Draco Malfoy (dracoed) wrote in reoccurrence, @ 2020-07-16 14:05:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | longbottom neville, malfoy draco |
pictures in my head
WHO. Draco & Neville
WHERE. Hogsmeade Apothecary
WHEN. Thursday 17th July
WHAT. Draco braves a trip to the apothecary and it does not go well [in progress]
WARNINGS. mental health, ptsd, panic attacks
It was a strange headspace Draco found himself in. For seven years he’d been resigned to - if not contented with - staying at the manor or slipping invisibly into the Muggle world where no one knew him, at least not for who and what he really was. Now he found himself in the position where he was both going out of his mind stuck in the house, and afraid to leave it. The multiple reoccurrences within its walls over the last couple of weeks had not helped his already frangible mental state, and Aurors and ministry people bearing down on him as a result meant that he was in a constant state of anxiety. He barely slept, and his appetite was even more non-existent than usual. If Narcissa hadn’t rung the damn dinner bell twice a day and made him sit at the table for meals, they probably would have passed him by entirely. On the other hand, he seemed to have managed to patch things up with Pansy. Her unexpected reaction to his admission that he was no longer totally ignorant about the Muggle world was a surprising boost of confidence. He knew he had to get out, to get some air, at the very least. Unfortunately there was an errand he’d been putting off for weeks, which involved actually going out in public, and he didn’t trust any of the House Elves or his mother to do it properly. His pride was not quite so worn down that he was tempted to owl one of his former housemates to help either. He tried to look at it as a good opportunity to show himself that he could go out, at least just for a few minutes, and deal with anything that might come up. He was sick of being the cowardly recluse who couldn’t leave his own house. He was a Malfoy, and he could manage a simple trip to the apothecary for fresh ingredients. His experiments certainly weren’t going to get much further without them. Still, despite his internal faux-bravado, he knew the shop Diagon Alley was out of the question, especially during school holidays when the place would be infested with students. He decided on Hogsmeade instead, likely to be much quieter in summer. He Apparated directly into the town, and was relieved when a quick glance through the windows into the shop showed it to be empty of customers. He hurried inside, ignoring the too-cheerful clerk behind the counter, and went to the shelves to look for the things he needed. -- When the reoccurred started showing up, Neville had been in the thick of it along with Harry. It was nerve wracking at first and, honestly, still was. He wouldn’t wish that on anybody, even his worst enemy. Not that it was a problem to see old friends again or maybe some heroes he would never otherwise get to meet, but it was jarring to see someone who he’d believed to be dead standing in front of him very much alive. Neville sometimes needed a break from it all, but he knew he couldn’t. He couldn’t saddle Harry with all that by himself. On those days he needed a break he left his journal at home and ran errands in Hogsmeade on quiet days like this. He’d been down to the stationary shop and chatted with the clerk before making his way down to the apothecary. He greeted the clerk just as cheerily when the bell went off above his head, indicating his arrival. Neville didn’t usually mind running into people he knew, but it was basically impossible not to in a village like Hogsmeade. Everybody who lived there knew everybody else, but the other person in the shop didn’t look like any of his neighbors. Neville didn’t say anything initially but seeing the man out of the corner of his eye made him pause in recognition. “...Malfoy?” he asked, moving back to the shelves where he’d seen the other man initially to get a better look at him. It was Malfoy but he looked… different somehow. -- On hearing his name, Draco closed his eyes for a moment before looking around with a growing sense of impending dread. Less than five minutes. Less than five minutes until someone recognised him. His life was truly an unending punishment. When he saw who was calling his name, his heart immediately started pounding at triple speed. Swearing internally, he turned back to the shelf, gripping the solid wood with his fingers and shutting his eyes tight as though maybe if he wished hard enough the man might magically disintegrate. He hadn’t seen Longbottom in seven years. The mere sight of him was enough to trigger a flood of memories, images he’d shoved right back into the darkest recesses of his mind that immediately threatened to overwhelm him. -- Neville couldn’t say what he expected from Draco, but this reaction was not it. In fact, it made him step back slightly, feeling the sudden need to give him more space. He glanced back at the cashier and frowned when he saw her watching. He waved his hand to try to get her to maybe go do something else before turning back to Malfoy. “Are… are you okay?” he asked hesitantly, not wanting to approach. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you!” -- “You don’t scare me, Longbottom,” Draco tried to growl out, but what emerged from his mouth was pretty small and pathetic and not at all convincing. He was starting to feel like he couldn’t breathe. “No, no, no…” he murmured to himself. Not now, not here, not in front of fucking Neville Longbottom of all people. The more he told himself to get a grip the more he felt himself spinning out, standing in a room that was burning, flames all around, the sound of screaming roaring in his ears. His hand slipped; something fell off the shelf and smashed on the floor, but the sound barely registered. -- Neville was fairly certain that nobody had ever seen Draco Malfoy in a state like this before. Maybe his mother, but that was different. Neville took a step back and waved off the cashier again, figuring he needed space. Neville eyed the shelves warily, but when they didn’t wobble as Draco gripped onto them, he didn’t feel the pressing need to pull him away for fear of injury. Instead, he knelt down on the ground, the entire aisle between them so he wasn’t in Draco’s space. “Okay, that’s good, because I’m not exactly scary,” he said, trying to keep his tone as gentle as possible. “Especially not in this shop.” Dealing with the reoccurred was definitely one thing, but this was different. Draco had been alive this whole time as far as Neville knew. This was something different. -- Draco could barely hear him. His head was full of screaming and a cold thin voice and a too-loud, serpentine hiss. The thud of a body falling, the icy brush of spindly fingers against the back of his neck... It felt like his throat was closing up, and every horrible rushed breath seemed to make it worse. He tried to tell himself that he wasn’t dying, that this had happened before and he’d survived it, but no coherent thought could get through. He made a harsh choking sound and folded inwards, collapsing until he was curled up against the cabinets with his hands clenched into fists. Stop, stop, stop… he thought desperately, unable to stop everything from crumbling as he gasped for air. “Um…. is everything okay over there?” called the assistant from a distance, sounding concerned for the rest of things Draco had managed not to break. -- “Fine,” Neville called back, keeping his eyes on Draco. Okay, he could do this. He’d dealt with eleven year olds freaking out before, he could handle Draco Malfoy. It was no different--except that it was, but he couldn’t afford to think like that now. It was like the reoccurred too. The panic attacks weren’t new, but it was new from someone who had constantly berated Neville his entire life. Still, he approached the other man so he could try to talk him through it. He got down onto the ground in front of Draco, leaning on his elbows, close enough so that he could prevent him from rocking back and hitting his head, but not so close that they were touching. “Draco, hey, come back to me,” he said, his voice only a touch louder than normal to try and break through whatever was happening in Draco’s mind at that moment. “You’re safe in the apothecary. I know I’m not who you want to see right now, but I need you to look at me, okay?” -- Draco shuddered. Through the roaring and the screaming he could just about hear Longbottom’s voice. The sheer novelty of having the hero of Gryffindor talking to him while he was breaking down in a humiliating public way made him open his eyes and look up in confusion. That round, irritatingly good-intentioned face swum painfully in front of his eyes as his lungs made horrible squeaking noises through his mouth. “L’ve me ‘lone, L-Long…” he tried, but even Draco Malfoy couldn’t manage a sneer in this situation. - Neville could decipher what Draco tried to say to him, but he chose to ignore it. He knew Draco hated it, and to be honest, Neville hated it too, but leaving him alone was definitely counterproductive. If he could anger him into overcoming this panic attack… well, that was something, wasn’t it? “There you are,” he said, managing a smile when Draco looked at him. “But you have to come all the way back. To the apothecary. It’s just me and you in here and you know you don’t have to be scared of me.” The shop girl was there too, but she wasn’t helping. Not that she didn’t have good intentions, or Neville assumed she might, but he didn’t want to overwhelm Draco with too many people, so he wanted to make sure Draco stayed focused on him. -- Draco found himself targeting on something behind Longbottom’s doe-like eyes. His voice was unexpectedly soothing. His memory flickered; the swing of a shining steel sword, the satisfying thud of the hated reptilian head rolling over the ground. “I don’t?” he managed, as his throat opened up enough to allow him to speak. He took a deep shuddering breath. “If I were you... I’d... want to at least hit me.” -- Full sentences. That was a good sign. Neville sat back on his heels, though he didn’t move back yet. He didn’t know what was going on in Draco’s mind or how often this happened, but he couldn’t imagine it was easy. Whatever he was going through it was rough, and childhood grudge or no, Neville didn’t want to see anybody like this, not even his worst enemy. “Of course not,” he told him with a gentle smile. “I don’t usually hit people, especially when they haven’t done anything to deserve it.” Not that Draco had never done something to deserve it. In fact, there were several times in his teens that Neville thought Draco needed a swift kick in the ass and a punch in the face, but hitting didn’t solve his problems. It didn’t back then and it certainly wouldn’t now. -- “Course not,” Draco breathed. Longbottom was actually so infuriatingly reasonable that the rest of the apothecary was coming into focus around him, and the screaming died away slowly in his ears. He focused instead on the feel of the wooden floor under him and the cabinets at his back, and the annoyingly calm expression on Longbottom’s self-righteous face. And his sudden inimical urge for a cigarette. “Ever... merciful.” -- “It’s one of my many flaws,” Neville said, unable to help himself. His own heart rate was easing back to normal now that Draco seemed to be calming down. Neville wasn’t about to just up and leave him there, though. He didn’t expect Draco to accept any sort of help or assistance that Neville offered, but he intended to offer it anyway once the other seemed to be steady enough to get back on his feet. He wouldn’t ask when that was, though. Neville had no intention of pressuring him, and if Draco wanted to sit on the floor for an hour, well, Neville figured that was what they’d do. -- Draco let his head fall back against the cabinet, and it made an uncomfortable clunk. His body was still decelerating from what felt like a marathon dash, but at least his mind seemed to be properly back in the present - where humiliation was truly rife. It was a good thing he’d decided not to care what people thought about him anymore. “Need some air,” he muttered, putting a hand to his churning stomach and leaning forward again in an effort to find his feet. -- When Draco declared that he needed air, Neville stood up and offered Draco his hand. Maybe he would take it, maybe he wouldn’t, but the offer was there. Despite what Draco had done in the past, Neville hated seeing him like that. He was so vulnerable and nobody deserved to be in that position. Perhaps that was what irritated Draco about Neville the most, but he couldn’t really help it. “Fresh air sounds pretty good,” Neville admitted. -- After a moment’s pained hesitation, Draco took Longbottom’s offered hand. He hated that he needed the help, but his chest felt like it had been stepped on by an elephant, and his stomach was still threatening to evict whatever he’d eaten that day. He groaned as he was pulled to his feet, wondering vaguely if he’d managed to break a rib. He let the former Gryffindor support him as they staggered out into the street. He did feel better once he was no longer surrounded by the thick smell of dittany and small dead things soaking in brine. He shook Neville off so that he could sit down again on the bottom stop, his head hanging loosely between his knees. “...Thanks,” he managed, summoning every ounce of his shattered dignity to be able to speak. -- It was an odd sort of realization that Neville had as they walked out of the shop, that he was supporting someone who used to be his enemy. Neville never really had trouble letting go of the past and forgiving some smaller issues, but the problems he’d had with Draco seemed massive in comparison. Still, it had been a long time since Neville had seen him, and this Draco Malfoy was very different than the one Neville remembered. “Anytime,” Neville said, sitting down next to him on the ground, leaving the second half of the stoop free so that other patrons could go in and out of the shop. “Do you need anything?” -- Draco shook his head quickly. “No… I’m… it’ll pass,” he said, taking deep, satisfying breaths. Unbelievable, he thought to himself. He’d gotten through Pettigrew and Burbage without a breakdown, even played nice for the Aurors and the PR woman (though that had been a near thing). And yet one look at Neville Longbottom of all people, maybe one of the most banal people in the world, and all the carefully crafted walls around the place in his mind where he kept all of his worst nightmares came crashing down. No amount of cigarettes in the world could have staved that off. He glanced up at Longbottom out of the corner of his eye. The man looked a little older, which wasn’t really surprising, but otherwise it was a bit disconcerting, like looking through a window in his past. A past he was not especially proud of where Longbottom was concerned. “Why are you helping me?” he asked, halfway between puzzlement and suspicion. -- Neville simply nodded and listened to Draco breathe, deciding not to watch him while he tried to come down from that panic attack. Neville didn’t know what caused them. He had some bad effects after the war too, so he could only assume this was a result of that. Neville still had nightmares, but he didn’t think that he had it nearly as bad as Draco did. He didn’t want to ask him about that, though, because Neville knew as well as anyone that the memories and trauma were all deeply personal. If Draco wanted to share, Neville would listen, but he wouldn’t force him. “I don’t see a reason not to,” he responded, tilting his head slightly. “You seemed like you needed help, so I tried to help.” Neville shrugged his shoulders and looked out toward the street. “I don’t like letting people suffer alone, especially if they don’t have to.” -- “No reason?” Draco almost laughed; it came out a kind of strangled choking noise instead. He shifted, sitting up and tipping his head back against the wall. “If you say so, Longbottom. Don’t suppose the hat ever considered putting you in Hufflepuff?” -- “You know, I asked it to, but it told me no,” Neville told him with a short laugh. “We’re not the same people we were seven years ago, though. If we were, you wouldn’t be sitting here talking to me, even if I had done the same thing back then.” -- “Not really much of a choice at the moment,” Draco muttered. He couldn’t argue that he had changed, but he wasn’t sure being a different person automatically meant that he was a better person. If he were Neville, he’d probably have done nothing more than raise an imperious eyebrow and leave him hyperventilating on the ground. Maybe with a kick to the ribs for good measure. - “Sure there is,” Neville said. “You could always tell me to get lost, but you haven’t. I’d call that progress. I doubt it’s progress in the direction you want to travel in, but progress is progress.” Neville had enemies before, and while Draco was always a bully to the point of cruelty, Neville had always struggled to consider him truly evil. The Carrows? Sure, he’d kick them when they were down, but for some reason he couldn’t fathom doing the same to Draco. -- Draco ignored him. Finally his breathing was evening out, and on impulse he reached for the cardboard packet in the inner pocket of his robes. He put a cigarette to his lips with one trembling hand, and drew out a cheap lighter with the other. He could have used his wand, of course, but he’d gotten into the habit of doing it the way he’d first learned. He drew in a lungful of smoke with considerable relief before letting it out again. Sensing Longbottom staring at him, he tipped the packet in his direction. “I’m sorry, did you want one?” he asked, with a combination of sarcasm and whatever shreds of good manners he actually had left for emergencies. -- Neville glanced over when Draco pulled the pack out of his robes and lit up. He hadn’t expected to be offered one, but he shook his head instinctively and put a hand up as almost a barrier between him and the offered pack. “No thanks,” he said good naturedly. “I’m trying to quit. It’s not good for the plants.” -- “Was that a joke, Longbottom?” Draco asked, in some surprise. “I’d never have guessed you were capable.” He was even more surprised not to be bombarded with questions. He’d never smoked in front of another wizard before, not even his mother - who merely dealt with the ends left in his bedroom and the lab and the scent that tended to follow him around - and he had not expected the first one to be Longbottom of all people. -- “I have a yearly quota to meet,” he told him with a wry grin. “I usually just bore the first years with plant puns, but I thought I might try something different.” It hadn’t completely been a lie. Nasty habits had been easy to pick up after the war, but Neville had managed to quit early on into the nicotine addiction. He was tempted every once in a while when the memories started to really surface, but now was not one of those times luckily. -- “Full of surprises, you are,” Draco murmured. He glanced at Longbottom sidelong. It was hard to believe someone his own age could be a Professor at Hogwarts, and Longbottom probably would have been the last one on his list if he’d had to guess. He’d always made fun of the boy for being weak and cowardly, but here they both were. Draco’s nightmares were full of screaming, screaming of people he’d seen die, seen tortured, and tortured himself with either Voldemort or his aunt or the damn Carrows standing over his shoulder. But Longbottom had been on the other side of that, where it was so much worse, and he was a Professor with a full life while Draco couldn’t walk into a shop without a full meltdown. Draco was the weak one, and always had been. Full of surprises indeed. “I’m not crazy, so you know,” he said, after a moment’s silence that probably wasn’t really very long but felt to him like a gaping chasm. -- Perhaps Neville was lucky in that his memories really only manifested in the form of dreams and the occasional odd recollection, but any panic attacks he’d had ceased quickly once the war had ended. The dreams had been the worst of it and sometimes he still got them, but he couldn’t imagine going through what Draco did. Neville wondered if this was a daily occurrence or if it came on too randomly for Draco to feel comfortable out in public. Either way, Neville now had it in his head to be worried about his former enemy. Funny how things like that worked. “I didn’t think you were,” Neville assured him. “These things happen. You’ve been through a lot.” -- “So’ve a lot of people,” Draco pointed out, still confused by just how damn understanding Longbottom was being. No one could actually be that righteous, could they? He took another drag with a hand that still shook despite his best efforts. “And most of them can walk into a shop without knocking things - oh, hell,” he grunted, and fished in his pocket for some gold. “I should pay for whatever the hell I broke in there.” --- |