Twelve Steps

Twelve Steps

Chapter One

"We admitted that we were powerless--that our lives had become unmanageable."

- Al-Anon Family Groups

* * * * *

One Month Later

"Rise and shine!"

Moaning, Draco Malfoy buried his head in the dubious comfort of a cheap foam pillow. I am not here, he thought. This is an illusion. When I open my eyes, I will be at Hogwarts. Snape will give me a lecture on the dangers of succumbing to Muggle nightmares.

"Time for vitals, Damien!" came the voice again, more insistently.

Draco sleepily swung his legs off of the bed and stood, almost tripping over the bedside table. He doubted he would ever get used to the Muggles' cock-eyed notion of electricity, and he never remembered where to find the light switch in the dark. Pressing his hands against the wall, he followed the cheap plaster to the door and stepped out. The corridor was silent, his bare feet padding softly on the tile floor as he trudged into the common room of the Laurel Addictions Centre. None of the other patients--inmates, he thought viciously to himself--were awake yet, although he could hear someone mumbling behind one of the nearby doors.

After the plump nurse had taken his pulse and pricked his finger with a set of strange Muggle instruments, her hands covered in powdery white gloves as if he had a communicable disease, she asked him to push up his sleeves. "Come on, Damien," she bleated cheerfully. "This is your third day here; you know the routine! We only do this for your own safety."

Resisting the urge to slap the Muggle for her insolence, Draco slid the sleeves of his pyjamas up to reveal a mess of criss-crossing scabs, blisters, and puncture wounds. The nurse clucked her tongue. "Oh, oh!" she said. "You've been a naughty boy, I see." She prodded one of the more recent wounds with her gloved finger until it began to ooze blood. "We'll have to bandage that, Damien. That's two new ones today; Dr Wellington will not be pleased with your progress. What did you use this time?"

Draco merely glared at her, inwardly cursing Dumbledore for having the audacity to send him to this prison in the first place. 'This is the safest place to hide you,' Dumbledore had said, his eyes twinkling with bland entreaty. 'The Ministry will be after your blood, and the Prophet will seek your story. Where better to hide you than a place that instructs even Muggles to use a pseudonym?'

"Damien," the Muggle continued, her tone softening. "It will be so much easier on all of us if you tell us what you used on your arms. Do you really want us to search your room every day? Wouldn't you prefer a wee bit of privacy?"

Draco compressed his lips into a thin line. They had taken everything away from him--his robes, his potions, his ingredients. Only his wand remained, and that was now as useful to him as a scrap of rotting wood. They had dressed him in Muggle clothing that scratched and tore at his already tender skin. His magic had been wrenched away from him and his blood tainted. They had stolen his dignity in so many ways, and yet there was one thing they could not do. They could not make him cooperate. Dumbledore was a mentally deranged old coot for thinking that any wizard could survive in this madhouse.

After they had turned his room upside down four times, they finally located the paper clip that he had 'borrowed' from the front desk. Resolving to filch an even sharper tool before lunch, Draco stepped into the narrow Muggle shower stall and once again wished a thousand ancient hexes upon the Hogwarts Headmaster. Even the water here was inferior, harsh and biting with the winter chill, no matter how he twisted the tap. He stood shivering under the unrelenting spray, scrubbing at his arms until they were rubbed raw. Peering down at his wrist, he thought he could still make out the remnants of the Dark Mark in a shallow tracery of angry red lines. The Muggle head doctors were laboring under the assumption that he was a "self-injurer," as they had called it, shaking their bald heads in a dim-witted lament. He saw no reason to correct them; if he had told them about his plans to develop a new potion with his own blood as its primary ingredient, one that would restore his magical abilities, they would have only invented a new label for whatever ailed him.

Whatever was the matter with him, one thing was certain: it would not be cured by a ridiculous Muggle remedy.

* * * * *

Lunch had come and gone, and Draco was now obliged to make his way to his third session of group therapy. He had palmed the Muggle antidepressants that they mistakenly foisted upon him each day and refused his lunch yet again; he was suspicious of meat that had not been prepared by loyal house elves. Who knew how many Muggles had sneezed on the veal before it was served?

He entered the stuffy, octagonal room with no small amount of trepidation, hands tucked neatly into his trouser pockets. He had purloined a pair of toe-nail clippers from the nursing station before lunch, and he hoped to retain them until he was able to get back to his own room, which meant acting at least marginally civil during the therapy hour. Sighing, he slouched into one of the overstuffed armchairs that were gathered into a haphazard circle and scanned the faces of his fellow inmates. There were eight of them, not including their 'group leader'.

"Hello, everyone!" chirped the leader, her eyes shining with the over bright enthusiasm of someone who had spent too much time in the sun. She had never heard of Azkaban, Draco thought sourly. He squinted at her name tag, which he had neglected to notice during the first two sessions, and then bit back a howl of ironic laughter. The sodding woman's name was Rain. He leaned back in his chair, feeling drained by the very act of breathing in this claustrophobia-inducing room, and closed his eyes. He was back at Hogwarts. He was at Hogwarts, soaring over the Quidditch pitch--

"Very well," concluded Rain, interrupting his reverie. "Now that we've reviewed the Twelve Steps, shall we go around the room and introduce ourselves?"

Draco studiously ignored the others, but their voices occasionally intruded upon his bitter monologue of revenge. One man, he noted, was a "speed" addict, whatever that was. Did the Muggles really consider driving their vehicles too quickly to be an addiction? How strange, he thought. Another fellow confided that he was a "recovering alcoholic," which led Draco to a wistful remembrance of his last taste of absinthe. The woman to his left had some obscure Muggle disease called 'bulimia', though he had no idea what it meant. Since she was missing several teeth and spoke with a pronounced lisp, he imagined that she might have a penchant for swallowing acidic substances.

"And you?" Rain prompted, when the circle had wound its way around to him. He shifted in his chair. The Muggle doctor--Wellington, his name was, but Draco had heard one of the other men refer to him as Dr Swillington in disparaging tones--had told Draco in no uncertain terms that unless he began cooperating in therapy, they would confine him to his room. Certainly Draco would not have objected to this; he had no desire to consort with the unwashed masses. However, he did find it necessary to obtain certain ingredients and tools for the preparation of his curative potion.

"My name is Damien," Draco said, the alias sounding strange to his own ears. The others looked at him expectantly. "And I'm--I'm a cutter." He stared down at his arms in order to mask his derisive snort, knowing that the Muggles would think he was consumed with shame and remorse.

"Let's all thank Damien for sharing," Rain said, beaming. Draco contemplated what sort of Unforgivable curse he would have used on her, had he met her a little over a year ago. A scattered clapping resounded through the room and then dwindled into an uncomfortable silence.

When the group was finally dismissed, Draco slipped back to his room in record time. Smothered by the Muggles and unable to attend to even the basic necessities of life that he had grown accustomed to in the wizarding world, he had come to relish the scant privacy that his room afforded.

He entered the room and blinked in surprise; someone had flipped the light switch already. One of the nurses from the afternoon shift stood in the corner of the room, a feather duster clutched in one hand and a sliver of narrow rosewood dangling from the other.

"Unhand my wand, you nosy bint!" Draco hissed, before he could stop himself. The nurse dropped both items in shock, shooting him a glare of indignation. Kneeling, she retrieved the feather duster and continued to tidy up the other side of the room, where a spare bed lay empty.

"You can do what you wish with your wand, Damien," she said, smirking. He knew that she would be reporting his odd behaviour to the doctors later, and he cursed himself for his hasty insubordination. "You're not to laze around for the rest of the day, though. There is an evening prayer session after supper, and the staff expects this room to be as clean as a whistle by tomorrow morning."

"And why would you concern yourself with the sterilisation of my humble abode?" he demanded crossly, stalking over to where his wand had fallen. He snatched it up with both hands and ran his fingers over the polished wood in an almost affectionate gesture. Soon, he promised himself. I may be powerless now, but this can't be permanent.

"I wouldn't, ordinarily," she muttered, straightening the coarse cotton sheets. "But you'll be getting a roommate tomorrow, and we've both been entrusted with the task of making him comfortable. I do hope you'll cooperate, my dear. After all, you are both in the same situation, aren't you?"

"We are?" he echoed.

"Oh, yes. The doctors here treat people with all sorts of addictions," she droned, almost as though she was reciting a canned speech, "but you will come to realise that they are all only outward manifestations of the same problem." With a slightly gentler smile, she reached over to pat his shoulder on her way out the door. He jerked away, horror dawning on his face at the idea of a Muggle bestowing sympathy upon him.

Splendid, he thought with scorn. A roommate who shares my plight--so that would be a Muggle who has somehow defeated another Dark Lord and lost his magic in the process? That's bloody likely.

Scowling, he flopped down on the bed and allowed fatigue to sweep over him in a crushing wave, overwhelming his nascent anxieties. As he slipped into a dreamless sleep, the wand tumbled from his grasp and rolled underneath the bed. Dust stirred in its wake and then settled over the wood, dulling its lustre.

* * * * *