Brick

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She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly
Off the coast and I'm headed nowhere
She's a brick and I'm drowning slowly
"Brick," Ben Folds Five

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I love him. I always have. Of course I did. He's Harry fucking Potter. How could I not? I'm a Malfoy, but I'm not superhuman. I loved him, you loved him, hell, everyone did. You expected me not to? What? Just because he's my nemesis, I don't love him? Some things are just stronger than that.

We got together maybe a week into sixth year. I know I'd vowed to make him sorry for what he'd done to my Father, but those things all become somehow less important when those green eyes are staring into you. Anyway, I had every intention of doing just that. We were fighting in the hall, and I was fully planning on breaking his nose, his whole face, right there in front of the entire school in the hall in front of Snape's Potions dungeon. I had him pressed against the wall and had my fist aimed at the perfect angle to smash those stupid glasses of his, but then I realized that he'd stopped fighting back. He was just looking at me, waiting for me to pulverize him.

So I kissed him. Well, what would you have done? Imagine it, the savior of the world is looking at you like the whole fucking mess has gone to hell and he's so helpless and lost and scared. I kissed him. It's exactly what you'd bloody do in the same situation, and don't tell me any different. I kissed him. Because there's not another fucking thing that I could have done at that moment that would have made any damned sense at all. So I did it. And I made a habit of it after that.

Harry didn't seem to mind. He didn't seem too crazy about it either, really. Sometimes he would kiss me back, usually not. Sometimes he'd damn near bite my bottom lip off, but I think that was more out of anger than lust. Most of the time he just sat there, stood there, laid there while I kissed him. I'm not sure if he liked it all that much, but I know he wanted it. Some nights he'd come right into my dorm and crawl in bed with me. He never said anything or did anything really affectionate; he just laid there in the bed next to me and waited for me to kiss him. So I did.

I don't know what went through Harry's mind when we were together. Hell, I don't know what he was thinking all through that year, or the next. He just kept on not talking in classes, not eating at meals, not bothering to try at Quidditch, not smiling ever and not really kissing me back. It was just what we did.

Somewhere in those two years, I decided I'd fallen in love with him. I don't know how or when and certainly not why. It just happened. I didn't ask for it, it just was. So I asked him to move in with me when we left Hogwarts. He agreed with the same look on his face that he had when I asked him to kiss me. He never really did, he just leaned his face a bit closer to mine, as if to say that I could kiss him if I wanted to, but he didn't really care either way. I imagine that's how he felt about our flat as well, and I was the one to move all of his things.

One morning, a couple of years after we moved in here, I asked him if he'd ever thought about getting married. He gave me that blank stare, this time punctuated with tears rolling silently down his cheeks, and said no. I cried with him, from across the room.

Sometimes, on terribly bright days, much earlier than any self-respecting human should be awake, he kisses me back. And that's good enough for me.