Imperfections of Perfection

Added note/disclaimer: I also use quotes from other places. If you find a quote that wasn't cited, please notify me.

"Is it the world, or my eyes, that are sadder?

I see not the grace that I used to see."

V

Broken Mirror

Draco was sick again. I knew it was because of the letter. That cruel and callous letter informing him that he was now tied with Harry Potter in wealth as a result of his mother's demise at her own hand. She took poison, they said.

Draco didn't need that. It's the last thing he needs, I thought angrily. I was sitting with Blaise in the seventh year boys' dorm. It was only him and Draco now... and me because I had abandoned the girls dormitory and opted to sleep in what had once been Theodore Nott's bed, I believe.

"He's just lying there," Blaise told me when I walked into the room. "I tried getting him to respond, but...." He looked at me helplessly.

I sighed. "Give it time, Blaise. Remember how he was when he found out that his father was in jail? And sixth year?"

Blaise remembered.

I looked at him. Draco was so pale... so fragile looking, lying there in the bed, eyes closed.

"Pansy..." Blaise said, suddenly catching my chin in his dark hand. I looked up at him. "He'll be all right. Draco's strong.... We both know that."

His hand dropped and I nodded. "I know."

"Good," he said.

Blaise liked me for reasons I didn't know.

Maybe Hermione Granger didn't know I could hear her when she called me a stupid cow, but I did hear her. I heard other people too.

She's Malfoy's slut...

She was the Death Eaters whore - didn't you hear that was how she wasn't killed

Stupid Pansy. Doesn't have a brain... and I can't say much for her looks either. All her charm is that she's a good fucktoy, I hear.

I heard them and oh, how it hurt. Draco used to make me feel better because he'd let me hold him, stroke his hair.

I'd kiss him on occasion and he'd let me. He wouldn't pull away, but he never kissed me back. Draco was there for me and now...

I had to be there for him... but unlike Blaise and me, Draco wasn't alone in the world. He had his brother, Acheron to watch over him.

It's funny, you know. Acheron looked nothing like Draco - at all. The first time I met him, I was shocked.

He had dark, dark hair - so dark it looked blue. He had Draco's silver eyes, but he was taller than tall. His face was slightly rounder than Draco's, not as pointy, and soft where Draco was sharp. He wasn't fat, but he wasn't thin - slim is the word, I believe.

Draco said that he looked more like a Black than a Malfoy - maybe that was why he'd gotten away without being detected for so long in the Muggle world. Acheron was very different - dark where Draco was pale.

I suppose I had a schoolgirl's crush on Acheron Malfoy - I knew every detail from the tiny scar that crossed his left eyebrow, the curl of his inky black eyelashes, the lightly tanned face...

But it was over. I couldn't have him and he didn't know I was alive. Besides, Blaise liked me and he was nice too. He acted a little colder sometimes, but... times had changed.

Oh, how times had changed.

Voldemort was gone - no one was left to tell us to hate the Mudbloods and Draco might as well have become a Mudblood, seeing as he'd come back his pockets full of little thin boxes and a somewhat flat box he called a 'gameboy' and something about video games, fast cars...

He spoke of the internet, of the computers - of mechanics in a car. He spoke about something called the telly. He spoke of other things too - Muggle schools, their classes, and subjects. And he spoke of felly - tellytones... whatever that was.

He spoke of airplanes and how they applied so-and-so's law of blah. He spoke of things Blaise and I didn't understand at all.

He wrote constantly to a group of friends that were all Muggle - none of them knew he wasn't Muggle at all. They thought he liked birds and so he used them to deliver messages.

He spoke of his brother and how they'd gone on trips to Australia, Brazil, Italy, and other places during the school breaks. And he said he wished he could go back to the Muggle school - he'd liked it there more than he liked Hogwarts.

We were shocked.

It wasn't like Draco at all. Draco had always been against the Mudbloods - he'd always hated them. He'd never liked them... and yet... somewhere along the way the war had turned him into a Muggle-lover.

It broke my heart to see him like this. I hoped that someday he'd be right in his mind. I really did.

xxx

"Ms. Parkinson," Professor Greene said in Transfiguration. "Explain the concept of transfiguring solid objects into liquids."

I started. I'd been watching Draco. There was something... odd about him. He seemed thin...

Mind you, Draco was always thin. Every year, though... there was something that I couldn't figure out. I saw him out of the corner of my eye, so thin and ill-looking that I turned my head to look at him properly. Thing was, he looked perfectly healthy, perfectly arrogant and insolent. He looked like he was absolutely perfect; not a hair out of place, his head held up arrogantly as he listened or pretended to listen to the teacher.

"I... uh... I... er... that is," I stuttered and felt my face slowly burning as the class began to snicker.

"Tsk, tsk," Professor Greene said. "Not paying attention, are we, Miss Parkinson? Ten points from Slytherin."

The Ravenclaws, Hufflepuffs, and Gryffindors - especially the Gryffindors looked pleased with themselves.

Blaise looked at me sadly and Draco didn't react. I expected them both to react, or not react, they way they had.

Greene was explaining the concept when the bell sounded and there was a rush of sound as people put their things away.

xxx

"I hate this," Blaise said when we sat together during lunch.

"It can't be helped," Draco responded, staring down at his food.

"Yes it can!" I said suddenly. "Don't give up - remember Draco? That's what you told us all when we were all down. We have to make them all see that we're not nearly as bad as they make us be!"

"It's not that simple, Pans," Draco told me. "We can't convince people to give us a chance now. Not when for the past several years we've only confirmed their beliefs that we're evil."

"It's not too late," I insisted. "Look, just figure out a way to get with the Golden Trio and if we can convince them, we can convince the rest."

"And how do you propose we do that?" Blaise asked gloomily. "We can't."

"Yes, Pansy," Draco said, ignoring Blaise's answer. "Tell us, please, what you propose?"

"Well..." I hesitated. "I'm sorry, Draco... but you're going to have to do most of the work here. Go to them and apologize. Convince them you're sorry for everything you've done to them."

"But that'd be a lie," Draco said flatly. "I haven't got any regrets, remember? Live your life with no regrets, remember?"

"Sure you don't," I said dryly. "But seriously, Draco... you're going to have to convince them... for us."

Draco's shoulders slumped slightly before he nodded. "All right, Pans. I'll try. That's all I'm promising."

I nodded and smiled sadly at his unspoken words - I can't do everything.

I know... I know, Draco.

And I can only hope someday you'll be happy with yourself.

- Ella Wheeler Wilcox

A/N: I did Pansy simply because a surprising number of people view her as "evil" (or at least, I've rarely come across a story where she's not evil). I kind of wanted to do a different take on her... and I honestly don't know if I succeeded with that.

Citation/Disclaimer(s)/Reference:

1. There IS a bell at Hogwarts. In the American version of the book "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" in the chapter about Norbert the Dragon, Ron and Hermione were arguing about whether or not to miss Herbology in order to go and watch the dragon hatch. They end up going to class and everyone - or so I'm assuming, knows what happens because they've read the books. In the paragraph that begins with Ron and Hermione arguing, it says "the bell sounded," thus proving my point that there is a bell at Hogwarts. Yes, I'm obsessed... more or less... And I probably didn't have to tell you that - you all already knew, right?