Cold

Cold

Chapter One

(Draco Malfoy)

Silence. Silence was always the answer. To every scream... to every whisper... to every call. Silence came every single time, unless accompanied by the reverberation of my voice off those marble walls. The room was deadly cold, even if it was the middle of summer. What did it matter? In Malfoy Manor, everything was cold, the floors, the walls... the people... for the most part.

I sat in bed, wrapped up to my neck in my covers, trembling in fear like a small child, even if I was at the age of seventeen. I should have felt like an adult. I should have felt whole. But I felt neither. I was a lonely little child, covered in bruises and a left arm and sheets drenched in crimson blood. The clock stroke one, one in the morning that is, and I was still sitting there, frozen from the beating I had gotten previously, my father's screams still lingering upon my eardrums.

"The bastard... deserved to go to Azkaban..." I finally muttered to the walls. "Even if he did escape. At least he left... He won't be back. They'll be searching for him here..."

I decided that letting myself bleed probably wouldn't help much and weakly stood on those horribly icy floors, watching that scarlet fluid pitter patter from the Dark Mark on my arm, which glowed slightly in the dark. I pulled the sheets off the bed and tossed them in the laundry basket, then headed into the bathroom attached to my large room. The mirror gleamed in the florescent light that filled the room.

My face appeared in the reflection, pale and morbid, gray eyes darker than normal, standing out upon all the white. My hair was that stupid silvery-blonde, like my stupid father's. My face was pale. Completely pale. Even for me. I had definitely lost a lot of blood. I sighed and pulled off my shirt, turning on the shower.

"Maybe a bath could help..."

The water was nice. It was warm, even if I still felt chilled by it. Nothing seemed to make me warm. Nothing. Of course, what was there to make me warm? Why did I have to be warm? If there was one moment where I felt warm and safe, it would only be shattered by the fact that I would have to return to that cold soon after. Warmth... it never lasted... ever... so why want it?

"Because... it's good... it's nice..." I sighed and stepped in the shower. "It's everything I'm not... and nothing I'll ever have..."

It was so normal for me to feel like this... to talk like this. I had been taught now. I was nothing. I would always be nothing, and if I didn't become a Death Eater by my eighteenth birthday, I would be disowned, and truly nothing. I dipped my head under water and came back up, my bangs hanging in my eyes. Finally, my shuddering had stopped, but only because my fear had relaxed. I stared at nothing. School would be starting again tomorrow. It would be my final year. N.E.W.T.'s and then life would begin for Draco Nobody, because I would probably be renounced by then.

"Draco Nobody," I thought. "I kind of like it. Malfoy's a name that decides destiny... my destiny... Damn..."

The water was turning red now. The bleeding hadn't stopped. Not that I was surprised, I just wanted it to stop so I could sleep... something... anything to get my father out of my head. I emptied the tub and wrapped a tourniquet around my arm, covering the Dark Mark and the bleeding wound it seemed to be. After dressing in my uniform, I stared in the mirror again.

That same pale face and stupid silvery blonde hair as before, of course. I could help but wonder what I would look like with different color hair. I didn't want it anymore, even if I was a 'stud' at school, even if I was near perfection in looks- according to most people, even if I did look rich and famous like a movie actor. I hated everything about me. I hated every little pore of my skin, because it looked like my father's. I wanted nothing more than sheer separation from him. Why did I have to look so much like him? I longed to punch the mirror and shatter it into millions of tiny pieces, then jump on them until they were dust, but I didn't need to lose anymore blood. Thanks to him.

A brief knock came on the door and in walked my mother, ignoring the fact that I didn't let her in. She stood with her head held high, but her eyes told the story. She hated him too. We were both trapped in this world under his control. Mother insisted that I try and get along with my father, become a Death Eater, anything to make him happy so he'd stop hurting me. I refused. She cried that night. She cried almost every night now. I couldn't understand why she didn't just leave him. I obviously couldn't have been stopping her. It had to be something else. But whatever, I told myself, this is my life, I should be happy. But I wasn't.

(Ginny Weasley)

The commotion was wild. Ron and Harry and Hermione were already boarding the Hogwarts Express. It seemed that every student was excited about returning to Hogwarts. Every student except me, though I never showed it. I smiled brightly and waved to the people I knew as I boarded the train myself. Mother was yelling at Ron to be safe and stay clean. Ron rolled his eyes and then shouted, "I will, mom!" Harry and Hermione laughed and waved as well. They were all so happy.

"Hey, Gin, c'mon, the train's starting up!" Ron called back.

I hid my true feelings as always, giggled, and followed. Truly, I was broken on the inside, utterly and completely devastated. I had seen them, Harry and Hermione, sitting in Harry's room, in a sweet kiss. I couldn't believe it. Harry had fallen in love, and I never had a chance. I tried my hardest to win him from Hermione, even curling my hair and wearing make-up, something I didn't usually do, but nothing worked. He was infatuated with her and I was the only one that knew.

Never had I felt such misery. I loved him for six years, six long years, and he never noticed...ever. The door to the back car shut and I stood in front of it, staring at it, watching the trio take their seats, joking and retelling stories of the summer they had spent together. I wasn't wanted there. I knew that I wasn't, especially when Luna joined them, wearing her blonde curls tied up on top of her head and speaking nonsense as usual. Ron hugged her and she sat in his lap.

"You have a rash," I read from her lips.

Ron slapped his forehead and quickly returned, "THEY ARE FRECKLES!" His usual response.

I quickly backed away from the door and began to walk off. Love was so wonderful, or so it seemed, but it was nothing to me. Nothing anymore, that is. As far as I was concerned, I could die right then and there, and not care. It didn't matter. I wouldn't be missed. My eyes started to get hazy, tears piling in the bottoms of them, but I refused to let them fall, especially as I smiled and sped past people in their cars. I quickly opened one that I saw was empty, slammed it shut and slid down the wall, burying my face in my skirt that stopped at my knees.

I had been wanting to do this for half the summer, since I saw Harry fall in love with someone that wasn't me. It didn't help with nightmares I had already been having, it just added that devastation to the mix of Tom Riddle coming back. Oh, how it hurt! It didn't matter to anyone how I felt. Everything just felt... cold. Just horribly freezing cold...