look up at him. We were locked in a green gray stare.

Somewhere Lucius said, "Finish him, my son."

All I could think was that I was going to die. I was going to die and with me dies the world. We are defeated. An unreadable emotion passed over Draco's face and he raised his wand, ready to strike out a spell with enormous force and enormous consequence. It happened so fast that my mind was sent reeling. Lucius was on the ground, stunned and Draco turned his head in anger.

"Go."

I scuttled backward on my elbows and reached for my wand. The words stammered from my mouth, "W-what?"

"Go. I said go. NOW."

And I did.

I was running for that hole in the night because I knew that was where Voldemort was. From the corner of my eye I felt the flash of green.

Then there was that scream that Draco repeated today. The unending self-loathing cry. I couldn't turn around. I couldn't stop running.

That's when the chronology of the story ceases to flow continually. The final duel with Voldemort transcends time and space. There was blood and there was pain. We fought for hours, for hundreds of years, for only seconds. I was home, I was millions of miles away, I was nowhere. Trees around us grew tall and withered. They shrank back and hid in their seeds. I changed thousands of times, a thousand different Harrys with a thousand different pasts. We fought wandless, flinging emotions rich with occult. His were all anger, hate and power. Mine were all things. Sorrow, vengeance, joy, love. Everything I am, was and will be surged.

Countless people have asked countless times what happened and how it felt to destroy the Dark Lord. The thing responsible for bringing the wizarding world to its knees. I tell them there haven't been words invented yet that do the horror justice.

And I relive it, every Sunday. Every Sunday for the last twenty-two months as I walk home from St. Mungo's Hospital. The steps seem harder and harder to climb and the doorway harder to pass through with the passing of each week. Sometimes I stand on the threshold of Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place for hours. The key just doesn't seem to fit the lock anymore.

*****

I resent this change in our Sunday routine. She is an intrusion in our awkward relationship. I feel out of place on this smooth, chartreuse couch. I miss the walled in feeling of the cream arms, there's too much space on my sides. The legs are hardly anything, little chunks of light color. I can't hide my feet behind them. I feel so exposed.

The room we're in is large and airy. It's some sort of common room, it's filled with soft furniture and lost souls. At least we are free from the enclosure of white that is his room. This one has soft blues and greens. It's a swirl of carefully placed muted sage and cerulean. Colors that comfort and sooth the savage feelings of the pale patients that glide along the lines of the floors. They circle us like the negatives of dementors. Instead of causing you despair, they leak their own.

There is a table between us. It is low to the ground and made of the same light wood. The legs curve in and end in clawed feet, clutching a wooden ball between its dragon toes. The tabletop has a faded mosaic on it made of tiny little tiles that make me think a child created it. It would take tiny fingers to lay such a delicate pattern of ceramic shards. There are series of dark blue pieces lined next to teal and aqua. They crush next to cobalt bits and mix into navy. The sides flood in with olive and viridian. The shades range from midnight to periwinkle, from moss to mint. There are some transparent pebbles scattered into the mix and I'm sure they are sea glass, rounded smooth from years of tumbling in the ocean mirth. I can't see the overall picture; I'm too caught up in the details.

My lack of sight extends to him. I can only pick out the individual shades of white and silver in his hair as it falls over his brow, instead of a complete impression of his mood. He's a blend of angles and edges, of milk and ivory. His ashen eyes stare somewhere past my head and I don't know if he has seen me yet. I study the frangible blonde lashes that frame his half shut lids. They are long and fine, if you weren't looking you would never see them. My eyes search out the places where the light reflects on his hair and skin and it's almost blinding. It's like trying to read a book under the noon sun. You know there are words and meaning but the white drowns them out and you can't help it when your eyes water. His body is rigid, he's sitting like he's in a full body bind. The hospital robes fall delicately over his skin and onto the matching light green couch. We mirror one another on these fixtures like strangers. Opposite sides of a coin, he is all fair and I am lost in shadow.

I realize I am just as tense and the coffee's gone cold in my hand and I can't tear my gaze from his sad expression.

Then she speaks.

I know she's addressing me. Telling me she's glad I could join them. I am resentful again, angry that my Sunday alone with my rival and my memories, my death that never came, has been dragged into this open, inquiring room. I know he spends a few hours every Tuesday and Saturday with her, but now she's extended herself into a day that's not hers. I hate her for it. She's tall and lean and has the same aristocratic beauty I associate with the massacre of the Parkinson girl. Pansy was pretty in a very aesthetic way, like a straight edged vase, there are no visible flaws but all you can think is why there are no flowers in it. The last time I saw her she was rotting in a field, her outside finally matching the wretchedness of her soul. I can't help but transfer some of my feelings for the Death Eater onto this woman who sits with her legs crossed, determinedly, between us.

Her name is Christine Perpolio and she is a mediwitch. She specializes in mental illness caused by unforgivable curses. I've no doubts that she treats the Longbottoms as well as the many others who filled St. Mungo's in the wake of the Dark Lord's second reign. Losing their minds to the overwhelming amount of torture under the Cruciatus Curse. He, however, is a special case (and doesn't she know it) because his madness is the result of being the caster. Unleashing a spell that should have come from my mouth. She eyes him with intrigue, like a specimen. Ravenclaw is written all over her face, I'm sure Hermione would love her. Her brow is set in lines of study, grooves caused by intense thought and pondering. There are thin little glasses hanging on the tip of her nose. The robes she wears are sharp red, she stands out like the living in a graveyard.

Somehow that statement is so very true. She's the only one speaking.

"Draco? Draco, yesterday you told me something you wanted Harry--"

"Potter," he interrupts, a voice just above a whisper. It sounds like hissing.

"Something you wanted Mr. Potter to know. He's here, would you like to share it now?"

The question hangs in the air and I wonder why she didn't ask me if I wanted to know what he has to share. I think it rude. He is conflicted again. I see him weighing his words. I suddenly wish this wasn't happening. I wish we were locked in his bleached room not speaking. I wish I didn't come today. I wish it were any day but Sunday.

"I wish I had killed you." His words are venom and scathing. They are black ink. They are arsenic laced vinegar. They are malice. He snaps his blue tinged lips shut.

"Draco," her voice is a stern mother's, "Draco, when we are honest with ourselves and others we can begin to understand. Tell us, tell Mr. Potter the truth."

He looks like she just asked him to kill his own father.

I chastise myself for the cruelty of my thought. I'm upset, this is not how Sunday is supposed to go. Her driving into our unspoken truce. Asking for the truth when there is none.

But it's too late, he's already gone.

***

She is here. She is Tuesday and Saturday, but Saturday already came. And now it's here again, only he is here as well and I know it must be Sunday, but Sundays are not like this. I know her name but I want to call her Pansy and that's not right. She is a dark witch. The worst kind. She lures and extracts all of your secrets with her black magic disguised as self-help.

"...Harry--"

"Potter." His given name, unlike mine, may have been given but I never took it. The R feels like a razor on my tongue.

"Something you wanted Mr. Potter to know. He's here, would you like to share it now?"

Her magic works in subtle syllables. Commanding with a question. Would I share anything with him, let alone my thoughts? I don't remember agreeing to this I don't remember being led off to this disgusting room to mingle with the other white clad inmates, like cattle. Cattle. The Dark Lord always referred to muggles like cattle, like mindless animals who grazed and shit on our land. The Dark Lord was senile and raved like a lunatic and we in our black robes and white masks ate up every word. Words. He's terrified to hear my words. His face is like a book, everything about him is written on it in big black bold ink. Terrified to know why. Terrified to understand. This is his fault. This is all his fault. If there were no Harry Potter I wouldn't be in this place. A little voice that sounds like me asks if where I would be instead is any better. A world without Harry Potter.

"I wish I had killed you."

My voice comes out dark black and I don't know who I'm speaking to. I look at him for the first time today like it's the first time in my life. I suddenly realize he's not the same. In my room he is the life. He is the color and I abhor him for it. Here in this room. This room washed in ocean water, he is drained. His eyes say that he belongs here in this walled world instead of out there walking among the living like a cruel imposter. I've been seeing him as that ignorant eleven year old for nine years, but this face that's regarding me is not his. It is almost gaunt, like he's starving. Hungry, like his eyes. The scar is faded. This isn't the boy I spent seven years in bitter rivalry with. He isn't a child, poster boy for the wizarding world. He is an angry, brooding survivor of war, emitting as much dark as light. I see it rise up in him.

"Draco," her voice cuts with practiced care. "Draco, when we are honest with ourselves and others we can begin to understand. Tell us, tell Mr. Potter the truth."

The truth? The truth? What is the truth? I wish I had killed him. At one time. Now, I look at him and I'm sure that I have, because Harry Potter is dead. The man that comes to visit me every Sunday, the man that is sitting across from me, separated by the sea scene table, who reflects my emotions, is not the child I hated. Hate. But I'm not the child that hated either. I can't be that child anymore because now I have blood on my hands and it's not my blood anymore. I can't be that child because that child was his, and I'm not his any more. His child wouldn't have family blood dripping from his nails like it did from the fangs of that silver snake. Cold steel serpent tipping the long black cane. It strikes with all its fury, ripping teeth across my cheek. His footsteps echo away and I know if I wait long enough my mother will come to fix the mess of my face. I wish I could feel my arms but the curse has left them limp and useless. It always ends the same. I am on the ground and he's over me. He is power. He is control. He is everything. He is God because he can decide if I should live another day. He is Devil because always he leaves me alive. When the table turns and I stand over him. The boy who lived. And he looks at me and he looks at me and I recognize the pain in his eyes and I've become my father in the worst way. I hear his words as if in a distance, finish him my son. But what he really means is what he always means and if I don't do as he says I won't be his son. I won't be his son until the boy's blood is on my hands like mine on his. For a moment I think blood is blood and what does it matter who's, it won't be mine, wiped from disappearing wounds.

I am power. I am control. I am everything. I am God and I decide that he should live and I am Devil and take my father instead.

I am not his son anymore. Malfoy blood runs in my veins and all over my hands, I don't want the name anymore. I don't know who I am. Maybe that's why he calls me Draco because he doesn't know either.

He's gone and I am in my room with my white tiles and my white walls. It feels cold like the bathroom on the third floor. I'm laying on the tile, spilling blood from my nose and lips I could crawl the fifty feet to my bedroom and find something to clot the crimson sewage, but the white marble is cool against my skin, it eases the burning, stinging nerves that surface, cut into the air. I want to let the punishment heal on its own. I want to see how he reacts to his own wrath, wreaked on my face that is his face as well. Denying is so easy when the evidence vanishes within the hour. I want him to see what he has done.

*****

Hermione once asked me why I still come here when the effort is so fruitless. I told her she had her job and her family and I have my Sundays. It was almost funny to watch her brow furrow in an attempt to understand. The statement seemed so odd to her. I told her it was all I had left. My life was full of Sundays, because during the week I am dead. The situation lost its comedy when she burst into tears, but I couldn't console her, she had wanted to understand and now she did.

Ron and Hermione married quickly after the war. They rushed full on into a life filled with a future. Hermione took a position with the Ministry in the interspecies relations department. Her passion is to understand and extend her empathy to all creatures and bring them together. Her past efforts with the house elves in our school days seem so faded, her latest efforts are so large scale I am aghast at her ability to take on such a burden. Then, she's always been that way. Ron put everything he had into quidditch and earned a spot on the Chuddly Cannons. Everyday his eyes shine with a dream come true. Their daughter was born a few months ago with a head of curly red hair. Her name is Virginia. Their life is full and they can live with their past.

They mourn the loss of Bill and Ginny. All of the Weasleys do. Both were lost in the last battle, so close to the end. I keep a picture of both of them in happier times on my dresser. I don't know that it helps to look, I hardly feel anything but guilt. Ginny had taken up the sword of the side of good with such ferociousness and vigor that I was surprised. I welcomed her warrior spirit and did not ask why. In confidence, one night under the stars, she told me it was because darkness of Voldemort took away her Tom and she would never forgive him for it. He had taken part of her also. She had shined so brightly that night, the eve of Armageddon. The brightest always burn out the quickest. He took the rest of her as well. It should have been me, Ginny. It should have been me.

I'm sitting again in my cream chair. The experiment of last Sunday did not repeat and I am thankful. But today feels like pulling teeth because he is just sitting there, lightly on his bed staring at the corner. He's made no gesture of acknowledgement and I wonder how long he can sit without blinking.

I've come to a conclusion. I wrestled with my thoughts all week and now they are confirmed as I sit and stare at him sitting and staring. Something has gone wrong with us. Something happened that should not have. The Fates in their distraction of so many cords left his tangled on the floor and mine uncut. Something went wrong and now we are locked in this unending cycle. Tied together with our discarded threads. But then, haven't we always been tied together? Opposites in everyway? Gryffindor and Slytherin, black and white, good and bad? Now, we are mixed and perhaps that is what is wrong.

He had to keep me alive to finish my task, taking on the role of martyr and sacrificing all that he has ever lived for. I fulfilled my selfish need for revenge, ending the life of Voldemort and slipped into morbidity. My task is complete and yet I still live, my chance at rest taken ahead of schedule. He murdered his father to save the world, now he's kept locked in a mental prison unable to enjoy the fruit of his labor. Where is the justice in that?

No god could witness this and still allow it to occur. No god could let us live like this, festering with emotions we weren't meant to feel. So there is my conclusion. Damn the gods, damn the devils, damn every force that claims power over the lives of men. They have forgotten us. They have turned a blind eye. And I, like always, am left to do what is right. What is just.

My purpose taken from me, I choose a new meaning. I choose Draco. I choose to make him live. To make us live.

He, like always, has to make everything I do difficult. I imagine the corner has been burned away by his stare. He's lost in some memory that I am not privy to. But I know that it always leads to the same, just as my memories. "Draco, I..." I try to engage. But the effort is fruitless today.

***

Hullo. Hogwarts too? My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking at wands. I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first-years can't have their own. I think I'll bully father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow. Have you got your own broom? Play Quidditch at all? I do - Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet? Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been - imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave, wouldn't you? I say, look at that man! Oh, I've heard of him. He's some sort of servant, isn't he? Yes, exactly. I heard he's a sort of savage - lives in a hut in the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic and ends up setting fire to his bed. Do you? Why is he with you? Where are your parents? Oh, sorry, but they were our kind, weren't they? I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same, they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families. What's your surname, anyway? Well, I'll see you at Hogwarts, I suppose... Come and get it, Potter! Oh, yeah? Catch it if you can, then! Having a last meal, Potter? When are you getting a train back to the Muggles? I'd take you on any time on my own. Tonight, if you want. Wizard's duel. Wands only - no contact. What's the matter? Never heard of a Wizard's duel before, I suppose?...The Forest? We can't go in there at night - there's all sorts of things in there - werewolves, I heard. I'm not going in that forest. And what if whatever hurt the unicorn finds us first?...

...Bet you loved that, didn't you, Potter? Famous Harry Potter, can't even go into a book-shop without making the front page. Potter, you've got yourself a girlfriend!...Jealous? Of what? I don't want a foul scar right across my head, thanks. I don't think getting your head cut open makes you that special, myself. All right there, Scarhead? Training for the ballet, Potter?...Scared?...

...I'm afraid he won't be a teacher much longer. Father's not very happy about my injury, he's complained to the school governors...Of course, if it was me I'd have done something before now. I wouldn't be staying in school like a good boy, I'd be out there looking for him. Maybe you'd rather not risk your neck. Want to leave it to the Dementors, do you? But if it was me, I'd want revenge. I'd want to hunt him down myself...

...Scare easily, don't they? I suppose your daddy told you all to hide? What's he up to - trying to rescue the Muggles? Well... if they were, I wouldn't be likely to tell you, would I, Potter?...Don't you dare insult my mother, Potter...Trying not to think about it, are we? Trying to pretend it hasn't happened? You've picked the losing side, Potter! I warned you! I told you, you ought to choose your company more carefully, remember? When we met on the train, first day at Hogwarts? I told you not to hang around with riff-raff like this! Too late now, Potter! They'll be the first to go, now the Dark Lord's back! Mudbloods and Muggle-lovers first! Well - second - Diggory was the f-

Manners, Potter, or I'll have to give you a detention. You see, I, unlike you, have been made a prefect, which means that I, unlike you, have the power to hand out punishments. Tell me, how does it feel being second-best to Weasley, Potter?... Maybe, the stupid great oaf's got himself badly injured. Maybe he's been messing with stuff that's too big for him, if you get my drift...and as for Potter... my father says it's a matter of time before the Ministry has him carted off to St Mungo's...apparently they've got a special ward for people whose brains have been addled by magic...Saved Weasley's neck, haven't you? I've never seen a worse Keeper... but then he was born in a bin... did you like my lyrics, Potter?... Can't see how you stand the stink, but I suppose when you've been dragged up by Muggles, even the Weasleys' hovel smells OK. Or perhaps, you can remember what your mother's house stank like, Potter, and Weasleys pigsty reminds you of it... Trip Jinx, Potter! It's him...Afraid I'm going to have to dock a few points from Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. I know prefects can't dock points, Weasel King, but members of the Inquisitorial Squad. The Inquisitorial Squad, Granger. A select group of students who are supportive of the Ministry of Magic, hand-picked by Professor Umbridge. Anyway, members of the Inquisitorial Squad do have the power to dock points... so, Granger, I'll have five from you for being rude about our new Headmistress. Macmillan, five for contradicting me. Five because I don't like you, Potter. Weasley, your shirts untucked, so I'll have another five for that. Oh yeah, I forgot, you're a Mudblood, Granger, so ten off for that...be good now, Potty... Weasel King...You're dead, Potter. You're going to pay. I'm going to make you pay for what you've done to my father...You think you're such a big man, Potter. You wait. I'll have you. You can't land my father in prison. The Dementors have left Azkaban, Dad and the others'll be out in no time...

"Draco, I..."

...Go...Go. I said go. Now...It is curious to be able to remember every word you've ever said to someone. There was nothing said between us sixth year. Our animosity had grown so much that words just ceased, frozen in our throats with ice cold hate but reflected in our eyes with fires of rage. Then, then I was just gone. The dark mark was already on my arm then and I just disappeared into the night with the rest of the snake children and we didn't meet again until that night. Go...Go. I said go. Now...It is curious to sit here and know him better than I know myself. Know the way his body moves, know what conclusions he draws to. To be able to read his emotions and know just what to say to pull out the worst in him. To know these things and then try to be convinced that I don't care...

*****

It's Sunday. It's always Sunday. He walks in and looks so somber. Sober and eyes slick with saline. The last five weeks he was so different. Like a spark of what the old Harry Potter was. I wanted to yell at him. I wanted to tease. I wanted provoke him. Instead, he provoked me. He did not sit. His chair abandoned in the corner. He stood next to me at the cold window. He sat with me on the stainless floor. He leaned against the bed and loosened the restraints. He spoke of things and I simply listened. He did not seem to mind that I did not speak. Only that I heard his voice. He talked of the day outside my reach. He described the sky and the muggle objects then created my play of light. I am not happy to learn their source. Their entertainment value has vanished. So today, I do not face the window. I turn my back to it and I see him stand there. So close to the door. I swallow hard, because somewhere dread has built inside my throat. This Sunday is different. Different than the days we sat in silence, different then the last few in light chatter. Why? Why? What is significant about today? Today...

I'm choking on my breath as I enter. Today is one of his lost days. He's standing by the window, but facing the door. Facing me. He's watching me, but I don't know if it has dawned on him that I am present. He sometimes is confused between the real me and the memory of me. His worlds blend into one another. We don't exchange greetings. We hardly ever do.

Today, I have come to say good-bye.

"Draco." I pause, my words aren't easy today. "I've been dying too long. It's been two years, you know. Two years to the day."

Today...

"Of course...it would fall on a Sunday. That's their joke you see. You and I. We were meant to always be together. Orbiting one another in our polarity. Only, they screwed up, they killed us and didn't kill us. And now we live and die in a Sunday. Every Sunday. The day I was brought into this life...and I don't mean my birth, I mean when I was taken into the world of magic because that's truly when my life started...I made my first friend. The first person I really cared about and cared about me. I also made my first enemy. My life has been ruled by the both since. By friends and enemies. Every decision based on saving friends and defeating enemies. And now, now I'm turned around. I've defeated my friends by alienating them from me and now I'm trying to save my enemy. My best enemy. Hoping you could save me as well. I guess it was stupid to think we could fix each other. So I'm going away. I don't know where, maybe France or America. There are hospitals there. I guess its time to see if someone else can fix me, because, at least, I'm sure that I can't."

And that was the truth. I bore everything. Everything I had. I feel dizzy and almost sick. I watch him for any sign that he even heard me. He is still a white silhouette against the window looking at me and not looking at me. I turn to face the door. Lifting my arm to pull the handle is the hardest thing I have ever done.

Desperate. Frantic.

"No!" It is a garbled plea, as if he had choked on it. I freeze and tilt my head around, not wanting to break the dream. "Don't go." Go. I said go. Now...

I turn back around and see that he's walked half way across the room, he's standing in front of the bed, scared to come any closer. Worried I will fly before he's had his say.

"I-I-I didn't always want to be like him, Potter. When I was younger I swore I would never...I wanted to be like my mother, she was so protective...but I was his son." The words are flowing out of him uncontrolled with such urgency that I am shocked and cannot move. He's telling me everything he's wanted to say for who knows how long. Things he wants me to know. Needs me to know. Things he hasn't said because he thought he could always wait until next Sunday, but today, today I told him there weren't going to be any more Sundays.

"It wasn't in my design to be like her. I wasn't born--I was bred. Created in his image like some sick experiment in immortality. He took everything...took me into his folds...his lies. I wasn't living my life, I was living his. My thoughts, my choices...they were all given to me. As I got older I thought it would just be easier to give in, to be who he meant me to be. I started to think she was weak. Weak for letting him do the things he did to her. I didn't see until it was too late the strength it took to take the blows meant for her child. To step into the path of his calm abuse. He was already too much of me. I was already marked, fighting for what I thought I believed in." He has sunk to his knees, and his hand clutches at the scar covered dark mark on his forearm. His face looks as if he's fighting to get the words out.

"And then, then, then, that night, that night, Potter, something went wrong. I looked at you and I knew you would die. You would die with all the finality of the word and the consequence of all that I was hit me and I really knew you would die. And it wouldn't matter to him that I had your blood on my hands, because he'd just ask for more. There would never be enough for him. I could see the trail of death that would follow me into the future. All for the sake of being his son. Something awoke inside me when I looked at you, dying, on the ground. I didn't want to be him anymore. I stepped into the path. I made a choice to be my mother's son instead. And I killed him and I killed me, because his life was my life..."

My last chance to make him understand. My last Sunday to confess. "You're the only choice I ever made and look how that's turned out. We're both rotting under our skin!" I'm yelling and crying, desperate for him to hear me.

He's still across the room, so close to the door but his words echo like shouts, though they are hardly above a whisper.

"Draco. It doesn't have to be this way. We can go. We can walk out this door together. I need you to be alive in this world with me. This world you helped to save."

He's looking at me again and I recognize that watery defeat. That look that punctures me to my soul. We're locked in a green gray stare that is so familiar. His eyes tell me, I'll die Draco.

"You don't know what you're asking me to do." But his eyes tell me he does. I'll die Draco. He's asking me to make another choice. To live or to die. Go with him now into an uncertain future and live or turn away and let him walk out the door, letting us both die. I cry out, this is too much. I realize it was his name that I called. His given name. With lightning speed he is on the floor with me, his arm wrapped around my shoulder, holding my neck and cradling my head. His other hand grips my right bicep. He's holding me like he's trying to keep me from falling off in the abyss. Using physical force to hold my mind. Keeping me from drifting into the recesses of my memory. The gesture is so full of strong emotion, I give in and rest my head on his shoulder. Before I can stop them the words are out of my mouth, "I don't know how to live."

And that was the truth, the absolute truth. It was the first time in my life I had ever been so brutally honest with anyone, or even myself. Everything became so very clear. The whirling and confusion of my thoughts stop and I feel so anchored in the moment. Here like I haven't been here for so long.

"Neither do I," he said into my hair and I knew it was true. By being his adversary, Voldemort defined him. Without his enemy, life lost it's meaning. Only I didn't realize before that he lost me as well. His rival. His opposite. He drew me back and held my forearms like steel traps. I was drowned in his world of bright green. No, not drowned. I was baptized. "But we'll learn." And I couldn't hold back a sob as it shuddered through my body. He pulls me close, kisses my forehead and whispers into my skin, "We'll learn."

There once were two boys. That's how the story started.