Empty Chairs at Empty Tables

EMPTY CHAIRS AT EMPTY TABLES

Champagne Supernova

England won the first round World Cup game, due mostly to luck, but also (Draco thought) due to the Seeker's excellent play. It was true he'd not expected them to beat Bulgaria, and true that he could not have imagined the Snitch would turn up just behind and to the right of Viktor Krum, and true that if Draco himself had not paused to tighten a loose wristguard he'd not have spotted it. It was even true that Krum, for all his brilliance, was an old man by Quidditch standards--an old man whose eyesight was not what it once was. And yet--Draco would have liked a little credit, a few fewer headlines screaming, "Ex-Death Eater has Dark Lord's Own Luck!"

Everyone he knew had watched the game and all of them had opinions on it. He knew, abstractly, that this was a good thing: that it was helping to rebuild a shattered country, to reunite a troubled people. That night there were riots on the streets in wizarding London, and Potter and all the Aurors were called home to help cover things up. It was just as well; as soon as he was gone Pansy Parkinson turned up. The years, or the war, had given her a dignity that almost made her beautiful, but there was a brittle edge to her now. He decided to get her over with and out before she could yell at him.

When she had gone Draco lay on the bed smoking and watching television, waiting for Potter to come back. The bed smelled faintly of Pansy and there was a damp spot on the sheets but he couldn't do anything about that. He was surprised to find himself almost eager for Potter--Potter who at least wanted him for himself. He sat up at the sound of a key in the lock, and flinched as the light went on in a blinding flash. Potter loomed over him, looking tired and angry, hair tangled and eyes blazing.

"Why didn't you tell me, Malfoy?" he demanded. "Did you think I wouldn't stand up for you? That I would sit quietly by and let them do that to you?"

Draco looked away. He had thought so; he still wondered if it were not the case.

"I see," Potter's voice was troubled. He put out a hand and grabbed Draco roughly by the chin, forcing his head up. "What kind of monster do you think I am, Malfoy? That you think I would countenance rape?"

It was so absurd that Draco could have laughed, if Potter had not been deadly serious. The other man's lip was trembling, his eyes filled with tears. But then, Potter was the sort to cry easily. Just because he was sorry did not mean he was not guilty. "It didn't matter, Potter," he said finally, aware of the inadequacy of the response. "I didn't mind."

"Merlin's Beard!" Potter's face twisted. "I can smell her on you, and you say it doesn't matter! Does anything matter to you anymore, Malfoy? Are you a whore in truth?"

Draco grabbed his wrist and dragged him down onto the bed. "It makes you excited, doesn't it, Potter?" he asked, knowing it was true. "It makes you hard just thinking about me with a woman, because what I do with them is what you want me to do to you." For the first time he kissed Potter and not the other way around. The man fought for a moment and then submitted with a sob. Draco ran skillful hands over the body beside him, and rolled over, pinning Potter to the bed. "You want this--don't try to tell me you don't." Potter bucked beneath him, but it was a desperate-for-more and not a desperate-to-escape sort of thing.

He did not move when Draco sat up, freeing him, only watched wide-eyed when Draco upended the suitcase beside the bed to find condoms and lubrication. He lay quiet and still while Draco undressed them both; quiet and still except that he was trembling with fear or lust or both. Draco had a hard time going slow, being careful: he had had virgins before, but none so innocent--or so foolish--as Harry Potter. It had been a long time since he'd wanted to do this with anyone, since he'd felt in danger of losing control. Somehow coming into Potter felt like coming home. He almost took what he wanted and pulled out; it would have been frighteningly easy to make it painful, degrading, to have it all end in tears. He could have made it so Potter would not want to see him ever again and still walked away without blame.

Some final vestige of decency prevented him, or the memory of himself at thirteen. He knew what it was to be afraid and disgusted with oneself. He knew what it was to want something that he should not want. He almost even knew what guilt felt like. He did not have enough self-control (or enough charity) to wait for Potter to come. Finishing, he flopped down beside him, feeling shattered.

Harry Potter turned to Draco Malfoy. He had not worn glasses in years, of course, but there was something about his expression that recalled an eleven-year old on a broom, determinedly pushing too-large frames up his nose. "I want you to do that to me again," he said.

Draco could have cried; he nearly did groan. He had been up since dawn, nervous about the game; he had been through a grueling press conference; in the space of six hours he had shagged Pansy twice and Potter once. In forty-eight hours he had to play for his life against Nigeria. He was not even sure he could get it up he was so exhausted. But Potter's mouth slid downward, warm and slick on bare skin, and almost despite himself Draco felt his body harden. In the end it was that easy.

Everyone in the world had come to this second game, or so it appeared. The stands bulged with spectators; there were twice as many on the British side as there had been the first time. Draco was so tense he thought he was going to throw up, and most of his team seemed almost as bad. The first game--against an older, more experienced Bulgarian team--that had been a write-off. No one had expected them to win, only to be good sports about losing.

The Nigerian team, in contrast, was nearly as young as they were, made up of inexperienced players and a talented but uneven Seeker. The two teams should be fairly evenly matched. All those people in the stands were waiting for a British win, and if Draco failed them they were liable to lynch him. If he were particularly unlucky they would probably destroy the Quidditch pitch, and possibly the city of Rennes, as well. On his wrists the admantine cuffs seemed to tighten. No magic; his broom had been charmed to work without it, but he could not leave the field. There would be no saving himself.

The Nigerian Seeker, grinning, flew beside him. He was perhaps twenty-one or two, a handsome kid armored in beaded bracelets and protective tattoos, and with an enormous gold ring in his nose. He kept up a running commentary on the game, and his accent was pure America. He was supposed to be relatively easy to distract--Draco could only hope. Three hours in, there had been no sign of the Snitch, and the score was tied. Draco wasn't sure whether that was good or not. His team was playing magnificently, but they couldn't last forever; they had to be nearly exhausted and their reserve players were even less prepared to play.

He was sweating so hard beneath his robes that he could almost feel himself growing dehydrated. Out of sheer boredom, Draco tried a feint, and the Nigerian, caught off guard, swore. The crowd, thinking he'd spotted the Snitch, roared; Draco pulled up because didn't have the heart to tease them. The Nigerian knew the words to every Bob Marley song ever written and was working his way through the repertoire when the Snitch flickered briefly into existence and then disappeared. Draco was not sure he'd seen it (he'd never been prone to hallucinations but there was a first time for everything) but he knew that the Nigerian hadn't.

Five hours in, he saw it again, this time on the very edge of his vision. The third time it happened, his team was up by ten and he was ready, rolling smoothly away from the Nigerian and banking. They were evenly matched but Draco had a start; he was going to win it. The Snitch drifted slowly over to the stands and hovered just beside the barrier. A wiser man would have slowed up, come in at an angle; Draco knew that victory was going to come head on if it came at all. He caught the Snitch, and he might even have managed to pull out, but the Nigerian, unable to stop, hit him from behind and the rail hit him from the front. Both of them cartwheeled slowly to the ground.

Draco broke his jaw--only to be expected when one plowed face-first into steel at forty miles per hour. The Nigerian broke his back, and they were both lucky the charm on the field slowed the fall enough so that they didn't break their necks. At first glance it seemed that Draco had gotten off easily; he was fully healed in a week while the Nigerian would be in therapy for months. But it was Draco who would never be allowed to play Quidditch again.

He was hazy on what happened immediately after, when the British fans rushed the field. He remembered that Sirius Black had been there, and Potter and Ron and Charlie Weasley. He remembered the team medi-wizards clucking over his x-rays, and he remembered waking in the night to find Potter sprawled on the bed beside him, clutching Draco's hand tight as a lifeline. In the morning, though, he wondered if that last had been a dream; the Potter standing by his head looked less than pleased with him. In fact, Charlie Weasley and Jamieson looked almost as displeased.

Draco, blinking up into the morning sun streaming through the blinds, was displeased too. He felt as though he'd been kicked in the face; he wasn't sure he could even turn his head his neck was so stiff. Tomorrow morning he was supposed to play either Ireland or Brazil in the semi-final. Both teams were phenomenal; he'd see Brazil in the qualifying round and he'd been watching tapes of Ireland with Ron. They probably didn't have a chance, but that didn't mean he wasn't willing to try. But he could have done with rather more sleep.

"What's going on?" he asked now, struggling into a sitting position. Potter, Weasley, and Jamieson moved aside, and a short woman in a severe dark suit stepped out of the shadows. Draco frantically looked her over and concluded he'd never seen her before in his life.

"Mr. Malfoy," she began. "I am the chief neuromancer at St. Mungo's hospital in England. I've been called in as a consult on your case. Are you familiar with Cruciform Syndrome?"

Draco stared up at her, frantically reevaluating his body and finding that he still felt basically intact. He could wiggle his fingers and toes, see and hear; he rather thought he could stand up if he had to. But neuromancy meant brain damage, surely; if they had called a specialist in from England it must be severe. He did not think he could bear it if he were paralyzed. "No," he answered, "I've never heard of it. Is it bad?"

The doctor cracked a smile. "Well, Mr. Malfoy, it isn't good. In layman's terms, it is the result of extended exposure to Cruciatus. We don't know why, but people are affected in one of two ways: the first, with which I imagine you are familiar, is comparatively rare; it consists of a permanent loss of brain function. However, recently we have determined that many survivors are also affected. This is what is typically called Cruciform Syndrome--it results in small, harmless lesions to the brain--visible only on a brain scan. It manifests as nerve damage, with symptoms including dizziness, low-grade fever, depression, seizures, and nausea. Under ordinary circumstances, it is easily controllable. There is no reason, in other words, that you can't live a completely normal life despite this, Mr. Malfoy.

"That said--there are a few things you will not be able to do. You should be able to Apparate or Floo, but we recommend that you exercise extreme caution in driving Muggle autos or operating similar machinery. You will not be eligible for an Auror's licence, and you will not be allowed to play Quidditch professionally. These regulations come into effect immediately, of course."

Draco felt as if he'd lost all command of the English language. "Wait," he demanded. "What did you just say?"

The coach stepped forward. "I'm sorry, Malfoy." Jamieson did look sorry, too, his face red and steadily growing redder. "But I have to suspend you from the team. Can't--Don't--Daren't let you play against medical advice. Insurance, you know. It would look pretty bad if you fainted in the middle of a game."

Draco said, "I don't understand." Even in his own ears his voice sounded strained and thin. "This must be some kind of a joke." But, looking from face to face he knew it was not. "You mean that's it? You're suspending me before the World Cup semi-final, even though you don't have another Seeker, because you're afraid I won't be insured if I play? That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard!"

It was Charlie Weasley who answered him. "Look, Malfoy. I know it's stupid; you know it's stupid. But it's the way things are done now. We have to comply with international relations. Either we drop you or the whole team is disqualified. I'm sorry; you've played well to date, and losing you is probably not going to help the team. But at the end of the day, we need the favor of these countries more than we need to win here today."

"So this is political, is all?" Draco asked. Potter stirred restlessly from his corner but he didn't turn to look at him. "This would happen no matter who I was?"

"Yeah," Charlie said. His golden eyes, meeting Draco's, were guileless and clear; either he was a phenomenal liar or he was telling the truth.

"Okay." Draco forced himself to shrug. Make it seem casual; never let them see you hurt. "Do what you have to do." And he did understand--of course he did. He was no stranger to hurting people. What was one man's disappointment, even one man's life, weighed against a country's good? They must be negotiating with someone; despite himself he felt a prickle of interest. Who could it be, and why?

"Thank you, Malfoy," Charlie responded, and the smile he gave Draco was genuine, if tired. All at once Draco felt a surge of something he would have like to write off as lust, but could not. Pleasure--a small part of him was pleased that Charlie approved of him. No one had looked at him that way since his father's death, and it should not have mattered to him. He was a Malfoy; he did what had to be done and damn the consequences. Whether he was liked or not was immaterial. He looked away from Charlie and caught Potter's eyes on them.

Potter was glaring, of course; Draco had learned early on that there were few things that did not enrage England's finest. And instead of being ashamed of himself, Potter smiled back conspiratorially at Draco and cleared his throat. "Surely we can iron out the details of Mr. Malfoy's...future...later? I think he looks rather tired." Within a minute they were all gone but Potter, and no doubt glad of the dismissal.

Draco flopped back against his pillows and stared at Potter; Potter propped a shoulder against the wall and stared back. His ragged dark hair hung in his eyes, he had loosened the knot in his tie so that it sagged around his throat, and his khakis were wrinkled, the knees stained faintly with something that didn't bear too much thinking about. There was nothing to him--no charisma, no elegance--nothing Draco could not have found anywhere, because there was nothing extraordinary about him. And yet--there was something appealing about Potter, and when he crawled onto the bed beside Draco (in blatant disrespect of hospital rules, even French hospital rules, which appeared to be fairly liberal) Draco, despite his exhaustion, despite the fact that he could not turn his head to the left or open his mouth for Potter's; Draco felt his body respond to Potter's very presence.

Embarrassingly, that was how Granger caught them when she came in without knocking. Well; it would have been embarrassing no matter who had caught them: Harry atop Draco, bodies pressed so tight together that no hand could fit between them, mouths hard and not too careful. It was made significantly worse by the histories they shared, the pasts twined like lovers, the remembrance of Granger's pale taut form writhing beneath him only days before. Harry rolled away with a choking sound that might have been a moan. Draco, resolutely unashamed, smirked up at the Mudblood; he was what he was, and why deny it? But could it be she was pleased, seeing them so? Perhaps she had found it arousing.

After a moment he raised tentative fingers to his mouth. Blood, and no wonder the Mudblood was smiling. Potter had marked him like a dog with a bitch in heat. Oh, they must have looked a pair of proper fools, true enough; but they were not doing anything wrong. Beside him, though, Potter was shaking and sick. Draco wondered how it was he could be falling in love with someone he did not even like. Blaise had been wild and passionate and brave and cool and brilliant; Potter was a fool and a coward and mean besides. When it was clear Potter was not capable of speech, he said coldly, "You might have knocked. Suppose I had been dressing?"

Credit where credit was due; Granger was far less discomfited than most women would have been. He almost forgot himself enough to laugh with her when she answered, "Why would I care? I've seen every bit of you anyway."

Instead he grimaced and snapped, "Don't remind me!" and was rewarded by a brief flicker of hurt in her eyes before she returned to business. Potter, when he spared him a glance, was red-faced and miserable; Draco thought, but did not say, that the two of them had everything in common but innocence and Potter was fast losing that.

The Mudblood threw a pale beige file folder into Draco's lap. "Here." Her voice was sharp enough to cut, suddenly; he thought she was remembering who and what they all were to one another.

"What is it?" Draco was already flipping through the pages. "Is this a test? Some kind of personality thing?"

"Close," Granger replied, smirking a bit herself. "It's the A.C.M.E. I need you to take it."

"Acme?" Draco questioned, pausing to admire a spectacularly complicated set of pie graphs. "This looks impossible. Are those essay questions at the end?"

Granger made a stop-taking-the-piss-you-moron-this-is-for-your-own-bloody-good-face at him. "Yes," she answered patiently. "It's A.C.M.E.--Appalling Career Measurement Exam--pay attention, Malfoy! It tallies up your qualifications and skills and suggests job options. The Ministry is required to rehabilitate you--." Potter made a sort of snorting noise and Granger paused to glare. "To make you into a productive member of society," she finished smoothly. "Now as you won't be allowed magic, it will probably have to be as a member of Muggle society. It's like the Sorting Hat. It directs you to what you want." She threw Draco a chewed looking ballpoint pen (now that was appalling) and raised an eyebrow at Potter. "Harry and I will leave you to it--the sooner you finish the sooner you can start your new career.

Draco waited till they'd gone to make obscene gestures at the door. The exam would take him hours, he read so slowly, and why did he have to do it in the hospital room anyway? The pain in his jaw, temporarily dulled by lust, came back in full and throbbing force. He got up and moved slowly and carefully to the door, being sure not to bend anything unnecessary. There was no guard in the hallway; he was alone as he'd not been since coming back to England. He was hardly going to make a run for it, not with cuffs on his wrists that prevented him doing magic and could only be unlocked by an Auror. Discarded on the sticky tile floor he found a copy of the latest Le Monde. He had very little French, but he recognized his own name; they had spelled in the old Norman way: Malfoi--bad faith. He left the paper where it was and walked slowly back to his room.

In three hours Draco had managed to do all of the math sections on Granger's little test, and most of the personal ones, and two of the four essays, and still he was less than half done. The whole thing had succeeded in making him feel thoroughly stupid, in a way he thought he had left behind forever; Granger was sure to comment on his creative spelling but without a CorrectQuill there was nothing that could be done. When Potter and Granger came in (again without knocking, but it was true they had both seen everything there was to see) he flung the folder back at her, thoroughly disgusted with the whole situation.

"Finished?" Granger tilted an eyebrow in polite surprise.

"Hardly." Draco was aware that he sounded sulky but unable to help himself. "I've had enough. Go ahead, rip me to pieces."

Granger, flipping through the pages, looked up at him again. "You've done the maths, anyway; I guess that that's a start. But, Malfoy--you were second in our class at Hogwarts; I didn't think that this would give you any trouble."

"I had magic then, Granger," he snapped. "I was light years ahead of the rest of you and it still took everything I had to stay even." He listened to himself in surprise; he had thought that these were old hurts, long healed, but now they felt as raw as ever. "I'm not--I can't--it didn't come easy for me. It never has. You don't understand. You never had to work for any of it, and Potter never bothered." He had said too much and he knew it.

Realization dawned in Granger's eyes. She opened and closed her mouth several times, clearly at a loss. He was about to interrupt her when she finally began. "Malfoy--it's nothing to be ashamed of. Everyone learns differently. You were a thousand times better than me at Potions, remember? I always hated you for that."

"You don't understand," Draco said again, turning away. "It's okay for you, maybe; no one ever expected anything of you anyway. Just by showing up you've beaten the odds. Why do you think Dumbledore adores you so? Because the average Muggle-born, Muggle-raised type never accomplishes anything. At best, they generally learn not to do any harm to themselves. Maybe one a generation goes on to be anything else; and there you were--a mind like an admantine trap. You're the poster child for his diversity movement; there have been two really successful Muggleborns in the last two centuries and the other one is Albus Dumbledore. I, on the other hand, am a Malfoy born and bred. For me to be different--don't you get it? In our world, different is wrong."

Granger moved closer, put a hand up as if to touch his cheek, as if he were someone else. But Draco had already raised his head, and over her shoulder he caught Potter's disinterested green eyes. "I'm sorry," he said with an effort. They were difficult words to say, for one with his training; as her world and Potter's was a difficult place to live. "Can't you just grade me and be done with it?"

Granger gave him a small, sympathetic smile. "Sure, Malfoy. Give me a minute. I think there should be enough done here." She laid the papers out in a grid at their feet and flicked her wand at them. "Correlio!" The sheets sorted themselves into order, scuttling like tiny crabs across the tile. On the blank page at the top, Draco's name formed slowly, followed by two columns of bulleted points, almost equal in length, and a third list consisting of three short sentences.

Draco blinked as she bent to take up the paper. It had been years since he'd seen magic used casually, and with admantine bracketing his wrists he had not even felt the spell being worked. Was it better to be a Squib among wizards, and always remember what he had lost, or to be a wizard among Muggles and forget everything he had ever been?

"Here we are, then," Granger announced, sliding on reading glasses. She held the paper in her right hand, and unconsciously her left crept to down to cradle her stomach: a poignant reminder of the new life they two had created, that she could not even be sure yet she bore. He wondered if he was required to take one of the suggested jobs. Suppose they recommended he be a farmer? Or worse, a priest? Granger read, "Soldier. Well, that one makes sense, but it's right out. Sorry, Malfoy. Engineer. That one is possible, but it takes years of school, I think. Mark it maybe. Teacher. Yes, but again, that needs training. Arithmancist. Harry, that's it! You know Dumbledore's been looking for an Arithmancy professor!"

"He can hardly be a professor without a wand, Herm, even if you could persuade Dumbledore and the board to have him," Potter pointed out. "Besides, what if he don't want to be a professor?"

"Oh, honestly, Harry," Granger said, her voice businesslike. "Arithmancy's all theory anyway so there's no need for a wand, and you know I'm Chairwizard of the Board, and after all they let Snape teach there. And really, who wouldn't want to teach at Hogwarts?"

"Me, for starters," Potter answered bluntly. "Maybe Malfoy, too."

"Well?" Granger demanded, turning on Draco. Her eyes were bright and fierce as a fury's; Draco was unaccountably reminded of the time in fourth year when she had slapped him.

Meekly, he gave in: "All right. If you can persuade Dumbledore, I'll do it." Surely that was safe; chair or no she'd never force Dumbledore to have him. Yet he was filled with unaccountable misgivings. Perhaps this was why Dumbledore had wanted him put to death.

"Now," Granger continued briskly, "what should we do with you over the summer? I think a nice job in a shop would just suit you, Malfoy, and you'd have plenty of time at night to prepare lesson materials. Don't you think--."

"No," Draco snarled, unable to mask his outrage. "I don't think. I'm a Malfoy, Granger, I can't work in a shop! Besides, I don't want to."

Granger stared at him as if he'd grown a second head. "Don't want to work in a shop?" Behind her Potter made throat-slitting hand signals at Draco, who ignored him and watched, fascinated, as Granger's eyes widened and her nostrils flared. "Draco Malfoy! Doesn't want to work in a shop--too good to work in a shop! I was just beginning to think you were a human being, Malfoy! I was just starting to feel the tiniest bit sorry for you. What is it that you have against shopkeepers, Malfoy?"

Draco swallowed. "Nothing. It's a, uh, that is--."

"It's an honorable trade," Potter interjected swiftly. "He'll do it, 'Mione. And he won't complain either, right, Malfoy?"

"Right," Draco confirmed. Merlin, did the girl have no sense of humor at all? No wonder she did so well as Minister. He still didn't want to work in a shop, though. "I'm tired," he said flatly and was surprised to realize just how true it was. Suddenly he was so exhausted it hurt to breathe. "Are we finished here?"

Granger nodded and turned to go; Draco sank down onto the bed with a sigh. But just as she opened the door, he found words again. "Thank you, Granger--for everything." The smile she gave him almost made her beautiful, and for the first time he wondered what their child would look like. Would he be Arithmancy Master at Hogwarts in eleven years, teaching his own children?

Iceland won the World Cup; England lost the very next game to Brazil, and the Aurors were once again called out. Draco was aware that returning to Potter's apartment was like coming home. He would miss it, and maybe even Potter, when he left for Hogwarts. Because, after all, Granger had somehow managed to ram him down Dumbledore's throat. They had found him work in a smallish New Age bookstore ten miles outside of Hogsmeade. It was owned by a fat middle-aged man, the brother of a Mudblood male they'd apparently been at school with. It wasn't bad, mostly because it got very little business and he and the other kids working there were able to spend most of their time smoking marijuana in an alley at the back.

He was surprised, at first, that these Muggles let him into their world so easily--or rather, let Michael Drake in. All of them were at least ten years his junior; they should have balked at sharing drugs and parties and small hopeless magics with a stranger and an old man. Yet they seemed to think he was one of them, more or less from the start, and in the mirror he saw that the fine lines and faint scars on his face were visible only in direct sunlight. Generations of superior genes and superior health care made him seem much younger than he was--he passed for a university student.

In July, Harry turned thirty and Draco thought, we're getting old. At thirty his father had been president of an enormous multi-national corporation, and his mother had been Head of Research for the Ministry and the Weasleys had had fourteen children and Harry's parents had been dead. And what was he? He was nothing, no one; a man who had once killed something he did not really understand. He was the newest, and most inept, and certainly most terrified, member of the Hogwarts staff.